Deanes and Chapters the which I will do and punctually observe it by the grace of God We have commanded all our Bishops respectively not to lett any Lease after We have named any of them to a better Bishoprick but did not in those Instructions name the Deans who yet were intended by Vs These are therefore to declare unto you that no Dean shall presume to renew any Lease either into Lives or Years after such time as We have nominated him either to a better Denary or a Bishoprick having observed that at such times of remove many men care not what or how they lett to the prejudice of the Church and their Successors And this is Our expresse Command to you your Chapter and your Successors which in any case We require both you and them strictly to observe upon pain of Our high displeasure and as you and they will answer the contrary at your and their utmost perils Given under Our Signet at Our Mannor of Greenwich the Two and Twentieth day of June in the Tenth year of Our Reign Whereby you may perceive that the same holy Spirit that led this blessed King to be of this mind doth now likewise lead me to be of the same mind that no Bishop Dean or Chapter ought to Lease out the Lands and Revenues of the Church for any longer Term than 21. years For if they could not Lease them for three Lives though set to the utmost value without a great deal of wrong and prejudice to their Successors as this Blessed and most Pious King did most rightly conceive then certainly they might not Set and Lease those Lands for a 100. shillings that were well worth a 100 pounds per annum and that for a 100. or a 1000. years without much more wrong and prejudice done unto their Successors and a very ill example of covetousness and injustice unto all others 2. The other sort of sacrilegious persons that do commit this horrible 2. The lay sacrilegious persons and why sin and yet shelter themselves under the shadow of Law are those lay Lords Knights and Gentlemen that have received these Ecclesiastical Rights and Revenues from the former sacrilegious persons and these think themselves most innocent because they have both Law to countenance them and the Church-men to confirm them in what they do Yet you know that if the Thief which stealeth the goods cannot be freed the Receiver of those stolen goods cannot be justified But I shall by Gods help hereafter more fully shew the Sacriledge of these men that have so unjustly received these goods and possessions of the Church from those that were far more unjust than themselves and are therefore like Simeon and Levi brethren iâ— this evil and so liable to the like punishment CHAP. IV. Of two sorts of sacrilegious persons that rob the Church of Christ without any colour or pretence of Law but indeed contrary to all Law SEcondly for the other sort of Thieves and Sacrilegious persons that 2. The sacrilegious persons contrary to all Law of two kinds rob the Church of God without any the least pretence of Right or Law but apparently contrary to the Law both of God and man I find them to be of two special kinds That is 1. Impious Patrons whether Clergy or Laity that do sell the Ecclesiastical Dignities or any wayes sinisterly bestow them 2. Vnjust Parishioners that do fraudulently detain or most maliciously deny the Tythes and other just Duties of the Church 1. In former times Patrons were appointed to be as their names import 1. Patrons Fathers and Guardians unto the Church of Christ to see good men and able schollers placed and planted in all Parishes to teach the people of Impious Patrons to whom likened God and so they were as the Ecclesiastical Stories do record unto us But now such is the corruption of our times that our Patrons for the most part I fear cannot be said to be like Augustus Caesar that found Rome a City of Bricks and left it of Marble to cause their Parishes to be supplied 1 Reg. 14. 27. with better abler men than they were But they are rather like Rehoboâ—m the son of Solomon that found in the Temple of God Shields of Gold but left in it Shields of Brasse So do many Patrons present men worse and worse What they do for when any golden-mouthed Chrysostome is banished or any learned Aâ—gustine is dead or pious Bernard removed they will presently name Priests of Brasse and brazen-faced Priests unto the Churches that deserve no better than Brasse for their Ministery and the Gâ—ld they will reserve for themselves And Balaams asse if he can buâ— speak and come laden with Numbers 22. Coin shall be preferred And as the Poet saith Si nihil attuleris ibis Homere foras Though Homer comes to seek the Place that shall be void if he comes with nothing to give he shall get nothing of them For who knows not the practice of our times to be for the Priest that seeks the Living either to pay The usual practice in these times some good sum of money for it or to compound for the greater oâ— some part of the Tythes or to marry either kinswoman or servant before the poor Clerk or rather simple Clerk can be presented to any Church The Aegyptians took away the straw from the Israelites and yet required Exod. 5. 11. of them the whole tale of Bricks as formerly which was a hard task and a great tyranny But these Patrons take away the Corn and leave for the poor Priests nothing but the straw They will have all the Gleab-lands and the Priests shall glean for their maintenance and these Grand Masters commonly must have the greater Tythes or at least some part or parcel thereof and the Priest shall have but Reliquias Danaâ—m atque immitis Virgil. Aeneid l. 2. Achillis what these Canker worms shall leave them a cloud for Juno and a shadow instead of a Water-Nymph And yet they must exceed in the tale of their Bricks and bring far more than their Predâ—cessors brought they must study more and preach oftner than ever was done in former times which is a hard case and yet as true a case as any that you shall find in all Sir Edward Cook 's Reports But though like Jeroboam the son of Nebat that erected an Altar against the Altar of God and made Priests to serve at that Altar of the lowest the meanest and basest of the people that the greatest gain might redound into his own hands because none buyes deerer and gives larger than the greater dunse So our Patrons of Ecclesiastical preferments in many I dare not say in most places are resolved to sell their Churches as Judas sold his Christ and his Saviour to them that will give most for them yet because as S. Gregory saith Partem habebit cum Simone qui contra Simonaicos Gregor habâ—tur 1. q. 1.
of Parliament made by powerful Commands and either through fear or errour can make that which is against the Will and contrary to the Law of God to be no sin or free the sinner from God's wrath Or do you think that I stand against so many well-deserving Gentlemen of such means and friends and power as you are only for covetousness to gain the Rent of a few houses and no longer than the remainder of a poor old man's life Surely not any one that had but the least inch of worldly wisdom would do so For besides my pains and labour I have spent already and shall spend yet before the Church shall lose them perhaps ten times more than my span-long life shall gain by them And what of that I have done my best when I have lost them Et liberavi animam meam and shall leave to God Causam suam Let him arise and defend his own Cause but let men take heed how they strive against God or seek to obstruct his Service and cause the diminution of his Worship which I hope your Piety will never suffer any one of you to do And I shall pray for you all and assuredly remain Your affectionate friend and servant Gryffith Ossory THE CONTENTS of the Chapters Chap. I. AN Introduction shewing the occasion of this Treatise and what the Author doth therein Page 1. Chap. II. Of Sacriledge what it is how manifold it is and how it hath been alwayes punished and never escaped the Hand of the Divine Vengeance p. 4. Chap. III. The divers sorts and kinds of Sacrilegious persons And first of those that do it under colour of Law and upon the pretence of Reformation whereby they suppose their Sacriledge to be no Sacriledge at all p. 15. Chap. IV. Of two sorts of Sacrilegious persons that rob the Church of Christ without any colour or pretence of Law but indeed contrary to all Law p. 21. Chap. V. The words of King David in the 2 Sam 7. 1 2. and their divisions When they were spoken And how or in what sense Sitting and Standing are commonly taken in the Scriptures And of the two Persons that are here conferring together p. 27. Chap. VI. What the Rest and peaceable times of King David wrought The Prince's authority in causes Ecclesiastical and how they should be zealous to see that God should be justly and religiously served p. 31. Chap. VII The Objections of the Divines of Lovain and other Jesuites against the former Doctrine of the Prince his Authority â—ver the Bishops and Priests in Causes Ecclesiastical answered And the foresaid truth sufficiently proved by the clear testimony of the Fathers and Councils and divers of the Popes and Papists themselves p. 37. Chap. VIII That it is the Office and Duty of Kings and Princes though not to execute the Function and to do the Office of the Bishops and Priests yet to have a special care of Religion and the true Worship of God and to cause-both the Priests and Bishops and all others to discharge the duties of God's Service And how the good and godly Emperours and Kings have formerly done the same from time to time p. 41. Chap. IX Of the chiefest Parts and Duties of Kings and Princes which they are to discharge for the maintenance of God s Service and the True Religion and the necessity of Uathedral-Churches and Chappels for the people of God to meet in for the Worship and Service of God p. 46. Chap. X. The Answer to the Two Objections that the Fanatick-Sectaries do make 1. Against the necessity And 2ly against the Sanctity or Holiness of our Material Churches which in derision and contemptuously they call Steeple-houses p. 53. Chap. XI The Answer to another Objection that our Fanatick-Sectaries do make against the Beauty and Glorious Adorning of our Churches which we say should be done with such decent Ornaments and Implements as are besitting the House and Service of God The Reasons why we should Honour God with our goods and how liberal and bountiful both the Fathers of â—â—â— Old Testament and the Christians of the New Testament were to the Church of God p. 58. Chap. XII The Answer to another Objection that our brain-sick Sectaries do make for the utter overthrow of our Cathedrals and Churches as being so sowly stained and profaned with Popish Superstitions and therefore being no better than the Temples of Baal they should rather be quite demolished than any wayeâ— adorned and beautified p. 63. Chap. XIII That it is a part of the Office and Duty of Pious Kings and Princes as they are God's Substitutes to have a care of his Church to see that when such Cathedrals and Churches are builâ— and beautified as is fitting for his Service there be Able Religious and Honest painful and faithful Bishops placed in those Cathedrals that should likewise see Able and Religious Ministers placed in all Parochial Churches and all negligent unworthy and dissolute men Bishops or Priests reproved corrected and amended or removed and excluded from their places and dignities if they amend not p. 67. Chap. XIV Of the maintenance due to the Bishops and Ministers of God's Church how large and liberal it ought to be p. 75. Chap. XV. That the payment of Tythes unto the Church is not a case of Custom but of Conscience Whenas the tenth by a Divine right is the Teacher's tribute and the very first part of the wages that God appointed to be paid unto his Workmen and therefore that it is as heynous a sin and as foul an offence to defraud the Ministers of this due as it is to detain the meat or money of the labouring-man which is one of the four Crying-sins p. 82. Chap. XVI The Answer to the Choisest and Chiefest Objections that the School of Anabaptists have made and do urge against the payment of Tythes now in the time of the Gospel p. 91. Chap. XVII What the ancient Fathers of the Church and the Councils collected of most Learned and Pious Bishops have left written concerning Tythes And of the three-fold cause that detains them from the Church p. 98. Chap. XVIII Of the second part of the Stipend Wages and Maintenance of the Ministers of the Gospel which is the Oblation Donation or Free-wil-offering of the people for to uphold and continue the true service of God and to obtain the blessings of God upon themselves and upon their labours which Donations ought not to be impropriated and alienated from the Church by any means p. 105. Chap. XIX That it is the duty of all Christian Kings and Princes to do their best endevours to have all the Impropriatioâ—s restored to their former Institution to hinder the taking away and the alienation of the Lands Houses and other the Religious Donations of our Ancestors from the Church of Christ and to suppress and 〈◊〉 all the Vnjust and Covetous sâ—ttle customs and frauds that are so generally used and are so derogatory to the service of God from
amongst the people and especially from this Kingdom of Ireland where most corruption is used and most need of Instruction unto the people p. 114. Chap. XX. The Authour's supplication to Jesus Christ that he would arise and maintain his own cause which we his weak servants cannot do against so many rich powerful and many-friended adversaries of his Church p. 117. A DECLARATION Against SACRILEDGE CHAP. I. The Declaration of the Bishop of Ossory exhibited to the High Court of Justice before Jesus Christ the righteous Judge against the most horrible sin of Sacriledge and all sacrilegious persons that detain the Tythes rob the Church and take the Lands and Houses of God into their own possessions Together with his most humble Petition to the Eternall and Almighty God his most gratious Redeemer and his most loving Master Jesus Christ that he would arise and maintain his own cause and smite all his Enemies upon their cheek-bone and put them to perpetual shame and root out their memorial from off the earth Sheweth THAT by Your most glorious Martyr the strenuous defender of the true Christian Faith and his most gratious Master Charles the I. of ever blessed memory he was called and appointed to be the Bishop of Ossory and to inable him the better to discharge his duty in the service of God the inâ—tructing of his people and the governing of that Diocess commended to his care he was invested and admitted to have and to injoy all the rights interests priviledges and prerogatives of that Bishoprick But the Irish Rebells through the perswasions of their Popish Priests and suggestions of Satan have expelled him and detained all his dues and rights from him about 19 years together And when the goodness of God was pleased to restore the gratious Son of that gloriouâ— Martyr unto his Crown and Dignity his Majestie imitating the pious steps of his most Religious Father restored all the Reverend Bishops and the rest of the Learned and Loyall Clergy unto their ancient rights and pristine dignities the malicious enemy of all goodness the Devill and Satanas still envying the Satan now deals with the Church of Christ as he did with the Church of the Jews after their captivity Ezra 4. 7. Neh. 6. 1. Honour of God and by all means striving to obscure the Glory of his Church and the happy Restauration of his service As formerly after the captivity of the children of Israel the Jews in Babylon when they were happily returned unto their own Land which the God of their Fathers had bestowed upon them and their posterities for ever and were now beginning to re-edify their Temple for the honour of their God and the place of his Worship for his people he stirred up Bishlam Mâ—thredath Tabeel Samballat Tâ—biah Geshem and the rest of their companions the enemies of Gods people to hinder all their proceedings in setting forwards the true service of their God by writing false Letters unto the King and upon their unjust informations procuring letters from the King to obstruct the building and working of Gods House to the great prejudice and grief of â—â—ose Holy men that aimed at nothing more then to promote the glory of God and the good of his people So now he stirred up many Armed men or men of Arms and Commanders of men men of Renown that in the year 49 shewed themselves very active and serviceable for their and our undubitable King his now gratious Majesty and whom his Majesty for that their faithfulness and service did most gratiously and justly according as they had deserved most Royally and like a King reward them with Cities Lands Houses Gardens and the like evidences of his Royall bounty under the pretence of this his Majesties grant and gift to labour and strive to swallow down the Lands and Houses which I am sure do of right belong unto the Church of God and am confident his Majesty is so pious that he never intended to reward his servants with any of those goods of what nature soever they are that were dedicated and set Why Lands dedicated for the service of God should not be alienated Rom. 2. 22. apart for the service of God because the alienating of any things set apart and consecrated for Gods service and dedicated to that end is no less then sacriledge and Sacriledge is a â—â—n of such a transcendent nature as is far more odious and abominable in the sight of God then most of all other sins for St. Paul demandeth If thou that abhorrest Idols wilt commit sacriledge And you all know what a horrible sin Idolatry is and how highly the Lord God was offended and how grievously he punished and plagued the Israelites for the same as when he slue 3000 men for their Idolatry Exod. 32. 28. in worshipping the golden Calfe And yet St. Paul sheweth herein that sacriledge is far more odious and Why sacriledge is more abominable and a greater sin then Idolatry a more abominable sin in the sight of God because by Idolatry we do but give the honour of God to that which is no god but by our sacriledge we rob the true God of that honour which is due unto him and we deprive him of that worship and service and thanks that he should have from many men if they were not deprived and robbed of their estates by that sacriledge which makes them unable to do that service and to bring others to do that service unto God which they ought to do And therefore most justly hath that sacriledge which is the diminution of the revenues of the Church been ever accounted the highest the boldest and the most damnable sin in the World For our Religion is the very ground of all our happiness and the chiefest of all our comforts and the riches honours and Revenues of the Church the Tythes Oblations and Donations of Religious men are as I shall fully shew unto you in this Treatise the very main outward props of our Religion and if with Sampson you take away the pillars you overthrow the House sublatis studiorum praemiis ipsa studia pereunt saith Seneca so take away the props of Religion and your Religion like a tottering wall will soon fall unto the ground and when you have supplanted our Religion you have dissolved all the tyes and associations betwixt God and men and left us all as aliens and strangers and which is worse enemies unto God And therefore when other mischiefes have their limits and so hurt but one or other and there is an end yet this sin of Sacriledge strikes at Goodness and Godliness it self it sets the world besides its hindges and sweeps away our peace and all our happiness from off the earth when as God and the King and all of us are thereby unexpressibly damnified And therefore he is no better then a savage beast and hath a heart of iron and Cyclopick breasts quae genuere ferae that can invade heaven and rob God
and put down the Prerogatives of his King and spoil mankind of all safety which made the very Heathens themselves to have alwaies an exceeding great reverence of the things that were dedicated unto their gods and to violate the Religion of other Countries which they thought much more vain then their own they conceived to be so monstrous that it was alwaies accounted inauspicious and the wrongs done to a false deity carried an horror with it and was usually revenged by the true God Yet these men being many rich and powerfull both in wealth wit and What the men of the year 49 do say Friends would perswade our good King and all others but not aright that they are most zealous for the Church of Christ and the service of God and what lands and houses they seek to take from us belong not to us nor to the Church of God and therefore that it is no sacriledge nor any waies unjust in them to take from us what the King hath justly bestowed on them but it is a â—oul imputation most uncharitably cast upon them by me to blemish their sincerity in the service and for the honour of God And therefore seeing that in foro poli I am like Troylus impar congressus What the Author doth in this câ—nflict abouâ— the â—ights of the Church 1. Thing A hilli Infoelix puer too weak every way to contest with so many magnanimous men of Arms that are incompassed with so many heroick friends I must 1. Appeal to thee O my God and sweet Saviour Jesus Christ and desire thee with the words of the Psalmist Arise O God maintain thine own cause or as our last Translation hath it plead thine own cause for I am not Psal 74. 23. able to maintain it unless thou wilt arise to plead the cause of the helpless and pluck thy right hand out of thy bosom to consume the enemy and let not man have the upper hand but do thou to them as thou didst unto the Midianites unto Sisera and unto Jabin at the brook of Kison which perished at Endor and became as the dung of the earth which say Let us take to our selves the houses of God in possâ—ssion and especially to them that not only say but also do violently and sacrilegiouslâ— mis-inform good and pious Princes and take both the houses of God and the lands of the Church into their possessions O my God make them like a wheel that is alwaies tottering and turning and as the stubble before the wind that is ever shaking Psal 83. 12. and never at rest and like as the fire that burneth up the wood and as the flame that consumeth the mountains persecute them even so with thy tempest and make them affraid with thy storms that they may understand what a heynous sin it is to commit Sacriledge and to rob the living God by hindering and disinabling his servants to do him service and to ascribe the honour due unto his name 2. I must and will to the uttermost of mine ability demonstrate unto all 2. Thing Church-robbers the heynousness of this sin and the fearfull punishment there of and to that end 1. I will here set down what I have written above 45 years agone concerning sacriledge and what you may find in the True Church l. 3. c. 2. pag. 429. with some amplification and explication thereof 2. I will upon the resolution and religious intention of the good and 2d Thing godly King David to build God an House for his servants to meet in it to worship him shew unto you the necessity and use of Cathedrals and Churches for Gods Worship and the duty of all Christian Kings and Princes therein and the full description and detestation of this horrible and most odious sin of Sacriledge And I will do my best to enlarge this point unto the full that so my Reader may reap the full benefit of this my Discourse and the easier retain in his memory what he readeth in it and that the same good Doctrines and Instructions the oftner and the more usually they are published and in the more large Volums they are printed may the more likely have their fate to continue when as small Treatises especially not methodically dâ—gested are the sooner neglected and do suffer through the iniquity of time to be buried in oblivion CHAP. II. Of Sacriledge what it is How manifold it is and how it hath been alwayes punished and never escaped the Hand of the Divine Vengeance 1. SAcriledge which the Greeks call 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the sacrilegious person Sacriledge what it is Râ—i sacra violatio aut usurpatio Thom. primâ— secunda q 99. Prov. 20. 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the usurpation or the violation of any sacred thing and this violation of it is to be understood for any kind of irreverence or dishonouring of it Sacrilegium dicitur quasi sacrilaedium saith Innocentius and as Aquinas saith All that is sacriledge which is done to the irreverence of any sacred thing And Solomon saith It is an abomination to the Lord to devour things that are sanctified Et non owne quod displicâ—t dicitur abominatio And not all things that displease God are said to be abominations sed quod valdâ— dâ—splicet but the things which do most highly and exceedingly displease the Lord is said to be an abomination saith Perâ—ldâ—s Sâ—mma Vitiorum Peraldus 2. You may observe that this high displeasing-sin of Sacriledge is manifold but especially it consisteth in these three things Sacriledge threefold and committed 3. wayeâ— 1. Way against sacred persons 1. The violation and abuse offered to Sacred persons such as are Kings and Queens that are called and appointed by God to be nursing Fathers and nursing Mothers unto the Church of Christ and the Bishops Priests and other Ministers that are consecrated to serve God at his Altar Whosoever doth irreverently abuâ—â— any of them either in word or deed committeth sacriledge because they are sacred persons And so Agesilaus was wont to say That he did greatly wonder why any man should think that they are not worthily accounted in the number of sacrilegious persons qui lâ—dereâ—t eos qui diis supplicarent vel Deos venerarentur which did any wayes hurt or wrong those which did supplicate or intercede for us and worshipped God whereby that most prudent Prince signified Eos non tantuâ— sacrilegos esse qui Deos ipsos aut Templorum ornatum spoliarent sed â—os maxime Aemilius Probus qui Deorum ministros praecones contumeliis affâ—â—erent saith Aeâ—ilius Probus because that as our Saviour saith He that despiseth you despiseth me Luke 10. 16. and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me 2. The prophaning of the Church or the abuse of any places consecrated 2. Way against sacred places for to be the places of Gods service is no lesse than sacriledge 3. That is sacriledge and
enemies perish O God that say unto themselves let us take the Houses of God in possession make them O Lord like Oreb and Zeb and like unto the dung of the earth as the Holy Prophet Ps 74. 10 11. speaketh And I say to these Sacrilegious persons as the holy woman Delphina In the life of St. Elzear p. 26. said to her husband Saint Elzear Count of Sabran Take heed that you attempt not to lay your hands on that which is vowed to God or dedicated to his service because God will not be mocked he cannot endure to be robbed or suffer his service to be prejudiced and abated by taking away the means that should maintain it but he will punish them and powre down vengeance upon the heads both of them and of their posterity that take away the Lands Houses and Possessions of the Church that were vowed and dedicated to Jesus Christ to relieve his members and to uphold his service as you may well understand if you do but consider it by that memorable example of * As I remember Dr. Hanmer in the History of Ireland William Earl Marshall of this Kingdom of Ireland who when he had appeased the Rebellion that then rose in his time took a great deal of the lands of the Church into his own hands and the Bishop because he would not restore it unto the Church excommunicated him for the same and he went to the King and complained but before the Bishop could come to his answer he died and was buried in that Excommunicated estate yet his son entreated the King to cause the Bishop to absolve him which he did conditionally that his son would restore those lands unto the Church which the son denying God denied his blessing to his posterity that there is not one heir Male of him left upon the face of the earth to injoy those lands that he Sacrilegiously took away from the Church Neither do I see how it can be otherwise for the very Heathens that had not the knowledge of Gods laws nor of Jesus Christ could say that vulgò ereditum est it was generally by all men believed some fatall and fearfull punishment must needs be imminent to that man qui sacris rebus ac Deo dicatis manus injiceret aut qui pios homines aut certè fungentes sacris ministeriis oppugnaret which should lay his hands to take away any sacred thing or offer any injury to any godly man or oppose and wrong them especially that administer holy things and to that end to confirm this truth they did proverbially recite that Homerical distich Homer I◠◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Cùm divo certare viro simul atque câ—piâ— quis Câ—ique deus bene vulâ— damnum certè huic imminet ingens Pro mensâ—ra delâ—cti erit plagarum modus Which in effect signifieth thus much that although God wisheth well to every man and takes no pleasure in the destruction of his Creatures which he made that they might have their being and be happy if they did not offend yet if any man will be so wicked as by his Sacrilegious doings to strive with God to despise his maker and to spoil his servants whom God wisheth well unto then certainly damnum huic imminet ingens a mighty mischief and some fearfull evil doth hang over such a mans head and he shall not escape it And therefore let all men take heed and beware of Sacriledge for though it may seem a sweet spoil yet it will prove at last to be as pernitious Josh 7. 25. as Achan's wedge or as fatall as Turnus his luckless bâ—lt that bereaved him of his life which otherwise he might have injoyed and have received pardon when Christ beholding the stollen cognizance of his beloved spouse shall take away his mercy and shut up his loving kindness in displeasure which otherwise he would have gratiously shewed and Infoelix humerâ— cum apparuit ingens Balteus notiâ— fulserunt cingula bullis Pallantispuert Virgil. l. 12. shall adde some further vengeance saying as Aeneas did to Turnus when he beheld the belt Pallas te hoc vulnere pallas Immolat poenas scelerato ex sanguine sumit This is laid on thee for thy Sacriledge one torture more for that for I would heartily wish that all Sacrilegious persons Lords Souldiers Knights or Gentlemen would diligently mark and weigh and never forget the manner of Christ his behaviour when he came into the Temple how Joh. 2. 14. different it was from his usual carriage at all other times for he that was the Instrument of Mercy and descended from Heaven cum amore non flagello and came to pardon and not to punish yet he that was so ready and so willing and well-pleased to pardon Theeves Adulterers and other wicked nefarious fellows and called all such as were weary and heavy laden with the burden of their sins and promised that he would â—ase them When he saw how his Sanctuary was abused by those sacrilegious Merchants Matth. 11. 2â— that bought and sold therein He puts on Justice and Severity and as it appears more angerly than ever he seemed to be while he walked here on earth â—umbled down the tables of those Money-changers and the violators of holy things and chaced them with a whip-cord both from Himself and from his Temple And he tells them the reason why he was so exceedingly angry which was because they had so highly and so vildly transgressed in making his House which was the House of prayer to become by their sacriledge a den of Theeves O consider this all ye that commit Sacriledge and forget God lest he teary you in pieces while there is none to help you And you that are brave Souldiers and commit Sacriledge consider also what Charles the Great that was as great and as brave a Souldier as any that was in the World in his dayes saith to you all Novimus multa regna reges eorum propterea cecidisse quia Ecclesias Verba Garoli Magni in capital Catul. tit 7. c. 104. spoliaverunt resque earum vastaverunt alienaverunt vel diripâ—erunt Episcopisque Sacerdotibus atque quod majus est Ecclesiis eorum abstulerunt pugnantibus dederunt quapropter nec fortes in bellâ— nec in fiâ—e stabiles fuerunt nec victores extiterunt sed terga multi vulnerati plures interfecti verterunt regnaque regiones quod pejus est regna coelestia perdiderunt atque propriis haereditatibus caruerunt hactenus carent And it will be worth your labour to remember what commands that wise and strenuous Earl of Strafford delivered for his children i. e. to his son William Wentworth The Earl of Straffords speech at his death commends himself Gives him charge to serve his God to submit to his King with all faith and alleagiance in things temporal to the Church in things spiritual Gives him
