the Ark c. 1 Chron. 13. which Officers because they represented the People it is said the People came together so the People rescued Jonathan whom Saul had appointed to die 1 Sam. 14.45 by which it appears that an Appeal did lie from the King to the People So the Kingdom of Israel was rent from Rehoboam by the People by which it appears that the Synedrium of Seventy one at Jerusalem had the Authority that as Kings did judge particular Persons so these had the Power to judge Kings The Hogen-Mogen words of Sovereign and Supreme are but verba solennia words of Course and Complemental but confer no Power what Great and Sovereign Powers Kings by Right have are given and limited by Laws of common Consent and not Absolute what other Laws of Sovereignty there are of Right that belong to them is past all Understanding absolute Sovereignty in Kings hath no warrant beyond any Divine Law that belongs only to God who is Lord of all the Kingdoms of the Earth And though Appeals to all the People may be Nonsence yet it is very good Sense to Appeal to their Epitomy their Representatives their Ephori and Tribunes to the Laws and to the Legislators which are the Supreme and Sovereign Power of the Nation and have an equal share in making our Laws The Commons House 4. Car. 1628 having prepared a Petition to present to his Majesty sent it to the Lords for their concurrence who returned it adding these words viz. With due regard to leave intire the Sovereign Power wherewith your Majesty is intrusted for the Protection Safety and Happiness of the People Which terms of Sovereign Power were so distasteful to the Commons as looking being free from any condition and that they were no part of the Law no Parliamentary words that they weakned Magna Charta and all our Statutes that by intendment and implication they might give a Sovereign Power above all those Laws c. and therefore would by no means admit thereof tho' strongly contested for by the Lords Rush 568. These and such like were the things that made the Parliament in 1641 Remonstrate to his Majesty That the most Publick and Solemn Sermons before his Majesty were either to advance Prerogative above Law or decry the Property of the Subject and thereby lay a foundation of difference between the King and his People or else Invectives to make those odious who sought to maintain the Religion and Laws of the Kingdom and to have them weeded out of all Commissions or other Imployments of Power in the Government that the Bishops and others of the Clergy did by their Suspensions Excommunications Deprivations and Degradations of divers painful learned and pious Ministers oppress his Majesty's Subjects that the High Commission Court and the Courts of the Bishops did exceed in sharpness and severity little less than the Romish Inquisition that those were fittest for Ecclesiastical Preferments and soonest obtained them who were most virulent against Godliness and Honesty and used means to suppress the Purity and Power of Religion and to increase and maintain ignorance looseness and prophaness in the People that the Archbishops and other Bishops and Clergy continued the Convocation by a new Commission and turned it to a Provincial Synod in which by an unheard of Presumption they made Canons that contained in them many matters contrary to the Kings Prerogative to the fundamental Laws and Statutes of the Realm to the Right of Parliaments to the Property and Liberty of the Subject and matters tending to Sedition and of dangerous Consequence thereby establishing their own Usurpations justifying their Altar-worship and those other Superstitions and Innovations which they formerly introduced without warrant of Law They imposed a new Oath upon divers of his Majesty's Subjects both Ecclesiastical and Lay for maintaining their own Tyranny and laid a great Tax upon the Clergy for supply of his Majesty and generally they shewed themselves very affectionate to the War with Scotland which was the beginning of all our future mischief and by themselves stiled Bellum Episcopale all their pretended Canons and Constitutions were armed with several censures of Suspension Excommunication Deprivation by which they would have thrust out all the good Ministers and most of the well affected People of the Kingdom and left an easie passage to their own design of Reconciliation with Rome Remonstr Decemb. 15. 1641. This is no new way of Remonstrating against such ill Church of England Men designing to enslave a free Kingdom by their Doctrines For in the Parliament 1625 the House of Commons did Article against Mr. Ric. Montague that he might be punished and his Book burnt for his impious and profane scoffing at Preaching Meditations and Conferrences which in plain English is Conventickling Pulpits Lectures Bible and all shew of Religion and for casting the odious name of Puritans on Orthodox Men. Rushworth 215. And in the Parliament 1628 the Commons did Remonstrate against Dr. Neal Bishop of Winton and Laud Bishop of Bath and Wells that there hath been no small labouring to remove that which is the most powerful means to strengthen and increase our own Religion and to oppose both those which is the diligent Teaching and Instructing in the true Knowledge and Worship of God and therefore means have been sought out to depress and discountenance Pious Painful and Orthodox Preachers how conformable soever and Peaceable in their Disposition and Carriage they be yet the preferment of such is opposed and instead of being encouraged they are molested with vexatious Courses and Punishments and hardly permitted to Lecture Rushworth 215 633 634. What were they also in their Opinion but high and mighty Church of England Men against whom the Parliament 4 Car. 1628. did Declare and Remonstrate That with a wicked and malicious intention to seduce and misguide the Conscience of the Kings most Excellent Majesty touching the observation of the Laws and Customs of this Kingdom and of the Rights and