mean the infirmities of it if they live to be an hundred years Old so certainly Conscience will call Men to an account if not in Health yet in Sickness if not Living yet Dying yea if not dying so soon as they are Dead for Conscience is a King that never Dies as they say in Law Rex nunquam moritur And they will find it in the next World by the Name and Nature of a Never dying Worm and as the Proverb saith Nullum Tempus occurrâ—t Regi The Kings time never lapseth Some Men will find that Conscience hath not lapsed or lost any time like Creditors that lose their Debts and Priviledge of suing for them for want of demanding them within such a term of years but will recover all its Arrears and sue them till they have paid the uttermost farthing We proceed in the next place to the Eighth Query which I proposed to speak of viz. The Quomodo Or how and in what manner it is thas Conscience doth use to smite men for sin To which I answer That Conscience doth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 at sundry times and in divers manners First of all Conscience doth sometimes smite men very gently and easily with light and soft touches as Old Ely did his Sons when he said It is not a good report which I hear of you my Sons you make the Lords People to transgress 1 Sam. 2. Chap. v. 24. It whips Men sometimes as Mothers use to do their Infant Children with a small Twig and a soft hand whereby they are rather scared than hurt and toucheth them with that tenderness as one would touch the Apple of ones Eye But Secondly Conscience doth many times correct Men smartly smite them severely yet not so but that they are able to bear it as you shall hear some Men say of those fits of the Stone Gout or Collick which they have felt that they were very painful indeed but they thank God such as they were able to undergo and but able It is as much as ever some Men can do to bear that burthen of a wounded Conscience which lies upon them but they make a hard shift with much a-do rub along a little more weight added to them would sink and over-whelm them their Consciences correct them in full measure though not above measure and this it may be is the case of thousands their Consciences give them their full Dose though they destroy them not with a Hypercatharsis Thirdly But some there are a case two frequent in the World though not so common as the former whose Consciences do smite them Ad extremum viriuna and lay on upon them with all their might whose Conscience thunder and lighten upon them as God did upon the Israelites from Mount Sinai Exodus 19.16 And it came to pass that there were Thunder and Lightnings and a thick Cloud upon the Mount and the Voice of the Trumpet exceeding loud so that all the People that was in the Camp trembled and Mount Sinai was altogether on a Smoak because the Lord descended upon it in Fire the Smoak thereof ascended as the Smoak of a Furnace and the whole Mount quaked greatly With such like Terrour so far as a Creature may imitate his Creator so doth Conscience sometimes cloath it self If a Beast doth but touch the Mountain to allude to the passages at Mount Sinai it is stoned or struck through with a Dart Heb. 12.20 I mean if a bruitish thought do but touch a mans mind so terrible is the sight thereof as aggravated by Conscience that he may say as Moses 21. I exceedingly quake Look with how grim a Countenance and with how incens'd a Heart Ahasuerus lookt upon Haman when coming out of his Garden he found that proud Traytor fallen upon the Bed where Hester his Queen was and said of him Will he force the Queen also before me in the House Hester 7.8 With such an aspect and with such a rage doth Conscience accost some Men cause their Faces to be covered presently with shame and confusion Doth it not fall upon some Men like a Bear robbed of her Whelps or like a Man under Jealousie upon him whom he suspects Of which Solomon saith It is the rage of a Man he will not spare in the day of his wrath Conscience seems sometimes to vie with Death in the point of Terror and to make it self more a King of Terrors than he for Sin is the sting of Death and Conscience is as it were the sting of Sin That Death is less terrible than an inraged Conscience is manifest because thousands fly or have fled from a pursuant Conscience to hide themselves in the valley of the shadow of Death and have chosen rather to fall into their own Bloody and Murtherous Hands than to remain in the hands of Conscience How many pursued by Conscience have repaired to a Melancholly Beam as one calls it or any thing they could make a Gallows of as it were to a City of Refuge or to the Horns of an Altar that is have chosen strangling rather than life The Jews allow but Thirty nine Stripes to be given even to Malefactors 1 Cor. 11. But Conscience will give Thousands and Millions fetching Blood at every stroak Stone Collick Strangury are the names of three little Tortures compared to that of a wounded and wounding Conscience for so it is that a wounded Conscience will wound if we wound it it will wound us that ever Gnawing Worm if we tread upon it will surely turn again Nothing can make the Torment of Racking and Burning seem small but the greater Torment of a Tormenting Conscience All I have said is easie to believe if we but consider some men have preferred Hell it self before the smitings of an incensed Conscience so Judas when