will it excuse her to say that they were châ—â—â—y at least the Sanguinous 〈◊〉 of them â—â—r our Gaols themselves sometimes have been scarce able to contain the Thousands that at one time have groaned 〈◊〉 her heâ— knâ—tâ—est Thoâ—gs her Haltâ—â—â— and Axâ—â— only excepted Enacted Interrorem as being but seldom put in Execution as if a deliberate studied Ill aggravated with the Formality of Justice and in the pretended cause of Heaven were therefore more excusable because commited supposed but once in an Age when a foul Act for that very cause should rather appear the more deform'd as t is the rarity that makes the Monster Besides Queen Mary had that plea to make for what were Two hundred and sixty Protestants even by Foxes Muster-Roll Burnt for Religion in her five years Reign to the some Millions of Protestants in those days when haâ—f the Kingdom was of that Perswasion A far shorter Catalogue of Sufferers I am a fraid when fairly computed compared with the infinitely larger Scroll of those almost unaccountable numbers of more lingring Martyrs that have done our Reformation the honour to breath out their last in her Penal Jayls besides some of them that have tasted her kinder stroke of Mercy from the quicker Dispatch of Halters The number of both which upon inquiry made has been found to amount to near six Thousand To return therefore to his Majesties proposal of Abrogating these Laws t is a greater Duty upon the Church of England to abolish them then in the Dissenters themselves for as t is a Yoke imposed upon their weaker Brethren in it self wholly unjust the Sufferer under that Yoke in indeavouring to break it only Acts by the motives of self-defence the common Principle of Nature But the Imposer of that Yoke is tied by the Obligation of Religion it self to repeal and repent his own Act of Injustice Besides If all arguments of Conscience cannot prevail and Policy not Equity though Heaven forbid so uncharitable a thought is our Churches guide yet even then too what does she yeild up in abolishing those Laws why truly nothing for whilst the Government continues in the Hands of a Prince of the Romish Religion those Statutes will utterly lye dead for the Royal Indulgence a Prerogative in the Crown will never put them in Execution What reason therefore has the Church of England for her Nonconcurrence to a proposal so Equitable when she has not so much as the least pretext even of meer Interest it self for her refusal But this I am sure as the Church of England can have no solid Reasons to oppose their Repeal the State has very substantial Ones to inforce it For as Trade is the greatest support and strength of a Kingdom I know no Politicks so conducing to the Commerce and Wealth of a Nation as Liberty of Conscience What greater encouragement to Naturalization and England that is not overloaded with People can have no fairer Inlet to bring in whole Families and Estates and indeed the Wealth of the World besides the opening that current of Commerce even amongst our present Natives which the restraint of Worship at all times so much shut up than Liberty of Religion Nor can I better instance the effects of this policy than in the grouth of the Dutch Greatness and the decay of the Spaniard from their different Extreams of National conduct in that Point I am certain his Majesty resolves to eternize his Glory by being the truest Pater Patriae of all the Crow'd Heads since the Conquest nor has he a fairer prospect of making his Kingdom a true Paradice of Peace and Plenty but by taking this pattern at the least from the first Paradice that is by making the Lyon and Lamb lye down in Peace together our long dissention being no otherwise to be reconciled and our Enmities husht but by this only universal Pacification I shall only add this last Consideration the Execution of our Penal Laws and the Restraint of Conscience has been the greatest Blow that ever was given to the Hereditary Right of the Subjects of England their natural Properties and Immunities given and Sealed to them by Magna Charta it self For who can call his Liberty or Estate his own whilst a Superiour Opinion in Power shall seize our Persons and confiscate our Estates for no other cause but difference of Worship and Faith and neither Person Estate or Liberty redeemable under a less Composition then renouncing of God for Conformity of Worship absolutely against Conscience is little less And all this capital offence so unfixt and so undeterminable a sort of Transgression that a Man has only a meer Lottery to be in the Right or the Wrong For the blackest Criminal in one Reign has been the whitest Saint in the next and so Vice Versa over again