Liberties of the Subjects to incense his Royal Displeasure against his good Subjects so refusing to scandalize subvert and impeach the good Laws and Government of this Realm and the Authority of the High Court of Parliament to Alienate his Royal Heart from his People and to cause Jealousies Sedition and Division in the Kingdom who did Teach that his Majesty is not bound to keep and observe the good Laws and Customs of this Realm concerning the Rights and Liberties of the Subjects And that his Royal Will and Command in imposing Loans and Taxes and other Aids upon the People without common consent in Parliament doth so far bind the Consciences of Subjects that they cannot refuse the same without peril of Eternal Damnation that those who refused the Loan did therein offend against the Law of God against his Majesty's Supreme Authority and by so doing became guilty of Impiety Disloyalty Rebellion and Disobedience and liable to many other Taxes and Censures that Authority of Parliament
any Foreign State or Power Upon this Popish Foundation which hath not the least ground in Scripture stands our Darling Ecclesiastical or Church-Discipline and Regiment a meer Popish Relick and Hierarchy set up only not to minister unto but to domineer contrary to Christ's Precepts and Examples And our Ecclesiasticks have not as yet made it their concern or business to endeavour a farther Reformation thereof tho' designed even from the beginning of the Reformation in Henry the Eighth's Days but are very well pleased to eat the Fat and drink the Sweet thereof And tho' they know that their Incroachments and Usurpations have been all got by Popish Priest-craft and by which they have for above 1000 Years cajoled and fooled both Crowns and People out of their just Rights and subjected Caesars and great Princes and Principalities to their own Empire And instead of a pure Gospel Government have Established to themselves a mighty Throne of Iniquity and Abominations fitted for Pride Domination self-ends and Interest c. Which Priest-craft togegether with Antichrist began to work in the Days of the Apostles even from Judas's Purse and continues to this very Day which is demonstrably made out as by many Histories so more punctually and particularly by Father Paul s Treatise of Beneficiary matters shewing how and when and by what Priest-craft all their Acquisitions Friars Annals Arms Spiritual Benefices Unions and Vacancies of Benefices Canons Cardinals Coajutors Commendam's Election of Bishops and Priests Exemptions Goods Ecclesiastical Appeals Monks Monasteries Indulgencies Investitures Pluralities Non-residence Excommunication Episcopal Audience Absolutions Dispensations Prebends c. were acquired used and abused A foul Mistake and Crime to think to Establish the Church with good Government taken from human Reason as if t were a Temporal State The Church and Kingdom of Christ as it is more Excellent than any other Kingdom in the World the Scepter of Righteousness being the Scepter of his Kingdom and to which Kingdom all other Kings and Princes ought to bow down and be subservient so it and the Government thereof differs from all other Governments and Kingdoms First It hath but one Head and that not by Election or Succession but by everlasting Continuation Secondly This Head chose his Church or Kingdom and not the Church him John 15.16 Luke 32.23 Thirdly The Laws of this Kingdom are more excellent and more unchangeable than the Laws of any other Commonwealth or Kingdom as being the Dictates and Precepts of Christ the onely and Eternal Head and are the unchangeable Copies and Expressions of his Immutable and most Holy Will Fourthly The Obligements and Conformity of every Member thereof unto these Laws are far more strickt and severe than in any other Commonwealth or Kingdom viz. That every one should love his Lord and King above all and his Neighbour and fellow Citizens as himself should abstain from all appearance of Evil and resist unto Blood striving against Sin c. Fifthly In the visible Government of his Church and Kingdom he hath appointed a Priesthood by irrevocable Ordination in which it is dissimular to all Temporal Governments as Officers of his Church and Kingdom to continue after his Ascension viz. Priests and Bishops and soon after his Ascension the Apostles added Deacons also by Ordination What Powers Christ gave them what Duties be obliged them unto are visible by their Commission written in great and indelible Characters viz. Go teach all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you and so I am with you to the end of the world Matth. 28.19 20. and they were to Preach not themselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and themselves the servants of his Church for Jesus sake 2 Cor. 4.5 This is the Summ of their Commission and Authorities that Christ left them Christ well knowing that his Apostles and Ministers and their Successors were to gather him a Church from among both Jews and Gentiles all bitter Enemies to him and his Gospel and to Establish it in the Bosom of their Kingdoms did prescribe them such a Government and Laws as they might any where execute peaceably without prejudice to the Subjects of any Commonwealth or Kingdom either in their Lives or Fortunes no other Subjects being subject unto that Spiritual Regiment but onely such as embraced the Christian Religion In this Christian Church Christ ordained Officers to Teach Baptize Ordain and Administer his Sacraments but for what concerned Honesty and Dishonesty doing Good and working Wiekedness and breaking the Laws of Morality Christ gave many general Rules and Precepts to the whole Church who were to Govern its own Body and the Officers thereof and not the Officers the Church or Body viz. to love one another even our Neighbours as our selves c. And if any did trangress the Laws not peculiar to them as Men but as Christians if the Offence were private then they were privately to be admonished If publick