Sam. 3.13 There is a Saying that would bear hard in this case Qui non prohbet cum potest jubet 2. Some did not enough deprecate the death of the King which every one was able to have done though many could do nothing else but that to promote it The old Armor of Christians which are Prayers and Tears ought to have been taken up by all men and managed to the best advantage for the defence of his Majesty's life If that were not done you were remotely accessary to his death 3. If you did not sufficiently lay that to heart mourn over and bewail it you are in some degree guilty concerning it So had Lot been of the sins of Sodom if he had not vexed his righteous soul with the ungodly conversation of that place as he is said to have done 2 Pet. 2.8 The Apostle chargeth the Corinthians concerning the Incestuous man 1 Cor. 5.2 saying Ye are puffed up and have not rather mourned that he who hath done this thing might be taken away from among you God sent his Angel as we read Ezek 9.4 to set a mark of preservation upon the foreheads of the men that sighed and cried for the abominations done in the midst of Jerusalem and upon them only as who should say the rest were involved in the common guilt 4. If we have not duly reproved and reprehended such as had a hand in the King's death according to what opportunities we have had so to do labouring to convince them of the horrible evil and sin of which they were guilty and to call them to repentance then are we in part guilty of and accessary to it our selves So much is intended in that passage of the Apostle Eph. 5.11 Have no fellowship with the fruits of darkness but rather reprove them implying that they who reprove them not are reckoned by God to have part or fellowship with them 5. If we have not sufficiently detested the putting of the King to death and seasonably entred a Protestation against it surely we are in part guilty of it David hath an expression to that purpose Psal 101.3 I hate the work of them that turn aside it shall not cleave to me intimating that the only way to have nothing of other mens turnings aside or sins to cleave to him was for him to hate their wayes and as for entring our protest against other mens sins see how careful Joshuah was to clear himself by doing that Josh 24 14 15. Put away the gods which your Fathers served in Egypt and serve ye the Lord. And if it seem evil to serve the Lord chuse ye this day whom ye will serve but as for me I and my house will serve the Lord. 6. They who do any ways provoke stir up or encourage others to a sin the acting whereof they themselves do not touch with the least of their fingers are for that reason guilty of that sin Witness that most remarkable passage Exod. 32.35 The Lord plagued the people because they made the Calf that Aaron made The people are said to have made it because they put Aaron upon the making of it 7. They who were any ways contributing and assisting towards the death of the King though ignorantly and far from intentionally or to any of those things which did make way for the acting and accomplishing of that bloody Tragedy were in part accessary to his death As the men who broke off the golden ear-rings which were in the ears of their wives and daughters and brought them to Aaron therewith to make a golden Calf are therefore said to have made that Calf though they made it not a Calf but only Aaron gave it a form and shape Exod. 32.20 And Moses took the Calf which they i. e. the people had made and burnt it Causa causae est causa causati is an old Rule 8. We become guilty of the sins of other men which we imitate and follow for in so doing we do as it were vouch vindicate and justifie them Luke 11 49 50 said the Wisdom of God I will send them Prophets and Apostles and some of them they shall slay and persecute That the blood of all the Prophets which was shed from the foundation of the world may be required of this Generation c. 9. Lastly to name no more at this time We may be guilty of other mens sins and so of murthering the King in particular Deme rendo by our other sins whereby we have provoked God to let so great a judgment for it may be considered as a judgment as well as a sin befal the Nation Witness that pat Text 2 Sam. 24.1 And again the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel and he moved David against them to say Go number Israel and Judah Now quit himself who can from all those remote ways of accessoriness to the late Kings death Now I am very prone to think that the Accessoriness of men to the sins of others in such way and manner as hath been expressed is one of the best accounts that can be given why God punisheth some men for other mens sins ex gr Israel and Judah for David's numbring of the people 2 Sam. 24. Particularly for men's justifying the sins of others by treading in their steps and doing wickedly as they did before them which is very provoking to God witness Deut. 32.13 14. The Lords anger was kindled against Israel and he made them wander in the wilderness forty years c. And behold ye are risen up in your Fathers stead an increase of sinful men to augment yet the fierce anger of the Lord against Israel Possibly one main reason of God's imputing Original sin to any besides him that committed it and whose actual sin it was is because men do justifie the same by their actual transgressions For if Adam did not do well in doing what God had forbad him why do we the same thing presuming from day to day to eat as it were of forbidden fruit Yea I do verily believe that God never did and never will impute Original sin to the eternal condemnation of any one person male or female that hath not or shall not rise up and justifie the same by his or her actual transgressions But now lest the hearts of them who were primarily immediately intentionally and wilfully guilty of murthering King Charles the First should be hardned by hearing that almost every body had remotely or indirectly a hand or finger in the death of that good King give me leave to tell you that there is no comparison betwixt the greatness of their guilt who are the principal Actors the wilful and deliberate Contrivers and Executots of such a bloody fact as that was and of others who by some of the ways before-mentioned are become sore against their will and intentions and beyond all that they could ever imagine in some sort Accessary to and remotely concern'd in it and at a great distance guilty of the same It
Loyalty and Peace Or Two Seasonable DISCOURSES From 1 Sam. 24.5 viz. David's heart smote him because he cut off Saul's skirt The First Of CONSCIENCE and its Smitings The Second Of the Prodigious Impiety of Murthering King CHARLES I. Intended To promote sincere Devotion and Humiliation upon each Anniversary Fast for the late King's Death By Dr. SAMUEL ROLLS Chaplain in Ordinary to his Majesty LONDON Printed by Tho. James Mathematical Printer to the King 's most Excellent Majesty for Joseph Hindmarsh at the Black Bull in Cornhill near the Royal Exchange 1678. but stand ready for such another I had dedicated these my first-fruits in the Church to him to whom all first-fruits are due but that I considered that Kings like High Altars ought not to be approached all at once but by steps and degrees as also that such a Tragedy as I here relate could not be pleasant to his Majesty to read though very profitable for his Subjects that it should be written The Loyal Contents of this small Treatise may assure the world that your Lordship hath admitted into his Majesties Service a Person of as unfained and fervent Loyalty as your heart could wish or as the world affords And now my Lord what remains but my most ardent wishes in which I know your Lordship will joyn with me viz. That the Soul of our Lord the King may be bound in the bundle of life with the Lord his God as the Phrase is 1 Sam. 25.29 and the lives of his enemies may be slung out as out of the middle of a sling that his Enemies may be clothed with shame but upon himself his Crown may flourish and that God would cover his head both in the day of Battle and of Peace For your Lordship I have no greater thing to wish than that the King of Kings may take your Lordship as much into his favour as the King of England has done and instead of the Star which his Majesty hath bestowed upon you may in due time give you that Crown of Righteousness which the Lord the righteous Judg shall give at the great day to all them that love his appearing which is the hearty Prayer of My Lord Your Lordships most humble faithful and obedient Servant S. ROLLS TO The most Reverend Father in God WILLIAM Lord Archbishop of Canterbury Primate of all England and Metropolitan and one of his Majesty's most Honourable Privy Council S. R. The least of all the Servants of the Church and not worthy to be so called humbly dedicates his poor and unworthy Labours in the ensuing Treatise of Conscience c. May it please your Grace THough some Writings of extraordinary men may seem to need no Patron yet I am very sensible that mine do and this of mine above all the rest which for the nature of the Subject may pretend to deserve one because I do easily foresee it will fall under the displeasure of many both for the Author 's and Arguments-sake for the Author's sake because he hath given his Service to the Church of England which he had done many years sooner but for an invincible impediment not unknown to your Grace and now doth with as much heartiness chearfulness and satisfaction as ever man did for which there are some that do stomach him the more because a doubting trembling sâ—â—upulous Conformist is in their apprehension the honestest man that conforms and in the most safe and salvable condition though the Spirit of God speaking by St Paul hath told us That whatsoever is not of faith is sin and that he that doubteth is damned if he eat No less distasteful to many prejudiced and malecontented people is the Argument of the latter part of this Fook For they cannot endure to hear that Fact called a horrid and bloody Murther which they have look'd upon as a gallant and heroick Enterprize not unlike the signal Atchievements of Jael against Sisera Ehud against Eglon recorded in the Book of Judges I doubt too many had rather that Act had been made a Precedent than the Actors thereof an Example My Lord If I fly not to your Grace's Protection men of that ill Character will be ready to swallow me up quick whilst their rage is kindled against me For having preached but one 30th day of January upon the subject of this Book I know to my sorrow what it and a few more expressions of my Conformity cost me and how I was made to run the Gaunlet for it and from some men could have no quarter But my comfort is that I have fully satisfied my own Conscience in this that I have written and if your Grace's Judgment shall be also satisfied therewith I shall value it more than I shall regard the censure and clamor of a thousand disaffected persons who for want of Capacity Learning and Integrity are not the thousandth part so able to make a judgment of it I therefore beseech your Grace to take both it and its Author under your wing at least the Author for his good and loyal Intentions which may extend far towards the covering of his weaknesses who will easily own that he hath nothing to be proud of if he may be proud of any thing but that he had the honour to have been sometime of the same University and Colledge with your Grace and admitted thereinto upon your Grace's personal Examination and Allowance I write not this as presuming to invite your Grace to water what you have planted but only to make a hedge about it that no wild Creatures may root it up Now that he whose right hand hath fixed your Grace in that place of Eminency where you now shine as a Star of the first Magnitude would always hold your Grace as a Star in his own right hand and make you as hitherto your Grace has been a burning and shining Light shining forth more and more like the Sun towards the perfect day is the hearty Prayer of Your Grace's Most Devoted Orator Humble Servant and Obedient Son S. ROLLS To the Right Honourable Henry Earl of Arlington Lord Chamberlain Of His Majesty's Houshold and one of His Majesties most Honorable Privy-Council c. S. R. Humbly dedicateth the ensuing Treatise wishing it may prove in any measure worthy of your Lordships acceptance May it please your Lordship HAving lately received more immediately from your Lordships hand an Honour too big for me to mention in print I hold it my bounden duty thankfully to acknowledge it Were I able to write any thing that might be worth your Lordships reading which I can scarce presume to think that were one proper way of doing it for the Calves of Mens Lips are as usual a Thank-offering as any and the Calves or Sacrifices of their Pens are almost the same thing For Pens are a sort of Lips wherewith men speak so loud that the world may hear them My Lord within the compass of this Book I have endeavored to express my hearty Loyalty first to the