witness the Reigns of Edward the sixth Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth where the Protestants were the Devils one while and the Papists another Nay in the Reign of Henry the eight both Papist and Protestant were at one time in the wrong For t' was remarkable in his Reign that in the same day have Papists been Hanged for Traytors for disowning his Church Supremacy and Protestants Burnt for Heriticks for denying of Transubstantiation Thus in their turns have all Religions and Opinions lain under the Scourge of the severest of Laws and all for want of that Obedience to a Law which Humanity it self is utterly unable to pay For though our breach or not breach of all other Laws either Human or Divine lyes in our own free will and choice to conform or not conform to this or that Belief is wholly above the Power of Man Faith only being irresistible And if our wordly well-being and all we enjoy in this Life depends upon such Capricious Decrees of Law certainly the great Charter of our Liberties and Estates that confirmed 'em both under no such condition or Restriction is not a little invaded by the Penalties of such Laws Nor is Restraint of Conscience and the Execution of our Penal Laws in their own nature and tendency only destructive to the rightfull Liberty of English-Men but the very Letter of those Laws themselves has made the most visible Rupture into the very strongest Walls of our Magna Charta that is our Tryal by our Peeres by a Jury of Twelve our Magna Charta more particularly confirmes to us that hereditary right and our Penal Laws most notoriously take it from us For instance 22 Car. 2. Cap. 2. It is there Enacted That one Justice of Peace or other chief Magistrate shall upon the Oath of two Witneses make a Record of a Conventicle which Record shall be a Conviction and the Offender sined as the Statute further Expresses So that to gain the point of Gaolment or Consiscation without any process whatever here 's a Justice of Peace or a Mayor of a Town though but by Occupation a Thatcher shall in Conjunction with no more then a Clark or perhaps none
our Protestant Church utterly wants this Loop-hole upon true examination will be found wholly Inexcusable for in Executing of her Sanguinary Laws in Punishment of meer matter of Conscience she cuts off not like Rome the supposed Members of Perdition but even those Professors of Christianity which by her own Confession may be equally with her self the Sons of Grace and Co-heires of Salvation Nay I 'l venture to add one bold Word more because a true one The Church of England in her once Executing of her Sanguinary Laws is undoubtedly guilty of more Barbarity then the Ten Primitive Heathen Persecutions For in all cases of Suffering for Religion 't is an undeniable Maxim That He that makes the Martyr least thinks he makes him The Bloodiest Pagan Tyrants in all the studied Arts of Torments Blood and Christian Massacre did not believe that they Butchered the then only Professors of Truth and Heires of Heaven but on the contrary in Devotion to their own supposed true Deities they thought they only Executed Apostates Blasphemers and Infidels for such they accounted the Christians as profest Deserters of their Heathen Gods and Sacrifices But all this while our Church of England I am sorry to her shame it must be spoken out does the very Heathens themselves in Enacting and Executing those severest Penal Cruelties by which she Ruins Destroys or Cuts off those very Members of Christianity who if true Zealots in their Profession she owns are in the number of the Elect of God and if any true Zealots amongst them those certainly that have courage to suffer Gaols Sequestrations Banishments c. even to the constancy of dying for their Religion are not the least of them and consequently she cannot deny but in Executing those Laws she both makes the Martyr and knows she makes him too And if she 's so blameable in her Severity against the Romanists much more criminal must her Rigour against the Dissenters be whom she owns to differ from her self in little more then Ceremonies and Punctilios by her own Confession no ways essential to Salvation Nay the Ferment has sometimes boil'd so high that our Protestant Church has put her Zeal upon the stretch to find means to vent her Indignation when some of those very Laws against Recusancy have been extended against the Protestant Dissenters the greatest part of their Sufferings received from the Lash of those Laws I shall not pretend to dive so far as to ascertain whether that comprehension was Originally Designed by those Laws or otherwise an Artificial Superstructure to serve a State turn but either