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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A69646	The Ivdgement of Martin Bucer concerning divorce written to Edward the sixt, in his second book of the Kingdom of Christ, and now Englisht : wherein a late book restoring the doctrine and discipline of divorce is heer confirm'd and justify'd by the authoritie of Martin Bucer to the Parlament of England.; De regno Christi. De coniugio & divortio. English	Bucer, Martin, 1491-1551.; Milton, John, 1608-1674.	1644 (1644)	Wing B5270; ESTC R3964	32,365	42

divided me from a most unanimous friend one truly according to mine own heart My minde is over-prest with grief in so much that I have not power to write more I bid thee in Christ farewell and wish thou maist be able to beare the losse of Bucer better then I can beare it Testimonies giv'n by learned men to Paulus Fagius who held the same opinion with Martin Bucer concerning Divorce Paulus Fagius born in the Palatinate became most skilfull in the Hebrew tongue Beeing call'd to the Ministery at Isna he publisht many ancient and profitable Hebrew Books being aided in the expenses by a Senator of that Citie as Origen somtime was by a certain rich man call'd Ambrosius At length invited to Strasburgh he there famously discharg'd the office of a Teacher until the same persecution drove him and Bucer into England where he was preferr'd to a Professors place in Cambridge and soon after died Melchior Adamus writes his life among the famous German Divines Sleidan and Thuanus mention him with honour in their History And Verheiden in his Elogies To the PARLAMENT THE Book which among other great and high points of reformation contains as a principall part thereof this treatise here presented Supreme Court of Parlament was by the famous Author Martin Bucer dedicated to Edward the sixt whose incomparable youth doubtless had brought forth to the Church of England such a glorious manbood bad his life reacht it as would have left in the affairs of religion nothing without an excellent pattern for us now to follow But since the secret purpose of divine appointment hath reserv'd no lesse perhaps then the just half of such a sacred work to be accomplisht in this age and principally as we trust by your succesful wisdom and authority religious Lords and Commons what wonder if I seek no other to whose exactest judgement and revieu I may commend these last and worthiest labours of this renowned teacher whom living all the pious nobility of those reforming times your truest and best imitated ancestors reverenc't and admir'd Nor was be wanting to a recompence as great as was himself when both at many times before and especially among his last sighs and prayers testifying his dear and fatherly affection to the Church and Realm of England he sincerely wisht in the hearing of many devout men that what he had in this his last book written to King Edward concerning discipline might have place in this Kingdom His hope was then that no calamity no confusion or deformity would happen to the Common-wealth but otherwise he fear'd lest in the midst of all this ardency to know God yet by the neglect of discipline our good endeavours would not succeed These remarkable words of so godly and so eminent a man at his death as they are related by a sufficient and well known witnes who heard them and inserted by Thuanus into his grave and serious history so ought they to be chiesly consider'd by that nation for whose sake they were utter'd and more especially by that general Counsel which represents the body of that nation If therfore the book or this part therof for necessary causes be now reviv'd and recommended to the use of this undisciplin'd age it hence appears that these reasons have not err'd in the choyee of a fit patronage for a discourse of such importance But why the whole tractat is not beer brought entire but this matter of divorcement selected in particular to prevent the full speed of some mis-interpreter I hasten to disclose First it will be soon manifest to them who know what wise men should know that the constitution and reformation of a common-wealth if Ezra and Nehemiah did not mis-reform is like a building to begin ord●rly from the foundation therof which is mariage and the family to set right fi●st what ever is amisse therein How can there els grow up a race of warrantable men while the house and home that breeds them is troubl'd and disquieted under a bondage not of Gods constraining with a natureles conste●int if his most righte●us judgements may be our rule but laid upon us impe●iously in the worst and weakest ages of knowledge by a canonicall tyranny of stupid and malicious Monks who having rashly vow'd themselves to a single life which they could not undergoe invented new fetters to throw on matrimony that the world thereby waxing more dissolute they also in a general loosnes might sin with more favor Next there being yet among many such a strange iniquity and perversnes against all necessary divorce while they will needs expound the words of our Saviour not duly by comparing other places as they must doe in the resolving of a hunder'd other Scriptures but by persisting deafely in the abrupt and Papistical way● of a literal apprehension against the direct analogy of sense reason law and Gospel it therfore may well seem more then time to apply the sound and holy persuasions of this Apostolic man to that part in us which is not yet fully dispossest of an error as absurd as most that we deplove in our blindest adversaries and to let his autority and unanswerable reasons be vulgarly known that either his name or the force of his doctrine may work a wholsom effect Lastly I find it cleer to be the authors intention that this point of divorcement should be ●eld and receav'd as a most necessary and prime part of discipline in every Christian government And therfore having reduc't his model of reformation to 14. heads he bestows almost as much time about this one point of divorce as about all the rest which also was the judgement of his heirs and learned friends in Germany best acquainted with his meaning who first publishing this his book by Oporinus at Basil a Citie for learning and constancie in the the true faith honorable among the first added a special note in the title that there the reader should finde the doctrine of Divorce handl'd so solidly and so fully as scars the like in any Writer of that age and with this particular commendation they doubted not to dedicate the book as a most profitable exquisit discours to Christian the 3d a worthy pious King of Denmark as the author himself had done before to our Edward the sixt Yet did not Bucer in that volume only declare what his constant opinion was herein but also in his comment upon Matthew written at Strasburgh divers years before he treats distinctly and copiously the same argument in three severall places touches it also upon the 7. to the Romans promises the same solution more largely upon the 1. to the Corintbians omitting no occasion to weed out this last and deepest mischief of the Canon law sown into the opinions of modern men against the lawes and practice both of Gods chosen people and the best primitive times Wheri● his faithfulnes and powerful evidence prevail'd so farre with all the Church of Strasburgh that they

