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
barbarous Heathens And therefore no doubt but these Jews and these Gentiles shall rise in judgement and condemn our most wicked and rebellious generation But you will say What if my King seek to kill me for so now the Rebels have ascended to that height of impiety that they are not ashamed thus slanderovsly to taxe him and most falsely to accuse him Doth not nature it self teach me that common principle vim vi pellere and rather kill him than suffer my self to be killed To resolve this Question I demand of thee What if thy father seek to kill thee Mayest thou rather kill him than be killed First thou must know That the father next under God is the cause of the very Being 2 The sons obligation to his father is more than ever he can do to requite it and the giver of the life of his son so is not the son of the father 2. The father as I proved upon the 5th Commandment had under the Law of Nature and for many years after Moses potestatem vitae necis the power of life and death over all his children and the children unlesse they grew very ungracious and more than unnatural never durst resist them otherwise when God commanded Abraham Gen. 22.2 to offer up Isaac for a burnt-offering he might have answered First that he had no right to do it Secondly that he was old and feeble and the Lad was young and lusty as you see he was better able to carry the wood upon his shoulders than his father and therefore he might fear his son would be his death if he went about to sacrifice him But Abraham knew that his son was better taught and that nature shewed him The child should not with cursed Cham despise his father no not in his sin much lesse to resist him in his right And yet the King to whom the Paternal-right is transferred is more than any private Father for he is the publique Father of us all under whom we we may lead a quiet and a peaceable life in all godlinesse and honesty 1 Tim. 2.2 as the Apostle speaketh and without whom we can have neither our Estates enjoyed nor our Persons secured from the violence of the strongest but that every one shall be exposed to the will of him that can master him which was the case of the Jewes when there was no King in Israel and will be little better with us if God doth not preserve our King And therefore men though they may flee with David to preserve their lives yet ought not to offer violence unto their King though he should prove as wicked as Saul was to David without cause to seek to take away their lives then certainly most wicked are those men that rebell and fight against a good King that expendeth his own fortunes and exposeth his own life to preserve the Estates and Lives of all his loyall subjects but to proceed 3. The last branch of that honour which I said was due unto our King 3 To assist our King is aid and assistance in all his urgent necessities which aid we all confesse to be due and yet few of us will believe or can endure scarce to hear the truth how far this aid is to be extended How far the aid that we owe unto our King extendeth I must tell you what the Scripture saith that it comprehendeth 1. Our Estates For 2. Our Persons For 1. He that bids us render unto God what is Gods 1 To the uttermost of our abilities bids us also render unto Caesar what is Caesars and S. Paul tells you that this tribute is due unto him Indeed when there is no urgent necessity it is a great deal seemlier for the Majesty of a King as Artax said to give then to take by pulling from his subjects and it is a golden Apothegm of King James unto his Son where he saith Enrich not your self with exactions from your Subjects but think the riches of your Subjects your best treasure And so it is generally conceived that whosoever in the time of peace overchargeth his subjects with taxations either for his own Luxury or to enrich his Favourites is very unwise because he that ruleth over men must be just 2 Sam. 23.3 ruling in the fear of God and Justice tells us he must take nothing from any man but when necessity requireth And then the ordinary glosse and Mr. Calvin also saith Neque nostrum est vel principibus praescribere quantum in res singulas impendant vel eos ad calculum vocare It is neither our part to prescribe how much they shall expend nor to call them to an account for their expences that account must be given to a higher Judge But we read that when Saul was annointed to be King over Israel Samuel told him he should come to the Plain of Tabor and there should meet him three men going up to God to Bethel one carrying three kids another carrying three loaves of bread and another carrying a bottle of wine and they should salute him and give him two loaves of bread which he should receive of their hands which thing wanted not a mystery but was an embleme as Divines make it of the right of Kings in their necessities The mystery of the gift of the men that met Saul unfolded two parts of three which was a very great proportion and yet we find that divers of the heathens went much further when after the coronation of their Kings most of his subjects especially the Nobility and those of any Fortunes presented unto him a Purse with a key hanging thereat by which Hierogly phick they shewed that all their treasure was submitted to his necessities he might unlock their Store-horse and put into his Purse What the heathens did give unto their Kings whatever pleased him because they conceived it right that he which protected all should have the use of any part of all when his necessity did require it and seeing they were bound to expose their persons for him they saw no reason they should detain their estates from him because my life should be dearer unto me then all my wealth And if our King had such subjects as these Heathens I think he needed not to have wanted to supply his necessities But our Kings are not like Augustus that taxed all the world as much as he pleased nor like Charles the fifth Qui immania tributa populis imperavit as Oscrius writeth nor like the Eastern Kings that impose upon their subjects what they will but of their speciall grace and favour have granted such priviledges and made such concessions limitations and pactions with their subjects as cannot be discussed or expressed within my limited time to set down how far and to shew how well or ill they were concluded and therefore all that I shall say herein is this that we ought to consider how far God requireth us to assist our King and take heed
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
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
malicious treacherous and murderous ill properties for great Courtiers that ought to be as well good as great else are they but a great shame among men and a great staine unto all their posterity 10. 10 The common people for the most part had a hand in his death by a three fold imployment As salus populi the good of the people and the liberty of the subjects was one main pretended cause why these murderers kild their King ne gens pereat lest if he lived the Nation should be destroyed so the people upon all occasion must be ready at hand to serve their turn and to do the services wherein these their grand Masters shall imploy them and this imployment we find to be three fold 1. Mar. 14.43 When their King is to be taken they must be sent armed with swords and staves to apprehend him 2. They must draw petitions for some base and unworthy thing as they did Math. 27.20 when they petitioned that Barabbas a thief and a murderer might be released and their King crucified 3. They must come to the Judgment-Hall or place of Judicature and for fear the King should find some favour from him that knew him innocent they must with loud voices cry for justice and double their desires for execution and all this saith the Evangelist was done by the multitude Math. 27.20 Hosi-anna as they were perswaded by the Priests and Presbyters Ah silly people that even now cry Hosanna serva quaeso Save Lord and now presently Crucifige that loved their King as his enemies confess and yet joyn with his enemies to kill their King and never ask What hath he done but this we will do to please them that set us on the work Who then but a mad man would repose trust in a multitude of men and relie upon a broken reed a reed that wavers with every winde And not only so but to shew the baseness of these base people for I know not how to say their envy or their malice that they should maligne their King who had done them good every way and no harm to any of them when Pilate a heathen Judge and a stranger to the Jews shall profess him to be a just person Math. 27.24 and therefore wash his hands from the blood of the innocent man this giddy multitude of rude people the generation of vipers that gnaw out the bowels of their own dams the brethren of Cain and the children of their father the Devil Joh. 8.44 that hath been a murderer from the beginning do cry out as vengeance doth require Math. 27.25 His blood be upon us and upon our children What Nefandum scelus a most fearfull thing when the blood of our own just King unjustly murdered by so many sorts of men that had their hands imbrued with his blood shall like Abels blood cry to God for vengeance against us and our children for ever O let us rather repent and desire of God that the blood of this lamb Jesus Christ may wash away these our bloody sins And thus I have shewed you the chiefest Actors in this bloody Tragedy all the whole Kingdom of Jury rebelling against their King and most Traiterously betraying him to an Ignominious death save only some few followers of Christ of whom this King foretold what should betide them some of them should be killed and some persecuted from City to City for Math. 23.34 as S. Basil said of Herod 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his meat was the flesh