God neither do I believe that the laws of our Christian Kings and Princes ever intended so to do for it is an old rule in law that Praelatus ecclesiae statum possessiones meliorare potest sed deteriorare non potest nec debet But when it was alledged and manifested in Parliaments that the houses belonging to the Church being ruined or far out of reparation and the lands either wast or not well managed could not be improved to the best advantage and benefit of the Church without the Tenants and present Occâ—piers thereof had some competent time therein therefore the pious Kings enacted their laws not to force but to licence Cathedrals and Colledges to lease out their lands and possessions not to make their children Why Bishopâ— and Clergy-men were permiâ—â—ed to granâ— leâ—seâ— of the lands and revenues of the Church and friends Knights and Ladies or to fill their own â—ossers with sines to the great prejudice of their successors and the neglect and treading down of Gods serviâ—e but that the revenue and the inheriâ—ance of the Church might be improved and the best advantage made of it for the glory of God and the furtherance of Gods service by the instruction of his people and relieving his poor members for which ends it was first dedicated unto God Therefore when either Bishop or any other Clergy man from the letter of the law doth pervert the end and abuse the meaning of the law I make it a case of Conscience and demand Whether such men as do let out the lands and houses of the Church for their own private gain and not for the benefit of Gods Church and the advancement of Gods service do not commit this horrible sin of Sacriledge For my part I conceive them to be the worst and most Sacrilegious persons of all others that should know the truth and not give such ill examples both of Covetousness and Sacriledge unto their neighbours but let them lease what they will for the benefit of How the Bishops and other Clergy-men may lease their Lands without Sacriledge Gods Church the furtherance of Religion and the no-prejudice of their successors and they shall never find me to oppose them But otherwise to lease the lands of the Church that is better worth then a 100 l. per annum for less then a 100 s. for to make our children great and the Church poor to benefit our selves and to prejudice Gods service and to say We have a law that warrants us to do it We have Acts of Parliament that allow it and have the practice and presidents of other Bishops Deans and Chapters that have done it is but to say as the Jews said to Pilate We have a law and by our law he ought to die And ought he therefore to die think you because these Jews had such a law I verily think not so and I think likewise that though you have or should have a law to take away and alienate the rights of the Church yet you should not do it if you love the Church or do any waies fear God And for the practice of some other Bishops Deans and Chapters I confess heretofore many of them have done bad enough and worse in my mind then the worst of lay men for them to sell the rights of the Church and so with Judas to betray their Master Christ but Vivitur praeceptis non exemplis if the practice and presidents of others would or could excuse our faults then Drunkards Whore masters and Murderers might easily find presidents enough to excuse their wickedness and so I know the Sacrilegious persons may as easily find the like But I shall hereafter shew you how and by whose power and by what By whole power the laws for leasing and passing away the Church-lands came to be made Consider that means these our Laws and Acts of Parliament for the alienating leasing and selling of the revenues of the Church came to be made and leave it to any pious mind and conscientious man to consider Whether they ought in the strictness thereof to be observed or not and not rather commend the care and great piety of our late most gratious King and now glorious Martyr Charles the I. Who a little to curb the extravagancies and large extent of our laws by his regall Authority wrote his letters to all Bishops Deans and Chapters that they should lease out their lands for no longer term then 21 years as it appeareth by this his most gratious and pious Letter directed unto my self the Dean and Chapter of the Cathedrall Church of Bangor which for the honour and praise and our thankfulness to so pious and so Religious a King for his care and love to the Church and service of God I thought it my duty to insert it in this place To our Trusty and wel-beloved the Dean of Bangor Charles Rex TRusty and welbeloved We greet you well We have lately tâ—ken the State of our Cathedral and Collegiat Churches into our Princely Consideration that We may be the better ablâ— to preserve that livelyhood which as yet is left unto them Vpon this deliberation We find that of later times there hath not risen a greater inconvenience then by turning Leases of one and twenty years into Lives for by that means the present Dean and Chapter put great Fines into their Purses to enrich themselves their wives and children and leave their Successors of what deserts soever to Vs and the Church destitute of that growing means which else would come in to help them By which course should it continue scarce any of them could be able to live and keep house according to their Place and Callings We know the Statute makes it alike lawful for a Dean and Chapter to let their Leases for the Term of one and twenty years or three Lives but time and experience have made it apparent that there is a great deal of difference between them especially in Church-Leases where men are commonly in years before they come to those Places These are therefore to will and command you upon peril of Our utmost displeasure and what shall follow thereon that notwithstanding any Statute or any other pretence whatsoever you presume not to let any Lease belonging to your Church into Lives that is not in Lives already And further where any fair opportunity is offered you if any such be you fail not to reduce such as are in Lives into Years And We do likewise will and require that these our Letters may remain upon Record in your own Register-Books and in the Register of the Lord Bishop of that Dioces that he may take notice of these our Commands unto you and give Vs and our Royal Successors knowledge if you presume in any sort to disobey them And further whereas in Our late Instructions O that the mind and piety of this most godly King expressed in this Letter had bin observed by all our Predecessors Bishops
Government of the Common-wealth CHAP. VIII That it is the Office and Duty of Kings and Princes though not to execute the function and to do the Offices of the Bishops and Priests yet to have a speciall care of Religion and the true Worship of God and to cause both the Priests and Bishops and all others to discharge their duties of Gods service And how the good and godly Emperours and Kings have formerly done the same from time to time BUt as God hath given unto the Kings and Princes of this world a Power and Authority as well over his Church and Church-men be they Prophets Apostles Bishops Priests or what you will as over the Common wealth and all the lay persons of their Dominions So they ought and are bound to have a special care of Religion and to discharge their duties for the glory of God the good of his Church the promoting of the Christian Faith and the rooting up of all Sects and Heresies that defile and corrupt the same for as Saint Augustine saith and I shewed you before In Aug. contra Crescon l. 3. c. 51. hoc Reges Deo serviunt herein Kings and Princes do serve God if as they are Kings they injoyn the things that are good and inhibit those things that are evil and that Non solum in iis quae pertinent ad humanam Societatem sed etiam ad divinam Religionem and again he saith that Kings do serve Idem Epist 48. Christ here on earth when they do make good laws for Christ and Athanasius said unto the Emperour Jovinian Conveniens est pro principe studium amor rerum divinarum It is meet and convenient for a good Prince to study and love Heavenly things because that in so doing his heart shall be alwaies as Solomon saith in manu Dei in the hand of God and Saint Theodoret l. 4. c. 3. Cyrill tells the Emperours Theodosius and Valentinian that Ab ea quae erga Deum est pietate reipublicae vestrae status pendet the state and condition of Prov. 21. 1. their Common-wealth doth wholly depend according to that piety and Religion which they bear towards God Because as Cardan truely saith Cardanus do sapientia lib. 3. Summum praesidium Regni est justitia ob apertos tumultus Religio ob occultos Justice is the best defence of a Kingdom and the suppressor of open tumults because righteousness exalteth a Nation and Religion is the only Protector and safety against all secret and privy Machinations because as Minutius Minut. Fâ—l in Octav. Foelix saith What the Civil Magistrate doth with the sword of justice to suppress the nefarious doers and actours of wickedness Religion rooteth The want of the fear of God the only thing that maketh Rebells out and suppresseth the very thought of evil which a Godly and a Religious man feareth as much and more then a wicked and prophane man doth dread the punishment of his offence and so Religion Piety and the fear of God keepeth the very hearts and souls of the subjects from swelling against their Soveraign and from the least evil thought of Rebellion and it is the want of the fear of God and true Religion whatsoever men pretend that makes Rebels and Traytors in every place because the true Religion Rom. 13. 1. tels us plainly that every soul that is every man unfainedly from his heart should be subject to the Higher Powers And the true Religion teacheth us as Tertull. saith Colere Imperatorem ut hominem à Deo secundum Tertul. ad Scapul solo Deo minorem To acknowledge and to serve the Emperour and so our King and our Prince as the next person to God and inferior to none but to God When as he is Omnibus major solo Deo minor above all men and below none but only God And therefore it is most requisite that all Kings and Princes should have How requisite it is for Kings to have a care to preserve Religion care of the true Religion and the service of God and with the Prophet David to build Temples and Churches for him that hath given their Crowns and Thrones unto them and to provide maintenance for those servants of God that serve at his Temple as they do for those that serve themselves and so both to be Religious themselves and to see that their subjects so far as it lieth in them should be so likewise and this their own piety and goodness in the service of God will make them famous amongst all posterities and their names to shine as the Sun when as Saint Ambrose saith Nihil honorificentius quà m ut Imperator filius Dei dicatur nothing Ambrosius Epist 32. can be more honorable then that the Emperour or King should be named and called the Son of God which is a more glorious Eâ—logie then Homer The fruits and benefits of maintaining true Religion in a kingdom could give to the best Heroes of all Greece or that Alexander Julius Caesar or the like could atchieve by all their military exploits or the best domestick actions that they have done and their making provision for the Teachers of the true Religion and the promoters of Gods service the Bishops and Ministers of Christ his Church which makes their subjects both Loyall and obedient unto them and also Religious towards God will preserve the peace and procure the happiness of their Kingdoms And according as God hath given this Authority and laid this charge How many former kings were very zealous to uphold Religion upon all Kings and Princes to have a care of his Religion and the Ministers of his Church so we find very very many both in former times and also of latter years and so both of Gentiles Jews and Christians that were exceeding zealous for the Honor of God and the upholding of them that served at his Altar as 1. Gentile kings 1. The Gentile Kings as Pharaoh King of Egypt that in the extremity of that dearth which swallowed the whole Land he made provision for Gods Priests so that they neither wanted means nor were driven to sell The great bounty of king Croesus to the god Apollo and to his Priests their Lands And so Croesus King of Lydia was so wounderfull zealous of the Honor and the worship of the god of Delphos and so bountifull to Apollo's Priests that Herodotus saith that he made oblation of three thousand choice Cattel such as might lawfully be offered and caused a great stack of wood to be made wherein he burnt Bedsteads of Silver and Gold and Golden Maysors with purple rayment and Coats of exceeding value and he laid the like charge upon the Lydians that every man should consecrate those Jewels which he possessed most costly and pretious from which their Sacrifice when as the streams of liquid and molten Gold distrained in great abundance he caused thereof to be framed half slates or sheards
observe that the Apostle would have us to understand 1. That Aaron and the Levites were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 men 2. That they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mortal men that died But this Priest by the Antithesis must be neither man that is simply a man and no more but a man nor mortal after the manner of other men because the Prophet testifieth â—n â—n that he liveth and therefore going to prove the necessity of the change of the Law he saith it is evident because ouâ—-Lord sprang out of Judah of which Tribe Moses spake nothing concerning Verse 14. the Priesthood And he addeth that it is yet far mâ—re evident because that after the similitude of Melchisedec there ariseth another Priest who is made 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not after the Law of a carnal commandment 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but after the power of an endlesse life and Who hath the power of an endlesse life but Jesus Christ Therefore this Melchisedec can be none other than Jesus Christ because the Apostle saith he was of an endlesse life or otherwise the similitude doth not hold that Christ was of an endlesse life 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 after the likeness of Melchisedec if hiâ— life was none otherwise endlesse than what is or may be collected out of Moses touching the endlesse life of Melchisedec but the Apostle proveth Christ to be so of an endlesse life not by what Mosâ—s said or said not of Melchisedec but by the testimony of the Prophet David which saith The Lord sware that He i. e. Christ is a Priest for ever and so is of an endlesse life which cannot be said of that Melchisedec spoken of by Moses unless that Melchisedec be Jesus Christ Because that if he was not Jesus Christ we are sure that he died and therefore could not be of an endlesse life 4. Because the Apostle to answer and prevent an Objection that might 4 Reason be made because he had said that Melchisedec 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was made like unto the Son of God meanes no otherwise by this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hebr. 7 3. made like unto the Son of God but that he was indeed the Son of God Even as Nebuchadnezzar saith The fourth man that walked with the three children in the fiery-Furnace was like unto the Son of God whereby Dan. 3. 25. he meant that he was none other than the Son of God that came there to preserve his servants So here the Apostle in saying that he was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 made like unto the Son of God meaneth without question that this Melchisedec or this Christ that met Abraham assumed now a body of the same likeness habit and countenance as afterward he meant to unite personally unto himself for that it is un usual thing in Scripture to say that he which is is like unto himself as that Saint Paul is like Saint Paul as where the Apostle saith that Christ Was found in shape or fashion as a man and took upon him the form of a servant and was made Phil. 2. 7 8. in the likeness of men that is he was made indeed a true perfect and a natural man 5. Because Abraham did give unto this Melchisedec the Tythe of all that 5. Reason was taken from four Kings a great booty as perceiving under that visible shape and form of man an invisible deity to subsist to whom the tythe of all things is only due and everlastingly due to him and to none but to him as the Lord saith himself All the tythe of the land is the Lords that is Levit. 27. 30. the Lord Christ's because he is the everlasting Priest which Melchisedec if he was a mortal man and not Christ could not be 6. Because Saint Paul confirmeth the perpetuity and eternity of Christ 6. Reason his Priest-hood with the testimony of the Prophet David who speaking of Christ saith Thou art a Priest forever 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the order of Melchisedec saith the Greek copy but Sicut vel quâ—madmodum Melchisedecus Petrus Câ—naeâ—s de Repub Heb. l. 3. c. 3. pag. 402. even as or in like manner as Melchisedec is a Priest forever saith the Hebrew text as Aben Ezra doth expound it and so makes it clear that that Melchisedec was Jesus Christ 7. And lastly Because all they which do affirm this Melchisedec to be 7. Reason either Shem the son of Noah or any other King of Salem and a Mortal man Fateri coguntur ea omnia quae de illo Apostolus dixit etiam Mâ—ssiâ— câ—â—venire saith Cunaeus are compell'd to confess that all those things which the Apostle speaks of Melchisededec do very well and literally agree with Christ but cannot agree with any other mortal man without admitting many mystical and figurative interpretations thereof And therefore I do say that this Melchisedec which received these tythes was no mortal man but the immortal son of God to whom all tythes are due and he assuming a visible shape did appear unto Abraham after his great victory which he had over his enemies and is the first victory that we read of in the Holy Scripture and may typifie the spiritual Conquest of our enemies by our Saviour Christ who offered unto Abraham bread and wine as the type of our blessed Sacrament of the Lords Supper and it is probable that our Saviour had respect hereunto when he said unto the Jews that Abraham saw his day and rejoyced that is not only with the eyes of faith Joh. 8. 1â— as all the rest of the Patriarchs and Prophets did see him but also in a visible This point is more fully handled in my book of The best Religiâ—n in the Treatise oâ— the Incarnation of Christ 2. Point that Chriâ—t received tythes as he was Priest shape which he assumed like unto that whereunto he was afterward to be united and which many Prophets and just men desired to see and have not seen God yielding not such a special favour unto them as herein he did unto faithful Abraham And so you see the first point sufficiently cleared that Christ was alwaies and continually an eternal Priest as well before as after his Incarnation And 2. For the other point that he alwaies received the Tythes as he was this eternal Priâ—st the Scriptures make it plain for here you see this Melchisedec which is Christ receiveth the tythes of Abraham and Saint Paâ—l saith that he whose descent is not counted from them that is from the posterity of Aaron that is Christ received tythes of Abraham and all the Levitical Priests that were as then in the loyns of Abraham paid tythes to Him to whom only all tythes are due and the Levites to whom Moses under the law commanded the tythes to be paid were but his substitutâ—s and Tythe-gatherers and receiving what is due to him unto themselves for his service And seeing Christ himself received tythes
or some part of the Tythes of an impropriate Church for the inlarging of their Larder-house And that you need not doubt of this I must here set down what you may find in Mr. Crashaws Epistle to Mr. Pâ—rkins second Treatise of the Duties of the Ministry that in one County of the Kingdom of England the East riding of the County of York there are contained one hundred and five Parishes whereof nigh an hundred or the full number of an hundred are of this hateful name and bastardly title of Impropriations and some of them are of yearly value of four hundred pounds others worth three hundred pounds per annum others two hundred pounds and almost all worth one hundred pound a year and yet the Minister's part is ten pound stipend yea some have but eight pounds and some but six pounds and some but four pounds to live upon for the whole year and out of the Great Benefice of four hundred pounds a year the Minister had but eight pound per annum until of late with much labour ten pounds yearly for a Dr. Gardiner in his Scourge of Sacriledge Preacher And saith mine Author the most of the Churches in the properest Market-Towns of this Kingdom are thus held and retained by our Nobility and Gentry And so I found it in my Diocess of Ossory in the Kingdom of Ireland that the Impropriations had so swallowed up the Tythes and the Revenues of the Churches that as I shewed it in my Remonstrance to his Majesty six or seven Vicaridges united together will scarce make twenty pound a year for the Preacher Et durus est hic sermo for hereby the people perish and as the Prophet saith The poor Children cry for Bread and for want of means to maintain the Ministers there is none that is able to give it them I know King Henry the 8th that could cause his Parliaments as I ever understood from the old Parliament men of those times to make what Laws and to conclude what Acts of Parliament he pleased got many Laws to be made and many Acts to pass to justify and to make good and Lawful the Taking away Leasing Selling and Alienating the Tythes Lands Houses and Possessions of the Church and of our High Priest Jesus Christ from his servants to be inherited by lay persons and many other Acts of Parliaments have been made since that time to the same purpose which very thing we conceive as I have shewed to be very High Sacriledge and a robbing of Jesus Christ and the obstructing of his service and we fear the cause of the perishing of many souls And therefore how the Shield of the Pope's Authority that was the first Foster-Father of this execrable and accursed title of Impropriation or the power of King Henry the 8th that would expunge the Pope's Sacriledge with a greater Sacriledge and be the second Patron of this Bastard brood or all the pretences of the now detainers of the Tythes and portion of Christ and the Lands Houses and Possessions of the Church by these Humane Laws can bear off the blow of Gods wrath and turn aside the fierceness of his vengeance when in the day of his fury he shall powre out the full vial of his indignation upon the head of all Sacrilegious persons and upon the children and posterity of them that have devoured the Lords inheritance and laid wast his dwelling place I can no waies understand neither do I know how to give them any comfort or counsel but to advise them to a full and timely Restitution of that which otherwise will be their utter destruction Quia non remittitur peccatum donec restituatur August ad Maced Epist 54. oblatum cum restitui potest The sin shall never be remitted and blotted out of Gods book until the Tythes and goods of Gods Church be restored when men can restore them and will not do it CHAP. XVIII Of the second part of the Stipend Wages and Maintenance of the Ministers of the Gospel which is the Oblation Donation or Free-wil-offering of the people for to uphold and continue the true service of God and to obtain the blessings of God upon themselves and upon their labours which Donations ought not to be impropriated and alienated from the Church by any means YOu have heard of the first part of the Ministers maintenance the second part consisteth in the voluntary Oblations or Free-wil-offerings of the people which the Lord requireth should be done according as every one in his own heart thought good to bestow upon the service of God and what they did offer in this kind was most acceptable in the sight of God For this is a Principal Branch of that Honor which we yield unto God by and with our substance which we are injoyned to do Prov. 3. 9. Because what we relieve the poor with is not so much our alms as their exigence which as necessity exacts it so it is soon passed and as quickly perisheth but those Donations that were given for the service of God as they savour of a more inward and deeper piety so they are of a more lasting substance and besides the eternal Treasures which men do thereby lay up for themselves they do provide for the perpetuity of Religion unto the after-ages of men and may be justly said to Honour God not only in themselves but in all those likewise which they gain by their Donations to Honor him And it is strange and marvellous to consider how liberal and how free the people of old time were in their Donations and Free-wil-offerings to maintain the Worship of God and to do any thing that did any wayes appertain to his service for if you look into the 36. Chapt. of Exod. vers 5. you shall find how Bezaleel and Aholiab spake unto Moses saying The people bring much more then enough for the service of the work which the Lord hath commanded to be made and Moses gave commandment and caused Exod. 36. 5 6 7. it to be Proclaimed through the Camp that they should bring no more for that they had already brought enough and too much So they that returned out of Babylon were as ready and as willing to offer up their gifts and free-wil-offerings for the service of the Temple as their Forefathers were for the erecting of the Tabernacle as you may see it in the books of Ezra and of Neh 7. 70. c. 10. 33. Nehemiah But the Christians of the Primitive Church were so zealous herein that they exceeded all that went before them in their Donations and Free-wil-offerings for the service of God and the increase of the Christian Religion for they sold their Lands and Possessions and laid the prizes thereof at the Apostles feet and had all things in common among themselves And Pope Vrban the I. instituted Vt eâ—clesias praedia ac fundos fidelibus oblatos Platin. in Vrban â—piscopus recipereâ— partireturque proventus clericis omnibus viritim
nihilque cujuspiaâ— privatum esset sed in commune bonum That the Bishops should receive the Churches Possessions and grounds offered to the Faithful and that the profits thereof should be divided by the Clergy man by man and that nothing should be of private propriety to any one but in common amongst them all And Gratian tels us that by a decretal Epistle unto all the Bishops he decreed that none should presume to alienate ought of the Church Revenues under the pain of Excommunication And Pope Lucius the I. about twenty years after Vrban directed an Epistle to the Bishops of Spain and France to the same purpose And though the malice of Dr. Burges towards the Bishops will not suffer him to yield that King Lucius gave the Lands of the Idol-Priests unto â—ide Flor. hist ad an 186. Matth. Westm the Christian Bishops yet is it clear enough out of Antiquit. Brit. and Armachanus that Lucius endowed the Christian Church with more Lands and Revenues then the Idol-Priests injoyed And afterwards while it was permitted by the Imperial Laws for every one to Collate upon the Church whatsoever he would without exception their Donations were so great that the Kings and Emperours conceived Cod. l. 1. titulo 5. l. 1. it fit with Moses to grant a prohibition that they should not offer any more nor bestow any Lands or Goods upon the Church without some special licence and toleration from the Civil Magistrate for fear that the Church if this freedome of Donations should still continue would have sucked out all the blood from the veins and the marrow out of the bones of the poliâ—ick body and so leave the Common-Wealth deprived of their Lands like Pharaohs lean and evil-favoured Cows and the Church like those that were fat and wel-liked And therefore they enacted the Statute of Mortmain that was a sâ—persedeas against these too-liberal contributions and the Emperour Justinian enacted that no Legacy bequeathed unto the Church exceeding the value covetousness and hath advised you to give unto Caesar what is due to Caesâ—r and you know that his Wars and the affairs of the Common-wealth are very chargeable unto him and we know that your profession is not to hoord up wealth and to make account of transitory things And therefore if you be pleased to forgo those lands and riches and vessels of Gold and Silver which you have and care not for I will warrant you both safety of life and freedom to use your Religion according to your Conscience To whom the godly man answered That he desired three dayes liberty Pâ—udent Peâ—istâ—ph to return his resolution and by the third day he had gathered together a multitude of poor lame blind impotent men and women whose names he delivered up in a Schedule into the Tyrant's hands and said These are the goods of the Church for whom I am but the Steward of those goods that you desire and my Master commanded me to keep for them and for his Service A blessed man that herein shewed he feared God more than man And I would all our Bishops that have alienated and past away the lands houses and pâ—ssessions of the Church in long Leases and Fee-ferms unto their children and friends for a trifling rent only reserved unto their successors had had some part of this good mans spirit for then the Church of Christ had not been left so naked as it is But you may remember the Canon that I quoted to you before which saith If any Bishop do grant the Tythes or other possessions of the Church Caus 16. qu. 7. c. 3. Greg. 7. Si quis à modâ— Episcopus to any lay man let him be numbred among the greatest Hereticks and let his name be like Demas a lover of this world more than a lover of God And I hope that by this which I have already shewed it is apparent unto you and to all men that will not be blind having their eyes open and grope with the Sodomites for the wall at noon-day The Donations of good and holy men whether houses lands or goods which they have freely dedicated and given to God to perpetuate the Service and to promote the Religion of Jesus Christ ought not by any means to be either by the Bishop alienated or by his children or any other person received and taken away from the Church contrary to the will and intention of the Donor And I say here in the name of God That no Bishop can passe it away nor any lay person can receive it and detain it from the Church without sin and committing a most horrible Sacriledge in the sight of God And if men did but remember what the Apostle saith That a Testament or a mans last Heb. 9. 17. Will is of force and inviolable after men are dead and that the very Gentiles and Heathens thought it a Piaculum and a heynous offence to infringe and alter a mans last Will and Testament I wonder why these mens Wills that gave their own goods and it was lawful for them to do what they would with their own to God and to maintain Gods Service should not be of force and stand unalterable but that men will so fearlesly break them and so presumptuously take away the things that they bequeathed unto God especially if men considered the form and style of their Donation which I find thus expressed in sundrie Copies These things being lawfully our own Capit. Car. â— 6. cap. 285. we offer and give to God for the maintenance of his Service from whom if any man presume to take them away which we hope no man will attempt to do but if any man shall do Let his account be without favour and his judgement without mercy in the last Day when he cometh to receive his doom which is due for his Sacriledge which he hath committed against that our Lord and God unto whom we have given and dedicated the same For this form and manner of their Dedication should in my judgement make their hairs to stand on end and their hearts to tremble for fear of this judgement when they go about to take away the lands houses and possessions of the Church which were offered for the service of God and which I would not do for all the World and which I think none durst do but such as have their hearts heardened above Pharaohs heart But here I must tell you How that after I came to London to put this Treatise into the Press I lighted upon a Pamphlet not only foolish but most wicked defending the most horrible sin of Sacriledge to be no sin at all and the selling and taking away of the Church-Lands to be no offence at all which Pamphlet had I met it at Kilkenny I would have done as our Saviour did at Jerusalem made a scourge to Whip the publisher of it C. Burges out of the Church of Christ and after the detecting of his lies and errors condemn
