who loves to maintain divisions in the Church of God and will not as it seems by him hold communion with any but such as are of their Covenant Whose bonds were then loosed The bonds of Goal-birds thieves and perhaps murtherers and other rogues and malefactors for they are the usual guests in such places if any such have taken the Solemn League and Covenant c. I know none that were more fit to take it than such and doubtless not a few of them did take it to bolster them up in their villany they found favor when others that had not taken it suffered for smaller matters But who doth he call Goal-birds c. He cannot be ignorant that in the times that St. Peter and St. Paul and Silas were cast in prison nay our blessed Savior himself that thieves and murtherers were often let go free the best Christians were the ordinary Goal-birds And was it not so when your Covenant was in force were not the best of the Nobility and Gentry the gravest and most pious Fathers of the Church and the most learned and Orthodox Divines plundred sequestred and cast into prison by your Covenanters deny it if you can 'T is true when Godly Kings ruled over us the case was far otherwise and we doubt not when the Land is once well rid of your Covenant but that those who do well shall live peaceably under His Sacred Majesty that now is whom God prosper and preserve and that none but such as ought to be put into prisons and such as are oriminal shall be the common guests in such places as they were formerly He promiseth to use all brevity in his Reply and for my part I shall do so too being not willing to bestow much time or to spend ink and paper upon such a Scribler as he is I. Proposition The Doctor himself doth admit the Covenant to be in some sense lawful and good 2. Here is evidence enough against the Doctor that the Covenant is lawful and good or how else could he give a sober sense of it Men that are ready to sink will lay hold of any thing to save themselves You may see an example of it 1 Reg. 20.33 Now the man did diligently observe whether any thing would come from him and did hastily catch at it And they said Thy Brother Benhadad This is meer sophistry to conclude à dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter The Doctor doth admit the Covenant in some sense to be lawful and good it seems it hath many senses and I think so too that it was an equivocal Compact but in what it may be admitted to be lawful and good I consess I could never yet understand for the best you can make of it 't is no better but an invention of factious Novelists contrary to the rule of all Antiquity to subvert and cast down an ancient primitive Apostolical Government by Bishops and to set up a new fangled upstart Presbytery in the room thereof which hath strangely bewitched ignorant and illiterate men taken with novelties and I have heard how that Philip Earl of Pembroke fell in love with it yet being asked what Classical was He said Presbyterial and what was Presbyterial but Synodical a man doubtless of a strong faith to believe as the Church believes 3. He quotes the Doctors words That he believes few took it in any sense against primitive reformed regular Episcopacy c. as the reverend Primate of Armagh proposed in his Reduction of Episcopacy and hence he infers If this Reduction be necessary the Government cannot be unlawful but good England God be praised hath yet store of able Divines to defend Episcopacy as it was first regulated by the Apostles by Scripture Fathers Councels and Reason against all the Adversaries of it who pretending some Errors in it and inveighing against personal faults of some Bishops would fain extirpate the frame of primitive Ecclesiastical Government as it was here established by Edw. 6. Qu. Elizabeth King James and King Charls of blessed memories and they that do it we have reason to believe would do it to accomplish some sinister end of their own to revenge private injuries they suppose they underwent or for some expectations which it may be they deserved not which they think they lost by the Bisliops for it can be nothing else but malice in the more learned Presbyters and delusion in those that are of weaker judgements to oppose a received Truth for sixteen hundred years and upward in continuance whereof the Church of England hath been so happy to the amazement and envy of all other National Churches under the most pious Kings and Queens this Land ever bred and they that labour to dissolve this form must condemn all our best Princes of ignorance and superstition and our greatest and learnedst Bishops and Ministers whom the world admired for learning and piety of all the faults they would fain charge this Government with and must extol their own Wisdom and Zeal before theirs under a notion of new Lights and further Revelation I have not seen the Reverend Primate of Armaghs Reduction yet I have reason to believe that the learned Primate did not attempt to divest himself of his honors and preferments in the Church you did that for him and for the rest of the Bishops and eminent Divines but held it fit that Bishops should keep a nearer conjunction with Presbytery than they have done of late years and in that respect I know none of the Clergy that are against it but hold it very fit and necessary that it should be so observed The Doctor had reckoned up some evils defects and dangers incident to Episcopacy as Pride Ambition c. Is not saith he all this enough to prove from his own pen that such a Covenant pre-extirpating such Episcopacy is lawful and good The learned Doctor Gauden unwilling to break the bonds of peace and unity if it were possible to keep them explained their Covenant in the calmest sense to the supporting of moderate Episcopacy But this Anonymus will not away with any qualisication it must sound of nothing but extirpation of Episcopal Government and to speak plainly I dare say that was the true inrent of it and the Doctor is mistaken to think it will admit of any sober construction for it was doubtless another Trojan horse devised by the Politick Sinons of the latter Age full of armed men and when the walls of Episcopacy were broken down to let it in it had doubtless proved if God had not been more merciful to us the utter ruine of Monarchy and Episcopacy and overthrown at once both King Church and State for though there were many necessary and pious things couched in it yet I know not any one of them that they have kept sincerely but the rooting out of Episcopacy nay they rather chuse to break all the rest that they might fully reak their spleen to abollish that II. Proposition Herein all sober
