a power as he ascribes to them and as the Suffragans I shall now shew you were invested withal who were of the Order of Bishops as much as any other Some have called them Titular Bishops ordained to assist and aid the Bishop of the Diocess in his Spiritual Function and think they had their name from this that by their Suffrages Ecclesiastical Causes were judged But the better to understand what they were you must know that all the Bishops of any Province were antiently called by the Metropolitan his Suffragans being to advise and assist him in the common Affairs of the Church So the word is often used in the Canon Law and in latter times in the Provincial Council of Salisburg b An. 1420 Cap de Officio Ordinarii The Archbishop Everard speaks to all the Bishops as his Suffragans being called together with him in partem solicitudinis into part of the care of the people under his charge Which are the words of our Linwood also who saith the Bishops are called Suffragans because they are bound to help and assist the Archbishop c Archiepiscopo suffragari assistere tenentur Annor in cap. de Constitutionibus But since those times they only have been called Suffragans who were indeed ordained Bishops but not possessed as yet of any See and thence called Titular Bishops which kind of Bishops are no stranger than those Ministers at Geneva whom they call Apostoli who preach in the Country Churches and administer the Sacraments but have no certain charge Yet in England I must tell you it was otherwise as appears by the Statute of 26 Hen. VIII chap. 14. where provision is made for Suffragans which had been accustomed to be had within this Realm as it tells us both in the beginning and the middle of it And it is enacted that the Towns of Thetford Ipswich Colchester Dover Guilford Southampton and twenty places more besides them should be taken and accepted for Sees of Bishops Suffragans to be made in this Realm c. For this end every Archbishop or Bishop being disposed to have them for the more speedy administration of Holy things had the liberty given them to name and elect two fit persons and present them to the King who thereupon had full power by the Act to give to which of those two he pleased the Stile Title and Name of Bishop of such of the Sees aforesaid as he thought most expedient and he was to be called Bishop Suffragan of the same See After which the King was to present him by his Letters Patents under the great Seal to the Archbishop of Canterbury or of York signifying his Name his Stile Title and Dignity of Bishoprick requiring him to Consecrate the said person so nominated and presented to the same Name Title Stile and Dignity of Bishop For which purpose either the Bishop that nominated him or the Suffragan himself was to provide two Bishops or Suffragans to consecrate him with the Archbishop and to bear their reasonable costs This Statute though repealed in the first and second of Philip and Mary d Chap. 8. yet was revived among sundry other in the first of Queen Elizabeth e See ch 1. And it is sufficiently manifest from thence that these persons had Episcopal Ordination being Consecrated by the Archbishop and two Bishops more as much as any other And therefore secondly had Episcocal Power and Authority as much as the Bishop of the Diocess though being dependent on him the Suffragan could not use or execute any Jurisdiction Power or Authority but by his Commission under his Seal as the Statute likewise provides Upon which score Mr. Mason calls them Secondary f De Minist Angl. l. 1. c. 3. Bishops and further observes truly that though in compare with others they may seem to have nothing but a Title because they had not their proper Diocesses to themselves yet if we speak absolutely they had both the Title and the thing signified by it For they had for their Episcopal Seat some great Town g Oppidum illustre lege Parliamentaria illis designatum appointed to them by the Act of Parliament in which and some certain adjacent places to which the Bishop of the Diocess limited them they exercised their Episcopal Function From whence also they borrowed the name of Suffragan of Bedford Suffragan of Colchester c. So that none of those who were Consecrated Bishops among us in England whether Primary or Secondary as his words are were meerly Titular but destinated all of them to the administration of a certain place according to the sixth Canon of the Council of Chalcedon Accordingly we find that such Suffragans being made acted like other Bishops in all things For the Register of the Consecration of Archbishop Parker tells us that at the time of it four Chairs were set for four Bishops one of which was John Hodgskin Suffragan Bishop of Bedford who assisted also in the Consecration of the Bishops of London Ely Lincoln and divers others which he could not have done had he not had Episcopal Power and consequently the Power of Ordaining Presbyters as well as of Consecrating Bishops And so much this Apologist might have learnt from him whom he calls a Learned Prelate if he had read his Books with care I mean Bishop Bramhall who writes thus of the Power of Suffragans h Romphaea Printed 1659. p. 93 The Office and the Benefice of a Bishop are two distinct things Ordination is an Act of the Key of Order and a Bishop uninthroned may Ordain as well as a Bishop inthroned The Ordination of Suffragan Bishops who had no peculiar Bishopricks was always admitted and reputed as good in the Catholick Church if the Suffragans had Episcopal Ordination as