two Presbyters who chance to be neer a Bishop the only pastor of the whole diocess and yet not bound to feed any flock either by Word or Sacrament or Government but having a free liberty to devolve all that service upon others and himself to wait at Court so many years as he shall think fit This is our English Bishop not only in practice but in Law and so was he defended by the great disputants for Prelacy in England The portion of Episcopaâ—y whiâ— yet is stu to cannot be kept upon any principle either of honor or conscience But now let the Warner speak out if any such Bishop can more be defehded or was ever known in Scripture or seen in any Christian Church for 800 years and above after the death of Christ I take it indeed to be Conscience that forces now at last the best of our Court-Divines to devest their Bishop of all civil employment in Parliament Court or Kingdom in denying his solitariness in ordination in removing his official and Commissary courts in taking away all his arches Arch-Bishopâ— Arch-Deacons Dean and Chapter c. in erecting Presbyteries for all ordinations and spiritual jurisdiction It is good that conscience moves our adversaries at last to come thus far towards us But why will they not yet come neerer to acknowledg that by these their too lately recanted errors they did too long trouble the world and that the little which yet they desire to keep of a Bishop is nothing less then that English Bishop but a new creature of their own devising never known in England which his Majesty in no honor is obliged to maintain for any respect either to the Laws or Customs of England and least of all for Conscience The smallest portion of the most moderate Episcopacy is contrary to Scripture While the Warner with such confidence avows that no text of Scripture can be alledged against Episcopacy which may not with more reason be applyed against the Presbytery behold I offer him here some few casting them in a couple of arguments which according to his great promises I wish he would answer at his leasure First I do reason from Ephes 4.11 all the officers that Christ hath appointed in his Church for the Ministry of the Word are either Apostles Evangelists Prophets pastors or Doctors but Bishops are none of these five Ergo they are none of the officers appointed by Christ for the Ministry of the Word The major is not wont to be questioned the minor thus I prove Bishops are not Apostles Evangelists nor prophets for it s confessed all these were extraordinary and temporary Officers but Bishops say you are ordinary and perpetual our adversaries pitch upon the fourth alledging the Episcopal office to be pastoral but I prove the Bishop no Pastor thus no Pastor is superior to other Pastors in any spiritual power but according to our adversary a Bishop is superior to all the Pastors of his Diocess in the power of ordination and jurisdiction Ergo The doubt here is onely of the major which I prove Argumento à paribus no Apostle is superior to an Apostle nor an Evangelist to an Evangelist nor Prophet to a Prophet nor a Doctor to a Doctor in any spiritual power according to Scripture Ergo no pastor to a pastor Again I reason from 1 Tim. 4.14 Mat. 18.15 1 Cor. 5.4 12 13. What takes the power of ordination and jurisdiction from Bishops destroys Bishops as the removal of the soul kills the man and the denyal of the form takes away the subject so the power of ordination and jurisdiction the essential form whereby the Bishop is constitute and distinguished from the Presbyter and every other Church officer being removed from him he must perish but the quoted places take away clearly these powers from the Bishop for the first puts the power of ordination in the Presbytery and a Bishop is not a Presbytery the second puts the power of jurisdiction in the Church and the third in a company of men which meet together but the Bishop is not the Church nor a company of men met together for these be many and he is but one person When the Doctors learning hath satified us in these two he shall receive more Scriptural arguments against Episcopacy The Prelats unable to answer their opposites But why do we expect answers from these men when after so long time for all their boasts of learning and their visible leasure none of their party has had the courage to offer one word of answer to the Scriptures and Fathers which in great plenty Mr Parker and Mr Didoclave of old and of late that miracle of learning most noble Somais and that Magazin of antiquity Mr Blondel have printed against them What in the end of the Chapter the Warner adds of our trouble at King James his fifty and five questions â—â—96 and of our yeelding the bucklers without any opposition till the late unhappy troubles we answer that in this as every where else the Warner proclaims his great and certain knowledg of our Ecclesiastick story the troubles of the Scots Divines at that time were very small for the matter of these questions all which they did answer so roundly that there was no more speech of them thereafter by the propounders but the manner and time of these questions did indeed perplex good men to see Erastian and Prelatical counsellors so far to prevail with our King as to make him by captious questions carp at these parts of Church-discipline which by Statutes of Parliament and Acts of Assemblies were fully established Our Church at that time was far from yeelding to Episcopacy Prelacy was ever grievous to Scotland great trouble indeed by some wicked States-men was then brought upon the persons of the most able and faithful Ministers but our Land was so far from receiving of Bishops at that time that the question was not so much as proposed to them for many years thereafter it was in Ann. 1606. that the English Prelates did move the King by great violence to cast many of the best and most learned Preachers of Scotland out of their charges and in An. 1610. that a kind of Episcopacy was set up in the corrupt Assembly of Glasgow under which the Church of ScotlaÌ„d did heavily groan till the year 1637. when their burthens was so much increased by the English Prelatical Tax-masters that all was shaken off together and divine Justice did so closely follow at the heels that oppressing Prelacy of England as to the great joy of the long oppressed Scots that evil root and all its branches was cast out of Britain where we trust no shadow of it shall ever again be seen CHAP. IX The Commonwealth is no monster when God is made Soveraign and the commands of men are subordinated to the clear will of God HAving cleared the vanity of these calumnious challenges wherewith the Warner did animate the King and all
assembled in Parliament of England concurre without a disordering opinion when the King himself for perfecting the harmony offers to add his voice for three whole years together In the remainder of the Chapter the warner layes upon the Scots three other crimes First That they count it Erastianisme to put the Government of the Church in the hand of the Magistate Aâ—s The Doctors knowledg is greater then to be ignorant that all these goe under the name of tne Erastians The elder prelats of Englaâ—d were Erastians and more but the younger are as much anti-Erastian as the most rigid of the Presbytery who walking in Erastus ways of flattering the Magistrate to the prejudice of the just rights of the Church run yet out beyond Erastus personall tenets I doubt if that man went so far as the Doctor here and elsewhere to make all Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction but a part of the Magistrats civill power which for its Execution the supreme Governours of any state may derive out of the fountain of their supremacy to what ever hands civill or ecclesiastick themselves think fit to commit it Let the Doctor adde to this much knowledge but a little ingenuity and he shall confesse that his brethren the latter Bishops who claim Episcopacy by Divine Right are all as much against this Erastian Cesaro-papisme as any Presbyterian in Scotland The Elder Bishops indeed of England and all the Laws there for Episcopacy seem to be point blank according to the Erastian errors for they make the Crown and Royall Supremacy the originall root and fountain whence all the iscipline of the Church did flow as before the days of Henry the Eight it did out of the Popes headship of the Church â—under Christ However let the Doctor ingeniously speak out his sence and I am deceived if he shall not acknowledge that how grosse an Erastian so ever himself and the eldest Bishops of England might have been yet that long agoe the most of his prelaticall friends have become as much opposite to Erastianisme as the most rigid of the Presbyterians The other crime he layes to the charge of the * The Scots first and greatest crime is irreconciliablenesse with Rome Scots is that they admit no latitude in Religion but will have every opinion a fundamentall Article of Faith and are averse from the reconcialition of the Protestant Churches Ans If the Warner had found it seasonable to vent a little more of his true sense in this point he had charged this great crime far more home upon the head of the Scots for indeed though they were ever far from denying the true degrees of importance which do cleerly appear among the multitude of Christian truths yet the great quarrel here of the Warner and his friends against them is that they spoyled the Canterburian designe of reconciling the Protestant Churches not among themselves but with the Church of Rome When these good men were with all earnestness proclaiming the greatest controversies of Papists and Protestants to be upon no fundamentals but onely disputable opinions wherein belief on either side was safe enough and when they found that the Papists did stand punctually to the Tenets of the Church of Rome and were obstinately unwilling to come over to England their great labour was that the English and the rest of the Protestants casting aside their needless belief of problematick truths in piety charity and zeal to make up the breach and take away the schism should be at all the pains to make the journey to Rome While this designe is far advanced and furiously driven on in all the three Kingdoms and by none more in Ireland then the Bishop of Derry behold the rude and plain Blue-caps step in to the play and mar all the Game By no art by no terrour can these be gotten along to such a reconciliation This was the first and greatest crime of the Scots which the Doctor here glances at but is so wise and modest a man as not to bring it above board The last charge of the chapter is that the Scots The Scots were ever anti-episcopal keep not still that respect to the Bishops of England which they were wont of old in the beginning of Q. Elizabeth's Reign Ans In that Letter cited by the Warner from the general Assembly of Scotland 1566. Sess 3. there is no word of approbation to the Office of Episcopacy they speak to the Bishops of England in no other quality or relation but as Ministers of the word the