not his Argument hold water if there were not such Scripture for it Reason it self will evince what he contends for either in Monarchical Aristocratical or Aeconomical Policy Do but judge whether it be fit for such servants or wives to vow a Covenant without nay against the consent of those under whose charge they are would you be content your Relations should deal so with you when they are to be guided by you to resolve to do what they please are you not ready to shake hands with the Church of Rome now which you would have us to believe you are such a great enemy to you run away from them you think and yet for want of discretion you run almost always in their mouthes Let your wife son or daughter vow to leave you and go into a Monastery and ask a Roman Priest or Jesuite whether they may do it without your consent and he shall tell you it is not in your power to hinder them though it be against your express prohibition And do you not see now that your Covenant made without the Kings consent was first forged in the Popes Consistory The way you go is to make divisions in all Countreys and Families to cause all that should obey to rebel against their Governours But how doth that Text make against Doctor Gauden you say the Text speaks onely of a vow made by a man and that all such vows are binding If a man vow a vow unto the Lord c. Here is not the least exception no not of a son under his father but all men that vow are by God holden unto it whether the chief Governour consent or not it is onely the vow of a woman in her minority or matrimony which may be made void But what if they vow things unlawful contrary to the will of him who hath the rule over them as the Covenant is said to be I understand not your Divinity What if a woman being a Pagan vow to serve God who can make her Vow void surely no man so then the more ado you keep to justifie your un-warrantable Covenant to destroy the Church-Government amongst us of which the King is and ought to be the chief Overseer and Ruler you do but hamper and intangle your self the faster You would fain justifie your Covenant though it were taken and prest upon your fellow subjects over whom I know no authority you have without the Kings consent is not this to wrest the Scepter out of the Kings hand will you make Kings like the Log you speak of which fell from Jupiter that such croaking frogs may leap upon at pleasure Are Kings placed by God to let those that should obey rule over them Kings are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Shepherds of the People Now what if the sheep should covenant to run away to the wolves as you did do you think it is fit for the shepherd to let them do it if he can stop them But you will needs make your selves supream Governors and the King and the rest of his subjects must be under you But why I pray must not the kings consent be first ask'd obtain'd by lawful means before you obtruded your Covenant upon his subjects which was to maintain the true Protestant Religion and his Majesty was the King so bad a Christian as not to suffer his subjects to joyn together to maintain the true Protestant Religion or was he so careless of his own safety that he would deny them leave to covenant for his defence no such matter But the King saw the Hook though your Bait was cunningly laid he discerned the sad and tragick Effects were like to follow it if Episcopal Government should be ruined by you would not consent whereupon you had no way to effect your purpose but by the eccho and noise of the times and the midwifery of tumults and Armies You call this notorious untruths nothing but impudence and therefore you will pass through this mire without answering Answer him indeed you cannot and if you think to pass through let me tell you plainly you will stick fast and are in danger to be drowned in it and therefore my advice is that you make haste back again before you pass any further The Covenant interpreted against all Episcopacy must needs grieve some and pierce to the quick those former lawful Oathes where he takes it for granted that the Covenant is not lawful and think you that others do not take it so as well as he not onely of Allegiance and Supremacie and Canonical obedience but that of the King a his Corona ion and there can be no superfetation of such a cont any Vow and Covenant without apparent perjury And what have you to say against this You say suppose the Covenant were against all Episcopacy All Episcopacy what against primitive Episcopacy which you allow of and think it to be Presbyterie But what need that supposition now if you take Episcopacy as it was here established which you vowed to extirpate But you will never leave your equivocations What is that to the Oath of Supremacie and Allegiance to his Majestie can no man be true to Kings but he that is for Bishops Surely it is something to the Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacie for subjects to rule and to make the King stand for a cypher But why to Kings it seems you were stumbled and would shift it off upon the ubjects of other Kings that have no Bishops but you have left it inde inite which answers to a universal and therefore it includes the King of Great Brittain as well as the rest so then he that takes your Covenant cannot in that be true to Kings that is to say all Kings unless he be for Bishops because it is a Church-Government confirmed by the Kings Laws here In other kingdoms where Bishops are not the case is not the same yet I wish all Protestant Kings and Princes were so happy as to erect Episcopacy within their Dominions The valiant King of Denmark's resolution was when the Swede besieged Copenhagen if I rightly understand the meaning of what I read that he then promised that if it pleased God to give him the Victory he would make his Scholars bear their proportion with his Nobles I can give it no other interpretation but serting up of Lords Bishops in his countrey But as for the kingdom of England you know what King James spake prophetically No Bishop no King and it proved too true for no sooner were my Lords the Bishops cast down and the Archbishop beheaded but immediately it fell sore upon the King himself even to the loss of his life though the Covenant ran for his preservation Dr. Doubtless the sense of the Covenant hath lately quickned many mens cosciences in their Allegiance to the King so to bring him as David home with infince joy and triumph I think the Doctor hath pleased you now for you grow presently very high in your own
