other from the Lord Redeemer Head and King of his Church nor yet are they of the same but different Natures as is said before Again if it were properly Subordinat to the civil Power then the Magistrat himself might Exerce all Ecclesiasticall Acts in the Administration of Word and Sacraments as well as of Jurisdiction for as nor ason can be adduced why He may Institute or Alter Church Government or Officers or Exerce the External Regulation thereof which will not by parity of strength infer his Exercing Acts of Order So every Superior Power including all the Inferior He may as well Exerce all Ecclesiastical Power as civil if the One be Subordinat to the Other And further the Magistrat himself as a Christian is but a Member of the Church and Subject to Church-Government and Discipline though it should not be practised except for most weighty Causes in great necessity and with singular Prudence and all due Respect and Reverence to Civil Authority and the Person therewith vestâ—d and accordingly many Magistrats have been censured Yea in some cases as if the Magistrat should unjustly forbid to Preach Baptise Ordain Deprive Excommunicat c. the Church may Exerce Church Power without and against His consent which She could not do if it were Subordinat to him I know there are many clamours of the Absurdity and Inconsistency of two Collateral and Co-Ordinat Supream Powers and Governments in one Kingdom And indeed that Absurdity and Inconsistency may hold true of two Supream Collaterall and Co-Ordinat Powers ejusdem Generis but not in this case where they are diversi generis Yea of their own Natures they are so far from being hurtful that being rightly mannaged they are singularly helpfull to one another Neither can these two Powers and Governments in a Land import now under the New Testament greater absurdity and Inconsistancy then under the Old when the Jewes had their Ecclesiastical Sanedrin as well as civil Courts for the affairs of the Commoun-wealth Hence also it followeth that as Ecclesiastical Power is not Subject to the civil So in matters Ecclesiastical there should be no Appellation from the Church to the civil Magistrat For though when Church Judicatories without their sphere meddle in civil Causes as such or for Ecclesiastical offences inflict civil Punishments they may be Declined as Judges Incompetent in the one case complaint of an unjust or Heterogeneous Sentence is lawful in the other though the Magistrat before He adde his Ratification may require a Reason of Ecclesiasticall proceedings or in case of an injust Sentence may desire the Church to consider the matter again the Church iâ— bound thus to give a Reason or Consider the matter especially in a degenerat or declining time of the Church when more is permitted to the Faithful Magistrat then otherwise Yet there can be no Appellation from the Church to the Magistrat in Ecclesiastical Causes Sentences Not only because all Appellations are from the Inferior to the Superior in Eodem genere but the Church and State are not such as is cleared before but also because the Church is indued with Compleat Power of Cognoscing Final determining Ecclesiastical affairs without dependance upon the State and these Determinations being Just the Lord hath promised to Ratify Mat. 18 18. And the Magistrat having no Formal Church Power cannot pronounce Ecclesiastical Sentence or make Redress by Himself so the Appellation is in vain Pauls Appealing to Caesar Act. 25 11. will not help this weak cause For He did not appeal in an Ecclesiastical cause from an Ecclesiastical Court to a Court of another Nature but in a matter of alleaged Sedition from Festus an Inferior Magistrat to Caesar the Supream Neither is the Instance of Ieremy stronger then the former Ier. 26 8.9 c for there is no mention of His appealing from the Priests to the Magistrat but of his Apology before the Princes who came to hear the matter and their Voluntary delivering him from the Uniust persecution of the Priests and Prophets who were not competent Judges of Life and Death Neither is the Exception of the Difference betwixt a Heathen and Christian Magistrat more Valid in this matter for besids all that is before said in the old Testament the Government of the Church was Committed to Church-Officers even when the Magistrat was Religious and why not in the New The Government of the Church is not committed to them because the Magistrat is Heathen or upon Temporary but upon other Moral and Immutable grounds therefore should not be taken from them when he becometh Christian It is sure that the Church had power given unto Her to Govern Herself when the Magistrat was Heathen now when and where is that Power Repealed If Church-Govenment belong to the Christian Magistrat then it is either as Magistrat or as Christian if as Magistrat or as Christian then according to the known maxime it belongeth to Every Magistrat and so to the Heathen and to Every Christian both which are false Was the Magistrat no Magistrat or Incompleat when being Heathen he did not meddle with Church Government or did the Church Usurp and Rob the Heathen Magistrat of that Power in the Apostles dayes and 2 or 300 years after Shall the Church by the promise of Nursing Fathers have less Power and Priviledge or be in worse Condition by a Christian then Heathen Magistrat And how vain iâ— the Distinction of Outward Regulation of the Church and Inward for that must be the other terme for the Inward Regulation thereof belongs incontrovertibly to Jesus Christ and if the Magistrat hath the Outward what is left to the Church These things which had they been formally digested would have been more clear and convincing are only thus confusedly and abruptly hiâ—ted nor should I have said so much if besids the Erastian Spirit which more then ever doth now rage some Parliamentary and Council-Expressions and aggreeable practices had not given occasion Whether it be Primitive or not let the Reader Judge but sure I am the Kings Government of the Church and State Charles c. Supream Governor in all causes as well Ecclesiasticall as Civil The Bishops serving the King in the Church is neither Scriptural nor Safe Dialect Him they may serve and Whether or How Time will tell but well know I whom they do not serâ—e in the Church and indeed it is proper that they who are there only by the Will of Man should only serve Man His Commissioners they are and accordingly Sharp hath deposed some Ministers by Vertue of the Power which he hath from his Majesty and therefore they can expect no greater Assistance Blessing or Reward then he can give But yet there is a greatâ—r to whom they must give an Accompt Having beyond my first intention detained Thee longer then perhaps was Necessary or will be Profitable or Pleasant Thow may'st now speak with the Deduction which is of age able to
NAPHTALI OR The Wrestlings of the Church of SCOTLAND For the KINGDOM of CHRIST Contained in A true and short Deduction thereof from the beginning of the Reformation of Religion until the Year 1667. Together with The last Speeches and Testimonies of some who have died for the Truth since the Year 1660. Whereunto are also subjoined A Relation of the Sufferings and Death of M R HEW M C KAIL and some Instances of the Sufferings of Galloway and Nithisdale LAM 1 12. Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow which is done unto me wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger MIC 7 8. Rejoice not against me O mine Enemy When I fall I shall arise When I sit in darkness the Lord shall be a Light unto me ISAI 14 32. What shall one then answere the Messengers of the Nation That the Lord hath founded Zion and the poor of the People shall trust in it Printed in the Year 1667. AD LECTOREM NOn hîc Herculeae sunt cum sudore palestrae Nullus Olympiaco in pulvere Ludus iners Pro sadore cruor Christi de Corpore manat Ardua pro ludo est lucta rapina neces Scotica bis denis luctata Ecclesia Lustris Penè dedit victas lassa labore manus Duros passa Patres dudum velut ame Novercas Vi premitur Stygia fraude subacta gemit Constitit effraenes contra tumidasque procellas Proque Fide steterat dum stetit ulla fides Nusquam cana fides nunc est jurataque Coeli Numina mortales vinc'la nec ulla ligant Credula dum nimis est fida haec Ecclesia vanà Spe lusâ rupto Foedere strata jacet Strata tamen non tota jacet de pulvere surgit Auricomum tollet mox supra astra caput Ipsa triumphalem currum Crux saeva ministrat Sanctorum sanguis fertile semen erit Ecce Sacerdotum turmam Regumque Coronam Pendentem infami de trabe Lector habes Cerne oculo Heroum facies corpora cernas Verba audi videas pectora plena Deo Hîc loquitur Princeps magno cum Judice Vates Et Juvenes Vatum spes animosa senum Hîc Generosa cohors Miles Mercator agelli Cultor Arte rudis spirat ab ore Deum Disce immortalem hinc Animam vitamque futuram Nulla est pro Christo mors male grata pio Pro Christi Crux est diademate Laurea restis Faedere pro Sancto est vitta monile decus READER THE LORD in great mercy having wonderfully and with an outstretched arm notwithstanding all the opposition of Sathan and earthly Principalities redeemed Scotland from the Power and darkness first of Gentilism and then of Antichristianism by raising of some burning and shining Lights and other Instruments fitted for that Work Whereby the Light of the Glorious Gospel from a very small beginning did increase more and more untill at length shining with brightness and heat as the Sun in his strength it filled the Land with knowledge in so much that the name thereof became Jehouah Shammah the Lord is there And having built to Himself a house upon the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles not only sufficiently instructed with righteous Laws and Judgments for Doctrine and Worship But also provided with all Ordinary Officers necessary in the Christian Church and with a form of Church-Government of his own Institution distinct from and without any prejudice unto the Civil Government of the Kingdom Whereby the Church of Scotland for Soundness of Faith Purity of Worship Excellency of Government Freedom and Power of the Gospel beautiful Order and Unity was not inferior to any if not preferable to most of the Reformed Churches and therefore was deservedly famous and esteemed amongst them Having also for an hundred Years from it's first National Establishment preserved the same from utter overthrow notwithstanding the many various and renewed endeavours of men by force and fraud to reduce it unto the same Errors Ignorance and Superstitions wherein it self at first lay buried and under which others groaned And several times revived and restored it when by it's own Impurity Indifferency and Formality it began to decline or by the Treachery Subtilty or Violence of others it was oppressed Thereby not only disappointing confounding and many times ruining the Adversaries and comforting and strengthening the faithful But also alwayes rebuilding to Himself a Temple the glory whereof did far excell and darken the glory of the former And having many times engaged the whole Land to Himself by several most solemn Obligations of voluntary Surrender and Resignation by frequently renewed Oaths and Covenants So that within these few Years past there were not many persons of age of whatever degree and not so much as one Preaching Minister in all the Land who not only did not make publick profession of the true Reformed Religion but also subject themselves unto the Presbyterial Form of Church Government and Discipline who did not which we desire to be noted for that effect in their own persons swear and subscribe with the hand unto the Lord in the National Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant In so much that as to the publick Profession of the Truth and almost as to the number of persons the Church of Scotland was of equal extent with the Nation and in that respect of all other National Churches did most resemble the old Church of the Iewes The Lord I say having to the conviction and acknowledgement of our selves and others done such great things for us whereof we are glad the present Apostacy whereby Scotland's Bethel is become Bethaven and the Land that was sometimes Holiness unto the Lord is become alas too Edom-like the border of wickedness an Aceldama a Tragical Theatre of blood persecution ought to be unto us no less matter of Sorrow Shame and Fear then it is Sin in itself Wonder and Amazement unto others Who can hear our Covenanted and Kindest Lord who hateth putting away and defieth us to shew the bill of our Mothers divorcement who groaneth under our Backslidings being pressed therewith as a cart full of sheaves complaining that He is broken with our whorish hearts and therefore declaring that He will be no more our Husband nor we His Wife and that His heart cannot be toward us But that He will drive us out of His house and love us no more and not cover the lip for Shame And in consequence thereof who can behold the Fathers house not only defiled by turning it into a house of Marchandise and den of theeves but the Temple casten down to the ground and the Adversary in the midst thereof insultingly and scornfully set up their ensignes for signes of Triumph And furder behold the blood of the Saints shed like water and their flesh given to be meat to the fowles of the heaven and beasts of the Earth and
Election of the People Act. 6.3 4 5. Trial 1. Tim. 3 10. laying on of the hands of the Presbytery 1 Tim. 4.14 and they must be Fixed to particular flocks Tit. 1.5 How distinct are these and all other Directions given to Church-Officers for Regulation thereof from the directions given to the civill Magistrat for Regulation of the Commonwealth And the Church Officers not the civil Magistrat are Commended or Discommended according as they faithfully or unfaithfully Exerce this Power and follow these Directions So the Angel of the Church of Ephesus which I hope none will say was the Magistrat is commended for Trying them which said they were Apostles and were not Revel 2.2 It was not the Emperor Senat c. that tryed these false Apostles as of late the Parliament Council High Commission ejected many Hundreds of faithful Ministers without Trial The Angels of the Churches of Pergamus and Thyatira are discommended for tollerating false Doctrin and Corrupt Practice v. 14.15.20 so is the Church of Corinth blamed for not timeous Excommunicating of the Incestuous Person 1 Cor. 5. For the like Ommissions which are reproved in these Angels I know them who now deserve a sharper censure sed quod defertur non aufertur From all which as the Formal Specifical Difference betwixt the Power and Government of Church and Common wealth is aboundantly evident So Jesus Christ Himself not the civil Magistrat is the Author Fountain of Church-Power and Government Then which there can be nothing more clear to them who do not wilfully shut their own eyes or whom the God of this world hath not blinded For besids that Himself telleth us that He hath receaved all Power and Judgement from the Father Mat. 28. ver 18. Iohn 5.22 and Iohn beareth him that Testimony Iohn 3.35 And who should derive Power to others but He who receaved it for that end Let us consider his Name and Relation to the Church In what Relation he standeth to the Common-wealth or civil Magistrat I do not here iâ—quire but the Apostle tells us that Heâ— and not the civil Magistrat is Head of the Church Ephes 1.22 and 5 13. as such he doth not only Mystically communicat inward Grace to the members but Occonomically derive Power and Direction for the Outward Regulation of the whole body How then can the Magistrat be Head of the Church or supream Governor in all causes Ecclesiastical Must the Church have two Heads or a Head above a Head Why may not a Church Officer or Officers as well claim with the Pope to be Head of the Common-wealth Will they shew us a Warrant from Scripture or Reason for the one which will not as strongly plead for the other Well then let Christ be still Head of the Church And as such Ye will find Him and not the civil Magistrat Instituting all Church-Ordinances for Administration of Word and Sacraments Mat. 28 19. 1 Cor. 11 23. for Excommunication and Absolution Matt. 18 17 18. and all other Acts of Government and Disciplin Ye will find Him and not the civil Magistrat Instituting Church-Offices He it is who gave Ephes 4 11. and sett in the Church 1 Cor. 12 v. 28. Apostles Prophets Evangelists Teachers c. And who is he that dare alter by addition or diminution Ye will find Him and not the civil Magistrat Authorizing these Officers to Exerce the Several Acts of the Power of Order and Jurisdiction Mat. 28 19 Ye will find Him not the civil Magistrat Furnishing these Church-Officers with Gifts and Graces for their work as none goeth here upon their own Expences so can any Magistrat breath the Holy Ghost as Christ did upon his Apostles Ioh. 20.22 In His Name and not in name of the Magistrate must they performe all Church-Acts they must Assemble Mat. 18 20. Baptise Mat. 28 19. Excommunicat 1 Cor. 5 ver 4. and do all in His Name He and not the Magistrat maketh Lawes Absolutely and Primarily oblieging to the Church and Church-Officers and therefore is He called the Lawgiver Isai 33 22. Iam. 4 12 He and not the civil Magistrat will call Church-Rulers to their final Accompt An Accompt they must give Hebr. 13 17. to whom but to Him that gave them Commission and is Iudge Isai 33 22 And in recognition of all this the Apostle Paul acknowledgeth that the Lord Jesus and not the civil Magistrat Giveth Ministerial Power and Authority 2 Cor. 10 8. and 2 Cor. 13 10 And because of this they are called the Ministers of Christ 1 Cor. 4 1. and Ambassaders for Christ 2 Cor. 5 20. and not of or for the Magistrat as now the King termeth the Prelats Our Bishops His Servants they are therefore should not be Pleasers of Man nor of the Magistrat Gal. 1 10. as they ought to be if he gave them Commission If the Magistrat as such be Head of the Church and Fountain of Church Power and Government I would gladly know how or whence the Apostles their Successors and others in the Ministery had power to Teach or Govern the Church when there was no Christian Magistrat to derive Power to them Or whether they had any Power at all or were but Usurpers Or what the Church shall do for Power when the Magistrat is Heathen Antichristian or a Woman Child a Fooll a Tyrant or Heretick c. Shall the Church all this time want a Head Or shall the Body of Christ have a Pagan-Head Shall a Woman who must not speak in the Church be Head of the Church shall a child or Idiot who cannot Govern themselves have the External Regulation of the Church Or shall Cruell Tyrants who oppress or destroy the Common-wealth and Bodies of men have the Regulation of the Church of the Souls of men We may then go to the Pope the Turk the wild Indian-Infidels and Savages for a Head to the Church before She want for whatâ—ver belongeth to one man as a Magistrat belongeth to all Magistrats But we will hold us content with the Head Iesus Christ which the Father hath given us Now from this that Church-Power and Government are thus distinct from the Civil and that Jesus Christ and not the Magistrat is Author and Fountain thereof it evidently followeth that it is not Subordinat to the Magitrat It is true that the Magistrat hath much Power Objectively Ecclesiasticall and that Church Officers as Subjects are subject to him yet Ecclesiastical Power it-self is not Properly Subordinat to the Civil This will the more appear not only because it is not Derived from the Magistrat as the Head or Fountain thereof nor is Exerced in his Name but also if we consider that Proper Subordination is only in things flowing from the same Fountain and of the same Nature whereas civill and Eccesiasticall Powers are neither from the same Immediat Fountain if the one be from Iehovah Essentially considered and as great Lord Creator and Gubernator of the World the