King of Kings in speaking highly and honourably of his Vicegerent upon Earth which is Conscience and nextly to my good Lord and Master the King of England by attempting to make the sin of Regicide as odious in the eyes of all men as it is in its own nature that all After-ages may fear and dread it next to the sin against the Holy Ghost and for ought I know it is a sin of the second Magnitude and next to that Now if every man shall become so perswaded surely for time to come men will as soon throw themselves into caldrons of scalding Oyls or into hot burning Furnaces as either directly or indirectly contribute to the death of their King whereas whilst men make nothing of that first fact what do they Reader I See no necessity of pre-advertising thee touching any more than one thing in this Book viz. the Title if it Loyalty and Peace which I have given it because I am well assured that if men shall revere Conscience more than they regard Interest and entertain those dreadful apprehensions of the Sinfulness of murthering Kings which this Treatise doth bespeak and receive the due impression of some other passages therein contained as soon may a Camel go through the eye of a Needle as they find in their hearts to be disloyal or unpeaceable 1 Sam. Chap. XXIV Verse 5. And it came to pass afterwards that David's heart smote him because he had cut off Saul's Skirt MY Text is part of a Remarkable Story referring to David and Saul Saul had been possest with an Implacable Spirit of Envy such as no Harp could lay from the time that the Women sang in their Dances Saul has slain his thousands and David his ten thousands Little did those sweet Singers of Israel if they may be so called think how great a Discord that their praising Melody which gave the preference to David a Son and Subject above Saul his Father and Sovereign would make in the heart of Saul against David in so much that ever after he hunted him like a Partridge upon the Mountains Thinking no sacrifice great enough to expiate for that his Crimen Alienum or other folks fault in over-commending him but the life and heart-blood of him that was so commended Which sheweth us that Solomon spoke like an Oracle when he said Who can stand before Envy Saul returning from following the Philistins I had almost said like a Lyon that hath tasted blood and thirsts for more was told that David was in the Wilderness of En-gedi ver 1. Forthwith he took three thousand chosen men out of all Israel and went to seek David and his men upon the Rocks of the Wild Goats No Rock but he who is called the Rock of Ages was sufficient for David's security or can be for ours In ver 3. it is said that Saul came to the Sheep-Cotes by the way thinking possibly that the Shepherds of whose Profession David formerly was could inform concerning him where saith the Text Was a Cave which Saul went into to cover his feet It followeth that David and his men remained in the sides of that Cave and no wonder because as Strabo tells us there were some Spelunca or Caves especially towards Arabia and Iturea where in time of War Shepherds hid themselves and their flocks yea whereunto all the Inhabitants of Villages and small Cities did repair for shelter some of them being able to contain at once four thousand men The Mouths of some of those Caves were so small and full of Windings that no man at his Entrance could espy those that were within but those that were within could espy those that were entring so that David and his men saw Saul coming but he saw not them whereupon he went on securely little suspecting that he was within one step of death if God and David had so pleased And possibly he laid by his uppermost Garment the Skirt whereof David was said to have cut off and might be more prone to do when it was separated from that sacred Body to which it did belong than when Gods Anointed had it on to whose holy Anointing David had special regard though his followers had none Witness their words ver 4. And the men of David said unto him Behold the day of which the Lord said unto thee I will deliver thine Enemy into thine hands that thou mayest do to him as it shall seem good to thee meaning that thou mayest kill him Counsel worthy of such Councellors as they who were a parcel of Runnagates men in debt and in distress and of desperate fortunes who looked for nothing but a Jail or worse if Saul should live to be reconciled to David Men likely enough to have been Saul's Executioners if David had but said the word Strike off his Head or Cut his Throat For of that sort of men I presume are all the Executioners of Horrid and Bloody Edicts But as bad and faithless men as they were they prefume not to give such counsel as that without a religious pretext and colour for what they said They countenanced this their sanguinary Advice with three specious things viz. Divine Prophecy Promise and Providence For say they Behold the day of which the Lord said unto thee Behold I will deliver thine Enemy into thine hand Which words seem to refer to some Prophecy and Promise of that Nature which God had made to David by the mouth of Nathan Gad or Samuel though there be no such Prophecy or Promise recorded in Scripture which causeth some to think that Providence was the onely Argument which David's Ragged Regiment and Outlawed Crew of Desperadoes made use of to stir him up to take away the life of Saul And then they read the words thus Behold the Day of which the Lord saith unto thee putting in the Present Tense per Enallegen temporis for the Preterperfect Carrying the sense thus Behold this is the day in which the Lord by the plain voice of a signal Providence hath told thee that he hath put King Saul into thine hand to do with him what seems good in thine Eyes Having now so tempting and charming a Providence before thee be not thou like the Deaf Adder that hearkeneth not to the voice of the Charmer though he charm ever so sweetly Yea methinks I hear some of them say unto David as the King of Israel said unto Elisha concerning those Enemies whom he had led blind-fold into Samaria My Father shall I smite shall I smite Or as he said Let me smite but once and I will not smite again Behold a Price is put into the hand of a Fool if he have not the heart to improve it So plain and powerful was the Argument taken from Providence always amongst those whose Fingers itched to be doing and whose mouths watered at that for which they had no better Arguments The force and stress of which Argument lies here What may be done may be done That is what may be
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
You may conceive that indignation to be wherewith Conscience resents it when any Man saith to it either in words or in effect As for what thou hast spoken to me in the Name of the Lord I will not do it but whatsoever proceedeth out of my own Heart and Mouth that will I do The day is yet to come in which Conscience ever did or ever will speak peace to those that are in flat rebellion against it and as the Text saith Had Zimri peace who slew his Master So may it be said Had ever any Man peace whilst he was in actual Arms and Hostility against his Conscience No no The way to peace and tranquility of Mind is to do nothing but by full and free leave and consent of our well informed Consciences Direct 5. If thou wouldst shun the smiteings of Conscience being so terrible as thou hast heard they are give thy Conscience the preferrence and preheminence above all other faculties of thy Soul yea above all other Creatures interest and considerations whatsoever The interest of God and Conscience is one and the same and therefore that Interest should take place of all others Say not my Will and Affections nor yet my Pleasure Profit nor Honour do incline or invite me this or that way If Conscience suggest other things and say O do not that thing whereto thy will and affections are so much inclined or thou so much tempted by thy worldly interest for Conscience is more than all the rest All other Sheaves ought to bow to the Sheave of Conscience to allude to what was prophesied and as it were tipified concerning Joseph and his Brethren that they should be subject to him We have a Proverb My Mind to me a Kingdom is To be sure every Mans Conscience is his Kingdom So long as any Man holds the possession of a good and unvanquished Conscience he may be said to be in his Kingdom for surely among those Kings of whom God saith By me Kings Reign Conscience is one Dejure and he admits of Tyrany and Vsurpation in his Soul who suffers any other Creature to rule over him or any being but he that is The King of Kings and Lord of Lords One saith well That Peace is every thing in Gods Order and that there is not rue Peace but where it is so you may therefore conclude that where the soveraignty of Conscience next and immediately under the great God is not owned and submitted to there can be no Peace for so long as Conscience can hold a Scepter in his Hand he will smite all such Persons or do what is worse Direct 6. If thou wouldst disable COnscience from smiting or arresting thee labour alwayes to carry a pardon about thee signed and sealed with the Blood of Jesus have thy Discharge and Acquittance from the great God alwayes in readiness to produce then mayest thou presently stop the mouth of Conscience if it begin to accuse thee with such words as those Rom. 8.33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect it is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth it is Christ that died nay rather that is risen again c. Then may you say using the Apostles words 1 Cor. 6.11 And such meaning such great sinners were some of you but you are washed but you are sanctified but you are justified in the Name of our Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God Lastly Thou mayest build upon it that a well informed Conscience will never smite thee so as to do thee any great hurt if thou canst but sincerely say of thy self what Saint Paul saith of himself Acts 24.16 Herein do I exercise my self to have alwayes a Conscience void of offence towards God and towards Man Nay let me tell you the fore-going Directions well observed and practised will not onely prevent the stripes and smitings of Conscience but also procure the smiles thereof and cause it to speak to thee in such Language as the great Judge will to all true believers at the great day saying Well done good and faithful servant enter into the joy of thy Lord. FINIS The Second DISCOURSE OF No Conscience OR Of the Murthering OF King Charles I. Calculated more especially to be Read on any Thirtieth Day of JANVARY BY DOCTOR SAMUEL ROLLS One of His Majesties Chaplains in Ordinary LONDON Printed 1678. The Second Discourse NOw Reader if thou art only for Practical Divinity stop here and go no further for I confess to thee what remains will be partly Polemical partly Political being such as the solemnity of the 30th day of January and the occasion of the Fast of that day doth call for For methinks if I may presume to know the Whispers of Mens Hearts I hear some prejudiced Persons object and say What cause hath any Mans Conscience to smite him for having been concerned in the Death of King Charles the First Why is he called a Martyr or why his Judges called Murtherers So many of them as died upon the account of that Fact Now why should I be thought uncharitable for imagining this to be the lauguage of some Mens Hearts since David saith Psal 36.1 The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart that there is no fear of God before his eyes there taking upon him to judge the Root in their hearts by the fruit in their lives there being so greata foundation in the practices of some men to judge so of their hearts Namely That they think the King no Martyr nor his Judges no Murtherers Nay what if some do think That they were the true Martyrs who suffer'd for putting the King to death This will be more easie for any man to believe if he shall but consider that not one of all those men that were condemned and executed for giving Sentence against the late King of Blessed Memory would ever acknowledge that he had sinned against God in so doing Since they did seem to be of that mind who had the Microscope of Death before them which I so call because death oft makes men spy small faults in themselves who before could not espy great ones Doubtless there are many others of the same mind though a man would wonder that there should be such a vail of ignorance upon the hearts of any that are called Christians as not to know so black and foul a Crime as that to be a sin But sith so it is that some if they durst would rather applaud that Bloody Fact than profess to abhor it and would not doubt to say That Ministers in observing the Thirtieth day of January as a solemn Fast do but mock God and flatter the State being a time which some had rather keep as a day of Thanksgiving the more their Sin and Shame I think it but necessary not in order to kindling of Coals or increasing Animosities or causing the surviving relations of the Kings Judges to be more hated and scorned for God knows I abhor any such