way the Severity of those Laws is not a little notorious where so trivial matters of Dissent in Religion as has been said before have been so cruelly treated But if our Protestant Church cannot possibly be reconciled to Liberty of Conscience and therefore these Laws were her Weapons against it her more generous way at least more agreeable to a Christian Profession had been first fairely to have overthrown it by dint of Argument before she made use of dint of Steel to do it by and for that purpose I wonder how that famous Bishop Taylor has past for so great a Doctor of the Church all this while and his Treatise upon that Subject called Liberty of Prophesying not yet answered or why at least was not the Author under no small Ecclesiastical Fulminations if no other way to answer it for so terrible a Blow against the Churches long main favourite Bulwark her Penal Laws 'T is true I confess all other means failing they lighted upon one incomperable Stratagem to confute it for 't is in Controversie as 't is in War where open Force cannot Conquer Policy must viz. finding their Impotence at all other Weapons after the late Kings Restoration they very wisely bought up the whole Impression to silence and stiâ—le it and the rest of his Works Reprinted without it 'T is true some People will object What are all these Laws to the Church when enacted only by the civil Power as an Expedient for its own Security and Defence and therefore Warrantable and Lawful nor in any respect are they chargeable upon the Ecclesiastics Alas this is such a feeble Objection that 't is scarce to be named without blushing as if the Clergy did not Act in Parliament by their Representatives nay the very Bishops â—itting there in Person assenting to and undoubtedly little less then Original Founders of those Laws but grant it as they say the mâ—er Establishment of the Civil Power the Clergy by owning the Justice and asserting the Necessity of such Laws for defence of their Church the Lay-power in this case is little more then the Cats-paw to rake out the Chesnut I confess indeed we have had many late Pulpit Discourses on this Subject and several softening Perswasions urged to throw off this Severity on the Temporal Administration But truly to our Churches great misfortune her numerous Excommunications the peculiar Bolts of her own spiritual Vengeance and the Goalings that have followed those Thunder-Peales are such notorious confronting Demonstrations against her that her clearing her Hands in this matter is a Second washing the Ethiop Besides wherein are the Civil Rulers and the Temporal Power of a Christian Government any ways more authorised to outgo the Gospel Moderation and Clemency for any Politick Consideration whatever then the more immediate Oracles of Truth our Pastors themselves And this the great Legislators of those Penal Statutes very well knew and therefore as I told you before they cunningly converted Recusancy into high Treason and Nonconformity into Sedition Disloyalty and what not to find something tho but Seemingly justifiable for the Fangs of their Laws to lay hold of and so boulstered up their Penal Statutes to make them able to walk upright But to evidence how highly our very Church Men have interested themselves in the Persecution of Non-conformity and shewn their implacable aversion even to the least shadow of Moderation what was their Prosecution of Dr Whitâ—y and Mr Bold on the latter of whose Head our Church Indignation and our Ecclesiastical Boanerges were not contented to pouer down their common Vials of Wrath by any single process against him to try the Point but they heaped no less then six several Suites at Law against him at one time as if the Glory of so Divine a Quarrel could put the stamp of Honour even upon common Barrerty it self Nay some of our very Clergy Men thought it no Blemish to their Gown to act the very part of Informers against him I 'l only put this one Question to all the Doctors of our Church With what Conscience can a Church that owns its self â—allible establish Laws to punish Dissenters in Religion when by her own Confession of â—alliâ—ility she neither has nor can have any certainty or assurance how strong soever she thinks or hopes her own Foundation but that she Punishes those that possibly may be more in the Right
