brought away the Hallowed things out of mine House and also have given them unto the Levite c. According to all thy Commandements which thou hast commanded me I have not transgressed thy Commandements neither have I forgotten them I have not eaten thereof in my mourning neither have I taken away ought thereof for my Vnclean Vse nor given ought thereof for the dead but I have hearkened to the Voice of the Lord my God And have done according to all that thou hast commmanded me Look down from thy Holy Habitation from Heaven And bless thy people Israel and the Land which thou hast given us a Land that floweth with milk and honey Such a conscientious true payment of Tithes as this according to all Gods Commandements without the least Substraction or embezlement emboldens enables every particular man to make such a Prayer to God as this not only for himself but for the whole Land brings a blessing upon himself and all the Realm yea makes it a Land flowing with milk and honey and abundance of all rich blessings Besides we read in 2 Chr. 31.1 to 15. That when godly King Hezekiah had destroyed Idolatry and appointed the Courses of the Priests and Levites after their Courses every man according to his service he brought â—urings and Peace-offerings to minister and to give thanks and to praise in all the Gates of the Tents of the Lord He appointed also the Kings portion of his Substance for the burnt-offerings for the morning and evening for the Sabbaths the new Moons and set Feasts moreover he commanded the people that dwelt in Jerusalem To give the Portion of the Priests and the Levites that they might be encouraged in the Law of the Lord. And as soon as the Commandement came abroad the children of Israel brought in abundance the first Fruits of Corn Wine Oyl and Honey and of all the encrease of the field and the Tithes of all things brought they in abundance And concerning the children of Israel and Judah that dwelt in the Cities of Judah They also brought in the Tithes of Oxen and Sheep and the Tithe of holy things which were dedicated unto the Lord their God and laid them by heaps In the third moneth they began to lay the foundation of the heaps and finished them in the seventh moneth and when Hezekiah and the Princes came and saw the heaps they blessed the Lord and his People Israel Then Hezekiah questioned with the Priests and Levites concerning the heaps And Azariah the chief Priest of the House of Zadok answered him and said Since the People began to bring the Offerings into the house of the Lord We have had enough to eat and have left Plenty But did the people grow poor thereby no but much richer than before for the Lord hath blessed his people and that which is left is this great store Then Hezekiah commanded to prepare Chambers or store-houses in the house of the Lord and they prepared them and brought in the Offerings and the Tithes and the dedicate things faithfully over which Cononiah the Levite was Ruler How different was this practice of all the people and godly Saints in those daies in a chearfull bringing in their Tithes and Oblations to the Priests and Levites in abundance for their encouragement which caused King Hezekiah his Princes the Priests Levites and God himself to bless them from the sacrilegious practice of Tith-detaining Hypocritical Saints Anabaptists Quakers Sectaries and Christians in our daies who shall never receive such a blessing as this from God or good men but their curses If these Texts and Presidents will not move such hard-hearted men let them consider both this â—â—â—cept and promise of God Prov. 3.9 10. Honour the Lord with thy Substance and with the first fruits of thine encrease So shall thy Barns be filled with Plenty and thy Press shall burst out with new Wine And Mal 3.7 10 11 12. Return unto me and I will return unto you saith the Lord of hosts but ye said Wherein shall we return Bring ye all the Tithes into the Store-house that there may be meat in mine house and prove me now herewith saith the Lord of Hosts If I will not open you the windows of heaven and powr you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground neither shall your Vine cast her fruit before her time in the field saith the Lord of Hosts And all nations shall call you blessed for ye shall be a delight some land saith the Lord of Hosts What Christians heart though never so covetous and worldly should not these sacred promises of God the last of them recorded in the last of all the Books and Prophets in the Old Testament they being not meerly Levitical and Judaical but of eternal verity use and evangelical too excite and engage most cheerfully to pay and bring in all their Tithes and Dues to Gods Ministers now as well as to the Priests and Levites heretofore Christ himself having made like parallel promises of blessings and rewards for relieving and maintaining his Ministers in the Gospel Mat. 10.40 41 42. Mark 9.41 Phil. 4.18 19 9. That the due payment of Tithes to Gods Priests and Levites was a great encouragement to them in the law of the Lord and in the diligent execution of their duties 2 Chron. 31.3 4 5 10. And on the contrary The with-holding of them from them a great discouragement necessitating them to desert their duties and functions witnesse that memorable Text Neh. 13.10 11 12. And I perceived that the portions of the Levites had not been given them mark the consequence For the Levites and the Singers that did the work were fled every one to his field Then contended I with the Rulers and said Why is the house of God forsaken and I gathered them together and set them in their place Then brought all Judah the Tithes of the Corn and the new Wine and the Oyl unto their treasuries And I made treasurers over the treasuries Shelemiah the Priest and Zadock the Scribe and of the Levites Pedajah c. for they were counted faithfull and their office was to distribute unto their Brethren Which reason still continuing under the Gospel in relation to the Ministers and Preachers thereof Heb 13.16 17. Phil. 4.10 to 21. is a strong argument to engage all true Christians desiring the propagation of the Gospel and a painfull able Ministry duly to pay their tithes and portions to them 10. That it was the bounden duty care of Religious Kings and Governours amongst Gods own people when the people were backwards to pay and bring their Tithes and duties to the Priests and Levites to command and enforce them to do it by special Covenants and Oaths sealed subscribed by the Princes and people Neh. 9.38 cap. 10.1 to the end and likewise by positive Ordinances
a young Bullock and seven Rams the same may be a Priest of them that are no Gods But as for us the Lord is our God and we have not forsaken him and the Priests which minister unto the Lord are the Sons of Aaron and the Levites wait upon their business c. For we keep the Charge of the Lord our God but ye have forsaken him And behold God himself is with us for our Captain and his Priests with sounding Trumpets to cry allarum against you The issue of this Atheistical State-policy and Sacrilegious deprivation spoliation of Gods Priests and Levites of their Suburbs Possessions Ministry by Jeroboam and his Sons is very remarkable 1 It brought ruine upon his whole Army though double the number of Abijah his host of whom they had a great advantage by an ambushment God himself smiting him and his host so that they fled before Judah and Abijah and his people slâ—w them with a great slaughter so that there fell down slain of Israel five hundred thousand chosen men 2 Chron. 13.13 to 20. The greatest slaughter in one battel that ever we read of in Sacred or prophane Stories before or since 2. It brought Captivity on his Adherents and people who were brought under at that time pursued and had their Cities taken and plundered v. 18 19. 3. It drew down this misery and fatal Judgement on himself v. 20. Neither did Jeroboam recover strength again in the dayes of Abijah and the Lord strook him and he died 4. It became sin to the house of Jeroboam even to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth 1 Kings 13.33 34. 5. It made all the succeeding Kings of Israel professed Idolaters and most of them bloudy Murtherers Vsurpers Persecutors and produced perpetual successive civil warrs between Judah and Israel 1 Kings 14.30 chap. 15.6 7 16 32. 2 Chron. 28.4 to 12. 6. It brought final captivity ruine and desolation in conclusion to the whole kingdom of Israel and the ten revolting Tribes 2 Kings 17.20 21 22 23. where this sad story is recorded And the Lord rejected all the seed of Israel and afflicted them and delivered them into the hand of spoilers until he had cast them out of his sight For he rent Israel from the house of David And they made Jeroboam the Son of Nebat King of which God thus complains Hos 8.4 They have set up Kings but not by me they have made Princes and I knew it not and Jeroboam drave Israel from following the Lord and made them sin a great sin for the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did they departed not from them untill the Lord removed Israel out of his sight as he had said by all his servants the Prophets So was Israel carried away out of their own Land to Assyria till this Day when as the Kingdom of Judah continued above 134. years after in Davids royal posterity enjoying Gods Priests Levites Prophets and Ordinances till their captivity for their sins in mocking abusing his Messengers Prophets and despising his words 2 Chron. 36.16 17. And then after 70. years captivity they were restored again to their Country re-edified Jerusalem and the Temple and with them the Priests and Levites returning from bondage were restored likewise to their Cities and Glebes of which the Kings of Judah never deprived them as Jeroboam and his Sons and the Kings of Israel who were all Idolaters did whence thus we read Ezra 2.70 So the Priests and the Levites and the Singers and the Porters the Nethinims dwelt in their Cities and all Israel in their Cities Thus seconded Neh. 11.18 20. All the Levites in the holy City were 284. and the residue of Israel of the Priests and Levites were in all the Cities of Judah every Man in his Inheritance and Neh. 13.10 The Levites and Singers that did the work were fled every one to his field In the Prophecie of Ezechiel written during the Jews Captivity in the Land of the Chaldeans Ezech. 