the Service-Books and Books of Common-Prayer bestrewing the whole Pavement with the Leaves thereof They also exercised their madness on the Arras Hangings which adorned the Quire representing the whole story of our Saviour And meeting with some of his Figures amongst the rest some of them swore that they would stab him and others that they would rip up his bowels which they did accordingly so far forth at the least as those figures in the Arras Hanging could be capable of it And finding another Statua of Christ placed in the Frontispiece of the South-Gate there they discharged Forty Muskets at it exceedingly triumphing when they hit him in the Head or Face And it is thought they would have fallen upon the Fabrick if at the humble suit of the Mayor and Citizens they had not been restrained by their principal Officers Less spoil was made at Rochester though too much in that their Follies being chiefly exercised in tearing the Book of Common-Prayer and breaking down the Rails before the Altar Seaton a Scot and one of some command in the Army afterwards took some displeasure at the Organs but his hands were tyed whether it were that Sandys repented of the Outrages which were done at Canterbury or else afraid of giving more scandal and offence to the Kentish Gentry I am not able to determine But sure it is that he enjoyed but little eomfort in these first beginnings receiving his death's wound about three Weeks after in the fight near Powick of which within few Weeks more he dyed at Worcester 26. But I am weary of reciting such Spoils and Ravages as were not acted by the Goths in the sack of Rome And on that score I shall not take upon me to relate the Fortunes of the present Warr which changed and varied in the West as in other places till the Battel of Stratton in which Sir Ralph Hopton with an handful of his gallant Cornish raised by the reputation of Sir Bevil Greenvile and Sir Nicholas Slaining gave such a general defeat to the Western Rebels as opened him the way towards Oxon with small opposition Twice troubled in his March by Waller grown famous by his taking of Malmsbury and relieving Glocester but so defeated in a fight at Roundway-Down Run-away Down the Soldiers called it that he was forced to flye to London for a new Recruit Let it suffice that the King lost Reading in the Spring received the Queen triumphantly into Oxon within a few Weeks after by whom he was supplied with such a considerable stock of Arms aud other Necessaries as put him into a condition to pursue the Warr. This Summer makes him Master of the North and West the North being wholly cleared of the Enemy's Forces but such as seemed to be imprisoned in the Town of Hull And having lost the Cities of Bristol and Exon no Towns of consequence in the West remained firm unto them but Pool Lime and Plymouth so that the leading-members were upon the point of forsaking the Kingdom and had so done as it was generally reported and averred for certain if the King had not been diverted from his march to London upon a confidence of bringing the strong City of Glocester to the like submission This gave them time to breathe a little and to advise upon some course for their preservation and no course was found fitter for them than to invite the Scots to their aid and succour whose amity they had lately purchased at so deer a rate Hereupon Armin and some others are dispatched for Scotland where they applied themselves so dextrously to that proud and rebellious people that they consented at the last to all things which had been desired But they consented on such terms as gave them an assurance of One hundred thousand pound in ready money the Army to be kept both with Pay and Plunder the chief Promoters of the Service to be rewarded with the Lands and Houses of the English Bishops and their Commissioners to have as great an influence in all Counsels both of Peace and Warr as the Lords and Commons 27. But that which proved the strongest temptation to engage them in it was an assurance of reducing the Church of England to an exact conformity in Government and Forms of Worship to the Kirk of Scotland and gratifying their Revenge and Malice by prosecuting the Arch-bishop of Canterbury to the end of his Tragedy For compassing which Ends a Solemn League and Covenant is agreed between them first taken and subscribed to by the Scots themselves and afterwards by all the Members in both Houses of Parliament as also by the principal Officers of the Army all the Divines of the Assembly almost all those which lived within the Lines of Communication and in the end by all the Subjects which either were within their power or made subject to it Now by this Covenant the Party was to bind himself amongst other things first That he would endeavour in his place and calling to preserve the Reformed Religion in Scotland in Doctrine Discipline and Government That he would endeavour in like manner the Reformation of Religion