then they that transgressed openly were to be rebuked openly but if after Friendly Admonitions and Reprimands private and publick they still continued incorrigible then not to own them as Brethren nor keep company with them with such no not to cat and in sine pursue and proecute them as Publicans and Heathens i. e. Sue them in the Civil Courts And this is the Summ of the whole Government and Discipline which Christ left to his Church and any other there is not extant in Scripture nor is there need of any more or other as is hinted before Let the Pope Prelate or Paesbyter demonstrate any other Form of Church Government if they can they know they cannot but they will pelt us with Stories of another Government and of its Antiquity and general Use thereof for many Ages Be it so let them derive it as high as they can from that very Day and Date the very beginning of Popish Priest-craft will appear which by good management heaping Pelian upon Ossa now one thing and then another it early arrived at that monstrous heap of Irregularities nay Impieties it is now at in the Irregular use of the same in both Churches Take it as it is with the best Construction can be made of it What Concord what Agreement had it with the Government set forth in the Gospel even the same that Light hath with Darkness and Christ with Belial To Day to burn Books and Tenets of Men as pious and learned and having as precious Souls to save as themselves and to morrow suspend and extravagantly punish Ministers and others for writing Rebukes of Sin or not reading a Book of Sports or for Lecturing Excommunicate others for not paying Fees or not observing the Orders of their Courts and of their Officers Chancellors Surrogates Archdeacons Officials Sumners c. And if an Excommunicate Person come into the Church in the time of Divine Service the Celebration thereof is to
command was to have peace one with another Mark 9.50 and the unity of the spirit is preserved by the bond of peace Ephes 4.3 But the little self-ends of Earth and Interest of the Preferments Ambition and Domination is the cause of Controversies Animosities and Contentions to which Priests are as subject as others 2. I say There were false Prophets among the Jews and was foretold that as there were false Prophets among them so there should be false teachers among us 2 Pet. 2.1 And St. Paul forewarned the Bishop of Ephesus That out of your own selves should arise men speaking perverse things Acts 20.30 and Christ himself when he cautioneth us to beware of false Prophets by calling which shall be found false by their teaching St. Paul also granteth many to be ministers of Christ by profession and yet in words and deeds the ministers of Satan 2 Cor. 11.13 14 15. such false Apostles saith he are deceitful workers and transform themselves into the Apostles of Christ and for certain these Priests of such different Perswasions Principles and Doctrines cannot both be in the right and therefore good Reason that if poor Laicks are to live and die Eternally according to the Doctrines our Pastors pulpit to us it is but just and right that we should try the Spirits as commanded John 1.41 and judg of Doctrine as directed Cor. 10.15 for certainly we are not to live by the deputy Faith of our Officers but by our own Faith and must stand and fall accordingly Now seeing our Teachers cannot agree Doctrines as in point of Resistance and Passive Obedience taking and refusing new Oaths Ceremonies Conformity as well as in many others they do not and both cannot be in the right then are their Flocks in a very sad condition Pulpit-rebels both to the one and to the other as the one or the other prevails for neither are Infallible so that we are clearly left to be our own Judges and both Priest and People have no other Divine Rule or Authority without them warrantable to one another as a common Ground or Rule either for Holy living or decision of Controversies in Matters of Religion unto which all ought to submit but the Scriptures nor any other within either Priest or People But the Illumination of the Spirit so interpreting the same Scriptures as warrantable both to Priests and People and to such whose Consciences they can so perswade can have no other ground in matters of Religion but only from the same Scriptures and these not being possible to be understood without Divine Illumination which no man can know at all times to be in himself much less to be at any time for certain in another and therefore the Scriptures being the only infallible Rule of life and of judging Controversies and the Light within us no farther Light than wherein it agrees with this Word if it do not it is Darkness not Light Now these things considered will justifie our taking up the Cudgels for our own Defence and Justification in these great and dangerous Disputes having Souls Lives Fortunes Liberties to save and enjoy as well as Ecclesiasticks Though the Church of England be the best constituted Church in the World wherein the lively Oracles of God are purely Preached and full fraught with many very worthy pious and learned Priests and Prelates yet there are amongst them many false Prophets and no wonder was not there a Judas among the Twelve and false Teachers nay very many time-servers that pimp for Domination Honors Preferments and other vile and base ends and like Micha's Levite for a little better reward swallow any thing stick at nothing by School-quirks and false Reasonings perverting Scriptures to rob whole Kingdoms of their Laws Liberties and Religion that daub with untempered Mortar flatter Profaneness court and allure Royalties to Perjury and Robbery whilst they Preach Quod libet licet and Sovereignty absolutely Absolute to be in Kings and their unaccountableness betray Truths smothering and dissembling the Strictness and Purity of holy Ways I contend not here against the lazy Drones that suck the Hony from the Bees by their Non-residency nor against the Dammees Euphoniae gratia