paid for that purpose all which amounted to three thousand two hundred forty seven pound sixteen shillings two pence half-peny The Clergy of England within the Province of Canterbury freely contributed the fortieth part of all such Church Livings as were charged with First-fruits and the thirtieth part of all their Benefices not so charged those of London only excepted who besides the thirtieth part of such as paid First-fruits gave the twentieth part of all the rest Which Contribution of the Clergy amounted to one thousand four hundred sixty one pound thirteen shillings and eleven pence whereunto was added by the benevolence of the Bishop of London at several times coming in all to nine hundred five pound one shilling and eleven pence By the Dean and Chapter one hundred thirty six pound thirteen shillings and four pence and made of the surplusage of Timber one hundred nineteen pound three shillings and nine pence Given by the Justices and Officers of the Common Pleas thirty four pound five shillings and by those of the Kings Bench seventeen pound sixteen shillings eight pence All which together made no more than six thousand seven hundred and two pound thirteen shillings and four pence And yet with this small Sum such was the cheapness of those Times the Work was carried on so prosperously that before the Month of April 1566. all the Roofs of Timber whereof those large ones of the East and West framed in Yorkshire and brought by Sea were perfectly finished and covered with Lead the adding of a new Steeple being thought unnecessary because too chargeable though divers Models have been made and presented of it The whole Roof being thus Repaired the Stone-work of it stood as before it did sensibly decaying day by day by reason of the corroding quality of the Sea-coal smoke which on every side annoyed it Which being observed by one Henry Farley about the middle of the Reign of King Iames he never left solliciting the King by several Petitions and Addresses to take the Ruinous Estate thereof into his Princely Consideration till at last it was resolved on by the King And to create the greater Veneration to so good a Work he bestowed that magnificent Visit on it described at large in the first Book of this History Anno 1620. The product and result whereof was the issuing out a Commission under the Great Seal of England bearing date the sixteenth day of November then next following directed to Sir Francis Iones Knight then Lord Mayor of London George Lord Archbishop of Canterbury Francis Lord Verulam then Lord Chancellor of England and divers others to the number of sixty Persons and upwards Which Commission importing That this Church being the greatest and most eminent as also one of the principal Ornaments of the Realm and in much decay any six or more of these Commissioners whereof three to be of the said Kings Privy-Council should meet to make Particulars of the decay and likewise what Houses Cellars c. had been built near it either to the annoyance of it or the Church-yard And moreover to Inquire what Lands Rents c. had been given towards its Repair or Sums of Money collected to that purpose and not accordingly employed And further to consider of the most fit and proper means to raise money to carry on the said Repair And lastly to appoint Surveyors and other Officers of their Work and to make Certificate of their Proceedings therein into the Chancery Upon the Meeting of which Commissioners and diligent search made into the Particulars afore-mentioned it was acknowledged that the Bishop of London had the whole care of the Body of that Church and the Dean and Chapter of the Choires But that which each of them enjoyed to this purpose was so little that they yearly expended double as much upon the Roof and other parts decayed to preserve them from present ruine Which being made evident to the Commissioners as also that in former times even from the very first foundation thereof it had been supported partly out of the large Oblations of those that visited the Shrines and Oratories therein and partly from Publick Contributions in all parts of the Kingdom It was concluded to proceed in the same way now as had been done formerly And that it might proceed the better the King himself and many of the principal Nobility and Gentry declared by their Superscriptions for the encouragement of others to so good a Work what Sums they resolved to give in pursuance of it Doctor Iohn King then Bishop of London subscribing for 100 l. per Annum as long as he should continue in that See Mountain who succeeded not long after in that Bishoprick procured with great charge and trouble some huge massie Stones to be brought from Portland for the beginning of the Work But money coming slowly in and he being a man of small activity though of good affecâ—ions the heat of this great business cooled by little and little and so came to nothing But Laud succeeding him in the See of London and having deservedly attained unto great Authority with his Majesty no sooner saw his Office settled both at home and abroad but he possessed him with a Loyal and Religious Zeal to persue that Work which King Iames had so piously designed though it went not much further than the bare design Few words might serve to animate the King to a Work so pious who aimed at nothing more than the Glory of God in the Advancement of the Peace and Happiness of the Church of England And therefore following the example oâ— his Royal Father he bestowed the like Visit on St. Pauls whither he was attended with the like Magnificence and entertained at the first entrance into the Church with the like Solemnity The Divine Service being done and the Sermon ended which tended principally unto the promoting of a Work so honourable both to his Majesties Person and the English Nation his Majesty took a view of the Decays of that Church and there Religiously promised not to be wanting in the Piety of his best Endeavours to the Repair of those Ruines which Age the Casualties of Weather or any other Accidents had brought upon it In order whereunto in the beginning oâ— this year he issued out his Royal Commission under the Great Seal of England bearing date the tenth of April in the seventh year of his Reign directed to Sir Robert Ducy Lord Mayor of the City of Londan George Lord Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Lord Coventry Lord Keeper of the Great Seal c. William Lord Bishop of London Richard Lord Bishop of Winton Iohn Lord Bishop of Ely c. Nicholas Rainton Ralph Freeman Rowland Heylyn c. Aldermen of the City of London Edward Waymack and Robert Bateman Chamberlain of the said City of London In which Commission the said King taking notice of this Cathedral as the goodliest Monument and most ancient Church of his whole Dominions as also that it was the principal
That there was no design in the King or Prince or in any of the Court or Court-Bishops of what name soever to alter the Religion here by Law established or that the Prince was posted into Spain of purpose that he might be perverted or debauched from it But the best is that he which gave the Wound hath made the Plaister and such a Plaister as may assuredly heal the Sore without troubling any other Chyrurgeon It is affirmed by him who published the Breviate of our Bishops Life That he was not only privy to this Journey of the Prince and Buckingham into Spain but that the Journey was purposely plotted to pervert him in his Religion and reconcile him to Rome And this he makes apparent by the following Prayer found amongst others in the Bishops Manual of Devotions than which there can be nothing more repugnant to the Propositions â—or proof of which it is so luckily produced Now the said Prayer 〈◊〉 thus verbatim viz. O Most merciful God and gracious Father the Prince hath put himself to a great Adventure I humbly beseech thee make clear the way before him give thine Angels charge over him be with him thy self in Mercy Power and Protection in every step of his Iourney in every moment of his Time in every Consultation and Address for Action till thou bring him back with Safety Honour and Contentment to do thee service in this place Bless his most truly and faithful Servant the Lord Duke of Buckingham that he may be diligent in Service provident in Business wise and happy in Counsel for the honour of thy Name the good of the Church the preservation of the Prince the contentment of the King the satisfaction of the State Preserve him I humbly beseech thee from all Envy that attends him and bless him that his eyes may see the Prince safely delivered to the King and State and after it to live long in happiness to do thee and them service through Iesus Christ our Lord. Amen And with this Prayer so plainly destructive of the purpose for which it was published I shut up the Transactions of this present year We will begin the next with the dismission of the Archbishop of Spalato a man defamed by the Italians at his coming hither and as much reproached by the English at his going hence His name was Marcus Antonius de Dominis Archbishop of Spalato in Fact and Primate of Dalmatia in Title Such anciently and of right those Archbishops were till the Bishop of Venice being made a Patriarch by Pope Eugenius the Fourth Anno 1450. assumed that Title to himself together with a Superintendency over all the Churches of that Country as subordinate to him He had been long conversant with the Fathers and Ancient Councils By this Light he discerned the Darkness of the Church of Rome and the blind Title which the Popes had for their Supremacy Inclining to the Protestant Religion he began to fear that his own Country would prove too hot for him at the last and therefore after he had sate in the See of Spalato about fourteen years he quitted his Preferments there and betook himself for Sanctuary to the Church of England Anno 1616. Extremely honoured at his first coming by all sorts of people entertained in both Universities with solemn Speeches presented complemented feasted by the great Lords about the Court the Bishops and some principal Persons about the City Happy was he that could be honoured with his Company and satisfied with beholding his comely presence though they understood not his Discourses Commended by King Iames at first for a constant Sojourner and Guest to Archbishop Abbot in whose Chappel at Lambeth he assisted at the Consecration of some English Bishops Made afterwards by the King the Master of the Savoy and Dean of Windsor and by himself made Rector of West-Illesby in the County of Berks A Revenue not so great as to bring him under the suspicion of coming hither out of Covetousness for the sake of filthy Lucre nor so contemptible but that he might have lived plentifully and contentedly on it During his stay here he published his learned and elaborate Book entituled De Republica Ecclesiastica never yet answered by the Papists and perhaps unanswerable He had given great trouble to the Pope by his defection from that Church and no small countenance to the Doctrine of the Protestant Churches by his coming over unto ours The foundring of so great a Pillar seemed to prognosticate that the Fabrick of that Church was not like to stand And yet he gave greater blows to them by his Pen than by the defection of his person the wound so given being conceived to be incurable In these respects those of that Church bestirred themselves to disgrace his person devising many other causes by which he might be moved or forced to forsake those parts wherein he durst no longer tarry but finding little credit given to their libellous Pamphlets they began to work upon him by more secret practises insinuating That he had neither that Respect nor those Advancements which might encourage him to stay That the new Pope Gregory the Fifteenth was his special Friend That he might chuse his own Preferments and make his own Conditions if he would return And on the other side they cunningly wrought him out of credit with King Iames by the Arts of Gundamore Embassadour at that time from the King of Spain and lessened his esteem amongst the Clergy by some other Artifices So that the poor man being in a manner lost on both sides was forced to a necessity of swallowing that accursed bait by which he was hooked over to his own destruction For having sollicited King Iames by several Letters the last of them bearing date on the third of February to licence his departure home he was by the King disdainfully turned over to the High-Commission or rather to a special Commission directed to Archbishop Abbot the Lord Keeper Lincoln the Bishops of London Durham and Winchester with certain of the Lords of the Privy Council These Lords assembling at Lambeth on the 30th of March and having first heard all his Excuses and Defences commanded him to depart the Realm within twenty days or otherwise to expect such punishment as by the Laws of the Land might be laid upon him for holding Intelligence by Letters Messages c. with the Popes of Rome To this Sentence he sorrowfully submitted protesting openly That he would never speak reproachfully of the Church of England the Articles whereof he acknowledged to be sound and profitable and none of them to be Heretical as appears by a Book entituled SPALATO's Shiftings in Religion published as it was conceived by Laud's especial Friend the Lord Bishop of Durham How well or rather how ill he performed this promise and what became of him after his return to Rome is not now my business The man is banished out of England and my History leads me next into Spain not Italy The