1.1 2 3. prophesying of the re-edifiing of the Temple the dimensions and whole fabrick thereof ch 40.1 to 45. we find frequent mention of holy Chambers therein provided for the Priests and their vestments And ch 45.1 to 5. God enjoyns the Israelites by this Prophet upon their restitution to their own Land when they should divide it by Lot for an Inheritance That they should offer an holy portion of the Land an oblation unto the Lord the length thereof twenty five thousand reeds and the breadth ten thousand This shall be holy in all the borders thereof round about Of this there shall be for the Sanctuary 500 reeds in length with 500 in breadth square round about and fifty Cubits round about for the Suburbs thereof Then he addes The holy Portion of the land shall be for the Priests the Ministers of the sanctuary which shall come neer to minister unto the Lord and it shall be a place for their Houses and an holy place for the Sanctuary And the 25000. of length and 10000. of breadth Shall also the Levites the Ministers of the House have for themselves for a possession for twenty Chambers In the 47. Chapter verse 13. to the end of the Prophecy he writes of the bounds and division of the land of Canaan after their restitution according to their several tribes in relation to and imitation of the bounds and division of it formerly made and recited by Joshua out of which there was a special portion reserved for the Priests and Levites as there was in Joshua's division forecited Thus expressed Ezeck 48.8 to 15. And by the border of Judah from the East side unto the West side shall be the offering which they shall offer of 25000. reeds in breadth and in length as one of the other parts from the East side unto the West side and the sanctuary shall be in the midst of it The oblation ye shall offer unto the Lord shall be of 25000. in length and 10000 in breadth And for them even for the Priests shall be this holy Oblation toward the North 25000. in length and toward the West 10000. in breadth and toward the East 10000 in breadth and toward the South 25000 in length and the sanctuary of the Lord shall be in the midst thereof It shall be for the Priests that are sanctified of the sons of Zadock which have kept my charge which went not astray when the children of Israel went astray after Jeroboam and his calves as the Levites went astray And this oblation of the land that is offered shall be unto them a thing most holy by the border of the Levites And over against the border of the Priests the Levites shall have 25000. in length and 10000. in breadth all the length shall be 25000 and the breadth 10000. reeds And they shall not sell of it neither exchange nor alienate the first fruits of the land for it is holy unto
from the Secular Priests to themselves That the Command of Tithes was not Moral but Ceremonial and not to be performed by constraint of Conscience to the Minister and that out of whatsoever Lands at least was given to any of the four Orders of Fréers Mendicants as now to Anabaptists and Quakers their disciples no Tithe was in conscience to be deduced for the Minister as he proves out of the Council of Vienna held An. 1340. Pope Innocent the 4th and Richard Archbishop of Armagh in Defens Curatorum Alex. l. 4. Consil 60. and William Râ—ssel a Franciscan Freer his Doctrine condemned in the Convocation of the Clergie Anno 5 H. 6. as Haeretical and publikely recanted by him at Pauls Cross as such That Tithes especially personal fall not under divine precept at least that they should be paid to the Parochial Curate as a due unto him of right unlesse there were a Custom to the contrary but that every one might lawfully give them to pious uses at their pleasure Whereupon these Nâ—w Masters and Preaching Freers preaching and teaching thus against the Old and Nâ—w Testament were enjoyned by several Councils and Synods in their Sermons to exhort inform and instruct the people without any fraud to pay their Tithes faithfully to their Ministers as DVE by the Lawes of God and the Church under pain of being deprived of the power of absolving the people from their sins Therefore John Cannes with his confederate Anabaptists and Quakers new Doctrines Invectives Petitions against our Ministers Tithes derived from these old and new Franciscan Mendicant Freers now swarming amongst them is far more truly really Antichristian than our Ministers and their Tithes of which more in its due place 11. That God in the Levitical and Judicial Law prescribed Laws for Warr and Souldiers in the Wars Deut. 20. throughout and amongst others v. 2 3 4. It shall be when ye come nigh unto the Battel that the Priest shall approach and speak unto the people and shall say unto them for their encouragement Hear O Israel you approach this day unto battel against your enemies let not your hearts faint fear not and do not tremble neither be ye terrified because of them for the Lord your God is he that goeth with you against your Enemies to save you After which v. 8. c. The Officers are commanded to make Proclamation that every man who was fearfull and faint-hearted should go and return to his house lest they should discourage their brethren that they should proclaim Peace to every City they came nigh before they besieged or stormed it and if they won it by force the Souldiers should take the spoil thereof unto themselves and eat the spoil of their enemies which the Lord their God had given them And by another Levitical Law the Priests were thus enjoyned by God to pray for and bless his people Num 6.23 24. c. On this wise ye shall blesse the children of Israel saying to them the Lord bless thee and keep thee the Lord make his face shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee the Lord lift up his Countenance upon thee and give thee Peace and they shall put my name upon the Children of Israel and I will bless them If then it be neither Jewish nor Antichristian nor superstitious nor unlawfull for Ministers of the Gospel to encourage Christian Souldiers going to battel in the self same manner and form or to bless them and the people in these very Levitical words as Iohn Canne and all Anabaptistical Independent Chaplains of the Army and Mr. Peters especially will grant who have frequently used the self same or like encouragements and exhortations to the Army receiving good constant pay for their pains And if it be neither Jewish nor Antichristian nor unchristian for our Saintlike Officers and Soldiers under the Gospel to make like Proclamation to cowardly persons or to proclaim peace to Cities and garisons ere they besiege or storm them and if obstinat and won by force to take the Spoil and Plunder of such Cities Enemies to themselves and eat therof which I am certain all our Officers Soldiers and their Anabaptistical Tithe-oppugning Chaplains will grant and subscribe to though thus prescribed by the Levitical law abolished as they say by Jesus Christ Then questionless our Ministers of the Gospel may still receive and enjoy their Glebes Tithes Oblations by like reason without the least guilt or reproach of Judaism or Antichristianism though prescribed to the Levitical Priests and Levites by the Levitical law else John Canne and others of his fraternity professing themselves the only Ministers of the Gospel and rejecting all others as Antichristian must give over their Chaplains places in the Army Navy Garrisons and no more encourage nor accompany any Soldiers in the wars or bless the people as aforesaid because it was a part of the Levitical Priests Office who were also to blow the Trumpets in the wars Num. 6.1 to 10. Josh 6.4 c. prescribed by an abolished Levitical law 12. That all Israelites Jews both Priests and people were by the Levitical law frequently commanded inviolably to perform keep pay execute the solemn Oaths Vows Covenants they made to God or men and no wayes to infringe them or prevaricate in them Levit. 19.12 Num. 21.2 3. cap. 30.2 to 16. Deut. 12.11 cap. 23.21 22 23. Josh 2.11 12 13. cap. 6.22 to 26. cap. 9.15 to the end And among other things we finde their Tithes vowed to God by Jacob Gen. 28.20 21 22. coupled with their Vows as things devoted by them to God by Vow as well as reserved by Law Deut. 12.11 Yea all the Jews were obliged by a Solemn Covenant to bring pay their first fruits and Tithes to God his Priests and Lâ—vites Nen. 10.31 to 39. Will or dare John Canne then or any other Tithe-leniers averr that it is both Jâ—wish Antichristian unlawfull for Ministers and Christians under the Gospel inâ—iolably to observe and perform all those just lawfull Oathes Vows Covenants they have solemnly made to God and men with hands listed up to heaven as some of their persidious horrid violations of them without blush or check of late seems to proclaim before God and all the world and to pay those Tithes Dues to our Ministers which our Ancestors and we by Solemn Vows and Covenants too have dedicated unto God and his Ministers and never intended by our Covenant to abolish or diminish in the least degree as Canne perjuriously and absurdly asserts but to establish and perpetuate as the late Ordinances for Tithes and Aâ—gmentations made by the very Prescribers and Subscribers of the late Solemn League and Covenant which it seems John Canne never took though he presseth it on others as his words Many have sworn who I hope will now observe it import both at the time and since the making taking of the Solemn League and Covenant with the Assemblies Exhortation for the better taking
naked and ye cloathed me not nay stripped me naked of all my cloathing and Livelihood and would neither relieve nor maintain me your selves nor permit others to do it in an antient legal way And then what can you answer or to whom can you resort for protection from this inevitable just Charge and Doom of Damnation for all eternity 4ly Consider seriously the exemplarie punishment executed upon Ananias and Saphyra Acts 5.1 c. with that fearfull judgement of retaliation denounced against all plundering Enemies of the Church of Christ Isay 33.1 Wo unto thee that spoylest and thou wast not spoyled and dealest treacherously and they dealt not treacherously with thee when thou ceasest to spoyl thou shalt be spoyled and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously they shall deal treacherously with thee Seconded by Obadiah 15. As thou hast done it shall be done unto thee thy reward shall return upon thine own head And if any fondly conceit as many do that the Swords and Power of an Army shall bear them out against the Lord of Hosts himself let them consider that of Psal 33.16 There is no King saved by the multitude of an Host themselves have seen it by late experience neither is any mighty man delivered by great strength Jeroboam the Idolatrous Usurper had an Army of no lesse than eight hundred thousand chosen men to make good his usurped Title against Abijah Davids right Heir yet when he had cast out the Priests of the Lord from their Suburbs and Possessions and made him Priests for his Calves of the lowest of the people he was vanquished by a far smaller Army and no lesse than five hundred thousand of his forces slain in one dayes battel and the Lord soon after smote him that be dyed 2 Chron. 13 Oreb Zeba and Salmunna the Princes and Generals of the Midianites when they entred into the Land of Israel to destroy it had an Army like unto Grashoppers for multitude and they and their Camels were without number Judges 6.5 6. Yet when they said Let us take to our selves the Houses of God in possession they were totally routed by Gideon and his 300. men having only Trumpets and Lamps and perished at Endor and became as dung for the earth Judg. 7. 