he went and hanged himself though others it may be have been preverted from doing the same thing chiefly by considering that what is said of God may as truly be said of and to Conscience Psal 139. If I make my Bed in Hell behold thou art there Some it may be fear that never dying Worm in Hell more than the Fire and Brimstone we read of as supposing that the Torments of Conscience are all in all as to the Pena sensus or the positive Punishment which the damned do there undergo Say not the Lion is not so terrible as he is Painted or Conscience as I have described it for it alone can tell thee how terrible it is Of it as of the great God may be said Who knoweth the power of his wrath according to his fear so is his wrath The terrors of Conscience are as boundless as the extent of Fear which is a passion that knows no limits The Sea is bounded by Sands but the dreads of Conscience hardly by any thing no Boanarges or Son of Thunder like to Conscience no high Court of Justice nor yet of Injustice so terrible as that Two Witnesses serve in other Courts Conscience is a
rather to scare men than to hurt them and causeth Conscience to smite them that if that will serve the turn he may hold his hand for it is better to fall into the hand of Conscience than into the hand of God If God had not such a witness as Conscience is how could he convict men at the day of Judgment of secret sins as the Text saith God will bring every secret thing to light whether it be good or whether it be evil and in the 1 Corinth 4.5 is said God will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and make manifest the counsels of the heart What but Conscience can witness against Men at the day of Judgment their Heart Murthers Heart Adulteries as Solomon said to Shimei 1 Kings 2.44 Thou knowest all the wickedness which thy Heart is privy to Now Conscience is such a witness as none can withstand or deny its testimony If two credible witnesses are sufficient even in matter of Life and Death much more Conscience which is a thousand witnesses Hence it is that we read of him who coming to a Wedding Feast without a Wedding Garment that when the King said unto him Friend How camest thou in hither not having a Wedding Garment he was speechless Matth. 22.12 Hence also we read of Every Mouth being stopt and all the World becoming guilty before God Rom. 3.19 Hence it was that no reply was made to our Saviour when he said He that wâ—â— without sin let him cast the first stone at her for the Text saith John 8.9 They which heard it being convicted in their own Consciences went out one by one Now whereas some are brought in pleading thus for themselves at the day of Judgement When did we see thee Hungry and fed thee not Naked and clothed thee not Sick and in Prison and did not administer unto thee Matth. 25.44 The reason is because they knew not that which Christ tells them of in the next verse In as much as you did it not to one of the least of these you did it not to me If their Consciences had been sooner convicted of their unkindness to their Saviour expressed in their unkindness to his Disciples and Followers they would not have had one word to say for themselves or presumed to open their Mouths It can never be doubted whether the Message were left with those Persons whom Conscience was appointed to warn because Conscience alwayes speaks with the Parties themselves and leaves its errand in their own Breasts Indeed when Christ shall come to judge the World it is said He will come like a Thief in the night Yea when God comes to ruine Persons or Nations after fair warnings given but never taken he oft-times doth it suddenly Hence Destruction is said to come as a whirlwind or as sorrow upâ—n a Woman in Travel who are sometimes never better at ease or more light-some or cheerful than just before their Pains hence those words of Solomon Prov. 29.1 He that being often reproved hardeneth his Neck shall suddenly be destroyed and that without remedy There we read indeed of sudden destruction but of frequent reproof going before it Now Conscience is the great Reprover and a man is never throughly convicted as to himself till he be so of his own Conscience so I have done with the first use Second Vse The next Use or Corollary is this If Conscience be such a Smiter as hath been shewed then it is no argument that sinners scape scot-free or go unpunished because their sins do not go before to Judgment that is are kept secret from men and consequently exempted from Humane Punishment Pain and Shame because it is Punishment enough God wot for a Man to run the Gantlet and undergo the Rack of his own Conscience If God shall but say take him Conscience take him by the Throat clap Irons upon him throw him in thy Dungeon feed him with the Bread of Spiritual Affliction and give him those Waters to drink which are more bitter than the Waters of Marah If the great Judge shall thus deliver up a man to the severest of Jaylors and say throw him in Prison and give him no hope to come out till he pay the utmost farthing Handle him as thou didst Cain Judas Francis Spira for thou canst do it teach him as Gideon taught the Men of Succoth with Bryers and Thorns tear him in pieces and let none deliver him Psal 15.22 If such a sentence as that shall come forth from the great God he upon whom it is past needs no Poverty no loss of near and dear Relations no Bodily Sickness