expresse Articles for the preservation of royalty in all its just rights in his Majestie and his posterity what unkindnes was heer in the Scots to their King When by Gods blessing on the Scotes helpe the opposit faction was fully subdued his Majestie left Oxford with a purpose for London The Scotes selling of the King is a most false calumnie but by the severity of the ordinances against his receivers he diverted towards Linn to ship for Holland or France where by the way fearing a discovery and surprise he was necessitate to cast himselfe upon the Scotes army at New-wark upon his promise to give satisfaction to the propositions of both Kingdomes he was received there and to New-castle here his old oathes to adhaere unto Episcopacy hindred him to give the expected satisfaction AT that time the prime leaders of the English army were seeking with all earnestnes occasion to fall upon the Scots much out of heart and reputation by Iames Grahame and his Irishes incursions most unhappy for the Kings affaires Scotland at that time was so full of divisions that if the King had gone thither they were in an evident hazard of a present war both within among themselfes and without from England our friends in the English Parliament whom we did and had reason to trust assured us that our taking the King with us to Scotland was the keeping of the Sectarian Army on foot for the wracke of the King of Scorland of the Presbyterian party in England as the sending of his Majestie to one of his houses neer London upon the faith of the Parliament of England was the only way to get the Sectaryes disarmed the King and the people settled in a peace upon such tearmes as should be satisfactory both to the King and the Scots and all the wel-affected in England This being the true case was it any either unjustice unkindnes or imprudence in the Scots to leave the King with his Parliament of England was this a selling of him to his enemies the monyes the Scots received at their departure out of England had no relation at all to the King they were scarce the sixth parte of the arreares due to them for bygon service they were but the one halfe of the sume capitulat for not only without any reference to the King but by an act of the English Parliament excluding expresly from that Treaty of the armies departure all consideration of the disposall of the Kings person The unexpected evills that followed in the Armies rebellion in their seasing on London destroying the Parliament murthering the King no mortall eye could have forseen The Scots were ever ready to the utmost of their power to have prevented all these mischiefes with the hazard of what was dearest to them notwithstanding of all the hard measure they had often received both from the King and the most of their friends in England That they did not in time and unanimously stur to purpose for these ends they are to answer it to God who were the true Authors the innocency of the Church is cleered in the following treatise Among the many causes of these miseries the prime fountaine was the venome of Episcopall principles which some serpents constantly did infuse by their speaches and letters in the eares and heart of the King to keep him of from giving that satisfaction to his good subjects which they found most necessary and due the very same cause which ties up this day the hands of covenanters from redressing all present misorders could they have the King to joyne with them in their covenant to quit his unhappy Bishops to lay aside his formall and dead Liturgie to cast himselfe upon the counsels of his Parliaments it were easy to prophecie what quickly would become of all his enemies but so long as Episcopall and malignant agents compasseth him about though all that comes neer may see him as lovely hopfull and promising a prince for all naturall endowments as this day breaths in Europe or for a long time has swayed a Scepter in Britaine yet while such unlucky birds nest in his Cabin and men so ungraciously principled doe daily besiege him what can his good people doe but sit downe with mournfull eyes and bleeding hearts till the Lord amend these otherwise remediles and insuperable evills but I hold heer least I transgresse to farr the bounds of an Epistle I account it an advantage to have your Lordship my judge in what heere and in my following treatise The reason of the dedication I spake of Religion the liberties of our country and the Royall Family I know non fitter then your Lordship both to discerne and decerne in all these matters Me thinks I may say it without flattery which I never much loved either in my selfe or others that among all our Nobles for constancy in a zealous profession for exemplary practise in publick and privat duties the mercy of God has given to your Lordship a reputation second to none And for a rigid adhaerence to the Rights and Priviledges of your Country according to that auncient disposition of your most Noble Family noted in our Historians especially that Prince of them Georg Buchanan the Tutor of your Grand-Father I know none in our Land who wil pretend to goe before you and for the affairs of the King your interest of blood in the Royall Family is so well known that it would be a strange impudency in me if in your audience I durst be bold wittingly to give sinistrous information Praying to God that what in the candid ingenuity true zeale of my spirit I present under your Lordships patrociny unto the eye of the World for the vindication of my mother Church and Country from the Sicophantick accusations of a Stigmatised incendiary may produce the intended effects I rest your Lordships in all Christian duety R. B. G. Hague this 28 May 7 Iunie 1649. CHAP. I. The praelaticall faction continue resolute that the King and all his people shall perish rather then the praelats be not restored to their former places of power for to set up Popery Profanity and Tirranny in all the three Kingdomes WHile the Comissioners of the Church and Kingdome of Scotland The unseasonablenes of Doctor Brambles warning were on their way to make their first addresses to his Majestie for to condole his most lamentable afflictions and to make offer of their best affections and services for his comfort in this time of his great distresse it was the wisedome and charity of the praelaticall party to send out Doctor Bramble to meet them with his Faire Warning For what else but to discourage them in the very entry from tendering their propositions and before ever they were heard to stop his Majesties eares with grievous praejudice against all that possibly they could speake though the world sees that the only apparent fountaine of hope upon earth for recovery of the wofully confounded affaires of the King is in