Church of England had a great stock at that time to be driven in Spain and many of the Romish Factors were desirous to be trading in it No sooner was the Princes Train of Lords and Gentlemen come to the City of Madrid but the King of Spain assigned a day for his Reception A Reception so Magnificent so full of State and Royal Pomp that it redounded infinitely to the honour of the Spanish Court and the satisfaction of the Prince Never was King of Spain on the day of his inauguration received into that City with a more general concourse of all sorts of people and greater signs of Joy and Gallantry then the Prince was conducted through it to the Palace Royal. In which his Quarters being assigned him there wanted no allurements on their parts to win him to a fair esteem of their Religion and to put some high value also on their Court and Nation Nor was the Prince wanting for his part in all fit compliances by which he might both gain on them and preserve himself for by his Courtly Garb he won so much on the affections of the Lady Infanta and by his Grace and circumspect behaviour got so much ground upon that King and his Council that the Match went forward in good earnest A dispensation for the Marriage was procured from Gregory the fifteenth then sitting in the See of Rome The Articles of the Marriage with all the circumstances thereof were agreed upon and solemnly sworn to by both Kings Nothing remained to bring the whole business to a joyfull issue but the Consummation But before that could be obtained the Prince must try his fortunes in an harder Conflict than any he had learnt in the Schools of Love The change of his Religion was much hoped for by the Court of Spain at his first coming thither To perfect which he was plied from time to time with many perswasive Arguments by many persons of great Honour about that King And many of the most learned Priests and Jesuites made their Addresses to him with such Rhetorical Orations with such insinuating Artifices and subtle Practises as if they had a purpose rather to conquer him by kindness than by disputation Nor stop they there but dedicated many Books unto him to gain him fairly to their Party invited him to behold their solemn Processions to captivate his outward senses and carried him to the most Religious places famous for their magnificent Fabricks and pretended Miracles In which conjuncture of designs it is not to be thought but that the Pope bestirred himself in gaining to his Church a Prince of such parts and greatness For first he writes unto the Bishop of Conchen Inquisitor general of Spain not to be wanting to the opportunity which God had put into his hands The next day being the twentieth of April he addressed his lines unto the Prince extolling the piety of his Predecessors their Zeal unto the Catholick Church and to the head thereof the Pope inviting him by all the blandishments of Art to put himself upon the following of their brave examples Never had Prince a harder game to play than Prince Charles had now He found himself under the Power of the King of Spain and knew that the whole business did depend on the Popes dispensation with whom if he complied not in some handsome way his expectation might be frustrate and all the fruits of that long Treaty would be suddenly blasted He therefore writes unto the Pope in such general terms as seemed to give his Holiness some assurances of him but being reduced unto particulars signified nothing else but some civill complements mixt with some promises of his endeavours to make up the breaches in the Church and restore Christendom to an happy and desirable peace Which notwithstanding was after reckoned amongst his crimes by such as rather would not then did not know the necessity which lay upon him of keeping at that time a plausible correspondence with the Catholick party But these Temptations and Allurements these Artifices and Insinuations prevailed so little with the Prince that he still kept his stand and was found impregnable carrying himself with such a prudent Moderation in these Encounters that he came off alwaies without Envy but not without Glory And that it might appear on what grounds he stood it was thought fit to let them see that he professed no other Religion than what was agreeable to the Rules of Antiquity and not much abhorrent from the Forms then used in the Church Rome And to this end by the prudent care of the Lord Keeper Williams the English Liturgie was translated into Spanish so many Copies of the book then Printed being sent into Spain as gave great satisfaction both to the Court and Clergy The work performed by a converted Dominican who was gratified for his pains therein by a good Prebend and a Benefice as he well deserved And this I must needs say was very seasonably done For till that time the Spaniards had been made believe by their Priests and Jesuites that when the English had cast off the Pope they had cast off all Religion also That from thenceforth they became meer Atheists and that the name of God was never used amongst them but with a purpose to expose it to profanation An Argument whereof may be the extreme squeamishness of the Constable of Castile sent into England in the beginning of the Reign of King Iames to swear the peace between both Kings Who understanding that the business was to be performed in the Chappel where some Anthems were to be sung desired that whatsoever was sung Gods name might not be used in it and that being forborn he was content they should sing what they listed And when the Earl of Nottingham attended by many Gentlemen of worth and quality went into Spain to take the like Oath of the Catholick King it was reported by his followers at their coming back how much it was commiserated by the Vulgar Spaniards that so many goodly persons should be trained up in no other Religion than to worship the Devil But let us leave the Prince and return for England where the King had as hard a game to play For having left such a Pawn in Spain he was in a manner bound to his good behaviour and of necessity to gratifie the Popish Party in this Kingdom with more than ordinary Favours He knew no Marriage could be made without the Popes Dispensation and that the Popes Dispensation could not be obtained without indulging many graces to his Catholick Subjects To smooth his way therefore to the point desired he addresseth several Letters to the Pope and Cardinals in which he gives him the title of most holy Father and imploys Gage as his Agent in the Court of Rome to attend the business At home he dischargeth all such Priests and Iesuites as had been formerly imprisoned inhibiting all Processes and Superseding all proceedings against Recusants and in a word suspends
persons as were either Papists or suspected to be Papists or had not received the Communion within the space of one whole year or whose Wives or any of their Servants were Recusants or suspected to be so might be removed from all Commissions of charge and trust from being Justices of the Peace or bearing any Office in the Common Wealth But this Petition was not made ready for the Lords till the twentieth of May next following and being then reported to them by the Archbishop of Canterbury they did proceed no further in it The Commons in the mean time had been wholly busied in the Prosecution of the Lord Treasurer Cranfield whom at last they brought unto his Sentence A Gentleman he was by birth but had his breeding in the City from whence by his own wit and industry he preferred himself into the Court where he was first made Master of the Wardrobe afterward Master of the Wards and finally advanced by the power and favour of the Duke one of whose Kinswomen he had married to the office of Lord Treasurer and the honour of being made the first Earl of Middlesex In this Office he had disobliged the Prince when he was in Spain by disswading and diverting those Large Supplies which were required for the maintaining of his Port in a Forraign Kingdom And he had disobliged the Duke by joyning in some secret practises to make him grow less and less in his Majesties Favour They had both served the turn of the Commons in drawing the King by their continual importunities to dissolve the Treatie And the Commons must now serve their turn in prosecuting this man to his final destruction Which they pursued so effectually that in the end he was sentenced in the House of Lords to be deprived of the Office of Lord High Treasurer of England to be fined fifty thousand Pounds and remain a Prisoner in the Tower during his Majesties will and pleasure It was moved also to degrade him from all Titles of honour but in that the Bishops stood his Friends and dasht the motion So Cranfield sell and Williams did not stand long after Laud was now brought into an higher degree of credit with the Duke of Buckingham than he was before by means whereof he came to be of great power and authority with him Insomuch that when the Duke fell sick of an Ague in the beginning of May he was extreme impatient in his Fits till Laud came to visit him by whom he was so charmed and sweetned that at first he endured his Fits with patience and by that patience did so break their heats and violences that at last they left him From this time forwards he was not used only as a Confessor but a Counsellor also imployed by him in considering and advising whether the great endowments belonging to the Hospitals founded in the dissolved house of Carthusian Monks commonly but corruptly called the Charter-House might not be inverted to the maintenance of an Army for the present Wars as well for his Majesties advantage as the case of the Subject And to this Proposition as it seems he returned a Negative for I find not that the business advanced any further He liked not any inversions or alienations of that nature lest being drawn into example the Lands of Colledges or Cathedral Churches might in like manner be imployed unto secular uses Besides he could not choose but know that a project had been set on foot about ten years before for the Entituling of the King to all Sutton's Lands which probably might have succeeded if Coke then being Lord Chief Justice and one of the Trustees for erecting the Hospital had not stood stoutly to his trust By which though he got the Kings displeasure yet amongst others he preserved the reputation of an honest man And Laud might very well conclude that he who durst oppose the King when he was in his favour would be found more intractable at this time when he was in disgrace which rendred him the less sollicitous to appear in a business not otherwise approved of by him But in another point which was more to his liking and lay within the spheare of his activity he gave him as much satisfaction as he had desired This was the giving him the heads of Doctrinal Puritanism that is to say the Heads of such Doctrines as were maintained by those of the Puritan Faction though not maintained by them as Puritans but as Calvinists only The Duke had a desire to know them and he served him in it I must needs say the name of Doctrinal Puritanism is not very ancient but whether first taken up by the Archbishop of Spalato at his being here I am not able to say Nor am I of opinion that Puritan and Calvinian are terms convertible For though all Puritans are Calvinians both in doctrine and practise yet all Calvinians are not to be counted as Puritans also whose practises many of them abhor and whose inconformities they detest though by the errour of their Education or ill direction in the Course of their Studies they may and do agree with them in some points of Doctrine But I must take the word as it stands in the Breviate and so let it go These Doctrinal heads being ten in number related to the indispâ—nsible morality of the Lords-day-Sabbath the indiscrimination of Bishops and Presbyters the Power of Soveraign Princes in Ecclesiastical matters the Doctrine of Confession and Sacerdotal Absolution and the five Points so much disputed about Predestination and the Concomitants thereof Which last Points having been hotly agitated for twenty years last past in the Belgick Churches did now begin to exercise the Church of England upon this occasion The Priests and Jesuites having been very busie of late in gaining Proselites and sowing their erronious Doctrines had got a haunt in a Village of the County of Essex called Stanford-Rivers The Rector of that Church was Richard Montague Batchelor of Divinity Prebend of Windsor and one of the Fellows of Eaton Colledge a man exceedingly well versed in all the Learning of Greeks and Romans and as well studied in the Fathers Councils and all other ancient Monuments of the Christian Church Desirous to free his Parish from this haunt he left some Propositions at the house of one of his Neighbours which had been frequently visited with these Night-Spirits with this Declaration thereunto that if any of those which ranged that walk could convince him in any of the same he would immediately subscribe and be a Papist After long expectation instead of answering to his queries one of them leaves a short Pamphlet for him entituled A new Gag for the Old Gospell in which it was pretended that the Doctrine of the Protestants should be confuted out of the very words of their own English Bibles This book he was required to answer and found it no such knotty piece but that it might be cleft in sunder without Beetle or Wedges But in perusing of that
Clergy Fourthly That they should double the yearly Rents which were reserved unto the Crown by their former Grants And finally That these Conditions being performed on their parts the King should settle their Estates by Act of Parliament Home went the Commissioners with joy for their good success expecting to be entertained with Bells and Bonfires but they found the contrary the proud Scots being generally resolved rather to put all to hazard than to quit that Power and Tyranny which they had over their poor Vassals by which name after the manner of the French they called their Tenants And hereunto they were encouraged under-hand by a Party in England who feared that by this Agreement the King would be so absolute in those Northern Regions that no Aid could be hoped from thence when the necessity of their designs might most require it Just as the Castilians were displeased with the Conquest of Portugal by King Philip the Second because thereby they had no place left to retire unto when either the Kings displeasure or their disobedience should make their own Country to hot for them Such was the face of Church and State when his Majesty began his Journey for Scotland to receive the Crown a Journey of great expence on both sides but of small profit unto either On the thirteenth day of May he advanced toward the North but by such leisurely Removes that he recovered not the City of York till the twenty fourth into which he made a Solemn and Magnificent Entrance attended by the Flower of the English Nobility the principal Officers of his Court and some of the Lords of his Privy Council He was received at his first entrance into Scotland with a gallant body of that Nation consisting for the most part of the like Ingredients and so conducted into Edenborough on the tenth of Iune Edenborough the chief City of the Realm of Scotland and indeed the Summa totalis of that Kingdom extended a whole mile in length from the Palace-Royal of Holy-Rood-House lying at the foot of the Hill to a fair and ancient Castle mounted on the top thereof From this Castle the King was to descend the Street in a Royal Pomp till he came to his Palace as the Kings of England commonly on the like occasion ride from the Tower thorow London to the Court of Whitehall where the Solemnities of the Coronation were to be perform'd The day designed for it was the eighteenth of Iune the concourse of People beyond expression and the expressions of their Joy in gallantry of Apparel sumptuous Feastings and Acclamations of all sorts nothing inferiour to that concourse But this was only the Hosanna of his first Reception they had a Crucifige for him when he came to his Parliament It was conceived at his Majesties first going toward the North that he would have settled the English Liturgie in that Church at his being there but he either carried no such thoughts with him or if he did he kept them to himself as no more than thoughts never discovering any such thing in his words or actions The Scots were of another temper than to be easily won to any thing which they had no mind to and a less mind they could have to nothing than the English Liturgie King Iames had taken order at his being in Scotland Anno 1617. That it should constantly be read twice every day in his Chappel-Royal for that City and gave command that the Lords of his Privy-Council and the Lords of Session should be present at it on the Sundays and there receive the Holy Communion according