Selected quad for the lemma: church_n
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A44223
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A defence of King Charles I occasion'd by the lyes and scandals of many bad men of this age / by Richard Hollingworth ...
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Hollingworth, Richard, 1639?-1701.
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1692
(1692)
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Wing H2502; ESTC R13622
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26,155
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45
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that if he be not hindered by the Infirmities of Old-Age or Sickness he preach every Sunday in some Church within his Diocess 4. That the Ordination of Ministers shall be alwaies in a publick and solemn manner and strict Rules observed concerning the Sufficiency and other Qualifications of those men who shall be received into Holy Orders and the Bishop shall not receive any into Holy Orders without the Approbation and Consent of the Presbyters or the major part of them 5. That competent Maintenance and Provisions be established by Act of Parliament to such Vicarages as belong to Bishops Deans and Chapters out of the Impropritions of the several Parishes 6. That no man for the time to come shall be capable of two Parsonages or Vicarages with Cure of Souls and likewise that one or more Acts of Parliament be passed for regulating Visitations and against immoderate Fees in Ecclesiastical Courts And that they might be might be wanting in nothing if any thing could satisfie they declare in the close That if their Lordships shall insist upon any other thing which they shall think necessary for Reformation they were very willing to apply themselves to the consideration thereof And now let me ask any man whether these men acted like the Tools and Instruments of a Tyrant of one who was resolved to set up his own Will in opposition to the Nations Good or Contentment But yet all this was nothing the state of things is changed from what it was when they made their Protestation now no Peace no Reconciliation without the King 's taking the Covenant and thereby perjuring himself and signing an Act for others to be perjur'd as well as himself or else wholly to be laid aside as useless and unprofitable Members of the Body-Politick and to be wholly uncapable of any Place of Trust or Profit either in Church or State And here I now appeal to all impartial and unprejudic'd Readers who were in fault and who stood betwixt the Kingdom and a Compleat Happiness and what reason there was to continue such a bloody and unnatural War when a Peace was offered and might have been concluded upon such fair and agreeable Terms as these were And they therefore that at this time censure and reproach the Memory of King Charles the First must be men either of Resolved Prejudices or else of Profound and Stupid Ignorance who never gave themselves Leave to read his Story and thereby to be acquainted with true Matter of Fact The Truth is had such things been granted as to Church-Affairs when King Charles the Second was restored I am sure those men who at this Treaty scornfully refused these Offers would have thought themselves happy in the enjoyment of them and have blessed God for such healing Abatements and Condescensions but God's Justice reckoned with many of these men in 62 for their Cruelty to the Episcopal Clergy in 43. The other great thing that came under debate at that time was the Militia and what Moderation the King's Commissioners shewed and what fair Offers they made let any man read the Conference and then judge In short they consented That the Militia for three years should be in the Hands of Twenty Commissioners the one half by the two Houses which certainly considering the King 's Right to it and his Ancestors having alwaies enjoyed the whole Power of disposing of it was a very great Condescension on the King's part But alas it was nothing the Instructions on the other side were to have all or none and here they broke and certainly any Prince or any Noble Person deputed by him as these were would have broke with any Enemy rather than to have submitted to such slavish terms as these were For as the Commissioners told those that appeared in the Parliaments behalf that upon these Terms His Majesty for himself and his Posterity too would have parted with their peculiar Regal Power of being able to resist their Enemies or protect their good Subjects and with the undoubted and never-denyed Right of the Crown to make War and Peace He that reads over the whole Conference will find it was managed on the King's Commissioners side in all other things with the same Spirit and the same great Abatements of the Royal Power so that if there had been any real Inclination to Peace on the other side a Blessed and Happy Peace would have ensued and the future Miseries and Desolations of the War had been prevented but God did not see it good neither was the Nation worthy of such a Blessing at that time her Sins cried aloud for further Vengeance and she had it in very great proportions Well after this by the assistance of the Scots and the new-modelling of the Army the Parliaments Arms prosper at a great rate and the King's Affairs consequently went backward But however His Majesty upon all promising Opportunities or at least to gratifie the Tenderness of his Bowels towards a distracted and oppressed People left not off to shew his Zeal for Peace that his poor Subjects might not live in those continual Fears and Dangers they were in and therefore he sends from Oxford and tells them how deeply-sensible he was of the Continuation of this bloody and unnatural War and that he cannot think himself discharged of the Duty he owes to God or the Affection and Regard he hath to the Preservation of his People without the constant application of his earnest Endeavours to find some Expedient for the speedy ending of these unhappy Distractions Which Message when neglected and not answered His Majesty Good man ten days after send another to them extreamly wondering that they after so many Expressions on their part of a deep and seeming sence of the Miseries of the Afflicted Kingdom and the Dangers incident to his Person during the continuance of this unnatural War should delay a safe Conduct to the persons mentioned in the last Message who were to treat of Peace And again this Message being slighted within a few days after he follows them with another and tells them Notwithstanding the strange and unexpected Delays which can be Presidented by no former Times to his former Message therefore he will lay aside all Expostulations as rather serving to time than to contribute any Remedy to the Evils which for the present do afflict this distracted Kingdom And therefore he offers to put things into such a posture as certainly if they had designed an End of the Nations Confusions would have terminated in an happy and settled Peace But this taking no effect he presently in a few days sends another Message with such solemn and religious Professions of his Desire for composing the present Differences betwixt them that truly he that reads them must upon necessity unless he be all Will and Prejudice conclude that this Great King is very wrongfully blamed and barbarously used when he is called by such Names as very many of this Nation out of great Good manners and also
