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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A51391 The Bishop of VVorcester's letter to a friend for vindication of himself from Mr. Baxter's calumny Morley, George, 1597-1684. 1662 (1662) Wing M2790; ESTC R697 25,939 52

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enough as joyned to Gods Laws to oblige us to consent and obey him as our Governour Thes. 153. XII When God doth not notably declare any person or persons qualified above others there the people must judge as well as they are able according to Gods general rules Thes. 157. XIII And yet All the people have not this right of choosing their Governours but commonly a part of every Nation must be compelled to consent c. XIV Those that are known enemies of the Common Good in the chiefest parts of it are unmeet to Govern or choose Governours but such are multitudes of ungodly vicious men Pag. 174. So that if those that are strongest though fewest call themselves the Godly Party all others besides themselves are to be excluded from Governing or choosing of Governours And amongst the ungodly that are to be thus excluded he reckons all those that will not hearken to their Pastors he means the Presbyterian Classis or that are despisers of the Lords-Day that is all such as are not Sabbatarians or will not keep the Lords-Day after the Jewish manner which they prescribe and which is condemned for Judaism by all even of the Presbyterian perswasion in the world but those of England and Scotland only XV. If a People that by Oath and Duty are obliged to a Soveraign shall sinfully dispossess him and contrary to their Covenants choose and Covenant with another they may be obliged by their latter Covenant notwithstanding their former and particular subjects that consented not in the breaking of their former Covenants may yet be obliged by occasion of their latter choice to the person whom they choose Thes. 181. XVI If a Nation injuriously deprive themselves of a worthy Prince the hurt will be their own and they punish themselves but if it be necessarily to their welfare it is no injury to him But a King that by war will seek reparations from the body of the People doth put himself into an hostile State and tells them actually that he looks to his own good more then theirs and bids them take him for their Enemy and so defend themselves if they can Pag. 424. XVII Though a Nation wrong their King and so quoad Meritum causae they are on the worser side yet may he not lawfully war against the publick good on that account nor any help him in such a war because propter finem he hath the worser cause Thes. 352. And yet as he tels us pag. 476. we were to believe the Parliaments Declarations and professions which they made that the war which they raised was not against the King either in respect of his Authority or of his Person but only against Delinquent Subjects and yet they actually fought against the King in person and we are to believe saith Mr. Baxter pag. 422. that men would kill them whom they fight against Mr. Baxter's Doctrine concerning the Government of England in particular HE denies the government of England to be Monarchical in these words I. The real Soveraignty here amongst us was in King Lords and Commons Pag. 72. II. As to them that argue from the Oath of Supremacy and the title given the King I refer them saith Mr. Baxter to Mr. Lawson's answer to Hobb's Politicks where he sheweth that the Title is often given to the single Person for the honour of the Commonwealth and his encouragement because he hath an eminent interest but will not prove the whole Soveraignty to be in him and the Oath excludeth all others from without not those whose interest is implied as conjunct with his The eminent dignity and interest of the King above others allowed the name of a Monarchy or Kingdome to the Commonwealth though indeed the Soveraignty was mix'd in the hands of the Lords and Commons Pag. 88. III. He calls it a false supposition 1. That the Soveraign power was only in the King and so that it was an absolute Monarchy 2. That the Parliament had but only the proposing of Lawes and that they were Enacted only by the Kings Authority upon their request 3. That the power of Armes and of War and Peace was in the King alone And therefore saith he those that argue from these false suppositions conclude that the Parliament being Subjects may not take up Arms without him and that it is Rebellion to resist him and most of this they gather from the Oath of Supremacy and from the Parliaments calling of themselves his Subjects but their grounds saith he are sandy and their superstructure false Pag. 459 460. And therefore Mr. Baxter tells us that though the Parliament are Subjects in one capacity yet have they their part in the Soveraignty also in their higher capacity Ibid. And upon this false and trayterous supposition he endeavours to justifie the late Rebellion and his own more then ordinary activeness in it For IV. Where the Soveraignty saith he is distributed into several hands as the Kings and Parliaments and the King invades the others part they may lawfully defend their own by war and the Subject lawfully assist them yea though the power of the Militia be expresly