highest stile they give them is Reverend Pastors and Brethren the tenour of the whole Epistle is a grave and brotherly admonition to beware of that fatall concomitant of the most moderate Episcopacy the troubling of the best and most zealous servants of Christ for idle and fruitless Ceremonies How great a reverence the Church of Scotland at that time carried to Prelacy may be seen in their Supplication to the secret Councel of Scotland in that same Assembly the very day and Session wherein they writ the Letter in hand to the Bishops of England The Arch-bishp of S. Andrews being then usurping jurisdiction over the Ministry by some warrant from the State the Assembly was grieved not only with the Popery of that Bishop but with his ancient jurisdiction which in all Bishops popish and protestant is one and the same That jurisdiction was the only matter of their present complaint and in relation thereto they assure the Councel in distinct terms that they would never be more subject unto that usurped Tyranny then they would be to the Divel himself So reverend an opinion had the Church of Scotland at that time of Episcopal Jurisdiction The Prelates lately were found in the act of introducing Popery into the Church and Tyranny into the Kingdom But suppone that some fourscore yeers ago the Scots before they had tasted the fruits of Protestant Bishops had judged them tolerable in England yet since that time by the long tract of mischiefs which constantly have accompanied the order of Prelacy they have been put upon a more accurate inspection of its nature and have found it not onely a needlesse but a noxious and poysonous weed necessary to be plucked up by the root and cast over the hedge Beside all its former malefices it hath been deprehended of late in the very act of everting the foundations both of Religion and Government of bringing in Popery and Tyranny in the Churches and States of all the three Kingdoms Canterburian self-conviction cap. 1. And for these crimes it was condemned killed and buried in Scotland by the unanimous consent of King Church and Kingdom when England thereafter both in their Assembly and Parliament without a discording voice had found it necessary to root out that unhappy plant as long ago with great wisdom it had been cast out of all the rest of the reformed Churches had not the Scots all the reason in the world to applaud such pious just and
attempt of the royal authority About that time some noble men had got the revenues of the Bishop-ricks for their private use and because they could not enjoy them by any legal right therefore for eluding the Law they did effectuate that some Ministers should have the title of this or that Bishoprick and the revenues were gathered in the name of this titulare or tulchan Bishop albeit he had but little part e. g. Robert Montgomery Minister at Sterline was called Arch-Bishop of Glasgow and so it can be instanced in other Bishop-ricks and Abbacies Now this kind of praelats pretended no right to any part of the Episcopal office either in ordination or jurisdiction when some of these men began to creep in to vote for the Church in Parliament without any Law of the State without any commission from the Church the General assembly discharged them being Ministers to practise any more such illegal insolencies with this ordinance of the Church after a little debate King James at that time did shew his good satisfaction The innocency of the much maligned assembly of Aberdeen But the Warner here jumps over no less then twenty seven years time from the assembly at Edingburgh 1579. to that at Aberdeen 1605. then was King James by the English Bishops perswasion resolved to put down the general assemblies of Scotland contrary to the Lawes and constant practice of that Church from the first reformation to that day The act of Parliament did bear that once at least a year the assembly should meet and after their business was ended they should name time and place for the next assembly When they had met in the yeer 1602 they were moved to adjurn without doing any thing for two whole years to 1604 when then they were conveened at the time and place agreed to by his Majestie they were content upon his Majesties desire without doing any thing to adjourn to the next year 1605 at Aberdeen when that dyet came his Majesties Commissioner offered him a Letter To the end they might be an Assembly and so in a Capacity to receive his Majesties Letter with the Commissioners good pleasure they sate down they named their Moderator and Clark they received and read the Kings letter commanding them to rise which they obeyed without any further action at all but naming a dyet for the next meeting according to the constant practise of Scotland hereupon by the pernicious counsel of the Arch-Bishop Banckroft at London the King was stirred up to bring sore troubles upon a number of gratious Ministers This is the whole matter which to the Warner here is so tragick an insolence that never any Parliament durst attempt the like See more of this in the Historicall vindication * Christmas and other superstitious festivals abolished in Scotland both by Church and State The next instance of our Presbiteryes usurpation upon the Magistrate is their abolition before any statute of Parliament thereupon of the Church festivals in their first book of discipline Ans Consider the griveousness of this crime in the intervall of Parliaments the great Councel of Scotland in the minority of the Prince entrusted by Parliament to rule the Kingdom did charge the Church to give them in write their judgement about matters Ecclesiasticall in obedience to this charge the Church did present the councel with a write named since the first book of discipline a which the Lords of councel did approve subscribe and ratifie by an Act of State a part of the first head in that write was that Christmas Epiphany Purification and other fond feasts of the Virgin Mary as not warrented by the holy Scriptures should be laid aside Was it any encroachment upon the Magistrate for the Church to give this advice to the privy councel when earnestly they did crave it the people of Scotland ever since have shewed their ready obedience to that direction of the Church founded upon Scripture and backed from the beginning with an injunction of the State His third instance of the Church of Scotlands usurpation upon the Magistrate is The friends of Episcopacy thryves not in Scotland their abolition of Episcopacy in the assembly 1580 when the Law made it treason to impugne the Authority of Bishops being the third estate of the Kingdom Ans The Warner seems to have no more knowledge of the affaires of Scotland then of Japan or Utopia the Law he speaks of was not in being some years after 1580 however all the general assemblies of Scotland are authorised by Act of Parliament to determin finally without an appeal in all Eclesiastick affairs in the named assembly Lundie the Kings Commissioner did sit and consent in his Majesties name to that act of abolition as in the next assembly 1581 the Kings Commissioner Caprinton did erect in his Majesties name the Presbyteries in all the Land it is true three years thereafter a wicked Courtier Captain James Stuart in a shadow of a close and not summoned Parliament did procure an act to abolish Presbyterie and erect Bishops but for this and all other crimes that evil man was quickly rewarded by God before the world in a terrible destruction these acts of this Parliament the very â—â—â—t year were disclaimed by the King the Bishops were put down and the Presbytery was set up again and never more removed to this day The Warners digression to the perpetuity of Bishops in Scotland to the acts of the Church and State for their restitution is but to shew his ignorance in the Scots story what ever be the Episcopall boasting of other Nations yet it is evident that from the first entrance of Christian Religion into Scotland Presbyters alone without Bishops for some hundred years did govern the Church and after the reformation there was no Bishop in that Land but in tittle and benefice till the year 1610 when Bancroft did consecrate three Scots Ministers all of them men of evil report whom that violent Commissioner the Earl of Dunbar in the corrupt and nul assembly of Glasgow got authorised in some part of a Bishops office which part only and no more was ratified in a posterior Parliament Superintendents are nowhere the same with Bishops much less in Scotland where for a time only til the Churches were planted they were used as ambulatory Commissioners and visitors to preach the word and administer the Sacraments for the supply of vacant and unsetled congregations The second book of discipline why not at all ratified in Parliament The fourth instance is the Churches obtruding the second book of discipline without the ratification of the State Ans For the Ecclesiastick enjoyning of a general assemblies decrees a particular ratification of Parliament is unnecessâ—ry general acts of Paâ—liament commanding obedience to the acts of the Church are a sufficient warrant from the State beside that second book of disciplin was much debated with the King and at last in the General assembly 1590 his consent was obtained unto
zealous in their doctrine to presse upon the Magistrate as well as upon the people the true practice of piety the sanctification of the Sabbath day the suppression of heresy and schism and repentance for the sins of the time and place wherein they live I his is a crime whereof few of the Warners friends were wont to be guilty of their shamefull silence and flattery was one of the great causes of all the sins and calamities that have wracked the three Kingdoms the stream of their Sermons while they enjoyed the Pulpit was to encourage to superstition and contempt of piety to sing asleep by their ungracious way all that gave ear unto them The man is impatient to see the Pastors of Holland or any where to walk in another path then his own and for this cause would stirre up their Magistrates against them as it was his and his Brethrens custom to stir up the Magistrates of Britain and Ireland to imprison banish and heavily vex the most zealous servants of God only for their opposition to the Prelats profanity and errours The Warner I hope has not yet forgotten how Doctor Bramble and his neighbour Lesty of Down did cast out of the Ministry and made flee our of the Kingdom men most eminent for zeal piety and learning who in a short time had done more good in the house of God then all the Bishops that ever were in Ireland I mean Mr. Blair Mr. Levington Mr. Hamilton Mr. Cuningham and others The Warner needed not to have marked as a singularity of Geneva that there all the Ecclesiasticks quâ tales are punishable by the Magistrats for civil crimes for we know none of the reformed Churches who were ever following Rome in exempting the Clergy from saecular jurisdiction except it were the Canterburian Praelates who indeed did scare the most of Magistrats from medling with