and his drink was the blood of men so these Regicides will never leave a follower of this King untill like the Whore in the Revelations Revel 7.6 they be drunk with the blood of the Saints and thereby shew themselves as they are 1. Vnsatiable because they never leave till they be drunk 2. Vnmercifull because they will be drunk with blood and 3. Vnjust because no blood will serve them but the blood of the Saints and servants of this King the witnesses of Gods truth And therefore let all the lovers of this King look to themselves because the branches must needs wither when the root is plucked up And besides these followers of Christ that loved him we find some others that had no hand in killing him and those were the Samaritans a people as much hated by the Jews as Papists are by the Puritans and though this King confer'd upon the Jews beneficia nimis copiosa multa magna and did nothing at all for these Samaritans save only to pitty them and hinder the fiery Zâ—lots the two sons of Zebedee to destroy them by calling for fire out of Heaven to consume them as Elias did the two Captains and their fifties yet we do not read that either they hated the person or sought the life of this King no more do I find that any Papist joyned with the Parliament of England and the Conquerors of our King to put King Charles to death which I believe will be sufficient witnesses to rise in judgment to condemn them that have condemned the King at the last day Thus I have passed over all or most of the acts and scenes of this Tragedy and I might here end but that as the Prophet saith abyssus abyssum invocat and one Tragedy requires another and the destruction of this King and his followers cals for destruction upon the destroyers that like Damocles's sword hangs by a feeble thread ready to fall upon their necks for the Prophet David demands the question Shall they escape for their wickedness And he doth immediatly answer The Lord shall destroy both the blood-thirsty and deceitfull men and all these men that I have shewed being most deceitfull and very much thirsting after blood and that blood not of the basest people but of the best of men their Prophets their Preachers and their own most just and pious King it must needs pull destruction upon their heads Therefore Christ in the parable of the Vineyard saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. 21.41 The Lord will miserably destroy them that is 1. Them that plotted to take away his inheritance 2. Them that consulted to take away his life 3. Them that so unjustly put him to death 4. Them that abused and wronged his servants that sought to defend his right And 5. I feare me them that might have helped to protect both their King and his servants and did not for if any where then surely here that axiome must hold good Qui non vetat peccare quum potest ipse peccat and that too-ill-applied Sentence so protect rebels assist murderers by our seducing brethren in the 5. of Judges where Debora saith Curse ye Meros curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof because they came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty must needs be applied to them that had ability to defend their King and to relieve his oppressed servants and yet suffered them to be destroyed by
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
saith If it had been an open enemy that had done me this dishonor I could well have born it but it was thou my companion and mine own familiar friend my disciple mine Apostle my Servant and my Purse-bearer and for thee to betray thy Master it is a Treason beyond all Treason and a murder more execreble then any murder because that besides their malice towards their Masters such servants as Judas and this Zimri were do shew themselves replenished with ingratitude to render so much evil to them that have done so much good to them which is a monster in nature and a sin most odious amongst the Heathens whose proverb was Ingratum si dâ—xeris omnia dixer is and therefore though there is no vice in the World which hath not room and entertainment in some Kingdom or other as Pride among the Babylonians Envy among the Jews Anger among the Thebans Covetousness among the Tyrians Gluttony among the Sidonians Lying among the Cretians Witch-craft in Thessaly Magick in Egypt and other sins so well known that I need not name them in Germany France England and Ireland yet ingratitude is such a sin that no Countrey will willingly receive it nor any man own it or entertain it into his house for though thy self shouldst be as ingratefull to thy neighbour as Pharaohs butler was to Joseph Laban to Jacob Saul to David Joash to Jehojada Demetrius to Jonathas Augustus to Cicero Carthage to Hannibal Rome to Scipio and many more that either banished or murdered those that protected and preserved them from ruine yet thou canst not abide that any man should prove ingratefull unto thee but having so well deserved at his hands thou wilt cry out that he is worst then the brute beasts as we must confess an ingratefull person is indeed for you see the dog will love his Master and often venture his life for him for a piece of bread and the very Tygers Bears and Lions will love those that keep them and do feed them and they will shew their thankfulnness for the benefits that they do receive as it is manifest by that which fell to Helpis the Samian who upon a certain Coast of Africa having drawen out a bone that stuck in a Lions throat was in recompence of that benefit fed and maintained by the Lion's hunting so long as his ship lay at anchor on that shore and that which A. Gellius saith befell to Androdus a Roman slave who being banished out of Rome and wandering in a Forrest that was full of wild and savage Beasts met a Lion that came fawning upon him and shewing unto him his Pawe that was wonderfully sore and swollen by reason of a thorn that was over-head got into it which the slave pulled out and so cured the poor distressed Lion who in requitall of that curtesy accompanied him out of the Forrest and kept him from the danger of all other Beasts and afterwards that Lion being taken and carried to Rome and the slave some certain years after returning to Rome was apprehended and adjudged to be throwen unto the Lions and being cast among the Lions his cured patient presently knew him and fawning upon him Gellius l. 5 c. 14. as congratulating their meeting he not only did him no hurt but also preserved him from all the rest that they durst not touch him and the reason being known the slave was pardoned and the people termed the Lion his host and him the Lion's Physitian And if brute and savage Beasts were thus gratefull for some small benefits what Beasts are they that will destroy their best benefactors and what words can be found fit to express this ingratitude that goeth beyond all other villanies For to murder a man is most odious as I shall anon shew unto you but to murder a King is far more abominable and such a King as is our Master and such a Master as useth us not like slaves but as our Saviour saith Hence forth I call you not servants but I have called you friends Joh. 15.15 like his companions is a sin most abominable and so far transcendent beyond my capacity to express it that as Valerius saith of Sejanus Valer. M. l. 9. c. 11. He is now in bell if the Devill will receive so vile a varlet and can find out torments sufficient for his deserts so will I say of Zimri and of all such servants as slay or betray their Masters I leave them seriously to consider what they have done and to abhorre themselves in dust and ashes or to expect that fearfull judgment that hangs over their head And I do exceedingly honor the honorable House of Commons and do most Highly commend the Votes and Orders that I understand they have made concerning those men that had any hand in the death of our late Pious Just and most Gratious King whereby they have shewed themselves to be most Religious towards God and most Loyall toward their King So I have done with the persons mentioned in this Text Elah and Zimri the Master and his servant 2. Two Things mentioned in Jezabels speech The things mentioned in this speech are these two 1. Murder 2. Peace 1. Murder the very worst of all human actions 2. Peace the very best of all worldly blessings And so here is Zimri's fact and Zimries punishment 1. His fact is the slaying of his Master which is Murder 2. His punishment is to be deprived of all Peace which is the greatest punishment of all plagues 1. For his fact which is murder before I speak thereof I shall humbly intreat your Honors and all the rest of these Christian auditors not to mistake my words or meaning in any Application thereof otherwise then I mean for in the prosecution of this point I purpose not to touch upon any of those that his Majesty hath most graciously pardoned by an act of Oblivion for all their former offences nor upon any of them that were slain in the war 2 Sam 11.25 when as David saith The sword devoureth one as well as another but my discourse shall reach no further then my Text goeth that is those that in cold blood shall maliciously persecute their neighbours unto death as Cain did his brother Abell and Joab Amasa and those that shall treacherously slay their Master as Zimri did his King and his Master Elah And those also that shall deliberately and judicially condemn an Innocent person unto death as the Judges of Jezreel did Naboth and the Jewish Sanhedrim condemned their King and our Saviour Christ And though the Prophet saith Consolamini populum meum and the sons of Consolation are commanded to bind up the broken hearted and to Preach the glad-tidings of the Gospell unto the penitent yet there must be Boanerges sons of Thunder to sound out the Alarme of Gods judgments against transcendent and impenitent malefactors and to lay the axe to the root of the Tree to cut down every tree that beareth not
