and put our present King and Queen in the actual Possession of all those Legal Jurisdictions Priviledges Preheminences and Authorities which he was formerly vested with and it is now the same Sin to resist them it was formerly to resist him There may possibly be some who will lightly regard what ever I or any other Man of this Age can say to them will they then vouchsafe to hear one of the most Noble and Royal Orators that ever spoke to men Constantine the Great in his Oration to the Holy Assembly Chap. 24. Of the calamitous Deaths of Decius Valerian and Aurelian three Emperors who persecuted the Church And now I ask thee O Decius who didst once insult over the Calamities of the Just who didst hate the Church who didst inflict such Punishments on those who lived most piously What art thou doing in the other World with what and how dreadful Circumstances art thou surrounded Yea the remainder of thy Life after it in this World and the manner of thy Death shew thy Felicity when thou and all thy Army fell in the Scythian Fields And the celebrated Roman Empire by thy Fall became after this contemptible to the Goths And thou O Valerian when thou didst enter into a bloody War against the Servants of God hast thereby made his Justice known to Men being taken Prisoner by the Persians and kept in Chains in thy Purple and Royal Robes After which thou wert flea'd being dead by Sapores King of Persia and thy Skin by his Order taâ—â—ed and kept as an eternal Trophy of thy Misfortune And thou O Aurelius the unjustest and most wicked Incendiary how much hast thou discovered his Justice whilst madly invading Thrace thou wert cut off in the Field and didst deâ—ile the surrows of the Publick Road with thy wicked Blood Chap. 25. Of Dioclesian who basely resigned the Empire and was struck with Lightning for persecuting the Church Dioclesian also after a wicked Slaughter and cruel Persecution condemning himself through distraction was reduced to a private Life and punished with the Restraint of a mean House What did he get by his War against our God Why that he was ever after afraid of Thunder and Lightning Nicomedia saith this and they who saw it will not be silent among whom I my self was one The Palace was consumed and his very Chamber burnt with Fire from Heaven and thereupon wise Men foretold what would follow for they could not conceal their Thoughts nor suppress their Resentments at the ill things were done but openly and publickly with assurance said one to another What madness is this what boasting in human Power for a Mortal to begin a War against God and injuriously to affront the most chast and holy Religion and without any Cause or Provocation to contrive the Destruction of so many just Men and of so numerous a People What a famous Master and teacher of Modesty to his Subjects will he appear How rarely he teacheth his Soldiers to take Care of their Countrymen Why they stab their fellow Subjects bravely who in Fight never saw the back of a beaten Enemy At last the Providence of God undertook the avenging this Impiety tho' not without the publick Hurt for so much Blood had been shed by him that if he had slain as many of the Barbarians as he did of his own Subjects we might have procured a long Peace by it But the whole Roman Army being then in the Hand of a mean-spirited Prince who had acquired it by Force his whole Army perished when God was pleased to think fit to restore the Romans to their ancient Liberty The Voices of oppressed Men who cryed to God for Help under their Burthens and begged the Return of their natural Liberty are not forgotten nor the Praises they returned when they had regained it and saw an end of their Calamities Did they not declare to all the World How much they admired the singular Providence and paternal Love of God to men when their Liberty and the Equity of their Contracts was restored That is when they were delivered out of the Hands of perfidious Tyrants and became subject to a Prince who would keep his Faith and Promise to them They may be pleased to consider How much of this was our Case and ask their Consciences If the self-same Divine Justice and Providence has not appeared in our Times also and whether we have not as much Reason as they to be pleased and thankful Having thus dispatched what I think fit for the present to be offered to the Friends of the late King I come now to that part of the Nation who being satisfied and highly pleased with the present State of Affairs may therefore be called in contradistinction the Williamists Many of these of late have appeared very pertly against the Doctrine of Non resistance and Passive Obedience and discoursed of it with a Contempt and Scorn as if it were one of the worst and most exploded Doctrines in the whole World and full as Antichristian as that of deposing Kings and disposing of their Kingdoms Now these two being directly contrary each to other in all