a canonical coat though defiled with drunkenness adultery scolding fighting and other evils which were too common of late to that order But how doth he prove The pretended declaration of King James was Bishop Adamsons lying libel that the Scots Ministers exempt themselves from civil jurisdiction first saith he by the declaration of King James 1584. Ans That declaration was not from King James as himself did testifie the year thereafter under his hand but from Mr. Patrike Adamson who did acknowledge it to be his own upon his death bed and professed his repentance for the lyes and slanders wherewith against his conscience he had fraughted that infamous libell His second proof is from the second book of disciplin Chapter II Though always in England yet never in Scotland had Commissaries any jurisdiction over Ministers It is absurd that Commissaries having no function in the Church should be judges to Ministers to depose them from their charges Ans Though in England the Commissary and officiall was the ordinary judge to depose and excommunicate all the Ministers of the diocese yet by the Laws of Scotland no Commissaries had ever any jurisdiction over Ministers But though the officials jurisdiction together with their Lords the Bishops were abolished yet doth it follow from this that no other jurisdiction remaineth whereby Ministers might be punished either by Church or State according to their demerits is not this strongly reasoned by the Warner His third proofe is the cause of James Gibson James Gibson was never absolved by the Church from his Process who had railed in Pulpit against the King and was only suspended yea thereaftâ—r was absolved from that fault Ans Upon the complaint of the Chancelor the alledged words were condemned by the generall Assembly but before the mans guiltiness of these words could be tryed hee did absent himselfe for which absence he was presently suspended from his Ministry in the next Assembly he did appeare and cleared the reason of his absence to have been just feare and no contumacy this he made appeare to the Assemblies satisfaction but before his processe could bee brought to any issue he fled away to England where he died a fugitive never restored to his charge though no tryal of his fault was perfected Mr. Blacks appeâ—â— froâ— the Councel cleered The fourth proof is Mr. Black his case hereupon the Warner makes a long and odious narration If we interrogate him about his ground of all these Stories he can produce no warrant but Spotswoods unprinted Book this is no an hâ—â—tick Râ—gistâ—r whereupon any understanding man can rely the Writer was a pâ—ofest enemy to his death of the Scotish Discipline he spent his life upon a Story for the dâ—sgrace of the Presbytery and the honour of Bishops no man who is acquainted with the life or death of that Authour will build his belief upon his words This whole narration is abundantly confuted in the historicall Vindication when the Warner is pleased to repeat the Challenge from Issachars burden he ought to have replyed something after three yeers advisement to the printed Answer The matter as our Registers bear was shortly thus In the yeer 1596. the Popish and Malignant Faction in King JAMES his Court grew so strong that the countenance of the King towards the Church was much changed and over all the Land great fears did daily encrease of the overthrow of the Church Discipline established by Law The Ministers in their Pulpits gave free warning thereof among others Mr. Black of S. Andrews a most gracious and faithfull pastor did apply his doctrine to the sins of the time some of his Enemies delated him at Court for words injurious to the King and Queen the words he did deny and all his honest hearers did absolve him by their testimony from these calumnies of himself he was most willing to be tryed to the uttermost before all the world but his Brethren finding the libelled calumnies to be onely a pretence and the true intention of the Courtiers therein was to stop the mouthes of Ministers that the crying sins of the times should no more be reproved in pulpits they advised him to decline the judgment of the councell and appeal to the general Assembly as the competent Judge according to the word of God and the Laws of Scotland in the cause of doctrine for the first instance they did never question but if any thing truely seditious had been preached by a Minister that he for this might be called before the civil Magistrate and accordingly punished but that every Minister for the application of his doctrine according to the rules of Scripture to the sins of his hearers for their reclaiming should be brought before a civil court at the first instance they thought it unreasonable and desired the King in the next Assembly might cognosce upon the equity of such a proceeding The Ministers had many a conference with his Majesty upon that subjâ—ct often the mat er was brought very near to an amicable conclusion but because the Ministers refused to subscibe a band for so great a silence
Oâ—dinance to a standing Law the Kings consent is required but with what qualifications and exceptions wee need not here to debate since his Majesties consent to the present case of abolishing Bishops was obtained well neere to as farre as was desired and what it yet lacking wee are in a faire way to obtaine it for the Kings Majestie long agoe did agree to the rooting out of Episcopacy in Scotland hee was willing also in England and Ireland to put them out of the Parliament and all civil Courts and to divest them of all civill power and to joyne with them Presbyteries for Ordination and spirituall jurisdiction yea to abolish them totally name and thing not onely for three yeares but ever till he and his Parliament should agree upon some setled order for the Church was not this Tantamont to a pertuall abolition for all and every one in both houses having abjured Episopacy by solemne Oath and Covenant the Parliament was in no hazard of agreeing with the King to re-erect the fallen chaires of the Bishops so there remained no other but that either his Majestie should come over to their judgement or by his not agreeing with them yet really to agree with them in the perpetuall abolition of Episcopacy since the confession was for the laying Bishops aside for ever till hee and his houses had agreed upon a settled order for the Church If this be not a full and formall enough consent to the Ordinance of changing the former Lawes anent praelats his Majestie who now is easily may and readily would supply all such defects if some of the faction did not continually for their owne evil interests whisper in his eares pernicious counsell as our Warner in this place also doeth by frighting the King in conscience from any such consent The praelats would flâ—tter the King into a Tyranny for this end he casts out a discourse the sinews whereof are in these three Episcopall maximes First that the legislative power is soly in the King that is according to his Brethrens Commentary that the Parliament is but the Kings great councel of free choyce without or against whose votes hee may make or unmake what Lawes he thinkes expedient but for them to make any Ordinance for changing without his consent of any thing that has been instituting any new thing or for them to defend this their legall right and custome time out of minde against the armes of the Malignant party no man may deny it to be plaine rebellion II. The praelates take to themselves a negative voice in Parliament That the King and Parliament both together cannot make a Law to the prejudice of Bishops without their owne consent they being the third order of the Kindome for albeit it be sacriledge in the Lords and Commons to claime any the smallest share of the legislative power this in them were to pyck the chiefest jewel out of the Kings Crowne yet this must be the due priviledge of the Bishops they must be the third order of the Kingdome yea the first and most high of the three farre above the other two temporall States of Lords and Commons their share in the Legislative power must be so great that neither King nor Parliament can passe any Law without their consent so that according to their humble protestation all the Lawes and Acts which have been made by King and Parliament since they were expelled the house of Lords are cleerly void and null Wee must grant that the King and Parliament in divesting Bishops of their temporall honour and estates The praelats grieve that Monks and Friers the Pope and Cardinals were casten out of England by H. in abolishing their places in the Church doe sin more against conscience then did Henry the eight and his Paliament when they put down the Abbots and the Friers We must beleeve that Henry the eight his abolishing the order of Monks was one of the acts of his greatest Tyranny and greed we must not doubt but according to Law and reason Abbots and Priours ought to have kept still their vote in Parliament that the Monasteryes and Nunryes should have stood in their integrity that the King and Parliament did wrong in casting them downe and that now they ought in conscience to be set up againe yea that Henry the eight against all reason and conscience did renounce his due obedience to the Pope the Patriarch of the West the first Bishop of the universe to whom the superinspection and government of the whole Catholick Church in all reason doth belong Though all this be here glaunced at by the Warner and elsewhere wee prove it to be the declared mind of his Brethren yet we must be pardoned not to accept them as undenyable princâ—ples of cleare demonstrations The just supremacy of Kings is not prejudged by the Covenant The last ground of the Doctors demonstration is that the Covenant is an Oath to set up the Presbyterian government in England as it is in Scotland that this is contrary to the Oath of Supremacy for the Oath of Supremacy makes the â—ing the onely supreame head and Governour of the Church of England that is the civill head to see that every man doe his duty in his calling also it gives the King a supreame power over all persons in all causes but the Presbytery is a Politicall Papacie acknowledging no governour but only the Presbyters it gives the King power over all persons as Subjects but none at all in Ecclesiastick causes Ans Is there in all this reasoning any thing sound First what article of the Covenant beares the setting up of the Presbyterian government in England as it is in Scotland II. If the Oath of supremacy import no more then what the Warners expresse words are here that the King is a civill head to see every man doe his duty in his calling let him be assured that no Presbyterian in Scotland was ever contrary to that supremacy III. That the Presbytery is a Papacy and that a politicall one the Warner knowes it ought not to be granted upon his bare word IV. That In Scotland no other governors are acknowledged then Presbyters himselfe contradicts in the very next words where hee tells that the Scots Presbytery ascribs to the King a power over all persons as subjects V. That any Presbyterian in Scotland makes it sacriledge to give the King any power at all in any Ecclesiastick cause The Warnerâ— insolent Vanity it is a senselesse untruth The Warners arguments are not more idle and weake then his triumphing upon them is insolent for he concludes from these wife and strong demonstrations that the poore covenant is apparently deceitfull unvalide impious rebellious and what not yea that all the learned divines in Europe will conclude it so that all the Covenanters themselves who have any ingenuity must grant thus much and that no knowing English man can deny it but his own conscience will give him the lie