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
all his ways Psal 145.17 and holy in all his works and the Prophet Daniel testifieth as much and so do all the Saints and Servants of God yea and the very wicked Reprobates do confess the same for Adoni-bezek the Tyrant that had Seventy Kings having their Thumbs and great Toes cut off to gather their meat under his Table doth acknowledge that God did most justly deal with him as he had dealt with others and so we finde that the Law of God is most just and requireth Justice to be done at all times in all places and to all persons as an eye for an eye tooth for tooth and he that sheddeth man's blood by man should his blood be shed yet such is the corruption of man's Nature that we do often judge amiss of the just Judgments of God and therefore Christ adviseth us not to judge that is amiss or if we judge not to do it according to the Superficies and outward appearance of things but to judge righteous Judgments and especially of all the Judgments of God that he sheweth either in this world or in the world to come And because God of late hath poured out much of his wrath and indignation and shewed many Judgments upon these Kingdoms I will endeavour Rom. 2.3 by the help and assistance of the same God to make as the Apostle saith a Declaration of the just Judgments of God to stop the mouths of all discontented Murmurers and to shew the just deserts of us all that either have been or still are most justly punished and I shall further shew how that in the midst of God's anger against these Nations he was pleased to continue his mercies and loving kindnesses to his dear and faithful Servant and our late most gracious King of ever blessed Memory Charles the First And first as the Poet saith A Jove principium Musae so I shall begin with him that was Jehovah's Vice-gerent the Anointed of the Lord and our most gracions King CHAP. I. FIrst then for King Charles I knew him before he was crowned King a most virtuous Vera quidem res est patrem sequitur sua proles Et sequitur leviter filia matris iter and Religious Prince religiously following the pious steps of his good and godly Father and well-beloved and well spoken of by all his Fathers Court pietas spectata per ignes and his Travels through France and Return from Spain have sufficiently testified his sincerity and constancy in the true Religion so that I may truly say of him Firma valent perâ—se nullúmque Machaona quaerunt And after he was crowned King all in white in token of that purity and innocency which he desired always to retain according to the counsel of Solomon that saith Let thy Garments be always white I living in His Court in no mean place had a very great desire to note and observe the lives actions and contrivements both of the King and of most other men that were of any note in the King's house and throughout all the space of seventeen or eighteen years that I was resident in His Court whereof I waited in my turn six or seven years upon His Majesty my Witness is in Heaven that I could observe none nor find out any man either of the Lords Knights or other Gentlemen of his House that was of so mild a Disposition so courteous in his Conversation and so pious in all the actions and circumstances of Religion as King Charles was a man that I never heard to take the Name of God in vain at any time nor ever saw him passionately angry with any man neither do I believe that the mouth of the Father of Lies could justly tax him of any open crime or inexcusable defect either of Charity Equity or Piety before the Birth of the Long Parliament or after throughout all his life for he knew that Qui sceptra duro saevus imperio reget Timet timentes metus in autorem cedit Seneca in Oedipo Act. 3. and I am sure I am able to arise in the last day to testifie against many of his enemies and accusers that I have often heard them justifying him in those things for which afterwards they accused him and condemned him yea they were his Counsellours to have them done and then his Prosecutours and Persecutours of him unto the death for doing them Much more could I speak and speak it most truly in the just praise and commendation of this good and godly King and when all that I could speak were set down I must confess mine offence that plenty it self and the abundance of his virtues Talem vix reperit unum Millibus 〈◊〉 multis bominum consultus Apollo Ausonius and merits hath made me poor in mine expressions thereof Prob dolor infoelix sors nostra amittere talem Ter foelix talem quae tenet or aviorum And is it not therefore strange that the just and good God should suffer the wicked Sons of men so strictly to prosecute and so unexemplarily to handle and to deal with so just so good and so Religious a Prince as the Long Parliament hath done with King Charles and so to confute that Poet which saith Nullum caruit exemplo nefas when as no Historie of any Times of any Kingdom can parallel the proceedings against King Charles I answer no not at all but in the death of this good and godly King may be seen the great merey of God and I dare not say the Revelation of the just Judgment of God but the gentle chastisement of a most loving Father to a most dear and dutiful Son that all men that see the same might praise God for the one and fear him for the other for as the death of the Son of God Jesus Christ was most unjustly done by the wicked Jews that condemned him for Blasphemy against God and Treason against Caesar whereof he was most innocent and guilty of neither yet was it most justly suffered to be done by the determinate Counsel of God as Saint Peter sheweth because that out of his great love and mercy to save sinful man he became his Surety to pay his Debts and to satisfie God's Wrath by suffering that death for our sins that as the Prophet saith We by his stripes might be healed therefore did God most justly execute upon him what he had most mercifully undertaken for us all so though King Charles was a very good man and a most religious Prince and as his friends knew most innocent and free from all those crimes that were layd to his charge by the long Parliament yet could be not be justified from all offences against his God but as Moses that was faithful in all Gods House yet failed he a little at the waters of Meriba and as David that was a man according to Gods own heart yet offended he also in numbering the people and as Ezechias and Josias that were two of the three best Princes of all the Kings of
Death of the King we do see and must acknowledg the just Judgment of God and that he spareth not his dearest Children if they do offend but though Coniah were as the Signet upon his right-hand when he transgresseth God will cut him off so in this very Judgment of God The great goodness of God towards King Charles seen we may plainly see Mercie ana Truth met together Righteousness and Peace kissing each other yea we may clearly see the great love and mercie of God towards this good and godly King both in his Death and in the consequents of his Death as specially 1. In his Friends 2. In his Honour 3. In his Posterity 4. In his Felicity for First In his death touching his Death it is a true saying Qui non vult in vita praevidere mortem non potest in morte videre vitam and as another saith Turpe est eo statu vivere in quo non statuas mori therefore did King Charles live so Justly so innocently so Religiously and so Christianlike that he might well say nec pudet vivere nec timeo mori I am neither ashamed to live nor afraid to die for he lived like a Saint and died a Martyr like a good Christian yea so Christianlike that although I would not wish it for a World to be where I fear many of his Enemies are yet next to my being with Christ I would wish nothing of God sooner or rather then to be where I assure my self King Charles is Nec dubito qui sic vixit sic mortuus idem est Qui n sit apud Superos nobilis umbra Deos. Secondly 2 In the Consequents of his death 1. In his Friends Claud. 2. Stilicon For the Consequents of his death and First For his Friends as Claudian saith Haec amicitias lengo post tempore firmat Mansuróque adamante ligat nec mobile mutat Ingenium parvae strepitu nec vincula noxae Dissolvi patitur nec fastidire priorem Allicitur veniente novo Or as Solomon saith fortis est ut mors dilectio Love is as strong as death So they verified all this in testifying to the World that although his Enemies took him out of the World and his Picture which with all reverent respect to Christ be it spoken was in my judgment the likest that ever I saw to that Picture and Description of our Saviour that Publius Lentulus sent to the Senate of Rome out of our houses yet they never were nor ever shall be able to take him or our loves to him out of our Hearts the hearts of all us that truly knew him quia igneti nulla cupido and therefore loved him and so loved him that neither Life nor Death nor all the malice of his Foes could or can lessen our love and honour that we bare to him or blot out the goodness of this King and the Sweetness of his disposition from our thoughts and memories but as the Son of Sirach saith of good Josias so we say of good King Charles In Honour and good name Ovid in Ibin Antut Anaxaâ—chus pila minuaris in alta The remembrance of King Charles is like the composition of perfume that is made by the art of the Apothecarie the more you stir it the Sweeter it smelleth and therefore Secondly He is happie in his honour and good name that shall continue Famous and Blessed among all Posterities for evermore for though Anaxarchus-like that for his Detracting tongue was Pestled to death in a Brasen Morter his Enemies say with malicious Juno Non sic abibunt odia vivaces aget violentus iras animus saevúsque dolor aeterna bella pace sublatâ geret Their hatred to him shall never