find answered by the University of Oxford and seconded by the University of Cambridge The King told his Parliament March 19. 1603. The third which I call a Sect rather than Religion is the Puritan and Novelist who do not differ so far from us in points of Religion as in their confused forms of Polity and Parity being ever discontented with the present Government and impatient to suffer any superiority which makes their Sect unable to be suffered in any well governed Common-wealth And it is one reason why Grotius was so condemned for a Papist among this people because in his Book de Anti-Christo he hath left this Character of them Circumferamus oculos per omnem historiam quod unquam seculum vidit tot subditorum in principes bella sub religionis titulo horum concitatores ubique reperiuntur Ministri Evangelici ut quidam se vocant quod genus hominum in quae pericula etiam nunc opti mos Civitatis Amstelodamensis magistratus conjicerit videat si cui libet de Presbyterorum in Reges audacia librum Jacobi Britanniarum Regis cui nomen Donum Regium videbit eum ut erat magni judicii ea praedixisse quae nunc cum dolore horrore conspicimus I will give it you presently in that Kings English But the King giving them a fair hearing in the conference at Hampton Court partly by his Arguments and partly by his Authority suppressed them for that time Yet this restless people so incensed him by their murmurings and reproaches that he frequently in his Writings and Speeches in Parliament professed both his jealousie of them and caution against them in his Preface to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 These rash heady Preachers says he think it their honour to contend with Kings and perturb whole Kingdoms and p. 41. 42. Take heed my Son to such Puritans very Pests in the Church and Common-weal whom no Desert can oblige neither Oaths nor Promises bind breathing nothing but Sedition and Calumnies aspiring without measure railing without reason and making their own Imaginations without any warrant of the word the square of their Consciences I protest before the great God and since I am here as upon my Testament it is no place for me to lye in that ye shall never find with any Highland or border Thieves greater ingratitude and more lies and vile perjuries than with these Fanatick-spirits and suffer not the principles of them to brook your Land if ye like to sit at rest except ye would keep them for trying your patience as Socrates did an evil Wife The good King Charles found this Prophecy to be true for notwithstanding all the care that himself and Arch-bishop Laud who apprehended the approaching danger to suppress them in so much as that Mr. Baxter says in that 7. § That the old Non-conformists being most dead and the latter gone most to America we cannot learn that in 1640. there were many more Nonconformists Ministers in England than there be Counties if so many the Wolves be like had got on the Sheeps Cloathing and not being able to ruine the Church by open force seek to undermine it by secret Arts being got within the Pale In 37. says Mr. Baxter Arch-bishop Laud using more severity than formerly and the Visitations inquiring more after private Fasts and Meetings and going out of their Parishes to hear And in many Places Lectures and Afternoon Sermons being put down which was done only where Faction and Sedition were Sown and there Catechizing a much more useful exercise was injoyned in its room by these things and some other which he there mentioneth the minds of Men were made more jealous than before and fears and jealousies were made the grounds of the War the King and Arch-bishop being reported to be Popishly affected though they both as well in their Life time as at their Deaths gave irrefragable Arguments for the contrary sealing the truth of their Professions with their Blood And after the Imprisonment of some the stigmatizing of others and the removal of many beyond the Seas all which both many and some amounted not to above Three or Four whom though the Parliament received in Triumph and plentifully rewarded yet they found them to be turbulent Persons viz. Prin Burton and Bastwick for I hear not of any removed beyond the Seas by authority these were the causes of Alienating the peoples Minds from the Bishops and made them afraid of Popery more than before and so it is still any restraint from Faction is Condemned for Popery Mr. Baxter tells us there of another Intregue Then was the New Liturgy imposed on the Scots with other changes there attempted which were the resuming of some Lands belonging to the Church and Crown which had been Sacrilegiously withheld during a great part of King James and King Charles's Reign with the fear of losing the Tithes that some great Men there detained from the Clergy whereupon the Scots Armed and Invaded England and some English Lords saith Mr. Baxter took advantage to prevail with the King to call a Parliament once again And here doubtless was the beginning of the War the Scots and such English as were in confederacy and had agreed upon a Covenant for Reformation being the first Aggressors But let Mr. Baxter proceed The Irish observing it is like how the Scots thrived in their Rebellion on Oct. 23. 