to flie and lurk in corners Till the Earl of Huntingdon apprehending him brought him up again to his old lodging in the Tower where he made an unfortunate end I shall not urge the practises of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton a man of great wit and policy notwithstanding he was Indicted of high Treason and arraigned at Westminster with Arnold Warner and others because though the case were plain yet the Jury acquitted him but to their own cost and trouble And it was well for him the Advocates of those times desired not so much to triumph in the calamities of poor men nor that the prisoner should loose his head rather then they their oration and the glory of the day But say some there were no Ministers had any hand in those tumults none of them were Trumpeters to Sedition at that time What was Goodman and Gilby Were not they Ministers Was not Jewel a Ministâ—â— â—ho preacht at Gl ceâ—â—er against the Queens proceedâ—ngs Was not Doctor Sands a Ministâ—r though Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge when he walkt abâ—ut with the Ragged Staff and assisted the proclaimers of Lady Jane Were not Hooper Rogers Crowly Ministers all enrolled as friends and favorers of these actions And were there not divers other Ministers both of Kent and other Counties who upon Wyats fall forsook the Realm or was there any thing more likely to drive them out then a guilty Conscience what shall we say of those two Apostles falsly so called of the time Cranmer and Ridley W re not they Ministers yet great instruments of the Queens troubles And that not in King Edwards time onely upon which account some would excuse them but after his death and under the Reign of Queen Mary For Ridleys Sermon of Pauls Cross wherein like another infamous Shaw he so highly magnified and defended the Title of Lady â—anâ— and perswaded the people to accept and obey her as Queen iâ—pugning against all honesty and conscience the right of King Henries two Daughters was the Sunday after King Edward was dead And 't is well known the Reign of a Prince commenceth not from the time of his Coronation but instantly upon the death of his predecessor And therefore was he justly attainted and convicted of Treason Cranmer was both Counsellor and Oracle in the business and was therefore arraigned and condemned with the Lady Jane and Guildford Dudly as contriver and principal assistant in that Treason as appeareth by the Records in the Kings Bench. This man was a very Proteus in all his actions and of a disposition most servil and vitiously plyable to any humor of the King and ready always to follow the prevailing party He was first a principal instrument of the Kings divorce from â—â—â—en Kâ—â—bâ—â— ne whereby the 〈◊〉 Gatâ—â— were let opon to the Lady Anne Bolen yet afterward to serve the Kings Appetite he was used again as a chief instrument in her condemnation as appears by the Statute where Cranmâ—rs Sentence is recorded judicially 28. Hen. 8. c. 7. as of his own knowledge convincing her of some fowl act Nor can any wise or indifferent man but condemn him of inexcusable iniquity that being a Counsellor of State Primate and M tropolitan of the Realm pretending also to be a Reformer of Religion would so much betray his Master whose creature he was as to frustrate and make void his will whereof himself was made chief Executor subscribe to extinguish his issue as much as possibly he could by disinheriting his two Daughters and transferring the Crown to another Line and Family and all this most basely and contrary to his conscience onely to please a Subject and to avoid â—omâ—â—inde of affliction which he feared upon the Succession of Qâ—een Mary and against which 't is manifest by the frequent changings lapses relapses and perjuries which he made he was never well armed It is manifest therefore that in all places at home as well as abroad this Spirit of Reformation hath ever been and is seditiously pragmatical and dangerous unto Princes and States wheresoever it getteth footing and is not countenanced and advanced so far as to bear all the sway it self It is in this onely respect not in any other like the Motto of her who meerly for temporal and worldly ends made her self the great Patroness of it that is it is Semper Eadem always the same and never changeth This was it which induced them of Genevah to expel their Bishop and Leige-Lord This was it which induceth them of Sâ—ethland to renounce their lawful King Them of Holland to depose their Sovereign Prince This was it which Sollicited the Bohemians to depose the Emperor their Elected Crowned and Acknowledged King That imprisoned the most Vertuous and Religious Queen and Martyr Mary Queen of Scotland and cast her undeservedly into those calamities which pursued her to death This was it which held out Rochel and Montauban in defiance against their King and lastly that which begat so many conspiracies commotions and causes of jealousie unto Queen Mary of England So as within the space of Sixty years it hath been observed More Princes have been deposed and persecuted by Protestants their Subjects upon the quarrel and difference of Religion then had bin by the Popes excommunications or by the attempts and practises of any Subjects Catholikes in Six hundred before Of the troubles which have arisen to other Princes upon this occasion we have spoken somewhat already The business of Sweden is defended by one Master T. M. upon these grounds First That it was done by the demand of the whole State But this is a manifest falshood For if you take the whole State formally that is for all the people of the Nation it is certain that Sigismund their lawful King had not onely a great but the far greater and better part of the people well affected to him If you take it Virtually that is for some general Assembly representing the people legally met and resolving upon that business there never was any such called The meetings that were were onely of Duke Charls his faction who in comparison of the Kings party both of Nobility and Commons were but few yet as it often happens the better case was more negligently managed and those for the Duke who were also inclined to Innovation in Religion being more active industrious and unanimous in their design made shift to secure the Military provisions and to invest themselves of the chief Strengths of the Kingdom before the others and so prevailed as Chytraeus himself a Protestant Author is sufficient witness Chytra Continuat Crantzii Secondly he saith it was for the defence of their Priviledges and Liberties None of which were violated as by the same Chytraeus appeareth Thirdly that it was for the fruitoin of Religion That 's true indeed and confessed That they might introduce and establish a new Religion they renounced their old King which is the thing we charge them with and wherein whatsoever they did
Honor and Strength of the Nation Titulus Secundus HItherto Schisme and Sacriledge annexed to it chiefly reigned but the second plague was the utter ruin and extinction of Religion For by abuse of the name and authority of King Edward the very Church it self was entirely subverted Religion absolutely changed Heresie introduced and established in the full open and publike profession thereof And we might say the craft and malice of the Devil whose work it is to corrupt true Religion confound States herein most perfectly appeared For though indeed the way to Heresie and all publike disorder were sufficiently levelled and made plain by King Henry the Eighth who onely by reason of his greatness and imperious cruelty was fit to begin such a work yet Religion it self was suffered to stand a while longer at least in the general and more visible parts of it he knowing well that all could not be effected at once and that it was necessary for him to seduce States as he doth souls gradatìm by degrees opportunity and succession of time And being also confident that if those forts of Piety and true Christian-Catholike Devoâ—â—on that is the Religious Houses were once-razed the Church in England brought under a Lay head and by consequence the sheep made Governors of their Shepherds he should easily upon a second attempt there and by some other hand overthrow Religion it self King Henry at his death had appointed by will sixteen Executors who during the minority of his Son King Edward should be as it were his Guardians and Counsellors for the better governing of the Realm Among these one who made himself afterward Principal was the Lord Edward Seymour Earl of Hartford who being the Kings Uncle by the Mother-side procured himself in a short time to be made Protector and by that means gat as he thought a dispensation from his Joynt Executorship with the others and demeaned himself now in all things concerning the Affaires of the Realm as their Superior A thing which King Henry least of all intended rather he had provided with as much caution as was possible against the encroaching of any one upon the rest under any title or pretence soever But this was the way to bring about some furthâ—â— designes intended by that Party which advanced the Protector to that dignity and which the other and more honest part of the Councel did not either so providently foresee or so faithfully resist as they ought to have done One of the first things which the Protector set on foot after the Protectorship was secured to him was Innovation of Religion abolishing the Old Catholike and introducing a New under the title of Reformation Not so much out of any great preciseness that was ever observed in him or devotion that he was thought to have more one way then another but because he was thirsty and desired to drink to the bottom of the Cup which in King Harries time it seems he had but onely tasted There was yet some Game in his eye which he intend-to bring into Toyls viz. some few remains of Church-Lands Collegiate-Lands and Hospitals which he could not compass or draw into possession by any Engine better then that pretence of reforming Religion Cranmer that unworthy Arch-Bishop of Canterbury was his Right Hand and chief Assistant in the work although but a few months before he was of King Harries Religion yea a Patron and Prosecutor of the Six Articles To this end viz. the more to amuze the people and as they thought to give some strength and countenance to what they meant to set up a couple of strangers Religious men indeed by profession but such as were long since run from their Orders that is Peter Martyr and Bucer must be sent for as far as Germany and placed in the Divinity Chairs at Cambridge and Oxford That the world might see how contrary not onely the Pastors of the Church and Clergy but even all the learned men in both the Universities and of the whole Kingdom generally were to his proceedings By these two Apostate Friers together with Cranmer Ridley Latimer and some others was a new Liturgie framed and the old abolished together with that Religion which had been so many hundreds of years observed in this Nation with great happiness and honour The Protector though powerful of himself by abuse and pretence of the Kings name in all things which he did although the King were but a Child of nine years old was yet well seconded by the Duke of Northumberland and by the Admiral his onely Brother by the Marquis of Northampton c. all of them persons seemingly at least much inclined to Reformation and by them he overbore all the rest that opposed him or were any thing contrary to his designs As there were many both eminent and wise men and equally intrusted in the publike affairs with himself could things have been carried rightly In particular the Lord Privy Seal the Lord St. John of Basing Bishop Tonstall Sir Anthony Brown and that wise Secretary Sir William Paget but most especially the Noble Chancellor the Lord Wriothsley a man of singular experience knowledge prudence and who deserveth to be a Pattern to his Posterity far to be preferred before any new Guides But being made Earl of Southampton though it neither won him to the Faction nor contented nor secured him yet he stood thâ— more quiet and made no great opposition to their doings All things now grew to confusion there remained no face nor scarce the name of Catholike Church in England and though there were great multitudes of men well affected to the old Religion and discontented that the Church should be thus driven into the Wilderness and forced to lurk in Corners Yet did they shew loyalty obedience and love to the publike Peace notwithstanding They took up no Arms they raised no Rebellion not so much as against the shadow of a King or the usurper of his Royal name The Protector in the mean time goeth on with his work which is principally to enrich himself with the Remains of the Church having long before as 't is said tasted the sweetness of such Morsels in the Priory of Aumesbury He now seizeth two Bishops houses in the Strand and of them buildeth Sommerset house which as the world saw quickly reverted and slipt out of his hands After this he procureth an Act to be made whereby all Colledges remaining all Chantries Free Chappels and Fraternities were suppressed and given to the King And how greedily he entered into the Bishop of Bath and Wells his Houses and Manors that Church will never be able to forget Notwithstanding that Bishop Bourn afterward by his industry recovered something but nothing to the spoiles and wast which was made Nor was he satisfied with this For shortly after contrary to all Law to King Henries will and against his own Covenants those I mean which he entred to his Advancers when they made him Protector He committed the Lord Chancellor
more honorable with them and more becomming good Christians then the Sword and Fortune of a Conqueror in comanding In which most Christian posture I leave them to proceed Titulus Tertius THe last and greatest tempest against poor English Catholikes was raised by Queen Elizabeth This not onely shook the foundations of the Church which had been so lately repaired by the most Catholike Princess Queen Mary but proceeded so far as humane policy and power could to extirpate the very name and memory of Catholike Religion in England Camd. in Elizab. And this as it were in an instant and without noise For as her own Historian Camdeu reporteth it was done Sine sanguine sudore No man unless perhaps it were Master Secretary Cecil did so much as sweat in the bringing in of New Religion nor was any mans blood I mean at the first beginning drawn about it The Christian world stood amazed at the first news of such a sudden alteration Both because Religion had been so lately and so solemnly restored by Parliament as also because the Queen her self that now was always professed her self so much Catholike during the Reign of her Sister She constantly every day heared Mass saith the same Camden and beside that ad Romanae Religionis normam soepius confiteretur went often to Confession as other Roman Catholikes did Yea saith Sir Francis Ingleseild when she was upon other matters sometimes examined by Commissioners from the Queen she would her self take occasion to complain that the Queen her Sister should see me to have any doubt of her Religion and would thereupon make Protestation and Swear that she was a Catholike The Duke of Feria's Letter to King Philip is yet extant to be seen wherein is certified that the Queen had given him such assurance of her beleefe and in particular concerning the point of Real Presence that for his part he could not beleeve she intended any great Alteration in Religion The same profession also she made to Monsieur Lansack as many Honorable Persons have testified and at her Coronation she was Consecrated in all points according to the Catholike maner and anointed at Mass by the Bishop of Carlile taking the same Oath to maintain Catholike Religion the Church and Liberties thereof as all other her Catholike Predecessors Kings and Queens of England had ever done Concerning the grounds which moved her to make this Alteration so much contrary to the expectation and judgement of Christendom we shall speak in due place This was manifest that the long sickness of Queen Mary gave her great advantage time both to deliberate and draw all platforms into debate to prepare instruments in readiness for all designs and to make choise of the fittest and surest Counsellors such as were most likely to advance her ends Neither did she seem to value her Honor overmuch in order to the bringing about of her chief design For in open Parliament after her intentions for a change began to be discovered she protested that no trouble should arise to the Roman Catholikes Horas Preface of Queen Elizab. for any difference in Religion Which did much abate the opposition which otherwise might probably have been made by the Catholike party and put the Clergy themselves in some hopes of Fair quarter under her Government She knew full well that a Prince alone how Sovereign soever could not establish a new Religions in his Kingdom but that it must be the work of a Parliament to give Authority and Countenance to a business of that nature Therefore to win the Bishops and the rest of the Catholikes in Parliament to silence at least she was content to use policy with them and promise them fair as Monsieur Mauvissieir hath well observed Les memoir de Mons. Mich. Castelnau who was a long time Embassador heer from the French King and curiously noted the passages of those times Add hereunto That when the Act for Supremacy was revived which was always the great Wheel of these Motions whereas by King Henry's Law both Bishops and Barons stood in danger thereof as the examples of Sir Thomas Moor Lord Chancellor of England and Doctor Fisher Bishop of Rochester had shewen in this Parliament the Queen was content to exempt the Lords and Barons absolutely from the Oath as they in King Edward the Sixths time had exempted themselves and to leave the Rigor of it onely upon the Clergy and Commons She also thought good to qualifie the Stile somewhat viz. from Supream Head changing it into Supream Governor which though it altered not the sence yet it abused some into a beleef that the Queen pretended not unto so much in matters Ecclesiastical as the King her Father had done Beside we are to remember that King Henry by pulling he Abbyes had much weakned the power of the Clergy in Parliament having deprived them of the Votes of no less then Five and twenty Abbots who constantly sat in Parliament in the quality of Barons And lastly it is well known The Lower House of Parliament it self as they call it was so calmly spirited in those times that they used not much to oppose what their good Lords of the upper House liked All which things considered and that too many of the Catholikes both Lords and others thinking it better wisdom to purchase their future security by present silence then to expose themselves to trouble and vexation afterward by opposing that which they feared they should not be able to hinder therefore either but faintly resist or quietly absent themselves who can wonder if the whole business were carried with ease upon such promises of the Queen and by the industry and craft of Sinon alias Secretary Cecil who had the chief Management of it in his hands By his advise it was thought fitting that the Noble Earl of Arundel should for a time be abused with some hopes of marrying the Queen who thereupon by the interest which he had in the house of Peers ingrosed into his own hands the Proxies or voices of so many of them who thought good to be absent as when time came served the Queens turn exceedingly well The duke of Norfolk Son in law to Arundel but now a Widower was already exasperated against the Pope because he might not have dispensation to marry his Kins-woman and therefore it was no hard matter to joyn him with Arundel The Queen had also against this time either made or advanced in dignity and consequently in interest certain new Lords whom she knew to be favorers of her design viz. William Lord Parr was made Marquis of Northampton a good Speaker and a Politick man Edward Seymour Son to the late Duke of Sommerset was made Viscount Beauchamp and Earl of Hartford Sir Thomas Howard was made Viscount Bindon Sir Oliver Saint John Lord St. John of Bletso Sir Henry Cary Lord Hunsdon She had also as much weakened the Catholikes party by discharging from the Counsel-Table many of the old Counsellors
in England might not marry Queen Mary of Scotland a Papist as all the World knew yet the Protector made it no scruple of Conscience to pursue that business to the utmost hazzard Calvinism and Lutheranism are themselves as opposite as the Antipodes yet they enter-marry frequently and their issué bear witness thereof Was it then tolerable in the Reformed Churches and is it now intolerable with Spain Or is there any particular cause of scrupulosity and fear in this overture more then in those other doth the State of the Kingdom and fear of alterations trouble them that fear is vain The Husband is head of the Wife and though the Infanta be born in Familiâ Imperatrice yet there is no Soveraignty invested in her she can make no mutation of State least of all without consent of the State and we have little cause to distrust her having had such a president before of King Philip who being king of England yet neither did nor could attempt of himself any alteration And if the English be sure to hold their Religion it were neither Justice nor Humanity if she should be denied hers There is no man of Honor would offend a Lady of her Dignity for a difference that concerns her Soul her Faith her Devotion towards God What then is the reason why this Match seems so distasteful Is the name are the qualities of a Spaniard become so odious amongst us Surely ab initio non fuit sic of old it was not so it is neither an ancient quarrel nor a natural impression in the English In the time of Edward the Third there was a firm and fixed amity between England and Portugal and from that Lancaster of England the Kings of Portugal are descended As for Castile John of Gaunt married Constance the Daughter of King Peter by right of whom the Crown of Castile appertained unto him and his Daughter Katherine was married afterward to Henry the Third King of Castile upon which Match as appears yet in the Records of the Savoy John of Gaunt resigning that Crown the controversie ended and the Kings of Spain as flourishing Branches of the Tree and Stock of Lancaster have ever since quietly possessed that Kingdom So that Prince Charls by this Match is likely to warm his Bed again with some of his own Blood I might adde further that King Henry the Seventh married his Son to King Ferdinands Daughter on purpose to continue the Successon of that amity I might remember the Treaties of 1505. between King Henry the Seventh and Philip of Austria Son in Law to King Ferdinand for the preservation and strengthning of that League And how much the amity of England was esteemed and how readily embraced by Charls the Fifth Emperor and Grand-childe of Ferdinand appeareth very well by the Treaty Arctioris Amicitiae in the year 1514. And by that renowned Treaty of Calice the greatest Honor perhaps that ever was done to the English Crown and by the Treaty 1517. between Maximilian the Emperor Charls King of Spain and King Henry the Eighth not to speak of the Treaties for entercourse in the years 1515. and 1520 nor of the Treaty at Cambray 1529. nor lastly of that famous one 1542. Let it suffice that by them all it is manifest with what mutual constant and warm affections both Crowns and both Kingdoms entertained the strictest correspondence that could be till the Schism of Henry the Eighth and disgrace done to Queen Katherine by that unhappy Divorce and the Kings confederating with France made the first breach So as in those days we see there was no such unkindness no such hatred no such Antipathy betwixt the two Nations The first spark of difference between them brake out in Queen Maries time about the matter of Religion no other pretext could be found to make that breach which Wyat desired Yet neither is this the true nor the sole motive of the grudge which is now taken There is an other impostume which will not be cured without lancing The remembrance the hatred ever since Eighty Eight Manet altâ mente repostum Sticks still in our Stomacks and it is most true Hinc illae lachrymae from hence springs all our pain Well but let us be as indifferent as we can let us consider not onely their attempts upon us but the provocations that is the wrongs which we first did unto them Strad de bell Belgic Let us remember the Money intercepted which the King was sending unto D'Alva the want whereof at that time hazarded well nigh the loss of all the Netherland Provinces so lately reduced Camd. in Elizab. the assistance given to the Prince of Orange by Gilbert Morgan and others the first voyage of Sir Francis Drake the sacking of Saint Domingo the Protection of Holland by Leicester the infinite Depredations Letters of Mart executed to the infinite damage of the Spaniards beside the Philippicks the invectives which were in every Pulpit the Ballads and Libels in every Press were provocations such as Flesh and Blood would not endure in the meanest persons I speak nothing at all of the Portugal voyage nor of the surprize of Cales nor of the Island voyage but can any wise man think That the King of Spain should not be sensible of such indignities Was it not probable nay was it not equal that he should send a fury to Kingsale to revenge these wrongs And yet notwithstanding this Hostility when His Majesty came to the Crown how friendly yea how quickly did the King of Spain alter his course and send the Constable of Castile as the Dove out of the Ark to see if the Flouds of Enmity were any whit faln and to seek Peace with an Olive branch in his hand to establish a general Amnestia or Perpetual Oblivion of all unkindness past to bury all quarrels and reconcile the two Crowns and Kingdoms into an everlasting Friendship And surely cursed will he be that seeks to violate this Peace and under colour of Religion to extirpate Charity and publike concord And I pray what would be thought of the loyalty of that man who should now set himself to trouble and exasperate mens mindes with the old feuds and quarrels which this Nation hath had with Scotland But stay here my Pen must intrude no further without warrant into the Labyrinth of this secret Councel I know not whether it be agreeable to the Kings pleasure or no or fit matter for private Subjects to discourse upon I know very well how unsearchable the secrets of Princes are in what an abyss they lie and how much too deep to be sounded by every shallow discourser I remember also what Praying and Preaching here was against the Match of Queen Elizabeth with Mounsieur a business of very like nature with this in hand and declaimed against upon the same pretended peril of Religion alteration of Government and what not Yet it is very well known That those of the Councel who did most oppose it
