and Sanctity are indeed not very frequent but yet they are not Miracles but brought to pass by Education Discipline Correction and other natural wayes I would see the greatest Pelagian of them all fly higher T. H. I make here no jest of Inspiration Seriously I say that in the proper signification of the words Inspiration and Infusion to say virtue is inspired or infused is as absurd as to say a Quadrangle is round But Metaphorically for Gods bestowing of Faith Grace or other Vertue those words are intelligible enough J. D. Why should he trouble himself about the Holy Spirit who acknowledgeth no Spirit but either a subtil fluid body or a Ghost or other Idol or Phantasm of the imagination who knoweth no inward Grace or intrinsecal Holyness Holy is a word which in Gods Kingdom answereth to that which men in their Kingdoms use to call publick or the Kings And again wheresoever the word Holy is taken properly there is still some thing signified of propriety gotten by consent His Holiness is a Relation not a Quality for inward sanctification or real infused holiness in respect whereof the third Person is called the Holy Ghost because he is not only holy in himself but also maketh us holy he is so great a stranger to it that he doth altogether deny it and disclaim it T. H. The word Holy I had defined in the words which his Lordship here sets down and by the use thereof in the Scripture made it manifest That that was the true signification of the word There is nothing in Learning more difficult than to determine the signification of words That difficulty excuses him He says that Holiness in my sence is a Relation not a Quality All the Learned agree that Quality is an Accident so that in attributing to God Holiness as a Quality he contradicts himself for he has in the beginning of this his discourse denyed and rightly that any Accident is in God saying whatsoever is in God is the Divine Substance He affirms also that to attribute any Accident to God is to deny the simplicity of the Divine Substance And thus his Lordship makes God as I do a Corporeal Spirit Both here and throughout he discovers so much ignorance as had he charged me with error only and not with Atheism I should not have thought it necessary to answer him J. D. We are taught in our Creed to believe the Catholick or Universal Church But T. H. teacheth us the contrary That if there be more Christian Churches than one all of them together are not one Church personally And more plainly Now if the whole number of Christians be not contained in one Common-wealth they are not one Person nor is there an Vniversal Church that hath any Authority over them And again The Vniversal Church is not one Person of which it can be said that it hath done or Decreed or Ordained or Excommunicated or Absolved This doth quite overthrow all the Authority of General Councils All other Men distinguish between the Church and the Common-wealth only T. H. maketh them to be one and the same thing The Common-wealth of Christian men and the Church of the same are altogether the same thing called by two names for two reasons For the matter of the Church and of the Common-wealth is the same namely the same Christian men and the Form is the same which consisteth in the lawful power of convocating them And hence he concludeth That every Christian Common-wealth is a Church endowed with all spiritual Authority And yet more fully The Church if it be one Person is the same thing with the Common-wealth of Christians called a Common-wealth because it consisteth of men united in one Person their Soveraign And a Church because it consisteth in Christian men united in one Christian Soveraign Upon which account there was no Christian Church in these Parts of the World for some hundreds of years after Christ because there was no Christian Soveraign T. A. For answer to this Period I say only this That taking the Church as I do in all those places for a company of Christian men on Earth incorporated into one Person that can speak command or do any act of a Person all that he citeth out of what I have written is true and that all private Conventicles though their belief be right are not properly called Churches and that there is not any one Universal Church here on Earth which is a Person indued with Authority universal to govern all Christian men on Earth no more than there is one Universal Soveraign Prince or State on Earth that hath right to govern all Mankind I deny also that the whole Clergy of a Christian Kingdom or State being assembled are the representative of that Church further than the Civil Laws permits or can lawfully assemble themselves unless by the command or by the leave of the Soveraign Civil Power I say further that the denyal of this point tendeth in England towards the taking away of the Kings Supremacy in causes Ecclesiastical But his Lordship has not here denyed any thing of mine because he has done no more but set down my words He says further that this Doctrine destroyes the Authority of all General Councils which I confess Nor hath any General Council at this day in this Kingdom the force of a Law nor ever had but by the Authority of the King J. D. Neither is he more Orthodox concerning the Holy Scriptures Hitherto that is for the Books of Moses the power of making the Scripture Canonical was in the Civil Soveraign The like he saith of the Old Testament made Canonical by Esdras And of the New Testament That it was not the Apostles which made their own Writings Canonical but every Convert made them so to himself Yet with this restriction That until the Soveraign Ruler had prescribed them they were but Counsel and Advice which whether good or bad he that was counselled might without injustice refuse to observe and being contrary to the Laws established could not without injustice observe He maketh the Primitive Christians to have been in a pretty condition Certainly the Gospel was contrary to the Laws then established But most plainly The word of the Interpreter of the Scripture is the word of God And the same is the Interpreter of the Scripture and the Soveraign Judge of all Doctrines that is the Soveraign Magistrate to whose Authority we must stand no less than to theirs who at first did commend the Scripture to us for the Canon of Faith Thus if Christian Soveraigns of different Communications do clash one with another in their interpretations or misinterpretation of Scripture as they do daily then the word of God is contradictory to it self or that is the word of God in one Common-wealth which is the word of the Devil in another Common-wealth And the same thing may be true and not true at the same time Which is the peculiar priviledge of T.H. to make
credit As to that I say An Atheist is punished by God not as a Subject by his King but as an Enemy and to my argument for it namely because he never acknowledged himself Gods Subject He opposeth That if nature dictate that there is a God and to be worshiped in such and such manner then Atheism is not a sin of meer ignorance as if either I or he did hold that Nature dictates the manner of Gods Worship or any article of our Creed or whether to worship with or without a Surplice Secondly he answers that a Rebel is still a Subject de Jure though not de Facto And 't is granted But though the King lose none of his right by the Traytors act yet the Traytor loseth the priviledg of being punisht by a praecedent Law and therefore may be punish'd at the Kings will as Ravillac was for murdering Henry the 4th of France An open Enemy and a perfidious Traytor are both enemies Had not his Lordship read in the Roman story how Perseus and other just enemies of that State were wont to be punished But what is this trifling question to my excusing of Atheism In the seventh Paragraph of my Book de Cive he found the words in Latin which he here citeth And to the same sense I have said in my Leviathan That the right of nature whereby God raigneth over men is to be derived not from his creating them as if he required obedience as of Gratitude but from his irresistable Power This he says is absurd and dishonourable Whereas first all power is honourable and