that there is more of the Old City than of the Ancient Church in Rome Lastly If the Papal Supremacy be so absolutely necessary to Christ's Kingdom here on Earth Whether the Cardinals be not strange Men that they by their long Janglings and Disputes upon a Vacancy and at an Election should so long debar him from the Administration of that Power by his Vicar And whether it be not more suitable to a Monarchy that suffers no Interregnum And consequently since Rex Angliae non moritur The King of England is said not to dye according to our Law whether the King be not according to the 37th Article the Supreme Governour in all Causes Ecclesiastical and Civil in all his Dominions and whether the Bishop of Rome hath or ought to have any Jurisdiction in any of them At this a Jesuit stood up and looking earnestly upon some newly proselyted Papists Regard not said he what any prating Heretick of them all says Have we not made you sufficiently sensible that all the Protestant Religion is an Innovation that King Henry the 8th a mere Julian was the first that apostatiz'd from the Holy Catholick Faith the first that arrogated to himself the Pope's incommunicable Dignity of being Head of the Church 'T is false replyed one of the Church of England King Henry the 8th onely reassum'd what some of his Predecessours own'd what none of them ever could or any of his Successours ever can give away from the Crown of England But the Papal Supremacy is an Usurpation and an Innovation too 't was never heard of in the World untill above 600 Years after Christ nay Pope Boniface the 3 d was the first that ever pretended to be the Vniversal Bishop The Christians in * Tertull. ad Scap. cap. 2. Tertullians's time acknowledg'd the Emperour to be Hominem a Deo secundum solo Deo minorem And †Opt. Lib. 3. Optatus has the same Strain Super Imperatorem non est nisi solus Deus qui fecit Imperatorem What need I mention what Cyril and Chrysostome and Gregory the Great and Pope Agatho have clearly and plainly said and written upon this Point you have been told often enough nay in that Council which you call the Eighth General Council the Emperour Basilius publickly professeth none of the Bishops contradicting him * Epag Basilii in Conc. quod vocat Act. 8. 1. Gubernacula Ecclesiasticae navis sibi a Deo commissa That the Government of the Church was committed to him by God There was no reply made of a long time for a great bustle that was among the Papists at last three or four lusty Fellows came dragging in a mighty tall Statua almost resembling the old Image of St. Christopher in Nostre Dame in Paris he held in his Hand a long Scroll which was a Catalogue of all the Popes and was hung from Head to Foot with all manner of old fashion'd Trumpery Before it march'd an aged Hermit with a Scyth in his Hand and looking upon the Protestants as if he would have mowed them down at once Ye base Innovatours cryed he that have troubled the World with new Doctrines where was your Religion before Luther See here the ancient and undeniable Records of ours see here the infallible Traditions of many Ages by which we clearly know that we profess the same Fundamental Truths the first Martyrs asserted who were so very old that their Beards help'd to burn them and which none but a Company of new fangled Hereticks in the last Century ever denyed Good Father grey-Beard replyed Bishop Montague don 't think to afright us out of our Senses with an old Worm-eaten Idol over-run with Cobwebs you might as well have brought a Tom of Bedlam with the Luggage of the Gibeonites to prove the Antiquity of your Doctrines as this old wither'd Hercules for assure your self we cannot onely prove them the spurious Inventions of your Cabalistical Innovatours but we can tell you the very Time and Occasions of the introducing every one of them into the Christian Church we have not onely the Scriptures Fathers and Councils maintaining all the grounds of the Protestant Religion according to the Reformation of our Church of England but before it even in the darkest days of Popery we meet with many the learned'st Men that those Ages afforded inveighing against the Corruptions both in Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of Rome as Robert Grosthead Bishop of Lincoln William Occham John Gerson Picus Mirandula Hierom Saveranola Hus and Hierom the Followers of Waldo and in the Year 1260 Nicholas Gallique wrote a Book upon that Subject entituled the Fiery Dart But since we cannot convince you of the Antiquity of Protestantism we will be so complemental for this once as to allow Popery to be older than Christianity it self it is no difficult thing to prove several of your Legends out of Livie and Valerius Maximus what a dull Theologue was Lipsius not to remember that several of the fine Stories he tells concerning our * Just â—ips de Virg. Hallu cap 6. Lady at Hall were long before recorded of the †Val. Max. lib. 1. cap 8. Statua of Claudia plac'd in the Temple of the Mother of the Gods the speaking and Miracles of Images are all Ethnick Illusions and the friskings of Monkish Puppets the Artificial Contrivances of Heathenish Oracle-mongers many of your Saints are slipt into places of Trust held by the old Deities but I wonder that since Diana had so noble an Office as to hunt the Stag and the Wild-Bore that St. Gertrude should get no better Preferment in your Legends than that of a paltry Rat-catcher But we will talk no more of the Antiquity of your Religion As for that Jesuit who boasts so much of it although he is the greatest Innovatour amongst you yet rather than fail upon occasion he can learnedly prove his own Order to be the eldest as well as the richest in the World nay contemporary with the very Hivites and Perizzites for Numb 26. 44. we reade Of Jesui the Family of the Jesuits He had a great deal more to say to them but that he was interrupted with a great Crowd and Noise of Clergy-men coming in from all parts of the Kingdom who made great Complaints against the Presbyterians and other Dissenters for that they in a time when the Government both in Church and State was in such danger by reason of the Papists were then more ungovernable restless and insolent than at any other time and indeed so it plainly appeared for those there present began to be troublesome and mutinous pretending great Fears of Popery but levelling all their Invectives against Persons the most remarkable for Loyalty and Conformity and clamouring for a speedy Reformation of I do not know what holding a great many Seditious Pamphlets in their Hands complaining railing petitioning threatning which when the Papists observed they very cunningly slipt away well knowing that they had too much alarm'd
above those who design mischief when they are awake and dream of nothing that is good when they are asleep above Popish Priests up to the Ears in Legends Fanaticks in Pulpits or Witches upon Bromstaves for his fancies are for the real good of others as well as for to please himself Parables are lively Pictures of significant truths and Morality was excellently described in Fables by a Heathen but it does not a little trouble me that the Beasts in Aesop should shame some men now a days who will not be convinc'd of the Errors and Mischiefs they are engaged in when they have the opportunity of being better taught by the truly ancient and Catholick Doctrine of the Church of England but her Adversaries the Jesuits and Fanaticks who deny the King to be Head of the Church do likewise reject the Reformation by his Authority the Papists Sham it and would make it a ridiculous Schism the Presbyterians though they renounce the Pope yet retain to themselves that Usurpation which was above 500 years a gaining by the Popes finding that such a Discipline was not consistent with the Doctrine of the Church of England Preach't up a Reformation more pure and primitive as they pretended the reasons we shall know afterwards Therefore the Emblem of the Church we saw in the last Vision having vanquish't and discovered the unjust Stratagems both of the Council of Trent and of the Assembly of Divines ordered her own Convocation of Orthodox and Learned Church-men to defend her for the future against both Papists and Presbyterians They were no sooner fat but in came Harding and boldly told them That they were a small obscure meeting of Calvinists that reformed the Church As soon as Bishop Jewel espied him That is very false said he I will tell you the truth and tell you otherwise in the Epistle I wrote concerning the Council of Trent to a Venetian Noble man my words relating to our Reformation are these For our selves we have done nothing but with very good reason nothing but what we saw to be lawfull and to have been practised by the Ancient Fathers without any reprehension at all wherefore we called a full Synod of Bishops and by common consent of all estates purged our Church as it were Augeas 's Stable of all superfluities which either the negligence or malice of men had brought in this was justly in our power to doe and because we could doe it we did it faithfully At this I was so encouraged as to ask Harding whether or no they were Calvinists or a small obscure meeting that signed the Judgment of the Convocation that the Pope cannot call them without the King's consent in the year 1536 there being present the Archbishop of Canterbury the Bishop of London 13 Bishops 49 Abbots c. Now the fatal blow was given to the Papal Authority in England and yet these could not be Calvinists nor were they few or contemptible indeed you Popish Writers are great adversaries to National Councils because they will look after the Civil Rights that the Court of Rome do not encroach upon them which a General Council wherein the Pope is what he pleases cannot therefore Cardinal Palavicini profoundly tells Lib. 14. cap. 12. us that Concilio Nazionale sempre abhorrito dà Pontifici That the Pope did always abhor a National Council and good reason because it sometimes stops that Torrent of Money which he says is so necessary to maintain the carnal felicity of the Church therefore we know why you stickle so much against the Methods of our Reformation which Mr. Shaw has well justified and Origo Protest which Dr. Burnet says was advanced with such deliberation in King Henry the Eight and King Edward the Sixth's time as is as great an evidence of the ripeness Part 1. Pag. 289. of their proceedings as can be shewed in any Church in any Age So that we were Reformed without that violence the German Divines were as the Letters between Osiander and Cranmer testifie or without Rebellion which is always the consequence of Popish Reformations At this he march't off and made room for Raynolds a Rhemish Renegado who came Busling up And although said he ye have fob'd off Mr. Harding yet I suppose I shall prove your Reformation to be a wicked Separation from the Roman Communion which the irreconcilable divisions among you testifie for hear what I say to Whitaker Pag. 481. Have you not at this present among you a great murmuring even amongst the Protestants against the Communion-Book and State of Religion which in the beginning of her Majesties Reign was Queen Elizabeth brought in If the Catholicks said nothing have you not the Puritans detesting your Faith and were it not for the Prince's Sword ready to dispossess you of Chairs and Churches I was mightily amazed to hear this for 't is 99 years ago since these words were Printed which a Gentleman observing See you not said he what a scandal these rascally Schismaticks are to our Reformation indeed the man foretold what too certainly came to pass but he must know that we do not acknowledge that any of their Principles had any share or part in it any more than they had in bringing in the King for in the days of Queen Mary Knox that peevish Puritan was as malicious towards the Orthodox in Francfurt as the Papists were to them in England And moreover 't is no wonder that they agree not with us for they disagree among themselves and are not the same they were Those in King Edward's time scrupled only some Ceremonies as Bucer Rogers and Hooper those in Queen Elizabeths time excepted against some Prayers Canons and Articles but now they are for Abolishing Supremacy and Episcopacy they have lay'd the Ax to the root and are gone so far from the Church of England that they are come round about to the Church of Rome and are worse Papists than any before the Reformation We perceive by Raynolds that the Jesuits very well knew this and therefore whilst the Presbyterians were busie to advance their Discipline they thought them fit tools to carry on their Fifth Monarchy their Principles being both alike destructive both of Church and State in order to which they quarrel with our Reformation and as the Pope and the Devil would have it Cry up a thorough one of their own Of which I will give you such a full sight if you will go along with me that you shall never forget it untill you are in heaven Pray Sir said I before you doe that let me know by what methods they brought their Discipline to that perfection in 48. I will not trouble you said he with a long relation of their several Cabals they had all King James his Reign he himself was sufficiently sensible of their restless humour and said What his Son King Charles found by experience that there were not greater thieves and cut-throats among the Highlanders and Borderers for as soon
it but you were reforming us to those Fantastical Customs from whence at first 't is probable that the Romish Corruptions had their beginning but what and if you thought to banish the Mass by taking away the Common-Prayer-Book 't is certain that you at the same time made room for the Targum and surely your Friends the Jews could not but smile at their return into England again to meet such plenty of Adonirams Obadiahs and Ichabods such blessed Reformers from Popery as would have sold them St. Paul's Church for a Synagogue who preach'd Christ to the Gentiles this was establishing his Throne Nineteenthly My Beloved We cannot help it cry'd Vines if the Turk should come in For that Horse of Superstition and Idolatry upon the Back of Vines to the Commons 1646. which the Devil hath in former times made war against the Church is slain under him and now he is mounted upon a fresh Horse of another Colour called Liberty of Opinion falsly called Liberty of Conscience Well done old Beelzebub cry'd a Cavalier laughing heartily a very good Jockey truly and very well mounted upon an Horse that will carry double and treble I hope he will be so gratefull to your Worships for helping him to him that he will take some of you up behind him one of these Days But for the Horse of Superstition and Idolatry did those Horses rout him which Cromwell brought into the Church watered at the Font and fed at the Communion Table assure your selves that those very Gentlemen who raised that abominable Lye concerning the Nag's-head are the Men that would make you believe that there is a Horse of Superstition grasing within the Pale of the Church of England although 't is hard to prove him to be lineally descended from those Horses upon which the Popes ride whilst Princes hold their Stirrop But since the Devil is mounted as you say we find he will not ride alone for your Brother the Quaker is got upon his Mare that may in time breed as many false Opinions as the Trojan Horse carried treacherous Grecians But how came we cry'd he from Hebrew to Horseback How replyed a Gentleman over Hedg and Ditch by leaping a Similitude of Vines's who compares the Service of the Church to an Horse of Idolatry whenas his Brethren who style themselves the Horsemen and Chariots of Israel are Heyryck to the Commons May 27 1646. nearer related to the old Centaures and his Horse of Opinions might as well have been a Hydra or the Beast with seven score Heads But my Friends cry'd he turning to the Presbyterians were not you forewarned of those very things of which ye now complain Did not the Authour of the Loyal Convert whoever he was thus argue with you in the Year 1643 Think you such swarms of Sectaries sweat Page 17. for nothing Are their Purses so apt to bleed to no end Will not their costs and pains expect at least a congratulatory connivance in the freedom of their Consciences Or will their Swords now in the strong possession of so great a multitude know the way into their quiet Scabbards without the expected Liberty of their Religions and can that Liberty produce any thing but an establish'd Disorder And is not Disorder the Mother of Anarchy and that of Ruine At this they being all silent for a considerable time he said again pray what do you your selves think to be the reason that your intended Reformation should so dismally miscarry What! replyed Faircloth why * Faircloth on John 7. 