there are no appeales from the generall Assembly to the King as in England from the Bishops Courts to the King in Chauncery where a Commission uses to be given to delegats who discusse the appeales Ans The warner considers not the difference of the Government of the Church of Scotland from that which was in England what the Parliament is in the State that the generall assembly is in the Church of Scotland both are the highest courts in their owne kind There is no appeale any where in moderat Monarchies to the Kings person but to the King in certaine legall courts as the Warner here confesseth the appeale from Bishops lyes not to the King in his person but to the King in his court of Chauncery As no man in Scotland is permitted to appeale in a civil cause from the Lords of Session much lesse from the Parliament so no man in an Ecclesiastick cause is permitted by the verie civil Law of Scotland to appeale from the general assembly According to the Scots order practise the King in person or else by his high Commissioner sits al 's usually in the generall assembly as in Parliament But though it were not so yet an appeale from a generall assembly to be discussed in a Court of delegats were unbeseeming and unreasonable the one Court consisting of above two hundred all chosen men the best and most able of the Kingdome the other but of two or three often of very small either abilities or integrity who yet may be more fitt to decerne in an Ecclesiastick cause then a single Bishop over his officiall the ordinary trusted in all acts of jurisdiction for the whole dioces But the Scots way of managing Ecclesiastick causes is a great deale more just safe and Satisfactory to any rationall man then that old popish order of the English where all the spirituall jurisdiction of the whole dioces was in the hand of one mercenary officiall without all reliefe from his sentence except by an appeale as of old to the pope and his delegats so therafter to the King though never to be cognosced-upon by himselfe but as it was of old by two or three delegats The Churches just severity against Montgomery and Adamson was approven by the King and the parties themselfe the weakest of all courts often for the quality and ever for the number of the judges Two instances are brought by the Warner to prove the Church of Scotlands stopping of appeals from the generall Assembly to the King the cases of Montgomery and Adamson if the causes and events of the named cases had been wel knowne to the Warner as he made this chapter disproportionally short so readily he might have deleted it al together Both these men were infamous not only in their Ministeriall charges but in their life conversation both became so insolent that contrary to the established order of the Church Kingdome being suborned by wicked statesmen who in that day of darknes had wel neer brought ruine both to King and country would needs take upon them the office of Arch-Bishops While the assembly was in proces with them for their manifold and high misdeameanors the King was moved by them and their evill patrons to shew his high displeasure against the assemblyes of the Church they for his Majesties satisfaction sent their Commissioners and had many conferences whereby the pride and contempt of these prelats did so encrease that at last they drew the sentence of excommunication upon their own heads the King after some time did acknowledge the equity of the Church proceedings and professed his contentment their with both these unhappy men were brought to a humble confession of their crimes and such signes of repentance that both after a renunciation of their titulare Bishopriks were readmitted to the function of the ministry which they had deserted Never any other before or after in Scotland did appeale from the generall assembly to the King the late excommunicat praelats in their declinatour against the assembly of Glasgow did not appeale as I remember to the King but to another generall assembly to bee constitute according to their own Popish and Tyrannical principles CHAP. IV. Faulty Ministers in Scotland are lesse exempted from punishment then any other men The pride of prelats lately but never the Presbitery did exempt their fellows from punishment for their civil faults THE Warner in his fourth Chapter offers to prove that the Scottish discipline doth exempt Ministers from punishment for any treason or sedition they can act in their pulpits Ans This challenge is like the rest very false The rules of the Church discipline in Scotland obliges Churchmen to bee subject to punishment not only for every fault for which any other man is lyable to censure but ordaines them to bee punished for sundrie things which in other men are not at all questionable and what ever is censurable in any they appoint it to be much more so in a Minister It is very untrue that the pulpits in Scotland are Sanctuaries for any crime much lesse for the grievous crimes of sedition and treason Let the Warner remember how short a time it is since an Episcopall chayre or a canonicall coate did priviledge in England and Ireland from all censure either of Church or State great numbers who were notoriously knowne to be guilty of the foulest crimes Was ever the Warners companion Bishop Aderton challenged for his Sodomy so long as their commune patrone of Canterbury did rule the court did the warner never heare of a prelate very sibb to Doctour Bramble who to this day was never called to any account for flagrant scandals of such crimes as in Scotland are punishable by the gallows the Warner doth not well to insist upon the Scots Clergie exempting themselfe from civill punishments no where in the world are Churchmen more free of crimes deserving civil cognisance then in Scotland and if the ears and eyes of the world may be trusted the popish clergy this day in Italy and Spaine are not so challengeable as the praelaticall divines in England and Ireland lately were for many grosse misdemeanors But why does the Warners anger run out so farre as to the preachers in Holland The Warner is injurious to the Ministers of Holland is it because he knoweth the Church disciplin in Holland to be really the same with that he oppugnes in the Scots and that all the reformed Churches doe joyne cordially with Scotland in their rejection of Episcopacy is this a ground for him to slander our Brethren of Holland Is it charity for him a stranger to publish to the world in print that the ministers in Holland are seditious oratours and that they saucily controll the Magistrats in their pulpits Their crime seemes to be that for the love of Christ their master they are zealous in their doctrin to presse upon the Magistrat as well as upon the people the true practise of piety the sanctification
King did really consent to the abolition of Bishops I grant for the turning an ordinance to a standing Law the Kings consent is required but with what qualifications and exceptions wee need not heere to debate since his Majesties consent to the present case of abolishing Bishops was obtained well neere as farre as was desired and what is yet lacking wee are in a faire way to obtaine it for the Kings Majestie long agoe did agree to the rooting out of Episcopacy in Scotland he was willing also in England and Ireland to put them out of the Parliament and all civil courts and to divest them of all civil power and to joyne with them Presbyteries for ordination and spirituall jurisdiction yea to abolish them totally name and thing not only for three yeares but ever till he and his Parliament should agree upon some setled order for the Church was not this Tantamont to a perpetuall abolition for all and every one in both houses having abjured Episcopacy by solemne oath and Covenant the Parliament was in no hazard of agreing with the King to re-erect the fallen chaires of the Bishops so there remained no other but that either his Majestie should come over to their judgement or by his not agreing with them yet really to agree with them in the perpetuall abolition of Episcopacy since the concession was for the laying Bishops aside ever till hee and his houses had agreed upon a settled order for the Church If this be not a full and formall enough consent to the ordinance of changing the former Lawes anent praelat◠his Majestie who now is easily may and readily would supply all such defects if some of the faction did not continually for their own evill interests whisper in his eares pernicious counsel as our Warner