Injunctions and to be earnest and zealous in it as the two last recited examples of King Hezekiah and Nehemiah evidence And this was so far from being an unjust oppressive action and grievance to the people as some now term it that it is recorded by God himself for their Honour and others imitation yea so well-pleasing unto God that Nehemiah clozeth up the history of his acting in this kind with this memorable addresse and prayer to God himself Neh. 13.14 Remember me O my God concerning this and wipe not out the good déeds that I have done for the House of my God and for the Offices thereof And will not God remember their ill Deeds in wrath and vengeance who shall do the contrary to what he and King Hezekiah acted in robbing God and his Ministers of their Tithes and setled dues St. Hierom with others affirm That the Israelites had four sorts of Tithes 1. That which the people paid to the Levites being the Tenth of every thing that was food for man not so much as Herbs excepted and whatever received increase from the earth 2. That which the Levites paid to the Priests being the full tenth of their Tithes 3. That which they received for expences in their solemn feasts when they went to the Tabernacle or Temple whereof the Owner and his family were to eat in those Feasts as well as the Levite Deut. 4.26 27. ch 12.17 18. 4. The third years Tithes which were then laid up for the Levites and likewise for the stranger the fatherlesse the poor widdow within their gates in the Husbandmans own Barns and Store-houses and not then carried to Jerusalem as the other Tithes were Deut. 14.28 29. ch 26.12 13. Their first and second Tithes every year as they affirm amounted to 19. in the hundred So as the Husbandmans clear Lay-Chattel the Tithes first deducted came but to eighty one bushels of Corn or eighty one Pipes or Tuns of Wine or Oyl in every hundred which considering the costs the Husbandman was at in threshing and fanning the Corn barrelling up the Wine and Oyl and carrying them to Jerusalem and the Priests treasuries at their own costs amounted to double the Tithes we pay now and more besides the first fruits paid out of them in kind before the Tithes their Free-will Offerings Sacrifices Oblations and other charges of Gods worship prescribed by the Levitical law together with half a shekel every poll for the service of the Tabernacle Exod. 30.12 13 14. yet the Israelites were obliged by God to pay all these Tithes which all the godly amongst them chearfully did without murmuring notwithstanding every seventh year amongst them was Sabbatical and free from tillage and the voluntary fruits of the earth then growing were to be for the poor and the beasts of the field were to eat the rest Exod. 23.10 11. Lev. 25.3 c. What would our Anabaptists Quakers and tithe-oppugners have said and done had they been born Israelites under the law and clogged with so many Tithes and expences who now grumble at and refuse to pay half so much Tithes as they constantly did though they pay no first-fruits Sacrifices and other costly Oblations of several sorts to God as the Israelites did besides all these Tithes I fear their covetous Sacrilegious hard hearts would have induced them to cast off not only Gods Priests and Levites as now many of them do our Ministers as superfluous creatures but even all Gods chargeable Ordinances and Levitical forms of worship as intollerable grievances oppressions yea renounced God himself to save their purses and turned Atheists out-right Let them therefore reform this their Sacrilegious tithe-detaining practices and opinions lest whiles they pretend to avoid Judaism they prove worse than the very Jews themselves yea worse than the very Jewish Pharisees the worst of Jewes who paid tithes even of Rue Annis Mint Cumin all other Herbs and of all they had Mat. 23.23 Luke 11.42 cap. 18.12 Whose righteousness all Christians righteousness must exceed by Christs own verdict else they shall never enter into the kingdom of heaven Mat. 5.20 Nay worse than the very Idolatrous Jewes under Jeroboam and his successors who paid their Tithes duely even to the base Idolatrous Priests at Bethel and Gilgal who waited on the Service of the golden Calves and brought all the Oblations to their very Calves which God reserved to his Priests Levites and himself as is evident by Amos 4.4 5. Come ye to Bethel and transgresse at Gilgal multiply transgression and bring your Sacrifices every morning and your Tithes after thrée years and offer a Sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven and proclaim and publish the free offerings for this liketh you O ye children of Israel saith the Lord of Hosts Let those Pharisees idolatrous Jews and Israelites practice then shame all our Anabaptists Quakers Soldiers Sectaries and other Tith-oppugners now lest they rise up in judgement and condemn them at the last day These forementioned Cities Suburbs Houses Glebes Tithes thus setled on the Priests and Levites for their Habitation maintenance and reward of their Ministerial Function had nothing properly typical or Ceremonial in them and being assigned to them by God himself only for their necessary Habitation and competent Livelihood may and ought to be continued and imitated in a fitting proportion under the Gospel for the Habitation maintenance livelihood reward of the Preachers of the Gospel who are to live by the Gospel as well as they did by the Temple and Altar 1 Cor. 9.13 14. 3. There was another supplemental maintenance besides these Glebes and Tithes prescribed by God in the Levitical law for the Priests which was properly Ceremonial Levitical and quite abolished with that Priesthood by Christs death and that was the Priests share out of every meat-Offering made of fine flower oyl and frankincense unto the Lord by the people a small part whereof the Priests were to offer up to God upon the Altar and the remnant which was left was to be Aarons and his sons with the breast and right shoulder of every Peace-Offering offered by the people called the Wave-breast and the heave-shoulder given by God to the Priest who offered the bloud and fat of the Peace-offering at the Altar together with the skin of every burnt-offering Levit 2.3 10. chap. 7.6 to 11. and 28 to 38. Exod 29.26 27 28. chap. 9.21 Numb 6.19 20. And from them that offered a Sacrifice whether it were Ox or Sheep this was the Priests DVE likewise from the people they were to give unto the Priest the shoulder and the two cheeks and the maw by Gods special appointment Deut 18.3 Ezech 44.29 30. which Fee Eli the high Priests Sons exceeding and exacting more than was due by violence it exceedingly provoked God made men to abhor the Sacrifice of the Lord and proved the ruine of Eli and his Family 1 Sam 2.12 to the end These Dues and Fees of the Priests serving onely at the Altar
beneficial to others than that of Souldiers and Commanders for they are the very Embassadors of God himself and Jesus Christ the King and Lord of glory the King of Kings and Lord of Lords the Prince of the Kings of the earth and only Potentate to whom all other Powers and knees must bow beseeching men in Christs stead to be reconciled to God 2 Cor. 5 20. The Ministers servants messengers of Jesus Christ workers together with him Stewards of the mysteries of God and the glory of Christ 1 Cor 4.1 2. 2 Cor 6.1 8.23 2 Tim 2.24 imployed to preach to sinfull men the unsearchable riches of Christ to turn them from darkness unto light and from the power of Satan unto God Eph 3.8 Acts 26.18 to rescue their souls from the slavery and power of sin Satan hell death everlasting damnation and make them the sons of God heirs and coheirs with Christ of everlasting glory and felicity in Gods heavenly Kingdom through the power of Gods Grace and Spirit working in with by and through their Ministry on their hearts Now the calling of a Souldier though it be honourable and in some cases lawfull and necessary if rightly managed yet it is for the most part sinfull hurtfull pernicious dangerous unbeseeming the Gospel in respect of the cause managing abuses thereof it being accompanied with murther violence rapine treachery perjury sacrilege cruelty inhumanity profaneness blasphemy contempt of God of all sacred civil Laws and Ordinances ambition treason and the worst of sins tending usually like an overflowing Deluge to the subversion desolation ruine of whole Families Cities Countries Kingdoms Churches yea Mankinde it self Religion Lawes Liberties Properties turning whole famous Cities into ashes and Kingdoms into Golgothaes Acheldamaes fields of bloud and dead mens sculs yea very wildernesses as the Scripture Histories and experience manifest Hence God styles great Warriers and Armies The rod of his anger the Battel-Axe with which he breaketh in pieces the Nations destroyeth Kingdoms and treadeth them down like the mire in the streets and then at last destroyes them in his wrath when they have executed his judgements for their rapines violence and bloudy cruelty Isa 10.5 c. Jer. 50.1 to 48. c. 51.20 c. They being really carried on from one war to