die yet as Solomon saith Memoria justi erit in benedictionibus the remembrance of this just man and good King shall be blessed for ever Indeed the malice of his enemies hath been and still is such and so great as that to falsifie the Saying of the Poet Pascitur in vivis livor post fata quiescit that tells us we hate the living onely and our hatred dieth with death they never cease to stain his good name and obscure his honour with apparent lies and scandalous aspersions for their hate to him is immortal and unexplicable seeking to burie his honour with himself yea and before himself was buried even while he was alive they dealt with him as the Jews did with his Master Christ saying that he was a Blasphemer a Glutton a Drunkard a Sabbath-breaker a Traytor unto Caesar and a Seducer of the people that had a Devil and did cast out Devils through Beelzebub the chief of the Devils and what not so do these like those Jews say that King Charles was an Hypocrite making onely an outward profession of honesty and piety that he was a Tyrant and a Traytor which both are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most inconsistible when as a Tyrant as Claudian describes him Jnstat terribilis vivis morientibus baeres Claudian De bello Gildico Virginibus raptor thalamis obscoenus adulter Quisquis vel locuples pulchra vel conjuge notus Crimine pulsatur falso si crimina desunt For which I think the Devil could not have the face to tax King Charles with any of all these things for we all know that he was so mercifull a Prince as seldom if ever he took the advantage of the rigor of any Law but lessened and sweetened that same many times and in many things neither do I believe that Juno her self had she been his Queen could have suspected him for any false Play so Chast a Prince was King Charles beyond the fair carriage of Alexander towards the Wife and Daughters of Darius And that he should be a Traytor is a thing that the like was never heard of because Treason is as you know crimen laesae Majestatis an offence against the Supreme Majestie which was solely and fully resident in himself and would he think you be a Traytor to himself Indeed he was when too confidently he trusted himself into the hands of those perfidious Gentlemen the Scots that worse then Judas sold him and delivered him to be crucified by his grand enemies of the Parliament and other treason I am confident can no ways be fixed on him But quid miror quid opus est verbis what need we say any more When men laid to Christ his charge the things that he never knew and taxed him with what he never did nor said what wonder is it if they slander the Foot-steps of his Anointed Yet all they do is to no purpose for as Plutarch saith Plutarch in Numa Omnes bonos justosque viros major post mortem sequitur laus invidia non multum post illos temporis supervivente non nunquam etiam ante exitum eorum moriente the greatest praise and honour will follow good and just men after they are dead envy and malice not living long after them but sometimes dying before them even
graviora malorum Supplicia For though God cometh to punish lies and perjuries and such like horrid crimes slowly and as it were on leaden feet yet when he cometh he layeth on soundly and smites them home as it were with Iron hands and as the Poet Claudian saith In prolem dilatarunt perjuria patris Claud. in curetium O that all Parents would always remember this even this saying of Claudian Et quas fallaceis collegit lingua parentis Has eadem nati lingua refudit opes The punishment of the Fathers perjuries will reach unto his Children even as Moses told us long agoe from the mouth of God himself that God is jealous of his honour and will visit the sins of the Fathers especially such horrid sins as perjuries and high slanders upon the Children unto the third and fourth Generation and as the Wives and Children of these Irish Rebels can now testifie the truth of these things and I shall more fully declare the same anon unto you Thirdly The bloody barbarous and inhumane murders of the wilde Northern Their bloody and inhumane dealings Irish and the rest of the uncivillized Rebels do add a great deal of more weight unto their impiety for though the murthers and slaughters don here in England be most bloody and cruel yea most unnatural and unchristian when as the Poet saith Nec hospes ab hospite tutus but the Brother fought against his Brother and sometimes killed one another as we read they did in the Warrs of Sertorius and the Fathers often fought against their Children and the Children against their Parents just as our Saviour saith it should be in the time of the great Antichrist yet if we compare them with the Savage Butchering of the Women with Child young Infants aged Matrons old Fathers and all others of what age Sex or Condition soever they were that were done especially by the Northern Irish and the other Rebels that are expressed in the Remonstrance published by a learned and Reverend man Dr. Jones the now Bishop of Cloghar and the other Commissioners authorized for the Examination of those out-rages then we shall finde that as the Poet saith Saevior est tristi busiride Saevior illo Qui falsum lento torruit igne bovem Quique bovem siculo fertur donasse tyranno Et dictis artes conciliasse suas the barbarous inhumanity of these Rebels to have exceeded all the cruelties of Phalaris Busiris Dyonisius and the rest of the Savage Tyrants of the Heathens or the bloody persecutors of the Primitive Christians and the English cruelties to be very merciful and their bloody slaughters to be but gentle punishments in respect of these Tragick Acts that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the lemnian hands they laid upon the poor Protestants so far that they which felt them not can hardly believe such infernal destruction should be invented and executed by any humane Creature here on Earth for as the Poet saith Vix ulla fides tam saevi criminis unum Tot poenas cepisse caput quis prodere tanta Funera quis caedes possit deflere nefandas Quid tale immanes unquam gessisse feruntur It was so great and so horrible an impiety that scarce faith can be given to it scarce tears can be found sufficient to bewail it and scarce torments enough devised to punish it being so inhumane that if I were an Infidel or Pagan I would refuse all the happiness that their Priests could perswade me to accept of for imbracing of their faith rather then I would be of their Religion that would incite their people to the unjust effusion of so much innocent blood and the savage butchering of so many guiltless persons when as such cruelties would be a sufficient Argument unto me to prove that they could not be the Priests of any good God but rather the Children of Apollyon and the first-born of that destroyer which laboureth with all his might to bring all men unto perdition for that we may justly say that as the Sun darkneth all the light of the Stars so the Irish cruelty if the Relation of their inhumanity be true blotteth out all the strangeness of most other former cruelties especially if we add Fourthly The generality of their intended wickedness Psal 137.7 the generality of their intended resolution which was as the Children of Edom cried in the day of Hierusalem saying Down with it dâ—wn with it even to the ground that the name of Israel might be no more in remembrance so they thought to root out all the English and Brittish blood out of Ireland but the Prophet Jeremiah and Obediah demand the same question of the Edomites saying Obadiah v. 5. If theeves come to thee if Robbers by night would they not have scollen till they had enough that is no more then what they thought enough or as Jeremiah saith Jerem. 49.9 They will destroy till they have enough as if he said they will onely destroy so much but no more and if Grape-gatherers come to thee would they not leave some gleaning-Grapes And yet these Rebels worse then Theeves or then robbers by night were not satisfied with enough nor could they tell when they had enough but they would cut off head and tayl root and branch and leave not any gleanings nor any remnant for their Children to destroy afterwards And so you see the wickedness of the Irish and yet not all for after they had done all this and after that with the Inhabitants of Thessalonica and of Antioch when they threw down the Statues of their Emperous they had provoked their King by their our-rages and they considered that they had done foolishly by imagining such a device as they were not able to bring to pass and found their King more merciful then the Thessalonians found Theodosius or the Antiochians found Julian when upon their submission and reducement to their former obedience he would have been contented with some reasonable satisfaction to be made to himself and his abused Subjects far less then their iniquity deserved and the yielding up of the prime Rebels and the bloody murderers to answer the Laws for their offences and it may be the decimating of them to suffer death for their doings and to that end had appointed a most honourable wise and sweet natur'd Noble-man that might more rightly be termed deliciae generis humani then the Son of Vespasian to be a Commissioner on the King and the Protestants behalf to treat with some that were chosen to do the like on the Irish side how things might be well pacified and a firm peace setled on all sides betwixt the Protestants and the Papists the English and the Natives and these Commissioners after much time spent and a great deal of pains taken had brought things as they conceived to a reasonable good pass and a far fairer conclusion on the Irish side then either their wickedness deserved or any reason could give them any hope to expect and the Noble Marquess