in this place also doeth by frighting the King in conscience from any such consent for this end he casts out a discourse the sinshews whereof are in these three Episcopall maximes The Praelats would flatter the King into a Tyranny First that the legislative power is sollie in the King that is according to his Brethrens Cōmentary that the Parliament is but the Kings great counsel of free choyce without or against whose votes hee may make or unmake what Lawes he thinks expedient but for them to make any ordinance for changing without his consent of any thing that has been or instituting any new thing or for them to defend this their legall right and custome time out of mind against the armes of the Malignant party no 〈◊〉 may deny it to be plaine rebellion II. The praelats takes to themselves a negative voice in Parliament That the King and Parliament both together cannot make a Law to the praejudice of Bishops without their own consent they being the third order of the Kingdome for albeit it be sacriledge in the Lords and Commons to clame any the smallest share of the legislative power this in them were to pyck the chiefest jewel out of the Kings Crowne yet this must be the due priviledge of the Bishops they must be the third order of the Kingdome yea the first and most high of the three far above the other two temporall States of Lords and Commons their share in the Legislative power must be so great that neither King nor Parliament can passe any Law without their consent so that according to their humble protestation all the Lawes and acts which have been made by King and Parliament since they were expelled the house of Lords are cleerly voide and null That the King and Parliament in divesting Bishops of their temporall honour and estats The Praelats grieve that Monks and Friers the Pope and Cardinals were easten out of England by Henry the eight in abolishing their places in the Church doe sin more against conscience then did Henry the eight and his Parliament when they put down the Abbots and the Fryers Wee must beleeve that Henry the eight his abolishing the order of Monks was one of the acts of his greatest Tyranny and greed wee must not doubt but according to Law and reason Abbots and priours ought to have kept still their vote in Parliament that the Monasteryes and Nunryes should have stood in their integrity that the King and Parliament did wrong in casting them down and that now they ought in conscience to be set up againe yea that Henry the eight against all reason and conscience did renounce his due obedience to the Pope the Patriarch of the West the first Bishop of the universe to whom the superinspection and government of the whole Catholick Church in all reason doth belong Though all this be heere glaunced at by the Warner and elsewhere 〈◊〉 prove it to be the declared mind of his Brethren yet we must be pardoned not to accept them as undenyable principles of cleare demonstrations 〈…〉 supremacy of Kings is not prejudged by the Covenant The last ground of the Doctors demonstration is that the covenant is ane oath to set up the Presbyterian government in England at it is in Scotland and that this is contrary to the oath of Supremacy for the oath of Supremacy makes the King the only supreame head and governour of the Church of England that is the civil head to see that every man doe his duty in his calling also it gives the King a supreame power over all persons in all causes but the Presbytery is a politicall papacie acknowledging no governours but only the Presbyters it gives the King power over all persons as subjects but none at all in Ecclesiastick causes Ans Is there in all this reasoning any thing sound First what article of the covenant beares the setting up of the Presbyterian government in England as it is in Scotland II. If the oath of supremacy import no more then what the Warners expresse words are here that the King is a civil head to see every man doe his duty in his calling let him be assured that no Presbyterian in Scotland was ever contrary to that supremacy III. That the Presbytery is a papacy and that a politicall one the Warner knowes it ought not to be graunted upon his bare word IV. That in Scotland no other governors are acknowledged then Presbyters himselfe contradicts in the very nixt words where he tells that the Scots Presbytery ascribes to the King a power over all persons as subjects V. That any Presbyterian in Scotland makes it sacriledge to give the King any power at all in any Ecclesiastick cause it is a senselesse untruth The Warners arguments are not more idle and weake The Warners insolent vanity then his triumphing upon them is insolent for he concludes from these wise and strong demonstrations that the poor covenant is apparently deceitfull unvalide impious rebellious and what not yea that all the learned divines in Europe wil conclude it so that all the covenanters themselfes who have any ingenuity must grant this much and that no knowing
as to charge him to perseveer in the maintainance of Episcopall governement upon all hazards without the change of any thing except a little p. 278. and to assure that all Covenanters are of a faction engaged into a Religious rebellion who may never be trusted till they have repented of their Covenant and that till then never lesse loyalty justice or humanity may be expected from any then from them that if hee stand in need of them hee is undone for they will devoure him as the Serpent does the dove These and the like pernicious maximes framed by an Episcopall hand of purpose to separat for ever the King from all his covenanted subjects how farr they were from the heart language and wrytings of our late Soveraigne all who were aquainted with his carriage and most intime affections at New-Castle in the Isle of Wight and thereafter can testify But it is reason when the Praelats doe frame an image of a King that they should have liberty to place their owne image in its forheade as the statuary of old did his in the Boss of Pallas targe with such artifice that all her worshipers were necessitat to worship him and that no hand was able to destroy the one without the disfolution and breaking in peeces of the other yet our Praelats would know that in this age there be many excellent Engyneers whose witty practicks transcend the most skilfull experiments of our Auncestors and what ever may be the ignorance or weaknes of men wee trust the breath of our Lords mouth will not faile to blow out the Bishop from the Kings armes without any detriment at all to royalty Allwayes the wicked and impious cunning of these craftsemen is much to be blamed who dare be bold to insert and engrave themselfes so deeply in the images of the Gods as the one cannot be intended to be picked out of the other more then the Aple from the eye unles the subsistance of both be put in hazard The other matter of his rayling against us is the solemne league and covenant The only crime of the Covenant is that it extirpate praelacy when this nimble and quick enough Doctor comes assisted with all the reasons the whole University of Oxford can afford him to demonstrat it as he professes in his last Chapter to be wicked false void and what not wee find his most demonstrative proofes to be so poor and silly that they infere nothing of his conclusion To this day no man has shewed any errour in the mater of that covenant as for our framing and taking of it our adversaries drave us thereunto with a great deale of necessity and now being in it neither their fraud nor force may bring us from it againe for we feare the oath of God After much deliberation we