greatest power is most honourable It is not a more noble tenure for a King to hold his Kingdom and the right to punish those that transgress his Laws from his Power than from the gratitude or gift of the Transgressor There is nothing therefore here of dishonour to God Almighty But see the subtility of his disputing He saw he could not catch Leviathan in this place he looks for him in my Book de Cive which is Latine to try what he could fish out of that And says I make our obedience to God depend upon our weakness as if these words signified the Dependence and not the necessity of our submission or that incumbere and dependere were all one J. D. For T. H. his God is not the God of Christians nor of any rational men Our God is every where and seeing he hath no parts he must be wholly here and wholly there and wholly every where So Nature it self dictateth It cannot be said honourably of God that he is in a place for nothing is in a place but that which hath proper bounds of its greatness But T. H. his God is not wholly every where No man can conceive that any thing is all in this place and all in another place at the same time for none of these things ever have or can be incident to sense So far well if by conceiving he mean comprehending but then follows That these are absurd Speeches taken upon credit without any signification at all from deceived Philosophers and deceived or deceiving School-men Thus he denieth the Ubiquity of God A Circumscriptive a Definitive and a Repletive being in a place is some heathen language to him T. H. Though I believe the Omnipotence of God and that he can do what he will yet I dare not say how every thing is done because I cannot conceive nor comprehend either the Divine substance or the way of its operation And I think it Impiety to speak concerning God any thing of my own head or upon the Authority of Philosophers or School-men which I understand not without warrant in the Scripture And what I say of Omnipotence I say also of Ubiquity But his Lordship is more valiant in this place telling us that God is wholly here and wholly there and wholly every where because he has no parts I cannot comprehend nor conceive this For methinks it implies also that the whole World is also in the whole God and in every part of God nor can I conceive how any thing can be called Whole which has no parts nor can I find any thing of this in the Scripture If I could find it there I could believe it and if I could find it in the publick Doctrine of the Church I could easily abstain from contradicting it The School-men say also that the Soul of Man meaning his upper Soul which they call the rational Soul is also wholly in the whole man and wholly in every part of the man What is this but to make the humane Soul the same thing in respect of mans Body that God is in respect of the World These his Lordship calls here rational men and some of them which applaud this Doctrine would have the High Court of Parliament corroborate such Doctrines with a Law I said in my Leviathan that it is no honourable attribute to God to say he is in a place because infinite is not confined within a place To which he replies T. H. his God is not wholly every where I confess the consequence For I understand in English he that says any thing to be all here means that neither all nor any of the same thing is else where He says further I â—ake a Circumscriptive a Definitive and a Repletive being in a place to be Heathen Language Truly if this Dispute were at â—he Bar I should go near to crave the asistance of the Court lest some trick might be put upon me in such obscurity â—or though I know what these Latin words singly signifie yet I understand not â—ow any thing is in a Place Definitively and not Circumscriptively For Definitively comes from definio which is to set bounds And therefore to be in a Place Definitively is when the bounds of the place are every way marked out But to be in a place Circumscriptively is when the bounds of the place are described round about To be in a Place Repletive is to fill a place Who does not see that this dictinction is Canting and Fraud If any man will call it Pious Fraud he is to prove the Piety as clearly as I have here explained the Fraud Besides no Fraud can be Pious in any man but him that hath a lawful Right to govern him whom he beguileth whom the Bishop pretends to govern I cannot tell Besides his Lordship ought to have considered that every Bishop is one of the Great Councel trusted by the King to give their advice with the Lords Temporal for the making of good Laws Civil and Ecclesiastical and not to offer them such obscure Doctrines as if because they are not versed in School-divinity therefore they had no Learning at all nor understood the English Tongue Why did the Divines of England contend so much heretofore to have the Bible translated into English if they never meant any but themselves should read it If a Lay-man be publickly encouraged to search the Scriptures for his own
Bargains with him but Commands him not Oh the understanding of a Schoolman J. D. Sometimes he is for holy Orders and giveth to the Pastors of the Church the right of Ordination and Absolution and Infallibility too much for a particular Pastor or the Pastors of one particular Church It is manifest that the consecration of the chiefest Doctors in every Church and imposition of hands doth pertain to the Doctors of the same Church And it cannot be doubted of but the power of binding and loosing was given by Christ to the future Pastors after the same manner as to his present Apostles And our Saviour hath promised this infallibility in those things which are necessary to Salvation to his Apostles until the day of Judgment that is to say to the Apostles and Pastors to be Consecrated by the Apostles successively by the imposition of hands But at other times he casteth all this Meal down with his foot Christian Soveraigns are the supream Pastors and the only persons whom Christians now hear speak from God except such as God speaketh to in these dayes supernaturally What is now become of the promised infallibility And it is from the Civil Soveraign that all other Pastors derive their right of teaching preaching and all other functions pertaining to that Office and they are but his Ministers in the same manner as the Magistrates of Towns or Judges in Courts of Justice and Commanders of Armies What is now become of their Ordination Magistrates Judges and Generals need no precedent qualifications He maketh the Pastoral Authority of Soveraigns to be Jure divino of all other Pastors Jure civili He addeth neither is there any Judge of Heresie among Subjects but their own civil Soveraign Lastly the Church Excommunicateth no man but whom she Excommunicateth by the Authority of the Prince And the effect of Excommunication hath nothing in it neither of dammage in this World nor terror upon an Apostate if the Civil Power did persecute or not assist the Church And in the World to come leaves them in no worse estate than those who never believed The dammage rather redoundeth to the Church Neither is the Excommunication of a Christian Subject that obeyeth the Laws of his own Soveraign of any effect Where is now their power of binding and loosing T. H. Here his Lordship condemneth first my too much kindness to the Pastors of the Church as if I ascribed Infallibility to every particular Minister or at least to the Assembly of the Pastors of a particular Church But he mistakes me I never meant to flatter them so much I say only that the Ceremony of Consecration and Imposition of hands belongs to them and that also no otherwise than as given them by the Laws of the Common-wealth The Bishop Consecrates but the King both makes him Bishop and gives him his Authority The Head of the Church not only gives the power of Consecration Dedication and Benediction but may also exercise the Act himself if he please Solomon did it and the Book of Canons says That the King of England has all the Right that any good King of Israel had It might have added that any other King or soveraign Assembly had in their own Dominions I deny That any Pastor or any