in the Kingdoms of England and Ireland according to the Word of God and the example of the best Reformed Churches but more particularly to bring the Churches of God in all the three Kingdoms to the nearest conjunction and uniformity in Religion Confession of Faith Form of Church-Government and Directory for Worship and Catechising Secondly That without respect of persons they would endeavour to extirpate Popery and Prelacy that is to say Church-Government by Arch-bishops Bishops their Chancellors Commissairs Deans Deans and Chapters Arch-deacons and all other Ecclesiastical Officers depending on it And thirdly That he would endeavour the discovery of such as have been or shall be Incendiaries Malignants and evil Instruments either in hindering the Reformation of Religion or in dividing between the King and his people c. whom they should bring to condign punishment before the Supream Iudicatories of either Kingdom as their offences should deserve Of which three Articles the two first tended to the setting up of their dear Presbyteries the last unto the prosecution of the late Arch-bishop whom they considered as their greatest and most mortal Enemy 28. The terror of this Covenant and the severe penalty imposed on those which did refuse it compelled great numbers of the Clergy to forsake their Benefices and to betake themselves to such Towns and Garrisons as were kept under the command of his Majesty's Forces whose vacant places were in part supplied by such Presbyterians who formerly had lived as Lecturers or Trencer-Chaplains or else bestowed upon such Zealots as flocked from Scotland and New-England like Vultures and other Birds of Rapine to seek after the prey But finding the deserted Benefices not proportionable to so great a multitude they compelled many of the Clergy to forsake their Houses that so they might avoid imprisonment or some worse Calamity Others they sent to several Gaols or
the conduct of the Cause and had befooled themselves and others with the flattering hopes of gaining the Free exercise of their Religion It cannot be denyed but that they were resolved so to act their parts that Religion might not seem to have any hand in it or at the least might not suffer by it if the plot miscarried To which end they procured the chief Lawyers of France and Germany and many of the reformed Divines of the greatest eminence to publish some Writings to this purpose that is to say that without violating the Majesty of the King and the dignity of the lawful Magistrate they might oppose with Arms the violent Domination of the House of Guise who were given out for Enemies to the true Religion hinderers of the course of Justice and in effect no better then the Kings Jaylors as the case then stood But this Mask was quickly taken off and the design appeared bare faced without any vizard For presently upon the routing of the Forces in the Woods of Amboise they caused great tumults to be raised in Poictou Languedock and Provence To which the Preachers of Geneva were forthwith called and they came as willingly their Followers being much increased both in courage and numbers as well by their vehemency in the Pulpit as their private practices In Daulpheny and some parts of Provence they proceeded further seized upon divers of the Churches for the Exercise of their Religion as if all matters had succeeded answerable to their expectation But on the first coming of some Forces from the Duke of Guise they shrunk in again and left the Country in the same condition wherein first they found it Of this particular Calvin gives notice unto Bullenger by his Letters of the 27 of May Anno 1560 complaining much of the extreme rashness and fool-hardiness of some of that party whom no sober counsels could restrain from those ingagements which might have proved so dangerous and destructive to the cause of Religion Which words of his relate not onely to the Action of Daulphine and Provence but to some of the attempts preceding whatsoever they were by him discouraged and disswaded if we may believe him 8. But though we may believe him as I think we may the Pope and Court of France were otherwise perswaded of it Reinadoes going from Geneva to unite the party was as unlikely to be done without his allowance as without his privity But certainly the Ministers of Geneva durst not leave their Flocks to Preach Sedition to the French of Provence and Languedock if he had neither connived at it or advised them to it and such connivings differ but little from commands as we find in Salvian Once it is sure that the Pope suggested to the French King by the Bishop of Viterbo whom he sent in the nature of a Legate that all the mischief which troubled France and the Poyson which infected that Kingdom and the Neighbouring Countries for so I finde in my Authoâ— came from no other Fountain then the Lake of Geneva that by digging at the very Root he might divert a great part of that nourishment