to the form prescribed in the Common-Prayer-Book And this he did unto this end That as well the Citizens of Edenborough as such as came thither upon Business might by degrees be made acquainted with the English Forms and consequently be prepared for the receiving of such a Liturgie as the King with the Advice of his Bishops and other Learned Men according to the Act of the Assembly at Aberdeen should commend unto them But these Directions being either discontinued or carelesly followed after his decease and the five Articles of Perth not press'd so diligently on the People as they might have been the Scots were generally as great Strangers to the Liturgie of the Church of England as when King Iames first came amongst us His Majesty could not be so ill served as not to be well enough informed how things went in Scotland and therefore was not to venture rashly upon such a business wherein he might receive a foil He thereupon resolves to proceed no further in Matters which concerned the Church than to pass an Act of Ratification an Act Confirmatory of such Laws and Statutes relating unto Church-concernments as by King Iames had been obtained with great charge and cunning And though he carried this Act at last yet was it not without a far greater opposition than he had reason to expect from that Convention But the Commission of Surrendry did so stick in their stomacks that they could not chuse but vent their disaffections on the first occasion Nor would they suffer him to enjoy the benefit of that Act so hardly gotten with Peace and Honour but followed him into England with a pestilent Libel in which they charged him to have carried that Act by corrupting some and a plain down-right buying of the Voices of others This was the first taste which they gave the King of their malevolency towards his Person and Government but it shall not prove to be the last His Majesty had another business to effect at his being there for which he needed not their Assistance and for that reason did not ask it This was the raising of the City of Edenborough to a See Episcopal which before was only a Borough Town belonging anciently to the Diocess and Jurisdiction of St. Andrews The Metropolitan of St. Andrews was willing for the common good to yield unto this diminution of his Power and Profit and that the whole County of Lothian extending from Edenborough-Fryth to the Town of Barwick should be dismembred from his own Diocess to serve as a Diocess to this Bishop of new Election And on the other side the Duke of Lenox whose Ancestors had long enjoyed the Priory of St. Andrews with a great part of the Lands belonging to it was willing to let his Majesty have a good penyworth of some part of those Lands to serve as a Patrimony to this new Episcopal See and the Bishop of it Which Provision being thus made and settled Forbesse a right grave and solid Divine is made the first Bishop of this City his Cathedral fixed in the Church of St. Giles being the fairest in the Town a Dean appointed for that Church some Ministers of Edenborough and the Parts adjoining being nominated for the Canons or Prebends of it A design pious in it self and purposely intended to inure the Edenburghers to the Fatherly Government of a Bishop who by tempering the exorbitancies of
the Ministers there might by degrees prepare the People to such impressions of Conformity as his Majesty by the Council and Consent of the rest of the Bishops should graciously be pleased to imprint upon them But such ill luck his Majesty had with that stubborn Nation that this was look'd upon also as a general Grievance and must be thought to aim at no other end than Tyranny and Popery and what else they pleased We have almost done our work in Scotland and yet hear nothing all this while of the Bishop of London not that he did not go the Journey but that there was little to be done at his being there but to see and be seen And yet it was a Journey which brought him some access of Honour and gave him opportunity of making himself known to those of best Quality of that Kingdom He had been in Scotland with King Iames but then he waited only as a private Chaplain He is now looked upon as the third Bishop of England in Place and the greatest in Power a Counsellor of State and the Kings great Favorite He entred Scotland as a Privy-Counsellor of England only but returned thence as a Counsellor for that Kingdom also to which Office he was sworn on the fifteenth of Iune Nor did he shew himself less able in that Church than in the Council-Chamber being appointed by his Majesty to Preach before him on the last of that Month in which some question may be made how he pleased the Scots although it be out of question that he pleased the King The greatest part of the following Iuly was spent in visiting the Country and taking a view of the chief Cities and most remarkable Parts and Places of it Which having seen he made a Posting Journey to the Queen at Greenwich whither he came on Saturday the twentieth of Iuly crossing the Water at Blackwall and looking towards London from no nearer distance But in this Act he laid aside the Majesty of his Predecessors especially of Queen Elizabeth of Famous Memory of whom it was observed That she did very seldom end any of her Summer Progresses but she would wheel about to some end of London to make her passage to Whitehall thorow some part of the City not only requiring the Lord Mayor and Aldermen in their Scarlet Robes and Chains of Gold to come forth to meet her but the several Companies of the City to attend solemnly in their Formalities as she went along By means whereof she did not only preserve that Majesty which did belong to a Queen of England but kept the Citizens and consequently all the Subjects in a reverent Estimation and Opinion of her She used the like Arts also in keeping up the Majesty of the Crown and Service of the City in the Reception and bringing in of Foreign Embassadors who if they came to London by Water were met at Gravesend by the Lord Mayor the Aldermen and Companies in their several Barges and in that Solemn manner conducted unto such Stairs by the Water side as were nearest to the Lodgings provided for them But if they were to come by Land they were met in the like sort at Shooters-Hill by the Mayor and Aldermen and thence conducted to their Lodgings the Companies waiting in the Streets in their several Habits The like she used also in celebrating the Obsequies of all Christian Kings whether Popish or Protestant with whom she was in Correspondence performed in such a Solemn and Magnificent manner that it preserved her in the estimation of all Foreign Princes though differing in Religion from her besides the great contentment which the People took in those Royal Pomps Some other Arts she had of preserving Majesty and keeping distance with her People yet was so popular withal when she saw her time that never Majesty and Popularity were so matched together But these being laid aside by King Iames who brooked neither of them and not resumed by King Charles who loved them not much more than his Father did there followed first a neglect of their Persons which Majesty would have made more Sacred and afterwards a mislike of their Government which a little Popularity would have made more grateful Laud having no such cause of hastning homewards returned not to his House at Fulham till the twenty sixth of the same Month But he came time enough to hear the news of Abbot's Sickness and within few days after of his Death which hapned on Sunday morning the fourth of August and was presently signified to the King being â—hen at Greenwich A man he was that had tasted both of good and ill Fortune in extremes affirmed by the Church Historian for I shall only speak him in the words of others to be a grave man in his Conversation and unblameable in his Life but said withal to have been carried with non amavit gentem nostram forsaking the Birds of his own feather to fly with others and generally favouring the Laity above the Clergie in all Cases which were brought before him Conceived by one of our State Historians to be too facil and yielding in the exercising of his Function by whom it also affirmed That his extraordinary remisness in not exacting strict Conformity to the prescribed Orders of the Church in point of Ceremony seemed to resolve those legal Determinations to their first Principle of Indifferency and to lead in such an habit of Inconformity as the future reduction of those tender-conscienc'd men to long discontinued Obedience was interpreted an Innovation By the first Character we find what made him acceptable amongst the Gentry by the last what made him grateful to the Puritan in favour of which men he took so little care of the great Trust committed to him and gave them so many opportunities of increasing both in Power and Numbers that to stop tâ—em in their full career it was found necessary to suspend him from his Metropolitical Jurisdiction as before was noted It is reported That as Prince Henry his Majesty then Duke of Yorke Archbishop Abbot with many of the Nobility were waiting in the Privy Chamber for the coming out of King Iames the Prince to put a jest on the Duke his Brother took the Archbishops Square Cap out of his hands and put it on his Brothers head telling him that if he continued a good Boy and followed his Book he would one day make him Archbishop of Canterbury Which the Child took in such disdain that he threw the Cap upon the ground and trampled it under his feet not being without much difficulty and some force taken off from that eagerness This though first it was not otherwise beheld than as an Act of Childish Passion yet when his Brother Prince Henry died and that he was Heir apparent to the Crown it was taken up by many zealous Church-men for some ill presage unto the Hierarchy of Bishops the overthrow whereof by his Act and Power did seem to be fore-signified by it But as
their fears in that were groundless so their conjectures were no better grounded than their fears there never being a greater Patron of the Episcopal order than he lived and died but whether there might not be some presage in it in reference to the Archbishops person the diminution of his Dignity and fall of his Power may be best judged by this suspension and the consequents which followed on it And though he lived not long under the disgrace yet in the interval of time he saw so much of his Authority devolved on Laud that he grew more and more discontented and was ready in a manner to have made himself the head of the Puritan Faction It is related by a late Writer That towards his death he was not only discontented himself but that his house was the Rendezvouz of all the Malecontents in Church and State that he turned Midnight to Noonday-by constant keeping of Candles lighted in his Chamber and Study as also that such Visitants as repaired unto him called themselves Nicodemites because of their secret coming to him by night I know how much that Author hath been mistaken in other things but I see nothing in this which may not be consistent with the truth of History Certain I am his Chaplains were successively declared Calvinians his Secretary a professed Patron of the Puritan Faction his doors continually open to the Chiefs of that party and such as stickled in that cause and amongst others to him by whose Suggestion if we may take his own report the Historical Narration was called in for the great danger which it threatned to the grounds of Calvinism For his compliance with the Gentry against the Clergie this reason is alledged from his own mouth That he was so severe to the Clergy on purpose to rescue them from the severity of others and to prevent the punishment of them by lay Iudges to their greater shames which leaves the poor Clergy under a greater obloquy than any which their enemies had laid upon them But the truer reason of it was that having never been Parson Vicar nor Curate he was altogether ignorant of those afflictions which the Clergy do too often suffer by the pride of some and the Avarice of others of their Country Neighbours and consequently shewed the least compassion towards them when any of them had the hard fortune to be brought before him And for his compliance with the Puritans against the Church this reason is alledged by others viz. That he shewed the greater favour to them to keep the ballance even betwixt them and the Papists as Laud was thought to be indulgent to the Papists the better to keep down the pride and prevalency of the Puritan Faction But the truer reason of it was That he had been alwaies inclinable to them from his first beginnings insomuch that when he went Chaplain into Scotland with the Earl of Dunbar imployed by King Iames in some negotiation about that Church he was upon the point of betraying the cause if Hodgskins afterwards one of the Residentiaries of York who went Chaplain with him had not preacquainted the Earl with his tergiversation And as he laboured to be Popular upon both accounts so he endeavoured a more particular correspondence with the Gentry of Kent but most especially of his own Diocess It had been formerly the custom of his Predecessors to spend the greaâ—est part of the long vacations in the Palace of Canterbury met at the first entrance into the Diocess with a body of five hundred horse conducting them to Canterbury with great love and duty feasting the Gentry relieving the poor City entertaining their Tenants and by them liberally furnished on the other side with all sorts of provisions Abbot affected not this way and therefore never bestowed any such visit upon his Diocess but when he was confined to his house at Ford by the Kings appointment and yet resolved upon a course which carried some equivalence with it towards his design For once or twice in every year and sometimes oftner at the end of the term he would cause enquiry to be made in Westminster Hall the common Rendezvouz in St. Pauls Church and the Royal Exchange for all such Gentlemen of his Diocess as lodged in and about the City of London dispersing several Tickets from one to another by which they were invited to a general entertainment at his house in Lambeth the next day after the end of the present term where he feasted them with great bounty and familiarity A course as acceptable to the Kentish Gentry as if he had kept open Hospitality in his Palace at Canterbury because it saved them both the trouble of attending on him and the charge of sending Presents to him both which had been expected if he had spent any part of the year amongst them But this he discontinued also for three or four years or more before his death fearing as his affairs then stood that it might render him obnoxious to some misconstructions which he was willing to avoid To bring his Story to an end I shall say no more but that he had his Birth at Guilford the chief Town of Surrey and the best part of his breeding in Baliol Colledge in Oxon. whereof he was Fellow and from thence preferred to be Master of Vniversity Colledge and Dean of Winton Other preferments he had none till he came to Lichfield of which he was consecrated Bishop on the third of December Anno 1609. from thence translated unto London within few Months after and within twelve Months after that to the See of Canterbury Marks of his Benefaction we find none in places of his Breeding and Preferments but a fair Hospital well built and liberally endowed in the place of his Birth To which the woful man retired in the first extremity of those afflictions which his misfortune at Bramzill had drawn upon him and to this place he designed his body whensoever it should please God to translate him out of the Church Militant to the Church Triumphant which hapned on the fourth of August as before was said The End of the First Part. CYPRIANUS ANGLICUS OR THE HISTORY OF THE Life and Death OF The most Reverend and Renowned PRELATE WILLIAM By Divine Providence Lord Archbishop of Canterbury Primate of all ENGLAND and Metropolitan Chancellor of the Universities of Oxon. and Dublin and one of the Lords of the Privy Council to His late most SACRED MAJESTY King CHARLES Second MONARCH of Great-Brittain PART II. Carrying on the History from his Nomination to the Metropolitical See of Canterbury August 6. 1633. to the day of his Death and Burial Jan. 10. 1644. LONDON Printed by E. Cotes for A. Seile 1668. THE LIFE OF The most Reverend FATHER in GOD WILLIAM Lord Archbishop of Canterbury LIB IV. Extending from his being made Archbishop of Canterbury to the end of the Parliament and Convocation Anno 1640. CANTERBVRY was anciently the principal City of the Kingdom and afterwards of the