thing remembring what Amaziah did Who put to death those that slew his Father but he slew not their Children but did as it is written in the Book of Moses viz. Deuter. 24.16 where the Lord commanded saying the father shall not die for the children neither shall the children die for their fathers but every man shall die for his own sin 2 Chron. 25.4 I say not in order to fixing any odium or disgrace upon the survivors but purely to convince as many as stand in need of it that Ministers and People may and ought to observe the Thirtieth of January as an Anniversary Fast Yea and that our Rulers do well in appointing it so to be kept in order to bewailing and seeking the expiation of a most notorious Sin and fetching out the stain of Royal Blood I say in order thereunto I hold it necessary and a Duty to set a Mirror before the Eyes of Men in which they may see the true visage and complexion of that horrid Crime which God grant may never more be laid to Englands charge Know then if either Perjury High Treason Rebellion Sacriledge Wilful and deliberate Murther Parricide or the killing of a Father Patricide or the ruining of our Native Countrey Justicidium or taking away the life of a Just Person Regnicidium or the destroying of a Kingdom Monarchicidium or the destruction of Monarchy it self Legicidium or the subversion of Laws Suicidâ—um or a mans killing of himself or being Felo dâ— se Animaecidium Soul-murther so far as in men is Multicidium or the Murthering of many at once both as to body and soul if Gods mercy prevent not yea Deicidium or striking at the life of God himself in a higher sense than most other sins are said to do I say if all these things put together do amount to a very great and stupendious sin then such a sin it was to put King Charles the First to death And now you see I have not charged the Kings Judges with Cumulative Treason or many Petty Treasons or Non Treasons pretended when they were all put together to amount to High Treason for High Treason it self is but one Article in this Charge Now it remains that so great a Charge as this should be proved against them And had I not been conscious of its being easie to be proved I would never have exhibited it for fear of violating the Ninth Commandment First Article of this Charge is Perjury for I do aver that they who sentenced the King to death did in so doing horribly violate the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy as also the Solemn League and Covenant though an Oath of their own imposing wherein they swore to preserve the Kings life and honour c. And as many of them as were his Majesties Servants as some such there were did also break the particular Oath which they had taken as such and thus breaking four Oaths at once may be said to be shod round with Perjury Some it may be would have added that they had also violated their Baptismal Vow and Oath and as many Repetitions and Confirmations of it as they had made in receiving the holy Eucharist because by those two Sacramental Vows all other Duties are bound upon men and consequently the observation of all our lawful Promissory Oaths but I need not strain so far to find out Aggravations of so Notorious a Fact Secondly My Charge against these men iâ— that of High Treason It is Petty Treason for a Woman to kill her own Husband though but a private man and what petty Sovereigns are private men compared with Princes 'T is Treason by our Laws barely to imagine the death of the King Queen or Prince yea to kill the Chancellor Treasurer or any Justice of either Bench Justices of Assize or any other Justices doing their Offices is by the Statute declared to be High Treason Statut. de Proditionibus 25 E. 3. Stat. 5. cap. 2. Yea it is Petty Treason for a servant to kill his Master c. Nay clipping crashing rounding or fileing for lucre sake any of the Peoples Moneys or Coyns of this Realm is adjudged High Treason Stat. 5 Eliz. 11. Is the Kings Money as it were inviolable and not to be clipped or diminished but upon pain of death and is not his person so In a Statute 13 Car. 2. cap. 1. it is thus said It shall be Treason in any persons whatsoever to compass imagine invent devise or intend death or any bodily harm maim or wounding imprisonment or restraint of the person of the King c. If to maim or imprison his person be Treason what is it then to put him to death But methinks I hear some say Though the Laws of England do punish Treason as a great and capital Crime yet possibly it is not so in the eye of Gods Law Now though every Breach of Gods Commandment be a sin yet possibly there are some Laws of Men that may be broken without sin To that I reply the sinful Laws of Men are better broke than kept Such as was Nebuchadnezzar's when he commanded all people to fall down and worship the Golden Image that he had set up Dan. 3.5 Such also was Darius his Dan. 6.7 when he made a Decree That whosoever should ask a Petition of any God or man save of the King for thirty dayes should be cast into a Den of Lyons Such also were the Statutes of Omry Micah 6.16 But no man can imagine that those Laws are sinful by which the lives and liberties of Princes as well as of the People are secured to them Now most certain it is that Humane Laws when lawful can never be violated without sin or without doing that which is in the sight of God as well as of men unlawful I think at present of no less than firâ— Commandments of the Second Table which were broken by those who put King Charlâ— the First to death viz. first of all the Fifâ— Commandment in these words Honour the father and thy mother for Kings are Poliâ—â—cal Fathers and to kill them is as 〈◊〉 from honouring them as any thing can be Secondly It was a manifest violation of the Sixth Commandment which saith Theâ— shalt not kill Thirdly of the Eighth Commandment also which saith Thou shalt 〈◊〉 steal For was not the language of theâ—â— hearts who put the King to death the same with that of their mouths Mat. 21.38 who said of our Saviour Come 〈◊〉 us kill him and let us seize on his inheritance Witness Cooks Confession viz. That what be did in reference to the Kings death was not 〈◊〉 of malice but covetousness not out of hatred to the King but for the love of money Habetâ—â— confitentem reum The Ninth Commandment which is Thou shalt not bear false witness c. was as manifestly transgressed by those who had a hand in that good Kings death as any of the former For without the horrible breach of that Commandment it had
been utterly impossible for them by a pretended High Court of Justice and seemingly formal process of Law or rather Pageantry of Judicature to have sentenced so excellent a Prince to die the death of a Malefactor 'T is not yet forgotten what one or more said of hm when the pit was digging and the net spreading for the life of the late renowned King viz. Blacken him blacken him meaning Calumniare fortiter ut aliquid haereat i. e. Brand him smut him make him odious lay those things to his charge which he never did represent him for so did Cook that was Solicitor against him in his printed charge as bad almost as was Nero himself or as they did our Saviour John 7.20 The People said thou hast a Devil c. i. e. Thou art possest Satan hath fill'd thy heart and body both thou keepest a familiar one or more and doest cast out Devils by Belzebub the Prince of Devils Sith this was done to the green dry wonder not at what was done to the dry I am confident Jezebel did not more falsely accuse Naboth of Blasphemy in the high Court of Justice which she procured against him than was his Majesty of famous memory accused in the things that were laid to his charge some of which were so horrid the more horrid and execrable the guilt of his accusers as nothing could be more If our proverb be true about losing a good name He that wholly takes away the good name though but of a private person though he do nothing more does worse than behead him What then have they done or wherewithal shall their Crime be expiated who did not only take away the Head of an excellent Prince one of a thousand but his good name also as much as in them lay and did not only extinguish his Life and Light but endeavoured to make him go out in a snuff and leave a loathsome stench behind him which maugre all their malice God hath converted into a sweet odor and now he who had no Funeral Sermon on the day he was Buried hath hundreds that may be so called preached anniversally on the day of his Death viz. each 30 day of January and his name imbalmed a-fresh on every such day and like to be so to all posterity Lastly If their Treason who imbrued their hands in the Blood of the late King were not attended with the breach of the Tenth Commandment no sin ever was This horrid Murther and Treason was certainly one branch springing from that bitter root Covetousness which the Apostle calleth the root of all evel and if of all evils surely of this for one They thought the Life of a King in an ill sense more worth than the lives of ten thousand of his Subjects I mean a better prey a greater booty of which they could make more earnings and greater advantage to themselves than of ten thousand other Lives They would have said of a common man Quid laudis in nece tantillae bestiae He had not been worth the beheading what should they get by his death But doubtless they had well computed what was to be gotten by the death of their King He had Fields and Vineyards They knew how to part the Skin of a royal Lyon if he were but once dead they would be his Executioners as it were that they might make themselves his Executors I mean serve themselves of his Revenues and cause him to die that they might live more splendidly The Flowers and Jewels of one Royal Crown are sufficient to enrich though with a vengeance many private Families That by their own confession some of them aimed at and doubtless so did the rest or most of them that did never confess it Was it not the wedge of Gold I mean the Kings Revenues and that which they called A Babylonish Garment viz. The Lands of Bishops Deans and Chapters which those Achans those Troublers of Israel long'd for and made their way to through the Blood of their King So Judas for the lucre of 30 pieces betrayed his Lord and Master Now if that be not a great sin which breaks five Commandments at once let the World judge And so I pass on to my Third Aggravation of their sin who Murthered King Charles the First It was flat and down-right Rebellion open and palpable Rebellion In what can a Son more rebel against his Father than if he seek to take away his Life yea do actually murther him Now Kings are as well Political Fathers to their Subjects de facto as they are Nursing Fathers de jure Yea such Political Fathers are much more superior to their Political than Natural Fathers are to their Natural Children Sons if abroad in the World and at full age are not indecently suffered to be covered in the presence of their Fathers but may ordinary Subjects be so in the presence of their King If then Kings be unquestionable Fathers to their Subjects and of an order of Fatherhood superior to those who begat them then whatsoever is Rebellion in Children against their Natural Fathers the same thing if against their King is as true and as great yea greater Rebellion Ex parte objecti Now the Scriptare calls it Rebellion in a Son but to resist and refuse the lawful Commands of his Father Deut. 21.18 If a Man have a stubborn and rebellious Son which will not obey the voice of his Father or the voice of his Mother and that when they have chastened him will not hearken to them There you have a Rebel against his Natural Parents de facto viz. A Child that will not obey or hearken to the voice of his Father or of his Mother And his Punishment is set down v. 21. All the men of his City shall stone him with stones that he die Is Disobedience in a Child to the lawful Commands not only of a Father but of a Mother Rebellion and such as God appointed to be punished with death and such a death too as is there described viz. Then shall his Father and his Mother lay hold on him and bring him out unto the Elders of his City and unto the Gate of his Place and they shall say unto the Elders of his City This our Son is stubborn and rebellious he will not obey our voice c. v. 19 20. Where first of all his own Parents were to be his accusers yea as it were the Constables that were charg'd with him to bring him before the Magistrates and give evidence against him declaring his Crime viz. saying This our Son is stubborn and rebellious a glutton and a drunkard Then his own Countreymen or Townsmen here called the Elders of his City were to be his Judges and to give sentence against him and that sentence of Death and that the Death of a Dog viz. to be stoned and that stoning by the hand not of one strange Executioner but by the hands of Countreymen or fellow-townsmen every one of which did or might fling a
was demollished Were ever any Temples build with Stone or Brick so sacred to God as he was Did the great God ever dwell so eminently so sensibly in any Temple madâ— with hands as he useth to do in all Christian Princes who are the Temples of the Living God in a more noble sense than any thing without Life and Reason ever was or could be Could ever dead Temple be as it were a nursing Father to God Israel which Christian Princes are said to be Some have charged Belshazzer with Sacriledge for alienating the Vessels of the Temple only so far forth as to drink in them when he feasted a thousand of his Nobles at one time others have called the sin of Annanias and Saphira Sacriledge and so it was to keep back any part of that which they had dedicated to God and to his Church but sith the two first instances of Sacriledge are much more notorious than these two latter if I shall prove that Murthering of King Charles the First was greater Sacriledge than either of them viz. Than that of Eli's Sons and that of Achan by proving the greater I have certainly prov'd the less for Omne majus in se continet minus As for the Sacriledge of Eli's Sons it was but this They took a part of Gods Meat for so were Sacrifices as the Altar was Gods Table and whereas it should have been boil'd for Gods use they caused it to be rosted for their own They rob'd him of part of his Meat who if he were hungry would not tell us for his are the Beasts upon a thousand Mountains Psal 50.12 The World is his and the fulness thereof c. They were over-kind to themselves and over-bold with God which cost them dear as you have read but what is all that in comparison of being cruel to the Life of a Man a Christian a Prince and our own Prince The Sacriledge of Eli's Sons compared with that of Murthering the King seems if I may so speak to have been lighter than vanity and nothing Nay doubtless it did far exceed that Sacriledge of Achan which was greater than that of Eli's Sons For what was it that that Achan who for his sin was stoned to death and burn'd and called the troubler of Israel because of the sad consequence of it did steal from God Was it not only a Garment some Silver and one wedge of Gold Now what trifles what meer bawbles are all those things if weighed in a ballance against the Life of the King I thought to have wholly passed by the instance of of Annanias and Saphirah their Sacriledge which together with the lie that attended