necessary resolutions of their English Brethren though the Warner should call it the greatest crime CHAP. II. The Presbyterians assert positively the Magistrates right to convocate Synods to confirm their acts to reform the Churches within their Dominions IN the second Chapter the Warner charges the Scots Presbytery with the overthrowing the Magistrates right in convocating of Synods When he comes to prove this No controversie in Scotland betwixt the King and the Church about the convocating of Synods he forgets his challenge and digresses from it to the Magistrates power of chusing Elders and making Ecclesiastick Laws avowing that these things are done in Scotland by Ecclesiastick persons alone without consent of the King or his Councel Ans It seems our Warner is very ignorant of the way of the Scots Discipline the ordinary and set meetings of all Assemblies both Nationall and provinciall since the first reformation are determined by Acts of Parliament with the Kings consent so betwixt the King and the Church of Scotland there is no question for the convocating of ordinary Assemblies for extraordinary no man in Scotland did ever controvert the Kings power to call them when and where he pleased as for the inherent power of the Church to meet for discipline as well as for worship the warner falls on it hereafter we must therefore passe it in this place What he means to speak of the Kings power in chusing Elders or making Ecclesiastick Laws himself knows The Warners Erastian and Tyrannick principles hated by the King his Majestie in Scotland did never require any such priviledge as the election of Elders or Commissioners to Parliament or members of any incorporation civil or ecclesaistick where the Laws did not expresly provide the nomination to be in the Crown The making of Ecclesiastick Laws in England as well as in as in Scotland was ever with the Kings good contentment referred to Ecclesiastâ—â—k Assemblies but the Warner seems to be in the mind of those his companions who put the power of preaching of administring the Sacraments and Discipline in the supreme Magistrate alone and derives it out of him as the Head of the Church to what Members he thinks expedient to communicate it also that the Legislative Power aswel in Ecclesiastick as civil Affairs is the property of the King alone That the Parliaments and general Assemblies are but his arbitrary Councels the one for matters of State the other for matters of the Church with whom or without whom hee makes Acts of Parliament and Church-cannons according to his good pleasure that all the Offices of the Kingdom both of Church and State are from him as he gives a commission to whom he will to be a Sheriff or Justice of Peace so he sends out whom he pleaseth to preach and celebrate Sacraments by vertue of his Regal mission The Warner and his Erastian friends may well extend the Royal Supremacy to this largenesse but no King of Scotland was ever willing to accept of such a power though by erroneous flatterers sometime obtruded upon â—â—m se Canterburian self conviction cap. ult The Warners ignorant and false report of the Sâ—â—ts proceedings The warner wil not leave this matter in generall he discends to instance a number of particular incroachments of the Scots Presbyters upon the Royal authority we must dispence in all his discourse with a small piccadillo in reasoning he must be permitted to lay all the faults of the Presbyterians in Scotland upon the back of the Presbytery it self and if the faylings of Officers were naturall to and inseparable from their Office mis-kennning this little mote of unconsequentiall argumenting we will go through his particular charges The first is that King James anno 1579 required the generall Assembly to make no alteration in the Church-policy till the next Parliament but they contemning their Kings command determined positively all their discipline without delay and questioned the Arch-Bishop of S. Andrews for voting in Parliament according to the undoubted Laws of the land yea 20 Presbyters did hold the generall Assembly at Aberdeen after it was discharged by the King Ans The VVarner possibly may know yet certainly he doth not care what he writes in these things to which he is a meer stranger the authentick Registers of the Church of Scotland convinces him here of falshood Bishops were abolished and Presb teries set up in Scotlanâ— with King Iames consent His Majesty did write from Stirling to the Generall Assembly at Edenburg 1579. that they should cease from concluding any thing in the discipline of the Church during the time of his minority upon this desire the Assembly did abstaine from all conclusions only they named a Committee to go to Striveling for conference with his Majestie upon that Subject What followeth thereupon I. Immediately a Parliament is called in October 1579 and in the first Act declares and grants jurisdiction unto the Kirk which consists in the true preaching of the word of Jesus Christ correction of manners and administration of the true Sacraments and declares that there is no other face of Kirk nor other face of Religion then is presently by the favour of God established within this realm and that there be no other jurisdiction Ecclesiastical acknowledged within this Kingdom then that which is within the samen Kirk or that which flowes therefrom concerning the premisses II. In April 1580 Proclamation was made ex deliberatione Dominorum Consilii in name of the King charging all Superintendents and Commissioners and Ministers serving at Kirks To note the names of all the Subjects aswel men as women suspected to be Papists or and to admonnish them to give Confession of their faith acording to the form approved by the Parliament and to submit unto the discipline of the true Kirk within a reasonable space and if they fail that the Superintendents or Commissioners present a role or catalogue of their names unto the King and Lords of secret Counsel where they shall be for the time between and the 15 day of July next to come to the end that the acts of Parliament made against such persons may be execute III. The short confession was drawn up at the Kings command which was first subscribed by his royal hand and an act of Secret Counsel commanding all subjects to subscribe the same as it is to be seen by the Act printed with the Confession wherein Hierarchie is abjured that is as hath been since declared by National assemblies and Parliaments both called and held by the King Episcopacy is abjured IV. In the assemblies 1580 and 1581 that Confession of faith and the second book of discipline after debating many praeceding yeares were approved except one chapter de diaconatu by the Assembly the Kings Commissioners being alwayes present nor finde we anything opposed them by him yea then at his Majesties special direction about fifty classical Presbyteries were set over Scotland which remain unto this day was there here any
general assembly IN this Chapter the challenge is that there are no appeals from the general Assembly to the King as in England from the Bishops Courts to the King in Chauncery Appeales in Scotland from a generall Assemâ—ly were no lesse irrational then illegall where a Commission uses to be given to delegats who discusse the appeals Ans The warner considers not the difference of the Government of the Church of Scotland from that which was in England what the Parliament is in the State that the general assembly is in the Church of Scotland both are the highest Courts in their own kinde There is no appeal any where in moderate Monarchies to the Kings person but to the King in certain legall Courts as the Warner here confesseth the appeal from Bishops lies not to the King in his person but to the King in his Court of Chancery As no man in Scotland is permitted to appeal in a civill cause from the Lords of Session much lesse from the Parliament so no man in an ecclesiastick cause is permitted by the very civil Law of Scotland to appeal from the general Assembly According to the Scots order and practice the King in person or else by his high Commissioner sits as usually in the generall Assembly as in Parliament But though it were not so yet an appeal from a generall Assembly to be discussed in a court of Delegats were unbeseeming and unreasonable the one court consisting of above two hundred all chosen men the best and most able of the Kingdom the other but of two or three often of very small either abilities or integrity who yet may be more fit to discern in an Ecclesiastick cause then a single Bishop or his Official the ordinary Trustee in all acts of Jurisdiction for the whole Dioces But the Scots way of managing Ecclesiastick causes is a great deal more just safe and Satisfactory to any rational man then that old Popish order of the English where all the spirituall Jurisdiction of the whole Dioces was in the hand of one mercenary Officiall without all relief from his Sentence except by an appeal as of old to the Pope and his Delegats so thereafter to the King though never to be cognosced upon by himself but as it was of old by two or three Delegats the weakest of all Courts often for the quality and ever for the number of the Judges The Churches â—â—st severity aâ—â—inst Montâ—â—mery Aâ—â—mson was â—proven by â—â—e King and â—â—e parties â—â—mselves Two Instances are brought by the Warner to prove the Church of Scotlands stopping of appeals from the generall Assembly to the King the cases of Montgomery and Adamson if the causes and events of the named cases had been well known to the Warner as he made this chapter disproportionably short so readily be might have deleted it altogether But these men were infamous not onely in their Ministeriall charges but in their life and conversation both became so insolent that contrary to the established order of the Church and Kingdom being suborned by wicked Statesmen who in that day of darkness had well neer brought ruine both to King and Countrey would needs take upon them the Office of arch-Arch-Bishops While the Assembly was in Process with them for their manifold and high misdeameanors the King was moved by them and their evil Patrons to shew his high displeasure against the Assemblies of the Church they for his Majâ—sties satisfaction sent their Commissioners and had many conferences whereby the