Bucer which are so obvious and so usefull in their own faculty next to be so caught in a prejudicating weaknes as to condemn that for lewd which whether they knew or not these elect servants of Christ commended for lawfull and for new that which was taught by these almost the first and greatest authors of reformation who were never taxt for so teaching and dedicated without scruple to a royall pair of the first reforming Kings in Christendom and confest in the public confession of a most orthodoxall Church state in Germany This is also another fault which I must tell them that they have stood now almost this whole year clamouring a farre off while the book hath bin twice printed twice bought up never once vouchs● a friendly conference with the author who would be glad and thankfull to be sh●wn an error either by privat dispute or public answer and could retract as well as wise men before him might also be worth the gaining as one who heertofore hath done good service to the Church by their own confession Or if he be obstinat their confutation would have render'd him without excuse and reclam'd others of no mean parts who incline to his opinion But now their work is more then doubl'd and how they will hold up their heads against the sudden aspect of these two great and reverend S●ints whom they have defam'd how they will make good the censuring of that for a novelty of licence which Bucer constantly taught to be a pure and holy law of Christs kingdom let them advise For against these my adversaries who before the examining of a propounded truth in a fit time of reformation have had the conscience to oppose ●ght 〈◊〉 but their blind reproaches and surmises that a single innocence might not be oppr●st and overborn by a c●ow of mouths for the restoring of a law and doctrin falsely and unlernedly reputed new and scandalous God that I may ever magnifie and record this his goodnes hath unexpectedly rais'd up as it were from the dead more then one famous light of the first reformation to bear witne● with me and to d●e me honour in that very thing wherin these men thought to have blotted me And hath giv'n them the proof of a capacity which they despis'd running equal and authentic with some of thir chiefest masters unthought of and in a point of sagest moment However if we know at all when to ascribe the occurrences of this life to the work of a special providence as nothing is more usual in the talk of good men what can be more like to a special providence of God then in the first reformation of England that this question of divorce as a main thing to be restor'd to just freedom was writt'n and seriously c●mmended to Edward the sixt by a man call'd from another Countrey to be the instructer of our nation and now in this pres●nt renewing of the Church and Common-wealth which we pray may be more lasting that the same question should be again treated and presented to this Parlament by one enabl'd to use the same reasons without the lest sight or knowledge of what was done before It were no trespas Lords and Commons though something of lesse note were attributed to the ordering of a heavnly power this question therfore of such prime concernment both to Christian and civil welfare in such an extraordinary manner not recover'd but plainly twise born to these latter ages as from a divine hand I tender to your acceptance and most considerate thoughts Think not that God rais'd up in vain a man of greatest a●ority in the Church to tell a trivial and licentious tale in the eares of that good Prince and to bequeath it as his last will and testament nay rather as the testamont and royall law of Christ to this Nation or that it should of it self after so many yeares as it were in a new feild where it was never sow'n grow up again as a vitious plant in the minde of another who had spoke honestest things to the Nation though he knew not that what his youth then reason'd without a pattern had bin heard already and well allow'd from the gravity and worth of Martin Bucer till meeting with the envy of men ignorant in thir own undertak'n calling God directed him to the forgott'n Writings of this faithfull Evangelist to be his defence and warrant against the gross imputation of broaching licence Ye are now in the glorious way to high vertu and matchless deeds trusted with a most inestimable trust the asserting of our just liberties Ye have a nation that expects now and from mighty suffrings aspires to be the example of all Christendom to a perfetest reforming Dare to be as great as ample and as eminent in the fair progress of your noble designes as the full and goodly stature of truth and excellence it self as unlimited by petty presidents and copies as your unquestionable calling from heaven giv● ye power to be What are all our public immunities and privileges worth and how shall it be judg'd that we sight for them with minds worthy to enjoy them if wee suffer our selvs in the mean while not to understand the most important freedom that God and Nature hath givn us in the family which no wise Nation ever wanted till the Popery and superstition of some former ages attempted to remove and alter divine and most prudent Laws for human and most imprudent Canons whereby good men in the best portion of t●ir lives and in that ordinance of God which entitles them from the beginning to most just and requisite contentments are compell'd to civil indignities which by the law of Moses bad men were not compell'd to Be not bound about and straitn'd in the spatious wisdom of your free Spirits by the scanty and unadequat and inconsistent principles of such as condemn others for adhering to traditions and are themselvs the prostrate worshippers of Custom and of such a tradition as they can deduce from no antiquitie but from the rud●st and thick●st barbarism of Antichristian times But why doe I anticipate the more acceptable and prevailing voice of lerned Bucer himself the pastor of Nations And O that I could set him living before ye in that doctoral chair where once the lernedest of England thought it no disparagement to sit at his feet He would be such a pilot and such a father to ye as ye would soon find the difference of his hand and skill upon the helm of reformation Nor doe I forget that faithfull associate of his labours Paulus Fagius for these thir great names and merits how pretious so ever God hath now joyn'd with me necessarily in the good or evil report of this doctrin which I leav with you It was writt'n to a religious King of this land writt'n earnestly as a main matter wher in this kingdom needed a reform if it purpos'd to be the kingdom of Christ Writt'n by him who