the Ordination of the greatest Bishops in the world Nay if he had but read their own Authors he would not have doubted that Suffragans were altogether to speak in their stile as bad as Bishops For the Admonition to the Parliament puts them among the Titles and Offices devised by Antichrist and declares that though they take upon them which is most horrible to rule Gods Church yet they are plainly by Christ forbidden and utterly with speed to be removed You may read more to the same purpose in the Preface as I find it cited in the Censure of the Pamphlet called Humble Motives for Association An. 1601. p. 23 25. In which year I find this a part of the Secular Priests complaint against the Jesuites that they would not be subordinate in any manner to the Ordinary Prelates of England as Bishops and Suffragans and that they withstood their endeavours to have Bishops or Suffragans i Dialogue between a Secular Priest and a Lay Gentleman p. 73. 87 90. By which you may see they were numbred among the Prelates to whom all Priests were to be subject which made those fiery Dissenters from our Church to declaim so
lowdly against them And all this serves to convince our Apologist of unskilfulness in these matters who pronounces roundly that Mr. Gataker k p. 13. of his Book never had any Episcopal Ordination because he was Ordained by a Suffragan of one of those places mentioned in the Statute viz. the Suffragan of Colchester Suppose he were * As Mr. Clark tells us he was Collect. of Lives of ten Divines p. 131. he had notwithstanding Episcopal Ordination as I have demonstrated and as good as if he had been Ordained by the greatest Bishop in the World But he did not understand I see by this what those Suffragans were and contrary to what became an humble and modest man and the Title likewise of his Book wrote about things which he had not studied or considered Which made him also confound these with the Rural Deans alledging the Primate of Armaghs judgment concerning the power of Suffragans to prove it to be his Judgment that the Chorepiscopi or Rural Deans might lawfully ordain In which he hath done him a notorious injury for there is not such a word in his Book as that the Rural Deans may lawfully ordain But only that the number of Suffragans which was 26 might well be conformed to the number of the several Rural Deanries and supplying the place of those who in the Antient Church were called Chorepiscopi might every month assemble a Synod of the Rectors within the Precinct and conclude all matters brought before them by the major part of voices These are his words which do not signifie that Suffragans were the same with Rural Deans or Chorepiscopi but that there might be as many of the one as there are of the other and Suffragans do all that which those antient Officers did though they had power to do a great deal more For I have proved a plain distinction between them The Chorepiscopi were made by one single Bishop viz. the Bishop of the City to whom they belonged as the Council of Antioch tells us Can. 10. But the Suffragans being real Bishops were made as other Bishops are by three at the least according to the fourth Canon of the first Council at Nice And so they had power to Ordain Presbyters and joyn in the Consecration of other Bishops which the Chorepiscopi had not Nor did our Church ever acknowledge any such power residing in the Rural Deans or any meer Presbyters subject to the Jurisdiction of our Bishops to ordain Priests But as Hadrianus Saravia tells the Ministers of Guernsey l See Clavi Trabales p. 142. in his Letter to them As many Ministers as were naturally of the Country being not made Ministers of the Church by their Bishop or his Demissories nor any others according to the Order of the English Church were not true and lawful Ministers Where by Demissories I think he means the Suffragans of the Bishop of Winchester to whose jurisdiction they belonged Yes may some say our Bishops have sometimes declared otherwise For this Apologist m Pag. 13. out of Archbish Spotswood alledges the story of the three Scots Bishops who never had been ordained but by Presbyters and yet Bishop Bancrofts opinion was that they need not be ordained again which hath often been alledged heretofore by others particularly by the Lancashire Ministers of the first Classis at Manchester in whom he might have found a great deal more than this amounts unto For they fly to a Letter of the late Primate of Ireland with the Animadversions of Dr. Bernard upon it n The judgment of the late Archb. of Armagh c. 1658. in which this Story is cited and the judgment of many other learned Divines but nothing at all to the business For as the Gentlemen to whom the Lancashire Ministers wrote their Letter well observe o Excommunicatio excommunicata p. the Primate did not make void the Ordination by Presbyters but it was with a special restriction to such places where Bishops could not be had Which are the very words also of Archbishop Bancroft in the case of the Scottish Bishops As for the Ordinations made by our Presbyters the Primate declared himself against them in the very same Letter which they craftily concealed as you may read p. 112. of Dr. Bernards Book The words are these You may easily judge that the Ordination made by such Presbyters as have severed themselves from those Bishops unto whom they had sworn Canonical Obedience cannot possibly by me be excused from being Schismatical Which I find cited again in another Book of of his called Clavi Trabales p. 