place where the Altar formerly had stood In Christ-Church the Cathedral of that City to which the Lord Deputies repair on Sundays and Holydays for Gods Publick Worship he found the Holy Table scituated in the middle of the Choire or Chancel and day by day profaned by Boys and Girles who sate upon it This Table he caused to be removed also as he did the other And whereas the Earl of Cork had built a stately Monument for his Wife and some of her Ancestors but chiefly for himself and his own Posterity at the East end of the Choire in St. Patrick's Church being the second of that City the Lord Deputy required him to take it down or otherwise to satisfie the Archbishop of Canterbury in the standing of it Of all these things he gave Order to his Chaplain Bramhall to give the Archbishop an Account which Bramhall did accordingly in his Letters of the tenth of August 1633. In which Letters he gave this testimony also of the Deputies Care That it was not possible for the Intentions of a mortal Man to be more serious and sincere in those things that concerned the good of the Irish Church than his Lordships were And that he might lay a sure foundation to proceed upon he procured the University of Dublin to make choice of Laud then being Lord Elect of Canterbury for their Lord and Chancellor To this they chearfully assented passed the Election on the fourteenth of September Anno 1633. being but six days before his actual Confirmation into the Metropolitical and Supream Dignity of the Church of England Nor was it long before they found on what a gracious Benefactor they had placed that Honour He had been told by Ryves his Majesties Advocate who formerly had exercised that Office in the Realm of Ireland of the deplorable condition of that Church in the respect of Maintenance Most of the Tythes had been appropriated to Monasteries and Religious Houses afterwards vested in the Crown or sold to private Subjects and made Lay-Fees The Vicaridges for the most part Stipendary and their Stipends so miserable sordid that in the whole Province of Connaught most of the Vicars Pensions came but to 40 s. per Annum and in many places but 16. The Bishopricks at that time were many in number but of small Revenue having been much dilapidated in the change of Religion some of them utterly unable to maintain a Bishop and no good Benefice near them to be held in Commendam This had been certified unto him by Letters from the Lord Primate about three years since and it had been certified also by Beadle Bishop of Killmore That the Churches were in great decay and that some men of better quality than the rest were possessed of three four five or more of those Vâ—caridges to the great disservice of the Church and reproach to themselves These things he could not chuse but look on as great discouragements to Learning and such as could produce no other effects than Ignorance in the Priest and Barbarism in the People Scandalous Benefices make for the most part scandalous Ministers as naked Walls are said in the English Proverb to make giddy Houswifes Where there is neither Means nor Maintenance for a Learned Ministry what a gross night of Ignorance must befal those men who were to hold forth the Light to others And if the Light it self be Darkness how great a Darkness must it be which doth follow after it That Observation of Panormitan That poor Churches will be filled with none but ignorant Priests being as true as old and as old as lamentable For remedy whereof he took an opportunity to move his Majesty to restore all such Impropriations to the Church of Ireland as were then vested in the Crown The Exchequer was at that time empty the Revenue low which might seem to make the Proposition the more unseasonable But so great was his Majesties Piety on the one side the Reasons so forcible on the other and the Lord Deputy of that Kingdom so cordially aâ—fected to advance the Work that his Majesty graciously condescended to it and sound his Ministers there as ready to speed the business as either of them could desire Encouraged by which Royal Example the Earl of Cork who from a very small beginning had raised himself to a vast Revenue in that Kingdom Re-built some Churches and Repaired others restored some of his Impropriations to those several Churches and doubtless had proceeded further if a difference had not hapned betwixt the Lord Deputy and him about the removing of the Monument which he had erected for himself and his Posterity in one of the principal Churches of the City of Dublin as before was said And as for the improving of the Bishopricks as Ossory and Kilkenny Killmore and Ardagh Down and Connor and possibly some others had before this been joined together so was it advised by the Primate That Kilfenore should be joined unto that of Killalow lying contiguous to each other Both which being joined by a perpetual union were thought sufficient to make an indifferent Competency for an Irish Bishop But all this Care had been to little or no purpose if some course were not also taken to preserve Religion endangered on this side by Popery and on that by Calvinism each side unwillingly contributing to the growth of the other The perverse oppositions of the Calvinist made the Papist obstinate and the insolencies of the Papists did both vex and confirm the Calvinists Betwixt them both the Church of England was so lost that there was little of her genuine and native Doctrine to be found in the Clergy of that Kingdom The Papists being first suppressed it was conceived to be no hard matter to reduce the Calvinians to Conformity and to suppress the Papists it was found expedient That the standing Army should be kept in continual Pay and that Monies should be levied on the Papists themselves for the payment of it In order whereunto the Bishop of Killmore before-mentioned had given an Account unto his Grace then Bishop of London touching the dangerous condition of that Church by the growth of Popery and now he finds it necessary to give the like Account unto the new Lord Deputy Him therefore he informs by Letters dated November 5. 1633. which was not long after he had personally assumed the Government and received the Sword to this effect viz. That in that Crown the Pope had a far greater Kingdom than his Majesty had That the said Kingdom of the Pope was governed by the new Congregation de propaganda Fide established not long since at Rome That the Pope had there a Clergy depending on him double in number to the English the Heads of which were bound by a corporal Oath to maintain his Power and Greatness against all Persons whatsoever That for the moulding of the People to the Popes Obedience there was a great rabble of Irregular Regulars most of them the younger Sons of
Noble Houses which made them the more insolent and uncontrollable That the Pope had erected an University in Dublin to confront his Majesties Colledge there and breed up the Youth of the Kingdom to his Devotion one Harris being Dean thereof who had dispersed a Scandalous Pamphlet against the Lord Primates Sermon preach'd at Wansteed one of the best Pieces that ever came from him Anno 1629. That since the Dissolving of their new Frieries in the City of Dublin they had Erected them in the Country and had brought the People to such a sottish negligence that they cared not to learn the Commandments as God spake and left them but flocked in Multitudes to the hearing of such Superstitious Doctrines as some of their own Priests were ashamed of That a Synodical Meeting of their Clergy had been held lately at Drogheda in the Province of Vlster in which it was decreed That it was not lawful to take the Oath of Allegiance And therefore That in such a conjuncture of Affairs to think that the bridle of the Army might be taken away must be the thought not of a Brain-sick but of a Brainless man which whosoever did endeavour not only would oppose his Majesties Service but expose his own neck to the Skeanes of those Irish cut-throats All which he humbly refers to his Lordships seasonable Care and Consideration Upon this Information the Deputy obtains his Majesties leave to hold a Parliament in that Kingdom which he managed with such notable dexterity that he made himself Master of a Power sufficient to suppress the Insolencies of the Papists and yet exceedingly prevailed upon their Affections From which time forwards the Popish Recusants in that Kingdom were kept in stricter duty and held closer to loyal Obedience for fear of irritating so severe a Magistrate than ever they had been by any of his Predecessors This Parliament brought with it a Convocation as a thing of course and in that somewhat must be done to check the spreading of Calvinism in all parts of that Church The Articles of Religion agreed upon in Convocation Anno 1615. were so contrived by Vsher the now Lord Primate That all the Sabbatarian and Calvinian Rigours were declared therein to be the Doctrines of that Church Most grievous Torments immediately in his Soul affirmed to be endured by Christ which Calvin makes to be the same with his descent into Hell The abstenencies from eating Flesh upon certain days declared not to be Religious Fasts but to be grounded only upon Politick Ends and Considerations All Ministers adjudged to be Lawfully called who are called unto the Work of the Ministry by those that have Publick Authority given them in the Church but whether they be Bishops or not it makes no matter so that he be Authorized unto it by their several Churches The Sacerdotal Power of Absolution made declarative only and consequently quite subverted No Power ascribed unto the Church in Ordaining Canons or censuring any of those who either carelesly or maliciously do infringe the same the Pope made Antichrist according to the like Determination of the French Hugonots made at Gappe in Dolphine And finally such a silence concerning the Consecration of Archbishops and Bishops expresly justified and avowed in the English Book as if there were not a different Order from the Common Presbyters All which being Vsher's own Opinions were dispersed in several places of these Articles for the Church of Ireland approved of in that Convocation and finally confirmed by the Lord Deputy Chichester in the Name of King Iames. By means whereof these two great mischiefs did ensue First A great matter of division which it caused to the Priests and Papists of the Realm that in three Kingdoms under the Obedience of one Sovereign Prince there should be three distinct and contrary Professions and yet pretending every one to the same Religion And secondly Whensoever the Points were agitated here in England against the Sabbatarian and Calvinian Rigours the Disputants were forthwith choaked by the Authority of these Articles and the infallible Judgment of King Iames who confirmed the same If therefore the Archbishop meant to have Peace in England the Church of Ireland must be won to desert those Articles and receive ours in England in the place thereof This to effect it was not thought expedient by such as had the managing of that design to propose any abrogation or repealing of the former Articles which had so many Friends and Patrons in that Convocation that it was moved severally both in the House of the Bishops and in that of the Clergy to have them ratified and confirmed in the present Meeting And questionless it had been carried in that way if it had not seasonably been diverted by telling the Promoters of it That those Articles had already received as much Authority as that Church could give them and that by seeking to procure any such Confirmation they would weaken the Original Power by which they stood This blow being thus handsomly broken their next work was to move the Primate That for the avoiding of such scandal which was given the Papists and to declare the Unity in Judgment and Affections between the Churches a Canon might be passed in approbation of the Articles of the Church of England To this the Prelate being gained the Canon was drawn up and presented to him and being by him propounded was accordingly passed one only man dissenting when it came to the Vote who had pierced deeper into the bottom of the Project than the others did It was desired also by Bramhall not long before the Lord Deputies Chaplain but then Bishop of Derrie That the whole Body of Canons made in the year 1603. might be admitted in that Church But the Primate was ever so afraid of bowing at the Name of IESVS and some other Reverences required in them which he neither practised nor approved that he would by no means hearken to it which bred some heats between him and Bramhall ending at last in this Temperament That some select Canons should be taken out of that Book and intermingled with some others of their own composing But for the Canon which approved and received the Articles of the Church of England it was this that followeth viz. Of the Agreement of the Church of England and Ireland in the Profession of the same Christian Faith FOr the manifestation of our Agreement with the Church of England in the Confession of the same Christian Faith and Doctrine of the Sacraments We do receive and approve the Book of Articles of Religion agreed upon by the Archbishops and Bishops and the whole Clergie in whole Convocation holden at London Anno Dom. 1562. for the avoiding of diversities of Opinions and for the establishing of Consent touching true Religion And therefore if any hereafter shall affirm That any of those Articles are in any part Superstitious and Erroneous or such as he may not with a good Conscience Subscribe unto Let him be Excommunicated