the uttermost for the advancement of his own Kingdom doth quickly take advantage of for setting on work and promoving of that Mystery of iniquity Which springing up in that bitter root of Pride and working in the Spiritual power and subtilty thereof as it began to work very early in the Christian Church even amongst the Disciples themselves in presence of their and our Lord as appeareth by their contention who should be greatest And notwithstanding all the Grace Power and Presence of the Lord which appeared in the times that followed all the long violent persecution wherewith the Church of God was then exercised yet continuing it's motion did still advance until attaining it's maturity in the revelation of the Man of Sin it filled and overwhelmed the Christian World with these strong delusions of Superstition Idolatry and all darkness that so long prevailed therein So it is the main and only Engine whereby Sathan as in all other Churches so in this of Our's hath so actively bestired himself and attempted the overthrow of their later Reformations These are the causes why notwithstanding of that great and glorious Light which the Lord made to shine amongst us the true Government and Discipline of the Church of Christ though his own great Ordinance instituted both for Fencing and securing of Truth in Purity and for promoving of the same in Power and though by the Light of that same Truth clearly discovered and Manifested through long opposition and many difficulties did scarce in these dayes attain it's establishment Yet the Lord who of his own free Mercy and Grace did visit us with the day-spring of his blessed Gospel from on high did also by his own Power and Presence in and with his faithful Servants at length also compleat his work and establish his Kingdome over us and his Government amongst us And so the Kingdome became the Lord's even the first fruits of the Kingdomes of the Earth unto our Lord Jesus Christ The Progress and Period of this work was from the Year 1560. unto the Year 1592. dureing which space these things are very observable 1. So soon as this Church attained to freedome from persecution and contrary violence they Assembled in their first National Synod in the Year 1560. by vertue of that Intrinsick Power and Priviledg granted by our Lord unto his Church and exercised by his Apostles and their followers and that without any question or control Nor did they so much as petition for the licence of the then Authority though the same might have been more easily obtained then the warrant at that time impetrated for conveening of the Parliament 2. As they first Assembled and by vertue of the same warrant did set on foot and continue a constant series of their Courts and meetings except in so far as by plain force and violence they were restrained so they held the same in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ only and in his sole Authority by Direction of his Word and Spirit concluded all their Counsels Votes and Acts. It 's true that they much and long wished for and thereafter heartily accepted the countenance and concurrence of the Powers for the time and that not only for Decency but also as the gracious performance of that promise Isa 49. ver 23. of the favour and assistance of Kings and Queens to the Church in the later dayes But as they were persuaded that the Lord Jesus perfect in all his house when invested at his exaltation with all Power in Heaven and in Earth did make a full grant and Commission of all Gifts and Offices requisit in his Church 1 Cor. 12. ver 28. Ephes 4. v. 8. 11. Wherein neither King nor Prince is mentioned and that there was no Authority wanting to these first Decrees made at Ierusalem though emitted upon that simple warrant Ast. 15. ver 28. It seemed good unto the Holy Ghost and unto us wherein neither King nor Prince was included so did they account it a gross usurpation for the Kings on Earth in place of their promised Patrociny to which they are oblidged to claim and invade an Over-ruling Arbitriment in the matters of God and his Church beleev that He who established the distinction and confirmed their Right by separating Caesar's things from the things of God doth also exact the same on their part 3. The Brethren conveening in these Assemblies did meet in perfect Parity and Equality against which the Extraordinary employments and Commissions delegated to some upon the account of the particular exigence of these times did grant no Priviledge or Preheminence From these three observations without mentioning the first Book of Discipline containing the true grounds and frame of Presbyterial Government which was compiled in the Year 8560. and then approved by the whole Church and subscribed to by a great many Lords and Counsellors it is evident that Presbyterial Government was from the beginning of the Reformation constantly intended and it's foundation really laid We need not mention that the Pope's Authority and all Jurisdiction flowing therefrom was by Law in the same Year 1560 expresly abrogated and discharged nor that in these first Assemblies greater Benefices were craved to be dissolved and Prelacy reputed to be only an Humane Device nor is it necessary for us to clear how that Extraordinary employment of Superintendency used for a few Years in the beginning was both only designed for an Interim and in it self wholly different from Prelacy and was at length rejected as burthensome All these things are sufficiently cleared by the late Large Apology 4. It is observable that as the Avarice and Power of some who possessed and grasped after the Churches Revenues did by the procurement of a few packed Commissioners in the Year 1671 introduce these Mock-Bishops called Tulchan for the better securing of their own gain which in the Assemblies immediatly succeeding were first protested against then quarrelled and lastly restrained and subjected thereunto So the Lord used the same as a warning to awaken and animat his Servants to a more vigorous prosecution of the establishment of His House in it's due Government In pursuance whereof the Assemblies with the King's concurrence from the Year 1575 until the Year 1581. did with much Prayer Fasting and Painfulness intend the work until by perfecting of the Second Book of Discipline and reducing of the Bishops to a simple Dimission and condemning their Office as unwarrantable they câ—mpleated their work in the exact model of Presbyterial Government in all it's Courts and Officers 5. During this space in March 1581. as we now reckon and after the Assembly had condemned the Office of Bishops as unwarrantable the King his Court and Council did swear and subscribe to the National Covenant By which both the Pope's usurped Authority over the Church in one Article and his wicked Hierarchy in another are abjured And the swearers did join themselves unto this true Reformed Church in Doctrine Faith Religion and
Ministers who dare to preach in contempt of that Act to be punished as Seditious persons and also to be careful to remove and dispossess such who should be Suspended or Deprived for non-conforming declaring that if they thereafter presume to exercise their Ministry they should be punished as Seditious persons Thus in the height of Perfidy and Violence men under the pretext of abused and perverted Authority proceed to dare and presume against God their own Consciencâ—â— all their Sacred Indissoluble Oaths and Engagements and to persecut such for preaching who standing stedfast therein and having a dispensation of the Gospel committed unto them by him who is King in Zion higher then the Kings of the Earth may out to contemn the menaces of vain Man in regard of that heavy and severe woe sounding in their ears if they preach not the Gospel But the Act doth furder proceed to require of all a due Acknowledgement of and hearty Complyance with the Kings Government Ecclesiastical and Civil and therefore to ordain and declare that who ever shal ordinarily and wilfully withdraw and absent themselves from the ordinary Meetings for divine VVorship in their own Churches on the Lords day whether upon the account of Popery or other dissaffection shall incurre each Heritor the loss of a fourth of that years rent each Yeoman the loss of a fourth or under of his moveables each Burgess the loss of his Liberty and Burgeship with the fourth of his moveables and concludes with a reference to the Council for further punishment more effectual execution likeas in order hereunto the Council by several Proclamations since have so much intended the severity of this Act that every Parish in stead of having a Lawfull Pastor is now inslaved to a Graceless Violent Hireling as it's Lord and Master and to the extortion of Souldiours appointed for his Executioners and Exactors We shall not here debate the Lawfulness or Unlawfulness of the Obedience here required only for the vindication of many thousands of the Faithful who by their sufferings have born Testimony against this Act we add 1. that waving the ordinary captious maner of proposing the question in the terms of Hearing or nor Hearing which strickly taken are not the subject thereof we are assured that none seriously pondering the obligation of the Oath of God sincerely really constantly all the dayes of our life to endeavour the extirpation of Prelats and their dependants but they will acknowledge that the owning of and submitting to the Apostat Curats according to this Act as our Ministers is most diametrally opposit thereto Can we Lawfully Own such whom we are bound to abhorre Or Submit to such whom we are bound to extirpate Surely this were to rebuild what we have destroyed 2. That though some nimble Sophisters who fear not after vowes to make inquiry can and have swallowed both Owning and Submitting as not repugnant to the duty of Extirpation yet seing the direct contrary thereof is by the terms themselves very significantly imported and that these terms were for this express cause and design particularly elected and made choice of by the Parliament for ranversing of the Obligation of the holy Covenant no sober man will be tempted by their delusion to think either that Owning and Submitting signify no more then Simple Submitting or that that Active Assenting and Complying Submission here mean'd is no more then that Stil and Passive Submission unto which men by the force of inevitable necessity and against their wills are oftentimes constrained 3. That whoever pretending to enter into the Ministery doth presumptuously contemn and despise the sacred Rule and Order of Entry appointed by the great Shepherd cannot be reputed to enter by the Door nor to be so much as Externally by him Sent or Called But such as do enter by gross and palpable Perjury and wicked Violence and Intrusion do without question contemn the sacred Rule and Order of Gods Word so that to admit such to be so much as Externally Called were to make the God of Order the Author of Confusion and him who is the Truth the favourer of Perjury We know that this notion of an External Call is conceited by many to be no other thing then the performance of such Rites and Solemnities as are prescribed to the Admission of a Minister done by such a Person or Persons on whom the like hath been performed but seing that by many instances of gross Disorder and Violence which are obvious for any man to suppose many absurdities might be hence inferred and that to be Externally Called according both to the meaning of Truth and the import of the words is to have such a Visible Evidence of the Call of Iesus Christ as in Reason and Charity doth oblige all men to receave the person so called as truely sent Certainly if any Person force his own Entry into the Ministry by open and profane Contempt of the Rule and Order given by our Lord Jesus he doth in like maner as palpably disprove any Evidence of a Lawful Call which he can pretend to no man is obliged either to Beleeve him to be Called or to Receave him as Sent. Which things are so evident in themselves that whoever denyeth them is obliged by the same consequence to affirm that if Simon Magus had in his horrid wickedness purchased the Apostleship by money the Christian World had been bound to Receave him as an Apostle 4. Though we are not to lanch out into these depths how the Soveraignity of Divine Providence hath suffered Churches to fall away into Apostacy and again recovered them and if during these times of Apostacy a standing Ministry still continued or how long it did if not what way it was revived and raised up in which cases true Faith in Jesus Christ which is the substance of all and a conscientious walking according to the measure of the times doth certainly purge and sustain many things otherwise chargeable with Informality Yet of this weare confident that it hath alwayes been both the sin and misery of all Apostatizing Churches that they have not resisted the beginnings of Defection and when the Authors theirof did prove incorrigible though formerly Ministers that they did not separate from them and account them as Heathens and Publicans which course if duely and zealously observed had undoubtedly put a great stop and hinderance to the rise and wicked Usurpation of Antichrist all whose malice and violence without the delusion and complyance of such who ought to have resisted them had never proven so effectual 5. That a man may be a Minister and yet not a Minister unto all so as to oblige them to receave him as sent to them which may be intuitively understood beyond the light and power of any demonstration if we but suppose the case of a particular Congregation living under and acknowledging their own lawful Pastor that amongst such a few violent persons arising bring in
stirrup they had mounted the saddle of Power Promotion and Riches and from subtile dissolving the nerves or forcible breaking the Arme of Preâ—bytery that they should rather have said to both as Ruth to Naomâ— Where thâ—u goest I will go where thou lodgest I will lodg thy People shall be my People and thy God my God Where thou diest I will die and there will I be buried God do so to me and more aâ—so if ought but death part thee and me And it may be truly said as the Church of Scotland hath had no Detractors but such as were Ignorant of her or mis-informed about her or whom Faction Partiality Prejudice Wickedness or Love of unlawful Liberty did inspire So no Person or Party hath endeavoured hithertil to root out Presbytery but the Lord hath made it a burdensome stone unto them And I am sure there is no other Form of Church Government can boast of so many Testimonies by Blâ—od as Presbyterial Government might do But of all Contradicters the Church of Scotland of old and late hath only had to do within herself with Prelatists some whereof being high flown have pleaded a Jus Divinum others Antiquaries have pleaded Antiquity and many Adiaphorists of late being beaten from both these strengths have pleaded Indifferency in general and only Jus Carolinum as to this or that Species But as no eyes save their own neither these except by delusion of their seâ—se could ever see Prelacy that is an Ordinary Ecclesiastical Ordâ—r Distinct from and Superior to that of a Preaching Presbyter having the sole power of Ordination and Jurisdiction in the Holy Scripture otherwise then by Prohibition to Lord it over Gods heritage or in the example of Diotrephes who loved Preheminence as many famous writing whereunto I refer the Reader unanswerably demonstrat therefore the Office being a stranger in the Word of God rather then the brasâ—n Serpent which once had Divine Institution should be Nehushtan in the Church So let no man Exorcist-wise adjure us by the Charming words of Antiquity Primitive times and Bishops Fathers c. For Moses we know the Prophets and Apostles we know but what is Antiquity and who are the primitive Bishops and Fathers Must men be stigmatized as giddy-headed Novellists and as much Athenian in their Principles and Professions as other mâ—n in their Newes or then be Implicite in-tail-following Antiquaries No there is a Medium of proving all things and holding that which is good Pure Antiquity deserveth all esteem and reverence but Simple Antiquity as such is neither a certain nor Safe Rule and much less oblieging to future times and so remote as our's are Our Lord Himself repelleth that pretence that it was said of old Were there not many Errors and Corruptionâ— which themselves will not Justify as ancient and early in the Church yea more as Prelacy is alleaged to be We are commanded to the Law and Testimony but never to the Fathers and good reason because few or none of them were without gross errours in Judgment or Practice Are not the writings of the first Age very few or obscure Are not many of these and after Ages lost or Corrupted Yea other later writings are deceatfully emitted under the name of Ancient Times and Persons so that in such a mist it is hard to determine what was written by these Fathers what not Later Corrupt or Inadvertant writters about these former times did speak of Persons and things under the abused Names which were corruptly used in thâ—ir own times And the writtings of particular Persons suppose of greatest Antiquity do rather hold forth their own private Opinion or the Practice of the Time and Place wherein they lived then the Universal Judgment and Practice of the Church in all Times and Places And if they will Sanctuary themselves in primitive Times let it be cleared what is meant by Primitive For if the two first Ages be meant it is more then they can do to prove by sufficient Authority that there was then such a Prelacy as is before mentioned or now usurped and exercised If after ages be meant wherein the Church grew more corrupt and Prelacy did aspire and exalt itself to an Universal Supremacy in the Bishop of Rome and establishment of that Antichristian Hierarchy then indeed they are like themselves for twins were never more like in face then the present Prelats resemble the Romish but then it were Candor in them to tell plainly that Papacy and Prelacy are of one Original with this difference that Prelacy is the first born or rather the Father which begat the other And if they mean a Middle time betwixt these Periods wherein indeed Bishops were first known in the Church and will reckon their descent from them why are they so unlike unto them that they look neither like Sons nor Successors Ask those who have dived into these depths of Antiquity and they will tell that a present Prelat and a faithful Presbyterian Pastor or Moderator at most do little more differ then the present Prelats and these first Primitive Bishops For as it was long before such a thing was known in the Church so when thorow the Malice and Subtilty of Sathan the Ambition of some Church-men the Unwatchfulness of others and Indulgence of some Magistrats it did creep in at first it was intended and acknowledged for no more then a Prudential Humane device for greater Unity a Cure because without warrant worse then the desease which as the Apostles never prescribed in their own times though there were then many Divisions so there is alike Reason to Extend further to Papal Supremacy in the case of divisions amongst Prelats and Patriarches and had never the impudence to aspire with some present Prelats so high as a Jus Divinum At first these Primitive Bishops being Elected by other Presbyters with consent of the people and not by the Civil Magistrat only as now the Prelats are by the Kings Letter to the Dean and Chapter were Ordained by the laying on of the hands of Presbyters and rot of Bishops only as the Prelats are Their Ordination vas not Essentially different from that of Presbyters nor to an Order distinct from and Superior to that of Presbyters or Pastors as the Consecration of the Prelats is alleaged to be Neither did they though perhaps they had a negative voice usurp the sole power of Ordination and Jurisdiction nor Exerce the Acts thereof without the potestative Concurrence of Other Presbyters as now the Prelats do Many of them being Holy Humble and Sober in their conversation toward the people and other Presbyters did nor with the present Prelats assume the lofty Tittles of Lordship Grace c. Nor live and ride in such state and pomp claming and taking the preference of the greatest Peeres of the Land Ordinarly and especially at the beginning they had not such vast charges as now the Prelats have Diocies over Hundreds of Pastors and many Thousands of people