8. Psal 83.9 10 11 12. Senacherib invaded Judah with a victorious and numerous Army above treble the Number to any Army in our daies Yet when he trusted to the strength of his Army and bid defiance to the God of Heaven as those do now who oppugn and spoil his Ministers of their inheritance God sent his avenging Angell which cut off all the mighty men of valour and the Leaders and the Captains and one hundred fourscore and five thousand of his souldiers in one night and when they arose early in the morning behold they were all dead corps so he returned with shame of face into his own land and when he was come into the house of his God his own Sonnes that came out of his own bowels slew him there with the sword 2 Kings 19.35 36 37. 2 Chron. 32.21 The two proud surly Captains with the fifty armed troopers at their heels who came in a violent manner but to fetch down Elijah the man of God from an hill to King Ahaziah were destroyed with fire from Heaven and the third Captain only saved who fell on his knees before him and besought him for his own and his fifties lives and used him like a man of God without any rudeness or plunder 2 Kings 1.9 10 c. To lesson all souldiers and Captains now to reverence Gods Ministers and do his Prophets no harm in their Persons Callings or Estates Else he who rebuked Kings and miraculously slew those Captains and their Troopers for their sakes will avenge their quarel now as well as in former ages And if former victories and successes have and do puff them so far up with pride or security as to think they may now reduce our Ministers like Conquered vassals to such poverty as to enforce and make them eat the very crumbs under their Tables insteed of feeding at their own let them remember that one memorable President wherewith I have quelled many usurping souldiers of the greatest Conqueror and Abuser of Kings I ever yet read off in the world and Gods retaliation upon him for his Tyranny and inhumanity after the Conquest of no less then 70. Kings and who now living hath conquered the tenth part of that number thus recorded to all Posterity Judg. 1.5 6 7. And Iudah fought against Adonibezeck in Bezeck and they slew the Canaanites and Perazites And Adonibezeck fled and they pursued after him and caught him and cut off his Thumbs and great Toes And Adonibezeck said threescore and ten Kings having their thumbs and great toes cut off have gathered their meat under my Table As I have done so God hath requited me and they brought him to Ierusalem and there he died It is very dangerous for any Conquerers to make ill Presidents of Tyranny or Rapine because they have power in their hands to do it Mark what a Wo and judgement God denounceth against such Mich. 2.1 2 3 4 Wo to them that devise iniquity upon their beds when the morning is come they practise it Because it is in the power of their hand And they covet fields and they take them by violence and houses and take them away So they oppress a man and his house even a man and his heritage Nay Ministers now and their Heritage as well as other mens But mark what follows immediately Therefore thus saith the Lord Behold against this family do I devise an evil from whence they shall not remove their necks neither shall they be hauty for this time is evil In that day shall one take up a Parable against you and lament with a dolefull lamentation and say we be utterly spoiled He hath changed the portion of my people as some now would change our Ministers How hath he removed it from me turning away Lord It is most perilous for any by meer Arbitrary Votes will and violence to seiz on change divide any other mens lands houses inheritances especially Gods Ministers it will prove as bad as a cup of poison to them they shall vomit them up again with a vengeance And though their excellency mount up to the Heavens and their Head unto the Clouds yet their triumphing shall be but short and their joy but for a moment They shall perish for ever as their own dung They which have seen them shall say Where are they They shall fly away as a dream and shall not be found The eyes which saw them shall see them no more neither thall their place any more behold them mark the reason because they have oppressed and violently taken away an House which they builded not Job 20.4 to 20. How much more the Houses Glebes Tithes of God and his Ministers Let this sad consideration then
that they most affect yea farr lesse troublesom to more convenient for our Ministers Persons families and necessary Cattel than bare stipends which must enforce them to run to Markets to buy all their Corn and other provisions both for their Houshold Horses Cattel at the dearest rates So if this Maintenance by Tithes be once abolished either before any other competent Maintenance setled in its steed lesse grievous and inconvenient than Tithes which all wise men in the world will never be able to invent much lesse to establish as things now are setled or Ministers left wholy to an arbitrary unconstrained Benevolence without any limited Proportion or means to recover it if detained as some now petition This expected proposed unconstrained Maintenance would in verity and reality signify just Nothing and be no Maintenance at all in the Petitioners own sence and intention as appears by John Cannes forecited passages and the very words of their Petitions since they refuse to pay them their very Tithes yet due by Law and never freely contributed one penny to them for their Ministry which they revile disclaim as Antichristian Wherefore if any New-fangled Politicians resolve to settle such a new Maintenance only insteed of the old for the peoples pretended Ease let them first establish settle an arbitrary Excise Custome uncoercive voluntary Impost and monthly Contribution as this on the people for Maintenance of the Army and Navy not so simply necessary as the Ministry for our real welfare without any compulsory means to recover it if not freely rendred till the next harvest come and see what a competent Maintenance that will be for the Souldiers and Seamen and provide that all Tenants for the year ensuing shall render only what Rents they please to the State their Landlords Lessees who shall have no power to distrain sue or enter upon any of them in case they deny to pay their Rents and trie what a certain Annual Revenue this whimsy will produce to the States and Land-Lords purses Or else give over this Jesuitical Anabaptistical devised new Maintenance for our Ministers as a Stratagem only to starve their bodies and their Peoples souls without any more Debates concerning Tithes to gratify such malicious Projectors and offend all Godly people through the Nation who deem this old way of Maintenance of Gods own Prescription farr better lesse inconvenient in all respects than this arbitrary or any other new-fangled way of these or other mens invention 5ly That although God by his divine Providence is able to support the faithfull Ministers of the Gospel though totally stripped naked of all their Glebes Tithes antient Maintenance through the unrighteousnesse or malice of ungodly men as he did the Apostles and his Ministers in all ages in times of Persecution yet let all such who have or shall have a hand in such a Sacrilegious design consider 1. That they shall be as bitter Enemies to and Persecutors of the Ministers of Christ amongst us in and by this very Project as Julian the Apostate Christian was to Gods faithfull Ministers in the primitive Times when he took away their Preferments Glebes and Church Revenues as the High Commissioners and Prelates were of late to all those godly Puritan Ministers whom they deprived of their Benefices for Non-conformity to their Ceremonies and no real Crime deserving such an inhuman Censure depriving them of their Livelyhoods 2ly That they shall hereby draw a great Scandal upon our very Religion it self Church Nation render them odious Sacrilegious to all foreign Churches Nations gratify rejoyce the hearts of the Pope Jesuites Papists and other professed Enemies of our Religion accomplish their Designs against our Church and Ministers exceedingly sad the hearts and grieve the righteous souls of all Gods faithfull Saints amongst us of all Protestant Churches in Foreign parts and draw this just Censure on themselves 2 Pet. 2.14 15. An heart they have exercised with covetous practices cursed Children which have forsaken the right way and are gon astray following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor who loved the wages of unrighteousnesse These are wells without water Clouds carried with a Tempest to whom is reserved the mist of darknesse for ever 3ly That although God should miraculously preserve a faithfull able Ministry and his true Religion still amongst us through the bounty and charity of other well affected Christians yet they have done their uttermost endeavours to destroy them and the peoples souls with them both for the present and succeeding ages 4ly That this unrighteous violent act will in all probability bring in a world of Confusion Atheism Schisms Heresies Divisions Contentions Blasphemies disorders amongst us in all places a famine of the sincere preaching of Gods word a neglect and contempt of Learning and Piety a dilapidation Spoliation of all or most Parish Churches Chapels a confusion of the bounds of all Parishes and Parochial Congregations and bring all those Calamities on our Nation as it did upon the Israelites when Jeroboam thrust out the Priests and Levites from their Glebes Suburbs Ministry thus registred 2 Chron. 15.3 5 6. Now for a long season Israel was without the true God and without a teaching Priest and without Law as some would have us now And in those days mark the consequence there was no peace to him that went out nor to him that came in but great veration upon all the Inhabitants of the Country And Nation was destroyed of Nation and Citie of Citie for God did vex them withall Adversity In which condition they continued till King Asa and the people renued repaired the decayed Altar House and worship of the Lord Gathered all the people to Jerusalem to worship God and enter into a Solemn Covenant and Oath to serve the Lord God of their Fathers with all their hearts and with all their soul And that whosoever would not seek the Lord God of Israel should be put to death whether small or great man or woman Offred Sacrifices to the Lord of the Spoyl they had taken from the Enemy 700. Oxen and 7000. Shéep and brought into the house of God the things that his Father had dedicated and himself had dedicated Silver and Gold and Vessels formerly taken thence and then there was no more war in divers years v. 8. to the end of the Chapter And probably our Wars Taxes Vexations will never end till we give over our late irreligious Sacrilegious Rapines Church Robberies and do the like as this pious King and his people here did 5ly That this discouraging robbing abusing despising mocking misusing of Gods Messengers Prophets sent amongst us and of all his and their words against our wicked Atheistical Sacrilegious Rapines is the High way to provoke the wrath of God to rise against us till there be no remedy yea to bring in a powerfull Foreign Nation upon us to pillage waste destroy enslave our whole Nation extirpate us out of the Land of our Nativity and