56. And both in that and the former Book p Judgment of the Archb. p. 122 c. Clavi Tiab p. 55. he tells us the Primate thought their Ordination void upon another score Because at the imposition of hands they neither used those antient words Receive thou the Holy Ghost c. nor the next Be thou a faithful dispenser c. nor any other words to that sense at least there is no order or direction for it And they also wholly omitted those words at the solemn delivery of the Bible inro the hands of the person ordained Take thou Authority to preach the Word of God c. So that there being no express transmission of Ministerial Power he was wont to say that such Imposition of hands by some called the Seal of Ordination without a Commission annexed seemed to him to be as the putting of a Seal to a Blank And if a Bishop had been present and done no more than they did he thought the same quere might have been of the validity of such Ordinations As for other Reformed Churches their case is widely different from that of these men as he might have learnt from another Bishop whom he cites now and then to no purpose viz. Bishop Bramhall * Replication to the Bishop of Chalcedon p. 71 72. who rells you that he knew many learned persons among them who did passionately affect Episcopacy and some of them acknowledged to him that their Church would never be rightly settled till it was new moulded And others he tells you though they did not long for Episcopacy yet they approve it and want it only out of invincible necessity And that their principal learned men were of this mind appears from hence that Dr. Carlton afterward Bishop of Chichester protesting in open Synod which then sate at Dort that Christ instituted no parity but made twelve Apostles the chief and under them seventy Disciples that Bishops succeeded to the Twelve and Presbyters of inferiour rank to the Seventy and challenging the judgment of any learned men that could speak to the contrary Their answer was silence which was approbation enough And after saith he discoursing with divers of the best learned in the Synod and telling them how necessary Bishops were to suppress their Schisms then rising their answer was That they did much honour and reverence the good
that he should study rather how to give no account at all For he is grosly ignorant in other Learning as well as in this as appears by his discourse about Ordination by Presbyters which follows a little after The Friendly Debate gave him no occasion to mention any thing of this nature but he had a mind it seems to give us a taste of his skill in this great Question though it be so small that I know not how to excuse his boldness in medling with it He supposes that the Chorepiscopi which he makes the same with our Rural Deans may lawfully Ordain And next that Suffragans were but such Presbyters so that he who was Ordained by them had not Episcopal Ordination And then thirdly He would have you believe that Archbishop Vsher and other Learned men concurring in judgment with him were of this opinion Every one of which propositions are notoriously false as I will plainly shew you by demonstrating these three things 1. That those called Chorepiscopi Rural or Country Bishops never had the Power of Ordination being not of the Order of Bishops but Presbyters something advanced above the rest 2. On the other side that Suffragans had the power of Ordination being not meer Presbyters but Bishops as those in the City were And lastly That the late Primate saith nothing contrary to this For the first The Country Bishops saith the Council of Neocaesarea n About the year 314. Can. 13. were but of such a degree as the seventy Disciples and appointed after their Type to whom the Antients every body knows make Presbyters to be the Successors as Bishops are to the Apostles And therefore that Council calls them only Assistants to the Bishops in that part of their Diocess which was distant from the City But that they had only a part of the Episcopal Power committed to them not the whole we learn from the Council of Ancyra presently after Can. 13. which decreed that the Chorepiscopi or Country Bishops ought not to ordain either Ppesbyters or Deacons o 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 To which purpose he that pleases may find many authorities in Justellus his notes upon that place And in the Council of Antioch Can. 10. the same is decreed again that they should know their bounds or measures and appoint Readers Sub-Deacons and Catechists but not dare to proceed further nor to make a Priest or Deacon without the Bishop of the City to which both he and his Region were subject The same Canons were in the Roman Church as appears by the Body of the Decrees p v. part 1. Distinct 63. c. 4. The words of which being abbreviated by Sigebert he calls them Arch-Deacons But afterward the Council of Laodicea decreed Can. 57. that this sort of Officers should be abolished and no Bishops should be appointed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Villages and in the Countries and that they who had been already constituted should do nothing without the consent of the Bishop of the City But instead of them there should be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Visitors that should go about to find out what was amiss and correct mens manners In like manner we find in the Body of the Canon Law q Distinct 68. c. 5. a Decree of Pope Damasus to this purpose That the Chorepiscopi have been prohibited as well by that See as by the Bishops of the whole world One reason of which prohibition might be that they did not r 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 know their own bounds as the Council of Antioch determined but ventured to appoint Church Officers without the Bishops Consent Upon which occasion St. Basil wrote a particular Epistle to the Chorepiscopi requiring that no Minister ſ Epist 181. p. 959. Tom. 1. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Readers and such Ministers as those Luke 4.10 whatsoever though of the lower rank should be made without him contrary to the Canons It is a sad thing saith he to see how the Canons of the Fathers are laid aside insomuch that it is to be feared all will come to Confusion The Antient Custom was this That there should be a strict inquiry made into the lives of those who were to be admitted to minister in the Church The care of this lay upon the Presbyters and Deacons who were to report it to the Chorepiscopi and they having received a good testimony of them certified it to the Bishop and so the Minister t 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was admitted into Holy Orders But now you Country Bishops would make me stand for a Cypher and take all this Authority to your selves nay you permit the Presbyters and Deacons to put in whom they please according as Kindred or Affection inclines them without regard to their worth But let me saith he have a note of the Ministers of every Village and if any have been brought in by the Presbyters let them be cast out again among the common people And know that he shall be but a Lay-man whoever he is that is received into the Ministry without our consent By this it is apparent that Presbyters had not power so much as to make the lowest Officers in the Church and that the Chorepiscopi though above the rest of the Presbyters in Office yet were not so high as Bishops but were a middle sort of men between both An image of whom was remaining in the late Bohemian Church as I learn from Comenius who in his Book concerning the Discipline and Order among them tells us that beside the Seniors or Bishops u For they had Episcopal Ordination after they had been made Presbyters and Epicopal Jurisdiction and Succession from the Bishops of the Waldenses and Ministers or Presbyters they had certain Ecclesiastical Persons called Conseniors who were between the other two For they were chosen out of the Ministers presented by them to the Bishop and then solemnly ordained by him to the Office of Conseniors by a new imposition of hands But at the same time these Conseniors promised Obedience to the Bishop x Ratio Discipl Ord. Eccl. cap. 2. p. 37. as the Ministers when they were Ordained promised Obedience to them as well as to the Bishop z Ib. p. 33. Their Office therefore was among other things as we are told Chap. 1. page 23 24. to keep good Order to observe what was worthy of correction to inform the Bishop of it to provide fit persons for the Ministry to exercise Discipline with the Bishop and visit with him or without him if he required it to examine those that were to be ordained Ministers or Deacons to give them testimonials to the Bishop and in short To supply the place of the Bishop in businesses of lesser moment So it appears by the Book and by Comenius his Annotations upon that Chapter a page 92. Minoribus in negotiis Episcopi vices obirent Thus much may suffice for the Chorepiscopi who had not such
we will rather therefore draw up the Solemn League and Covenant here and send up with you some Noblemen Gentlemen and Ministers that shall see it subscribed which was accordingly done The Covenant was cried up the Scots came into England and what did they come for It was saith the Preface to Mr. Knox his History to fight the Battels of the Lord i. e. to pull down Episcopacy and to set up Presbytery in its room according to the Covenant which League and Covenant saith Mr. Rutherford was the first foundation of the ruine of the Malignant party in England f See Toleration Discuss'd p. 117. but not of Episcopacy this Gentleman would have you believe for it was declared in the Assembly that the Covenant did not bind against a Primitive Episcopacy page 31. What they mean by a Primitive Episcopacy I will not stand to enquire but this is well known that the Three Ministers in their first answer to the Divines of Aberdeen positively affirmed That Episcopacy was not abjured by their Confession nor their Covenant g See Large Declara ion p. 117. which was averred by many other Covenanters to those who otherways scrupled to enter into their Covenant And I know that some declared the same in England and yet notwithstanding nothing would satisfie but the extirpation of Episcopal power and they laboured tooth and nail to settle the Government by Presbyters alone This the people thought was the great end of the Covenant and there is no doubt but the scope of the first contrivers of it was to destroy Episcopacy root and branch This was their first work after the War was begun to send a Commissioner to the English Parliament 1642. to move them to cast out Bishops not a word of limiting them and others to the King at Oxford to sign all propositions which because he would not do they resolve to assist their Brethren against him under the name of the Common Enemy h Second Fair Wa ning p. 185. But before they came they told the Commissioners of Parliament as I shew'd you they must covenant to reform Doctrine and Discipline conform to Scotland And accordingly the same Author