peaceably a recovery of so sacred a Right by a Restitution from the same Parliamentary Power that that rob'd him of it What can the Kingdom fear or the Protestant Religion be more threaten'd by conceding the perpetual Repeal of that part of Test Law then it does from the Prerogative which daily at this present dispenses with it The Roman Catholicks are and will be in all Posts of Power and Trust whenever the King's Favour and their own Abilities shall raise them to it without the Dissolving of the Test And when dissolved what more 〈◊〉 they do or how higher can they rise by i◠〈◊〉 â—oo His Majesty in the Universal 〈◊〉 of his People in matter of Religion and under his Resolution of a perpetual 〈◊〉 of Liberty of Conscience with the Repeal of all Penal Laws for that very Reason ought to think himself obliged not to leave the â—est uncancell'd For as there are very severe Penalties and Forfeitures contain'd in the Test which every Person entring into pubâ—ick Employ without a Qualification from receiving the Test incurrs What are these Penalties when duly examin'd any more than for meer matter of Conscience For if a Romanist as we see daily and Universal Examples in all Posts of Trust acts with equal Integrity and steddy Justice with the Protestants themselves without any Male-Administration in discharge of such Power or Authority what is the charge against them from the Test Penalty for Nonqualification any more at the bottom than meer matter of Conscience not for any Ministerial incapacity of executing that Trust but only a Consciencious Incapacity of subsâ—â—bing a Religious Declaration contrary to the Sentiments of their Faith requireâ— by that Test And that the Test Penalties 〈◊〉 particularly strike at Matters of Religion all Male-Administrations in Papists or not Papists with or without Tests are liable to Legal and Just Censure and Condign Punishments from other more ancient strokes of Law than the Hand of the Test And for some little farther Inquest into this Test Law and the Exclusions from Trust enaâ—â—ed by it I shall refer you to a Command I hope as Authentick as that of an Act of Parliament viz Honour thy Father and thy Mother c. In that Precept we are told that â—â—ey the King is included And if so suppose a Roman Catholick Prince Commands a Roman Catholick Subject to serve him as an Officer in his Military Affairs or a Sheriff Justice of the Peace ar what else in his Civil Administration In all which places his Religion can be no Incapacity for a Romanist in one Post may have as much Courage and Loyalty and in the other as much Integrity and Uprightness as another Subject And shall this Romanist in refusing either of the aforesaid Trusts be acquitted from a Breach of God's Commandments in disobeying his King by an excuse of his Tenderness to a Law of Man. And pray has this Novel Test Law a sound Root at the bottom that pretends to superâ—ede and exclude that Fundamental Indispensable Duty of Obeying the Immutable Laws of God. Now to come to the last point the Qualification of Members in Parliament And to begin with the Exclusion of the Popish Pees from Sâ—ssions in Parliament by Virtue of the Test His Majesty desires their Restoration and consequently the Relavation of that part of the Parliamentary Test And the Reasons moving him thereunto are the undoubted unquestion'd Birthright of the â—eers so unnaturally and so notoriously invaded and destroyed by this Parliamentary Exclusion A point so well handled â—ud so often before by several better Pens and so altogether unanswerable that I shall only add that as the Nobility of the Land are all Branches and Emanations from the Imperial Fountain of Honour His Majesty is in equal Justice obliged to recover a Gemm from their Coronets as a Ravisht Jewel from his own Crown And indeed his Majesty in so doing is in the highest degree a Champion for the very Dignity and Foundation of Parliaments themselves for truly when rightly considered how are our present Parliaments the Comprehensive Body of the Nation when so many of the Peers who neither are nor can be there by Representatives are shut out Nay how much is the Sanction and Honour of the very Laws they make and the very Constitution of our laâ—er Parliaments impair'd and lessen'd by such an Exclusion And truly when His Majesty by this intended Religious Charter resolves to establish and confirm all his Subjects Civil Rights Properties Freedom and Franchises on that solid and immoveable Basis above the reach of any Religious Tyranny or the shock of Conscience to move it would be very hard to leave his Barons of all his Subjects the only deserted whilst â—ifled and divested of so Original and Importan a Heritage as their Session in Parliament Thus far and no farther does His Majesty desire the Repeal of the Penal Laws and Test wherein 't is highly remarkable His Majesty's Alleviation of some visible burthen Oppression or Injustice lying upon all or some part of his people under the pressure of the Penal Tests in all the foremention'd Cases is so