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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
head_n	body_n	king_n	politic_a	2,735	5	10.6730	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75445	An answer to the Solemne League & Covenant; presented to the publick view of all loyall subiects in England, Scotland, and Ireland; in the twelfth year of the reign of our most gracious sovereign Lord Charles by the grace of God, of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c. Published according to order.		1660 (1660)	Wing A3448; Thomason E1045_3; ESTC R207947	9,622	16

Body politick and how should the Members enter into a covenant or frame and devise it without the head But the King is so far from yielding his royall assent to this Covenant that he striotly forbids it and that under the pain of Treason in his Proclamation printed at Oxford Ergo We may not enter into this Covenant nor entangle our consciences with this new Oath This Covenant we make with God and in all things especially the things appertaining to God we must obey God rather then man We have the Kings vertua consent thereunto for though he be not present in person at the Parliament nor hath given his Royall assent under his hand yet this Parliament is called and continued by his Authority and his consent is vertually contained in the Votes of both Houses It is a ruled case in Divinity That we must obey God rather then man when God commandeth one thing and man another but when the commands of God and of his Vicegerent upon earth clash not one against another St. Bernards doctrine is most true we must obey him as God who is in the place of God in those things which are not against God When St. Peter and St. John returned this answer to the Councell the Councell forbad that which God commanded God commanded the Apostles to preach Christs Resurrection and the Assembly of Priests and Elders forbad them This is not the Covenante's case for where doth God command the English to swear to preserve the Scotch Discipline and Liturgie which they themselves have often varied Or to abjure Episcopacie which was the only government of the Church for more then 1500 years and under whose shade Christian Religion most flourished and the Church stretched forth her branches to the Rivers and her boughs to the ends of the earth Where doth the Scripture warrant much less command the association of two Kingdomes and joyntly taking up armes in the quarrell of the Gospel and defending and propagating Religion by the sword The calling of the Parliament by the Kings Authority doth not conclude his assent to all the Ordinances of both the Houses for is it were so why did this Parliament after they had voted the Militia and the extirpation of Prelacie and Pluralities send to his Majesty and humbly intreat his royall assent nay why in all Parliaments since the first even till this day after both Houses had past bills did still the Lords and Commons lay them at his Majesties feet beseeching him in humblest manner to take them up and signe them with his royall hand and if he liked them his answer hath been Le Roy vieut if he ditated them Le Roy s'avisera Did the calling of a Parliament in the Kings name and by his Authority vertually include or conclude his Royall assent to all the Acts King Richard the 2d had given his consent to his own deposing for that Parliament wherein he was deposed was called in his name and by his Authority 4. No Covenant especially publick and solemn between two Nations for reformation of Religion may be taken without warrant from Gods word for in every such Covenant God is a partie and his consent must be both had and known which cannot be but from his word Beside this Covenant is bound with an Oath which is an Act of Religion and cultus latriae that is a part of divine worship and if it be not commanded by God it is forbidden in Scripture under the name of will-worship Moreover that golden rule of the Apostle applyed by him to the use of things indifferent stretcheth also to this case of Conscience Whatsoever Oath we take or Covenant we enter into not perswaded in Conscience that we have good ground for what we do in Scripture is sinne to us But this Covenant hath no warrant for it in holy Scripture for from the Alpha of Genesis to the Omega of the Apocalypse there is no v●la nor vestigium of such a Covenant as this Ergo This Covenant must not be taken by any who desire to walk exactly before God according to the precise rule of his word There is warrant in Gods word both for the matter of this Covenant and the form and manner of taking the oath For the matter we have a pattern of a Covenant taken for the reformation of the false and preservation of the true Worship of God and the uniting of Kingdoms in the truth thus reformed 1 Sam. 18.3 4. 2 Kings 23.5 2 Chron. 25.8 9. 2 Chron. 30. Ezra 10.2 And for the form and manner of taking it by lifting up the hand we have a Precedent Apoc. 10.50 None of these instances are ad Rhombum all those Covenants were made against idolatrie and other sins expresly forbidden by the law of God but this Covenant is against Prelacie and such a form of worship practised in the Church of England as hath been justified by the word of God and unanswerable a guments drawn from Scripture by Whitgift and Hooker in their answer to Cartwright Covell to Barrow and Browne Burges to Ames and Ball to Can and many others In all those Covenants the King had the main stroak but in this none at all 1. For the Covenant mentioned 1 Sam. 18.3 4. it comes not home to our case for that was a private Covenant between two intimate friends for the safety of both their lives sought after by a bloody Tyrant this is a National Covenant between two Kingdoms for the Reforming Religion and settling Peace that was made by the true King appointed by God and anointed before this by Samuel against him who indeed held the Crown but was rejected by God himself this a Covenant made by Subjects against the Commands of a most gracious Prince 2. For the Covenant mentioned 2 King 23.5 the text saith King Josiah made this Covenant that they should walk after the Lord and keep his Commandements and his Testimonies and his Statutes with all their heart c. And that he put down the Chemarims c. There the King makes a Covenant and reforms a Church and not the People here the people enter into a Covenant without the King and they take upon them against his command to Reform or rather Deform the Church by overthrowing the Hierarchy and abolishing Episcopacy Chius ad Choum these things agree as well as Harp and Harrow 3. For the Covenant mentioned 2 Chr. 15.8 9. King Asa gathered all Judah and Benjamin together to Jerusalem where they offered to the Lord of the spoyles and made this Covenant and in performance of this Oath or Covenant v. 16. he deposed Maacah his Mother from her Regency because she had made an Idoll in a grove and Asa brake down her Idoll and stampt it and burned it at the brook Kidron 4. Eor the example of Israel 2 Chron. 30. who in the dayes of Hezekiah though they were under another King yet joyned with the men of Judah in keeping the Passover it yeilds no support at