yea by spoils won in battel by Generals Collonels Captains Souldiers is not only lawfull expedient but the most fiting rational convenient Maintenance of all others warranted by direct Presidents Precepts both before under the Law and likewise by the Gospel which doth no wayes abolish condemn but approve confirm this way of Maintenance 3. That if Tithes and other Maintenance formerly setled on our Ministers be either wilfully with-held or substracted from them by the people in part or in whole the Civil Magistrates may yea ought by coercive Laws and Penalties to enforce the payment of them in due form and time both by the Law of God and Rules of Justice without any injurie or oppression to the detainers 4. That our Ministers Tithes are really no burthen grievance oppression to the people but a charge debt dutie as well as their Landlords Rents or Merchants poundage That the abolishing of them will be no real ease gain advantage to Farmers Lâ—ssees and the poorer sort of people as is falsely pretended but only to rich Land-lords and landed men and a loss detriment to all others 5. That the present Opposition and endevoured Abolition of Tithes and all other coercive Maintenance for Ministers proceeds not from any real grounds of Pietie Conscience or any consideble real inconveniences mischiefs arising from them but meerly from base covetous carnal hearts want of Christian love charitie to and professed enmitie hatred against the Ministers of the Gospel yea from a Jesuitical Papistical Anabaptistical design to subvert ruine our Ministers Church Religion the probable if not necessary consequence of this infernal Project if it should take effect which would prove the eternal shame infamie ruine of our Nation not its glory and benefit CHAP. I. THe first of these Propositions being the foundation and corner-stone whereon all the rest depend and into which it hath a prevailing influence I shall be more copious in its Probation and in the Refutation of the Objections which are or may be raised against it That there is a just competent and comfortable Maintenance due to all lawfull painfull Preachers and Ministers of the Gospel from the people even by Divine right institution and express Texts Precepts of the Gospel is as clear as the noonday Sun by these irrefragable Gospel Testimonies I. By Matth. 10.5 6 9 10 11. where when our Lord and Saviour Christ himself first sent forth authorized commanded his 12. Apostles to preach the Gospel he gave them these instructions among other Provide neither gold nor silver nor brass in your purses nor scrip nor bread adds Mark 6.8 for your journey neither two coats nor shooes nor yet staves adding this as the reason thereof For the Labourer is worthy of his meat or his Reward Hire Wages Maintenance as the Greek word will bear and other following Scriptures render it II. By Luke 10.1 6 10. recording that when our Saviour Christ not long after his former Commission to the 12. Apostles sent forth the 70. Disciples by two and two to preach in every City and place whither himself would come he gave them almost the self-same instructions Carry neither purse nor scrip nor shoes and into whatsoever house ye enter first say Peace be to this house c. And in the same house remain eating and drinking such things as they give subjoyning this reason for it For the Labourer is worthy of his Hire Go not from house to house as Beggars use to doe for alms And into what City you enter and hey receive you eat such things as are set before you c. III. By John 6.35 36 37 38. where our Lord Jesus Christ soon after the former Commissions used these words to his Disciples Behold I say unto you Lift up your eyes and look on the fields for they are white already to harvest And He that reapeth receiveth Wages and gathereth fruit unto eternal life c. I sent you to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labour c. Which may be aptly paralleld with and interpreted by Matth. 9.37 38. Then said he our Saviour unto his Disciples The harvest truly is plenteous but the Laborers are few pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that he would send forth Laborers into his harvest Which when he did he agreed with them all for a certain stipend by the day and when the evening was come he said unto his Steward Call the Laborers and give them their hire beginning from the last unto the first Mat. 20.1 to 15. as is there parabolically expressed From which Texts words of our Lord and Saviour Christ himself it is most apparent 1. That the Apostles Preachers Ministers of the Gospel are and ought to be diligent painfull Labourers in Christs spiritual harvest not idle loiterers 2. That they were not obliged but expresly prohibited to provide gold silver brass scrips shoes clothes bread meat drink lodging and other necessaries at their own free cost when they were commissioned and sent forth to preach the Gospel as some now would enforce them to for this very reason That being Labourers in the Lords own harvest for the eternall salvation of mens soules they were worthy to receive them as hire or wages from those to whom they preached 3. That our Saviour Christ himself at the very original institution and first mission of his 12. Apostles and after of his 70 Disciples to preach the Gospel thrice one after another expresl y resolves in positive terms That they are worthy of their meat hire wages for their Labour in the Gospel and so by consequence all other lawfull Labouring Ministers who diligently preach the Gospel are worthie of the like at this day and neither of them obliged to preach the Gospell freely without any recompence wages reward as some Seducers now pretend 4. That meat drink clothes lodging and a competent maintenance are as truely justly due to the true Labouring Ministers of the Gospell from the people and that of pure common natural yea Gospell right justice not as meer arbitrary Charity or Benevolence but as merited HIRE WAGES as much as well as deserved hire wages are due to any other hired servant or labourer whatsoever by common justice and the law of God Gen. 29. 15. Exod. 2.9 Levit. 19.13 Deut. 24.14 15. Mat. 20.1 to 16. Joh. 4.36 Or as well as pay wages are justly due to the best deserving Officers soldiers Luke 3.14 Ezek. 28.18 19. and that by Christs own trebled resolution recorded by the Evangelists for their greater evidence and conviction who emphatically by way of reason applies these words only to his Apostles and Ministers For the Labourer is worthy of his meat hire wages they being the most divine excellent usefull necessary Labourers of all others and that in matters of highest concernment in relation both to God and Men Therefore of all other labourers they are most worthy of a honorable comfortable certain hire salary reward for their support and encouragement 5. Hence
beneficial to others than that of Souldiers and Commanders for they are the very Embassadors of God himself and Jesus Christ the King and Lord of glory the King of Kings and Lord of Lords the Prince of the Kings of the earth and only Potentate to whom all other Powers and knees must bow beseeching men in Christs stead to be reconciled to God 2 Cor. 5 20. The Ministers servants messengers of Jesus Christ workers together with him Stewards of the mysteries of God and the glory of Christ 1 Cor 4.1 2. 2 Cor 6.1 8.23 2 Tim 2.24 imployed to preach to sinfull men the unsearchable riches of Christ to turn them from darkness unto light and from the power of Satan unto God Eph 3.8 Acts 26.18 to rescue their souls from the slavery and power of sin Satan hell death everlasting damnation and make them the sons of God heirs and coheirs with Christ of everlasting glory and felicity in Gods heavenly Kingdom through the power of Gods Grace and Spirit working in with by and through their Ministry on their hearts Now the calling of a Souldier though it be honourable and in some cases lawfull and necessary if rightly managed yet it is for the most part sinfull hurtfull pernicious dangerous unbeseeming the Gospel in respect of the cause managing abuses thereof it being accompanied with murther violence rapine treachery perjury sacrilege cruelty inhumanity profaneness blasphemy contempt of God of all sacred civil Laws and Ordinances ambition treason and the worst of sins tending usually like an overflowing Deluge to the subversion desolation ruine of whole Families Cities Countries Kingdoms Churches yea Mankinde it self Religion Lawes Liberties Properties turning whole famous Cities into ashes and Kingdoms into Golgothaes Acheldamaes fields of bloud and dead mens sculs yea very wildernesses as the Scripture Histories and experience manifest Hence God styles great Warriers and Armies The rod of his anger the Battel-Axe with which he breaketh in pieces the Nations destroyeth Kingdoms and treadeth them down like the mire in the streets and then at last destroyes them in his wrath when they have executed his judgements for their rapines violence and bloudy cruelty Isa 10.5 c. Jer. 50.1 to 48. c. 51.20 c. They being really carried on from one war to another out of vainglory ambition covetousness a mad humour of false greatness nullus supra caeteros eminendi modus in sua fata pariter ac publica to their own and the publick ruine yet still under a pretext of publick good and safety as Seneca excellently writes in his 94 Epistle a piece worth the reading of Alexander the great Caesar Pompey Marius qui cum omnia concuterent concutiebantur cum multis fuerunt Authores mali pestiferam illam vim qua plerosque nocuerunt ipsi quoque sentiunt Indeed the Profession of a Souldier even in the best of men and warres is so full of danger pollution that it leaves some scarrs of sin and tincture of pollution on them however they demean themselves Whence we read that though David were a man after Gods own heart and fought the battels of the Lord against his professed enemies by his special command with constant success yet God would by no means permit him to build an house and Temple to him for this very reason Because he had been a man of Warr and made great Battels and shed much Blood upon the Earth in his sight And the 12000. Israelites who by Gods special command went up to war against the Midianites and slew them returning with victory and great spoils without the loss of one man though treble their number when as they came back from the war were all of them whosoever had killed any person or touched any slain enjoyned by God and Moses to remain without the