benefit so he will be as graciously pleased we shall forgoe them and exchange them when we find it for our benefit and the benefit of his Church and Service which in all our bargains and commerce we ought chiefely to regard because we are but Gods Stewards for the service of his Church and so whatsoever our Religion and our Ancestors have honoured God withal we must imploy not so much for our own best advantage as for that which maketh most for Gods honor And therefore we that are instructed with the inheritance of the Church and portion of Jesus Christ must not make such bargains for our Master as Glaucus made for himself when he changed his golden Armour for brazen furniture neither must we deal with the Church of Christ as Rehoboam did with the Temple of Solomon when he took away all the shields of 1 Reg. 14. 26 27. gold and made in their steed shields of brass but what bargain or covenant soever we make without sin for the greater glory unto God and greater good unto the Church we hold it good with whomsoever the same is made CHAP. XIX That it is the duty of all Christian Kings and Princes to do their best endevours to have all the Impropriations restored to their former Institution to hinder the taking away and the alienation of the Lands Houses and other the Religious Donations of our Ancestors from the Church of Christ and to suppress and root out all the Vnjust and Covetous suttle customs and frauds that are so generally used and are so derogatory to the service of God from amongst the people and especially from this Kingdom of Ireland where most corruption is used and most need of Instruction unto the people THus you have heard how that Cathedrals and other Parochial Churches should be built and beautified for the Honor of God Godly Bishops and Preachers should be placed in them for the Service of God and then the allowance that God hath appointed should be given and yielded unto them for their maintenance And now because the Lands Houses Tythes and Hereditaments of the Church which the Lord God hath granted and the godly Emperours pious Kings and zealous Professors have given and dedicate for Gods service are in these dismal daies snatched away by the hands of Hacksters and haters of Religion and alâ—enated by the Souldiers that divide Christ his garments amongst them from the true servants and Ministers of Christ who should be very thankful unto these Souldiers as they often say that we have any thing left unto us For as the Orator â—elleth the grave Senators of Rome of an audacious fellow called Fimbria that stabbed Quintus Scaevola an honest man at the funerals of Caius Marius and then boasted of the great favour Cicerâ— in Orat pro Roscio â—merino that he shewed to him Quòd non totum telum in ejus corporâ— absconderat That he had not thrust his dagger wholly to the Hilt into his body but only gave him a slight stab that was sufficient to kill him So these brood of Fimbria having seized upon a great part of the Houses Lands and Patrimony of the Church and still detayning them Per fas nefas in their own hands do labour to get more and think the favour that they have done us deserveth no small thanks that they brought or left to us what we have and have not deprived us of all together Therefore Covetousness Injustice and the love of this World being so deeply grounded and setled in the hearts of our Demas's and this Epidemical disease of taking and detaining the Churches right being as one saith just like the Kings-evil which no Physitian but the King himself will serve to heal it Our address must be unto his Majesty to supplicate that he would be graciously pleased to interpose his Royal Command to stop the current of these intruders into Gods right and to cause the Restitution of the Church-goods to be made unto the Church And among the rest of the injuries done by these Mâ—litary * I speak of the Souldiers because either the Souldiers of that Parliament or of Crumwel oâ— his Majesty have almost all the Kingdom of Ireland and â—o fill the House of Lords and the House of Commons and are the chief men in every place So that nothing can be done either in Parliament City or Countrey but what they will have done because they are the Major Party and so can Out-vote all the rest and therefore Ireland being now Regnum Militum This my discourse cannot be Gratum opus agricolis but Ingratum miliâ—ibus which is all one to me if you consider what I say in the latter end of this book and that I fear not what they say of me Quia nec mâ—lior sum si laudaverâ—nt nec deterior si vituperaverint men to the Church of God there is one great Abuse which is generally used and practised here in Ireland by the rich proprietors and possessors of Lands and Town-ships to the abundant detriment and loss of the Ministers and to the hazard and danger if not the destruction of many I know not how many souls and that is when the Gentleman proprietor that holds all or most of the Parish in his own hands if he be offended with his Minister and cannot have the Tythes as he pleaseth himself he can make the Rectory or Vicaridge that might be well worth fifty or sixty pounds per annum to be scarce worth ten pound a year or nothing for he will leave all his ground unplowed and turne it to pasture and so bring a dearth through the scarcity of Corn in the Common-Wealth and then he will buy young Bullocks and fils his Lands with dry Cattle whereof their Religious Lawyers of whom Dr. Gardiner †Dr. Gardiner in his Scourge of Sacâ—â—ledge saith that he never heard yet at any hand of any good that they have Prophesied unto the Church tels them their custome will preserve them from the payment of any Tythes and so they bring a spiritual dearth and a famine of Gods Word unto the rest of the poor parishioners when for want of sufficient maintenance they shall want a sufficient Minister that is able to give them any Instruction because as the Poet saith Nulla illis captetur gloria quaequâ— Ovid. trist lib. 5. Ingenii stimulos subdere fama solet And the benefit that these worldlings reap by this lawless impious and wicked Custome to pay no Tythes for their dry Bullocks nor any thing to God for the fruits of their ground is one main reason why the Minister's part of six or seven Parishes doth scarce amount to twenty pounds per annum as I have formerly shewed in my Reâ—onstrance to his Majesty and I conceive it likewise to be a special Reason why the poor simple Iâ—ish Papists have so many Popish Priests amongst them for want of Protestant Priests for that want of sufficient maintenance
cannot do against so many rich powerful and many-friended adversaries of his Church ANd now sweet Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ having made mine humble addresse according to my bounden duty to thine Annointed thy Livetenant and my Sacred Soveraign to assist thy servants to maintain thy right Thy right I say as thou art a Priest and a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec and I know that his Majesty being the son of so pious and so gracious a Father as is now so glorious with thee in Heaven will stretch forth his Royal hand as thou didst unto S. Peter to preserve us from sinking I must now with fear and reverence and in all humility crave leave to return my speech unto thy Sâ—lf and as â—hou hast commanded us to hear thy voice so thou hast promised to hear our prayers And therefore I pray thee let not my Lord be angry but suffer thy servant to speak unto thee And we confess that we are not worthy to â—it with the dogs of thy flock yet thou hast called us to a most high and honourable place to be thine Embassadours to thy chosen people and unto Kings and Princes to be thy Stewards and the Dispensers of thy manifoldgraces And according to our places thou hast commanded us to behave and carry our selves as may be most agreeable for thine Honour to preach thy word to relieve the poor to keep hospitality to build thine House and to do other the like works of piety and charity And we know that thou art not like Pharaoh a cruel Master that taketh Matth. 21 33. Matth. 2â— 14. Luke 19 13. away the straw and yet will require the whole tale of bricks for thou didst deliver thy Vineyard unto the Husbandmen before thou didst expect the fruits of it and thou gavest thy Talents unto thy servants before thou didst look for any gain from them But now O Lord God our straw is kept from us our vineyard is taken away and we have scarce any one talent left unto us for O God the It was all taken from us and now still much is detained from us Heathen have come into thine Inheritance and as of old they made Hierusalem so now of late they have made the famous Church of S. Keny and many other Churches in Ireland an heap â—â— stones the dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the air and the flesh of thy Saints unto the beasts of the field And as the Prophet David said The Tabernacles of the Edomites and Ismaelites the Moabites and the Hagarens Gebal and Ammon and Amalec the Philistines with them that dwell at Tyre Assure also is joyned with them and have holpen the children of Lot to devour Jacob and to lay waste his dwelling place So the Independents the Arminians the Brownists the Anabaptists Luther and Calvin and Cartwright the Hugonots with them that are called Quakers and the Jesuites also have joyned with them and have to the â—ttermost of their power holpen our Grand Opposers the Presbyterians if not to devour the seed of Jacob to destroy the Church and thy Service which they now deny to desire to do it yet I am sure to be confederate against thee and to lay waste thy dwelling place to imagin craftily against thy people the true Royalists and to take counsel against the secret ones the Bishops and Governours of the Church And as Elias said of the children of Israel They 1 Reg. 19. 10. have forsaken thy Covenant they have thrown down thine Altars and they have killed thy Prophets So I may say of the children of Belial they have forsaken the true Protestant Religion they threw down thy Churches they killed many of thy servants and they said Come and let us root out the Bishops that they be no more a people and that the name of Episcopacy may be no more in remembrance and to that end as the Prophet saith They brake down all our carved and curious works with axes and hammers they have set fire upon thy holy places and have defiled the dwelling place of thy Name even to the ground Yea and they said in their hearts Let Psal 74. 7 8. us make havock of them altogether And by taking away all our lands houses and possessions they fed us with the bread of tears and gave us plenteousness Psal 80. 5 of tears to drink and so they made us a very strife unto our neighbours and our enemies laughed us to scorn when they saw us made as the filth of the world and as the â—ff-scouring of all things 1 Cor. 4. 13. And though thou hast brought unto us a most gracious King to our unspeakable joy and comfort yet to this very day they and their â—ssociates and that which troubles us most of all they that come in thy Name and under pretence of thy Service and for service done unto thee and thy Church do by the example of those thine enemies and the haters of thy Church either through ignorance or covetousness labour by all means and with great friends to blind the eyes of our good King that he should not understand the truth of the Churches Right that so they might the easier and the sooner carry away the lands houses and possessions of the Church from thee and from thy servants whereby they shall be made invalid and unable to discharge the duties and the works that thou requirest at their hands if thou dost not help them to their instruments and means wherewith they may do their work And therefore because we are weak and friendless and far unable to deal and to prevail against so many powerful armed men we lift up our eyes and hands to thee O Lord God and pray thee to arise and maintain thine own Cause and let not man have the upper-hand for they have rebelled against thee and have robbed thee as the Prophet testifieth and be not angry with us for ever but be gracious unto thy servants and lay not that to our charge which we cannot help when we have done our very best to preserve thy Right and to uphold thy Service but let the sin lie upon the heads of them that commit it Hear us O Lord our God and grant our request for Jesus Christ's sake thy dear Son and our only Saviour to whom with thee and the Holy Spirit our blessed Comforter be all Glory and Dominion and Thanksgiving for ever and ever Amen Jehovae Liberatori VINDICIAE REGUM OR THE GRAND REBELLION That is A Looking-Glasse for REBELS Whereby they may see how by ten several degrees they shall ascend to the height of their Design and so throughly rebell and utterly destroy themselves thereby AND Wherein is clearly proved by the holy Scriptures ancient Fathers constant Martyrs and our best modern Writers That it is no ways lawful for any private man or any sort or degree of men inferiour Magistrates Peers of the Kingdom
the Statutes of England 25 Edw. 3. c 2. And as you know it was one of the greatest Articles for which the Earl of Strafford was beheaded that he had actually leavied warre against the King The Nobles and Gentry Lords and Commons of both Houses of Parliament in all Kingdomes being convicted in their consciences with the truth of this Doctrine do in all their Votes and Declarations conclude and protest and I must believe them that all the leavies moneys and other provision of horse and men that they raise and arm are for the safety of the Kings person and for the maintenance of his Crown and Dignity Nay more then this the very Rebels in this our Kingdom of Ireland knowing how odious it is before God and man for subjects to rebell and take armes against their lawful King do protest if you will believe them that they are the Kings souldiers and do fight and suffer for their King and in defence of his Prerogatives But you know the old saying Tuta frequensque via est per amici fallere nomen The Devil deceiveth us soonest when he comes like an Angel of light and you shall ever know the true subjects best by their actions farre better then by their Votes Declarations or Protestations for Quid audiam verba cum videam contraria facta When men do come in sheeps cloathing and inwardly are ravening wolves when they come with honey in their mouths and gall in their hearts and like Joab with peace in their tongue and a sword in their hand a petition to intreat and a weapon to compell I am told by my Saviour that I shall know them by their works not their words And therefore as our Saviour saith Not he that saith Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdome of Heaven but he that doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven So I say not he that cryeth peace peace is the son of peace but he that doth obey his Prince and doth most willingly whatsoever he commandeth or suffereth most patiently for refusing to do what he commandeth amisse This is the true subject Well to draw towards the end of this point of our obedience to our Soveraign That is when the Commonalty guide the Nobility and the Subjects rule their King Governour I desire you to remember a double story The one of Plutarch which tells us how the tayle of the Serpent rebelled against the head because that did guide the whole body and drew the tayle after it whithersoever it would therefore the head yielded that the tayle should rule and then it being small and wanting eyes drew the whole body head and all through such narrow crevises clefts and thickets that it soon brought the Serpent to confusion The other is of Titus Livius who Titus Livius Decad. 1. l. 2â— tells us that when the people of Rome made a factious combination to rebell against their Governours Menenius Agrippa went unto them and said that on a time all the members conspired against the stomack and alledged that she devoured with ease and pleasure what they had purchased with great labour and pain therefore the feet would walk no more the hands would work no more the tongue would plead no more for it and so within a while the long fast of the stomack made weak knees feeble hands dimme eyes a faltering tongue and a heavie heart and then presently seeing their former folly they were glad to be reconciled to the Stomack again and this reconciled the people unto their Governours I need not make any other application but to wish and to advise us all with the people of Rome to submit our selves unto our Heads that are our Governours lest if we be guided by the tayle we shall bring our selves with the Serpent unto destruction And to remember that excellent speech of S. Basil The people through ambition are fallen into grievous Anarchie whence it happeneth that all the exhortations of their rulers do no good no man hath any list to obey but every man would reign being swelled up with pride that springeth out of his ignorance And a little after he saith that some sit no lesse implacable Basilius de Spiritu Sancto c. ult scil 30. An argument of obedience drawn from the fifth Commandement and bitter examiners of things amisse then unjust and malevolent Judges of things well done so that we are more brutish then the very beasts because they are quiet among themselves but we wage cruel and bloody warres against each other And let us never forget that the Lord saith Honour thy father and thy mother and I must tell you that by father in this precept you must not onely understand your natural father but also the King who is yâ—â—◠〈◊〉 cal father and the father of all his subjects and the Priest your spiriâ—ual father and those likewise that in loco patris do breed and bring you up 1 Chron. 2. 24. and though natural affection produceth more love and honour uâ—to those fathers that begat us yet reason and religion oblige us more unto the King that is the common father of all and to the Priest that begat us unto Christ then unto him that begat us into the world for that without our new birth which is ordinarily done by the office of the Priest we were no Christians and as good unborn as unâ—hristened that is unregenerated and What we are and should be without King or Priest without the King that is Custos utriusque tabulae the preserver both of the publick justice and of the pure religion our fathers can neither bring us up in peace nor teach us in the faith of Christ and therefore if my father should plot any treason against the King or prove a Rebel against him I am bound in all duty and conscience to preferre the publick before the private and if I cannot otherwise avert the same to reveal the plot to preserve the King though it were to the losse of my father's life and therefore certainly they that curse that is speak evil of their King are cursed and they that rebel against him shall never have their dayes long in the land but shall through their own rebellion be soon cut off from the land of the living For mine own part I have often admired why the subjects of King Whether for the liberty of Subjects we can be warranted to rebell In the dicourse of the differences betâ—ixt King and Parliament CHARLES should raise any civil warre and especially turn their spleen against him If any say it is for their liberties I answer that I am confident His Majesty never thought to bring any the meanest of his subjects into bondage nor by an arbitrary government to reduce them into the like condition as the Peasants of France or the Boores of Germany or the Pickroes of Spain are as some do most fâ—lsely suggest but that they should continue as they have been in the dayes
of his Father of blessed memory and of all other his most noble Progenitors the freest subjects under Heaven And I hope they desire not to be such Libertines as those in the Primitive Church who because Christian liberty freed us from all Jewish The Libertines of the Primitive Church what they thought Ceremonies and all typical Rites which were such a burthen that neither we nor our fathers could undergo and also from the curse and malediction of the moral law would under this pretence of Christian liberty be freed from the obligation of all lawes and give themselves the freedom to do what they pleased for this would prove to be not the liberty but the bondage and the base slavery of a people that are not governed by lawes but suffered to do what they please because that neither God nor good lawes confine us but for our own good and he that forbids us to obey impious commands bids us to obey all righteous lawes and rather to suffer then to resist the most unrighteous Governours But I fear that under the name of the liberty of the subjects the licentiousnesse of the flesh is aymed at because What is often aimed at under the name of theâ— liberty of the Subjects Whether for the preservation of ouâ— Religion we can be warranted to rebell you may see by what is already come to passe our civil dissention hath procured to many men such a liberty that few men are sure either of their life or estate and God blesse me from such a liberty and send me rather to be the slave of Christ then such a libertine of the world And if religion be the cause that moveth you here hereunto I confesse this should be dearer to us then our lives but this title is like a velvet mask that is often used to cover a deformed face decipimur specie recti for as that worthy and learned Knight Sir John Cheek that was Tutor to King Edward the sixth saith If you were offered Persecution for Religion you ought to flye and yet you intend to fight if you would stand in the truth ye ought to suffer like Martyrs and you would slay like Tyrants Thus for Religion you keep no Religion and neither will follow the Counsel of Christ nor the constancie of Martyrs And a little after he demands why the people should not like that Religion which Gods Word established the Primitive Church hath authorized the greatest learned men of this Realm and the whole consent of the Parliament have confirmed Sir John Cheek in The true subject to the rebell p. 4 c. and the Kings Majesty hath set forth is it not truly set out Dare you Commons take upon you more learning then the chosen Bishops and Clerks of this Realm have This was the judgement of that judicious man And I must tell you that Religion never taught Rebellion neither was it the will of Christ that Faith should be compelled by fighting but perswaded by Micah 3. 10. preaching for the Lord sharply reproveth them that built up Sion with blood and Hâ—erusalem with iniquitie and the practice of Christ and his Apostles was to reform the Church by prayers and preaching and not with fire and sword and they presse obedience unto our Governours yea though they True religion never rebelleth were impious infidels and idolatrous with arguments fetched from Gods ordinance from mans conscience from wrath and vengeance and from the terrible sentence of damnation And this truth is so solid that it hath the clear testimony of holy Writ the perpetual practice of all the Primitive Saints and Martyrs and I dare boldly say it the unanimous consent of all the orthodox Bishops and Catholick Writers both in England and Ireland and in all the world That Christian Religion teacheth us never with any violence to resist or with arms to withstand the authority of our lawful Kings Whether the Laws of our Land do warrant us to rebell If you say The Laws of our Land and the Constitutions of this our Kingdom give us leave to stand upon our libertie and to withstand all tyrannie that shall be offered unto us especially when our estates lives and religion are in danger to be destroyed To this I say with Laelius that Nulla lex valeat contra jus divinum Mans Laelius de privileg Eccles 112. lawes can exact no further obedience then may stand with the observance of the divine precepts and therefore we must not so preferre them or relye upon them so much as to prejudice the other and for our fear of the losse of estate life or religion I wish it may not be setled upon groundlesse suspitions for I know and all the world may believe that our King is a most clement and religious Prince that never did give cause unto any of his subjects to foster such feares and jealousies within his breast and you know what the Psalmist saith of many men They were afraid where no fear was And Job tells you whom terrours shall make afraid on every side and shall Job 1â— 11 12. drive him to his feet that is to runne away as you see the Rebels do from the Kings Army in every place and in whose Tabernacle shall dwell the King of fear for though the ungodly fleeth when no man pursueth him yet they that trust in God are confident as Lyons without fear they know that the heart of the King is not in his own hand but in the hand of the Lord as the Prov 21. 1. Bonav ad secundam dist 35. art 2. qu. â— rivers of waters and he turneth it whithersoever it pleaseth him either to save them or destroy them even as it pleaseth God He ordereth the King how to rule the people And therefore in the name of God and for Christ Jesus sake let me perswade you to put away all causelesse fears and groundlesse jealousies and trust your King if not trust your God and let your will which is so unhappy in it self become right and equall by receiving direction from the will of God and remember what Vlpian the great Civilian saith that Rebellion and disobedience unto your King is proximum sacrilegio crimen and that it is in Samuel's judgement as the sinne of witchcraft whereby men forsake God and cleave unto the Devil and above all remember The remembrance of his Oâ—th should be a terrour to the conscience of every Rebel the oath that many of you have taken to be true and faithful unto your King and to reveal whatsoever evils or plots that you shall know or hear to be contrived against his Person Crown or Dignity and defend him from them Pro posse tuo to the uttermost of your power So help you God Which Oath how they that are any wayes assistant in a warre against their King can dispence with I cannot with all my wit and learning understand and therefore return O Shulamite return lay down thine
House of Commons p. 6. heads Therefore some say this may well draw a suspicion upon the justice of the Sentence though I will not censure any man for any injustice therein But as the Earl said at his death which he undertook like a good The Earle's words at his death Christian full of Charity and no less Piety it was an ill Omen to this Nation that they should write the Frontispiece of this Parliament with letters of Blood which if unjustly done or unduly prosecuted I fear may with Abels blood cry for vengeance in the ears of God against the Contrivers of this mischief to produce our miseries And the God of Heaven doth only know how much of the blood of this Kingdom must be squeezed out to expiate all the mis-proceedings and the fearfull projects of our people God Almighty turn his anger from us and let not the righteous perish with the wicked nor the sins of some few be laid upon us all This was the first impediment that was to be removed before they could proceed any further in this Tragedy and thus it was most artificially acted And I say He was a great and a very great impediment of their design which made me the larger in the prosecution thereof because he was a person of that great ability and so great fidelity both to the Church and State and the taking off of his head made a very wide gap for our enemies to enter into the Vineyard of Christ and a large breach into the City of God to deface the Church and to destroy this Kingdom CHAP. III. Sheweth how they stopped the free judgment of the Judges procured the perpetuity of the Parliament the consequences thereof and the subtle device of Semiramis 2. THe next Let that might hinder their design was the great learning The second impediment of their design long experience and free judgment of the grave Judges to declare what is Truth and what is Law in every point for these men being skilful in the Laws and Statutes of our Land knew how contrary to the same and how repugnant to the fundamental Constitutions of our Government the erecting of a new Church and the framing of a new Common-Wealth would be and their judgment being to be inquired in any emergent Doubt might prove very prejudicial unto their plots and a hinderance of their Design except it were diverted by some course Therefore to stop this stream to put a gagg in their mouthes to imprison How they stopped the free judgment of the Judges all truths that might make against them and to make these Judges yield to whatsoever they do or at least not to contradict any thing they say they get many of them to be accused of High-Treason and they do but accuse them and not proceed to any trial against them which was a pretty plot of their policy because that hereby they kept them and the rest of their fellow-Judges that had any finger in the mis-sentencing of the Ship money and were therefore in the same predicament and to be under the same Censure under the lash and to be still silent for very fear of their proceeding against them for they saw by many presidents that those men which favoured their design or contradicted not their waies were winked at by this Faction though they were the greatest Delinquents and therefore redimere se captos to free themselves out of the hands of these men they might conceive it their safest course to gain-say none of their conclusions which was a Plot of no small value to further their design by this removal of this second impediment 3. The third Let that stood in their way to make stop of their impious The third impediment of their design design was the Royal power to dissolve the present Parliament as formerly to dissolve any other which they knew to be an inseparable flower of the Crown Timor undique nostris this brought them in fear on every side lest if they were too soon discovered they might suddenly be prevented and their plot might prove abortive Like the untimely fruit of a woman that perisheth before it seeth the Sun or as the apples of Sodome vanishing when they are touched into Nothing or at the best but to stinking blasts Therefore to escape this rock they sail about and like cunning Water-men they look towards you when they row from you their eyes and mouthes are one way when their hearts and minds are another way for they tell the King that the discontinuance of Parliaments hath produced abundance of distempers in this State and a world of grievances both in the Church and Common-wealth besides they say what the King and every man else saw to be true That the Scots were entred into our Land and setled in the bosom of this Kingdom and though perhaps The fair pretences for the continuance of the Parliament if some things had been better looked into we mought at first most easily have kept them out yet now duriùs ejicitur quà m non admittitur hostis it was too late to shut the door and it is not so easy to expel and drive them out except we made them a bride of gold to pass over the river and so to go homewards again And this cannot be done without a great deal of money which moneys though the Parliament should grant them as we are most willing to do to free your Majesty from these guests and to prevent the dangers of an intestine war yet they cannot suddenly be levied and collected as the times and occasions now required therefore it must be borrowed to supply our present necessities and lenders we shall find none except we can shew them a way how they shall be repaid again and the expeperience we have lately had in these latter years of so many Parliaments so unhappily and suddenly dissolved puts us out of all hope to find any way to secure their debts except your Majesty will pass an Act for as yet they durst not say they needed not His assent to what they did that this Parliament shall not be dissolved until it be agreed upon by the consent of both houses This and the like were their fair pretences like the Syrens voyces very How the King was seduced by their pretences sweet and very good and the good King that ever spake as he thought could not think that His great Councel whom He trusted with all the Affairs of His Kingdom meant any otherwise then they said or looked any further then they shewed Him He never dream'd that they intended to have an everlasting Parliament and so perfidiously to over-reach both the King and the Kingdom But though our gracious King being not so much versed with the dissembling subtilty and serpentine windings of wicked hypocrites that are to be removed from the King and expelled out of his House supposed all them to mean sincerely and to deal fairly as they seemed to do yet I