found that covenant the soveraigne meanes to joyne and keep together the whole orthodox party in the three Kingdomes for the defence of their Religion and Liberties which a popish praelaticall and malignant faction with all their might were overturning who still to this day are going on in the same designe without any visible change in the most of their former principles And why should any who loves the King hate this covenant which is the straytestty the world can devise to knit all to him and his posterity if so be his Majestie might be pleased to enter therein but by all meanes such a mischiefe must be averted for so the roote of Episcopacy would quickly wither without any hope of repullulation an evill farr greater in the thoughts of them who now mannage the conscience of the Court thē the extirpation of Monarchy the eversion of all the three Kingdomes or any other earthly misery As for the third subject of the Warners fury against us The Bishops are most justly cast out of England our unkindnes to the late King if any truth were in this false challenge no other creature on earth could be supposed the true cause thereof but our unhappy praelats all our grievances both of Church and State first and last came principally from them had they never been authors of any more mischiefe then what they occasioned to our late Soveraigne his person family and Dominions this last dozn of yeares there is abundant reason of burying that their praeter and Antiscripturall order in the grave of perpetuall infamy But the truth is beside more auncient quarrels since the dayes of our fathers the Albigenses this limb of Antichrist has ever been witnessed against Wickleif Huss and their followers were zealous in this charge till Luther and his disciples got it flung out of all the reformed world except England where the violence of the ill advised princes did keep it up for the perpetuall trouble of that land till now at last it hath well neare kicked downe to the ground there The Scots were never injurious to their King both Church and Kingdome As for the point in hand we deny all unkindnes to our King whereof any reasonable complaint can be framed against us Our first contests stand justified this day by King and Parliament in both Kingdomes When his Majestie was so ill advised as to bring downe upon our borders an English army for to punish our refusing of a world of novations in our Religion contrary to the lawes of God and of our country what could our land doe lesse then lie downe in their armes upon Dunce law for their just and necessary defence when it was in their power with ease to haue dissipat the opposit army they shew themselves most ready upon very easy conditions to goe home in peace and gladly would have rested there had not the furious Bishops moved his Majestie without all provocation to breake that first peace and make for a second invasion of Scotland only to second their unreasonable rage was it not then necessary for the Scots to arme againe when they had deseate the Episcopall Army and taken Newcastle though they found nothing considerable to stand in their way to London yet they were content to lie still in Northumberland and upon very meane tearnes to returne the second time in peace For all this the praelats could not give it over but raised a new Army and filled England with fire and sword yea well neere subdued the Parliament and their followers and did almost accomplish their first designes upon the whole Isle The Scots then with most earnest and pitifull entreaties were called upon by their Brethren of England for helpe where unwilling that their brethren should perish in their sight and a bridge should be made over their carcasses for a third warre upon Scotland when after long tryall they had found all their intercessions with the King for a moderat and reasonable accommodation slighted and rejected they suffered themselves to be perswaded to enter in covenant with their oppressed and fainting brethren for the mantainance of the common cause of Religion and liberty but with
elder praelats of England were Erastians and more but the younger are as much anti-Erastian as the most riged of the Presbytery That they count it Erastianisme to put the governement of the Church in the hand of the Magistrat Answ The Doctors knowledge is greater then to bee ignorant that all these goe under the name of Erastians who walking in Erastus ways of flattering the Magistrat to the prejudice of the just rights of the Church run yet out much beyond Erastus personall tenets I doubt if that man went so far as the Doctor heere and else where to make all Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction but a part of the Magistrats civill power which for its execution the supreame Governours of any state may derive out of the fountaine of their supremacy to what ever hands civill or Ecclesiastick themselfes think fit to commit it Let the Doctor adde to this much knowledge but a little ingenuity and he shall confes that his Brethren the Later Bishops who claime Episcopacy by divine right are all as much against this Erastian Caesaro-papisme as any Presbiterian in Scotland The elder Bishops indeed of England and all the Lawes there for Episcopacy seeme to be point blank according to the Erastian errours for they make the crowne and royall supremacy the originall root and fountaine whence all the discipline of the Church doth flow as before the days of Henry the eight it did out of the Popes head-ship of the Church under Christ How ever let the Doctor ingenuously speake out his sence and I am deceived if he shall not acknowledge that how grosse an Erastian so ever himselfe and the elder Bishops of England might have been yet that long agoe the most of his praelatical friends have become as much opposit to Erastianisme as the most rigid of the Presbiterians The other crime he layes to the charge of the Scotes is The Scotes first and greatest crime is irreconciliablenes with Rome that they admit no latitude in Religion but will have every opinion afundamentall article of faith and are averse from the reconciliation of the Protestant Churches Ans If the warner had found it seasonable to vent a little more of his true sence in this point he had charged this great crime far more home upon the heade of the Scotes for indeed though they were ever far from denying the true degrees of importance which doe cleerly appeare among the multitude of Christian truthes yet the great quarrell heer of the warner and his freinds against them is that they spoiled the Canterburian designe of reconcealing the Protestant Churches not among themselfes but with the Church of Rome When these good men were with all earnestnes proclaming the greatest controversies of Papists and Protestants to be upon no fundamentalls but only disputable opinions wherein beleefe on either side was safe enough and when they found that the Papists did stand punctually to the Tenets of the Church of Rome and were obstinately unwilling to come over to England their great labour was that the English and the rest of the Protestants casting aside their needlesse beleefe of problematick truths in piety charity and zeale to make up the breach and take away the shisme should be at all the paines to make the journey to Rome While this designe is far advanced and furiously driven on in all the three Kingdomes and by none more in Yreland then the Bishop of Derry behold the rude and plaine blewcapes step in to the play and marre all the game by no arte by no terrour can these be gotten alongs to such a reconciliation This was the first and greatest crime