25. Pag. 25. Israel could not be cured without a full and total extirpation of all the accursed Things and Persons also That is replyed the Cavalier every Throat that could not swallow the Covenant was to be cut which amounted to some hundreds of thousands and by all the accursed things you meant whatever you called Popish But I protest Saints according to your Definition of Popery many things more Popish than any thing you objected against the Church escaped your sagacious Reformation Why did you not utterly abrogate all Leggs of Mutton Town and Country because they have the Popes Eye in every one of them Why was not the Man in the Almanack that great Malignant laid by the Heels whose Heart is influenc'd by Leo the name of a great many Popes Why did you not demolish all the Signs of the Cross-Keys of the Mitre and of the Cardinals Cap Why did ye suffer the Babylonish Game of Cross and Pile the Antichristian Game of Chess with Kings and Queens and Bishops in it Why was there a Toleration of Dice the very Bones of the Whore of Babylon with black Patches on them these were all dismal Tokens of the Beast and more the just Objects of your refining Zeal than many things you did abolish But to be serious with you after all the Remonstrances you made did the King ever deny to concur with you in a Legal Reformation of any abuse But instead of closing with him in calm and moderate Counsels you brought all things into Confusion with violent Invectives and distant Scandals the Peoples easy Fancies being the best grounds of your clamorous Arguments to prove the Ceremonies of the Church Popish and particular Irregularities of some few Clergy-men were made use of as a general Argument against its Discipline and Government whenas indeed the Faults of its Members are not its Constitutions nor did so good and just a King any more countenance them than your Rebellion and therefore they did not authorize you to revile the whole body of the Church much less to treat the best of its Members with such barbarous Insolencies without distinction as you have done and * De Moribus Eccl. Cath. Tom. 1. cap. 34. St. Austin if you will allow of any Saints but your selves hath taught you a better Lesson when he saith Nunc illud vos admoneo ut aliquando Ecclesiae Catholicae maledicere desinatis Vituperando mores hominum quos ipsa condemnat quos quotidie tanquam malos filios corrigere studet Now this I advise you that you cease at length to revile the Catholick Church by disparaging the manners of Men which it self condemns and whom as evil Sons it dayly endeavours to correct The words immediately before are Novi multos esse Sepulchrorum picturarum adoratores I know that there are many Worshippers of Tombs and Pictures So much Superstition could never be found among the Sons of the Church of England who might have found more Charity among Turks and less Inhumanity from Infidels than from you But you who could not endure one establish'd Religion let in at least 40 to drive it out as Foreigners themselves computed This was First my Beloved a plentifull Reformation You that could not allow the King any considerable Supplies towards the maintaining a Foreign War in which you engaged him could raise and consume 17 Millions Sterling in less than three Years in a Domestick War
Cardinals and Jesuits to burn them in Effigie in remembrance of the execrable Design of the Jesuits on the 5th of November it was very pleasant to hear the Porters out-rail the Factious Preachers and to see the Rabble warming themselves in the flaming Relicts of the Beast fancying the Whore of Babylon a kind of old Witch that was put to pain with the burning her Imps but I was most of all surprized to see a great many Papists in disguise as active and chearfull as any of the Company untill I perceived that although the Pope was burnt in Effigie yet several Protestants of the Church of England were the Persons that were aimed at to be sacrificed in Propriis Personis So that I withdrew as fast as I could but by the way I had a Copy of Verses put into my Hands which because they came from the warm Fancy of some Zealous Mongrel design'd for a Post of a Conventicle I have here set down as a Specimen of his Future Hopes Upon the Gun-Powder Treason Tell me the Man that can divulge the Traitour That under-ground did build this damn'd Theatre Had but this Plot stay'd untill to Morrow We had been like to Sodom and Gomorrah Iron Bars Gun-Powder Faggots and Deal Board They heapt up for to destroy thy People O good Lord. Whilst I was laughing with my Companion and descanting upon these Lines I wondred to see such a sudden and strange Change in the vast Multitude there met together the common People as if weary of idle Tumults began quietly to retire to their Business the Romish Priests sculk'd about and betray'd a world of Despair in their Looks the Fanaticks had put on their Suffering Complexions and look'd as heavy as smoak'd Beef so the People being dispersed some of the Company had unfortunately drop'd a strange new-fashion'd Idol which had a Belt on upon which was embroidered in Letters of Bloud the Association Good Lord what striving their was to keep it from being at first seen as if it had been the Cub of some hopefull Basilisk There was a small Company of the new-instituted Order of St. Ignoramus great Reformers of the third Commandment who proferr'd to wash their Hands in scalding Lead to swallow Fire and Brimstone and to doe harder things than the trial of the Ordeal to testify its Innocency nay its very non Entity But when that would not doe a couple of Foreigners endeavoured to take Possession of two considerable Forts that they might protect it and in order to that they would have accepted of the Votes of their very Country Puppets in Rare-Showes but all in vain for a numerous Company of Loyal and true hearted Englishmen broke in upon them and being made sensible of the several un-christian Artifices both of the Papists and Fanaticks to alter and destroy the establish'd Government lay'd their several Addresses at his Sacred Majestie 's Feet wherein they Religiously vow and promise to defend it At this time there came a Gentleman to me and pulling me by the Sleeve That our Fears and Jealousies said he might for ever vanish and our future Peace and Prosperity be real and lasting not onely the Loyal and true-hearted Nobility Gentry and Commonalty of the Realm but the Learned Clergy too are now doing their utmost endeavours to confute the Principles as well as prevent the Practices both of Papists and Fanaticks and if you will go along with me you shall see them as pleasantly baffled and exposed as your Heart can imagine or desire We went untill we came to a stately Theatre like that at Oxford wherein I was infinitely pleased to see such a number of Learned Writers of the Church of England on one hand of them sate those who had written in defence of the Romish Doctrines on the other sate Smectymnuus with many more late Writers of the Presbyterians The Solemnity began with Consorts of Musick and an Anthem sung by those of the Church of England the Subject of it was the Gun-Powder Treason the Martyrdom of King Charles the First and the Birth and Return of King Charles the Second which because it was in a strein something differing from that of our late Poet I have here set down Novemb. the 5th I. The Law came down and spoke Of Old in Fire and Smoak The terrible Thunder from around it broke Sure those Wretches vow'd To send up one as loud With the Law-giver in a smoakie Cloud Had our meek Moses gone To God and left us here alone Streightway some Calves as God's had sate Calves which Rome's Bulls would have begat How soon should we Have lost our new got Liberty And strangely have slidden back to th' old Idolatry Januar. the 30th II. Oh wondrous strange it was decreed That the Great Charles should bleed Not burn that Trial he Alas Did'scape because he was a worse to pass The Quintessence of Inhumanity Charles Ah! Charles that Sacred Name Our Pride and yet Eternal Shame Had'st thou an Infant Martyr been None had the Glory of thy setting seen Immortal Honour was design'd to Thee A Free-Will Offering to be So the Child Jesus was preserv'd From Herod's Cruelty Sad Bethlehem Massacre And for Mount Calvary reserv'd Chorus Long may we sing God save the King The Royal Martyr's Son By Wonders plac'd upon his Father's Throne Traytours in vain their Plots do lay Traytours do but themselves betray In vain their Treacherous Foes their Malice show His Crown of Light shall ne'er wax old His e'er will flourish that 's of Gold Charles now triumphs above Charles now triumphs below As soon as the Anthem was ended one in long Scarlet Robes stood up and turning to the Papists said Since so many Grave and Reverend Divines of the Church of England have so frequently confuted the Doctrines and Positions of your Church of Rome and yet you still perservere in your perfidious and rebellious Practices We therefore demand that the Fundamental Principles of such fatal Bigottry may be here openly exposed that the World may know what ridiculous Consequences and foolish Absurdities those Opinions are subject to for which you so zealously disturb the Peace of Christendom and give such occasion of Scandal to Turks and Infidels The Papists were so provok'd that they soon accepted the Challenge for immediately a Lane was made among them to give way for a Monster much like a Chinese Hieroglyphick in Kirker with a great many Hands Feet and Eyes and a Head representing the Terrestrial Globe on the top of which stood a Cupola As soon as one of our Church saw it he cryed out it is not lawfull to bring Briareus into a Christian Assembly Briareus said one of the Papists know you not that by this Emblem we represent the Universality of the Church of Rome do not you know that the Bishop of Rome is the Vniversal Bishop of the whole Catholick Church No replyed he I know it no more than the Pope of Rome Gregory the Great did not
words in it and besides what is worse you will be found in your Plea for the Dissenters to defend the Actions of the Scribes with the Language of the Pharisees though by the way you may chance to meet with the Whip for them that prophane the Temple and as smarting Correction for those that are Hypocrites in the Corners of the Streets But Sir did you ever reade any Punns or Quibbles in the Evangelists Did the Apostles Ridicule and Burlesque the Ceremonial Law though abolish'd Did they Droll upon or make sport with Kings or those that are in Authority under them Hermias a Christian Philosopher was the first that wrote Gentilium Philosophorum Irrisio a Book so called but is there no difference betwixt the Diabolical Magick of Heathenish Institutions and the decent Ceremonies of a Christian and Reformed Church No so it seems by you whilst those that constitute them are made no better than Numa Pompilius the first Roman Ritualist as you call him and the Orders appointed by them with whom Christ by the Blessed Spirit is promised to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the end of the World than the Palladium of Troy or the Image of Diana Thus you shew your Malice more than Wit in your disproportionable Similitudes and Examples whenas to expose a Child for its indifferent Innocency you might as well dress him in the Armour of one of the Titans and then frighten all Nations with him Your Instances Rejoynders Quotations are all the way of the same Nature which though at first glance they may seem to some to look upon the Church yet like the Parthians shoot another way yet you draw them in by the Head and Shoulders dress them up with Daisies and Primroses to amuse and cheat the easie Reader whenas a Judicious Eye that pierceth through the Buffoonry of such a Scribler will no more mistake him for a good Casuist than a Morrice-Dancer for a good States-Man had you like Janus look'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you might in the prophane abuse of all things Sacred in the late Blessed Reformation of the Dissenters have met with ridiculous Impieties that rather require the severe Lashes of a flaming Wit if Blasphemy Sacrilege and Treason do rather deserve them than Peace and Order But now to the purpose what do you in particular object against our Reformation Whig I tell you I clear the Articles of the Church of England from the Rubbish of Popery and Arminianism and since the Compassionate Enquirer has made a Syncope of the Name and Fame of St. Augustine alias Austin for confuting the Pelagian Heresie and since he pretends to rout him and the whole Synod of Dort that was of St. Austin's Mind with a whole long row of Fathers Greek and Latin then and there quoted I think I was no less bound after the Examples of our own Kings and Parliaments and many Writers of the Church knowing this Arminianism to be an inlet into Popery to oppose and expose it Pamp. Here is indeed the whole matter in short from Page 45 to 65 Onely Sir by the way there was no need of half that noise about it with all that ruffling of flanting Metaphors and learned Out-cry the design is to lay a new Indictment for the pretended Crime of Arminianism against the Church to help to run it down as in the late Rebellion but you want an Oliver Cromwell to make Evidence It had been as witty since you are got to Dort to say that St. Augustine's Name is begun in the Middle like an Holland Cheese as that a Syncope was made of it and much more to the Capacity of the Phlegmatick Tribe but Sir though he did not very well agree with Pelagius yet he would never have set up his Horses at Hippo with Aerius much less at Dort with any of his Successours therefore I do not know why the Church of England which is as considerable as the Church of Africa was should receive Ecclesiastical Government from Dort or Civil from Amsterdam We are neither Calvinists nor Arminians nor Pelagians nor Novatians but of the truely Ancient Catholick and Apostolical Church of England we have our own National Convocation And as for our Articles pray let them alone you have already filch'd away one of them viz. the 20th as the Papists have done the second Commandment But what was you going to say about Ceremonies and Reformation Whig For your Ceremonies I say they were left as a Key to Let in Papists and now they are a Lock to shut out Protestants Thus Indulgences and Remission of Sins were granted to all that would engage in the Holy Wars but in process of time were dispensed to them that would Massacre the Waldenses and Albigenses Thus the Inquisition was first set up to discover the Hypocritical Moors of Spain but the edge of it since turn'd against the Protestants Pamph. Here are two more Instances that have been upon the Tenter-hooks these hundred years but when will you prove the Ceremonies of the Church comparable to Romish Indulgences or the Penal Laws to the Inquisition when the Moon has Calv'd and left you her horns for a Legacy But that is not the End why they are retain'd and if they were Abolish'd you would discover your selves to be worse than Hypocritical Moors by a Rebellion of which neither the Waldenses Albigenses or Protestants in Spain were ever guilty Whig I say they are Popish and therefore your Reformation wants a Reformation for as one said The English have driven the Pope out so hastily that he has left his Garments behind him And therefore we desire a Reformation of what is necessary and as often as is necessary Pamph. I will make bold with an Answer from Bishop Sanderson It were good saith he for your own selves that you may not Rove in infinitum and in compassion to us that you would give us a perfect Boundary of what is Popery now with some Prognostication or Ephemerides annex'd if you please whereby to conclude what will be Popery seven years hence Therefore propose what you would have Reform'd Whig Before I come to particulars I must say what honest Gerson said of old There can be saith he no General Reformation without the Abolitions of sundry Canons and Statutes which neither are nor reasonably can be observed in these times which doe nothing but ensnare the Consciences of men to their endless perdition no Tongue is able to express what evil what danger and confusion the neglect and contempt of the Holy Scriptures which doubtless is sufficient for the Government of the Church else Christ had been an imperfect Law-giver and the following of Humane Inventions hath brought into the Church Serm. in die circ Pamph. Truly friend this is too long-wasted and looks as you say like a Shrimp in a Lobster's Symar What does this signifie to us you might as well have scrape'd an Objection out of the Minor-Poets for he neither talks of our Canons nor