it was punished with present death How much less was their Sacriledge than theirs who put the late King to death They rob'd the Church but of a sacred estate if I may so call it because devoted to God but these of a sacred Life nay they stole away but part of an estate these destroyed a precious Life not in part but in whole They with-held but what themselves had given and might have chosen whither they would have given and could give again but the Murtherers of our King withdrew that which they never did or could give and which when they had once withdrawn they nor all the World could never give again They destroyed but one small sinew of the Church if money may be so called as it is called the sinew of War yea did but strike that one little sinew but these cut off the temporal Head of the Church for so we own the King of England to be next and immediately under God Supream Head and Governor How great then was that Sacriledge which hath clearly outdone that of Annanias and Saphirah that of Eli's Sons that of Achan yea the most notorious of all the Sacriledges recorded in Scripture if not all those Sacriledges put together Who now cryes not out as the Prophet Jer. 9.1 Oh that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night for the slain c. slain with the Aggravations of multiplied perjury high Treason horrid Rebellion transcendent Sacriledge And so I have made good the four first Articles exhibited against the Murtherers of King Charles the First c. 5. The putting of the late King to death was Homicidium i. e. down right Murther I need not fear to say greater than that of David in the matter of Uriah For there a King murthered a Subject but in this case Subjects murthered their King and Servants their Master What is Murther but taking away the Life of Man without just cause and without a just authority If so to do be not murther I wonder what is If either of these be in the case it is single murther as I may call it but if both do meet it is murther upon murther if I may so phraise it or redoubled Murther Now they both meet in the case of King Charles the First For First If he had done any thing worthy of death who but the King of Kings had authority to punish him for it or to inflict upon him the death which he had deserved If equals have no power of each other as the Law tells us that Par in pares non habet potestatem What power can Inferiors have upon their Superior Now he must needs be Superior to all the people of England and they all his Inferiors whom the Nation sweareth to own as the Supreme The Law of England being such as alloweth of no man to be put to death but by his Peers whither Lords or Commons doth surely suppose that no man hath any legal authority to put a King of England to death for what Fact soever sith he hath no Peers as that word signifieth equals for every body else in and of the Kingdom is his Subject Flagitious Princes such as Nero whatsoever become of their evil Servants and Counsellers must be left to the justice and judgment of God but our hand must not be upon them Did not Saul by the hand of Doeg whom he imployed for that purpose kill in one day 85 persons wearing Linnen Ephods 1 Sam. 22.18 for which and for many other things he had well deserved to die Yet I no where find David who of all men was most provokt to do it attempting upon his Life yea I hear him saying The Lord forbid that I should stretch forth my hands against him seeing he is the anointed of the Lords 1 Sam. 24.6 Muthology represents Achilles to have been impenetrable and invulnerable so far as he was anointed with Ambrosia but Kings in a sense are anointed all over with the ointment of Divine Authority and Power therefore impenetrable and inviolable dejure whatsoever they may be de facto Give me leave to change the mode and cry instead of Plectuntur â—lectantur Achivi If Princes err for want of good advice from those Subjects of theirs who ought to give it them let Subjects pay
for it but presume not to meddle with the persons of Soveraigns whom God hath reserved to his own immediate Justice Let them stand or fall to their own Master and who is that but God Almighty Would it not be murther in him who is no Executioner nor appointed by the Magistrate thereunto to put to death the fowlest Malefactor that was ever brought to a Gaole because he has no authority so to do To be sure they who put the late King to death neither had or could have any authority or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for what they did for we have no such Law or Custom in England thanks be to God as to put our Kings to death if they do not please us They may be free in their own perswasion to do such things if commissioned from Rome for that purpose who doubt the Supremacy of all Princes but the Pope to whom they apprehend all other Princes to be of right in subjection but we Protestants have not so learned Christ and Religion as to think that the Heads of all Secular Princes are at the Popes Devotion and their lives in his hands and that they are to hold them but durante illius beneplacito During his Holiness Pleasure Therefore I am amaz'd to think what kind of Heteroclite degenerate Protestants they were if we may call them Protestants who took the boldness to behead King Charles the Martyr Sixthly The sixth Article which I exhibit against the Murtherers of the late Royal Martyr is that their fault was Regicide the murthering not of a private person or subject but of a King which gave a great accent to their crime and made them as it were double-died in blood Though the blood of Jesus Christ may and will upon true and lively repentance wash away the Guilt of Royal Blood so as to prevent the eternal damnation of them that shod it and oh the virtue and value of that Blood that can do so yet I know no Laver that God hath appointed to wash out the stain thereof I mean the blot and stain which it always leaves upon the names and memories of them whose hands have been so imbrewed To attempt that were to wash a Blackamore All injuries become greater by the greatness of the object or party against whom they are committed Read the greatness of their sins in the greatness of the punishments which God hath inflicted on them as the Scripture tells us who have so much as resisted or rebell'd against their Kings but more against them who have put their Kings to death When the Moabites who had paid tribute to King Ahab rebell'd against his Son Jehoram 2 Kings 3.5 They were sorely beaten and the King of Moab brought to such distress that he took his Eldest Son that should have reign'd in his stead and offered him for a burnt offering upon the Wall v. 27. Again we read how Ho eah the King of Israel was punished and the Israel it es carried away Captive though the Governours were Heathen and the Subjects the People of God 2 Kings 17. because after he had made himself servant and tributary to Shalmonezer King of Assiria he afterwards denied him tribute c. In like manner Zedekiah King of Judah was punished as you may see 2 Kings 25.1 compared with chap. 24.20 Thorow the anger of the Lord it came to pass in Jerusalem and Judah until he had cast them out from his presence viz. giving them up to Famine Desolation Captivity Destruction of their City and Temple chap. 25 c. that Zedekiah rebell'd against the King of Babylon yea see what is added chap. 25.7 They slew the Sons of Zedekiah before his eyes and put out the Eyes of Zedekiah and bound him in Fetters of Brass and carried him to Babylon Lord what a dismal train of Consequences insued upon a Jewish King his rebelling but against a Babylonish King Instance we next in Sheba who rebell'd against David and drew all the ten tribes after him was he not by him besieg'd in Abel had his head cut off by the advice of a Woman and thrown out to him 2 Sam. 20.22 The Amalakite that said he had slain Saul though he had not slain him and though he said that Saul bid him was notwithstanding presently put to death at the command of David saying this to him 2 Sam. 1.14 How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thy hand to destroy the Lords anointed Yea David was so incensed at it that he cursed the Mountains where Saul was slain v. 21. Ye mountains of Gilboa let there be no dew neither let there be rain upon you nor fields of offerings for there the shield of the mighty is vâ—lely cast away the shield of Saul as though he had not been anointed with oyl The meer murmurings of the Israelites against Moses are both spoken of and punished as murmurings against God Exod. 16.8 So Numâ—â— 20 13. it is said the people chode with Moseâ— for water and yet v. 13. it is said that thâ— water was called the water of Meribah be cause the Children of Israel strove with thâ— Lord. Hannaniah perswaded the Jews to revolt from the King of Babylon only anâ— yet it is said that he taught rebellion againâ— the Lord Jer. 28.16 Was not Miriam punished with Leprosie but for speaking againâ—â— Moses Numb 12.10 Mind what God said and did upon that occasion ver 8. were yâ—â— not then afraid ye viz. Miriam and Aaron to speak against my servant Moses ver 9 And the anger of the Lord was kindled againâ—â— them and he departed v. 10. And the Cloâ—â— departed from off the Tabernacle and behold Miriam became leprous Nay we find disobedience to the very Priests and Loviteâ— threatned with Leprosie Deut. 24.8 9. Takâ— heed of the plague of Leprosie that ye take heed diligently to observe and do according tâ— all that the Priests and Levites shall teach thee ver 9. Remember what the Lord thy God dâ—â— to Miriam viz. who was strucken with Leprosie for murmuring against Moses who was no Priest To perswade men to revelt from those Princes whose subjects they are is yet a farther Crime than bare murmuring and see how God punished it in Ahab and Zedikiah who were rosted to death by Nebuchad-nezzer Jer. 29.22 And how Shemaiah's whole Family was likewise extirpated v. 32. Hear David's Sentence against Saul's Servants for not using their utmost indeavours to preserve his Life 1 Sam. 26.16 As the Lord liveth ye are worthy to die because ye have not kept your Master the Lords anointed See how miserably Rachab and Banah two of Ishbosheth's Captains came off who murthered their Master and carried his Head as a present to King David hoping for a reward v. 12. David commanded his Young Men and they slew them and cut off their hands and feet and hanged them up possibly in Chains as a terror to others Had Zimri peace who slew his Master Elah King of Israel Surely no for when
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
diffused power of the two last should happen to be equally divided as is possible for it to be and yet to have a power of determining it self and turn the Scales must not that be done by some one man will it not necessarily issue there For say All power were in a Senate consisting of a thousand men admit there be all the Members of that Senate present at a debate save only one by means of whose absence there being five hundred Votes on the one side there can be but 499 on the other upon this so great division you see the whole Affair is carried by but one voice Even amongst those who by their constitution have an equal share in Government is there not generally a Dominus fac totum a Chieftain or Superintendant a Leading-man a man that hath the casting voice generally given him in whose advice and counsel all the rest or the major part of them do acquiesce And what is such a man but a Monarch in his place and amongst those over whom he governs so absolutely so uncontroulably let him go by what name he will either of Justice Magistrate or Minister c. Kings themselves do not act without their Privy Council and other persons of Honor who are assisting to their Affairs but in conjunction with them their advice and assistance they do what they please And truly so do those petty invisible Princes or Kings that walk incognito and under disguise They in conjunction with some of the best Head-pieces that are about them and by the assistance of their party which adheres to them carry what they please carry all before them in spight of all opposition Thus it was from the beginning thus it now is and will be to the end of the world Were it not easie to say Who is in effect a Monarch amongst the Anabaptists and amongst the Quakers c So that all the Governments in the world are virtually and in effect Monarchies though the people see it not and their Votes are little more than for fashion-sake and to please them with a shadow of Power and Liberty when their real power is little more than to sit still He then that is an Enemy to Monarchy and to every thing that is like it will presently become an enemy to all sorts of Governments all the world over which are indeed and truth but so many Virtual Monarchies all things considered So men fly the Name whilst they continue the Thing and alter the Shadow whilst they accept the Substance of Monarchy over them Amongst those who are equal in power the wisest will always govern the weakest and they that by their Wealth or Prudence or otherwise can make the greatest Party will carry all before them If then the light of Nature and universal practice of the world hath determined Monarchy to be the best and most necessary form of Government who can sufficiently decry their sin who did not only destroy an excellent King and Monarch but also aimed at the destruction of Monarchy or Kingly Power throughout Europe that if it were possible the Name and Thing might be rooted out and might be restor'd no more And so I have made good the 12th thing which I charg'd upon them viz. an attempt to destroy Monarchy though it be the best Government in the world Thirteenthly It must needs be confest they were Self-murtherers or Felo de se's who murthered the late King For in taking away