or Pain no Temporal Prison no Reproach or Disgrace from Men to make him miserable nay he shall be so in spight of Riches Honour Power the best of Wives and Children the kindest of Relations and Friends and what ever else this World can give him he shall tremble as did Belshazzar even when quaffing and carouzing with all his Friends about him he shall fit Uneasie and as it were upon Thorns though he sit upon a Throne with his Crown on his Head and his Scepter in his Hand and Thousands of Nobles standing bare before him he shall not be heartily merry though upon his Wedding day nor at the Birth and Baptizing of a brave Son long desired nor at a Prince-like Feast when he hath all his Kindred and Friends about him the rarest Wines shall not be able to make him merry till they have made him not himself and then how he can be said to be merry who is not himself I know not Wine commonly makes the Brute or Brutal part of Man merry but what is that to the Man or to the Soul of Man which is himself God knows if Conscience be wounded a Man can possess no Mirth but what is rather to be called Madness or like the Laughter or Dancing of those who are stung with a Tarantula and let the Beast or Beastial part of Man be never so Brisk and Jocond that which is properly called the Soul viz. The Humane rational Soul or Spirit of a Man intermeddles not with its joys which makes me think of the Apostles words The Widow which liveth in Pleasure is Dead while she lives for what is Death but a separation of Soul and Body and in this case Soul and Body are separated for her animated Body hath Pleasure but her Soul hath none Reader If thou hadst ever known what the smitings of Conscience mean I need not tell thee that they are sufficient to give a man a very Hell upon Earth whilst they who behold his outward Prosperity not knowing where the Shooe pinches him do think him as it were in Heaven if there be any such thing as Heaven upon Earth So I have done with the second Vse The Third Vse is this If Conscience be so great and terrible a smiter it must needs be great folly in Men needlesly to provoke and inrage it as too many do from day to
will not so much as bark Or what does a Sword signifie if it be rusty and has lost all its edge Chyrurgeons can asill spare their smarting as their healing Plaisters because proud Flesh must be taken off by Corrosives Give me a Fever rather than a Lethargy sith it is the manner of Physicians to cure Men of Lethargies by casting them into Fevers It is better to be blistered than stupified therefore Epispastick Plaisters are applied when stupefaction is feared but especially when incumbent Let my Conscience rather raise Blisters on me from Head to Foot than suffer me to fall into a dead sleep of Security and fall into Hell in a Golden Dream of Heaven and Happiness Now that Conscience may be in smiteing case as the matter shall require and have that sharp edge which is due to it take the following directions Dir. 1. Keep the Eye of Conscience alwayes open and clear that it may be able to see when cause is given to smite The will indeed is Coeca potentia a blind faculty truly so called and if not led by the understanding will fall into many a Ditch hence 't is commonly said that Voluntas sequitur ultimum dictamen intellectus practici But as for the Conscience that to be sure ought to be no blind faculty for that is understanding it self therefore called Intellectus practicus it does belong to it not to be led but to lead it is the very eye of a Soul I had almost said the very Apple of its Eye therefore let not so much as a Mote get into it to dim and obscure it Direct 2. Keep alwayes a tenderness upon thy Conscience though not a perplexing scrupulousness What said God to Josiah 2 Kings 22.19 Because thine heart was tender I also have heard thee saith the Lord c. A tender Conscience is soon wounded and a Conscience that is wounded will certainly wound and smite Conscience of all things is not to be exposed to hardship for what Divines say of the Holy Ghost viz. That Spiritus Dei estres delicatula That he is a tender thing soon grieved and quenched The same in its measure may be said of Conscience it is a most tender thing 'T is preternatural when those parts of the Body that ought to be soft and tender become hard and callous as when a Mans Kidneys become petrified and turned into meer Stones so it is when the heart of a Man becomes a heart of stone which ought to be a Heart of Flesh Direct 3. Labour to escape the frequent and more fervent smitings of Conscience for by means of them it is that the hearts of Men become perfectly hardned Just like School-Boys who having often felt the smart of the Rod or Ferula and are feeling of it from day to day are wont to despise those Corrections and to become Rod and Ferulâ— Direct 4. Encourage Conscience to smite thee by mending upon it as often as it tells thee thy faults remembring that passage Job 34.31 32. Surely it is meet to be said unto God I have born chastisement I will not offend any more that which I see not teach thou me if I have done iniquity I will do no more Conscience will have little heart to smite a man any more but rather consent that he be reserved to the day of Judgment to be punished if when smitten he revolt more and more and if he be not manifestly worse is not one jot the better for all its smitings Direct 5. Be much in