they prosper bear rule and raign in a flourishing stare for some years they shall therefore flourish for ever and never be punished because the Lord is flow to anger and cometh to punish on leaden feet using much patience towards the most wicked reprobates to see if his long sufferance can lead them to repentance But if they be such as the wise man speaketh of that Because sentence against an evill work treason Eccles 8.11 or murder or the like is not executed speedily therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evill Te peccare sinit siquidem divina potestas Temporis ad spatium parcit quandoque nocenti Sed gravius tandem tormentum rector Olympi Injungit torquetque magis delicta nocentum Obadiah v. 15.16 Exod. 1.22 15.5 then will God recompence the slownesse of his coming with severity of vengeance and smite then home with iron-hands for this law is irrevocably enacted in heaven that murders adulteries oppressions perjuries and other such wickednesses shall not always prosper but shall undoubtedly be punished though the times and the manner are not by us to be known 2. For the punishment of malefactors it is 1. Sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and they shall suffer the same strokes and receive the same measure as they have measured unto others As thou hast done it shall it be done unto thee Even as Pharaoh drowned all the male-children of the Israelits in the waters of Nilus so was He and all his Host drowned in the red Sea and as the sword of Agag had made many women childless so did the sword of Samuel make Agags mother childless among women and as all the foresaid examples that have proved Traytors and have kil'd their Kings have been kil'd themselves just as the Lord had said Whosoever sheddeth mans blood by man shall his blood be shed 2. Sometimes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they shall suffer some punishment that shall be somewhat like to the sin 2 Chron. 12.5 that they have committed for so the Lord saith You have forsaken me and therefore I have also left you and so it hapned to Solomon that as he divided Gods service betwixt God and the Idols so God divided his Kingdom betwixt Rehoboam his son and Jeroboam his servant And this likeness of the punishment hath a reference sometimes 1. To the Subject 2. To the Place 3. To the Time of our sinning for 1. 1 Kings c. 11. c. 12. As Adam sinned in eating the forbidden fruit so his punishment shall be to eat the fruit of the ground in the sweat of his face and Hezechias for shewing his Treasure was punished with the loss of his treasure 2 King 20. as many other men for being proud of their wealth do lose their wealth some one way and some another 2. The Lord saith that 2 In respect of the place 1 King 21.20 In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood even thine which came to pass accordingly you may see in 1 King 22 38. 3. Sometimes the punishment hath reference to the time of our sinning 3 In respect of the punishment as the spies that searched the land of Canaan 40 daies and sinned by their false report were punished by wandering in the wilderness 40 years and it is observed that Pompey was killed by Septimius and Achillas as upon the same day wherein he had formerly triumphed for the spoile of Jerusalem and the Jews had their City utterly destroyed by Titus at the same time of the year and as some think on the same day of the month wherein they had crucified our Saviour Christ 3. In respect of the persons sinning and punished we are to observe 3 The persons sinning 2 King 14.6 that although the Lord saith The fathers shall not be put to death for the children nor the children be put to death for the fathers but every man shall be put to death for his own sin and the soul that sinneth that soul shall die and God will not have them say The fathers have eaten sower grapes and the childrens teeth are set on edge Yet it is most certain that many times the wickedness of the fathers is remembred in their posterity and the punishment of that wickedness is oftentimes delated and after a sort both deferred and in part transferred as well to the children and to the childrens children of them that walk in the same steps and follow the same courses as their fathers did and sometimes upon the very innocent Infants as upon the wicked fathers that are murderers and malefactors themselves For so the Lord saith that for the sin of Jeroboam therefore behold and mark it well I will bring evil upon the house of Jeroboam 1 King 14.10 11. and will cut off from Jeroboam him that pisseth against the wall and him that is shut up and left in Israel and will take away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam asa man taketh away dung till it be all gone And so Baasha the son of Ahijab smote all the house of Jeroboam 1 King 15.29 he left not to Jeroboam any that breathed untill he had destroyed him 1 King 16.3 4. according to the Word of the Lord and the Lord threatneth the very same punishment and the rooting out of all his posterity to Baasha 1 King 16.11 12. that killed his King Nadab and did other evils in the sight of the Lord and this Zimri the servant of Elab brought to pass according as the Lord had threatned and the very like punishment happened to all the posterity of Ahab even for Naboths murder and other sins of Ahab 2 King 9.9 and c. 10.17 and too many more murderers and wicked men that by their sins and desire to raign and unjust preferring of their children have pulled down vengeance upon themselves and rooted out all their posterity And for Romulus Tarquinius and Nero I say neither of them were either good or honest and yet the holy Scripture doth not allow the killing or sentencing of them to death and the proof of the Senat 's killing Romulus or sentencing Nero to death is not Authenticall nor the examples by any means to be followed when they are so apparantly contrary to the practice and precepts of the holy Apostles and the success which followed Neroes death proved so lamentable Corn. Tacit. l. 20. 21. as the Tragicall butchering of three of their succeeding Emperors Galba Otho and Vitellius that had been three most famous Captains and had done very worthy exploits for their Countrey And therefore whosoever thinketh by murder and slaughter to usurp another mans Kingdom Inheritance or Possession and thereby to raise his house and to advance his children as Zimri Baasha Shallum and others thought to do or thereby to benefit the Common-wealth as they pretend to do he deceives himself because this is the only
these murderers All these saith our Saviour shall be destroyed and so they were all of them that repented not did soon perish For 1. Judas the prime Traytor hanged himself and that without any regard of his grand Masters who when they saw his disconsolate soul and heard his confession of his foul Treason said no more but What is that to us as if they said Be hang'd or be damn'd we do not care thou shouldst have looked to that thy self 2. Pilate that unjust Judge not long after the execution of this King was disgracefully displaced and exiled his Countrey and therefore killed himself in a strange land 3. Herod died most miserably being eaten up with worms 4. Annas and Caiphas were violently killed as the Stories do report 5. The Priests and Presbyters Pharisees and Sadduces and many others that were Actors in the murdering of this King lived I believe most of them to see the famous City of Jerusalem besieged and many of them to see it destroyed and at least 1100000. of their Countrey-men slaughtered and all the rest even their Children that were unborn when they kil'd their King either Captivated by their enemies or scattered like Vagabonds over all the face of the earth And as the severall Factions and the different Sects conspired together and agreed as one man to kill their King So their divisions and differences made way for the Romans to destroy them all and which is strange by this their wicked act the very things that they feared came upon them for their great Prophet Caiphas tels them it was expedient that he should die lest the Nation perish and by the just Judgment of God their Nation must perish because they did so wickedly put their King to death And so they were resolved to kill him lest the Romans should invade their Land and change their laws and because they did kill him God sent the Romans to destroy their Country to change their laws and to make such havock of slaughtering them ut nec locus crucibus nec cruces corporibus sufficerent And ever since the murder of their King they have been hated of all Nations For Sisibut King of the Visigothes and Dagobert the 10th King of France commanded them on pain of death to depart out of their Dominions And Ferdinando and Isabella King and Queen of Castile within these seven-score years 1500. years after the murdering of their King handled them very shrewdly Camerar l. 5. c. 9. and put an infinite number of them to death And Emmanuel King of Portugal did the like So hateful are they for their regicide to all good men and so just is God in all his wayes and so exceedingly hating Rebellion against our Kings and much more the murdering of our own lawful just and pious King that the same never escapeth the severest punishment that can be imagined as I shall shew it in the next Treatise For if he who sheddeth mans blood though but a poor Beggar by man shall his blood be shed then surely he that sheds his Kings blood cannot escape the severe vengeance of God who peremptorily saith Vengeance is mine and I will revenge saith the Lord. And you know what the Apostle saith It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God who is a consuming fire And therefore if any man hath persecuted Gods Servants the Preachers or conspired to take away the life of his King the Annointed of the Lord let him repent and that quickly lest God as He saith to the Church of Pergamos do quickly come unto him and fight against him with the sword of his mouth which is a two-edged sword that cuts on every side the soul with the worm of conscience and the body with most fearful plagues and punishments For if the blood of Abel which had no voice while it lived yet being dead cryed so loud here on earth that it was easily heard in heaven and it was as fearful as it was loud for it was for vengeance against his brother then questionless the innocent blood of a just King being dead yet speaketh and speaketh louder for vengeance against his Subjects than the other did against his brother which I fear without our speedy and deep repentance will be abundantly poured out upon this sinful generation for that we have so barbarously murdered our own King in such wicked manner that I never read the like in any History nor the Sun I believe did ever see the like since the devilish murder of the King of kings from which these murderers took their pattern to proceed in like manner in most particulars and herein therefore Licet parvis componere magna I thought good to parallel the practises of both sorts of murderers the Jewish and the English murderers The murdered I confess are far unlike and will admit of no comparison the difference and distance betwixt their Persons being so great as is betwixt Heaven and Earth the Creator and the creature King Charles being begotten by an earthly father as all other men are and subject to like passions as we are but Jesus Christ the King of the Jews was conceived by the Holy Ghost and free from all sin and mastering all affections And King Charles was King but of small Territories But Jesus Christ was Rex universae terrae and he was and is King of kings and Lord of lords King Charles did good but to many and hurt but few if he hurt any but the King of the Jews did good to all and wronged none and so in all other things I know how that the one is finite and the other infinite in justice wisdom Power and all other Attributes of excellencies But if we look how both these Kings were handled by their Subjects we shall find the later not much unlike the former and King Charles hated traduced mocked spightfully used and causelessely killed and murdered And all this in like manner though not in every particular in like measure by his own Subjects as Jesus Christ was by the wicked Jews As I hope I have fully and sufficiently and plainly declared unto you in this Treatise And therefore that we ought all of us to confess lament and bewail as in general all our sins so more especially this our great sin of murdering our own King and to pray to God night and day that for the merits of the death and passion of Jesus Christ the King of the Jews he would pardon and forgive us our sins committed in putting to death our own most just and gracious King Grant this O dear Father for thy dear Son Jesus Christ his sake to whom be glory c. THE SECOND TREATISE 2 Kings 9.31 Had Zimri peace that slew his Master THE Doctrine of Obedience both to God and to our lawful King and his Magistrates hath been so fully and so excellently handled by the Right reverend and most Worthy and Learned Bishop of Downes that more need not and better cannot