to whom it is utterly impossible to perform Ministerial duties Being diligent Preachers themselves they were not as the Prelats are Idle drons nor Non-residenrs nor yet of a strange language to the people as Wallace through his ignorance of the Irish tongue and almost of all others except his Mothers must be a Barbarian to his Diocy of the Western-Isles Neither did they involve themselves in Secular affairs and Offices then which what is there more absurd in Reason and repugnant to Scriptural precept and Example For Christ Himself telleth us that his Kingdome is not of this World Joh. 18 ver 38. and how can his Officers be of it He refused to be a Judge Luc. 12 14. And speaking to the Disciples of Civil Authority and Dominion saith it shall not be So amongst yow Mat. 20 ver 25. Luc. 22 ver 25 And the Apostle Paul telleth us that Ministerial weapons are not Carnal 2 Cor. 10 ver 4 And that the Ministers of the Gospel should not entangle themselves with the affairs of this Life 2 Tim. 2 ver 4 That the Ministerial calling is so weighty that the best qualified and most diligent is not sufficient for it 2 Cor. 2 ver 16. how then are they sufficient for it and civil affairs too And therefore they should Waâ— upon it Rom. 12 ver 7 and give themselves wholly to it 1 Tim. 4 ver 15. and not wait as the Prelats do upon Courts Parliaments Council Convention of Estats c. as members thereof nor Exerce the office of Provosts Justices of peace c. Nor will it excuse them that they commit Ministerial inspection of the flock to Deputs For if they be Shepherds should not the Shepherds feed the flock Ezeck 34 ver 2. If to them be committed the Ministery Teaching Exhorting should they not themselves Wait upon these Rom. 12 7 If they must give accompt of Souls should they not Watch for them Heb. 13 ver 17 And if the Lord will require the flock at their hand Ezek. 34 ver 10 how will they answer to God the people their own Conscience if they have any or to others who ask a reason of them for feeding of themselves only and committing the flock to Others and especially to such who are so far from being Learned Holy Apt to teach Blameless of a good report Chast Sober Grave Lovers of good men Meek and Gentle as the Scripture requireth that many are Novices Ignorant Prophane Light Given to Wine False Covetous Contentious Proud Passionat and Self willed and so far from taking heed to the flock or being an Example to them in Word Conversation Charity Spirit Faith and Purity that they neither take heed to themselves nor rule their own families well I remember that one speaking of such as commit the flock to Vicar-Curats as all are who serve under Prelacy saith Adibunt per Vicarios in Paradisum in Persona in Inferos They shall go to Heaven by their Deputs but to Hell in Person These men if I may borrow an allusion from the duty and commendation of faithfull and approven Ministers have taken forth the Precious from the Vile and taught the people the difference betwen the Holy and Profane and caused men to discern betwen the Unclean and the Clean but mark How and for what End Is it not by making sad the hearts of the Righteous whom they have selected and set up as the Only object of all their Malice and persecution and Strengthening the hands of the Wicked whom they have taken into their bosome as their Only Familiars and Confidents The one they thurst with the side and shoulder the other they do not suffer to turn from his evill way by promising him life But if any desire more particular information about them amongst other places to that purpose let them read and consider Ier. 23.9 to 33. and 5.31 Ezek. 34.1 to 11. and 22.25.26.28 Zeph. 3.4 Mal. 2.8.9 Mat. 23. and as face answereth to face in water they shall see their Call Qualities Doctrine Conversation Works and Influence amongst the people and the Effects of all together with their righteous Doom and Reward He hath already made Contemptible and Base before the people those who have corrupted the Covenant of Levy and being partiall in the Law have made many to stumble thereat and will he not cause to cease from feeding of the flock those who feed themselves eat the fat and cloth with the wooll but do not for indeed they cannot strengthen the deseasâ—d heall the sick bind up that which iâ— broken bring back that which is driven away nor seek that which is lost They have not only turned his house of Prayer into a den of Theeves but from them is profanness gone forth over all the Land and seing they deserve no more honourable Exit will he not scourge out of his Temple those who have sold Faith and a good Conscience for a mease of pottage Yea seing He hath said it we will beleeve that He will make the false Prophet and the Unclean Spirit pass out of the Land and that these men shall bear the Wounds or marks of False Prophets and for shame shall deny for lies are their ordinary refuge that â—ever they were prophets And that Others perhaps their nearest Relations the Fathers and Mothers who begat them shall so little esteem regard or Pity them that they shall accompt them unworthy to live Ye shall not Live And that He will again gather those that are now sorrowfull for the solemn Assemblies that he will search for the flock seek that which was lost bring back that which was driven away bind up that which was broken strengthen that which was sick by the hand of Pastors after his own Heart who under and after the Example of the great shepherd DAVID shall feed them in a good pasture with Wisedome and Understanding To all this as well as the Curse upon them who make the blind to wander out of the way let all the People say Amen Neither are they who plead an Indifferency of Forms of Government more Scriptural or Rationall then the Former for it seemeth equally absurd incosinstant with the Faithfulness of J. Christ who was faithfull to Him who appointed him With the Lords way of dealing with the Jewish Church whereunto he prescribed a Specifical and Fixed Form of Government And with the Perfection and Plainness of the Holy Scriptures wherein all Church Assemblies Officers Powers Acts and who should Exerce the same every other thing necessarily belonging thereunto which the Light of Nature doth not teach and is not common to it with Civill Government and Order are clearly held forth Expressly or by necessary Consequence in Speciall or Generall directions and warrantable Examples as appeareth by the many debats Extant thereanent to leave the Government of his Church Indifferent and Arbitrarily determinable and alterable according to the will of the Civill Magistrat or the various and mutable humours
and Inclinations of Persons Times and Places or the pretended conveniency of Civil Policy as to leave Doctrin and Worship thus Indifferent and arbitrarily determinable and variable according to these crooked and changable rules If Church Government must be Indifferent and thus arbitrarily determinable and Ambulatory because the Holy Scripturs do not Expressly affirme that Presbyterial Government is the Only Government which should be in the Christian Church and also Expressly declare that it is Unalterable to the worlds end and that the first Institution and Practice thereof by the Apostles and their Successors in the Ministry never was nor shall be Repealed why may not the Civil Magistrat or any other arrogating a power of Instituting or Altering Church Government or Officers by Parity of reason make many other Necessary and Practicall points of Faith which are not more Expressly declared by the Holy Scriptures to be Unalterable Truths then Presbyterial Government is though all be evident enough to be also Indifferent arbitrarily determinable mutable then farewel Infant-baptisme Womens receaving of the Lords Supper observation of the first day of the week for the Christian Sabbath yea farewel Law Testimony more sure Word of Prophecy whereunto we should go take heed for a new Rule of Faith Practice welcome Humane Prudence State-Policy Corrupt Changable Disposition of man pretended Necessity or Conveniency of State Time Place yea welcome all Doctrins Practices which though they were once positively prohibited can alleage that the Scripture doth not Expressly declare that they never were nor shall be repealed And where are we then In vain is the Law in vain is the pen of the Scribe and every one without transgression may do what seemeth good in his own eyes if only he can Temporize and offeâ—d not the Civil Magistrat by violation of his Arbitrary Institutions and Lawes in Church affâ—iâ—s wherein he must be Supream O my soul come not intâ— the secrets of such Latitudinarian or rather in this Nullifidian Adiaphorists We would not be here mistaken as if we denyed to the Civil Magistrat any Power which the Holy Scriptures allow unto Him for as we assert his Office to be an Ordinance of God and his Person being lawfully therewith vested to be signally impressed with a special Character of Majestick Authority wherefore in a due Subordination to Him who is Lord over all He should be subjected to and obeyed So we chearfully grant that whereas the Heathen Magistrat because of his Morall incapacity to Exerce more power about Religion and Ecclesiastical affairs hath only a Power in Actu signaâ—o and â—us ad rem the Christian Magistrat hath Ius in re and in Actu Exercito may and should by his Lawes establish the true Religion within his dominions and command his Subjects to make publick profession thereof That by his Civil Sanction he may and should Ratify Ecclesiasticall Sentences aggreeable to the Word of God That anent these he may and should Exercise an Antecedent Discretive Iudgment whereby he may not adde an Implicit approbation That for Preaching and Propagation of the Gospel and for nursing of Piety and Learning he may and should provide Necessary and Convenient accommodation and encouragement as to Persons Places and Revenues That for his own Information and Advice he may call Occasionall Meetings of Church Officers and others to Confer and Debate matters before him That Pro râ— nata he may Convocate Ecclesiasticall Synods to reason and conclude Church affairs according to the Scripture That for his own Information and for preventing of Outward Force and Inward Confusion he may be Present therein by Himself or his Delegats That by his Power he may and should Defend and Encourage the Church in the free and peaceable Possession of all her Intrinsecall Priviledges and all the Members thereof in the Profession and Practice of the same That by the same Authority he may and should repress Error Heresy Superstition Atheisme Blasphemy and Profanness and Punish the Authors and Spreaders thereof That in case of negligence he may Command all and even Ministers to perâ—orme their râ—spective duties in general as necessity requireth And that for Civil transgressions he may Civilly puniâ—h Ecclâ—siastical Persons as well as other Subjects according to the Law of God and Righteous Lawes of the Land The Zealous discharge of all which we would thankfully acknowledg to God and Man as the Faithfull performance of that gracious Promise that Kings shall be the Churches nursing â—atheâ—s But if discontented herewith as if all this together with the Weighty affairs of the Common wealth were too little work for his Transcendent Power and Abilities and as if Jesus Christ had no Kingdom or Government or these were not distinct from the Kingdoms and Government of the World or though thâ—y were as if he were equally Head and Fountain of both He will needs aâ—bitrarily Institut or Alter the Species of Church Government Authorise Exauthorise or Restrain Church-Officers in the Exercise of the Power of Order or Jurisdiction in whole or in part as the Parliament and Councill have prohibited some Hundreds the whole Exercise of their Ministry and the High Commission which claimeth no power but what is solely and immediatly derived from the King hath deprived some from the Office interdicted Others the administration of the Lords Supper If he will Define Articles of Faith and prescribe what heads of Doctrine Ministers shall treat or not treat of in their Sermons as the King hath done in his printed Letter to the Bishop of York And thereupon Primarily Immediatly and Antecedently to any Judgment of the Church which is the Pillar of Truth and to which the Spirits of the Prophets are Subject Cognosce and Determine of Ministers Doctrine when the Church herself is willing and ready to try the Spirits And Criminally or Capitally punish them therefore under the pretence of Treason and Rebellion as several instances can be adduced against King and Councill in the series of our Church If he will Ordain particular Church Censurs to to be executed against particular persons for particular definite Ecclesiastical alleaged offences leaving nothing undone by Himself in person but the Execution of what he hath appointed As the Parliament hath appointed Suspension and Deprivation of Ministers for not observing the Bishops meetings and the King in his Commission to the High Commission hath appointed Excommunication whereas they may as well Immediatly Suspend Deprive and Excommunicat themselves as Appoint them to be executed in the manner specified in the said Act of Parliament and Commission If after the example of Antichristian or Pagan Nations he will Institut and Enjoin Needless Vain Superstitious Significant and Burdensome Rits in the Worship of God as most of the Imposed Ceremonies in the Lyturgy can be instructed be If he will arrogate the Sole Power of convocating Ecclesiastical Synods which is an Intrinsecall priviledg of the Church
whereof She was in Possession three hundred years before there was a Christian Magistrat in the world Authorizing it And will Imprison Confine Condemn and Banish Ministers for pleading and Practising this Right as King James did not a few in and about the Year 1606. and the Present King of late by Parliament Council and Commissioner did interdict all the Lawfull Assemblies of the Church which did not derive their Power from the Abjured and Perjured Prelats and if he will not only claim the only power of indicting â—â—lemn Fasts and Thanksgivings as de Facto is done these â—or 6 years past but also institute a day to be Aniversarily â—oly for ever which no mortal man can do If I say 〈◊〉 will thus Invade the Kingdom of Christ confound it 〈◊〉 the Kingdoms of the World and equally Exerce the â—overnments of both no man needs pronounce but rather fear the Domesticall and Personall doom Executed upon Saul and Uzziah for usurping the Priests office How in â—quall dealing is it that He who clamoureth so much of other men and particularly Ministers wandering without their sphere and overstretching-meddling with Civil affairs should himself be Circumscribed and move within no Fixed sphere Is it not enough that He have a Power Objectively Ecclesiasticall about Church affaires but he must also have a Power Formally Ecclesiasticall whereby he may Exerce Acts purely Spiritual and proper to Church Officers Will it not suffice him that he have an Externall Power of providing for the Church and protecting of her from Outward Violence or Inward Disorder but he must also have an Internall power of Doctrin Government and Disciplin the several Forms Acts thereof Is is not Sufficent that he have an Imperat Power whereby He may command all his Subjects as such to do their respective duties but he must also have and Elicit power whereby he may at least materially or equivalently Exerce Spirituall Acts in his own person Will it not please him that he have a Civil Power of Punishing Church Officers as Subjects for Civil transgressions but he must also have a Spiritual Power of Censuring them for Ecclesiasticall offences Will it not content him that he have a Secundary Power of Judiciall Approbation or Condemnation of what the Church hath already found and declared to be Truth or Error but he must also have a Primary and Immediat Power of Cognition of Truth and Error Antecedent to any Judgment of the Church thereanent Will it not satisfy him that he have a Discretive Power whereby he may not Implicitely Ratify Ecclesiasticall Sentences but he must also have a Definitive Power of Authoritative Decision And in a word is it not enough that he have a Cumulative Power of Confirming and Strengthening the Power and Priviledges of the Church but he must alsâ— have a Privative Power whereby if he please he may destroy the same That the Lord hath had and to the Worlds end will have a Church none who beleeve the Authority of the Holy â—criptures can deny or question And that he hath fixed Discriminative boundaries betwen his own and the Kingdoms of the Earth that is betwen his Church and other Civil Societies and their respective Governments is no less evident For though both consist of Men and sometimes of the same Persons though both have Order and Government a Power to Exercise the same and that Derived from God and the Persons invested therewith should be qualified and in the Exercise thereof should walk Absolutely by the Rule of the Word Punishing and Censuring after clear Conviction by Confession or Probation And should Ultimatly aime at the Glory of God and Good of the People and for that effect be mutually subservient and useful one to another in these amongst other things they aggree Yet they are Formally distinct For they consist of men under distinct Notions and Relations Civil Society and Policy is founded upon the Light and Law of Nature Ecclesiasticall by Revealed Positive precept The one is Common to all men as Men the other is Peculiar to those who profess the True God The Form of the one may be Monarchical the other not The object of the one is Civil the other is Spirituall The Nature of the one and Manner of Exerceing it is Magisterial the Other Ministerial The Acts and Sentences of the one are Corporall rhe other Spiritual The Immediat Rule of Exerceing the one is the â—awes of the Land and the other the Word of God and â—cclesiastical Constitutions aggreeable thereunto The one â—s performed in the Name of the Supream Magistrat the other in the Name of Jesus Christ The Immediat End of the one is the Good of the Common-wealth the other the Good of Souls Yea though the Church and Common-wealth of the Jewes of all others that ever were did most aggree yet were they Formally distinct for they had ordinarily distinct Rulers the Priest and Levits for the one Judges and King 's for the other They had distinct Acts Sacrificing praying c. in the Church Death Banishment Confiscation Inprisonment Ezra 2 26. in the State They had distinct Objects the Matters of the Lord and the Matters of the King 2 Chron. 19.11 Distinct Lawes the Ceremoniall for the Church the Judicial for the Common-wealth and the Morall for both They had sometimes distinct Members when these of the One were not admitted to some Priviledges of the Other The Form of the State did alter from Judges to Kings but the Churches was unalterably the same And they had their distinct Periods of Duration for the Church continued though corrupt after the Civil Government was overturned by the Romans And as the Church and State of the Jewes were in these things distinct so had they their distinct Governments and Judicatories for Exerâ—â—ing the same Respectively For Exo. 24.1 there are 70. Elders who v. 14. appear to be vested with Authority and to have Aaron and Hur for their Presidents or Moderators now these 70 Elders cannot be the 70 who Numb 11. shared of the Government with Moses for these mentioned Exod. 24. were in Authority when the Israelits were at Sinai whereas the other mentioned Numb 11. were chosen after they went from Sinai neither can they be any other 70 in Civil Authority because before the Election of those Numb 11. Moses was alone in the Government Again Deut. 17. there are distinct causes viz. Blood Blood plea and plea which were Civill and Stroke and Stroke which whether it was Leprosy belonged to the Priests to Judge of Lev. 13.3 Distinct Rulers viz. the Priests the Levets and the Iudge who v. 11. are distinguished by the disjunctive particle Or Distinct Acts of telling or exponing the Sentence of the Law of telling Iudgment v. 10.11 distinct Penalties of Death and puting the Evill from Israel v 12. Further in â— Chr. 23.4 Ye will find 6000 of the Levites who were Officers and Iudges which must needs have been in Ecclesiastical affairs