Christians who understand themselves agree with him 1. He after his scurrilous manner falls upon a discreet Gentleman Sir L. B. as appears by that prudent saying of his to the Doctor That many sober and honest men are by their once taking the Covenant so scared from all complyings with any Church Government under any name of Bishops or notion of Episcopacy never so reformed and regulated that they fear by looking back to the primitive catholick and universal Government of this and all other ancient Churches to be turned into pillars of Apostacy as Lots wife was into a pillar of salt And can you deny this to be true Many honest men who had been sworn to the King could at first hardly be charmed by you to accept of your enchanted Covenant and they strained as much to swallow it down as I have seen some do at a Pill who never took any before Was it not so with many tender conscienc'd men you had much ado to bring them to it but you dealt with them as Farriers do with their horses to put it down their throats with a horn but when they had been caught by you as if they had sworn by the Stygian-lake or drank of the Lethean Cup they forgat all Allegiance to the King and fell down fast bound hand and foot with the fetters of your Covenant nay you still go on to perswade them as you seem to believe your self that it is Apostacy to depart from it and that there is no remission for those that shall break it but they must perish everlastingly yet there were multitudes that cast off the Covenant as a thing of no value after they had been accustomed by you to several Covenants New Engagements Negative Oathes and what not and could easily take as many of them as you will without any remorse of conscience at all 2. He enlargeth his second point against the Doctor who said that the admitting of some Church Government under the name of Bishops reformed and regulated according to the primitive Catholick and Apostolick Institution c. is not against but very consistent c. with the Solemn League and Covenant and the true intention of it c. allowable by God and all good men that rightly understand themselves who thus far concur with the Doctor To this he opposeth the second Article of the Covenant which he saith runs thus You shall sincerely really and constantly through the grace of God endeavor the extirpation of Popery and Prelacy that is Church-Government by Archbishops Bishops their Chancellers and Commissaries their Deans Deans and Chapters Archdeacons and other depending on that Hierarchy superstition heresie schism profaneness and whatsoever shall be found contrary to sound Doctrine c. this expresly relates to the Prelacy or Episcopacy then in being or in use in England which was far from apostolick and primitive c. as the Dr. hath confessed c. if there be any other Episcopacy truly apostolick and primitive free from all these evils and agreeable to sound doctrine c. it is far from the sense of this Covenant to extirpate it that it plainly includes a binding of all Covenanters to promote it The Episcopacy you would promote is Presbytery is that truly Apostolick and free from all those evils may not a Presbyter lord it as much in his Parish as a Bishop in his Diocess may not as much pride be coucht under a Presbyterian Cloak as under a Bishops Rocket examine your selves The Doctor and all others that would bring these men to their right understanding do but labor in vain and may as well wash the Blackmoor white I alwayes thought they stood more in need of Hellebore to purge their brains than of reason to convince them Where the Bee gathers honey they Spider-like suck venome they are incorrigble and it is not convenient for sober honest-minded men to go about to convert them every man may do well to spare his pains to undertake to perswade them to come home to their due obedience Solomon said right Proverbs 27.22 Though thou shouldest bray a fool in a morter among wheat with a pestel yet will not his foolishness depart from him But as the Romans gave them over with a conclamatum est who did not revive in seven days we may rather despair of these mens return who have had almost thrice seven years to understand themselves better and yet continue their former obstinacy and become more obdurate and hardned in their opinions by any yieldings or concessions that are made to them by the Episcopal party Henry the Fourth of France whom most knew to be a Protestant in his heart and I wish the Presbyters were but so well opinionated of Episcopacy as he was of the Reformed Churches called an Assembly of Protestants and Papists to see if he could make some reconcilement between them He propounded a question to the Protestants whether a Papist might be saved They in their judgement of charity said that he might Then he demanded of the Papists whether a Protestant might be saved They in their rigid and uncharitable opinion replyed A Papist might but a Protestant might not His determination was Let me have no more Religions within my Dominions than that wherein all Christians may be saved The Popish Priests and Jesuits went away triumphing as if they had got the day and so do the Presbyters by reason of the Doctors sober sense of the Covenant as if they had wan the Goal whereas all discreet men must confess it is more his Christian charity than