truth as the Poet saith of Ibis Tincta Lycambaeo sanguine tela dabunt Ovid. in Ibin Their sword is dipt in blood and â—ats the flesh of Innocents and they will give you poyson in a golden cup and deceive you even with Scripture Phrases when as Claudian saith de voluptate Stiliconis Blanda quidem vâ—ltu Claudian de volupt l. 2. Stilic sed qua non tetrior ulla Interius fucata genas amicia dolosis Illecebris So their Doctrine hath the Countenance of truth and the shews of a great deale of piety and charity but you can not see so far as the further end of their intention or at least of his intention that sets them on this course which is to divide the seamless coat of Christ to bring sects and divisions into the Church and to break the two staffes wherewith the Church of Christ is guided and subsisteth Beauty and Bands i.e. the pure Doctrine and the discreet Discipline of the Governors of the Church that these Governors being suppressed and their discipline destroyed and the bands which are the Fences of Gods Vine-yard being broken all to pieces the wild Bore out of the Forrest and all the Beasts out of the Field may destroy the Vine-yard at their pleasure and make the Church of Christ to become the Synagogue of Satan and the House of God a Den of thieves And therefore when any of these false Prophets should arise and seek to withdraw Gods servants from the Truth and true God Deut 13.5 1 Reg. 18.40 the Lord commands his people to put that Prophet to death and so Elias caused all the Prophets of Baal to be slain and Jehu did the like and though our Saviour Christ be not so severe in the New Testament as God was in the Old Testament to command us to put the false Prophets to death yet he doth most seriously advise us to beware of them Apoc. 22.15 and the Holy Ghost calleth them Dogs barking dogs of whom the Apostle biddeth us to beware lest they bite us And truely we have the greatest reason in the world to beware of them because these false Prophets that seduce the people with their smooth Preaching and with the Words of God are worse then any other wicked men that destroy none but themselves and they bring thousands after them out of the right way and from the right service of God And yet these false Prophets were the only Prophets whom the Jews magnified and the true Prophets of God they persecuted for Jezabel fed 400. of these false Prophets at her own Table which was a pretty company for one woman to maintain and for Elias which was the true Prophet of the Lord she swore that she would be the death of him as you may see in 1 Reg. 19.2 1 Reg. 19.2 And the rest of the People of the Jews walked in the same waies And therefore the Lord saith Micah 2.11 If a man walking in the spirit and falshood do lie or walk with the wind and lie falfly he shall even be the Prophet of this people And this hath been the Common course of the world in all ages For all wicked men and all worldlings that would notwithstanding seem to be Religious and pretend to serve God as well as the best and rather then the best will therefore have Preachers and Prophets to instruct them in the way of God as they pretend but it is indeed to cover and to cloak their Hypocrisie and therefore their Preachers must be like Jezabels Prophets Prophets like themselves that will Prophesie what they please and serve what god they please and with what service they like best And such Prophets and Preachers as will do so to follow their directory they shall want no preferment they shall have annuities and pensions and augmentations and eat at Jezabels Table Thus did the Jews lay down a pattern to magnify the false Prophets and now the Christians follow them But how did they deal with the other sort of Prophets that were the Prophets of the Lord the Prophet Esay tels you To the Seers they said see not Esay 30.10 and to the true Prophets they said Prophesy not to us right things and because the true Prophets that the Lord owned to be His Prophets would not dissemble and smooth them up by sowing pillows under their elbows and prophesying placentia deceits and pleasing things unto them therefore the Holy Ghost tels us they mocked these Messengers of God 2 Chr. 36.16 and despised his words that is the Words of God that were spoken to them by his Messengers and they misused his Prophets as you may see in 2 Chron. 36.16 And as S. Stephen saith they persecuted them from time to time and from place to place And thus did the Jews use or rather abuse the true Prophets And have we not seen the like dealings in our own time and the people imitating these Jews to a hair Persecuting all the Reverend Bishops and all the grave Preachers and spoyling them of all their Livelihoods to make them the very scorn of the World as we have been above these two Lustra's of years and yet in a deep Hypocrisy to magnify and to advance the false Prophets and those young novices and Preachers that commended their waies and walked after their steps though now the tide being turn'd the most of them cry Peccavi and say with the Jews We have sinned with our Fathers we have done amiss and dealt wickedly to let you see what kind of Prophets they were and what you should conceive of their extorted confession but enough of this that sheweth you what Prophets and whose Prophets their Fathers persecuted the true Prophets of the Lord. Yet here is one point more and that is 3. The Generality of their persecution for Quem Prophetarum 3 The Generality of the Persecution saith the Martyr Which of the Prophets have not your Fathers persecuted Can you name any one of Gods Prophets that hath escaped their persecuting hands And is it not strange that there is no Bound nor Measure of their malice 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Devil is Gods ape but it must extend and reach to all Gods Prophets Surely no For the Devil is Gods apâ—â—â—nd as in many things else so he would fain imitate God herein As God would have all the Prophets of Baal destroyed that there might not be a false Prophet left to seduce his people so the Devill would have all the Prophets of the Lord destroyed that there might not be one true Prophet left to instruct Gods people and therefore he crieth out unto his instruments Down with them down with them even to the ground and let the foundations be cast down that their building may be quite demolished like the re-edifying of Jericho whose builder should be accursed and should lay the foundation thereof in his First born Josh 6.26 and set up the gates thereof in his
the Priests but also to root out Presbyterium Our late persecution worse then Julians persecution the very Priesthood of Jesus Christ and so to extinguish the Christian religion out of the world for these men imitating him sought to supress not the then Bishops that perhaps might be found to have offended though that was never proved but Episcopacie it self and the discentive succession thereof which we received by prayers and the imposition of hands even from the Apostles time from those that are yet unborn and have I am sure done neither good nor evill and yet have received this evill from these men to have the Calling that they were to enjoy supprest their honours buried and their undubitable Rights and Means alienated from them Prohscelus nefandum quod magnum est mirum a most wonderfull thing that wickednesse should have no bounds no stop no reason nor moderation in its progression but like a stone tumbling down a hill never leave tumbling till it comes to the bottome or like a right Apollyon and a blind smiter that will slay the righteous with the wicked or rather destroy the righteous because they will not be wicked And yet this is not all we are not yet come to the height of these persecutors wickednesse Ezek. k. 13 15. or to the depth of their abomination but as the Lord saith unto the Prophet Ezechiel turn thee yet again and thou shalt see greater abominations so from the Lord I will shew to you greater abomination and the greatest that ever was committed here on earth For 3. The 〈…〉 the beâ—â—â—ving and murderring of the first King Touching which three 〈◊〉 are â—â—â—â—trable They have not only persecuted the Prophets and slain the Preachers and foreshewers of the coming of Jesus Christ but they have also saith our Martyr betrayed and murdered that just one For the fuller and more perfect understanding of which point I shall desire you to observe these three things 1. What they are and how they are styled by the holy Ghost that did this deed Traytors and Murderers 2. Of whom they are the Traytors and Murderers which is here exprest by that Just One and we shall find him to be 1. None of the Plebeians or common sort of men but a King the highest and the chiefest man in all the Kingdom 2. Not an alien as were Caesar and Herod but their own King originally and lineally descended from the Jews 3. Not an Vsurper as was Jeroboam and many others of the Kings of Israel and Athalia among the Jewes and Rich. the third and the late Cromwell amongst us but he was their own lawfull King without question lawfully descended from the Royall line 4. Not an unjust or tyrannical King as were Pharaoh Dionysius and Nero nor yet a lascivious King as were Sardanapalus Belshazzar and Heliogabalus but a most just perfect and pious King No better King under heaven 3. Who they were that the holy Martyr meaneth by these Traytors and Murderers of their King and we shall find them to be the Lords and Commons the People the Elders the Scribes and Pharisees and the whole Council of the Jewes 1. Part. 1. Their style and denomination which is twofold â— Traytorss They that have put this just King to death are here styled and shall ever be justly termed Traytors and Murderers 1. Traytors that is to their King for the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Holy Ghost useth in this place and is derived of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies prodo or trado from whence the word Traitor cometh doth properly and most usually signifie both in prophane Authours and in the Ecclesiasticall and Civil writers the illegal and undutiful demeanour and the rebellious behaviour of Subjects toward and against their King and as the most curious criticks and best searchers of the Scriptures do observe this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Traytor is never applyed to any King for any act be it never so illegall so foul so barbarous or so bloudy that the King commits agains his Subjects when as we find not one text in all the book of God the holy Bible that speaks of many wicked idolatrous and tyrannical bloudy Kings where any one of those Princes or Kings is signified by this word or called by this name of Traytor And therefore this word Traytors that the Martyr useth doth sufficiently shew that he meaneth thereby to prove Christ to be King and the Traytors that killed him to be his Subjects as I shall further declare unto you hereafter 2. 