signally manifested that nothing but a wilful Blindness can plead Ignorance However to convince the very Infidel World and to clear his unblemisht Honour Candour and Integrity from all the â—eeble Clâ—uds that Malice and Ingratitude have rais'd to shade those inviolable Oracles his Protestations of desending the Protestant Religion His last Declaration of continuing the Test in the House of Câ—â—â—mons so totally dispels every least shadow of the popular fear and puts that stamp upon the Word and promise of a King and so eternally silences all those â—rightful Apparitions of the Romish Influence over the Protestant Religion that this very Religious Liberty so setled as purposed with the continuance of the Test in the House of Commons joyn'd in the security cuts off even the very Intaâ—l of all Legislative power from Popish Hands even to the end of the World. For whilst the Test consines in the House of Commons there cannot be to much as one Individual Member by the Test Qualification but must be a Protestant And possibly the very conceding of the other point viz. The establishment of a Religious Charter of Liberty with our Compliance with His Majesty in Repeal of the Penal Laws and â—est in all other Stations may be one of the most effectual means if not the only expedient to continue that Test in the House of Commons unshaken and immoveable aâ—d consâ—quenâ—ly 〈◊〉 Exclusion of the Romans from all Legâ—slative Power to endless Posterity For whilst at present the Penal Laws 〈◊〉 in fâ—rce the Papist has some considerable strength and Allies to joyn hâ—m as havinâ— indeed so vast a Body as the 〈◊〉 Dissenters under disguâ— and disoblâ—gation to friend the Romish Party as fellow sâ—fferers under the weight of Penal Oppressions and which upon any Parliamentary refusal of repealing those Penal Laws may make them but more and stron 〈◊〉 riveted into one joynt interest with the Roman Catholicks if no worse Ferment follows and consequently render their power so united more formidable But after the Sanction of a Religious Liberty the Protestant Dissenters will have so far gain'd the Ultimate of their Desire and Ambition that then in course they will fall in with the Church of England For all Repeals of that kind end in that greatest of Interest SELF and when their own self interest shall be so intirely satisfied from so ample and open a Field of Liberty as that Religious Charter the Bapists that poor diminitive handful of Men for ever after must and will inevitably stand alone and whilst the Parliamentary Test can only by Parliamentary Authority be dissolv'd where shall there be one individual Man of them whether Church of England or dissenting Member that shall so much as listen even to the least Whisper that inclines to any farther Popish Concessions more than their granted Liberty much less to any such threatning station as an Access to Parliament And more and above when this Parliamentary House of Commons Test shall be enacted by the Royal Fiat from a Roman Catholick Prince and that Qualification of the Legislative Authority together with the Church of England Establishment founded even by such a hand it may undoubtedly put no little Check in all Romish Successions so much as to every start that shall but arise to either of their prejudice or violation and when Liberty of Conscience shall even by a Roman Catholick Prince be so solemnly own'd and avow'd a Fundamental and Original Franchise of the people of England and so exemplarily ratiâ—ed as such what dread can we have from Romish daâ—gers when not only our Parliament Walls shall be so eternally barr'd against them but also so asserted and so potent a free born English Right shall stand up to confront all future Popish Pretensions whatever And all that Popish Tyranny over Conscience which almost in all Mouths and in all Pamphlets has been all along the Gorgon that frights half Mankind out of their little Senses as being so industriously represented the only Indelible Romish Principle and indeed their ultimate aim and desiâ— in England must now vanish into air when this Parliamentary Exclusion shall leave them no hands to grasp it should it enter into their Hearts to endeavour it To conclude Wherein are His Majesty's Demands unreasonable in asking the Repeal of the Penal Laws in which so great a part of the Vox populi as their Addresses testifie joyns with him and the principles of Nature Humanity and Conscience plead for him Or in asking the Repeal of the Test in those Branches formentioned for the asserting of his own Honour and recovering the Birth-right of a King by endeavouring to shake off the most shameful Vassalage that Monarch ever truckled under And why must his Endeavours of doing his People so much right in the first and himself so much right in the last be so poorly misinterpreted by the unnatural Surmizes of his ungrateful People But let us blush and mend and by giving up of these Laws do Equity in return of Clemency and Mercy FINIS