their desert He repeats what the Doctor said of Mr. Marshal and others who had a great hand in pennning and promoting the Covenant and they own'd it to some foreign Divines that the Covenant was levelled at the despoticum Tyranicum Regimen mis-government not the Government by Episcopacy I am of opinion that Mr. Marshal that penned and promoted the Covenant Badger-like kept one hole open for himself to pass forth at this exposition of it was but a reserve for him and its probable he would never have said so much against Bishops if he might have been one or rather the chief amongst them But how moderate and meek a Bishop he would have been and free from tyranny over his brethren let those that have seen his proceedings all these turbulent times judge In the next place he undertakes to disprove what Dr. Gauden saith in these words That it was the sense of those who with himself had as much right to sit among them that is in the Assembly I know not whether this gloss be true or not as any others but were not permitted either by popular Faction or cumults or by other shufflings and reasons of State who took care to exclude all the excellent Bishops of the Church and the most able Episcopal Divines c. He that can have a face of brass to deny this and to call it a very great slander which almost every man can justifie
should be confuted as he that denies a God or snow to be white Argumento baculino non Aristotelico It would be too tedious for me to traverse the whole matter from the beginning I shall therefore give you but one example for all the proceedings being all alike I pray what was the reason that the reverend Prelare John Williams Lord Bishop of Lincoln with as many Bishops as durst joyn with him at least twelve in number drew up a Solemn Protestation against the Violence that was offered to those eminent Clergy-men that were called by His Majesties Writ to serve in the Upper-House who durst not come thither for fear of being murthered by popular tumults raised against them He saith The Doctor was not chosen What right Doctor Gauden had to sit there by Election I am not able to say but this I may say that he and such well-affected persons to the Government of the Church of England had more right to sit there than many that did who sate onely to stir up Contentions in Church and State to uphold Factions and overthrow the best Governments formerly setled by the Laws of the Land such as no other part of the world is able to parallel had he not reason then taking the Denomination synechdochically from the greater and not the better part who were but few in number in respect of the other to call it a Sequatious Assembly A grand Inquest c. as you say And had he not cause enough to desire to sit there that he might by his judicious advice help those that were too few to stop the fury of the Presbyterians against the Bishops He quarrels with him about being Parson of the Deanery of Bocking in Essex worth 4 or 500 pound per Annùm who to his shame and little honor to those employed him is non resident from it and preacheth at the Temple If his Parsonage had been better worth though I can hardly believe you that it is worth so much it is like he well deserved it for those who preach at the Temple must be men of more then ordinary gifts it is not fit for such who have but mean parts to attempt to teach the learned Judges and Lawyers of the Land who know as much as most men can instruct them But for Essex was chosen Mr. Stephen Marshal of Finchingfield I have heard that Finchingfield is a great Benefice and I cannot tell whether it be not as good as Bocking But why might not Doctor Gauden as well be non-resident as Mr. Stephen Marshal and preach in London and was so long absent from his Parish that they petitioned the Parliament against him that he might either live there with them or leave them to choose another But they could get no other answer from the Parliament but they had left him to his choice and had the times continued he would have stayed upon that choice for ought I know until the day of his death What you say of D. B. his second Edition of the Tract of Sacriledge which you think cannot be answered I say it is not my business now to reply to it but I believe that if Doctor Gauden hath promised to confute it he will be no worse than his word 2. Others having right to sit were not admitted by Popular Faction c. Is a most gross and malicious untruth For amongst those were chosen and summoned to fit in that Assembly what say you to Dr. Richard Love nay what say you to Mr. Christopher Love I think he sat in the Assembly too who suffered him to be beheaded at Tower Hill for endeavoring to return to his Loyalty Dr. Ralph Browning Bishop of Exeter Dr. Samuel Ward Dr. John Harris Dr. Robert Saunderson Mr. Robert Cross James Arch-Bishop of Armagh Dr. Matthias Styles Dr. Featley Dr. Christopher Pashly Dr. John Hacket Dr. Thomas Westfield Bishop of Bristol Dr. Henry Hammon Dr. Richard Oldsworth and many more I suppose you named almost all that were worth naming to give a handsom lustre to the Assembly and indeed there is scarce one of those recorded here but was worth your whole Assembly besides I would you had set down a Catalogue of the rest I think you are ashamed of it but you had enough to out-vote them and they were meetly brought thither to serve your turns or else they should have been laid aside as they were soon after Yet he makes a confusion in setting down their names as if there were no priority and order to be taken notice of then he demands Where can you pick out three Bishops more excellent for learning and piety or other Episcopal Divines more able He is such a Sophister in this way of Questions that no man can give any certain Answer he saith those fourteen were chosen and summoned but whether they all sate there he saith not and for their learning piety and abilities his words seem to imploy something compared amongst themselves but yet relating to the Presbyterial Divines they were not to be compared with them Now he hath another frolick to save himself that he be not taken in a lye For of 121 Divines chosen to sit twenty four