2 Murders They are murderers because he was unlawfully put to death for otherwise a lawful Judge may lawfully put a malefactor to death and be no murderer because God commandeth Idolaters and sorcerers and others the like malefactors to be put to death and they that legally put such men to death are never termed murderers but when the party executed is innocent and the Judge condemning him not vested with lawful authority the man so put to death is truly said to be murdered and his executioners murderers And such was the death of Christ because he was most innocent And so was the death of King Charles and the Judge had neither lawful authority nor a just cause to condemn him and therefore they that crucified Christ and put him to death are rightly termed murderers and because Christ was a King as I shewed you from the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 traytors they were no ordinary murderers of plebeians 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and of the common sort of men but that which is the highest and the worst of all murders they were the murderers of their King and therefore the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Martyr useth to expresse the death of the fore-shewers of the coming of Christ and the words of the Husbandmen which they said together of the King's Son Marc. 12.7 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that comes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Occido used here to signifie the death of this King ought properly to be translated either by killing or slaying or murdering as our last Translation renders the Martyr's words most rightly that they were his murderers But here it may be the Jews will object and say That Man or that King cannot justly be said to be murdered which is brought to a publick Trial and hath 1. His Charge given him to answer Three things seeming topalliat and to disprove the murdering of this King discussed 2. The Witnesses ready to prove the Charge 3. A Lawful Judge to pronounce sentence against him And all this was used against Christ the King of the Jews and against Charles the King of England saith the long Parliament therefore neither the one nor the other can justly and properly be said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be murdered but they are unjustly taxed and
this heavy Crime of murdering them is not justly laid upon them that brought these Kings to their just deserved deaths Therefore to justifie their deaths to be murders and to clear St. Stephen from this unjust taxation laid upon him by the Jews we are to examine the three foresaid particulars how far they can justifie the Jews or any others in the like case from being murderers 1 The Charge unjust and first for the Charge that was laid against him we find the same pretended to be twofold and as I conceive very like the Charge that was laid against King Charles So King Charles was charged with the same Crimes 1. The abridging of their Liberty and betraying the same unto the Romans for so they say If we let this man alone all the World will run after him and the Romans will come and take away our Dominion from us 2. The corrupting of their Religion by abolishing their old Rites and Traditions of the Elders and teaching new Points of Doctrine to prophane the Sabbath to communicate with Sinners to justifie their slovenly eating with unwashen hands and the like loosness and liberties that the precise Pharisees could not endure he allowed unto his Disciples and follower in the service of God This was the pretended Charge that they laid against their King and against S. Stephen as you may see Acts 6.13 14. and that his adversaries laid against our good King But this pretended Charge was most false whenas he neither abridged their Liberty nor corrupted their Religion but most divinely cleared the same The Jew◠murdered Christ because he was their King Luc. 23 2◠and purged it from the false glosses of the Scribes and Pharises But the true cause indeed whatsoever they pretended why they killed him was because he was their King for S. Luke saith that when they led him to Pilate they began to accuse him saying We found this fellow perverting the Nation and forbidding to give tribute unto Caesar saying that he himself is Christ a King and when Pilate asked them Shall I crucifie your King a thing that was never known among the Heathen that Subjects should desire to crucifie their King and especially that they should so solemnly and judicially condemn him to death they answered him flatly So K. Charles was murdered by his adverfaries because he was their King and would have ruled them as their King when as they desired to be Kings themselves and to rule as they did after they had killed him We have no King but Caesar whom notwithstanding they loved no better than they loved Christ but hated him in their hearts as their often rebellions against him do sufficiently testifie And when Pilate the Judge and therefore knew best the Charge laid against him wrote his Title and fixed it upon his Crosse as shewing unto all that saw him the very cause why they put him to death which was Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews They came presently unto Pilate and desired him to alter the Superscription and not to say He was their King but that he said He was their King But Pilate herein like a resolute Judge that knew the truth and their dissembling answered them stoutly according to the truth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 What I have written I have written And therefore this Charge being so unjust to kill him because he is their King whose life they are obliged to defend with the hazard of their own death S. Stephen may justly call them murderers 2. 2 The witnesset are false Math. 26.59 60. For the witnesses it is plainly said that they sought many yet found they none but at last there came two they could get no more and of them two it is said 1. That they were false witnesses and that is apparent when they add unto his words and change his meaning for he said no more but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Destroy this temple John 2.19 v. 21. and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in three dayes I will raise it up and he spake this of the temple of his body as the Evangelist testifieth but their witnesses avouch that they heard him saying Marc. 14.58 59. I will destroy this Temple that is made with hands and within three dayes I will build another made without hands that is another material and magnificent Temple which Christ never meant and never spake of it nor of the temple of his body as they testifie for he said not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I will destroy this Temple but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Do you destroy this temple and I will raise it up You shall do the evil and bring destruction as you use to do and I will do the good and bring resurrection to them that are fallen 2. Marc. 14.59 It is said that these false witnesses which did both add unto his words and change his meaning did not agree together for the one said he heard him saying I will destroy this temple that is made with hands and within three dayes Cap. 14.58 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Math. 26.61 I will build another made without hands yet the other could not testifie that he said so but that he said I am able to destroy the temple of God and build it in three dayes and there is a great deal of difference betwixt I will destroy thee and I am able to destroy thee when I am able to do many things that I will not do Even as God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham but will not raise them And therefore seeing these two witnesses cannot agree together they destroy one another and must needs be invalid to condemn an innocent man and much less to condemn their King that was more innocent than any man But they were resolved to have done it whether they had witnesses or no witnesses for they said among themselves What need have we of witnesses Then all of them Math. 26.65 Marc. 14.63 64 So K. Charles was condemned without witnesses Joh. 18.31 Math. 26.4 Marc. 14.1 And was not K. Charles by craft and subtilty brought to his death as they had formerly resolved did presently vote him guilty of death not as it seems for the testimony of the witnesses but because their malice thought him worthy of death Yet they confess 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It is not lawful for us that is they had no lawful authority to put any man to death and for all that S. Mathew tells us they consulted how they might take him by subtilty and kill him and S. Mark testifieth as much that they sought how they might take him by craft and put him to death And therefore when Traytors have conspired and resolved to kill their King witnesses are but shadows and the formalities of their proceedings are but cloaks to palliat and cover their wickedness and to blind the eyes of the vulgar people whom they would perswade to believe that they do all things
right when they do the greatest wrongs and do commit such horrid murders as to murder their own King 3. For the Judge our Saviour seemeth tacitly to yield 3 The Judge was corrupt that by the permission of God not his Commission Pilate through the power of the sword and according to the Laws of the Conquerors had power and authority granted unto him to be the Judge both of life and death but according to the Laws of the Romans that had then subdued the Jews and committed this power unto Pilate none were to be condemned to death except he were proved guilty of the Crimes that should be laid to his charge And this Judge ingenuously and openly confesseth that although like a good Judge herein he had examined the matter throughly John 18.38 and sifted him and his cause ad amussim to the uttermost yet he could find no fault in him worthy of death and therefore being desirous to free him whom he found so innocent by a fair excuse and to quit himself from pronouncing so unjust a sentence against a just man he advised his adversaries to take their King and to judge him according to their Law that is if they had any Law to crucifie their King that was so just and had offended no Law because the Romans thought such proceedings of Subjects against their King very strange and therefore had no such Law neither in their 12. Tables nor in any of the Acts and Decrees of their Senate whereby he might justly condemn him and justly answer it if he were questioned for it And herein also this Judge by this fine device shewed himself witty and his counsel honest as it aimed at a good end that is to free the party accused but afterwards becoming the Judge of Christ not by the Roman Law which as himself confessed gave him no authority to condemn any innocent person but by the importunity of the rebellious Subjects and malicious enemies against their King that thirsted after his blood he forgets his duty and contrary to his own conscience So was King Charles condemned to death to satisfie the Parliament and the people that still cryed Justice Justice Mar. 15 15. Luke 23.24 and contrary to the Roman Law and to all other Laws he doth most unjustly condemn that Just King to death And both the Evangelists S. Mark and S. Luke tell us He did it to content the people and to satisfie the High Priests and the Elders that had over-perswaded him to become his Judge and over-ruled him to adjudge him unto death And therefore the Charge laid against this King being unjust the witnesses being both false and disagreeing and his Judge thus corrupted and compelled and so as it were newly made by the clamor of the people condemning him contrary to the Roman Law which was then the Law of their Land to please the people it is apparent to all the World as I conceive that both the Judge and Witnesses and all the Complotters and Contrivers of this Kings death and all the whole Parliament and Council of the Jews that approved and rejoyced at his death yea and all the people that cryed to have him put to death are justly meant by S. Stephen and by him here rightly termed murderers because as I take it the Law saith that in murder there can be no accessary but all and every one that hath any hand in it are deemed principalls And how far murderers are to be pardoned I leave it to him that pardoneth all sins to be determined But if God will pardon murderers I wish he would not prefer them to places of Trust and Authority lest the Woolf lett-go still continue a Woolf to vex the Lambs And as it is said of the Devil Daemon languebat monachus tunc esse volebat Daemon convaluit mansit ut ante fuit 2. 