of the Scotes which the Doctor here glances at but is so wyse and modest a man as not to bring it above board The last charge of the chapter is The Scotes were ever anti episcopall that the Scotes keep not still that respect to the Bishops of England which they were wont of old in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths reigne Ans In that letter cited by the warner from the generall assembly of Scotland 1566. Sess 3. there is no word of approbation to the office of Episcopacy they speake to the Bishops of England in no other quality or relation but as Ministers of the word the highest stile they give them is reverend Pastors and Brethren the tenour of the whole Epistle is a grave and brotherly admonition to beware of that fatall concomitant of the most moderat Episcopacy the troubling of the best and most zealous servants of Christ for idle fruitles Ceremonies How great a reverence the Church of Scotland at that time carried to praelacy may be seen in their supplication to the secret counsell of Scotland in that same assembly the very day and Session wherein they write the letter in hand to the Bishops of England The Arch-Bishop of S. Andrews being then usurping jurisdiction over the ministry by some warrant from the state the Assembly was grieved not only with the popery of that Bishop but with his auncient jurisdiction which in all Bishops Popish and protestant is one and the same That jurisdiction was the only matter of their present complaint and in relation thereto they assure the counsel in distinct tearmes that they would never be more subject unto that usurped tiranny thē they would be to the devill himselfe So reverend an opinion had the Church of Scotland at that time of Episcopall jurisdiction But suppone that some fourscore yeares agoe the Scotes before they had tasted the fruits of Protestant Bishops The Praelates lately were found in the act of introducing Popery into the Church and Tiranny into the Kingdom had judged them tolerable in England yet since that time by the long tract of mischiefes which constantly has accompanied the order of praelacy they have been put upon a more accurat inspection of its nature and have found it not only a needles but a noxious and poysonous weed necessare to be plucked up by the root and cast over the hedge Beside al its former malefices it hath been deprehēded of late in the very act of everting the foundations both of Religion and governement of bringing in Popery and Tiranny in the Churches and States of all the three Kingdomes Canterburian self conviction cap. 1. And for these crimes it was condemned killed and buried in Scotland by the unanimous consent of King Church and Kingdom when England thereafter both in their Assembly and Parliament without a discording voice had found it necessary to root out that unhappy plant as long agoe with great wisedome it had been cast out of all the rest of the reformed Churches had not the Scotes all the reason in the World to applaud such pious just and necessary resolutions of their English Brethren though the warner should call it the greatest crime CHAP. II. No controver sie in Scotland betwixt the King and the Church about the convocating of Synods The Presbiterians assert positively the Magistrats right
the Kings Majestie in Scotland never had never craved any first fruits the Church never spoiled the King of any Tythes some other men indeed by the wickednesse most of Praelats and their followers did cousin both the King and the Church of many Tythes but his Majestie and the Church had never any controversie in Scotland about the Tythes for the King so far as concerned himselfe was ever willing that the Church should enjoy that which the very act of Parliament acknowledgeth to bee her patrimony Nor for the patronages had the Church any plea with the King the Church declared often their minde of the iniquity of patronages wherein they never had from the King any considerable opposition but from the Nobility and gentry the opposition was so great that for peace-sake the Church was content to let patronages alone till God should make a Parliament lay to heart what was incumbent for gracious men to doe for liberating congregations from their slavery of having Ministers intruded upon them by the violence of Patrones Which now at last blessed be God according to our mind is performed As for the dependence of any vassals upon the King King Iames avowes himselfe a hater of Erastianisme it was never questioned by any Presbyterian in Scotland What is added in the rest of the Chapter is but a repetition of that which went before to wit the Presbyters denying to the King the spirituall government of the Church and the power of the keyes of the Kingdome of heaven such an usurpation upon the Church King James declared under his hand as at length may be seen in the Historicall vindication to be a sinne against the Father Son and Holy Ghost which puts in the hand of the Magistrat the power of preaching and celebrating the Sacraments a power which since that time no Magistrat in Britaine did assume and if any would have claimed it none would have more opposed then the most zealous patrones of Episcopacy The injurious invectives which the Warner builds upon this his Erastian assertion wee passe them as Castles in their aire which must fall and evanish for want of a foundation Only before I leave this Chapter let the Warner take a good Sentence out of the mouth of that wyse Prince King James to testifie yet farther his minde against Erastianisme His Majestie in the yeare 1617 having come in progresse to visit his auncient Kingdome of Scotland and being present in persone at a publick disputation in Theologie in the Universitie of St. Andrews whereof also many both Nobles and Church-men of both Kingdomes were auditors when one of those that acted a part in the disputation had affirmed and went about to maintaine this assertion that the King had power to depose Ministers from their Ministeriall function The King himself as abhorring such flatterie cried out with a loud voice Ego possum deponere Ministri caput sed non possum deponere ejus officium CHAP. VII The Presbyterie does not draw from the Magistrat any paritie of his power by the cheate of any relation IN the seventh chapter the Warner would cause men believe many more of the Presbyteries usurpations upon the civill Magistrate The Presbytery cognosceth only upon scandals and that in sewer civil things then the Bishopscourts were wont to meddle with The first is that all offences whatsoever are cognoscible in the consistory upon the case of scandals Ans First the Presbyterie makes no offence at all to come before the consistory but scandall alone Secondly these civill offences the scandall whereof comes before the Presbytery are but very few and a great deale fewer than the Bishops officiall takes notice of in his consistoriall court That capitall crimes past over by the Magistrate should bee censured by the Church no society of Christians who have any discipline did ever call in question When the sword of the Magistrat hes spared a murderer an adulterer a Blasphemer will any ingenuous either praelaticall or popish divine admitte of such to the holy table without signes of repentance The Warners second usurpation is but a branch of the first that the Presbyterie drawes directly before it selfe the cognisance of fraud in barganing false measures oppression and in the case of Ministers brybing usury fighting perjury c. Ans Is it then the Warners minde that the notorious slander of such grosse sins does not deserve so much as an Ecclesiastick