AN ANSWER To the Solemne League Covenant PRESENTED To the publick view of all Loyall Subiects in ENGLAND SCOTLAND and IRELAND In the twelfth year of the Reign of our most Gracious Sovereign Lord CHARLES BY THE Grace of God of ENGLAND SCOTLAND FRANCE and IRELAND KING Defender of the FAITH c. Published according to Order LONDON PRINTED for GEORGE HORTON 1660. AN ANSWER TO THE Solemn League And Covenant WHether is this Covenant so grounded upon holy Scripture so conformable to the Laws of the Land yet in force and so consonant to former Oaths and Protestations that a religious Christian and Loyal Subject may without scruple of Conscience and danger of ensnaring his soul enter into it I answer negatively And although I had more then once made a Covenant with my self Rebus sic stantibus ôr rather jacentibus never to question this Covenant which the Authority of bath Houses and Piety and Learning of the Assembly of Divines hoth commended as the Soveraign Remedy of all the Maladies of the times yet because my Conscience tells me that it hath not approbation from the Three that bear Record in Herven I dare not conceal those Reasons which at the first made me doubt of the lawfulness of it and in the end put it out of doubt The Reasons propounding the naked truth without any cloathing of Art or ornament of Rhetorick are these Andi non phalerata sed fortia Not to take advantage of the preposterous order in setting down the parts of this Covenant wherein he that runneth may read a double Solecism For in it the Church of Scotland precedeth the Church of England and the Liberties of the Subject are set before the Royal Prerogative and Imperiall Dignity of the Prince Surely such a sacred and venerable Evidence of fidelity is a publick Covenant made by two Nations and signed by the Name of the great Jehovah that in it both matter and method phrase and order ought to be maturely advised on and not only every period and line but every word and syllable therein to be exactly scan'd before the Conscience of millions of men be charged with it If we cannot brook or keep out hands from tearing a List Catalogue or Register wherein they who are many degrees below us are yet ranked above us and named before us can his Majesty take it well at our hands that we should accept of a Covenant hand over head wherein the members are set above the head and his Soveraign Majesty slighted and that not only by misplacing his person but limiting and restraining the preservation of his Person and Authority to the defence of the true Religion and maintenance of the Liberties of the Kingdoms What is this but to indent with our Soveraign and capitulate with our head as Ochan sometimes did with the Emperor Frederick Defende gladio ego defendam te argumentis Defend me with thy Sword and I will defend thee with my Pen If his Majesty will defend our Faith we will bear faith to him if he will keep safe our Pendants we will safeguard his Crown Which limitation I except at not that I doubt but that there is and ought to be a mutualitie between King and Sub●ect and that if he either desert the true Faith or infringe the Laws and just Liberties of his Subjects for which he pawned his Faith at his Coronation God will call him to an account for it but this doth not discharge us of our Allegiance to him Though he keep not touch with us yet we may not break with him for he is as Tertullian gives him his true dimensions according to the golden reed of the Sanctuary Solo Deo minor caeteris omnibus major and consequently questionable for his breach of faith before none but God Alas what a fickle estate and lamentable condition were Princes in if upon pretence that they defend not that Religion which the people believe to be true or maintain not those Liberties which they challenge as their birthright their royall Crownes may be exposed to rapine and their sac●ed persons to violence Not to dive into the depths of State not anxiously to enquire into the reason which moved the first contrivers and projectors of this League to set it on foot at this present and presse it with all earnestness I am perswaded that none will deny that their main scope and aime therein was to engage our brethren of Scotland in the present quarrell for pulling down Episcopacie and setting up the Presbyterie and by this National and solemne League to strengthen their partie and foment the late unnaturall War which drained the Wealth of the Kingdome and was like to draw out the life-blood also Nemo tenetur divinare say the Canonists neither will I take upon me the office of a Prophet to foretell the Catastrophe of these Tragedies Yet sure I am this Queen of all Islands never received such prejudiced and wrong nor ever was so near the brink of destruction as when she drew in forraign Forces to defend her self against homebred Enemies and I pray God we experimentally interpret not the mysterie of Pharoahs dream concerning the lean kine which eat up the fat and yet were never a whit the fatter If there be a decree of Heaven that these two Nations shall be drowned one in anothers blood for the crimsons sins of both not yet repented of yet let not us draw this most fearfull judgement upon both Kingdomes by the cord of an oath But to argue syllogistically No Subjects living under a Christian Prince who is a professor of the true Religion and a Defender of the Orthodox Faith may enter into a publick and solemne Covenant for the reformation of Religion without the consent much less against the express command of their Soveraign For such disobedience and sleighting of their King cannot stand with the duty they owe him of fear and Loyalty injoyned Prov. 24.21 My Son Fear the Lord and the King Eccles 8.1 I advise thee to take heed to the mouth of the King to the word of the oath of God Rom. 13.1 Let every soul be subject to the higher powers whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation V. 4. If thou do evil fea for he beareth not the sword in Vain Prov. 16.14 The wrath of the King is the Messenger of death Prov. 19.12 The Kings wrath is like the roaring of a Lion 1 Pet. 2.13 Submit your selves to every ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether it be to the King as Supreame v. 17. Fear God honour the King Nor with the Prayers of the Church made for him that we may serve honour and humbly obey him in God and for God Not with the principles of right Reason for the King is the supreme head of the Church and Commonwealth under Christ and all his Subjects conjuncti●● in Parliament or divisim are but Members of the same