by which those mischiefs were fomented and that by prosecuting such a Forraign War he might evacuate those bad humours which distempered his Kingdom and therefore if the King be pleased to engage herein his Holiness would not onely send him some convenient Aids but move the Scotch King and the Duke of Savoy to assist him also But neither the Queen-Mother nor the Guise for the King acted little in his own affairs could approve the motion partly for fear of giving offence unto the Switzers with whom Geneva had confederated thirty years before and partly because none being like to engage in that War but the Catholicks onely the Kingdom would thereby lye open to the adverse party But nothing more diverted the three Princes from concurring in it then the impossibility of complying with their several interesses in the disposing of the Town when it should be taken The Duke of Savoy would not enter into the War before he was assured by the other Princes that he should reap the profit of it that belonging anciently to his jurisdiction But it agreed neither with the interest of France nor Spain to make the Duke greater then he was by so fair an addition as would be made to his Estate were it yeilded to him The Spaniard knew that the French King would never bring him into France or put into his hands such a fortified pass by which he might enter when he pleased As on the other side the Spaniards would not suffer it to fall into the power of the French by reason of its neer Neighbour-hood unto the County of Burgundy which both then was and ever since hath been appendant on the Crown of Spain By reason of which mutual distrusts and jealousies the Pope received no other answer to his motion in the Court of France but that it was impossible to apply themselves to matters abroad when they were exercised at home with so many concernments 9. This answer pinched upon the Pope who found as much confusion in the State of Avignion belonging for some hundreds of years to the See of Rome as the French could reasonably complain in the Bowels of France For lying as it did within the limits of Provence and being visited with such of the French Preachers as had been studied at Geneva the people generally became inclined unto Calvins Doctrines and made profession of the same both in private and publick nay they resolved upon the lawfulness of taking up of Arms against the Pope though their natural Lord partly upon pretence that the Country was unjustly taken from the Earls of Tholouse by the Predecessors of the Pope partly because the present Pope could prove no true Lineal Succession from the first Usurper but chiefly in regard that persons Ecclesiastical were disabled by Christs Commandments from exercising any Temporal Jurisdiction over other men Being thus resolved to rebel they put themselves by the perswasion of Alexander Guilatine a professed Civilian into the protection of Charles Count de Mont-brun who had then taken Arms against the King in the Country of Daulphine Mont-brun accepts of the imployment enters the Territory of Avignion with three thousand Foot reduceth the whole Country under his command the Popes Vice-Legate in the City being hardly able for the present to make good the Castle But so it happened that the Cardinal of Tournon whose Niece the Count had married being neer the place prevailed with him after some discourse to withdraw his Forces and to retire unto Geneva assuring him not onely of his Majesties pardon and the restitution of his Goods which had been confiscated but that he should have liberty of Conscience also which he prized far more then both the other By which Action the people were necessitated to return to their old obedience but with so many fears and jealousies on either side that many
privity and advice Which whether it were done with greater Moderation or Discretion it is hard to say 27. So good a Foundation being laid the building could not chuse but go on apace But first they must prepare the matter and remove all doubts which otherwise might interrupt them in the course of their building And herein Beza is consulted as the Master-Workman To him they send their several scruples and he returns such answer to them as did not onely confirm them in their present obstinacy but fitted and prepared them for the following Schism To those before they add the calling of the Ministers and their ordaining by the Bishops neither the Presbyterie being consulted nor any particular place appointed for their Ministration Which he condemns as contrary to the Word of God and the ancient Canons but so that he conceives it better to have such a Ministery then none at all praying withal that God would give this Church a more lawful Ministery the Church was much beholding to him for his zeal the while in his own good time Concerning the Interrogatories proposed to Infants in their Baptism he declares it to be onely a corruption of the ancient Form which