Camp seven dayes and to purifie themselves on the third and seventh day as unclean and polluted persons Numb 31.1 17 19 20. and all the Officers and Captains of hundreds and thousands in the host brought an oblation what every man had gotten of Jewels of Gold Chaines Bracelets Rings Ear-rings and Tablets to make an Oblation for their souls before the Lord v. 48 49 50. Such a stain and guilt was there adhering to their War-like calling in this best of Warrs against Gods professed idolatrous enemies And may not all Officers Souldiers whatsoever then justly fear finde a deeper guilt of sin and stain of blood than was in David or those Officers and Souldiers adhering to their persons profession in our unnatural uncivil Wars even with and against their very Christian nearest dearest Kings Brethren Friends Kindred Neighbours of the self-same reformed Protestant Religion and thereupon make the like or a far richer oblation than they did out of their spoils and gains by Warr as an attonement for their Souls in stead of provoking God and encreasing their guilt by seeking to spoil his faithfull Ministers of their long enjoyed maintenance In all these 6. particulars wherein the calling of Ministers excells in merit that of common Souldiers Captains and Officers of War both in respect of time studie costs labour diligence parts danger honour excellencie use profit and necessitie to which I might add that the Ministers frequent tears prayers in times of War and Judgements are far more prevalent beneficial victorious than the Souldiers Arms besides their constant use and benefit in daies of peace when Souldiers are needless useless I referr it to the unprejudiced judgements consciences of all rational Christian men and Souldiers themselves whether our faithfull preaching Ministers be not worthie of as large as liberal as constant setled honourable coercive a maintenance from the people as any Souldiers Officers Captains Collonels Majors or Major Generals whatsoever if not a better larger salarie and reward than they enjoy for the premised reasons when as yet some ordinarie Soldiers Troopers receive as much or more pay by the year as many of our godly Ministers and every Ancient Serjeant Lieutenant as much as the most and best beneficed Ministers and most Captains Collonels Majors five or six times more than our ablest best deserving Ministers and some general Army-Officers have received gained more monie lands wealth in few moneths or years space at least than hundreds of our most meritorious Ministers put together can gain in all their lives by their Ministry How then can they tax them as covetous oppressive yea as caterpillars of the people by their Tithes and Duties for receiving only 30 40 50 80 100 200 or 300 l. a year and very few of them more or so much from the people by an antient right paid once a year when as they receive ten times more from the impoverished people and at least the tenth part or more of all our poor Ministers livings by monthly enforced contributions and yet will neither give them the Tenthes of their pay and spoyles of Warr as Abraham and others did Gen 14.10
Arguments drawn from Melchisedec not pertinent to our present businesse after which he largely argues the change and abolition of the Levitical Law and Priesthood by Christ a theam of a different nature from the former to which the objected words refer therefore the total and final abolishing of all Tithes to which these words have no relation can never be inforced from them being ratifyed by the former clause as appurtenances to Christs everlasting Priesthood as well as to Melchisedecs Therefore as due to his Ministers under the Gospel as to any Priests and Levites under the Law which were likewise Types of Christ the true high Priest expiring at and by his death 3. The Priests and Levites under the Law had Cities Glebes Houses setled on them for their habitation families Cattel as well as Tithes by the Ceremonial Law for their better maintenance accommodation and that in a large proportion Lev. 25.32 33 34. Num. 35.1 to 12. Josh 21.1 to 43. 1 Chr. 6.54 to the end ch 9.10 to 35. 2 Chr. 11.13 14. Ezra 2.70 Neh. 11.26 ch 13.10 Ezec. 45.1 to 6. ch 4.8 9 to 15. If then this Text proves the Total Abolition of all our Ministers Tithes root and branch as Jewish and Antichristian as some impudent Scriblers and Petitioners against them now affirm It likewise proves the abolition of all their Rectories Glebes Houses likewise as well as of their Tithes as Jewish and Antichristian And so Ministers of the Gospel now shall neither have Tithes nor Glebes to support and feed them their families and Cattel nor yet so much as an House wherein to lodge and put their heads and be inforced to complain as our Saviour once did of his forlorn condition Mat. 8.20 and Luke 9.58 the Foxes have holes and the Birds of the air have Nests but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head A condition to which some Jesuitical Anabaptistical Athiestical uncharitable beasts of Prey worse than any Foxes or Harpies would now gladly reduce all our faithful Ministers and their Families whiles some of them Lord it and lodge themselves in our Kings Princes Bishops Deans and Chapters new acquired royal Palaces and not content therewith would spoyl all our Ministers of their more contemptible Glebes Rectories Tithes to enrich themselves and their Posterities and make our Ministers like our Saviour in his voluntary Poverty both Houseless and Harborless They may with as much Justice like the hard-hearted bloudy Jews Souldiers even crucifie them on crosses between such thieves as themselves to make them like our Saviour even in his voluntary sufferings as part their Glebes Lands Rectories Tithes among them and cast Lots upon their vestures even before their death when as the Souldiers who crucified our Saviour did not part his raiment amongst them nor cast Lots on his vesture till after his crucifixion by them there being as much Authority Conscience Law Justice Reason for the one as other seeing none by any Laws can lose or forfeit their Lands Livelihood but such who first forfeit their Lives to publick Justice 4. The Israelites were enjoyned by the Levitical Law Deut. 12.17 18 19. ch 14.26 27 28 29. to harbour entertain the Priests and Levites within their gates and not to forsake them so long as they should live upon the earth but freely to permit and invite them to come eat drink feast rejoyce and be satisfied with them and their Families before the Lord as well as to pay them Tithes But this Law as they argue is now abolished by Christ with the Priesthood Therefore when our Ministers are stript of all their Tithes Glebes Rectories Houses maintenance by our new Reformadoes it must be Jewish and Antichristian for them or any others so much as to lodge entertain or give them any thing to eat or drink within their gates or so much as to admit invite them to a Feast or meal within their Houses and then they with all theirs and other poor widows and orphans must all presently starve perish by John Cannes and these uncharitable mens new Gospel Light and Charity because Hospitality and Alms to such are Levitical and Jewish abolished with the Levitical Law and Priesthood which abrogated all Charity and Humanity out of the world as well as out of these Tithe-Oppugners hearts if this their Objection be Orthodox Gospel truth 5. Meer Freewill Offerings and voluntary unconstrained Contributions were prescribed by the Levitical and Judicial law both for and towards the maintenance of Gods Priests and worship for the building and repairing of the Tabernacle and of the Temple afterwards towards which the godly Kings Princes Generals Captains Officers Souldiers and all the pious people of God contributed most joyfully liberally and in such abundance upon all occasions that they gave far more than was sufficient and thereupon were prohibited by special Proclamation to give or bring any more as in the case of Materials of all sorts for the building and furniture of the Tabernacle of the congregation and of the Temple towards which many Heathen Kings and their Officers contributed freely and the very captive Jews Exod. 35.20 to 30. chap. 36.2 to 9. Levit. 22.18 21 23. chap. 23.38 Num. 15.3 chap. 29.39 chap. 31.48 to the end 1 Chron. 26.26 27 28. chap. 22.1 to 17. chap. 29.1 to 17. 2 Chron. 24.4 to 15. chap. 27.3 chap. 29.3 to 20.31 chap. 34.8 to 15. Ezra 1. throughout chap. 3.5 chap. 7.16 chap. 8.28 29. Therefore Ministers under the Gospel must not be maintained nor Churches Houses for publick Assemblies built or repaired by Free-will offerings and voluntary contributions being Levitical Jewish and so abandoned and if not by Tithes nor forced Rates as they allege then the Ministers must utterly starve and all our Churches fall to sudden ruine as many now do And is this Gospel Saintship and Christianity 6. The Priests and Levites by the Levitical Law were prescribed what wives they should marry and what not Levit. 21.7 to the 14. will it therefore follow as the Papist Votaries conclude Therefore Ministers of the Gospel must not marry and must all now be divorced from their wives as well as from their Tithes and Benefices because the Levitical law is abolished and Priests wives Jewish as well as their Tithes Our beastly Ranters then may seize upon Ministers wives as well as the brutish Anabaptists Quakers Swordmen on their Tithes and Glebes 7. The seventh day Sabbath it self though prescribed by a Moral law was in some sense ceremonial and enjoyned by Ceremonial laws too therefore as most affirm abrogated by Christs death as Jewish as to the precise seventh day from the Creation and the Jewish rigidities Sacrifices on it will it therefore follow that it is Jewish and unlawfull for Christians under the Gospel to observe the Lords day every week and render unto God the same weekly proportion of time for publike worship as the Jews did or to keep any publike Fasts