pride and contempt of these Prelats did so encrease that at last they drew the sentence of Excommunication upon their own heads the King after some time did acknowledge the equity of the Church proceedings and professed his contentment therewith both these unhappy men were brought to a humble confession of their crimes and such signs of repentance that both after a renunciation of their titulary Bishopricks were re-admitted to the function of the Ministry which they had deserted Never any other before or after in Scotland did appeal from the generall Assembly to the King the late Excommunicate Prelate in their declinator against the Assembly of Glasgow did not appeal as I remember to the King but to another Generall Assembly to be constitute according to their own Popish and Tyrannicall principles CHAP. IV. Faulty Ministers in Scotland are lesse exempted from punishment then any other men THe Warner in his fourth Chapter The pride of Prelats lately but never the Presbytery did exempt their fellows from punishment for their civill faults offers to prove that the Scotish Discipline doth exempt Ministers from punishment for any treason or sedition they can act in their Pulpits Answ This challenge is like the rest very false The rules of the Church Discipline in Scotland obliges Churchmen to be subject to punishment not only for every fault for which any other man is lyable to censure but ordains them to be punished for sundry things which in other men are not at all questionable and whatever is consuâ—able in any they appoint it to be much more so in a Minister It is very untruâ— that the Pulpits in Scotland are Sanctuaries for any crime much lesse for the grievous crimes of sedition and treason Let the Warner remember how short a time it is since an Episcopall Chaire or a Canonicall Coâ—t did priviledge in England and Ireland from all censure either of Church or State great numbers who were notoriously known to be guilty of the foulest crimes Was ever the Warâ—â—â—â— companion Bishop Aderton challenged for his Sodomy so long as their common Patron of Canterbury did rule the Court did the Warner never hear of a Prelate very sibb to Dâ—ctor Bramble who to this day was never called to any account for flagrant scandals of such crimes as in Scotland are punishable by the Gallows the Warner doth not well to insist upon the Scots Clergy exempting themselves from civill punishments no where in the world are Churchmen more free of crimes deserving civill Cognisance then in Scotland and if the ears and eyes of the World may be trusted the Popish Clergy this day in Italy and Spaine are not so challengeable as the Prelaâ—icall Divines in England and Ireland lately were for many grossâ— misdemeanors The Warner is injurious to the Ministers of Holland But why does the Warners anger run out so far as to the Preachers in Holland is it because he knoweth the Church D scipline in Holland to be really the same with that he oppugnes in the Scots and that all the Reformed Churches doe joyn cordially with Scotland in their rejection of Episcopacy is this a ground for him to slander our Brethren of Holland Is it charity for him a stranger to publish to the World in print that the Ministers in Holland are seditious Orators and that they saucily controll the Magistrates in their Pulpits Their crime seems to be that for the love of Christ their Master they are
as the Court required against his Majesties countenancing of treacherous Papists and favouring the enemies of Religion a severe Sentence was pronounced not only against Master Black but also all the Ministers of Edinburgh In the mean time The Tumult of the seventeenth day of December was harmless and no Minister guilty of it malcontented States-men did adde oyl to the flame and at the very instant while the Ministers and their friends are offering a Petition to his Majesty they suborn a villane to cry in one part of the Streets That the Ministers are slain and in another part of the Streets That the King was killed whereupon the People rush all out to the Streets in their Armes and for half an hour at most were in a tumult upon meer ignorance what the fray might be but without the hurt of any one man so soon as it was found that both the King and Ministers were safe the people went all peaceably to their houses This is the very truth of that innocent commotion whereupon the Warner here and his fellowes elsewhere make all their Tragedies None of the Ministry were the Authors or approvers thereof though divers of them suffered sore troubles for it CHAP. V. No Presbyterian ever intended to Excommunicate any Supream Magistrate THe Warner in his fifth Chapter The Prelats ordinarily but the Presbytery never were for rash Excommunications charges the Scots for subjecting the King to the censure of Excommunication and bringing upon Princes all the miseries which the Popes Excommunications of oâ—d were wont to bring upon Anathematised Emperours Ans It does not become the Warner and his fellowes to object to any the abuse of the dreadfull sentence of Excommunication no Church in the world was ever more guilty of that fault then the Prelats of England and Ireland did they ever censure their own Officials for the pronouncing of that terrible sentence most profanly against any they would had it been for the non-payment of the smallest sums of money As for the Scots their doctrine and practice in the point of Excommunication is as considerate as any other Church in the world that censure in Scotland is most rare and only in the case of obstinacy in a great sin what ever be their doctrine in generall with all other Christians and as I think with the P elaticall party themselves that the object of Christian doctrine Sacraments and Discipline is one and the same and that no member of Christ no son of the Church may plead a highness above admonitions and Church Censures yet I know they never thought it expedient so much as to intend any Processe of Câ—uâ—â—h aâ—â—â—â—dversion against their Soveraign To the worlds end I hope they shall not have again greater grievances and truer causes of â—â—ritation from their Princes th n they have had already It may be confidently believed that they who upon so pregnant occasioâ—s dâ—d never so much as intend the beginning of a Process against their King can never be supâ—osed in danger of any such proceeding for time to come The Prelates flatter Princes to their ruine However we love not the abused ground of the Warners flattering of Princes to their own great hur is it so indeed that all the sins of the Princes are only against God that all Kings are not only above all Laws of Church and State but when they fall into the greatest crimes that the worst of men have ever committed that even then their sins must not be against any man or against any Law such Episcopall Doctrine spurs on Princes to these unhappy precipices and oppressed people unto these out-rages that both fall into inextricable calamities CHAP. VI. It grieves the Prelates that Presbyterians are faithfull Watchmen to admonish Princes of their duty The Scots Ministers Preaching for Justice was just and necessary THE sixth Chapter is spent on an other crime of Presbytery it makes the Presbyters cry to the Magistrate for Justice upon capitall Offenders Ans What has Presbytery to doe with this matter were it never so great an offence will the Warner have all the faults of the Prelaticall Faction flow from the fountain of Episcopacy this unconsequentiall reasoning will not be permitted to men below the degrees of Doctors But was it a very great crime indeed for Ministers to plead the cause of the fatherlesse and widowes yea the cause of God their Maker and to preach unto Magistrates that according to Scriptures murtherers ought to die and the Land bee purged from the staine of innocent blood when the shamefull impunity of murther made Scotland by deadly feuds in time of peace a field of war and blood was it not time for the faithful servants of God to exhort the King to execute justice and to declare the danger of most frequent pardons drawn from his hand often against his heart by the opportunity and deceitfull information of powerful solicitors to the great offence of God against the whole Land to the unexpressible grief and wrong of the suffering party to the opening also of a new floodgate of more blood which by a legall revenge in time easily might have been stopped Too much pity in sparing the wilfull shedders of innocent blood ordinarily proves a great cruelty not only towards the disconsolate oppressed who cry to the vicegerents of God the avenger for justice in vain but also towards the soul of him who is spared and the life of many more who are friends either to the oppressor or oppressed As for the named case of Huntly let the world judge Huntleys notorious crymes whether the Ministers had reason often to give Warning against that wicked man and his complices Beside his apostasie and after-seeming repentance his frequent relapses into avowed Popery in Eighty eight he banded with the King of Spaine to overthrow the religion and government of the whole Island and after pardon from time to time did renew his treasonable plots for the ruine of Britain he did commit many murders he did invade under the nose of the King the house of his Cousin the Earl of Murray and most cruelly murdered that gallant Nobleman he appeared with displayed Banner against the King in person he killed thereafter many hundreds of the Kings good people when these multiplyed outrages did cry up to the God of heaven was it not time for the men of God to cry to the Judges of the earth to doe their duty according to the warrant of many Scriptures What a dangerous humor of flattery is this in our Prelates not onely to lull a sleep a Prince in a most sinful neglect of his charge but also to cry out upon others more faithful then themselves for assaying to break off their slumber Never any question in Scotland betwixt the King the Church for Tythes and Patronages by their wholsom and seasonable admonitions from the Word of God The next challenge of the Scots Presbyters is that they spoile the