2 Of whom these Tâ—â—ytors were murderers Having spoken of the style and denomination of these Persecutors of the Prophets that they were traytors and murderers we are now to confider of whom they were the traytors and murderers and the Martyr tells us it was of that Just One and I told you that we find him to be 1. 1 Of a King proved 1. By his Birth A King and so proved to be divers wayes as 1. At his birth when the Wise men that came from the East worshipped him as King while he was in his swadling clouts and they are by the constant course and order of the Church annually on the twelfth day after the day of his birth commemorated and commended for it 2. 2 By the ministration of his Office In the ministration of his kingly office when he entred Jerusalem as Kings use to do in a Royall and a pompous manner and his disciples and a great multitude of his followers did him obeysance and gave him royall honour as to their King by cutting down the boughs and spreading their garments under his feet and crying Blâ—ssed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord Luke 19.38 Matth. 21.15 and the childrens crying Hosanna as we use to do God save the King and when the chief Priests and Scribes were displeased at this acceptation of him for their King and bad him to rebuke his disciples for this attempt Christ told them plainly that if these should hold their peace the stones would immediately cry out that is to proclaim him King and to do him all Royal homage 3. 3 At his arraignment At his arraignment when he was to lay down his soul to be a ransome for our sins he avouched himself to be a King for Pilate demands the question Art thou a King and Pilate understood not any kingdome in this question but of a temporal kingdome when as in his conception to speak of a Spiritual King or kingdome was but a vain fancie and a meer Chimaera and therefore ad mentem interrogantis to satisfie the demand of Pilate Christ answereth without dissimulation aequivocation or mental reservavation Mark 15.2 that he was a King Matth. 27.11 or if he did not so he made no answer unto Pilate which as the Evangelist saith he did 4. 4 At his death At his death he had it written upon his Crosse who he was Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews so that when they took away his life they could not deprive him of his right unto his kingdome 5. 5 At his burial At his burial he had his grave sealed as a King 2. 2 â—hey were the murderers of their own King We find this just one whereof this Martyr speaketh to be not only a King but also the King of these Jews that murdered him for he was not a King of Egypt that oppressed them nor the king of Syria that sought to subdue them but their own King the King of the Jews for so the wise men testifie Where is he that is born king of the Jews And so Pilate the
I would fain know if these four things were not the very causes that made the Rebels to being King Charles unto death this covetousnesse to get what is none of our own hath been the death of many Kings of many men for what made Caracalla slay his brother Geta in his mothers lap and between her armes but this inordinate desire to raign What made Phraharers son of Horodes King of Parthia kill his own Father and 29. of his brethren but the like desire to raign And what made Abimelech the bastard son of Gedeon slay 70. of his brethren in one day and Jehn to slay his Master even as Zimri had done the like before him and Absolon attempt to do so to his own Father but only this ambitious desire of bearing rule And if you look into the 8. c. of the 5. Book of Camerarius Camerar l. 5. c. 8. his historical meditations you shall find a Catalogue of such wicked murderers that have bin the death of many Kings that they might raign as kings themselves and therefore let the pretences of these murderers of their King be what you will change of Religion Arbitrary Government great Tyranny or loss of liberty yet all these are but forged and fained to blind the World and to deceave the people and the true Cause indeed is this Haereditas erit nostra This Profit is the point that doth the deed And as the desire to raign makes the regicides Cant. 2. so this inheritance of the Church which is signified by the Vineyard brought the doctrine of killing deposing and depriving into the Church of Christ and it is as truly Esay 5. as wittily said by one that Quid vultis mihi dare is the Jews question in this case Omnia haec tabi dabo is the Devil's answer to the Church-robber And such a dialogue betwixt the Devil and the Jew for the inheritance of the Church is powerfull enough to bring any King even Christ himself the King of Kings unto his death so I do assure my self and all the World may be assured of it it is not the calling or the office of the Bishops or of Deans Prebends which neither they nor their grand Master was ever able to disprove to be Divine that they so much detest but it is their Lands and inheritance that they so greedily gape for and as this made Naboth to lose his life so this makes our calling detestable and this was the cause the cause 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that brought Charles our King and one speciall cause that brought Christ the King of kings unto their deaths because they would not betray the trust that God reposed in them nor surrender up this their rightfull Inheritance unto the greedy Usurpers but shewed themselves faithfull shepherds that were ready to lay down their lives for their sheep rather then to betray the laws and liberties of the people and the happiness that God had determined for their subjects and for this as we owe to our Saviour Christ our selves our souls and our bodies to honor him and serve him to praise him and to magnify him for ever as our only Saviour and preserver from everlasting death and destruction so this good King this just magnanimous King King Charles that rather suffered an ignominious death then to give away the inheritance of the Church or annull the highest calling in the same the Calling of the Reverend Bishops deserves to be everlastingly Loved indelibly Chronicled and universally Published like Mary Magdalen for a faithfull Martyr a true Protector and a nursing Father unto the Church of Christ which here I vow for mine part ever to do whensoever opportunity offers it self to do it But as I said before they had their King in their hands Ob. they had him their Prisoner so they had his Kingdom in their power and possession already what needed they therefore to kill him that they might have that which they had For if Ahab had had the Vineyard questionless Naboth had not died Saint Mark answereth fully that they kild the Heire Sol. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they might hold it and continue in it An answer specially to be observed for covetousness is a sin of Retention and never thinks of Restitution and the sin of forcible entrance can not endure to be put out of Possession thereforelest if he lived he might use some means to Regain it there is no surer way for them to hold in Peace what they unjustly got by the sword but by the death of the Just Owner And the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as I conceive signifieth not only that we may hold what we have but also that we may have more then we hold as if they should have said Some-what we have while we have him our prisoner and in our hands but more we shall get when we get him dead for then we shall have all as much as we can or will desire Therefore seeing ambition is like the daughters of the Horseleëch that still crieth more and more these murderers are like the Whore in the Apocalyps that having tasted the blood of the Saints will never give over till she be drunk with blood so will they never be satisfied with any less than the blood of their King Apoc 17. the death of the right Heir that they may hold what they have and have whatsoever they desire So you see the true Causes why these wicked murderers have put their King to death Now 3. 3 The patient and silent demeanor of this King Esay 53. Act. 8.32 When his adversaries most maliciously illegally and falsly accused him and laid many things to his charge contrary to all truth yet he answered not unto their charge but this good King being reviled reviled not again and being smitten smote not again but as a Lamb before his shearer is dumb so opened he not his mouth The Reason The Reason of not answering to their charge four fold why he answered not is not expressed by the Holy Evangelists therefore we may not curiously prie into that which is concealed nor Positively conclude the Reason that is not revealed unto us Yet with Modesty it may be conjectured that he would not answer 1. Reason 1 Lest his wise and satisfactory Answer might convince Pilate that was a rational man and seemed to bear no malice against him and being satisfied to let him go freed from the accusation of his enemies and so the Counsell of God which he knew and came to fulfill it touching the Redemption of mankind by his death might thereby be frustrated So far did he prefer our good before his own life A most gratious King 2. Reason 2 He answered them not lest his answering might have ministred an occasion to these malicious miscreants to suborn more perjurers to bear false witness against him so carefull was this good King of the good of his enemies that they should not heap
straightly prohibite to be done is a disgracing of God himself and all the contempts done to this Image do presently redound to God that is represented without all question in this Image And the City of Thessalonica besides many others can well testifie how severely the Emperours punished the abusing of their Images when they deemed all the dishonour that was done against their Images to be Treasons against themselves 8. And lastly this killing of a man not only defaceth the Image of God but also robbeth God of his Temple which is Sacriledge and makes none account of but trampleth under feet that which God did so highly esteem and purchased at so high a rate as with his own blood And in a word it is so odious so haynous and so horrible a sin every way as it is impessible for me to expresse the vileness and the haynousnesse of this sin of Man-slaughter or the malicious killing of a man And therefore to shew how odious this sin is in the sight of God immediately after the Flood the great Commandment and the only Commandment that he gave to all the sons of Noah was to abstain from shedding of mans blood and he doth so pathetically and with such terrible threatnings expresse the punishment of the Transgressors saying Surely that you need not doubt it your blood of your lives will I require yea at the hand of every beast will I require it See Exod. 21.28 and though they be void of reason and understanding of what they do yet will I not hold them guiltless if they shed mans blood And therefore much rather and much sooner at the hand of man and at the hand of every mans brother Gen. 9.5 6. See Numb 35.31 33. Levit. 