Let John Canne and all presumptuous peremptory Tith-oppugners answer me yea this their Soveraign Land-lord and Creator if they can who will one day call them to a stâ—ict accompt for detaining this due Rent Tribute Homage from him and may justly dispossesse and strip them naked of all they have for this their ingrate contemptuous carriage towards him as he hath done many of late by fearful fires blasts droughts and other judgments as well as heretofore Mal. 3.8 9 11. 7. That as the Gospel it self succeeded the Levitical law Baptism and the Lords Supper Circumcision and the Passeover So the Apostles and Ministers of the Gospel succeed the Priests and Levites under the Law in their Ministerial function in the Church of Christ by Gods appointment their Ministry and Office being both the same in substance even to worship praise serve honour God according to his revealed word will and instruct exhort direct guide his people in the way of salvation and bring them to eternal glory though differing in some circumstances of lesser moment abolished by Christs death It is therefore most reasonable just equitable convenient they shall receive enjoy the like setled maintenance by Glebes Tithes Oblations as their predecessors did God having prescribed none other kinde of reward or subsistence for them in the Gospel that any can shew me It is usual in all Kingdoms States Nations where there are any publick setled offices and Officers for any persons who succeed others in those Offices to enjoy the self-same Salaries Houses Lands Fees Revenues as their predecessors lawfully received unlesse there be some special Laws to alter their Stipends This we see verified in all Civil Military and Ecclesiastical Officers yea in the times of greatest publick changes revolutions that ever befell the Nation those whom most yet call Judges Sheriffs Majors Generals Colonels Captains Governors of Forts Registers c. though their Commissions be altered in some things and themselves in more do yet receive the self-same Salaries pays Fees maintenance annexed to their Offices as their lawfull Predecessors did yea to come closer home All our Protestant Ministers since the reformation of Religion have generally enjoyed the Glebes and Tithes as the Parishioners enjoy frequent the Churches possesse the Houses Inheritances which their Popish predecessors did before them though the one of them just like the Levitical abolished Priests made it their chiefest businesse and part of their calling to say Masse and offer an unbloody Sacrifice as they falsly termed it on their Altars both for the quick and dead and the other who succeed them make it their principal work to preach the Gospel and administer the Sacrament according to Christs institution Since then the Ministers of the Gospel succeed the Levitical as well as the popish Priests as the Gospel doth the Law and the Christian Sacraments the Jewish and we with all converted Gentiles engraffed into Jesus Christ and the Church of God succeed the Jews who were broken off from their own Olive Tree that we might be ingraffed in their places who now partake of the root and fatnesse of their Olive Tree as the Apostle resolves Rom. 11.16 to 25. Why the Ministers of the Gospel should not likewise succeed the Levitical Priests as well as the popish in the enjoyment of their setled Maintenance by Glebes Tithes being not meerly ceremonial as I have proved nor yet so papal as Bishops Deans and Churches Lands in which our Anabaptists Army-Officers and Tithe-oppugners will yet succeed them without any scruple and all believing Gentiles who succeed the believing Israelites in Gods Church succeed them likewise in the due and just maintenance of their Ministers by Tithes and Glebes reserved to and prescribed by that true holy just and righteous God who is not only the God of the Jews but of the Gentiles also Rom. 3.19 Let any rational Christian now resolve his own Conscience and mine from grounds of Scripture Reason or Equity if he can God having given us a Land flowing with milk and honey as fit as able to render Glebes and Tithes of all things in kinde to his Ministers as he did unto the Jews It is a received maxim in our Law Quod venit in loco alterius est de natura Prioris If this be Gospel as it hath been ever held both Law and reason under the Gospel I need adde no more to this Aphorism to prove the lawfullnesse and equity of our Ministers Glebes and Tithes and their continuance as well for the future as heretofore by a divine Right 8. That all Christian Churches and pious Christians generally throughout the world from the Apostles dayes till now have unanimously resolved both in point of Piety Justice Conscience and right Reason that they are bound to consecrate and Render unto God the self-same weekly portion of time for his publick worship as the Israelites and Jews under the Law were obliged to do to wit one day in seven though they differ in the circumstance only of the day they observing the seventh day from the Creation every week in memory of the Creation and Gods rest thereon for their Sabbath prescribed by special Laws and we the first day of every week in memorial of our Saviours Resurection thereon by the General Moral Equity of these Laws warranted by Apostolical practice only without any special Gospel-precept Let then the whole Army of Tithe-Oppugners render me one dram of Reason or shadow of answer if they Canne why all Christian Realms Churches Nations in the world may not should not by the self-same rule of Piety Justice Equity proportion continue and render the like proportion of Glebes Tithes to God and his Ministers under the Gospel as the Jews did to him his Priests and Levites under the Law as well as they render to him the self-same Proportion of time for his Weekly publick Service and why payment of Tithes Oblations under the Gospel to God who gives us both them and the residue of our Estates and encrease out of his own meer free grace for the maintenance of the Ministers of the Gospel and support of his publick Worship on the Lords Day should be more Judaical Vnchristian Antichristian Superstitious as Canne and others stile it than the dedicating appropriating of the Lords Day to Gods publick Worship and Honour who hath given and allowed us the other six for our imployments when as he might have justly reserved the nine parts of our Lands and goods to himself had he pleased instead onely of the Tenth as well as the six daies in lieu of the seventh wherewith he is content which Divines usually urge to induce men to the more chearfull Sanctification of the Lords Day and some Scriblers against Tithes as well as others St. Augustin in his 229. Sermon de Tempors thus enforceth this very argument and let Canne and all his confederates reply to it if they can Hear O indevout mortality know that all things thou possessest receivest
Levitical Priests themselves especially after their abolition as he was a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck to whom Abraham himself and the Levites then in his loins paid Tithes of all Heb. 7.1 to 15. of which at large before Therefore he had a just Right to receive Tithes from them both before the institution and after the abolition of the Levitical Priesthood which he might have lawfully claimed exercised and his Apostles likewise in his Right though they did it not We read that Christ had a just Right Title by Inheritance and lineal descent from his Father King David to the Temporal Crown and Kingdome of Judah being therefore said by the Wise men Mat. 2.2 to be born King of the Iews an unanswerable Argument for the lawfullnesse Excellency of Hereditary Titles to Crowns and Kingdomes before that of Election only wherewith I frequently silenced vapouring Souldiers against Hereditary Kingship being the very Title of Christ himself both to his Spiritual and Temporal Kingdome and that which God instituted amongst his Church people as the best surest of all other taken up by most Heathen Nations Now though Christ neither claimed nor exercised this his Temporal Right but avoided it when the people would have made him King by force John 6.15 who yet after cryed him up for the King of Israel John 12.13 15. which even Pilate himself acknowledged when he said unto the Jews Behold your King demanded of them Shall I crucifie your King and wrote fixed this Title on his Crosse Iesus of Nazareth King of the Iews John 19.14 15 19. will or can John Canne or any other of his antimonarchical confederates hence justly infer that it was unlawfull for Christ himself Right Heir by Descent to his Hereditary Temporal Kingdome kept and thrust out thereof by usurping Herod who murthered all the infants in Bethlehem and the Coasts thereof that were two years old and under and would have murthered our Saviour himself to secure his own usurped Power Mat. 2.13 16. such is the bloody cruelty Jealousie of Usurpers to have claimed or exercised this his just Hereditary Right to the Crown or unlawfull for the people to have thrust out this bloody Intruder Herod by force from his usurped Authority and made Christ King as they intended or because Christ did then voluntarily forbear relinquish his Temporal Right to Herod will it thence necessarily follow that it is therefore unlawfull for any other Hereditary Christian King or Right Heir to a Crown kept from or thrust out of his Throne Kingdome by armed violence against the generality of his peoples desires by any aspiring usurping Herod to lay claim to his Crown Kingdome or for the faithfull natural born Subjects according to their duty Oathes Allegiance to endeavour by all lawfull means and open force to expell dethrone such Herods and Crown set up their lawfull Soveraign on the Throne of the Kingdome Doubtlesse they cannot be so absurdly stupid to affirm it seeing Jehoiadah the high Priest the Captains of Hundreds Levites Souldiers and people too thrust out and slew with the sword Athaliah the bloody Usurper of the Kingdome and Throne of Judah in the second year of her Usurpation crowned Joash the Kings Son King as the Lord had said of the Sons of David and set him upon the Throne of the Kingdome whereupon all the people of the Land rejoyced and the City was quiet as is recorded at large to their eternal Honour by God himself and for others imitation in the like case 2 Chron. 23. and 2 Kings 11. The rather because all other men by our Laws may justly lay claim to and repossesse themselves of such Lands Houses Goods as others forcibly detain or take from them against all Law Right notwithstanding Christs Non-claim to his Rightful Crown Therefore by the self-same Reason our Ministers of the Gospel now may lawfully challenge and take Tithes from the people though Christ and his Apostles did it not albeit they had a just Right and Title to them which they might have exercised had they pleased without Sin or Judaism as our Ministers do now as Paul resolves in 1 Cor. 9.4 5 6 15 18. To clear which Right from Judaism and all other cavils beyond all contradiction I shall cite only two Prophecies relating joyntly to Christs Kingdom and Ministers under the Gospel The first is Jer. 33.15 to the end In those dayes and at that time will I cause the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David and he shall execute Righteousnesse and Judgement in the Land In those days shall Judah be saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely and this is the name wherewith he shall be called The Lord our Righteousness For thus saith the Lord David shall never want a man to sit upon the Throne of the house of Israel Neither shall the Priests the Levites want a man before me to offer Burnt-Offerings and to kindle Meat-Offerings and to do Sacrifices continually Thus saith the Lord if you can break my Covenant of the day and my Covenant of the night so that there should not be day and night in their season then may also my Covenant be broken with David my Servant that he should not have a Son to reign upon his Throne therefore our Covenants Oaths to our Kings their Heirs and Successors should be as stable as inviolable and strictly observed as Gods to David and his Posterity Ps 89.3 4 34. Ps 132.11 12. Hebr. 6.17 18. Ps 15.4 Eccles 8.2 Gal. 3.15 17. and with the Levites the Priests my Ministers As the host of heaven cannot be numbred neither the sand of the Sea measured so will I multiply the seed of David my Servant and the Levites that minister unto me c. The second is Isa 66.18 to 20. I will gather all nations and tongues and they shall come and see my Glory and I will set a Sign among them and I will send those that escape of them unto the Nations and to Tarshish c. and to the Isles afar off whereof England is chief and principally intended And they shall bring all your Brethren for an Offering unto the Lord out of all Nations upon Horses and in Chariots and in Litters and upon Mules and upon swift Beasts to my holy Mountain in Jerusalem saith the Lord as the Children of Israel bring an Offering in a clean Vessel unto the House of the Lord And I will also take of them for Priests and for Levits saith the Lord From which Texts I shall observe 1. That as Christs Title to his everlasting Spiritual Kingdom under the Gospel over all the converted Gentiles as well as Jews is expresly set forth to be neither elective nor by conquest but by DESCENT HEIRSHIP and lineal succession after the flesh from King David Whence he is stiled Heir of all things Heb. 1.12 And the Lord shall give unto him THE THRONE OF HIS FATHER DAVID and HE shall reign over the House of