King of his Tythes first Fruits Patronage and Dependence of his Subjects Ans The Warner understands not what he writes The Kings Majesty in Scotland never had never craved any First fruits The Church never spoiled the King of any Tithes some other men indeed by the wickedness most of Prelates and their followers did cozen both the King and the Church of many Tythes but his Majesty and the Church had never any controversie in Scotland about the Tythes for the King so far as concerned himsef was ever willing that the Church should enjoy that which the very Act of Parliament acknowledgeth to be her patrimony Nor for the patronages had the Church any plea with the King the Church declared often their mind of the iniquity of patronages wherein they never had from the King any considerable opposition but from the Nobility and Gentry the opposition was so great that for peace sake the Church was content to let patronages alone till God should make a Parliament lay to heart what was incumbent for gracious men to do for liberating Congregations from their slavery of having Ministers intruded upon them by the violence of Patrons Which now at last blessed be God according to our mind is performed As for the dependence of any vassalls upon the King it was never questioned by any Presbyterian in S otla d. K. James avowes himself a hatâ—â— of Eâ—â—stianâ—sm What is added in the rest of the Chapter is but a repetition of that which went before to wit the Presbyters denying to the King the spirituall Government of the Church and the power of the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven such an usurpation upon the Church King James declared under his hand as at length may be seâ—n in the Historicall vindication to be a sin against the Father Son and Holy Ghost which puts in the hand of the Magistrate the power of Preaching and celebrating the Sacraments a power which since that time no Magistrate in Britaine did assume and if any would have claimed it none would have more opposed then the most zealous Patrons of Episcopacy The injurious invectives which the Warner builds upon this his Erastian assertion we pass them as Castles in their ayr which must fall and evanish for want of a foundation Only before I leave this Chapter let the Warner take a good Sentence out of the mouth of that wise Prince King James to testifie yet farther his mind against Erastianisme His Majestie in the year 1617 having come in progress to visit his ancient Kingdom of Scotland and being present in person at a publick disputation in Theologie in the University of St. Andrews whereof also many both Nobles and Church-men of both Kingdoms were auditors when one of those that acted a part in the disputation had affirmed and went about to maintaine this Assertion that the King had power to depose Ministers from their Ministeriall function The King himself as abhorring such flattery cried out with a loud voice Ego possum deponere Ministri caput sed non possum deponere ejus officium CHAP. VII The Presbytery doth not draw from the Magistrate any part of his power by the cheat of any relation IN the seventh Chapter The Presbytery cognosceth only upon scandals and that in fewer civill things then Bishops courts were wont to meddle with the Warner would cause men believe many more of the Presbyteries usurpations upon the Civil Magistrate The first is that all offences whatsoever are cognoscible in the Consistory upon the case of scandal Ans First the Presbytery makes no offence at all to come before the Consistory but Scandall alone Secondly these civil offences the scandall whereof comes before the Presbytery are but very few and a great deal fewer then the Bishops Official takes notice of in his Consistorial Court That capitall crimes past over by the Magistrate should be censured by the Church no society of Christians who have any discipline did ever call in question When the sword of the Magistrate hath spared a Murderer an Adulterer a Blasphemer will any ingenuous either Prelaticall or Popish Divine admit of such to the holy Table without signs of Repentance The Warners second usurpation is but a branch of the first that the Presbytery draws directly before it self the cognisance of fraud in bargaining false measures oppression and in the case of Ministers bribing usury fighting perjury c. Ans Is it then the Warners mind that the notorious slander of such grosse sins does not deserve so much as an Ecclesiasticall rebuke Shall such persons without admonition be admitted to the holy Communion Secondly the named cases of fraud in bargaining false measures oppression come so rarely before our Church-judicatories that though this thirty years I have been much conversant in Presbyteries yet did I never see nor doe I remember that ever I heard any of these three cases brought before any Church Assembly In the person of Ministers I grant these faults which the Canons of the Church in all times and places make the causes of deprivation are cognosced upon in Presbyteries but with the good liking I am sure of all both Papists and Prelates who themselves are free of such vices And why did not the Warner put in among the causes of Church-mens deprivation from Office and Benefice Adultery gluttony and Drunkenness Are these in his c. which he will not have cognoscible by the Church in the persons of Bishops and Doctors The Warners third challenge amounts to an high crime that Presbyterian Ministers are bold to preach upon these Scriptures which speak of the Magistrates duty in his Office or dare offer to resolve from Scripture any doubt which perplexeth the conscience of Magistrates or People of Husband or Wife of Master or Servant in the discharge of their Christian duty one to another What ever hath bin the negligence of the Bishop of Derry yet I am sure all the preaching Prelates and Doctors of England pretended a great care to goe about these uncontroverted parts of their Ministeriall Function and yet without medling with the Mysteries of State or the depths of any mans particular vocation much less with the judgment of jurisdiction in Political or Aeconomical causes The Châ—rcâ—es pâ—oceedings in tâ—e late engagement â—leered from mistâ—kes As for the Churches declaration against the Late engagement did it not well become them to signifie their judgment in so great a case of conscience especially when the Parliament did propone it to them for resolution and when they found a conjunction driven on with a clearly Malignant Party contrary to solemn oathes and covenants unto the evident hazard of Religion and them who had been most eminent instruments of its preservation was it not the Churches duty to give warning against that sin and to exhort the ring-leaders therein to repentance But our Warner must needs insist upon that unhappy engagement and fasten great blame upon the Church for giving any advice
of the Commanders to whom the managing of that great trust should be committed for after the right stating of the War the next would be the carying on of it by such men who had given constant proof of their integrity To put all the power of the Kingdom in their hand whose by-past miscariages had given just occasion to suspect their designes and firmness to the interest of God before their own or any other mans would fill the hearts of the people with jealousies and fears and how wholsome an advice this was experience hath now too clearly demonstrated To make the world know our further resolutions to meddle with civill affaires the Warner is pleased to bring out against us above 80 years old stories and all the stuff which our malicious enemy Spotswood can furnish to him from this good Author he alledges that our Church discharged Merchants to traffique with Spaine and commanded the Change of the market-dayes in Edenburgh Ans Both these calumnies are taken off at length in the Historical Vindication After the Spanish Invasion in the year 88 many in Scotland kept correspondence with Spaine for treacherous designs the Inquisitors did seduce some and persecute others of our Merchants in their traffique the Church did deale with his Majesty to intercede with the Spanish King for more liberty to our Countrey men in their trading and in the mean time while an answer was returned from Madril they advertized the people to be wary how they hazarded their souls for any worldly gaine which they could find about the Inquisitors feet The Church meâ—led not with the Munday Marâ—et buâ— by way of supplication in Parliament As for the Market days I grant it was a great grief to the Church to see the Sabbath day profaned by handy labor and journeying by occasion of the Munday-markets in the most of the great Towns for remedy hereof many supplications have been made by the Assembly to the Parliament but so long as our Bishops sate there these petitions of the Church were alwaies eluded for the Prelates labor in the whole Island was to have the sunday no Sabbath and to procure by their Doctrine and example the profanation of that day by all sorts of playes to the end people might be brought back to their old licentiousness and ignorance by which the Episcopall Kingdom was advanced It was visible in Scotland that the most eminent Bishops were usual players on the Sabbath even in time of divine Service And so soon as they were cast out of the Parliament the Churches supplications were granted and acts obtained for the carefull sanctification of the Lords day and removing of the Markets in all the Land from the Munday to other days of the week The Church once for safty of the infant Kings life with the concurrence of the cret Counsel did call an extraordinary meeting The Warners next challenge of our usurpation is the Assembly at Edenburgh 1567 their ratifying of Acts of Parliament and summoning of all the Countrey to appeare at the next Assembly Ans If the Warner had known the History of that time he would have chosen rathet to have omitted this challenge then to have proclaimed to the world the great rottenness of his own heart At that time the condition of the Church and Kingdom of Scotland was lamentable the Queen was declared for Popery King James his Father was cruelly without any cause murthered by the Earl of Bothwel King James himself in his infancy was very neare to have been destroyed by the murtherer of his Father there was no other way conceivable of safety for Religion for the Infant King for the Kingdom but that the Protestants should joyn together for the defence of King James against these Popish murtherers For this end the general Assembly did crave conference of the secret Counsel and they with mutual advice did call for a meeting of the whole Protestant Party which did convene at the time appointed most frequently in an extraordinary and mixed assembly of al the considerable persons of the Religion Earls Lords Barons Gentlemen Burgesses and Ministers and subscribed a bond for the revenge of King Henries death and the defence of King James his life This mixed and extraordinary Assembly made it one of the chiefe Articles in their bond to defend these Acts of the Parliament 1560. concerning Religion and to endeavour the ratification of them in the next ensuing Parliament As for the Assemblies letter to their Brethren for so frequent a meetting at the next extraordinary Assembly it had the Authority of the secret Counsel it was in a time of the greatest necessity when the Religion and liberties of the land were in evident hazard from the potent and wicked counsels of the Popish Party both at home and abroad when the life of the young King was dayly in visible danger from the hands of them who had murthered his Father and ravished his Mother Lesse could not have been done in such a juncture of time by men of wisdom and courage who had any love to their Religion King and Countrey but the resolution of our Prelates is to the contrary when a most wicked villain had obtained