Which Order contained the sum and substance of those considerations which he had offered to the Board touching that particular With which the Merchant Adventurers being made acquainted with joynt consent they made choice of one Beaumont reputed for a learned sober and conformable man to be Preacher to their Factory residing at Delf Forbes a Scot by birth who formerly had been Preacher to the Society being either dead or other wise departed to avoid conformity And that this man might be received with the better welcome a Letter is sent with him to the Deputy Governour subscribed by the Archbishop himself in which he signifieth both to him and the rest in his Majesties name That they were to receive him with all decent and courteous usage fitting his person and calling allowing him the ancient Pension which formerly had been paid to his Predecessors Which said in reference to the man he lets them know that it was his Majesties express command that both he the Deputy and all and every other Merchant that is or shall be residing in those parts beyond the Seas do conform themselves to the Doctrine and Discipline settled in the Church of England and that they Frequent the Common-Prayer with all Religious duty and reverence at all times required as well as they do Sermons and that out of their company they should yearly about Easter as the Canons prescribe name two Church-Wardens and two Sides-men which may look to the Orders of the Church and give an account according to their office It was also required that these present Letters should be registred and kept by them that they which come after might take notice what care his Majesty had taken for the well ordering of the said Company in Church affairs and that a Copy of the same should be delivered to the said Beaumont and to every Successor of his respectively that he and they might know what his Majesty expected of them and be the more inexcusable if they disobey it With this Dispatch bearing date the seventeenth of Iune this present year 1634. away goes Beaumont into Holland taking with him these Instructions for his own proceedings that is to say That he should punctually keep and observe all the Orders of the Church of England as they are prescribed in the Canons and the Rubricks of the Liturgie and that if any person of that Company shall shew himself refractory to that Ordinance of his Majesty he should certifie the name of any such offender and his offence to the Lord Bishop of London for the time being who was to take order and give remedy accordingly Which Order and Instructions given to Beaumont in private were incorporated also in the Letter least otherwise he might be thought to act any thing in it without good Authority And he accordingly proceeded with such honest zeal and was so punctual in observing his Majesties pleasure and commands that for a reward of his good service he was preferred unto a Prebends place in the Church of Canterbury though by the unhappy change of times it brought more reputation than advantage with it And now at last we have the face of an English Church in Holland responsal to the Bishops of London for the time being as a part of their Diocess directly and immediately subject to their Jurisdiction The like course also was prescribed for our Factories in Hamborough and those further off that is to say in Turky in the Moguls Dominions the Indian Islands the Plantations in Virginia the Barbadoes and all other places where the English had any standing Residence in the way of trade The like done also for regulating the Divine Service in the Families of all Ambassadours residing in the Courts of Foreign Princes for his Majesties Service as also in the English Regiments serving under the States The superinspection of which last was referred to Boswel his Majesties Resident at the Hague and his Successors in that place as he and all the rest of the Embassadors in what place soever were to be ordered by the care of the Lords of the Council and they to be accountable therein to his Sacred Majesty as the Supream Ordinary The English Agents and Embassadours in the Courts of Foreign Princes had not been formerly so regardful of the honour of the Church of England as they might have been in designing a set Room for religious uses and keeping up the Vestments Rites and Ceremonies prescribed by Law in performance of them It was now hoped that there would be a Church of England in all Courts of Christendom in the chief Cities of the Turk and other great Mahometan Princes in all our Factories and Plantations in every known Part of the world by which it might be rendred as diffused and Catholick as the Church of Rome In reference to the regulating of the French and Dutch Churches here amongst our selves he conceived himself in a capacity of putting his own Counsels in execution either as Bishop of the Diocess or Archbishop of the Province of Canterbury He had considered of the dangers which those Foreign Churches drew on this by standing divided and dismembred from the rest of the body and of the countenance and encouragement which was given to the Puritan Faction in the promoting of Schism There was no Traverse to be made to this Dilemma but either they were or were not of the same Religion with the Church of England If they were not of the same Religion why should they being strangers borne in other Countries or descending from them expect more Liberty of Conscience than the Papists had being all Natives and descending from English Parents If of the same why should they not submit to the Government and Forms of Worship being the outward acts and exercises of the Religion here by Law established It was now as when they first fled into this Land from the Fire and Faggot from which their own Countries having felt no Persecution for forty or fifty years last past were at this time freed And therfore if they did not like the Terms of their staying here they might return from whence they came in peace and safety with thanks to God and the good English Nation for the long and comfortable Entertainment they had found amongst them Upon these grounds and such Considerations as had before been offered to the Lords of the Council before he had sate a whole year in the Chair of Canterbury he caused these three Articles to be tendred to the French Congregation in that City and the two Dutch Congregations in Sandwich and Maidston Apr. 14. 1634. 1. What Liturgie do you use or whether you have not the Dutch or French in use 2. Of how many Descents for the most part they were born Subjects 3. Whether such as are born Subjects will conform to the Church of England For Answer to the Articles after some fruitless Pleas touching their Exemptions they obtained time till the fifth of May against which time with the
gave them some hope of finding more relief from the Court of Exchequer than they could expect from the Lord Mayor who being at the first made Judge in the business for the ease of the Clergy carried himself rather like a party concerned in it than an equal Umpire But there was no contending with the Purse of the City For though the proceedings of the City Landlords were declared to be unjust and Sacrilegious under the hands of many Bishops and most of the Heads of Houses in both Universities Anno 1620. yet the business going on from bad to worse they were necessitated to cast themselves at the feet of King Charles and to petition for a remedy of these growing mischiefs which otherwise in some tract of time might become insupportable Which Petition being taken into consideration by his Sacred Majesty he was graciously pleased to refer the same to the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury the Lord Keeper Coventry the Earl Marshal the Lord Bishop of London the Lord Cottington Mr. Secretary Windebank and Chief Justice Richardson or any five or three of them of which the Lord Archbishop to be alwaies one requiring and thereby authorizing to call before them all parties concerned in the business and after a full hearing and examination thereof to end if they could or otherwise to report to his Majesty where the Impediment lay that so his Majesty might take such further order therein as in his Princely wisdom he should think most meet Which reference being made the fifteenth of May of this present year was carried on with such equality and moderation that the rich Landlords had no reason to complain of any obliquity or partiality in the conduct of it But having been accustomed to â—eed on the Churches Bread and to have the poor Clergie obnoxious them they could with no patience entertain the thoughts of relinquishing their former dyet or suffer a deserving Clergy to enjoy their own Nothing more feared than that the Clergy by this means would grow too rich They who conceived two thousand pound of yearly Rent not enough for an Alderman think one hundred pound per annum as was affirmed by one of that number to be too much for a Minister And should the Clergy once grow rich they would become more absolute and independent not so obsequious to them as they had been formerly and consequently more apt to cross them in their opposition or neglect of establisht Orders And in this state the business stood when Iuxon the Bishop of London was advanced to the Treasurers Staff in the end of March 1635. which much encreast the hopes of the one and the fears the other Some of the Clergie had the hap to better their condition and improve their Benefices by the appearing of so many powerful persons in their behalf and possible enough it is that some expedient would have been resolved on by the Referâ—ees to the general content of both parties his Grace of Canterbury being very sollicitous in behalf of the Clergy if the troubles which brake out soon after in Scâ—tland and the preparations for the War which ensued upon it had not put the business to a stand and perswaded both the King and Council to an improfitable compliance with that stubborn City from which he reapt nothing in conclusion but neglect and scorn So frequently have the best designs been overthrown not so much by the puissance and might of the adverse party as through defect of Constancy and Resolution to go through with them Mention was made in the Narrative of our Archbishops late proceeding against the Congregations of the French and Dutch of somewhat which was done in order to it in the Metropolitical Visitation of the Province of Canterbury Concerning which we are to know that in the beginning of the year 1634. he resolved upon that Visitation And having some distrust of Brent his Vicar General he prâ—pared one of his Confidents to be a joynt Commissioner with him that he might do no hurt if he did no good But afterwards being more assured of Brent than before he was he resolved to trust him with himself and not to fetter him with any such constant Overseer to attend his actings The Articles for his Visitation Printed for the use of Churchwardens and Sides-men in their several Parishes had little in them more than ordinary But he had given directions to his Vicar General to enquire into the observation of his Majesties Instructions of the year 1629. to command the said Churchwardens to place the Communion Table under the Eastern Wall of the Chancel where formerly the Altar stood to set a decent Raile before it to avoid profaneness and at the Raile the Communicants to receive the blessed Sacrament It had been signified to the Archbishop that a Dog in one place or other but I remember not the name had run away with the Bread appointed for the holy Communion and that the Communion Wine had been brought unto the Table in many places in Pint-pots and Bottles and so distributed to the people The placing of a Raile before the Table would prevent all infamies of the first sort and he hoped the Ministers would take order to reform abuses of the last Williams at that time Bishop of Lincoln had placed the Table of his own Chappel in the state of an Altar and â—urnisâ—ed it with Plate and other costly Utensils beyond most others in the Kingdom The Table stood in the same posture in the Cathedral Church of Lincoln of which he was both Bishop and Residentiary and in the Collegiate Church of Westminster whereof he was Dean The Chancel of St. Martins Câ—urch in the Town of Leicester had been made a Library which he when he was in his good humours perswaded the people to remove to trim and prepare the said Choire with Railes and such other Ornaments as were fitting for it and then to place therein their Communion Table all whicn they accordingly performed But understanding of the Order of the third of November made by his Majesty and the Lords of his Council in the Case of St. Gregories he untwisteth all this Line again For a Certificate being presented to him by the Vicar Church-wardens and some others of the Parish That the place where the Table stood before was far more fit by reason of the more capacity to receive the Communicants and the more audibleness of the Ministers voice and the Proximity of it to the place where Morning and Evening Prayer had been appointed to be read than the Chancel was he gave them leave to remove the Communion Table to the place where it formerly stood especially at such times as they received the Communion All which by his Letters of the nineteenth of December 1633. he signifies to Burden one of Lambs Surrogates in the Archdeaconry of Leicester requiring him not to be troublesome or molestfull to the said parties in any thing concerning the Premises Which Letter Burden sends to Lamb and Lamb