THE VISIONS OF THOROUGH REFORMATION The Royall Armes doth Presbyter defâ—â—â— To Paint the Comon Wealth 's upon the pâ—â—â— Thus to Reform from Popery he draw's A Cross the Comon Seal toth good old Câ—â—â—â— Thus when the Kingdom turns a Comon weâ—â— The Imperiall Crown will be the Popes by Steâ—â— THE VISIONS OF THE Reformation OR A DISCOVERY OF The Follies and Villanies that have been Practis'd in Popish and Fanatical Thorough Reformations since the Reformation of the Church of England WITH A DIALOGUE betwixt the Authour of Melius Inquirendum and a Priest of the Church of England By Edward Pettit M. A. the Authour of The Visions of Purgatory Quod unquam vidit saeculum tot subditorum in Principes Bella sub Religionis titulo horum Concitores nunc reperiuntur Ministri Evangelii uti se vocant Grot. de Antich LONDON Printed for Joanna Brome 1683. TO THE READER Courteous Reader 'T IS whisper'd that Morpheus never walks in his sleep but when the Brains of Mercury's winged Head drop into his leaden Heels When you shall have perus'd these ensuing Papers you will conclude that although I have taken a long nap I have had but little rest However my Memory is not so defeated but I may be able to make a discovery of such Passages as may be profitable for your Instruction and pleasant for your Diversion The Scenes indeed are laid in Visionary-Lands but the Actours of the ensuing Tragi-comedies were not Fairies or Hobgoblins but men of Renown and famous in their generation and though they be but Dreams they lively represent the Substantial Miseries which Ruffled the last Age and Threaten this The subject matter you will find in the Title Page more of it in the Contents and most of all in the whole Book If the Manner and Style of my Writings should make thee sneeze like Guinea-Pepper I hope 't will clear thy head and then thou wilt clear me If any shall take snuff that I pick such holes in the Purple of the Trent-Fathers I have done no more than what Matthew Paris said long ago of the 4th Lateran Council Concilium illud Generale quod more Papali Grandia prima fronte prae se tulit in risum scomma desiit quo Archiepiscopos Episcopos Abbates Decanos Archidiaconos omnesque ad id Concilium accedentes Ludificatus est If their own Writers thus boldly speak the truth why should we be silent who have been provok'd by such injuries and instructed by such sad and long experience I have therefore endeavour'd to drag into the Light from the very Land of Darkness the whole Scheme and Mystery of the Ridiculous Impieties of an Hypocritical Superstitious and Rebellious Age and to expose them to the just scorn and contempt of the Vnderstanding World Why should not the foolish wickednesses of men be scourg'd in a strain that may make them most sensible of them Who ever met with an Academy of Complements for a Generation of Vipers or a Help to Discourse with a Drove of Asses 'T is true that the Follies of Mankind do rather require our grief than our mirth but Tears will flow as well from excessive laughter as sorrow Let men pretend what they will our affections will be suitable to the Genuine Nature of their Actions and therefore what mortal man could forbear Hummering to see Friar Juniperus an old mossy over-grown Coxcomb playing at Titter-totter with the little Boys to testifie forsooth his Humility or to reade of the Flemish Capuchin's inviting half a dozen Devils to come and lodge in his Corpusculum for fear of catching cold when he had driven them out of another man this I suppose was a Cast of his Charity Have not these men Reform'd Religion into superfine Notions But come hither good Reader Suppose younder Cobler should in an ecstasie skip out of his Bulk and pretend to Reform an Apothecarie's Shop would it not be enough to split the sides of half the Country to see what a delicate Dose his Worship would soon give himself by a lick from every Individual Gally-pot Could you on the other hand forbear smiling to see how a pack of grave and solemn Knaves do Skulk and Leer when they see those eyes that pierce through the varnish of their pretences into the villany of their designs to see what ugly faces they make when a witty and just Satyr tickles their Guilty Consciences So true is the Saying of the Poet Ridiculum acri Fortius melius magnas plerumque secat res But we have greater than Poetical Licence even the Examples of the Holy Fathers and of the Holy Scriptures too What severe Ironies do we meet with in Irenaeus adversus Haereses lib. 1. cap. 5 But in the Holy Scriptures we meet with many to shew that their folly shall be manifest unto all men 2 Tim. 3. 9. And that they might proceed no farther the Prophet Elijah surrendred up the Priests of Baal to the fatal consequences of their strong delusion by Sarcasms that Bit as deep as their Knives wounded 1 King 18. 27. But we do not desire that the superstitious of our Age should sacrifice but amend themselves Dr. Brown in his Hydriotaphia calls the 14 Chapter of Isaiah a Poetical Taunt and the Prophet Habakkuk threatens a Taunting Proverb 2. 6. the Philippians are bid to beware of Dogs cap. 3. v. 2. and the Psalmist says He that sitteth in the Heavens shall have them in derision Psal 2. 4. and the righteous shall laugh at him Psal 52. 6. Our Saviour himself whipt the buyers and sellers out of the Temple which they had made a den of Thieves But this way of writing is at present most necessary We have the Reprobate Ghosts of Celsus Porphery and Lucian stalking in the shapes of the prophane Scriblers of this disobedient Age. And therefore 't is time that the Counterfeit enchantments of such Magicians who encourage a Rebellion which is as the sin of witchcraft should be destroyed and themselves scourged with the same Rod. Now as these men offend in the subject Matter of their Writings so ought we to take care that we offend not in the Manner of ours we ought to keep within the bounds of Religious Modesty for though the Scriptures are as sharp as a two-edged Sword and may wound to the healing they do not venom to the destroying I could never conceive that that is true wit which is either prophane or immodest any more than that the Devil is in the true shape of a Man when he has a Cloven foot I thank God I always detested the one as I have renounc'd the other Besides as the Truth needs no lies so neither does Vertue any thing that is impure for its defence the case of the immodest woman Deut. 25. 11 12. has a Moral signification which is that how great obligations soever we have to defend Goodness yet we ought not to doe it by the discovery of those wicked actions of which
King Edward the Sixth to remove all those devices by which the Popish Clergy had enslaved the Nation and that it might be parallel with the Primitive Doctrine of the Church it suffered a short but violent Persecution under Q. Mary untill her Death set Q. Elizabeth upon the Throne and restored the Reformation to its fullest perfection Never were Church and State more happy whose united Interests seem'd founded upon a Rock never to be separated or removed The first years of her Reign promised a Succession of Halcyon Ages and the Kingdom look't like the World new born from the darksome Womb of the Chaos calm Glories o'respread the happy Isles whose Lands resembled the Virgin Spring after the deluge and successes Crown'd the Seas The Excellency of Paradise were given to the Vallies and the Beauty of Lebanon to the Mountains the Wildernesses blossom'd like a Rose and Gleams of Joy warm'd the Northern World But oh cry'd he at this he seem'd melted into tears the frailty of all immoderate Excellency This Mother Church soon found a generation of Vipers in her own Bowels This Reformation which was advanced by such wise Methods was at once utterly confounded by as strange ones as ever astonish't the World we find in the Chronology of Helvicus Fanaticks of Renown Contemporary with Luther the Devil thought it was time to bestir him when he saw the Intrigues of his Kingdom of Darkness in such manifest danger of discovery and therefore sent his Enthusiastical Agents whose rebellious projects and loud blasphemies were more serviceable to him than the Pope's Nuncio's King Henry the 8th himself in his Preface to the Book of Articles observes That as Superstition and Prophaneness were purged away so a spirit of presumption dissention and carnal liberty were breaking in The German heats and violences bred a Pestilential Sect of Anabaptists in the very Infancy of the Reformation and what in respect of us was more unhappy than the Marian Persecution those who fled to Foreign Plantations of the Gospel brought home with them a Political Discipline utterly inconsistent with the methods of our wise and pious Reformers or with the fundamental Laws of the Kingdom for which they had no Evangelical or Apostolical Precept and although they little foresaw what dismal Schisms such different Schemes of Church-Government would necessarily produce yet they certainly were the first occasions of our Civil Wars and home-bred Factions which has made the Reformation a hissing and scandal to Foreigners who judge of our affairs by the event not knowing the Causes and condemn us in general for the extravagant Villanies which the ambitious Frensies of some particular men have publickly acted Sir I wish it were possible said I that you could appear openly for then those many people who are deluded would be convinc'd of these things you say Hold you there Sir said he that is the way to be called a Malignant Popish Tory Apparition a vagrant Hobgoblin of the Church of England they would swear that I kill'd my self Popishly and crossed my self with my Sword and all true Protestant Conjurers would be binding me to my good behaviour in the bottom of the Red Sea but you can't think Sir how I am troubled that my head should appear for a Sign to a Haberdasher of Sedition upon Ludgate-hill but pray tell the Gentleman who lives there when he is at home that he will never leave till he is lay'd by the heels in order to the having his own exalted upon a Pole untill the Coxcomb looks like a true Protestant Indian Cabbage But as for those people who have such a great fancy for nonsense what sort of Logick will convince them a man must dispute with them with his heels upward but as for a Ghost he will find it a difficult thing to put his face into shapes enough to please them and besides they have forged so many lies about Spirits and Apparitions that they will not believe truths And since they will not believe Moses and the Prophets the Apostles and Evangelists the Fathers and Councils but are utterly against every thing that is Orthodox neither will they be convinc'd though Steven Marshal himself arose from the dead whose last words ought to be more heeded than all his Preaching through the whole course of his life when he so often cry'd out King Charles King Charles and testified so much horrour and regret for the bloody confusions he had promoted nor was he the only man that had those stings of Conscience upon him but I could tell you the name of one of the 104 Godly a great Sequestrator who seem'd a mighty Zealot all along untill he came to dye but then he was not fit to be seen by Malignants because to the astonishment of that party who Reprobate every body else without a Fever or Frensie his Conscience which could digest the bread of so many Orphans and Widows that allowed him to protect the Estates of Papists whilst he plundered the Church under the notion of Popery nay that could dispence with him to rob the good Old Cause it self and keep her Money for her several years now pull'd off her Mask and frighted him as if so many Devils had been about his bed it full sorely convinc'd him but I do not hear that they cared much for his Conscience when it had done getting of money or prove any thing the honester for it Therefore since such serious occasions cannot move them I think it the best way for you to laugh them out of those stubborn and foolish humours which subject the Nation to such real Miseries and deplorable Calamities as it lately felt by a thorow Reformation if you run into such disorders again it will be question'd whether ye be Chronicled for the greater Fools or they for the greater Knaves to prevent which there is variety of means and all lawfull and necessary frowning and laughing are performed by the same sinews and may have both the same ends and I do not reade any one Canon of Scripture against bitter Ingredients in the cure of a desperate disease Go therefore to the Zealous of the Land and tell them who surfeit with Preaching and are sick of the Prayers of the Church who are light-headed with Reformations and want of sleep who would have all the World of their opinions and yet are not of the same mind one hour who pretend to love nothing but God and their Wives that they are desired either to leave off hatching of Disciplines and Governments or multiplying and encreasing for they will certainly doe one of these things either they will people the Nation with Ideots for 't is remarkable that the very genius of this people is much altered since Tobacco and Revelations grew so cheap and there is scarce a Fanatical family of note which has not some one or others of it who have the Cramp very signally upon their Intellectuals or else they will beget a Generation that will breed teeth only to bite
and devour one another Or lastly a Generation that will either curse them or laugh at them who will fill all their Stages with one anothers Grandsires and to convince them of this show them only what has been done by ours that were before us both by true Papists and true Protestants as they call themselves either under the pretence or notion of a thorow Reformation you will find that though they have two faces that look different ways yet they have both the same Lineaments the same Principles the same Practices and both impudently deny them like the two men that stole the piece of Flesh from the Butcher in the Fable He that took it swore he had it not he that had it swore he did not take it who took it or who has it I do not know quoth the Butcher but by Jove ye are a couple of Knaves this was one of the first Associations but now the Mystery of Iniquity is compleat because they both make it a Mystery and untill the time to come discover fully the truth of things present pray give the World an Impartial Account of what has been done by the Papists first and then by the Presbyterians and then ye may guess for the future why they are so like one another who they are that Reform Murther it self that can stab men without spilling a drop of Blood or secretly rejoyce at it when 't is done without being guilty that can Rebell without Plotting and Plot without Rebelling by observing what has past in the last Age you will know what a great and glorious Reformation they are endeavouring now With that he put his hand to my head and I expected that he would have clapt a face to the nape of my neck and have made a Janus of me but he only stroak'd me o're the forehead and then vanish'd Right Worshipfully His hand was so very cold and put my head into such a dizziness that I could not tell where I was for the first thing I stumbled at was the Threshold of St. Peter's Church in Rome and I fell backward into the year 1534 it was on St. Peter's day Pope Clement was seated in his Throne in his Pontificalibus and all the Cardinals with Generals of Orders Bishops Abbots c. which made a very splendid show the Anthems then sung were excellent Composures and the Musick extraordinary to carry on the Solemnity of the day when on a sudden a great Groan was heard as if some Infernal spirit had howl'd in Disdiapason and as well as I could distinguish it cryed Reform At this the Eunuchs could not sing one Note more but made noises like hoarse Cuckows the Cardinals Hats began to flag and the Gems in the Triple Crown were in an Eclipse and there was so great an Earth-quake that the Church had like to have fallen on their heads had not a lame fellow whom no body then knew but afterwards proved to be Ignatius Loyola stept out and like another St. Dominick * Who slew 120000 of the Albigenses and therefore the Pope fancied he saw him uphold the Lateran Church upheld it At this they hasted in great amazement to the Consistory in Monte Cavallo as soon as I got in there entred several Nuncio's from England and Germany that lookt as if they had been affrighted and sent home with Bottles tied to their tails for one brought the sad Message that there was no more Peterpence to be Coyn'd in