the connivance of a Queen to kill her husband and to make way for the killing of her Son in his Cradle and after these murders to draw a Nation and Church from the true Religion established by Law into Popery and a free Kingdom to an illegal Tyranny in this case there may be no meeting either of Church or State to provide remedies against such extraordinary mischiefs Beleeve it the Scots were never of this opinion What is subjoyned to the next Paragraph of our Churches presumption to abolish Acts of Parliament By the laws customs of Scotland the assembly procedes the Parliament in the â—foâ—mation of Ecclesiastical abuses is but a repetition of what is spoken before Not only the laws of Scotland but equity and necessity refers the ordinary Reformation of errors and abuses in Religion to the Ecclesiasticall Assemblies what they find wrong in the Church though ratified by acts of Parliament they rectifie it from the word of God and thereafter by Petition obtaines their rectification to be ratified in a following Parliament and all former Acts to the contrary to be annulled This is the ordinary Method of proceeding in Scotland and as I take it in all other States and Kingdoms Were Christians of old hindred to leave Paganisme and embrace the Gospel till the Emperial Laws for Paganisme and against Christianity were revoked did the Oecumenical and Nationall Synods of the Ancients stay their reformation of heresies and corruptions in Religion till the laws of State which did countenance these errors were cancelled Was not Popery in Germany France and Britaine so firmly established as Civill Laws could do it It seems the Warner here doth joyn with his brother Issachar to proclaim all our Reformers in Britaine France and Germany to be Rebels
for daring by their preachings and Assemblies to change these things which by Acts of Parliaments had been approved before new Parliaments had allowed of their reformation Nevertheless this plea is foolishly intended against us for the Ministers protestation against the Acts of Parliament 1584 establishing in that houre of darkness iniquity by a Law and against the Acts of the Assembly of Glasgow declaring the unlawfulness of Bishops and Ceremonies which some Parliaments upon Episcopal mis-information had approved both these actions of the Church were according to former Laws and were ratified afterward by Acts of Parliament yet standing in force which for the Warner a private man and a stranger to challenge is to contemn much more grosly the Law then they do whom here he is accusing of that crime The Church part in the road of Ruthven cleâ—red By the next Story the Warner wil gain nothing when the true case of it is known In K. Jame's minority one Capt. James Stuart did so far prevail upon the tender and unexperienced years of the Prince as to steal his countenance unto Acts of the greatest oppression so far that James Hamelton Earl of Arran the next to the King in blood in his health a most gallant Prince and a most zealous Professor of the true Religion in time of his sickness when he was not capable to commit any crime against the State was notwithstanding spoyled of all his livelihood and liberty his Lands and honor with the dignity of high Chancelor of Scotland were conferred on that very wicked Tyrant Captain James a number of the best affected and prime nobility impatient of such unheard-of oppressions with meer boasts and no violence at the road of Ruthven chased away that unhappy Chancelor from the Kings person this his Majesty for the time professed to take in so good part that under his hand he did allow it for good service in his letters to the most of the Neighbor Princes he dealt also with the secret Counsel and the chief Judicatories of the Land and obtained from them the approbation of that act of the Lord as convenient and laudable pormising likewise to ratifie it in the next ensuing Parliament When the Lords for their more aboundant cleering required the Assembles declaration thereupon the Ministers declined to meddle at all with the case but the Kings Majesty sent his Commissioners to the Assembly entreating them withall earnestness to declare their good liking of that action which he assured them was for his good and the good both of Church and Kingdom for their obedience to the Kings importunity they are here railed upon by the wise Warner It is true Cap. James shortly after crept in again into Court and obtained a severe revenge against the authors of that action before a Parliament could sit to approve it but within a few months the same Lords with some more did at Striveling chase again that evill man from the Court whither he never more returned and this their action was ratified in the next Parliament and so stands to this day unquestioned by any but such as the Warner either out of ignorance or malice I am weary to follow the Warner in all his wandrings The interest of the general assembly of Scotland in the reformation of England at the next leap he jumps from the 1584 to the 1648 skipping over in a moment 64 years The Articles of Stiveling mentions that the promoving of the work of Reformation in England and Ireland be referred to the general Assembly upon this our friend doth discharge a flood of his choller all the matter of his impatience here is That Scotland when by fraude they had been long allured and at last by open violence invaded by the English Prelates that they might take on the yoke of all their corruptiones they were contented at the earnest desire of both the houses of Parliament and all the wel-affected in England to assist their Brethren to purge out the leaven of Episcopacy and the Service Book with all the rest of the old corruptions of the Engish Irish Churches with the mannaging of this so great and good an Ecclesiastique work the Parliament of Scotland did intrust the general assembly No marvail that Dr. Bramble a zealous lover of all the Arminianisme Popery and Tyranny of which his great Patron Dr. Lade stands convicted yet without an answer to have been bringing in upon the three nations should be angry at the discoverers and dis-appointers of that most pious work as they wont to style it What here the Warner repeats it is answered before as for the 2 Stories in his conclusion The violent apprehenâ—â—â— of Masse-Priests in their act of Idolatry râ—proved by the Warner which he takes out of his false Author Spots-wood adding his own large amplifications I conceive there needs no more to be said to the first but that some of John Knocks zealous hearers understanding of a Masse-Priest at their very side committing Idolatry contrary to the Laws did with violence break in upon him and sease upon his person and Masse-cloathes that they might present him to the ordinary Magistrate to receive justice according to the Law This act the Warner wil have to be a huge Rebellion not only in the actors but also in Iohn Knocks who was not so much as present thereat What first he speaks of the Assemblies convocating the people in arms to be present at the tryall of the Popish Lords and their avowing of that their deed to the King in his face we must be pardoned to mistrust the Warner herein upon his bare word without the relief of some witness and that a more faithfull one then his Brother in evill Mr. Spots-wood whom yet here he doth not profess to cite Against these Popish Lords after their many treasons and bloody murders of the Lieges the King himself at last was forced to arme the people but that the generall Assembly did call any unto Arms we require the Warners proof that we may give it an answer CHAP. VIII The chief of the Prelates agree with the Presbyterians about the Divine right of Church-iscipline THe Warners challenge in this Chapter is That we maintaine our discipline by a Iure divino and for this he spews out upon us a Sea of such Rhetorick as much better beseemed Mercurius Aulicus then either a Warner or a Prelate In this challenge he is as unhappy as in the rest it is for a matter wherein the most of his own Brethren though our Adversaries yet fully agree with us that the discipline of the Church is truly by divine right and that Jesus Christ holds out in Scripture the substantials of that Government whereby he will have his house to be ruled to the worlds end leaving the circumstantials to be determined by the Judicatories of the Church according to the general rules which are clear also in the word for matters of that nature In this neither Papists nor the
Magistrates against the Presbyterians let us try if his skill be any greater to inflame the people against it He would make the world beleeve that the Presbyterians are great transubstantiators of whole Commonwealths into beasts and Metamorphosers of whole Kingdoms of men into Serpents with two heads how great and monstrous a â—erpent must the Presbytery be when she is the mother of a Dragon with two heads But it is good that she has nothing to do with the procreation of the Dragon with seven heads the great Antichrist the Pope of Rome this honor must be left to Episcopacy the Presbytery must not pretend to any share in it There is no Lordship but a meer service and ministry in the Pastors of the Church The Warners ground for his pretty similitude is that the Presbyterians make two Soveraignties in every Christian state whose commands are contrary Ans All the evil lieth in the contrariety of the commands as for the double Soveraignty there is no shew of truth in it for the Presbyterians cannot be guiâ—ty of co-ordinating two Soveraignties in one State though the Prelates may well be guilty of that fault since they with their Masters of Romae maintain a true Hierarchy a Spiritual Lordship a domination and principality in their Bishops above all the Members of the Church but the Presbyterians know no 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 no dominion no Soveraignty in Church Officers but a meer ministry under Christ As for the contrariety of commands its true Christs Ministers must publish all the commands of their Soveraign Lord whereunto no command of any temporal Prince needs or ought to be contrary but if it fall out to be so it is not the Presbytery but the holy Scriptures which command rather to obey God then man Dare the Warner here oppose the Presbyterians dare he maintain a subordination of the Church to the State in such a fashion that the clear commands of God published by the Church ought to give place to the contrary commands of the State If the Warner must needs invert and contradict Christ his ruling of this case let him go on to preach doctrin pointblank contrary to the Apostles that it is better to obey men then God It falls out as rarely in Scotland as any where in the world that the Church and State run contrary ways but if it so happen the common rules of humane direction towards right and wrong judgment must be followed if a man find either the Church or the State or both command what he knows to be wrong for neither the one nor the other hath any infallibility there is no