were men which of all others were thought to care least for Religion Sir Philip Sidney indeed like a Noble and worthy Courtier as he was endeavored by a short Treatise to present unto Her Majesty the unfitness disproportion and inconveniencies of that Match both in relation to Her Person and the whole Realm but he did it privately and with discreet circumspection Stubs like an indiscreet and fiery Zelot taking the question in hand and prosecuting it in a way more likely to incense and corrupt the people then to advise or inform the Queen Cund in Elizab. his hand paid for his presumption And though some of the greatest and wisest of the Councel appeared very earnestly for it as a thing which was likely to unite the whole Kingdom of France unto England and would surely bring along with it the offer of the Netherlands by the Prince of Orange and the States whereby England was like to become a petent Monarchy yet was the whole Body of the Kingdom cast into much distemper and jealousies thereby Some upon partiality and faction others upon distrust of the practises of France some for their own some for their friends sinister ends and ambitions as in this very case I am perswaded men are not a little possessed with the same diseases and humors And if I did not well know the nature of the multitude which is a Beast with many heads and as mad brains I should wonder how they durst oppose the designs of their Sovereign a Prince of so great Experience and Judgement and who hath managed this business from the beginning with such wariness caution and prudence as this great Conjunction cannot portend any other effects then honor comfort and prosperity to the whole Nation Is he not the fittest to judge in his own case And his case being the case of the Commonwealth in general if any private man shall arrogate to himself either more wisdom to amend what is already done or pretend more affection to the State or more providence to foresee and prevent inconveniences certainly he must needs fall into the custody of the Court of Wards till he recover himself But having said this I shall leave the whole matter as a deliberative still and tell you in few words what the occasion was of this Discourse which followeth The occasion of the following Discourse THere met at a Merchants House in London where Merchants for their Table and Hospitality do worthily bear the Bell from all the Merchants in Europe divers persons of quality where being together in a Garden before Dinner T. Aldreds Letter the Pamphlet aforesaid and some strange reports of seditious practises from Amsterdam were read and discoursed upon In the midst of all comes in a fine Chaplain belonging to a great person in England and one that was of the Merchants acquaintance who hearing but a little of the discourse which at that time was the common Table-talk of City and Country with much vehemency he affirmed the Match was likely to breed great troubles and mischief to the Kingdom and that forsooth in regard as well of the increase of Catholikes within the Realm which it would occasion as also in regard of Spain which he ignorantly called an ancient Enemy Hereupon also he took occasion to rail bitterly against the Church of Rome as the Seminary of all the commotions in Europe and the contriver and plotter of all Treasons in England And being resolved to shew his Rhetorick in the Ruff and to omit nothing which might exasperate the company against Catholikes he alledged for examples in thundering language Heywards Reign of Edw. 6. the death of King Edward the Sixth sillily enough that you will say the many conspiracies against Queen Elizabeth buâ— especially that horrible project of the Gun-powder Treason which being undertaken onely by a few desperate Male-contents in justice might rather be buried with the offendors then objected perpetually to innocent men who do generally with great sorrow abhor the very memory of the fact and were publikely acquitted thereof by the King himself in the next Parliament following See the Kings Speech in Parliament Besides this he urged That Princes be disquieted yea endangered many times by Excommunications Bulls and other censures from the Pope by the Catechisms and Doctrines of Jesuites and that the Subjects of England are withdrawn by them from their obedience to their lawful Princes Lastly That they are a people so full of treacheries and disloyalty as no Nation can shew the like He forgat nor you must think to arm himself with the authority of Doctor Morton whose Maxim it was That we may now as well expect a white Aethiopian as a good Subject of that Religion He produced a Book entituled A discovery of Romish Doctrine in the case of Conspiracy and Treason wherein the Author playeth his master-prize against poor Catholikes with equal malice and indiscretion charging them with an infinity of scandalous accusations able to drive men into despair of the Kings Grace towards them and to breed in His Majesties Royal Heart an everlasting distrust of them He urged Parson Whites rash and uncharitable judgement against them That all their Religion was full of such Doctrines as afforded Monsters of conspiracy against the State that they teach men to murther Kings to blow up Parliaments and that since Bells time never was there such a ravenous Idol found as are the Priests of the Seminaries Ormerode also that famous Picture-maker was alledged in this heat who by a great mistake took upon him to condemn the singular and renowned Doctor Allen as affirming That Princes may be slain by their Subjects from the Text Numb 25. At length he concluded all with that Rhetorical flourish of Monsicur Lewis Baily in his Book of The Practice of Piety pag. 783. which he produced with much oftentation as if it alone had been enough to cast the whole Society of the Fathers into a fit of a Quartane Jesuites and Priests saith he are sent to withdraw Subjects from their Allegiance to move Invasion and to kill Kings If they be Saints who be Scythians Who are Cannibals if they Catholikes This conclusion for the art and wit of it could not but deserve a plaudite so the company went to Dinner and after Dinner this fine Chaplain was gone in haste Thereupon some of the company not so much taken with his Rhetorick as were the rest desired a Gentleman then present who well understood the World and was a freeman not obliged to any particular order furthen then as a Son of the Church to deliver his opinion of the Ministers invective which at last upon their much importunity he was perswaded to do in such maner as is here with his leave and particular information represented to you After some pause Claudius accusat Maechos quoth he Catilina Cethegum This is most ridiculous who can endure to hear a Gracchus inveigh against Sedition A man may perceive by the Prologue That
of the Leaguers That if they obeyed not they should repent it And yet again at Spires he labored to have prevailed with them by fair means but thither the Duke being grown more jealous and fearful of Caesar would not come However by this course which the Emperor constantly held towards them you may see how unwilling he was to disturb the Peace or to begin the War and how inexcusable they were that rejected so often the offers of accommodation But beside this if I should relate the malice and contempt they used to him you might well think they ought not to have expected the least degree of mercy from him in case they should fall into his hands as it hapned they did For in all their publike Letters they vouchsafed him no other Title then Charls of Gaunt Surius in Chron. usurping the name of Emperor whereby they renounced all obedience to him and so far as in them lay deposed him Which was an indignity the meanest Prince of them all would not have accounted sufferable in his own person I must not forget that the Landsgrave did usually both by Letters and Messages with no little bravery and confidence assure the Princes and Towns of the League that within three moneths they would force Charls to flie out of Germany and leave the Empire to them But how then did their pretences hang together that this League was made onely se defendendo and for their Lawful Protection Surely they aimed at some thing more when they talked of expelling the Emperor out of Germany As they also did when they solicited the Kings of France England Denmark the Hans Towns and Swisses to joyn with them and dishonorably abused him by many foul and infamous aspersions It is true France indeed though his enemy at that time nobly denied them Denmark lingred expecting the success neither was King Herry forward though his great Counsellor and Favorite Cromwel sollicited their business diligently and was so forward as to promise an hundred thousand Crowns for their aid At which time Doctor Thirlby Bishop of Westminster and Sir Philip Hobby were the Kings Ambassadors with the Emperor and by that occasion witnesses of the whole Tragedy And yet a little further to disprove their proceedings by Law Let us remember first the Decree at Worms above mentioned which as Gail the Lawyer hath told us in the case of publike Peace obligeth all persons alike Let us remember the Decree of Maximilian the First Emperor about the year 1500. in these words Consentientibus Statuum Ordinum votis c. By the general consent of the Princes and States of the Empire an Edict or Constitution was published necessary for publike Peace called in the Language of the Empire Landtfrieden By which Constitution Proscription or Banishment was adjudged to all such as disturbed the publike Peace by force of Arms Gailius de Pace lib. 1. c. 14. which Gail further explains to this sense Omnia Bella c. All War saith he made without consent of the Prince and Commission from him upon private revenge or quarrel onely is adjudged unlawful And Cap. 5. In crimen laesae Majestatis incurrit c. He commits high Treason saith he whosoever within the Empire raiseth Arms but by the Emperors Authority and Commission because he usurps to himself that which is the proper Prerogative Imperial Yea Lib. 1. tit 190. their own Goldastus confesseth it to be ancient Law Nemo intra Imperii fines c. That no man presume to gather Soldiers within the bounds of the Empire but by consent of the Prince of that respective Circle where he is and that he give sufficient Caution to the State that he intends not to attempt any thing against the Emperor or against any of the States of the Empire Tom. 2. And in another place he alledgeth a Decree of Ludovicus Pius against the King of the Romans and his Confederates as guilty of High Treason for attempting against the Emperor The like also of Henry the First against Arnulphus Duke of Baviere who rebelled against him and of Otho the First against Ludolphus King of the Romans and lastly of Maximilian the First against Emicho Earl of Lingen whom he proclaimed Traytor confiscated his Lands and Estate and gave them to other Princes of the Empire onely for going to serve the French King in his Wars though out of the Empire contrary to his Proclamation And as for the Imperial Towns which confederated with these Princes there is as little to be said for them For it is a Maxim of Law recorded by Gail Vbi supra that Civitatum Imperialium solus Imperator est dominus That the Emperor onely is Lord of the Imperial Cities and not their several Magistrates And that they pretended their Liberties in this case against the Emperor to no purpose And for Luther who was the primum mobile and cheif wheel of all these motions or rather the malus Genius that Fury which agitated the people and stirred them up to all these disorders if the Princes and Towns were thus guilty he could not be innocent If the Flock did erre the Shepherd which led them was to blame I shall not here charge him again with any small faults I will not accuse him of belying Caesar most impudently when he wrote to his friend thus Wormatiam ingressus sum In Epist I entred Worms saith he at a time when I knew that Caesar would not keep Faith with me Nor of his traducing or vilifying that most Fundamental Constitution of the Empire in Aureâ Bullâ making it one of the cheif miracles which Antichrist was to work viz. The translating of the Empire from the Greeks to the French in the person of Carolus Magnus Turesel Epitom lib. 6. p. 204. which was done by Pope Leo the Third Nor of his usurping upon the Emperor and Temporal Governmâ—nt in those pretended Laws of his which he published concerning the Publike Exchequer and how he would have Church-Lands and Abby-Lands to be disposed when he and the Princes should be Masters of all It shall be enough that I say He first counselled the Princes to take Arms and oppose Caesar in his quarrel and this Sleydan himself acknowledgeth And that all his Preaching and all his endeavors were to overthrow the Ecclesiastical Electors whose Dignities and Estates being established by the Aureâ Bullâ it was Treason or Sedition in the highest degree so to do The three Ecclesiastical Electors are three Chancelors of the Empire and in respect of their Regalities immediately subject to the Emperor so as there lieth no appeal from them to the Pope but to the Emperor and Chamber at Spires Luther therefore contriving their ruine attempted treacherously to pull the fairest Flowers out of the Imperial Crown Neither could he effect the suppression of them but he must undermine and endanger the State of the Temporal Electors also who as links of the same chain must necessarily
by Edward the Sixth was not warrantable being done in his Minority and when he had neither age to discern what he did nor liberty to discern any thing to the Protector and Northumberland in whose hands he was If you approve not this Argument why do you disallow the same plea for the Authority of the King of France was the age of the one a Bar in Law and not in the other or was the one an absolute King and not the other was King Edwards consent sufficient to authorize his Uncles doings and was King Charls his consent insufficient and nothing worth to authorize the Constable with his Army to pursue and punish their Army of Rebels Beza's opinion therefore In câ—nfess fid is much contrary to what he alloweth and commendeth here For if there be no other remedy but preces and lachrymae for private persons against the oppressions of a Tyrant he betrayed the Admiral and the Prince very foully to bring them into the fields of Dreux to fight against the King for Religion Doctor Bilson hath taken up somewhere one notable singularity to excuse the Prince of Conde viz. That he was not an absolute Subject of France ought not simple subjection to the Crown Ergo might lawfully do something more then others But it argueth such a gross ignorance in the Laws of France and in the state of that Prince that it deserveth more to be pitied then answered Neither could it help the Admiral who had no other Protection then that of his Sword nor Priviledge but from his new Religion But because that smooth profession of Beza above mentioned is so much insisted on and cunningly used as it were to cast a mist before the eyes of an unwary Reader it will be necessary to clear that business a little further by letting you see the man himself in more proper colours as in relation to this point First therefore read his Positions and Catechism of Seditions viz. That Book of his called Vindiciae contra Tyrannos There acting the part of Junius Brutus a Noble Roman indeed but great enemy of Kings he propounds in the first place this Question Whether Subjects be bound to obey their Kings when they command contrary unto Gods Law and resolveth presently Pag. 22. We must obey Kings for Gods sake when they obey God But otherwise Pag. 24. we are absolved For as the Vassal saith he looseth his Fief or Lordship if he commit Felony so doth the King loose his Right and his Realm also viz. By commanding contrary unto Gods Law Which considering that Gods Law is onely as they themselves shall think good to interpret it is dangâ—rous enough But Pag. 65. he is more notable Conspiracy saith he is goâ—d or ill according as the end is at which it aimeth Which is a most pernicious Maxim and a Doctrine fit for nothing but to encourage Ruvillac Poltrot or some such villanous assassinate to his desperate work or to be a buckler to the Conspirators at Ambois So Pag. 66. The Magistrates saith he or any one part of the Realm may resist the King being an Idolater as Lobna revolted from Joram when he forsook God And Pag. 132. The Government of the Kingdom is not given to the King alone but also to the Officers of the Realm And again Pag. 103. The Kings of France saith he Spain and England are crowned and put as it were into pâ—ssession of their charge by the States Peers and Lords which represent the people And Pag. 199. There is a stipulation in all Kingdoms Hereditary As in France when the King is crowned the Bishops of Beauvois and Loan ask the people if they desire and command This man shall be King What if they do it is no argument that the people do therefore chuse him to be King for his Kingdom is confessed already to be Hereditary and so the Succession determined by Law much less that they make him such It is an acceptation onely not an election a declaration of their willing Subjection Obedience and Fidelity towards him and nothing else as you may be well informed out of Francis Rosselets Ceremonies at the Consecration or Inauguration of the Kings of France Was there ever an Assembly of Estates held to consecrate or elect a King of France or do the Kings of France count the time of their Reign from their Inauguration onely and not from their entrance was not Charls the Seventh full Eight years King of France before he was crowned as the French Historians themselves report Gaguin Giles or think you that the Peers are Ephori No they are Pares inter se but not Companions to the King They are not States as in Holland to rule and direct all Affairs For in France and England all the Authority depends upon the Kings and what is the State but the Authority of the Prince Who onely by his Letters Patents createth Peers disposeth all Offices giveth all Honors receiveth all Homages in cheif as being the sole Fountain from whence springeth both Nobility and Authority And he that would either restrain this Sovereignty within any narrower bounds or communicate it to others makes no difference between the Crown of a King and the Berrette of a Duke of Venice Many other Maxims and Rules he hath of this nature fit for nothing but to introduce Anarchy and confusion in the World most of them false all of them dangerous Vails onely to cover the ugly faces of Sedition and Treason because in their proper shapes no man living can abide to see them I might here travel and weary you further with as much good stuff out of his Book De Jure Magistratus for his it is as most men think or else Hottomans who was his Comrade But I shall leave them both for indeed they touch the string of Sovereignty with too rough a hand yea rather they strain to break it if they could by such gross and misinterpretable Paradoxes as when they say The States are above the King that is the Body above the Head As if any man could seriously make it a question whether people should be commanded by the Master or by some of their fellow-servants by the Subject or by the Sovereign by the Prince of Conde and the Admiral or by their Lawful King and Sovereign King Charls And therefore had King Philip good reason to cut off the head of that Justice of Arragon upon a just occasion and to teach the people by example what the true meaning was of Nos qui podemos tanto come vos All which Paradoxes it were easie to refel but that I have undertaken onely to discover and not to combate And because they are both learnedly and piously confuted already by Barclay Baurican and Blackwood Onely by the way I shall desire you to observe how politickly they go to work They profess not openly and absolutely any desire to change the State or to depose Kings But this they do They labor by insinuation first