speak it though I should die for it and if some did not speak it I think the stones would cry against it and proclaim it Better for the Clergy were their hope only in this world never to have been born or at least never to have seen a Book then to fall into the hands and to be put under the censure of these men that do thus love Christ by hating his Ministers who as I said This Act more pâ—ejudâ—ciall to the future times than now before by this one Act are made liable to undergo all kind of evils which shall not only fall upon the present Clergy for were it so our patience should teach us to be silent but also to the increase of all prejudices to the Gospel more than my fore-sight can expresse in all succeeding Ages And therefore I may well say with Jeremy Shall not my soul be avenged Jer. 5. 9 29. on such a nation as this And we need not wonder that such plagues calamities and distresses have so much increased in this Kingdom ever since the passing of this Act and yet the anger of the Lord is not turned away but his hand is stretched out still and I fear his wrath will not be appâ—ased till we have blotted this and wiped away all other our great sins and transgressions with the truest tears of unfained repentance These are like to be the consequences of this Act And yet our good King who we know loved our Nation and built us a Synagogue and was as I assure my self most unwilling to passe it was notwithstanding over-perswaded considering where thirteen of the Bishops were even in prison and in what condition all the rest of them stood in question whether all they should stand or be cut down root and branch to yield His assent unto the Act though if the case in truth were rightly weighed not much lesse prejudicial to his Majesty than injurious to us to be thus deprived of our right and exposed to all miseries by excluding us from all Civil Judicature And I would to God the King and all the Kingdom did continually consider how his Majesty was used ever since the confirmation of this Act for they How the King hath been used ever since this Act passed no sooner had excluded the Bishops and Clergy out of their right but presently they proceeded and prosecuted the Design ever since to thrust out the King from all those just Rights and Prerogatives which God and Nature and the Laws of our Land have put into his hands for the Government of this Kingdom neither was it likely to succeed any otherwise as I have fully shewed and I would all Kings would read it in the Grand Rebellion But I see no reason why it may not and why it should not be reâ—racted That the Act should be annulled and annulled when the Houses shall be purged of that Anabaptistical and Rebellious Faction that contrived and procured the same to Passe for these three special Reasons 1. Because that contrary to all former Precedents that Bill for their 1. Reason exclusion was as it is reported at the first refused and after a full hearing among the Lords it was by most Votes by more than a dozen voices rejected And yet to shew unto the World that the Faction's malice against the Bishops had no end and their rage was still implacable at the same Session and which is very considerable immediately assoon as ever they understood it was rejected the House of Commons revived it and so pressed it unto the Lords that if I may have leave to speak the truth contrary to all right * For I conceive this to be â—â— approved Maxim That no Right no. proved forfited by some offence can be taken away without wrong 2. Reason In his Majesties answer to the Petition of the Lords and Commons 16. of July p. 8. it must be again received and while the Bishops were in prison it was with what honour I know not strangely confirmed 2. Because this Bill had the Royall assent after that a most riâ—tous tumult and many thousands of men with all sorts of Warlike weapons both on land and water most disloyally had driven His Majesty to flie from London that most Rebellious City not without fear for his own safety even for the safety of his life as himself professeth And when they had so cunningly contrived their Plot as to get some of the Kings servants and friends that were about him and imployed in the Queens affairs to perswade Her Majesty to use all her power with the King for the passing of this Bill or else Her journey should be stayed as formerly they had altered Her resolution for the Spaw and at Rochester she should understand the sense of the House to stop Her passage unto Holland whereas the passing of this Bill might make way for Her passage over And many other such frights and fears they put both upon the King and Queen to inforce Him full sore against his will as we believe to passe this harsh Bill for the exclusion of the spiritual Lords out of the House of Peers and of all the Clergy from all Secular Judicature But Master Pym will tell us as he did that it was the opinion of both Houses There was no occasion given by any tumults that might justly cause His Majesties departure To whom I answer with the words of Alderman Garraway If the Houses Ald. Oar. speech at Guild-hall had declared that it had been lawful to beat the King out of Town I must have sate still with wonder though I should never believe it but when they declare matters of Fact which is equally within our own knowledge and wherein we cannot be deceived as in the things we have seen with our eyes if they dissent from truth they must give me leave to differ from them As if they should declare They have paid all the money that they owe unto the City or that there * For now I understanâ— it is pulled down was no Crosse standing in Cheapside we shall hardly believe them And therefore seeing we all remember when the Alarm was given that there was an attempt from Whitehall upon the City how hardly it was appeased and how no Babies thought the Design of those subtile heads that gave that false Alarm was no lesse than to have caused Whitehall to be pulled down and they that loved the King and saw the Army both by land and water which accompanied the persons accused to Westminster the next day after His Majesties departure as if they had passed in a Roman Triumph conceived the danger to be so great that I call Heaven to witness they blessed God that so graciously put in the Kings heart rather to passe away over-night though very late than â—azard the danger that might have ensued the day following The meaning therefore of both Houses may be That there was nothing done which they confessed to
they went which if some men were brought to their Legal tryal I believe would be more than sufficiently proved against them can be no lesse than â—eynous Crimes perhaps within the compasse of high Treason Or were these things but our jealousies and fears which do wear the garments of Truth yet their proceedings in Parliament do add more fuell unto the fire of our suspicion as for our men whom we have chosen to plead for us and to treat with them to respect them more than us to enrich them by impoverishing us giving them no lesse than 300000. l. who had How they behaved themselves towards the Scots entered into our Land and brought upon us such fears of I know not how many mischiefs that might succeed and not only so but also to shew what love they bare to them and how little regard they had of us their Native Brethren that put such trust and confidence in their fidelity as to commit all our fortunes and liberties into their hands paying weekly such a Pension for their provision besides the maintenance of our own Army which were forced to carry them their monies when themselves were unpaid as in a short time was able to exhaust all the wealth of this Kingdom and yet for all his Majesties continual calling upon them to dispatch their discharge and to finish the Treaty for the good of both Kingdoms keeping them here so exceeding long and making so very much of them which in truth we envyed not but admired what it meant when we saw with what continual feastings they were entertained in London and their lodgings frequented as the Kings Court till all the people began to murmur and to wax weary of so great a charge and such a burden as they knew must at last light upon their shoulders which must needs be matters worthy of our best examinations But as yet the common people that seeth no further than the present tense Why they detained them here so long and the outside of things did little know what many wife men did then foresee that these men aimed further than they seemed to do and delayed the businesse purposely till they had attained many of their desires and had fully endeared themselves into the affections of the Scots that if need required that they could not effect all the residue of their design as they intended which now could not so suddenly be brought unto perfection they might recall them here again to assist them to do that by force which by their craft and subtilty they should fail to do as now by their sending for them going unto them and alleadging the Act of Pacification for their assistance to withstand their King and to overthrow our Church it is apparent to all the World how perfidiously they dealt with God and man and how treacherous their thoughts were from the beginning both to the King and Kingdom Yet As we found our Brethren of Scotland howsoever these men behaved themselves in their secret intentions to have carried themselves none otherwise than as wise rational and religious men in all the Treaty So I assure my self they will hereafter still continue both faithful unto God and loyal unto their King and as they perceived not their intentions at the first so they will not now joyn with them in any Association of Rebellion to withstand their own Liege Lord and to change the established Laws and Religion of our Kingdom but will rather live in peace and happiness in their own Land than by forsaking their enjoyed quietness to involve themselves in the unhappiness of a desperate War in another Country 2. After they had thus endeared themselves unto their Brethren of Scotland 2. The compelling of all people to take their new framed Protestation they framed a Protestation to maintain and defend as far as lawfully they might with their lives powers and estates the True Reformed Protestant Religion his Majesties Royal Person Honour and Estate the power and priviledge of Parliament the lawful Rights and Liberties of the Subjects and every person that should make the Protestation in whatsoever he should do in the lawful pursuance of the same and to their power and as far as lawfully they might â—o oppose and by all good means endeavour to bring to condign punishment all such as shall either by force practice counsels plots conspiracies or otherwise * Which word is like the c. in the Canonical Oath do any thing to the contrary of any thing in the said Protestation contained and neither for fear hope nor other respect to relinquish this Promise Vow and Protestation In which Protestation though no man can espy the least shadow of ill prima facie at the first reading thereof yet if you look further and search narrowly into the intentions of the composers the frame of the Protestation and the practice of these Protestors ever since the framing of it you shall find that Deâ—init in piscem mulier formosa supernè these men are no Changelings but as like themselves as ever they were For 1. As it was intended so it succeeded it terrified the Papists and made 1. To terrifie the Papists to raise a Rebellion in Ireland them so desperate as almost to despair of their very Being as concerning the place where or the manner how they should live Which thing together with many other harsh and hard proceedings against many of them and the small countenance which they shewed unto a very moderate Petition that the Papists exhibited unto them hath driven abundance of them into Ireland whom I saw my self and there consulting with the Irish which were then also threatened by the Agents of this Faction there that ere long they should be severely handled and brought to the Church whether they would or no or pay such a Mulct as should make them poor what course they should take in such a desperate condition wherein they were all like to be ruined or to be rooted out of all the Kings Dominions they concluded what they would do To defend themselves by a plain Rebellion So this course against them hath been the leading-card as some of them confessed of that great Rebellion which being kindled as some Sectaries in England expected they thought they would so much the more weaken the King by how much the more combuâ—ion should be raised in each one of his Dominions And therefore notwithstanding all the Kings gracious Messages and wishes unto the House of Commons which I wish all men would remember how affectionately he desired it to hasten to relieve that bleeding Kingdom yet still they protracted and neglected their redresse and at last passed such Votes made such Orders and procured such Acts as rather respected themselves and their posterity to get all the land and goods of the Rebels to themselves that were the Adventurers than the relieving of us that were distressed and would as I told some of the House of Commons rather increase
consecrated 1. Sacriledge what it is to holy uses and to convert the same to any other purpose than which they were dedicated is termed sacriledge that is the stealing of holy goods from the right owners to our selves and others to whom we leave them 2. That this sacriledge is a sin for it is a snare to the man who devoureth 4. That it is a sinne that which is holy and after vowes to make inquiry that is whether such a service be needful or such a taking away be a sin 3. That this sinne is a very great sinne for Saint Paul saith Thou that 3. A great sin abborrest Idols committest thou sacriledge And Idolatry is the giving of our goods and service to false gods Sacriledge the taking away of goods dedicated to the service of any God especially of the true God And this seemeth by the Apostles words to be a greater sinne than the other because the devill laboureth more to take away the service of the true God than to establish his own service for he knoweth that as light taken away darknesse must needs follow so the true Religion being destroyed Hosea 2. 8. Ezech. 16. 1 Reg. 18. 19. Gen. 22. Idolatry must needs succeed and he knoweth that Idolatry hath been bountiful enough to the service of Idols that he needeth not so much to fear the taking away of their goods as to care that the goods dedicated to Gods service be taken away 4. That this sin is a very dangerous sinne both to 1. The Persons that commit it 2. To the Common-wealth that suffers 4 A most dangerous sin Joshua 7. Act. 5. 4. 1. To the sacrilegers it for 1. Not onely Achan Aâ—anias and Sapphira and other private men perished for this sinne but the proudest Kings and greatest Peers that became sacrilegious were plagued and destroyed by God as Belshazzar the great Monarch of Assyria William Rufus and abundance more that you may find in our Histories for the curse of God like Damocles sword by a slender thred hangs over their heads and makes them like those that perished at Endor and became as the dung of the earth And I beseech you mark it Make them like a wheel and as the stubble before the wind persecute them with thy tempest let them be confounded and be put to shame and perish which say Let us take to our selves the houses of God in possession and if this be the guerdon of them that say it I wonder what shall be the plague of them that do it and I wonder more that the very thought of this Curse doth not make their hearts to tremble if their consciences were not seared to be senselesse of all fear 2. The sin of sacriledge extendeth it selfe not onely to the persons committing 2. To whole Nations it but also to the whole Nation that suffereth it as the sin of Achan was not onely a snare to catch him to be destroyed but it troubled all Israel so that they were still discomfited and never prospered till the sacrileger was punished and the Lord appeased If you say The sinne is taken away when the Parliament takes these things away I answer that we must not idolize the Parliament as if it were a kind of omnipotent Creature and like the Pope such an infallible Lord God upon earth as that their Votes and Sanctions were the supremest rule of justice that cannot be unjust because they are enacted by the whole State because as no conclusions are therefore truths because determined by a whole Councell so no Lawes are therefore just because done by a whole Parliament but when they do agree with the common rules of truth and justice which God hath given unto men and shewed the same in his holy Word which he hath left to be the right rule of our actions And therefore if the greatest Assemblies Parliament or Councell make not the will of God the rule to guide their proceedings thereby their Sanctions are so farre from taking away the nature of the sin that they do increase the evill and make it the more out of measure sinfull and to become a national sin that before was but personal and the more exceedingly sinful when the same is confirmed by a Law so that none dares speak against it and the sinners are become senselesse in their sinnes and therefore the Prophet demandeth how any man that feareth God dares meddle with such a people that will thus justifie their sinnes saying Shall the throne of iniquity that is any unjust course have fellowship with thee which framest mischief by a Law And the Lord doth extremely threaten them that walk after unrighteous ordinances as that they should sow much but not reap tread the Olives but not annoint themselves therewith Mich. 6. 15 16. and sweet wine but not drink it because the Statutes of Omri are kept and all the works of the house of Achab and they walked in their counsels and the Prophet Hosea doth more fully set down the wrath of Hos 5. 10 11. God both against the makers and the observers of all unrighteous Laws If you say The Lands and Lordships of the Bishops were not the patrimony Object of the Church but were onely in superstitious times given by our Kings and others unto the Church-men and therefore now the King being in want they may be restored to the Crown again I confesse the Lands of the Church are the free bequests of godly Sol. Kings and of other pious men dead long agoe with most fearful imprecations made against all those that should seek to alter their Wills and Testaments and the Apostle saith If it be but a mans Testament no man Gal. 3. 15. altereth it that is no honest man ought to alter it though perhaps his Will might have been made wiser and his goods bestowed to better use for our Saviours Maxim when he gave a Penny to him that laboured but one hour and but a Penny to him that had endured the heat of the day is unanswerable Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own And therefore 1. As others daily leave their estates of great Amount to whom they please many times to strangers and perhaps to idiots or debauched persons of wicked lives and noxious manners and yet no man grudgeth or endeavoureth to take away those just Legacies which their good Benefactours had bestowed upon these unjust men so there is no reason that any mans eyes should be evill for the goodnesse of their Ancestours unto the Clergie but that their Wills should stand to those uses after their death as intemerate as if they were now alive to dispose of their beneficence 2. They are most injurious to the King who is wise as an Angel of God and therefore holdeth this sacriledge odious to his Princely heart that would seek to enrich his Crown with that which will shake it on his head and endanger all his Posterity to such
Printed and imprison if they can catch them all that publish them as they did many worthy Ministers in the City of London and in many other places of this Kingdom 6. They have publickly voted in their House and accordingly indeavoured 6. Wrong by Mâ—ssages to perswade our brethren of Scotland to joyn in their assistance with these grand Rebels to rebel against their Soveraign but I perswade my self as I said before that the Nobility and Gentry of Scotland are more Religious in themselves more Lâ—yal to their liege Lord and indeed wiser in all their actions then while they may live quietly at home in a happy peace to undertake upon the perswasions of Rebellious Subjects such an unhappy war abroad 7. It is remonstrated and related publickly that as if they had shaken 7. Wrong off all subjection and were become already a State Independent they have Treated by their agents with forraign States and do still proceed in that course which if true is such an usurpation upon Soveraignty as was never before attempted in this Kingdom and such a Presumption as few men know the secret mischiefs that may luâ—k therein 8. They suffer and licence their Pamphleters Pryn Goodwin Burges 8. Wrong Marshal Sedgwick and other emissaries of wickedness to publish such Treasons and Blasphemies and abominable Aphorisms As that thâ— negative vote of the King is no more then the dissent of one man the Affirmative vote of the King makes not a Law ergo the Negative cannot destroy it and the like absurd and sensless things that are in those Aphorisms and in Prins book of the Soveraign power of Parliament whereby they would deny the Kings power to hinder any Act that both the Houses shall conclude and so taking away those just prerogatives from him that are as Hereditary to him as his Kingdom compell him to assent to their conclusions for which things our Histories tell us that other Parliaments Why the two Spencers died have banished and upon their returns they were hanged both the Spencers the Father and the Son for the like presumption as among other Articles for denying this Prerogative unto their King and affirming Per aspertevid Ebsmere postnaâ—i p. 99. that if he neglected his duty and would not do what he ought for the good of the Kingdom he might be compelled by force to perform iâ— which very thing divesteth the King of all Soveraignty overthroweth Monarchy and maketh our government a meer Aristocracy contrary to the constitution of our first Kings and the judgment of all ages for we know full well from the Practise of all former Parliaments that seeing the three Pag. 48. States are subordinate unto the King in making Laws wherein the chiefest power consisteth they may propound and consent but it is still in the Kings power to refuse or raâ—ify and I never read that any Parliament man till now did ever say the contrary but that if there be no concurrence of the King in whom formally the power of making of any Law resideth ut in subjecto to make the Law the two Houses whose consent is but a requisite condition to compleat the Kings power are but a liveless convention like two Cyphers without a figure that of themselves are of no value or power but joyned unto their figures have the full strength of their places which is confirmed by the Viewer of the Observations out of 11. Hen. 7. 23. per Davers Polydore 185. Cowel inter verbo Praerog Sir Pag. 19 20 21. Thomas Smyth de republ Angl. l. 2. c. 3. Bodin l. 1. c. 8. For if the Kings consent were not necessary for the perfecting of every Act then certainly as The Letter to a Gentleman in Gloucestershire p. 3. another saith all those Bils that heretofore have passed both Houses and for want of the Royal assent have slept and been buried all this while would now rise up as so many Laws and Statutes and would make as great confusion as these new orders and ordinances have done And as the Lawyers tell us that the necessity of the assent of all three States in Parliament is such as without any one of them the rest do but Lamberts Archeion 271. Vid. the Viewer p. 21. lose their labour so Le Roy est assentus ceo faict un Act de Parliament and as another saith Nihil ratum habetur nisi quod Rex comprobarit Nothing is perfected but what the King confirmeth But here in the naming of the three States I must tell you that I find in most of our Writers about this new-born question of the Kings power a very great omission that they are not particularly set down that the whole Kingdom might know which is every one of them and upon this omission I conceive as great mistake in them that say the three States are 1. The King 2. The House of Peers Which be the three States of England 3. The House of Commons For I am informed by no mean Lawyer that you may find it upon the Rowls of Henry the fifth as I remember and I am sure you may find it Speed l 9. c. 19. p. 712. Anno. 1 Ric. 3. in the first year of Richard the third where the three States are particularly named and the King is none of them For it is said That at the request and by the assent of the three Estates of this Realm that is to say the Lords Spiritual the Lords Temporal and Commons of the Land Assembled it is declared that our said Soveraign Lord the King is the very undoubted King of this Realm Wherein you may plainly see the King that is acknowledged their Soveraign by all three can be none of the three but is the head of all three as the Dean is none of the Chapter but is Caput capituli and as in France and Spain so in England I conceive the three Estates to be 1. The Lords Spiritual that are if not representing yet in loco in the behalf of all the Clergy of England that till these Anabaptistical tares have almost choaked all the Wheat in Gods field were thought so considerable a party as might deserve as well a representation in Parliament as old Sarum or the like Borough of scarce twenty Houses 2. The Lords Temporal in the right of their Honor and their Posterity 3. The Commons that are elected in the behalf of the Conntrey Cities and Butroughs and what these three States consult and conclude upon for the good of the Church and Kingdom the King as the head of all was either to apprâ—ve or reject what he pleased And Joh. Beda advocate in the Court of Parliament of Paris saith p. 42. De jure Regum The Church is within the State made a part of the same and is subject to the Soveraign of the whole Territory being in France and England one of the three estates of the Kingdom whereof the King is head and superior aswel of the Clergy
institution of Kings is immediately from God Justin lib. 1. Herodot lib. 1. Clio. reges erat from the beginning of things that is the beginning of the world the rule and government of the people of all Nations was in the hands of Kings Quos ad honoris fastigium non ambitio popularis sed spectata inter bonos moderaiio provehebat And Herodotus setteth down how Deioces the first King of the Medes had his beginning And Homer also nameth the Kings that were in and before the wars of Troy But the choice of Deioces and some others about that time and after whereof Cicero speaketh may give some colour unto Cicero in Officiis our rebellious Sectaries to make the royal Dignity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a humane ordinance therefore I must go before Herodetus and look further then blind Homer could see and from the first King that ever was I will truly lay down the first institution and succession of Kings and how times have wrought by corruption the alteration of their right and diminution of their power which both God and nature had first granted unto them And I hope no Basilen-mastix no hater of Kings nor opposer of the royal God the first King 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 1. 17. Apoc. 19. 16. government can deny but that God himself was the first King that ever the world saw that was the King of ages before all worlds and the King of Kings ever since there were any created Kings The next King that I read of was Adam whom Cedâ—â—nus stiles the Catholique Monarch 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a mighty King of a large Territory of great Dominion and of unquestionable right unto his Kingdom which was the whole World the Earth the Seas and all that were therein For the great King of all Kings said unto him Be fâ—uitful and multiply and replâ—nish the Gen. 1. 28. Adam the first King of all men earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth Which is a very large Commission when dominare is more then regere and therefore his royalty is so plain that none but wilful ignorants will deny it to be divinum institutum a divine institution and affirm it as they do to be humanum inventum a humane ordination when you know there were no men to chuse him and you see God himself doth appoint him and after the flood the Empire of Noah was divided betwixt his three sons Japheth reigned in Europe Johan Beda de jure Regum p. 4. Sem in Asia and Cham in Africa Yet I must confess the first Kingdom that is spoken of by that name is the Kingdom of Nimrod who notwithstanding is not himself termed King but in Gen. 10. 9. the Scripture phrase a mighty hunter because he was not onely a great King but also a mighty Tyrant or oppressour of his people in all his Kingdom or as I rather conveive it because he was the first usurper that incroached upon his neighbours rights to enlaâ—ge his own dominions and the first king that I find by that name in the Scripture was Amraphâ—l king of Shinar with whom we find eight other Kings named in the same chapter Gen. 14. 1. But we are not to contest about words or to strive about the winde when the Scripture doth first give this name unto them the plain truth is that which we are to enquire after and so it is manifest there were Kings ever since Adam and so named ever since Noahs flood for Melchizedâ—ch which in the judgment of Master Selden Broughton and others was Sem the eldest son of Noah though mine own minde is set down otherwise was King of Salem and Justin tells us that long before Ninus which was the son of Nimrod there were many other Kings as Vexores King of Aegypt and Tanais King of Sâ—ythia 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euripides de Cyclop Gen. 14. 14. and the like and as reason sheweth us that eveâ—y one qui regit alios Rex est so every master of a family that ruleth his own houshould is a petty King as we commonly say to this veâ—y day every man is a King in his own house and as their families were the greater so were they the greater Kings so Abraham hand three hundred and eighteen servants that were able men for the War in his own house and therefore the inhabitants of the Land tell him Princeps Dei es inter nos thou art a Prince of God that is a great ruler amongst us and yet the greatest of these rulers were rather reguli then reges Kings of some Cities or small Territories and of no large dominion as those thirty and one Kings which Joshua vanquished doth make it plain Josh 12. 14. Selden in his Titles of honour cap. 1. But Master Selden confesseth that civil societies beginning in particular families the heads thereof ruled as kings and as the World encreased or these kings incroached upon their neighbours so their Kingdoms were enlarged Kings therefore they were and they were kings from the beginning But how they came to be kings or what right they had to regal power from whence their authority is deâ—ived 1. Whether God ordained it or 2. Themselveâ— assumed it 3. The people conferred it upon them herein lyeth all the question To which I must briefly answer that the right of all kings which have any The chiefest rights to kingdoms either of three ways right unto their kingdoms is principally either 1. By birth whereof The last is and may be just and good 2. By the sword whereof The second is so without question but 3. By choice whereof The first is most just and so best of all For 1. The best right whereby the Patriarehs and all the rest of the posterity of 1. The best right without contradiction is by inheritance Gen. 4. 7. Gen. 25. 31. Adam injoyed their royalty was that which God hath appointed that is the right of primogeniture whereby the elder was by the law of nature to reign and rule over the younger as God saith unto Cain though he was never so wicked an hypocrite unto thee shall be the desire of thy brother and thou shalt rule over him though he was never so godly and syncere a server of God which made Jacob so earnestly desirous to purchase the birth-right or the right of primogeniture from his bâ—other And 2. When the rightful kings became with Nimrod to be unjust Tyrants 2. The right by conquest is a just and a good right then God that is not tyed to his Vicegerent any longer then he pleaseth but hath right and power Paramount to translate the rule and transfer the dominion of his People to whom he will hath oftentimes thrown down the mighty Psal 89. 44. So the Israelites enjoyed the kingdome of Canaan and David the
territoâ—ies of them that he subdued c. Esdras 1. 2. Esay 45. 1 2. Dan. 2. c 4. from their seat and given away their crownes and kingdomes unto others that were more humble and meek or some other way â—itter to effect his divine purpose as he did the kingdom of Saul unto David and Belshazzar's unto Cyrâ—s and this he doth most commonly by the power of the sword when the Conquerour shall make his strength to become the Law of justice and his ability to hold it to become his right of enjoying it for so he gave the Kingdoms of the earth to Cyrus Alexander Augustus and the like Kings and Emperours that had no other right to their Dominions but what they purchased with the edg of their swords which notwithstanding must needs be a very good right as the same cometh from God which is the God of war and giveth the victory unto Kings when as the Poet saith Psal 144. 10. Victrix causa Deo placuit And he deposeth his Vicegerents and translateth the government of their Kingdomes as he seeth cause and to whom he pleaseth 3. When either the Kings neglected their duty and omitted the care of 3. The right of elective kings and how they came to be elected their People so far as that the People knew not that they had any Kings or who had any right to be their Kings or upon the incursion of invading Foes the Nations being exceedingly multiplied and having no Prince to protect them did change the orderly course of right belonging unto the first-born which their rude and salvage course of life had obâ—â—â—erated from their minds unto the election and choice of whom they thought the better and the abler men to expel â—heir enemies and to maintain justice among themselves so the Medes being oppressed with the insolencies and rapines of enemies and the greater man said it cannot be that in this corruption and lewdness of manners we shall long enjoy our Countrey and therefore 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let us appoint over us a King that our Land may be Herodot lib. 1. governed by good Lawes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And we turning our selves to our own affairs need not be oppressed by the rage and violence of the lawless and finding by their former experience of him that Deâ—â—ces was the justest man amongst them they â—hose him for his equity to be their King which is the first elective King that I do read of and Câ—â—ero saith Mihi quidem non apud Medos sâ—lùm sed â—tiam â—pud majorâ—s nostros Cicero in Oâ—â—ic pag. 322. justitiae fruendae causâ videntur olim benè morati râ—gâ—â— censâ—tuti even as Justin said before And when the People do thus make choice of their King it is most true which Roffensis and our most learned Divines do say that Licet Rossensis de potestate Papae fol. 283. communicatio potestatis quandoque sit per consensum hominum potestas tamen ipsa immediatè est à Deo cujus est potestas though the power be sometimes conferred by the consent of menâ— yet it is immâ—diately given from God whose power it is Et communitas nihil sui confert regibus saith Spalat nisi ad Spalat tem 2. 529. summum personam determinet potiùs personam applicat divinae potestati quà m divinam potestatem personae it à Winton Resp ad Matth. Tort. â—ol 384. saith Christâ— Domini non Christi pâ—puli â—â—nt But as their justice and goodness moved the People to exalt them to this Why kings were rejected by the people height of Dignity so either their own tyranny when change of place did change their manners or their Peoples inconstanâ—y that are never long pleased with their governours caused them to be deposed again and many times to be murdered by those hands that exalted them Then the People perceiving the manifold evils that slow from the want of How the Aristocracy and Democracy issued out of Monarchy government do erect other governments unto themselves and rather then they will endure the miserable effects of an Anarchy they resign their hurtfull liberty and their total power sometimes into the hands of â—â—w of the best of the flock which we call Aristocracy or optimacy and sometimes into the hands of many which we call Democracy or a popular state In all which Elections of Magistrates and resignations of the Peoples power voluntarily to the hands Each form of government lawfull of their governours call them what you will Senate Consuls Duke Prince or King thougâ— thoug I dare not any way reject any of them as a forme utterly disallowed and condemned of God yet comparing them together I dare boldly Democracy the worst kinde of Government say the farther men go from God's first institution the more corruption we shall finde in them and therefore it must needs follow that Democracy is the next degree to Anarchy and Aristocracy far worse then Monarchy for though it may seem very unreasonable that one man should have all the power toto liber in orbe Solus Caesar â—rit And many plausible reasons may be alleadged for the rule of the Nobles or of Inter partes plebemque certamina exercere modâ— turbulenti tribuni modò consules praevalidi in urbe ac foro tentamenta civilium bellorum mâ—x è plebe infiâ—a C. Marius nobilium saevissimus L. Sylla victam armis libertatem in dominationem verterunt Tac. l. 2. hist P. 16. usque 28. Prov. 28. 2. Ecclesiast 10. 16. Aug. de l. arbit l. 1. c. 6. the People yet the experience that the Roman State had in those miserable Civill Wars that so frequently and so extremely afflicted them after they had put down their Kings as when Caâ—â—s Marius the meanest of the Commonalty and Lucius Sylla the cruellest of all the Nobility destroyed their liberty and rooted out all property by their Civill faction and the assistance of an illegal Militia and a multitude of unruly voluntiers and the fatal miscarriages of many businesses and the bad successes of their Armies when both the Consuls went forth Generals together with the want of unity secrecy and expedition which cannot be so well preserved amongst many do sufficienty shew how defective these Governments are and how far beneath the excellency of Monarchy as it is most fully pâ—oved in the unlawfullness of Subjects taking up armes against their Soveraigne and more especially by the wisest of men that tells us plainly that for the transgressions of a Land many are the Princes thereof but by a man of understanding and knowledg the State thereof shall be prolonged and in another place he crieth Wo to that land whose king is but a childe either in knowledg or in years for that during his infancy and the want of ability the government will be managed by many others which can produce nothing else but woes to that Common-wealth and therefore