informs me that their Covenant came into England with such a clause as this We shall reform our Church in Doctrine and Discipline conform to the Church of Scotland i Ib. p 383 of which the Independent Brethren cheated them making that be razed out and those words inserted which we now read in it However the abolition of the Office of Bishops was their great demand of the King as Mr. R. Baily expresly affirms adding that the unhappy Prelates had found it to be their great demand from the beginning of our troubles unto this day k Review of fair Warning 1649 chap. 12. p. 76. And he plainly affirms that to deny them this satisfaction was to conclude that the King himself and all his Family and three Kingdoms should perish Why so I beseech you It could not be otherwise notwithstanding all their fine words in the beginning for they had sworn to root them out and could not break their Covenant to save three Kingdoms And therefore at last Mr. Baily perswades himself the King did consent to abolish Name and Thing not only for three years but for ever Strange when his Majesty had so often clearly protested that he could not with a good Conscience consent to it Did they force him at last to do it against his Conscience or did they give him such satisfaction that he saw at last he might safely do it Alas we dull souls do not understand the mysteries which they can find in words His Majesty consented to lay aside Bishops for three years till he and his Parliament should agree upon some settled Order for the Church Now this saith he was tantamount to for ever it being supposed mark the jugling that they can never agree to admit Episcopacy again Why so For all and every one saith he l Ib. chap. last p. 8â— in both Houses having abjured Episcopacy by solemn Oath and Covenant observe that the Parliament could not agree with the King to erect the faln Chairs of the Bishops so there remained no other but that either his Majesty should come over to their Judgment or by his not agreeing with them yet really to agree in the perpetual abolition of Episcopacy since he had granted to lay aside Bishops till he and his Houses had agreed upon a settled Order in the Church This was an admirable contrivance especially if you call to mind as the Answer tells him how there was something else agreed viz. that twenty Divines of his Majesties nomination being added to the Assembly should have a free consultation and debate about the settlement of Church-Government after those three years or sooner if differences could be composed A very free Debate this was like to be in which all Reasons that could be given for Episcopacy were shut out of doors and concluded by an Oath to be put to silence But why should I trouble my self any farther The wider indeed the hole grows in the mil-stone the clearer a man may see through it but this mans Sophistry is visible enough already nor needs there more words to shew that this modest Braggadocio vaunts himself ridiculously in the merits of his party and that Mr. Vicars and such like were not the only men that reviled and calumniated They that pretend to humility modesty and seriousness cannot forbear it But if you desire a farther tast of his Spirit I pray have so much patience as to hear how he uses me In the Preface he accuses me of railing and in his Book p. 2. of reviling without taking notice of one word that I have said in answer to these calumnies They are resolved I see to be confident and to have their saying do or say we what we can For he tells you also of my jeering scoffing false accusation and mocking lightness and drollery p 90. 92 137. but not a syllable to make good the charge No that was a hard thing but very easie to say that I write sometime what might better become some Ecclesiastical Hudibras or a Doctor of the Stage than m p. 35. c. Just thus Mr. R. Baily was pleased to answer that excellent Bishop which this man commends Dr. Bramhall Concerning the 8th Chapter of whose Fair Warning he saith it much better beseemed a Mercurius Aulicus than either a Warner or a Prelate n Review p. 48. He charges him also with gathering together an heap of Calumnies c. though as the Reply tells him that heap was nothing else but a faithful Collection of Historical Narrations which require not the credulity of the simple but the search of diligent people if they distrust them The same I say for my self they must be beholden to a new light which no body can see but themselves to make Historical truth to be a slander They are
plain consequence as this in our Casuist that this Land is given to English men and therefore as Birds defend their Nests so ought Englishmen to cherish and maintain themselves in their Land and to grieve and hurt Aliens for respect of their Common-wealth I will not trouble you with the rest of the Story q Which you may find in the Survey of Londâ—â— by J. Stow p. 152 c. nor with the Uses or Application which the People made of this goodly Sermon Only this you may know in general that they bestirred themselves lustily for respect of their Common-wealth That was the word then as now it is in this Casuist the Peoples Weal of which he teaches them to take a tender care And it will be no hard matter to improve their understanding of their own good and their affection to it so far as to make them digest this new truth mentioned by his late Majesty in his Large Declaration r Pa. 407. out of the Protestation 22. Sept. 1638 That what Subjects do of their own heads is much better than what they do in