these are personal Sins and hurt others only by Example and such there are but my contest is against those Ecclesiasticks who living and had interest at the upper end of the World not only usurped more Powers than they had right unto but abused those Powers and that Interest they had at Court from which abuse of Power pulpiting Divine Prerogatives of Kings beyond measure their unaccountableness misconstruing and extending Passive Obedience beyond its just Bounds Which have been the Harrangues of Prints and Pulpits till their own Copiholds came to be concerned come all the disturbances of Government in Church and State to whole Kingdoms No wonder then if contempt be poured on such of the Clergy and on such of them only as Preach such destructive Doctrines as deserve the severe Reprimand of whole Kingdoms for thereby all Laws Liberty Property Religion and Honesty would be trampled under foot Therefore it 's no Crime in the Laity to stand up in the defence of their own Rights and Concerns As it is the duty of Priests Ministers of the Gospel to teach us with Wisdom and Knowledge so it is our duty to esteem them highly in love if they do so for their Works sake and they that labour in the Word and Doctrine are worthy of double Honour and double Revenue they cannot have too much but they that do not Teach us with Knowledge and Understanding are worthy of neither but when they abuse and usurp Powers they have no right unto and claim them as their due by the most Potent Claim in the World Jure Divino monstrum horrendum Witness Excommunication because there hath as of old so of more late Days so much ill use made thereof of which I shall only say with Erastus de Excommunicatione that there is no such thing as it is now used in all the Scripture in Sanctis Scripturâ—s nullum extat mandatum sed commentum est pure humanum p. 67. Which renders the Execution thereof abominable To wrest Scripture to maintain such unlawful Powers doth very ill become the Priests of the most High God As it is their Duty to Teach so it is our Priviledge and Right to judge of their Doctrines yea and to put them in mind and admonish them also of their duty Coloss 4.17 Mistake me not as if this were bent against the Bishops only no no Papist Presbyter Independant are all to blame in this Point and it 's no excuse to us if we are deceived by the cunning Crastiness of our Ghostly Fathers whereby they lie in wait to deceive Let us look a little back no farther than our own Times and Memories and let them stand or fall in the good Graces of the Kingdom according to their Merits or Demerits Rushworth 644 1628. In the time of
fraudulenter occultar nihil intentatum praetermittit 442. About the Year 1558 there being a Custom among the People of Paris in the Summer Evenings to go out of the Suburbs of St. German in great Multitudes to take the Fresco and to Solace themselves with divers kinds of Sports those of the new Religion instead of doing so began to sing the Psalms of David in French Verses the Multitude first laughed at the Novelty then leaving the Sports joyned themselves unto the Singers And the number of those who came to that place began to increase more than usually whereupon the Pope's Nuntio told the King of this Novelty as of a thing pernicious and dangerous because the Ministeries of Religion usually Celebrated in the Church in the Latin Tongue by Religious Men only were put into the Mouths of the common People in the Vulgar Language which was an invention of the Lutherans telling him that if he did not resist the beginnings in a short time all Paris would be Lutherans the King gave order that the principal Authors should be proceeded against wherein they went not very far having found Anthony King of Navar and his Wife in that Number but for hereafter it was forbid upon pain of Death Trent 410. Thus you see how both the Hugonots and Papists behaved themselves beyond Sea and that the King and Queen of Navar were not ashamed to Conventicle openly nor of Christ nor of his Words lest Christ should be ashamed of them when he shall come in his own Glory and in his Fathers and of the Holy Angels Luke 9.26 not ashamed to search the Scriptures in their own Language because commanded and because in them is eternal life John 5.39 This Nation and Government did presume at least that such solemn Rebukes such severe Reprimands as the Preachers of such Doctrines received from the whole Kingdom represented in Parliament by King Lords and Commons Clergy and Layety should have forewarned and discouraged all the succeeding Clergy for ever Preaching such destructive Doctrines again of which we now see and feel the smart and sad effects which our prudent Predecessors did foresee and would have prevented by their timely Rebukes and Precautions but they have not prevailed In the Church of Ephesus there were those that boasted themselves to be Apostles but being tried by the Angel of that Church were found Lyars Is it not so with us Have we not many that boast themselves to be the only true Church of England Men that if tried by our Angels would be found but Mungrils nay Lyars making Kings glad with their Wickedness and Princes with their Lyes Hos 7.3 But the Works and Labour and Patience of our true Church of England Men true Nathaniels indeed cannot bear such Church of England Men as are so evil as to dare to Preach and Print such enslaving Doctrines Nay now at this very Day it s a shame to tell how such false Prophets use the Church of the Great God by making Her a very Tool and Slave to serve their own turns and to bring their own ends about not caring what havock they make of the Purity and Simplicity of the Gospel Mr. Clifford on Psalm 51.4 pulpits That Kings as such are above the Law have Power to Dispense with the Law at their Pleasure and alter Religion at Pleasure pag. 7. Mr. J. T in his Sermon on Eccles 10.20 declares That Resistance in all Cases and in all its Degrees and Circumstances absolutely