his life they forfeited their own If an Earl or a greater Subject do wilfully but murther a poor Foot-man or Beggar by so doing he forfeits his life according to God's Law yea and the Law of England too He then that kills a King had he a hundred thousand lives would by so doing forfeit every one of them and be made to pay his forfeiture too unless great clemency interpose I remember no one Regicide in all the Scripture but what is punished with death save only that of Jehu committed upon the person of Joram which being done at the express command of God ought not I think to be called Regicide But I pass on Fourteenthly The murthering of the late King was Animaecidium not only Self-murther as to each of their Bodies but Soul-murther as to every of them unless the infinite Mercy of God should step in and prevent it Is Hell-fire the wages of them that wilfully murder but a private person witness those words 1 John 3.15 And ye know no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him i. e. no wilful murtherer hath jus in re as to eternal life i. e. any present actual capacity to enter into life eternal as he that was under a Leprosie under the Law might not for that time be admitted to eat the Passeover though jus ad rem i. e. a dormant suspended right which may or shall be restor'd and redintegrated upon his repentance that he may have as David had when he defiled Bathsheba But divers do say If David had never actually repented of that great sin he had never had eternal life but had been everlastingly damn'd So Baronius in his excellent Book De peccato mortali veniali If the wilful murthering of one private man be enough to sink a Soul into Hell what will not the murder of a King do Will not God heat that Furnace yet ten times hotter for Regicides Korah Dathan and Abiram are called sinners against their own Souls Numb 16.38 for rebelling against Moses and Aaron i. e. for but murmuring against them though not one drop of blood was shed by their hands How greatly then have they sinn'd against their own Souls who have rebelled and resisted even to blood I have before quoted that Text Rom. 13.2 They that resist shall receive to themselves damnation I leave that word to fasten this head on their Consciences as a nail in a sure place and pass on to the next Fifteenthly The murthering of the King was Multicidium pardon the making of a new word in such a case as this or Caedes multorum or Homicidium multiplicatum complicatum i. e. it was a great many murthers in one First it was virtually so according to the computation which we read of 2 Sam. 18.3 But the people answered Thou shalt not go forth i. e. David should should not go forth to Battle thou art more worth than ten thousand of us c. Secondly It was actually so as the Complices in that violent action by encouraging and emboldning each other thereunto were guilty of the sin and death of one another Thirdly As the death of the late King was remotely the death of many persons and families I mean the ruine and destruction of multitudes of Families which depended upon him which was worse than dâ—ath its self Sixteenthly Putting of the late King to death was Legicidium as well as Regicidium i. e. the death of the Law as well as of the King For first By the King's death a stop was put to the
making of any more Laws which might be judged necessary for the good of the Nation For without the King no Law can be made His Royal Assent Sanction and Fiat makes every Law to be a Law Therefore the Parliament did never presume to call any things by the name of a Law which they made without the King but by the name not of Acts but of Ordinances of Parliament Secondly there was stop put to the execution of those good and wholsome Laws which were before in being Execution say they is the life of Laws and who but the King is the great Executioner of Laws or the life of their Execution When Judges and other great men in the Law went off by death who but a King could legally substitute others in their room If any Justice be done by Officers not legally called and constituted we must be beholden to usurpation for it Laws are things full of life and spirit if they be such for the constitution and execution of them as they ought to be and upon the life of good Laws depend all our Lives Liberties good Names Estates Properties It is as it were the breath of their Nostrils If the true Soul of the Law go out of it which is the King they must either be restored by some Vsurper or usurping spirit or fall to the ground They who destroy our Laws or the due execution of them had as good in effect burn up all our Ships break down all our Forts and Fences yea they had as good almost cut down all our Banks and Buttresses upon the Sea-shore and let in the Sea upon us as do what they do He that destroys one good Law or the effect and progress of it may do the world more mischief than if he had destroy'd twenty men yea a hundred such as they might be I had almost said If a man could stop the motion of the Sun Moon and Stars and all their Influences upon the earth their light and height c. for ought I know would not be more missed than the free course or progress of Laws would be What Death then could be greater than their demerits who kill'd not only the Law-maker but the Laws themselves which are all in all in all that we have to shew or plead for any thing that we call ours in this world Seventhly Alas alas that I should yet have more wherewith to accuse those poor unhappy men who put the late King to death I say it was Homicidium barbarum a barbarous Murther in reference to the circumstances of it Who knows not that cruelty may be shew'd even towards a noxious Brute which ought to be put to death as towards a wild Boar or the like namely by making its necessary death more painful or more lingring than it need to be but if the same thing be done to a harmless Animal as to a tame Dove or such like the cruelty and barbarousness is yet greater upon that account If the severity be applied to a reasonable Creature man or woman it is counted ten times so barbarous but when barbarous usage shall be applied to a Prince a King our own King a virtuous King and one that had been a man of sorrows and acquainted with griefs for many years together not to grant him as handsome an Exit out of the world as could consist with an untimely death was such a transcendant instance of inhumane barbarity as I think no age can parallel Reader If thy heart can bear the mention of them which I assure thee mine hardly can and if thou art content to weep a while for the following Lines are scarcely to be writ or read with dry eyes I shall quote a few instances of the barbarous usage which our dear and dread Sovereign that then was met with as I find them recorded in Dr. Perrinshief's excellent History of the Life and Death of King Charles I. To say nothing of the King-killing Party in Parliament and Army their over-ruling all the vigorous endeavours which were used from time to time by the whole House of Lords together with the major part of the House of Commons to compromise all matters with his Majesty having courageously Voted though the Army was drawn up to London to over-awe them That the King's Concessions were a sufficient ground for Peace Dr. P. p. 174. But to come immediately to such passages as do refer to his Death Some would have the King saith Dr. Perrinshief pag. 185. first formally degraded and divested of all his Royal Habiliments and Ensigns of Majesty and then as a private person exposed to Justice Others designing a Tyrannical Oligarchy whereby they might have a share in the Government would have the King proceeded against as King that by so shedding his Blood they might extinguish Majesty and so mâ—rther Monarchy For several of them did confess that indeed he was guilty of no Crime more than that he was their King and because the excellency of his parts and the rights of his birth would not suffer him to be a private person pag. 186. In their second debate about the matters of Accusation all embraced the advice of Harrison to blacken him c. Ibidem Accordingly they impeached him as a Tyrant Traitor Murtherer and an implacable common Enemy because he had levied war against the Parliament Upon which the Author afterward descants thus excellently pag. 187. Those who had none but the light of nature to make them generous never reproached their conquered Enemies with their Victory but these men would murther their Prince against whom they had nothing else to object but the unhappy issues of a war which leaves the Conquered the only Criminal while the name of Justice and Goodness are the spoils of Conquerors Most barbarous was their cruelty because most inexorable For saith he pag. 187. while they were thus ingaged to perpetrate their intended mischiefs all Parties declare against it The Presbyterian Ministers almost all those of London and very many out of the several Countries and some though few of the Independents The Scots also by their Commissioners declare and protest against it The States of Holland also by their Embassadors did intercede and deprecate it as most destructive to the Protestant Interest Some of the most eminent of the Nobility as the Earl of Southampton the Duke of Richmond the Marquess of Hertford and the Earl of Lindsey and others neglact no ways either by Prayers or Reasons to save the King yea they offered themselves as Hostages for him and if the Conspirators must needs be fed with blood to suffer in his stead pag. 189. The Prince of Orange did daily send as Arents the Kindred and Allies of the Conspirators with full Power and to propose any Conditions make any Promises and use all threatnings to divert them from their intended cruelty But all was in vain For no conditions of Peace could please them whose Ambition had swallowed the hopes of Empire therefore they would
remove the King to enthrone themselves To me it seems so barbarous as nothing can be more not to suffer his Majesty to plead for himself because he would not own the Authority of the Court which they themselves knew in their own Consciences was not vested with any lawful Authority but was a meer usurpation and a high affront to bring a King before such contemptible Judges See in pag. 194. At his departure he was exposed to all the indâ—gnities that a base rabble could invent and commit when the barbarous Souldiers cried out Justice Justice Execution Execution See also page 199. The Conspirators meet in a Committee to appoint the manner time and place of the murther Now blush O Heavens and be ashamed O Earth at the reading of that which followeth Some saith he page 199 and 200. would have his Head and Quarters fastned upon Poles as it is usual with Traitors that the marks of their cruelty might outlast his death Others would have him hang'd as they punish'd Thieves and Murtherers Others gave their Votes that he should suffer in his Royal Habiliments with his Crown and in his Robes that it might be a Triumph of the People's power over Kings At last they agree That he should lose his Head near White-hall-gates before the Banqueting-house that so from thence where he used to sit on his Throne and shew the splendor of Majesty he might pass to his Grave there parting with the Ensignes of Royalty and laying them down as Spoils where he had before used them as the Robes of Empire Thus did they endeavour to make their malice ingenious and provided Triumphs for their revenge And because they suspected he would not stoop to the block they caused to be fastned in it some Iron staples and Rings that by them with cords they might draw him down if he would not comply Who can forbear to tell one signal Passage of most barbarous and blasphemous Hypocrisie which the same Author writeth pag 203. Some of the chief Conspirators suspecting lest the Lord Fair fax should hinder the Execution came to him that morning that they had signed the Warrant for the Kings Assâ—ssination and disired him with them to seek the Lord by Prayer that they might know his mind in the thing which he assenting to Harrison was appointed for the duty and by compact to draw out his profane and blasphemous discourse to God in such a length as might give them time for the Execution which they privately sent to their Instruments to hasten of which when they had notice that it was past they rose up and perswaded the General that this was a full return of prayer and God having so manifested his pleasure they were to accuiesce in it But for further tormenting my Readers heart and my own I would add what the same Author tells us pag. 205. Thus the King finished his Martyrdâ—m but the Enemies not their malice who abused the headless trunk Some washt their hands in the Royal Blood others dipt their stavâ—s in it they sold the chips of the block and the sands that were discoloured with his Blood and exposed his very Hairs to sale which the Spectators bought for different uses some as the Reliques of so glorious a Prince and some out of a brutish malice would have them as Spoils and Trophies of their hatred to their lawful Sovereign One is said to have curiously survey'd the murthered Carcass when it was brought in the Coffin into White-hall and to assure himself the King was dead with his fingers to have searched the wound whether the head were fully severed from the body or no pag. 206. After-terward they permitted the Body to be unbowelled to an Emperick of the Faction together with the rude Chirurgions of the Army not permitting the King 's own physicians to this office and commanded them to search which was as much as to bid them so report whether they could not find in it Symptoms of the French Disease or some other evidences of frigidity and natural impotency that so they might have some colour to slander him who was eminent for chastity or to