1641. rose and murdered 200000. Persons and Mr. Baxter is not ashamed to say the News was here reported that they said they had the Kings Commission just as much as the Parliament had to fight by his Authority against his Person whereupon the Parliaments Declarations raised in multitudes of the people a fear that they had partakers in England and when they had done their work there they would come hither And mark the consequence there was no way of safety but to adhere to the Parliament for their own defence i. e. to strengthen the War against the King And in 42. says he the lamentable Civil War broke out but between whom did the Bishops fight against the King or against one another or against the Parliament no such matter How began the War then Mr. Baxter says the Houses of Lords and Commons consisted of such as had been Conformists except an inconsiderable number Some number then were apparently Non-conformists and it seems they had infected many others for Mr. Baxter says they were such as had been Conformists they were not so when the War began and N.B. their fear of being over-powr'd by the Loyal party of whom they thought themselves in sudden danger caused them to countenance such Petitionings and Clamours of the Londoners Apprentices and others as we think disorders and Provocations of the King This doubtless was a beginning of the War of which see the Kings complaint in his Ch. of Tumults Mr. Baxter says farther the first open beginning was about the Militia which by an Act of Parliament is thus determined That the
unpunished Oxford Reasons p. 22. And the Speeches within Doors spake no less for Sir H. Martyn told them the Kings Office was forfeitable and that the happiness of the Kingdom depended not on him or any of the Royal Branches of that Stock Exact Collect. p. 552. and Sir H. Ludlow that he was not worthy to be King of England That this was the sense which their own Creatures had of the Covenant appears by the Answer of the Army to the Scots Declaration 1648. Who pleading that they had Covenanted for preservation of the King reply in a Paper Printed for Robert White before the Kings death That it was conceived to be absurd and hypocritical to swear the Preservation of the Kings Person as a Man and at the same time to be ingaged in a War against him and he in the Field And Mr. Marshal had said long before That if the King had been so slain it had been none of the Parliaments fault for he might have kept himself farther off if he pleased p. 19. of his Letter The same Man said in his Sermon Jan. 8. 1647. The question is now whether Christ or Anti-Christ shall be King And in a Sermon to the Mayor and Aldermen 1644. These are miserable and accursed men Factors for Hell Satans Boutefeus and as true zealots are set on fire from Heaven so these Mens Fire is kindled from Hell whither also it carrieth them Mr. Arrowsmith in a Sermon 1643. It is not a Kingdom divided against it self but one Kingdom against another the Kingdom of Christ against Anti-Christ So my Countryman John Bond told them they fought against Babylon Dagon and Anti-Christ and exhorted them to pull it down though like Samson they dyed with it In a Sermon 1644. Joseph Boden said they were fighting for the Lamb against the Beast Anno 1644. And Mr. Marshal in his Meroz I pray look on me as one that comes to beat a Drum in your Ears to see who will come out to follow the Lamb. This use the Covenanters made of that limitation defending the Kings Person in the preservation of Religion and you know who says p. 423. of the Holy Common-wealth We are to believe that Men would kill them whom they fight against And doubtless if His Majesty had perished in the War the guilt had lain not only on the Souldiers but chiefly on those that gave them their Commission The Author of Bounds and Bonds spake home at that time If by the Covenant you thought your selves indispensably bound to preserve the Royal Person how comes it to pass that you thought your selves obliged by the same Covenant to wage War against him I have heard of a distinction saith he between his Power and his Person but never between his Person and himself And if the Covenant would have dispensed with any Souldier of England or Scotland to kill his Person by accident of War as his Life was oft in danger before he came to the Scaffold his death had been violent and the Obligation to preserve him had ended and yet according to this argument the Covenant had not been broken why then should those Men think the World so dull as not to understand plainly enough that the Covenant provided for his death more ways than one 4. They that permitted such Pamphlets to be published without controle as declared the King to be a Tyrant Oxford Reasons p. 21. That judged his Actions to be illegal and his Declarations false and scandalous and his suggestions as false as the Father of lies could invent Exact Collect p. 494. That banished the Queen as a Traitor Imprisoned the Bishops in the Tower That held him to such unreasonable Articles and Propositions at Newcastle and Carisbrook as His Majesty declared he could not consent unto without devesting him of his Authority That rejected all his offers for peace And in January 17. 