contemplation of Death and Judgment and of the world to come or if thou wilt of the quatuor novissima or the four last things viz. Death Judgment Heaven and Hell for they are as it were the four wheels which draw the Chariot of Conscience and when they or any of them is quite taken off Conscience draws but heavily Commend me to the good man that said I bless God I carry my dying thoughts always about me and do use to try my most solemn enterprises by the touch-stone of this question Will this or that give me comfort when I come to die How will Conscience look upon this or that through the perspective of Death and approaching Judgment To think often of our dying and coming to judgment is an excellent way to keep our Consciences alive and awake and in smiting case so I have done with the 5. Direction and 4. Use The 5. Vse or Corollary is this Sith Conscience is so terrible a Smiter and so like to the Hand and Rod of Moses which could fetch Water out of a Rock as has been shewed it behoves every Man to stand in Awe of his own Conscience and to take that advice as in reference to God himself viz. Stand in awe and sin not It was an old and a good saying Dâ—sce revereri teipsum That is That a Man should learn to reverence respect and dread himself Sure I am There is no part of a Mans self which he ought more or yet so much to dread as his Conscience But for Conscience no one faculty in the Soul of Man would be terrible to him nor yet all his faculties put together but Conscience infuseth terrour into every one of them Who could not look upon the Register of his Memory without any trouble or fear were it not that Conscience did severely reflect upon the evil action therein registred Who could not exercise his speculative understanding in contemplating the worst things he hath done without regret or remorse were it not that Conscience that Practical Intellect did make such terrible use of them Who could not disport himself with his Fantasie and Imagination and pleasantly act over all his former enormities upon that stage were it not for Conscience that is apt to spoil the Sport to look a Man out of Countenance and to speak to him in those words of Solomon Eccles 11.9 Rejoyce O Young Man in thy Youth and let thy Heart cheer thee in the days of thy Youth and walk in the wayes of thine heart and in the sight of thine eyes but know thou that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment They had wont to say Cave Cato videt Take heed Cato sees you But I say Cave Conscientia videt Take heed Conscience sees you get out of Consciences sight if you can and do your worst but I had almost said you may as easily fly from God himself who is Omnipresent as from Conscience which is Gods Deputy though it be not every where present as God is and present to all Creatures as God is yet it is present to every Mans self and I was about to say of it in reference to every Mans Soul as is said of the Soul in reference to the Body that Conscientia est tota in toto tota in qualibet parte That is Intirely in all and every part and faculty of the Soul Say often to thy self It is more to me that my Conscience is privy to
what I do though all the World besides be ignorant of it than if all the World besides knew it and my own Conscience knew nothing of it for if Conscience be disposed to take vengeance on me and to call me to a strict account for what I have done I know it can create punishments for me beyond all that men can inflict or that can be inflicted by any hands save his who is able to cast Soul and Body into Hell Fire and in that regard is the onely Person whom I ought to dread and reverence more than my own Conscience for as Self Murther is the worst and cruellest of all Murthers so Self-smitings and what are they but reflections of Conscience are the terriblest of all smiteings They are those Arrows of the Almighty that stick in Mens hearts and the venom thereof drinketh up their Spirits What pity is it that many men never learn to fear themselves enough till they come to feel themselves so sharp upon and so uneasie to themselves that they can bear it no longer that they seem a greater Hell to themselves than Hell it self would be which was Spira's case It is one good answer wherewith to stop the mouth of the tempter How can I do this wickedness and sin against my own Conscience How can I look my Conscience in the face if I comply with such a temptation or rather how dreadfully will Conscience stare me in the face when I have done it I had rather displease the whole World than displease that part of my self which is called Conscience for if that once be angry and continue so I shall have no joy in my Life all my comforts will be imbittered it will give me for Beauty Ashes for the Oyl of Joy Mourning for the Garment of Praise the Spirit of Heaviness it will be Colloquintida or Death in the pot of all my Injoyments They feel Conscience least who fear it most and they who in one sense are most afraid of Conscience are usually least hurt by it as Parents love not to strike those Children whom they can sufficiently over-awe and deter from mis-doing without striking them So I have done with the 5. Vse A Sixth shall be this Sith Conscience is so dreadful a Smiter it must needs be every mans concern to maintain Peace Amity and a good Correspondence with his own Conscience that it may either not smite him at all