probability one of them is true If we of the Church of England are not in the right with the Scriptures and all Primitive Antiquity on our side it is fairly probable They of the Deposing Church are for their Claim is older than the Peoples But the Mischief is the Devils is older than either for he pretended to our Saviour when he had shewed him all the Kingdoms of the World and made a conditional Tender of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 All this Power and Glory is delivered into my Hands and I give it to whomsoever I will Now this was long before People or Pope put in any Claim and before the latter of these had any Being The Pope it is true claims under the People but the Devil in his own Right But I believe neither of them can shew their Charter though the Devil claimed by a Grant and so I shall leave him and them Pope and all in the intire possession of their several Rights if any they have The Doctrine of Non-resistance has been often proved the genuine Doctrine of the best Ages of the Church and that so fully and clearly that those who would not yield to the Force of the Proof have not been able to deny the Truth of it but have been forced to pretend it was only Temporary and doth not oblige all Ages which is hardly Sense or that the Church is now in other Circumstances than she was then which is not true neither for in some Places she is now under the same or worse Circumstances than she was in the three first Centuries and consequently they at least are under the same Obligations the Primitive Christians were and therefore this very Doctrine is of eternal Verity and will have its Use till the End of the World. The command is general the Examples of it are
to whom his Duty is first owing for in this Case it is our undoubted Duty to obey God rather than Man. Art thou then saith Tertullian a Servant and Soldier to two to God and Caesar too certainly thou wilt not be for Caesar when thou owest thy Service to God even in common things I yield to the better or I believe thou wilt be for the better So far were they then from valuing themselves upon the score of their Loyalty to their Prince The Disloyalty of two other Parties have made the Church of England take into the contrary Extreme and as a Jesuit wished it might do her much good in Scorn So she had like to have paid too dear for the Pretence and they that would now again sacrifice her to their Interest and Reputation are to speak softly none of her best Friends They pretend we have not suffered enough for our Religion to justifie our Resistance Why according to their Principles we are never to resist whatever we suffer but to suffer on till there is not one Man left to resist Now did ever any Man before they complain That for the Elect's sake God had shortned those Daies If they think we have not suffered enough for our Religion they may be pleased to go for France or Ireland and there make up what is wanting But if they love Company and would needs have us suffer with them too I do not understand the Favour If they are Prodigal of their own Lives and Fortunes in this World they ought to be tender of other Men's Cruces nec colimus nec optamus We neither worship nor wish for Crosses said Octavius a Primitive Christian And it is madness to desire to be and to bring others into affliction and Trouble when God doth not willingly afflict or grieve the Children of Men and hath sent us a Deliverance before we expected it and sooner than some Men are well-pleased They have another Objection which is full as extravagant as this If say they King William has conquered King James why doth he not claim the Crown by Conquest Why he that has several Rights to the same thing may use his best and wave the rest Nemo juro suo quod cum damni periculo conjunctum est uti cogitur No Man is bound to produce an invidious Title Should King William have treated us as a conquered People they would have been the first that would have complaimed who now complain only because they have not that Case The truth is they would have him claim as a Conqueror that they might thence take occasion to ruine him but he has the Right of a Conqueror and the Right of a Lawful Successor too and tho' his own personal Right of Succession is more remote that of his Lady is immediate and by it be claims to our great Good and his immortal Honour And they in the mean time might if they pleased be as satisfied in the Right he has by conquest as the Saxons were when King William I. won the Crown in a Battle and wore it under the Pretence of an Election because he could lay no Claim to it by Succession And Henry VII twisted his Right by Conquest with his Descent from Lancaster and his Right by Marriage But these Men seem not to care which way our Ruine come if we may but be miserable we have not suffered enough under King James but he too would fain come in by Conquest and if ever he get the Crown again that