Assembly of Pastors in any particular Church or all the Churches on earth though united are Infallible Yet I say the Pastors of a Christian Church assembled are in all such points as are necessary to Salvation But about what points are necessary to Salvation he and I differ For I in the 43d chapter of my Leviathan have proved that this Article Jesus is the Christ is the unum necessarium the only Article necessary to Salvation to which his Lordship hath not offered any Objection And he it seems would have necessary to Salvation every Doctrine he himself thought so Doubtless in this Article Jesus is the Christ every Church is infallible for else it were no Church Then he says I overthrow this again by saying that Christian Soveraigns are the Supream Pastors that is Heads of their own Churches That they have their Authority Jure Divino That all other Pastors have it Jure Civili How came any Bishop to have Authority over me but by Letters Patents from the King I remember a Parliament wherein a Bishop who was both a good Preacher and a good Man was blamed for a Book he had a little before Published in maintenance of the Jus Divinum of Bishops a thing which before the Reformation here was never allowed them by the Pope Two Jus Divinums cannot stand together in one Kingdom In the last place he mislikes that the Church should Excommunicate by Authority of the King that is to say by Authority of the Head of the Church But he tells not why He might as well mislike that the Magistrates of the Realm should execute their Offices by the Authority of the Head of the Realm His Lordship was in a great error if he thought such incroachments would add any thing to the Wealth Dignity Reverence or Continuance of his Order They are Pastors of Pastors but yet they are the Sheep of him that is on earth their soveraign Pastor and he again a Sheep of that supream Pastor which is in Heaven And if they did their pastoral Office both by Life and Doctrine as they ought to do there could never arise any dangerous Rebellion in the Land But if the people see once any ambition in their Teachers they will sooner learn that than any other Doctrine and from Ambition proceeds Rebellion J. D. It may be some of T. H. his Disciples desire to know what hopes of Heavenly joyes they have upon their Masters Principles They may hear them without any great contentment There is no mention in Scripture nor ground in reason of the Coelum Empyraeum that is the Heaven of the Blessed where the Saints shall live eternally with God And again I have not found any Text that can probably be drawn to prove any Ascention of the Saints into Heaven that is to say into any Coelum Empyraeum But he concludeth positively that Salvation shall be upon earth when God shall Raign at the coming of Christ in Jerusalem And again In short the Kingdom of God is a civil Kingdom c. called also the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of Glory All the Hobbians can hope for is to be restored to the same condition which Adam was in before his fall So saith T.H. himself From whence may be inferred that the Elect after the Resurrection shall be restored to the estate wherein Adam was before he had sinned As for the beatifical vision he defineth it to be a word unintelligible T.H. This Coelum Empyraeum for which he pretendeth so much zeal where is it in the Scripture where in the Book of Common Prayer where in the Canons where in the Homilies of the Church of England or in any part of our Religion What has a Christian to
The lawful Assembly of Pastors or of Bishops But there can be no lawful Assembly in England without the Authority of the King The Scripture therefore what it is and how to be interpreted is made known unto us here by no other way than the Authority of our Soveraign Lord both in Temporals and Spirituals The Kings Majesty And where he has set forth no Interpretation there I am allowed to follow my own as well as any other man Bishop or not Bishop For my own part all that know me know also it is my opinion That the best government in Religion is by Episcopacy but in the King 's Right not in their own But my Lord of Derry not contented with this would have the utmost resolution of our Faith to be into the Doctrine of the Schools I do not think that all the Bishops be of his mind If they were I would wish them to stand in fear of that dreadful Sentence All covet all lose I must not let pass these words of his Lordship If divine Law and humane Law clash one with another without doubt it is better evermore to obey God than man Where the King is a Christian believes the Scripture and hath the Legislative power both in Church and State and maketh no Laws concerning Christian Faith or divine Worship but by the Counsel of his Bishops whom he trusteth in that behalf if the Bishops counsel him aright what clashing can there be between the divine and humane Laws For if the Civil Law be against God's Law and the Bishops make it clearly appear to the King that it clasheth with divine Law no doubt he will mend it by himself or by the advice of his Parliament for else he is no professor of Christ's Doctrine and so the clashing is at an end But if they think that every opinion they hold though obscure and unnecessary to Salvation ought presently to be Law then there will be clashings innumerable not only of Laws but also of Swords as we have found it too true by late experience But his Lordship is still at this that there ought to be for the divine Laws that is to say for the interpretation of Scripture a Legislative power in the Church distinct from that of the King which under him they enjoy already This I deny Then for clashing between the Civil Laws of Indels with the Law of God the Apostles teach that those their Civil Laws are to be obeyed but so as to keep their Faith in Christ entirely in their hearts which is an obedience easily performed But I do not believe that Augustus Caesar or Nero was bound to make the holy Scripture Law and yet unless they did so they could not attain to eternal life J. D. His fifth conclusion may be that the sharpest and most succesful Sword in any War whatsoever doth give Soveraign Power and Authority to him that hath it to approve or reject all sorts of Theological Doctrines concerning the Kingdom of God not according to their truth or falshood but according to that influence which they have upon political affairs Hear him But because this Doctrine will appear to most men a novelty I do but propound it maintaining nothing in this or any other Paradox of Religion but attending the end of that dispute of the Sword concerning the Authority not yet amongst my Country-men decided by which all sorts of Doctrine are to be approved or rejected c. For the points of Doctrine concerning the Kingdom of God have so great influence upon the Kingdom of Man as not to be determined but by them that under God have the Soveraign Power Careat successibus opto Quisquis ab eventu facta notanda putat Let him evermore want success who thinketh actions are to be judged by their events This Doctrine may be plausible to those who desire to fish in troubled Waters But it is justly hated by those which are in Authority and all those who are lovers of peace and tranquillity The last part of this conclusion smelleth rankly of Jeroboam Now shall the Kingdom return to the house of David if this people go up to do Sacrifice in the house of the Lord at Jerusalem whereupon the King took counsel and made two Calves of Gold and said unto them It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem behold thy Gods O Israel which brought thee out of the Land of Aegypt But by the just disposition of Almighty God this Policy turned to a sin and was the utter destruction of Jeroboam and his Family It is not good jesting with edge-tools nor playing with holy things Where men make their greatest fastness many times they find most danger T. H. His Lordship either had a strange Conscience or understood not English Being at Paris when there was no Bishop nor Church in England and every man writ what he pleased I resolved when it should please God to restore the Authority Ecclesiastical to