This being a matter easily to be proved they were required to make up their number according to their first Foundation by King Henry vi But against this the Fellows pleaded That out of an hatred to their Founder a great part of their Lands had been taken from them by King Edward iv conferred by him upon the Abby of Westminster and the Church of Windsor and by them enjoyed until this day and that they hoped his Grace would not tye them to maintain the whole number of their Fellows with little more than half their Lands To which so reasonable a desire upon full proof made of the Suggestion his Grace did readily consent and left them in the same state in which he found them The noise of these Proceedings in England in the Iune and Iuly of this year being quickly posted to the Scots became a principal Incentive of those Combustions which not long after inflamed that Kingdom For it could be no hard matter for the Presbyterians there to possess the People with the sense of the like smart Sufferings by the Pride and Tyranny of their Bishops if they permitted them to grow great and powerful and did not cast about in time to prevent the mischief And to exasperate them the more the Superstitions of the Liturgie now at the point of being put in execution were presented to them which if once settled amongst them as was then intended would in short time reduce them under the Obedience of the Church of Rome They could not but confess That many things which were found fault with in the English Liturgie were in this altered unto the better the name of Priest so odious unto them of the Puritan Faction changed to that of Presbyter no fewer than sixty Chapters or thereabouts taken out of the Apocrypha appointed to be read by the Church in the English Book reduced to two and those two to be read only on the Feast of All-Saints The new Translation Authorised by King Iames being used in the Psalms Epistles Gospels Hymns and Sentences instead of the old Translation so much complained of in their Books and Conferences But what was this compared with those Superstitions those horrible Corruptions and Idolatries now ready to be thrust upon them in which this Liturgy as much exceeded that of England as that of England had departed from the simplicity and purity of the holier Churches Now therefore somewhat must be done to oppose the entrance of the Popish superstitious Service-Book either now or never But the Presbyterian Ministers who had gone thus far did not alone bring fewel to feed this flame to which some men of all degrees and qualities did contribute with them The Lords and Gentry of the Realm who feared nothing so much as the Commission of surrendries above mentioned laid hold on this occasion also and they being seconded by some male-contented Spirits of that Nation who had not found the King to be as prodigal of his bounties to them as his Father had been before endeavoured to possess them with Fears and Jealousies that Scotland was to be reduced to the Form of a Province and governed by a Deputy or Lord Lieutenant as Ireland was The like done also by some Lords of secret Counsel who before had governed as they listed and thought their power diminished and their persons under some neglect by the placing of a Lord President over them to direct in Chief So that the People generally being fooled into this opinion that both their Christian and Civil Liberty was in no small danger became capable of any impression which the Presbyterian Faction could imprint upon them nor did they want incouragements from the Faction in England to whom the Publication of the Book for Sports the transposing of the holy Table the suppressing of so many Lecturers and Afternoon Sermons and the inhibiting of Preaching Writing Printing in defence of Calvinism were as distasteful and offensive as the new Liturgie with all the supposed superstitions of it was to those of Scotland This Combination made and the ground thus laid it is no wonder if the people brake out into those distempers which soon after followed Sunday the 23 of Iuly was the day appointed for the first reading of the New Liturgy in all the Churches of that Kingdom and how it sped at Edenborough which was to be exemplary to all the rest shall be told by another who hath done it to my hand already Iuly 23. being Sunday the Dean of Edenborough began to read the Book in St. Giles his Church the chief of that City but he had no sooner entred on it than the inferiour multitude began in a tumultuous manner to fill the Church with uprore whereupon the Bishop of Edenborough stept into the Pulpit and hoping to appease them by minding them of the Sanctity of the place they were the more enraged throwing at him Cudgels Stools and what was in the way of Fury unto the very endangering of his life Upon this the Archbishop of St. Andrews Lord Chancellor was enforced to call down from the Gallery the Provost Bailiffs and other Magistrates of the City to their assistance who with much ado at length thrust the unruly Rabble out of the Church and made fast the doors This done the Dean proceeded in reading the Book the multitude in the mean while rapping at the doors pelting the Windows with stones and endeavouring what in them lay to disturb the Sacred Exercise but notwithstanding all this clamour the Service was ended but not the peoples rage who waiting the Bishops retiring to his Lodging so assaulted him as had he not been rescued by a strong hand he had probably perisht by their violence Nor was S. Giles his Church thus only pestered and profaned but in other Churches also though not in so high a measure the peoples disorders were agreeable The Morning thus past the Lord Chancellor and Council assembled to prevent the like darings in the Afternoon which they so effected as the Liturgy was read without any disturbance Only the Bishop of Edenborough was in his return to his Lodging rudely treated by the people the Earl of Roxboroughs Coach in which he passed serving for no protection to him though Roxborough himself was highly favoured of the People and not without some cause suspected to have had a hand in the Commotions of that day The business having thus miscarried in Edenborough stood at a stand in all other Churches of that Kingdom and therefore it will not be amiss to enquire in this place into the causes and occasions of it it seeming very strange to all knowing and discerning men that the Child that had so long lain in the Womb perfectly formed and now made ready for the birth should not have strength enough to be delivered Amongst which causes if disposed into ranke and order that which appears first is the confidence which Canterbury had in the Earl of Traquaire whom he had raised from the condition of a
private Laird to be a Peer of that Realm made him first Treasurer Depute Chancellor of the Exchequer we should call him in England afterwards Lord Treasurer and Privy Counsellor of that Kingdom This man he wrought himself so far into Lauds good liking when he was Bishop of London only that he looked upon him as the fittest Minister to promote the Service of that Church taking him into his nearest thoughts communicating to him all his Counsels committed to his care the conduct of the whole Affair and giving order to the Archbishops and Bishops of Scotland not to do any thing without his privity and direction But being an Hamiltonian Scot either originally such or brought over at last he treacherously betrayed the cause communicated his Instructions to the opposite Faction from one time to another and conscious of the plot for the next daies tumult withdrew himself to the Earl of Mortons house of Dalkeith to expect the issue And possible it is that by his advice the executing of the Liturgy was put off from Easter at what time the reading of it was designed by his Majesty as appears by the Proclamation of December 20. which confirmed the Book By which improvident delay he gave the Presbyterian Faction the longer time to confederate themselves against it and to possess the people with Fears and Jealousies that by admitting of that book they should lose the Purity of their Religion and be brought back unto the Superstitions and Idolatries of the Church of Rome And by this means the People were inflamed into that Sedition which probably might have been prevented by a quicker prosecution of the Cause at the time appointed there being nothing more destructive of all publick Counsels than to let them take wind amongst the People cooled by delaies and finally blown up like a strong Fortress undermined by some subtle practice And there were some miscarriages also amongst the Prelates of the Kirk in not communicating the design with the Lords of the Council and other great men of the Realm whose Countenance both in Court and Country might have sped the business Canterbury had directed the contrary in his Letters to them when the first draughts of the Liturgy were in preparation and seems not well pleased in another of his to the Archbishop of St. Andrews bearing date September 4. that his advice in it was not followed nor the whole body of the Council made acquainted with their Resolutions or their advice taken or their power called in for their assistance till it was too late It was complained of also by some of the Bishops that they were made strangers to the business who in all Reason ought to have been trusted with the knowledge of that intention which could not otherwise than by their diligence and endeavours amongst their Clergy be brought to a happy execution Nor was there any care taken to adulce the Ministers to gain them to the Cause by fair hopes and promises and thereby to take off the edge of such Leading men as had an influence on the rest as if the work were able to carry on it self or have so much Divine assistance as countervailed the want of all helps from man And which perhaps conduced as much to the destruction of the Service as all the rest a publick intimation must be made in all their Churches on the Sunday before that the Liturgie should be read on the Lords day following of purpose as it were to unite all such as were not well affected to it to disturb the same And there were some miscarriages also which may be looked on as Accessories after the Fact by which the mischief grew remediless and the malady almost incurable For first the Archbishops and Bishops most concerned in it when they saw what hapned consulted by themselves apart and sent up to the King without calling a Council or joyning the Lay Lords with them whereas all had been little enough in a business of that nature and so much opposed by such Factious persons as gathered themselves on purpose together at Edenborough to disturb the Service A particular in which the Lay Lords could not be engaged too far if they had been treated as they ought But having run upon this error they committed a worse in leaving Edenborough to it self and retiring every one to his own Diocess except those of Galloway and Dumblaine For certainly they must needs think as Canterbury writes in one of his Letters to Traquaire that the Adverse party would make use of the present time to put further difficulties upon the work and therefore that they should have been as careful to uphold it the Bishop of Ross especially whose hand had been as much in it as the most But possibly the Bishops might conceive the place to be unsecure and therefore could not stay with safety neither the Lords of the Council nor the Magistrates of the City having taken any course to bring the chief Ringleaders of the Tumult to the Bar of Justice which must needs animate all disaffected and seditious persons and almost break the hearts of those who were well enclined And such indeed was the neglect of the Civil Magistrate that we hear of no man punished scarce so much as questioned for so great a Riot as was not to be expiated but by the death or some proportionable punishment of the chief offenders Which had it been inflicted on some three or four for a terror to others it might have kept that City quiet and the whole Kingdom in obedience for the time to come to the saving of the lives of many thousands some hundreds of thousands at the least in all the three Kingdoms most miserably lost in those long and cruel Wars which ensued upon it But the Lords of Scotland were so far from looking before them that they took care only for the present and instead of executing Justice on the Malefactors suspended the Liturgie it self as the cause of the Tumult conceiving it a safer way to calm the differences than to encrease the storm by a more rigorous and strict proceeding All that they did in order to his Majesties Service or the Churches peace was the calling in of a scandalous Pamphlet entituled A dispute against the English Popish Ceremonies obtruded on the Kirk of Scotland which not being done till October 20 following rather declared their willingness to suffer the said Book to be first dispersed and set abroad then to be called in and suppressed Nor seemed the business to be much taken to heart in the Court of England from whom the Scots expected to receive Directions Nor Order given them for unsheathing the Sword of Justice to cut off such unsound and putrified Members which might have saved the whole Body from a Gangreen the drawing of some Blood in the Body Politick by the punishment of Malefactors being like letting Blood in the Body Natural which in some strong Distempers doth preserve the whole Or granting that the Tumult
had been grown so high and so strongly backed that Justice could not safely have been done upon them a way might have been found to have cooled the Fever without loss of Blood by bringing the whole Corporation under the danger of a forfeiture of their Lands and Liberties in a Legal way which course proved so successful unto King IAMES on the like occasion Anno 1597. Or finally supposing that the Cause admitted not such a long delay if then his Majesty had but sent a Squadron of the Royal Navy which he had at Sea to block up their Haven he had soon brought the Edenburghers unto his devotion and consequently kept all the rest of the Kingdom in a safe Obedience This was the way to keep them under and of this course the People of the City were more afraid than of any other Somewhat they are to do which might make his Majesty hope better of them than they had deserved and nothing they could do which might better please him than to express their chearfulness in admitting the Liturgie To this end they addressed their Letters to the Archbishop of Canterbury as more concerned in this Affair than any other of the Lords which were neer his Majesty expressing in the same their great dislike of the late Tumult for their Innocency therein they refer themselves to his Majesties Council in that Kingdom declaring further their concurrence with the Bishops which remained in the City and the Ministry of the same for settling the Service-Book and offering Means above their Power to such as should undertake the Reading of it and finally desiring his Grace to make known to his Majesty how ready they were at all points to advance the Service which they promised to accept as an accumulation of his Graces Favours unto them and their City And that this Letter of theirs which bears date the nineteenth of August might bear the greater credit with him they did not only seem industrious for the apprehending of some and the inquiring after others of the Principal Actors but bound themselves by an Obligatory Act of the Common-Council both for the Indempnity and Maintenance of such as should read the Book the Ministers of Edenborough refusing to do their parts in it without such Encouragements But the danger was no sooner over by the coming home of the Fleet but they Petitioned the Lords of the Council to put them into the same condition with the rest of the Subjects and that the Service-Book should be no further pressed on them than it had been in all the other parts of the Kingdom To which they were encouraged by a general confluence of all sorts of People such most especially as had most shewn their disaffection to the work in hand For the Harvest was no sooner in and the People at more leisure than before to pursue that Quarrel but the City swarmed with throngs of People from all parts even to a formidable number which moved the Lords to publish two Proclamations on the seventeenth of October The first commanding all of them to repair to their Dwellings except such as should shew sufficient reason for their stay and continuance there The second for Adjourning the Sessions from Edenborough to the Town of Linlithgow But this served rather like the powring on of Oyl to encrease the Flame than of Water to quench it For the next day the Bishop of Galloway being to Sit with the Lord Chief Justice upon some especial Business in the Council-House he was pursued all along the Street with bitter Railings to the very Door and being drawn in from the rage of the People they immediately beset the House demanding the delivery of him and threatning his destruction The Earl of Traquair being advertised