way these Gentlemen will have no reason to complain of the Want of Sufferings Tertullian who wrote his Apology for the Christians in or about the Year of Christ CC. as Pamelius stateth the Time in his Annals of the Life of that Father saith in his first Apology c. 37. If we Christians would become your publick and declared Enemies or secret Revengers of our own Wrongs should we want Force and number to support it We exceed the Moors the Marcomans and the Parthians or any other one single Nation in the whole World we are but of Yesterday and yet we have filled all your Places your Cities your Islands Castles Corporations Councils Tribes Companies Palace Senate and Forum or Market-Place and we have left you nothing to enjoy alone but your Temples now we who so willingly lay down our Lives are we not thereby fitted and prepared do you think to manage any War tho' we were very much inferior in Number if our Religion did not oblige us rather to suffer Death than to inflict it we might without Arms or Resistance barely by disagreeing with you and the Envy of a Separation very much endager and disquiet you for if so great a part of the Empire as we now make should break it self off from the rest and retire into any remote Corner of the World it would certainly confound your Dominions to lose so many Subjects be their Quality what it will yea our very departure from you would be a severe Punishment the Desolation and Silence we should leave behind us would strike you with an Horror and Amazement as if the World were expiring you would be forced to seek for new Subjects to supply our Places and perhaps we should leave you more Enemies than Subjects or Defenders This Place has been often cited to prove the Doctrine of Passive Obedience and in truth it is a noble Testimony of the Faith and Patience of those Saints But then the Church continued after this under Pagan and Persecuting Princes one hundred and ten years and something more in which short time there is reckoned about twenty nine Emperors their times being short and their ends Bloody they almost all of them pershing by the Sword. Did any of the Primitive Christians in those days make any scruple to submit to the prevailing Power The same Author in this very Apology puts the Question to the Pagans Vnde Cassii Nigri Albini c. De Romanis nisi fallor id est de non Christanis From whence are all your Vsurpers Traitors and Rebels They were if I am not deceived all Romans that is no Christians Those very Loyal Pagans that Persecuted the poor Christians because they would not sacrifice for the safety of the Empire and Emperor Those Loyal Pagans who would swear falsely by all their Gods rather than by the single Genius of the Emperor they were the Men that so frequently deposed murthered and destroyed their Princes that in one hundred and ten years there was about thirty of them and scarce three in all that time that died a natural Death But where the Numerous body of Loyal Christians in the mean time who as he tells Scapula were so great a Multitude that they were almost the greatest part of every City and as he tells us in the other Apology they were fit to have undertaken any the most dangerous War though they had been inferiour in numbers who so stoutly and fearlessly suffered deaths that
but scorned and trodden upon by his proud Enemy Did the Christians of this Age petition for their old Persecutor did they refuse to be under the milder Government of his Son Gallienus because the Father was still living tho' in Captivity No he tells us That this was added to his Punishment that though he had a Son which succeeded in the Empire yet there was no Revenger of his Captivity and Slavery nec omnino repetitus est nor was he in the least ever demanded or desired Next after him arose Aurelian a mad and a rash Prince who was cut off in the beginning of his Rage After him came Dioclesian who was hardly persuaded to begin a Persecution but raged more than any of his Predecessors soon after he fell into a Sickness and was thought by the Violence of it to have been dead but tho' he escaped with his Life he was a long time disracted and was forced by Galerious Imperio cedere to resign the Empire in the Year 305. and although he lived to the Year 313. which was nine Years after he was deposed none of the Christians of that Age desired he should again ascend the Throne One of the last of the Pagan Princes that persecuted the Church was Licinus upon whom Constantine made War for that very Cause and reduced him to a private Life in Thrace in the Year 324. and in the Year 325. put him to death for endeavouring to recover his Throne But neither here did the Christians that were his Subjects desire again to be under their Pagan Persecuting Prince rather than under their Deliverer Constantine Julian the Apostate was the last Pagan Prince that reigned in the Roman Empire and he perished in Persia by an unknown