to have their own wills them but whom themselves will choose and their choice cannot long satisfie their mindes but as the Jews received Christ into Jerusalem with the joyfull acclamation of Hosanna and yet the next day had the malicious cry of Crucifige so the least distaste makes them greedy of a new change such is the nature of the People But though I said before the election of our chiefe Governours may for many respects be approved of God among some States yet I hope by this that I have set down it is most apparent unto all men contrary to the tenet of our Anabaptisticall Sectaries that the hereditary succession of Kings to govern God's People is their indubitable right and the immediate prime principal Ordinance of God therefore it concerns every man as much as his soul is worth to examine seriously whether to fight against their own King be not to resist the Ordinance of God for which God threatneth no less punishment then damnation from which Machiavel cannot preserve us nor any policy of State procure a dispensation CHAP IV. Sheweth what we should not do and what we should do for the King the Rebels transgressing in all those how the Israelites honoured their persecuting King in Egypt how they behaved themselves under Artaxerxes Ahashuerus and under all their own Kings of Israel and how our Kings are of the like institution with the Kings of Israel proved in the chiefest respects at large and therefore to have the like honour and obedience AS every lawfull King is to be truly honoured in regard of God's Ordinance 2. All kings are to be honoured in respect of God's precept considered two wayes 1. What we should not do so likewise in respect of God's precept which commandeth us to honour the King and this duty is so often inculcated and so fully laid upon us in the holy Scripture that I scarce know any duty towards man so much pressed and so plainly expressed as this is 1. Negatively what we should not do to deprive him of his Honour 2. Affirmatively what we should do to manifest and magnifie this Honour towards him for 1. Our very thoughts words and works are imprisoned and chained up in the linkes of God's strictest prohibition that they should no wayes peeep forth to produce the least dishonour unto our King for 1. The Spirit of God by the mouth of the wisest of men commands us 1. To think no ill of the King Curse not the King no not in thy thought Eccles 10. 30. to think no ill of the King let the King be what he will the precept is without restriction you must think no ill that is you must not intend or purpose in your thoughts to do the least ill office or disparagement to the King that ruleth over you be the same King virtuous or vitious milde or cruell good or bad this is the sense of the Holy Ghost For as the childe with Cham shall become accursed if he doth but dishonour and despise his wicked father or his father in his wickedness whom in all duty he ought to reverence so the Subject shall be liable to Gods vengeance if his heaâ—t shall inâ—end the least ill to his most tyrannicall King 2. The same Spirit saith Thou shalt not revile the Gods that is the Judges of 2. To say no ill of the King Exod 22. 28. Act 23. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3. To do no hurt to the King Psal 105. 15. 1 Sam. 24 4 5. the Land nor curse that is in â—aint Pauls phrase speak evill of the Ruler of the people and what can be more evill then to bely his Religion to traduce his Government and to make so faithfull a Christian King as faithless as a Cretan which is commonly broached by the Rebels and Preached by their seditious Teachers 3. The great Jehovah gives this peremptory charge to all Subjects saying Touch not mine Anointed which is the least indignity that may be and therefore Davids heart smote him when he did but cut off the lap of Sauls garment What then can be said for them that draw their swords and shoot their Cannons to take away the life of Gods Anointed which is the greatest mischiefe they can do I beleive no distinction can blinde the judgment of Almighty God but his revengefull hand will finde them out that so maliâ—iously transgress 2. What we should do to honour the King Eccles 8. 2. 1. To observe the kings commands his precepts and think by their subtilty to escape his punishments 2. The Scriptures do positively and plainly command us to shew all honour unto our King â—or 1. Solomon saith I counsell thee to keep the Kings commandment or as the phrase imports to observe the mouth of the King that is not onely his written law but also his verball commands and that in regard of the oath of God that is in respect of thy Religion or the solemne vow which thou madest at thine initiation and incorporation into Gods Church to obey all the precepts of God whereof this is one to honour and obey the King or else that oath of â—â— si religio tollitur nulla no bis cum coelo ratio est Lactant Inst l. 3. c. 10. allegiance and fidelity which thou hast sworn unto thy King in the presence and with the approbation of thy God which certainly will plague all perjurers and take revenge on them that take his name in vain which is the infallible and therefore most miserable condition of all the perjured Rebels of this Kingdom For if moral honesty teacheth us to keep our promises yea though it were to our own hindrance then much more should Christianity teach us to observe our deliberate and solemn oathes whose violation can bear none other fruit then the heavy censure of God's fearful indignation But when the prevalent faction took a solemn Oath and Protestation to defend all the Privileges of Parliament and the Rights of the Subjects and then presently forgetting their oath and forsaking their saith by throwing the Bishops out of the House of Peers which all men knew to be a singular Priviledge How the prevalent Faction of the Parliament forâ—wore themselves 2. To obey the kings commandements Josh 1. 18. * Quia in talibus non obedientes mortaliter peccanâ— nisi foreâ— illud quod praecipitur contra praeceptum Dei vel in sa lutis dispendium Angel summa verb. obedientia 3 To give the king no just cause of anger Prov. 2. 2. The Rebels have given him cause enough to be provoked 4. To speak reverently to the king and of the king Eccles 8. 4. and the House of Lords acknowledged to be the indubitable right of the Bishops and their doctrine being to dispence with all oaths for the furtherance of the cause it is no wonder they falsifie all oaths that they have made unto the King 2. The people said unto Joshua Whosoever rebelleth against thy commandment
and will not hearken to the words of thy mouth in all that thou commandest he shall be put to death surely this was an absolute government and though martial yet most excellent to keep the people within the bounds of their obedience for they knew that where rebellion is permitted there can be no good performance of any duty and it may be a good lesson for all the higher powers not to be too clement which is the incouragement of Rebels to most obstinate trayterous and rebellious Subjects who daring not to stir under rigid Tyrants do kick with their heeles against the most pious Princes and therefore my soul wisheth not out of any desire of bloud but from my love to peace that this rule were well observed Whosoever rebelleth against thy commandment he shall be put to death * 3. The wisest of all Kings but the King of Kings saith The fear of a King is as the roaring of a Lion who so provoketh him to anger sinneth against his own soul And I believe that the taking up of Armes by the Subjects against their own King that never wronged them and the seeking to take away his life and the life of his most faithful servants is cause enough to provoke any King to anger if he be not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 too Stoically given to abandon all passions and that anger should be like the roaring of a Lion to them that would pull out the Lions eyes and take away the Lions life 4. The King of Heaven saith of these earthly Kings That where the word of a King is there is power and who may say unto him what dost thou And Elihu demands Is it fit to say to a King thou art wicked or to Princes you are ungodly Truely if Elihu were now here he might hear many unfitter things said to our King by his own people and which is more strange by some Preachers for some of them have said but most maliciously and moâ—e falsely that he is a Papist he is the Traytor unwoâ—thy to reign unfit to live good God! do these men think God saith truth Where the word of a King is there is power that is to blast the conspiracies and to confound the spirits of all Rebels who shall one day finde it because the wrath of God at last will be awaked against Jerem. 27. 8. their treachery and to revenge their perjury by inabling the King to accomplish the same upon all that resist him as he promised to doe in the like case 5. The Israelites being in captivity under the King of Babylon were commanded 5. To pray for the king Ezra 6. 10. 1 Tim. 2. 1 2. to pray for the life of that Heathen King and for the life of his sons And Saint Paul exhorteth Timothy to make supplications prayers intercessions and giving of thanks for Kings and for all that are in authority and how do our men pray for our King in many Pulpits not at all and in some places for his oveâ—throw for the shortning of his life and the finishing of his dayes nullum sit in omine pondus and they give thanks indeed not for his good but for their own supposed good success against him thus they praevaricate and pervert the words of the Apostle to their own destruction when as the Prophet Psal 109. 6. saith Their prayers shall be turned into sin 6. To render all his dues unto him 6. Christ commandeth us to render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars that is as I shall more fully shew hereafter your inward duties of honour love reverence and the like and your outward debts tolls tribute custome c. and the Rebels render none unto him but take all from him and return His Arms to his destruction I might produce many other places and precepts of Holy Scripture to inforce this duty to honour the king but what will suffice him cui Roma parùm est Luke 16. 31. if they beleive not Moses neither will they believe if one should arise from the dead and if these things cannot move them then certainly all the world cannot remove them from their Wickedness Yet 3. Quia exempla movent plus quà m praecepta docent you shall finde this 3. All kings should be honoured by the example of all Nations 1 The Israelites 1 In Egypt Exod. 12 37. Exod. 1. 9. doctrine practised by the perpetual demeanour of all Nations For 1. If you looke upon the Children of Israel in the Land of Egypt it cannot be denyed but Pharaoh was a wicked king and exercised great cruelty and exceeding tyranny against Gods people yet Moses did not excite the Israelites to take arms against him though they were more in number being six hundred thousand men and abler for strength to make their party good then Pharoah was as the king himself confesseth but they contained themselves within the bounds of their Obedience and waited Gods leisure for their deliverance because they knew their patient suffering would more manifest their own piety and aggravate king Pharoah's obstinacy and especially magnify Gods glory then their undutiful rebelling could any ways illustrate the least of these 2. Davids demeanour towards Saul is most memorable for though as one 2. Under Saul The loyal Subjects belief p. 55. faith king Saul discovered in part the described manner of such a king as Samuel had foreshewed yet David and all his followers performed and observed the prescribed conditions that are approved by God in true Subjects never resisting never rebelling against his king though his king most unjustly persecuted him Samuel also when he had pronounced Sauls rejection yet did he 1 Sam. 15. never incite the people to Rebellion but wept and prayed for him and discharged all other duties which formerly he had shewed to be due unto him and Elias that had as good repute with the people and could as easily have stirred 3. Under Ahab up sedition as any of the seditious Preachers of this time yet did he never perswade the Subjects to withstand the illegal commands of a most wicked king 1 Reg. 21. 25. that as the Scripture testifieth had sold himself to work wickedness and became the more exceedingly sinful by the provocation of Jâ—zabel his most wicked wife and harlot but he honoured his Soveraignty and feared his Majesty when he fled away from his cruelty And because these are but particular presidents I will name you two observeable Two examples of the whole Nation under Heathen kings 1 Under Artaxerxes Ezra 1. 1. examples of the whole Nation 1. When Cyrus made a Decree and his Decree according to the Laws of the Medes and Persians should be unalterable that the Temple of Jerusalem should be re-edified and the adversaries of the Jews obtained a letter from Artaxerxes to prohibit them the people of God submitting themselves to the personal command of the king contrary to that unalterable Law of Cyrus pleaded neither the
goodness of the work nor the justness of the cause but yeilded to the kings will and ceased from their work until they obtained a new Licence in the second year of king Darius and if it be objected that they built the Temple in despite of those that hindered them with their sword in one hand and a trowel in the other it is rightly answered that having the kings leave to build it they might justly resist their enemies that did therein not onely shew their malice unto them but also resisted the will of the King 2. When Ahasâ—uerus to satisfie the unjust desire of his proud favorite had 2. Under Ahashuerus Hester 3. 10. wickedly decreed and most tyrannically destined all the Nation of the Jewes to a sudden death yet this dutiful people did not undutifully rebel and plead the King was seduced by evil counsel and misguided by proud Haman therefore nature teaching them vim vi pellere to stand upon their own defence they would not submit their necks to his unjust Decree but being versed in God's Lawes and unacquainted with these new devices they return to God and betake themselves to their prayers until God had put it into the Kings heart to Hester 8. 11. grant them leave to defend themselves and to sheath their swords in the bowels of their adversaries which is a most memorable example of most dutiful unresisting Subjects an example of such piety as would make our Land happy if our zealous generation were but acquainted with the like Religion But here I know what our Anabaptist Brownist and Puritan will say that The author of the Treatise of Monarchy p. 32. I build Castles in the air and lay down my frame without foundation because all Kings are not such as the Kings of Israel and Judah were as the Kings that God gave unto the Jews and prescribed special Laws both for the Kings to govern and the people to obey them but all other Nations have their own different and several Laws and Constitutions according to which Laws their Kings are tyed to rule and the Subjects bound to obey and no otherwise I answer that indeed it is granted there are several Constitutions of Royalties Henric. Stephan in libello de hac re contendit in omnes respub debere leges Hebraeorum tanquam ab ipso Deo profectas per consequens omnium optimas reduci in several Nations and there may be Regna Laconica conditional and provisional Kingdoms wherein perhaps upon a real breach of some exprest conditions some Magistrates like the Ephori may pronounce a forfeiture as well in the successive as in the elective Kingdoms because as one saith succession is not a new title to more right but a legal continuance of what was first gotten which I can no ways yield unto if you mean it of any Soveraign King because the name of a King doth not always denotate the Soveraign power as the Kings of Lacedaemon though so called yet had no regal authority and the Dictator for the time being and the Emperours afterwards had an absolute power though not the name of Kings for I say that such a government is not properly a regal government ordained by God but either an Aristocratical or Democratical government instituted by the people though approved by God for the welfare of the Common-wealth but as the Israelites desired a 1 Sam. 8. 4 20. King to judge them like all the Nations that is such a King as Aristotle describeth such as the Nations had intrusted with an absolute and full regal power as Sigonius sheweth so the Kings of the Nations if they be not like the Spartan Kings were and are like the Kings of Israel both in respect of their ordination from God by whom all Kings as wel of other Nations as of Israel do reign and of their full power and inviolable authority over the people which have no more dispensation to resist their Kings then the Jews had to resist theirs And therefore Valentinian though an elected Emperour yet when he was requested by his Electours to admit of an associate answered it was in your power Sozom. histor l 6. c. 6. Niceph hist l. 11. c. 1. to chuse me to be an Emperour but now after you have chosen me what you require is in my power not in you Vobis tanquam subditis competit parere mihi verò quae facienda sunt cogitare it becomes you to obey as Subjects and I am to consider what is fittest to be done And when the wife takes an husband there is a compact agreement and a solemn vow past in the presence of God that he shall love cherish and maintain The wiâ—e may not forsake her husband though he break his vow and neglect his duty her yet if he breaks this vow and neglects both to love and to cherish her she cannot renounce him she must not forsake him she may not follow after another and there is a greater marriage betwixt the King and his people therefore though as a wife they might have power to chuse him and in their choice to tye him to some conditions yet though he breaks them they have no more power to abdicate their King then the wife hath to renounce her husband nor so much because she may complain and call her husband before a competent Judge and produce witnesses against him whereas there can be no Judge betwixt the King and his people but onely God and no witnesses can be found on earth because it is against all Lawes and against all Reason that they which rise against their king should be both the witnesses against him and the Judges to condemn him or were it so that all other Kings have not the like constitution which the Scripture setteth down for the Kings of Israel yet I say that excepting some circumstantial Ceremonies in all real points the Laws of our Land are so far as men could make them in all things agreeable to the Scriptures in the constituting of our Kings according to the livelyest pattern of the Kings of Israel as it is well observed by the Authour of the Appeal to thy conscience An Appeal to thy conscience pag. 30. Our Kings of the like Institution to the kings of Israel 1. Respect Kings of England are kings by birth Proved 1. Reason in these four special respects For 1. In his Right to the Crown 2. In his Power and Authority 3. In his Charge and Duty 4. In the rendring of his Account 1. As the Kings of Israel were hereditary by succession and not elective unless there were an extraordinary and divine designation as in David Salomon Jehu so do the Kings of England obtain their Kingdoms by birth or hereditary succession as it appeareth 2. By the Oath of Allegiance used in every Leete that you shall be true and faithful to our Soveraign Lord King Charles and to his Heires 2. Because we owe our legeance to the King in
of England are accountable to none but to God 1. Because they have their Crown immediately from God who first gave it to the Conquerour through his sword and since to the succeeding kings by the ordinary means of hereditary succession 2. Because the Oath which he takes at his Coronation binds him onely before God who alone can both judge him and punish him if he forgets it 3. Because there is neither condition promise or limitation either in that 3 Reason Oath or in any other Covenant or compact that the king makes with the people either at his Coronation or at any other time that he should be accomptable or that they should question and censure him for any thing that he should do 4. Because the Testimony of many famous Lawyers justify the same truth 4 Reason for Bracton saith if the king refuse to do what is just satis erit ei ad poenam quòd Dominum expectet ultorem The Lord will be his avenger which will be punishment enough for him but of the kings grants and actiâ—ns nec privatae personae nec justiciarii debent disputare And Walsingham maketh mention of a Letter Bracton fol. 34. a. b. apud Lincol anno 1301. written from the Parliament to the Bishop of Rome wherein they say that certum directum Dominium à prima institutione regni Anglia ad Regem pertinuit the certain and direct Dominion of this Kingdom from the very first institution thereof hath belonged unto the King who by reason of the arbitrary or free prceminence of the royal dignity and custome observed in all ages ought not to answer before any Judge either Ecclesiastical or Secular Ergo neither before Ex l bera praeeminentia the Pope nor Parliament nor Presbytery 5. Because the constant custome and practice of this kingdom was ever such 5. Reason that no Parliament at any time sought to censure their king and either to depose him or to punish him for any of all his actions save onely those that were called in the troublesome and irregular times of our unfortunate Princes and were No legitimate and just Parliment did ever question the kings of England for their actions swayed by those that were the heads of the most powerful Faction to conclude most horrid and unjustifiable Acts to the very shame of their judicial authorities as those factious Parliaments in the times of Hen. 3. king John Rich. 2. and Hen. 4. and others whose acts in the judgment of all good authors are not to be drawn into examples when as they deposed their king for those pretended faults whereof not the worst of them but is fairly answered and all thirty three of them proved to be no way sufficient to depose him by that excellent Heningus c. 4. p. 93. Civilian Heningus Arnisaeus And therefore seeing the Institution of our kings is not onely by Gods Law but also by our own Laws Customs and practice thus agreeable to the Scripture kings they ought to be as sacred and as inviolable to us as the kings of Israel were to the Jews and as reverently honoured and obeyed by us as both the Apostles Saint Peter and Saint Paul advise us to honour and obey the king CHAP. V. Sheweth how the Heathens honoured their Kings how Christ exhibited all due honour unto Heathen and wicked Kings how he carried himself before Pilate and how all the good Primitive Christians behaved themselves towards their Heathen persecuting Emperours 2. WE finde that not onely the Jews that were the people of God a royal Priesthood that had the Oracles of God and therefore no wonder 2. The Heathens Persae quidem olim aliquid coeleste atque divinum in regibus inesse statuebant Osorde Instit regis l 4. p. 106. Justin l. 4 Herodot l. 8. What great respect men in former times did bear unto their kings that they were so conformable in their obedience to the will of God but the Gentiles also that knew not God knew this by the light of nature that they were bound to yield all honour unto their kings For Quintus Curtius tells us that the Persians had such a divine estimation and love unto their king that Alexander could not perswade them either for fear or reward to tell him where their king was gone or to reveale any of his intentions or to do any other thing that might any ways prejudice the life or the affairs of their king And Justin tell us that the Sicilians did bear so great a respect unto the last Will and Testament of Anaxilaus their deceased king that they disdain not to obey a slave whom he had appointed Regent during the minority of his son And Herodotus saith that when Xerxes fled from Greece in a vessel that was so ful of men of war that it was impossible for him to be saved without casting some part of them into the Sea he said O yee men of Persia let some among you testifie that he hath care of his King whose safety is in your disposition then the Nobility which accompanied him having adored him did cast themselves into the Sea till the vessel was unburthened and the King preserved And I fear these Pagans will rise in judgement to condemn our Nobility that seek the destruction of their King And the Macedonians had such a reverent opinion of their King that being foyled in war before they returned again to the battle they fetched their cradle wherein their young King lay and set him in the midst of the Camp as supposing Justin l. 7. that their former misfortune proceeded because they neglected to take with them the good augure of their King's presence And Boëmus Aubanus speaking of the Aegyptian Kings saith that they have so much good will and love from all men ut non solùm sacerdotibus sed etiam singulis Aegyptiis major Aubanus de Africa l. 1. p. 39. Reges divinos love genitos à love nutritos Homerus Hesiodus appellarunt regis quà m uxorum filiorúmque aâ—t aliorum principum salutis inesset cura that not onely the Priests but also the Aegyptians have a greater care of the safety of their King then of their wives or children or any other Princes of the Land And the same Author describing the manner how the Tartars create their King saith the Princes Dukes Barons and all the people meet then they place him that is to be their King on a Throne of gold and prostrating themselves upon the ground they cry with an unanimous and loud voice Rogamus volumus praecipimus ut domineris nobis We intreat you and beseech you to reign over us and he answereth If you would have this of me it is necessary that you should be obedient to do whatsoever I shall command you when I call you to come whethersoever I shall send you to go whomsoever I shall command you to kill to do it immediately without fear and to commit
as all were not Law-makers yet all of them preserved Religion as the onely preservation of their Lawes and the happinesse of their Kingdomes which they saw could not continue without Religion But 2. The wisedom of our grave Prelates and the learning of our religioâ—s Clergie having stopped the course of this violent stream and hindred the translation 2. In the Parliament of this right of Kings unto their new-born Presbytery and late erected Synods There sprang up another generation out of the dregs of the former that because they would be sure to be bad enough out of their envy unto Kings and malice unto the Church that the one doth not advance then unworthyness and the other doth not bear with undutifullness will needs transfer this right of ruling God's Church unto a Parliament of Lay-men the King shall be denuded of what God hath given him and the people shall be endued with what God and all good men have ever denyed them I deny not but the Parliament men as they are most noble and worthy Gentlemen so many of them may be very learned and not a few of them most religious and I honour the Parliament rightly discharging their duties as much as their modesty can desire or their merit deserve neither do I gain say but as they are pious men and the greatest Council of our King so they may propose things and request such and such Lawes to be enacted such abuses to be redressed and such a reformation to be effected as they think befitting for Gods Church but for Aaron's seed and the Tribe of Levi to be directed and commanded out of the Parliament Hugo de Sancto Vict. lâ—b 2. de sacr â—id par 2. cap 3. Laicis Christianis fidelibus terrena â—ossidere conceditur clericis verò tantùm spiritualia commiâ—tuntur quae a tem illa spiritualia sunt subjiciâ— c 5. diâ—eâ—s omnis ecclesiastica â—dministratio in trâ—bus consislit in sacramentis in ordinibus iâ— praeceptis Ergo Laâ—ci nihâ—l juris habent in leâ—ibus prâ—ceptis condendit ecclesiastâ—cis chair how to perform the service of the Tabernacle and for Lay men to determine the Articles of faith to make Canons for Church men to condemn heresies and define verities and to have the chief power for the government of Gods Church as our Faction now challengeth and their Preachers ascribe unto them is such a violation of the right of Kings such a derogation to the Clergy and so prejudicial to the Church of Christ as I never â—ound the like usurpation of this right to the eradication of the true Religion in any age for seeing that as the Proverb goeth Quod medâ—corum est promittunt medici tractant fabrilia fabri what Papist or Atheist will be ever converted to profess that religion which shall be truly what now they alleadge falsly unto us a Parliamentary religion or a religion made by Lay-men with the advice of a few that they choose â— faece Cleri I must seriously profess what I have often bewayled to see Nadab and Abihu offering strange fires upon God's Altar to see the sacred offices of the Priests so presumptuously usurped by the Laity and to see the children of the Church nay the servants of the Church to prescribe Lawes unto their Masters and â— did ever fear it to be an argument not onely of a corrupted but also of a decaying State when Moses chaire should be set in the Parliament House and the Doctours of the Church should never sit thereon therefore I wish that the Ark may be brought back from the Philistines and restored to the Priests to be placed in Shilo where it should be and that the care of the Ark which king David undertook may not be taken out of his hands by his people but that he may have the honour of that service which God hath imposed upon him For 3. As nothing is dearer to understanding righteous and religious Kings 3. Opinion Of the Orthodox Quia religio est ex potioribus reipublicae parlibus ut ait Aristoâ— Polit. l. 7 c. 8. ipsa soâ—â— custodit hominum inter se socieâ—ates ut ait Lactant. de ira Dei cap. 12. Peritura Troja perdidit primâ—m Deos. Therefore the Tyrians chayned their gods lest iâ— they fled they should be destroyed then the encrease and maintenance of true religion and the inlargement of the Church of Christ throughout all their Dominions so they have at all times imployed their studies to this end because it is an infallible maxime even among the Politicians that the prâ—sperity of any Kingdome flourisheth for no longer time then the care of Religion and the prâ—sperity of the Church is maintained by them among their people as we see Troy was soon lost when they lost their Palladium so it is the truest sâ—gn of a declining and a decaying State to see the Clergy despised and religion disgraced and therefore the provisiâ—n for the safety of the Church the publick injoying of the word of God the form of Service the manner of Government and the honour and maintenance of the Clergy are all the duties of a most Christian King which the King of Heaven hath imposed upon him for the happiness and prâ—sperity of his Kingdom and whosoever derive the authority of this charge either in a blinde obedience to the See of Rome as the Jesâ—ites do or out of their too much zeal and affection to a new Consistory as the late Presbyterians did oâ— to a Lay Parliament as our upstart Anabaptists aad Brownists do are most unjust usurpers of the Kings Right which is not onely ascribed unto him and warranted by the Word of God but is also confirmed to the Princes of this Land by several Acts of Parliament to have the supremacy in all causes and over all persons as well in the Ecclesiastical as in the Civil government which being so they â—â—â—xempted thereby from all inforcement of any domestical or forraign power and freed from the penalties of all those Laws both Ecclesiastical and civil whereunto all their Subjects Clergy and Laity and all inferiour Q Curtius de rebus Alexand. Joh. Bedâ— p. 22 23. persons and the superiour Nobility within their Kingdomes are obliged by our Laws and Statutes as hereafter I shall more fully declare Therefore it behoveth all Kings and especially our King at this time seriously to consider what prejudice they shall create unto themselves and their just authority if they should yeild themselves inferiour to their Subjects aggregativè or reprasentativè or how you will or liable to the penal Laws for so they may be soon dethroned by the unstable affection and weak judgment of discontented people or subject to the jurisdiction of Lay Elders and the excommunication of a tyrannous Consistory who denouncing him tanquam Ethnicum Matth. 18. 17. may soon add a stranger shall not raign over thee and so depose him Deut. 17. 15. from all