of the Bishops danger who formerly had been his Tutor came to his Relief and with much ado forced an Entrance thorow the Press But being got in he was in no better plight than the Bishop the Clamour still encreasing more and more and encompassing the Council-House with terrible Menaces Hereupon the Provost and City-Council was called to raise the Siege but they returned answer That their condition was the same for they were surrounded with the like Multitude who had enforced them for fear of their Lives to sign a Paper importing First That they should adhere to them in opposition to the Service-Book Secondly To restore to their Places Ramsey and Rollock two Silenced Ministers and one Henderson a Silenced Reader No better Answer being returned the Lord Treasurer with the Earl of Wigton went in Person to the Town-Council-House where they found the heat of the fury somewhat abated because the Magistrates had signed the Paper and returned with some hope that the Magistrates would calm the Disorders about the Council-House so as the Bishop might be preserved But they no sooner presented themselves to the Great Street than they were most boysterously assaulted the Throng being so furious as they pulled down the Lord Treasurer took away his Hat Cloack and White Staff and so haled him to the Council-House The Lords seeing themselves in so great danger at length pitch upon the best expedient for their safety and sent to some of the Noblemen and Gentry who were disaffected to the Service-Book to come to their Aid These Lords and Gentlemen came as was desired and offered both their Persons and Power to protect them which the Lords and the Council-House readily embraced and so were quietly guarded to Holy-Rood-House and the Bishop to his Lodging The Lords of the Council not thinking themselves to be secure published a Proclamation the same day in the afternoon for repressing such Disorders for the time to come But they found slender Obedience yielded to it Commissioners being sent unto them from the Citizens in an insolent manner for demanding the Restitution of their Ministers to their Place and Function and performing all such Matters as had been agreed on at the Pacification These Riots and Seditions might have served sufficiently in another Reign to have drawn a present War upon them before they were provided in the least degree to make any resistance But the Edenburghers knew well enough what they were to do what Friends they had about the King and what a Party they had got among the Lords of his Council which Governed the Affairs of that Kingdom And they were apt enough to hope by the unpunishing of the first Tumult on Iuly 23. That the King might rather have patience enough to bear such Indignities than Resolution to revenge them so that he came at last to that perplexity which a good Author speaks of That he must either out-go his Nature or fore-go his Authority For instead of using his just Power to correct their Insolencies he courts them with his Gracious Proclamation of the seventh of December in which he lets them know How unwilling he was that his Loyal and Faithful Subjects should be possessed with groundless and unnecessary doubts and fears touching
of the Kingdom honoured him with the Order of the Garter and made him one of the Lords of his Privy Council so that no greater characters of Power and Favour could be imprinted on a Subject The Office of Lieutenant General he had committed unto the Earl of Strafford Lord Lieutenant of Ireland of whose Fidelity and Courage he could make no question And the Command of the Horse to Edward Lord Conway whose Father had been raised by King Iames from a private condition to be one of his principal Secretaries and a Peer of the Realm Of which three great Commanders it was observed that one had sufficient health but had no will to the business That another had a good will to it but wanted health and that a third had neither the one nor the other And yet as crasie and infirm as the Earl of Strafford found himself he chearfully undertook the charge of the Army in the Generals absâ—nce and signified by Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury that he durst venture upon the peril of his head to drive the Scots out of England but that he did not hold it Counsellable as the case then stood If any other of the Lords had advised the King to try his Fortune in a Battel he doubted not of sending them home in more haste than they came but the Scots had rendred him unfit to make the motion for fear it might be thought that he studied more his own Concernments than he did the Kings For these Invadors finding by whose Counsels his Majesty governed his Affairs resolved to draw them into discredit both with Prince and People And to that end it was declared in a Remonstrance publisht before their taking Arms That their Propositions and Desires so necessary and vital unto that Kingdom could find no access unto the ears of the gracious King by reason of the powerful Diversion of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Deputy of Ireland who strengthned with the high and mighty Faction of Papists near his Majesty did only side in all matters of Temporal and Spiritual affairs making the necessity of their Service to his Majesty to appear in being the only fit Instruments under the pretext of vindicating his Majesties Honour to oppress both the just Liberties of his Free Subjects and the true Reformed Religion in all his Kingdoms Seconding this Remonstrance with another Pamphlet called The Intention of the Army they signified therein to the good People of England that they had no design either to waste their Goods or spoyl their Country but only to become Petitioners to his Sacred Majesty to call a Parliament and to bring the said Archbishop and Lord Lieutenant to their condign Punishments In which those modest men express That as they desired the unworthy Authors of their trouble who had come out from themselves to be tried at home according to their own Laws so they would press no further Process against Canterbury and the Lieutenant of Ireland and the rest of those pernicious Counsellors in England whom they called the Authors of all the miseries of both Kingdoms than what their own Parliament should discern to be their just deserving And that the English might see the better whom they chiefly aimed at a book was published by the name of Laudensium Autocatacrisis or the Canterburians Self-conviction in which the Author of it did endeavour to prove out of the Books Speeches and Writings of the Archbishop himself as also of some Bishops and other learned men who had exercised their Pens in the late disputes That there was a strange design in hand for bringing in Superstition Popery and Arminianism to the subversion of the Gospel and of suppressing the Religion here by Law established But as these Reproaches moved not him so neither did their Remonstrance or any other of their Scribbles distract his Majesties Resolutions untill he found himself assaulted by a Petition from some Lords in the South which threatned more danger at his back than he had cause to fear from the Northern Tempest which blew directly in his teeth Complaint was made in this Petition of the many inconvenicences which had been drawn upon this Kingdom by his Majesties engagings against the Scots as also of the great encrease of Popery the pressing of the present payment of Ship-money the dissolving of former Parliaments Monopolies Innovations and some other grâ—evances amongst which the Canons which were made in the late Convocation could not be omitted For Remedy whereof his Majesty is desired to call a Parliament to bring the Authors of the said pretended grievances to a Legal Trial and to compose the present War without Bloudshed Subscribed by the Earls of Essex Hartford Rutland Bedford Exeter Warwick Moulgrave and Bullingbrooke the Lords Say Mandevil Brooke and Howard presented to the King at York on the third of September And seconded by another from the City of London to the same effect His Majesty being thus between two Milstones could find no better way to extricate himself out of these perplexities than to call the great Council of his Peers to whom at their first meeting on the 24 of the same month he signified his purpose to hold a Parliament in London on the third of November and by their Counsel entertained a Treaty with those of Scotland who building on the confidence which they had in some Lords of England had petitioned for it According unto which Advice a Commission is directed to eight Earls and as many Barons of the English Nation seven of which had subscribed the former Petition enabling them to treat with the Scots Commissioners to hear their Grievances and Demands and to report the same to his Majesty and the Lords of his Council These points being gained which the Puritan Faction in both Kingdoms had chiefly aimed at the Scots were insolent enough in their Proposals Requiring freedom of Commerce Reparation of their former Losses and most especially the maintenance of their Army at the charge of the English without which no Cessation would be harkned to Satisfaction being given them in their last Demand and good Assurances for the two first they decline York as being unsafe for their Commissioners and procure Rippon to be named for the place of the Treaty where the Lord Lieutenant was of less influence than he was at York and where being further from the King they might shuffle the Cards and play the Game to their best contentment The rest of October from the end of the first week of it when they excepted against York was drilled on in requiring that some persons of quality intrusted by the Scottish Nation might have more Offices than they had about his Majesty and the Queen and in the Court of the Prince That a Declaration might be made for naturalizing and settling the Capacities and mutual Priviledges of the Subjects in both Kingdoms but chiefly that there might be an Unity and Uniformity in Church-Government as a special means for conserving
many of his Majesties Subjects to forsake the Kingdom 12. That he had endeavoured to cause discord between the Church of England and other Reformed Churches and to that end had suppressed and abrogated the Priviledges and Immunities which had been by his Majesty and his Royal Ancestors granted to the Dutch and French Churches in this Kingdom 13. That he had endeavoured to stir up War between his Majesties Kingdoms of England and Scotland and to that end had laboured to introduce into the Kingdom of Scotland divers Innovations both in Religion and Government for their refusing whereof he first advised his Majesty to subdue them by force of Arms and afterwards to break the Pacification made between the Kingdoms forcing the Clergie to contribute toward the Maintenance of the War 14. And finally That to preserve himself from being questioned for these and oâ—her his traiterous courses he had laboured to divert the ancient course of Parliamentary Proceedings and by false and malicious slanders to â—â—cease his Majesty against Parliaments This was the substance of the Charge to which afterwards they added other which were more Particulars when they found themselves ready for his Tryal Anno 1644. and there we shall hear further of them I note here only by the way That one of those which had been added to make up the Tale and create a greater hatred of him as selling Iustice taking 〈◊〉 c. for which never any Man of Place and Power was more cleary innocent was found so far unfit for a Prosecution that it was suppressed An excellent Evidence of his Integrity and Uprightness in such a long-continued course of Power and Favour But Sorrows seldom come alone The Danger first and afterwards the questioning of so great a Prelate left the Church open to the Assaults of a potent Faction and the poor Clergy destitute of a constant Patron The first Assault against the Church was made at St. Margarets Church in Westminster on a day of Publick Humiliation November 17. the same on which the Bishop of Lincoln was â—â—â—eâ—tated with such Triumph in the Abby-Church At what time the Minister Officiating the Second Service at the Communion-Table according to the ancient Custom was unexpectedly interrupted by the naming and singing of a Psalm to the great amazement of all sober and well-minded men And at the Meeting of some Anabaptists to the number of 80. at a House in Southwark it was preached That the Statute 35 Eliz. for restraining the Queens Majesties Subjects in their due Obedience was no good Law because made by Bishops striking at once both at the Liturgie and Government of the Church by Law established The Bishops left out of the Committee for Examinations in the business of the Earl of Strafford and in all other Committees by the fraud and artifice of the Clerk of the Parliament not named in such proportion to the Temporal Peers as had been accustomed The same Clerk at the Reading of such Bills as came into that House turned his back toward them in disdain that they might not distinctly hear what he read as if their consenting or dissenting to the point in question had been judged unnecessary And to prepare the way the better for their Declination Pennington attended by some hundreds of the Raskal Rabble presents a Petition to the Commons in the name of the City of London subscribed by 15000 hands of several qualities most of them indigent in Estate and of known disaffections to the present Goverment In which Petition it was prayed That the Government of Bishops might be abolished That Rites and Ceremonies might be press'd no longer upon the consciences of the weak and that many other things at which they found themselves grieved might be also abrogated After which followed many bitter Speeches made against them by the Lord Faulkland Bagshaw White and others in the House of Commons by the Lords Say and Brook in the House of Peers by Brook alone in a Printed Pamphlet in which he reproacheth them as born of the Dregs of the People the names of the Lords Spiritual being despitefully left out of all Bills which passed this Session to shew how insignificant they were in an Act of Parliament And all this seconded by many Petitions of like nature in the name of many whole Counties and Populous Cities and in their names presented to the Houses of Parliament though the said Petitions for the most part were never either seen or heard of by the greatest and most considerable number of those in whose names they were subscribed Which coming to his Majesties knowledge he called both Houses unto Whitehall Ianuary 25. Where he informed them of the Distractions that were then occasioned through the connivence of the Parliament there being some men who more maliciously than ignorantly would put no difference between Reformation and Alâ—eration of Government from whence it came that Divine Service was irreverently interrupted and Petitions in an indirect way procured and presented That he was willing to concur with them for reforming all Innovations both in Church and Commonwealth and for reducing all things to the same condition in which they stood in the best and happiest times of Queen Elizabeth That he could not but take notice of many Petitions given in the name of divers Counties against the established Government of the Church and of the great threatnings against the Bishops That they will make them to be but Cyphers or at least their Voices to be taken away That if upon serious debate they could shâ—w him that the Bishops had some Temporal Authority not so necessary for the Government of the Church and upholding Episcopal Jurisdiction he would not be unwilling to desire them to lay it down And finally If they had encroached too much upon the Temporality he was content that all Abuses of that kind should be redressed and that he would go with them so far and no further And to say truth it concerned the King to look about him when his own Regal Power not that of the Bishops only was so openly strook at it being Preached by the said Anabaptists but the Week before That he could not make a good Law because not PERFECTLY REGENERATE and was only to 〈◊〉 in Civil Matters But all this little edified with such of the Lords and Commons as had the carrying on of the Plot against Episcopacy they â—ound the temper of the King and having got him on the Anvile they resolved to hammer him As an Expedient to the Work it was sound necessary to question and disgrace all those who either had been active in advancing those Publick Orders which were now branded by the name of Innovations or otherwise industrious in his Majesties Service some to be sacrificed to the pleasure of particular Persons others to satisfie the fury or discontentments of the People generally Of the first sort were Pocklington and Bray both Doctors in Divinity the first of late made Chaplain in Ordinary to the King the