or in measure so as he may be able to bear it staying if I may so speak its rough Wind in the day of the East-wind not thrashing out the Fitches with a thrashing Instrument nor turning about the Cart Wheel upon the Cummin but beating out the Fitches with a Staff and the Cummin with the Rod To allude to what is said of God Isaiah 28.27 Correct him but in measure though it leave him not altogether unpunished as God promised his People Jer. 30.11 School Boys who have Masters eminently severe are concerned to make as few faults as ever they can and to please them as much as ever lies in their power as ever they hope to sleep in a whole skin such a Master is Conscience if it set on Now the way to give it content and to keep it quiet with us is as followeth Direct 1. See that Conscience it self be well advised and informed like a Jury that have received full instructions from the Judge else it may chance to chide us sometimes upon pure mistake as the weakest People are usually the most querulous What serves the Word of God for what more proper use can be made of pious and able Ministers of our acquantance with Judicious and experienced Christians than that by the help of all these our Consciences might be guided into the way of truth Neither is it easie for us to imagine that in case we did use all these means to inform our Consciences aright that God would suffer them to err in any great and dangerous instances Direct 2. When we have got our Consciences well advised our next business should be to consult and advise with our Consciences When Conscience hath heard what God hath to say to it we should hear what Conscience had to say to us As God gave his Law to Moses and Moses to his People so God speaks first to Conscience or gives his Law to Conscience and Conscience in Gods Name gives Law to us If we pay not that respect to our Consciences to consult with them they will never be at peace with us but think themselves slighted and affronted Conscience expects that every Man should say to it By your leave and may it stand with your good liking before he enterpriseth any matter of concernment When a Man hath any thing in design the first question to be asked is Is it lawful to be done And of whom should a Man ask that but of his Conscience leaving thar to inform it self the best it can by all the wayes and means aforesaid For as God took it ill when the Israelites sate down to eat and drink with the Gibeonites and asked not Counsel of the Lord So will Conscience when we do any thing of importance and do not first ask its Counsel and repair to it as to an Oracle Direct 3. If thou wouldst not have Conscience smite thee then when Conscience is yet in doubt and suspence be thou in suspence also suspend acting till Conscience become resolved according to that good old saying Quod dubitas ne facias Remembring the Apostles Words He that doubteth is damned if he eat because he eateth not of faith for whatsoever is not of faith is sin Rom. 14.23 As also the Exhortation which the same Apostle giveth v. 5. Let every man be fully perswaded or assured in his own mind Meaning of the lawfulness of that which he taketh in hand He that would maintain peace and friendship betwixt Conscience and himself or rather that would have his Conscience good friends with him let him await the full resolution and satisfaction of Conscience before he presumes to act Direct 4. He that would escape the severe stroaks and smitings of Conscience let him take heed of doing any thing contrary to the express distates and commands of thereof of going if I may so express it to Tarshish as did Jonah when Conscience would send him to Nineveh of going to the West when the Commission which he hath received is for the East Conscience is very impatient of being contradicted and that Men and Women should proceed point blank contrary to its Counsel and Command Next to that indignation wherewith you may imagine the great God resented it when the Israelites of old made this stubborn reply to his Prophet Jeremy Jer. 44.16 viz. As for the Word that thou hast spoken to us in the name of the Lord we will not hearken unto thee but we will certainly do whatsoever thing goes forth out of our own Mouth to burn Incense unto the Queen of Heaven c.
he was besieged by Omri and saw that the City was taken he went into the Pallace and burnt the Kings House over him and died 1 Kings 16.18 How sped the Servants of Amon King of Judah who murthered him in his House See 2 Kings 21.24 And the People of the Land slew all them that had conspired against King Amon and made Josiah his Son King in his stead Joash his Servants conspired against him and slew him 2 Chron. 24.25 which was a most just thing on Gods part to avenge the Blood of the Sons of Jehoiada the Priest v. 25. but how came they off see 2 Chron. 