rebooke Shall such persons without admonition be admitted to the holy communion Secondly the named cases of fraud in barganing false measures oppression come so rarely before our Church-judicatories that though these thirty yeares I have been much conversant in Presbyteries yet did I never see nor doe I remember that ever I heard any of these three cases brought before any church assembly In the persone of Ministers I grant these faults which the canons of the Church in all times and places make the causes of deprivation are cognosced upon in Presbyteries but with the good liking I am sure of all both papists and praelats who themselves are free of such vices And why did not the Warner put in among the causes of church mens deprivation from office and benefite adultery gluttonny and drunkennes are these in his c. which he will not have cognoscible by the Church in the persons of Bishops and Doctors The Warners third challenge amounts to an high crime that Presbyterian Ministers are bold to preach upon these scriptures which speake of the Magistrats duty in his office or dare offer to resolve from scripture any doubt which perplexeth the conscience of Magistrats or people of Husband or Wife of Master or Servant in the discharge of their Christian duty one to another What ever hath been the negligence of the Bishop of Derry yet I am sure all the preaching Praelats and Doctors of England pretended a great care to goe about these uncontroverted parts of their ministerial function and yet without medling with the Mysteries of State or the depths of any mans particulare vocation much lesse with thejudgement of jurisdiction in politicall or aeconomicall causes As for the Churches declaration against the Late engagement The Churches proceedings in the late engagement cleered from mistakes did it not well become them to signify their judgement in so great a case of conscience especially when the Parliament did propone it to them for resolution and when they found a conjunction driven on with a cleerly malignant partie contrary to solemne oathes and covenants unto the evident hazard of Religione and them who had been most eminent instruments of its preservation was it not the churches duty to give warning against that sinne and to exhort the ring leaders therein to repentance But our Warner must needs insist upon that unhappy engagement and fasten great blame upon the Church for giving any advice about it Ans Must it be Jesuisitisme and a drawing of all the civill affaires to the Churches barre in
assistance of any two Presbyters who chaunce to be neare a Bishop the only Pastor of the whole dioces and yet not bound to feed any flock either by word or Sacrament or governement but having a free liberty to devolve all that service upon others and himself to wayte at court so many yeares as he shall think fit This is our English Bishop not only in practise but in law and so was hee defended by the great disputants for praelacy in England But now let the Warner speake out The portion of Episcopacy which yet is stuck to cannot be kept up upon any principle either of honour or conscience if any such treasure can more be defended or was ever knowne in scripture or seen in any Christian Church for 800. yeares and above after the death of Christ I take it indeed to be conscience that forces now at last the best of our Court-divines to devest their Bishop of all civill imployment in Parliament court or Kingdome in denying his solitarines in ordination in removing his officiall and Commissary courts in taking away all his arches Arch-Bishops Arch-Deacons deane and Chapter and all the c. in erecting Presbyteries for all ordinations and spirituall jurisdiction It is good that conscience moves our adversaries at last to come this farre towards us butwhy will they not yet come nearer to acknowledge that by these their to lately recanted errours they did to long trouble the world and that the little which yet they desire to keepe of a Bishop is nothing lesse then that English Bishop but a new creature of their own devising never known in England which his Majestie in no honnour is obliged to mantaine for any respect either to the lawes or customes of England and least of all for conscience While the Warner with such confidence avowes The smallest portion of the most moderat Episcopacy is contrary to scripture that no text of Scripture can be alleadged against Episcopacy which may not with more reason be applyed against the Presbytery behold I offer him here some few casting them in a couple of arguments which according to his great promises I wish he would answer at his leasure First I doe reason from Ephesians 4.11 all the officers that Christ has appointed in his Church for the Ministry of the word are either Apostles Evangelists Prophets Pastors or Doctors but Bishops are none of these fyve Ergo they are none of the officers appointed by Christ for the Ministry of the word The Major is not wonte to be questioned the minor thus I prove Bishops are not Apostles Evangelists nor prophets for it s confessed all these were extraordinary and temporary officers but Bishops say yow are ordinary and perpetuall our adversaries pitch upon the fourth alleadging the Episcopall office to be pastorall but I prove the Bishop no Pastor thus no Pastor is superior to other Pastors in any spirituall power but according to our adversary a Bishop is superior to all the Pastors of his dioces in the power of ordination and jurisdiction Ergo. The doubt heer is only of the Major which I prove Argumento à paribus no Apostle is superior to an Apostle nor an Evangelists to an Evangelist nor prophet to a prophet nor a Doctour to a Doctour in any spirituall power according to scripture Ergo no Pastor to a Pastor Againe I reason from 1. Tim. 4.14 Math 18.15 1. Cor. 5.4.12.13 What taks the power of ordination and jurisdiction from Bishops destroyes Bishops as the removall of the soule kills the man and the denyall of the forme takes away the subject so the power of ordination and jurisdiction the essentiall forme whereby the Bishop is constitute and distinguished from the Presbyter and every other Church officer being removed from him he must perish but the quoted places take away cleerly these powers from the Bishop for the first puts the power of ordination in the Presbytery and a Bishop is not a Presbytery the second puts the power of jurisdiction in the Church and the third in a company of men which meet together but the Bishop is not the Church nor a company of men met together for these be many and he is but one persone When the Doctors learning he satisfied us in these two he shall receave more scripturall arguments against Episcopacy The Praelats unable to answer their opposits But why doe wee expect answers from these men when after so long time for all their boasts of learning and their visible leasure none of their party hes hade the courage to offer one word of answer to the Scriptures and Fathers which in great plenty Mr. Parker and Mr. Didoclave of old and of late that mitacle of learning most noble Somais and that Magazin of antiquity Mr. Blondel have printed against them What in the end of the Chapter the Warner addes of our trouble at King James his fiftie and five questions 1596 and of our yeelding the bucklers without any opposition till the late unhappy troubles we answer that in this as every where else the Warner proclaines his great and certaine knowledge of our Ecclesiastick story the troubles of the Scots divines at that time were very small for the matter of these questions all which they did answer so roundly that ther was