Tithes in their Fines and Rents and if they have a godly able Minister to instruct them for their Salvation and spiritual Weal they must hire and pay him out of their own private purses only while their Land-lords or others purse up their Tithes whereon now their Ministers live without further charge unto them and which is more chargable they must pay their Ministers share of Taxes and other publick Payments to boot out of their own purses and estates which now are defrayed wholly by Ministers themselves And so instead of hoped Ease by Abolishing Tithes they shall but draw a causless perpetual Charge on themselves and their Posterities as our New Projectors have done by the sale of all the Crown Lands and Revenues to themselves and their Friends and Souldiers at easie rates to enrich themselves which should have defrayed all publick Ordinary Charges as they ever have done which now must be raised out of the peoples private purses only whiles these New Statesmen and Souldiers purse up and enjoy the publick Revenues which should defray them and Tax the impoverished Nation at what extraordinary uncessant Rates they please and then dispose of them at their pleasures when levyed to themselves and their Creatures the only way to make our Taxes both Easeless and Endless to the peoples utter ruin and their own extraordinary enriching by their spoils 5ly The poor people in every Parish will lose the charitable relief they receive from their Ministers who in many places were and still are a grest relief to the poor and impotent by their liberal Charity and Hospitality now much decayed by heavy and endless Taxes and unconscionable Substractions of their Tithes by Sectaries Souldiers and lawless Covetous Earth-wormes 6ly I must truly inform and tell all such Farmers Tenants and other deluded Countreymen who think to gain much ease and profit by the abolishing of Tithes for the future they shall soon repent of and be doubly burthened hereafter to the uttermost improved value of them in the augmentation of their Taxes to the Souldiers who will be harder new Iron Land-lords Tithe-lords to them than their Ministers now are This was St. Augustines observation long ago recorded by Gratian Bochellus with many others and made good by many practical Experiments in former and latter ages His words are these Our Ancestors did therefore abound with plenty of all things Because they gave Tithes to God and rendred Tribute to Caesar Modo autem quia decesserit Devotio Dei accessit Indictio Fisci Nolumus partire cum Deo Decimas modo tollitur totum Hoc tollit fiscus quod non accepit Christus That is But now because our devotion to God in paying Tithes is departed the Sequestration of the Exchequer is come both on Tithes and Lands We would not pay our Tithes unto God now the whole is taken away in Taxes and Sequestrations The Exchequer sweeps away that which Christ doth not receive And how many have found this true in our dayes by Sequestrators and Swordmen who have sequestrâ—d all the Profits of their Lands as well as their Tithes and the Ministers Tithes and Glebes to boot He addes This is a most just Custome that if thou wilt not give God his Tenth thou shalt be reduced to a Tenth of thy Estate Et dabis impio militi quod non vis dare Deo et sacerdoti and thou shalt be forced to give that to a wicked Souldier which thou wilt not give to God and thy Pious Minister This the whole Synod of Lingon in France Anno 1404. declared for and observed as a truth in those daies And Angelus de Clavasio in his Summa Angelica Tit. Decima sect 20. in his time Petrus Blesensis Arch-Deacon of Bath who flourished about the year of our Lord 1160. writes thus to the Cistertian Monks who had then procured from the Pope a Bull of Exemption from paying Tithes out of the Lands and Possessions of their Order Epist 82. ad Cistercienses You know that Covetousness is the root of all Evil yet it is said and we relate it with tears that this Mother of Transgression this Mistris of Ambition this Captain or Ringleader of Iniquity this Wagoner of Mischief this Cutthroat of Vertues this Original of Sedition this Sink of Scandals hath dared to break in even to your Congregation the Votes and Tongues of all men would be loosened into the commendation of your Sanctity if you did not forcibly snatch away that which is anothers If you did not take away Tithes from Clergy-men This is a Convectio or Rapine little enough but that which doth not a little dishonest your life By the Testimony of the Scriptures they are the Tributes of needy Souls And what is this injurious Immunity that you should be exempted from the payment of Tithes to which the Lands were subject before they were yours and which are hitherto rendered to Churches not out of respect of Persons but by consent of the Territory mark now the just punishment upon them for this their Covetousness and exemption from Tithe-paying Milites Galliarum sibi jus Decimarum usurpant c. The Souldiers of France usurp to themselves the Right of Tithes and have no regard of your Privileges Eas a vobis potenter extorquent They extort them from you by the Power of the Sword Adversus eos debetis insurgere non adversus Clericos aut Ecclesiasticos Clericos You ought to rise up against them but not against Clergy-men Or the Churches of Clergy-men Laurentius Bochellus recites inserts it into his Decret Eccles Gall. l 6. Tit. 8. c. 19. p. 966. printed An. 1609. From which Authorities I must tel all Country Farmers and others now busling to exempt themselves by the power of the Souldiers from paying their antient due setled Tithes to their Ministers that they shall at last but only change the hand and be enforced to pay Tithes with a Witness to the Souldiers even by obtaining their desires Whiles I was a late close Prisoner in Pendennys Castle in Cornwall under Souldiers I never yet knew why I heard some Officers there who had purchased Crown-lands in Cornwall not for Mony but Arrears of pay amongst other their New Projects oft times peremptorily saying We will have all Tithes put down Whereupon I told them they should have done well to have added Saint James his advise to their peremptory words and wills which he much censures by saying as they ought to do If the Lord will we will do this or that James 4.13 14 15 16. Which I thought they durst or could not subjoyn to their former words because it was both against the will and command of God that Ministers Tithes should be put down especially by Souldiers who received far above the tenth part of them in Monthly Taxes for their pay and from whose practice of receiving constant pay for their Military service the Apostle proves the lawfulness of Ministers Tithes and Salaries under the
Silver and a wedge of Gold coveted took and hid them in the midst of his Tent which so much kindled the Anger of God against the Children of Israel for this his Trespass in these devoted things That they were presently smitten before their Enemies of Ai and fled before them Whereupon Joshua their General and chief Governour humbling himself before God and requiring the cause of this ill success God returned him this Answer Israel hath sinned and they also have transgressed my Covenant which I commanded them for they have taken of the devoted thing and have also stollen and dissembled also and they have also put it among their own stuff Therefore the children of Israel could not stand before their Enemies but turned their backs before Enemies Because they were accursed neither will I go with you any more O Israel thou canst not stand before thine Enemies untill thou hast taken away the accursed devoted thing from among you Whereupon this Sacrilegious Robbery of Achan being discovered by Lot and his own Confession and hid stoln Plunder devoted to God taken forth of his Tent and powred out before the Lord in the presence of Joshua and all the Children of Israel Joshua passed this Judgement against him for his Sacrilege Why hast thou troubled Israel the Lord shall trouble thee this day and all Israel stoned him with Stones and they burned them with fire as a devoted Sacrifice to God after they had stoned him with stones And they raised over him a great heap of stones unto this day So the Lord turned from the fiercenesse of his Anger Wherefore the place is called the Valley of Achor that is Trouble to this day And when Hiel many hundred years after in Idolatrous Ahabs daies would needs seize upon the devoted Spoyl of Jericho and build it again for his own habitation he laid the Foundation thereof in his first-born Abiram and set up the Gates thereof in his youngest Son Segub that is God destroyed and cut off all his Posterity before the Gates were set up and the Building finished according to the word of the Lord which he spake by Joshua the Son of Nun as we read at large Josh 7. throughout 1 Kings 16.34 and Josh 6.16 I read of Ataxerxes that in imitation of Cambyses before him he caused some Judges betraying their Trusts like Tresylian of old and too many of late to be excoriated alive and their Skins to be hanged up round about the Tribunals that the other Judges sitting upon them might have an example hanging before their eyes what punishment the pravity of Iudges did demerit I desire all Souldiers Officers and Sacrilegious Anabaptists would hang up these Skins and Examples of Achan and Hiel before their eyes recorded in sacred Writ and then make this use and application to themselves of them If Achan for stealing away only a Babylonish Garment and a few Shekles of Silver and Gold of the very Spoyls of Iericho devoted to the service or Treasury of the House of the Lord brought so much wrath misery upon the whole Nation and Camps of Israel and such a fatal death and exemplary punishment upon himself and Hiel only for building upon the ruines of the Soyl of this devoted City drew down sudden Death and Destruction upon all his Sons and Posterity O what strange exemplary wrath vengeance and judgements shall we then draw upon the whole Nation Army our Souls Bodies and Posterities to their utter extirpation if instead of rendring unto God and his Ministers the Tenth of our warlike Spoyls belonging of right unto them we shall sacrilegiously rob them not only of these Tenthes and all other issuing out of our Lands and Estates but even of all their other Glebes Rectories Tithes Revenues demolish the very Churches Houses dedicated to Gods worship or turn them into Houses for us and our Posterities to inhabit and obstinately yea atheistically refuse to take warning by their and other sacrilegious Persons tragical examples 4ly Let those who will imitate Charles Martels President remember 1. his punishment Historians record That for this his Sacrilege he was smitten with a long and terrible Convulsion of all his Members whereof he died in great anguish that Eucherius Bishop of Orleans in a Vision SAW HIM DAMNED FOR IT and that upon search made in his Tomb by an Angels Admonition it was also confirmed for truth no relique of his Corps being found therein but only a dreadfull Serpent Apud Frances Carolus Martellus insignis vir fortitudinis exactis vitae sue diebus in Ecclesia beati Dionysii legitur esse Sepultus sed quia Patrimonia cum Decimis omnium fere Ecclesiarum Galliae pro stipendio commilitonum suorum mutilaverat miserabiliter à malignis Spiritibus de Sepulchro corporaliter avulsus usque in hodiernum diem nusquam comparuit as Matthew Westminster stories of him 2ly The censure passed against him for this Sacrilegious Robbery by the Marginal Authors and others especially by Agobardus Bishop of Lions An. 828. in his Book De Dispensatione Rei Ecclesiasticae contra Sacrilegos worthy the reading who thus complains p. 269. Nunc non solum possessiones Ecclesiasticae sed ipsae etiam Ecclesiae cum possessionibus venundantur c. Which he condemns as detestable Sacrilege execrable to God and men By Petrus Damianus Anno 1060. l. 1. Epist 11. where he gives this censure of his practice and others Inter omnia vero hic mala Illud excedit et Diabolicam fere modum videtur aequare nequittam Quia pradiis in Militem profligatis c. Moreover among all wicked Acts this exceedeth and seems almost to equal the very wickednesse of the Devil That all the Farms and Possessions of the Church being prodigally spent upon Souldiers insuper etiam et Decimae plebes adduntur in Beneficium Secularibus Moreover Tithes and people are likewise added and conferred on these Secular men for a reward which in his lib. 4. Epist 12. lib. 5. Epist 9. he stiles a great Sin Sacrilege and Prophanation of holy things concluding What is it to turn Tithes to the use of Souldiers and Secular men nisi mortiferum iis virus quo pereant exhibere but to give them deadly Poyson whereby they may perith Petrus Blesensis Arch-deacon of Bath Epist 82. Joannis de Belith De Divinorum Officiorum Explicatione c. 5. write much to the same effect making it a greater Robbery and Sacrilege to take away Ministers Tithes though it be by the Popes own Bulls than violently to take away and plunder Mens Horses as they are riding or carting in the High way and convert them to their proper use as Souldiers use to do 3ly Let them remember That Charles Martels immediate Successors so much detested both his practice and Sacrilege that by publick Edicts they decreed in these terms That the Tithes and Ecclesiastical Lands and Goods seised upon by prophane Persons so they stiled
grounds policies hypocritically gilded over with the paint of Conscience Reformation Religion Propagation of the Gospel c. which makes the Design more detestable both to God and all good men The second sort of Tithe-Oppugners are professed Anabaptists Dippers Seekers Quakers and other blasphemous Sectaries and Heretiques lately sprung up amongst us many of which have crept into the Army for their greater security and the better accomplishment of their dangerous destructive Designs against our established Government Magistrates Laws but especially against our Religion Church Ministers Ministry their Tithes and Glebes Scarce one of a thousand of these poor Sneaks were of ability to pay any Tithes of late and those of this prevailing Faction who have crept into Sequestrations Offices Imployments of late and thereby gained any Estates for the most part have enriched themselves by sequestred Tithes Glebes Bishops Deans Chapters Lands and Revenues which these hungry Harpyes have most greedily preyed upon not out of any real grounds of Piety or Conscience as they pretend which I could yet seldom or never find in any of them but out of an unsatiable greedy HOLY HUNGER OR THIRST in the Poets sence after Gold Gain Spoyl the Revenues of our Church and an implacable bitter Enmity against our Ministers Persons Callings whether Presbyterians the chief Butt against whom their Malice is bent or Independents of a more moderate strain whose Ministry is the main Fort they level all their present power against to raze it even to the very Foundation now prosecuting the total abolition not only of their present Tithes Glebes but of all other future coercive maintenance in lieu of them only to subvert their Ministry and quite starve if they cannot violently storm them out of it This is most perspicuous not only by their manifold former libellous Pamphlets against our Ministers Calling and the late Ordinances for Tithes which I have elsewhere collected refuted but by their fresh Petitions both against their Tithes and Ministry too as Antichristian Jewish Popish c. especially by John Canne the old Amsterdam Anabaptists Second Voyce from the Temple or Synagogue of Satan rather newly dedicated to those he stiles The Supream Authority of the Nation wherein he exhorts and stimulates them by all the Art Rhetorick Motives false Arguments he can muster up to do execution and take vengeance upon Babylon to wit the National Ministry Church-worship Government of England as he explains it p. 2. till it be wholy desolate not a Stone left upon a Stone till it be thrown down To take a most effectual and certain course to starve and famish these Antichristian Idols by taking away the Food and Maintenance whereby hitherto as at this present they are nourished fed and left alive and more particularly their Tithes To repeal all Laws and Statutes formerly made whereby the Whore hath lived deliciously and proudly and keeps on to this Day her Whorish attire To make the Whore desolate and naked by making no Act or Law to stand in force which doth yield any relief to her To set themselves in array against her by the Armies power no doubt which he alludes to bend their Bow fan and empty her To set upon this work speedily in good earnest as it seems they do whiles it is to day And why so Because the Lord himself hath by a Call more than ordinarie called them to this more than ordinary Imployment if he could have proved it by Scripture or Law it had been more worth than all his Pamphlet put this fair or rather foul opportunity into their hands hath commanded his sanctified ones and called his Mighty ones the Army-Officers to fulfill his pleasure upon this great Whore the Church and Ministry of England and SION is in travel and ready to bring forth this Monster of Desolation and Confusion which if they neglect or delay then mark how he briefly menaces them with the Fates of their late Predecessors I would think you should never be sitting in that House but be thinking still on those who sate there before you and why not as well on Faux and the Gunpowder Traytoâ—s as those since there seems another Powder-plot in the Vault to blow them up intended by Canne and his Confederates if they fail in accomplishing this their desired work whom the Lord hath lade aside as despised broken Idols and Vessels wherein his Soul had no pleasure And why As they knew not their Generation-work which he excites them to neither were faithfull to the interest of Jesus Christ God is no respecter of Persons as men sow so they shall reap Ex ungue Leonem ex cauda Draconem You may see by these passages and his whole Pamphlet pursuing them what these malicious inhuman barbarous irreligious hypocritical Anabaptists aym at in their present violent prosecutions against Tithes even utterly to starve famish subvert extirpate our Ministers Ministry Church Worship Government and make our Land a mere Spoyl Desolation as their Predecessors did Munster and some parts of Germany whiles in their power But let Canne and his Anabaptistical Confederates remember what tragical ends their New King John with all his Princes Grandees Officers Prophets Followers came to in conclusion in Germany And what fatal ruine befell Jack Cade Iack Straw Wat Tyler Sharp and other levelling Companions who had the self-same Designs against our English Laws Lawyers Clergy Tithes Glebes as He and they have now animated thereto by the new-dipped Iesuites and other Romish Emissaries lately crept into their Anabaptistcal Fraternity to further this their Infernal Gunpowder-plot against our Church Religion Ministers Magistrates Government Laws and let them thereupon repent of desist from abominate this their Diabolical wicked Design lest they incur the self same punishments in conclusion by stirring up God and all the whole Nation against them as most accursed Rebels Traytors Instruments of Satan yea that very Antichrist and Whore of Rome they pretend they are blindly acting against whose designs in truth they are but accomplishing in the highest degree I must here observe and desire all others to take notice of three things First that in Cannes Voyce and in all other late Pamphlets Petitions of the Anabaptists wherein they seem to vent their most passionate zeal against Antichrist Babylon the Whore of Babylon their chief Instruments and Supporters I cannot find so much as one Clause or Syllable against Iesuites Popish Priests Papists Romish Emissaries or exciting the execution of any Laws or Statutes formerly made against them but the whole stream bent of them all is only against the Godly Ministers Ministry worship of the Church of England the Presbyterian Government and our present Church-worship the only Babylon Whore Antichrist they intend and fight against not the Pope and Church of Rome 2ly That they are so far from pleading against the Pope Popish Priests Iesuites and urging the execution of the good Oaths Laws made by late and former