because 1 Chron. 28 1. there were Princes of Tribs Captains of Thousands Hundreds Stewarts and Officers for Civil affairs And 2 Chron. 19 8 c. there are Church Officers Priests Levits chief of the Fathers there are distinct Matters the Matters of the Lord and the Matters of the King Ver. 11. There are distinct Acts or Sentences for Warning not to trespass is more proper to Ecclesiastical then Civil Persons And there are distinct Moderators or Presidents Amariah is over you for the Mattâ—rs of the Lord and Zebadiah for the Matters of the King Now what should all this mean viz. Distinct causes and Persons set over them to Judge them respectively and what meaneth these distinct Acts Sentences and Penalties if not to hold out the Distinction of Government and of Judicaâ—ories respectively exercing the same Yea â—hat was in the Old Testament we may know by what we read in the New for Matth. 21 ver 23. and 27 ver 1. and 26 v. 3 57 59. Act. 4 v. 5 6 15. and 5 v. 21 27. there are Assemblies Councils which must needs be Ecclesiastical not only because they consisted of Ecclesiastical persons the High Priest Cheef Priests and Elders of the People Cognosced of Ecclesiastical Causes the life Doctrin and Authority of Christ and his Apostles And past Ecclesiastical Sentences about preching in the Name of Christ Act. 4 and 5. But also because the Jewes being subdued the Supreme civil Government was taken out of their hands and little left them but the Ecclesiastical And if at any time in the Old Testament the same persons were members of both Judicatories it was under distinct Notions and considerations as Ecclesiastical in the one and Civil in the Other As now the Ruling Elder under several Considerations and Capacities may be a member of an Ecclesiastical and Civil Iudicatory It is true that the High Priests and some Kings had great hand in both Civil Ecclesiastical affairs but Extraordinary and may be Typicall instances are not an Ordinary and Universal Rule And it may be also that in the New Testament these Councils meddled in Civil Affairs for Matth. 27 ver 1. they take counsel against Iesus to put him to death but that was by Corrupt Abuse of their Power which crept in in the declining State of the Church and when the Civil Government was taken from them by strangers or when wanting a Magistrat they took more upon them then at another time for it was not so from the beginning and was by the like Corrupt and Extravagant Abuse as now the High Commission if it be an Ecclesiastical Courr doth Scourge Stigmatize Fine and Banish or the Prelats now as Members of Parliament Council and Session make themselves Judges of Blood Pleas c. And as this was the Manner Difference of the Jewish Church and State under the Old Testament so under the New Testament there is by Divine Institution a Formal and Specifical Difference between the Government of the Church and Common-wealth For ye will not only find Office-bearers Given unto and Set in the Church Rom. 12 ver 8. 1 Cor. 12 ver 28. Ephes 4 ver 11. Which are as wel Distinct from Office-bearers of the State as from the People for neither Magistrat nor People were ever called Apostles Prophets Evangelists c. especially in the Apostles sense But also RULERS distinct from the Rulers of the Common-wealth who 1 Thess 5 ver 12. are Over the People and Hebr. 13 ver 17. Rule over them Now these Rulers cannot be the Magistrat for in none of the places doth the Apostle Intend or Mention him Besids at that time there was not a Christian Magistrat to Rule the State and how should the Rule of the Church be committed to a Pagan And 1 Tim. 5 ver 17. He that Labours in Word and Doctrin seemeth to have more Honour then He who Ruleth which if either Magistrat or Prelate be the Ruler how they will Relish that the poor preaching Presbyter should be more Honoured then they let any man Iudge Here then are Ecclesiastical Rulers distinct from these of the Common-wealth To these Rulers belongeth the Cognition of Ecclesiastical Offences in Contradistinction to Civil Causes and Iudges Matth. 18. Tell the Church Now the Civil Magistrat cannot be this Church where is He ever so termed Or how will He being himself a Heathen accompt another man so Here then is a Church distinct from the Common-wealth here are Church-Offences distinct from Breaches of Civil or Municipall Lawes here is Church-Delation or Complaint distinct from any complaint to the Magistrat tell the Church and consequently here is a Church-power of Cognition of these Offences distinct from that which resids in the Magistrat else it were in vain to tell the Church and as good or better to tell the Magistrat And here is a Church-Sentence Let him be unto thee as a Heathen which the Magistrat being then Heathen himself would never pronounce against or inflict as a Punishment upon another man To these Church-Rulers also is committed not only the Power of Order or Pastorall Administration of Word and Sacraments but also the Power of Jurisdiction whether Dogmatical Diatacticall Critical or Exusiastical and not to the Civil Magistrat And accordingly Jesus Christ giveth the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven to Peter and not to Cesar Mat. 16.19 Ye will find Church-Assemblies distinct from Parliaments Convention of Estâ—ts Senats c. yea when the Magistrat was an Enemy determining questioned Matters of Faith and Practice Act. 15 The Apostle Paul enjoineth the Church of Corinth and not the Magistrat both to Excommunicat and Absolve the Incestuous man 1 Cor. 5.4.5 and 2 Cor. 2.7.8 The same Apostle leaveth Titus and not the Magistrat to Ordain Elders in Every City Tit. 1. v. 5 and accordingly it is performed by the Presbytery and not by the Magistrat 1 Tim. 4.14 The Apostle Iohn thereateneth by Himself and not by the civil Magistrat to Censure Diotrephes 3. Iohn 10. And as the Power it self and the several Acts thereof are Committed to Church-Officers So to them and not to the Civil Magistrat are all the Directions given for Regulation of the Exercise thereof distinct from the Directions given to the Magistat for Regulation of the affairs of the Common-wealth and so in the case of Offence there must be private rebuke before Publick delation Mat. 18 15 16 17. In the case of Publick Scandal there must be a Rebuking before all 1 Tim. 5 20 In the case of Publick Censure there must be Notoriety of the Fault 1 Cor. 5.1 or sufficient conviction of the Person by Confession or Probation Mat. 18.15 In the case of Excommunication it must be when the Church is gathered together 1 Cor. 5.4 and not after the Prelatical fashion in a corner In the case of Absolution there must be sufficient evidence of Repentance 2 Cor. 2.7 In the case of Ordination of Ministers there must be the
of Scotland England and Ireland by the providence of GOD living under one King and being of one reformed Religion Having before our eyes the glory of GOD and the advancement of the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ the Honour and Happinesse of the Kings Majesty and his Posterity and the true publick Liberty Safety and Peace of the Kingdoms wherein every ones private condition is included And calling to minde the treacherous and bloody Plots Conspiracies Attempts and Practices of the Enemies of GOD against the true Religion and Professours thereof in all places especially in these three Kingdoms ever since the Reformation of Religion and how much their rage power and presumption are of late and at this time increased and exercised whereof the deplorable estate of the Church and Kingdom of Ireland the distressed estate of the Church Kingdom of England and the dangerous estate of the Church and Kingdom of Scotland are present and publick testimonies We have now at last after other means of Supplication Remonstrance Protestation and Suffering for the preservation of our selves and our Religion from utter ruine and destruction according to the commendable practice of these Kingdoms in former times and the example of GODS People in other Nations after mature deliberation resolved and determined to enter into a mutuall and solemn League and Covenant Wherein we all subscribe and each one of us for himself with our hands lifted up to the most high GOD do Swear 1. That we shall sincerely really and constantly through the grace of GOD endeavour in our several places and callings the preservation of the Reformed Religion in the Chuch of Scotland in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government against our common Enemies The Reformation of Religion in the Kingdoms of England and Ireland in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government according to the Word of GOD and the example of the best Reformed Churches And shall endeavour to bring the Churches of GOD in the three Kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and Uniformity in Religion Confession of Faith Form of Church-government Directory for Worship and Catechizing That we and our Posterity after us may as Brethren live in Faith and Love and the Lord may delight to dwell in the midst of us 2. That we shall in like manner without respect of persons endeavour the Extirpation of Popery Prelacy that is Church-government by Arch-bishops Bishops their Chancellours and Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-deacons and all other Ecclesiasticall Officers depending on that Hierarchy Superstition Heresy Schism Prophanesse and whatsoever shall be found to be contrary to sound Doctrine and the power of Godliness Lest we partake in other mens sins and thereby be in danger to receive of their plagues And that the Lord may be one and his Name one in the three Kingdoms 3. We shall with the same sincerity reality and constancy in our severall vocations endeavour with our estates and lives mutually to preserve the Rights and Priviledges of the Parliaments and the Liberties of the Kingdoms And to preserve and defend the Kings Majesty's Person and Authority in the preservation and defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the Kingdoms That the world may bear witnesse with our consciences of our Loyalty and that we have no thoughts or intentions to diminish his Majesty's just power and greatnesse 4. We shall also with all faithfulnesse endeavour the discovery of all such as have been or shall be Incendiaries Malignants or evil instruments by hindering the Reformation of Religion dividing the King from his people or one of the Kingdoms from another or making any faction or parties amongst the people contrary to this League and Covenant That they may be broughr to publick triall and receive condigne punishment as the degree of their offences shall require or deserve or the supream Judicatories of both Kingdomes respectively or others having power from them for that effect shall judge convenient 5. And whereas the happinesse of a blessed Peace between these Kingdoms denyed in former times to our Progenitors is by the good Providence of GOD granted unto us and hath been lately concluded and settled by both Parliaments We shall each one of us according to our place and interest endeavour that they may remain conjoyned in a firme Peace and Union to all Posterity And that Justice may be done upon the willfull Opposers thereof in manner expressed in the precedent Article 6. We shall also according to our places and callings in this Common cause of Religion Liberty and Peace of the Kingdoms assist and defend all those that enter into this League and Covenant in the maintaining and pursuing thereof And shall not suffer our selves directly or indirectly by whatsoever combination perswasion or terrour to be divided and withdrawn from this blessed Union and conjunction whither to make defection to the contrary part or to give ourselves to a detestable indifferency or neutrality in this cause which so much concerneth the Glory of GOD the good of the Kingdoms and honour of the King But shall all the dayes of our lives zealously and constantly continue therein against all opposition and promote the same according to our power against all Lets and Impediments whatsoever And what we are not able our selves to suppresse or overcome we shall reveale and make known that it may be timely prevented or removed All which we shall do as in the sight of GOD. And because these Kingdoms are guilty of many sins and provocations against GOD and his Son Jesus Christ as is too manifest by our present distresses and dangers the fruits thereof We professe and declare before GOD and the world unfained desire to be humbled for our own sins and for the sins of these Kingdoms especially that we have not as we ought valued the inesteemable benefit of the Gospel that we have not laboured for the purity and power thereof and that we have not endeavoured to receive Christ in our hearts nor to walk worthy of him in our lives wich are the causes of other sins and transgressions so much abounding amongst us And our true and unfained purpose desire and endeavour for ourselves and all others under our power and charge both in publick and in private in all dutyes we owe to GOD and man to amend our lives and each one to go before another in the example of a real Reformation That the Lord may turn away his wrath and heavy indignation and establish these Churches and Kingdoms in truth and Peace And this Covenant we make in the presence of Almighty GOD the Searcher of all hearts with a true intention to peform the same As we shall answer at that great Day when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed Most humbly beseeching the Lord to strengthen us by his Holy Spirit for this end and to blesse our desires and proceedings with such successe as may be deliverance and safety to his people and encouragement to other Christian Churches
together with the former Acknowledgment of Sins and Engagement to duties should be read publickly to the People upon the day of the Intimation and the last Fast day when the Covenant was to be sworn This resolution of the Commission upon the same grounds was unanimously approven by the Committee of Estats then sitting and by their Act October 14. Ordained to be put in Execution in all things according to the directions of the Commission And accordingly in the moneth of December it was for the second time sworn in all the Congregations of the Kingdome upon the same day except where vacancy or the Ministers being under scandal or process did occasion a delay till another day that the place was supplyed by another Minister with great Solemnity and such mixture of Joy Sorrow as became people entering in Covenant with the Lord And was thereafter Subscribed by all the Swearers After ward the Parliament Conveening in January 1649 by their very first Act except the Election of their President upon the same grounds Resolved to keep a Fast by themselves for the Causes contained in the Acknowlegment and to Renew the Covenant according to the Order of the Commission which was also most solemnly done And last of all the Generall Assembly 1649. by their Act July 7. did unanimously and expresly Ratify the Proceedings of the Commission as to the Acknowledgment of Sins Engagement to dueties the Fasts and Renewing of the Covenant by Swearing and Subscribing thereof Hence as the Covenant it self so the Solemn Acknowledgment of Sins Engagement to duties became National Authorised by the Supream Judicatures of Church and State and are still obliging by Oath Oh! that the Lord had kept these things in the Imagination of the thought of our hearts for ever ERRATA WHilst this was upon the Press some Errors which escaped in some sheets were corrected in others so that thou must not stumble though some Copies be more correct then others Besides other literal escapes which will not marr the sense before thou read the Book correct with thy pen thâ—se following Pag. 3. lin 4. for other as read as other p. 4. l. 32. r. witnesses p. 5. l. 3. r. solemn p. 6. l. 12. r strong p. 8. l. 15. r. sufficiently p. 15. l 29. for or r on â—b l. 16. r. opportunity p. 24. l. 14. for of r. or p. 25. l. 4. r. resolution Ib. l. 32. forâ— are r. are a lb. 33. r. worthies p. 30. l. 21. for 27. r. 17. lb. 23. for 10. r. 8. p. 35. l. 8. r. 1560. Ib. l. 30. r. 1571. p. 38. l. 16. r. 1584. p 67. l. 27. for hoth r. both p. 70. l. 12. for he r. the. p. 81. l. 12. r. during p. 88. l. 18. r. slain p. 100. l. 11. de e the. Ib. l. 12. r. generally Ib. 19. for the r. that p. 103 l. 14. for out r. ought p. 120. l. 16. for what r. that p 129. l 12. r. rageth in p. 154. l. 23. for where r. were p. 188 l. 6. r. his p 281. l. 27. r. it is p. 282. l. 13. r. Advocats A True and short DEDUCTION Of the WRESTLINGS of the CHURCH of SCOTLAND For the KINGDOM of JESUS CHRIST From the beginning of the Reformation of Religion unto the Year 1667. AFter all these great glorious things which the Lord in his Love Mercy and Faithfulness hath wrought for this Land and in his Holiness and Righteousness hath declared amongst us these clear and powerfull Manifestations of his blessed Truth which have so brightly shined forth to the Glory Beauty and Praise of this whole Nation After these many sacred and most solemn Engagements whereby in the evidence and power of the same Truth all Ranks and degrees from the King even to the meanest became and are still bound and devoted to the Most High and Holy Our Covenanted God and to our blessed Lord