1647. Voted no more Addresses and that they could repose no more trust and confidence in him which was a year before they were secluded the House which by the Army was understood of their intention to proceed in Justice against him They who deprived him of all the Comforts of his Life his Wife and Children his Counsellours and Chaplains as if with an Italian hatred they would have destroyed his Soul as well as his Body These were they that did diminuere Caput Regis as the Civil Law speaks and they who afterward finding him thus bound and fettered defamed and condemned did obtruncare Caput Regis were but the others Executioners What action was more barbarous than that of the Scots selling their Native Prince that cast himself upon them to his declared and avowed Enemies after which he was hurried up and down from one Prison to another and inhumanly treated till he was forcibly taken from them Whoever shall compare the Declaration of the Scots when they Invaded England upon their Covenant with the actings of the High Court of Justice against His Majesty may see what Coppy they wrote after and whose Journy-men they were in bringing him to the Block whom they had pulled out of the Throne They were Roman Souldiers that actually Crucified our Saviour but we know who Sold him and how long the Chief Priests and Elders took Counsel against him Matth. 27.2 And St. Peter tells the Men of Israel Acts 2.23 Him have ye taken and with wicked hands Crucified though the Roman Souldiers did it There is this only difference between the Graves and the Prisons of Kings that in the Prisons they dye daily or are buried alive in the Grave they are at rest from all their fears and sorrows But to this it may be replied that these were not Presbyters properly so called though they were a Juncto of Presbyterians I would therefore have it considered whose Scholars these were who taught and animated them to these practices and upon whose principles they acted I could set down such maximes of the Consistorian Brethren as the Jesuites would blush to own but I shall forbear to foul my Paper with such Collections as I have among my Adversaria The Reader may satisfie himself usque ad nauseam if he observe what is Authentickly mentioned in His Majesties large Declaration in Bishop Bancrofts dangerous positions in Bishop Spotswood and the Writings of the several Presbyteries of Scotland in the result of false Principles the Calvinists Cabinet and which is instar omnium the Holy Common-wealth What fruit could such bitter Roots produce but Wormwood and Hemlock as indeed they did in every Furrow of our Fields It was said of Cato that he did good not that he might appear to be good but because he could not do otherwise and some Men do espouse such principles that if they Act according to them they cannot do any thing but what is notoriously evil What shall we say of Mr. Andrew Ramsey that Preached That it was Gods will that the Primitive Christians should confirm the Truth by suffering but now the Truth
from these words until he come to the period where he says As I have here described the Judgment of such Non-conformists as I have Conversed with I do desire those that seek our blood and ruine by the false accusation of Rebellious principles to tell me if they can what body or party of Men on Earth have more sound and Loyal principles of Government and Obedience And if any person can extract any such principles within all that period I will say he hath turn'd Mr. Baxter's Whetstone into the Philosophers Stone He says indeed we are all bound if it be possible and as much as in us lyeth to live peaceably and follow peace with all men But how have they followed this principle We have he saith many years beg'd for peace of those that should have been the Preachers and wifest promoters of peace and cannot yet obtain it nor quiet them that call for fire and sword not knowing what spirit they are of This is the Presbyterian way of Petitioning for Peace to rail against their Superiours charging them with persecution fire and sword and asserting that there can be no peace until the Laws for Conformity be all reversed the Bishops Authority and the Kings too in Ecclesiastical affairs taken away the Liturgy exchanged for Mr. Baxters new Directory as he hath at large declared in the first part and such a desolation as this they call peace solitudinem volunt pacem vocant He says the Declaration about Ecclesiastical affairs telleth us that the King would have given the people peace Answ And there were a sort of men whom the King for peace sake desired to read only so much of the Liturgy as was beyond exception and they would not did not these