unlawful because it supposes an Appeal of the People from the King to themselves and makes them Judges of their own Causes for to place Sovereignty and the last Appeal in all the People together is perfect nonsense because all the People will never be of one mind while the World stands pag. 8.9 and I will add nor all the Clergy And yet he is so ingenious as to confess That the Interest of a Nation is to be preferred before the Interest or Welfare of one Man according to John 11.49 50 51. It is expedient for us that one man dye for the People and that the whole Nation perish not So that we have a sure word of Prophesie that it is the Testimony of God himself That a greater Interest of Mankind is to be preferred before a lesser pag. 20 21. As perfect nonsense as this Priest is pleased to make Appeals unto the People to be yet so wise were the Roman State above Fifty Years before Christ's time and so careful of their own Happiness Rights and Interests that they thought it even then a most prudent Law And therefore Publius Valerius caused it to be an Establish't Law That Appeals should be allowed from any Magistrate to the People Livy lib. 3. n. 8. And that no Man should offer to make any Magistrate without liberty of Appeal and if he did it should be lawful to kill him Ibid. lib. 3. n. 34. For which prudent Law they honored him by adding Publicola to his other name What the Power of the First Kings were appears for that Ephron Chief Prince of the Children of Heth would not grant Abraham the possession of a Sepulchre in the Land of the Children of Heth but in the presence and with the approbation of the Children of Heth before all that went in at the gate of his City Gen. 23. Nor would Hamor Prince of the Country make a League with Jacob but by the consent of all that went out of the gate of his City Gen. 34. because all the great Concerns of the Governed was referred unto the Common Council and consent of the People which in those Empires was easily done which commonly was circumscribed within one or few Cities But when Kings began to enlarge their Territorios so that all the People could not Assemble in one Place without danger of confusion there were ordinarily instituted Tribunes of the People or Officers of the Kingdom or of the Governed to assist and defend the Rights and Priviledges of the People granted to them by the Law of God and Nature and upon great Exigences great Assemblies of the Sages of the Governed were assembled as an Epitome of the Universal People were extraordinarily congregated to consider and consult thereof In the Israelitish Kingdom which by consent and judgment of all Politick Writers was the best constituted Government of the World was the same order observed the King had his particular Officers and the Kingdom theirs Seventy one Elders their Captains chosen out of every Tribe which both in War and Peace should take care of the whole Magistrates also in singulis Municipiis that as they were to take care of the whole so the several Officers were to take care of their particular Cities and Charges over which they were set For David called all the Congregation when he desired to Invest Solomon in his Kingdom when he had restored the Policy of that Nation to have it examined and approved 1 Chron. 19. So when David was to fetch back
become more sensless of God's Glory Wrath and Indignation and the eternal Welfare of the pretious Souls of God's own People than was Balaam's dumb Ass The fatal mischief of such base Flattery and of such Pulpit Laws and Doctrines as it was foreseen punished and declared to tend to the ruine of this or any other Nation by the Wisdom of our Sage Predecessors so we did see it was fairly fulfilling in our late Days and times Such was the Imprudence nay Impudence of the then Court Clergy favourites and sycophants in those Days that tho' Sibthorp and Mainwaring were by King and Parliament so severely doomed to be punished yet no sooner was the Parliament up but by the Interest of those fawning time-servers the said Mainwaring and Sibthorp were preferred and Archbishop Abbot frowned upon because he would not License such pulpit destructive Doctrines And it is such only of the Clergy and other lewd Priests that are in contempt and vile esteem with the Nation whilst others true Church of England Men indeed are as highly in their Esteem and Veneration Thus to discover Crimes of some Priests is not to Calumniate the Church of England but that she may be purged of such Vermin The Reverend Dean of Rippon in his Sermon on 1 Kings 8.66 is of like Mind and Principles who therein declares That be the Kings Heart inclinable to any Religion or none yet it leaves him no Rival none to contradict him for he is made our King by God's Law of which the Law of the Land is only declarative Kings must not be upbraided with their Promises which Promises are Donatives and it is reason the Donor should have the explaining of his own Mind that the King is major universis as well as singulis that the sole Legislative Power is lodged in the King and to him belongs the Interpretation of all Laws and Dispensing with them and that he may make a grant with a non obstante to them c. Pure Doctrine for a Reverend Dean to Preach and yet this pure Mungril Church of England Man preferred to be Bishop of Chester for these abominable Doctrines Whoever will seriously consider and compare those dismal Preachments and Prints destructive to all human Societies which our high Church of England Men pulpitted and printed heretofore and how highly they were disgusted by several Parliaments the greatest Wisdom of our Nation and dissatisfied therewith and how they stigmatized those very Doctrines and condemning the Authors of them to mulcts and punishments and yet when those Parliaments were up those very false Teachers were carressed with Pardons and Preferments whoever I say will compare those Doctrines with those Mr. Samuel Johnson printed and maintained even to the