Jesus Christ who alone is King in Zion and of all Saints and whose are all the Kings and Kingdomes of the Earth for the advancement of his Glory and Kingdome and for the owning and maintaining of his glorious Work and precious Truth which is all our Felicity and Joy And after all this horrid Apostacy and Rebellion whereby the same wretched Nation in the same Generation and almost in the same Persons neither from the conviction of any pretended Reason or Conscience nor from any solid persuasion of the very Advantage designed but in the manifest Spirit of Wickedness and violence have forgotten despised and blasphemed the former power and Glory Rebelled against God by breaking the Holy Covenant Rejected our Lord and Saviour Overturned the Work of his own blessed Spirit and Arme Abrogated and rescinded all these righteous Lawes and Ordinances whereby it was established And by most Unjust Arbitrary and Cruel Lawes and Practises have endeavoured the rebuilding and promoving of the Kingdome of Darkness and Antichrist and precipitating of all men either into the same condemnation with themselves or utter ruine and Extermination After we say all these things which the Lord hath thus wrought and permitted in the midst of us neither the Discouragement and Fainting of some nor the Unsuccesfulness of the more honest and Zealous endeavours of others nor yet our Silence hithertil is greatly to be wondered at For whose eyes can behold all these things without Dimnes and affecting of the heart And whose heart can consider them without Astonishment and Horrour if not Stupefaction or Discouragement How little wonder is it that every visage suppose of the fairest Nazarit be blacker then a coale That every eye run down with waters that the souls of many refuse to be comforted neither do nor dare rejoice as other people When not only by their going a whoreing from the Lord their dayly bread is become the bread or Adversity and the waters of Affliction and when their famine of the Word of the Lord is such that though they wander from sea to sea seeking it they cannot find it Bot also the Comforter that should releeve their souls is far from them and either covereth Himself with a cloud that their prayers cannot pass through or then answereth them only by terrible things in Righteousness How can they who by their Vanities have moved the Holy God to Jealousy and thereby have provoked their Rock to fell them stand before their Enemies or chase a thousand put ten thousand to flight alâ—hough that we should plead with our Mother with our Rulers with all other ranks of persons within the Land that they would put away their whoredomes out of their sight their Adulteries from betwen their breasts yet what hope is there that Words shall prevaill where the Power and Glory of the most High is contemned Or that Reason shall be heard where the Counsell of God is rejected Here indeed is matter of Wonder and Praise even the Longsuffering of the Lord which is Salvation and the Mercy and
Discipline promising by the Great Name of the Lord our God to continue in the Obedience of the Doctrine and Discipline thereof all the dayes of their lives Which Discipline as the foregoing Assertions do clearly discover to have been from the beginning fundamentally Presbyterial so the Model of Presbytery being now compleated and any shaddow of power that the Mock-Bishops had lately usurped being now fully abrogated it is sufficiently clear that both Prelacy is by this Covenant abjured and Presbytery owned and sworn to And really if it be further considered that the Assemblies both 1581. and 1590 while most intent and forward in the erecting of Presbyteries did enjoyn and require the same to be subscribed by all ranks of People in the Land and that these Acts were both seconded and enforced by Ordinances of King and Council it may be justly doubted whether the impudence of the succeeding Prelats in denying of the Obligation or Perjury in breaking of it be greater This is the Great Oath into which as the Lord God did bring us by the Power of his own Spirit and Truth in opposition to that Bloody Bond called the Holy League wherein Antichrist and his followers had at that time conjured themselves against the true Church of God So the Kingdom thereby became the Lords and we his peculiar people as-well by the people's subjecting of themselves and their Alleageance as by the King 's submitting Himself and his Scepter in a due Subordination unto God and our Lord Jesus Christ for the maintenance and defence of his Church and Gospell the Liberties of the Land and Ministration of Justice And this Oath and the Ordinances enjoyning it notwithstanding the many fearful violations thereof that have ensued do yet stand to this day unrepealed and declared against to the unanswerable conviction and condemnation even in their own Courts and Consciences of all it 's wicked Transgressors 6. As the Tulchan Bishops were the effect and product of the Avarice of these Lords that favoured them So the same principle of Avarice and Wickedness did again resist the Work of God when almost brought to Perfection by stirring up certain of the Nobles to re-induce Bishops for the better inhaunsing of their Benefices and the devouring of the Churches patrimony And not only for their better establishment that what they want of Divine Right and Warrant might be supplyed by the accession of the Kings power and Command but also that by their meanes the growing wickedness of these times might abound without restraint or control the Devil inciteth others of the more prophane licentious and violent Courtiers such as the Earle of Arran and his complices to move and instigat the King contrary both to the Word and Oath of God to usurp the Prerogative of Jesus Christ who is alone King in Zion and to invade His Churches Priviledges purchased for Her with His own Blood by assuming to Himself in the first and immediat Instance the cognition of Her Doctrine and Censures Which though the Church did constantly and valiantly oppose both by Petitions and Protestations yet this Wickedness did so impetously proceed that all at once in a Parliament summarily called in the Year 1582. the Prerogative of Our Lord is translated upon the King and his Jurisdiction and Empire exalted over all persons and Causes the Estate of Bishops their power and dignity confirmed the power of the General Assemblies of the Church put in the King's hand We mention not these things with any purpose to debate these questions which have been moved on this Subject Only we are confident that how extensive soever the King's power may be in the case of Reformation which Alas for the most part cometh short of it's reach yet where a Church is Regularly constituted and so acting and by Him sworn to be maintained no King or Prince ought so far to intrude Himself into Her Power and Priviledges unto which he is neither called nor gifted as to assume to Himself a Soveraign immediat power of judging and discerning upon Doctrine and her most spirituall Rights and Censures and thereby in effect not only to constitut Himself a Proper and direct Church-Officer without our Lords appointment but in stead of Papacy so justly abrogated and so solemnly abjured to erect and revive the same in Himself a Secular Person far more absurdly and intollerably We know that other formalities and notions are pretended as these of Treason Sedition and Disorder to palliat and colour this Usurpation but seing nothing spoken or acted by warrant of the Word of God can fall under the definition or pain of these crimes and that all Ministers and Ecclesiastick Courts are known allowed and presumed both to speak and act according to that only warrant and Lastly seing both the warrant is to them committed and the Church is priviledged and permitted to have it 's own proper power and cognition thereanent as it followeth by clear consequence that the things questioned must and ought to be first subjected to her tryal and cognition so none do deny the Magistrat's just right and power over both these things and persons they being once lawfully found to be destitut of the warrant pretended But seing both Scripture and Reason doth testify against this Usurpation as most unlawful in it self and injurious to our Lord Jesus and that all experiences have proven it to be most pernicious to His Church Kingdom therefore many of his faithful Servants have worthily and valiantly resisted it not only to bonds and banishment but even to blood for the Testimony of their Lord Master We return to the purpose of this observation which is to vindicat the honour of the Lord's Work and the memory of his faithful Servants in the discovery of the old malice and subtilty of the great Enemy of the Church of God working in the wicked Prelats their abettors who to the effect they may enjoy their carnall designes and prosecute their wicked lusts without controll endeavour mainly by an absolute surrender of all things powers persons and interests to flatter and exalt the King unto an illimited Soveraignty and pretended Omnipotency thereby both to oblidge and enable him the more to such acts deeds and grants as are requisite for the satisfying of their vain Ambition insatiable Covetousness and wicked lusts Which Flattery and Usurpation being not more agreeable to the vain heart of man then contrary to the Kingdom of our Lord and the Power and Purity of His blessed Gospel what wonder if his faithful Servants who can neither deny His Name nor dissobey His commands by complying with the wicked practices and the blasphemous flattery of these vile Apostats be not only hated of all men but with their Lord and Master become the continual object of the reproaches violence and cruelty of the wicked as enemies and rebells to lawful Authority Now that the World may perceav the wicked intent and design of this Prerogative that it is
none other then that of the Devil as to conciliat and endear the Powers to Prelats who while they creat the King's Prerogative pretend themselves to be the King 's only Creatures so to arm and animat the same Powers against our Lord and His followers Let it's Rise and Effects both first and last be marked and observed and the search will declare that wicked men lusting to Tyranny and licentiousness are checked and galled by the freedom and power of faithful Ministers in the application of the Holy Word and Spiritual Censures What remedy This freedom is found Treasonable and prejudiciall to the King's service and Interest and the plain Zeall of God is therefore taxed as Sedition and Treason and under these formalities the Priviledges of the Church are infringed and all the asserters thereof lashed with the same calumny whereupon and to perfect the cure the King must be declared IN ALL and OVER ALL And by vertue of his fained Omnipotency and for recovery of that Unity and Order which only the coming of our Lord His blessed Gospel and Powerful Ministry is pretended to have disturbed the Ancient Policy or the Church must be restored and the greatest flatterers made the Archest Prelats who by inhaunsing and by destroying the Power may compesce the pretended insolency of the Ministry and by the continual pretending of Dissatisfaction and Disloyalty may terrify men out of all Conscience until by the introducing of Will-worship and vain Superstitions they may extinguish all Light and thereby reduce that Golden Age of Order into stupid Flattery and of Unity into Implicit Obedience And if these be not the kind caresses and most native issues of Prerogative and Prelacy and the very restoring and re-establishing of the Kingdom of Antichrist he who cannot find it in this Period will find all supplyed by the next 7. Though we love not to reflect on Events and know that no man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before him yet seing thereby the Lord's Judgments are made manifest men ought both to observe and fear The dissastrous ends of all the promoters of Prelats in these dayes viz of the Earle of Morton beheaded Mr Iohn Douglass Archbishop of St Andrews dying in the pulpit the Earle of Arran after disgrace privately killed Mr Patrick Adamson Arch-bishop of St Andrews after recantation and disgrace dying in extream poverty may justly cause their course the rather to be shunned and detested But that which we love rather to observe is that as the promoters and advancers of Prelacy were alwayes known to be men of no Principles and for the most part of very flagitious practices so the resisters thereof and favourers of Presbytery especially the Lord 's faithful Ministers in these dayes were not only very eminent in Knowledg Piety and Holiness but above all had that great Testimony and confirmation which our Lord Himself maketh use of Iohn 7.18 that they sought not their own glory and therefore neither spoke nor did of themselves but sought His Glory that sent them and therefore were true and no unrighteousness was in them As both their slighting of Court favours by which they were much tempted and their obstinat refusall of Bishopricks whereof King Iames himself bare them witness doth Testify 8. The Lord whose Work is perfect and who when He beginneth will also make an end hereafter in the Year 1586. shineth through the cloud dissipateth the darkness and after the storm blesseth us with a great calm wherein the Assemblies re-assuming their just power and the matter by the King being brought to a treaty and Conference the Bishops are first Restrained then Reduced Thereafter the order of Presbyteries being set down perfected in the Year 1590. both the Nationall Covenant is renewed and subscribed by Order of the Secret Council at the Assemblies desire and all the power that remained either in Bishops or Commissioners by the Assembly is devolved upon the new erected Presbyteries And thus the Work of the Lord in the Parl. 12. Iam. 6. bv the 114. Act. thereof ratifying Presbyterial Government in all it's Assemblies Courts and Officers qualifying and restricting the former Act. 1584. anent the King's Prerogative and abrogating all Acts contrary thereto or inconsistent therewith and by other Acts there recorded receaveth it's last and full accomplishment with Power and Beauty added to the former Grace and Glory 9. That as only the malice of Sathan and wickedness of men have in all Ages opposed the establishment of Presbytery so the Lord whose great Work and Ordinance it is doth no less evidently commend it by making as on the one hand it 's sincere and holy severity powerfully to coerce and restrain all vice and profanity so on the other hand the harmonious and orderly Subordination of it's Courts and Assemblies most efficaciously to prevent and suppress all Schisme and Heresy Which both the experience of these and all succeeding times do most clearly confirm But though the Lord had shewed us all these great and manifold temptations and troubles and terminated them all in such an wonderful and blessed deliverance that we might for ever fear His great Name love His precious Truth and keep His holy Covenant and though in the short Sun-shine of that day of Salvation He caused both King and People to taste and see the Order Beauty and Power of that Establishment Yet O! how soon did we forget the Works of the Lord We keeped not His Covenant O Lord the People of thine Inheritance enjoyed it but a litle It is not necessary for our design that we should trace and recount all these sad steps and degrees by which the Holy and Wise God thought fit to bring back his Church in this Land unto that great distress that hereafter ensued and caused her to wander long in a Wilderness of great Desertion nor what were the causes and beginnings of that so horrid Defection which the Histories of the most partial pens whatever provocations they pretend to be in the Lord 's faithful Ministers cannot purge nor palliat from a mere design of carnal Policy carryed on by manifest Diâ—simulation and palpable fraud It is enough for us let the true Histories of these proceedings be examined and it will appear without the help of our obsevation that as the beginnings of that Defection were no other then the Unfaithfulness of Man and the inconsistence of the Wisdom of God with the carnal wisdom of this World and that old opposition and rooted prejudice of the Kings and Powers of the Earth who have for the far greatest part set themselves and taken counsel against the Lord and against His Anointed so for the unquestionable confirmation of all that hath been said either as to the wicked Rise or woful Effects of Prelacy in this Church the Devil's part therein was visibly to promote his own Kingdom by re-acting the most palpable and gross Mystery of Iniquity that can possibly be described In so far