upon the Pamphlets lying on every Stationer's stall 3. The next sort of men that betrayed and killed their King 3 Rulers of the people were not so much a Sect of seduced Zelots as a companie of great Rulers Rulers of the people saith the Text or as they are termed in their rebellion against Moses Princes of the Assemblie famous in the Congregation men of Renown Numb 6.2 and these were either the heads of severall families as our Lords and Nobilities are or else such as in their several countries or cities by their wealth or authority had gained power over the people to like or dislike what they pleased as our Knights of the Shire or Burgesses for the Parliament are and these were very deep in setting forward the Treason and Murder of their King 4. The Sadduces were another Sect among the Jews of pestilent doctrine 4 The Sadduces denying all Scripture that made against them and denying the immortalitie of the soul and the resurrection of the dead like Cromwels Atheistical Commanders and all punishment for sins after death therefore being more wicked in their tenets then the Pharisees and absurder then the Scribes it is very like they were more active in the death of their King then the rest of the forementioned Murderers 5. 5 Lawyers like the Chair-men of the long Parliament There were some comprised under some of the former Sects that are termed by the Evangelists 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lawyers which as Christ saith sate in Moses Chaire and so were Chair-men because of some excellent parts that were thought to be in them beyond the ordinary sort of men and these men saith our Saviour have taken away the key of knowledge i.e. the Law and instead thereof they taught the traditions of men which traditions S. Luke 1.52 Matth. 15.3 Ephes 2.15 Paul calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we may properly term Ordinances as our English Translation renders it and by these new-devised Ordinances of these Chairâ—men they quite spoyled and frustrated the good old Law both of God and Man 6. The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which we translate Elders or 6 The Presbyans as the word properly sounds Presbâ—ters had a mighty share in the blood of their King and S. Luke saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 7 The Priests Matth. 27.1 Mark how the Prâ—sbyters are not only called the Elders but the Elders of the people because the common people only magnifie them and they only endevour to please the people the Presbyterie were the first that came against him 7. The Priests joyned with these Presbyters to kill their King for so the Evangelist saith that when the morning was come all the chief Priests and Elders of the people took counsell against Jesus so put him to death and as then the Jewish Elders and Priests conspired together against their King so we find now the Presbyters or Preaching-Elders and Romish Priests though their faces are averse and seem to look divers wayes yet like Sampsons Foxes they are tyed together by the tayls and both are Anti-Kings enemies unto Monarchy and do like Mars his Priests called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 scatter the fire of Sedition and Rebellion amongst the people and Sheba-like blow their Trumpets in all places even in their Pulpits to stirre up the discontented people to take Armes against their King though he be Christ himself And therefore if any King would be free from Rebellion he must banish these Priests and Presbyters from his Dominions 8. 8 The whole Paâ—liament of the Jews conspired together to put Christ their King to death Mar. 15.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nemine contradicente Esay 1.4 S. Mark saith that these Priests held a Consultation with the Presbyters or Elders and Scribes and the whole Councill and bound Jesus and carried him away and delivered him to Pilate so here is the whole Parliament of the Jews against their King who had they not been Jews had never done it but these had formerly forsaken God and therefore no wonder that they do now betray their King yet it might be wondered that this Councill consistings of Heterogeniall parts severall Sects as Pharisees and Sadduces Scribes and Herodians Priests and Presbyters whereof most of them differed in many things and hated each other very much even as much as Papist and Puritane Calvinist and Lutheran do amongst us yet they can deponere inimicitias lay aside all differences and conspire together to betray to death their Lord and King and our Saviour himself tels us how Videlicet when they saw the Heir they said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 within themselves i. e. by their wicked thoughts and then they said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 among themselves i. e. by consultation and publishing their intention one to another Come i. e. by combination and making a firm League and Covenant with an indissolveable oath that although we be of sundry sects and different opinions among our selves yet after we have made this Covenant we need not suspect one another but we may confide in the Covenanters and assure our selves of fidelity to assist one another to the uttermost ut occidamus even to kill him that his Kingdom and his Vineyard both Church and Common-wealth may be our own and thus saevis inter se convenit Vrsis these cruell Bears and savage Beasts do consult and agree together to put to death the Lords Anointed Therefore this Counsell worse then the worst of the Popish counsels may rightly be termed a Devillish counsell Psal 1.1 even the counsell of the ungodly the way of sinners and the seat of the scornfull when as Jacob saith of his sons Simeon and Levi The instruments of cruelty are in their habitations and their swords are the weapons of violence and therefore O my soul come not thou into their secret and let not mine honor be united unto their assembly But let thy thoughts abhor all their actions For in their anger they slew a man and through envy they murdered the best of men and their own King even Jesus Christ and therefore cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruell and for their malice let all such murderers be divided in Jacob and scattered in Israel and let due vengeance be speedily rendered to all such abominable Traytors 9. 9 Flattering Courtiers We read of another Faction that had their fingers in this Treason i. e. the Herodians who were a company of flattering Courtiers and alwaies followed the over-ruling party And these were subtile Foxes that made use of Policy without honesty and therefore Christ that knew them well enough Mar. 8.15 and I would to God King Charls had known his Courtiers also adviseth us to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Herodians i. e. the leaven not of bread but of the doctrine and practices when as their Doctrines are contagious and infectious and their practices
all think that which is evil and all speak that which they think and finally where all men do what they list in such and so unfortunate a Realme where the people are so wicked let every good man beware that he be no inhabitant for in a short time there must happen there either the ire of the gods or the fury of men to the depopulation of the good or the destruction of the bad when as nothing can betide the people in such a Kingdom but Oppressions and Taxes murmurings distractions and dissentions until the fire be kindled among them to consume and to destroy one another But if the personal shedding of the innocent blood be thus haynous and so severely punished what shall we say to National shedding of such Blood as was shed in these Kingdoms that was so infinitely more abominable than the other But as Doctor Turner when he was terrae filius in the University said to his Opponent Thinkest thou with terrible words to terrifie terrible Turner So these monsters of men that dare to kill both Kings and their Masters and then to suppresse the good and to advance the wicked to silence the wise and to magnifie fools will say these things are but shadows and bug-bears to frighten Babes and poor-spirited men that have neither the courage of Heroicks nor the knowledge of Scriptures for they can tell us well enough that although some King-killers have been punished like Zimri for slaying their Masters yet à particulari non est syllogizari we must not conclude a General Rule from particular examples for Baasha slew his King and his Master Nadab and yet he reigned 24. years and died peaceably in his bed And Jehu killed Joram his King and his Master and yet he reigned 28. years and prospered and died peaceably in his bed And Menahem slew Shallum his King and reigned 10. years and died peaceably in his bed and so did many more that are recorded in prophane Authors and the ambitious hunters after Kingdoms perswade themselves that they may speed with the best and not perish with the worst fortune And so likewise those Common-wealths and Kingdoms that have killed their Kings which they conceived to be wicked In the third speech at the Conference of Parliament pag. 15. Eutrop. l. 1. did not only escape free from punishment but were prosperous and had good successe and were the instruments of much good unto the people As it fared with the Senate of Rome which as Halicar l. 1. saith killed and cut in pieces their King Romulus and afterwards expelled Tarquin and judicially sentenced Nâ—ro to death as some do write and is the onely sentence for death that I have read in any history though for deprivation not so which sentence notwithstanding was never executed yet was it decreed and as those and the like Senators do alleadge the Common-wealth prospered after it I answer that una hirundo non facit ver and though Balaams asse once spake shall we think that all other asses shall be able to speak So one or two examples in particular are of no force in the generall but the truth is that Gâ—ds judgements are