make his Seed infamous Shew me who can a Murther committed though upon but a private person with more barbarous circumstances of cruelty inhumanity and malice then was this upon the King of which you may read more at large in the Book forementioned p. 171 to p. 207. Read those passages over and over and see how they make that sin out of measure sinful and then consider if for the Nation to be humbled before God once a year for so prodigious and publick a Villany be any more than is fit and necessary Eighteenth Aggravation The Scripture will bear me out in the expression if I call the murther of the late King by the name of Deicide because the Scripture calls Kings by the name of Gods I have said they are Gods only allaying it with the following words but they shall die like men Though the true and the living God be immortal yet there are certain mortals who are called Gods even by him who is the true and only immortal God or who alone hath immortality viz. in and from himself And of this sort of Gods are all Kings or Rulers therefore so called because they have the Image and Inscription of Gods Authority and Majesty upon them so and in such a manner as private men have not though Parents and Masters as such are vested with some lower degree of Power and Authority in their respective Persons and Places Now the murthering of King Charles I. was the murthering of a mortal God which is a greater sin by much than is the murthering of a meer mortal man There are three forts to which the name of God is applied The first is God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God by essence that is he that made the World all other are but mortal gods and much inferiour to him To us there is but one the true and the living God 1. There are Dij 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 False Gods such were all the Idols of the Heathen 3. There are Dij 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Gods so called by Grace and favourable condescension Such are Angels and Magistrates Kings are inferior to the true God but superior to all false Gods yea in their own dominion superior to him who exalteth himself above all that is culled God c. 'T is much to be feared that whilst a sort of men busie themselves and are much concern'd about that Image of God in Princes which consists in righteousness and true holiness and do either ascribe or not ascribe it to them and have been wont to respect or disrespect them accordingly I mean as they have taken them for Saints or no Saints I say whilst men trouble themselves about that which is a matter of hope and charity not of science or certainty it is much to be fearâ—d they overlook that Image of God which is certainly in all
Kings and Rulers as such viz. in point of Authority and Dominion which they ought to honor and reverence though they knew the other were wanting For most sure it is That Dominium non fundatur in gratia A man may be a King and ought to be reverenced as such though he be no Christian but a profest Ethnick or Heathen God has given the earth to the Children of men Wo would be to Princes if none were bound to obey them but such as do and will own them for Saints Then would they be Sainted and un-Sainted toties quoties as oft as they pleas'd or displeas'd the people for so has been the manuer of men Who cannot instance in men who but a little while before were generally vogud to be but carnal or moral men that to serve an end have presently been run up to Saints canonized all of the sudden and they who but a few weeks before were thought not to have grace so much as a grain of muster-seed amounts to their grace in an instance was become by common same like as a great tree so that the birds of the air might come and lodge on the branches thereof But let me tell thee Reader even such Princes as were Antiochus Epiphanes or Epimanes as some call him and such as Nero who respective to their morals have appeared in the world like Devils yet were Gods by Office and Denomination from Scripture and we must alwayes allow that God who is the fountain of all honour is the best Herald and best knows what title to give to every one and in their place and sphere ought to be respected as such Saint Paul when inadvertently he called Ananias the high Priest a whited-wall Acts 23.3 for judging contrary to the Law when it was said to him Revilest thou Gods high Priest repli'd I wist not that he was the high Priest for it is written Thou shalt not speak evil of the Ruler of thy people Not but that he of whom he spake it was in and of himself as a whited wall or painted sepulcher but nevertheless the respect due to a a great Noble ought to have been paid him in his place Yea to kill a very bad Prince were Deicide or the killing of a mortal god for as a Prince he is a god But what if a King that resembles God not only in his Greatness but Goodness not only in his Power and Authority but in his Purity and Holiness in his Wisdom and Mercy and several other of his most glorious Attributes and such a one many have told us that knew him if we did not was King Charles the First what if he be murthered by his own Subjects are they not Regicides with a witness that shall do it yea they have done it Now if any man shall ask me that indivious question as some account it which of the Kings Subjects was it that put him to death I answer first of all Negatively Not the Body or Community of the Nation not the major part or generallity but a few in comparison of them 2. Not the representative of the Nation the Parliament I mean for all the Lords disclaim'd it and and most of the Commons and were laid aside to make way for it but positively first All that were active in the War betwixt King and Parliament must be confessed to have remotely and ignorantly though not voluntarily and intentionally contributed thereunto because that the murther of him had never been but for the War Some classical men sore against their will and intention were partly accessary to that most unclassical and illegal action But they must needs be charg'd with the murthering of the King who suffered themselves to be made his Judges and to sit as such His very Executioner whosoever that disguised Caitiff was for whom it bad been well if he had been born without hands if not that he had never been born was not so guilty of his death as was every one of his presumptuous Judges For Plus peccat Author quam Actor is an old and a good rule i.e. The Author is worse than the Actor Thirdly Some chief Officers of the Army that then was though possibly they were not nominated amongst his Judges had as great a hand in his death as any body had and possibly were the first means of it and the greatest sticklers for it Their names and ends are sufficiently known Fourthly That sort of men who not only adhered to the Parliament but had a respect for the Covenant till neer the time of the King's death and then of a sudden had wont to cry out The Covenant was an Almanack out of date And why said they so but because the Covenant did seem to stand in their light and to be a block in their way who had a mind to have the King's Head cut off I say Those who cri'd up the Covenant till towards the year 1648 but then criâ—d it down as much and made an Almanack out of date of it and about that time and ever after did alwayes more adhere to the Army than to the Parliament they were the well-willers to the death of the King they were promoters countenancers and abetters of it I have met with a parcel of Names Characters and Periphrases somewhere which if I am able to expound them do describe that Generation of men who were best pleased with the King's death and gave most countenance to it before and afterwards viz. The Cantonizers of the Church the dividers and subdividers of it in semper divisibilia The Mother Church of Enthusiasts and Enthusiasm in England The Ecclesiastical Democracy The close Persecutors of such as dissent or depart from them They who pretend to run so far from Babylon as that they run beyond Jerusalem The Punctuallists who demand Scripture for every punctilio or circumstance in and about the Service of God but can shew none for many of their own Practices ex gr Their Auricular Confessions of faith c. The people that talk much of a Judgment of Charity by which they make Saints of those they have a kindness for and yet have less charity in judging of others than most men have The Antpodes to â—rclacy and Monarchy The Disciples of the Council of Savoy such as dâ—scribe the Church of God as if it were like to that which is unintelligibly said of the Soul of man viz. tota in toto tota in qualibet parte Men of the new-found Discipline The Trap door men who from that passage in the Covenant which was for preserving the Lâ—fe and Honor of the King found this door of â—scape viz. in the preservation of Religion and insisted much upon it That the life of Religion and the life of the King could not consist together They who dscourse and act as if every Member-Church were the whole body mystical of Christ or as if Christ had innumerable entire bodies or his whole body mystical in every place where two or
three are met together as Papists say of his body natural The younger Brethren of Presbytery For saith one Our English Amsterdam was founded since our English Geneva They who cried down the Covenant as it was for Monarchy and for the preservation of the King's Life and Honour but did and do still cry up the Covenant against Prelacy and to upbraid all Conformists with Perjury who have declar'd the Covenant not to be obligatory The great Freeholders in point of Discipline who brook no Landlord in that point or to have any Authority over them The Hance-town Church-men who claim to have all Power and Jurisdiction within themselves and say Who is Lord over them That sort of men who of all sorts of Christians seem to have least regard to one Article of our Creed viz. I believe the Holy Catholick Church or they by whose practice one would think that were no Article of their Creed If there be no sort of men to whom the Characters aforesaid do agree sith no Party is nam'd none need to be concern'd but if any such there be or have been they were they who said of the King's death Ah! ah so would we have it The Limner who drew the foregoing Picture thought it a disparagement to write under it This is the Picture of such an one for if it be like no body it is good for nothing 'T is possible that some whom it doth not concern will out of a jealous humour apply it to themselves but let them be warn'd by what was said of one that did so I said the Author of a certain Character have made a Fools Cap and such an one has put it upon his head and fancies that it fits him But in good earnest if the Painter have not wrong'd those people whose Picture he meant to give us but such be their real Feature and Portraicture if it be as like them as can be they are a people worthy to be exposed chid and rebuked and most unworthy to be esteem'd by others at any such rate as they esteem themselves and one another Let those Characters be intended of whomsoever for I shall not pretend to know of whom they are intended but I have found them somwhere methinks the men of such a Complexion and Constitution as they seem to describe must needs be some of those men that were well-willers to the death of King Charles the Martyr For they can never love Kings well who would be Kings themselves John 19.12 Whosoever maketh himself a King speaketh against Caesar Fifthly Doubtless Fifth-Monarchy-men gave no discountenance to the death of the King for many of them thought long for the expiration of the fourth Monarchy which they supposed might be at the death of the King or soon after For when all was overturn'd overturn'd overturn'd then they thought he would come whose right it is Sixthly But that the Papists should be so hearty for the King's Murther as it should seem they or some of them were is not that the wonder of all wonders May not such a truth as that is be confirmed by the Testimony of two great Orthodox Divines If so they are forth-coming The first shall be Dr. Perrinshiefe pag. 195. For there mentioning Jesuitical Counsels he addeth whose Society it is reported upon the King's offering to give all possible security against the corruptions of the Church of Rome at a Council of theirs did decree to use their whole Interest and Power with the Faction to hasten the King's death which sober Protestants had reason enough to believe because all or the most of the Arguments which were used by the Asserters of this violence on his Majesty were but gleanings from Popish Writers Also pag. 213. the same Author saith thus How little the Papists credited what the Faction would have the world believe was too evident by the Conspiracies of their Father against his Life and Honour which the discovery of Hubernefield brouâ—ht to light They were mingled likewise amonâ—st the Conspirators and both heated and directed their fury against him They were as importunate in their calumnies of him even after his death as were the vilest of the Sectaries For his sake they continued their hatred to his Family abetted the usurpations of the following Tyrant by imposing on the world new Rules of Obedience and Government inventâ—d frrsh calumnies for the Son obstructed by various Methods his return to the Principality because he was heir as well of the Faith as of the Throne of his Father My next witness and two such witnesses may suffice as well as twenty shall be Dr. Moâ—ulâ—n Prebendary of Canterbury in a Book of his called A Vindication of the Protestant Religion in the point of Obedience to Sovereigns c. pag. 58. The late Rebelion was raised and fostered by the Arts of the Court of Rome Jesuites professed themselves Independent as not depending on the Church of England and in the Committees forthe destruction of the King they had their Spes and their Agents The Roman Priest and Confessor is known who when the fatal stroke was given to our holy King and Martyr flourishâ—d his Sword and said Now the greatest Inemy that we have in the world is gone I 'll â—uote no more but rather commend that excedent Book to thy reading Thus have we made a competent discovery at whose door the death of the late King doth principallyâ—ie Her upon methinks I hear some saying But what is the King's death to us who had not the least finger in the death of the murthered King What is that to us Let them look to it as was said to Judas when in despair Answ There are many ways and circumstances whereby a man that was not principally concern'd yet may be brought in as truly accessary to the Kings death or to any such thing as it was viz. 1. Connivendo 2. Non reprehendendo 3. Non praeveniendo 4 Non dolendo 5. Demerendo 6. Non deprecando 7. Imitando 8. Non detestando satis contra protestando 9. Provocando 10. Non puntendo cum possumus 'T is much to be feared that this whole Nation may come in for a share in the Kings death thus remotely or upon account of one or other of the foresaid particulars For 1. Some did as it were connive at it when it was in fieri or bringing about and dic not do all they could have done to prevent it Now to such that passage 1 Sam. 26.15 16. may be applied David said to Abner wherefore hast thou not kept thy Lord the King For there came one of the people in to destroy the King thy Lord. As the Lord liveth ye are worthy to die because ye have not kpt your Master the Lords Anointed And now see where the Kings spear is and the cruse of water that was at his Bolster Was not old Eli therefore charged with the sins of his wicked Children because his Sons made themselves vile and he restrained them not 1