no more speach of them therafter by the propounders but the manner and time of these questions did indeed perplex good men to see Erastian and Prelaticall counsellors so farr to prevaile with our King as to make him by captious questions carpe at these parts of Church-discipline which by statuts of Parliament and acts of Assemblyes were fully established Our Church at that time was far from yeelding to Episcopacy Prelacy was ever grievous to Scotland great trouble indeed by some wicked States-men was then brought upon the persones of the most able and faithfull Ministers but our land was so far from receiving of Bishops at that time that the question was not so much as proposed to them for many yeares thereafter it was in Ann. 1606 that the English Praelats did move the King by great violence to cast many of the best and most learned Preachers of Scotland out of their charges and in Ann. 1610 that a kind of Episcopacy was set up in the corrupt assembly of Glasgow under which the Church of Scotland did heavily groane till the yeare 1637 when their burdens was so much increased by the English praelaticall Tax-masters that all was shaken of together and divine justice did so closly follow at the heeles that oppressing praelacy of England as to the great joy of the long oppressed Scotes that evill root and all its branches was cast out of Britaine where wee trust no shadow of it shall ever againe be seen CHAP. IX The Common-wealth is no monster when God is made Soveraigne and their commands of men are subordinated to the clear will of God HAving cleered the vanity of these calumnious challenges where with
Ministers must not only want the confort of an assured and undoubted calling to the Ministry but may very well know and be assured that their calling and Ministry is null The words immediatly following are scraped out after their printing for what cause the author lest knoweth but the purpose in hand makes it probable that the deletted words did expresse more of his mind then it was safe in this time and place to speake out it was the late doctrine of Doctor Brambles prime friends that the want of Episcopall ordination did not only annull the calling of all the Ministers of France Holland Zwit-zerland and Germany but also did hinder all these societies to be true Churches for that popular Sophisme of the Jesuits our praelats did greedily swallow where are no true Sacraments there is no true Church and where is no true Ministry there are no true Sacraments and where no true ordination there is no true ministry and where no Bishops there is no true ordination and so in no reformed country but in England and Ireland where were true Bishops is any true Church When Episcopacy comes to this height of elevation that the want of it must annuall the Ministry yea null the Church and all the Reformed at one strock is it any mervaill that all of them doe concurre together for their own preservation to abolish this insolent abaddon and destroyer and notwithstanding all its ruine have yet no disconfort at all nor any the least doubt of their most lawfull ordination by the hands of the Presbytry After all this was writen is heer it stands The Praelats are so baselie injurious to all the reformed Churches that their selfes are ashamed of it another copie of the Warners book was brought to my hand wherin I found the deleted line stand printed in these distinct tearmes and put it to a dangerous question whither it be within the payle of the Church the deciphering of these words puts it beyond all peradventure that what I did conjecture of the Warner and his Brethrens minde of the state of all the reformed Churches was no mis-take but that they doe truely judge the want of Episcopall ordination to exclude all the Ministers of other Reformed Churches and their flocks also from the lines of the true Church This indeed is a most dangerous question for it stricks at the root of all If the Warner out of remorse of conscience had blotted out of his book that errour the repentance had been commendable But he hes left so much yet behind unscraped out as does shew his minde to continue what it was so that feare alone to provoke the reformed heere at this unseasonable time seemes to have been the cause of deleting these too cleare expressions of the praelaticall tenet against the very being and subsistence of all the Protestant Churches which want Episcopacy when these mē doe still stand upon the extreame pinacle of impudency and arrogance denying the Reformed to be true Churches and without scuple averring Rome as shee stands this day under the counsel of Trent to be a Church most true wherin there is an easy way of salvation from which all separation is needlesse and with which a re-union were much to be desired That gracious faction this day is willing enough to perswade or at least to rest content without any opposition that the King should of himselfe without and before a Parliament though contrary to many standing Lawes grant under his hand and seale a full liberty of Religion to the bloody Irish and to put in their hands both armes Castles and prime Places of trust in the State that the King should give assurance of his endeavour to get all these ratified in the nixt Parliament of England these men can heare with all moderation and patience but behold their furious impatience their whole art and industry is wakned when they heare of any appearance of the Kings inclination towards covenanting Protestants night and day they beate in his Majesties head that all the mischieves of the world does lurke in that miserable covenant that death and any misfortune that the ruine of all the Kingdomes ought much rather to bee imbraced by his Majestie then that prodigious Monster that very hell of the Covenant because forsooth it doth oblige in plane tearmes the taker to endeavour in his station the abolition of their great Goddesse praelacy The nixt hurt of Ministers from the Presbytry The generality of the Episcopal clergy have ever been covered with ignorance beggery and contempt is that by it they are brought to ignorance contempt and beggery Ans Whither Episcopacy or Presbytry is the fittest instrument to avert these evills let reason or experience teach men to judge The Presbyteriall discipline doth oblige to a great deale of severer tryalls in all sort of learning requisite in a divine before ordination then doth the Episcopall let either the rule or practise of Presbyterian and Episcopall ordination be compared or the weekly Exercises and monthly disputations in Latine upon the controverted heads be looked upon which the Presbytry exacts of every Minister after his ordination all the dayes of his life for experience let the French Dutch and Scots divines who have been or yet are be compared with the ordinary generation of the English Clergie and it will be found that the praelats have not great reason so superciliously to look downe with contempt upon their Brethrens learning I hope Cartwright Whitaker Perkins Reynolds Parker Ames and other Presbyterian English were inferior in learning to none of their opposits some of the English Bishops has not wanted good store of learning but the most of them I beleeve wil be content to leave of boasting in this subject what does the Warner speake to us of ignorance contempt and Beggery does not all the world know that albeit some few scarce one of twenty did brook good benefices yea plurality of them whereby to live in splendor at Court or where they listed in their non-residency neverthelesse it hath been much complained that the greatest parte of the priests who had the cure of soules thorow all the Kingdome of England were incomparably the most ignorant beggerly and contemptible clergy that ever have been seen in any of the reformed Churches neither did we ever heare of any great study in the Praelats to remeed these evils albeit some of them be provident enough for their owne families Doctor Bramble knowes who had the skill before they had sitten seven yeare in their charge to purchase above fifeteen hundred pounds a yeare for themselves and their heirs what somever The third evil which the Ptesbytery brings upon Ministers is that it makes them prat and pray nonsence everlastingly Ans The Praelats continue to hate preaching and prayer but to idolize a popish service It is indeed a great heartbrake unto ignorant lazy and unconsciencious Ministers to be put to the paines of preaching and prayer when a read service