government For seeing all attempts are most violent that have their beginning and strength from zeal unto Religion be the same true or false and from the false most of all and those are ever the most dangerous whose ringleaders are most base as the servile War under Spartacus was most pernicious unto How necessary it is for Kings to retain their just rights in their hands the Romans there can be nothing of greater use or more profitable either for the safety of the King the peace of the Church and the quiet state of the Kingdome then for the Prince the King to retain the Militia and to keep that power and authority which the Laws of God and of our Land have granted to and intailed upon him in his own hands unclipped and unshaken for when the multitude shall be unbridled and the rights of the Kings are brandished in their hands we shall assuredly taste and I fear in too great a measure as experience now sheweth of those miserable evils which uncontrouled ignorance furious zeal false hypocricy and the merciless cruelty of the giddy-headed people and discontented Peeres shall bring upon us and our Prince But to make it manifest unto the World what power and authority God hath granted unto Kings for the government of the Church and the preservation of his true Religion we finde them the worst men at all times and in all places that mislike their Government and reject their authority and we see those Churches most happy and those Kingdoms most flourishing which God hath The Kings that maintain true religion make their Kingdoms happy blessed with religious Kings as the State of the Church of Judaea makes it plain when David Ezechias Jâ—sias and the other virtuous Kings restored the Religion and purified that Service which the idolatry of others their predeâ—â—ssours had corrupted and we know that as Moses * Exod. 14 31. Num. 12. 7 8 Deut. 34. 5 Josh 1. 1 2. so kings are called the servants of God in a more special manner then all others are that is not onely because they serve the Lord in the Government of the Common wealth but especially because he vouchsafeth to use their service for the advancement of his Church and the honour of his Son Christ here on earth or to distribute their duties more particularly we know the Lord exspecteth and so requireth a double service from every Christian king 1. The one common with all others to serve him as they are his creatures and Christians and therefore to serve him as all other The double service of all Christian kings Christians are bound to do 2. The other proper and peculiar to them alone to serve him as they are Kings and Princes In the first respect they are no more priviledged to offend then other men 1. As they are Christians but they are tyed to the same obedience of Gods â—aws and are obliged to performe as many virtuous actions and to abstain from all vices as well as any other of their Subjects and if they fail in either point they shall be called to the same account and shall be judged with the same severity as the meanest of their people and therefore Be wise O ye Kings be learned ye that are Judges of the earth Serve the Lord in fear and rejoyce unto him with reverenâ—e Psal 2. 10. for with God there is no respect of persons but if they do offend he will binde Kings in fetters and their Nobles with linkes of irâ—n and we dare Rom. 2. 11. Psal 149. 8. not flatter you to give you the least liberty to neglecâ—â—â— strict service of the great God 2. As they are Christian king and that is twofold In the second respect the service of all Christian kings and princes hath as I told you before these two parts For 1. To protect the true religion and to govern the Church of Christ 2. To preserve peace and to govern the Common wealth 1. To protect the Church Aug cont lit petil l. 2. Opâ—at Mâ—livit lib. 3. 1. It is true indeed that the Donatists of old the grand fathers of our new Sectaries were wont to say Qâ—id Imperatori cum Ecclesia What have we to do with the Emperour or what hath the Emperour to do with the Church but to this Optatus answereth that Ille solito furore accensâ—s in haec verba prorupit Donatus out of his accustomed madness burst forth into these mad termes for Prima â—mnium in republ functionum est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist l. 7. c. 8. Arist Polit. l. 3. c. 10. it is a duty that lyeth upon all Princes because all both Christians and Pagans ought to be religious as I shewed to you before not onely to be devout but also to be the means to make all their Subjects so far as they can to become devoted to Gods service as the practice of those Heathens that had no other guide of their actions then the light of nature doth make it plain for Aristotle saith that Quae ad Deorum cultum pertinent commissa sunt regibus magistratibus those things that pertain unto the worship of the Gods are committed to the care of Kings and civil Magistrates and whatsoever their religion was as indeed it was but meere superstition yet because Superstition and Religion hoâ— habent commune do this in common Vt faciant animos humiles formidiâ—e divûm Therefore to make men better the more humble and more dutiful the transgression thereof was deemed worthy to receive punishment among the Pagans and that punishment was appointed by them that had the principal authority to govern the Common-wealth as the Athenian Magistrates condemned Socrates though he was a man wiser then themselves yet as they conceived very faulty for his irreligion and derision of their adored gods And Tiberius The chief Magistrates of the Heathens had the charge of Religion would set up Christ among the Romane gods though the act added no honour unto Christ without the authority and against the will of the Senate to shew that the care of religion belonged unto the Emperour or chief Magistrate and therefore as the Lord commanded the kings of Israel to write a copy of his Law in a boâ—ke and to take heed to all the words of that Law for to do them that is not onely as a private person for so every man was not to write it but Deut. 17. 18 19. as King to reduce others to the obedience thereof so the examples of the best kings both of Israel and Juda and of the best Christian Emperours do make this plain unto us for Joshâ—a caused all Israel to put away the strange gods Josh 24. 23. The care of the good kings of the Jews to preserve the true religion that were among them and to incline their hearts unto the Lord God of Israel Manasses after his return from Babylon tooke away the strange Gods
of Eâ—tyches Constantine the Fiâ—th called the sixth Synod against the Monothelites and so did many others in the like cases God having fully granted this right and autho ity unto them for their better information in any point of religion and the goverment of the Church And therefore they that deny this power unto Kings or assume this authority unto themselves whether Popes or Parliament out of the Kings hand they may as well take his eyes out of his head because this is one of the best helps that God hath left unto Kings to assist and direct them in the chiefest part of The unparallel'd presumption of the Faction to call a Synod without the king their royal government how presumptuous then and injurious unto our King and prejudicial to the Church of Christ was the factiâ—n of this Parliament without the Kings leave and contrary to his command to undertake the nomination of such a pack of Schismatical Divines for such a Synod as might finally determine such points of faith and discipline as themselves best liked of let all the Christian world that as yet never saw the like president be the Judge and tell us what shall be the religion of that Church where the Devil shall have the power to prompt worldlings to nominate his prime Chaplains Socinians Brownists Anabaptists and the refuse of all the refractory Clergy that seem The quality of the Synodical men learned in nothing but in the contradiction of learning and justifying Rebellion against their King and the Church to compose the Articles of our saith and to frame a new government of our Church I am even ashamed that so glorious a Kingdom should ever breed so base a Faction that durst ever presume to be so audacious and I am sorry that I should be so unhappy to live to see such an unparallel'd boldness in any Clergy that the like cannot be found in any Ecclesiastical History from the first birth of Christ's Church to this very day unless our Sectaries can produce it from some of the Vtopian Kingdoms that are so far South ward In terra incognita beyond the Torrid Zone that we whose zeal is not so fiery but are of the colder spirits could not yet perfectly learn the true method of their Anarchical government or if our Lawyers can shew us the like president that ever Parliament called a Synod contrary to the King's Proclamation I shall rest beholding to them produce it if they can Credat Judaeus apella non ego The third thing requisite to a King for the preservation of true religion and 3. An authority and power to guide the Church and to uphold the true religion the government of God's Church is power and authority to defent it for though the Prince should be never so religious never so desirous to defend the faith and never so well able in his understanding and so well furnished with knowledge to set down what Service and Ceremonies should be used yet if he hath not power and ability which do arise from his right and just authority to do it and to put the same in execution all the rest are but fruitless embryoes like those potentials that are never reduced into actions or like the grass upon Ps 1â—9 6. the house top that withereth before it be plucked up But to let you see that Kings and Princes should have this power and authority in all Ecclesiastical causes and over all Ecclesiastical persons we finde that all Ages and all Lawes have warranted them to do the same for Solomon displaced Abiathar and placed Sadoâ— in his room Jeremy's case was heard by the King 1. Reg. 2. 27. 35. Jerem. 26. How all kings and Emperors exercised this power oâ—er the Church of Israel Theodoâ—â—â—s and Valentâ—nian made a Decree that all those should be deposed which were infected with the impiâ—ty of Nestorius and Justinian deposed Sylverius and Vigilius and many oâ—her Kings and Emperours did the like and not onely the Law of God whereof the King is the prime keeper and the keeper of both Tables but also the Statutes of our Land do give unto our King the nomination of Bishops and some other elective dignities in the Church the â—ustody of the Bishops Temporalties during the vacation the Patronage Paramount or right to present by the last lapse and many other furtherances and preservatives of religion are in terminis terminantibus deputed by our Lawes unto the King and for his care and charge thereof they have setled upon him our first Fruits Tenths Subsidies and all other contributions of the Ecclesiastical persons which the Pope received while he usurped the government of this Church these things being due to him that had the supreme power for the government And therefore seeing the examples of all good Kings in the Old Testament and of the Christian Kings and Emperours in the New Testament and all Lawes both of God and man excepting those Lawes of the Pontificials that are made against the Law of God and all Divines excepting the Cassian de Incarn l. 1. c. 6. Jesuites and their sworn Brethren the Presbyterians do most justly ascribe this right and power unto Kings I may truly say with Cassianus that there is no place of audience left for them by whom obedience is not yielded to that which all have agreed upon nor any excuse for those Subjects that assist not their Soveraign to inable him to discharge this great charge that is laid upon him What then shall we say to them that pull this power and tear this prerogative out of the King's hand and place it in the hands of mad men as the Prophet epithets the madness of the people I or that furious Knox belched forth Psal 65. 7. How the Disciplinarians rob the king of this right Knox to the Commonalty fol. 49. 50 55. this unsavory Doctrine That the Commonalty may lawfully require of their King to have true Preachers and if he be negligent they themselves may justly provide them maintain them defend them against all that oppose them and detain the profits of the Church Livings from the other sort of Ministers a point fully practised by the English Scotizers of these dayes and as if this Doctrine were not seditious enough and abundantly sufficient to move Rebellion Goodman publisheth that horrible tenet unto the world that it is lawful to kill wicked Kings which most dangerous and more damnable Doctrine Dean Whittingham affirmeth to be the tenet of the best and most learned of them that were our Disciplinarians But when as true Religion doth command us to obey our Kings whatsoever their Religion is aut agendo aut patiendo either in suffering with patience whatsoever What true religion teacheth us they do impose or in doing with obedience whatsoever they do command Religion can be no warrant for those actions which must remain as the everlasting blemishes of that Religion which either commanded or approved of
their doing I am sure all wise men wil detest these Doctrines of Devils and seeing it is an infallible rule that good deserveth then to be accounted evil when it ceaseth to be well done it is apparent that it is no more lawful for private and inferiour persons to usurp the Princes power and violently to remove Idolatry or to cause any Reformation then it is for the Church of Rome by invasion or treason to establish the Doctrine of that See in this or any other forraign kingdome because both are performed by the like usurped authority Yet these were the opinions and practises of former times when Buchanan The old Disciplinarians Knox Cartwright Goodman Gilby Penry Fenner Martin Travers Throgmorton Philips Nichols and the rest of those introducers of Outlandish and Genevian Discipline first broached these uncouth and unsufferable tenets in our Land in the Realm of England and Scotland and truely if their opinions had not dispersed themselves like poison throughout all the veines of this Kingdom and infected many of our Nobility and as many of the greatest Cities of this Kingdome as it appeareth by this late unparallel'd rebellion these and the rest of the trayterous authours of those unsavory books which they published and those damnable tenets which they most ignorantly held and maliciously taught unto the people should have slept in silence their hallowed and sanctified Treason should have remained untouched and their memorial should have perished with them But seeing as Saint Chrysostome saith of the Hereticks of his time that although in age they were younger yet in malice they were equal to the antient Our rebellious Sectaries far worse then all the former Disciplinarians Hereticks and as the brood of Serpents though they are of less stature yet in their poyson no less dangerous then their dammes so no more have our new Sectaries our upstart Anabaptists any less wickedness then their first begetters nay we finde it true that as the Poet saith Aetas parentum pejor avis Tulit nos nequiores These young cubbs prove worse then the old foxes for if you compare the Wheles with the wolves our latter Schismaticks with their former Masters I doubt not but you shall finde less learning and more villany less honesty and more subtilty hypocrisy and treachery in Doctor Burges Master Marshal Case Goodwin Burrowes Calamy Perne Hill Cheynel and the rest of our giddy-headed Incendiaries then can be found in all the seditious Pamphlets of the former Disciplinarians or of them that were hanged as Penry for their treasons for these men do not onely as Sidonius saith of the like apertè invidere abjectè Sidon lib. epist fingere serviliter superbire openly envy the state of the Bishops basely forge lyes against them and servilely swel with the pride of their own conceited sanctity and apparent ignorance but they have also most impudently even in their pulpits slandered the footsteps of Gods Anointed and so brought the abomination of their transgression to stand in the holy place they haue with Achan troubled Israel and tormented the whole Land yea these three Kingdomes England Scotland and Ireland and for inciting provoking and incouraging simple ignorant poore For which their intolerable villanies If I be not deceived in my judgement they of all others above all the Rebels in the kingdom deserve the greatest and severest punishment God of Heaven give them the grace to repent discontented and seditious Secturies to be Rebels and Traytors against their own most gracious King they have not onely with Jerusalem justified Samaria Sodome and Gomorrah but they have justified all the Samaritanes all the Sodomites all the Schismaticks Hereticks Rebels and Traytors Papists and Atheists and all that went before them Judas himself in many circumstances not excepted and that which makes their doings the more evil and the more exceedingly wicked is that they make Religion to be the warrant for their evil doings the pack-horse to carry and the 〈◊〉 to cover all their treacheries and thereby they drew the greater multitudes of poore Zelots to be their followers And therefore seeing it is not onely the honour but also the duty as of all other Kings so likewise of our King to be as the Princes of our Land are justly stiled the Defenders of the Faith and that not only in regard of enemies abroad but also in respect of those far worse enemies which desire alteration at home it behoves the King to looke to these home-bred enemies of the Church and seeing the king though never so willing for his piety and religion never so What Gods faithful servants and the kings loyal Subjects must do in these times 1. To justifie the kings right able for his knowledge and understanding yet without strength and power to effect what he desires cannot defend the faith and maintain the true Religion from the violence of Sectaries and Traytors within his kingdome it hehoves us all to do these two things 2. To justifie the kings 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 his authority and right to the supreme Governour and defender of the Chuch and of Gods true religion and service both in respect of Doctrine and Discipline and that none else Pope or Parliament hath any power at all herein but what they have derivately from him which I hope we have sufficiently proved 2. To submit our selves unto our king and to add our strength force and 2. To assist Him against the Rebels power to inable his power to discharge this duty against all the Innovators of our Religion and the enemies of our peace for the honour of God and the happiness of this Church and Common-wealth for that power which is called the Kings power and is granted and given to him of God is not onely that Heroick virtue of fortitude which God planteth in the hearts of most noble Princes as he hath most graciously done it in abundant measure in our most gracious king but it is the collected and united power and strength of all his Subjects which the Lord hath commanded us to joyn and submit it for the assistance of the kings power against all those that shall oppose it and if we refuse or neglect the same then questionless whatsoever mischief idolatry barbarity or superstition shall take root in the Church and whatsoeuer oppression and wickedness shall impair the Common-wealth Heaven will free His Majesty and the wrath of God in no smal measure must undoubtedly light upon us and our posterity even as Debora saith of them that refused to assist Barac against his enemies Curse ye Meroz curse bitterly the Inhabitants thereof because they Jud. 5. 23. came not forth to helpe the Lord against the mighty CHAP. VIII Sheweth it is the right of Kings to make Ecclesiastical Lawes and Canons proved by many authorities and examples that the good Kings and Emperours made such Laws by the advice of their Bishops and Clergy and not of their Lay
dominion they deny not because they must do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the son of man doth it so the manner of their rule 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Kings of the Nations rule with tyranny he prohibiteth but as the servants of Christ ought to rule with charity not with austerity with humility and not with insolencie he denieth not and so he denieth not the name of Lord as it is a title of honour and reverence given unto them by the King and ascribed by their people but he forbiddeth an ambitious aspiring to it and a proud carriage and deportment in it yet it may be so with you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it is with the son of man whom no man can exceed in humility and yet in his greatest humility he saith ye call me 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Master and Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and ye say well for so I am John 13. 13. And therefore he forbad not this title no otherwise then he forbad them to be Fathers Doctors and Masters and I hope you will confess he doth not inhibit the Children to call them â—athers that begat them nor forbid us to call them Doctors unto whom the Lord himselfe hath given the name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Doctors in his Church Ephes 4. 11. otherwise we must know why S. Paul doth call himselfe the Doctor of the Gentiles 1 Tim. 2. 7. and why doth the Law command us to honour our Father and our Mother if we may call no man Father But Christ coming not to diminish the power of Princes nor to make it unlawful for Christian Kings to honour his servants which the heathen Princes did to the servants of God as Nebuchadnezzar preferred Daniel among the Babylonians and Darius advanced Mordecai among the Persians nor to deny that honour unto his servants which their own honest demerits and the bounty of their gracious Princes do confer upon them it is apparent that it is not What Christ forbiddeth to his Ministers the condition of these names but the ambition of these titles and the abuse of their authority is forbidden by our Saviour Christ For as Elias and Elizâ—us in the old Testament suffered themselves with no breach of humility to be called Lords as where Abdias a great officer of King Ahab 3 Reg. 18. 1. saith art not thou my Lord Elias and the Shunamite called Elizaeus Lord 4 Reg. 4. 16. So in the new Testament Paul and Barnabas that rent their cloaths when the people ascribed unto them more then humane honour yet refused not the name of Lords when it was given them by the Act. 16. 30. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 keeper of the prison that said Lords what shall I do to be saved which title certainly they would never have endured if this honour might not be yielded and this title received by the Ministers of the Gospel and Saint Peter tells us that Christian women if they imitate Sarah that obeyed Abraham * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whom he propounded to them as a pattern may and should call their husbands though mean Mechanicks Lords or else he proposeth this example to no purpose and therefore me thinks they should be ashamed to think this honour may be afforded to poor Trades-men and to deny it to those eminent pillars and chief governours of God's Chuâ—ch And as the Scripture gives not onely others the like eminent and more significant titles of honour unto the governours of the Church as when it saith they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Presidents 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rulers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Princes as where the Psalmist saith instead of thy Fathers thou shalt have children whom thou mayest make Princes in all lands which the best interpreters do expound of the Apostles and Bishops that are called Origen ho. 19. in Matth. Hier. in Psal 45. 16. Sozom lib. 3. c. 23. Nazian in ep ad gâ— Nyssen Theodor l. 1. c. 4. 5. l. c 9. the Princes of God's Church but also giveth and alloweth this very title of Lord unto them as I shewed before so the fathers of the Primitive Church did usually ascribe the same one to another as Saint Hierom writing to Saint Augustine saith Domine verè sancte and the Letters sent to Julius Bishop of Rome had their superscription 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To our most blessed Lord. And Nazianzen saith Let no man speak any untruth of me nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Lords the Bishops and in all antiquity as Theodoret sheweth this title of Lord is most frequently ascribed unto the Bishops Saint Chrysâ—stom in Psal 13. as he is cited by Baronius Anno 58. â— 2. saith that Hereticks have learned of the Devil to deny the due titles of honour unto their Bishops neither is it strange that he which would have no Bishops should deny all honour unto the Bishops but they can be contented to transfer this honour though to cover their hypocrisie in another title that shall be as Emperour instead of King from the Episcopacy to the Presbytery so that indeed it is not the honour which they hate but the Persons of the Bishops that are honoured Therefore though for mine own particular I do so much undervalue the vanity of all titles that weâ—e it not the duty of the people to give it more then the desire of the Bishops to have it I should have spared all this Discourse yet seeing it is the right of Kings to bestow honours and it is an argument of their love to Christ to honour them that honour God to magnifie the order of their Religion and to account the chief Ministers of the Gospel among the chief States of the Land I could not pass it over in silence but shew you how it belongs to him to give this honour to whom he will and because this dignity cannot be given to all that are in the same order it is wisely provided by the King that the whole order or Ministry should be honoured in those few whose learning The whole order honoured in few and wisdome he hath had mâ—st use and experience of or is otherwise well informed thereof and it is no small wonder unto me that any learned man should be so blinded with this errour as any wayes to oppose this truth or that any Christian should be like the sons of Jacob so transported with envy when they see any of their brethren made more honourable then themselves for they ought to thinke themselves honoured in the honour of their brethren but that when the lord Bishops are down the Lords Temporal shall not contâ—nue long for as Geneva put away their Bishop their Prince so the Cantons and Switzers put away all Lords A just judgement of God that they which will have no spiritual Lords should not be any temporall Lords but should be as little regarded by their creatures as they regard the servants of their Creator Six
do because the God of Heaven that hath built his Church upon a rock and will not turn away his face from his Anointed will so bless our King that it shall never be with him as it was with Zedechia when it was not in hâ—s power to save Gods Prophet but said unto his Princes Behold he is in your Jeâ—em 28. 5. hand for the King is nâ—t he that can do any thing against you yet as Mordecai said to Hester God will send enlargement and deliverance unto his Church and Hester 4. 14. they and their fathers houses that are against it shall be destroyed because as Saint Peter saith we have forsaken all to become his servants that otherwise might have served Kings with the like hâ—nour that they do and we have left the world to build up his Church we put our trust under the shadow of his wings and being in trouble we do cry unto the Lord and therefore he will hear our cry and will helpe us and we sâ—all never be confounded Amen CHAP X. Sheweth that it is the Kings right to grant Dispensations for Pluralities and Non-residency what Dispensation is reasons for it to tolerate divers Sects or sorts of Religions the foure special sorts of false professors S. Augustines reasons for the toleration of the Jewes toleration of Papists and of Puritans and which of them deserve best to be tolerated among the Protestants and how any Sect is to be tolerated 2. WHereas the Anabaptists and Brownists of our time with what conscience 2. That the King may lawfully grant his dispensation for Pluralities and Non-residency I know not cry out that our Kings by their Lawes do unreasonably and unconscionably grant dispensations both for Pluralities and Non-residency onely to further the corrupt desire of some few aspiring Prelates to the infinite wrong of the whole Clergy the intolerable dishonour of our Religion the exceeding prejudice of Gods Church and the lamentable hazard of many thousand soules I say that the Pluralities and Non-residency granted by the King and warranted by the Lawes of this Land may finde sufficient reasons to justifie them In Anno 112. for if you consider the first limitation of Benefices that either Euaristus Bishop In Anno 636. of Rome or Dionysius as others thinke did first assigne the precincts of Parishes and appointed a certain compass to every Presbyter and in this Kingdome The first distribution of Parishes Honorius Arch-bishop of Canterbury was the first that did the like appointed the Pastorall charge and the portion of meanes accrewing from that compass to this or that particular person whereas before for many years they had no particular charge assigned nor any Benefice allotted them but had their Canonicall pensions and dividents given them by the Bishop out of the common stock of the Church according as the Bishop saw their severall deserts for at first the greater Cities onely had their standing Pastors and then the Countrey Villages imitating the Cities to allow maintenance according to the abilities of the inhabitants had men of lesser learning appointed for those places Therefore this limitation of particular Parishes being meerly positive and an Pluralities and Non-residency no transgression of Gods Law humane constitution it cannot be the transgression of a divine ordinance to have more Parishes then one or to be absent from that one which is allotted to him when he is dispenced with by the Law-maker to do the same for as it is not lawfull without a dispensation to do either because we are to obey every ordinance of the higher power for the Lords sake so for the higher power to dispence with both is most agreeable to reason and Gods truth for all our Gods Law admitteth an interpretation not a dispensation of it Lawes are either divine or humane and in the divine Law though we allow of interpretation quia non sermoni res sed rei sermo debet esse subjectus because the words must be applyed to the matter else we may fall into the heresie of those that as Alfonsus de Castro saith held it unlawfull upon any occasion to sweare because our Saviour saith sweare not at all yâ—t no man King nor Pope hath power to grant any dispensation for the least breach of the least precept of Gods Law he cannot dispence with the doing of that which God forbiddeth to be done nor with the omitting of that which God commandeth but in all humane Lawes so far as they are meerly positive and humane it is in Mans Law may be dispensed with the power of their makers to dispence with them and so quicquid sit dispensation superioris non sit contra praeceptum superioris and he sinneth neither against the Law noâ— against his own conscience because he is delivered from the obligation of that Law by the same authority whereby he stood bound unto it And as he that is dispensed with is free from all sin so the King which is the dispenser is as free from all fault as having full right and power to grant His dispensations â—or seeing that all humane Lawes are the conclusions of the Law of nature or the evidences of humane reason shewing what things are most benefiâ—iall to any society either the Church or Common-wealth and that experience â—eacheth us our reason groweth often from an imperfection to be more perfect when time produceth more light unto us we cannot in reason deny an abrogation and dispensation to all humane Lawes which therefore ought not to be like the Lawes of the Medes and Persians that might not be changed Aug. de libero arbit l. 1. and so Saint Augustine saith Lex humana quamvis justa sit commutari tamen pro tempore juste potest any humane Law though it be never so just yet for the time as occasion requireth may be justly changed dispensatio est juris communis relaxatio facta cum causae cognitione ab eo qui jus habet dispensandi Dispensation what it is and as the Civilians say a dispensation is the relaxation of common right granted upon the knowledge of the cause by him that hath the power of dispensing or as the â—tymologie of the word beareth dispensare est diversa pensare The reward of learning and vertue how to be rendered to dispense is to render different rewards and the reward of learning or of any other virtue either in the civill or the ecclesiasticall person being to be rendered as one saith not by an Arithmeticall but a Geometricall proportion and the division of Paâ—â—shes being as I said before a positive humane Law it cannot be denyed but the giver of honour and the bestower of rewards which is the King hath the sole power and right to dispose how much shall be given to this or that particular person If you say the Law of the King which is made by the advice of his whole Ob. Parliament hath already determined what