another out of vainglory ambition covetousness a mad humour of false greatness nullus supra caeteros eminendi modus in sua fata pariter ac publica to their own and the publick ruine yet still under a pretext of publick good and safety as Seneca excellently writes in his 94 Epistle a piece worth the reading of Alexander the great Caesar Pompey Marius qui cum omnia concuterent concutiebantur cum multis fuerunt Authores mali pestiferam illam vim qua plerosque nocuerunt ipsi quoque sentiunt Indeed the Profession of a Souldier even in the best of men and warres is so full of danger pollution that it leaves some scarrs of sin and tincture of pollution on them however they demean themselves Whence we read that though David were a man after Gods own heart and fought the battels of the Lord against his professed enemies by his special command with constant success yet God would by no means permit him to build an house and Temple to him for this very reason Because he had been a man of Warr and made great Battels and shed much Blood upon the Earth in his sight And the 12000. Israelites who by Gods special command went up to war against the Midianites and slew them returning with victory and great spoils without the loss of one man though treble their number when as they came back from the war were all of them whosoever had killed any person or touched any slain enjoyned by God and Moses to remain without the Camp seven dayes and to purifie themselves on the third and seventh day as unclean and polluted persons Numb 31.1 17 19 20. and all the Officers and Captains of hundreds and thousands in the host brought an oblation what every man had gotten of Jewels of Gold Chaines Bracelets Rings Ear-rings and Tablets to make an Oblation for their souls before the Lord v. 48 49 50. Such a stain and guilt was there adhering to their War-like calling in this best of Warrs against Gods professed idolatrous enemies And may not all Officers Souldiers whatsoever then justly fear finde a deeper guilt of sin and stain of blood than was in David or those Officers and Souldiers adhering to their persons profession in our unnatural uncivil Wars even with and against their very Christian nearest dearest Kings Brethren Friends Kindred Neighbours of the self-same reformed Protestant Religion and thereupon make the like or a far richer oblation than they did out of their spoils and gains by Warr as an attonement for their Souls in stead of provoking God and encreasing their guilt by seeking to spoil his faithfull Ministers of their long enjoyed maintenance In all these 6. particulars wherein the calling of Ministers excells in merit that of common Souldiers Captains and Officers of War both in respect of time studie costs labour diligence parts danger honour excellencie use profit and necessitie to which I might add that the Ministers frequent tears prayers in times of War and Judgements are far more prevalent beneficial victorious than the Souldiers Arms besides their constant use and benefit in daies of peace when Souldiers are needless useless I referr it to the unprejudiced judgements consciences of all rational Christian men and Souldiers themselves whether our faithfull preaching Ministers be not worthie of as large as liberal as constant setled honourable coercive a maintenance from the people as any Souldiers Officers Captains Collonels Majors or Major Generals whatsoever if not a better larger salarie and reward than they enjoy for the premised reasons when as yet some ordinarie Soldiers Troopers receive as much or more pay by the year as many of our godly Ministers and every Ancient Serjeant Lieutenant as much as the most and best beneficed Ministers and most Captains Collonels Majors five or six times more than our ablest best deserving Ministers and some general Army-Officers have received gained more monie lands wealth in few moneths or years space at least than hundreds of our most meritorious Ministers put together can gain in all their lives by their Ministry How then can they tax them as covetous oppressive yea as caterpillars of the people by their Tithes and Duties for receiving only 30 40 50 80 100 200 or 300 l. a year and very few of them more or so much from the people by an antient right paid once a year when as they receive ten times more from the impoverished people and at least the tenth part or more of all our poor Ministers livings by monthly enforced contributions and yet will neither give them the Tenthes of their pay and spoyles of Warr as Abraham and others did Gen 14.10