unsearchable his wayes are in the Seas his paths in the great waters and his footsteps are not known yet this we may know for certain that although a sinner do evill an hundred times and God prolong his dayes yet it shall be well with them that fear the Lord but it shall not be well with the wicked neither shall he prolong his dayes but be shall be like a shadow because he feareth not before God and so the Prophet David testifieth at large and Job did the like before him And we may know also that although Jehu and some others that had speciall Commissions from God to fulfill his will prospered and escaped the hand of judgement for their zeal to Gods service and their repentance for their transgression Psal 37.9.10 yet is it a most certam truth that murderers King-killers and all other like wicked malefactors shall never escape unpunished and yet God doth not alwayes punish them in like manner Either in respect 1. Of the time or Either in respect 2. Of the punishment or Either in respect 3. Of the persons for 1. In respect of the time he reserveth the punishment of some though they be never so wicked for the next life and suffereth them to prosper all their dayes in this world as he did the rich glutton what evill soever he did and this both holy Job and the good King David do sufficiently prove and examples enough might be produced of most wicked tyrants and murderers and the like malefactors that escaped the hand of God in this life but how they escaped the next I cannot tell themselves by this time know and this future punishment is the heaviest punishment in the world and the prosperity of such malefactors is the worst and the unhappiest prosperity that can be Others he punisheth in this life and yet those not all alike in respect of the time of their punishment but some presently as Achan Cosbi Corah Dathan and Abiram Nadah and Abihu Ananias and Saphira and the like others have some time given them to see if in that time they will confesse their sinnes repent them of their wickednesse amend their lives and make satisfaction to the parties wronged Zimri 7. dayes so Zimri had 7. days given him before he was punished Shallum that slew Zacharia had one month given him Otho that caused Galba to be slain had leave to reign four months before he suffered for his murder Otho 4. months Vitel. 8. mon. Phil. Arabs 5. years Decius 2. years Niceph. l. 18. c 58. Phocas 8. years 2 Kings 15. Peka 20. years and Vitellius that was the destruction of Otho had 8 months before Vespasian brought him to death Philip Arabs that slew young Gordian had 5. years given him before Decius revenged the death of Gordian and Decius that was the death of Philip raigned 2. yeares before he was punished for the death of Philip Phocas had 8. years after he killed his Master Mauricius before he had his punishment and Peka raigned 2. years after he killed Pekahiah before Hoshea revenged the death of Pekahiah so the Prophet tells the Nintvites they should have 40. days before they should be destroyed the children of Israel 40. years in the wilderness and Jerusalem was not destroyed in 40 years after they had crucified Christ the Son bearing with them just so long as his Father bore with them in the wilderness the old world had 120 yeares given them to repent before they were destroyed and the wickednesse of the Amorites remained well-nigh 400. years before it was revenged having continued from the wandring of the Israelites in the wildernesse even till the dayes of King Saul And therefore let no man wonder that we see not adulteries oppressions and murders presently punished neither should we think that because
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
for his flock For the affirmative or positive duties of a good Shepherd what he should do for his sheep never any came neer the goodnesse of this good Shepherd For 1. He provideth for his flock not onely the outward food of their bodies which he doth for all other living creatures when as the Prophet saith He openeth his hands and filleth all things living with plenteousness and as the same Prophet saith He feedeth the young ravens that call upon him and the best of us hath not a crum of bread but what he hath from him but he hath provided also the spiritual food of their souls which is the Word of God and the blessed Sacrament of the Lords Supper for as our Saviour alledged against Satan Mat. 4.4 Man liveth not by bread alone but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God and the blessed Sacraments are Verba visibilia Evangelii the visible and palpable words of the Gospel and are as the celestiall manna the heavenly food that perisheth not but feedeth us to eternall life The errour of the Messalian Hereticks if we strive to receive the same worthily as we ought to do though now we have too too many that are poysoned with the conceit of the Messalian Hereticks that said Baptism and the Lords Supper did neither profit us nor hurt us but that they which were inspired by Gods Spirit were guided by the revelation of that Spirit how to behave themselves in all their wayes which is the readiest way to lead them to the infernal spirits because we are not to be led by the inspiration of any spirit but by those holy directions which the Spirit of God hath left us in the holy Scriptures What is meant to be inspired with Gods spirit and when we pray to be inspired with Gods Spirit we mean no otherwise then that the Spirit of God would guide us to lead our lives and to do all things as we are commanded by the same spirit to do in the word of God that is left unto us by the Prophets and Apostles of Jesus Christ to be the onely Rule of all our actions 2. As he provideth thus both our temporal and our spiritual food 2 Christ ordereth how the food of his should be disposed so he ordereth and disposeth this food unto his sheep not according to their sensual appetite but for the natural good of their bodies and the spiritual health of their souls that it may be unto them the savour of life unto life and not the savour of death unto death As 1. For their natural food 1 Their natural food he would have us with the son of Jakeh to desire neither poverty nor riches neither too much nor too little but to be fed with food convenient lest if we be too full we forget the Lord grow too proud as the great rich men commonly be or if we be too poor we be driven to steal and to lie Prov. 30.8 9. and to take the name of God in vain And What should be convenient for every man because most men are loath to understand what is the mean betwixt too much and too little and what measure is that that is convenient S. Paul tells us That having food and rayment we should therewith be contented for the greatest Monarch in the world can have no more and our Saviour that best knew what is convenient for every man bids us prey to God that he would give us this day our daily bread that is so much as will serve us for our present necessity Luke 12.19 and not with that fool in the Gospel to lay up much goods for many years when he knew not that his soul in that night should be taken from him and then he could not tell who should enjoy those things or how those things should be spent that he had provided And 2. For our spiritual food 2 Their spiritual food this good Shepherd hath commanded us that are his under-Shepherds to give unto his sheep their owne portion in due season 1. Their own portion and that both in quality and quantity 1 Their own portion 1. In quality 1. In Quality what is most proper for every one as all meats serve not for every stomack and every potion serves not for all diseases so it is with our spiritual food and the divine physick of our soules and therefore we are advised to give milk unto the babes and stronger meat to them that are stronger men in Christ that is plain and easie doctrines to the plain and more ignorant people and deeper and more polite discourses to the judicious and those of deeper knowledge because as S. Paul saith we are debtors both to the Greeks and to the Barbaâ—ians to the wise and to the unwise and therefore as Christ biddeth his Apostles so must we sometimes launch forth into the deep both of Divinity and Humanity and as well of Arts as of Languages And so we are to give praises to the good reproofes to the bad but flatteries unto none when we ought no more to flatter the sweet and clement then to fear the cruel tyrant and in like manner we are commanded to apply comfors and consolations to the dejected spirits to pronounce pardon to the penitent sinners and to thunder out the terrors of Gods judgements to none but such as are impenitent and obstinate transgressors 2. In Quantity we are to give our sheep neither too much of this spiritual food 2 In quantity nor yet too little for where prophesie faileth the people perish and the worst famine is the famine not of corn wine and oyl but of the famine of Gods Word and therofere the Apostle saith Wo is me if I preach not the Gospel and wo is them that hinder us to preach it as they have done these many years And yet as we are not to give our sheep too little of this spiritual pasture lest they should want so they should not have too much lest they should loath it for a man may eat too much of the Honey-comb saith Solomon Prov. 25.16 Num. 11.20 and the children of Israel had so much Manna that they loathed it and Quails so plentifully that the flesh came out at their nostrils and so men may have the Word of God so fully that they will despise it or at least neglect it because as Solomon saith Prov. 27.7 the full soul loatheth or treadeth under foot the honey-comb but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet so is the Word of God precious when it is not so plentiful and despised when we are full of it And truly I do believe Knowledge how more plentiful now then ever it was the Gospel of Christ and the rest of the holy Scriptures were never since Christ his time so fully and so generally and so truly published as of late they were in the reigne of our late King