doubt but either or both may be disobeyed yet with this difference that for disobedience to the Churches most just commands a man cannot fall under the smallest temporal inconvenience without the States good pleasure but for his disobedience to the most unjust commands of the State he must suffer what ever punishment the law doth inflict without any relief from the Church Two instances are brought by the Warner of the Church and States contrary commands the first the King commanded Edenburgh to feast the French Ambassadors but the Church commanded Edenburgh to fast that day when the King desired them to feast Ans Here were no so contrary commands but both were obeyed the people did keep the humiliation and some of the Magistrates that same day did give the banquet to the French Ambassadors as the King commanded that for this any Church censure was intended against them it is a malicious calumny according to the author of this fable his own confession as at length may be seen in the unloading of Issachars burden As for his second instance The Warner is full of calumnious untruths the difference of the Church and State about the late ingagement we have spoken to it in the former Chapter at length the furthest the Church went was by humble petitions and remonstrances to set before the Parliament the great danger which that ingagement as it was stated and managed did portend to Religion the Kings person and whole Kingdom when contrary to their wholesom advices the ingagement went on they medled not to oppose the act of State further then to declare their judgment of its unlawfulness according to the duty of faithful watchmen Ezek. 33. It is very false that the Church have chased any man out of the Countrey or excommunicated any for following that engagement or have put any man to sackcloath for it unto this day Neither did ever any man call the freedome of the late Parliament in question how unsatisfied soever many were with its proceedings When the Warner heaps up so many untruths in a few lines in things done but yesterday before the eyes of thousand we shal not wonder of his venturing to lye confidently in things past long before any now living were born but there are a generation of men who are bold to speak what makes for their end upon the hope that few will be at the pains to bring back what hath flown from their teeth to the touchstone of any solid triall CHAP. X. The nature of the Presbytery is very concordant with Parliament IN the 10 Chapter the Warner undertakes to shew the antipathy of Presbyteries to Parliaments albeit there be no greater harmony possible betwixt any two bodies then betwixt a general Assembly and Parliament a Presbytery and an inferiour Civil Court if either the constitution or end or dayly practise of these judicatories be looked upon but the Prelatical learning is of so high a flight that it dares undertake to prove any conclusion yet these men are not the first that have offered to force men to beleeve upon unanswerable arguments though contrary to common sence reason that snow is black the fire cold and the light dark The eight desires of thâ— Church about the ingagement were just and necessaâ—y For the proof of his conclusion he brings back yet again the late engagement how often shall this insipide Colwort be set upon our table Will the Warner never be filled with this unsavoury dish The first crime that here the Warner marks in our Church against the late Parliament in the matter of the ingagement is their paper of the eight desires upon this he vapoureth out all his good pleasure not willing to know that all â—hese desires were drawn from the Church by the Parliaments own messages and that wel-neer all these desires were counted by the Parliament it self to be very just and necessary Especially these two which the wise Warner pitches upon as most absurd for the first a security to religion from the King upon oath under his hand and seal here the question among us was not for the thing it self but only about the time the order and some part of the matter of that security And for the second the quallification of the persons to be imployed that all should be such who had given no just cause
know and bee assured that their calling and Ministery is null The words immediatly following are scraped out after their Printing for what cause the Author best knoweth but the purpose in hand makes it probable that the deletted words did expresse more of his minde then it was safe in this time and place to speake out it was the late Doctrine of Doctor Brambles prime friends that the want of Episcopall ordination did ot onely annull the calling of all the Ministers of France Holland Zwit-zerland and Germany but also did hinder all these Societies to bee true Churches for that popular Sophisme of the Jesuits our Prelats did greedily swallow where are no true Sacrament there is no true Church and where is no true Ministry there are no true Sacraments and where no true ordination there is no true Ministry and where no Bishops there in no true ordination and so in no reformed Country but in England and Ireland where were true Bishops is any true Church When Episcopacy comes to this height of elevation that the want of it must annull the Ministry yea the very being of all the Reformed Churches at one strock is it any marvell that all of them do concurre together for their own preservation to abolish this insolent abaddon and destroyer and notwithstanding all its ruine have yet no discomfort at all nor any the least doubt of their most lawfull ordination by the hands of the Presbytery The Prelats are so basely injurious to all the Reformed Churches that their selfes are ashamed of it After all this was written as here it stands another copy of the Warners book was brought to my hand wherin I found the deleted line stand Printed in these distinct termes and put it to a dangerous question whether it be within the payle of the Church the deciphering of these words puts it beyond all peradventure that what I did conjecture of the Warner and his Brethrens minde of the state of all the reformed Churches was no mis-take but that they do truely judge the want of Episcopall Ordination to exclude all the Ministers of other Reformed Churches and their flocks also from the lines of the true Church This indeed is a most dâ—ngerous question for it stricks at the root of all If the Warner out of remorse of conscience had blotted out of his booke that errour the Repentance had beene commendable But hee has left so much yet behind unscraped out as does shew his minde to continue what it was so that feare alone to provoke the reformed here at this unseasonable time seemes to have been the cause of deleting these too cleare expressions of the prelaticall tenent against the very being and subsistence of all the Protestant Churches which want Episcopacy where these men doe still stand upon the extreme pinacle of impudency and arrogance denying the Reformed to be true Churches and without scruple averring Rome as shee stands this day under the councell of Trent to be a Church most true wherin there is an easy way of salvation from which all separaion is needlesse and with which a re-union were much to be desired That gracious faction this day is willing enough to perswade or at least to rest content without any opposition that the King should of himselfe without and before a Parliament though contrary to many standing Lawes grant under his hand and saâ—â— a full liberty of Religion to the bloudy Irish and to put in their hands both armes Castles and prime Places of trust in the State that the King should give assurance of his endeavour to get all these ratified in the next Parliament of England these men can heare with all moderation and patience but behold their fu ious impatience their whole art and industry is wakned when they heare of any appearance of the Kings inclination towards covenanting Protestants night and day they beate in his Majesties head that all the mischiefes of the World doe lurke in that miserable Covenant that deâ—th and any misfortune that the ruine of all the Kingdomes ought much rather to be imbraced by His Majesty then that prodigious Monster that very hell of the Covenant because for sooth it doth oblige in plaine termes the taker to endeavour in his station the abolition of their great Goddesse Prelacy The next hurt of Ministers from the Presbytry is The generality of Episcopall Clergy have ever been covered with ignorance beggery and contempt that by it they are brought to ignorance contempt and beggery Ans Whither Episcopacy or Presbytry is the fittest instrumen to avert these evills let reason or experience teach men to judge The Pâ—esbyteriall discipline doth oblige to a great deale of severer tryalls in all sort of learning requisite in a divine before ordination then doth the Episcopall let either the rule or practise of Presbyterian and Episcopall ordination be compared or the weekly Exercises and monthly disputations in Latine upon the controverted heads be looked upon which the Presbytery exacts of every Minister after his ordination all the dayes of his life for experience let the French Dutch and Scots divines who have beene or yet are be compared with the ordinary Generation of the English Clergy and it will be found that the Prelates have not great reason so superciliously to looke downe with contempt upon their Brethrens learning I hope Cartwright Whitaker Perkins Reynolds Parker Ames and other Presbyterian English were inferior in learning to none of their opposits some of the English Bishops have not wanted good store of learning but the most of them I believe will be content to leave of boasting in this subject what does the Warner speak to us of ignorance contempt and Beggery does not all the World know that albeit some few scarce one of twenty did brooke good benefices yea plurality of them whereby to live in splendor at Court or where they listed in their non-residency neverthelesse it hath bin much complained that the greatest part of the Priests who have the cure of the soules thorow all the Kingdome of England were incomparably the most ignorant beggerly and contemptible Clergy that ever have bin seen in any of the reformed Churches neither did we ever heare of any great study in the Prelats to remedy these evills albeit some of them be provider t enough for their owne Families Doctor Bramble knowes who had the skill before they had sitten seven yeare in their chaire to purchase above fifteen hundred pounds a year for themselves and their heirs what some-ever The Prelats continue to hate preaching and prayer but to idolize a popish service The third evill which the Presbytery brings upon Ministers is that it makes them prate and pray nonsence everlastingly Ans It is indeed a great heartbreake unto ignorant lazy and unconsciencious Ministers to be put to the paines of Preaching and Prayer when a read service was wont to be all their exercise but we thought thâ—t all indifferently ingenuous men had long