Silver and a wedge of Gold coveted took and hid them in the midst of his Tent which so much kindled the Anger of God against the Children of Israel for this his Trespass in these devoted things That they were presently smitten before their Enemies of Ai and fled before them Whereupon Joshua their General and chief Governour humbling himself before God and requiring the cause of this ill success God returned him this Answer Israel hath sinned and they also have transgressed my Covenant which I commanded them for they have taken of the devoted thing and have also stollen and dissembled also and they have also put it among their own stuff Therefore the children of Israel could not stand before their Enemies but turned their backs before Enemies Because they were accursed neither will I go with you any more O Israel thou canst not stand before thine Enemies untill thou hast taken away the accursed devoted thing from among you Whereupon this Sacrilegious Robbery of Achan being discovered by Lot and his own Confession and hid stoln Plunder devoted to God taken forth of his Tent and powred out before the Lord in the presence of Joshua and all the Children of Israel Joshua passed this Judgement against him for his Sacrilege Why hast thou troubled Israel the Lord shall trouble thee this day and all Israel stoned him with Stones and they burned them with fire as a devoted Sacrifice to God after they had stoned him with stones And they raised over him a great heap of stones unto this day So the Lord turned from the fiercenesse of his Anger Wherefore the place is called the Valley of Achor that is Trouble to this day And when Hiel many hundred years after in Idolatrous Ahabs daies would needs seize upon the devoted Spoyl of Jericho and build it again for his own habitation he laid the Foundation thereof in his first-born Abiram and set up the Gates thereof in his youngest Son Segub that is God destroyed and cut off all his Posterity before the Gates were set up and the Building finished according to the word of the Lord which he spake by Joshua the Son of Nun as we read at large Josh 7. throughout 1 Kings 16.34 and Josh 6.16 I read of Ataxerxes that in imitation of Cambyses before him he caused some Judges betraying their Trusts like Tresylian of old and too many of late to be excoriated alive and their Skins to be hanged up round about the Tribunals that the other Judges sitting upon them might have an example hanging before their eyes what punishment the pravity of Iudges did demerit I desire all Souldiers Officers and Sacrilegious Anabaptists would hang up these Skins and Examples of Achan and Hiel before their eyes recorded in sacred Writ and then make this use and application to themselves of them If Achan for stealing away only a Babylonish Garment and a few Shekles of Silver and Gold of the very Spoyls of Iericho devoted to the service or Treasury of the House of the Lord brought so much wrath misery upon the whole Nation and Camps of Israel and such a fatal death and exemplary punishment upon himself and Hiel only for building upon the ruines of the Soyl of this devoted City drew down sudden Death and Destruction upon all his Sons and Posterity O what strange exemplary wrath vengeance and judgements shall we then draw upon the whole Nation Army our Souls Bodies and Posterities to their utter extirpation if instead of rendring unto God and his Ministers the Tenth of our warlike Spoyls belonging of right unto them we shall sacrilegiously rob them not only of these Tenthes and all other issuing out of our Lands and Estates but even of all their other Glebes Rectories Tithes Revenues demolish the very Churches Houses dedicated to Gods worship or turn them into Houses for us and our Posterities to inhabit and obstinately yea atheistically refuse to take warning by their and other sacrilegious Persons tragical examples 4ly Let those who will imitate Charles Martels President remember 1. his punishment Historians record That for this his Sacrilege he was smitten with a long and terrible Convulsion of all his Members whereof he died in great anguish that Eucherius Bishop of Orleans in a Vision SAW HIM DAMNED FOR IT and that upon search made in his Tomb by an Angels Admonition it was also confirmed for truth no relique of his Corps being found therein but only a dreadfull Serpent Apud Frances Carolus Martellus insignis vir fortitudinis exactis vitae sue diebus in Ecclesia beati Dionysii legitur esse Sepultus sed quia Patrimonia cum Decimis omnium fere Ecclesiarum Galliae pro