curtisan Bishops against the highest civil judicatories in England but that ever a Presbitry or Synode in Scotland did so much as assay to impede or repeale the proceedings of any the meanest civil court I did never heare it so much as alleaged by our adversaries The nixt injury is against all Masters Serious catechising is no Episcopal crime and Mistresses of families whom the Presbytery will have to be personally examined in their knowledge once a yeare and to be excommunicat if grosly and wilfully ignorant Ans If it bee a crime for a Minister to call together parcels of his congre gation to be instructed in the grounds of Religion that servants and children and where ignorance is suspected others also may be tryed in their knowledge of the Catechisme or if it bee a crime that in family-visitations oftener then once a yeare the conversation of every member of the Church may be looked upon we confesse the Ministers of Scotland were guilty thereof and so farre as we know the generality of the Episcopall faction may purge themselves by oath of any such imputation for they had somewhat else to doe then to be at the pains of instructing or trying the Spirituall State of every sheep in their flocks we confesse likewise that it is both our order and practise to keep off from the holy table whom wee find groslly and wilfully ignorant but that ever any for simple ignorance was excommunicat in Scotland none who knowes us will affirme it The last whom he will have to be wronged by the Presbytery are the common people Church fessions are not high commissiones who must groane under a high commission in every parish where ignorant governors rule all without Law medling even in domesticall jarres be twixt man and wife Master and Servant Ans This is but a gybe of revenge for the overthrow of their Tyrannous high Commission-Court where they were wont to play the Rex at their pleasure above the highest subjects of the three Kingdoms and would never give over that their insolent domeneering court till the King and Parliaments of both Kingdomes did agree to throw it down about their eares The thing he jeares at is the congregation all Eldership a judicatory which all the Reformed doe enjoy to their great confort as much as Scotland They are farre from all arbitrary judications their Lawes are the holy Scripture and acts of superior Church-judicatories which rule so clearly the cases of their cognisance that rarely any difficulty remaines therein or if it doe immediatly by reference or appeal it is transmitted to the Classes or Synode The judges in the lowest Eldership as wee have said before are a doszen at least of the most able and pious who can bee hade in a whole congregation to joine with the Pastors one or more as they fall to be but the Episcopall way is to have no discipline at all in any congregation only where there is hope of a fyne the Bishops officiall will summon before his owne learned and conscientious wisedome who ever within the whole dioces have fallen into such a fault as hee pleaseth to take notice of as for domestick infirmities Presbyterians are most tender to medle therein they come never before any judicatory but both where the fault is great and the scandal thereof flagrant and broken out beyond the wals of the family These are the great injuries and hurts which the Church discipline has procured to all orders of men in the whole reformed world when Episcopacy has been such an innocent lambe or rather so holy an angel upon earth that no harme at all has ever come by it to any mortall creature a misbeleeving Jew will nothing misdoubt this so evident a truth CHAP. ULT. The Warners exceptions against the covenant are full of considence but exceeding frivolous THough in the former Chapters the Warner has shewed out more venome and gall then the bagge of any one mans stomack could have been supposed capable of yet as if he were but beginning to vomite in this last Chapter of the covenant a new flood of blacker poyson rusheth out of his pen. His undertaking is great to demonstrat cleerly that the covenant is meerly void wicked and impious His first clear demonstration is that it was devised by strangers imposed by subjects who wanted requisite power and was extorted by just feare of unjust suffering so that many that took it with their lips never consented with their hearts Ans This cleer demonstration is but a poor and evill argument the Major if it were put in forme would hardly be granted The Covenant was not dishonourable to union but I stand on the minor as weake and false for the covenant was not devised by strangers the Commissioners of the Parliament of England together with the Commissioners of the Parliament and generall assembly of Scotland were the first and only framers thereof but they who gave the life and being to it in England were the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament at West-Minister by the Kings call and at that time acknowledged by his Majestie without any question about the lawfullnes of their constitution and authority these men and that Court were not I hope great strangers in England The covenant was not imposed upon the King but the Parliaments of both Kingdomes made it their earnest desire unto his Majestie that he would be pleased to joyne with them in that Covenant which they did judge to be a maine peece of their security for their Religion and liberties in all the three Kingdomes As for their imposing of it upon the subjects of England an ordinance of Parliament though the King consent not by the uncontroverted lawes of England is a sufficient authority to crave obedience of all the subjects of England during the continuance of that Parliament The last part of the demonstration is dishonorable indeed to the English Nation if it were true it was no dishonour to England to joyne with their brethren of Scotland in a Covenant for mantainance of their Religion and Liberties but for many of the English to sweare a covenant with their lippes from which their heart did dissent and upon this difference of heart and mouth to plead the nullity of the oath and to advance this plea so high as to a cleer demonstration this is such a dishonour and dishonesty that a greater cannot fall upon a man of reputed integrity Especially when the ground of the lie and perjury is an evident falshood for the covenant was not extorted from any flesh in England by feare of any unjust suffering so far was it from this that to this day it could never be obtained from the Parliament of England to enjoyne that covenant upon any by the penulty of a two pence The Warners second demonstration is no better then the first the ground of it is Covenanters were not deceived but understood what they sweare that all oathes are void which