undergoing of Inquisition Torments and which the present Parliament and generality of the Nation now own justifie and practise with their Lives and Fortunes must confess that both the Reward and Punishment of the one and the other were mightily misplaced It is yet fresh in our own Memories when our Clergy were much more modest when but one Temporizing Sibthorp and another Court-Parasite Mainwaring durst Pulpit or Print such Doctrines under the Sacred Title of Apostolick Obedience Licens'd by the then Bishop of London and for which they received the just Censures of the King and the whole Kingdom in Parliament which in the truest sense is the Church or rather the Representative Governing part both of Church and State the Bishops and Priests being but Officers thereof which they do not love to hear of but now Confidence nay the Brow of Brass is the Temper and Complexion of very many Pulpits which Thunder every where with such Documents and Outcries as the High-ways to Preferments always having their Mouths half-cockt to let fly at all their gain-sayers not only in the Pulpits and Prints but also in all publick places and Meetings as Coffee-Houses Westminster-Hall Court of Request Lobbies in Parliament-time can witness whereby they have obtained a new name of Tory Church of England Men. They scorn to consider the black Characters they were then stigmatized and branded with by former Parliaments as serpens qui devorat serpentem fit Draco that they tended to the alteration and subversion of the whole Frame and Fabrick of the State and Common-wealth That they tended to the seducing of the Conscience of the King to increase his Royal displeasure against his Subjects to scandalize impeach and subvert the good Laws and Government of the Kingdom and Authority of Parliaments to avert his Majesty's Mind from calling of Parliaments to alienate his Royal Heart from his People to cause Jealousies Sedition and Divisions in the Kingdom c. Besides these Characters they held it a great presumption for a private Divine to debate the Right and Power of the King which is a matter of such a nature as to be handled onely in Parliament and that with moderation and therefore the said two Sermons called Religion and Allegiance were adjudged to be called in and burnt by the King's Proclamation the Author to make his submission and acknowledgment of his Crime to the imprisoned during the pleasure of the House to be fined 1000 l. suspended for three Years from the Exercise of the Ministery disabled to have any Ecclesiastical Dignity or Secular Office and for ever disabled to Preach at Court A better Example to imitate and follow than either Fire and Faggot or the Address of the Universities or the Pulpit Doctrines of the 9th of September 1683 wherein both King Nobles Prelates and People were interessed in that Judgment Were such Tenets of such ill consequence by the Judgment of the whole Nation in those Days and are they not the same now where 's the difference The violation offered to plain Texts of Scripture by perverting the true and natural sense and meaning of them by such of the Clergy a Generation of Men that under the umbrage of that Sacred Canopy of Religion as being appointed Teachers and Ministers of the Gospel indued with the Power of Ordination set up for themselves in an opposite and distinct Interest separated from the rest or Body of the Church whereby they erect regnum in regno against the Purity and Sincerity of Religion and Interest of Mankind and this they have been upon the catch to compass by little and little almost ever since the Apostles Days and that by sinister means hath been the occasion of all Misgovernments by ascribing Divine Power to Kings and that they are accountable to none but God for any male-regiment False Prophets not considering if Rulers hearken to Lyes and such are all false glossers on Texts of Scripture all his servants will be wicked Prov. 9.12 such-like of the Clergy are the Time-servers and Court-Parasites that draw odium and contempt upon that Sacred Profession that ought to be had in Reverence by all the Sons and Daughters of Men. I could wish that they would first pull out the Beams that are in their own
When Paul writ his Advice about the incestuous Person he directed his Epistle unto the Church of God which is at Corinth to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be Saints with all that in every place call upon the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ our Lord both theirs and ours They perverted the Spiritual Arms of Excommunication which was used only for the Correction of Sinners into the defence of their Temporal Possessions The Law of Tithes is indeed Mosaically Divine but not a Law naturally Divine nor Christian and it obliged only that People at that time now it obligeth none In the many Troubles and Uproars occasioned by the Bishops confederating with the Popes against the Emperor the Bishops obtained the Publick Incomes and the Regal Rights or Duties and when the Differences were composed they had taken so firm Possession that the Princes were necessitated to grant them in feudo that which de facto they had usurped to themselves by which they acquired also the Titles of Dukes and Marquisses and Earls Many of them are still in Germany remaining such both in Name and Fact but in Italy in Name only The Canonists say That the Poor are obliged to pay Tithes for that which is given them by Alms in Begging at Doors and the Harlots are bound to pay Tithes of their gain by Whoredom The greatest and most frequent Legacies and Gifts are from Harlots Prohibitions for Alienating which were made against Clergy-men in favour of the Laiety are turned about against the Laiety in favour of the Clergy The Popes never failed to get any Abuse whatever to be justified by Doctrines Tho' the Popes ought to feed and not share the Sheep yet they make themselves fat with the chiefest of all the offerings of Gods holy Church and People 1 Sam. 2.29 Having thus briefly declared the Government of the Church in general which is more at large set forth by Padre Paolo that incomparable Servite in his Treatise of Beneficiary matters let us consider how the Government of the Church of England now stands In brief thus First In the British times before the Conversion of the Saxons the particular modes of Administration as all things else concerning the British Church are very obscure But this is clear enough That the Popes Tyranny and Usurpation being then unborn and Princes enjoying their whole Power both in Ecclesiasticks and Civils nothing was ordained without their Authority and Permission who yet gave large Powers to their Clergy both for Debating and Judging in their own Consistories things proper to their Care and Inspection as at large appeareth in the Imperial Constitutions of Theodosius Justinian and others Seconldy The English Saxons Church being planted by Augustine the Monk through the care and direction of Gregory the Great did bear a respect to the Roman See but owned none of its Authority and Dominion in Ecclesiastical matters The Bishops and others of the Clergy assembled often and made Ecclesiastical Laws and Constitutions but not without the License and Allowance of the Kings who by their own Authority indeed by Ecclesiastical Usurpation and Tyranny enacted also many things of Religious and Ecclesiastical Practise as appeareth largely in the Saxon Laws collected by Lambert and others and Sir Henry Spillman's Councels Thirdly For about 1000 Years after Christ the English Church refused thus the Roman Yoke till that proud Priest Thomas Becket Archbishop of Canterbury first was so bold as to shake off the King's Rule and Authority in matters Ecclesiastical denying him Obedience without the Condition of Salvo Ordine suo and so as much as in him lay destroyed the Liberty of the English Church and the King's Prerogative This appeareth from Anselm's 36 Epist to Paschalis Matthew Paris and others Peter Pence indeed were formerly paid out of respect to the Bishops of Rome but the Pope never obtained the Investiture of Bishops and the right of receiving Appeals and consequently that Soveraignty and Headship over the Church till such time as Becket being killed Henry the Second to get Absolution subjected himself and his Kingdom to the Roman Jurisdiction about An. 1172. Fourthly This Foreign Authority was after 200 Years restrained by the Statute of Praemunire and other Acts of Parliament yet the Pope still kept his Foot here tho' not his Body or rather his Hand which scraped up a World of Treasure The Canon Law was the Law of the Church Archbishops without the King's leave assembled their Provincial Synods the Decrees of which bound all Men by no other Authority than that meerly Ecclesiastical and provided that they were not contrary to the Jus commune as it is called of the Pope rather than that of the King Great were the Priviledges and Exemptions of the Clergy from Secular Courts and Jurisdictions as is to be seen in Articuli Cleri and other old Laws and the History of those times abundantly testisie Fifthly This Exorbitant and Foreign Power was in part banished by Act of Parliament in Henry VIII his time Now it s provided that the King should be ordained Supreme Head or Chief and Supreme in Ecclesiastical Affairs as the Jewish Kings of old and the Ancient Christian Princes were and it is made High Treason to deny it Now consideration being had of the old Canon Law it was considered how to reform and reduce it to such a temper as would sute with this new Alteration and it was then thought fit that it should rather be quite Abolished and a new intire Body collected for the Government of the Church Sixthly To this purpose it was Enacted that Thirty or more Persons should be deputed by the King to make this Collection But it being better to live where nothing than where every thing is lawful they were not so rash to run down Root and Branch and take away the old Building before a new one was modelled and therefore till this Model should be prepared and confirmed in Parliament it was Enacted That the Canon or Ecclesiastical Laws should stand in the same force as formerly they did at that time except in such Cases wherein they thwarted the Laws of the Land Seventhly This new body of Ecclesiastical Laws was by Edward the Sixth attempted and an Essay made by Dr. Haddon since printed by the name of Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum but never was perfected nor confirmed by Act of Parliament and therefore the Canon Law is still in force as formerly but where it contradicts the Law of the Land Thus is the Crown with much ado pluckt out of the Paws of the Ecclesiastical Man of Sin and restored in Parliament to its Ancient Rights in matters Ecclesiastical It being by Act of Parliament Established That the Clergy should not Assemble without the King's License and Authority By all which it appears That the Kingdom the Church of England now hath a Supreme independent Right and Power within it self to make Coerceive Laws for the Welfare of it self without running to Rome or to
