Selected quad for the lemma: death_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A80452
|
A copie of a letter against the engagement. As it was sent to a minister, who perswaded his neighbour that he might subscribe.
|
|
1651
(1651)
|
Wing C6112; Thomason E622_13; ESTC R206436
|
14,704
|
16
|
But then thirdly 't is said the King is not able to protect us and therefore we are freed from our Allegeance and Subjection to him We know what they were who said Can this Man save us And the doom that follow'd upon Nolumus hunc Regnare because their Lord was gone not driven which will make our Sin and our Doom much the heavier into a far Country To lay the absurdity therefore at their own doors if their servants should rise up against them and cast them out of the Family would they suppose it reasonable or lawfull in their Wife to engage her self to be True and Faithfull to another Man Truly this Objection might yet carry some seeming force with it if we were to be subject namely for wrath which God knowes we have no great occasion to fear and not also for Conscience sake if our obedience were terminated in the King and not directed further by the Apostle as to the Lord and not to Man Or if we could say this Lord is not able to protect us will it be lawfull for us to deny or forswear Christ because he shewes himself to us in much weaknesse and under the Crosse Or is not a Son to Honour and acknowledge his Father because he is poor and impotent And sure 't would be full out as strange that our naturall and sworn Duty of helping the King should be avoided by this Reason because he has no power to help himself 4. The fourth Plea therefore is that what we doe is in Loyalty and pure affection to the King that we may preserve our selves and our Estates for his Service To doe evill that good may come of it will be so far from justifying us as it does justifie our Damnation for what is this but to be wiser than God and to seek out the seeming failings of his Providence with our owne Prudence He has no end sayes the son of Syrach of a wicked Man and can doubtlesse bring about his Ends and work out his Glory though we should keep our selves within the bounds that he has set us Better the Ark should totter to the ground than Vzzah stretch forth an unlawfull hand to hold it up The summe of the whole Argument is briefly this It is more probable and we are better able to restore the King without God than God without us 5. In the fifth place it is objected that by taking this Engagement we doe but the same thing as in paying Contribution Truly I am not over-forward to be a party or stickler so as to contribute in the least for Contribution And to him that makes this Objection and shall apprehend the same unlawfulnesse in submitting to Taxes as is evident in Subscribing the Engagement I shall advise and propound it as the onely safe way to keep himself from both and not from that sinfulnesse he has indulg'd to himself perhaps in one if he think or doubt it to be Sin frame an Argument from thence to engage himself in a second But I must confesse there is to my apprehension a very manifest difference between these two My paying of Contribution being but Actus simplex a bare single Act without any Tie or Obligation upon me as in the Engagement for hereafter And you know many things be lawfully and commendably done pro hie nunc here and at this time which by change of the Circumstances and at another time will be utterly unlawfull and I may not therefore be engaged or oblige my selfe unto them But then Secondly paying of Taxes or Contribution is none of mine owne Act and I cannot be thought to be any more accssary to the assisting and maintaining the present Usurpation by this then I might be thought Accessary to the robbery of my selfe and the enriching and strengthning of Theeves against Honest men when being assaulted by a strong Force for my Purse upon the High-way I put my hand in my Pocket and deliver it This will not be the case now in the Engagement which however I am under a strong Temptation indeed must yet be interpreted my own Act if I take it since no Force could put it upon me they could not have my promise unlesse I gave it them nor could I possibly be engag'd but by my selfe whereas in the case of Taxes as in that of being robb'd on the High-way my Mony would have been taken from me and the Theeves enrich'd and made strong by this means doe I what I could And therfore I may be allow'd here it as a piece of sinlesse Prudence not to enrage them needlessely against me and for the saving my Life and the rest of my Estate as suppose a little parcell of Gold about me which by not provoking the Theeves to strip me I goe clear away with when as the very same considerations will make nothing at all for the Engagement since they are not or cannot be urg'd this saving my Life or Estate to make the assisting and enriching of Rebels by my contribution lawfull but onely Prudent the lawfullnesse or sinlesnesse rather being first suppos'd in this which can by no meanes be said of the Engagement that it is not in my power to prevent it or keep my Money from them 6. From hence we shall be readily able to draw out an Answer to the Objection of Force whereby our subscription is pretended lawfull and excusable in respect to the great Fear and strong Temptation that is upon us for we fall not here God be thanked within the reach or power of Force And as to Force I can no more be forc'd to promise my fidelity to these Men than I can be forc'd to deny or renounce my Saviour which if a strong fear might be interpreted force for force I shall grant does excuse S. Peter lavish'd away abundance of Tears to no purpose The unequalnesse of these two sinnes comes not within the case for as to force they are the same and supposing them both unlawfull and in genere mali I am without peradventure to lay down my life rather than be guilty of either To commit a Veniall sin say the Romish Doctors thinking it to be Veniall it becomes Mortall And let the Engagement be suppos'd as diminutive and minute a Transgression as Art can make it or your own heart could wish it it will be no longer so when it is presumptuous He that is unjust in the least our Saviour tells us is unjust also in much And truly they that upon these tearmes and qualifications only think fit to take the Engagement acknowledging it otherwise and of it self sinfull I should very much wonder at their nicenesse to finde them stick at Nebuchanezzars Image when the force is greater the Furnace heated seven times hotter and while their Bodyes bow down to Worship their Soules may be as upright in them as their hearts are firme to the King and their former sacred Oaths and Obligations while they set their hands to the Engagement Fear though it