the Sword in their hands to compel the King to grant them what Liberty and Terms of Pacification they liked we are first to call again to minde that so famous and indeed furious Battle upon the Plains of Dreux of which Beza formerly boasted That the foundations of Reformed Religion in France were first laid and as it were consecrated therein Let us remember also the Battle of Saint Dennis the Battle of Jarnac the Battle of Coutras the Battle of Moncontour together with the besiedging of Roan and how much and Noble Blood was spilt in all these Actions At Roan the King of Navar lost his life at Saint Dennis the Constable was slain at Jarnaec the Prince of Conde and at Contras the Noble Duke of Joyeuse ended his days Tho Fields are yet stained France was let-blood too prodigally and strangers brought in as Surgeons to launce her wounds who have left behinde them greater cause of Lamentation then Remembrance At Moncentour where the Admiral stood alone as the sole Champion of the Reformed Churches The Missa-pulta testified what their quarrel was which by Beza's devise was advanced as a Basilisk to beat down the Royal Standard of France and the Labarum or Cross of Constantine Now as concerning the outrages assassinations and other mischeifs done and committed by these spirits of Reformation yet pretending nevertheless to be altogether innocent of Blood and Murther Polâ—rot in this Kalender must have the first place for killing the Duke of Guise who was the Kings Lieutenant General at that time so basely and treacherously as he did confessing it afterward before the Queen-Mother and avouching that Beza had both counselled and encouraged him to the Action After him we may remember how the Protestants in Valentia used Signeut de la Motte Gondrin the Kings Lieutenant in Daulphin who had assured them in case they would live peaceably and quietly with the Catholikes he would bring none of the Kings Soldiers upon them yet notwithstanding this they assembled forces of their own privately surprized La Motte and hung him up instantly in cold blood without any provocation save onely of their own malice to shew their contempt of the King and scorn of his Officers among them Which was a villany not sufferable in any Commonwealth especially where such favor and connivence had been offered but immediately before We may remember the Conspiracy of Simon May a man induced by the same spirit and instructed out of the same School to kill the Queen-Mother and Henry the Third But his purpose being discovered he was apprehended and had his desert Neither can the business be excused or shifted off with any colors himself confessed it and accused Seigneur de la Tour and Monsieur d' Avantigny two Gentlemen of good parentage yet birds of a Feather to have been hiâ— Counsellors and Abettors in the Plot Whereupon they were both of them apprehended but afterward released by His Majesty for private reasons not being willing as some thought at that time to search too deep into the wound either for the men engaged in it or the matter it self yet this was not all They proceed much further and seize upon the Kings own Rents and Râ—venues they coyn money and surprize either by fraud or force of Arms the cheif Cities of the Realm Orleans Troyes Poictiers Tours c. putting in Garrisons and Governors of their own party and for their own ends They deliver one of the Keys of France into the custody and command of Forreigners All which were attempts of the Highest Treason that could be and usurpations of the Prerogative Royal being done without colour of Commission or Warrant from the King and contrary to his express Will and the Law Lib. des Financ de France Nicholas Froumenteau a Minister of the new Edition confesseth That in Daulphin onely the Army of the Hugâ—nots killed Two hundred fifty and six Priests and One hundred and twelve Monks and Friers burnt Nine hundred Towns and Villages And yet what a pitiful tale do the Calvinists and others tell of a Massacre at Vassy by the Duke of Guise as if no cruelty had been comparable to that Which yet indeed was nothing at all in comparison of these and was done without the Dukes consent as not onely Monsieur Chasteauneuf in his Commentaries but also Thuanus Thuan. Historian lib. 29. who was a man never suspected to be of the Guisian Faction do expresly avouch Yea the blood that was drawn from the Duke himself laboring to have appeased the fray at the beginning was the cause that some quantity more was drawn from those Hugonots by the Dukes servants then otherwise there needed to have been No it was a toy and a trifle in respect of those outragious excessive carnages of Montbrison of Mornas and many other places acted by the Hugonots But such was the calamity of those times They which most justly deserved and unjustly complained against persecution did persecute their Neighbors most unjustly and tyrannically Let the world and all indifferent men judge by this In these Civil Wars there were no less then Twenty thousand Churches destroyed by Protestants and yet these men were born as they say to edifie the Church Is it not likely Could Mahomet himself edifie better or was his Alchoran and Turkish Superstition set up any other way then by the power of a Tyrants Sword and pulling down of Christian Churches I shall not commend any Act of Cruelty in whomsoever yet let men that are impartial consider how they can justly blame Charls the Ninth King of France for his proceedings against this sort of people at Paris and some other places in the year 1572. The Admiral being the principal Instrument and mover of all those Seditions and Troubles which for a long time had disquieted France and indangered so much the very life and person of the King the Queen Mother and other of the Princes who can wonder if his Majestie at last were compelled to use a mean extraordinary and somewhat rough for the cutting off such a Pestilent Member with his Complices who did nothing but Gangren-like perpetually corrupt and indanger the whole body of his State yea and often threatned the Head it self 'T is well known he was come to such height at this time that he Reigned in France as it were some Petty King in a Common-wealth meerly through the assistance of such people as had by his Means and Sollicitation chiefly revolted from their Lawful and Natural Sovereign he maintained in France an open War against the King and Crown of France he Sollicited and called in strangers to his aid levied Contributions exacted Tributes coyned Mony seized the Kings Revenues invaded his Towns contemned all his Laws yea what actions of Sovereignity did he not usurp exercise in contempt of his Sovereign For which having been first proclaimed Traytor in the year 1569. he afterward met with the punishment which both he and his had most justly deserved
keep men in aw In the year therefore 1477. this Decree or Law was made by Lewis the Eleventh King of France viz. All Treaties against the Kings Person or his Estate or against the Realm are declared to be Treason Which was revived or a new Law enacted to the same purpose and effect by Charls the Eighth in the year 1487. and in the year 1532. by Francis the First in the year 1560. by Francis the Second at Fontainbleau and by Henry the Second in the year 1556. All men were forbidden to bear Arms or to hold any particular Intelligences Councels or Assemblies for Conference but in Town houses or publike places By Henry the Third at Bloys in the year 1579. prohibition was made against the assembling or gathering of any Troops upon occasion or pretence of private quarrels or to enter into any such kinde of Association It was also Enacted That to hold intelligence to make Leagues offensive or to have participation with such either within or without France to levy Soldiers without the Kings License should be judged and deemed High Treason and offenders herein to be holden as disturbers of the State All which Laws are set down in the Code of Henry the Third Printed at Paris 1597. And all the Lawyers of France affirm the same viz. Francis Rogueau des droicts Royaux Bodin de Repub. Le grand Coustumier and others And surely with great reason For as without Order there can be no Peace so without Justice no Society And Calvinists in this respect differ not at all from the worst of Anabaptists if they refuse submission to the Superior Magistrate and to the Law Magistrates as King Josaphat saith 2. Paralip 19. Non hominis sed Dei exercent judicium Do execute the judgement not of man but of God And verily it cannot be denied but that this seditious Sect and Doctrine of Calvinism hath cast the State of France into a very desperate disease under which it laboreth at present and such as may seem to require more then an Aesculapius to give it perfect cure For as much as neither the Majesty of their King nor the Forces of his Armies nor the Wisdom of his Councel and Parliaments nor the Authority of the Estates so often assembled nor the Obedience due to Justice nor their own Peace and Safety together with that of the whole Kingdom can move a few desperate Out-Laws sheltring in Montauban and Rochel to yeild up themselves and their Arms to the King and to seek from His Royal Grace and Favor that Peace which all other his dutiful Subjects even of their own Tribe and Profession elswhere do securely enjoy Titulus Tertius KNOXISM OR The Troubles in SCOTLAND BUt perhaps this Fiery Zeal of the Rabbins of Genevah if it were transplanted into some colder Climate as for example into Scotland it would cool somewhat and be found of a better temper Not one jot better Calum non animum mutant It is to change air onely not complexion Their spirits that come from thence are too much fixed upon mischeif to be easily dispersed much less to be sublimated unto true goodness and vertue As experience hath shewn in the example of an infamous Empirick sent from Genevah thither whose practices have inflamed the whole Body of that Kingdom and filled it with so much irregular Zeal and abundance of ill Humors as thereby hath grown a Pleurisie of Troubles in that State which hath cost much blood and is not perfectly cured to this day The Authors of the Tumults and Alterations in Scotland with the Actors also were as violent as Whirlwinds they blew down all that stood in their way even Royalty and the Crown it self John Knox Goodman Gilby and Buchanan were the principal Instruments of the Work and emissaries of Master Calvin yet bravely seconded by Master David Fergersson a Learned Shoemaker but Minister at Dundee by Master Coverdale Willox Rous Harriot and Montgomery Victrix Legio a man may well say Et Novatores strenui Men of invincible obstinacy in their way and as perfect Innovators as could be desired All of them Ministers and of such Salt-peter Spirits as were fit to blow up and put into Combustion any Nation in the World By these was the Church of Scotland Reformed according to the Standard of Genevah and the Platform of those Elders Knox was their Nehemia's but far unlike him both in proceedings and qualities yet he pretended to act his part How properly and piously his Countryman will best inform you Langius vitâ Joh. Knoxi who wrote of his vertues Buchanan was ever a rude and slovenly Swiss of a presumptuous audacity and by nature factious He was one of them that in the time of James the Fifth at Edinburgh did solemnly in Lent eat the Paschal Lamb and being convicted of that Judaism a business which the King himself examined his Companions were condemned and burnt for the Heresie but he himself escaped and fled over into other Countreys as a man reserved to be a scourge to his own But to discern their spirits cleerly and to judge of their peaceableness patience sanctity c. which yet they so much pretended we must first read their Theorems and by the Maxims of their Doctrine we shall finde them Doctors extraordinary indeed and such as were scarce to be matched again in the whole World for the business which they came about I shall begin with Knox first who in his Book to the Nobility and people of Scotland instructs them thus in the point we treat of viz. Of obedience to Princes and Loyalty Neque promissum neque juramentum obligare potest c. Neither promise saith he nor oath can oblige any man to obey or give assistance unto Tyrants against God It is true no man saith that they can when the Tyrant expresly commandeth that which God exprâ—sly forbiddeth but that is not the case All the World knoweth in the sence of Knox and Genevah there is much pretended to be against God which is not at all forbidden by God And when a Christian Prince commands nothing but what his Office and the Laws of his Kingdom do require him to command certainly we may not so hastily presume it to be against God some better Authority must declare it to be so then the bare opinion of a Knox or a Buchanan So in his History of Scotland Princes saith he may be deposed by the people if they be Tyrants against God and his Truth and their Subjects are free from their Oaths and Obedience Secondly Goodman his Companion and Fellow Boutefeu sings to the same tune out of Exodus Goodm de obedientiâ in a Book which teacheth any thing more then what the title promiseth Toti populo hoc onus incumbit c. This is a duty saith he which lieth upon all the people in general to see that Idolaters be punished whosoever or how great soever they be none must be excepted neither King nor Queen
should be abolished and that whosoever defended the Popes Authority in Scotland should be banished and that all former Acts to the contrary should be repealed This was pretended to be done by the three Estates but the Queens Commission could not be shewn nor any consent of hers to confirm such Acts beside the opposition which the Clergy or State Ecclesiastical generally made against such proceedings See Jo. Leslaeus hist of Scotland not onely in the Parliament or Convention of States where they happened to be overborn but all the Kingdom over Therefore to make that seem good by a colour of Law which was at first begun by meer Faction and Violence some years after viz. Anno 1567. and after the deposition or rather unjust and forced Resignation of their lawful Sovereign the Queen they procure an other Parliament to be called the Earl Murray being then Regent and the King scarce out of his Cradle which confirms the Acts of the Parliament 1560. Cap. 9. and prescribes an oath to be taken by all succeeding Kings to maintain the Religion then received to which as yet no King had ever consented and establisheth the Confession of that Church The Queen provoked with their many and insufferable indignities had before this time sent for some French Forces into Scotland to oppose them But this they take so ill and the Preachers of new Doctrine in all parts of the Kingdom improve the occasion so much to her disadvantage and to the further incensing of the people that at last they not onely make shift to exclude her from all Government putting her in condition of a private person but dishonor her beside with most capital and criminous Accusations yea and cast her into prison not without great danger of her life Beza that Tibullus of Genevah instigating and encouraging them much thereunto who is pleased in his Reformed Zeal and Eloquence to call her Medea Athaliah and what not Nullum ejus sceleribus nomen c. The Good Man it seems could not finde words bad enough to express her guiltiness and yet how well is it known he had store of them always at command and how maliciously he pleaded against her while she was prisoner in England onely out of hatred to the House of Lorrain appears abundantly in his Book called Reveille-Matin I confess generally t is better to bury old quarrels then to renew their memory yet to justifie the Innocent and to detect perfectly the evil practises of these men I cannot forbear to insist a while on this Subject and to declare more particularly what inducements they pretended for such exorbitant courses They accused the Queen of procuring the death of her Husband the Lord Henry Darley out of a desire and intention to marry Bothwel who was principal in the murther Therefore say they for zeal to Justice for the Honor of the Realm and satisfaction to Forreign Nations it is necessary that she be under restraint til she cleer her self from the imputation of such heinous crimes These were their Accusations and pretenses But touching the Murther it was very unlike to be true and certainly required manifest proofs if ever any cause did Her Sex was not fit for such a Butchery and her nature known to be too Royal to harbor such dishonorable Treachery though she had some just cause of offence against him If she had desired to put him to death he was her Subject and she might have done it openly legally and by course of Justice He had been of the Confederacy for the killing of David Riza her Secretary his own Dagger was found in his Body The Earl Morton beeing fled into England upon that offence he presumed to revoke him and call him home without thâ— Queens knowledge or allowance Neither was he Loyal to the Queen in respect of Conjugal affection and duty his offâ—nsiveness in that kinde was very notorious and scandalous to all the Court and occasion of much disquiet and difference betwixt the Queen and him and from whence their common Adversaries took advantage in a short time to ruin them both What then is the proof of such a crime what evidence bring they to convince her guilty of the Fact First they object that Douglas Earl Bothwels man was executed for it True And that it was he that brought a Box of Letters of the Queens to Bothwel which he had received of Sir James Balfoor at Edenburgh to carry to his Master by which Letters intercepted their juglings and practises viz. of the Queen and Bothwel were discovered It is answered Lyes have commonly one Leg short and so 't is here For is it probable that either the Queen or the Earl should repose such confidence and so great secrets in a man that was known to be at the devotion of a contrary Faction as Sir James Balfoor was Is it likely she would at all send such a Packet which she knew contained matter of great Peril but of no consequence at all to her self For she directs them to be burnt and might have done that her self well enough without the labor of sending them to him Beside the Queen ever denied those Letters to be hers though her hand had been counterfeited to them neither was there Superscription Indorsement Seal Date or any thing else that might possibly discover more cleerly whose they were or from whom coming Her hand was onely Subscribed the Letters themselves of another Character and truly it is not probable that in a business of so great privacy she should require the State of a Secretary and that of some Stranger too for had it been the hand of any of her ordinary Amanuenses the case had been cleer and a discovery would have been easily made Neither could he who delivered them ever be found out to discover the Pack and Douglass who was the man accused to carry them protested at his death that he never knew of any such Letters Lastly supposing that she had indeed sent them yet was there no express proof of any unlawful act attempt or practise to charge her with Suppose she had desired to have her husband murthered doubtless it had been a great offence against God and odious to all men but was it a sufficient cause for her own Subjects to take Arms against her and to depose her Was not David in a like case in the business of Vriah and Bathshebah Yet he forfeited not his Crown Saint John Baptist reproved Herod for his Adultery yet did neither exhort nor counsel the people to deprive him of his Dignity though he were both a stranger of Idumaea and an usurper Edward the fourth of England was not deposed for keeping another mans Wife though he committed a great sin Nor Henry eighth for cutting off the Heads of so many of his own Wives and committing as great sins Spectante populo in the view of his Kingdom and of all the world Surely these Bouâ—efeux while they presume to punish their Kings for sin without
any good authority or proof do precipitate themselves unhappily into far greater Zeal in them is like a Sword in a mad mans hand dangerous to himself and others But to the matter What other probabilities did they produce against her Many She mourned faintly for his death which is a sign she was weary of his life She acquitted Bothwel for his death and did not punish him as he deserved Ergo let her die But what a Nugipoliloquides is this Buchanan are such conjectural presumptions as these matter of evidence sufficient to depose Princes As for her Mourning and the Funerals His Body was Embalmed and laid by James the fifth her Father the Lord Tracquaire Justice Clerk and others attended the Corps indeed most of the Counsel being Protestants the Catholike Ceremonies were not permitted and in Scotland it is not the custom to reserve the Corps Fourty days Nor was it decent that the Queen her self should have been there personally mourning as a Subject therefore she mourned privatly as his Sovereign and Wife which she did so long that her Counsel and Physitians both were forced to disswade her from it and to cease All which Sir Henry Killegrew might witness who was sent from England to condole and comfort her What could be required more of a Wife But as concerning Earl Bothwel and the Marriage following herein the jugling of Murray and his faction was most admirable and worthy to be known For First was not Bothwel acquitted for this crime by his Peers was not Murray himself who best knew the Plot together with the Lord Lindsey Sempil and other adherents principal to procure his purgation The Queen did not acquit him out of her own affection or will onely but by their advice and Counsel who were the chief Pilots of the State at that time Nay did not the same parties Murray Sempil c. procure others of the Nobles to joyn with them and sollicited the Queen to Marry Bothwel pretending it necessary for her to take such a Husband to defend her in troublesome times yea did they not in some maner force her to it and by their Hand-writing to Bothwel did they not binde themselves to obey him in case he would marry her did not they themselves viz. Murray Sempil and the rest in order to this procure the Divorce of Bothwel from his first Wife sister to the Earl of Huntly and are thereby most cleerly convinced of double dealing But what follows The charg of the Murther And of this the Lord Harris accused Murray himself viz. that at Craigmillar he Morton and Bothwel did consult conspire and determine the Kings death for the effecting whereof Indentures were there drawn and subscribed by them And to convince it more evidently Pourry Paris and Hay who were all three Executed for the Murther confessed at their death and called God to witness that those two Murray and Morton were the principal contrivers of it The like did John Hepburn Bothwels servant at his Execution for the same Fact protesting that he had seen the Articles and Writings drawn to that purpose as we said To blinde the world therefore a little Murray and Morton take up Arms upon a pretence to apprehend Bothwel and send out ships to pursue him at Sea whom themselves had sent away yea had sent the Lord Grange on purpose to him to advise and will him for his own safety to be gone promising that no body should pursue him as indeed none did very hastily for he stayed after this no less then two Months in Scotland viz. until Murray was returned out of France Then of necessity he must be gone otherwise by his stay or their taking him they would be all betrayed themselves So he finding himself over-reach't by his Associates in the Conspiracy and being as sure to be overpowered by them if he should abide it was content at last to withdraw and be offered up as a Sacrifice to the censure of the world for their purgation This therefore was the Texture and sum of the Plot concerning the death of the Lord Darley Husband to the Queen and the Queens Marriage of Bothwel These two Catilines Murray who was the Queens base Brother and Morton caused the King to be slain using Bothwels consent and assistance in it which Bothwel they perswade afterward to Marry the Queen and deal as effectually with the Queen that she should be willing to Marry Bothwel and this on purpose that they might have ground hereby to ruin them both and possess themselves of the government as in a short time they did upon a colourable though feigned accusation brought against them viz. against the Queen and Bothwel as conspiratours and contrivers of the Kings death T is well known the Earl Murray never truly loved the Lord Darley He was once in Arms and in the field to have kild him and thereupon flâ—d into England After this he perswaded the Lord Darley to give his consent to the Murthering of David Riza the Queens Secretary in which action a Pistol was also set to the Queens Belly being then great with Childe to terrifie her and if it could have been to procure her Micsarrying but the Lord Darley having obtained the Queens pardon for this yet fearing lest Murray should inform Her Majestie concerning him further then he liked he resolves with himself to kill Murray but first out of I know not what reason discovers his intention to the Queen whom he supposed to be very much incensed against Murray but she utterly disliked the business and would not endure him to speak of it which coming afterwards to Murrays knowledge as he had before practisd to estrang the Queen from her Husband and offered to procure her a Divorce from him which she also utterly condemned so now he resolves to make away him viz. the Lord Darlâ—y and to that end Plots with the Earls Morton and Bothwel as hath been said yet himself cunningly to divert suspicion and that he might be thought absolutely innocent in the business when as now all things were agreed upon withdraws himself from the Court first and then goes into France a little before the Murther was committed All which passages being indeed the most intricate maze of Treachery one of them that ever was devised by wicked men were made to appear plain enough unto Queen Elizabeths Commissioners at York as is manifest by Sir Ralph Sadlers Notes concerning that business which I have seen but afterward more cleer then the Sun at the Tryal and Execution of the Earl Morton Surius Chron. For Murray had met with vengeance before having been Pistolled by a man of his own profession as he rode in the Street at Edinburgh about the year 1570. Yet upon such false and treacherous Foundations as these do they ground all their disloyal proceedings and hard usage of the Queens Majestie their natural Sovereign afterward viz. That which they used towards her at Carbery hill their slanderous Libels their imprisoning her