portion is fit for every one and what service is required from him I answer that the voice of equity and justice tells us that a generall Law Sol. doth never deâ—ogate from a speciall priviledge or that a priviledge is not opposite to the pâ—inciples of common right and where the Law it selfe gives this priviledge as our Law doth it yet enâ—y it selfe can never deny this right unto the King to grant his dispensation whensoever he seeth occasion and where the Law is tacite and saith nothing of any priviledge yet seeing in all Lawes The end of every Law is chiefly to be respected as in all other actions the end is the marke that is aimed at and this end is no oâ—her then the publique good of any society for which the Law is made if the King which is the sole Law-maker so as I shewed in my Discovery of Mysteries seeth this publique good better procured by granting dispensations to some particular men doth he not performe thereby what the Law intendeth and no wayes breake the Law of common right as if a mans absence from his proper Cure should be more beneficiall to the whole Church then his residence Reasons of dispensations upon his Charge could possibly be as when his absence may be either for the recoveâ—y of his health or to discharge the Kings Embassage or to do his best to consute Heretiques or to pacific Schismes or to consult about the Church affaires or some other urgent cause that the Law never dreamt of when it was in making shall not the King whom the Lawes have intrusted with the examination of these things and to whom the principal care of Religion and the charge of all the People is committed by God himselfe and the power of executing his own Lawes have power to grant his dispensations for the same Certainly they that would perswade the world that all Lawes must have such force that all dispensations are transgressions of them as if generall rules should have no exceptions would manacle the Kings hands and binde his power in the chaines of their crooked wills that he should not be able to do that good which God and Right and Law it selfe do give him leave and their envy towards other mens grace is a great deale more then either the grace of humility How God doth diversly bestow his gifts Matth. 25. 15. Gen. 43. 34. or the love of truth in them for doth not God give five talents to some of his servants when he gives but one to some others and did not Joseph make Benjamins messe five times so much as any of his brethren's and have not some Lords six or eight or ten thousand pounds a year and some very good men in the Common-wealth and perhaps higher in God's favour not ten pounds a year and shall not the King double the reward of them that deserve it in the Church of God or shall he be so curbed and manacled that he shall neither alter nor dispense with his own Law though it be for the greater glory unto God and the greater benefit both to the Church and Common-wealth Besides who can deny but that some mens merits virtue paines and learning are more worthy of two Benefices then many others are of one and when in his younger time he is possessed of a small Benefice he may perchance afterwards when his years deserve better far easier obtain another little one to keep with it then get what I dare assure you he would desire much rather * For who would not rather chuse one Living of an 100 l. a year then two of 50 l. a peice one Living of equall value to them both and shall the unlearned zeal of an envious minde so far prejudice a worthy man that the King 's lawful right shall be censured and his power questioned and clipped or traduced by this ignorant Zelot I will blesse my self from them and maintain it before all the world that the King's dispensations for Pluralities Non-residency and the like Priviledges not repugnant to common right are not against Law nor the giving or taking of them upon just causes against conscience but what the violence of this viperous brood proclaimeth an intolerable offence we dare warrant both with good reason and true Divinity to be no sin no fault at all but an undoubted portion of the King 's right for the greater benefit both of the Church and State and the greater glory unto God himself And therefore most gracious King we humbly desire your Majesty suffer The Author's Petition to His Majesty not these children of Apollyon to pull this flower out of your Royal Crown to abridge you of your just right of granting dispensations for Pluralities and Non-residency which the Lawes of your Land do yet allow you and which they labour to annul to darken the glory of God's Church and to bring your Clergy by depriving them of their meanes and honour into contempt lest that when by one and one they have robbed you of all your rights they will fairly salute you as the Jews did Christ Haile King of the Jewes when God knows they hated him and stript him of all power I speak not of his Divinity either to govern them or to save himself 3. As the King hath right and power to grant his dispensations both of grace 3. The toleration of divers Sects and sorts of religions and of justice of grace when it is merely of the King ' Princely favour as in legitimations and the like and of justice when the King findeth a just cause to grant it so likewise it is in the King's power and right to remit any offence that is the mulct or penalty and to absolve the offender from any or all the transgressions of his own Lawes from the transgression of God's Law neither King nor Pope nor Priest nor any other can formally remit the fault and absolve transgressors but as God is the Law-giver so God alone must be the forgiver of the offence so the Jewes say who can forgive sins but God onely Yet as Mar. 2. 7. God which gives the Law can lawfully remit the sin and forgive the breach of the Law so the King which makes these positive Lawes cannot be denyed this As David pardoned Absolon and Solomon Abiathar power to pardon when he seeth cause or is so pleased the offenders of his Lawes as you see they do many times grant their pardons for the most haynous faults and capital crimes as treasons murders felonies and the like and if they may grant their pardons for the breach of the Law and remit the mulâ—â— imposed for the transgression thereof it is strange if they should not have right to dispense with whom they please when they see cause from the bond of the Law and therefore we are to discuss how far the King in these Lawes of the Church may give exemptions and tolerations unto them whose consciences cannot submit
to make this yet more plain he addes Si Rex fuerit sine fraeno id est lege if the King be without a bridle that is saith he lest you should mistake what he meanes by the bridle and thinke he meanes force and armes the Law they ought to put this bridle unto him that is to presse him with this Law and still to shew him his duty even as we do both to King and people saying this is the Law this should bridle you but here is not a word of commanding much lesse of forcing the King not a word of superiority nor yet simply of equality and therefore I must say hoc argumentum nihil ad rhombum 3 That neither Peers nor Parliament are co-ordinate with the King these do abuse every author If their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I speak not of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their natural strength and power but of their right and authority be coordinate and equal with the Kings authority then whether given by God which they cannot prove or by the people there must be duo summa imperia two supreme powers which the Philosophers say cannot be nam quod summum est unum est from whence they prove Omnâ—sque Philosoph jâ—riâ—consalti ponunt summum in eo rerum genere quod dicâ—di non possit Lâ—ctanâ— l. 1. c. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Maâ—c 3. 24 the unity of the God-head that there can be but one God and if this supreme power be divided betwixt King and Parliament you know what the Poet saith Omnisque potestas Impatiens consortis erit Or you may remember what our Saviour saith If a Kingdome be divided against it selfe it cannot stand and therefore when Tiberius out of his wonted subtilty desired the Senate to appoint a colleague and partner with him for the better administration of the Empire Asinius Gallus that was desirous enough of their Pristine liberty yet understanding well with what minde the subtle fox spake onely to descry his ill willers after some jests answered seriously 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that government must not be divided because you can never have any happiness where the power is equally divided in two parts when according to the well known axiome to every one Par in parem non habet potestatem But to make the matter cleare and to shew that the Soveraignty The Case of our Affaires p. 19. 20. The Lawes of our Land acknowledge all Soveraignty in the King is inseperably inherent in the person of His Majesty we have the whole current of our very Acts of Parliament acknowledging it in these very termes Our Soveraigne Lord the King and the Parliament 25. Hen. 8. saith This your Graces Realme recognizing no superiour under God but your Grace c. And the Parliament 16. Rich. 2. 5. affirmeth the Crown of England to have been so free at all times that it hath been in no earthly subjection but immediately to God in all things touching the regality of the said Crown and to none other and in the 25. of Hen. 5. the Parliament declareth that it belongeth to the Kings regality to grant or deny what Petitions in Parliament he pleaseth and so indeed whatsoever authority is in the constant practice of the Kingdom or in the known and published Laws and Statutes it concludeth the Soveraignty to be fixed in the King and all the Subjects virtually united in the representative body of the Parliament to be obliged in obedience allegeance to the individual person of the King and I doubt not but our learned Lawyers can finde much more proofe then I do out of their Law to this purpose And therefore seeing divers supreme powers are not compatible in one State nor allowable in our State the conceit of a mixed Monarchy is but a foppery to prove the distribution of the supreme power into two sorts of governours equally indued with the same power because the supreme power being but one must be placed in one sort of governours either in one numericall man as it is in Monarchy or in one specificall kinde of men as the optimates as it is in Aristocracie or in the people as in Democracie but if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a mixed Monarchy you meane that this supreme power is not simply absolute quoad omnia but a government limited and regulated 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we will not much quarrell with our Sectaries because His Majesty hath promised and we are sure he will performe it to govern his people according to the Lawes of this Land And therefore they that would rob the King of this right and give any part They deserve not to live in the Kingdom that diminish the supremacy of the King of his supreme power to the Parliament or to any of all his inferiour Magistrates deserve as well to be expelled the Kingdome as Plato would have Homer to be banished for bringing in the Gods fighting and disagreeing among themselves when as Ovid out of him saith Jupiter in Trojam pro Troja stabat Apollo Because as the Civilians say Naturale vitium est negligi quod communiter possidetur útque se nihil habere putet qui totum non habeat suam partem corrumpi patiatur dum invidet alienae and therefore the same Homer treating of our humane Government saith 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nec multos regnare bonum rex unicus esto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Aristotle doth so infinitely commend where he disputeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Arist Metaph. lib. 1. Statius Thebaid lib. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and so doth Plato and all the wise Philosophers that followed after because as the Poâ—t saith Summo dulcius unum Stare loco sociâ—sque comes discordia regnis And as our own most lamentable experience sheweth what abundance of miseries happened unto our selves by this renting of the King's power and placing it in the hands of the Parliament and his own inferiour officers and as those sad Tragedies of Etheocles and Polynices Numitor and Amulius Romulus and Remus Antoninus and Geta and almost infinite more do make it manifest to all the world §. The two chiefest parts of the regal Government the four properties of a just war and how the Parliamentary faction transgresse in every property 4. HAving spoken of those assistants that should further and not hinder 4 The chiefest parts of the Regal government which are two Exod. 2. 14. the King in the Common-wealth it resteth that I should now speak of the chiefest parts of this goâ—ernment when Moses killed the Aegyptian that wronged the Israelite and the next day said unto the Hebrew that did injure his fellow Wherefore smitest thou him the oppressor answered Who made thee a Prince and a Judge over us and the people say unto Samuel we will have a King over us that our King may judge us and go out before us and 1 Sam. 8. 20. 2 Sam. 5. 2.
à seipso cogi possit lâ—ges à superiore tantùm sciscantur dentúrque inferioribus And so Arnisaeus saith and proveth at large Majestatis â—ssentiam consistere in summa absoluta potestate that the being of Majesty and Soveraignty consisteth in the highest and most absolute power And Irvinus alleadgeth many testimonies out of Aristotle Cicero Vlpian Dio Constant Harmâ—nopolus and others to prove that Rex legibus non subjicitur And to make it yet more cleare that the kings power to rule his people was arbâ—trary Sigonius saith most truly that the power of governing the people was given by God unto Moses before the Law was given and therefore he called the people to counsell and without either Judges or Magistrates jura eisdem reddidit he administred Justice and did right to every one of them So Sigon de rep Heb. l. 7. c. 3. Hoc arbitrarium imperium expressit Deus 1 Sam. 8. David Ps 11. Reges â—os in virga ferrâ—a Idem Ibidem Joshua exercised the same right and the Judges after him and after the Judges succeeded the Kings quorum potestas atque aâ—toritas multò major ut quae non tam à legibus quà m ab arbitrio voluntate regis profecta sit whose power and authority was far greater as proceeding not so much from the Lawes as from the arbitrement and the will of the King saith Sigâ—nius for they understood the power of a King in Aristotles sence Qui solutus legibus plenissimo jure regnaret who being freed from the Lawes or not tyed to Lawes might governe with a plenary right And so Saul judged Israel and had altogether the arbitrary power both of life and death quodam modo superior legibus fuit and was after a sort above the Law undertaking and making Warr pro arbitratu suo according to his own will And in his sixth book he saith the Jewes had three great Courts or Assemblies 1. Their Councell which contained that company that handled those things Cap. 2. especially which concerned the State of the whole Common-wealth as warre peace provision institution of Lawes creation of Magistrates and the like 2. Their Synagogue or the meeting of the whole Congregation or people Cap. 3. which no man might convocate but he which had the chiefe rule as Moses Joshua the Judges and the Kings Cap. 4. Numb 15. Plenum regnum vocatur quo cuncta rex sua voluntate geriâ— Idem 3. Their standing Senate which was appointed of God to be of the seventy Elders whereof he saith that although this was alwayes standing for consultation yet we must understand that the kings which had the Common-wealth in their own power and were not obnoxious to the Lawes made Decrees of themselves without the authority of the Senate ut qui cum summo imperio essent as men that were indued with the chiefest rule and command And we find that the king judged the people two manner of wayes 1. Alone 2. Together with the Elders and Priests For it is said that Absolon when any man came to the king for judgment wished 2 Sam. 15. 2 6. that he were made Judge in the Land and he did in this manner to all Israel that came to the king for judgement and when the people demanded a King instead of Samuel to reigne over them and God said They had cast him off from 1 Sam. 8. 7. being their King he signifieth most plainly that while the Judges ruled which had their chiefest authority from the Law God reigned over them because his Law did rule them but the rule and government being translated unto Kings God reigned no longer over them Quia non pâ—â—ts legem Dei sed penes voluntatem unius hominis summa rerum autoritas â—sset futura because now all authority and all things were not in the power of the Law but in the power of one mans arbitrary will But seeing we are fallen upon the peoples desire of a king let us examine what right God saith belongeth unto him and because that place 1 Sam. 8. is contradicted by another Deut. 17. as it seemeth we will examine both places Deut. 17. 14. usque ad finem and see if Moses doth any wayes crosse Samuel and truly I may say of these two places that as S. Aug. saith in the like case Alii atque alii aliud atque aliud opinati sunt for some learned men say that Moses setteth down to the king legem regendi the Law by which he should governe the people without wronging them and Samuel setteth down to the people legem paâ—â—â—di the Law by which they should obey the king without resisting him whatsoever he should doe to them And other Divines say Haec est potestas legitima non tyrannica Spalat tom 2. fol 251. nec violenta ideò quando rex propria negotia non possit expedire per proprias res ac servos possit pro negotiis propriis tollere res servos aliorum isto modo dicebat G. Ochâ—m tract 2. l. 2. c. 25. Deus quod pertinebat adjus regis this is the lawfull and just right of the king Therefore to find out the truth let us a little more narrowly discusse both places And 1. In the words of Moses there I observe two speciall things 1. The charge of the people 2. The charge of the king 1. The people are commanded very strictly in any wise saith the Text to 1. Popular election utterly forbidden 2. The Kings charge make choice of no king of their own heads but to accept of him whom the Lord did chuse 2. The king is commanded to write out the Law to study it and to practice it and he is forbidden to do foure speciall things which are 1. Not to bring the people back into Egypt nor to provide the means to bring them by multiplying his horses 2. Not to marry many wives that might intice him as they did Solomon unto Idolatry 3. Not to hoord up too much riches 4. Not to tyrannize over his Brethren And Josephus to the same purpose saith Si regis câ—piditas vos incesserit is ex Joseph Antiquit l. 4. â—adem gente sit curam omnino gerat justitiae aliarum virtutum caveat verò ne plus legibus aut Deo sapiat nihil autem agat sine Pontisicis Senatorúmque sententia which Moses hath not neque nuptiis multis â—tatur nec copiam pecuniarum equorúmque sectetur quibus partis super leges superbiâ efferatur that is to be a Tyrant 2. The words of Samuel are set down 1 Sam. viii 11. to the 18. verse Rex Jacobus in his true Law of free Monarchs whereof I confesse there are severall expositions some making the same a propheticall prediction of what some of their Kings would doe contrary to what they should doe as it was expressed by Moses So King James himself takes it others take it
the gift or annull that Priviledge without the leave and consent of God that was the principal party in the concession as it appeareth in the example of Ananias and is confirmed by all Casuists 2. The other part of the oath is made to the Clergy in particular and so The second part of the oath Clericis Ecclesiasticis D. p. 165. also with their consent some things I confess may perhaps be revoked but without their consent not any thing can be altered in my understanding without injustice for with what equity can the Laity vote away the rights of the Clergy when the Clergy do absolutely deny their assent just as if the Clergy should give away the lands of the Laity or as if I had lent the king ten thousand pounds upon the publique assurance of King and both Houses to be repaid again and they without mine assent shall vote the remission of this debt for some great benefit that they conceive redounding to the Common-Wealth by which vote The party to whom the bond is made must release the bonds I should beleive my selfe to be no better then meerely cheated or as if the Parliament without the assent of the Londoners should pass an act that all the money which they lent should be remitted for the releiving of the State I doubt not but they would conclude that act very unjust and so is this act against the Bishops because the Kings obligation to a particular body personall or politique cannot be dispensed with by the representative Kingdome without the releasement of that body to whom the King is obliged For I find that all the Casuists will tell you that juramentum promissorium ita obligat ut invito creditore non potest in melius commutari quia aliter justitia veritas non servarentur inter homines and it is their common tenet that it Suarez de jurameâ—to promiss l. 2. c. 12. n. 14. cannot be dispensed with quia per promissum acquiritur jus ei cui fit promissio utilitas â—nius non sufficit ut alter suo jure privetur the benefit of others must not deprive me of my right This point is so cleare that neither Scholer nor any man of reason or conscience will deny it Therefore to perswade the king that is bound by his oath to preserve the Rights and Priviledges of the Church and Clergy to cast out the Bishops out of their rights or to take away their Lands without their own consent whom the king by his oath hath obliged himself to protect I cannot see how they can do it without great iniquity or His Majesty consent to it and be innocent when he is fully informed of the Rights of his Clergy whereas otherwise the most religious Prince may be subject to mistakings and so nesciently admit that which willingly he would never have granted And if they can not perswade him to do this without iniquity how dare they goe about to force and compell him against conscience to commit this and such other horrible impiety but I assure my self that God who hath blessed our king and preserved him hitherto without blame as being forced to what he did or not throughly understanding what was our right the Bishops being imprisoned and not suffered to informe him nor to answer for themselves will still arme His Majesty with that resolution as shall never yeild to their impetuousnesse to transcend the limits of his own most upright conscience Yet still it is urged they were excluded by act of Parliament therefore their Ob. exclusion cannot be unjust as being done by the wisdome of the whole State and the king should not desire it to be altered I answer that all Parliaments are not alwayes guided by an unerring spirit Sol. but were many times swayed by the heads of the most powerfull faction which The case of our affaiâ—s p. 17. How powerfull factions have procured Parliaments to doe most unjust things Turba tremens sequitur fortunam ut semper odit damnaâ—os Juven Saâ—â—ra 10. When Kings were most powerfull they could get the Parliaments to yeeld to what Statutes they thought best when the Lords or faction were most powerful they forced their Kings to make what Statutes they liked best are instances rather of their unsteady weaknesse then of their just power when forsaking the guidance of their lawfull head they suffered themselves to be led by popular pretenders as when Canutus prevailed by his armes he could have a Parliament to resolve that his title to the Crown was the best when Hen. 4. had an army of 60000 men he could have a Parliament to depose Rich. 2. and confer the Crown upon himself when Edw. Duke of Yorke grew powerfull he could have a Parliament to determine the reigne of Hen. 6. and leave him only the name of king for his life but give the very Kingdome unto the Duke under the names of Protector and Regent and then he could procure the Parliament to declare that Hen. 4. Hen. 5. and Hen. 6 were but kings de facto non de jure so Rich. the 3. as meere an Usurper as any could notwithstanding procure a Parliament to declare him a lawfull king and Hen. 7. could procure the forementioned acts that were made in favour of Edw. 4. and Rich. 3. to be annulled and Hen. 8. could have a Parliament to justifie and authorize his divorces and Queen Elizab. could have a Parliament to make it high treason for â— any man to say that the Queen could not by Act of Parliament bind and dispose the rights and titles which any person whatsoever might have unto the Crown when as we know it was adjudged in Hen. 7. that no Act of Parliament nor yet an Attainâ—er by Parliament can disable the right heire to the Crown because the descent of the Crown upon him purges all disabilityes whatsoever and makes him every way capable thereof Thus as the Parliaments when they were most prevalent caused their kings unwillingly to yeeld many things against right so the kings growing most powerfull prevailed to work the Parliament to consent to very unjust conclusions and therefore it is inconsequent to say this exclusion must be just because it is past by an Act of Parliament And therefore as in the 15. yeare of Edw. 3. the king being unwillingly The case of our affaires p. 20. drawn to consent to certain Articles prejudiciall to the Crown and to promise to seale the Statute thereupon made lest otherwise his affairs in hand might have been ruinated which we conceive to be just in like manner now the king very unwillingly drawn to passe this Act for the exclusion of the Clergy which is most prejudiciall both to the Crown and the Church and a mighty dishonour unto God himself lest otherwise more mischiefe might have followed when he hoped that this would have appeased the fury of that prevalent faction which now the kingdome seeth it did not Another Statute
Tyrant and it is one of the gracious apâ—thâ—gmes of King James his golden apothegme Basilicon doron l. 2. p. 99. our late noble and never to be forgotten Soveraigne worthy to be written in in letters of gold where speaking to his son he saith inrich not your self with exactions from your Subjects but think the riches of your Subjects your best Treasures and Artaxerxes said it was a great deale more seemlier for the Majesty of a King to give then to take by polling to cloath then to uncloath which belongeth to Theeves not to Princes unlesse they will stain their names for as Apollonius saith that gold which is taken by Tyranny is far baser then any iron because it is wetted with the teares of the poor Subjects and therefore Peter de la Primauday saith they are unworthy of the title of Prince that lending their eares to such as invent new wayes to get monyes from their Subjects and having against all humanity spoyled them of their goods do either miserably Pet. de la Primauday cap. 60. p. 670. consume them upon their pleasures or prodigally bestow them upon undeserving flatterers that fat themselves by the overthrow of others And therefore it behoveth all kings to consider that all mens goods are theirs only quoad tuitionem defensionem and their Subjects quoad possessionem proprietatem as you may see where Joseph bought all the Land of the Egyptians for king Pharaoh and then let it them againe in Fee-sarme to give the King Gen. 47. 46. the fifth part of the fruit of it and as you may conclude it from the eighth Commandment which saith as well to the King as to the Subject thou shalt not steale for if all be his he cannot be said to steale it and if this precept concerns not kings then have they but nine Commandments and therefore be wise O ye Kings and remember what Saint Augustine saith remotâ justitiâ quid sunt Regna nisi Latrocinia for though you may justly demand Tribute and Taxes yet you must have just occasions to use them and you must take but a just proportion or else they may come unjustly unto you But who shall be the Judges of the Kings just occasions in many kingdomes his conscience as the Roman Consuls imposed what taxes they thought meet upon the Provinces they subdued so Marcus Antonius being in Asia doubled their Tax and laid a second charge upon the People which was very unreasonable as Hebreas told him saying if thou wilt have power to lay The saying of Hebreas to M. Antonius upon us two taxes in one year thou must have also power to give us two summers and Autumns two Harvests and two Vintages and yet if our king do thus unreasonably tax us with more then we are able to beare we may reason with him as Hebreas did with Marke Antony refel his arguments and repel Kings herein not to be resisted 1. Reason his oppressions according to the course of Law but we may not in any case with the Sword make any resistance either actual or habitual against him 1 Because God hath not made us Judges of the Kings occasions and we know not his necessities and therefore we cannot determine what is just and unjust 2. Were it granted that the superior demanded without right yet the inferior 2. Reasan not onely may rightly render it without offence unto his conscience but also ought to pay it without resistance unto the Magistrate for if the Jews were not free and the Romans had no right to demand Tribute of them yet by our Saviours question unto Saint Peter and his replication unto the Apostles answer it is apparent that our Saviour was most free and was no way bound to pay any Hesselius in Matth. 18. Barrad to 2. l. 19. c. 32. thing unto the Romans not onely quâ— Deus as Hesselius saith but also as he was a man â—as Barradius more truely proveth yet lest he should offend them as he saith tributum solvit quia voluit he doth most willingly discharge it to teach us that we may and ought justly and without any scruple of conscience pay that which may be unjustly demanded and the best Authors that I have read are of the same judgement we have no other remedy but to cry to God who can judge them for their injustice non caret modis quibus Greg. Tholos l. 26. de repub c. 5. n. 25. possit quando voluerit hujusmodi principes tollere vel emendare But though in most of the Eastern Countries the Kings imposed upon their Subjects what taxes and tributes pleased themselves as Augustus taxed all the world as much as he would at his own pleasure and Charles the fifth saith Osorius prâ—ter pecunias quibus illum Hispani juverant immania tributa populis imperavit besides those monyes wherewith the Spaniard assisted him laid Osor de rebus Emanuel l. 12. p. 386. What the Kings of England promised to their Subjects most heavy taxes upon the people which is indeed a branch of the absolute right of Kings and was originally practised by most of them yet here with us our Kings out of grace and favour unto their people granted such a priviledge unto their Subjects and devested themselves of this right to lay no impositions or taxes upon their Subjects without the consent of their three States convened in the two Houses of Parliament and this Princely concession being truely observed may procure a great deale of love and peace unto the king and as much tranquility and happinesse unto the people Neither do I thinke that he loves his King but am sure that he hates his Country that would perswade him That we should not be niggards to assist our king for all the wealth of the kingdome to violate his own grant and faith herein but as our king granted this savour to impose no taxes without the consent of his Parliament so his parliament in all duty ought alwayes with all thankfulness to acknowledge this special grace and in requital thereof most fully to supply his wants and support his necessities whensoever he acquaints them therewith And therefore we ought not to be like those hide-bound Sectaries and close-fisted Puritans and Brownists that are so miserably covetous and extream niggards that when the king makes known his wants and demands his due for it is still his due though he granted not to cesse it without their consent for his royal supportation and the safety of his kingdome they will finde a hundred excuses to deny him but never a penny to give him out of all their wealth and this is the cause of our misery and may prove as fatal to us as it hath been to the Constantinopolitans whose churlishnesse and niggâ—rdlinesse towards their Emperour was the chiefest cause of the losse of that great Empire and to make the Turk sit in Christ his Chaire to have Mahâ—met adored where