was occasioned by a Lye of David's that as we read 1 Sam. 22.18 The King i. e. Saul said to Doeg Turn thou and fall upon the Priests And Doeg went and fell upon the Priests and slew on that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linnen Ephod ver 19. And Nob the City of the Priests smote he with the edge of the sword both men and women children and sucklings and oxen asses and sheep Hear David's Confession ver 22. that it was long of him David said to Abiathar I knew it that day when Doeg was there that he would surely tell Saul I have occasioned the death of all the persons of thy Fathers house Now had David been as deeply guilty of the death of so many Priests and other People as Saul was who commanded Doeg to kill them or as Doeg was who did so willingly execute that bloody command of Saul directly opposite to the Command of God 't is like he had been overwhelm'd with the sense of it but as the case stood he was not so because though he was not altogether unaccessary to the slaughter aforesaid yet he had so small a hand in it and was so very remotely indirectly and vnintentionally concern'd therein that his Conscience had not much to say to him concerning it For it fareth in such cases as these as it doth in some small and slender Errors in judgment which may be charged with dangerous Consequences at the long run they may possibly be no great prejudice to these that hold them or are deceived by them because they do utterly abhor those Consequences wherewith they are charged neither do they apprehend that they are chargeable with any such Consequences Ex. gr Suppose that be an Error that some have made such ill use of That Christ shall reign upon the earth a thousand years though Fifth monarchy-men have taken occasion from thence to raise Arms and rebel under pretence of bringing Christ to his Throne yet ought not all that ever were of that opinion or now are to be courted Rebels For there are and have been men of that perswasion who knew full well that the Kingdom of Christ upon Earth stood in no need of mens sins and Rebellion to set it up but would make way for its self when the full time was come God forbid that I should be so unjust as to charge every body with the death of the martyred King at any such rate as his Judges are charged with it but this I am bold to say viz. that the whole Nation at leastwise by deserving that so great a judgment should befal it as was the cutting off a good King or by not sufficiently bewailing that such a thing was done or notenough abhorring the tsinfulness of that fact are become so far forth accessary to it as doth give every man sufficient occasion to cast in his Lot amongst those that do fast and mourn upon every 30th day of January And now methinks I hear some people objecting against the Law which hath established a perpetual Fast upon that occasion to be celebrated every year and on such a day as if it were a thing of which no good account could be given or more than needs and concerning which the great God would say Who hath required this at your hands As if it did but kindle coals keep up revenge renew heats and animosities raise and disturb the Ghosts of the dead which should be at rest upbraid those who have received their punishment and upon the whole matter do more hurt than good Now to those who ask us Quo warranto do we keep our Anversary Fast on every 30th day of January To that I answer 1. We have frequent instances in holy Writ of Magistrates taking upon them to appoint Religious Fasts 1 Sam. 7.5 And Samuel said Gather all Israel to Mizepeh And they gathered to Mizpeh and drew water and poured it out before the Lord and fasted all that day c. Which passage the Chaldee Paraphrase doth thus gloss upon viz. Hauserunt aquas e puteo cordis sui abunde lachrymati sunt coram Domino resipiscentes i. e. They drew waters out of the wells of their hearts and wept abundantly before the Lord but that by the way See also 2 Chron. 20.3 Jehoshaphat feared viz. because Moab and Ammon were come up against him and set himself to seek the Lord and proclaimed a Fast throughout Judah See also Ezra 8.21 Then I proclaimed a Fast saith Ezra that we might afflict our selves before our God to seek of him a right way for us and for our little ones and for all our substance Also Esther 4.16 Go gather together all the Jews that are in Shushan said Queen Hester and fast ye for me and neither eat nor drink three days night or day I also and my maids will fast likewise and so will I go in unto the King which is not according to the Law and if I perish I perish See Jonah 3.5 So the people of Nineveh believed God and proclaimed a Fast ver 6. For word came to the King of Nineveh and he covered him with sackcloth and sate in ashes And he caused it to be proclaimed and published thorow Nineveh by the decree of the King and his Nobles c. All these Texts do manifest beyond all contradiction That even the best of Rulers and Magistrates such as Samuel Jehoshaphat Ezra c. have taken upon them to proclaim and enjoyn Religious Fasts when they saw causes for it which doubtless so good and knowing men as these would never have done if it had not belonged to them So then there can be no fault in Magistrates assuming to themselves to appoint a Fast and Fasts upon sufficient and meet occasions though some cannot endure to hear of Civil Magistrates their medling or making more or less about matters of Religion no though it be to promote it but I think they are more nice than wise in that particular But may some say Will the occasion bear a Fast viz. The Death of the King so many years ago To which I answer Why not Surely it will Great Judgments either incumbent or but impendent have been the occasions of Fasts So of Jehoshaphat's and of Esther's Fast and why are not great sins as much and as just an occasion of a Fast for they are causes and procurers of great Judgments Have we not as much cause to fast and pray in reference to that Guilt which is upon our heads as to War or other Calamities which do but hang or hover over our heads Now whereas some may think that though such an occasion as that may well bear a day or two once for all yet an Anniversary Fast upon such an account as this is too much I am not of their mind For why not Anniversary Fasts upon great and and publick sins as well as Anniversary Feasts upon great and publick deliverances and that appointed by Magistrates too Such was
the Feast of Purim i. e. of Lots which was instituted by Mordecai who you know was a very good man in remembrance of the Jews delivery from Haman before whom Lots were cast from day to day for the destruction of them We read also of an Anniversary Feast called the Feast of Dedication 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Feast wherein something is renewed because those things only are reputed consecrated which are separated from their old common and dedicated to some new and holy use That Feast was appointed by Judas Macchabeus to be observed from year to year for the space of eight days together in the Month Cafleu which answereth to our December Of this St. John chap. 20.22 speaks and mentioneth our Saviour's presence there It was at Jerusalem the Feast of the Dedication and it was winter And Jesus walked in the Temple in Solomons Porch God hath given us standing general Rules for set days of Fasting or Thanksgiving as the matter shall require but hath left it to the Rulers of the Church or State to appoint the time whether every year or as they please and made it our duty to obey them in it as in all other lawful things God forbid that we should not obey the Magistrate in those Commands of his in which he obeys God and surely he obeys God in commanding those things to be done which God also hath commanded or for which he hath given general Rules to be applied to particular times and places as the Magistrate shall think fit If any do think that the Fast which I am now speaking of is meerly a Fast for strife and for smiting with the fist I utterly deny that any such thing doth appear to have been the Magistrates intent in appointing it neither ought we to be so uncharitable as to think so neither is there any necessity of making it to be so For upon that day we call to remembrance a great and shameful sin which divers men have suffered for yet it is not to make their persons more odious whose lives have paid for what they did but to stigmatize their fact that the like may never be committed in this or any succeeding age it is not to make the Murtherers infamous but the Murther the Regicide to cause that to stink in the Nostrils of all men 'T is not to grieve the hearts of their surviving Relations Widows or Children c. I say it is to grieve no body that had no hand themselves in the death of that excellent King but it is that others may hear and do no more so wickedly I look upon a 30th day of January to be the most proper day in all the year to preach up Loyalty and to preach down Rebellion not in any railing or reviling but in a sober rational convincing way and may all Pulpits ring with Loyalty on every such day and Rebellion be rendered as odious on that day as we use to render Popery and his Holiness on each fifth day of November Did I know any person or persons that were so wretched and cross-grain'd as to turn a 30th day of January into a kind of Festival or Thanksgiving-day I would not doubt to apply to him or her those words Isai 22.12 13. In that day did the Lord call to weeping and to mourning and to baldness and to girding with sackcloth And behold joy and gladness slaying oxen killing sheep eating flesh and drinking wine ver 14. Surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye die saith the Lord God of Hosts I was about to say that as many people as do rejoyce at the remembrance of the late Kings death do as it were put him to death afresh as some are said to crucifie our Saviour again if I may so allude and do what in them lies to bring the guilt of his Royal Blood as much upon their own heads as it was upon the head of his Judges Now in the close of all If any man shall say to me Cui bono or Quorsum haec To what purpose is it for any man to set forth the murthering of the late King in its colours as you have done since the thing is past and gone and cannot be recall'd and now there is no help for it c. To that I answer By the same reason may you think it needless to call to remembrance any great sin of your own saying it is past and gone and now there is no help for it To what purpose should I mourn over it any more than David did over his Child when perfectly dead or why should not I rather do as he then did of whom it is said That when the child was dead he washed and anointed himself and changed his Apparel and eat bread 2 Sam. 20 c. I answer Though we ought to sorrow as little as we can for those Afflictions which are gone over our heads and cannot be recall'd and to forget them as soon as we can yet it ought not to be so with us such ought not to be our carriage in reference to our sins David saith That his sins were ever before him Who ever condemn'd Peter for weeping after the crowing Cock caused him to reflect upon his denying his Master Who ever found fault with David for watering his couch with his tears after he had polluted it with Adultery If we could forget our Afflictions more and our sins less it would be better for us Sorrows are best forgotten but sins are best remembred Possibly it is no more than God expects that so notorious a fact should be publickly lamented every year I am deceived if a good advantage may not be made of that days Solemnity if piously and prudently managed whereby to make more Converts and Proselytes to Loyalty than have been in England of late years and to bring men better acquainted with the Doctrine and Duty of Obedience to the lawful Commands of Magistrates than they seem to have been hitherto A Doctrine in which some men the more their sin and shame find no more relish than in the white of an Egg and is one of those sound Doctrines which some men will not endure which is a part of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that healthful wholsome or healing Doctrine of which the Apostle saith 2 Tim. 4.3 The time will come when men will not endure sound Doctrine Moreover I was about to say out of that Viper or viperous Action viz. Regicide at lestwise as one principal ingredient thereof may a good Theriaca Treacle or Antidote be made against all Sedition and Rebellion for time to come which things have now the death of a King to answer for and are become more infamous and hateful than ever before because stain'd and tainted and made more execrable by the guilt of Royal Blood Upon the 30th of January of all days in the year let Parents instruct their Children and Masters their Servants in the fifth Commandment particularly as it contains the