was used in the baptizing persons of riper years And thereupon desires as heartily as before That as the Church had laid aside the use of Oyl and the old Rite of Exorcising though retained at Rome so they would also abdicate those foolish and unnecessary Interrogations which are made to Infanâ—â— And yet he could not chuse but vaunt that there was somewhat in one of S. Augustines Epistles which might seem to favour it and that such questionâ— were proposed to Infants in the time of Origen who lived above Two hundred years before S. Augustine In some Churches and particularly in Westminster-Abbey they still retained the use of Wafers made of bread unleavened to which we can find nothing contrary in the Publik Rubricks This he acknowledgeth of it self for a thing indifferent but so that ordinary leavened bread is preferred before it as being more agreeable to the Institution of our Lord and Saviour And yet he could not chuse but grant that Christ administred the Sacrament in unleavened bread no other being to be used by the Law of Moses at the time of the Passover He dislikes also the deciding of Civil causes by which he means those of Tythes Marriages and the Last-Wills or Testaments of men deceased in the Bishops Courts but more that the Bishops Chancellors did take upon them to decree any Excommunication without the approbation and consent of the Presbyters Whose acts therein he Majestically pronounceth to be void and null not to oblige the Conscience of any man in the sight of God and otherwise to be a foul and shameful prophanation of the Churches Censures 28. To other of their Queries Touching the Musick in the Church Kneeling at the Communion The Cross in Baptism and the rest He answers as he did before without remitting any thing of his former censure Which Letter of his bearing date on the 24 of October 1567. was superscribed Ad quosdam Anglicanum Ecclesiarum fratres c. To certain of the brethren of the Churches in England touching some points of Ecclesiastical Order and concernment which were then under debate by the receiving whereof they found themselves so fully satisfied and encouraged that they fell into an open Schism in the year next following At which time Benson Button Hallingham Coleman and others taking upon them to be of a more Ardent zeal then others in professing the true Reformed Religion resolved to allow of nothing in Gods Publick Service according to the Rules laid down by Calvin and Beza but what was found expresly in the holy Scriptures And whether out of a desire of Reformation which pretence had gilded many a rotten post or for singularity sake and Innovation they openly questioned the received Discipline of the Church of England yea condemned the same together with the Publick Liturgie and the Calling of Bishops as savouring too much of the Religion of the Church of Rome Against which they frequently protested in their Pulpits affirming That it was an impious thing to hold any correspondency with the Church and labouring with all diligence to bring the Church of England to a Conformity in all points with the Rules of Geneva These although the Queen commanded to be laid by the heels yet it is incredible how upon a sudden their followers increased in all parts of the Kingdom distinguished from the rest by the name of Puritans by reason of their own perverseness and most obstinate refusal to give ear to more sound advice Their numbers much encreased on a double account first by the negligence of some and the connivance of other Bishops who should have looked more narrowly into their proceedings And partly by the secret favour of some great men in the Court who greedily gaped after the Remainder of the Churches Patrimony 29. It cannot be denied but that this Faction received much encouragement underhand from some great persons near the Queen from no man more then from the Earl of Leicester the Lord North Knollis and Walsingham who knew how mightily some numbers of the Scots both Lords and Gentlemen had in short time improved their fortune by humoring the Knoxian Brethren in their Reformation and could not but expect the like in their own particulars by a compliance with those men who aimed apparently at the ruine of the Bishops and Cathedral Churches But then it must be granted also that they received no smaâ—l encouragement from the negligence and remissness of some great Bishops whom Calvin and Beza â—ad cajoled to a plain connivance Of Calvins writing unto Grindal for setting up a French Church in the middle of London we have seen before And we have seen how Beza did address himself unto him in behalf of the Brethren who had suffered for their inconformity to established Orders But now he takes notice of the Schism a manifest defection of some members from the rest of the body but yet he cannot chuse but tamper with him to allow their doings or otherwise to mitigate the rigour of the Laws in force For having first besprinkled him with some commendation for his zeal to the Gospel and thanked him for his many favours to the new French Church he begins roundly in plain terms to work him to his own perswasions He lays before him first how great an obstacle was made in the course of Religion by those petite differences not onely amongst weak and ignorant but even Learned men And then adviseth that some speedy remedy be applied to so great a mischief by calling an Assembly of such Learned and Religious men as were least contentious of which he hoped to be the chief if that work went forwards With this Proviso notwithstanding That nothing should be ordered and determined by them with reference unto Ancient or Modern usages but that all Popish Rites