Histor Con. Trid. England that that King denied the payment of Annales that a Comedy had been acted before him to the disgrace of the Pope and his Court who had used too great precipitation in the Case of the Divorce not out of Conscience for those Dispensations were very usual and found advantageous to the Old Vicar but to keep on the profitable debate Another brought the News of the Liberty of the Augustan Confession And a third of the Victory of Wittenberg A fourth related how solicitous Charles the Fifth was for a General Council These things so troubled Clement the Seventh that calling him a great He Emperour he fell sick and dyed and was succeeded by Cardinal Farnese named Paul the Third The first business he took in hand was to stop those spreading alterations which threatned Rome it self for in Faenza a Town belonging to the Pope there was Preaching against the Church of Rome Anno 1528 and therefore as soon as the Consistory met a Cardinal who seemed much dejected stood up and said The holy City of Rome which has been famous for Prodigies ever since the days of Livie the Recorder was never more threatned with them than now for 't is certain that the Statua of the Blessed Virgin in Sancta Maria Magior wept Icicles for the Revolt of the frigid Zone and not knowing what those German Hereticks who threatned to eat the Pope might doe she had got the holy Wafer in her Armes to protect the Corporal Presence Her Ladyship of Loretto was packing up for Damascus and if she had once gone your Holiness might have whistled long enough in St. Peter's Keys for her several Images have had a Quartan Ague and what is more than all several souls come chattering their Teeth out of Purgatory and complain that they have had a very deep Snow lately therefore we ought to take a speedy course to prevent our ruine and I know no better way than Fryar James Hogostrate's a Dominican Inquisitor who advised Leo the Tenth to prosecute Luther with Chains and Gibbets For since Piety and Miracles ceased all great Actions are to be done with Fire and Sword by these we consumed the Hussits Lollards and Waldenses and all other Modern Goths and Vandals have been so far kept from sacking Rome that they have been buried from time to time in their own Country for rather than they should damn their souls and we lose our money I think your Holiness should thunder out Excommunications overturn all set the World on fire kindle the North-pole with Piles of flaming Hereticks make the frozen Seas boil over with heat untill sodden Whales make them greasie with their fat and swim for coolness under the Aequator He strain'd so fiercely that Leeches crept out at his Eyes and Nose which was taken for a Miracle to confirm the truth of what he said but Pope Paul the Third whose chief vertue was dissimulation being a subtile Fox and not willing to bark loud untill he could bite having composed his Whiskers that his mouth became a solemn Parenthesis was pleased most Infallibly to say We in vain cut off the member that is Gangreen'd if we neglect to take care of the head which is fatally ill The splendour of our Church cannot hide the extravagancy of our lives and not only bold Hereticks will be peeping into our Transgressions but even the Sons of the Church will be seeing what their Fathers doe with so much money as they drein from the veins of the living
Andrew Dudithius Bishop of five Churches as learned as any in that Council says to Maximilian the Second Emperour That In Epist ad Imp. needy and hungry Bishops came to Trent youths for the most part without Beards given to Riot and Luxury hired only to give their voices as the Pope pleased that the Council did not seem to consist of Bishops but of disguised Maskers not of Men but of Images such as Daedalus made that moved by Nerves which were none of their own Hireling Bishops who as Country Bag-pipes could not speak but as breath was put into them This is the Council the Papalins do so magnifie who flourish with Fathers and Councils and like Puddle-water reflect all the glories of the firmament when they may be fathom'd with a finger But Sir said I the designs of this are as deep as Hell and come from the very bottomless pit They doe so replyed the French man almost drown'd in tears Oh my poor Country which these transubstantiated Devils incarnate have almost ruin'd the Alps are not whiter with Snow than the Vallies are red with Blood What Bloodshed Massacres and irreconcilable Enmities did this Holy Synod procure us by the Holy League which these Holy Fathers contrived What alterations in Council did the Death of the Duke of Guise occasion when the Scheme of their Villanies was broken how easie is it from your History to trace the Causes of all the Civil Wars of France the liberty of the Gallican Church and the Supremacy of the French King were things that troubled the Court of Rome more than the Protestants the Persecution of which was only a Stale and to facilitate their grand design which was to destroy the Royal Family to consume the Nobility to divide the Commonalty so that the Pope might take what remained into his Fatherly Protection Do not you think Sir said he very earnestly that the Speech of de Ferrieres stuck in their Gizards and that particular clause That the Authority of the French King was not founded upon the Pragmatique or Concordates and Privileges given by Popes but upon the Law of Nature Hist Con. Trid. 723. Holy Scriptures Ancient Councils and the Law of Christian Emperours And how was his Holiness moved with the French Protestation for Abrogation of Proponentibus Legatis Did not the Fathers find great fault with the Government of France and how do they mention several things included in the very words of the Holy League what a mystick saying was that of the Pope's to Cardinal Lorain the great Agent in that Rebellion about Reforming France and how oft would he say That the Greatness of that Cardinal was profitable to the ends he had in aiming at some matters of great moment that he must shut up the Council provide Money and afterwards said he that shall happen which shall please God We have heard since Sir said I by Dr. Durel your Country-man that all the methods of that Villany were lay'd at Rome which several Papers have discovered Hold you there Sir said he think you that the Jesuits are such fools as to confess upon such pitifull dumb Evidences as Papers and Writings they that would swear the World out of their senses that can swallow Oaths without fear of splitting and fancy them only a composition of words got together by chance Think you that they fear kissing the out-side of that Book when they have denied the Truths contained in it or value the testimony of any Writings that debase the Authority of Scriptures Alas they are Scepticks as to every thing that shall hinder their designs and that Rule which our Saviour gives in the doing Charity they mis-apply to Actions of Sedition and Treason Let not their left hand know what their right hand does Do you think they believe that there was a Letter ever delivered to Monteagle No they deny all the Powder-Treason and are ready to swear that the Gun-powder was conveighed into the Cellar by those who went to search it I wonder they have not found out that Faux only walk't in his sleep and so 't was all a dream As for the people of France they have reason enough to have their eyes opened and to see and know what a glorious Reformation the Moulinists who are lineally descended from the Trent Fathers may in time produce both Princes and People have reason enough to take warning the same Principles are always qualified for the same Practices and although every Rebellion differs from others because of the change of Persons and Circumstances yet they commonly run Parallel in many material things and occurrences Alas the growing greatness of the King of France is so little an argument of his Posterities security that 't will ruine them he is but the Jesuits Cormorant to catch the Fish which they will eat and when ever they get the Popedom they will soon discover what an insignificant thing it is to be an universal footstool and how easily they will trample upon Monarchy for to the singular advantages they have above any Pope that ever lived they will have this extraordinary one of perpetuating the Popedom in their order therefore 't is that they magnifie and extoll the Council of Trent whose Canons of Doctrine and Discipline whose Decrees of Reformation do so directly tend to this great end and well they may boast of it for I think there never was the like in the world Yes verily by your discourse Sir said I you have rubbed up my memory that I have found out a renowned Gang of Theologues that look as if they were spit out of their mouths and who should these Gentlemen be but the Assembly of Divines sitting at Westminster in the late Rebellion Now although in their Preface to the Annotations upon the Scriptures they call it the Pseudo-Synod of Trent yet I will prove that there were better Protestants in Trent at that time and some more against the essential Points of Popery than this very Assembly of Divines and certainly such they were who declared against the impious and unchristian Stratagems of the Court of Rome from whom this Assembly seems to Copy all their Transactions Let the Devil take it ill if he pleases that I show to the world how pitifully he is put to his Politicks to keep up the custom and credit of Rebellion by vamping up old projects and playing an old game over again with new shapes of Hypocrisie I cannot help it the truth must out and there is nothing certainer than that as the Council of Trent was composed of men either very ignorant or prevailed upon by threats Vid. His Con. Trid. and fears or bigots to the Interests of the Court of Rome So the Assembly of Divines whom the two Houses applyed in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 183. an unwonted way to advise of Church affairs were not legally convened or chosen nor did they act in the name of all the Clergy of England nor with freedom and
impartiality could they doe any thing being limited and confined if not over-awed to doe and declare what they did How did the Cabals of Presbyterians and the Consistory jump in the methods of their Consultations And as the Pope either made or found Bishops enough in Italy to prevail in that Council so likewise did they by the same ways gain enough to compose their Decrees of Faith and Discipline and to silence all opposition With what a glorious Reformation did they a long time amuse the world as the Pope did in his Council and what did it come to Why as the Jesuits a small party at first which pretended to live by begging have got the start of them and do now threaten to overthrow the whole Hierarchy of the Romish Church so the Independents broke in upon them and routed their Discipline Did they not compose a solemn Covenant which is sufficiently shown to be exactly parallel with the Holy League And as the pretence of that in France was to destroy the Hugonots when as indeed it more immediately tended to the pulling down the Kingly Authority and the Liberty of the Gallican Church so this in England was pretended against the Papists under which notion they ruined Monarchy and Episcopacy Did not the Council of Trent tax Charles the Ninth as Hist Con. Trid. pag. 726. a favourer of Hugonots and did not our Assembly accuse the King as a Defender of Papists how did they Libel all honest Divines The Authour Mr. White Nov. 17. 1643. which opposed their wickedness as the Courtiers of Rome did the honest Fathers in the Council of Trent The Assembly ordered publick Thanksgivings when their Forces were beaten by the Kings So the Fathers assembled in Trent made Processions sung Mass and the Archbishop of Metz made an Oration for the Victory as they called it which the Duke of Guise had over the Hugonots when as there was 5000 Catholicks and but 3000 Protestants Hist Coun. Trent p. 606. slain The Assembly to make the good Old Cause look big vaunted that all foreign Churches of Protestants View of the late Troubles p. 564. sided with them but when they sent to know their opinions and expected that they would assent to and encourage them in their Proceedings Verdict upon Mel. Inquirendum they all condemned them So Cardinal Amulius brought Letters concerning the Oriental Christians that they did own the Pope and his Religion but the Portugal Ambassador confuted Hist Counc Trent 535. them as forgeries If they thus agree in their Plots certainly the issue will be almost alike replyed the French man Just as I was going to answer him I was interrupted with such a noise of sighing groaning and sobbing that I thought the wild Irish had got under a Tub at their Funeral Lamentations whenas a Scene opened and discovered a great number of men who looked so devout and so Saint-like that I fancied the very Flies about their heads ready to turn into Seraphims their hands were lifted up to catch their eyes that were ready to fly out of their heads and their faces with white Caps turned up made them look as if they were sick of the world But that which amazed me most of all was to see Salmasius and Grotius come stumbling in at a back door and as soon as Salmasius saw them Was there ever such a pack of hypocritical fools said he since the invention of Nonsense as this Assembly of Divines Good Lord how was Grotius amazed when he understood that they came from Trent for he always fancied that they came from Geneva Whence soever they come cry'd Salmasius they are plotting some Villany for now they are busie about a Fast that they may the more greedily devour the flesh of Kings and mighty men as they strain it these are the sober godly party that occasioned the Civil Wars of England Is the Authour of Melius Inquirendum among them replyed Grotius No Myn Heer said I he is busie in procuring another to succeed this Who is that said Salmasius Another Milton Sir said I I hope the King of England will thank him according to Law one of these days for the great and timely pains he took in his Book in which he says that yours which you wrote de Jure Belli Pacis has occasioned all the Civil Wars that have been in Europe ever since He may as well say replyed Grotius that Mare Liberum is Latin for Liberty of Conscience for why should my Book which was written in Latin move the Rabble the chief instruments of that Rebellion to those unparallell'd Exorbitancies who understood not a word of it therefore 't is their fault For there Aug. de Util. Cred. Tom. 6. cap. 1. will ever be a difference between an Heretick and a plain well meaning man that believes an Heretick saith St. Austin who taught them as many Treasonable Doctrines in English as ever Lucifer could invent in Hell And although he seems very tender of Hurting Loyal Ears upon the account of my Writings yet he prosesses the same Loyalty his Predecessors did in the late Rebellion which he lays at my door that he may with the more impudence proceed in those very practices which directly tend to the same end But since he is for sprinkling in a sentence or two of my Writings to justifie his own pray let him take this along with him too wherein I clearly show my opinion concerning the Causes of Rebellion Circumferamus oculos per omnem Historiam quod unquam vidit soeculum tot subditorum in principes Grot. de Antich bella sub Religionis titulo Et horum Concitores nunc reperiuntur Ministri Evangelii uti se vocant Let us look through all History what Age ever saw so many Rebellions against Princes and those that raise them are now found to be Ministers of the Gospel as they stile themselves Such as himself now is such as were this Blessed Assembly of Divines and that holy Council of Trent which first shew them the way to suppress Episcopacy and Monarchy who first taught them the sanctified methods of Reforming Princes and Prelates wherein they have infinitely out-done their Masters for the Fathers in Trent were forced to disguise themselves under many Stratagems before they could get those Decrees pass which was the end and scope of that most Popish Council but our Assembly-men fell upon them first with the greatest impudence and violence imaginable deluding the Nation with a fair pretence of thorough Reformation and the Suppression of Popery The Devil always provides a Vizard for his Agents and Murtherers can cry A Race a Race when they are running quite away Murtherers quoth Salmasius I think this Assembly will not own that they were guilty of the Murther of the King no more were the Jesuits of the Death of the King of France that fell by the hands of Raviliac they in the Council of Trent procured the King-killing Decrees they