given to the King unless it be also exprest that it shall not be in the other Thes. 363. The conclusion saith he needs no proof because Soveraignty as such hath the power of Arms and of the Laws themselves The Law that saith the King shall have the Militia supposeth it to be against Enemies and not against the Common-wealth nor them that have part of the Soveraignty with him To resist him here is not to resist power but usurpation and private will in such a case the Parliament is no more to be resisted then he Ibid. V. If the King raise Warre against such a Parliament upon their Declaration of the dangers of the Common-wealth the people are to take it as raised against the Common-wealth Thes. 358. And in that case saith he the King may not only be resisted but ceaseth to be a King and entreth into a state of Warre with the people Thes. 368. VI. Again if a Prince that hath not the whole Soveraignty be conquered by a Senate that hath the other part and that in a just defensive Warre that Senate cannot assume the whole Soveraignty but supposeth that government in specie to remain and therefore another King must be chosen if the former be incapable Thes. 374. as he tells us he is by ceasing to be King in the immediately precedent Thes. VII And yet in the Preface to this Book he tells us that the King withdrawing so he calls the murdering of one King and the casting off of another the Lords and Commons ruled alone was not this to change the species of the Government Which in the immediate words before he had affirmed to be in King Lords and Commons which constitution saith he we were sworn and sworn and sworn again to be faithful to and to defend And yet speaking of that Parliament which contrary to their
Oaths changed this Government by ruling alone and taking upon them the Supremacy he tells us that they were the best Governours in all the world and such as it is forbidden to Subjects to depose upon pain of damnation What then was he that deposed them one would think Mr. Baxter should have called him a Traytor but he calls him in the same Preface the Lord Protector adding That he did prudently piously faithfully and to his immortal honour exercise the Government which he left to his Son to whom as Mr. Baxter saith pag. 481. he is bound to submit as set over us by God and to obey for conscience sake and to behave himself as a Loyal Subject towards him because as he saith in the same place a full and free Parliament had owned him thereby implying That a maimed and manacled House of Commons without King and Lords and notwithstanding the violent expulsion of the secluded Members were a full and free Parliament and consequently that if such a Parliament should have taken Arms against the King he must have sided with them Yea though they had been never so much in fault and though they had been the beginners of the Warre for he tells us in plain and express terms VIII That if he had known the Parliament had been the beginners of the Warre and in most fault yet the ruine of the Trustees and Representatives and so of all the security of the Nation being a punishment greater then any faults of theirs against the King could deserve from him their faults could not disoblige him meaning himself from defending the Common-wealth Pag. 480. And that he might do this lawfully and with a good Conscience he seems to be so confident that in his Preface he makes as it were a challenge saying that if any man can prove that the King was the highest power in the time of those Divisions and that he had power to make that war which he made he will offer his head to Justice as a Rebel As if in those times of Division the King had lost or forfeited his Soveraignty and the Parliament had not only a part but the whole Soveraignty in themselves IX Finally Mr. Baxter tells us Pag. 486. That having often searched into his heart whether he did lawfully engage into the War or not and whether he did lawfully encourage so many thousands to it he tells us I say that the issue of all his search was but this That he cannot yet see that he was mistaken in the main cause nor dares he repent of it nor forbear doing the same if it were to do again in the same state of things He tells us indeed in the same place that if he could be convinced he had sinned in this matter he would as gladly make a publick recantation as he would eat or drink which seeing he hath not yet done it is evident he is still of the same minde and consequently would upon the same occasion do the same things viz. fight and encourage as many thousands as he could to fight against the King for any thing that calls it self or which he is pleased to call a full and Free Parliament as likewise that he would own and submit to any Vsurper of the Soveraignty as set up by God although he came to it by the murder of his Master and by trampling upon the Parliament Lastly That he would hinder as much as possibly he could the restoring of the rightful Heir unto the Crown And now whether a man of this Judgement and of these affections ought to be permitted to Preach or no Let any but himself judge FINIS He might have referr'd them to himself pag. 460. where he gives the same answer to the same objection Vid. Preface to the Holy Common wealth p●g 6.