Cujus contrarium verum est But let that pass The Clergy of England they count Atheists call them soldiers of Antichrist and a Bastardly Ministery And from the Fountain of this frenzy sprang in late times all those infamous and scandalous Libels of Vdal Penry Brown Greenwood Martin Marprelate Martin junior Hay any work for a Cooper The supplication to the President of Wales and many other to the late Queen and troublesome to the State But the spring-head of all was Calvin himself who Epist 105. declares magis sibi placere c. that he forsooth did rather approve the Scottish Reformation then that of England Gramercy good Sir John You like it better why because it was the issue of your own happy Brain 't is well known Knox fetcht his Coales from your Fire and cast his Engin of Reformation in your Mould and so upon the matter in commending it like a wise man you commend your self So Epist 26. he tells Cranmer relictam esse congeriem That there was a great heap of Popish superstitions yet remaining in the Church of England which did not onely dim but even much darken and corrupt the purity of Gods worship Hence it was that during all Queen Maries Reign The English Church at Genevah as they calld themselves was Antagonist and at defiance with the English Church at Franckfort for they at Franckfort defended the Authority of Bishops and used the Leiturgy and Ceremonies which were commanded by King Edward the sixth notwithstanding Mr. Calvin writing to the Protector by whose Authority they had been established was so modest as to call them scoffingly and by way of contempt Tolerabiles Ineptias certain fooleries but yet such as might be born withal for a time It is therefore we see no Hyperbolical charge or Calumny to say that this Presbyterian Discipline is the Palladium of Calvinists for which they do not onely contend but fight tanquam pro aris focis against all Kings and Princes that oppose it more eagerly and bitterly then for any other thing which no man will deny that knowes what their proceedings have been are in France Scotland Low-countries Bohemia and elsewhere or that hath read Bsialicon Doron written by a Pen that had cause enough to be sensible of their disorders or that Book of Philippus Nicolai De regno Xti which is ful of predictions of what lawless attempts and practises they would serve themselves to advance their consistory above the court which have not all prov'd untrue or lastly that of Joannes Schutz a learned Lutheran Lib. 50. caus who tells them plainly that they trust onely upon their Soecular power That they are seditious people and defend their opinions best with a Sword in their hand But that which King James himself saith of them is most remarkable Ego a Puritanis Prefat monitor c. I saith he have been vexed with these Puritans from my very Birth yea they persecuted me while I was yet in my Mothers Belly and it mist but little that they had not murdered me before I was born Among which Pranks that of the Ministers at Sterling must not be forgotten who appeared themselves in the field under the Command of some of the Nobility of that faction and forced the King to yeeld his person to them and to suffer a new guard to be put upon him and his old removed For which insolent attempt the chief of them viz. Mr. Patrick Galloway Pollard Carmichel and Andrew Melvin were glad afterwards to take covert in England yet James Gibson stood to it and called the King Jeroboam and persecutor Lawson opposed and affronted him to his face Pont and Balcanqual by open Proclamation and in the presence of a publike Notary censur'd him very formally and did what they could to withdraw the peoples Loyalty and affection from him When Philautia and Phantasia that is self-love and self-conceit do meet in Conjunction in the Brain there must needs be a great Eclipse of the understanding and a Heart swollen and blown up with singularity doth so far contemn yea hate whatsoever opposition is made against her that being not able to govern the strong passion and those fervors of a proud spirit which boyl incessantly within her Men run like so many furies upon rash and inconsiderate attempts both against the reverence due to Majestie Justice and all good government A thing manifestly observable in these Zelots And therefore the Zuinglians who are otherwise more then their half Brethren can scarcely approve them in the point of the Consistory For saith Gualter Minister of Zurich Comment in 1 Cor. c. 5. Galli habent sua seniorum Concilia c. The Reformed French saith he have their Consistories of Elders in whose hands all power and authority Ecclesiastical is as it were deposited and in These all counsels and resolutions are taken all Taxes and impositions layd for the maintaining of War against the King Proper work doubtless for the Ministers of Gods word as they will be called and for a Spiritual Court as it pretends to be and to as good a purpose De Offic. Ministror lib. 15. cap. 19.20 22. Musculus also sheweth as little esteem of them in his Loci Commun cap. 10. But above all Schultingius in his Hierarchica Anachresis doth most graphically and to the life discover their exorbitant and absurd practises shewing how all Kings Princes and Governors are made subject to their Excommunications that truly Brutum Fulmen of their elderships How Nobility and Commons both must assemble at the Summons of the Pastor who is more then half Pope in his Parish being attended by Assisting Elders rather to countenance what he will have done then to do any thing contrary to his minde Lastly Calvin at Genevah is the Supream Oracle beyond whom there is no appeal really Papa though out of a dissembled humility he seems not willing to be called Doctor So he And what confusion in the Civil State this Constitution of pretended Discipline may further cause in time Hooker in the Preface to his Books of Ecclesiastical Policy sheweth at large Titulus Quartus GEVXISM OR The Troubles in HOLLAND AND THE United Provinces BY Course we arrive now at the States of Holland Zealand and those other united Provinces that is at an Aceldama a Field of blood where the Principles mentioned so oft already in this Narrative and the Tragical effects of them have been acted with most lamentable fury and rage for many years together I will not be large in the declaration of them to shew you how the Lutheran faction first began and how violently the Calvinists succeeding did prosecute their work for then I should weary you I shall labor to be as breif as I may and rather to Epitomize things then dilate them Of all their Actions That Union of Vtrecht was the most notorious a devise cleerly according to the rules of Junius Brutus and in imitation of the Switz
and Cantons This Union was made by the States in the year 1578. For seeing on the one hand the fortunate Proceedings of the Duke of Parma and on the other the course of thâ— Male-Contents they enter a perpetual League which was comprized in Twenty Articles In the first whereof Holland Zealand Frize and Gelders joyn contra omnem vim quae sub praetextu c. to maintain one another against all force whatsoever that shall be made upon them in the Kings name or for matter of Religion After this viz. in the year 1579. the Prince of Orange who was the contriver and ringleader of all with those of Antwerp and Gaunt enter the League and subscribe on the Fourteenth of February and it was again confirmed at the Hague the Twentieth of July 1581. The design in all being to expel their Leige Lord the King of Spain and to deprive him of those Dominions as presently after they did publishing an Edict in the name of the States unitâ—d with this title or prescription Que le Roy a' Espague est descheu c. That the King of Spain is fallen from the Dominion of the Low-Countries and injoyning an Oath or form of Abjuration to be taken by all the people of those Countries in these words I W. N. Comme un bon vassal du ' pais Sware anew and binde my self to the Provinces united to be Loyal and Faithful to them and to Aid them against the King of Spain as a true Man of the Country Upon this they break all the Kings Seals pull down his Arms seize and enter upon his Lands Rents Customes and all Hereditaments whatsoever taking them into their own possession and as absolute Lords they Coyn Money in their own names they place and displace Officers of State Banish the Kings Counsellors seize upon Church livings suppress Catholike Religion beseidge Amsterdam and do all other acts that might import Supream and absolute Dominion And all this with so much terror and violence that as 't is reported Raald a Counsellor for Frizeland upon onely hearing of their maner of proceeding and of the new Oath against the King died suddenly therewith as of an Apoplexy The reasons they give why the King had forfeited his title and right to these Countries were these First because he labored to suppress Religion They mean their own which they had newly taken up contrary to the old and which had it not been for the opposition made against it by the Kings Governors in the Provinces had long before this time destroyed the Kings Religion which was legally established and received by the geâ—eral consent approbation and profession of the whole Country Secondly for oppressing that is governing them not according to the Law but by Tyranny Thirdly for abrogating their priviledges and holding them in a condition of bondage and servitude Such a Prince say they we are not bound to obey as a Lawful Magistrate but to â—ject as a Tyrant But this is a Presidâ—nt of vâ—ry dangerous consequâ—nâ—e doubtless For if private Subjects as 〈◊〉 that time they were without difpute may depose their Prince meerly upon general Charges and without having done any one overt Act contrary unto the Laws or the duty of his Office and may make themselves sole Judges in the cause of what is right betwixt the Prince and the People of which they were in no capacity either formal or virtual that is representative more then a Minor part Qui stat videat ne cadat there is no Prince nor State in the world can be secure The Rochellers may plead this as much as the Hollanders and so may any discontented party under a government which they like not as well as they But it shall not be amiss to enquire a little further into this business and lay open to plain view the grounds occasions and consequences thereof so compendiously as we shall be able The original primary and true cause of these troubles was the spring and growth â— heresie which by this time was like a Gangreen spread over the greatest part of Germany and not the least in these Low-Countries where under the shadow of religion especially of abetting and promoting liberty of Conscience as they called it All factions of State and discontentments of Ambitious persons shrowded themselves The peoples natural inclination to Novelty was great and set it much forward yet there wanted not the Concurrence of some Forreigners to blow the Coals of dissention both out of England and France Charls the Fifth Emperor a wise and provident Prince remembringing what a piece of work Luther had lately cut him out in Germany and with what danger difficulty and charge he overcame it intended as well for the quietness of these Provinces as for his own Interest and Honor to prevent as much as he could the Propagation of Martinests and all other Sects whatsoever And to that end finding no other means more proper and fit to be applied unto such a Malady had established the Inquisition among them about the yeer 1550. for the Execution whereof Mary Queen of Hungary then Regent of the Low-Countries procured such Explication and Mitigation of some Circumstances as was judged necessary But after this the Emperor resigning the whole government of these Provinces to his Son King Philip retired himself by a most memorable example voluntarily from the world and consâ—crated the last act of his life entirely to God and devotion King Philip at the first entrance into his government finding how much the Sects increased daily in Flanders notwithstanding the means opposed against them and considering what danger would ensue upon it to the State followed strictly his Fathers advise and in the year 1555. renewed the Commission Instructions and Articles for the said Inquisition But this as it happened through the general contagion and distemper of mindes which Heresie had bred in the people provd onely matter of further discontent to the Inhabitants of the Nether-Lands and did no good They alledge that all Strangers would thereupon be forced to depart the Country and by consequence their Trading would decay which was the Golden Mine and maintenance of those Provinces Thus they complained but indeed their inward grief was the humor of Innovation to which they were much inclined and therefore feared themselves There was another Politick Act of the Kings yet withall of very religious concernment and design which added Fewel to this Fire namely the Erecting of those new Bishopricks at Gaunt Ipres Floren. vand Haer de tumult Belgic Antwerp c. which he intended all the Provinces over And a third viz. the authority and power of the Bishop of Arras whose Cardinals Hat lately procured him by the Kings favor made him the more odious so as the greater his Obligation was to his Holiness or the King their Sovereign so much more it seemed was the malice both of the Nobility and common people incensed against him Lastly they urge their Ancient priviledges
Fifteen years after the beginning of the troubles Adde hereunto that when the Emperor procured the Treaty at Colen in the yeer 1579 and made choise of most Honorable and eminent persons for that purpose viz. Two of the Princes Electors the Bishop of Wurtzburgh the Count Wartzemburgh and Doctor Lawenman the King of Spain was as forward and sent thither the Duke de Terra Nova And the Duke Areschot with some others were Commissioners from the States with Commission Signed by the Arch-Duke Mutthias The States had by their Letter to the Emperor bearing date June the Eighth 1578. promised that they were and so would continue constantly resolved Vt in Belgio colatur religio Catholica sua Regi constet Authoritas that both Catholike Religion and the Kings Authority should be maintained in the Netherlands Before this at Worms in the year 1577. the Agents of the States submitted and referred themselves to the Emperor as likewise the King of Spain did Therefore both parties being so inclinable and consenting in Eodem Tertio in the same Umpire who could expect but that a general peace should follow But Davus perturbat omnia When the Emperors Commissioners were come to Colen at the time appointed viz. by the beginning of April the States Commissioners appeared not till the Fourth of May and then with a Commission insufficient and their Treating restrained to a Term of Six weeks and no longer when as themselves had been twice the time in but framing their instructions which the Commissioners of the Emperor took for a great error as justly they might do All which delays had been craftily procured by the Prince of Orange and his party on purpose to obstruct the peace And in the Articles themselves the States Commissioners propounded many things contrary to promise In the Articles proposed by the Duke de Terrâ Novâ in the behalf of his Master All kinde of severity relating to Religion was mitigated as the Emperors Commissioners had assured them to the intent ut nemo justè queri possit c. that no man might complain of the King as if he desired either to Tyrannize over their bodies or to Seize their Estates or to Oppress their Consciences for matter of Religion But nothing could prevail so the Imperial Commissioners finding such dallying and delays in the States That in Sixteen weeks they could get no answer and that in their Letters they did onely renew old grievances and quarrels they broke up the Treaty and departed Nevertheless Bâ—lduc and Valenciennes received the Articles So did Over-Issle and Tournay Artois and Henault guided by the Bonus Genius of the Country and Em. Lâ—lain that valiant and religious Marquis of Renty together with Monsieurs de Capre Heze Barze and the rest contemned the course of Orange offered their obedience to the King and made peace with the Duke of Parma But as for the Hollanders they were now further off then ever they publish discourses against the Treaty and labor by all means possible how to make good their usurpation and perfect their Union which they were all this time a framing not forgetting to scatter seeds of dissention and further discord among the Provinces in which business their Ministers helped them not a little And lastly at this time also by the advise of Orange and England they admitted Monsieur the Duke of Alenson in the year 1578. to a kinde of Protectorship of the Provinces creating him Duke of Brabant and absolute Prince of the Netherlands And all to shew how irreconcileable they were to their natural Sovereign Thus much hath been said to shew the Kings good inclination to Peace Now for his Tyranny and Exaction which they pretended and objected in the second place as the cause of making that Union and also his breaking of their Priviledges and the too severe Government of his Ministers contrary as they say to his Oath at Coronation surely so long after D' Alva's times and under the moderate Government of the Duke of Parma and after so many significations of the Kings gracious disposition and offers to ease their burthens if they would themselves this may rather be judged a Cavil to shift Peace then any desire to be rid of War But as for the business of the Tenth Penny an exaction which they so much complain of we must draw the Curtain a little and tell you it was necessity and not his own will which forced him to require that and that otherwise neither would he have done it nor the King have suffered it But as it happened being driven to an extremity for the satisfying of the Soldiers who always grow wilde if they want Pay he was constrained to incur an inconvenience that he might avoid a mischief England and Orange were the cause of it For about this time some of the Counsel here by the instigation of the Prince had made stop of no less sum then Six hundred thousand Duckets which were sent out of Spain to the Army but driven by hard weather and ill fortune upon the coast of Hampshire notwithstanding as some say the Queen had given a safe Conduct for the passage thereof But the Polititians of those times and Enemies of Spain knew well into what Streights the want of this money would drive D' Alva and that of necessity he must commit some error or other which would encrease the hatred of his Government and perhaps arm the peoples fury once more to sedition Besides this the King had sent another sum of Two hundred thousand Duckets by the Duke de Medina but that also was intercepted at Sea by the Zealanders and converted to other uses This man was of a milder nature and sent on purpose to qualifie the severity of D' Alva who by his natural Sterneness and some errors in Government which the general malice of the people and disfavor of some Forreign Princes did much aggravate had made himself it must be confessed not a little odious but having as was said lost his money and Ships he had small heart to stay among them so he quickly returned home again and with a resolution it seemed never to have further dealing with such sharking Cormorants and left D' Alva in a Labyrinth of difficulties how to get money and govern his Soldiers But however it appears by this that it was never the Kings pleasure nor purpose but meerly the necessity of his present wants which compelled the Duke to demand that Tribute and that the quarrel upon it was rather made and contrived by themselves then given And these great pretenders for the Commons that seemed then so extreamly careful of the peoples ease and sollicitous to keep them free from Taxes Impositions c. Let me ask them one question Why do they now Tax them so much Why do they lay such heavy burthens upon them they themselves now they have them in their power Excises Subsidies Taxes of all sorts which they have augmented and do daily augment and raise