without the least remorse for what they had done But far be it from us to think the better or more favourably of that sin the committers whereof did or seem'd to dye without repentance Now what I have written touching this matter I call Heaven to witness did not spring from any hatred that I do or ever did bear to the persons of them or theirs who had the infamous honour or seeming honour but eternal infamy of being the King's Judges but from detestation of the fact and a true desire that the like may be prevented for time to come and wheras it is commonly said that some do love Treason but always hate the Traytors I by a reverse do profess my self to have heartily pitied the persons of those Traytors to have true compassion and good will to their innocent Relations that yet survive them but mean time from my heart to abhor and detest that and all other Treason Did I say that as much as I hate Treason I have heartily pitied and do pity the Regicides I do not mean that I think it any pity that being what they were they should be brought to an untimely end to an ignominious death that I thought them too good to be hanged drawn and quartered who had been so vile as to behead their King all that they suffered in that nature was far less than they deserved But I do really pity them in relation to their poor Souls For I wish from my heart that all men might be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and am not willing if I could help it that any should perish everlastingly I wish no man so ill as to wish him in hell or that he might die in his sins that the bottomless pit might open its mouth and swallow him up Sure I am the Regicides did run as great a risk and bid as fair for Hell and Damnation as men could do by any one action their fact being so transcendently and complicatedly wicked and abominable as it was Had they courted Hell and been fond of Damnation what could they have done more to have enjoyed it than to bain their own Souls as much as in them lay by an eternal Poyson compounded of all sorts of deadly Ingredients one of which might seem sufficient to effect the work in spight of an Antidote The great compounded Antidotes Treacle c. do hardly consist of more Alexipharmacal Ingredients than this fact of theirs did of deleterious and deadly things or shall I call them damnable Ingredients For first Is Perjury a damning sin or is it not If not what mean these words of St. James Jac. 5.12 Above all things swear not neither by the Heaven nor by the Earth nor by any other Oath but let your yea be yea and your nay nay lest you fall into condemnation Now in these words swearing but vainly and frivolously and that but by Heaven or Earth or other Creatures seems to be threatned with damnation and is it not far worse and more damnable to swear falsely and that by the Name of God than to swear frivolously by the Name of any Creature yet even the later of those doth St. James deprecate with the most earnest obtestation Above all things my brethren swear not neither by Heaven c. 2. Is there no damnableness in Rebellion think you No danger that Rebellion should damn any man Is that a venial and no mortal sin Surely no Witness the words of the Apostle Rom. 13.2 Whosoever resisteth the powers resisteth the Ordinances of God and they that resist them receive to themselves damnation Now in this case there was resisting unto blood 3. Was no man ever damn'd for Treason What think you of Judas who was a Traytor to his Master and Saviour of whom the Scripture saith It had been good for him that he had never been born If he went to Heaven if he were not damn'd it was well for him that ever he was born therefore those words do intimate that he was damned 4. Can Sacriledge damn no man Is not that of its self a damnable sin Surely it is For 1. Sacriledge is Theft and the highest sort of Theft For will a man rob God saith Malachy Now Thieves are brought into the Muster-rolls of persons that must be damned 1 Cor. 6.9 10. Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God nor abusers of themselves with mankinde nor thieves c. It is well if Ananias and Saphira feel it not to their sorrow that Sacriledge can damn Souls In Zech. 5.3 we read of stealing and swearing as things each or either of which will bring men under the flying-role or curse of God This is the curse that goeth forth over the face of the whole earth for every one that stealeth shall be cut off as on this side according to it I will bring it forth saith the Lord and it shall enter into the house of the thief and of him that sweareth falsely by by my Name and shall remain in the midst of his house and it shall consume it with the timber thereof and the stones thereof ver 4. Against whom but Thieves and Robbers is that threatning denounced Hab. 2.11 The stone shall cry out of the wall and the beam out of the timber shall answer it applied to the unsatiable Chaldeans Now in Sacriledge there seems to be a complication of Theft and Perjury because it is a Robbing of God of that which was due to him by a Vow or that men have sworn for a Vow and an Oath come much what to one that they will give to God So was the case of Ananias and Saphira Indeed the Sacriledge of some men is their robbing of God not of what they themselves but of that which others have made God's by a Vow Now even they do fall under a horrible curse or execration Things given or devoted unto God called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they are devoted to God with the accursing of them which should convert them to their own use and so by a translated sense the word signifies a perpetual separation from Christ The Rabbins say of Votum cherem now the Hebrew word cherem answereth to the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as face to face in a glass est maximum votum But to hasten 5ly Is Murther wilful murther a damnable sin If not why saith St. John Ye know that no murtherer hath eternal life abiding in him i. e. hath any actual aptitude or capacity to enter into Heaven Now if the murthering of any man be he good or bad high or low superiour or inferiour be a damnable sin sure I am the murthering of an innocent good man yea of a King a good King which are great aggravations must be so too Yea if the wilful murthering of any one man expose to damnation much more needs must the murthering of many men at once Now the Regicides may be said to have been all of
them murtherers each of other because they did abet and encourage each other in and unto the murther of the King in which was included their own consequentially If there were forty of them each of them was guilty of the death of forty not the forty only guilty of the death of one man viz. the King but each of them of forty murthers viz. each of other for that they strengthened each others hands in and unto the work Again If naked Murther be a damnable sin as hath been proved that murther which is cloathed with barbarous and inhumane circumstances must needs be so much more In Judg. 19.25 we read of a Levites Concubine not only killed but with circumstances that were very barbarous viz. forced to death by the Benjamites dwelling in Gibeah Chap. 20.5 But what dreadful things ensued ver 6. I saith the Levite took my Concubine and cut her in pieces and sent her through all Israel for they have committed lewdness and folly in Israel The product of this was what we read Judg. 20.34 35. And there came up against Gibeah ten thousand chosen men out of all Israel and the battle was sore And the Lord smote Benjamin before Israel and the children of Israel destroyed of the Benjamites that day twenty and four thousand and an hundred men all these drew the sword or were men of valour as is said ver 44. Though wilful murther it self cloathed with the most extenuating circumstances be a great sin yet the barbarous circumstances wherewith it may be cloathed may make it twice so great a sin as otherwise it had been and much more expose it to the Divine vengeance as appeareth by the instance aforesaid But to proceed 6thly Is Hypocrisie a damning sin or not It must needs be so because Hell or the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth is called a portion with the Hypocrite Matth. 24.51 intimating that Tophet was prepared of old as much for Hypocrites as for any sort of men Doth not our Saviour let fly as many Vae's or Woes against Hypocrites as against any sort of men Mat. 25.14 15 16 23 25 27 29. and does he not utter those dreadful words in the close ver 33. Ye Serpents ye generation of Vipers how can ye escape the damnation of hell Now with what direful circumstances of Hypocrisie the late King's death was managed I have told you before 7thly If it be a mortal damning sin to murther but one man especially if a King a Monarch or any thing so great is it not more so to murther a whole Kingdom Country and Monarchy at once The whole species of Monarchy is much more than one individual Kingdom or Monarchy Now I have shew'd before that was aim'd at in putting the King to death which was not only Monarchicidium but designed to issue in Monarchiaecidium or in the ruine of all Monarchy 8thly Is it not a horrid and damning sin to subvert and destroy the good and necessary Laws of a Nation all at once Yea. Not the Laws only but also the very Legislative Power or the Power of making more good Laws as the matter should require If they who resist or disobey the powers that are shall receive damnation as the Apostle speaks Rom. 13.2 What will become of them who in effect destroy and disanul all the Laws of a Nation at once and all the Law-makers Such were the Regicides For when there was no King in England arm'd with power no new Laws could be made nor the old ones executed neither Legally for who but a King has power to give Commission to Judges and other great Instruments of the Law upon all emergent occasions c What the Apostle saith of the Law of God viz. The Law is good if a man use it lawfully is true of the Law of England it is good if it be used lawfully or legally but how could that be done when there was no King in being 9thly Is it not a damning sin for a man to murther himself as did Judas Ahitophel c And did not they murther themselves who murther'd the King For besides that they were dead men in the Eye of the Law the first moment they did or attempted it did it not cost most of them their lives and expose them to an untimely and shameful death though no punishment could be so shameful as was their crime 10thly and lastly Is Deicidium or striking at the life of God himself a damning sin If that will not damn men without great repentance what will The murthering of earthly Kings in Person is it not a kind of murthering the King of Kings in Effigie For his Stamp and Inscription they bear and from thence are called gods in Scripture frequently not that they are equal to the true and living God yea not but that they shall die like men but because in point of Power and Authority of Honour and Majesty they do resemble God much more than Subjects do Now as he that should spit upon the Kings Coin or Picture would be dealt with as one that offered an affront and indignity to his Person and were highly disaffected to him so in this case Now all those Soul-damning sins that I have mentioned being in the womb of that one sin viz. the murthering of the late King let the Reader judge whether the Regicides did not take as direct a course to damn their own Souls as men could take And whether if any shall hereafter attempt to do the same thing to his Majesty that now is as they did to his Father which God forbid it will not prove as ready and certain a course not only to throw away their corporal lives with ignominy but also to damn their Souls and the Souls of their Confederates as any that men could take I am hardned against those that shall say if any such there be That this was done in favour of Religion and for the preservation thereof in power and purity by a Story which a noted Parliament-man and Purchaser of the revenues of a Bishoprick told me about the year 1648. Whereas saith he it is given out that all the change which hath been made has been in order to the preservation and Reformation of Religion there is no such thing For said he had there been Preferments enough in Church State wherewith to have gratified all men of parts interest who were ambitious of them I do assure you there had been no war He was as capable of knowing what he said as any man could be being at that time a Member of Parliament and a great man amongst them though more plain-hearted than some others were The discoveries which I have made of notorious Hypocrisie and blasphemous pretences to God and Religion whilst men did uti Deo at fruantur mundo i. e. use God that they might enjoy the world together with the little difference which I could ever discern betwixt the conversations of those that called themselves the Godly Party