provide them Necessaries before they would budge toward the Tweed And yet all these Temptations were not of such prevalency with the Principal Covenanters as an Assurance which was given them of calling Canterbury their supposed old Enemy to a present Tryal Who having been imprisoned upon their complaint almost three years since seems to have been preserved all this while for no other purpose than for a bait to hook them in for some new Imployments The Walls of some Confederacies like that of Catiline are never thought to be sufficiently well built but when they are cemented with bloud All matters thus resolved on the Covenant agreed on betwixt them and the Scots was solemnly taken by both Houses in St. Margarets Church and generally imposed upon all such as were obnoxious to their power and lived under the command of their Forts and Garrisons the taking whereof conduced as visibly to the destruction of this most reverend and renowned Prelate as to the present subversion of the Government and Liturgy here by Law established In the first branch it was to be covenanted and agreed between the Nations that is to say between the Puritan or Presbyterian Factions in either Kingdom That all endeavours should be used for the preservation of the Reformed Religion in the Church of Scotland both in Doctrine Worship Liturgy and Government and for bringing the three Kingdoms to the nearest Conjunction and Uniformity in Religion Confession of Faith Form of Church-Government Directory for Worship and Catechising And in the second That in like manner they endeavour without any respect of Persons the extirpation of Popery Prelacy that is Church-Government by Archbishops and Bishops their Chancellors or Commissaries Deans Deans and Chapters Archdeacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on the Hierarchy Superstition Heresie Schism Profaneness and what soever should be found contrary to sound Doctrine and the power of Godliness But all this might have been pursued to the end of the Chace without danger to the life of any whether they endeavoured it or not whether their lives might be an hindrance or their deaths give a spur to put on the work And therefore in the fourth place it was also Covenanted That they should with all diligence and faithfulness discover all such as have been or shall be Incendiaries Malignants or evil Instruments by hindring the Reformation of Religion dividing the King from his People or one of the Kingdoms from one another or making any Faction or Parties amongst the People contrary to this League and Covenant that they may be brought to publick trial and receive condign punishment as the degree of their offences shall require or deserve or the supream Judicatories of both Kingdoms respectively or others having power from them for that effect shall judge convenient Which Article seems to have been made to no other purpose but to bring the Archbishop to the Block as the like clause was thrust into the Protestation of the third of May Anno 1641. to make sure work with the Earl of Strafford whom they had then designed to the said sad end And this may be the rather thought because the Covenant was contrived and framed in Scotland where none but his sworn Enemies could be supposed to have had any hand in it and being by them so contrived was swallowed without much enewing by the Houses of Parliament who were not then in a con 〈◊〉 to deny them any thing But by whomsoever it was framed his Majesty saw well enough that it aimed at the subversion of the present Government and the diminution of his Power if not the destruction of his Person the preservation and safety whereof was to be endeavoured no further than in defence of the true Religion and Liberties of the Kingdom Which how great or little it might be or what was meant by true Religion and the publick Liberties was left wholly unto their construction who would be sure not to interpret any thing to his best advantage His Majesty therefore looking on it as a dangerous Combination against himself the established Religion and the Laws of this Kingdom for the bringing in of Foreign Forces to subvert them all interdicted all his Subjects from imposing or taking the same as they would answer the contrary at their utmost Perils Which Proclamation bearing date on the ninth of October came out too late to hinder the taking and enjoyning of this Covenant where the restraint thereof might have been most necessary For the Commons were so quick at their work that on Munday September 25. it had been solemnly taken by all the Members of that House and the Assembly of Divines at St. Margarets in Westminster in the same Church within two daies after it was administred with no less solemnity to divers Lords Knights Gentlemen Colonels Officers Souldiers and others residing in and about the City of London a Sermon being preached by Coleman though otherwise a principal Erastian in point of Government to justifie the Piety and Legality of it and finally enjoyned to be taken on the Sunday following in all Churches and Chappels of London within the Lines of Communication by all and every the Inhabitants within the same as afterward by all the Kingdom in convenient time Prosecuted in all places with such cursed rigour that all such who refused to subscribe the same and to lift up their hands to God in testimony that they called him to witness to it were turned both out of house and home as they use to say not suffered to compound for their Goods or Lands till they had submitted thereunto A terrible and wofull time in which men were not suffered to enjoy their Estates without betraying themselves to the Kings displeasure and making shipwrack of a good conscience in the sight of God Upon which ground considering it consisted of six Principal branches it was compared by some to the six knotted whip or the Statute of the six Articles in the time of King Henry viii this Covenant drawing in the Scots and thereby giving an occasion of shedding infinitely much more bloud than those Articles did Certain I am that if all such as died in the War upon that account may not go for Martyrs all such as irrecoverably lost their Estates and Livings for refusal of it may be called Confessors Others with no unhappy curiosity observing the number of the words which make up this Covenant abstracted from the Preface and Conclusion of it found them amounting in the total to 666. neither more nor less which being the number of the Beast in the Revelation pursued with such an open persecution and prosecuted to the loss of so many lives the undoing of so many Families and the subverting of the Government both of Church and State may very justly intitle it to so much of Antichrist as others have endeavoured to confer on the Popes of Rome For if the Pope shewed any thing of the Spirit of Antichrist by bringing Cranmer the first Protestant
Peers we shall see hereafter And here we leave him for a time to see how far the Scots proâ—eeded and what they did in order to the service of those that so 〈◊〉 â—ired them which might be equal to the merit of so great a Sacrifice Of whom we are to know that passing by the Town of Berwick they entred England in the middle of Ianuary with a puissant Army consisting of eighteen thousand Foot two thousand Horse and one thousand Dragoons accommodated with all things necessary for the Expedition not hindred in their March till they came almost to the River Tine where they were stopped by the interposition of the Northern Army under the Conduct and Command of the Marquiss of Newcastle but so that they remained unfought with unless it were in petit Skirmishes and Pickeerings without engaging the whole Power on either side Langdale a Gentleman of approved Valour and Fidelity was commonly reported to have been earnest with the Marquiss to give them battel or at the least to suffer him with a Party of Horse to assault them in such places where they lay most open to Advantage not doubting but to give a good account of his undertakings In all which motions and desires he is said to have been crossed by General King an old experienced Souldier but a Scot by Nation whom his Majesty had recommended to the Marquiss of Newcastle as a fit man to be consulted with in all his Enterprises and he withal took such a fancy to the man that he was guided wholly by him in all his Actions Which King if he had been imployed in any of the Southern or Western Armies he might have done his Majesty as good service as any whosoever But being in this Army to serve against the Scots his own dear Countrymen he is said to have discouraged and disswaded all attempts which were offered to be made against them giving them thereby the opportunity of gaining ground upon the English till the Marquisses retreat toward York For in the opening of the Spring News came unto the Marquiss of the taking of Selby by the Forces Garrisoned in Hull by which necessitated to put himselâ— and the greatest part of his Army into the City of York on the safety whereof the whole fortune of the North depended Followed at the heels by Lesly who notwithstanding the undeserved Honours conferred upon him by the King and his own vehement protestations of a future Loyalty commanded this third Army also as he did the two first and leaving Newcastle at his back struck like a Souldier at the head not troubling himself in taking in such places as imported nothing in reference to the main concernment Resolving on the siege of the Capital City they were seconded by the Army of the Earl of Manchester drawn out of the Associated Counties and the remaining Yorkshire Forces under the Command of the Lord Fairfax By which beleaguered on all sides that great City was reduced to some distress for want of Victuals and other necessary Ammuniâ—ion to make good the place The News whereof being brought to Oxon. Prince Rupert is dispatched with as much of the Kings Army as could well be spared with a Commission to raise more out of the Counties of Chester Stafford Darby Leicester and Lancaster so that he came before York with an Army of twelve thousand men relieved the Town with some Provisions for the present and might have gone away unfought with but that such counsel was too cold for so hot a stomack Resolved upon the onset he encountred with the Enemy at a place called Marston More where the Left Wing of his Horse gave such a fierce Charge on the Right Wing of the Enemy consisting of Fairsax his Horse in the Van and the Scots Horse in the Rear that they fell â—oul on a part of their Foot which was behind them and trod most of them under their Horses feet But Ruperts Horse followâ—â—g the Execution too â—ar and none advancing to make good tâ—â— place which they had leâ—t the Enemy had the opportunity to â—ally again and got the better of the day taking some Prisoners oâ— good notâ— and making themselves Masters of his Cannon So that not being able to do any thing in order to the regaining of the Field â—e marched off unâ—ortunatâ—ly the greatest part of his Army mouldring away he retired to Bristol After this blow the Affairs of the North growing more desperate every day than other York yielded upon Composition on Iuly 16. being a just â—ortnight after the fight tâ—e Marquiss of Newcastle and some principal Gentlemen passing over the Seas so that the strong Town of Newcastle was taken by the Scots oâ— the nineteenth of October following While these things were Acting in the North Essex and Waller with their Armies drew near to Oxford hoping to take it unprovided in the absence of so great a part of his Majesties Forces On whose approach his Majesty leaving the greatest part of his Army for defence of that place marched on directly toward Wales Upon the news whereof it was thought fit by the two Generals to divide their Armies it being agreed upon that Waller should pursue the King and that the Earl of Essex should march towards the West for the regaining of those Countries And now the Mystery of iniquity appeared in its proper colours for whereas it was formerly given 〈◊〉 by the Houses of Parliament that they had undertaken the Waâ— for no other reason but to remove the King from his evil Counsâ—llors those Evil Counsellors were left at Oxon. and the Kings Person only hunted But the King understanding of this Division â—â—ought himsâ—lf able enough to deal with Waller and giving him 〈◊〉 go-by returned towards Oxon. drew thence the remainder of 〈◊〉 Aâ—my and gave him a sharp meeting at a place called Cropready 〈◊〉 where he obtained a signal Victory on the twenty eighth of Iunâ— and entred triumphantly into Oxon. This done he marched after tâ—e Earl of Essex who had made himself Master of some places in the West of good importance During this March it hapned that one of the Carriages brake in a long narrow Lane which they were to pass and gave his Majesty a stop at a time of an intolerable 〈…〉 Rain which fell upon him Some of his â—word and 〈…〉 were about him offered to hew him out a way through 〈…〉 with their â—words that he might get shelter in some of the Villages adjoyning but he Resolved not to forsake his Cannon upon any occasion At which when some about him seemed to admire and marvelled at the patience which he shewed in that Extremity his Majesty lifting up his Hat made Answer That as God had given him afflictions to exercise his patience so he had given him patience to bear his afflictions The carriage being mended he went forward again and trode so close upon the heels of Essex that at last he drave him into Cornwall and there reduced him to that