fomented the fatal divisions of that Kingdom to establish the Throne of Christ's Vicar upon the Ruines of the Monarchy they instructed and encouraged the Assassins and yet they did not kill him 't is easie to apply it but 't is hard to make them believe it I believe so too Sir said I for with the same confidence that the Jesuits could splendidly embalm the heart of that * Henry 4. Prince whom they had traiterously Murthered do our Presbyterians seem to lament for the Death of King Charles the First and who but they restored King Charles the Second who now such Defenders of the Regalia of France as the Jesuits and Father Maimbourg writes against the Usurpations of the Pope who but Presbyterians are Loyal Subjects who but they the Preservers of their Country and of the true Protestant Religion Hiccius Doxius of Colchester writes his Black Nonconformist and Dedicates it to the Archbishop of Canterbury just as * Answered by Dr. Durel Philanax Anglicus a Jesuit did before him these are the men that are so irreconcilable to Popery that every honest Orthodox Church-man is a Jesuitical Tory and is mark't out in Libels and Pamphlets to the Rabble who have a fair occasion to complement him when they Cart the Whore of Babylon through the streets of London These are your true Protestant Processions wherein they burn the Pope in Effigie that they may establish his Authority for the multitude are as ready to change Crucifie him into Hosanna's as Hosanna's into Crucifie him they are but as Dogs to Perk that fair game the Jesuits never want a consecrated Gun to shoot at this is the old game of 41 but they will neither acknowledge their former guilt nor fear that punishment which attended it which King Charles says was like that of Corah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 261. and his Complices at once mutining both against Prince and Priest in such a method of divine Justice as is not ordinary the earth of the lowest and meanest people opening upon them and swallowing them up in just disdain of their ill-gotten and worse-used Authority upon whose support and strength they chiefly depended for their building and establishing their designs against me the Church and State As soon as I had spoken these words the roof was in a moment uncovered and there descended the most glorious object that ever I beheld it was in the shape of a Virgin Beautifull as the Sun and which had all the Charms of Heaven and Earth her garments were not very rich but decent and comly her eyes piercing as lightning and on her face was enthron'd all the glories of modesty and innocency her feet which were bare seemed torn and bloody with Thorns and Briars on her right hand sat Kings and Princes and immediately next her King Charles the First with a Crown of light upon his head her left was guarded with a long row of Reverend Prelates in garments white as Snow she no sooner descended with a quickning light all about her but both the Trent Fathers and Assembly of Divines were so strangely Metamorphosed that I could not distinguish them from Devils or from one another for the Fucus and Paint of Hypocrisie upon their faces with which they had deluded and bewitch'd such multitudes of people melted off with the warmth of her Rays and she no sooner espied them but with an angry grief she threatned to make them in a short time as contemptible and odious to future Ages as the worst Hereticks in the world ever were I have said she turning and looking around her travelled through the Wilderness of this World now more than Sixteen hundred years and never yet could find any long-continued abode or resting-place But when the Defenders of the Faith like true Christian Champions had set me free from my long and dark imprisonment and had restored me to my Primitive purity and just Authority the Honour the Peace the Plenty I brought to these Kingdoms made me reflect not only upon their gratitude but their interest too for my security But wo is me I still like the Sun must pass through Clouds of various shapes which are every where drawn from the combined humours of a feculent world yet never was I so much darkned with sorrow and lamentations as in these Islands for the unparallell'd Indignities inflicted upon my head and my members by the most ungratefull men upon the most unjust accusation that ever was lay'd to my charge by Heathens or Infidels I who freed them from the Tyranny of the Bishop of Rome and all his detestable enormities was condemned and torn in pieces as guilty of Popish Superstitions So my great Bridegrome was accused as instrumental to the bringing the old Romans to take away the Place and Nation of the Jews but their destruction followed his Crucifixion and the Rebellious divisions of those very Jews provok't the Roman Emperours and lay'd them open to that final vengeance that they left that Land delug'd with blood which they found overflown with Milk and Honey Oh my people of England whom I love and pity with the tenderest compassion and with an unlimited charity Oh that ye weeping said she would know in this your day the things that belong unto your peace that ye would open your eyes and see and consider who they are that will by undiscreet zeal preposterous fears or an ambitious policy subject you to a more intollerable bondage than ever this Nation yet felt Are they not those Pharisaical Hypocrites which strain at a Gnat but swallow a Camel who Pray against Popery in the Church but Preach Jesuitism in the Conventicle who fight against me under a form of Godliness who for a pretence make long Prayers and thorough Reformations that they may destroy Widows houses and God's too Certainly ye have been sufficiently taught from the Calamities ye have lately felt without comparing them to others of a farther distance of time and place not to trust to any change of that Government which was restored with so Universal satisfaction and has still preserved you in peace but by an union of Loyal and truly Christian Resolutions to maintain it against all opposition upon what pretence soever which thing if ye doe then shall ye be delivered from the Presbyterianism of the Council of Trent and from the Jesuitism of the Assembly of Divines from Popish Leagues and Protestant Covenants from the Good Old Cause with a new name to it from establishing Christ's Throne upon the Blood Of Pious Prelates and of Christian Kings From Killing God's Anointed to his Glory From Prayers in unknown words for unknown things And from the Mass and from the Directory THE Third VISION OF THE REFORMATION A short Vindication of the Reformation of the Church of England The Methods the Presbyterians used to ruine it A full Description of their thorough Reformation Parallel desideratur IT is a great and lawfull conveniency that a well-meaning man has in Visions
as they by the same computation the Devil tells his Legions found that they were grown so numerous and strong as to make a prevalent Party in every County then they set up their Patriots whom they raise and then admire as Boyes do Paper-Kites These were the men that should Trounce Antichrist that should toss the Pope and all his Cardinals in Blankets that should purge out all superfluities of Popish Idolatry and make the Nation as clean as a peny indeed new Brooms sweep clean but they turned into rods to scourge it at last by their Ordinances as Resolutions viz. Resolved That the Kingdom be put into a posture of defence March 2. 1641. Now I would fain know against whom Against one another said I you know Sir the Spaniards sometimes at an Execution as soon as the person is hang'd do draw all their Swords we can't suppose that 't is to kill the man that is dead and it had been well for this Nation if as the Spaniards put up their Swords again quietly they had put themselves into a posture of Peace No no Sir replyed he Jack Presbyter must have a holy War too and since he fought for the Throne of Christ he may as lawfully kill Malignants as the Pope slew Infidels to regain his Sepulchre Item Resolved that a Committee be appointed to examine St. Paul whether or no it be lawfull to grant the King Tonnage and Poundage Pray Sir said I what do you mean by this I never heard thus much before Why said he Sir Jo. Eliot and Pym would not grant them untill they had first setled Religion touching Arminianism Sir said I do you think that St. Paul will be summon'd before a Rebellious Committee No Sir I will assure you he will appeal unto Caesar and besides do you think that he will satisfie the curiosity of those men about the difficult Points of Predestination and Free-will who care not for damnation upon such plain terms besides he does not know why nor does he believe that the Fundamental Laws of this State are contrary to the Fundamental Government of the Church so as to alter it and therefore he will be tryed by the Bishops for which there is more Greek in his Epistles than for a Burgess in all the Old and New Testament When the Church of England said he was Reformed from the Corruptions of Rome it was done with the advice and consent of all the Estates of the Nation and for the establishing a publick and lasting Settlement but these Ambitious men endeavouring to alter the Government in the State found it a requisite piece of Policy to make a Schism and Division in the Church in order thereunto which was the Reason they were so zealous about those Controversial Points So the Court Prelates in Trent gain'd their Decrees of Reformation whilst they diverted the well-meaning Fryars in sharp disputes about Doctrines so the Jesuits over-reacht the Franciscans and Dominicans by setting them together by the Ears And therefore I am perswaded that as St. Paul would have Condemned those Interlopers who troubled themselves about things they neither understood nor had to doe withall so likewise he would have blamed those men who called themselves either Calvinists or that stiled themselves Arminians as he did those who said I am of Paul I am of Apollo or I am of Cephas for among the many methods those Rebels used to obtain their glorious Reformation there was none of greater consequence First of all it made a great division among the Clergy and that numerous part of them which contrary to their Oaths separated from the Church either ignorantly or wilfully upon the account of Arminianism became the greatest Incendiaries of all and the chief Promoters of that unnatural Rebellion And secondly the People who by them were taught the Discipline of Calvin were taught likewise that Arminianism was down-right Popery which the visible Ceremonies of the Church branded with the same Character confirmed to them who could know no better therefore they must help too to promote the Reformation aforesaid they must carry on the work of the Lord in the land of the living which they did by Tumults and Petitions against Bishops as Popish Nusances and against the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church as Rags of Superstition That the Jesuits had a hand in encouraging that Controversie to enrage the People against the Church is a plain case and nothing is certainer than that they brought up the distinction of Long Cloaks worn in London and elsewhere and now they are playing the same game again with Socinus and his fratres Poloni But to return to those Learned Patriots I before mention'd after they had got the Power into their hands they no more depended upon the Judgment of Calvin or Arminius for what they did than upon the Hypothesis of Tycho Brahoe or of Copernicus for the Sequestring Delinquents Lands only in the mean time it testified their zeal to all the godly of the Land as they were deliciously pleased to stile themselves who are wise Disputants in defence of their several Enthusiasms when they are ignorant of the Catechism and like Ravilliac learned in all the Doctrines of King-killing when he scarce knew his Creed And who did all of them unanimously agree in one Billingsgate Argument against the Bishops and Clergy Railing reviling and calling them by names enough to fright old Nicolas untill he plucks in his horns like a Snail And althô Michael the Arch-Angel Epist Jude v. 9. when contending with the Devil durst not bring against him a railing Accusation yet these meek-hearted were taught by their Preachers in the Language of Sion to say that they were * Wilson to the Commons 1642. Croaking Frogs Spirits of Devils †Vicar's Jehov Jir p. 88. a stinking heap of Atheistical and Roman Rubbish a Rotten Rabble of Scandalous Priests Bastard Sons of Belial * White 's first Century Epist to the Reader persons illiterate and insufficient dumb Dogs Whoremongers and Adulterers who as fed Horses Neigh after their Neighbours Wives Priests of Baal Bacchus and Priapus And therefore says Coleman to the Parliament Aug. 30. 1643 the Hierarchy is become a fretting Gangreen and spreading Leprosie an insupportable Tyranny Up with it up with it to the bottom Root and branch Hip and thigh destroy these Amelekites and let their place be no more found Thus that Order of men who have been instrumental to all the Publick good this Nation ever enjoyed was exposed to the publick scorn and contempt of the insolent Rabble and made as the filth of the world and the off-scowring of all things But 1 Cor. 4. 13. what was their glorious Reformation in the end Truly more infamous than Jeroboam's Rebellious Idolatry he made the lowest of the people Priests to his high Places but here the lowest of the people viz. Triers c. made Priests and Kings too to the most high God as they pretended Truly replyed I
had St. Paul himself been here then he had as certainly been sequestred and plundered as Archbishop Laud was beheaded For our Puritans who depriv'd him of his Saintship would have found many Malignant places in his Epistles enough to have brought him before a High Court of Justice for in August 1642 one was committed to the Prison which they made of the Lord Peter's House for reading Malignant Chapters as said his Mittimus and some of them without doubt were St. Paul's Certainly the Jesuits who were very busie in all the late Rebellion and who were for expunging the 7 first Verses of the 13th Chapter to the Romans would have employed their Agents to have proved him a Prelatical Papist in England and a great Enemy to the Presbyterian Reformation which could not be done decently and in order as he would have all things in the Church Besides he put the Assembly of Divines to a great Postscript to their Annotat. expence of Learning about his Epistles to Timothy and Titus to defend their Form of Church Government and the House of Commons were forced to the Lord knows how many Ordinances to raise Horse Foot and Dragoons to prove themselves the Higher Powers and that shutting the King out of Hull fighting him in open Field and imprisoning him was not resisting him therefore he would have come within the reach of this thorough Reformation as sure as a Gun for the onely Cathedral in Christendom dedicated to his Honour was Reformed to a Stable for their Horses Well Sir said he before we talk of that come along with me I will shew you some more of their tricks to bring about their Reformation With that he carried me to St. Antolin's Church in which at the beginning of the Rebellion the Brethren had set up a Lecture to pull down Popery as soon as I came to the Door there was such crowding and thronging that I was unwilling to go in besides the Steam of the Saints which were half stew'd with Zeal was almost as troublesome as a Damp in a Coal-mine The Gentleman observing me to be somewhat backward took me by the Arme And pray Sir said he give your self a little trouble it will be much to your satisfaction I will assure you You must expect to be a little warm for Presbytery and the Sweating Sickness came into England much about the same time Warm Sir said I is that all the danger Truly I do not like their Looks what do they come hither for For what said he to take warning against Popery Why Sir said I is any body to be hanged for it No replyed he but yonder is a Gentleman that will doe execution upon it presently Pray Sir said I what reason have these People to be afraid of Popery They do not look as if Mahomet would bestow the Alcoran upon them for I do not believe that they ever had any Religion but they disgrac'd it they look more like Jews than any other people living or indeed like an Assembly of Egyptian Mummies And truly untill they stirred I imagined that several of them next the Wall had been Antic Wainscot or Grotesque Carvings but one Fellow amazed me mightily for he was of such a course grain'd Complexion that I thought an Effigies belonging to some Tomb had