AN ADDRESS TO THE Church of England EVIDENCING Her Obligations both of Interest and Conscience To Concurr with HIS GRACIOUS MAJESTY In the REPEAL of The Penal Laws and Tests Allowed to be Published this 1st of September 1688. IT has pleased the Almighty Power that Rules the Hearts of Princes to Englighten and Adorn His Present Gracious Majesty with such peculiar Beams of Mercy and Clemency those truly Royal Vertues that render him the nearest Portraict of that Deity whose Vicâ—-gerâ—â—â— he is To win therefore the Universal Love of his People a Conquest worthy of and indeed reserved for His Great Self He has set up His Standard of Compassion resolving to recover the Alienated Affections of thâ—se of His Subjects whom the Administration of His Predecessours may have any ways rendred uneasie There are but two things in the World dear to all Mankind Religion and Property The last of these I confess in the most moderate Distribution of common Right has all along had its free Course in the true Channels of Equity only the first has been a little restrained for Conscience has sometimes been shackled The Sighs therefore and Groans that have lately breathed from that Restraint have moved him to that Sacred Commiseration that He is resolved to break the Fetters that Extort them the Penal Laws which to Effect He has already declared His Determination for that choice of Magistrates in Authority under him that in His Princely Wisdom He thinks will be most hearty in Contributing their best and ablest Endeavours for that Great End. To carry on this Pious Work it is not at all in Reason to be doubted but the Suffering Party on all sides who are aggrieved by those Laws by the meer Dictates of Self-preservation will be no ways wanting to throw off a Yoke they have so long so unquietly born And if all their helps as may be expected His Majesty is secure of there remains only the Concurrence of the Church of England which if obtained His Kingdom will reap the Fruit and Himself the Honour of being the Founder of those lasting Blessings so much in themselves the more glorious as that all Hands and all Hearts shall be assistant to their Creation The Design therefore of this Address to my Pious Mother the Church of England is truly and fairly to reason with her why the Preservation of those Laws either is or ought to be any part of her Care and indeed how far those Statutes her sometimes Darlings are in themselves either Just Equitable or consistent with Christianity it self And how far she is equally if not more than the Dissenters obliged to Abolish them Nor shall I endeavour to urge her Consent from any Resignation or Compliance those fainter Motives of meer Generosity to the Pleasure and Will of the King that desires to have it so but Enforce the Argument from the Bonds and Tyes of Conscience and Justice that require her Assistance to their Dissolution and hereby Illustrate the Equity and Reasonableness of His Majesty's Proposal and prove the Work it self no more than the incumbent Duty of every Christian Subject to labour to perfect For Enquiry therefore into the Penal Laws I shall make bold to Trace the Grounds of their Rise and Original And to take them in Order I must first begin with the Romanist as being the first that fell under their Lash After the Death of Queen Mary for 't will suffice to set out here her Protestant Sister Elizabeth succeeding in the Throne under so fair a Prospect of Establishing her Religion as having at that time the Half if not the Majority of the Nation of her own Perswasion all Hands were set at Work for so glorious an Enterprize But the main Engine was That the Reformers having before their Eyes the late Severity of her Sisters Reign the Protestant Church either truely or rather seemingly ashamed as time will shew was conscious that she had no means so proper to Recommend her self to the People's Esteem as the avoiding all those Occasions of Odium which had rendred the Romish Church so much the Object of their Aversion and therefore the change must be wrought and Affections won by the opposite Extreams of Mercy and Moderation These foster Measures for a while were endeavoured to be rendred her very Fundamental Principles and one of her proudest Distinguishing Characters from her severer Predecessours But alas In few years Indulgence appeared a too slow-pac'd Progress of Reformation