24.17 Math. 26.52 will I require the life of man and to that end he did appoint Kings that they should ordain Magistrates under them that whosoever sheddeth mans blood by man should his blood be shed And the reason why God is so severe against Man-slayers is here rendered for that in the Image of God made he man and so whosoever killeth a man except it be whom the Law killeth destroyeth the Image of God and God cannot endure to have his own lively Image which no painter but Himself hath made to be defaced And therefore in Numbers 35.31 the Lord saith Ye shall take no satisfaction for the life of a Murderer which is guilty of death but he shall be surely put to death And the reason is rendered verse 33. And truly I do not find any sius I will not say that are irremissible but that are so difficult so hard and so seldom remitted as these two Videlicet 1. The abuse of God's Messengers and 2. The shedding of Innocent blood For Of the first it is said that when the Jews mocked the Messengers of God and despised his words and misused his Prophets 2 Chro. 36.16 the wrath of the Lord arose against his people until there was no remedy Of the second it is said 2 Kings 24.4 that the Lord sent Bands of the Chaldees to revenge the Innocent blood that Manasses had shed which the Lord would not pardon Also when God gave his Laws unto us on Mount Sinai the first Commandment of all that doth concern men after the duty that we owe to our Parents that bring us into the World and bring us up and feed us when we cannot feed our selves is Thou shalt not kill And truly in these respects I for my own part do so far hate the killing of any man except it be to save mine own life from him that would maliciously take it from me that I had rather do any servile work for a penny a day Greg. habetur 23. q. 8. si in mortem than receive the greatest Salary Honour and Preferment for killing of men And I think S. Gregory not far from my mind when he said Si in mortem Longobardorum me miscere voluissem hodie Longobardorum gens nec regem nec ducem baberet sed quia Deum timeo in mortem cujusâ—ibeâ— hominis me miscere formido For he that feareth God will be afraid to be the death of any man and will study by all means vacuas caedis habere manus Ovid. de arte l. 1. to keep his hands clean from blood And if it be so unnatural so unreasonable so devilish so beastly so haynous and every way so inexplicable and so detestable in the sight of God and all good men to kill and murder a man I would fain know what tongue what eloquence what Orator though he had the tongue of men and Angels can expresse the haynousness of a subject's killing his own King and a servant's killing his own kind and loving Master as Zimri did his King and his Master Elah 2 Sam. 18.3 and some others did such a King as was worth ten thousand of his subjects And therefore well and wisely might Jezabel demand Had Zimri peace that slew his Master But the wit of man is so crafty that it thinks to find a way to effect his own end and yet to evade the hand and escape the judgement of God when they keep their own hands free from blood but will notwithstanding prosecute the innocent person whom they hate either judicially as the Jews did Christ by their high court of Parliament that pronounced judgement against him for a malefactour which may and ought to be put to death by the Law of God or else secretly by others their assassins whom they procure to be their instruments to bring whom they hate to his untimely death either by poyson as Alexander was by Thessalus and Sir Thomas Overbury by Sir Jervase Eloway or by some other secret contrivance as King David plotted the death of Vrias and then as the Harlot commits Adultery and wipes her mouth and is clean so they will bring Christ and his servants to their death and then with Pilate they will wash their hands clean from their blood Truly methinks these are very fine shifts for murderers and malefactors to free themselves from blame if they could as well blind the eyes of the All-seeing God as they do many times deceive simple men that think those Judges to be just that have most unjustly beheaded innocencie it self And those murderers to be innocent that have killed their neighbors by the hands of their assassins But though Davids hands were far from that fact free from the blood of Vrias that was slain by the sword of the enemy yet God tels him he was the murderer his wit shall not serve his turn to wipe away his punishment though it was the High Court of Justice that condemned Naboth unto death yet the Prophet tells Ahab that God will condemn him and his posterity for it for as the devill saith S. Aug. is said to be a murderer non gladio armatus non ferro accinctus sed quia ad hominem veniendo verbum
the manner of them to deliver any man to die before that he which is accused have licence to answer for himself concerning the crime laid against him so it may be Zimri will shew some good reason why he kill'd his Master And I doubt not but he had learnt Absolons lesson that it was for the ill government of Elah propter bonum Reipublicae for the good of the people that they might be better governed and much eased of many burthens and relieved of their grievances To which I say that you must understand all Traytors and wicked actors to be just like unto Watermen that row one way and look another way so they pretend one thing and intend another thing Thus Zimri pretended to amend the Government to ease the people to reform the Laws and rectifie their Religion but his intention and his chiefest ayme was to make himself great to get his Masters place and to become a King himself which was first in his intention though last in the execution otherwise if his principal ayme had been as he pretended the publike good he would have turned and changed the Kingdom of Israel into a Common-wealth or else he would have made either Omri or Tibni whom the people loved and not himself whom they hated to be their King sed menrita est iniquitas sibi but wickedesse though not always yet sometimes bewrayeth it self as the action of Zimri to make himself a King discovered his prime intention and the chiefest occasion that moved him to slay his Master to be his Ambition and desire of bearing rule And indeed this Ambition and desire of bearing rule hath so strangely bewitched the minds of many men Camer l. 5. c. 8. that as Camerarius saith it is almost incredible to believe and most strange to consider what inordinate desire men have to raign and to rule as Kings what villanies they have committed to become Kings What horrible things have been done by those that were ambitious of bearing rule what execrable things they have done to continue Kings for Amurath the third caused five of his younger brethren to be strangled in his presence Ismael the second son to Teâ—mas King of Persia did put to death so many of his brethren as he could lay hold on and all the Princes that he suspected to have any desire to his Kingdom that so they might raign and rule without fear And Solyman mistrusting his own son Mustapha when he returned victorious from the Persian war and was received with such generall applause caused him presently to be strangled and a Proclamation to be made throughout all the Army that there must be but one God in heaven and one Emperour i.e. Himself here on earth and Camerarius saith that this is a perpetuall custom in the race of the Ottomans and among the Turkish Souldans to put all that pretend succession unto death Neither is it only a Turkish custom but it is also the practice of all such as are bewitched with such inordinate desire to rule as Kings to do the like For Plutarch writeth that Diotarus having many sons and desirous that only one of them should reign slew all the rest with his own hands and Justin saith that Horodes King of the Parthians killed his own Father and after that massacred all his brethren that he might reign and rule alone and the sacred story sheweth that the very people of God the sons of Israel were not free but pestered with this disease Judges 9. as Abimeleck the son of Gedeon slew seventy of his brethren in one day and played many other tragicall parts that he might make himself a King 2 Sam. 15.16 And the furious ambition of young Absolon did set him on fire to seek to end his Fathers dayes and to play the Parracide that he might reign in his Fathers place and so Zimri when he began to reign as soon as he sate on his throne he delayed not the time but presently slew all the house of Baasha 2 King 16.11 as Baasha had formerly done to all the posterity of Jeroboam he left him not one that pisseth against a wall neither of his kinsfolks nor of his friends And not to go from home for Examples Did not Henry the fourth put by Richard the second his own King and Cosen-German that he himself might be the King and did not Richard the 3d. cause the true King his brothers chidren his own Nephews the sons of Edward the fourth that were but children and never offended him to be done to death that he might wear the Crown himselfe And my papers would fail me if I should set down all the examples that I could produce of this nature for there is not any thing so sacred which the great men of this world that desire to be made greater will not dare to violate and spare neither King father brether nor friend to bring themselves to their desired advancement to be the rulers of the people and to have the power both of our lives and goods in their own hands as the proof is plainly seen in the foresaid examples and especially in Antoninus Caracalla who when he had most unnaturally and barbarously slain his own brother Geta even in his mothers lap and between her arms and being counselled by some friends to Canonize him among the Heroes and to place him with the Deastri to mitigate the thought of so execrable a fact answered like a vile Caitiffe Sit divus modò non sit vivus Let him be a god among the dead so he be not alive among men So great an enemy is the inordinate desire of raigning and ruling to all piety and right saith Camerarius l. 5. c. 8. And for Zimri's pretence to rectify the government to ease the people to establish the true service of God which King Elah and his Father Baasha had permitted to be continued as Jeroboam had corrupted it and to fulfill the Words of the Lord which he spake by Jehu the son of Hanani 1 King 16.2 I say these things were least in his thoughts and were but meer pretences and shadows to hide and cover his malice unto his King and his ambitious desire of bearing rule for he being a subject and a servant unto King Elah what warrant had he or what command from God to kill his King Jeroboam was the master piece of Idolatry and the ring-leader of them that made Israel to sin and yet I would fain know where God gives leave to his subjects to kill him for this intolerable impiety But when God setteth up Kings if they prove wicked to corrupt his service and to destroy his servants he can raise other Kings to punish them as he did Pharaoh King of Egypt and Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon to chastise and to remove the evill Kings of Judah or he can take them away by death or by twenty other waies that we know not of without making their own
way to bring wars and troubles unto himself and to the Common-wealth and a curse at least if not a rooting out of his posterity while the innocent blood that he hath shed or caused to be shed doth continually cry to God for vengeance against him or them that did it And so you see that neither Zimri nor any other killer of his King and of his Master or of any other man can have any peace either with God or with men 3. 3 King-killers and murderers and the like wicked men can have no peace with themselves The murderer and wicked man can have no peace with himself nor any rest or quietness in his own thoughts and conscience for as Lipsius saith Cognatum immo innatum est omni sceleri sceleris supplicium Sin bears its own punishment alwaies on his back they are so inseperably knit together that the one cannot be committed but the other will be inflicted because as S. Augustine saith Jossit Dominus ita est ut animus inordinatus sit sibi ipsi paena Lipsius de constantia l. 2. c. 13. the Lord hath ordained it and it is so that a wicked disordinate mind should be a punishment unto it selfe for as God said unto Cain so it is with us if we do ill sin lyeth at the door that is the reward of sin Gen 4.7 or the punishment due for that sin is alwaies at hand like a wild Beast to dog us and to bite us wheresoever we go and the conscience of sin especially of these bloody sins beareth forth such bitter fruit as that nothing in the world can be more grievous or more miserable to a mortall man for as Menander saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The conscience is as a god to all men to be a witness of our debts a judge of our deeds and a tormentor of all our transgressions and the wise man saith The spirit of a man will bear his infirmities that is all the sad calamities and misfortunes that may happen unto him a brave mind and a Heroick spirit will bear them all but a wounded spirit who can bear For as the Poet saith Strangulat inclusus dolor Ovid. Trist l. 5. atque exaestuat intùs And the Examples that might be brought hereof are infinite beyond number I will name to you but a few Oedipus that bloody incestuous King of Thebes is said to be led to Athens by his daughter Antigona i.e. to be doggd up and down by his own conscience and to be buried in the Temple of