submit to that Authority in whatsoever it should determine This his Lordship construes for a temporizing and too much indifferency in Religion and says further that the last part of my words do smell of Jeroboam To the contrary I say my words were modest and such as in duty I ought to use And I profess still that whatsoever the Church of England the Church I say not every Doctor shall forbid me to say in matter of Faith I shall abstain from saying it excepting this point That Jesus Christ the Son of God dyed for my sins As for other Doctrins I think it unlawful if the Church define them for any Member of the Church to contradict them J. D. His sixth Paradox is a rapper the Civil Laws are the Rules of good and evil just and unjust honest and dishonest and therefore what the Lawgiver commands that is to be accounted good what he forbids bad And a little after before Empires were just and unjust were not as whose nature is Relative to a Command every action in its own nature is indifferent That it is just or unjust proceedeth from the right of him that commandeth Therefore lawful Kings make those things which they command Just by commanding them and those things which they forbid Vnjust by forbidding them To this add his definition of a sin that which one doth or omitteth saith or willeth contrary to the reason of the Common-wealth that is the Civil Laws Where by the Laws he doth not understand the Written Laws elected and approved by the whole Common-wealth but the verbal Commands or Mandates of him that hath the Soveraign Power as we find in many places of his Writings The Civil Laws are nothing else but the Commands of him that is endowed with Soveraign Power in the Common-wealth concerning the future actions of his Subjects And the Civil Laws are fastned to the Lips of that man who hath the Soveraign Power Where are we In Europe or in Asia Where they ascribed a Divinity to their Kings and to
use his own Phrase made them Mortal Gods O King live for ever Flatterers are the common Moths of great Pallaces where Alexander's friends are more numerous than the King's friends But such gross palpable pernicious flattery as this is I did never meet with so derogatory both to piety and policy What deserved he who should do his uttermost endeavour to poyson a common Fountain whereof all the Common-wealth must drink He doth the same who poisoneth the mind of a Soveraign Prince Are the Civil Laws the Rules of good and bad just and unjust honest and dishonest And what I pray your are the Rules of the Civil Law it self Even the Law of God and Nature If the Civil Laws swerve from these more authentick Laws they are Lesbian Rules What the Lawgiver commands is to be accounted good what he forbids bad This was just the garb of the Athenian Sophisters as they are described by Plato Whatsoever pleased the great Beast the Multitude they call holy and just and good And whatsoever the great Beast disliked they called evil unjust prophane But he is not yet arrived at the height of his flattery Lawful Kings make those things which they command just by commanding them At other times when he is in his right wits he talketh of sufferings and expecting their reward in Heaven And going to Christ by Martyrdome And if he had the fortitude to suffer death he should do better But I fear all this was but said in jest How should they expect their reward in Heaven if his Doctrine be true that there is no reward in Heaven Or how should they be Martyrs if his Doctrine betrue that none can be Martyrs but those who conversed with Christ upon earth He addeth Before Empires were just and unjust were not Nothing could be written more false in his sence more dishonourable to God more inglorious to the humane nature That God should create Man and leave him presently without any Rules to his own ordering of himself as the Ostridg leaveth her Eggs in the sand But in truth there have been Empires in the World ever since Adam And Adam had a Law written in his heart by the finger of God before there was any Civil Law Thus they do endeavour to make goodness and justice and honesty and conscience and God himself to be empty names without any reality which signifie nothing further than they conduce to a man's interest Otherwise he would not he could not say That every action as it is invested with its circumstances is indifferent in its own nature T. H. My sixth Paradox he calls a Rapper A Rapper a Swapper and such like terms are his Lordships elegancies But let us see what this Rapper is 'T is this The Civil Laws are the Rules of Good and Evil Just and Unjust Honest and Dishonest Truly I see no other Rules they have The Scriptures themselves were made Law to us here by the Authority of the Common-wealth and are therefore part of the Law Civil If they were Laws in their own nature then were they Laws over all the World and men were obliged to obey them in America as soon as they should be shown there though without a Miracle by a Frier What is Injust but the Transgression of a Law Law therefore was before Unjust And the Law was made known by Soveraign Power before it was a Law Therefore Soveraign Power was antecedent both to Law and Injustice Who then made Injust but Soveraign Kings or Soveraign Astemblies Where is now the wonder of this Rapper That Lawful Kings make those things which they command Just by commanding them and those things which they forbid Vnjust by forbidding them Just and Unjust were surely made if the King made them not who made them else For certainly the breach of a Civil Law is a sin against God Another Calumny which he would fix upon me is That I make the King 's verbal Commands to be Laws How so Because I say the Civil Laws are nothing else but the Commands of him that hath the Soveraign Power concerning the future Actions of his Subjects What verbal Command of a King can arrive at the ears of all his Subjects which it must do ere it be a Law without the Seal of the Person of the Common-wealth which is here the Great Seal of England Who but his Lordship ever denyed that the command of England was a Law to English men Or that any but the King had Authority to affix the Great Seal of England to any Writing And who did ever doubt to call our Laws though made in Parliament the King's Laws What was ever called a Law which the King did not assent to Because the King has granted in divers cases not to make a Law without the advice and assent of the Lords and Commons therefore when there is no Parliament in being shall the Great Seal of England stand for nothing What was more unjustly maintained during the long Parliament besides the resisting and Murdering of the King then this Doctrine of his Lordship's But the Bishop endeavoured here to make the Multitude believe I maintain That the King sinneth not though he bid hang a man for making his Apparel otherwise than he appointed or his Servant for negligent attendance And yet he knew I distinguished always between the King 's natural and politick capacity What name should I give to this wilful slander But here his Lordship enters into passion and exclaims Where are we in Europe or in Asia Gross palpable pernicious flattery poisoning of a Common-wealth poysoning the King's mind But where was his Lordship when he wrote this One would not think he was in France nor that this Doctrine was Written in the year 1658 but rather in the year 1648 in some Cabal of the King's enemies But what did put him into this fit of Choller Partly this very thing that he could not answer my reasons but chiefly that he had lost upon me so much School-learning in our controversie touching Liberty and Necessity wherein he was to blame himself for believing that the obscure and barbarous Language of School Divinity could satisfie an ingenuous Reader as well as plain and perspicuous English Do I flatter the King Why am I not rich I confess his Lordship has not flattered him here J. D. Something there is which he hath a confused glimmering of as the blind man sees men walking like Trees which he is not able to apprehend and express clearly We acknowledge that though the Laws or Commands of a Soveraign Prince be erroneous or unjust or injurious such as a Subject cannot approve for good in themselves yet he is bound to acquiesce and may not oppose or resist otherwise than by Prayers and Tears and at the most by flight We acknowledge that the Civil Laws have power to bind the Conscience of a Christian in themselves but not from themselves but from him who hath said Let every Soul be subject to the higher Powers