Hand within two Years and one Month and was followed both living and dead with the Detestation of that and all the succeeding Ages S. Ambrose as he is cited by Grotius de jure belli pacis saith This Apostate had many Christian Soldiers under him who when he commanded them To stand to their Arms against the common Enemy of their Country obeyed him but when he commanded them to sight against the Christians then they acknowledged the Emperor of Heaven That is they refused to serve him in this And the famous Thebean Legion made this their Apology We offer our Service against any Enemy but we esteem in an Impiety to stain them with the Bloods of Innocent Men You may command our Hands against the Wicked and your Enemies but we cannot butcher the Pious and our fellow-Subjects We do well remember That we took up Arms for and not against our Countrymen and we have ever fought for Justice for Piety and the Preservation of the Innocent These things have hitherto been the Rewards of our Dangers Shall we oh Sir ever be able to keep our Faith and our promise to you if we now fail of performing our Promise to our God They were then said to be led into France to fight against the Bagaudae a sort of outlawed Christians who were forced by the Iniquity of the Times to take up Arms under Dioclesian and were all of them destroyed by Maximianus so that if that Story be true it is a pregnant Testimony That he Doctrine of Passive Obedience doth not oblige any Man to lend his Assistance to the Ruine of the true Religion Beside these Pagan Princes there were some Arian Princes who treated the Catholicks of their Times very hardly and though none of the Christians of those Times rebelled against them yet neither would the Catholicks assist the Arian Princes against the Catholick Bishops as is plain in the Story of S. Ambrose and the many Tumults at Constantinople Antioch and Alexandria in those Times and when these Princes sell by the Justice of God in Civil or Foreign Wars their Ends were looked upon as deserved Thus Valens perished in Thrace and Valentinian the younger at Vienne the one by the Hands of the Goths and the other by the Procurement of Arbogastes an Usurper and the untimely Deaths of these two Princes proved the Exaltation of Theodosius the Resettler of the Catholick Religion and the extirper of Arianism in the Roman Empire In all the various Events of these Times the Providence of God ordered things for the good of his Church and the Christians of those Times left them to his Disposal and submitted to those he set over them quietly and without disputing their Rights or Titles whereas Procopius who claimed the Empire as cousin to Julian the Emperor perished in the Attempt without pity or the Regard of the Church There is no part of the Reign of James II. that has not been examined and represented by many pens so that it were a needless but an ungrateful Task for me to rip it up again it may suffice to say in general Never any of our Princes so openly attempted the Ruine of the English Liberties or went so far in it never did any Man more openly endeavour the Ruine of an established Religion or by more illegal Courses than he nor Laws nor Oaths nor Promises nor Gratitude could restrain him he broke through all the Barriers God and Man had put in his Way and seemed resolved to ruine us or Himself no Remonstrances from abroad no Petitions at home could work upon him till he saw the Sword coming to cut up the Gourd he had planted and was so fond of then indeed he seemed to relent and to give back but still he would be trusted he would yield up nothing but so as that he might when the Danger was over re-assume the same again An English Parliament was the thing in the World he most hated because he foresaw if it was Free there was an end for ever of the Hopes of setting up Popery in this Kingdom and that was his main and almost only Design and yet as fond as he ever seemed to be of an Absolute and Uncontroulable Power if he had been of our Church he would not have hazarded all for it but he would have managed Things with some Reserve but the Jesuites he took into his Bosom and his Queen especially spurred him on and put him upon these Courses only by representing to him the Glory and Merit of extirpating the Northern Heresies and settling the Catholick Religion in England Well but what has he done since he left us that may give us any Assurance we were mistaken as to what was past or may hope for better Usage for time to come Why there have been some General Promises made In the Letter pretended to be sent to the Lords and Commons of England and after wards printed in London he or some other Person for him tells us We are resolved Nothing shall be omitted on our Part whenever we can with Safety return that can contribute towards the Redress of all former Errors or present Disorders or add to the securing of the Protestant Religion or the Property