never appeared And were none of those you speak of before to be reckoned amongst those twenty four it is certain if some of them did appear they durst not appear often there were enough of them in the first Catalogue to have defended Episcopacy if they might have had liberty against all the Presbyterians in the world It should seem their Arguments wrought so estectually with Mr. Herbert Palmer that he protested against Extirpation of primitive Episcopacy and Doctor Burges was suspended from sitting there by the House of Commons for declaring and protesting against the first Draught of the Covenant brought into the Assembly for that amongst other things there was required an Extirpation of Prelacy without limitation I would fain know to what end men late there in the Assembly was it to do drudgery for the House of Commons that they must not vote freely according to their conscience but they must be suspended for sitting there According to this rule so many carved images might have made up an Assembly of able Divines if Albertus Magnus might have sitted them to be in a possibility to Vote as the Parliament would have them but I doubt you have injured the House of Commons to charge them with such an absurdity and if it be true as you say you might have done well to conceal it now for both your reputations As for these that came not who excluded or deter'd them they were all summoned as appears by the Books of the Assembly who hindred them was it not either because they liked not the Election or the persons chosen to sit with them or that being for the late King durst not sit either for fear of molestation by the Parlinment or displeasure of the King Who can desire more than this man granteth magna est veritas pravalebit
himself had made with them in Horeb and mount Sinai punctually prescribed to God to Moses and by Moses as the supream Governor or King imposed upon them but this was not the case of the Church of England nor was there need of such a Covenant or any Moses c. as chief Governor commanding it Here you keep a fearful quoil and whiffle about making a great cry but there is little wooll calling the Doctor Deceiver Reviler and that in his Writings there are falshoods enough and yet shew none First you say it is false that there was no Covenant but of Gods own prescribing and secondly that he prescribed but one I do not finde that the Doctor saith any such thing for ho quoted that spontaneous Vow Numb 30.2 You are still fighting with your own shadow yet you must say something lest the Reader should think you were at a non-plus as Sergeant Green did who would undertake to overthrow all Episcopacy but being worsted by the learned Selden cryed out But Archbishops are no Bishops then said Selden Judges are no Lawyers and Aldermen no Citizens You instance in the Covenant of Moses and the Princes of the Congregation with the cheating Gibeonites as you call them Josh 9.15 But there was Moses the chief whose consent you never had and therefore are less excusable than the Gibeonites were But because you are so much taken with the Gibeonites example and bring it in so often as if it served your turn well I shall say more to it when I meet with it again The chief Covenant indeed was that which God made with his people upon mount Sinai and all lawfull Covenants which man makes with God are but branches of that as when we renew our obedience by serious repentance as the children of Israel and the children of Judah did vowing to keep Gods Commandments But I know not that God gave you any such command to vow against Episcopacy and I doubt you never asked his counsel when you entred into it what ever your heady zeal might suggest to you for it is not a good intention fi we may be so charitable as to think you intended no harm it that makes a good action but you must have sufficient warrant for it from Gods word shew but that and we have done It is false that the Covenant was imposed by Moses or that Moses was supream Governor for Moses was no more supream Governor or King than Samuel You love to move questions Samuel no doubt whilest he was the sole Judge over Israel was their supream Governour until Saul was anointed King But Samuel was never in Scripture called King as Moses was as King in Jesurun The like blustering he keeps who imposed the Covenant of the Law God or Moses Doubtless God principally but ministerially it was done by the hand of Moses this is to amuse his Covenanters and such as will be taken with shadows for what of all this here is great stir to little purpose unless you wil conclude aright as you should do the King in his kingdom is next under God as Moses amongst the Israelites and his subjects must be guided directed by him He blesseth God as one would bless an idol That Apostacy to strange gods was not the Church of Englands case that they should enter into a Covenant Tell me what meant the falling off of several Bishops to too much Popery in doctrine witness all their Arminian Tenents and also their general practice in Cathedrals and elsewhere seiting up Altars Tapers Candles c. devised by mans fancies which last is with many other things in the Queens Injunctions Injunct 3. affirmed to tend to idolatry and superstition c. the like may be said of Church Musick Anthems c. a thing which the judicious Hooker censured and condemned and the late Queen Elizabeth provided against Injunct 49. and if any Hymn were sung care must be taken that it be so done as to be understood and perceived and where this is not so done see the Censure of the Homily of the place and time of Prayer Part 2. To answer to every particular would require a large volumn but you have answered your self and justified the Doctor that Apostacy to strange gods was not the Church of Englands Case You quote judicious Hooker condemning something let him be the Umpire if you please between the Bishops and the Presbyters and you say Queen Elizabeths Injunctions have made provision against such things and the Books of Homilies condemns other things well what would you have then you see there is good provision made against all exorbitancies in Ceremonies and the Doctrine of