as an Enemy by an Enemy because he would not accept Laws His reason is because the Atheist never submitted his will to the Will of God whom he never thought to be And he concludeth that mans obligation to obey God proceedeth from his weakness Manifestum est obligationem ad prestandum ipsi Deo obedientiam incumbere hominibus propter imbecilitatem First it is impossible that should be a sin of meer ignorance or imprudence which is directly contrary to the light of natural reason The Laws of nature need no new promulgation being imprinted naturally by God in the heart of Man The Law of nature was written in our hearts by the finger of God without our assent or rather the Law of Nature is the assent it self Then if Nature dictate to us that there is a God and that this God is to be worshipped in such and such manner it is not possible that Atheism should be a sin of meer ignorance Secondly a Rebellious Subject is still a Subject De Jure though not De Facto by right though not by deed and so the most cursed Atheist that is ought by right to be the Subject of God and ought to be punished not as a just Enemy but as a disloyal Traytor Which is confessed by himself This fourth Sin that is of those who do not by word and deed confess one God the Supreme King of Kings in the natural Kingdom of God is the Crime of High Treason for it is a denial of Divine Power or Atheism Then an Atheist is a Traytor to God and punishable as a disloyal Subject not as an Enemy Lastly it is an absurd and dishonourable assertion to make our obedience to God to depend upon our weakness because we cannot help it and not upon our gratitude because we owe our being and preservation to him Who planteth a Vineyard and eateth not of the Fruit thereof And who feedeth a Flock and eateth not of the Milk of the Flock And again Thou art worthy O Lord to receive Glory and Honour and Power for thou hast created all things and for thy pleasure they are and were created But it were much better or at least not so ill to be a down right Atheist than to make God to be such a thing as he doth and at last thrust him into the Devils Office to be the cause of all Sin T. H. Though this Bishop as I said had but a weak attention in reading and little skill in examining the force of an Argument yet he knew men and the art without troubling their judgments to win their assents by exciting their Passions One Rule of his art was to give his Reader what he would have him swallow a part by it self and in the nature of News whether true or not Knowing that the unlearned that is most men are content to believe rather than be troubled with examining Therefore a little before he put these words T. H. no friend to Religion in the Margent And in this place before he offer at any confutation he says my Principles are brim full of Prodigious Impieties And at the next Paragraph in the Margent he puts that I excuse Atheism This behaviour becomes neither a Bishop nor a Christian nor any man that pretends to good education Fear of invisible powers what is it else in savage people but the fear of somewhat they think a God What invisible power does the reason of a savage man suggest unto him but those Phantasms of his sleep or his distemper which we frequently call Ghosts and the Savages thought Gods so that the fear of a God though not of the true one to them was the beginning of Religion as the fear of the true God was the beginning of wisdom to the Jews and Christians Ignorance of second causes made men fly to some first cause the fear of which bred Devotion and Worship The ignorance of what that power might do made them observe the order of what he had done that they might guess by the like order what he was to do another time This was their Prognostication What Prodigious impiety is here How confutes he it Must it be taken for Impiety upon his bare calumny I said Superstition was fear without reason Is not the fear of a false God or fancied Daemon contrary to right reason And is not Atheism Boldness grounded on false reasoning such as is this the wicked prosper therefore there is no God He offers no proof against any of this but says only I make Atheism to be more reasonable than Superstition which is not true For I deny that there is any reason either in the Atheist or in the Superstitious And because the Atheist thinks he has reason where he has none I think him the more irrational of the two But all this while he argues not against any of this but enquires only what is become of my natural Worship of God and of his Existency Infiniteness Incomprehensibility Unity and Ubiquity As if whatsoever reason can suggest must be suggested all at once First all men by nature had an opinion of Gods Existency but of his other Attributes not so soon but by reasoning and by degrees And for the Attributes of the true God they were never suggested but by the Word of God written In that I say Atheism is a sin of ignorance he says I excuse it The Prophet David says The fool hath said in his heart There is no God Is it not then a sin of folly 'T is agreed between us that right reason dictates There is a God Does it not follow that denying of God is a sin proceeding from mis-reasoning If it be not a sin of ignorance it must be a sin of malice Can a man malice that which he thinks has no being But may not one think there is a God and yet maliciously deny him If he think there is a God he is no Atheist and so the question is changed into this whether any man that thinks there is a God dares deliberately deny it For my part I think not For upon what confidence dares any man deliberately I say oppose the Omnipotent David saith of himself My feet were ready to slip when I saw the prosperity of the wicked Therefore it is likely the feet of men less holy slip oftner But I think no man living is so daring being out of passion as to hold it as his opinion Those wicked men that for a long time proceeded so succesfully in the late horrid Rebellion may perhaps make some think they were constant and resolved Atheists but I think rather that they forgot God than believed there was none He that believes there is such an Atheist comes a little too near that opinion himself Nevertheless if words spoken in passion signifie a denial of a God no punishment praeordained by Law can be too great for such an insolence because there is no living in a Common-wealth with men to whose oaths we cannot reasonably give
innumerable Such a Prophet was his Lordship and such are all Pastors in the Christian Church But the Question here is of those Prophets that from the Mouth of God foretell things future or do other Miracle Of this kind I deny there has been any since the Death of St. John the Evangelist If any Man find fault with this he ought to name some Man or other whom we are bound to acknowledge that they have done a Miracle cast out a Devil or cured any Disease by the sole Invocation of the Divine Majesty We are not bound to trust to the Legend of the Roman Saints nor to the History written by Sulpitius of the Life of St. Martin or to any other Fables of the Roman Clergy nor to such things as were pretended to be done by some Divines here in the time of King James Secondly he says I make little difference between a Prophet and a Mad-man or Demoniack To which I say he accuses me falsly I say only thus much That I see nothing at all in the Scripture that requireth a belief that Demoniacks were any other-thing than Madmen And this is also made very probable out of Scripture by a worthy Divine Mr. Meade But concerning Prophets I say only that the Jews both under the Old Testament and under the New took them to be all one with Mad-men and Demoniacks And prove it out of Scripture by many places both of the Old and New Testament Thirdly that the pretence