stipendio commilitonum suorum mutilaverat miserabiliter à malignis Spiritibus de Sepulchro corporaliter avulsus usque in hodiernum diem nusquam comparuit as Matthew Westminster stories of him 2ly The censure passed against him for this Sacrilegious Robbery by the Marginal Authors and others especially by Agobardus Bishop of Lions An. 828. in his Book De Dispensatione Rei Ecclesiasticae contra Sacrilegos worthy the reading who thus complains p. 269. Nunc non solum possessiones Ecclesiasticae sed ipsae etiam Ecclesiae cum possessionibus venundantur c. Which he condemns as detestable Sacrilege execrable to God and men By Petrus Damianus Anno 1060. l. 1. Epist 11. where he gives this censure of his practice and others Inter omnia vero hic mala Illud excedit et Diabolicam fere modum videtur aequare nequittam Quia pradiis in Militem profligatis c. Moreover among all wicked Acts this exceedeth and seems almost to equal the very wickednesse of the Devil That all the Farms and Possessions of the Church being prodigally spent upon Souldiers insuper etiam et Decimae plebes adduntur in Beneficium Secularibus Moreover Tithes and people are likewise added and conferred on these Secular men for a reward which in his lib. 4. Epist 12. lib. 5. Epist 9. he stiles a great Sin Sacrilege and Prophanation of holy things concluding What is it to turn Tithes to the use of Souldiers and Secular men nisi mortiferum iis virus quo pereant exhibere but to give them deadly Poyson whereby they may perith Petrus Blesensis Arch-deacon of Bath Epist 82. Joannis de Belith De Divinorum Officiorum Explicatione c. 5. write much to the same effect making it a greater Robbery and Sacrilege to take away Ministers Tithes though it be by the Popes own Bulls than violently to take away and plunder Mens Horses as they are riding or carting in the High way and convert them to their proper use as Souldiers use to do 3ly Let them remember That Charles Martels immediate Successors so much detested both his practice and Sacrilege that by publick Edicts they decreed in these terms That the Tithes and Ecclesiastical Lands and Goods seised upon by prophane Persons so they stiled
Canne and unknown to me or others unless it be the flat atheistical denyal of God of Christ and all his Offices of the Holy Ghost Scriptures Sacraments all publick Ordinances in the Church of all Kings Princes Parliaments lawfull Magistrates Laws Oaths Vows Covenants Protestations Engagements by many of them in their words writings and most of them in their works with their Jesuitical positions plots practices recited in the fifth Chapter And if these be not true infernal Darknesse and clear inglorious Discoveries of Antichrist and his Kingdom in the highest Degree that ever yet appeared amongst the people of this Common-wealth let the fifth Chapter with the positions and practices themselves compared with the Old and New Testament determine 12ly The decrying of our Vniversities Colleges Schools of human Learning Innes of Court and some mens endeavouring to seise upon their Lands and Revenues for the Armies use is no doubt a Jesuitical Papal plot to extinguish the light of our Knowledge both Divine and humane by puting out the Eyes of our Nation that so Jesuitical Popish darkness might over-spread our Church and State and so the blind leading the blind in both they must fall into the Pit of Destruction in a moment It is storied of Julian that blasphemous Apostate and professed Enemie of Christ and Christian Religion That he suppressed all the Schools of Christians prohibiting by general Laws and Decrees that any should profess practice or study any Arts or Sciences in any Schools that so they might become and remain Ideots without learning and so be insufficient and unable to preach the Christian Faith oppose or refute any Pagan or other Errors Blasphemies against the true God and his worship devising by all means possible whereof this was one of the Principal TO MAKE WAR AGAINST JESUS CHRIST and extirpate Christianity without shedding any Christian blood finding by experience that the Christian Faith and Christians were greatly increased by the torments and blood of the Martyrs So that bloody Apostate from and Persecutor of the Christian Faith Lucius the Emperour as he ruined the Churches Temples he commanded to be built for Christ cast out of his House Service and all Offices and place of Command whatsoever he that was a Christian commanded all those Christians to be slain who would not adore his Idols prohibited all Assemblies of Christians