been walking away from its Pedestal Whilst I was looking around me there stept a living Creature up into the Pulpit that took up all my Thoughts he was in the most mortified Dress that you can imagine for the white Border upon his black Cap made him look like a Black Jack tipt with Silver he wrinckled his Face up and down that it resembled a Crab-lanthorn possest with a Devil who had crumpled all the upper Crust with his Horns and Hoofs after he had been a considerable time putting himself into a posture of Ugliness and had wiped the Pearl from his Snout at last his Mouth opened his Lips trembled his Eyes twinkled but nothing was yet heard but a little grumbling in his Guts as if his Fervency lay in his Chitterlings the Audience in the mean time stretcht their Ears untill they look'd like Elephants Luggs and then to gratifie them a word or two slipt out of his Trunk but at last he roar'd so loud that I could not imagine but that there was an hollow place in his Head to make an Echo and the method and matter of his Prayer confirmed my fancy for excepting the malicious part of it which respected the King and his Loyal Subjects in which his Prayers for them contain'd a scandalous Invective against them those which were for deliverance from their Enemies as he called them were sawcy and blasphemously foolish their usual strain of ex tempore praying concluding That it would please the Lord to take his and their Foes a knock on the Costard and then they would joyn their hands to smite them Hip and Thigh This way of Praying was the Reformation of the Liturgy and according to the Rules of the Directory a superfine way of propagating Sedition leaving them scope to insert whatever might move the Passions of the ignorant Rabble and might compose a Form for devout Necromancers to raise the Devil But now for a touch of his preaching which was the modish Eloquence of Church-Conventicles in those days The Subject he treated upon was the Vnion of Protestant Dissenters against the common Dangers of Popery and his Text in order to it was this And in the Gen. 14. vers 5. fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer and the Kings that were with him and smote the Rephaims in Ashteroth-Karnaim and the Zusims in Ham and the Emims in Shaueh Keriathaim He was forc'd to spit five or six times before he entred upon his Discourse the speaking the Text had made his Mouth water so mightily but after he had done fluxing he began Beloved And shall we and our Brethren in the Country and our Brethren of Scotland be smitten by the Kings of the Earth as the poor Emims and Zusims were And will it not be better that we joyn in a Covenant together that we may joyn with them in Battel altogether Beloved If these People I here mention be Strangers unto you take it upon my word they were the ancient French Protestants and this Chedorlaomer was a huge great Popish King a mighty tall Man with a dimple upon his Chin above seventeen hand high a great sign of being a Persecutour Pray observe he came in the fourteenth year there he cheated the Protestants because he came in the Popish Stilo veteri But who do you think came with him Why all the Kings he could rap and rend Antichristian French Kings Sons of Belial And what do ye think his Majesty Chedorlaomer and the Kings that were with him did Why first they came and secondly they overcame and smote the Rephaims yea they smote them even the Rephaims of Ashteroth-Karnaim I suppose this was a good Town of trading Beloved there was a World of
Antichristian neither Name or Office one Instance for a thousand and that from the Reformed Churches Oecolampadius who Reformed the Church of Basil is stiled Bishop upon his Tomb which your Reformation had certainly demolish'd That Arch-Bishop Laud had no such Design as you speak of your Brother Fisher that Trent Presbyter can testify although he smiles to think that after you had confuted him with the Axe you should reform Lambeth-House into a Prison and a Dancing-School at once representing a Popish Inquisition and a Carnival too But since your main Argument that moved the People to assist you in your blessed Reformation was that the Liturgy of the Chuch was Popish I will tell you if you 'll keep it to your self that you either knew not what Popery was or else had a mind to bring it in the Fool and the Knave are both in the Case chuse which you will 't is certain that by the great number of Papists that were in the Parliament Army by the long delay of Assistance to be sent to the distressed Protestants in Ireland you were more intent upon the ruine of the Church of England than of Rome But pray what is Popish in the Liturgy All of it replyed they and therefore ought to be reformed * Preface to the Directory All the several burthensome Ceremonies 't was made a mere Idol lip-Labour and a great Hinderer of the preaching the Word Pray Gentlemen said he again since you quote the Publick Faith let me ask you one question Are the Responses in the Liturgy Popish and may not the Church of England enjoyn them No no replyed they they are not of Apostolical Institution How then cryed he came it to pass that the Assembly should order * Of Singing of Psalms Directory pag. 83. the reading the Singing Psalms Line by Line to the People Is that of Apostolical Institution Or are Sternhold and Hopkins of greater Authority than all the Fathers of the Church There is enough written by learned Pens to prove the Significancy Usefulness Innocency and Antiquity of the Ceremonies of the Church to satisfy every Objection and Scruple of yours before-hand but if that cannot doe you might a little reflect upon what followed your Reformation of them You abolish'd all those excellent Prayers for the King and the Church but how did yours you put in the room of them prevail to procure either his Honour or its good Estate You pretended to reform the Sabbath to a Pharisaical Strictness but the first general Battel was fought on the 23 d of October at Edghill on the Sunday wherein with five shot made at the King's Army you bid him Battel and then having abolish'd Holy-days even Christmas day it self which you made a Fast you sanctified your own first Thanksgiving-day with a leud Lie You took away the Order of Christian Burial and indeed there was little occasion for it when you preach'd so many at a time to the Sword that it could be no more used than in a Pestilence and moreover you being to set Christ upon his Throne on Earth could not comply with that Prayer that He would hasten the Kingdom of Glory Item You took away the Cross in Baptism and afterwards sold your Fellow-Christians to Turks and Barbarians among whom they must receive either the Badg of Slavery or Infidelity You altered the Form of Marriage and afterwards 't was solemniz'd by a sort of Bassa's in the very Livery of the Scarlet Whore In short you debauch'd the People with Superstitious Fears which made them fly into a wicked Rebellion and they were afterwards as unjustly hang'd up in Bundles for the Sin of Witchcraft Thus did ye involve the Nation in infinite Guilt and they were punish'd with Judgments shadowing or reflecting their Sins nor did ye your selves escape a retaliating Justice being severely chastised by that very Cromwell whom ye first set up in the House of Commons to be such a Stickler against Dr. Neal for a Defender of Arminianism and Popery At this they all fell a crying Ah Lard Lard 't was Covenant-breaking that brought all these Evils upon us and upon this Nation 'T was so indeed replyed he ye broke the first Covenant with your Prince in the oath of Allegeance by introducing the Solemn League which brought in the Engagement which brought in the Devil and all his Works He had no sooner spoken but there was a Fellow in a Red-Coat got into the Pulpit and playing as many Tricks as a Turkish Dervice upon a Moschite railed against the Presbyterian Reformation calling it * Goodwin 's twelve Cautions pag. 5. Rough Froward Peremptory Imperious c. which †Discovery of Sectaries pag. 26. Edwards observing All sorts of Mechanicks said he take upon them to preach as Smiths Taylors Shoemakers Pedlars Weavers A peculiar People truly replyed he you complained that the Liturgy of the Church of England was a great Hinderer of the preaching the Word I hope you have now enough of it But why should you find fault with a Red-Coat when as your warlike Doctrine could not endure a White one and besides these are but your Journey-men in Divinity your Scribes and Amanuenses whom you have taught all the Tricks of Sanctified Legerdemain and if they have out-done you in your own Trade you know that all Arts improve What and if they have not so much Learning as you yet they are arrived to such a pitch of Mystical Gibberish and Edifying Nonsense that they are more powerfull with the People than your selves although you first taught them to justle out the Prayers in the known Language by your unintelligible Cant and cramp Exorcisms and this was driving away Popery But Gentlemen let me ask you a question Is it not a main Artifice of the Popish Priests to keep the People zealously ignorant Is it not as easy to compose a thing in English of which the common People shall understand every single word and yet not know the meaning or Connexion of any whole Sentence as 't is to make some Lines in Spanish words which put together shall be true Latin the very Language of the Beast 'T is certainly as easy since ye have mix'd and balderdash'd the sacred Style with barbarous Expressions and made every thing ye do not like to be either Antichrist or the Whore of Babylon But moreover 't is very remarkable that ye had a fine way of amusing the Rabble with ends of Hebrew let me tell you that Mr. Herbert Thorndike as learned a Rabbi as any of you observes in his Book of Religious Assemblies from the Commentaries under St. Ambrose's Name that those who would needs speak in strange Languages Pag. 351. in the Church were of the Hebrews and Irenaeus Lib. 1. c. 8. tells that the Marcosians at the Ministration of Baptism used some Hebrew words to astonish the Minds of the Ignorant I cannot say that you directly design'd to bring in flat down right Popery as you call
against him and this was a Loyal and Rich Reformation Secondly You turned the most eminent Men for Letters and Honesty out of both Vniversities then filled up their Places with grave Dunces and formal Block-heads and afterwards their whole Revenues had like to have been sold to maintain the Army so that instead of Professours of the several Sciences we should have had a sort of Turkish Timariots who should have held these Lands in Capite of the Rump this was a Learned Reformation Thirdly You were mighty zealous for the Liberty and Property of the Subject insomuch that ye set the People above the King and afterwards an High Court of Justice is mounted above them all taking away the Lives of King Lords and Commons without Law or Reason And if the People may deal thus with their King where he is Supreme why not with all other Supremes whatsoever and consequently by Succession and with success for ought we know why not rise against their Magistrates till the last Resurrection and put them to Death till Death it self shall be swallowed up This was a righteous and peaceable Reformation Fourthly My Friends You declaimed against Popery mightily and yet did whatever the Papists desired or prompted you to doe time will shew that you and your Proselytes were Factours for the Pope and the Devil in every particular of that whole Rebellion all the Aspersions cast upon the King and the Church were of Romish Invention which your Malice knew how to improve the Rebel-Parliament * Parliament's Declaration to the King March 9 1641. entertain'd Advertisements from Rome Venice and Paris of the Pope's Nuncio soliciting France and Spain for 4000 Men a-piece but when came they over And was it not Popish Intelligence which ye greedily catch'd to inflame the People The Irish Rebels bragged that the King would come among them and assist them that they did but maintain his Cause against the Puritans that they had his Commission and those very Scandals you made use of lay'd that Rebellion to his Charge wherein they set up the Pope's Standard in Opposition onely to his Supremacy Cardinal Richlieu fomented all those unhappy Divisions by your means your Solemn League and Covenant proves most Jesuitically Popish The Jesuits had their Spies and Agents in all your Committees and how far they helped you in your Blessed Reformation Dr. * Vindication of the Protestants p. 57. Du Moulin will tell you and although the Person is not known that gave the Fatal Blow yet you brought the King to the Block and he was a Popish Priest and Confessour who then brandish'd his Sword saying Now our greatest Enemy we have in the World is gone And this was your true sober Protestant thorough Reformation Lastly At this they all sneak'd away and the Gentleman taking me by the Hand led me up to the top of an high Hill from whence I might view the Miseries of three Kingdoms raging in an unconquerable War and looking wistly upon the various and innumberable Evils which almost twenty Years Rebellion had brought upon us and wondring with my self when and how these troubles should end I was startled by a Jesuit who flourishing a bloudy Sword in his Hand spake as followeth So the Work 's done those Men are now cut down Which standing did oppose the Triple Crown The silly Hereticks themselves defeat And with their Bloud the Scarlet Whore looks great In Holy Wars the Pope Triumphs alone And as he lost so now regains a Throne Re-conquers now by Reformation THE Fourth VISION OF THE REFORMATION The King's Return The Factions endeavour to bring about their thorough Reformation again The Methods they have used ever since in order to it A Parallel betwixt the Jesuitical Papists and Fanatical Protestants in several new Remarks They Ridiculously inveigh against one another The Church of England vigorously opposes them both A Conference wherein the four main Arguments of the Papists viz. Universality Antiquity Unity and the Pope's Supremacy are exploded A Convocation of Orthodox Divines before whom the Authours of Melius Inquirendum of Julian the Apostate are summoned c. A Prophecy by the famous Ghost of A. A. C. THE Horrour of past Villainies and the endless prospect of future Calamities had so benumb'd my Spirits with drowsie Grief that I fell into a profound Trance for a considerable time untill at length I was awakened with the loud and joyfull Acclamations of vast Multitudes crying God save King Charles the Second At this I look'd and saw a mighty Train of People so splendid and brave as that the very confused Light of infinite Jewels made them resemble a new Milkie-Way in which Charles his Triumphant Wain was then moving Surely said I although I have not taken so long a Nap as the seven Sleepers yet I have snored out more strange Revolutions what gloomy Days were those I first began to nod in What Confusions in Church and State what cruel Animosities what fatal Divisions and what was worst of all Popery big with a whole Ages Revenge like a Polyphemus ready to devour all but now my waking Senses are saluted with the harmonious Triumphs of universal Joy and Concord Very strange indeed replyed my old Guide who carefully attended me and you might still think your self in a Dream were not our present Happiness as real as were our former Miseries I hope Sir said I they will be as lasting I wish so too said he but do not you see what soure Faces yonder grim Fellows make those cloudy Looks still threaten many a Storm to this Nation At this I saw a great number who seem'd somewhat discontented and were earnestly whispering and talking to one another and as soon as I came up to them I found among them several Presbyterians Independents Anabaptists Quakers and some Papists who let fall some mystical words which discovered a great deal of secret dissatisfaction but for what I could not tell for the briskest Cavaliers in the Kingdom did not seem more active in solemnizing his Majestie 's happy Restauration than most of them did So that turning to my Friend certainly Sir said I those People are not Breeding of Common-Wealths again so soon after their Delivery I hope they have no democratical Qualms in their Stomachs and have done longing for thorough Reformations for one while I confess said he one would think what you say and besides at the Solemnities of the King's Coronation they hung out as conspicuous Evidences of their Loyalty as any the most Obdurate Malignant for their Garlands were richly loaden with the glittering Confessions of their former Plunder and Sacrilege but their Loyalty was exactly like the Weather at that time very fair for a little Season and very foul both before and after they know how to temporize with present Difficulties in hopes of future Advantages and can be as impudently Loyal as they were boldly Rebellious think they may talk what Treason they please if they do but wipe their