For still notwithstanding the Encouragement of a Protestant Queen and the Establishment of our Church the Ecclesiastick Advances went on too leisurely and Conversions not fast enough to satisfie either the Churches Itch of Power or Warmth of Zeal under the â—ooser Râ—ins of Toleration For whilst 〈◊〉 Popish Party were any ways Comâ—â—ed at and Permitted any Liberty of their Worship their Church though falling could not want some few unshaken Members at least that would still follow even its Ruines And perhaps the Romish Priests though thrown out of Church Preserment could not or would not forbear to Confirm and Encourage their thin and scatterr'd Party and possibly through an Indispensable as they thought Duty to that Communion in which perswaded they only expected Salvation they might not to give all Perswasions their due in this Point omit either Arguments or Industry as Opinion wants neither to render their Religion never the less lovely for the Cloud it wore which indeed is but natural to all Religions whilst they think their own the only or at least the nearest way to Heaven These Remora's how small Stops soever to her advancing Glory the Church of England beholding with Impatience and Repining even at her smallest Favours to the Romish Party whilst but the least Impediments to her yet unsatisfied Ambition for to be uppermost was not enough unless she could be all too began to think of some more Expeditious way for the Weeding out of Popery and to look out for a sharper Pruning-Hook than meer Teaching and Preaching to do the Work of Reformation Set agog therefore upon Dispatch and Execution she felt the Itch of her Fore-fathers and if Honour and Reputation could be safe she should not scruple at a little of the Old-fashioned Shamble-work to gain her Point But considering that to 〈…〉 in Religion and 〈…〉 with Death would carry too 〈◊〉 the lookâ— of Old Sâ—ithsield and so 〈◊〉 her own â—â—â—boasted 〈◊〉 and Innocence she is therefore put to no 〈…〉 and Invention to over-leap that Difficulty and accomplish her Projection till aâ— last she lights upon this incomparable Stratagem to mask her Dâ—signs and smooth all viz. to punish â—ecusancy with Death under the Blâ—â—k and Dismal Brand of High Treason The Measures and 〈◊〉 used and made towards raising this artful Superstructure take in short as follows In the first Year of Queen Elizabeth she Assâ—rts her Spiritual and Ecclesiastical Supremacy in all things and Causes whatever and Creates an Oath to be tendered her Subjects for
Dissent on all sides And to six this â—â—putation upon them are there any of our Laws made all along against Nonconformists but whose Preamble runs upon any less Topick than the Breach of the Peace and the Underniining the very Foundation of the Government and all for deserting the Church of England and meeting in their own Religious Assemblies to offer up their Prayers and Devotions to God according to their Consciences Was there ever a late Conventicle disturb'd with any other Warrant than as Riotously and Routously Assembled and thereupon punish'd with Fines Imprisonments Sequestrations and Banishments sometimes to the Ruine of whole Families Whilst our Laws with the same Masquerade as in the Popish High Treason before charges the meer meeting to Worship God with no less then Sedition and Disloyalty But wherein lay this Sedition and Disloyalty Was it in their so Meeting No sure for as the Intention makes the Guilt the Intention was only a Religious Worship and not a State-Disturbance Was the Sedition then in the Doctrines they Preach'd or Printed If so Why was it not proved against them Their Writings are not only publick enough to stand that Test but also their Meeting house Doors stood open and their Enemies have all along been both Potent and Namerous enough to hear and detect any Seditious Design or Doctrines against the Church or State And the Law was furnish'd both with Rods and Axes to punish any Crime of that kind according to its Demâ—rit before the Penal Laws were so much as thought on Besides to clear them in this Point what Writers are so Voluminous as the Dissenters And to prove our Episcopal Spectacles read no such Seditious Doctrines amongst them How comes it that several of the Dissenters Books as Owen and Caryl's Works c. have been thought worthy to instruct our most Orthodox Clergy when so many of them are to be sound in all their Sudies and Libraries If then they neither publickly Preach nor Print any such Doctrines of that Seditious and Disloyal Stamp do they in Conversation Own or Avow any such Trayterous or Disloyal Principles No sure they have more Wit. If they are so hardy as to do that we have