them over-ruled in the Year 1640. the King and Prelats vigorously arm again and prepare for a new war But this intended War is composed by a new Pacification and in the mean time the Parliament formerly adjourned until Iune 1640 doth conveen at the time appointed and by their fourth fifth and sixth Acts fully establish Presbyterial Government ratify the Covenant with the Addition and Explanation of the Assembly and all Acts made thereanent abrogat the Estate of Bishops and all Acts whatsoever made in their favours Thereafter in the Treaty ensuing the Pacification it is agreed that the Acts past in the last Parliament with these to be made in the next Session thereof shall be published in the King's Name and have the strength of Laws in all time coming Which Treaty being closed and the last Session of the above-mentioned Parliament sitting in the Moneth of Iune 1641. the King in person being present among them and the Oath of Parliament for maintenance of Religion in purity as then established and of the King's Authority and the Peoples Liberties according to the Covenant and for endeavouring by all just and humble meanes of Union and Peace betwixt the three Kingdomes appointed to be taken by that all succeeding Parliaments being taken by the second Act thereof superscribed by the King and subscribed by the President the foresaid Treaty is amply and perpetually confirmed and the whole Articles thereof are ratifyed and recorded Thus by all the Security that either Sacred Oaths or Acts of Lawful Authorized Assemblies Ordinances of King and Council doubled and re-iterated Pacifications and Treaties Acts of Parliament Enacted Re-enacted the Kings Authority and Consent being often and solemnly interposed both by promise and hand-writ And all that either Religion Truth Faith Honour or Honesty could devise or grant these Wicked Prelats are cast out of this Church and Kingdom Presbyterial Government fully established the pure Worship of God with His pure and powerful Ordinances and Ministry restored and in the maintenance and pursuance of all these great Blessings the whole Land by many Oaths most Solemn tyes engaged unto the Lord for ever By all which Blessings and the restoring of the Lord 's own Ordinances amongst us as the Work of the Gospel and the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus in the Conversion of many thousands were greatly advanced and the Glory of God in the abounding of true Piety and flourishing of Righteousness did eminently shine amongst us as the memory of these times in all such as fear God and love our Lord Jesus Christ doth sweetly testify so all these great things were transacted to the perpetual shame and confusion of all our calumnious Adversaries without any diminution of his Majesty's just Authority and Greatness As the Power and Glory of the Lord was great in this Land so the splendor and fame thereof reaching unto other Nations it pleased the Lord thereby to provoke His People in England at that time grievously groaning under the Tyrannous yoke of Prelacy and justly alarmed by the imminent fears of prevailing Popery to set about and intend the like blessed Reformation It doth not concern us to reflect on the Causes and beginnings of that War betwixt the King and Parliament there nor what were the transactions betwixt the two Kingdoms in order to that Aid and Assistance given by Scotland and how the same was mannaged But this is certain that upon the Representation of the most just and important grounds of the maintenance of Religion and Liberty against the prevailing power of Popery Prelacy and Tyranny in that Kingdom of England and their most instant and earnest desires for our help and Assistance and rhe most rational clear motives of our own Security the hazard and loss whereof had undoubtedly been the consequence of the Prelats Victory there this Kingdom was induced in the Year 1643. to enter into that Sacred Bond of the Solemne League and Covenant never to be forgotten containing no other Articles then every one's Sincere and constant endeavours in their several places callings for the preservation of the Reformed Religion in this Church in Doctrine VVorship Discipline and Government the Reformation of the same in England and Ireland according to the VVord of God and the example of the best Reformed Churches and the nearest Conjunction and Vniformity of all the three in Truth Faith and Love the extirpation of Popery Prelacy Error and Profanity the preservation of the rights and Liberties of the People and of the Kings person and Authority in defence of the true Religion and the Kingdom 's Liberties the Discovery and the punishment of Incendiaries the retaining of the Peace and Vnion of the Kingdomes the mutual assistance and defence of all entering into this League and the performing of all duties we owe to God in the amendment of our lives and in walking exemplarly one before another And all these in order to no other end then the Glory of God the advancement of the Kingdom of Iesus Christ the Honor and Happiness of the King and his Posterity and the true Liberty Safety and Peace of the Kingdom This is that Covenant which in all the controversies it hath occasioned did never receave a greater confirmation then from the malice and opposition of it's adversaries who in the same Spirit with the same Spite have alwayes persecuted and reproached it with the same Calumnies of Rebellion Sedition and Blood which from the beginning the Devill hath ever been most active to raise and stir up against the Lord Jesus his Gospel Kingdom and Followers But seing such only as are blessed do evite the offence of Truth and all who truely seek Gods Glory or Love the Lord Jesus did and still do heartily approve and embrace this Covenant though it had brought the Sword not only into Britain but with the Truth into all the Earth though it were reproached as unfriend not only to our King but with our Lord Jesus to Caesar and all the Kings of the Earth though it had divided and disturbed not only Realms and States but with the Gospel families and nearest relations and had with Paul moved Sedition throughout the whole World we ought not thereby to be either shaken or offended We know also that all the subtilty and malice of Hell have been set on work and spared no calumny or cavillation by which either it's Words Matter or Manner might be impugned But these are so often and fully answered and without the assistance of any man's Patrociny by the obvious plainness of it's Phrase the Holiness Importance of it's Purpose and the Justice and Necessity of it's way and Manner so clearly confuted that nothing can be added Only seing the Constancy of Truth ought not to cede to the Confidence of prevailing Powers as we have asserted and do hold the subject matter of this League and Covenant to be in it self Holy Just and True so we cannot but disprove
the dangerous Method of some who the better to enforce the obligation of the Oath of God do suppose the Matter thereof especially as to that article against Prelacy to be antecedently Indifferent and not determined either by the Word of God or any other Moral Precept Justly apprehending how easily in this light and backsliding time such suppositions may become positions and that the obligation of the Oath of God now so much violated and little regarded may be found too weak to secure mens stedfastness As we are therefore persuaded and would have all to consider and fix it in their hearts that this wicked Prelacy and it's Hierarchy are not only contrary to the Word of God to the Practice of the Holy Apostles to sound Doctrine and the Power of Godliness under which express consideration we are also sworn to endeavour it's extirpation but by the sad experience of all Ages in the Christian Church especially in these our later times had been found most pernicious to all Truth and Righteousness and the main Engine and Device whereby the Devil hath alwayes laboured to advance his Kingdom of Darkness and therefore hath been the great butt and aime for the overthrow whereof the great Work of God in this Land hath been so Powerfully and Gloriously manifested so do we most constantly hold that as wel this Article against Prelacy as all the rest contained in this Holy Covenant were and are antecedently oblidging both to King and People without the supervention of either Oath or Promise and that the rooting out of Prelacy the wicked Hierarchy therein so obviously described is the main duty in the endeavour whereof as most advantageous unto all these great and holy Ends proposed by the Covenant all the Zeal of the faithful ought to be concentred As for such profane Jugglers who neither considering this Oath and Covenant as a special Ordinance and blessing of God whereby we are more effectually stirred up and enabled to the performance of all the duties of Religion and Righteousness therein contained nor knowing that this Covenant made with God and accepted by Him is also the Lords Covenant with us for the securing and establishing unto us all the great Blessings and Priviledges therein expressed that as we therein do avouch the Lord to be our God so doth He avouch us to be His People Do from the Righteousness and Necessity of it's matter vainly argue the superfluity of any accessory Obligation and would thence infer that the same may be the more easily dispensed with or renounced We de only remit them to that Solemn Covenant Deut. 29.10 c. made there betwixt the Lord and His People and thereafter so often renewed only for their greater Engagement to the most necessary duties of God's express commands We come in the next place unto the Manner and Form of this League and Covenant wherein not purposing to resume the many debates that have been raised anent it we shall only take notice that these old Acts and Laws viz. Act. 43. Parl. 6. of Mary 1555. and Act. 12. Parl. 10. Iam. 6.1585 made against Leagues and Bands contracted without the Kings consent are now obtruded with the force and lustre of a new Act. cap. 4. of the last Parliament to condemn the Covenant as from the beginning Unlawfull and Rebellious But as these old Acts at the time of the entering into this League and Covenant did then stand explained by the 29. Act. Parl. 2. Charl. 1. ratifyed and authorized by the King himself in a sense most consistent with the Covenant and could no wayes render the same from the beginning unlawful much less could the revival thereof in their greatest rigour or the superveniency of any other Act thereanent dissolve the Sacred Obligation of this Oath once lawfully contracted so the reason of the former answer made ro this objection and the Justice and Equity of that Act. 29. P. 2. C. 1. whereby the same was declared remaineth in ful force viz. that no League nor Bond made by the Subjects for maintenance of Religion Liberty and the Publick good of Church or State was or can be understood to be prohibited by these old Acts and Laws objected Because as the makers of such Bonds cannot be reputed to be movers of Sedition to the breach of the publick peace which is the express reason and certification of these old Acts objected so both the King and his Government being appointed for the preservation of these great ends and Interests and He himself principally oblidged both by the Command and Oath of God upon him to authorize all such bonds Covenants and other means which may advance the same It were a gross Paradox both in Reason and Religion that the King's neglect of his duty and perverting of his Office to the overthrow of these ends for which he is ordained should therefore oblige the People to a sinful Complyance and stupid connivance to the high Dishonour of the Great God and King of Kings and the utter ruine of the souls bodies and fortuns of themselves and their Posterity It 's true it may be and is replyed that this answer and reasoning doth proceed from an unjust jealousy of Kings and is founded upon an intollerable presumption in the Subject to censure and judge their actings But seeing the entering into this Covenant and into all others which we allow was so far from proceeding upon an unjust jealousy that on the contrary it was in a manner extorted by the force of the most palpable and rational necessity that can be imagined and seeing the feeling and discerning thereof is so far from that criminal presumption alleadged that to disprove it is in effect to deny both sense and reason unless our adversaries can prove that notwithstanding thereof the King is by God the Lord vested with such an uncontrollable Dominion and Soveraignty that whatever Violence Outrage or Cruelty he commit the People are obliged by a patience or rather stupidity greater then that of Beasts to endure without gain saying it is impossible for them to establish the Tyranny that they contend for But that the World may see that such objections are only the wicked flattery of selfish men and how little they do therein either use or regard Reason in the late Act abovementioned made against Leagues and Conventions it is declared that the explication contained in the Act 1640. viz. That such Leagues and Conventions as are made by Subjects for the preservation of the King Religion and the Laws are not prohibited by these old Acts is false and disloyall and contrary to the true and genuine meaning thereof which Declaration is not only a naked Assertion and contrary to the express reason and certification of these old Acts which is before sett down but so blind and irrational that in case of an Interregnum or the incapacity of the King to give His consent to any Bond Meeting or Convention which in such a case may be
this Solemn and important League and Covenant we cannot but wonder at the poor Sophistâ—y of such especially that more Temporizing then Seasonable Casuist who delude themselves in so great matters unto such an Indifferency as to assert that this Covenant doth as necessarily depend upon the King's consent for it's establishment as the private vow of a Daughter in her Father's house or of an Wife under her Husband's power in things free and arbitrary though not absolutely in their own disposal did according to the Judicial Law of the Jewes fall under the Father and Husband's power of ratifying or annulling But the simple proposal of these cases doth hold out such a disparity both as to the Persons being only women under power the Things in themselves being free but at another's disposal and many other Circumstances tedious to insist on and even as to Law it self by which the case is determined being meerly Judicial that none who fear the Lord or mind His Glory in any measure of Sobriety will daigne it with an answer And such indeed are the rest of the Cavils and Calumnies wherewith the Adversaries of Truth have endeavoured to impugn and asperse this Holy Covenant and are so fully and often answered already that to account them worthy the resuming and refuting were in some sort after Vowes to make inquiry There is one thing that our Adversaries have frequently objected which we cannot ommit viz. that the Covenants both National and Solemn League were urged and pressed both by Church Censures and Civill Sanctions of loss of goods sequestration and other arbitrary pains which hath been heavily complained of as a great violence done to Conscience But as it was then too evident that this Priviledge of Conscience was for the most part only pretended by such as had litle or no feeling thereof so the Practice of the present times doth now fully discover that what is now so insolently retorted was never before really scrupled at But the lawfullness of the course and practice then used and the iniquity of this retortion will easily be cleared if it be considered 1. that the Nationall Covenant being a standing binding Oath upon the whole Land and in the Year 1638. only renewed with such an agreeable explanation as none could or did quarrel but such as thereby intended to palliate and persist in their proceeding manifest violations was according to the example of good Josiah who brought back the People and CAUSED them stand to the Covenant of their Fathers 2 Chron. 34.32 most justly commanded and under the pains due to the breach therof ordained to be re-taken 2. That the solemn League and Covenant containing no other obligements then what the National doth import and being a most conducible expedient both for the securing and prosecuting the ends thereof and whereunto the National Covenant upon this ground did clearly oblige The pressing of the same League is warranted not only by the former ground but from the very bond of the National became an indispensible Duty By which reasons as the former proceedings are clearly justifyed so the present practice as being a direct and violent ranversing of these things which were once so righteously and rationally established is the more condemned But whatever be the disparity of these cases in the point of Reason we are sure that light and darkness do not more differ then the Lenity of these former times from the Rigour and violence now practized that where one then suffered for obstinacy against the Covenant hundreths do now suffer for their stedfastness therein As for these Wars and great commotions that ensued upon this great Transaction of the Solemn League we will not thereon insist Only we are confident that nothwitstanding all the Calumnious constructions of our Adversaries al such as seek out and have pleasure in the Works of the Lord will applaud unto the Glory and Righteousness thereof who as by the sword of Apostats in the Years 1644 and 1645. He did punish in his Justice the Hypocrisy and Self-seeking of such in this Land whose hearts were not upright in His Covenant and thereafter in the Year 1648. did by a prevailing Sectarian Party restrain and crush the gross and Generall Apostasy then intended under an Hypocritical pretext of pursuing the ends of the Covenant at that time so palpably perverted and abused so for the manifestation of his own Glory and of His Mercy to them that fear him and did not forget his Covenant He did intermix several gracious Intervals of His aboundant Compassion and at length did give unto His Work and People a full and absolute Victory over that malignant Spirit and Party that had so long prevailed in the Land and caused the wickedness of the wicked to cease and all iniquity to stop it's mouth Thus in the Years 1649 and 1650. thereafter the Lord was with us while we were with Him and while we sought Him He was found of us but as we did forsake Him so did He also forsake us by which position all the mixture and varieties both of our Actings and Gods Providences in these times may clearly be resolved There was indeed at that time in the Land not only a party Faithful unto God and zealous for His Name but also a great Zeal of God from clear knowledge and sad experience generally and solemnly professed before God and all men in our Publick Acknowledgement Anno 1649 In consequence whereof the League and Covenant was also by the whole Kingdom renewed that same Year And in answer thereunto the Lord did mightily both save and defend us from all our Adversaries and as He soon subdued our Enemies at Stirling and turned His Hand against our Adversaries in the North and caused the haters of the Lord faign submission unto Him so for His own Glory the establishment of His People and the utter confusion of His Adversaries He did highly advance His blessed Work by the accession of all these Advantages with the Defect whereof it had been formerly calumniated The Advantages we here mention are besides that Publick Acknowledgement then made and in the deep sense thereof the League and Covenant solemnly again renewed and taken whereby our Engagements were not only doubled but strongly confirmed 1. These many necessary and righteous Lawes enacted in the then Parliaments both for the ratifying the later large Confession of faith and the larger and shorther Catechisms agreed unto by both Kingdoms and for the restraining and coercing of Impiety and Blasphemy the encouragement of the Ministry and for the promoving of Godliness Amongst which Acts that abolishing Patronages deserveth a more special and commendable remembrance Not only because of the many woful Effects Abuses of Patronage as it then was now is exercised whereby frequently Godly men and in some measure qualified for the Work of the Ministry were are unjustly restrained from labouring therein Many Congregations needlesly continued desolate without afixed Ministry Many Naughty men