Perjuries than amongst those Fanatical spirits he should meet withall 39. But on the contrary he tells us of the Church of England at his first coming thither That he found that Form of Religion which was established under Queen ELIZABETH of famous memory by the Laws of the Land to have been blessed with a most extraordinary Peace and of long continuance which he beheld as a strong evidence of God's being very well pleased with it He tells us also That he could find no cause at all on a full debate for any Alteration to be made in the Common-Prayer-Book though that most impugned that the Doctrines seemed to be sincere the Forms and Rites to have been justified out of the Practise of the Primitive Church And finally he tells us That there was nothing in the same which might not very well have been born withall if either the Adversaries would have made a reasonable construction of them or that his Majesty had not been so nice or rather jealous as himself confesseth for having all publick Forms in the Service of God not only to be free from all blame but from any suâ—spition For which consult his Proclamation of the fifth of March before the Book of Common-Prayer And herewith he declared himself so highly pleased that in the Conference at Hampton-Court he entred into a gratulation to Almighty God for bringing him into the Promised Land so he pleased to call it where Religion was purely profest the Government Ecclesiastical approved by manifold blessings from God himself as well in the encrease of the Gospel as in a glorious and happy Peace and where he had the happiness to sit amongst Grave and Learned men and not to be a King as elsewhere he had been without State without Honour without Order as before was said And this being said we shall proceed unto the rest of our Story casting into the following Book all the Successes of the Puritans or Presbyterians in his own Dominions during the whole time of his Peaceful Government and so much also of their Fortunes in France and Belgium as shall be necessary to the knowledg of their future Actings AERIVS REDIVIVVS OR The History OF THE PRESBYTERIANS LIB XI Containing Their Successes whether good or bad in England Scotland Ireland and the Isle of Jersey from the Year 1602 to the Year 1623 with somewhat touching their Affairs as well in France and Sweden as the Belgick Provinces 1. THE Puritans and Presbyterians in both Kingdoms were brought so low when King IAMES first obtained the Crown of England that they might have been supprest for ever without any great danger if either that King had held the Rains with a constant hand or been more fortunate in the choice of his Ministers after the old Councellors were worn out than in fine he proved But having been kept to such hard meats when he lived in Scotland he was so taken with the Delicacies of the English Court that he abandoned the Severities and Cares of Government to enjoy the Pleasures of a Crown Which being perceived by such as were most near unto him it was not long before the Secret was discovered to the rest of the people who thereupon resolved to husband all occasions which the times should give them to their best advantage But none conceived more hopes of him than some Puritan Zealots who either presuming on his Education in the Kirk of Scotland or venturing on the easiness of his Disposition began to intermit the use of the Common-Prayer to lay aside the Surplice and neglect the Ceremonies and more than so to hold some Classical and Synodical Meetings as if the Laws themselves had dyed when the Queen expired But these Disorders he repressed by his Proclamation wherein he commanded all his Subjects of what sort soever not to innovate any thing either in Doctrine or Discipline till he upon mature deliberation should take order in it 2. But some more wary than the rest refused to joyn themselves to such forward Brethren whose Actions were interpreted to savour stronger of Sedition than they did of Zeal And by these men it was thought better to address themselves by a Petition to His Sacred Majesty which was to be presented to him in the name of certain Ministers of the Church of England desiring Reformation of sundry Ceremonies and