which tasted of the severity of those Laws were not a little insolent and prone to attempt Yet that she was withal a Princess very merciful is manifest by her compassion shewn to such as deserved not well of her that is To the Dutchess of Somerset to Sir John Cheek who had been the principal corrupter of King Edward her Brothers Infancy to Sir Edward Montague Lord Cheif Justice who had both counselled and subscribed to her disinheriting to Sir Roger Ch lmley to the Marquis of Northampton to the Lord Robert Dudly to Sir Henry Dudly to Sir Henry Gates c. who stood all of them attainted and the Duke of Suffolk All which persons were very obnoxious to Her Justice she knew very well they neither affected Her Religion nor Title They were already her prisoners in the Tower yet she released them all But for all this the Zealots of her time would not be quieted nor suffer her to enjoy any quiet They Libel against the Government of Women they pick quarrels and murmur at her marriage they publish invectives and scurrilous Pamphlets against Religion yea they forbear not to conspire and plot Her Deprivation out of a desire to advance Her Successor to the Crown under whom every Calvinist expected a Golden Age. The austerities and abstinences which Catholike Religion prescribed and which the Queen by Authority of Parliament had but lately reduced and was her self very exemplary in the observation of them were not much pleasing to some Gallants about the Court nor to many others both in City and Country whose affections were better satisfied with the Liberties of the former Age and therefore desired some change of this But among other Instruments of mischeif that Book written by Goodman intituled Of Obedience was a most pernicious Incentive among the commons teaching expresly Ad Nobil Scot. P. 94. That Queen Mary deserved to be put to death as a Tyrant and a Monster And that other of Knox with whom the Zealots of England did correspond too much where he hath among many other of like nature this passage Illud aud actèr affirmaverim c. This I dare boldly say saith he the Nobility Magistrates Judges and whole people of England were bound in Conscience not onely to oppose and withstand the proceedings of that Jesabel Mary whom they call their Queen but even to have put her to death and all her Priests with her After this Sir Thomas Wyat takes up Arms for which Master Fox worthily Chronicles him marches his Army like another Cyrus as some called him over Shâ—oters-Hill threatning both the Court and the City Prince and People And for this Goodman in his Book Of Obedience commends him saith He did but his duty and that it was the duty of all who professed the Gospel to have risen with him This was their doctrin then And though it be said That Goodman recanted his opinion in Queen Elizabeths days it was perhaps onely that part of it which opposed the Government of Women And if he did it absolutely what doth it prove but the inconstancy of such men and how easily they can conform themselves to times that favor them and of what spirit they are under the cross and affliction Wyats pretence was particoloured looking as he would seem both at Religion and bonum Publicum in his opposing the Queens marriage with Spain as both Holinshead and Stow agree They that suppose it to have been meerly upon a civil account are confuted by the Queen her self in her Speech at Guildhal where she tells the City That she had sent divers of her Counsel to Wyat to demand the Reasons of his Insurrections and that they found The business of the marriage was onely a cloak to cover Religion which was the thing principally aimed at For he urged also to have the Tower delivered to him to have power to nominate and chuse new Counsellors declaring plainly That he would not trust but be trusted But Master Fox is plain in the case for he confesseth of all that Rabble which followed Wyat That they conspired among themselves for Religion and made Wyat their cheif The marriage was looked upon by them onely as an accessory thing and a means to strengthen that which they meant to overthrow and eo nomine for that respect onely it was to be hindred Upon this account William Thomas a Gospeller of those times conspireth to kill the Queen and at his death is so far from repenting of such a foul intention That he glorieth to die for the good of his Countrey Yea the Faction grew so tumultuous and bold That Doctor Pendleton was shot at in the very Pulpit Preaching at Pauls and Master Bourn had a Dagger thrown at him in the same place the multitude being so disorderly That the Lord Major himself had much ado to quiet them and the Lords of the Counsel were forced to come thither the next Sunday with a guard to keep things in order and to prevent further combustions which were feared At Westminster upon Easter-day a desperate fellow wounded the Priest as he was at Mass in Saint Margarets Church there After this they found out a Perkin Warbeck and brought him upon the Stage one Wilâ—iam Fetherston counterfeiting King Edward whom the world and some of themselves especially knew well enough to be dead on purpose to amuze the Queen and disturb the State There was one Cleber sometimes a Pedant living at Yakesly in Norfolke put to death for a conspiracy against the Queen Vdal Staunton Peckham and Daniel were committed for the same crime for which and for attempting to rob the Exchequer and her Treasury and also for Heresie they had their desert Not to speak of the Treasons of Dudley and Ashton set on by the French In Devonshire Sir Peter and Sir Gawin Cary great Protestants together with Sir Thomas Denny took arms to impede King Philips arrival in England possessed themselves for some time of Excester Castle but afterward seeing things go contrary to their expectation they made an escape by getting over into France Thomas Stafford coming well instructed from Genevah made Proclamations publickly in several places of the Kingdom that Queen Mary was not lawful Qeen was unworthy to reign and to abuse the people further gave out no less boldly then falsly that already Twelve of the best fortified places in England were committed to the Spaniards Upon which pretense Bradford Proctor Streachly and he surprize the Castle of Scarborough in Yorkshire a Fort of singular strength which they would hold against the Spaniards they should have said against their Queen and Sovereign but they lost it and their heads beside Henry Duke of Suffolk one to whom the Queen had given life before being Father to the Lady Jane and a privy Counsellor in those Treasons of Northumberland fled into Leicestershire with the Lord Gray making Proclamation against the Queens marriage but not being able to raise a Commanding Army as he hoped was compelled
they did by private Authority and Faction It shall suffice therefore to send this Master T. M. for his better instruction unto a great Doctor of his own Church Doctor Bilson above mentioned who as we have heard before holdeth it tantum non as an Article of Faith that Princes are not to be deposed which is also the judgement of the greatest Doctor of the English Church and hath been so for these Fifty years and upwards But we demand of them is it good Doctrine in the Reign and case of Queen Elizabeth onely and not so in the Reign and case of Queen Mary It is a position frequently defended in their own Schools Dominium non fundatur in gratiâ and the contrary Doctrine is as generally exploded in Wâ—cleff The difference then of Religion alters not the Authority and power of Jurisdiction And Wyat with his complices rising in Arms without and against royal Authority was a Rebel against Queen Mary as much as Westmorland and the rest with them whom the English Chronicles mention were Rebels in rising against Queen Elizabeth But you will say Queen Mary observed not the Laws of the Realm she abrogated the Statutes of the First of Edward the Sixth which all the Kingdom approved and 't is the profession of good Princes to observe the Laws and to govern by them I answer it is true Legibus se Subjectos esse c. it is a most Christian profession of all Kings to be subject to their own Laws but it would be understood cum grano salis soberly and to refer more to the directive part or power of them then to the corrective or punitive especially in criminal cases if any such should happen lest the remedy should prove worse then the disease the reparation of a private person turn to the ruin of the publike which is contrary to reason the end of government Beside in Princes we may consider their private Acts as I may so cal them of Government which consist in the Executive part of their Office viz. in administring or dealing justice betwixt man and man and in seeing so far as the Law or reason requireth of them that all men under them live well and according to their several duties in these Acts the Prince may be justly supposed to be bound up to the Law and that he ought not to do otherwise then the Law prescribes But who ever accused Queen Mary of breach of Law or misgovernment in this sense Happy had it been for some of her Successors and this whole Nation if they had affected arbitrary Government and Rule no more then she did Secondly we may consider in Princes their more publike Acts which concern all their people in general and consist in the Legislative part of their Office and in these they are Free they are absolute unlimited and bound to nothing but onely to proceed upon such advise as the Constitutions of their several Governments do require that is most commonly and as is best upon advise and the consent of their whole people represented and giving them Counsel in Full Parliament I say in this capacity the Prince is bound to no Law but the Law of Reason and a Good Conscience as to all other respects at liberty to enact or abrogate to make or repeal what Laws he shall think fit and most likely to procure publike good upon such advise given And did not Queen Mary so proceed Did she do any thing but by publike consent advise and supplication of her people in Parliament Beside if Queen Mary should be so subject to her Brothers Laws as not to alter them upon any reason in a legal and due manner why was not Queen Elizabeth so subject to Hers yea why was not King Edward the Sixth himself so subject to the Laws of his Father Why were they altered and that in his Minority too When he was a Childe and understood no more in things of that nature and consequence then a Childe you will say The Religion which Queen Mary brought in was corrupt and impure That of her Brother before and of Queen Elizabeth after her was pure and according to Gods word But this is your assertion onely we say still That you proceed upon a false supposition that presumption and self-conceit rules the greatest part of your rost That thing viz. Whether Queen Maries or Queen Elizabeths Religion were best is the grand question betwixt us And as it is certain that it was never yet by any general and orderly Counsel no not of Protestants determined on your side so we are sure and the world together with your selves know it hath been often legally solemnly determined for us by all sorts of Counsels Provincial National Oecumenical And we pray what reason can be given why the Judgement of Parliament restoring Catholike Religion under Queen Mary with the consent and advise of the chief and best of the whole Clergy of the Nation should not be as good as that which under Queen Elizabeth abolish'd it not onely contrary to the Queens Oath taken at her Coronation but without the advise or consent of so much as any one Bishop or spiritual Prelate of the whole Kingdom who yet in a business of that nature viz. concerning Religion were by all Laws both of * Malach. 2.7 Heb. 13.7.8 17. God and of the Nation principally to be consulted with But let us gratifie our Adversaries as much as may be Let us suppose the worst viz. that Queen Mary had indeed erred in the introduceing of some kinde of superstitions ought she therefore presently to be censured by Ministers or deposed and put down by a Wyat God forbid Solomon himself a wise and a great King did fall into grievous sins and particularly into the grosest of those kinds whereof they presume to censure Queen Mary He had many Hundreds of strange Wives contrary to the Law of Moses and by reason of them fell to Idolatry beyond measure The Queen never took but one Husband and he a Catholike Prince of the same Religion with her self and with the whole Christian world beside except onely some few Provinces which Heresie had lately corrupted Yet neither did the Priest or people take upon them to depose such a King as Solomon They left him to him who is the Supream and most proper Judge of Kings and who in the time appointed by his Divine Providence raised up Jeroboam to chastise him in his Son Yea when Julian himself of a Christian Emperor became Apostate and persecuted the Christians of his time with all maner of vexation and cruelty which either policy of malice could devise neither the people nor the Pastors of the Church though they sharply reproved and inveighed against his proceedings yet none of them took up Arms against him none went about to deprive him either of Dominion or Life And if they thought it not expedient or becoming Christians to do so against a Tyrant acting Tyrannically and onely by the
best assistance to the support of the Estate Royal and of the Kingdom wherein they lived It is true through the malice of the Devil and Instigation of some Enemies of the Church some of them for the asserting of their legal Immunities and to preserve the Liberty of their spiritual Jurisdiction entirely Free as it ought they were dirven now and then yet very seldom in comparison of such a long tract of time as we instance in unto some vehement and earnest contestation with their Princes and though much further then was pleasing to them yet I suppose not beyond terms of due respect and the Authority of their Function much less did they endeavor to stir up rebellion or instigate the people to sedition and commotions against their Princes nor did they ever upon their own account solely concur in any thing of that nature The first King that ever gave cause in this Kingdom effectually and in the face of the world to trie the admirable patience obedience and loyalty of Catholikcs was King Henry the Eighth Flagellum Dei that scourge of God to the Church of England and all good Catholikes therein yet outwardly professing the same Religion in most things with Catholikes This he did first by a pretended Accusation of the Clergy to be fallen in a Praemunire because Scil they did that which all their predecessors the Bishops and Clergy of England for many Hundreds of years confessedly had done without any exception taken viz. for acknowledging the power Legantine of Cardinal Wâ—lsey which yet the King himself for his own ends and in his own case had first of all procured 2. upon the Statute of supremacy And 3. by suppression of the Abbies These were his Three first breaches by which the Foundation strength and glory of the Catholike Church in England became afterwards utterly ruinated By the first his way was levelled to the Second and the Second obtained gave him power and authority to compass the Third By the First indeed onely the Clergy smarted in a fine of an Hundred thousand pound The second lay heavy upon the Clergy and Temporalty both But by the Third viz. the suppression of the Abbies and Religious houses if we consider the infinite prejudice which the poor Commonalty suffered thereby both in point of spiritual and temporal interest the whole Kingdom might be said to be worse then conquered by him that is Robbed Spoiled Enslaved to the exorbitancy of his sole Will Prodigality Lust and Tyranny And all this done to be revenged on the Pope who condescended not to humor him in the business of his marriage Therefore and to advance his own power and greatness That Authority and Jurisdiction which had alway been acknowledged as sacred by the English ever since the English were Christians must in a moment be abandoned disclaimed abjured himself by an unheard of and fatal Ambition instead thereof made Head of the Church and all persons who out of scruple of Conscience refused to conform to such grand sudden and sacrilegious Innovations and to swear they knew not what were cut shorter by the head executed at Tyborn imprisoned banished and put into such condition as he was sure they should not oppose him The ground of the Praemunire was at first onely a quarrel which he pick't against the Cardinal Wolsey but afterwards stretched it upon the Tenters and made it reach the whole Clergy who being thereupon Summoned into the Kings Bench the business was so aggravated there by the Lawyers The Kings Learned Counsel that in the Convocation house they presently concluded to submit themselves to the King and offer him no less sum then One hundred thousand pound for their pardon This was look't upon by the Christian world as a Prodigy That so many Shepherds should be afraid of one Wolfe And though it becomes us not hear to censure whether they did as they ought yet certainly this weakness of the Pastors boded no good to the Flock and it is observed that neither themselves nor the Church nor Religion ever prospered in England afterwards However the King accepts of thâ—ir offâ—r and signs their Pardon but with a fetch far worse then the first For undâ—r a prâ—â—eâ—ce of procuring this Pardon to be confirmed to them in Parliament he draws thâ—m in there how willingly or unwillingly let the world judge to acknowledge him Supream Head of the Church It was a course even at that time not thought agreeable to Justice or Honor. For as we said the Cardinal Wolsey had the Kings License for the exercise of his Legantine power both under the Kings hand and the Great Seal of England and was employed by the Kings particular Mandate and pleasure in the quality of Legat to sit with the other Legat Cardinal Campegius and examine the business of his marriage And could the Divorce have been granted according to the Kings minde it is easily conjectured the Cardinal had never been questioned for his Legat-ship Touching the Second of Supremacy All the Subjects of England ever acknowledged that the Crown and State of England quoad Temporalia in Temporal affairs and matters is independent of any other power but of that Transcendent Majestie which saith Per me reges regnant and this to the intent that Kings and all Governors considering who will one day take their Audit may be more careful to rule with Justice and common equity without partiality passion prejudice against any mans person further then his crimes against Publike Order Common Right and the Peace of the State shall make him obnoxious and by so doing may keep their accounts streight against the day of Account And on the other side that Subjects remembring their duty and who it is that layeth this jugum suave the sweet Yoke of good Government upon their Shoulders might be induced to obey with more fidelity and prompt affection But the Question which King Henry the first of all Kings Princes or States of Christendom propounded to his Clergy and People in Parliament concerned matters purely Spiritual and wherein not himself onely and his Subjects at home but all Christian Kings Princes States and people in the world were concerned And therefore required far greater deliberation I say not then was used for in truth that was little or none at all the Kings pleasure and resolution was known and that as the world went then was sufficient but I say then could possâ—bly be used in England which was then but one single Kingdom and a small Province of Christendom And for the suppression of the Abbeys and Religious houses by that Act and this other of Supremacy together the Clergy of England were brought absolutely into Captivity and stood meerly as they have done ever since at the pleasure of the King and of the State Their Possessions the greatest part of them were seized their Goods forfeited their Churches profaned and sacked and upon the spoils thereof together with the sale of the Vestments Chalices Bells and other
of Parliament viz. the Abbots of Glastenbury Reading and Bury Stout Vertuous and Religious men and likeliest to oppose such practises were taken away before hand being condemned and executed upon the Statute of Supremacy as well to prevent the Bishops mediating for them as to terrifie the other Religâ—ous of the Kingdom from opposing the Kings designs But may we ask quo jure quo titulo by what colour of Law or Right was this suppression of the Abbies made and done I cannot tell what it may do now but certainly to have mov'd such a question then it would have cost a man his head It is certain these Abbies held their Lands in Frank Almoigne and in Fee They were quietly possessed of them by the Donations and Guifts of many Saxon English Norman Kings Princes and other Subjects who were their Founders continued legally by prescription in them admitted acknowledged and established by all Laws beside the accessory Charters of many succeeding Princes who confirmed them and most commonly added to them They held all their Lands Immunities and Estates by the same Laws Authority and Right by which the Temporal Lords held their Baronies as Magna Charta 9. of Hen. 3. and the confirmation thereof 28. Ed. 1. do abundantly testifie where it is granted that the Church of England shall be Free and have all her Liberties preserved to her inviolable Chap. 2. any Judgement given against them is declared to be Null and Void And chap. 4. The Bishops are ordered to Excomunicate all such as shall seek to infring those Charters as also they did 30. Ed. 1. including all those that should either make or procure to be made any Statutes contrary to those Liberties Whence we may note Two things The First that as Excommunication is the highest punishment which can be inflicted upon a man Spiritually so the State cannot declare its detestation and dislike of any crime more then by requiring or ordering such a punishment for it The Second That as by one and the same Charter both the Church and the Temporalty held their Liberties so that which gave or pretended to give the King power to abrogate and destroy the one could not in point of reason or justice but make the other obnoxious In the Leidger-book of Peterborrough are to be seen all King Johns Grants and Confirmations more fully and at large then they are set forth in any Printed Book Let any man but read them seriously and with attention and he will wonder at the proceedings of later times What need I remember that same Law called Sententia lata super confirmatione Chartarum by Ed. 1. or thâ— 42. of Ed. 3. chap. 8. where it is declared that any Statute whatsoever made contrary to Magna Charta shall be void or the confirmation of all these in 1 6 7 8. of Rich. 2. and in 4. of Hen. 4. All which good Laws were intended surely to prevent Sacriledge and Tyranny in succeeding times and to secure both Church and people from the encroachments of injustice The King knew very well he had no Title to any of these things but by colour and concession of Parliament and how far a Parliament hath power to give away the Lands or Interests of a Third Person neither heard nor convicted orderly of any offence that should deserve such sentence is a thing to be considered Surely is it not Therefore to make his Title appear stronger in the eye of the World Anno 31. of his Reign he procureth an Act to be made in Parliament exprâ—ssing how that since the Act of Anno 27. the Religious Houses themselves had voluntarity and of their own good wills without constraint in due course of Law and by writings of Record under their Covent-Seals givâ—n and confirmed to the King their Lands Houses Rents Revenues and all Rights whatsoever yea to this Statute they are said to consent as to an Act of their own seeking and suit and you may see among the Records of the Augmentation Court a great Chest full of particular Surrenders made by the Abbots and Covents under their hands seals to this purpose But is it not a likely tale that out of their bounty and good will they would renounce their Livings and become beggars Indeed unto so gracious a Prince as he was become towards them at that time it was â—he less marvail I my self did once deliver my purse upon Salisbury-plains and though I could not commend the honesty of those that took it yet was I fain for a while to complement their humanity towards me that they used me no worse You will say how then came it to be done why would the Abbots and other Religious give away their Lands if they were not willing I answer because they could hold them no longer They saw themselves generally deserted and forsaken by the Commons and knew very well what the King was resolved to do by that which he had done already And therefore to make some petty accommodations for themselves perhaps by granting or renewing of Leases or otherwise wâ—â—ch the King for his own ends viz. 〈…〉 the work more plausible and 〈◊〉 was content to connive at and which we may be sure came not to much they thought best to give that which they were otherwise sure to lose And by doing so rather then by using any kinde of contestation they shewed the simplicity of their obedience to be such as became their Holy Profession and the King shewed how little he feared God or regarded his Honour in the censure of the World Whosoever therefore considers the business impartially shall finde this great conquest of Religious Persons to deserve little Triumph and that the augmentation of Revenue and Treasure by it being so palpably Sacrilegious and contrary to all acknowledged Law Divine and Humane proved to be Aurum Tholosanum a curse to him that took it and upon which the judgement of God hath visibly attended ever since Nor is it strange that it should for first what saith the Scripture Is it not a curse to him that devoureth sacred things Prov. 20.25 and after vows to make enquiry And what saith History and the experience of all Ages Did ever Sacrilege go unpunished Marcus Crassus robbed the Temple at Hierusalem but is not his sad and disastrous end noted by Josephus Lib. 18. C. 8. Herod likewise opened the Sepulcher of King David and took thence much spoil but into what great miseries and misfortunes he fell afterwards Lib. 16. C. 11. the same Josephus relateth Vrraca a Gothish King going to rob but one Chappel of St. Isidore in Spain and that in a case of necessity too as might be pretended viz. to defray the charge of war and to pay his Army yet his very guts burst out of his belly in the Church-porch Histor gen of Spain as the History saith Leo the Fourth Emperor taking a precious Gem out of the Coronet of St. Sophia at Constantinople which had