and utterly insufficient at the sole arbitrement of Patrons violently obtruded upon the People without and against their own consent Presbyteries constrained contrary to the Rule of the Holy Scriptures to ordaine men whom the People neither choised nor could cheerfully receave Foundations of prejudice strife betwixt Pastor and People laid whereby the one cannot preach nor the other hear with profit Symoniacal Pactions often basely made betwixt Patrons the person presented to the disgrace of the Holy Calling as-wel as to the sin and shame of the Persons And the Ministry of too many in dispencing of Word Sacraments Censures made to depend too much upon the Will and pleasure of Man But also because it hath no Precept in the Word of God nor Example in the old Jewish nor new primitive and pure Christian Church to warrant it because Intentionally and Natively it spoileth the People of that Right and Priviledge in Electing their own Pastors which Scripture and Reason alloweth And because being the Patron 's pretended Heritage and therefore by him vendible to whom he pleaseth the whole and sole Power of Presenting of Ministers Planting of Churches Preaching of the Gospel settling Maintenance may be turned over unto put in the hands of men not only Profaâ—e Strangers to both Church Common-wealth but also proâ—esâ—ed Enemies of the Truth yea even Papists or Pagans And therefore being in itself a grievous and unwarrantable Burthen destructive of the Church and Peoples Liberties obstructive of the free course of the Gospel the Freedom Power Plainness of the Ministry and occasional of much base Flattery Partiality under which from the very times of Superstition which introduced it the Church did heavily groan it must needs be so much the greater Blessing to be delivered from it The second Advantage which the Lord's work receaved was by that great and long Transaction with the King in order to His return and Admission to the Government which at length after repeated Addresses many Treaties and the interposing of Forraign States and Princes produced the King's Approbation and Allowance of the Nationall and Solemn League and Covenant Which both by his great Oath unto the Most High God and his hand-writ and Subscription he most amply assured promising in the same manner to advance prosecute their Ends and to seek and procure the establishment thereof and of Presbyterial Government and of the whole work of God in all his Dominions We know our Adversaries persisting in their old malice disown and exclaim upon this Transaction as most disloyal and insolent for Subjects whose part is only to surrender submit to require and enter into Treaties with their Prince But 1. as these reproaches are from the same wicked Spirit false grounds and base and carnall ends which from the very times of popery have resisted and been objected against the Work of Reformation in this Land so do wee thereto oppose in full assurance before God and all the World these solid and evident reasons and warrants whereby not only these Treaties and Transactions with the late King but all these old Contracts and Agreements betwixt the then Powers and People which in some sort are the very foundation of the Protestant Religion in this Realm are justifyed and approven wherein if there be any disparity the difference of a King upon His Throne actually Exercing from a Prince only ascending thereto must cast the advantage on our side 2. Seing there is no Voluntary Kingdom which is not both erected sustained and continued by a Fundamental Contract and no Right thereto so good though even that of Divid himself and His Posterity who held the Kingdom both by inmediate grant and interposed Oath of the Most High which is not setled and confirmed by this agreement 2 Sam. 5.3 2 Kings 11.17 can any rationall man disprove or condemn Treaties so naturally antecedent and previous thereto 3. The reason and necessity of this Treaty is so dependent upon the preceeding War with the last King in which as-well as in his Kingdomes this King did succeed him that seing it can have no opposers but such as therein were enemies we willingly refer hoth the cases to the determinations of the same reasons And as for such who asserting the Covenant and the Justice of the long Parliaments War do nevertheless disprove our procedure in this Treaty as their mis-information doth not prejudge the Truth so neither are we answerable for their inconsequence The third Advantage which the Lord gave His Work was by what the King did after his arrival in Scotland both before and at his Coronation for the greater confirmation of the Covenant and Work of God and the more strong engaging of himself and this whole Land unto the Lord. Before his Coronation he emitteth that Declaration at Dumfermling sufficiently known by this designation wherein Professing and appearing in the full persuasion and love of the Truth he repenteth as having to do with in the sight of God His Fathers opposition to the Covenant and VVork of God and his own reluctancies against the same hoping for mercy through the blood of Iesus Christ and obtesting the Prayers of the faithful to God for his stedfastness and then protesteth his truth and sincerity in entering into the Oath of God resolving to prosecute the ends of the Covenant to his utmost and to have with it the same common friends and enemies exhorting all to lay down their enmity against the Cause of God and not to prefer Man's Interest to God's which will prove an Idole of Iealousy to provoke the Lord and he himself accounteth to be but selfish flattery so-forth proceedeth in the most cordial sincere assuring terms to testify his love and zealous resolutions for God his People and Covenant and on the other hand his great dislike and detestation of all Persons courses and Interests contrary thereto A Declaration so full of heart-professions and high attestations of the Great God that none seriously considering the present times can reflect thereon without horror and trembling from the Holy Jealousy of the Lord either for the then deep Dissimulation or the present unparalelled Apostacy However seeing the same is so assertive that no words could adde to it's assurance nor no argument less then the present Apostacy render it to any neutral person suspect of the least dissimulation sure we are that the generality of the Kingdom did thereby obtain all the warrant of the King 's most full and clear assent to and allowance of the Covenant that either Law or Reason could require Thereafter at his Coronation how the King did again confirm the Covenant and both He and his People thereby again engage themselves unto the Lord the order thereof printed and published to the World doth fully declare In which these passages are very observable 1. That the King is desired in Name of the People jointly to accept the Crown and maintain Religion ACCORDING TO THE
Glory and the Kings service that can be imagined as the Letter it self set down at large in the Apologetick Narration doth testify And though this duty and employment was no other then what the meanest subject in the most private capacity might and all were indispensibly obliged to have done yet those Ministers and one Gentleman with them are therefore instantly without hearing committed Prisoners 3. This Committee proceeding to prepare for the succeeding Parliament which was all it's work and design the Parliament siteth down the 1 day of January Where having taken the Oath of Supremacy without respect to it's due limitation contained in the 114. Act. Ia. 6. Parl. 12. 1592. then standing unrepealed and exalting the Kings prerogative upon the alleaged Warrand of the VVord of God and Laws of the Land but in effect directly contrary to both above all Offices Parliaments Laws Leagues Conventions Peace and War and likwise upon meer assertions alleageances in place of declaring upon known and certain grounds which is all that any Parliament can lawfully do directly Innovating the Fundamental Law Constitution of the Kingdom thereby making the Kings Throne the foundation of all the succeeding Perjury and Apostacy They spoil and divest first the Solemn League and Covenant and then the National Covenant Presbyterial Government the whole Work of God of all legal warrand and Authority Declaring all Acts and Practises made and standing in favours thereof to be void and null And by the same great Act rescissory they revive and reinforce all the corruptions and Superstitions of Crossing Kneeling and the like introduced by any Parliament since the Reformation As the Acts of the first Session of the last Parliament do clearly testify Although that these Acts have been and are both in themselves in their effects just cause of great astonishment and mourning to all the Faithful in the Land yet when we remember that height of Wickedness and Profanity that then abounded and the false flattering perjurious Sermons practises by which the Parliament was thereunto instigated but most of all that Act that then passed for an Anniversary Thanksgiving wherein as if we had been delivered to commit all this great Wickedness the Spirit and Work of the Lord are heinously blasphemed and calumniated as the only Author and Cause of all the Blood Bondage Usurpation Rebellion Rapine Violence and other Evils that either the malice and wickedness of men had caused or God in his Righteous Judgement had therefore permitted or inflicted and the Ranversing of our Blessed Reformation Holy Covenants and the Righteous Laws whereby they were established accounted the Restitution of Religion Righteousness and Liberties And the 29 of May as most Auspicious appointed for the yearly solemn commemoration thereof A day the profane Institution whereof cannot be better demonstrated then by it 's more profane observance and celebration ever since practised These things we say being considered do justly adde horror to our astonishment trembling unto our mourning But that their practise might be also consonant to their Acts and Statutes and by cutting off or laying aside it 's most eminent Opposers the return of Prelacy might be more effectually promoted in the same Session of Parliament not only was that Innocent and Faithful one Mr Cutâ—ry singled out and signally honoured by God to bear testimony to the Kingdom of His Son Jesus Christ His Cause and Covenant for no other fault then his faithfulness therein and his Declining the King's usurped Authority in prejudice of the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus and the priviledges of His Church clearly warranded by 114 Act Parl. 12. la. 6. then standing unrepeal'd and by a great cloud of faithful Witnesses who in like manner did testify against this Usurpation cruelly slain and put to death But also under the colour of certain Epidemick crimes wherein the Soveraignity of Divine Providence more then any man's malice had involved the whole Land others who had been eminent in the Work of God particularly the Marquess of Argyle were condemned to death and forfeited and several other Faithful Ministers besides these who were at first imprisoned by the Committee of Estates were without any cause signifyed imprisoned confined or otherwise vexed and incapacitated 4. The rise and re-establishment of this Antichristian Prelacy being thus prepared in the interval after this first Session of Parliament the King nominateth and presenteth Bishops and four of them being called to Court are there Re-ordained and Consecrated and that in such a manner as doth clearly infer their disowning and renouncing their former Minstery and their Warrand Mission thereunto In consequence whereof all the Ordinary meetings of Presbyteries and Synods are discharged until they should of new be licenced Authorized thereto by the Bishops now nominated and appointed and to the effect that matters might the better succeed several of our Faithful Ministers upon groundless suspitions and for refusing of the Oath of Supremacy arbitrarly and rigorously imposed without so much as admitting such qualifications as no Christian ought or can deny are some of them Banished and others confined 5. The second Session of this last Parliament sitting in May 1662. by their first Act they restore and re-establish Prelacy in all it 's pretended Rights Dignities and Priviledges but in effect in it's real Usurpations and Corruptions And for the better setling thereof and evident declaring to the World how Erastian and Antichristian this Woful Government is both in it's Rise Designs and Effects as by this Act the Restitution thereof is expresly founded upon the King's Supremacy as being an inherent Right in the Crown for the disposal of the external Government of the Church So it is also declared that whatever the King shall determine with advice of the Bishops and such of the Clergy as he shall nominate in the externall Government of the Church shall be valid and effectual without any other Proviso then that the same be consistent with the Laws of the Realm But the Absolute Complement of all Wickedness and the Hight of Usurpation above all that ever the Papacy it self aspired unto is that which followeth whereby the King and Parliament for clearing all scruples which may occurre from former Acts and Practices do rescind all former Acts by which the sole and only power of Jurisdiction within this Church doth stand in the Church and in the Meetings and Assemblies thereof and all Acts of Parliament and Council which may be interpreted to have given any Church-power Jurisdiction or Government to the Office-bearers of the Church their respective meetings other then that which acknowledgeth a dependence upon and subordination to the Soveraign Power of the King as supream and is to be regulated and authorized in the exercise thereof by the Bishops who are to put order to Ecclesiastick matters and to be accountable to the King for their Administration And the foresaid 114 Act Parl. 12. la. 6. whereby the Priviledges Power
and other essentiall Censures given by God to the spirituall Office-bearers in His Church and warranded by His Word are ratifyed is even in so far and totally cassed and rescinded And that the World may know how presumptuous and absurd this Usurpation is which cannot be justly conceaved without an instance of it's effects we here subjoyn that 4 Act. Sess 3. of the same Parliament for the constitution of a National Synod wherein the King is made soveraignly and properly to constitute this Assembly both as to the Appointment of it's Members Constituent and of it's constant President the absolute regulation of things there to be proposed which are declared to be only such as He shall please to signify the determination and limitation of it's Decisions which are to be agreed to by the President as well as the major part and providing that they be not contrary to the Prerogative or the Laws of the Realm And lastly as to the necessity of the King's presence in person or by his Commissioner and of his Ratification and Approbation without which no Act or Deed is to be of any force Now let the World consider what he could have done more in the constitution and regulation of his own Court of Exchequer And if he hath not done all as to the constitution of this Court immediatly depending upon our Lord Jesus Christ and his sole Authority which He Himself hath done or possibly could do by what warrand or rule He who is King of Kings will require We shal not here stand to examine these Acts according to former Laws Oaths and Engagements hereby most fearfully violated and contemned This is a strain of wickedness above all that former times could imagine O! that God would speak to the Authors but not in his wrath and as he hath set His only Son upon his holy Hill of Zicn so he would cause them to fear His displeasure that they may yet be wise and instructed to kiss the Son left he be angry and they perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a litle Surely to define that the sole Power and Jurisdiction of this Church doth not stand within the same but in some thing without beside our Lord Jesus and that the same is fountain'd in and derived from the King and that all Church-Officers in all Church matters are accountable to him who is neither thereto Gifted nor Called is to set the King upon our Lord Jesus his Throne and a high derogation from and reflection upon him who hes builded the Temple of the Lord bears the Glory sits and rules both as King Priest upon His Throne Who more worthy then Moses was faithful and perfect as a Son over His own House and therefore did not leave His Church destitute of any such necessary and proper Officer or Assister when neither King nor Prince was so much as members thereof And lastly it 's a plain Perversion in stead of Performance of that Promise made to the Church Isai 49. ver 23. That Kings should be it's Nursing Fathers where in place of Dominion there Submission is expresly injoyned they shall bow down to thee with their face toward the Earth We know that this empty Notion of External Policy is vainly pretended to colour the matter But seeing whatsoever can be meaned by external Policy even as to outward decency and Order is either particularly determined by our Lord Himself and His blessed Apostles or under the definition of General and Evident Rules left unto the Churches arbitriment whereby the King being no Church-Officer upon a double account is clearly excluded and seing that under the pretence of this External Policy the greatest most superstitious Novations in the pure Worship of God and the greatest Corruptions and Abuses both by the appointment of new Officers in the Church of Christ without His own warrand and the usurping and perverting of the Power of Spiritual Censures in the Government of Gods House may be and have been introduced we doubt not but all rational men do see the delusions of such vain pretences And certainly since the Act it self doth proceed to grant the King all the Power in over both Ecclesiastick Causes Persons that can be imagined it would be but ordinary ingenuity in our Adversaries plainly to assert that the King is the Great Apostle and Vicegerent of our Lord Jesus Christ in and over His House Although they should not only appear herein destitute of any better warrand then this present Act of Parliament But most plainly to justify al the Usurpation that ever the Pope or Antichrist can be charged with 6. Bishops being thus restored and admitted to sit and give voice in Parliament this Mixture and the Power of their Antichristian Spirit doth quickly exert it self And without regard to the nature of Parliamentary and all Civil Powers which are no wayes conversant about things and perswasions only Internal and meerly appertaining to conscience or to the Word of God which is the ground and warrant upon which all Power whatsoever being only Declarative in matters of this kind ought certainly and expresly to proceed They procure a Dogmatick Act declaring these Positions That it is lawful to Subjects for Reformation or necessary Self-defence to enter into Leagues or take up Arms against the King and such like to be Rebellious and treasonable and particularly that the National Covenant as it was explained in the Year 1638 and the Solemn League and Covenant were and are in THEMSELVES UNLAWFUL OATHS and were taken by and imposed upon the Subjects of this Kingdom against the Fundamental Law and Liberties thereof Which neither they nor all the invention of Hell is able to condescend upon or instruct And therefore out of the plenitude of their power as much as ever any Pope pretended to they loose the Obligation of Conscience and free the Subjects of their Engagements And further to compleat this their Wickedness they appoint a Declaration of this High Impiety to be signed by all in Publick Trust that none may be admitted to or exerce the same except they receave in their right hand or in their foreheads this their accursed mark O! Lord our God thow art of purer eyes then to behold Evil and canst not look on Iniquity VVherefore lookst thou on them that deal treacherously and holds thy tongue when the wicked devour the man that is more righteous then he Yet surely O Lord thou hast ordained them for judgement and O mighty God thou hast estabished them for correction Can the World beleeve that a whole Nation in it's most National Capacity including King Parliament and the body of the People should after most clear and evident convictions and signal Manifestations of the Glory and presence of God in the most important and holy Concernments of all Truth and Righteousness most solemnly as it were to day engage themselves by Oath unto the Lord and to morrow without so much as seriously