tell the World they would have no peace but victory So true it is as Mr. Baxter says with unpeaceble Clergy-men no Plea no Petition no not of the King himself could prevail but the things that have been are and the Confusions of our age come from the same causes and sorts of men as the Confusions in former ages did for which we need not go to Mr. Baxters Church History the Men and methods of 41. and 42. are well nigh revived They told His Majesty in their second Paper for Peace That if he would grant their desires it would revive their Hearts to daily and earnest Prayers for his Prosperity But what if he deny them Then p. 12. it astonisheth us to foresee what doleful effects our Divisions would produce which we will not so much as mention in particular lest our words should be misunderstood And it is obvious enough to whom they would apply that passage p. 117. of their reply to the Exceptions As Basil said to Valens the Emperour that would have him pray for the Life of his Son If thou wilt receive the true Faith thy Son shall live which when the Emperour refused he said the Will of the Lord be done So we say to you if you will put on Charity and promote peace God will honor you but if you will do contrary the Will of the Lord be done with your honors Amen say I Let them fall into the hands of God who is still exceeding gracious to them and not into the hands of such cruel men who have War in their Hearts while they Petition for Peace And will Mr. Baxter still demand what party of Men on Earth have more Loyal Principles Our English Papists who as Mr. Baxter grants adhered to the King would be offended if I should say they that fought against the King were more Loyal than they who with Lives and Fortunes fought for him dares he compare with the Church of England who lived and died and rose again with their King to the great regret and envy of those Men I will not say only that the Primitive Christians but even the Old Greeks and Romans had better Principles than any you practise by and will rise up in Judgment against such a Generation How vainly do you inquire what Hottoman or Bodin have written Consider the Precepts of our great Lord and the Practice of the Primitive Christians for the first 600. years and how night the true Members of the Church of England followed those Principles and Examples for Twenty years together and how far the Presbyterians Acted contrary to them and then convince the World whether the party you Boast of or these were most Loyal But Mr. Baxter demands Must this Age answer for their Fathers deeds what is all this to the present Non-conformists Answ If they follow the deeds of their Fathers we cannot deny them the reputation of being their Children who without controversie begat and Nurtured them And though I have not the opportunity to ask those Noble Lords and Gentlemen whom Mr. Baxter names concerning the Conformity of their Fathers yet I can give you their Sense and the Opinion of the whole Nation concerning the behaviour of their Children who have as great a mind to begin a second War And take it in the best English Dialect i. e. in the Acts of Parliament And first in the Act against Conventicles 16. Car. 2di N. 2. For providing of further and more speedy remedies against the growing and dangerous practice of Seditious Sectaries and other disloyal persons who under pretence of tender Consciences do at their meetings contrive insurrections as late experience hath shewn c. And in the Oxford Act they say of those that Preach in unlawful Assemblies Conventicles or Meetings under colour or pretence of the Exercise of Religion contrary to the Laws and Statutes of this Kingdom have settled themselves in divers Corporations of this Kingdom three or more in a place thereby taking opportunity to distill the poysonous principles of Schisms and Rebellion into the hearts of His Majesties Subjects to the great danger of the Church and Kingdom c. Now how little difference there is between such Seditious tumults and meetings the late Rebellion in Scotland doth demonstrate where the chief Masters of those Assemblies Preached an Evangelium Armatum and having in cold Blood barbarously murthered the most Reverend Arch-Bishop drew many Thousands into the Field and would have done the like by the King himself had he been in their power as by their Declarations we may guess I do not accuse their Brethren of England of Rebellion the Parliament says their actions tend to it and that is Tantamount to a Plot. Sedition and tumults open and professed disobedience to the Laws adhering to a Rebellious Covenant refusing the Tests of Obedience which require only the disclaiming of Rebellious Principles and Practices Preaching and Printing what is actually Seditious and tends directly to Rebellion and all this when our Parliament hath declared that there is an horrid Plot on foot for the destroying of the King and established Religion to the latter whereof you are avowed Enemies this may draw at least a suspition on you that you are in the Plot whether