the Church of England is comprehended in the 39 Articles if any man have transgressed and done more then he can answer he is lyable to be questioned for it and I think so may you for your contempt and covenanting contrary to all former Laws or Examples only what you have labored to procure since for your own security As for Popish families crept into England with swarms of Priests and Jesuites There have more crept in since these civil Wars began with your Covenant than ever were since the Reformation yet you would charge all upon the Bishops The Lawes made against Priests and Jesuits were they put in practice were good enough and had there been as good provision made against your Covenanting it had bin well for the Church of England You are very pettish because the Doctor speaks what others believe to be true that the Covenant was but the petty composition of a few politick men c. Lawyers or Ministers no great Clerks or Statesmen c. adding that their heads rather than their hearts and State-correspondencies more than their Consciences brought it forth we finde a great deal of pretended zeal in it but he that shall use St. Pauls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and hold it against the Sun shall quickly perceive many flaws and foul spots that it hath and besides the rottenness of their hearts the idleness of their heads that made it by mustering up clean and unclean together making no difference betwixt things lawful and those that are forbidden by the Law of God The Doctor said There is no pattern for any such Covenant in the New Testament nor in all succeeding ages c. no Covenanting Christians until the holy League meaning say you that of the bloody Papists to destrey the Hugonots so they termed the Protestants in France that is but an ill president for you to follow except that of Baptism the new and Evangelical Covenant of all true Christians You answer If there were no Precept nor Pattern in the New Testament it is sufficient if there be any in the Old if not Levitical or meerly typical unless the Doctor be turned An inomian I wish you were as sound in both Testaments as the Doctor is The Evangelical Covenant of Baptism in the New Testament is vastly different indeed from your Scorch Covenant
worth but that they who persecuted them were Orthodox and reformed Christians I cannot grant rather wolves and tygers men void of humanity and much more of Christian Piety But you have such fine acute ways to play sast and loose and to shuffle oft a Charge unless those that were persecuted you grant there was a persecution were such as were trapann'd by Williams if they were indeed learned and godly if any of those suffered with the rest they may thank their fellows but you spared no such men as you except here for those suffered most that were the most pious and of greatest wisdom and learning c. for their eminent parts were the greatest obstacle to your growing designs if any of them stood in your way they must become the objects of your fury who had such tender consciences that rather than fail of your aim the best must suffer with the worst and you spared none though you knew them to be persons of great desert which are onely hypothetically excepted by you Who then I pray you were the Amaziah-like Priests and Tyrants your Presbyters or our Bishops who were men of nobler spirits and scorn'd and abhorr'd such unreasonable and un-christian proceedings But why are you so much displeased with the Lord Bishop Williams a man long since dead and maugre all your envy died peaceably in his own countrey what you speak of his trapanning it is well known it was not used here in England until you trapann'd the whole Nation by your new Covenant but I know where your shoe rings you It is that un-Parliamentary Petition and Protestation so you call it that he had the chiefest hand in and a great many more honest cordial Bishops as well as himself This gallant Person hath obliged all the Clergy of the three Nations by this memorable Act to have a good opinion of his Loyalty to the King had the Bishops then held their peace for fear or favour their silence would have been interpreted consent and I know not what they could have pleaded now in defence of their Baronies and for their restitution into the Upper House of Parliament that we may once more have as it ought to be Lords Spiritual and Temporal I speak not to the honor of that reverend Prelate as if I meant to set forth a Panegyrick of his Gallantry for any favor or benefit I was obliged to him for I may truly say I was never more beholding to him than I was to the rest but I desire to give every man his due character had he not been a Person of great learning and noble parts surely King James so wise a Prince would never have raised him to so great preferment in Church and State How he came to fall into disgrace with some great Persons I cannot say but I believe it was by his too much leaning to that totten Prop of Presbytery hoping thereby to support himself against those who laid violent siege to his honor and preferment and as it is conjectured by some to his life also which fierce dissentions amongst the Bishops themselves and the Clergy that sided with their divisions made such breaches in the Church that the Presbyters entred upon them and had well-nigh routed them all but the best and learnedst men in the world are subject to failings as St. Paul and St. Peter were divided which make them the less able to resist the common enemy I hope it wil be a warning to the reverend Bishops to take care to agree as brethren among themselves IV. Proposition That maugre all this mans calumnies and malicious aspersions the Covenant even as to the point of Hierarchical Episcopacy lately laid aside is to be constantly and conscientiously observed and kept in the right sense thereof by all that have taken it as they will avoid destruction and damnation hereafter It should appear that the Presbyterians finde it best fishing in troubled waters they mean it seems that we shall never be at peace in the Church of England for all those that have taken their Covenant are bound constantly and conscientiously