or arrogating to ones self Divine Inspiration is argument enough to shew a Man is Mad is my opinion but his Lordship understands not Inspiration in the same sence that I do He understands it properly of God's breathing into a Man or pouring into him the Divine Substance or Divine Graces and in that sence he that arrogateth Inspiration into himself neither understands what he saith nor makes others to understand him which is properly Madness in some degree But I understand Inspiration in the Scripture Metaphorically for Gods guidance of our minds to Truth and Piety Fourthly whereas he says I make the pretence of Inspiration to be pernicious to Peace I answer that I think his Lordship was of my Opinion for he called those Men which in the late Civil War pretended the Spirit and New Light and to be the only faithful men Phanaticks for he called them in his Book and did call them in his Life time Phanaticks And what is a Phanatick but a Mad-man and what can be more pernicious to Peace than the Revelations that were by these Phanaticks pretended I do not say there were Doctrines of other Men not called Phanaticks as pernicious to Peace as theirs were and in great part a cause of those troubles Fifthly from that I make Prophetical Revelations subject to the examination of the Lawful Soveraign he inferreth that two Prophets prophecying the same thing at the same time in the Dominions of two different Princes the one shall be a true Prophet the other a false This consequence is not good for seeing they teach different Doctrines they cannot both of them confirm their Doctrine with Miracles But this I prove in the page 232 he citeth that whether either of their Doctrines shall be taught publickly or not 't is in the power of the Soveraign of the Place only to determine Nay I say now further if a Prophet come to any private Man in the Name of God that Man shall be Judge whether he be a true Prophet or not before he obey him See 1 John 4. 1. Sixthly whereas he says that upon my grounds Christ was to be reputed a false Prophet every where because his Doctrine was received no where His Lordship had read my Book more negligently than was fit for one that would confute it My ground is this that Christ in right of his Father was King of the Jews and consequently Supream Prophet and Judge of all Prophets What other Princes thought of his Prophesies is nothing to the purpose I never said that Princes can make Doctrines or Prophesies true or false but I say every Soveraign Prince has a right to prohibite the publick Teaching of them whether false or true But what an oversight is it in a Divine to say that Christ had the Approbation of no Soveraign Prince when he had the Approbation of God who was King of the Jews and Christ his Vice-Roy and the whole Scripture written Joh. 20.31 to prove it When his Miracles declared it when Pilate confessed it and when the Apostles Office was to proclaim it Seventhly If we must not consider in points of Christian Faith who is the Soveraign Prophet that is who is next under Christ our Supream Head and Governor I wish his Lordship would have cleared ere he dyed these few Questions Is there not need of some Judge of Controverted Doctrines I think no man can deny it that has seen the Rebellion that followed the Controversie here between Gomar and Arminius There must therefore be a Judge of Doctrines But says the Bishop not the King Who then Shall Dr. Bramhall be this Judge As profitable an Office as it is he was more modest than to say that Shall a private Lay-man have it No man ever thought that Shall it be given to a Presbyterian Minister No 't is unreasonable Shall a Synod of Presbyterians have it No For most of the Presbyters in the Primitive Church were undoubtedly subordinate to Bishops and the rest were Bishops Who then A Synod of Bishops Very well His Lordship being too modest to undertake the whole Power would have been contented with the six and twentieth part But suppose it in a Synod of Bishops who shall call them together The King What if he will not Who should Excommunicate him or if he despise your Excommunication who shall send forth a Writ of Significavit No all this was far from his Lordships thoughts The power of the Clergy unless it be upheld legally by the King or illegally by the Multitude amounts to nothing But for the Multitude Suarez and the School-men will never gain them because they are not understood Besides there be very few Bishops that can act a Sermon which is a puissant part of Rhetorick So well as divers Presbyterians and Phanatick Preachers can do I conclude therefore that his Lordship could not possibly believe that the Supream Judicature in matter of Religion could any where be so well placed as in the Head of the Church which is the King And so his Lordship and I think the same thing but because his Lordship knew not how to deduce it he was angry with me because I did it He says further that by my Principles he that blasphemeth Christ at Constantinople is a true Prophet as if a man that blasphemeth Christ to approve his Blasphemy can procure a Miracle for by my principles no Man is a Prophet whose Prophesie is not confirmed by God with a Miracle In the last place out of this That the lawful
Either they bind Christian Subjects to do their Soveraign's Commands or to suffer for the Testimony of a good Conscience We acknowledge that in doubtful Cases semper praesumitur pro Rege Lege the Soveraign and the Law are always presumed to be in the right But in plain evident cases which admit no doubt it is always better to obey God than man Blunderers whilst they think to mend one imaginary hole make two or three real ones They who derive the Authority of the Scriptures or God's Law from the Civil Laws of men are like those who seek to underprop the Heavens from falling with a Bullrush Nay they derive not only the Authority of the Scripture but even the Law of nature it self from the Civil Law The Laws of nature which need no promulgation in the condition of nature are not properly Laws but qualities which dispose men to peace and obedience When a Common-wealth is once setled then are they actually Laws and not before God help us into what times are we fallen when the immutable Laws of God and Nature are made to depend upon the mutable Laws of mortal men just as one should go about to controll the Sun by the Authority of the Clock T. H. Hitherto he never offered to mend any of the Doctrines he inveighs against but here he does He says I have a glimmering of something I was not able to apprehend and express clearly Let us see his Lordship's more clear expression We acknowledge saith he that though the Laws or Commands of a Soveraign Prince be erroneous or unjust or injurious such as a Subject cannot approve for good in themselves yet he is bound to acquiesce and may not oppose or resist otherwise than by Prayers and Tears and at the most by Flight Hence it follows clearly that when a Soveraign has made a Law though erroneous then if his Subject oppose it it is a sin Therefore I would fain know when a man has broken that Law by doing what it forbad or by refusing to do what it commanded whether he have opposed this Law or not If to break the Law be to oppose it he granteth it Therefore his Lordship has not here expressed himself so clearly as to make men understand the difference between breaking a Law and opposing it Though there be some difference between breaking of a Law and opposing those that are sent with force to see it executed yet between breaking and opposing the Law it self there is no difference Also though the Subject think the Law just as when a Thief is by Law Condemned to dye yet he may lawfully oppose the Execution not only by Prayers Tears and Flight but also as I think any way he can For though his fault were never so great yet his endeavour to save his own life is not a fault For the Law expects it and for that cause appointeth Felons to be carryed bound and encompassed with Armed men to Execution Nothing is opposite to Law but sin Nothing opposite to the Sheriff but force So that his Lordship's sight was not sharp enough to see the difference between the