either for worship or consultation so he was such an Enemy to Learning that he named the same as some do now A Poyson and common Pestilence and the Overthrow of Common-wealths and especially the knowledge of the Laws And thought no vice worse became a Prince than Learning because he himself was unlearned and thereupon prohibited Schools and Meetings for Instruction Whereas on the contrary Constantine the Great and all other Godly prudent Christian Emperors Kings and Princes founded Schools of Learning and Universities in all places encouraged and advanced learned men of all Arts and Professions especially Divines Lawyers and Philosophers well knowing that Learning was the principle means to promote Religion and the glory honour wealth and greatness of any Nation more necessary than any Arms or Souldiers and the chief means to preserve them from Idolatry Superstition Confusion ruine We may therfore clearly discern whence the present Outcries against our Vniversities Inns of Court Schools of Learning and all human learning proceed even from desperate Apostates from true Religion and Gods Church and those who would erect a New Babel of Confusion amongst us in Church State and thereby build up the demolished walls of the Romish Jericho within all our Dominions For proof whereof I shall transcribe this notable passage of our famous learned Bishop Jewel in his Sermon on Joshua 6. in his works in Folio p. 167 168. which is very pithy learned and satisfactory omitting all others Now to stay the restoring of Jericho many good waies may be devised The 1. maintenance of Schools and Learning That Learning and Knowledge is able to hinder the Building of Jericho is so plain that it needeth no speech In the time of Moses Law Aaron the great Bishop and High Priest had written in a Tablet before his Breast Doctrin and Truth not only Learning but also Truth whereby was meant that neither ought to be without the other For as Learning is dangerous and hurtfull in some cases without Religion So is Religion unable to defend it self to convince the Gain-sayers without Learning For this cause the Heathen when they erected Temples in honour of their Gods they did also build Libraries that is places to keep Books that by such means their Priests might grow in Knowledge and be better able to perswade others to their Religion Strabo of the Sinprincians that they built a Temple in honour of Homer and joyned thereto a Library Augustus the Emperor built a Temple and also a Library in the honour of Apollo Trajanus in like manner built a Library and called it Vlpia after his own name At Rome in the Capitol where all the Gods had a Solemn place for to be worshipped in there was also placed a Library Athens was a famous Universitie and had many Colleges and Schools of Learning Academia Stoa Lycaeum Canopus Prytanneum Tempe Cynosura in which places were divers Sects of Philosophers Such were in Persia the Wisemen whom they called Magi in Babylon the Chaldees in India Brachmanes in Aethiopia Gymnosophistae in France and England Druides and others in other Countries In all times the Kings and Princes which did set forth Religion were also Builders of Schools and Colleges and Advancers of Learning The people of Israel were never in better state as P. Phagius a learned man noteth out of their Story than when they had in every Town and Village Bathe chenesioth and Bathe medraschoth that is Synogogues wherein they assembled together and places to preach in The same Phagius relateth of Hierusalem that there were in it more than four hundred common Schools and Synagogues wherein the Law of God was taught The Patriarch Jacob was called A Minister of the House of Learning because he applyed himself to the knowledge of the Law of God and to Godliness The Prophets of God had their Schools to breed up under them such as might after their death draw the people from Idolatry and resist the false Prophets They which were so taught by them were called the Sons of the Prophets Samuel taught in such sort at Rama Elias and Elizeus the Prophets taught the Law of God besides Jericho St. John the Evangelist taught at Ephesus and Eusebius reporteth out of Philo that St. Mark had at Alexandria sundry Scholars which gave themselves to reading and reasoning and expounding of the Scriptures Others did the like at Antioch and at other places Out of such Schools it pleased God to take many excellent men and place them in his Church as Origen Tertullian Cyprian Lactantius Arnobius Basilius Nazianzenus Chrysostomus Hieronimus Ambrosius