13. 1. 1 Pet. 2. 13. How the Rebels swore and forswore themselves Kings at their admittance to any office to beare faith and true alleagiance to His Majesty at the beginning of this last Parliament to maintain the Kings just rights and all the priviledges of Parliament together with the liberty and property of the Subjects and yet immediately to forget their faith to break all these oathes and to make ship wrack of their conscience to drive the Bishops out of their House which is one of the first and most fundamentall priviledges of the Parliament they being the first of the three Estates of this Kingdome to take away not some but all the Kings rights out of his hands and to make him no King indeed to take away all our goods our liberties and our lives at their pleasure Holland and Bedford shew'd what trust is to be given them and then to assure the Divel they would be faithfull unto him which were thus faithlesse unto God to sweare again and make a solemne Covenant with Hell they would never repent them of their wickednesse but continue constant in his service till they have rooted out whom they deemed to be Malignants though Proverb 21. the King who is wise as the Angel of God that hath the Kings heart in his hand and turneth it like the Rivers of waters where he pleaseth knoweth best what to No trust to be given to lyars and perjurers 2 Sam. 20. 20. 16. do as God directeth him yet for mine own part either in Peace or War I I would never trust such faithlesse perjured creatures for a straw and seeing that to spare transcendent wickedness is to encrease wickednesse and to incourage others to the like Rebellion upon the like hope of pardon if they failed of their intention if our great Metropolis of London partake not rather of the wise spirit of the men of Abel then of the obstinacy of the men of Gibeah and delivered not unto the King the chiefe of those Rebells that rose up against him I feare that Judg. 20. Gods wrath will not be turned away but his hand will be stretched out still until he hath fullfilled his determined visitation upon this Land and consummated all with their deplorable destruction even as he did those obstinate men of Gibeah and Benjamin for though the King beyond the clemency of a man and the How the King desired the good of the Rebels expectation of any Rebell hath most Christianly laboured that they would accept of their pardon and save themselves and their posterity yet their wickednesse being so exceedingly great beyond all that I can finde in any history Rebellion it selfe being like the sin of witchcraft the Rebellion of Christians far worse and a Rebellion against a most Christian pious Prince worst of all and such a Rebellion ingendered by pride fostered by lyes augmented by perjury continued by cruelty reâ—using all clemency despisâ—â—â— all piety and contemning The unspeakable greatness of their sins God their Saviour when they make him with reverence be it spoken which is so irreverently done by them the very pack-horse to beare all their wickedness being a degree beyond all degrees of comparison hath so provoked the wrath of God against this Nation that I feare his justice will not suffer their hearts that can not repent accept and imbrace their own happiness till they be purged with the floods of repentant teares or destroyed with the streames of Gods fearefull vengeance which I heartily beseech Almighty God may by the grace of Christ working true repentance in them for themselves and reducing them to the right way be averted from them And the best way that I conceive to avert it to appease Gods wrath and to turne away his judgements from us is to returne back the same way as we proceeded hitherto to make up the breaches How we may recover the peace and prosperity of this Land of the Church to restore the Liturgie and the service of our God to its former purity to repeale that Act which is made to the prejudice of the Bishops and Servants of God that they may be reduced to their pristine dignity to recall all Ordinances that are made contrary to Law and derogatory to the Kings right and to be heartily sorry that these unjust Acts and Ordinances were ever done and more sorry that they were not sooner undone and then God will turne his face towards us he will heale the bleeding wounds of our Land and he will powre down his benefits upon us but till we do these things I do assure my selfe and I beleive you shall finde it that his wrath shall not be turned away but his hand will be stretched out still and still untill we either do these things or be destroyed for not doing them King James his speech made true by the Rebells Thus it is manifest to all the World that as it was often spoken by our sharpe and eagle-sighted Soveraigne King James of ever blessed memory no Bishop no King so now I hope the dull-ey'd owle that lodgeth in the desart seeth it verifyed by this Parliament for they had no sooner got out the Bishops but presently they laid violent hands upon the Crowne seized upon the Kings Castles shut him out of all his Townes dispossest him of his owne houses took How the Rebells have unking'd our King away all his sâ—ips detained all his revenues vilified all his Declarations nullified his Proclamations hindered his Commissions imprisoned his faithful Subjects killed his servants and at Edge-hill and Newbury did all that ever they could to take away his life and now by their last great ordinance for their counterfeit Seale they pronounce all honours pardons grants commissions and whatsoever else His Majesty passeth under his Seale to be invalid void and of none effect and if this be not to make King Charles no King I know not what it is to be a King so they have unking'd him sine strepitâ— and as the Prophet saith Hos 8. 4. they have set up Kings but not by me they have made Princes and I knew it not but whom have they made Kings even themselves who in one word do What kings they would have to rule us and have now exercised all or most of the regall power and their Ordinances shall be as firm as any Statutes and what are they that have thus dis-robed King Charles and exalted themselves like the Pope as if they were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Antichrist above all that are called Gods truly none other then king Pym king Say king Faction or to say the truth most truly and to call a spade a spade king perjurers king murderers king traytors * Which S. Peter never bade us honour The Rebells brave exchange Psal 146. 20. and I am sorry that I should joyne so high an office so sacred a thing as King to such wicked persons as I
have shewed them to be And what a royal exchange would the Rebels of this Kingdome make just such as the Israelites made when they turned their glory into the similitude of a Calfe that â—ateth hay and said these be thy Gods O Psal 146. 20. Israel which brought thee out of the Land of Aegypt for now after they have changed their lawful King for unlawful Tyrants and taken Jothams bramble for Judg. 9. 15. the cedar of Lebanon the Devils instruments for Gods Anointed they may justly say these be thy Kings O Londoners O Rebels that brought thee out of a Land that flowed with milke and hony out of those houses that were filled with all manner of store into a land of misery into houses of sorrow that are filled with wailings lamentations and woes when we see the faithful City is become an harlot our gold drosse and our happinesse turned to continual heavinesse But as the Rutilians considering what fruit they should reape by that miserable Virgil Aeneid l. 12. war wherein they were so far ingaged cried out at last Scilicet ut Turno contingat regia conjux Nos animae viles inhumata insletáque turba Sternamur campis We undo our selves our wives and our children to gain a wife for Turnus so our seduced men may say we ingage our selves to dye like doggs that these rebels may live like Kings who themselves sit at ease while others endure all woes and do grow rich by making all the Kingdome poore and therefore O England quae tanta est licentia ferri lugebit patria multos when as the Apostle saith evill men and seducers wax worse and worse deceiving 2 Tim. 3. 1 3. Gal. 6. 7. and being deceived for God is not mocked but whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reape for though we for our sins may justly suffer these and many other more miseries we do confesse it yet the whole world may be assured The Rebels sure to be destroyed Contemptrix superûm sevaeque avidissima caedis violenta fuit scires â— sanguine natam 2 Sam. 7. 1. that these Rebels the generation of vipers being but the Rod of Gods fury to correct the offences of his children such seeds of wickedness as they sow can produce none other harvest then ruine and destruction to all these usurping Kings and Traytors who thinke to please God by doing good service unto the Devil and to go to Heaven for their good intention after they are carried into Hell for their horrid Rebellion God Almighty grant them more grace and our King more care to beware of them and when God doth grant him rest with David on every side round about him to restore his Bishops and Clergy to their pristine station that when these bramble rods are burnt and these rebels fallen the King and the Bishops may still stand like Moses and Aaron to guide and gouerne Gods people committed to their charge And thus I have shewed thee O man some of the sacred rights of royal Majesty granted by God in his holy Scriptures practised by Kings from the beginning of the world yeilded by all nations that had none other guide but the light of nature to direct them I have also shewed thee how the people greedy of liberty and licentiousnesse have like the true children of old Adam that could not long endure the sweet yoke of his Creator strived and strugled to withdraw their necks from that subjection which their condition required and their frowardnesse necessitated to be imposed upon them and thereby have either graciously gained such love and fauour from many pious and most clement Princes as for the sweetning of their well merited subjection to grant them many immunities and priviledges or have most rebelliously incroached upon these rights of Kings wresting many liberties out of the hands of Government and forcibly retaining them to their own advantage sometimes to the overthrow of the royal government as Junius Brutus and his associates did the Kings of Rome sometimes to the diminution of the dimidium if not more then halfe his right as the Ephori did to the kings of Lacedemon but alwayes to the great prejudice of the king and the greater mischief to the Common-wealth because both reason and experience hath found it alwayes true that the regal Government or Monarchical State though it might sometimes happen to prove tyrannical is far more acceptable unto God as being his own prime and proper ordinance most agreeable unto nature and more profitable unto all men then either the Aristocratical or Popular Government either hath or possibly can be for as it is most true that praestat sub malâ— principe esse quà m sub nullo it is better to live under an ill Governour then where there is no Goveâ—nment so praestat sub â—no tyranno vivere qâ—à m sub mille it is better to be under the command of one tyrant then of a thousand as we are now under these Rebels who being not fex Romuli the worst of the Nobilty but faex populi the dregs of the people indigent Mechanicks and their Wives captivated Citizens together with the rabble of seduced Sectaries have so disloyally incroached upon the rights of our King and so rebelliously usurped the same to the utter subversion both of Church and Kingdom if God himself who hath the hearts of all Kings in his hand and turneth the same wheresoever he pleaseth had not most graciously strengthned his Majesty with a most singular and heroick resolution assisted with perfect health from the beginning of their insurrection to this very day to the admiration of his enemies and the exceeding joy and comfort of his faithfull Subjects and with the best aide and furtherance of his chiefest Nobility of all his learned and religious Clergy his grave and honest Lawyers and the truly worthy Gentry of his whole Kingdom to withstand their most treacherous impious barbarous and I know not how to expresse the wickednesse of their most horrid attempts so thou hast before thee life and death fire and water good and evil And therefore I hope that this will move us which have our eyes open to behold the great blessings and the many almost miraculous deliverances and favours of God unto his Majesty and to consider the most horrible destruction that this war hath brought upon us to fear God and to honour our King to hate the Rebels and to love all loyal Subjects to do our uttermost endeavour to quench this devouring flame and to that end with hand and heart and with our fortunes and with the hazard of our lives which as our Saviour saith shall be saved if they be lost to assist his Majesty to subdue these Rebels to reduce the Luk. 9. 24. Kingdom to its pristine government and the Church to her former dignity that so we may have through the mercy of God peace and plenty love and unity faith and true religion and all other happinesse remaining
lay hold upon it because commonly all the pleasure of this world is fled from us before we can scarce fasten on it and as the wise man saith extrema gaudii luctus occupat Sorrow and sadness do follow both our Profits and our Pleasures hard at the very heels For as the Player appeareth upon the Stage and then presently after few words exit he is gone so the wealth prosperity of this world do but salute us and then immediatly depart from us even while we are most busie about them and when they seem to smile most of all upon us And I could make this plain unto you by more examples than I have time to express For we read of Marcus Aâ—tilius Regulus that was a Roman Consul and Boetius de consol l. 2. c. 5. had laid Fetters upon many Africans yet being unhappily taken by the Carthaginians he found himself presently environed and then miserably â—ied in the Conquerors Chains and it is written of Cheops King of Egypt that erected the Pyramides which were all built of Theban Marble and were of that huge height and monstrous Magnitude that one of them was 20 years in building though it is reported there were circiter decem hominum â—iriades about 10 Myriades of men as Herodotus saith or 100000 men as others write that did continually Herodot l. 2. p. 22. Sandys l. 2. work upon it the same containing as Sands affirmeth eight Acres of ground at the bottom and ascending by 255 steps to the top and every step being of three foot in height and of a proportionable breadth and yet this great King that was of this great power before his death became so poor that he was compelled to prostitute his own Daughter to relieve his wants So Belisarius that in the dayes of Justinian 1. was one of the bravest Souldiers and of the greatest Commanders of the world to whom the Lady and Empress of the world Rome it self owed her self thrice at the least and who took two mighty Kings Gilimer King of Africa and Vitiges King of the Gothes to be his Prisoners yet within a little while this great man as some writers do report came to that poor pass as he was fain to cry Date obolum Belisario quem virtus exaltavit malitia depressit fortuna caecavit O give one half-peny to Belisarius whom vertue hath honoured envy hated and fortune spoyled and made him now a poor blind Beggar And Pedro Mexia setteth down the miserable ends and other strange traverses Treasury of times l. 4. c. 37 Pope John whom Marâ— 5. succeeded An. 1410. Pope Clement that was imprisoned by Charles 5. 1527. Archbishop of Flor. and four Cardinals butchered 1448. The Bishop of Liege Brother to the great Duke of Burgoyne and 10 Abbats massacred in his presence endured by divers Kings Emperours Dukes and other great Princes whereof he accounteth no less than 13. besides 2 Popes 2 Bishops 4 Cardinals and 10 Abbors that within one hundred and fifty years were thrown down from the Pinacle of Prosperity to the lowest Gulf of Adversity as George King of Bâ—hemia Charles Duke of Burgoyne Uladislaus King of Poland Constantinus Paleolagus Emperor of the East Charles 8. King of France James 4. King of Scots John de Albret King of Navarre Lewes Sforza Duke of that rich and goodly Countrey of Millain Francis 1. King of France that was the Patron of all Learning and those three great Kings Muley Mahomet King of Fez and Morocco Abdelmelec his Unkle and Sebastian King of Portugal that came to a miserable end and died all three in one day being Monday the 4th of August 1578. and which is worthy to be remembred above all John Justinian that trayterous Villain who covenanted with Mahomet to betray Constantinople so he would make him King which the great Turk promised and accordingly performed but after three daies struck off his head as his Treason well deserved and so I wish may be the reward of all disloyal Traytors And therefore seeing not only wicked Potâ—ntates but also most famous Kings and Princes and most excellent Prelates have been reduced to such ends what wonder is it that many great Scholars and many reverend Bishops whom their worth and learning raised to some height of dignity should be thrown down as they were of late by envy and hatred into the depth of misery The time would be too short for me to tell you of Craesus the rich King of Lydia Darius the great Monarch of Persia Manius Acilius the proud Consul of Rome holy Job the richest in the Land of Hus and warlike Caius Marius when he had hid himself in the Fens or Bogs of Mynturnes and of many thousands more that were exceeding rich and most honourable and in a moment of time became extream poor and miserable But you may see it every day that as the Poet saith Rich Cresus may suddenly become as poor as Irus Irus est subito qui modo Croesus erat And there is none of us but he may consider how many great and honourable persons have been suddenly disgraced and how many well left Heirs and wealthy men have in an instant consumed all their wealth and wasted their Patrimony like a Snow-bal and then came to be pitied by their Friends and scorned by some others whom formerly they despised and thought them not worthy to eat with the dogs of their Flocks such is the nature of wealth and so great is the vanity of all worldly riches that the wise man saith They betake them unto their wings and flee away like an Eagle i. e. very swiftly Prov. 23 5. And yet for all this it is a wonder to see the folly of most men shewed in the pursuit of this idle vanity for it is reported how Cyneas a most excellent Orator Plutarch in vita Phyrri p. 404. endeavouring to disswade King Pyrrhus a brave Souldier from his expedition against the Romans asked him what he would do when he had subdued them and he answered that he would bring Cicily into his subjection and what will your grace do then said the Orator the King replied then we have a fair passage to go to bring in Carthage and to conquer Africa And when you have conquered them what will you do said Cynâ—â—s We will then said the King bring all Macedon under the yoke of our Obedience And when both Rome and Cicily and Carthage and all Macedon have felt the stroke of your Majesties Sword what will you do then I pray you said the Orator then the King perceiving what he meant smilingly answered we will then take our ease and begin to make Feasts and continue so every day and be as merry together as possibly we can be And what letteth us now my good Lord said Cyneas but that we may be now as merry and more quiet sith we enjoy enough to effect all that presently without any further travel or more trouble which
Trust interrupting our Peace opposing his Majesty and violating all our ancient liberties Or if a better way may be found let us follow the same to God's glory and to produce the peace and happinesse of this Kingdom lest if we persist obstinately in this wilfull Rebellion to withstand God's Ordinance to oppose his Anointed and to shed so much innocent blood we shall thus fighting against Heaven so far provoke the wrath of the God of Heaven as that the Glory of Israel shall be darkned the Honour of this Nation shall be troden under-foot and be made the scorn of all other Nations round about us and the light of our Candlestick shall be extinguished and we shall all become most miserable because we would not hearken to the voice of the Lord our God Which I hope we will do and do most earnestly pray that we may do it to the Glory of God the Honour of our King and the Happinesse of this whole Kingdom through Jesus Christ our Lord to whom be Praise and Dominion both now and for ever Amen Jehovae Liberatori AN APPENDIX THe man of God speaking of transcendent wickednesse saith Their Vine is of the Vine of Sodom and of the fields of Gomorrah their Deut. 32â— 3â—â— grapes are grapes of gall their clusters are bitter their wine is the poison of Dragons and the cruel vemon of Aspes And I believe never any wickednesse deserved better to be clad with this elegant expression than that threefold iniquity 1. The unparallel'd Vote 2. The intolerable Ordinance 3. The damnable Covenant which the rebellious Faction in Parliament have most impiously contrived to make up the full measure of their impiety since the writing of my Discoveries For 1. Omitting that horrible practice of those rebellious blood thirsty Souldiers that did their best to murder their own most gracious Queen this Factionseeing how God prevented that plot voted this most loving and most loyal Wife to be impeached of High Treason for being faithful to do her uttermost endeavour which will be her everlasting praise to assist her most dear and Royal Husband their own Liege Lord and Soveraign King in his greatest extremities against a virulent mighty Faction of most malicious Traytors The strangest Treason that ever the World heard of 2. They made an Ordinance for the composing and convocating of such a Synod whereof I said somewhat before of Lay-men ignorant men factious men trayterous men and such concretion of heterogeneall parts like Nebuchadnezzars Image Gold Brass and Clay all mixed together and all so ordered limited and bridled as it is expressed in the 5. and 6. page of their Ordinance by the power of both Houses where there are such abundance of Schismaticall and seditious Members that I should scarce put the worst sensitive soul to professe that â—rratical faith or any brute beast to be guided by that Ecclesiastical Discipline that such factious Traytors as some of them are like to be proved should compose or cause to be composed 3. They composed a form of a sacred Vow or Covenant as they term it or as it is indeed the Covenant of Hell a Covenant against God to overthrow the Gospel of Christ under the name of Christ which Covenant is the oil that swimmeth uppermost upon the waters that is the oil of Scorpioâ—s or as Moses saith The poison of Dragons so lately wringed and diffused far and near to defile and destroy millions of souls when forgetting their faith to God and the oathes of their allegeance so often and so solemnly taken by many or most of them to be faithful unto their King they shall be compelled which is one degree worse than the vow of them that bound themselves with a curse neither to eat nor drink till they had killed Paul so hypocritically so perjuredly so rebelliously so horribly and so bloodily to make such a fearful Vow and such an abominable Covenant so wickedly contrived that without great and serious repentance spitteth forth nothing but fire and briâ—stone and can produce nothing else but Hell and Damnation to all that take it especially to them that will compell men to be thus transcendently wicked as if they would send them with Corah quick to Hell All which triplicity of evil I shall leave to some abler and more eloquent Pen to be set forth more fully in the right colours that being sufficiently displayed they may be throughly detested of all good men Amen O Lord have mercy upon us and incline our hearts to keep thy Laws THE CONTENTS Of the severall Chapters in the Plots of the Parliament Chap. I. SHeweth the Introduction the greatness of this Rebellion the originall thereof the secret plots of the Brownisticall Faction and the two cheifest things they aimed at to effect their plot Page 251. Chap. II. Sheweth the eager prosecution of our Sectaries to take off the Earl of Strafford's head How he answered for himself The Bishops right of voting in his cause His excellent virtues and his death p. 254. Chap. III. Sheweth how they stopped the free judgement of the Judges procured the perpetuity of the Parliament the consequences thereof And the subtile device of Semiramis p. 259. Chap. IV. Sheweth the abilities of the Bishops the threefold practice of the Faction to exclude them out of the House of Peers and all the Clergy out of all Civil Judicature p. 262. Chap. V. Sheweth the evil consequences of this Act How former times respected the Clergy How the King hath been used ever since this Act passed and how for three speciall Reasons it ought to be annulled p. 265. Chap. VI. Sheweth the plots of the Faction to gain unto themselves the friendship and assistance of the Scots To what end they framed their new Protestation How they provoked the Irish to rebell And what other things they gained thereby p. 270. Chap. VII Sheweth how the Faction was inraged against our last Canons What manner of men they chose in their new Synod And of six speciall Acts of great prejudice unto the Church of Christ which under false pretences they have already done p. 274. Chap. VIII Sheweth what Discipline or Church-government our factious Schismaticks like best Twelve Principal points of their Doctrines which they hold as 12. Articles of their faith and we must all believe the same or suffer if this Faction should prevail p. 270. Chap. IX Sheweth three other speciall points of Doctrine which the Brownists and Anabaptists of this Kingdom do teach p. 274 Chap. X. Sheweth the great Bug-bears that affrighted this Faction The four speciall means they used to secure themselves The manifold lyes they raised against the King And the two special Questions that are discussed about Papists p. 278. Chap. XI Sheweth the unjust proceedings of these factious Sectaries against the King Eight special wrongs and injuries that they have offered him Which are the three States And that our Kings are not Kings by Election or Covenants with the people p. 283. Chap. XII
Sheweth the unjust proceedings of this Faction against their fellow-Subjects set down in four particular things p. 2â—9 Chap. XIII Sheweth the proceedings of this Faction against the Laws of the Land The Priviledges of Parliament transgressed eleven special wayes p. 292. Chap. XIV Sheweth how they have transgressed the publike Laws of the Land three wayes and of four miserable Consequences of their wicked doings p. 295. Chap. XV. Sheweth a particular recapitulation of the Reasons whereby their Design to alter the Government both of Church and State is evinced And a pathetical disswasion from Rebellion p. 301. JVRA MAJESTATIS THE RIGHTS OF KINGS BOTH IN CHURCH and STATE 1. Granted by God 2. Violated by the Rebels 3. Vindicated by the Truth AND The Wickednesses of the Faction of this pretended PARLIAMENT at Westminster 1. Manifested by their Actions 1. Perjury 2. Rebellion 3. Oppression 4. Murder 5. Robbery 6. Sacriledge and the like 2. Proved by their Ordinances 1. Against Law 2. Against Equity 3. Against Conscience PUBLISHED 1. To the eternal honour of our just God 2. The indeleble shame of the wicked Rebels And 3. To procure the happy peace of this distressed Land Which many fear we shall never obtain until 1. The Rebels be destroyed or reduced to the obedience of our King And 2. The breaches of the Church be repaired 1. By the restauration of God's now much prophaned service And 2. The reparation of the many injuries done to Christ his now dis-esteemed servants By GRYFFITH WILLIAMS Lord Bishop of OSSORY Impii homines qui dum volunt esse mali nolunt esse veritatem quâ condemnantur mali Augustinus Printed at LONDON Ann. Dom. 1662. TO THE KING'S most Excellent MAJESTY Most gracious Soveraign WITH no smal paines and the more for want of my books and of any setled place being multum terris jactatus alto frighted out of mine house and tost betwixt two distracted Kingdoms I have collected out of the sacred Scripture explained by the ancient Fathers and the best Writers of God's Church these few Rights out of many that God and Nature and Nations and the Lawes of this Land have fully and undeniably granted unto our Soveraign Kings My witness is in Heaven that as my conscience directed me without any squint aspect so I have with all sincerity and freely traced and expressed the truth as I shall answer to the contrary at the dreadful judgement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 therefore with all fervency I humbly supplicate the divine Majesty still to assist Your Highness that as in Your lowest ebb You have put on Righteousness as a breast plate and with an heroick Resolution withstood the proudest waves of the raging Seas and the violent Attempts of so many imaginary Kings so now in Your acquired strength You may still ride on with Your honour and for the glory of God the preservation of Christ his Church and the happiness of this Kingdom not for the greatest storm that can be threatned suffer these Rights to be snatched away nor Your Crown to be thrown to the dust nor the Sword that God hath given You to be wrested out of Your hand by these uncircumcised Philistines these ungracious Rebels and the Vessels of God's wrath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 unlesse they do most speedily repent for if the unrighteous will be unrighteous still and our wickednesse provoke God to bring our Land to Desolation Your Majesty standing in the truth and for the right for the honour of God and the Church of his Son is absolved from all blame and all the bloud that shall be spilt and the oppressions insolencies and abhominations that are perpetrated shall be required at the hands and revenged upon the heads of these detested Rebels You are and ought in the truth of cases of conscience to be informed by Your Divines and I am confident that herein they will all subscribe that God will undoubtedly assist You and arise in his good time to maintain his own cause and by this war that is so undutifully so unjustly made against Your Majesty so Giant-like fought against Heaven to overthrow the true Church You shall be glorious like King David that was a man of War whose dear son raised a dangerous rebellion against him and in whose reign so much bloud was spilt and yet notwithstanding these distempers in his Dominion he was a man according to God's own heart especially because that from α to ω * As in the beginning by reducing the Ark from the Philistins throughout the midst by setling the service of the Tabernacle in the ending by his resolution to build leaving such a treasure for the erecting of the Temple the beginning of his reign to the end of his life his chiefest endeavour was to promote the service and protect the servants of the Tabernacle the Ministers of God's Church God Almighty so continue Your Majesty bless You and protect You in all Your wayes Your vertuous pious Queen and all Your royal Progeny Which is the dayly prayer of The most faithful to Your Majesty GRYFFITH OSSORY THE RIGHTS OF KINGS Both in CHURCH STATE And The Wickednesses of this Pretended PARLIAMENT Manifested and Proved CHAP. I. Sheweth who are the fittest to set down the Rights which God granted unto Kings what causeth men to rebell the parts considerable in S. Peters words 1 Pet. ii 17. in fine How Kings honoured the Clergie the â—aâ— but most false pretences of the refractary Faction what they chiefly aâ—me at and their malice to Episcopacie and Royaltie IT was not unwisely said by Ocham that great Scholeman Guliel Ocham Ludov. 4. to a great Emperour which M. Luther said also to the Duke of Saxâ—nie Tu protege me gladio ego defendam tâ— calamo do you defend me with your Sword and I will maintain your Right with my Pen for God hath committed the Sword into the hand of the King Rom. 13. v. 4 and His hand which beareth not the Sword in vain knoweth how to use the Sword better than the Preacher and the King may better make good His Rights by the Sword then by the Pen which having once 〈◊〉 His papers with mistakes and concessions more then due though they should be never so small if granted further than the truth would 〈◊〉 as I fear some have done in some particulars yet they cannot so easily be scraped away by the sharpest sword and God ordered the divine tongue and learned Scribe to be the pens of a ready Writer and thereby to display the duties and to justifie the Rights of Kings and if they fail in either part the King needeth neither to performe what undue Offices they impose The Divine best to set down the Rights of Kings upon him nor to let pass those just honours they omit to yield unto him but he may justly claime his due Rights and either retain them or regain them by his Sword which the Scribe either wilfully omitted