Abuses Given out to be subscribed by a thousand hands and therefore called the Millenary Petition though there wanted some hundreds of that number to make up the sum In which Petition deprecating first the imputation of Schism and Faction they rank their whole Complaints under these four heads that is to say The Service of the Church Church-Ministers the Livings and Maintenance of the Church and the Discipline of it In reference to the first the Publick Service of the Church it was desired That the Cross in Baptism Interrogatories ministred to Infants and Confirmations as superfluous might be taken away That Baptism might not be administred by Women That the Cap and Surplice might not be urged That Examination might go before the Communion and that it be not administred without a Sermon That the terms of Priest and Absolution with the Ring in Marriage and some others might be corrected That the length of Service might be abridged Church-Songs and Musick moderated And that the Lord's Day be not prophaned nor Holy-days so strictly urged That there might be an Uniformity of Doctrine prescribed That no Popish Opinion be any more taught or defended That Ministers might not be charged to teach their people to bow at the Name of Iesus And that the Canonical Scriptures be only read in the Church 3. In reference to Church-Ministers it was propounded That none hereafter be admitted into the Ministry but Able and Sufficient men and those to preach diligently especially upon the Lord's Day but such as be already entred and cannot preach may either be removed and some charitable course taken with them for their Relief or else to be forced according to the value of their Livings to maintain Preachers That Non-residency be not permitted That K. Edward's Statute for the lawfulness of Ministers marriage might be revived That Ministers might not be urged to subscribe but according to the Law the Articles of Religion and the King's Supremacy It was desired also in relation to the Church's Maintenance That Bishops might leave their Commendams some holding Prebends some Parsonages some Vicaridges with their Bishopricks That double-beneficed men might not be suffered to hold some two some three Benefices and as many Dignities That Impropriations annexed to Bishopricks and Colledges be demised only to the Preachers Incumbents for the old Rent That the Impropriations of Lay-men's Fee may be charged with a sixth or seventh part of the worth to the maintenance of a Preaching-Minister And finally in reference to the execution of the Church's Discipline it was humbly craved That the Discipline and Excommunication might be administred according to Christ's own Institution or at the
having none to joyn in Opinion with him baptized himself and thereby got the name of a Se-baptist which never any Sectary or Heretick had obtained before 15. It fell not out much otherwise in the Belgick Provinces with those of the Calvinian Judgment who then began to find some diminution of that Power and Credit wherewith they carried all before them in the times preceding Iunius a very moderate and learned man and one of the Professors for Divinity in the Schools of Leyden departed out of this life in the same year also into whose Place the Overseers or Curators as they call them of that University made choice of Iacob Van Harmine a man of equal Learning and no less Piety He had for fifteen years before been Pastor as they love to phrase it to the great Church of Amsterdam the chief City of Holland during which time he published his Discourse against the Doctrine of Predestination as laid down by Perkins who at that time had printed his Armilla Aurea and therein justified all the Rigours of the Supra-lapsarians Encouraged with his good success in this Adventure he undertakes a Conference on the same Argument with the Learned Iunius one of the Sub-lapsarian Judgment the sum whereof being spread abroad in several Papers was afterward set forth by the name of Amica Collatio By means whereof as he attained a great esteem with all moderate men so he exceedingly exasperated most of the Calvinian Ministers who thereupon opposed his coming to Leyden with their utmost power accusing him of Heterodoxies and unsound Opinions to the Council of Holland But the Curators being constant in their Resolutions and Harmin having purged himself from all Crimes objected before his Judges at the Hague he is dispatched for Leyden admitted by the University and confirmed by the Estate Towards which the Testimonial-Letters sent from Amsterdam did not help a little in which he stands commended for a man of an unblamable life sound Doctrine and fair behaviour as by their Letters may appear exemplified in an Oration which was made at his Funeral 16. By which Attractives he prevailed as much amongst the Students of Leyden as he had done amongst the Merchants at Amsterdam For during the short time of his sitting in the Chair of