guilty of the Stubborness that he is falsly accused of by Designers against Monarchy at this time for hearing nothing for a Month together by way of Message after he had parted with the Commissioners he Good man in order to a Compliance sends another Message to them and in it requires as they will answer to God to him and all the World that they will not longer suffer their fellow-Subjects to welter in each others Blood that they will remember by whose Authority and to what end they met in that Council and send such an Answer to His Majesty as may open a Door to let in a firm Peace and Security to the whole Kingdom And after this that if possible a stop might be put to this Bloodshed in the Bowels of his Kingdom he sends another Message for another Treaty wherein he promises them after he had expressed a becoming Pity for the Miseries of the Nation that no Endeavours or Concurrence of his shall be wanting and that he might give infallible Proof that those Desires of his were not feigned and pretended but real and hearty after his defeat of Waller at Croptedy-Bridge he even then by a Message courts the Lords and Commons to a Peace and tells them in these words That from an earnest and constant endeavouring of Peace as no discouragement given him on the contrary Party shall make him cease so no Success on his shall ever divert him Words spoke like a man of true Bowels and Affection to his People And after this from Travestock when he had defeated the Earl of Essex in Cornwal and made so advantagious a Conquest yet so far is he from being puffed up with that Success so far from shewing any inclination to enlarge his Power above what was for his Subjects good that he even then in the midst of his Laurels and Triumphs sends to the two Houses and tells them It having pleased God in so eminent a manner to bless his Arms in those parts with Success yet he did not so much joy in the Blessing for any other Consideration as for the hopes he had that it might be a means to make others lay to Heart as he did the Miserie 's brought and continued upon the Kingdom by this unnatural War and that it may open their Ears and dispose their Minds to embrace Offers of Peace and Reconciliation Which Message after so great a Success certainly argued not the Spirit of a Tyrant as our present Common-wealths-men call him but the Compassion of a tender Father whose Bowels yearned for the Miseries his Kingdom laboured under especially if we add what he a little after said in a publick Proclamation where after he had complained of receiving no Answer to the two former importunate Messages he tells the World he desired a Treaty for Peace in which he does assure all his People upon his Royal Word and the Faith of a Christian which was the greatest Security he could give them that he would insist only upon the Settling and Continuation of the true Reformed Protestant Religion his own undoubted Rights the Privileges of Parliament and his Subjects Liberties and Properties according to the known Laws of the Land And what besides this was truly necessary for the Peoples Happiness truly I cannot divine And thus far things went and these Condescentions the King made when his Affairs were very prosperous and the Scale seemed to be turned on his side which I think was an Argument of Sincerity on his side and will take off all Objections made against his future Offerings for Peace as if bare Necessity drove him when Success fell upon the Parliaments Forces The two Houses therefore at this melancholly juncture apprehending themselves in danger and fearing a severe account hereafter wanting as they thought Forces in England to stemm the Tide which was coming in so furiously upon them they therefore send Commissioners into Scotland to invite the Subjects of that Nation to come in to their assistance and rather than fail notwithstanding all their Protestations and Votes formerly not to alter the Essentials of the Church-Government whereby they swore to dissolve the Frame of the Church as it had been by Law established ever since the first excellent Reformation notwithstanding they knew it was not in their Power according to the known Laws of the Kingdom without the King's Consent And take it they did and by that means procured Twenty thousand of their Brethren as they called them to invade England against the King's Proclamation to the contrary by vertue of which Act I mean taking the Covenant they shut up all the Doors against Peace for they knew at the same time the King was resolved and had often so declared against altering the Government by Bishops as a thing which was directly contrary to the satisfaction of his Conscience and which he could no more recede from than from his Life it self And therefore from this I cannot but perswade my self they were resolved to continue the War and engross all into their own hands let what would become of the King or those Noble Persons that took in with and adher'd to his Just and Righteous Cause But yet that they might pacifie the Minds of a great number of the Nation who groaned under the Miseries of the War and began to see too much of a private Spirit under publick Pretences they afterwards in some precess of time consent to a Treaty and Vxbridge was the place pitched upon for it to which place the King agreed and accordingly sent Commissioners men of Honour and Honesty men of Fortunes and Estates men of great Parts and Endowments who understood the business they went about and were very fond of healing the Nations Breaches and putting things into such a posture as might settle the King upon his just Rights and the People upon their ancient Privileges together with the addition of more such as were necessary for that Time and Season And with what Temper they managed the whole Conference what Offers in the King's Name and by his Authority they made such as our Ancestors never enjoyed nor indeed ever thought necessary to ask let any man judge of by reading the Conference it self It would swell this Book into too great a bulk to run through the whole and I shall therefore give the Reader a taste by which he may guess at all the rest 1. As to Church-Affairs they offered That Freedom be left to all persons of what Opinion soever in Matters of Ceremony and that all the Penalties of the Law and Custom which enjoin these Ceremonies be suspended 2. That the Bishops shall exercise no Act of Jurisdiction or Ordination without the Consent and Counsel of the Presbyters who shall be chosen by the Clergy of each Diocess out of the gravest and most learned of the Diocess 3. That the Bishop keep his constant Residence in his Diocess except when he shall be required by His Majesty to attend him on any occasion and