from many sins they would fall into most fearfull abominations and did not he sustain them with his hand they would pull down many mischiefs and kindle many plagues upon their own heads 3. Way 3 By bestowing many gifts and favours upon his creatures as sending them raine and fruitfull seasons Acts 14.17 making the Sun to shine both upon the good and upon the bad and filling our hearts with food and gladness by giving us Health Wealth and Prosperity 4. Way 4 By that which is above all and beyond all the rest in giving his onely Son to redeem us when we were captives and to save us when we were utterly lost Seneca saith we esteem our selves too highly if we suppose our selves worthy that the revolution of Winter and Summer should be done for us But alas good Philosopher if thou thinkest it strange that the world should hold his course for our sake what wouldst thou think if thou knewest as much as we that God for our sake should send his only Son to suffer the most ignominious death of the cross to deliver us from everlasting death The inexpressable greatness of Gods love in sending his Son to redeem us for this love is so full of all bottomlesse Mysteries so transcendently infinite that all the other multitudes of his blessings heaped upon us in our creation and preservation are not worth the talking of or so much as to be once named in comparison of this blessing but as the light of the Sun obscureth all the light of the Starres so the consideration of this benefit swalloweth up all the memory of all other benefits whatsoever And therefore this is ever and anon shewed and urged as the chiefest argument of Gods love and as the most royal Present whereby the King of Heaven did so exemplarily commend his love towards the sons of men 1 Johon 4.9 for as the Apostle saith in this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was manifested the love of God towards us that he sent his onely begotten Son into the world Why this benefit exceedeth all other benefits that we might live through him And the reason why this benefit transcendeth and excelleth all other benefits seemeth to be two-fold 1. Reason 1 Because That before our creation we had done nothing that had displeased God or opposed his purpose to produce us but before our redemption we had every way offended his Majesty rejected his grace and refused his favours towards us nay we had not onely slighted his love but we had also in all hostile manner done as we see others do now unto us rendered to him evil for good and for all his grace and loving favours we offered Wars and all despightful Indignities unto him Reason 2 2. Because in our Creation Dixit facta sunt he spake the world and they were made commanded and they stood fast but in working our redemption Multa dixit magna fecit dira tulit he spake many excellent Sermons he did many admirable Works and he suffered many intolerable Things and yet Solus homo non compatitur pro quo solo Deus patitur of all Gods creatures The exceeding greatness of the Mystery of our Redemption by the Incarnation Passion of Christ Col 1.26 1 Pet. 1.10 12. man alone regards not all this for whom alone God did all this And therefore this work alone was that astonishing project wherewith the invisible God blessed for ever intended in the fullest measure to glorifie all his Attributes even at once and to make himself far more admirably known by this then he was either by the Creation or the preservation of all the things of this world And this was that unsearchable Mystery that was hidden from the Ages and the Generations before in which God would make known the riches of his glory and which the holy men of God for many ages together longed to see and the Angels themselves desired 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 most heedfully to pry into it So you see that God by innumerable wayes and specially by this superlative argument of his love to mankind doth sufficiently testifie that he loveth 3. For the extent and object of Gods love the Apostle saith that he loveth us 3 The Parties loved us Love what it is The extent of is The extent of Gods Love 1. Himself 2. All that he made and S. Austin defineth love to be a motion of the heart delighting it self in any thing And the better we conceive the thing to be the more is our heart inflamed to love it and therefore God being the chiefest good he must needs in the first place love himself best as the Father loveth the Son the Son in like manner loveth the Father and both of them equally love the holy Spirit and the Spirit them And besides himself God loveth all things that he made because all that he made were good Sin he made not therefore he loves it not but hateth the same with a perfect hatred But though God loveth every thing which he hath made That of all Creatures God loved Mankind best yet he loveth not all things equally alike for we finde that he shewed more evident testimonies of far greater love to mankind then he did to any other creature whatsoever for though he loveth his Angels with a very great and singular love when he maketh them his Ministers and these Ministers flames of fire that do continually burn with the love of his Sacred Majesty yet we do not read that he stileth himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a lover of Angels as he termeth himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a lover of men as Zanchy well observeth out of Tit. 3.4 And this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his love to man more then to any other creature appeareth more manifestly by the manifold effects of his love As 1. In creating man alone after his own Image 2. In giving to him alone dominion over the rest of his creatures over all the works of his hands 3. In predestinating his onely begotten Son to take upon him our flesh thereby to exalt the humane nature alone above all other creatures whatsoever for though the Angels were of a pure simple and unspotted being and we of a terrene corrupted substance yet as the Apostle well observeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 2.16 he took not upon him the Angels but he took the seed of Abraham And therefore the Prophet David considering these many many testimonies of the divine love to man crieth out with admiration O God what is man that thou art so mindfull of him or the son of man that thou so regardest him thou madest him a little lower then the Angels but it was to crown him with glory and worship Psal 8 5. Gods love to men not equally alike to all men Prov. 8. Exod. 20. Psal 11.6 And therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 here hath an emphasis that God loved us men or mankind 〈◊〉 〈◊〉
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
post nummos Haec Janus summus ab imo perdocet Haec recinunt juvenes dictata senesque Which made Euripides to present one in an humor that neglected all things and all reproaches for wealth because said he men seld om or never ask how good or how honest is such a one but how rich is he and each man is that which he possesseth and is so esteemed according as he is worth and no more And therefore most men I mean worldly men love their gold as their God and this God hath their love And yet riches in their own nature have neither honour nor knowledge nor power nor valour nor any other good nor evil in themselves more than that whereunto they that do possesse them do direct them but they are like the water Riches like the waters of Feneo of the lake Feneo whereof the Arcadians do report that whosoever drinketh of it in the night he falleth sick but whosoever taketh it in the day time he becometh well so riches used for the works of darknesse to oppresse the poor to subdue our Prince to uphold pride to maintain Idolatry rebellion and the like are very poyson unto our Souls but if we imploy them for the deeds of light How riches do evil and how they may do good to uphold the right to relieve the poor to defend the innocent they are as antidotes against all evil for neither is the rich man condemned nor the poor man saved because the one is rich and the other poor but as both may be saved so beth may be condemned because the rich man abuseth his wealth and the poor man his poverty And as most men hunt after riches so I might shew you how others affect authority and others are drunk with the desire of honours but the time would be too short for me to go about to cut off the head of this monstrous Hydra of misordered love and most men do professe to know that as S. John saith 1 Joh. 2.15 Whosoever loveth the World the love of the Father is not in him and that this world is full of snares and thorns and vanities and vexation of spirit and that the lovers of this world are none other than the Servants of the Devil and they do likewise confesse that God hath done and doth all those great things for them which we have set down and therefore that they are no worldlings but do love God with all their hearts and do think themselves much wronged if they should be otherwise suspected Yet because 2 Thes 3.2 as the Apostle saith all men have not faith so all men have not love What we must do if we love God especially such love as they ought to have therefore lest we should deceive our selves herein and so destroy our Souls we must know that God is truth and therefore he that loves God loves truth and whosoever loves lies and falsehoods loves not God and God is Justice therefore he that loves God loves that which is right and just and he that loves to do wrong loves not God and so God is Wisdom and God is Mercy and therefore he that loves God loves Wisdom and sheweth mercy and they that are foolish as all the wicked are and do shew cruelty