Leyden he drew unto him a great part of that University who by the Piety of the man his powerful Arguments his extream diligence in that place and the clear light of Reason which appeared in all his Discourses became so wedded at the last unto his Opinions that no time or trouble could divorce them from Harmin Dying in the year 1609 the Heats betwixt his Scholars and those of a contrary Perswasion were rather encreased than abated the more encreased for want of such prudent Moderators as had before preserved the Churches from a publick Rupture The breach between them growing wider and wider each side thought fit to seek the countenance of the State and they did accordingly For in the year 1610 the Followers of Arminius address their Remonstrance containing the Antiquity of their Doctrines and the substance of them to the States of Holland which was encountred presently by a Contra-Remonstrance exhibited by those of Calvin's Party from hence the Name of Remonstrants and Contra-Remonstrants so frequent in their Books and Writings Which though it brought some trouble for the present on the Churches of Holland conduced much more to the advantage of the Church of England whose Doctrine in those points had been so over-born if not quite suppressed by those of the Calvinian Party that it was almost reckoned for a Heresie to be sound and Orthodox according to the tenour of the Book of Articles and other publick Monuments of the Religion here by Law established For being awakened by the noise of the Belgick Troubles most men began to look about them to search more narrowly into the Doctrines of the Church and by degrees to propagate maintain and teach them against all Opposers as shall appear more largely and particularly in another place 17. At the same time more troubles were projected in the Realm of Sweden Prince Sigismund the eldest Son of Iohn and the Grand-child of Gustavus Ericus the first King of that Family was in his Father's life-time chosen King of Poland in reference to his Mother the Lady Catherine Sister to SIGISMVND the Second But either being better pleased with the Court of Poland or not permitted by that people to go out of the Kingdom he left the Government of Sweden to his Unkle CHARLES a Prince of no small Courage but of more Ambition At first he governed all Affairs as Lord Deputy only but practised by degrees the exercise of a greater Power than was belonging to a Vice-Roy Finding the Lutherans not so favourable unto his Designs as he conceived that he had merited by his Favours to them he raised up a Calvinian Party within the Realm according to whose Principles he began first to withdraw his obedience from his Natural Prince and after to assume the Government to himself But first he suffers all Affairs to fall into great Disorders the Realm to be invaded by the Muscovites on the one side by the Danes on the other that so the people might be cast on some necessity of putting themselves absolutely under his protection In which distractions he is earnestly solicited by all sorts of people except only those of his own Party to accept the Crown which he consents to at the last as if forced unto it by the necessities of his Countrey But he so play'd his Game withall that he would neither take the same nor protect the Subjects till a Law was made for entailing the Crown for ever unto his Posterity whether Male or Female as an Hereditary Kingdom In all which Plots and Purposes he thrived so luckily if to usurp another Prince's Realm may be called Good luck that after a long Warr and some Bloody Victories he forced his Nephew to desist from all further Enterprises and was Crowned King at Stockholm in the year 1607 But as he got this Kingdom by no better Title than of Force and Fraud so by the same the Daughter of his Son Gustavus Adolphus was divested of it partly compelled and partly cheated out of her Estate So soon expired the Race of this great Politician that many thousands of that people who saw the first beginning of it lived to see the end 18. Such Fortune also had the French Calvinians in their glorious Projects though afterwards it turned to their destruction For in the year 1603 they held a general Synod at Gappe in Daulphine anciently the chief City of the Apencenses and at this time a Bishop's-See Nothing more memorable in this Synod as to points of Doctrine than that it was determined for an Article of their Faith That the Pope was Antichrist But far more memorable was it for their Usurpations on the Civil Power For at this Meeting they gave Audience to