other Laws to noose 'em without the help of those Religious Penal Statâ—tes Do they then commit any open Act of Treason Sedition c. Let them do that if they dare If we once catch them at that Game the Government has 'em fast enough either Popish or Protestant Dissenters by the Heels and the Necks too Nor is any thing of this the Treason or Disloyalty that these Statutes pretend to Arraign Who ever heard of any Overt Act of Treason or Sedition Indicted by the 23d or the 35th of Elizabeth Then if neither Preaching Printing Speaking or Acting of any thing Traytorous or Seditious be the Capital Guilt these Statutes are level'd at certainly thinking of â—reason must be the Crime A Popish or Protestant Recusant is such an Offeader that by the very Affections of his Soul cannot be Loyal to the Crown And to prove this Infallible Accusation true the Protestant Wisdom has by Divine Inspiration formd a Law to Arraign and Condemn the very Thoughts of the Heart of which God only can be Judge And truly to make the Calumny stick the faster they have Establish'd it by a Maxime held almost as Sacred as Gospel No Bishop no King. No though Sedition and Disloyalty was the pretence it pâ—â—cht not there The Dissâ—ters grew too Numerous and the Church of England began to see her Grandâ—ur her Diana Grandure shrink and her Dear Dominion lessen and therefore for Enacting this and indeed all other her Penal Laws her old Arts must be once more her Refuge The Non-conformists must be crusht and supprest and to avoid ad â—mputations of Oppression and Cruelty Sedition and Riots and what not must be the Charge against them and the Law gilded over with that â—air Title to make it swadowable 'T is true indeed the Church Indignation has generally contented it self with omiting the latter part of the Execution viz. Death as a Pelon However it has too often laboriously taken care to make their Purses if not their Veins bleed for it and that too sometimes by so â—otal a Drein that whole Families have been reduced to the condition of Starving which is the very next Door to it And aâ— things considered Liberty next to Life is so dear that whole Years of Noysome Imprisonment have been very little the easier Punishment Take then the whole Penal Laws together the Rubbish so industriously piled up by our Protestant Bulwark-makers for the gaeat Fence of a Church and â—ome to the full Result of all Here 's the Church of England so poorly Prevaâ—icating as to â—ollow those very steps which with all her highest Noise and Exclamations she pretends are her greatest Detestation and Abhorrence And whilst the plainer Râ—manist Enacts Executes his most Capital Laws against Heresie from his Church under the downright Name of Heresie our poorer spirited Law-makers are for punishing Heresie from their Church under Masque and Disguise obtrâ—ding their Penal Laws upon the World under the meanest of Hypocrisie Imposture Besides 〈…〉 sent in 〈…〉 thing is not 〈…〉 would render it how 〈◊〉 the Church of England to treat so many 〈◊〉 Protestant States and Kingdoms with that 〈◊〉 as Brethren Professors of Truth when not one of all those Protestant Kingdoms but is a Dissenter from the Church of England and yet â—o vigourously Persecutes her own 〈◊〉 Subjects for the very same Dissent with all the forementioned stiâ—matizing Braâ—d c. Having given you this pâ—rtrait of our Penal Laws I shall only and some 〈◊〉 Lineaments more and so finish the Pâ—â—ce And to make a further Balâ—ance betwixt ourselves and Rome in that Point how unchristian or unwarrantable soever all such Penal Inflictions for meer Conscience may be the Church of Rome has or at least fancies she has some little pretext for such Laws For under her Famous Tenent of extra Ecclesiam nulla salus and her consinement of Salvation only within her own Boundaries she may have sometimes consented to the practice of cutting off a stray Sheep to terrisie the rest of the Flock from leaping the Fold as imagining to her self in so doing and in Sacrificing some lost Sons of Perdition for such she accounts them and thereby lopping off some corrupt Member already past hope of Redemption she only secures possibly the whole Body as she thinks from Apostacy and Damnation And consequently such examplary Acts though of the greatest Rigour how mistaken soever are only intended as absolutely necessary for that great end Vniversal Salvation But alas our more charitable Church that dares not bound the Grace of God but by a larger Latitude and more extended Operation of the Blood of Christ equally allows Salvation to true Zeal and Piety in both Churches and indeed in all Christian Professions Under all this Concession I say