unto their brethren as do the blood thirsty men that do now seaze and kill and slay the innocent that never offended them cannot be said to love God But for the fuller manifestation of our love to God 1. Two things to be done I will set down some of the most infallible signs of this true love of God the best of them that are collected 2. Lest upon the discussion of these truths we find our selves destitute of this love I will briefly and as the time will give me leave shew the impediments and set down the furtherances of our love to God 1 The infallible signs of our true love of God The Image of of Love how anciently painted And why And 1. I find amongst the Antient Hieroglyphicks that the Image of Love was painted in the shape of a beautiful woman cloathed in a green vesture wherein was written these two words prope procul far and nigh in the breast were ingraven life and death in the borders of her garment were set Winter and Summer and in her side a wound so wide and so largely opened that all her inward parts were transparent And those Sages that pourtrayed Love thus did it for these reasons 1. In the shape of a woman to shew the vehemencie of this affection The explanation of the hierogliphick 2 Sam. 1.26 because women by reason of their weaknesse to bridle their passions as they are more violent in their hate so are they more fervent in their love and more vehement in all their desires than men therefore David expressing the great love of Jonathan towards him saith that his love passed the love of women 2. Of a beautiful woman to shew that Love is an alluring subject and is sweet and delectable even to them that are troubled with Love 3. In a green vesture to shew that true love ought alwayes to be fresh and fair and never withered nor waxen old because it never faileth 1 Cor. 13.8 as the Apostle testifieth 4. In the words far and nigh that were set in the forehead of that Image was signified that contrary to the common practice of the world to follow that old Proverb Qui procul ab oculis procul est a limine cordis Out of sight out of mind true love remaineth firm as well in the absence as in the presence of them that we love when as neither length of time nor distance of place can any wayes alter the constancie or lessen the affection of a true Lover 5. In life and death that were ingraven on the breast was shewed that Cant. 8.6 as Solomon saith love is as strong as death Ecl. 49.1 and cannot be extinguished even by death it self but we will love the very names and memories of them whom we loved as the Son of Syrach saith of Josias 6. By the Winter and Summer that were set in the borders of her garment was signified that true love is permanent and durable as well in adversity as in prosperity for though as the Poet saith of worldly lovers Donec eris felix While prosperity lasteth and thy table is well furnished thou shalt want no friends nor misse of any guests but if adversity cometh thy friends will fail and thy guests will be gone so the Prophet tells us there be many men that will love God and praise him too cum lucrum accidit illis when they receive any benefit from him and when as David saith their corn and wine and oyl increaseth Psal 4.8 Job 1.11 but if any great losse or sud calamity should happen unto them then what the Devil said falsely of holy Job may be truely said of these worldly men they will
as Justin saith it did in Semiramis Cicero pro Cor. or if not yet as Cicero saith Cùm mors extinxit invidiamres gestae sempiterna nominis gloria nituntur when death slayeth envy the virtuous Acts of good men will shine to the eternal praise and glory of their good name for as the Rain or Dew will not stick upon a Sea-gulls back so the reproaches and imputations of the malicious cannot prejudice the honour and good name of the godly quia ut malam conscientiam laudantis praeconium non sanat ita bonam non vulnerat convitium because that as no praise nor flattery can heal a bad Conscience nor make a wicked man good so no slander nor dispraise can wound a good Conscience or make a good man wicked nor diminish any of his deserved honour but as Christ Laudatur ab his ut culpatur ab illis though he be blasphemed of the Jews yet is he truly honoured of all Christians and all Saints in all Nations that do him service and sing with St. Ambrose Thou art the King of glory O Christ thou art the everlasting Son of the Father that sitteth on the right hand of God in the glory of the Father so our late good King Charles notwithstanding that false In the Royal Exchange and infamous Inscription set up where his Picture and Statue stood and notwithstanding all that the venomous mouths of malice can vomit out against him which shall vanish like the Summer's Snow or the grass upon the House-top that withereth before it be plucked up shall have his virtues his goodness and his godliness Chronicled fama perennis erit and so long as we shall be able to speak or write we shall leave it recorded as in Marble to the eternal honour of this good King and the everlasting shame of his malicious enemies both which Nec ira nec ignis Nec poterit abolere vetustas Thirdly In his Posterity For his Posterity God said not of him as he did of Coniah Write this man childless but he gave him a numerous and a glorious off-spring and as Moses saith of the first Fathers and replenishers of the World He begat Sons and Daughters and he needed not to say of them as Clytemnestra said of her Children Ista Clytemnestra digna quevela foret For when my Nuts are ripe and brown My leaves boughs are beaten down Certè ego si nunquam peperissem tutior essem Nor with the Nut-tree In felix fructus in mea damna fero But the world seeth he was most happy in them all in whom he still liveth and shall live though his enemies studied their death manibus pedibusqúe laborârunt and have used all machinations and all plots and devices that either subtlety or cruelty could invent to cut them off but God preserved them and his Providence watched over them and especially his eldest Son after a strange and almost miraculous manner from the last Fight at Worcester where through the cowardize of some the over-sight of others and as they say the treachery of some chief Commanders in his own Army and by the prudent Carriage of a brave and valiant General to give the Devil his right as the Proverb goeth such as this Age will scarce equal he had been taken or swallowed had not he that dwelleth in the Heavens most graciously preserved him in a manner as he preserved Daniel from the Lions mouths and sent his Angel as he did to Tobias to direct him in his Journey and to carry him safe through Sea and Land which is wonderful in our eyes and doth sufficiently presage that God hath kept him for some great work that in his divine wisdom he intendeth to effect by him as now we see the same begun to his great honour and our unspeakable comfort And as God hath thus mercifully preserved his Eldest Son so he hath made his second and his third Son the Duke of York and the Duke of Gloucester famous for their excellent parts and Heroical Exploits like their Brother and Ascanius-like followers of their Father's Vertues passibus aequis Neither may I here omit that Virtuous and Heroick Lady the Princess of Orange that with her Brothers and as her Brothers will perpetuate the blessed memory of that blessed King for ever who is herein not like King Henry the 8th that notwithstanding his six Wives besides all his Concubines hath not a branch of his Body that we know of remaining under the Cope of Heaven nor like Ahab and other Tyrants and wicked men whose seed for their sins God rooteth out but as God hath promised and since performed unto Abraham that his Seed should be as the Stars of Heaven for number that is innumerable and hath likewise promised to all the faithful Children of Abraham that their Generation should be blessed so he hath done it and no doubt but he will perform it to this good King to muliply his seed and to bless them for ever even as the Prophet Esay saith of all God's people Their seed shall be known among the Gentiles and their offspring among the People all that see them shall acknowledg them that they are the seed Esay lxi 9. So shall the seed of King Charles be which the Lord hath blessed Fourthly The Prophet saith the age of man is but seventy years and Pindarus saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 umbrae somnium homo man is but the shadow of a man a thing of nothing Sicque in non hominem vertitur omnis homo In his eternal selicity Man's life is but a shadow that soon vanisheth and Job saith he hath but a short time to live and that short time is full of misery interminabilis labor even an endless toyl like the tumbling of a Sysiphus stone or the filling of the fatal Tunn by King Danaus daughters where the water run out as fast as they poured it in or as the Poet saith most truly Passibus ambiguis fortuna volubilis errat Et manet in nullo certa tenáxque loco Sed modò laeta manet vultus modò sumit acerbos Et tantum constans in levitate sua est And when the affairs of this world are best and our happiness at the highest then as the very Heathens have observed they presently decline and begin to turn like the Cart wheel Res humanae in summo declinant Which warneth all on Fortune's wheel that clime To bear in minde that they have but a time And such was the time of King Charles of whom I cannot say with him that wrote A short view of the long life and reign of Henry the third A dainty piece of story presented to King James Es liii 8. but I must say the short life and reign and long troubles of Charles the First for as the Prophet saith of Christ non dimidiavit dies suos he hath not lived out half his daies being cut off è terra viventium from the land of the living at a few moneths
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