Law and the Officer Again We acknowledge says he that the Laws have power to bind the Conscience of a Christian in themselves but not from themselves Neither do the Scriptures bind the Conscience because they are Scriptures but because they were from God So also the Book of English Statutes bindeth our Consciences in it self but not from it self but from the Authority of the King who only in the right of God has the legislative Powers Again he saith We acknowledge that in doubtful cases the Soveraign and the Law are always presumed to be in the right If he presume they are in the right how dare he presume that the cases they determine are doubtful But saith he in evident cases which admit no doubt it is always better to obey God than man Yes and in doubtful cases also say I. But not always better to obey the inferior Pastors than the Supream Pastor which is the King But what are those cases that admit no doubt I know but very few and those are such as his Lordship was not much acquainted with J. D. But it is not worthy of my labour nor any part of my intention to pursue every shadow of a Question which he springeth It shall suffice to gather a Posie of Flowers or rather a bundle of Weeds out of his Writings and present them to the Reader who will easily distinguish them from healthful Plants by the rankness of their smell Such are these which follow T. H. As for the following Posie of Flowers there wants no more to make them sweet than to wipe off the Venome blown upon some of them by his Lordships breath J. D. 1. To be delighted in the imagination only of being possessed of another man's Goods Servants or Wife without any intention to take them from him by force or fraud is no breach of the Law which saith Thou shalt not covet T. H. What man was there ever whose imagination of any thing he thought would please him whe not some delight Or what sin is there where there is not so much as an intention to do injustice But his Lordship would not distinguish between delight and purpose nor between a Wish and a Will This was venome I believe that his Lordship himself even before he was Married took some delight in the thought of it and yet the Woman then was not his own All love is delight but all love is not sin Without this love of that which is not yet a mans own the World had not been Peopled J. D. 2. If a Man by the terror of present death be compelled to do a Fact against the Law he is totally excused because no Law can oblige a Man to abandon his own preservation nature compelleth him to the Fact The like Doctrine he hath elsewhere When the Actor doth any thing against the Law of Nature by the Command of the Author if he be obliged by former Covenants to obey him not he but the Author breaketh the Law of Nature T. H. The second Flower is both sweet and wholsom J. D. 3. It is a Doctrine repugnant to Civil Society that whatsoever a man does against his Conscience is sin T. H. 'T is plain that to do what a man thinks in his own Conscience to be sin is sin for it is a contempt of the Law it self and from thence ignorant men our of an erroneous Conscience disobey the Law which is pernicious to all Government J. D. 4. The Kingdom of God is not shut but to them that sin that is to them who have not performed due obedience to the Laws of God nor to them if they believe the necessary Articles of the Christian Faith 5. We must know that the true acknowledging of sin is Repentance it self 6. An opinion publickly appointed to be taught cannot be Heresie nor the Soveraign Princes that Authorised the
same Hereticks T. H. The 4th 5th and 6th smoll well But to say that the Soveraign Prince in England is a Heretick or that an Act of Parliament is Heretical stinks abominably as 't was thought Primo Elizabethae J. D. 7. Temporal and Spiritual government are but two words to make men see double and mistake their lawful Soveraign c. There is no other Government in this Life neither of State nor Religion but Temporal 8. It is manifest that they who permit a contrary Doctrine to that which themselves believe and think necessary to Salvation do against their Consciences and Will as much as in them lyeth the eternal destruction of their Subjects T. H. The 7th and 8th are Roses and Jassamin But his leaving out the words to Salvation was venome J. D. 9. Subjects sin if they do not worship God according to the Laws of the Common-wealth T. H. The 9th he hath poisoned and made it not mine he quotes my Book de Cive Cap. 15.19 Where I say Regnante Deo per solam rationem naturalem that is Before the Scripture was given they sinned that refused to worship God according to the Rites and Ceremonies of the Country which hath no ill scent but to undutiful Subjects J. D. 10. To believe in Jesus in Jesum is the same as to believe that Jesus is Christ T. H. And so it is always in the Scripture J. D. 11. There can be no contradiction between the Laws of God and the Laws of a Christian Common-wealth Yet we see Christian Common-wealths daily contradict one another T. H. The 11th is also good But his Lordship's instance That Christian Common-wealths contradict one another have nothing to do here Their Laws do indeed contradict one another but contradict not the Law of God For God Commands their Subjects to obey them in all things and his Lordship himself confesseth that their Laws though erroneous bind the Conscience But Christian Common-wealths would seldome contradict one another if they made no Doctrine Law but such as were necessary to Salvation J. D. 12. No man giveth but with intention of some good to himself Of all voluntary Acts the Object is to every man his own good Moses St. Paul and the Decij were not of his mind T. H. That which his Lordship adds to the 12th namely that Moses St. Paul and the Decij were not of my mind is false For the two former did what they did for a good to themselves which was eternal Life and the Decij for a good Fame after death And his Lordship also if he had believed there is an eternal happiness to come or thought a good Fame after death to be any thing worth he would have directed all his actions towards them and have despised the Wealth and Titles of the present World J. D. 13. There is no natural knowledge of man's estate after death much less of reward which is then to be given to breach of Faith but only a belief grounded upon other mens saying that they know it supernaturally or that they know those that knew them that knew others that knew it supernaturally T. H. The 13th is good and fresh J. D. 14. David's killing of Uriah was no injury to Uriah because the right to do what he pleased was given him by Uriah himself T. H. David himself makes this good in saying To thee only have I sinned J. D. 15. To whom it belongeth to determine controversies which may arise from the divers interpretations of Scripture he hath an imperial power over all men which acknowledge the Scripture to be the Word of God 16. What is Theft what is Murder what is Adultery and universally what is an injury is known by the Civil Law that is by the Commands of the Soveraign T. H. For the 15th he should have disputed it with the Head of the Church And as to the 16th I would have asked him by what other Law his Lordship would have it determined what is Theft or what is Injury than by the Laws ' made in Parliament or by the Laws which distinguish between Meum and Tuum His Lordships ignorance smells rankly 't is his own phrase in this and many other places which I have let pass of his own interest The King tells us what is sin in that he tells us what is Law He hath authorised the Clergy to dehort the people from sin and to exhort them by good motives both from Scripture and Reason to obey the Laws and supposeth them though under forty years old by the help they have in the University able in case the Law be not written to teach the people old and young what they ought to follow in doubtful cases of Conscience that is to say they are authorised to expound the Laws of Nature but not so as to make it a doubtful case whether the King's Laws be to be obeyed or not All they ought to do is from the King's Authority And therefore this my Doctrine is no Weed J. D. 17. He admitteth incestuous Copulations of the Heathens according to their Heathenish Laws to have been lawful Marriages Though the Scripture teach us expresly that for those abominations the Land of Canaan spued our her Inhabitants Levit. 