Wriothsley to the Tower deposed Bishop Tonstal both from the Counsel from his Bishoprick viz. of Durham as thinking it a seignory too Stately for a man of Religion And therefore he dissolved it and brought it within the Survey of the Exchequer that is into his own power but as it was observed he never prospered after However the Act it self was most inexcusably unjust and tyrannical being so directly contrary to Law as appeared beside what hath been alledged before by 1. Ed. 3. chap. 2. where the King dâ—clareth That the Lands of Bishops ought not to be seized into the Kings hands and that what had been done in that kinde in his Fathers days was by advise of evil Counsel and hereafter should not be so But his sins now grew towards ripeness Therfore having also deprived and committed Doctor Gardiner the Bishop of Winchester dissolved the Colledge of Stoke fleeced all the Cathedral Churches in England and added unto the guilt of Sacriledge many other outrages oppressions and crimes under the Nonage of a Pupil King without any check or opposition save onely in the business of the Earldom of Oxford which he was not able to devour as he desired at last in the midst of his carriere and after he had sentenced and put to death his own and onely Brother the Lord Admiral chiefly as 't is supposed upon the instigations of an ambitious or malicious Wife he was himself arraigned for High Treason and ill governing of the Realm as may be seen by the Articles of his Attainder in Stow and thereupon condemned and executed on the twenty second day of January in the year of our Lord 1552. When the Brothers were gone viz. the Protector and Admiral Dudley Duke of Northumberland comes upon the Stage a man whose ambition and policy though unperceived had ruined both of them but especially the Protector whose chief Adversary he was and the principal contriver of the Charge against him which in brief referred unto these Heads 1. That he had subverted all Laws 2. That he had broke the orders appointed by King Henry the Eighth for his Sons good 3. That he held a Cabinet-Councel and by it transacted the publike and chief Affairs of State without the advice of his Fellow-Counsellors 4. Lastly That he observed not the Conditions upon which he was made Protector which were to do nothing in the Kings Affairs without consent of the rest of the Executors Upon these Rocks the Protector perished not without the manifest judgement of God for much injustice which he had committed in the time of his Government especially in the business of Religion and of the Church and Northumberland for a while prevailed This man though he were all otherwise in his heart yet thought fitting to seem a little more precisely religious then the Protector intending thereby to assure himself of the affections of such people as were more Zealously affected to new Religion The Protector looking onely at present proffit caâ—â—d to humor them in that point no further â—â—en might serve his own turn But Northumberland had other designs in his head which were no less then to advance his own Family to the Crown and to ruin the right Heirs And therefore to ingratiate himself more with the Common people in the year 1552. he causeth the Liturgy or book of Common prayer to be the second time Reformed and Purged of certain ceremonies and orders offensive to that sort of people which he desired to please and so to be published This project stood him in much stead among others of the Nobility it gained him the Duke of Suffolk who from henceforward seemed wholly to be at Northumberlands Devotion and to steer his course after the others compass Being a Potent man and the greatest Precisian of those times unless perhaps they dissembled both of them upon the same account But because the Lord Treasurer Paulet Marquis of Winchester was more like to cross theâ—â—â—mply with them therefore it is resolved to remove him out of the way And to that end Northumberland observing that it was the Treasurers custom sitting at the Counsel Table if at any timâ— he were suddenly called up to the King to make such hast thâ—t he commonly left his Spectacles behindâ— him he procured them once to be so sweetly anointâ—d and perfumed before his return that at his next putting them on they cost him his Nose and scaped very narrowly with his Life which yet with much adoe was saved and the Treasurer lived to make the Duke his good friend some part of requital as the event shewed Not long after this King Edward falleth sick whereupon designes growing now to maturity the Duke procures his Son Guildford Dudly to be married to the Lady Jane Grey Daughter to the Dutchess of Suffolk one who had a remote title to the Crown But they meant to advance it by their power The Lady her self being also studiously affected to the Protestant Religion and for that respect they doubted not to finde favors and assistants enough But therein their count failed them At the same time thâ— Earl of Pembrokes Son was married to the Lady Katharine another Daughter of the Duke of Suffolk And the Earl of Huntingdons Son to one of Northumberlands own Daughters All which marriages were solemnized upon one day at Durham House in the Strand And after them King Edward lived not long It is said that the Apothecary who poisoned him for the horror of the offence and disquietness of his Conscience drowned himself and that he Laundress which washed his Shirt lost the Skin of her Fingers But this is certain thâ—re are some yet living in Court who can tell how many weeping Eyes they have seen for the untimely and Treacherous loss of such a Prince See Heyward Hist Edw. 6. But the pretence and zeale of Religion which these men shewed did so overshadow all things for a time that not many could discern their impiety The Oration which Nortâ—umberland made to the Lords in the Tower when he was upon his departure for Cambridge to proclaim his Daughter in Law Lady Jane Queen doth shew what a Fox he was and how far he could both descend and dissemble to compass his ends Goodw. Annals Howbeit in his way the Justice of God met him For the people the Suffolk men especially sticking faithfully to the right Heir and their lawful Sovereign Queen Mary he was quickly deserted by all men apprehended and received at Tower-hil the due reward of his Treason and other sins with the loss of his head And so we see those two Lords of Misrule or Reformation if it must be called so that is to say the Protector Duke of Sommerset and this man Duke of Northumberland Born both of them for the Scourge and ruin of the Catholike Church in England by a just vengance of Heaven proved at last as it were Butchers and Executioners of one another undid their several Families and endangered the whole Realm
such as she thought would oppose themselves viz. the Lord Chancellor Heath Arch-Bishop of York the Lord Paget Lord Privy Seal the Secretary Boxhal Sir Francis Inglefeild and others in whose rooms were placed Sir Nicholas Baecon The new Marquis of Northampton The Earl of Bedford Sir Anthony Cave Sir Francis Knolls Rogers Parry and Secretary Cecil She depoâ—ed many of the old Judges made new Justices of the Peace and lastly concerning the Election of Knights and Burgesses for the Parliament ensuing she took such order by the great diligence and cunning of her Instruments in all the Counties that she wanted not a competent party ready to close with her design in that House Besides this to remove all scruples as much as might be out of the peoples heads and to make them think that the same Religion and Service continued still which was so lately before reestablished by Parliament and that all the alteration made was but onely the turning of the Leiturgy out of Latine into English for their better understanding she provided that in the Common-prayer-book there should be some part of the old frame still upheld some Collects Prayers and Anthemes of the old Missal some of the ancient Ecclesiastical Habits for Divine Service as Copes Surplices c. some Ceremonies as the Sign of the Cross Adoration and Bowing at the name of Jesus The Organs also and ancient manner of Singing their Matins and Even song was retained especially in her own Chappels and in most of the Cathedral and Collegiate Churches of the Kingdom The Title Authority and Jurisdiction of Bishops was also preserved with some considerable Grace and Dignity in the State together with most part of the Revenues of which at that present the Cathedral Churches were seized By which dexterous management of affairs the Common people were instantly luld asleep and complyed to every thing and it became not so hard a matter for the Queen to excuse her self even to those forreign Princes who expected otherwise at her hands As she did particularly to the Secretary D' Assonville who was sent by King Philip out of Flanders to Congratulate her advancement to the Crown By this time the Common-Prayer-Book was framed according to the Queens appointment by certain Commiâ—â—â—oners authorised for that purpose The principal whereof were Doctor Matthew Parker after advanced to the Arch-Bishoprick of Canterbury having been formerly as some say Chaplain to Her Highness Edmund Grindal afterwards Bishop of London Horn of Winchester Whitehead May Bill and Sir Thomas Smith Dr. of the Civil Law The Liturgy was framed according to the Model of that which the English strangers had used at Franckford in the year 1554. and varied not much from that which Northumberland had caused to be published towards the latter end of King Edward the Sixth By the Nobility that were meerly English Protestants as the Marquis of Northampton Earl of Bedford Lord Gray of Pytgo Secretary Cecil and others it was well approved and the estabishing thereof by Parliament very much urged But those who had tasted of Genevah and were more affected with Calvins Model both disliked and opposed it either not knowing or not regarding the Queens reasons of State in the business Sir William Cecil as we said was now Secretary of State a Politick man and one that knew well enough how much this alteration would advance him his industry carried all before him Howbeit his fortunes were yet but low having onely the Parsonage of Wimbledon and some few Lands about Stamford to subsist upon Therefore in his Letter to the Lord Marquis of Northampton who was his Mecaenâ—s in the year 1560. upon the birht of his son Sir Robert Cecil he desires the Marquis being the Lord Treasurer to move the Queen in his behalf for some means and maintenance for his G. C. as he calld them who were so likely to be famous in England afterward Sir Nicholas Bacon was his Brother in Law and another chief Engin of State a man of somewhat a deeper judgement in the knowledge of the Laws and a more plausible Orator I must not forget in this Catalogue of State-Engins the Lord Robori afterwards famously known by the name of Leicester who to possess the Queens favor solely had already discarded Sir William Pickening though formerly viz. in meaner fortune a favorite and no uncourtly Gentleman Nor yet Sir Nicholas Throgmorton nor Sir Francis Walsingham nor Sir Thomas Smith who were all with the rest prime instruments of this Action intimate Counsellors in the business and posseâ— ng wholly the ears and grace of the Queen sate as chief Pilots at the Storâ— guiding the the course both of Church and Common-wealth at their pleasure All of them at this instant big with hopes of Prefermâ—nt Honor and great Offices which they were sure to loose who held them under Queen Mary Though many men wondered how Master Sâ—cretary Cecil could so easily forget his Beads and his Breviary wherewith with he so exquisitely counterfeited a Catholik in Queen Maries time that Cardinal Poole himself was deceived by him so far as to do him many friendly Offices towards her Majestie which as by the event appeared he did not much deserve Their great and indeed onely pretence or reason for the Change was Reason of State The Queens safety Scilicet This they had all of them but especially Secretary Cecil wrought strongly into her Majesties apprehension Camd. in Elizab. Actum esse de eâ si Pontificiam Authoritatem in quâcunque re agnosceret she was but a lost Princess say they if she acknowledged the Popes authority in any thing For Duo Pontifices Two several Popes already had pronounced her Mothers marriage with the King to be unlawfull and Null It may be thought her Mothers Conscience did likewise pronounce the same sentence in her own Brest otherwise why did she being ready to go to the place of Execution so solemnly entreat and charge the Lady Kingst n Speed Chron. to go to the Princess Mary and upon her knees in her name to ask pardon of her for all the wrongs she had done her protesting that until this were done she could not dye in peace But upon this ground the Statesmen of those times conclude it necessary that the Queen should alter Religion Invest her self with the Sovereignty of all Power and banish that Authority out of the Realm which had presumed to declare her Majestie Illegitimate This Counsel how prosperous soever it proved in the event through Gods permission and how speciously politick soever it might be made to seem by the Arguments and Rhetorick of those men who for their own ends and interests desired a change yet Really it could not but be full oâ— dâ—nger both to thâ— Queen and thâ— Realm but espâ—cially to the Queen who if she had pleasâ—d might have secured her self of her own particular fears by some better way For hereby the Sentence of Excomunication in some sort necessarily issuing upon her
done it to her no little trouble No they never attempted any kinde or any shew of violent resistance at all either by Domestick or Forreign help but always from first to last most submissively behaved themselves towards her tendring her safety and the Peace of the Realm far above their own Lives Liberties and Estates 'T is true it was once debated among them whither they ought not to proceed to Excommunication against her both for the preservation of Catholikes and discharge of their Office Yet considering the great trouble and inconveniences that might arise thereby both to her Majestie and the State in case the people should fall into any disorders thereupon or take Arms in defence of Religion They concluded notwithstanding her case and proceedings were very much liable to censure yet for their parts to leave her to Gods Judgement and referred the whole business to his Holiness And herein also the Favor and Interest of King Philip as they had always done did stand her in no small stead For he knowing the practises of France upon this occasion and how much they labored at Rome that sentence of Excommunication might pass against Queen Elizabeth onely out of design and hoping to invest themselves of England thereupon under the Title and pretensions of Queen Mary of Scotland who was the next Heir and at that time married to their King Was the more willing to hinder it least by this means England and Ireland both together with Scotland should come to be Incorporate as it were into the Crown of France and so become an enemy too potent for him to deal with out of which respect also even in Queen Maries time more then once he had kept of proceedings against her which otherwise would have concerned her very neerly Therefore so long as there was any hope that the Queen might be capable of better Counsels he ceased not by his Ministers to do all good Offices here betwixt the Queen and the Clergy and at Rome hindered the passing of the censures for no small time notwithstanding all the indeavors and instances thereunto made by the French But the Prelates all this while as I said chose rather a Durate then Armate ever professing with their mouths and making it good no less with their examples and practises that Preces and Lachrimae indeed Prayers and Tears were the onely weapons which they had to fight against the Queen Though the world knows how little these prevailed with her whose severity towards them continued in the same extremity from first to last not relenting nor affording the least remission in any degree of Liberty or Estate unto their dying day Doctor Scot Bishop of Chester died at Lovain in Exile Goldwel of Asaph died at Rome Pate Bishop of Worcester was indeed at the Councel of Trent and subscribed there for the Clergy of England but never returned Doctor Oglethorpe Bishop of Carlile who had Crowned the Queen was yet deprived with the rest dying suddenly and very shortly after so did also Doctor Tonstal that Learned and Famous Prelate Bishop of Durham while he was Prisoner at Lambeth Yet not before he had personally given the Queen a sound and Godly Admonition concerning her strange proceedings with that liberty and freedom of zeal which became so venerable a Prelate and true Pastor of Gods Church as he was and as some have said Godfather to the Queen Bourn Bishop of Bath and Wells was prisoner to Cary Dean of the Chappel and there dyed Doctor Thirlby Bishop of Ely was first committed to the Tower afterwards He and Secretary Boxhal were sent to Lambeth and there ended their days Bishop Bonner of London Watson of Lincoln with the Abbot of Westminster Fecknam died all prisoners and as some say in the Marshalsey Prior Shelly was banished and died in Exile This was the the very Sad yet as by their Patience Submission and Sufferance appeared very Christian Catastrophe of so many grave religious and good Prelates of England chief Pastors of the Church of God in our nation Thus was a third and the most venerable State of the Realm who like the Cedars of Liâ—â—anus ever since King Etheldreds time for so many years together had stood flourishing in great Dignity and Power in this Land on a sudden cast down disgraced put in prison or banished the Realm The chief and immediate cause of which hard procedings against them was the refusing the Oath of Supremacy for no other crime no other fault could be charged upon them This indeed they refused as a thing which concerned their Conscience very much And although perhaps some of the Prelates now living had either for fear or upon surprizal in the Reign of King Henry the Eighth when it was first enacted given more consent or connivence to it then became Prelates of the Church to do yet they had now better considered themselves and resolved to be constant not onely to the Doctrine of Catholike Faith in that point but also to the judgement of the whole Kingdom which so lately in full Parliament had desired the Abrogation of that Law and acknowledged the Supremacy of Ecclesiastical Authority to be where Christ placed it viz. in the Sea Apostolike Nor did the English Prelates refusing to acknowledge the Queen Head of the Church any thing more then what the Protestants themselves at least no mean ones among them would likewise do For 't is manifest that setting aside some few English at home they do generally abroad dislike the Princes Supremacy in Ecclesiastical causes as much as any Not to mention Gilby who in his Book called Admonitio ad Anglos calls King Henry the Eighth reproachfully Monstrum Libidinosum Aprum qui Christi locum invasit c. A libidinous Monster a Wilde Bore broken into Christs Vineyard and making himself Head of the Church which belongs onely to Christ Calvin himself in his Commentary upon O see is very angry at those who attribute so much to Secular Princes as to give them such absolute power in the affairs of Religion and in plain terms confesseth Qui initio tantoperè extulerunt Henricum Regem Angliae certè fuerunt inconsiderati homines c. They saith he who first advanced the Authority of King Henry of England to such a height did not well consider what they did when they gave him that Supream Power in all Causes it was a matter which always greeved me very much saith he For indeed they did no less then blaspheme when they called him Supream Head of the Church under Christ Sir Thomas Moor Bishop Fisher Abbot Whiteing of Glastenbury and those many other Holy Abbots and Religious men of all sorts who suffeâ—ed in the case of Supremacy under Henry the Eighth never said more And Luther himself saith no less but more scurrilously as his humor was Quid ad nos Mandatum Electoris Saxoniae What hath the Prince Elector of Saxony to do to command me Let him look to his Sword and see
how well he manageth that and leave matters of Preaching to the Clergy such as himself was Scilicet Tom. 2. Fol. 259. and Tom. 1. Lat. Fol. 540. he tells them plainly Non est regum aut Principum c. It belongs not to Kings and Princes to take upon them to establish Doctrine no not the true Doctrine but to be subject and obedient themselves in that case And Chemnitius in his Epistle to the Elector of Brandenburgh speaking of Queen Elizabeth after he had taxed her sufficiently in other particulars he fals at last upon her Title of Supremacy in these words Et quòd foemineo a saeculis inaudito fastu se Papissam caput Ecclesiae facit saying by a strange Womanish and unheard of kinde of Arrogance she makes her self as it were a She-Pope in her own dominions Head of the Church What the doctrin practise of those in Scotland is and hath ever bin since their pretended Reformation is too well known to be disputed Cartwright teacheth the same in all his Books but especially in his last And so do all the Presbyterians generally both here and beyond Seas They of Amsterdam in their Confess Fid. 1607. go somewhat further Pag. 50. Art 2. when they resolve That Vnicuique Ecclesiae particulari est par plenum jus c. That every particular Church hath ful and equal power with any other Church or Churches to use exercise and enjoy whatsâ—ever ordinances of Perpetuity Christ hath committed to his Church therefore it is cleer upon that supposition That no one Person is left Supream Governor over many Dr. Whitacre in his answer to Reinolds speaking upon this subject Pag. 4. hath a passage not easie to be understood The Title saith he of Supream Head of the Church hath been disliked by diverse Godly Learned men and of right it belongeth to the Son of God and therefore saith he never did our Church give that Title unto the Prince nor did the Prince ever challenge it By saying that many Godly Learned men disliked it meaning Calvin Gilby Knox Luther c. mentioned before and upon this ground viz. that of right it belongeth to the Son of God he sheweth sufficiently what his own judgement therein is But when he saith never did our Church give the Title of Supream Head of the Church to the Prince nor the Prince challenge it who can tell what he meaneth For admit that what was done by King Henry the Eighth were not rightly said to be done by their Church yet I hope they will own the Church in King Edward the Sixths time who challenged the Supremacy notoriously enough as appeareth in the first Parliament which he held wherein it was Enacted That whosoever after the Fifth of March nex ensuing should deny that the Kings Heirs and Successors were not or ought not to be Supream Head in Earth of the Church of England and Ireland immediately under God for the third assertion should be guilty of Treason And that Queen Elizabeth after him declined the Title and chose rather to be called Supream Governess mended the matter not a whit For it was not the Title onely but the power pretended unto and exercised by and under that Title at which men made scruple and that power Queen Elizabeth claimed and exercised all her Reign as much as ever King Edward her Brother had done So that the refusing of this Oath being the onely or chief matter alledged for the deprivation of the Catholike Bishops seeing Protestants themselves were no better agreed about it they might in all reason have expected if not a milder sentence yet at least a more favorable Execution thereof from the Queen whom they had so lately and so unanimously acknowledged and no less willingly then any other persons of the Realm Who always bear themselves obsequiously towards her in temporal matters never made complaint never writ Libels Invectives or Books against her as the Reformers in other parts perpetually did against their Princes and as too many of her Subjects at home that is to say Ministers of her own making and others in short time set themselves to do No Homilies of sedition were dispersed among the people No Wyat No Oldcastle appeared in the Field by their instigation notwithstanding all the Adversity Disgrace Wants which they suffered In a word such was their behavior constantly towards her even to the very last of their lives that noe indifferent man will attribute it to any thing else but to the most excellent and right Christian resolution of those worthy men to suffer perfectly for such a good cause and unto that Patience Humility Obedience Aequanimity and Resigned Temper of Spirit which as it was exemplary in them so is it indeed Innate as I may say and most natural unto all Vertuous and Religious men that are truely Catholike And such in truth though envy frown when we speak it is the general Inclination and Temper of all English Catholikes towards their Sovereign Prince both within and without the Realm as the experience of their quiet behavior for so many years together of hard times have cleerly shewen When I speak of Catholikes within the Realm I mean Recusants in general as we are called men and women of all Estates and Conditions who have had our shares and tasted of the Cup of affliction as God was pleased to administer it unto us at this present not much less then a Hundred of years When I speak of those without the Realm I mean the Seminaries of Priests Religious Persons and Students that be Catholike beyond the Seas Concerning which Seminaries we are to know that when the old Clergy of England Bishops and Priests were some languishing in Prison other in Exile many dead and all in disfavor The Secretary and such other Politick Protestants as then sate at the Stearn of Government in England did confidently imagin that in a short time both Priest and Priesthood would be worn out and extingished in this Nation And truely it was observed that about the year 1576. there were not above Thirty of the old Priests remaining in the Realm Hereupon Doctor Allen a man even raised by God to do his Country good in a time of greatest necessity together with some others of the English Clergy begun the Seminary at Doway about the year 1569. meerly out of spiritual charity towards their poor Country and a Christian Providence to prevent the utter decay of Religious Professors Priests and others who might serve in time to come to uphold true Religion in England and to preserve a Continuation of the Catholike Church there as it had ever been from the Apostles times to that present unto succeeding Generations And as by the great blessing of God we see their pious Counsels have had an happy effect unto this day notwithstanding the many oppositions adversities and difficulties which they have met with as well from England as from other places They intended also