obedience to Authority the one savouring of constraint but the other being voluntary and chearful obedience Why not Since at the same time they may be taught that all power is originally in them and came from them who intrusted particular persons with it Which is the surest proof they will easily believe that it is to be imployed for their good for they would not have intrusted it with any body to other purposes and consequently they must retain the power still to hinder those persons from doing otherwise and in order to that must judge whether they do so or no. This indeed is for the People to command the Magistrate not to obey him But it is that Authority which they may fairly assume to themselves from this mans dangerous Maxime For if People are to submit in all things that are for their good and no further then they appeal back to themselves And this appeal they may well think supposes power originally in themselves some of which they have reserved as supreme and above all Laws and why they should not take all back when they judge it is not imployed for their good who can tell For they are to obey no Laws but those which are for their good unless it be for fear of wrath and when they combine together they need not fear that but can make themselves dreadful and give what Laws they please to their Governours No saith this Casuist a man must not resist that is express and rather than resist he must suffer p. 4. But this is to steal a Goose and stick a Feather Why must he when he is already perswaded that he need not unless he be forced It is resolved just before that if the Magistrate command any thing for the Peoples hurt there lies no Obligation upon Conscience to be obedient and they are made judges of what is for their hurt If then he require them not to resist and they find this is to their hurt they are not bound in Conscience not to resist but only for wrath And that is not to be feared when the multitude is agreed not to suffer themselves to be injured But they must avoid contempt and scandal And so they will in their own opinion even when they are contemptuous and scandalous They are Judges of all their own actions for the publick good and they may resolve that which we call contempt and scandal to be for the honour of the Nation for the making their Prince glorious by rescuing him out of the hands of those evil Councellors who procure Laws for their own private interest and not the peoples good In short this Principle if it be pursued will prove the very same with that in the perverse meaning of it so much cryed up when all our mischiefs began The welfare of the people is the Supreme Law for the right understanding of which Maxime I refer you to the last Lecture of Dr. Sanderson about the Obligation of Conscience Who hath uprightly determined elsewhere t Pralect 9. N. 9. that we ought to obey a Law made by a just Authority not onely when it may be supposed to be made with an ill intention but when it is unprofitable for the Publick nay something noxious and hurtful provided the thing it commands may be done without sin The Reason is because every man ought to minde what belongs to his part and duty and not trouble himself about other mens and our duty is to obey not to command and ordain Besides I may add though the Magistrate ought not to ordain any thing but what is for the peoples good yet when he doth otherwise it will be more for their good to obey him then to refuse obedience They ought still to look upon him as Gods Minister for their good because they receive a great many benefits by Government and Order be it what it will though in that particular he do amiss and so to submit to his command For the mischief of not obeying is greater then the hurt that is done the people by obedience It is in effect to turn all things upside down to reduce the King to the condition of a private man by making every body a Judge of his Laws whether they shall be obeyed or no. The very truth is such Casuists as these have quite unhinged the people from their dependance on their Governours and subjection to them And I may say of them as the secular Priests did of the Jesuits in another matter t Dialogue between Secular Priests Lâ—y Gentlemen 1601. pag. 67. They have not onely much impeached the due estimation honour and reverent respect which the people carried toward their Superiours but they have exceedingly impaired by their tricks shifts and evasions the natural sincere condition of our people which is there most decayed where they have had conversation and dealing Many of modest and temperate constitution are become imperious brazen-fac'd and furious They that were lowly and humble are become peremptory rash in their judgement and disdainful The simple and sincere are grown cunning and double dealers full of equivocation in their words and dissembling in their behaviour Well perhaps you will say we are all had enough but when the Doctor now named Bishop Sanderson determines that we should be obedient though the thing required of us be something hurtful to the Publick doth he not imply that if it be extremely hurtful we are not obliged To this I will answer before I end when I have first told you that it doth not follow from what hath been said concerning an obligation upon Conscience to yeild obedience to Laws that every transgression of a Law is of so deep a dye as some is He asks my opinion you know about this in the beginning of his Case And therefore I think good briefly to direct him to a better medium then any that