Erinnys i.e. to be overwhelmed with sorrows and perturbations for his lewd forepassed life and his wife and mother Jocasta in like manner strangled her self saith Sophocles And Procopius writes that Theodoric King of the Gothes after he had most unjustly put to death Symmachus and Boetius two noble Senators of Rome his own thoughts and conscience did so molest him that as he was at Supper with many friends about him and a Fish his head of great bigness being set on the table his imagination conceited It was the head of Symmachus that with angry eyes grinned upon him whereby he was so oppressed with fear and trembling that he suddenly rose from the table and could never afterwards be comforted but his conscience did continually so torment him that he pined away most miserably till he died And Polydore Virgil saith Polydor. l. 25. that Richard the third of this Kingdome after he had slain his two Nephews had the like tormenting conscience till he was slain by Hen. 7. at Bosworth Field And we read that Tiberius after he had been the death of very many that he hated was so vexed with such grievous torments of his wounded spirit that he desired all the gods rather to destroy him all at once then to suffer him thus to pine away with the continual sting and stripes of a tormented conscience wherein the just God dealt with him as he had done to many others to suffer many deaths before he put them to death as the subtle Fox was wont to say and Nero the monster of men when he had most unthankfully put to death his own Master and Tutor Seneca and most unnaturally caused his own natural Mother to be killed with many others of the faithful servants of Christ he was so grievously vexed in conscience that he could not be comforted by any means but thought in his mind that he did alwayes see his Mothers Ghost still crying for vengeance against him And to passe over those infinite examples that might be produced of this kind I will only alleadge that one of Apollodorus the Tyrant who dreamed that he was flea'd by the Scythians and that his heart thrown by them into a boyling Caldron should say unto him I am the cause of all this thy miseries my self so the heart and conscience of every malefactor especially the shedders of innocent blood will perpetually tell them where they are and what they must expect and howsoever they may put on a seeming countenance of peace and a quiet mind of no disturbance yet indeed they are but like the glow-worm that in a dark night makes a fiery shew but being prest you shall find nothing in him but cold moisture for the worm of conscience doth alwaies gnaw their wretched souls within them when their faces seem to smile without But it may be some will object that all sinners have not such unquiet minds and all murderers and King-killers have not as we see wounded spirits I answer that some indeed are of such brasen faces that they can laugh their sins out of countenance and smile with the fool when they go to the gallows but lassure my self their hearts bleed when their faces counterfeit smiles and they are like Dives that saw Lazarus a far off in Abrahams bosom but was himself tormented in Hell for the heart and soul may be sorrowfull when the face and countenance may seem cheerfull And it is a thousand to one but it is so with all murderers and the like haynous transgressors for that it is unpossible that such men should ever want furies so long as they have themselves or if they could find a way to run away from themselves and to cause their souls to forsake their bodies as Saul Zimri Achitophel and Judas did yet their consciences will not flie away from their souls nor their sins from their consciences but let a murderer King-killer or Master-killer or any other man-killer flye ab agro in â—ivitatem à publico ad domum à domo in cubiculum from the field into the City from the City into his house and from the house into his bed and thence like those impatient fishes that leap out of the frying pan into the fire from the private hell of their own breasts into the publick hell of damned souls yet Ecce hostem inveniet à quo confugerat behold there he shall find the enemy whom he feared that is a tormenting
rebellion and disobedience of the people as here because Zedechia was not suffered by these stubborn and disobedient people to follow the advice of this our Prophet therefore they were all delivered into seventy years Captivity And as the Lord is extream angry with those rebellious people that disobey and labour to displace the Kings and Governours that he sets over them So he sheweth abundance of his love and kindnesse to them that submit themselves to his ordinance and behave themselves dutifully and loyally towards those Kings whatsoever they be that God placeth over them as you may see it in the whole course and Story of King David and Saul for as he was the most dutiful and most faithful subject that ever we read of so God was pleased to raise him to be the best King that ever reigned over Israel for his King and his Governour was Saul the very first of that Order among the Jews and he was an hypocrite a persecutor a murderer a tyrant and a mad man yet when David whose life he thirsted after had him at his mercy and could as easily have taken off his head as to cut off the lap of his garment he said The Lord forbid 1 Sam. 24.6 that I should do this thing unto my Master the Lords Annointed to stretch forth my hand against him and his heart smote him because he had cut off his skirt And when he had him again in the like trap he said unto Abner Art not thou a valiant man and who is like thee in Israel wherefore then hast thou not kept thy Lord the King this thing is not good that thou hast done As the Lord liveth you are worthy to die because you have not kept your Master the Lords Annointed and his oath As the Lord liveth sheweth 1 Sam. 26.16 that he spake it in good earnest and jested not And if they be worthy to die that defend not and protect not such a wicked King especially in going about so vile an action as the murdering of so good a man and so dutiful a subject as David was then what shall become of them and what are they worthy of that murmur and grudge and plot against the life of such a â—ood King as maintained peace and jâ—stice amongst his people and offered no special injury to any particular man of us all Surely if I had the wisdom of Solomon and the eloquence of Demosthenes I were not able to expresse the odiousnesse of their sin that conspired against the person and proceedings of such a King as is inoffensive before God and all good men But to go on to shew unto you how faithful this good subject was to this bad King when the young man that was an Amalekite and none of Saul or Davids subjects came of his own accord to bring tidings unto David of Sauls death and of the good service that he thought he had done unto Saul at his own request to put him out of his pain David presently caused him to be put to death 2 Sam. 1.15 because he durst presume to offer any violence though that violence seemed to be a favour unto the Ruler of the people whom we are straightly forbidden to revile Exod. 22.28 or to speak evil of him So dutiful and so loyal a subject was David to so evil a Governour and so wicked a King as Saul And this his loyalty and fidelity unto Saul was one of the chiefest vertues that we find commendable in him before God had according to his fidelity to his King raised him to the Rule and Government of his people And I wish that all and every one of us would strive and study to imitate this good man in our obedience fidelity and loyalty to our King and Governours that God hath placed over us But here it may be some troubled and discontented spirit will say I could willingly yield all due respect and obedience unto our Kings and Governours could I be satisfied that God appointed them to be the Kings and Governours of his people Jeremy 23.21 but as the Lord saith of the false Prophets They run and I sent them not So he saith They have set up Kings but not by me Hosea 8.4 and they have made Princes and I knew it not And should we be obedient and faithful to such Kings and Governours that ambitiously set up themselves and are not righteously set up by God To these men that stumble at this block I answer 1. That the Prophet speaketh there as I shewed to you before not of any Soveraign Monarch but of the Aristocratical government of many men that will all be as Kings and Princes ruling and domineering over the people for so you see the Prophet speakes in the plural number of many Kings that in all the whole Scripture you shall never find to be either appointed or approved by God to be the Governours of his people for indeed those many Kings and Governours of equal authâ—rity are none of Gods Governours neither are they set up by God nor as I find approved by God in any place of all the Scripture But as God is One and the only Monarch of all the World so he ever appoints one Monarch only to be his Deputy to govern the people or nation that he committeth under his charge 2. I say that this Monarch and Governour whom God raiseth to govern his people attaineth unto his Throne and right of Government even by the ordination of God divers wayes as 1. Sometimes by Birth which is the most usual best and surest way and most agreeable to Gods will 2. Sometimes by Choice and the election of the people as Herodotus saith the Medes chose Deioces to be their King and the Princes of Germany now chuse their Emperour and they commonly chuse him that is by Birth the eldest son of the deceased King 3. Sometimes by the power of the Sword as God gave the Monarchy of the Medes unto Cyrus and the Kingdom of Darius and of many others unto Alexander and the Empire of the Romans unto Augustus and many other Kingdoms unto others that had no other right unto their Dominions but what they purchased with the edge of their Sword Which right though it be nothing else but Vsurpation and Intrusion in these ambitious hunters after rule and dominion yet notwithstanding it must needs be a very good right as the same cometh from the just God who is the God of war and giveth the victory unto Kings when as the Poet saith Victrix causa diis placuit And he having the right and power Paramount to translate the rule and transferre the dominion of his people to whom he will he hath oftentimes for their sins thrown down the mighty from their seat and translated the government of his people unto others whom some waies he thought fitter to effect his Divine will as he did give the Kingdom of Saul unto David and of Belshazzers unto Cyrus and