to observe and keep it in the right sense thereof that is as he hath interpreted it all this while to the extirpation of Episcopal Hierarchy as they will avoid destruction here destruction here this smells strongly of some mischief hatching by them against us and damnation hereafter I pray God they do not fall into the pit themselves which they are digging for others but if some must fall into it we shall pray in the words of the Psalmist Let them fall into their own net together and let us ever escape them They that have taken it must you say constantly keep it and what must or will they do that have not taken it do you suppose they will let you domineer over them they have as good reason and better to maintain their former Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy to His Majesty and of Church-men for their obedience to the Bishops you put all into a confusion You say destruction here and damnation hereafter is a hard saying but you will make it out I would fain know how you shall never make it out by your example of the Gibeonires Josh 9.15 you are very much taken with that pattern you repeat so frequently what a lye they told to children of Israel how crafty and wily they were to obtain their purpose how they cheated Joshua and all the Princes I am perswaded you laugh in your sleeves to think you have done so too with the whole Nation but I cannot finde that this makes any thing for that you would conclude from it because your Covenant was made and imposed as I told you before without Joshua and many of the Princes consent It 's true the Gibeonites to save their lives did this in fear but your Covenant was made in subtilty to usurp authority over others to destroy a legal ancient Church-Government and to take away the lives of all that should resist you under pretence of a Vow made to Almighty God which you say you are bound to perform Now if you are pleased to observe the scope of the Text you alledge although the Gibeonites came with their old shooes and ragged garments as your brethren of Scotland some say did at first to gain their ends when you hired them yet there it seems to intimate a secret permission of God that Joshua and the Princes should be deluded by them because they did not first ask counsel from him as men ought to do in all that they go about whose command was to destroy them all I am certain you had no such command to destroy us But God did so highly favor his people Israel that he would have them all free men and none of them to be employed in any servile work wherefore the Gibeonites were suffered by their Covenant to escape that they might be made hewers of wood and drawers of water for the children of Israel I consess your Covenanters
as you do onely mention it and no more but for any Covenants they entred into without their Princes consent if you knew of any you should have mentioned that or else hold your peace but it is clear you could finde none which is sufficient to shew your falshood and folly and blasphemy in the close who dare compare your Covenant with our sacred Covenant made with God in Baptism wherein we are sprinkled with the blood of Christ and spiritually washed from the guilt of original sin Give me leave to make a short digression if it be any to shew how hurtful it is to binde the King and his Subjects to stand to the Covenant We honor our Kings here as Christs Vice-gerents upon earth and although they are compassed with human infirmities and are restrained by good Laws from doing wrong because of the largeness of their power yet they ought not to be bound with Saint Peters bonds or hindred from doing any good they can You know that God hath given to the Kings of England a miraculous Gift of Healing most scroffulous Tumors called The Kings Evil for every good gift comes from God and that many hundreds have been healed by His Majesties touching of them since His happy Return who could finde no remedy before from Chyrurgions or Physicians and divers perished for want of help and if the Christian Kings of France can do the like it is but a farther Confirmation of the certainty and lawfulness of it now when they perform these Cures some worthy Bishop or Episcopal Divine waiteth on them repeating the Promise of our blessed Saviour to his Church over which the King is held by us to be Supream in his Dominions They shall lay their hand upon the sick and they shall recover Mark 16.18 If your Covenant will not allow this to be done by them but that poor people must perish for want of Cure when God hath so graciously provided it for them how do you think it possible the people will endure such a Covenant I have been told that some sons of Belial should speak evil of it who would speak no better of Saint Pauls Napkins or of the shadow of Saint Peter passing by I do not finde that this way of healing was practised here at least so frequently before Edward the Confessor's dayes who is well represented on the Royal Exchange under a double capacity of King and Priest with a Crown on his head and a Bible in his hand and from him it descended to his Successors yet if I forget not I have read something of King Lucius to this purpose who was the first Christian King here when Joseph of Arimathea lived in this Island But should any man ask a reason why the King doth not cure all Diseases as well as that or why it was not practised so often at least in former days it would be to tedious to discourse of Sympathies and Antipathies of Thora and Antithora or of such providential wayes wherewith our good God doth always supply mankinde with helps against all defects and inconveniences where we stand in need One may as well forbid the use of the Mariners Compass as if it were performed by sorcery or inchantments because we cannot give a certain reason why the Loadstone should attract iron as it doth or the Needle should point alwayes to the North. I shall onely assign two reasons of His Majesties curing the Evil. The first shall be that it is very probable that this Evil is more frequent and increaseth more now than it did of old by reason of change of Diet or from what cause soever it may proceed wherein