Mirma Maromah Maroum or a Prophecy of the downfall of Babylon Do not you wonder said my Friend to hear these People threatning the Pope with a whole Volley of Rumbling Gibberish who were but lately ready to run out of their Wits for fear of him when the Pamphlet entituled the Growth of Popery was printed Oh! Sir said I I suppose this is onely to whet the Irascible Appetite of the Saints and to encourage them to knock at Rome Gates as they threatned in the Days of Oliver This is replyed he fitted for an Association to destroy the Government under the Notion of Popery and would be as serviceable to the Jesuits ends in France But on the other hand yonder are a sort of Fellows playing upon the Hypocondria's of the Rabble and telling them sad Stories of a Prophecy found in a Kettle of a strange Monk-Fish taken in the Pyrenaean Sea upon the Coasts of Northampton-shire yonder are others selling your true Protestant Almanacks wherein all the twelve Houses are made Conventicles and many other ridiculous nonsensical and seditious Papers are thrown about with which the fickle Rout first kindle their Zeal and then light their Pipes but these are their Tricks of old And therefore let us try if we can hear what yonder Person whom I know to be a Jesuit in Disguise is saying to the Presbyterians as soon as we came to him Brethren said he since the Church of England hates to be Reformed still maintaining several Popish Ceremonies I think our Separation from it so far from being a Schism that we are bound in Conscience not onely to separate our selves but to carry along with us as many as we can by which means we shall rescue many poor Souls from the Paws of the Beast and from the Clutches of Antichrist and still stick fast to that Solemn League and Covenant which we made with Hands lifted up to the most High God and since it was the Breach of that Covenant which made the good Cause miscarry by the falling away of our Brethren the Independents therefore ought we laying aside the memory of all former Injuries to be reconciled to them who are our Fellow-Sufferers in the present Persecution We ought so replyed one of them even the Common Papist who lives innocently in his way he is to us as other Separatists Well then continued he since you are of my Judgment I hope you will take my advice You see your Congregations dayly encrease insomuch that we are able to vie numbers with the Episcopal-men that a great many Wealthy and rich Persons are our Friends I therefore advise that upon the Death of any of the House of Commons we doe all our utmost endeavour that godly Men and Friends to our Reformation may be chosen into their Places in order to this we must recommend those we design as most worthy Patriots and stigmatize with a brand of Reprobation and Popery those who stand in competition with them Thus shall we again slide insensibly into all the Advantages we have lost He talk'd at the same rate to the Independents Anabaptists Quakers and all other Sectaries who had their several Walks and they all took his advice for a little time after I heard a most horrid noise as if the Tartars had been sacking the Town but coming nearer they proved a vast number of common People carrying the Image of a Gentleman in triumph and in the mean time reviling and abusing several worthy Persons of good Note who stood looking on them I observed but two or three Clergy-men among them and one of them so crooked that his very Corps was uncanonical the other so fat that he had more need of Hoops than of a Girdle whilst he was dancing in his Chair he smiled a 1000 Vtopian Liberties and Privileges and many red-fac'd Politico's nabbled the Heads of their Canes in pious hopes of a happy Reformation at last a General Petition was delivered to him in a large Scroll upon the back of which was a Sentence in Capital Letters which was Multa Petentibus desunt multa I smiled to think what a biting Jest some merry Tory had put upon them but more surprized was I to find my self accosted by the very same Jesuit that had been talking with the Presbyterians for laying his Hands upon my Shoulders with a great deal of Familiarity now you see said he who are the Plotters who those are that would ruine the Government are they not those very Fanaticks that destroyed King Charles the First that are the Pests of all Humane Societies and are mortal Enemies to the Church and State Hark you Sir said I I have some News to tell you that is 1500 years old and more what is that said he what said I Clodius accusat Moechos Catilina Cethegum At this he sneak'd away but I pursu'd him at a convenient distance untill I saw him fall in with a company of People who seemed very moody and discontented as soon as he came to them Gentlemen said he your condition is very hard 't is strange that Men of your Parts should be thus neglected and thrown aside indeed I really pity you you can expect nothing from the Government upon the account of your Merits all Preferments are bought and sold in a scandalous manner that must be said for the Church of Rome they will let nothing of worth starve and the simplest sort of Fanaticks are very liberal to those who will justifie them at any rate but whilst in the Church of England ingenious Men want the Conveniences of Life the dullest Blockheads of the Age are by the help of a Sum of Money crowded into the fattest Benefices of the Nation after the great pain and peril of Ordination At this one of them grew so outragious that I thought he would have run mad so that staring about him I am resolved said he to be reveng'd upon an ungratefull World I 'le rend the Rocks asunder I 'le plunge in the Deep and wake all asleep I 'le settle the Nation as I please Here my Muses and Graces where are you Now for my Mathematicks Well! because the World is round 't is perfect Demonstration that the Succession ought not to go in the Right Line At this a brisk Gentleman hit him such a blow on the Mouth that he made his Teeth break their Ranks calling him ambitious and proud Coxcomb and turning to me surely said he had his Mothers Milk been curdled his Brains had been a Sillabub before now Then turning to him Friend said he rest your self contented such Insects as you ought to take example from the Hedg-hog which travels through the shady Groves and being contented with vulgar Crabs envies not those who enjoy the Golden Apples and after Supper is graciously pleased to wrap himself up within the Limits of his own proper Person and so securely rests and is more at ease than if he should put his Nose out all Night and pretend to have it grow to
an Elephant's Trunk before the next Morning but I perceive that some of those who are padling in all the ill Humours of the Nation have been tampering with you That Fellow Sir said I that spoke to him is a Jesuit and he has been as busy with all manner of Fanatical Male-Contents Perhaps said he with as much Success for 't is easy for him to draw those People to what Practices he please who are of the same Principles with himself As for that little Gentleman said I that frets like Gum-Taffety If he will change his Religion because he is not successfull he never had any And as for the Fanaticks they have been told that theirs is purely Popish untill their Ears are stretch'd with hearing it and they will by no means believe it But I will believe my Eyes said he And if you had ever been in France Spain Italy or Germany and had seen or heard the Jesuits or preaching Fryers in their Pulpits you might at the same time have seen all our Conventiclers Mimick Voltings their frisking Ecstasies their apish Laughings their sudden Howlings their awry Faces all their Postures are according to the Ceremonies of a Roman Missal their fumbling their Buttons their knocking their Breasts their Hands hanging loose and then again stretch'd as if they were bewitch'd with an hundred other jugling Tricks and all to set off and varnish their Doctrines which are the most modish Popery in the World viz. That the People is the Supreme Power That Kings and Princes may be Deposed and Murthered That Success is a certain Evidence of God's approving whatever comes to pass I have heard Sir said I Instances enough of the two first Positions pray let me have one of this last Jenkins said he in his Conscientious Queries printed 1651. Asks Whether The stupendious Page 2 d. Providence of God manifested among us in the destruction of the late King whether by these Providences God hath not remov'd the Government of Charles Stuart and whether a refusal to yield Obedience to the present Government be not a refusal to acquiesce in the Wise and Righteous pleasure of God and a stat Breach of the Fifth Commandment So Bellarmine uses it for an Argument for Image Worship Iconomachis Bell. lib. de Imag c 12. Argumenâ—um decimum omnia non sine divino quodam Miraculo malè successisse and then instances that Leo Isaurus for his demolishing Images lost the Empire of Italy whereas it was taken from him by the perfidious Rebellion and Perjury of the Roman Bishops Now you talk Sir said I of Image-Worship they object as a reason of their Separation that the Church of England is inclinable to Popish Superstition and Idolatry No but they are replyed he You must know that some kind of Image-Worship sprang from the obsolete Fancies of the Anthropomorphitae and therefore Pope Adrian argues thus God made Man in his own Image therefore Images ought to be worship'd Now one would think that Pope Adrian's Idea had whipt into that Zealot's Noddle by the way of Pythagoras who cryed Oh Lord take a Chair and come and sit among thine Honourable House of Commons But farther another Popish Doctrine they hold is that God sees no Sin in his Children that they cannot fall from Grace So the Jesuits hold that they cannot commit a Mortal Sin Nemo sociorum in Lethale peccatum incidere queat None of our Society can fall into deadly sin thus they vaunted to Cardinal Borromaeus saith Alphonsus de Vargas in his Book * Cap. 14. pag. 39. Edit 1636. De Stratag Jesuit Their Funeral Sermons are as so many Popish Canonizations and the Lives of their Saints wherein they boast of such extraordinary Revelations and Gifts of the Spirit of strange Voices great Lights and heavenly Apparitions seem to out-doe the Enthusiastick Legends of St. Francis St. Dominick Father Xaviere or Ignatius Loyola they both of them interpret many places of Scripture to the very same sense though both very false and the 21st of Ezekiel the 25th Verse hath been frequently quoted by Popish and Presbyterian Expositours to the same ends and purposes and so has the 8th Verse of the 149th Psalm I have often thought that John Owen learnt from the Psalter of Bonaventure to abuse and misapply the Psalms of David He says * Eben Ezer pag. 13. God came from Naseby and the Holy One from the West Selah And that saith Let our Lady arise and let her Enemies be scattered c. The preaching of Women in the Conventicles of Quakers is rank Popery †Bell. lib. 1. de Bapt. cap. 7. Bellarmine saith 'T is not onely permitted but lawfull for Women to teach and * Paludanus saith †In 4. Sent. dist Papa potest clavem Jurisdictionis Laico Foeminae committere And again Papa potest sicut Laico sic Mulieri committere quòd excommunicet The Pope can grant as to a Lay Person so to a Woman the power of Excommunication And the Canonists teach that they may exercise Spiritual Jurisdiction Thus you see that the Spirit of Popery in one shape or other appears among all the several Sectaries of Great Britain and some more of their Practices will plainly shew how injuriously they cast the Charge of their own Guilt upon the truly Reformed Church of England They condemn all but those of their own Persuasion and their Motto in Zion's Plea is aut hoc aut nihil So Campian in his Challenge to Oxford saith aut nostrum est aut nullius Regnum Coelorum The Jesuits did never more industriously corrupt the Writings of the Fathers than the Presbyterians did the last Books of Mr. Hooker's Ecclesiastical Policy The Papists endeavour to impose upon us the Rhemish Testament and the Presbyterians in King James's time were as busie to have the Geneva Notes put upon the Margent of the Bible The Jesuits have their Index Expurgatorius but they never cancell'd any thing with more boldness than the Presbyterians did when they procured that the 20th Article viz. That the Church hath power to decree Rites and Ceremonies c. was by their Malice left out in the printed Articles And lastly whoever shall reade their unsanctified Ribaldry with which they treat the Reverend Prelates of the Church of England will fancy them the very Cronies and Disciples of the famous Cardinal Palavicini who to maintain the new Frame of Papal Government modell'd by the Council of Trent does so ridiculously and maliciously inveigh against the Sacred and Primitive Order of Bishops calling them * In Hist Conc. Tr. Piccioli Vescovi Fanciulli impertinenti insolenti Buffoneschi little Bishops Babies impertinent insolent Buffoons He had no sooner done speaking but we heard a mighty shouting as if some Triumph had been coming along and hastening to see what was the matter I perceived a great Bonfire blazing in the midd'st of the Court and a world of People with many Torches bringing the Pope with his
Greg. Epist lib. 6. cap. 3. know it he detested it as a Symptome of Antichrist and Phocas who bestowed it upon Pope Boniface did not doe it untill he had an occasion to bestow his Master the Emperour Mauritius in the other World But now said he you may plainly see it with your Eyes look you there there is the Globe of the whole Earth of which the Pope is the Lord and Governour 't is true you Hereticks wander in some little bye Places as in England and in some petty Hans-Towns of Germany but his Authority is extended over all the World all the Indies acknowledge him all Italy France Spain Poland Hungaria Transylvania Gallicia Valentia Granada Andalusia Hold Hold Sir cryed he if you should stumble o'er the Straits Mouth you will beat out your Brains against Hercules's Pillars Pray let us examine this Monster 's Noddle what a grievous bruise has Martin Luther given him with his High Dutch Knuckles he has broken I do not know how many Degrees of Longitude and Latitude all Great Britain is quite beat out and the Low-Countries are so sunck in that I believe he must be trepan'd before he can recover in short the Protestants are almost as numerous as the Papists But suppose we grant him that thumping Appellation why did Pope Paul the 5th in his Bull wherein he excommunicated Queen Elizabeth use that sneaking Title of Servant of Servants your Triple Servant He should have sent a good deep-mouth'd Nuncio that should have stretch'd his Muzzle to the uttermost and have roar'd like a crack of Thunder among the Alpes and have cryed Paolo quinto Papa Monarcha di Regno di Vaticano Segnor del mondo supremo santissimo Vmano magistrato c. This would have conjur'd down all the Protestants and have put them into such a trembling Fit that they would have shak'd all their Heresie out of the Knees of their Breeches this would have better suited him who is the most serene and invincible Sultan of Contradictions the Grand-Seignior of all Mental Reservations and Equivocations the Sophi of Legends and Romances the Great Mogul of Indulgences the Czar of Holy Impostures and Pious Cheats the Great Cham of the Inquisition c. Hold Sir cryed one of the Papists this is Railery and Abuse 't is as true replyed he as that the Pope is Vniversal Bishop let him but keep within his own Diocese and not meddle any more with the Rights of Sovereign Kings and Princes and there is no body that I know of will be so ready to complement him from the Artick to the Antartick Pole for the Future But we hope cryed several of them you will allow our Church to be the Catholick Church For this word Catholick there has been much scrambling these many Years replyed he and you have taken much pains to monopolize it to your See of Rome in order to which for the great number of humane Hereticks whom you excommunicate you take all manner of Beasts Fowles and Fishes into the Pale of your Church St. Francis first converted the Birds and then afterwards he fully convinc'd and satisfied a Wolf that had a very tender Conscience nor was he the onely Apostle to the Brutes but the Bishop Book of Conf. p. 