Daneus or any other of those Niblers at Bellarmine as Master Normington of Cambridge once called them in a Sermon at Saint Maries much less with the impudencies of the Minister Crashaw nor with the mistakes of Chark Fenner Beard Burton or any other Triobolary Controvertists at home either of former or present times but as you see onely with faults of their Prime Leaders Classicall men Prelates and Dignitaries of their Church so if it should happen that any private man of our own writing onely by private Authority and judgement should either through oversight or indiligence be found chargeable with some kinde of mistake we would not have it stood upon as if it were the common practise of all to write so negligently or that the defence of Catholike Religion did any wit depend upon such mistakes As we say the defence of Protestancy doth very much upon those mistakes which we are ready to bring in charge against them and without which there were not half the colour for defence of it Concerning the third point viz. That the Priests and Students in the English Seminaries beyond Sea are Practicers against the State and do stir or endeavor to stir the People to Rebellion it is indeed an odious and heavy charge which the Book called The execution of Justice c. layeth roundly upon them and is seconded therein by a Proclamation in the year 1580. which doth directly charge those Priests and others as Accessories and privy to the Counsels of Philip King of Spain the Pope and some other Catholike Princes which as 't is said had combined together about that time to invade England to depose the Queen and subdue the Nation to the Spaniard But for answer I say that jealousie is a kinde of Argus full of eyes and so she is painted but they are all purblinde which is the cause that she mistakes so oft starts at her own shadow and is always trembling and doubting the worst of every body We cannot deny but there were great States-men that governed England in those days under the Queen yet howsoever it happened with all their Opticks they seemed not to have any particular foresight of the dangers which threatned them till they were at their doors yea having by error of Government provoked and drawn them upon themselves yet they took a course more proper to kindle the flame then to quench the fire But this is not a business to be discussed now That which we are to do is to justifie the Priests and other Good men of the Seminaries that they are not Traitors are not Enemies of the State do not practise consult cooperate where they live to any thing prejudicial to their Prince and Country First if any such Confederation had been betwixt his Holiness the King of Spain and other Princes against England as is pretended but was never yet proved and 't is well known that what the Catholike King did afterward as it was upon great provocations given so was it also upon his own score onely and with no other assistance but what was his own and ordinary in such cases Yet I say suppose there had been such Confederation or League betwixt them is it probable that so great and wise Princes as they were would acquaint a few poor Contemplative men Students at Rhemes and Doway with their designs Men so inconsiderable every way in relation to such service so useless and unable in respect of their maner condition and place of living to contribute any thing to the work Is it credible they would manage such high matters and of so great importance so weakly Let no man say That Priests might serve them by preparing a party here and by their reconciling of men to the Pope For it is not the Priests work to reconcile men to the Pope but unto God and to the Communion of the true Catholike Church whereof although the Pope as successor to Saint Peter be Supream and chief Pastor yet Catholikes by returning to the Church and consequently acknowledging that Supremacy of Spiritual Authority in his Holiness are not obliged so much as to take notice of any Temporal designs that he hath no though they were perhaps for advancement of Religion much less to consent concur or cooperate with them contrary to the Law of nature their Duty of Allegience and the interest of their native Country Secondly among so many Priests as by that time there were both in England and beyond the Seas and in so long a time that this pretended Confederacy was in framing when Spies and Intelligencers were many and well paid by the State was there so much as one Priest nominated or accused to have been so corrupted or induced any way by those Princes or their Ministers to practise ought to the prejudice of their Country was there ever any one apprehended or convicted of such a treaâ—on was there ever any Subject of England called in question for entertaining Priests that were sought after upon that account In a word when the Spanish Armado was under Sail for England was there so much as one Priest or Seminary-man found or known to be in it or at any time since discovered to have been used or imployed in that service 'T is confessed the Proclamation spoken of before being framed on purpose to put people into a fright and to make honest men odious doth traduce them sufficiently as persons suborned to prepare the way and procure safe landing for the Navy But Si accusasse sufficit quis erit innocens Such general charges prove nothing but passion or some undue byassed and distempered judgement They that know such men well know it to be a business far out of their way to spie Countries to observe how Ports are garded and what Havens lie upon the Goast However it is evidence of fact and the conviction at least questioning of some one person for such crime that would be given in the case Which seeing there never was Indifferent men cannot but think such Accusations to have been very injurious and that the great fears and jealousies shewen had more of the Chimaera and fiction in them then of real danger It was otherwise with the poor English themselves in Spain not long after both Religious and others For when the English Armado in the year 1589. made an attempt upon Lisbon and invaded some parts of Portugal the King of Spain took them to be so little either his Friends or Enemies to their Prince and Country as they are traduced that he laid them all fast by the Heeles and kept them close prisoners during the whole time that the Action lasted as many of them as were found at Valâ—adolid Burgos and some other places in Spain Nor was there in those many Actual attempts of Treason supposed to be made against Queen Elizabeth so much as one Priest Monk or Friar ever attainted or impeached about them Nor in the whole Five and forty years of her Reign any more then two
secular Priests attainted or convinced of Actual Treason against her Majestie viz. Ballard for knowing and yet concealing the attempts of Babington in the business of the Queen of Scots and old Parson Plomtree of the North who said Mass once at a rising in those parts And yet how greevously are they charged with such crimes all along the Queens Reign And how much was the people incensed against them upon that perswasion What Sermons Proclamations Lawes were made in Thunder and Lightening and Blood against these poor men Souldiers of our Saviour Christ and fighting onely with Spiritual Arms under his Banner The Cross in that part of the Catholike Church which is Militant in England What calamities afflictions miseries have they not endured by persecution hereupon The onely Colledges of Rhemes and Doway beside other Religious Orders from other places have sent out into our Lords Harvest no less then One hundred persons who have all suffered for Things purely Spiritual that is either for being Priests or for doing the Office of Priesthood viz. Saying Mass Reconciling of Sinners unto God c. In the year 25. of Queen Elizabeth it was made Felony to harbor a Priest and to be a Priest Treason And the Act looked so cruelly back to primo Elizab. that whosoever was made Priest since that time might very easily be drawn within compass of the charge The Law was made upon occasion of those Treasons of Parry Francis Throgmorton Anthony Babington and his complices as also upon occasion of F. Campian and those Priests arraigned with him For a general apprehension was taken that these had combined with some forreign Princes and other persons of power within England to restore Religion and deliver the Queen of Scots out of prison which was a business then fresh in memory Hereupon the Priests in England frame a supplication by common consent and finde means to present the same to the Queen at Greenwich by the hands of Master Shelley Wherein after they have first condemned and renounced the practises of Parry c. They profess and declare their own judgement in these words First we utterly deny that the Pope hath power to command or give License to any man to consent unto Mortal sin or to commit or intend to commit any thing contrary to the Law of God Secondly whatsoever person he be that maintaineth such opinion we renounce him and his opinion as devilish and abominable Thirdly we protest before God That all Priests who ever conversed with us have acknowledged your Majestie their lawful Queen tam de jure quam de facto as well of right as for your actual possession of the Crown that they pray for you and exhort your Subjects to obey you Fourthly and lastly they profess that it is heresie and contrary to Cotholike faith to think that any man may lift up his hand against Gods Anointed T is true the Petition had no other success with her Majestie then this viz. that Master Shelley who presumed to commit such a Treason as to present it was suffered to be sent to the Marshalsea by order of Secretary Walsingham and there to be kept prisoner to his dying day onely upon this pretence Scilicet because the Councel had not been first acquainted with the business Howbeit by this supplication the world may cleerly see They answer the Six Articles which in those times used to be so commonly and captiously propounded to such men framed by Doctor Hammon viz. Whither the Queen were lawful Queen notwithstanding the sentence Decleratory of Pope Pius Quintus against her whither that sentence were to be obeyed in althings Whither the Pope by such sentence could give her Subjects any lawful Authority to rebel or depose her c. For if she be their lawful Sovereign notwithstanding that sentence and that obedience and loyalty be due unto all lawful Princes by the Law of God and of nature it is easie to see what must be said to such questions According also as Bishop Watson Abbot Fecknam Doctor John Harpsfeild Doctor Nicholas Harpsfeild with others who were very often and rigidly examined upon them yet professed perpetually obedience to her Majestie tanquam verae Reginae as unto their true and lawful Sovereign Yea saith Doctor Nicholas Harpsfeild reported by Goldastus a Protestant Ego regalem ejus Authoritatem Goldast de Monar Sac. Imp. Rom. c. I do acknowledge saith he her Royal Authority in all Temporal and Civil affair without exception They presented the like humble supplication to his Majestie that now reigneth some while after the discovery of that wicked and desperate Plot of the Gun-powder-treason another to the Parliament then sitting and another to the Earl of Salisbury in all of them professing the same things And though it hindred not the passing of some severe Acts against Catholikes in that Parliament occasioned as I suppose by that foul and horrid attempt yet the King himself in his Proclamation published upon that subject gratiously professeth his opinion of the generality of his Catholike Subjects viz. That they did abhor such a detestable Conspiracy no less then himself True it is F. Garnet suffered for concealing that Treason and Sir Everard Digby for contributing in some sort to the security or rather flight of some of the Conspirators But as the one viz. Sir Everard Digby much lamented his ill fortune that he should leave behinde him the memory of so great a stain protesting always that he was never made privy to their design and drift So the other viz. F. Garnet knowing it onely as he did in the way of confession and the Seal of that Sacrament which is Secrecy being by the Doctrine of Catholike Religion and that not without most just and necessary cause esteemed so inviolable it may abate something even in the judgement of man of that Heynousness of guilt and blame whereof all good Christians otherwise must necessarily condemn him In a word how much Catholikes in general and especially Priests do detest rebellion and Treason even in times of greatest affliction and pressure and what Religious observers they are of all just loyalty and obedience to their lawful Princes appears cleerly not onely by a book written in those times by the learned Bishop of Chichester Doctor Christopherson against rebellion but also by the Annotations of the Divines at Rhemes upon the New Testament where Pag. 301. we read thus Subjects saie they are bound in Temporal things to obey even the Heathen being their lawful Kings and to be subject to them for Conscience to observe their Temporal Laws to pay them Tribute to pray for them and to perform all other duties of Natural Allegiance Doctor Kellison in his Survey goeth further giving the reason of this Because saith he Faith is not necessarily required to jurisdiction neither is any Authority lost by the loss of Faith Which is also the Doctrine of Saint Thomas who in his Book Cap. 6. de Regim Princip denieth utterly
layeth not any greater upon the Christians under him All or most of the old Catholike Bishops and Clergy of England died in prisons Antipath of Prelat as Master Prinn himself confesseth of the chiefest of them amâ—ng Rogues Murtherers and Felons in the Marshalsea The rest in Exile for Religion is this no punishment Or was there any other Crime laid to their charge but onely matter of Religion Not to speak of many others Master William Anderson in 45. Elizab. was executed upon no other charge but that he was a Priest and then found to be in England so was Master Barckworth in the year 1600. was this no punishment Anno 35. Elizab. Master Barwis a Citizen of London was executed for being reconciled to to the Church and Master Pormort attainted at least for reconciling him was this no punishment In the year 1575. as Holinshead himself recordeth it for a matter to be noted The Lady Morley the Lady Brown the Lady Guildford were committed all of them to prison onely for hearing Mass and Leases presently made of two Third parts of their Lands was this no punishment I might be infinite in examples of this kinde but it is needless The case is manifest and the sense of the whole Kingdom proclaimes the contrary to what that Author pretendeth convincing his assertion of not a little imposture and calumny To conclude then the loyalty and obedience of these Gentlemen and other people of all sorts which are commonly called Recusants towards their King and the State appears undeniably in all things not only by their humble petitions to his Majesty that now is in the year 1604. and at sundry times since but by their constant and general conformity unto the temporal Government in all Queen Elizabeths Reign by their Protestation made at Ely in the year 1588. where a great many of them were prisoners by some other offers which they made to the Lord North the Queens Lieutenant there and by their justification of them afterwards by their submâ—ssions sent up to the Lords of the Privy Councel and their profession of all due acknowledgement towards her Majesty notwithstanding the sentence of Excommunication by their readiness to serve her Majesty the State even in that Action of 88. for which they are so calumniated Lastly by the very Irish Recusants joyning their Forces with the Queens at Kinsale in the year 1600. All which Arguments do indeed shew them to be â—ubjects absolutè and not ex conditione or by leave of some other as their adversaries pretend Let the Readâ—r therâ—fore now judge if he please by what hath been said whether to be a Protestant and a loyal â—ubject or a Catholike and a loyal subject be more incompatible things This was the question propounded in the beginning to be declared and it hath been declared I suppose at large both from their doctrinal assertions and constant practises in all parts of Germany France Holland Scotland Genevah and many other Countries of Christendom what kinde of people both Lutherans Calvinist and other sectaries generally are towards their Sovereign Princes It hath bin shewn that the chief scope and end of their endeavours where they come is to set up their several professions by the Sword and violâ—nt resistance of the Civil Magistrate doing but his Office in restraining them according to Law yea with the ruin of the Church and State both that shall oppose them This I say both the Lutheran s n Germany the Hugonets of France the Gâ—uses of Hâ—lâ—and the Protestants and Puritans in all other places where they could have so apparently done or attempted to doe that there is neither colour of excuse for it nor liberty to deny it The World knoweth what was endeavored in Germany against the Emperor in France how long continued they in Armes against their Sovereign Prince viz. till they had by force not to say contrary to his Oath extorted from him such Edicts of Pacification as themselves liked And that in Holland and Scotland where they had the fortune to become Masters they renounced and deposed their Princes absolutely On the other side let us consider how far it is from being true that wherewith so many Books in England have abused the people viz. That to be a Priest or a Roman Catholike and a good Subject withall is impossible They are things inconsistent with one another For if we look back to former times we shall easily finde that from the Saxons to King Henry the Eighth it was never made so much as a quâ—stion To be a Catholike was never held any bar to Loyalty and yet the Princes had their differences somtimes with the Pope even then And in the grounds of Catholike Faith there is certainly nothing contrary unto civil obedience and duty towards the temporal Magistrate Witness the Government of the Sacred Roman Empire of the Kingdoms of Spain France Poland and many other Christian Principalities and States All which differing in their several constitutions or particular formes of Governing yet doe generally and unanimously account him the bâ—st Subject and least dangerous to the State who is most of all devoted to Catholike Religion It is not therefore malum in se simpliciter whatsoever Doctor Morton or Parson White say it is not an evil intrinsecal to Priesthood nor essentially folloâ—ing the profession of Catholike Religion to be an evil subject If it happens to prove so at any time it is ex accidente and from the voluntary wickedness of particular men if not as too often it doth from some evil constitution of State in which the profession of Catholike Religion hath been unduly subverted and is as unjustly prohibited and punished Neither can it be verified of Catholike Religion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or universally as sedition and troubling the Civil Government is apparently chargeable upon Calvinism and the other several professions of Protestancy Therefore surely it was an errour both uncivil and indiscreet in those Doctors to frame their proposition so general onely to make us odious and suspected with his Majestie who yet we hope understands us better then so and knows that the imputation is groundless and meerly passionate We deal not so with them We are ready to acknowledge that as to particular persons there are many especially among the Protestants of England of more calm and moderate dispositions of no such fiery zeal as works in many other of their Brethren abroad Boni viri boni cives such as we confess to be both good men and good Subjects of sociable nature obsequious not inclined to Sedition nor desirous to persecute And the like good Testimony doth even the Author of the Execution of English Justice give unto Catholikes acknowledging their obedience and loyalty towards the late Queen and that in a time when they wanted not matter of complaint for the manifold oppressions and afflictions which were heavy upon them T is true every man may be supposed to wish the advancement of his