because they sought to preserve them from ruine so were this people mad against Jeromy and cast him into the dungeâ—n and adjudged him to be put to death because he sought to stop them in their Pegâ—sine race unto their own destruction And therefore seeing they were so impatient to be reproved and so violent against them that sought their preservation there was no means used to prevent and hinder their evil deeds and the progress of their transgressions for as our Prophet sheweth 1 Their Prophets and Preachers flattered them 1 Their Preachers were flatterers and reproved not their wicked waies but they sowed pillows under their elbows so strengthened them in their wickedness And those other Prophets that did not flatter them yet were they silent for fear of them following the counsell of the Poet Dum furor in cursu est currenti cede furori Difficiles aditus impetus omnis habet To give place unto their fury to prevent their own calamity Which notwithstanding was but to escape the smoak and fall into the fire but to avoid mans anger by not reproving them and to be liable to Gods wrath for not reproving them 2. 2 Their judges were corrupt The Judges and Magistrates did not execute the laws against them for though the Lord commandeth them to execute true judgment and shew mercy and compassion every man to his brother Zech. 7.9 and oppress not the widow nor the fatherless nor the stranger nor the poor yet as our Prophet testisieth Jer. 5 28. they judged not the cause of the fatherless and the right of the needy did they not judg and the Prophet Esay saith Their Princes were rebellious and companions of theeves every one loved gifts and followed after rewards and judged not the fatherless neither did the cause of the widow come unto them Ezay 1.23 but they suffered oppressions robberies and murders to go unpunished and so the Laws lay as dead because the execution of the law is the life of the law and I fear not I care not to be condemned by the Law so I be freed by the Judg and saved from the Execution of the Law And this twofold remisseness and double error of the Magistrates and Minislers did exceedingly multiply the sins of the people and as highly provoke the wrath of God The sin of one man doth often bring a plague upon many not only against the offendors but also against the whole Nation and especially against those that were so slack in the punishing of these offences and performance of their duties For if you search the Scriptures you shall find that the sin of one man which is left unpunished brings a plague upon many and the execution of justice upon a transgressor doth avert Gods judgment from a multitude As when Achan sinned Josh 7.21 1 Chr. 2.7 Numb 25.8 all Israel was troubled and he was called the troubler of Israel who transgressed in the thing accursed And when Zimri and Cozbi offended the whole people suffered so that twenty four thousand of them died but when that Phineas executed judgment then the plague ceased Psal 106.11 saith the Text and when Achan suffered the wrath of God was pacified And therefore Moses very often Numb 35.31 and in many places exhorteth the children of Israel that whensoever any man committed Idolatry or Murder or Sodomy or any other haynous crime Deut. 17.12 they should take no satisfaction for his offence but the transgressor should be put to death The not punishing of transgressors incourageth others to transgreâ—s their eye should not spare him neither should they have pity upon him so should they turn away evil from Israel For it is most certain as the wise man saith that because sentence or judgment against an evil work is not speedily executed but deferred though not pardoned yet the heart of the children of men is altogether or fully set in them to do evill and it is the greatest incouragement that can be for wicked men to proceed on in their wickedness Eccl. 8.12 to see other wicked persons pardoned and not punished And I pray God the judgments of God as sicknesses death wars and the like may not proceed on us for our not proceeding to the execution of justice against Prophane oppressors the Kings murderers and other like wicked offendors the murderers of the Kings Loyall subjects For we know how Saul spared Agag that was destined by God for his wickedness to be put to death and how for sparing him he lost both his life and his Kingdom and had all his posterity rooted out and we know how the Israelits spared the Canaanits whom God commanded to be slain and how for sparing them they became thorns in their eyes and briars unto their sides And I beseech you to consider what the Prophet saith unto Ahab Thus saith the Lord because thou hast let go out of thy hand and so pardoned a man whom I appointed to utter destruction that is to death therefore thy life shall go for his life and thy people for his people 1 King 20.42 So hatefull it is to God that we should pardon such transgressors as he will not pardon And it is no wonder that God should thus deal with them that thus spare the transgressors for as he Qui non prohibet peccare cum possit jubet which doth not hinder a man to sin when he can hinder him spurres him on to sin saith Seneca so Qui justificat impium he that justifieth the wicked and spareth a transgressor whom he ought and can punish is partaker of his transgression and is as abominable before God as he is Prov. 17.15 that condemneth the innocent saith Solomon And these are the two chiefest sorts of evil The two things that God chiefly hateth in the doings of men towards other men that the Lord hateth in the doings of men towards men that is 1. To oppress condemn and wrong the good and godly men 2. To promote justify and free the wicked men and suffer them to flourish notwithstanding all their bloody sins and transgressions And against these evils we the Preachers of Gods Word are injoyned still to denounce the judgments of God and if we tell not the people of their faults and reprove them not for these doings they shall die in their sins and their blood shall be required at our hands as the Lord saith unto his Prophet And therefore as S. Clement saith Nos quod vobis expedire novimus Clement recognit l. 1. tacere non possumus We cannot but we must tell the people of their doings and the more abominable we see their doings the more bound are we to cry aloud and spare not to cry against their wickedness And so much for the doings of this people 2. In the doome and due desert of this people for their doings 2 The doome and judgment of this people for their wickedness you may
of it And whereas this day five years past all the Protestants in this Kingdome and we especially of this City were destined to be sacrificed and slaughtered and sent as an Holâ—â—â—st or whole burnt-offering from the holy Father to the infernal God as many thousands of our Brethren were then and since yet by the love of God towards us we are still preserved alive that we might serve him and love him again And what more shall I say but cry out with the Psalmist O how plentiful is thy goodness which thou hast laid up for them that fear thee Psal 31.21 and that thou hast prepared for them that put their trust in thee even before the Sons of men for thou hast shewed us Marvellous great kindness I cannot say in a strong City but I say in a weak City and delivering us from strong Enemies whose Subtilty and Cruelty Treachery and Perfidiousness would require the head of the best experienced converted Jesuite to express it I had rather preach of Gods Love than treat of their Malicâ— and to talk of his Goodness rather than their wickedness and that great goodness The Lord Marquess of Ormond which he hath so lately shewed in delivering our most Excellent Governour so often from that malicious wickedness of the Sons of Belial so perfidiously intended against him is not the least Testimony of Gods Love to us all especially if we consider that what was intended this day 5 years had now questionless been executed if God had not broken the Snare of the Fowler and by delivering him redeemed us all from the Sword of Malice and from the Jawes of death and therefore this ought to be rightly weighed and duly remembred in our Thanksgiving among the many great undeserved and unexpected Preservations that our good God hath wrought for us And because his Excellency trusteth not in Lying Vanities but putteth his Trust in the Lord and in the Mercy of the Most High therefore he shall not miscarry But indeed this Love of God to us hath been so great and his Blessings in our Deliverances have been so many that if I should go about to enumerate them I might as well tell the Stars for as the Prophet saith they are more in number than I am able to expresse and therefore I will now conclude with our hearty thanks and Praise unto our good God for all his Love and Favours and Deliverances that he hath shewed unto us through Jesus Christ our Lord who is blessed for evermore Labilis memoria hominis How easily and how soon men forget good things the memory of man is very frail and slippery especially in the retention of all good things for though as the Poet saith Scribit in marmore laesus we write injuries in marble and never forget nor forgive the least ill turn that is done against us yet we write all benefits and all good instructions in the sands where the waves of forgetfulness do soon wash all away as the children of Israel regarded not the wonders that God wrought in Aegypt neither kept they his great goodness in remembrance Psal 106.7 13 21. but soon forgot his works yea and forgat God their Saviour which had done so great things in Aegypt wondrous works in the Land of Ham and fearful things by the Red Sea therefore lest you should forget the first part of this text before you heard the second I thougt it high time to proceed to those points which the time prevented me to inlarge not the last time I was in this place but the last time I treated of this verse and I hope you do remember that I told you this text was a text of love and of a twofold love 1. The love of God to man And 2. The love of man to God And In the first I noted these four things 1. The lover God 2. The affection Love He loved us first 3. The beloved Us. 4. The time First And I have done with the first three and therefore not to stand upon any further repetition I am now to proceed to shew you the fourth point that is the time when he loved us 4 The time when God loved us first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he loved us first i.e. before we would or could love him for love is one of the affections and the affections are seated in the heart and the heart is placed in the midst of the body and the body could not contain the heart nor the heart cast forth the affections nor the affections produce love before our loves Jer. 31.3 God loved us from everlasting before our Creation and affections and hearts and bodies had their being But God loved us before we were created and before we could have the least thought of our very being for I have loved thee with an everlasting love therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee saith the Lord and this love was everlasting as well a parte ante from the time past as a parte post for the time to come and this love will appear the greater if we consider how freely and how undeservedly he hath loved us for the object of love is good either that which is really so indeed or seeming so to be And S. Aug. reasoneth most truly that antequam creati eramus nihil boni merebamur before we were made we could do no good we could merit no reward we could deserve no love And yet before we had received any being the love of God towards us had received a beginning and when our souls were unbreathed our bodies unframed and all this glorious structure laid in the dust before ever we beheld the light or the light was brought out of darkness or the darkness was upon the face of the deep our bodies and our souls were affected by God and we had a deep interest in the love of God when as then the earth was created for our habitation the creatures were produced for our service and the heavens were appointed for our comfort So God loved us before our Generation before we were before we had our being and after our transgression God loved us after our transgression John 8. when as God had made us his sons like himself and we had made our selves like our Father the devil there was cause enough of hate but none of love for then we found a way to run away from God we invented garments to hide our shame and to cover our nakedness from the eyes of men but to make us most loathsome in the eyes of God and we became 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haters of God that laboured with the old Gyants 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to fight and war with God to unthrone him and to ungod him when we desired to make our selves like Gods nay the only Gods and he should be no God at all unless we might have our wills and not his will to be done in heaven as we do in earth Yet then when