114. of Canaglion managed as difficult a Diocess in the Year 1593 for he Catholickly accused the Fishes so that afterwards they without all doubt believed the Doctrine of Holy Water St. Bernard in a Fit of Popery is reported by * Pet. de Nat. in vit Bern. Petrus de Natalibus to have excommunicated the Flies and therefore several Species of Creatures observing that all Regular Orders had put themseves under the Protection of some considerable Saints have likewise listed themselves the Dogs under St. Hubert a Huntsman the Horses under St. Loys their Ostler-General and because the Geese once preserved the Capitol there was an Order from the Vatican that St. Feriol should take care of them And so said he I hope we are all satisfied as to the Vniversality of the Romish Church pray set forth the Antiquity of it Upon this all the Papists desired that they might save that Argument untill the last fancying that it gathered strength every Moment and desired the Assembly to take into their consideration the Vnity of their Church and the Supremacy of the Pope as for the Protestants cryed one of them they are divided into as many Factions as there are days in the Year and make an Anarchy of the Kingdom of Grace but the Roman Catholicks are all united under one Head the Pope so making the true Hierarchy of the Holy Catholick Church Upon this one of the Church of England stood up and said as for our Church it has no more to doe or answer for the Factions among Protestants than yours nor so much neither when did ever any Minister of the Church of England preach the Doctrines of Fanaticks to promote its Interest when did any of them ever preach that which in their Consciences they knew to be a Lye for the sake of the Truth and if you look into your own you will find those Divisions which never were in our Church as the differences betwixt the Dominicans and Franciscans betwixt the Jansinists and Mollinists which have been continued with the greatest heats imaginable 't is true the Pope hath sometimes interposed his Authority but to no great purpose but where was the Papal Authority in the days of the Anti-Popes or what will become of it if the Jesuits gain their designs will all other Orders acknowledge the Papal Authority if the Jesuits confine it to their own the Church of England can never be subject to such a Fatal Division so long as the King of England is acknowledged to be in all Causes as well Ecclesiastical as Civil Supreme Governour As for the Pope's Supremacy that has been so sufficiently pelted with good Greek and Latin by many of these Learned Authours that I will onely humbly drop a few Queries concerning it at this time First then We desire to know Whether our Saviour ever granted it to St. Peter Secondly Whether the present Pope be his Successour Thirdly Suppose it was granted to St. Peter Whether there was any need of forging the Donation of Constantine afterwards Fourthly If it was granted to St. Peter because he first confess'd him to be Christ the Son of the living God Whether Pope Leo the 10th had any right to it for saying to Cardinal Bembo * Crispinus Quantum nobis nostrique ea de Christo fabula prosuerit satis est omnibus secuâ— notum Fifthly we desire to know whether any Bishoprick in Christendom remaining can shew a Succession so disordered and corrupted as that of Rome Not to mention their strange Schisms let any Person but consider the Stratagems and impious Intrigues of the Conclave the Factions of the Nepotism contrary to that Solemn Oath they take enough to make Angels tremble and he will conclude
the Government to carry on their Designs at present and infinitely pleased to think that they had left their Deputies in an uproar to make them more easy and successfull for the Future But because they perceiv'd that their rude Clamours grew distatefull to the Generality of People they began to be more calm upon which a Reverend Divine stood up and turning to them Can ye Brethren that dissent from us imagine said he that we can either redress your Grievances or answer your Writings whilst they thus fly in Swarms about us No certainly unless we had as many Ears as Argus had Eyes Let one or two of your select Champions now stand forth and we will give you all possible Satisfaction by answering all their Objections To this they all willingly agreed and after a short Debate pitch'd upon the Authours of Melius Inquirendum and of Julian the Apostate so Proclamation was made and the first of them cited to appear in their Defence As he was coming the same Person stood up again and said this Person has wrote a Book entituled MELIVS INQVIRENDVM OR A SOBER INQUIRY INTO THE REASONINGS OF THE SERIOUS INQUIRY WHEREIN The Inquirer's Cavils against the Principles his Calumnies against the Preachings and Practices of the Non-conformists are examined and refelled c. In which Book he shews himself the most dangerous and implacable Adversary of the Church of England abusing our Reformation and establish'd Government with all the unsanctified Buffoonry his Wit and Malice can invent and pretends to superinduce a Thorough Reformation of his own which for all his confident Varnish and pious Pretences would subject us to all the Calamities and Villanies we have already seen and felt Now although the sober part of this pretended Sober Inquirer is already sufficiently answered and refell'd by the Reverend and Learned Dr. Laurence Womock in his Verdict upon the Dissenters Plea c. Yet since he is maliciously pleased to swell into a third Edition with Additions we will e'en let loose a small Country Curate at him to trifle with him in his own way and to give him some gentle Corrections he cannot find fault with his Antagonist or despise him 't is but to fulfill his own Quibble * Pag. 110. Parvae Loquuntur curae ingentes stupent I paid for my peeping for immediately I was commanded to come into the Theatre where I stood trembling as if I had been to kick and cuff with Colbron the Gyant or to fight and scratch with some Wild Beast whenas a good brisk Fellow with a loose Coat hanging upon his Shoulders came in and turning to a Gentleman You Sir said he The ever and much honoured Epist Ded. S. K. Esquire Do you think that these Dissenters Court their Miseries with the same Passionate Caresses that other Inamorato's do their Mistresses that they should run over one anothers Heads for the first grasp of Destruction as if they rode Post all upon the Switch and the Spur for a Presentation to a warm Parsonage Hold Friend said I curb in your Pegasus or he will run over some of the Company by and by Inamorato's are as very Fanaticks as ever doted upon Chains and Fetters and have as wrong a Notion of Persecution and I do not know why the Circumcelliones might not pretend as many Charms for courting the Gallows as some of them have for whining after an Insolent and Squabbling Dowdy but your Miseries are so well qualified with the Liberality of the Holy Sisters that you can merrily bear them you never meet with so many Golden Mines as in the Torrid Zone of your Sufferings and can pleasantly endure to be smoak'd a little in Terra del Fogo so long as 't is by the way of Potosi this makes you so flippant under Tribulations and crackle like Bayes in the Flames of Martyrdom 't is certain that as Jack-Pudden gets most Money when he is briskly kick'd about the Stage so does Jack-Presbyter when the Penal Laws are pretty nimble upon him Well Sir since You and I must have a Tryal of Skill for the Diversion and Good of the Company pray tell me your Name Melius Inquirendum by Ignoramus what 's the meaning of this R. W. your Name begins with a W. and therefore it shall be Whiggus mine with a P. any one will do mine for once and away shall be Pamphilus But what are your Miseries you were speaking of What is the Matter with you Whig Why there is a certain Compassionate Enquirer lately come to Town with a great deal of Passion that would set us together by the Ears with Uniformity but why cannot we love a Christian as he is such though differing from us in Innocent Accidents as well as a Man because he is a Man though his Hair be of another Colour his Face of another Symmetry and Complexion than our own Pamph. If you cut off the Man's Head or lop off his Arme you cannot say you love him if you doe it willfully 't is no Innocent Accident you think the Supreme Magistrate who is a Man and a Christian too a great deal too tall for you you wilfully take his Authority down lower by the Head 't is no Accident and when he was made the Head shorter in his Person I wish you were Innocent Whig But you Church-men make the Breach so wide by endeavouring to reduce the World into a strict and precise Uniformity in every minute Punctilio Pamp. How come these Punctilio's to grow so fat and burly on a sudden that you durst not swallow them for fear the Devil and all his Works should crowd in after them for before the next full of the Moon you will be complaining that they are bigger than Camels and won't go down How can you love or agree with another Man that do not agree with your self but in this Book you have not shewn your self either a Man or a Christian but rather a prophane Satyr of another symmetry being a Composition of Man Beast and Devil that can blow hot and cold and Contradictions with the same Breath And now you have the Heels of a Goat can clamber over the most craggy Consequences I shall not trouble my self to trace you in all the bye-paths wherein you are wanton and rampant upon the Compassionate Enquirer but since you are broke loose upon the Reformation of the Church of England if I can come handsomely at you I will put a Curb in your Mouth that you shall be more sensible of than of the Axes and Halters you talk of Whig I see I cannot avoid the lash of virulent Tongues but I tell you I design nothing but a Reformation to the Primitive Institutions of Christ and his Apostles I would have no Inventions of Men but perfect Evangelical Purity and Simplicity and that 's the Design of my Book Pamp. But the strain of your Book shews little of the Evangelical Gravity or Modesty I doubt you will find a great many Idle
of these times nor have you who live in them any reason to complain of the neglect and contempt of the Holy Scriptures which are order'd to be read in the Church by the Rubrick in better order and more frequently than ever they were in any Conventicle But as you shew your self an excellent Artist at the Hocus-Pocus of Systole and Diastole so by sleight of hand you have scrub'd up a new-fashion'd Hypotyposis a figure of Rhetorick in which you Conjure up together Things Places Persons Times that little thought of meeting one another in this world Now if a true Syllogism in Logick should but flush in the Pan they would disperse like wild-fowl to their several quarters You talk earnestly for a Reformation but make a great many Cramp Quibbles about the Remedies for healing our divisions as if you had plundred a Druggist or cull'd the hardest names from the Gally-pots of an Apothecary's Shop But Sir to be short I demand of you that you plainly tell us in order though your grievances lye scatter'd up and down your Book like the Sporades or darkest specks in the Chaos what you would have Reformed in the Church of England and to what Model you would have them Reformed Whig I Will Sir And first for your sake I would have the Gouty Benefices reduced to the Modicum of Meagre Vicarages or that Lean Curats should have more of the Fat Parsonages if we be for Moderation in Reformation why are we immoderate for Revenues but instead of that nothing but laying Steeple upon Steeple like Pelion on Ossa and such Riding to Constantine o'er hedge and ditch for a thumping presentation Pamph. Ho Pegasus ho what is he broke loose again Pray stop a little and let me tell you Sir That if all the Gentlemen of England would follow the example of our good Constantine who refused the Impious request of your Brethren to make them a Lease of Bishops Lands for 99 years the consequence would be this That few men of Worth and Parts would be almost starv'd with want or ruin'd with discontent whilst heavy Block-heads waddle with plenty But there are a sort of Mongrel Heteroclites of your Faction that Gallop over the head and shoulders of Simon Magus into the Church doors that they may throw it out at the Windows these make the inequality by jumping o'er the Barrecadoes of Oaths and Sacraments who have found out a Salvo with which if they do but anoint their Mouths they can take an Episcopal Oath though hot as melted Lead without scalding their Chaps But hark you Sir One of your Friends at Sudbury was so deadly trepan'd the last Assizes at St. Edmunds-Bury that that Trade since you are such an Advocate for Trading is in danger to be lost But pray what makes you laugh Whig Why to think that you Church-men should hazard such Substantial Preferments for such Circumstantial Fopperies as Ceremonies are as the Sign of the Cross the Surplice and Organs c. Pamph. What say you to the Sign of the Cross in Baptism Whig I say they may as well put a finger in the Child's Ear in token that it shall hereafter hearken diligently to the Word of God or lay a little Salt upon the Child's Tongue in token that its Speech shall be season'd with Salt as make an Airy Cross over its Forehead in token that it shall confess a Christ crucified Pamph. Good morrow Mr. Udal I thought you had been hang'd fourscore years ago in token that you should not hereafter have talk't so prophanely if I be not mistaken you may find a great many of your squirting Jests in his or Penn's Writings But how comes it to pass that you who at other times make the Sign of the Cross such a stout over-grown humane Sacrament such a huge symbolical mystical Ceremony as to be more dreadfull to the Saint than raw-head and bloody-bones should now make it onely an airy vanishing Phantasm But I 'll tell you a piece of news Sir I have been told that when Sir William Waller that great Apostate-Gold-finder burn't the Picture of the Cross that His Majesty should say That although he would not Worship it yet he would not Burn it And all his good Subjects will tell you that you should not contemn and scoff at it Why should it not be a token that I should manfully fight against sin the world and the devil under Christ's Banners as when in the late Wars pulling out the lappet of a Shirt or some such device was a token that your Dissenters should perfidiously fight under the Banners of a Rebel against their Lawfull Sovereign You have had Reasons enough for the Ancient use of the Sign of the Cross but I will be bold to add That because the Church has retein'd it as a pious custome in opposition to the scurrilous Malice of Heathens Jews and Mahometans who would seem to affront the Christians with that Sign so ought the Church still to continue it so long as among your Dissenters as you call them there have been lately found * Dissenters Sayings that have denied to put their trust in a Crucified Saviour One word more of this and I have done If symbolical signs and tokens will move your Anger why not if they be Analogous my Devotion I do not think running for Fritters on Shrove-Tuesday a symbol of the Christian Race nor drawing Valentines in the Ash-heap of Mortality Yet I say again that tokens or symbols that bear a true Analogy will stir I hope my Devotion and I fear your Anger for should I point at your fore-head with two fingers and make Horns as they call it you would go near to hit a man a substantial Cuff for such a symbolical affront and although it did not make you a Cuckold any more than the Sign of the Cross makes a man a Christian yet 't would be a token that you shall hereafter be asham'd to confess it But go on to the next thing that must be Reform'd I think you spoke of the Surplice Whig Ay I say 't is strange that you Church-men must have your Summer-Ceremonies and your Winter-Ceremonies sometimes you are in White and then again in Black Pamph. Are not you in both when you have a black and white Cap on but I thought you had been for variety by the flourishing Harangues you make upon it in your Preface and besides you say Let the Worshippers of Mahomet quarrel about their Green and Red Turbants may not a man agree with another though his suit be not of the same colour How is it that you so disagree with your self But I can tell you Sir that for all the Clamours against Symbolical Colours when the Green Ribond was made a note of distinction to know those of your Faction by none of you ever spoke against it although it was the colour worn by the Leaguers in France and although such an Historian as you are cannot be ignorant of the great deflagration