Prophets that divine for money and pimp for domination Mich. 3.11 and Demas-like forsake the fellowship of Saints and embrace this present World So that unless the Apostles return from Heaven or that Christ himself come again in Person and lasn them as he did the Buyers and Sellers out of the Temple I see small hopes of Establishing the Government of the Church on a right Basis If they would be active in good earnest to divest themselves of all Temporal Domination and Jurisdiction and content to be reduced to the life and practise of the Apostles as they are to persecute their fellow Members for Conventicling we might be happy Yet I must do the right Reverend Author of Naked Truth that right That if the Ecclesiasticks were all of his mind and first seek the Kingdom of God it would easily be done and I do with him humbly conceive That the Bishops with the rest of the Clergy are bound in Conscience to implore the Assistance of both Houses of Parliament to Petition his Majesty for the Redress of the Abuses by Pious Laws settling the Church Government in the Primitive Purity and Authority which most evidently was very great and as greatly reverenced Bishops and Priests being the Persons to whom Christ and his Apostles committed the Souls of Men bought with his most precious Blood Therefore I think they do such Clergy-men not Priesthood not Episcopacy not true Church of England Men no wrong who esteem them as they manage their matters the very worst Interest that Protestant Kings and Kingdoms have but that of the Papists These Animosities and Differences have been ever since the beginning of the Reformation between the Conforming and Non-conforming Clergy and I may truly prophesie ever will be so long as Conscience shall be on the Earth and as long as Ministers will not be Servants but Lords over Gods heritage and will not condescend to let things made by God Almighty indifferent so to be and remain the Reasons are pregnant for that Conscience will be Conscience while the World stands and therefore there ever will be Scrupulonties and Obligations upon Conscience which are greater than all other Obligations in the World And therefore King James the First would say and that truly That the Puritans were never to be obliged and for that Reason Whereas if things indifferent might so remain and the Conventiclers permitted to preach in publick to take away all Fears Jealousies and Suspicion we should be all at quiet for then there would not be left so much as the pretence of Religion to occasion Dislentions or Quarrels Besides it is the time-serving Clergy only the Drones that vilifies and abaseth that caluminates and disturbs the Dissenters and not the Dissenters them EXtremities used against them at their Instigation Silencing Imprisoning Excommunicating making use of Laws against them that in their primary 35 Eliz. simple and sincere Institution were intended and enacted against Papists only and they not proceeded against so violently according to those very Laws in full force against them as against the Non conformists who have been Indicted under the Notion of Popish Recusants and Penalties levied upon them and the Papists either totally connived at or remissly prosecuted many Crimes through ungrounded prejudices laid to their charge as disturbing of the Government which they abhor and teach not of which they are no otherways guilty than by that Logick that the Fox his Earon his Head were Horns meer Surmizes Calumnies and Libels and nothing proved but that contrary to a human Law they following the Command and Example of Christ and his Apostles meet and assemble together to keep a more intimate near and dear Communion with their and our God and with one another and to make Peace and Reconciliation with God whilst they are yet in the way yet in the possibility of Salvation whcih Law in it self is null and void because it contradicts the Law of God which Commands all Men every where to call on the Name of the Lord Jesus and all Priests to teach all Nations Baptizing c. and to preach in every Church in season out of season c. to reprove exhort rebuke with all long-suffering and doctrine 2 Tim. Is not this with the Priests of old and the Captain of the Temple to be grieved at the heart that they teach the People and therefore laid hands on them and put them in hold and like Elymas the sorcerer being full of all subtlety and all mischief children of the Devil enomies of all righteousness never ceasing to pervert the right ways of the Lord Act. 4.2 and 13.10 But lying lips shall be put to silence which speak grievous things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous Psalm 31.18 It was St. Paul's Glory that Christ was preached any way though through strife or vain glory and I fear it is the glory of the more violent and haughty Tory Church of England Party as the road to Preferment to decry Conventicling and Preaching contrary to such a Law and to stop the Mouths of them that would Preach whereby they intitle themselves to the Character of the Shepherds described and deciphered Isai 56.10 11. Consider that in Preaching contrary to such a Law they do no more than what Christ and his Apostles did in their Days The Rulers of the Jews offended with Peter 's Sermon imprisoned him and John and having strictly examined them and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the Name of Jesus Did they therefore forbear Preaching or were they obedient to such Commands of the Rulers I tell you nay but answered and said unto them Whether it be right in the sight of God to bearken unto you more than unto God judge ye and continued speaking the Wrod of God with great boldness Acts 4. The like did the rest of the Apostles even from house to house though accused of turning the World up-side down and of doing contrary to the decrees of Caesar yet preaching the Word of God boldly Act. 17.26 Either the Author to the Hebrews Preacht false Doctrine when he exhorteth us to consider one another to provoke unto Love and to good Works not forsaking the assembling of our selves together as the manner of some is And so did St. Paul when he wrote his Chap. 14. to the Corinthians wherein he adviseth all to desire Spiritual gifts but rather that they may prophesie that they may speak unto men to edification and exhortation and comfort when the Church is come together in one place with particular Directions how all should behave themselves in such Assemblies that all may profit with a general Rule that all things be done decently and in order Either I say these Apostles taught false Doctrines in so Teaching or else they that preach and prate against such Assembling as the manner of some is are false teachers I know no medium take it as you please Can it it be imagined that if St. Paul who rejoyced