upon his royall Posterity and to give unto them good and faithfull Counsellors holy and wise Counsels and prosperous successes to God's Glory and to the good and interest of His people and to Their own Honour and Happiness 11. I do here now submit and commit my Soul and Body Wife and Children and Childrens Children from generation to generation for ever with all others his Friends and Followers all His Doing and Suffering Witnessing and Sympathizing ones in the present and subsequent Generations unto the Lord's choice Mercies Graces Favours Services Employments Impowerments Enjoyments Improvements and Inheritments on Earth and in Heaven in Time and Eternity All which suits with all others which He hath at any time by His Spirit moved and assisted me to make and put up according to His will I leave before and upon the Father's Mercifull Bowels and the Son's Mediating Merits and the Holy Spirit 's Compassionate Groans for now and evermore Amen The Joint Testimony of these who died together in Edinburgh Dec 7. 1666. subscribed by them in prison the same day of their death Men and Brethren THis is a great and important work both for us who are now to render up our spirits to Him that gave them And for yow who are not a litle concerned in the Cause and in our blood by justifying or condemning our sentence And therefore as we speak to yow as Dying men who dare not dissemble with God or man nor flatter our selves So ye should not be idle curious or unconcerned Spectators We are condemned by men and esteemed by many as Rebels against the King whose Authority we acknowledge But this is our rejoycing the testimony of our conscience that we suffer not as Evill doers but for Righteousness for the Word of God and Testimony of Jesus Christ And particularly for our renewing the Covenant and in pursuance thereof for Preserving and Defending of our selves by Armes against the Usurpation and insupportable Tyranny of the Prelats And against the most unchristian and inhumane Oppression and Persecution that ever was enjoyned and practised by just Rulers upon Free Innocent and Peaceable Subjects The Covenant and Cause being so just in themselves and the duties of Self-preservation and mutual Defence in maintenance thereof being to Judicious and unbyassed men so clear we need to say the less for vindication of our Practice Only the Lawes establishing Prelacy and the Acts Orders and Proclamations made for Complyance therewith being executed against us by Military Force and Violence And we with others for our simple Forbearance being Fined Confined Imprisoned Exiled Scourged Stigmatized Beaten Bound as beasts and Driven unto the mountains for our lives And thereby hundreds of Families being beggared several Parishes and some whole Country-sides exceedingly impoverished And all this either Arbitrarily and without any Law or respect had to guilt or innocency Or Unjustly contrary to all Conscience Justice and Reason though under the Pretence of iniquous Laws and without regard had to the penalty specifyed in the Law And all Remonstrating of Grievances were they never so just and many and Petitions for Redress being restrained by Laws condemning all former Remonstrances and Petitions in the like cases There was no other remedy left to us but that last of necessary Self-preservation and Defence And this being one of the greatest Principles of Nature warranted by the Law or God Scriptural Instances and the consent and Practices of all Reformed Churches and Christian States abroad and of our own famous Predecessors at home It cannot in reason or Justice be reputed a Crime nor condemned as Rebellion by any humane Authority Though we be not the first that have suffered for the Cause or God within the Land yet we are among the first that have been Legally condemned and put to Death Expresly for taking the Covenant And we are so far from being ashamed thereof that we account it our honour to be reckoned worthy to suffer for such a Cause And cannot but bless the Lord that we have such a cloud of Witnesses in this and other Reformed Churches going before us in the same duty for Substance and in Suffering therefore We cannot but regret if we could with tears oâ— blood the Nationall and Authorized Backsliding of the Land by Perjury and breach of Covenant The overturning of the Work of Reformation The great Desolation of the House of the Lord by smiting of the Shepherds and scattering of the Flocks The Intrusion of so many mercenary Hirelings into the Ministry who because of Apostacy Perjury Ignorance and Profanness can neither be acknowledged as God's mouth to the People in Preaching nor employed as their mouth to Him in Prayer The abounding of Popery Superstition and Profanness by unheard-of Oaths Blasphemies Uncleannesss and Drinking even in some whose Office and Place requireth them to be more Examplary And the shedding of the Blood of the Saints by the rage of Persecution And therefore we cannot but disown all these abominable Laws Courses Practices declare our abhorrence of the same dissent therefrom Protesting before Angels and Men that we be not interpreted as consenters thereto and beseeching the Hearer of prayer that we be not involved in the guilt thereof nor partake of the plagues which follow thereupon As this Land was happy above all Nations for the purity and plenty of the Gospel and for a Form of Church Government more conform to the Patern in the Scriptures then in others of the Reformed Churches So we acknowledge His great goodness to us in speciall that gave us our lines in such pleasant places For we have such full perswasion of the Truth of the Reformed Religion in the Church of Scotland And have felt so much of the Power and Sweetness thereof that we do here declare our firm belief and perswasion of and adherence to the same in Doctrine Worship Discipline and Government according to the Nationall Covenant the Solemn League and Covenant the Confession of Faith Catechisms Directory of worship and Propositions for Government Accounting it our honor and happiness to have been born in it to have lived in Communion with it and now to die through Grace Members Witnesses and Asserters thereof And further as Christians and as Members of the same Church and Common-wealth in the Fear and zeal of our God in Love to our Brethren in desire of the Perservation of Church and Kingdom and for our own Exoneration now when we take our leave of the World We do seriously and in the bowels of Christ Supplicate Warn Exhort and Obtest yow all the Inhabitants of the Kingdom from the King to the meanest of the Subjects according to your old Principles Professions Promises Declarations Oaths and Covenants faithfully to Own Maintain preserve and Defend the said Religion And after the example of our Noble and Renowned Ancestors to quit your selves like Men Christians in endeavouring by all just Means according to your Places and Powers to shake off this heavy
knew Him rightly His cross it is sweet easy to the believer for He maketh death to be life and bringeth light out of darkness I desire to follow the blessed Captain of my salvation through well and wo. I beseech you my dear Friends whom now I am to part with that ye stand to the defence of all the truths of God and of His Word that ye receive the Lord Christ as He hath offered Himself therein ye who have not closed with Him And that he who hath closed with Him abide in Him by a lively faith and love bringing forth fruits that you may put credit on your profession and keep off every thing that may shame your glorious and blessed Master before this evill and adulterous generation And I give you all warning and deâ—ort you heartily as ye love your own souls and as ye will answer to Him who shall judge the quick and dead that ye stand fast in all the duties ye are sworn unto in the National and in the Solemn League and Covenant both towards God your King and one another And that ye beware of snares in taking of any Oaths or Declarations contrary in the least to the Oath of God in these Covenants I leave my wife and little children upon Jesus Christ my Lord who are now to be made a widow and fatherless for His sake trusting He will care for them And I recommend them to the counsell and kindness of His people under Him I can forgive the wrong done to me in taking away my life for this Cause and wish God to be merciful to these that have condemned me or have had any hand in my death But blessed be God that brought and hath kept me on His side of this Cause and honoured me to be a publick witness for Him and His blessed Truth and Cause for which I shall praise Him in the World to come whether I now go yea I will praise Him on the borders of Death Eternity To His blessed Name Father Son and Holy Ghost be praise for now and ever So saith your dying friend for Christ JOHN WILSON A true Relation of the Sufferings and Death of M R HEW M c KAIL. Preacher of the Gospel M R Hew M c Kail having passed and improven the vertuous means of his Education at the University of Edinburgh and with his Uncle Mr Hew Mc Kail Minister there in whose family he did reside to the satisfaction and good hope of all in the Winter 1661. upon the very turne of this sad Catastrophe offers himself to Tryall being 20 years old before the Presbytery of Edinburgh in order to the work of the Ministery and being by them amply approven and licensed and having preached at several times with the great benefit and applause of all his hearers he did preach his last publick Sermon in Edinburgh in the Great Church thereof upon the Sabbath immediatly preceeding that 8 of September 1662. the day affixed by the then Parliament for the removal of the Ministers of Edinburgh His text was Song 1.7 In this Sermon taking occasion to speak of the great and many persecutions to which the Church of God hath been and is obnoxious and amplifying the Point from the Persons and Powers who have been instrumental therein he said that the Church and People of God had been persecuted both by a Pharaoh upon the Throne a Haman in the State and a Iudas in the Church and falling to inlarge the several wayes and manner of the Persecutions of these men the issue thereof the cases of Haman and Iudas appeared in the conviction of his Adversaries to have such a near resemblance to the state and condition of the then Rulers of State and Church that though he did make no Application yet he was reputed to be guilty thereof Whereupon within a few dayes thereafter there was a Party of Horsemen sent to the Place where he then lived near to Edinburgh for to seise his Person and make him Prisoner But upon almost no more then a moments advertisement he escapes out of his bed and shifting only to another chamber was miraculously preserved from the Search then used though most diligent and accurate For this cause he being necessitated to leave that Place retired home-ward to his Fathers house where having lurked a while and thereafter as occasions call'd him spent the four years that have since interveen'd in several places and with much uncertainty Yet during all this space to the certain knowledge and sweet remembrance of all that conversed with him he was most seriously exercised in the Study of Piety and true Knowledge wherein as he greatly advanced above all his equalls so at length he became most eminent and exemplary While he is thus living and employed at his Fathers house the late Troubles arising in the West fall out and the newes thereof having alarmed him with the rest of that Countrey upon the 18. of Nov. last being the Sabbath for such motives and upon such considerations as he himself doth fully afterward declare he joined himself to those who rose in these parts for the assisting of that poor afflicted Party as in their consciences by their Covenant they thought themselves indispensably obliged When and where he joined with them or what was his part or endeavours amongst them needs not to be remembered Only this is certain that being of a thin body and tender constitution he was so disabled and weakened with the toil and fatigue of continual marching and tempestuous weather particularly at Air where he lay a considerable time as if he had been dead by reason of fainting that he could no longer endure it Whereupon on Tuesday Novemb. 27. he was necessitated to part from them in the morning near to the New Bridge upon Cramond water And in his way towards Libberton Parish about twelve of the clock passing through Bread's Craigs he was taken without resistance having only a small ordinary sword by such of the Countreymen as were then sent out to view the fields in which passage it is very observable that his escape formerly mentioned was not more miraculous then his present taking was fatal for it is without question had he but retained and observed the least of that advertency and caution wherein at other times he was known to be both ready very happy he might without either hazard or trouble have escaped this inconvenience but God who gave him the full experience of his turning all things unto the good of them that love Him did thus by his simplicity and folly prepare the way for His own Glory and His servants joy and Victory Being brought to Edinburgh and first to the Towns Council-house in their search for letters he was immediatly stript and there being none found committed prisoner to the Tolbuith Upon the Wedensday being the 28 of November by order from the Secret Council he was brought before the Earle of Dumfreis Lord Sinclar Sir Robert Manray
be taken on Saturnday Decemb. 22. to the Mercate Cross of Edinburgh and there to be hanged on a Gibbet till they be dead and that their Goods and Lands be escheated and forfeited for his Highness's use At the hearing of which sentence he cheerfully said The Lord giveth life and the Lord taketh blessed be the Name of the Lord. And as he was carried back through the Guards to the Tolbooth when the People made lamention he answered Though men cut us off God will receave us trust in God trust in God Being come to his Chamber he immediately addressed himself to God by prayer with great enlargement of heart for himself and his fellow-prisoners condemned with him Being afterwards asked how his leg was which was tortured he answered merrily the fear of my Neck now maketh me forget my Leg. Thereafter he said to another freind O how good Newes to be within four dayes journey to enjoy the sight of Jesus Christ and protested he vvas not so cumbered hovv to die as he had been sometime to preach a Sermon To some vvomen lamenting for him he said that his condition though he vvas young and in the budding of his hopes and labours in the Ministry yet vvas not to be mourned for for said he one drop of my blood through the Grace of God may make moe hearts contrite then many years sermons might have done This afternoon he supplicat the Council for liberty to his Father to come visit him vvhich being granted his Father the next night came to him Their first meeting was very sad notwithstanding that according both to the testimony of his Parents and knovvledge of all his relations he vvas a most obedient Son yet these inevitable infirmities vvhich are incident to the best of men and cannot but furnish sad convictions when considered in the power and pure light of the spiritual Law of God did greatly trouble him in the remembrance of the fifth commandment The passage was thus After prayer his Father said unto him Hugo I called thee a goodly clive-tree of fair fruits and now a storm hath destroyed the tree and his fruits and branches He ansvvered that his Fathers too good thoughts of him had afflicted him His Father said he was perswaded God was visiting not his own sin but his parents sin upon him so that he might say Our Fathers have sinned and we have born their iniquity He said also I have sinned thow poor sheep what hast thow done M. Hew ansvvered with many groans that through coming short of keeping the fifth commandment he had come short of the promise that his days should be prolonged in the Land of the living and that Gods controversy with him was for overvaluing his children especially himself On Thursday the 20 of December more from the importunity of Friends then of his own inclination he gave in to the Privy Council a Petition as follows That whereas upon Tuesday last I was indicted and condemned for the treasonable deeds contained in the general and special Indictment exhibited against me in the which special Indictment containing my whole accession to the said Crimes there is only libelled presence in several places with an ordinary sword likeas my own confession which is the naked truth doth declare how the same was occasional And seeing that it was also in some sort purged retracted by my withdrawing and deserting with the first conveniency whereby not only my case appears to be different from that of others but also as favourable as possibly can be nixt to innocency it self likeas the same appeared no less to many of these Gentlemen who were upon my Assize And seeing the Torture I sustained and the ingenuity I then used as in the sight of God to the utmost of my knowledge deserve that favour that was at that time insinuated And that it is expected that his Majesty whose mercy I beg according to his great clemency and the most usual practice in the like cases will interpose his mercy for the rescue of many who are equally with me involved May it therefore please your Lordships graciously to consider the premisses and to pardon my great rashnes and precipitancy and therefore to indulge such a reprival at your Lo. shall think convenient until his Majesty's gracious pleasure anent the premisses shall be fully known At least till the Commissioner his Grace do return And your Lo. answer The words marked in this Petition by a different character were the amendments of his Friends affection which they were advised to put in by some members of the Privy Council to whom the copy of it had been presented immediately before the downsitting of the Councill and thereupon the Petition being transcribed was in so great haste presented unto him to subscribe it that he got it not read However the Petition was both disrelished and refused by the Council The truth is some of his Friends exceeding zealous of his safety had moved to several members of the Council that the Declaration might be tendered to him and some time permitted him to advise thereanent which motion it 's like was attended with some insinuations that probably he might be induced to subscribe it but as the motion was ineffectual without a warrand under his own hand so even the Authors thereof do bear him witness of his positive fixed and often declared resolution not to subscribe it at the highest rate Likeas upon some surmises to the contrary he thought it necessary for his own vindication to leave it under his hand that the above-mentioned resolution was from his own proper knowledge and motive without the assistance of the least disswasive from any other person During his abode in Prison the Lord was very graciously present with him both to sustain him against the fear of death and to dispel all these over-cloudings of terror unto which the frailty of flesh and blood hath sometime exposed the best of men and also in assisting him in prayer and praises to the admiration of all his hearers especially on the Thursday's night Dec. 20. whereon being set at supper with his fellow-prisoners and his Father and one or two besides he requested his fellow-prisoners saying merrily eat to the full and cherish your bodies that we may all be a fat Christmass Pie to the Prelates After supper in thanksgiving he burst forth in blessing God that had made him such a fool as to come to that prison and after many gracious words continued saying many crosses have come in our way and wrought but weakly upon us but here is a cross that hath done more good then all the many that befell us before Then lamenting the condition of the Church of God with much earnestness he used that exclamation in the last of Daniel What Lord shall be the end of these wonders The last night of his life being Fryday Decemb. 21. he proponed and answered himself several questions to the strengthening of his fellow-prisoners and great refreshing