amori nostri placide ac benigne pro nobis mori dignatus est which for the purchasing of our Salvation did most chearfully and readily vouchsafe to suffer a most shameful death for us for so much only we do love God as we love him more than we love any thing else though the same should be never so lovely And in very deed our love to his honour and our care of his service and the maintaining of his truth can never be near so much performed as we ought to do Therefore let others laugh at our too-much love to God and our too hot zeal to promote his truth and to maintain his service yet I shall never condemn the nature of those men that with the zeal Phinees and the boldness of St. Peter are sometimes violent and vehement in these proceedings but I shall blame them that know not when and wherein it is fitting to be so for in this our love to God if it be directed to the right end though we should fail in the manner We cannot love God too much nor near so much as we ought tō love him yet we can never fail in the measure of loving God because as when the subject of our hatred is sin it cannot be too deep So when the Object of our love is God it cannot be too high and they that with the Laodiceans are but warm when God requireth them to be hot can never be freed from sin when their moderation is become a transgression and their Sobriety is belied into a Vertue which had it been done by Elias John Baptist and the rest of the Prophets and Apostles and the Fathers of the Primitive Church we had been deprived of much truth and they had failed of the Crown of Martyrdom Yet I deny not but a man may eat too much honey and in Solomons sence Men may be too precise a man may be righteous overmuch and make himself over-wise that is if I might expound it make those things to be sins to be superstitious to be Idolatrous to be Popish which are not so as the English Rebels throughout all Ingland now do and to make that for Gods service and teach those things for truths which are not so As the Romish Priests throughout all this Kingdom do but to love God too much to be too careful to obey Gods Precepts or too vehement to publish what we know to be a truth most necessary to be known it is the Sophistry of Satan to say this is too much And yet I say not that every Christian doth or can love God in so great a measure as is required of him or as many others have and do love him for as there are degrees of faith That there are divers degrees as of Faith so of Love so there are degrees of love and every degree of spiritual love proceeds from a proportionable act of saving faith And therefore as our faith so our love is subject to all variations and changes ebbings and flowings according to the strength of our perswasions or the violence of our desertions And as some men are indued with a greater measure of faith than others be when as some have no more than a grain of mustard seed and that mixed with much anxiety and others are strong in faith like Abraham that doubted nothing of Gods Promise notwithstanding all the impediments that might cross it so some men have but an ordinary love to God and others are indued with a more eminent and heroical love And such was the love of the Primitive Christians when the rage of the Pagans was so great against them Eus l. 4. c. 15. l. 5. c. 1. that to be a Christian was a sufficient accusation to draw them to their execution as it appeareth by those two memorable examples of Attalus and Polycarpus for as they made Attalus to walk about the Amphitheater of the Lions there was a little Tablet born before him wherein those four words were only written Eus l. 4. c. 15. l. 5. c. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This is Attalus the Christian and when Polycarpus was led to his Execution the Governour commanded the Cryer to make Proclamation that Polycarpus had confessed himself to be a Christian And yet such was their Constancy and so great was their love to Christ that they did not only say with Ignatius Ure tunde divelle Burn me kill me tear me to pieces yet thou shalt never draw me from my Saviour Christ but they did also suffer the most exquisite torments that could be invented with such incredible patience that the sight thereof was so far from terrifying the beholding Christians that it rather enflamed them to undergo the like tortures The great love of the Primitive Christians unto God for as they were leading Ptolomaeus an honourable person to a most dishonourable death only because he had confessed himself to be a Christian Lucius another Christian seeing this injustice of Urbicius the Governour goeth unto him and demands What reason is it that thou shouldst put Ptolomaeus to death for confessing himself to be a Christian seeing he hath not committed Adultery nor Murder and thou canst not prove him a Thief or a Ravisher or guilty of any crime or iniquity therefore thy Sentence doth no credit unto the Emperour Antoninus the meek nor to his Son nor to the Senate of Rome To whom Urbicius answered nothing but only asked Lucius if he was a Christian Who replyed Yes that I am and was therefore presently led to his execution For which injustice he joyfully thanked Urbicius that by this means he should be delivered out of the hands of such cruel Masters and should go to God his most loving Father And albeit in the time of the Apostles and the Primitive Fathers the Persecutions raised against the Christians were thus cruel Isidor de summo bono l. 1. c. 28. and so tyrannical that many good minds cannot read or remember the same without weeping Yet Isidorus tells us That in the time of Antichrist and towards the end of the world the Synagogue of Satan and the wordly Senate shall more furiously rage against the Church of Christ and the City of God than ever he did in the Primitive times for Satan was to be bound for a thousand years Rev. 20.2 whereby his malice was chained and his power abridged that the Church might have some refreshment and therefore if the devil saith he when he was fast bound handled the Martyrs so cruelly then surely he will do much more when he shall be unchained which shall be and now is in the time of Antichrist Thumus Hist l. 6. C ham de crudel Antich l. 16. c. 15. Mr. Fox And truly I think that whosoever readeth Thuanus and Chamier and the book of the Martyrs of our Church and consider the Massacres of those Christians that within this last Century of years have suffered in France Germany Spain Italy
ádmixtis dulcia acerbis and a soft answer appeaseth wrath saith Solomon and a faire speech gaineth love and Secondly 1. Secondly on the Presbyterian part 1. Pride Pride 2. Ignorance 3. Envy 4. Ambition 5. Coveteousness 6. Hatred in the Presbyters are the causes of all the discontent betwixt them and the Bishops First Their Pride and Arrogancy was such that they thought too well of themselves Superbos Jequiter ultor a tergo deus and preferring themselves before others they thought themselves worthy to be set above others but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Menander none shall escape the punishment of Pride because as Cicero saith Nullum est officium tam sanctum tamque solenne quod non superbia abitio comminuere ac violare solet and as St. Augustine saith Destruit superbia quicquid justitia aedificat Pride destroyeth whatsoever Virtue or Righteousness buildeth and the Poet saith as much Inquinat egregios adjuncta superbia mores our Pride soileth and spoileth the best and fairest things and so the Pride of these men destroyed whatsoever their good parts deserved and deserve much they could not For Secondly 2 Ignorance Ignorance is many times the Mother of Pride when as none is so bold as blinde Bayard for though sometimes multum facit ad ingenium superbia Pride spurreth on some to get Learning and their Learning makes them the prouder yet true knowledge and especially the Divine Learning teacheth Humility and not Pride for when they have attained to all Arts and do know as much as Berengarius that was said to know as much as was knowable or as Solomon that wrote of all Natures from the Isop that groweth upon the Wall to the Cedar of Lebanon Yet may they cry out with the Poet O quantum mortalia pectora cecae noctis habet Ovid Mâ—t. l. 6 Alas alas how much Blindness lodgeth in all mortal men and they may most truly say with Job that they are but of yesterday and know nothing But their ignorance of the truth of the Holy Scriptures the Writings of the ancient Fathers and the Ecclesiastical Stories of all Times made them to neglect their Duties and to spurn against both their King and their Bishops for had they been well vers'd in these things and had understood them well I should have thought it not possible for the Devil to have filled them with so much poyson as they have shewed both against their King and against their Bishops and that just like the Coy-Duck Officiosa aliis exitiosa suis to destroy their Brethren to pleasure their Enemies and the Enemies of God's Church For Thirdly Seeing the Bishops whom they deemed no more then their Equals to be preferred before them and conceiving themselves thereby to be neglected they both hated the King for his choice and envied the Bishops for their places and because they were not capable to work any other revenge their Tongues were their own and they let fly their Arrows even bitter words both against our obedience to the King though cunningly and obliquely and most directly against the Calling of the Bishops making that nothing wherein themselves had nothing to do But till their envie had gotten power to work their ends it onely wrought the greatest mischief unto themselves for as it is said of Mount Aetna Nil a liud nisi se valet ardens Aetna cremare that it burns nothing but it self Sic se non alios invidus ipse cremat so the envious man comburitur intus extra doth burn and pine away himself through envie and this envie destroyed the whole Nation of the Jews because as Saint Ambrose saith Maluerunt invidere quà m credere they rather chose to envie Christ for his honour that he had for his Miracles and good Deeds then believe in him for their own Salvation and the Bishops thought with Pindarus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Melior est invidentia commiseratione that a Case hateful was better then woful and that it was better for them to be envied by these then to be pitied by all But Fourthly The next thing that made them to start aside like a broken Bow Ambition was not so much their envy against the Bishops as their ambition to obtain their places and their ambition which as the Scholeman saith is one of the Daughters of Pride failing to lay hold of what it went about or that preferment which they sought made them to flie out against the Bishops and as Arius missing the Bishoprick of Alexandria became the Father of the Arian Heresie and Aerius as Epiphanius writeth being denied the Bishoprick that he required did first broach that Heresie that there was no difference betwixt a Presbyter and a Bishop so the Presbyterians haughty spirit breaketh forth to discontent to murmure to traduce to maligne and to abundance of other evils not easily to be discovered for as Cicero saith Facillimè ad res injust as impellitur quisquis est altissimo animo gloriae cupido He is most easily induced to do very unjust things that is of an high minde and ambitious of glory and great places Nam dulce venenum Est mundi lethalis honos because this deadly desire of honour is like sweet poyson that enticeth us to suck it up And Fifthly As covetousness and the love of this present World Covetousness made Demas to forsake St. Paul so the like worldly love and the love of the things of this World hath made these false Brethren to forsake their leaders for this is that root of bitterness Javenal Satyr 14. which choaketh every pleasant flower and destroyeth every virtue for as Juvenal saith quae reverentia legum Quis metus aut pudor est unquam properantis avari what respect of Laws what fear of punishment or what shame of the World is at any time in a covetous man that maketh hast to be rich Nam saevior ignibus Aetnae Fervens amor ardet habendi Yet we may and ought to covet that which is good for he that coveteth the Office of a Bishop to feed the Flock of Christ to preach the Gospel and to promote the Glory of God desires a good work saith the Apostle but he that desires a Bishoprick to Lord it over God's Inheritance and to enrich himself and his Posterity to purchase Lands and to leave Lordships for his Children this is an evil sickness that produceth death And this covetousness is said to be the Epidemical Disease of the Presbyterians that are generally seen to be more covetous then any other kinde of men as it is expressed in particular by the Authour of the last Will and Testament of Sir John Presbyter Sixthly Covetousness Their covetous desire and ambition to get Wealth and Preferment and their unworthiness to obtain it causing them to miss of it have bred in them not onely envy against the Bishops but also discontent and hatred against the King for preferring the other and neglecting them though the King did to them herein