18.28 T. H. The 17th he hath corrupted with a false interpretation of the Text. For in that Chapter from the beginning to verse 20 are forbidden Marriages in certain degrees of kindred From verse 20 which begins with Moreover to the 28th are forbidden Sacrificing of Children to Molech and Prophaning of God's name and Buggery with Man and Beast with this cause exprest For all these abominations have the men of the Land done which were before you and the Land is defiled That the Land spue not you out also As for Marriages within the degrees prohibited they are not referred to the abominations of the Heathen Besides for some time after Adam such Marriages were necessary J. D. 18. I say that no other Article of Faith besides this that Jesus is Christ is necessary to a Christian man for Salvation 19. Because Christ's Kingdom is not of this World therefore neither can his Ministers unless they be Kings require obedience in his name They have no right of Commanding no power to make Laws T. H. These two smell comfortably and of Scripture The contrary Doctrine smells of Ambition and encroachment of Jurisdiction or Rump of the Roman Tyranny J. D. 20. I pass by his errors about Oaths about Vows about the Resurrection about the Kingdom of Christ about the Power of the Keys Binding Loosing Excommunication c. his ignorant mistakes of meritum congrui and condigni active and passive obedience and many more for fear of being tedious to the Reader T. H. The tears of School Divinity of which numer are meritum congrui meritum condigni and passive obedience are so obscure as no man living can tell what they mean so that they that use them may admit or deny their meaning as it shall
Will of the Bishops was made a Law in the second Year of his Reign wherein it was Enacted That every Ordinary may convene before him and imprison any person suspected of Heresie and that an obstinate Heretick shall be burnt before the People In the next King's Reign which was Henry the Fifth in his Second year was made an Act of Parliament wherein it is declared that the intent of Hereticks called Lollards was to subvert the Christian Faith the Law of God the Church and the Realm And that an Heretick convict should forfeit all his Fee-simple Lands Goods and Chattels besides the Punishment of Burning Again in the Five and Twentieth year of King Henry the Eighth it was Enacted That an Heretick convict shall abjure his Heresies and refusing so to do or relapsing shall be burnt in open place for example of others This Act was made after the putting down of the Pope's Authority And by this it appears that King Henry the Eighth intended no farther alteration in Religion than the recovering of his own Right Ecclesiastical But in the first year of his Son King Edward the sixth was made an Act by which were repealed not only this Act but also all former Acts concerning Doctrines or matters of Religion So that at this time there was no Law at all for the punishment of Hereticks Again in the Parliament of the first and second year of Queen Mary this Act of 1 Ed. 6. was not repealed but made useless by reviving the Statute of 25 Hen. 8. and freely put it in execution insomuch as it was Debated Whether or no they should proceed upon that Statute against the Lady Elizabeth the Queens Sister The Lady Elizabeth not long after by the Death of Queen Mary coming to the Crown in the fifth year of her Reign by Act of Parliament repealed in the first place all the Laws Ecclesiastical of Queen Mary with all other former Laws concerning the punishments of Hereticks nor did she enact any other punishments in their place In the second place it was Enacted That the Queen by her Letters Patents should give a Commission to the Bishops with certain other persons in her Majesties Name to execute the Power Ecclesiastical in which Commission the Commissioners were forbidden to adjudge any thing to be Heresie which was not declared to be Heresie by some of the first four General Councels But there was no mention made of General Councels but only in that branch of the Act which Authorised that Commission commonly called The High Commission nor was there in that Commission any thing concerning how Hereticks were to be punished but it was granted to them that they might declare or not declare as they pleased to be Heresie or not Heresie any of those Doctrines which had been Condemned for Heresie in the first four General Councels So that during the time that the said High Commission was in being there was no Statute by which a Heretick could be punished otherways than by the ordinary Censures of the Church nor Doctrine accounted Heresie unless the Commissioners had actually declared and published That all that which was made Heresie by those Four Councels should be Heresie also now But I never heard that any such Declaration was made either by Proclamation or by Recording it in Churches or by publick Printing as in penal Laws is necessary the breaches of it are excused by ignorance Besides if Heresie had been made Capital or otherwise civilly punishable either the Four General Councels themselves or at least the Points condemned in them ought to have been Printed or put into Parish Churches in English because without it no man could know how to beware of offending against them Some men may perhaps ask whether no body were Condemned and Burnt for Heresie during the time of the High Commission I have heard there were But they which approve such executions may peradventure know better grounds for them than I do but those grounds are very well worthy to be enquired after Lastly in the seventeenth year of the Reign of King Charles the First shortly after that the Scots had Rebelliously put down the Episcopal Government in Scotland the Presbyterians of England endeavoured the same here The King though he saw the Rebels ready to take the Field would not condescend to that but yet in hope to appease them was content to pass an Act of Parliament for the abolishing the High Commission But though the High Commission were taken away yet the Parliament having other ends besides the setting up of the Presbyterate pursued the Rebellion and put down both Episcopacy and Monarchy erecting a power by them called The Common-wealth by others the Rump which men obeyed not out of Duty but for fear nor was there any humane Laws left in force to restrain any man from Preaching or Writing any Doctrine concerning Religion that he pleased and in this heat of the War it was impossible to disturb the Peace of the State which then was none And in this time it was that a Book called Leviathan was written in defence of the King's Power Temporal and Spiritual without any word against Episcopacy or against any Bishop or against the publick Doctrine of the Church It pleas'd God about Twelve years after the Usurpation of this Rump to restore His most Gracious Majesty that now is to his Fathers Throne and presently His Majesty restored the Bishops and pardoned the Presbyterians but then both the one and the other accused in Parliament this Book of Heresie when neither the Bishops before the War had declared what was Heresie when if they had it had been made void by the putting down of the High Commission at the importunity of the Presbyterians So fierce are men for the most part in dispute where either their Learning or Power is debated that they never think of the Laws but as soon as they are offended they cry out Crucifige forgetting what St. Paul saith even in case of obstinate holding of an Error 2 Tim. 2. 24 25. The Servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men apt to teach patient in meekness instructing those that oppose if God peradventure may give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth Of which counsel such fierceness as hath appeared in the Disputation of Divines down from before the Council of Nice to this present time is a Violation FINIS