we differ from the Ancients and therefore God hath furnisht us with this remedy against it And secondly Christianity waxing cold and men being more subjoct to rebel against the Supream Magistrate than of elder times for so Saint Paul writes to Timothy That in the last dayes perillous times should come that men should be Traytors heady high-minded c. 2 Tim. 3.4 And Saint Peter saith 2 Pet. 3 3. There shall come in the last dayes scoffers walking after the rown lusts such as despise Government chap. 2.8 presumptuous not being afraid to speak evil of Dignities and therefore 1 Pet chap. 2.13 he commands all Submit your selves to every Ordinance of man to the King as Supream and verse 17. Fear God honour the King Now that Subjects might live more peaceably in obedience to the King this may be none of the least occasions God having hereby discovered unto us that he hath bestowed upon the King this divine Vertue of Healing some of the most general and spreading Diseases amongst the people more than he hath given to any other men I would we knew the extent of your Covenant if we must obey it I do not see but most degrees of Honor the Nobles as well as of the Clergy must be levelled by it It may be the Order of the Garter will be allowed for no better than an old Popish Ceremony fit to be abolished if you may tanquam ex cathreda interpret the sense of your Covenant which you hold to be as infallible as Rome doth her Church all must believe it under pain of damnation call but your Covenanters the Church and I find no difference But to return to Episcopacy methinks it is high time Bishops should be restored with more power than formerly which will be but moderate Episcopacy in regard of the great increase of Schisms and Heresies and the dangerous times we are fallen into But whom do you call your dear Mother of the Church of England Pray what is she Here according to your scurrilous way of jeering you proceed to speak non-sense it seems you are but an ungracious disobedient son your Mother is grown poor by many of your plunderings and sequestrings and now you will not know her Doth not St. Paul call himself the Father of those Churches he had begotten in Christ and why then cannot the Church of England spiritually and metaphorically be called our Mother whose breasts we suck in the two Sacraments of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist The Scripture saith That Kings shall be the Churches Nursing Fathers and Queens Nursing Mothers Are you such a Critick and understand not that or will you quarrel with the Scripture for it As for your Post-script of Doctor Vshers Model of Reformed Episcopacy the Learned Doctor Bernard being now living is able to give the best account of that but I hope I have given you a good account of all the rest POST-SCRIPT THe Reader may if he please for his own better satisfaction compare the Arguments of Anonymus with those of Mr. Zachary Crofton who is reported to be the Goliath of the Covenanters in London and he shall finde them to be birds of a feather having little more to say for themselves Qui utrumvis recte noverit ambos immo omnes noverit answer one and answer them all I would counsel them if they will take my advice to live peaceably and not to disturb the Church of God whereof they are members considering how dangerous Schisms are to let in Popery Judaism Turkism Paganism and all manner of impiety to the subversion if it were possible of the Christian Faith we are all as brethren travelling to the Heavenly Canaan Let us remember that Charge Joseph gave to his brethren going to their earthly Canaan See that you fall not out by the way God grant us all a right understanding in all things There are others since Zach Crofton that plead for a Reformation of our Church in Doctrine Worship and Discipline let them by strength of Argument prove the necessity the pretend and let us have the same liberty in an amiable way to defend it and I doubt not of a good issue always with this proviso That the Covenanters shall not when they are at a loss run back to shelter themselves under their Covenant as they use to do We know what Ajax said of Vlysses Et quaerre censciui Arma they need not blaze it about so much to perswade the people things are so extream bad in the Church of England their best way will be if they mean peaceably to make their Addresses to the reverend Bishops and by their advice if there be any thing that will not agree with these mens queezy stomachs something may be more fully explained to give them satisfaction which I believe for my part is impossible for any men to do they are so inconstant in their judgements and resolutions and that it would not please them long if they were suffered to make the Alteration themselves they will stand to nothing unless their Dalilah the Covenant may be allowed to be Supream Governor and that is the main reason of the great noise they make for want of Reformation which if there were such necessity for it as they would make the world believe there is nothing hinders more than their Solemn League and Covenant for to what end should the wisest men upon the earth alledge Scripture Councels Fathers to confirm any Truth if when all is done it will not square with their Lesbian Rule their leaden Covenant which will bend every way and which alone they will admit to be the measure of it it shall be held by them for no Reformation at all Wherefore all that are dis-satisfied with our Church in Doctrine or Discipline must renounce the Covenant if they expect any thing to be amended and which is the readiest way to set things to rights rest in the wise and pious determination of our Ancestors who setled Episcopal Government here the livelyest pattern this day in all the world whereby all erronious and heterodox Opinions may be kept down and Religion setled and continued according to the true Rule which is the word of God My Coronis shall be an Hexastick of Sir John Sucklings never to be forgotten IF I were of your Covenant Then you would call me John of Gant Or one of high renown But now I am John for the King You will call me a poor Suckling And so you 'l cry me down FINIS