25.3 When the Kingdom was established to him he i. e. Amaziah slew his Servants that had beheaded the King his Father If the Murtherers of private persons be now and then reserved to the judgment of the great day to be punished yet Divine Justice and Vengeance as if more concerned about the death of Princes than of Private Persons by the instances fore-cited seems to have alwayes overtaken those even in this Life who have spilt the Blood of Kings as Water upon the Ground Whence is easie to infer that though Homicide be a very great sin yet Regicide is greater and that he was a King whom the Men I am writing of put to death no man ever doubted Seventhly Neither was it Regicide only or the murthering of one who was meerly a King of which these men were guilty but also Justicidium or the murthering of a good King Who knows not that the wilful murthering of any man though a bad yea though the worst of men is a great and crying sin but the murthering of a good and vertuous man a man of a thousand is worse than that and beyond either of them is the murthering of a good and excellent King yea of one of the best Kings in the World which is the case before us Now by how much better the murthered person was by so much worse was the murther for Corruptio optimi est pessima is a never failing rule I dare not apply to this occasion those words of St. Peter Acts 3.14 Ye denied the holy one and the just because they are peculiar to our Saviour who is the holy and the just one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and there is no man so besides him but that the martyred King was a man of great vertue is I think as generally acknowledged by them that either knew him or have seen what is in History concerning him as almost any thing is Who could ever taxe him with Intemperance more or less Who knew not the greatness of his Patience under his unparallell'd Sufferings his professed forgiveness of his most provoking enemies Who ever did read more Divine Lines more pious Contemplations dropping from the Pen of any afflicted Prince than his incomparable and unimitable Book doth contain But it will not stand with the brevity here intended or with the Symmetry of this part with the rest of this Book to write a History in this place of that renowned Kings Vertues but he that shall read his Life excellently written as it is by Dr. Perringshief and others if he have any faith in Histories as what wise men hath not some will not as much admire the greatness of his Vertues as the barbarousness of his Sufferings and both together most of all Herein appeared the barbarousness of his murtherers that they could find in their hearts to use a Prince so immensely ill who deserved so excellently well The Apostle saith Rom. 5.7 Paradventure for a good man some would even dare to die Were they Men or Monsters or Devils incarnate or what were they then who instead of dying for a good man put a good man to death An untimely death I had almost call'd it a shameful death for so it in true tended but that I know no shame was in martyrdom If any man doubt the piety of that Martyr and the tenderness of his Conscience let him but read the 2. chap. in his excellent Book viz. upon the Earl of Strafford 's death Because when almost wearied out of his life by the importunity of those that he believed did wish him well and us'd it as a Maxime Better one man perish though unjustly than the people be displeased or destroy'd he had complied to sign a Bill against the Earl of Strafford's life though without plenary consent to his destruction as he himself saith Lord how uneasie was his Consciscience Reader forbear weeping if thou canst when thou readest those melting warning words of his I see it a bad Exchange to wound a man 's own Conscience thereby to salve State-sores to calm the storms of Popular discontents by stirring up a tempest in a man 's own bosom But I will not prevent thy reading of that whole most excellent Chapter which may almost warrant us to call him A father of Penitents as Abraham was called A father of the Faithful I shall conclude this seventh Article of my charge against the Murtherers of King Charles the First with a short reflexion upon David's words to Baanah and Rechab who cut off the head of Ishbosheth and brought it to him looking for a reward 2 Sam. 4.11 How much more when wicked men have slain a righteous person shall not I require his blood of your hand and take you away from the earth As if David had said for that he meant Saul was a wicked King an enemy to God as well as me and yet when one told me saying Behold Saul is dead viz. the Amalekite who said he slew him by his own command to put him out of pain 2 Sam. 1.10 I took hold of him and slew him who thought I would have given him a reward for his tidings If he were worthy of death who only reported himself upon a pick-thankly account to have kill'd Saul who seem'd otherwise about to kill himself and at his own appointment who was then full of anguish though Saul was a very wicked man as aforesaid what have they deserv'd who beheaded a virtuous King sore against his will and best endeavours to the contrary and that with many circumstances of barbarity as you will hear hereafter And so I proceed to the eighth Article wherewith I charge the said King's Judges viz. Hypocrisie I say with great Hypocrisie practized in that fact It was Homicidium maxime Hypocriticum It was even the Master-piece of Hypocrisie and the grandest Cheat under the Notion of Piety that ever was imposed upon the world Now all Hypocrisie is a perfect Lye and the fault that needs a Lye grows two thereby as Mr. Herbert tells us Who that understands the intrigue of that Business do's not cry out Tantum Religio potuit suadere malorum Could such a Monster spring from the Womb of Religion Who laid that Brat at her Door For it was none of hers So Politicians talk most of Religion when they mean nothing less as if they would compensate by taking God