apparently seen at this day may it please the Divine Goodness to give us grace to lay them to heart as is meet 'T is true in their opinion and as they have confidence to say Filia devoravit Matrem The Daughter that is the Protestant Congregations have over-reached the Mother-Church in perfection of wisedome and hath been able to reform Her in some parts yet certainly they ought not to pretend Her to be so foulely apostatized as that Antichrist should govern there Institut lib. 4. c. 2. Sec. 11. where Calvin himself confesseth even in the deepest of her supposed Errours there hath ever remained inviolabile Foedus Dei The Covenant of God inviolate Beside the Apostacy of that great Antichrist must be a publike thing notorious and visible to all men not secret nor creeping on by degrees and unperceived till after some long tract of time He is Stella cadens de Calo and drawing a third part of the Stars with him so strangely as it shall astonish and amaze the world to observe it Whereas to suppose the worst that can be The departure of the Roman Church from the purity of Christian Faith and that Apostacie which should make her become of the Church of Christ the Synagogue of Antichrist was so obscure so invisible such a long time of drawing on that as the greater and better part of Christendom doe not perceive it unto this day so of them which pretend they doe there is scarce any one couple among them can agree upon the time of his Appearance Many Ages ago sayes Calvin but when he dares not speak Napier a Scot and a great Traveller in this pretended search of Antichrist is of opinion that he hath reigned ever since the time of Pope Sylvester and the year 313. and so very wisely makes all the Christian Emperors Kings Queens c. that succeeded Constantine yea and Constantine himself who dyed not till the year 340. in stead of being Nursing Fathers and Nursing Mothers of the Church and Defenders of the Faith of Christ as by the Prophesies of Scripture concerning them they were to be Psal 72.11 Isa 49.23 to have been the supporters of Antichrist and advancers of his Superstitions Beza assigneth Pope Leo and the year 440. Doctor Fulk Willet and Dounham seem to name Boniface and the year 607. Bullinger and some other with him are content to stay longer and expect some hundred of years more viz. untill the time of Hildebrand that is Pope Gregory the seventh the year 763. yet Doctor Whitaker sayes Pope Gregory the first was the last true Bishop of Rome and all that followed after him Antichrists Perkins thinketh Antichrist appeared about 900 years since Hospinian 1200. Danaeus about the year 574. It were infinite to relate their jarring and contradicting of one another in divers other very material circumstances touching this question as whosoever please to see may finde in such Catholike Writers as have handled this controversie but especially in cardinal Bellarmin Now seeing Lutheâ—s pretended Calling proves so unjustifiable and hard to be made good we must of necessity take some liberty to look further into the business and to examine what his True Calling was and who it was indeed that set him on work to play such odd pranks in the Church of God Of this there goeth a black Story which divers men labour to palliate and disguise as well as they can divers wayes but Luther himself telleth the plain truth viz that it was the Devil that first set him on work to write against the Mass which all men know is the Principal and most Divine Office of Christian Religion and whereunto whatsoever else is done in Religion in one way or other relateth In his Book de â—brogandâ Missâ thus he writeth Contigit me sub mediam noctem subito expergefieri ibi Satan mecum cepit hujusmodi disputationem At midnight such a time saith Luther I happened to be suddenly awaked out of sleep and presently the Devil fell a disputing with me and so he proceeds in his Narrative wherein all all those Arguments are formally producâ—d and urged by the Devil upon which Luther afterward resolved to abrogate Mass as any man may see in the Book it self above cited which is commonly extant with the rest of his Works This with Doctor Fulk Charke and some others is onely a spiritual combat in minde which they suppose Luther might have with the Devil as many other good men have had in spirit but not any real or personal conflict But we reply whether those reasons came from the Devil by bodily and outward conference or onely by way of inward suggestion it is not so material that they came from the Dâ—vil in the opinion and apprehension even of Luther himself is confessed But Secondly Luther in that Narrative describeth the very voice and accent of the Devil in the disputation which he saith was a great yet a base and hollow voice and which so affrighted him that he sweat again although as himself confesseth against the Swenkfeldians upon other occasions such encounters were not unusual with him but rather familiar Thirdly the Devil knowing his humour flatters him with Titles and calls Doctor very learned Doctor up and down the disputation Fourthly Luther affirming elsewhere that Empser and Oecâ—lampadius two Preachers of Reformation but not of his strain were strangled by the Devil confesseth here that this encounter was like theirs though he had the good hap to come off alive perhaps because he yeelded as neither Job Saint Paul nor ever any good man ever did See Hospinian also a Calvinist in his Historia Sacramentaria Fifthly Jo. Manliuâ— a great Lutheran Preacher and Luther himself Epist ad Patâ—em Tâ—n 2. Witteb fol. 269. confesseth that he was frequently haunted by Spirits and that Satan used personally to affright and molest him he maintaines that Zuingliys â—arolstadius c. had their several Expositions of the words Hoc est corpus meum from the instruction of the Devil why may it not then be as probable that they had all one Master Sixthly Baldwinus another Lutheran writes a Book purposedly upon this Subject and confesseth in plain termes That it was a real Truth no fiction or dream but a matter of fact and a true Story His onely excuse of it is this It happened saith he after Luther had abandoned the Mass and thinkes the Devils intent was onely to bring to Luthers remembrance his old errours that he had been a Priest and said Mass fifteen years together and so to drive him to despair But truly if that were all the design The Devil was but an Ass To attempt such a tried souldier as he was armed cap a pe with a confidence invincible and the Doctrin of only Faith with such a blunt and feeble weapon as despair Luther was a man out of his reach for that He that teacheth nothing can hurt a Christian but onely unbelief Supr Sec. 2. med That
THE Jesuites Policy To suppress MONARCHY Historically displayed With their SPECIAL VOW Made to the POPE Printed in the Year 1669. BABEL OR Monarchomachia Protestantium NOt many years since upon divulging of a Letter written by Master Aldred against the Match with Spain and of that scandalous Libel against the Ambassador Count Gondamour as also by the instigation of some Hot-spurs in their Pulpits the people of London were much incensed to snarl and murmur even at the very name of Spain and every Artificer presumed like an Aristarchus to censure the King for that Negotiation as for an error of State which might possibly cast the whole body of the Kingdom into a distemper As if forsooth the Kings affection to the Kingdom and his own issue had been unnaturally frozen or that his judgement had failed him and those Superior Planets of the Counsel had also lost their light and erred in their course Whereupon I was urged by divers of my good Friends to write the Apology of that Action and Proceeding because some of them had heard me deliver at sundry times not onely a full Answer to all the Objections of the contrary faction but also divers Reasons in defence thereof founded as they thought upon very just and solid considerations And truly to speak what I think the benefits which the Realm may reap by this match are such and so advantageous as I wish it rather done then disputed on For first it setleth a firm Peace between both the Kingdoms which is a matter of greater importance then they seem to apprehend who so much oppose it Secondly Traffick will thereby be established and increased when the Seas by a concurrence of both Kings shall be scoured of Turks and Pyrats Thirdly The Kingdom will be again stored with Treasure and Coyn provided we keep it lockt up within our Four Seas and not suffer so much of it to be offered daily to that Idol of Cambaia Fourthly The Crown will be disengaged from a burdensom weight of Debts and by consequence the Subject likely to be much eased in matter of Contribution and Taxes Adde hereunto the renewing and confirmation of the ancient Treaties with the House and Dukes of Burgundy which is not to be reckoned as a Cypher in the business and what it is to have so great a Monarch as the King of Spain a firm friend and ally England very well knoweth It is true the Kingdom was never so full of Money as it was by spoils and depredations betwixt the years 1576. and 1590 but how dear those purchases might have cost us wise men saw if God who had determined to give the Crown of this Nation to her issue who suffered both disgrace and death here for his glory had not made both Winds and Sea at that time to fight for England Lastly Virginia a Colony of ours tenderly to be regarded shall hereby settle her Staples and Mart and adâ—â—nce their Trade by a much safer passage and entercourse with the Islands But to me it is above all arguments That this Match is so much for the Honor Safety and Commodity of Prince Charls which every true Patriot I conceive is bound in conscience to further and advance But thus we shall be said to leave Holland in the bryars an old and assured Friend and of power upon all occasions to assist the Realm God grant the Prince never stand in need of them And for our selves we may remember how small furtherance nay rather how great hinderance they have been to the Traffick of this Realm and what great losses and damage our Merchants have sustained by their means in the Indies Muscovy and Greenland I need not tell you how chargable a Neighbor they have been nor how unsure a Friend ever prefering France before England and yet notwithstanding the Favors which they may still receive at his Majesties hand are neither few nor small if themselves by inconsiderate courses deserve not otherwise But what cause do they pretend who murmur so much against Spain They object the Sin the Curse the disparagement to Match with a Catholike Have they any reason for that Yes Because the Jews were not permitted to marry with the Ammonites nor Religious persons with the profane But that is an opinion which relisheth too much of Judaism and the Talmud the Bar is removed we are now under the Law of Grace both Jews and Gentiles Circumcision and Uncircumcision in Christ are united and made one and incorporated into one Body his Church It is true the Jews might not marry out of their Tribes because the promise was made to Abraham and his Seed therefore his Seed was not to be stained with impure blood or a commixture of Paganism But now the promise being already performed that Judicial Law is abrogated Yea say they but still it sheweth that God is not well pleased when his children mix with superstitious people True But who are the Superstitious and of which side is the true Religion We know that is a question and will be But this is out of question That they are both of them Christians both are Baptized into that blessed Name both lay hold on the promises on the Testaments on the Gospel both pray the same Pater Noster both confess the same Creed yea both reverence the first Four general Councels of the Church Who indeed is the Catholike is Filius Christi of the surer side by reason of the Mother Church and of the elder House But is it indeed so strange a thing that a Protestant should marry a Catholike not to speak here of Queen Elizabeths Treaty with Mounsieur which yet how far and fairly it was proceeded in by both parties Camd. in Elizab. our famous Camden shews at large Did not Henry King of Navar a Protestant and the Protector of the Protestant Churches in France marry with the French Kings Sister a Catholike Thuanus lib. It was propter bonum publicum as this is for publike tranquillity and peace sake and therefore did the Elders and Consistory of Genevah so much as check or reprove him for it nay did they not allow it The same King afterward matcheth his own Sister an earnest Protestant to the Duke of Lorrain Thuanus lib. who is known to be a Prince no less earnestly Catholike and a Champion of the Catholike Church in France Nay did not Lewis himself the Prince of Conde and Protector in chief of the Hugenot party when time was apprehend with great desire the overture of a marriage with Mary Thuanus lib. Leslae hist Scot. in Mariâ Stuartâ Queen of Scotland and which certainly had taken effect had not the Admiral for his particular interests laid blocks in his way But above all others it is memorable and by us Englishmen not unfit to be considered what a bloody quarrel it was made Goodwins Annals in Ed. 6. that King Edward the Sixth who was a Protestant King and the first that ever was known
upon the Rack no less then five times the torture made him at last to speak something against himself yet he afterwards constantly denied it even to his death And all men know an argument from the Rack especially when 't is afterwards disavowed is reckoned elsewhere but a mean evidence or proof Fourthly he was a man that had a Wife and Children in England and therefore not likely to be drawn into such a plot but upon some great and present temptation which how unable a man Father Walpoole was to undertake the world knows being only a Priest of the Society a poor Religious man and under superiors Fifthly Rolls his companion whâ— came along with him never heard of any such thing nor was ever questioned about it Lastly the device it self was as ridiculous and improbable as any thing could be It was to be done Scilicet this Treason by poysoning the Queens Saddle But how is it possible to imagine such a thing should be done by a stranger and neither the Groomes of the Stable nor the Querries which are continually attending upon the Queens Horse discover the business none of which were ever questioned about it Mariana's Problematicall opinion is a Fifth objection as it happens But I shall not stand long about it First because it was but a private opinion not any general Doctrine of Catholikes Secondly because it was onely propounded by him problematically viz. in way of disputation not positively taught as his own words shew Thirdly because his whole Order disavowed it viz. in a Congregation held at Pariâ— Anno 1606. confirmed by their General Claudius Aquaviva Cardinal Tolet Categorically determineth the contrary Summa Lib. 5. Cap. 6. as likewise doth Gregor Valent. Part. 2. Q. 64. Card. Bellarm. Apolog. Cap. 13. Salmeron in Cap. 13. ad Rom. Less de Justit Juâ—e Lib. 2. Cap. 9. Dub. 4. Serrar in Cap. 13. Judic Azorius Institut Moral Becanus ad Aphorism 9. Gretser in his Vespertilio or Heretico-Politicus Richeome in his Apology Lastly the Doctors of the Sorbor as they had done formerly viz. Anno 1413. so now again Anno 1606 they declare it to be an unlawful and wicked P sition As for Simanch he may seem rather a Lawyer then a Divine and must be understood to speak according to particular Laws or Constitutions of some Nations and Kingdoms and whosoever will but read Heisius his Respons ad Aphorismos especially Pag. 85. 91. shall easily perceive that neither Simancha nor Becanus were guilty of that error Master Cuthbert Mayn's bringing of a Bull or Breve of the Pope into England is a Sixth And for such a pretended Treason he was executed at Launston upon Saint Andrews day 1577. as Stow saith in his Chronicles for preferring of Roman power His Indictment was for bringing in the said Bull and for reconciling of Master Tregion But as for Master Tregion it is answered already That he was reconciled unto God and to the Communion of his Church and not obliged to any particular service in behalf of the Pope in one kinde or other And concerning the Bull whereas the Law intends it in cleer words that the party accused should procure it immediately from Rome it was answered in behalf of Master Mayne that he never sought nor procured any Bull from Rome That which he had was onely the Copy of a Bull printed which he bought at Doway onely to peruse and see the manner of it neither was it a Bull for reconciling any man or for doing any thing prejudicial to the Queen or State but onely a Bull of the Jubily that was passed Which as it is a thing granted of course by the Pope every Five and twenty years and not at the Suit or instance of any particular person so was it also out of date and force when he bought it being expired with the year 1575. and so upon the matter was no more then a Scroll or an Almanack of the last year And yet notwithstanding because such a Paper as this was found about him and that he refused to come to Church Judge Manwood told the Jury That where manifest proofs could not be had presumptions must be allowed So the Jury quickly found him guilty upon such direction and he suffered Master Tregion lay a long time in prison among Felons and in a Dungeon most noysome fed with bread and water although he were a Gentleman of One thousand pound per annum of old Rent But being condemned in a Premunire for harbouring a Priest his Lands were seized by Writ into the Exchequer and though they were Entailed yet could the Knight Marshal finde means to avoid that and so begd them of the Queen Lastly the whole business rested upon the accusation of one Twiggs a Parish Clerk which was also false for he deposed against Master Mayne for Christmass 1575. when it was certainly known that he was at that time at Doway The Rising in the North and the Attempts of Babington in the business of the Queen of Scots were mixt Actions not for Religion onely nor State onely but for both Nor were they procured by the suit or sollicitation of Priests or Religious men but out of their own zeal who were engaged in those Attempts And. Philop The first as some have said was but the effect of a resolution which many of the Lords of the Councel had taken to pull down Cecil who being but Secretary and a very new man at Court over-acted his part and had given no small matter of offence to some of the greatest Lords but by a timely submission he made means to qualifie them and so the business was not owned so far as otherwise it might have been The other viz. of Babington and his Associates was onely to deliver out of an unjust prison the person of an absolute Princess and one who was no way a subject of England further say they then she was by fraud procured so to be nor an enemy further then she was forced by injuries and a desire to see her self at liberty Howbeit for this rsspect they are not within compass of my undertaking Nor am I to say any more concerning the Sentence Declaratory of Pius Quintus against the Queen The grounds and reasons thereof are alledged in the Bull it self to which may be added many unseemly and scandalous provocations dayly given by the New Ministers out of the Pulpits calling him Antichrist the Man of Sin the Son of Perdition and what not which the Queen and State were content publikely to connive at and countenance Others attribute it to mis-information and that his Holiness was not made rightly to understand the Queenes case and of the Catholikes of England And this is certain that many godly wise and judicious Catholikes both of the Clergy and others were not a little grieved at the manner of proceeding and wish'd rather Cardinal Allen himsâ—lf Bishop Watson and others that it had been wholly left to the judgement of God As
we see well enough it had been in other cases of this Nature Neither in King Edward the Sixths time nor against the Kings of Scotland Denmark Sweden Duke of Saxony Marquis of Brandenburgh or any other Protestant Prince was there ever any such sentence issued to this day Whereupon Father Pâ—rsons and Father Campian procured some kinde of mitigation concerning it presently after the publishing and Pope Gregory following declared That the Subjects of England ought to perform all duties to Queen Elizabeth notwithstanding the censures So little reason is there in truth that Protestants should clamour so loud as they do and cry out nothing but Treason Treason against religious and good men who as they have no other business so come they hither for no other end but to do them good and so far as lieth in their power and office to save their souls They tell the world that no less then two hundred Priests have been executed in England for Treason since the times of Reformation which is certainly a very heavy report and sufficient to make them odious to all the world if it were true or that there were any thing in it but fallacie and aequivocation of words whiles they call that Treason in England which in all parts of Christendome besides is both called and counted Religion and the highest Vertue For we beseech them to tell us of what Treason do they convict us at any time but the Treason of being a Priest the Treason to say Mass the Treason to refuse the Oath the Treason to absolve Penitents confessing their sins the Treason to restore men to the Communion of the Church the Treason to Preach and Administer Christs Sacraments the Treason to be bred up in the Seminaries that is in such places where onely as things now stand in England thâ—y can be Catholikely bred and fitted for such Christian imployment What actual and real Treason is in England according to the true sâ—nse and notion of that crime â—dious both to God and man the Statute of 25 Edw. 3. will inform us better then any other being enacted when the whole Kingdom was of one mind and of one judgement as all Christian Kingdoms and Societies ought to be not rent nor overborn by factions and parties undermining and supplanting one another by indirect and undue meanes as it was when these new Statutes of Treason were made By that Statute and by the opinions of the most learned Judges in England Ploydon Stamford c. Treason must alwayes be some Action or Intention actually discovered not an opinion onely or a profession of Religion And this is the reason why Sir John Oldcastle Stow. one of Mr. Fox his Martyrs in the Reign of Henry the Fifth mentioned before though he were both Traytor and Heretike yet for his Treason he was condemned in one Court and for his Heresie in another as also were Cranmer and Ridley in Queen Maries time Secondly it must be some Act or Intention discovered of a subject prejudicial to his Sovereign or to the State where he lives But what hurt had ever I say not Queen Mary Henry the Eighth while he stood right Henry the Seventh or any other Catholike Prince but even Queen Elizabeth her self King James or any other Protestant Prince by a Priests saying Mass absolving of Penitents preaching of sound Doctrine to them and particularly of all due and just obedience to Civil Magistrates as they have ever constantly done Therefore by the common Laws of England and in it self it is not it cannot be Treason or criminous to be a Priest to say Mass Absolve c. But onely by Statute Laws it is made so upon temporary and present occasions and for certain politick ends which men have projected of themselves and which they are resolved to follow And therefore also it is by the very Statutes themselves provided 22. and 27. Elizab. That if a Priest conforms be content to go to Church to renounce the Pope or his Orders c. he becomes ipso facto without more ado Rectus in Curia and is actually discharged of all imputation of Treason no further proceedings lie against him Yea even at the very place of Execution and when the instruments of death are upon him yet still 't is in his own power if he please in three words to pardon himself and frustrate the expectation of so many eyes as are commonly waiting to see his last Exit Let him but say I will conform or I will swear c. Ther 's no man living dares meddle with him further Which is far otherwise where the offence is judged to be Treâ—son indeed and really prejudicial to the Prince or State But the fatal resolution being taken to change Religâ—on upon a principle or pretended reason of State as false as the Counsel it self was evil viâ— That otherwise the Queen could not be secure either of her Kingdom or Life it was necessary to take a severe course with those men whose Function obliged them to maintain True Religion and to endeavour to reduce things again into the old State From this root also sprang their extream jealousie and hatred of the Queen of Scots For she being Heir Apparent to the Crown after Queen Elizabeth and a Princess zealously affected unto Catholike Religion and so strongly Allied in France Those Statesmen who had contrived and wrought all the alterations here could never think themselves secure so long as her head stood upon her shoulders Therefore was she first invited into England upon pretence of Friendship and for Safety But when she was here used with so much unkindness and kept under restraint for little less then twenty years together that at last in order to procure her Liberty she was indeed provoked to doe something which it was easie for them who loved her not to interpret to be Treason and so they cut off her head From hence also sprung those continual injuries and practises of much ingratitude against the King of Spain The intercepting of his Treasure The holding of his Towns The ayding of Orange and the States as hath been said Lastly from this onely Source and Fountain of unjust Policie sprung all those laws of severity and bloud against Recusants as we are commonly called viz. of Twenty pound a moneth of Two third parts of Estate against Hearing Mass against Harbouring a Priest against Being reconciled c. It is well known the Recusants of England against whom those Laws were made were generally persons in all degrees of the Noblest quality in this Nation Vertuous Grave Wise Charitable Just and Good men of fair and friendly Conversation towards all I shall not say Loyal to their Prince because the contrary is so commonly beleeved Stow. yet our own Chronicles will not altogether deny them right in that regard while they testifiâ— how diligent and forward they were to offer their service to the Queen and State even in that great Action of Eighty eight Neither were