should be of that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even of death it self will no more excuse me from Sin than that other passion of Love which is stronger than death would excuse one from all the adultery and fornication he should commit where he were so in Love And as to a strong temptation if there be any vertue in that 't is the onely best Argument I have heard I must needs say for giving over the Lords Prayer for 't would be a very inconsiderate and ill advis'd Petition to pray against Temptation as we do there Lead us not into Temptation if the Temptation the very being led into this temptation be the same thing which we Pray for so immediately in the next words But deliver us from evill 7. But must we be Martyrs say some for the King and Government if it were for Christ we knew what we had to do rather suffer many deaths than Subscribe or set so much as a little finger against him Here is the mistake which runs through every Argument remember what our Saviour sayes In as much as ye have not done it unto these ye have not done it unto me For obedience to the King in that he is the Minister of God is to be interpreted as direct an obedience to Christ our King as our Charity to the Poor in that they are his Members will be interpreted and rewarded as done unto himself which yet will not give me a liberty of obeying the King in unlawfull things no more than in Almes to the Poor for so unlawfull things are none of mine I may take liberty to steal from another And therefore though the King should be willing and desire we would subscribe the Engagement we may not do it for all that because I am commanded by a higher Law which therefore the King cannot dispence with not to dissemble with a double heart not to let my mouth speak guile much lesse my hand attest it Or if to answer that exception with a wild supposall he should be willing that we should performe it too Really abdicate his right of Soveraignty over us accept of a place in the Councell of State and be one of the Common-wealth yet when that is done if it could be so done there is still a Noli me tangere upon the Engagement in as much as the Right of the Crowne and the Soveraignty of a Monarch reverts immediately upon his abdication of it to the Duke of York and so as long as there are any of the Bloud to lay claim unto it for that is the nature of an Hereditary Kingdome and that this is such appears most demonstrably to any man by our Oaths taken to the King and his Heirs 'T is not therefore that we are Martyrs for the King or Government for supposing we were free at liberty to choose though we should infinitely prefer Monarchy before a Common-wealth and this King by what we have heard of him and for that he comes of so good a Breed before any other yet not perhaps at the price of our Lives A King and Monarchy are but by accident in our Case 't is to free our selves from Blood and Perjury and in regard of the Oath of God to avoid Sin that we think it fit to embrace sufferings and submit our Heads to the Axe rather than set our Hands to this Engagement 8. There are some you may meet with perhaps have a fine way yet to mince the matter and make it lawfull enough as being but a Paroll which no body therefore needs to Scruple at I answer a Paroll may be drawn doubtlesse in such a Forme and upon such Terms as 't will be unlawfull to signe it or oblige my selfe by it And therefore the liker it is to such a Paroll it is but the more like to be unlawfull Yet every Paroll I conceive will differ mainly from the Engagement in that Eo Nomine as it is a Paroll it presumes and necessarily supposes we are Enemies between whom such a Paroll is given and received for there is no Paroll passes between friends Whereas the Engagement has no such distinguishing note upon it but being taken by themselves and put to all men promiscuously and indifferently in the same termes it must be look't upon not as a Paroll to Enemies but as our absolute Matriculation and employing our selves with them and I am as very a Common-wealths man by it if I take it as Mr. Martin or the greatest Republican of them all But then Secondly giving my Paroll to the Enemy is therefore lawfull because by giving of it I give nothing give nothing to his Authority nor Secondly give my selfe at all out of my owne Power since by rend'ring my selfe againe at any time a Prisoner which is alwayes in my Power and which 't is supposed I would doe when it were better and honester and therefore more Eligible for me to doe so I am where I was before my Paroll and under no Tie or Obligation not to doe 'em the utmost disservice I am able whereas the Engagement being limited to no time and entred into upon no Conditions or Capitulations I wonder what there is in it now like a Parol is in the mildest sence of it a publike disclaiming and denying the good Cause for which I suffer'd and a disavowing my Allegiance for ever For no man can suppose that if I should bring them their Engagement the next day after I have taken it professing not to be Engaged by it I were any more discharg'd from the Obligation of it by so doing then I could be free of my Bond which I Sealed yesterday by saying to day I would not be bound by it or that they were to take such a discharge for good payment Ipse videris would be the Answer as from the Jewish Councell to Judas so to us from the Councell of State what is that to us See thou to that But then Thirdly however we could dispence with the time yet that it be mutuall and Conditionall is so necessary to the Nature of a Paroll that after it be given and accepted on both sides the Obligation on either side holds no longer then while the other side performes the Conditions As for example if I should be let out of the Tower to walke in London upon my Paroll of doing no differvice to the State and be then seiz'd on as a Spie and clapt up in Newgate My Paroll layes no Tie upon me that I shall not break Prison now as soone as I can and doe what lies in my power against them So on the other side they allow me the Liberty of the Town upon my Peroll as before of doing no disservice to the State if I should make use of this Liberty to lay a Traine for the blowing up of the Councell of State I could not plead my Paroll or suppose they were Engag'd by vertue of that to save me harmelesse I can see nothing of this now in the Engagement