at first refused to yeeld to these hard Conditions yet in the next year Anno 1606 upon a second Treaty with the Estates of that Kingdom it was agreed upon by the Commissioners on both sides That the free exercise as well of the Reformed as of the Romish Religion should be permitted to all men in the Realm of Hungary as in the time of Maximilian the Father and Ferdinand the Grandfather of the present Emperor Which Articles were more fully ratified in the Pacification made at Vienna on the fourteenth of September then next following In which it was expresly cautioned and capitulated That the Calvinian Religion should from thenceforth be exercised as freely as either the Lutheran or the Romish In managing which Negation between the Parties Matthias the Arch-Duke who hitherto had secretly encouraged the Hungarian Gospellers was not only present but openly gave both countenance and consent unto it 21. The gaining of this point put them upon a hope of obtaining greater even to the abrogating of all Laws and Ordinances for the burning of Hereticks and whatsoever else were contrary to their Religion as also to the nominating of the Palatine or Principal Officers and to the making of Confederacies with their neighbour-Nation During the agitating of which matters Botscay dyes in Cassovia but leaves his Faction so well formed that they are able to go on without their Leader An Assembly of the States of Hungary is called by the Emperor at Presburgh in the middle of August Anno 1607 but nothing done for want of the presence of Arch-Duke Matthias who was appointed by the Emperor to preside therein Which hapned also to the like Assembly of Estates of the Dukedom of Austria and of the whole Empire the next year at the City of Ratisbone Matthias in the mean season had his own Designs apart For at such time as the Assembly of the Estates was held at Ratisbone he makes a journey unto Presburgh convocates thither the Estates of Hungary confirms the Pacification made before at Vienna suffers them to confederate with their Neighbours of Austria and makes himself the Head of that Confederation By vertue whereof he commands the people of both Countreys to put themselves into Arms pretending an Expedition into Moravia but aiming directly against Prague the chief Town of Bohemia where the Emperor RODOLPHVS then resided Whom he so terrified with his coming with an Army of Eighteen thousand that he consented to deliver the Crown of Hungary into the hands of Matthias to yeeld unto him the possession of all that Kingdom and to discharge his Subjects from their former Allegiance upon condition that the Estates of that Realm should chuse no other King but the said Arch-Duke Which Agreement being made the 17 th of Iune 1608 Matthias is accordingly Crowned King of Hungary and Illisachius a profest Calvinian and one of the principal Sticklers in these Agitations is made Palatine of it 22. By this Transaction the whole Dukedom of Austria and so many of the Provinces subordinate to it as were not actually possessed by the Arch-Duke Ferdinand are consigned over to Matthias Many Inhabitants whereof professing the Calvinian Forms and Doctrines which only must be called the Reformed Religion and building on the late Confederation with the Realm of Hungary presumed so far upon the patience of their Prince as to invade some publick Churches for the exercise of it But they soon found themselves deceived For Matthias having somewhat of the States-man in him and being withall exasperated by the Pope's Nuncio interdicts all such publick Meetings He had now served his turn in getting the possession of the Crown of Hungary and was not willing to connive at those Exorbitances in his Austrian Subjects over whom he challenged a more absolute Soveraignty than over any of the rest which he had cherished for self-ends in the Kingdom of Hungary The Austrians on the other side who professed the Reformed Religion refuse to take the Oath of Allegiance to him if they might not exercise their Religion in as free a manner as the Hungarians were permitted to do by the Pacification And thereupon they presently give Order to their Tenants and Vassals to put themselves into Arms appoint a general Assembly of the Protestant and Reformed States to be held at Horn and there resolve to extort that by way of Force which they could not hope to gain by Favour Some pains was took by Maximilian the Arch-Duke another of the Emperor's Brothers to accord the difference who offered them in the name of the King to tolerate the free exercise of their Religion without the Cities and that in the bestowing of the publick Offices there should be no exception taken at them in regard of their difference in Religion and withall gave them many Reasons why such a general Liberty as they desired could not be granted by the King with reference to his Honour Conscience or particular safety 23. But this reasonable Offer did not satisfie the Reformed Party for so the Calvinians must be called by whom the Hungarians and Moravians are sollicited to associate with them till they had compassed their desires And upon confidence thereof refused more obstinately to take the Oath than before they did levying new Forces for the Warr and quartering them in great numbers round about the City of Crema the chief City of the Vpper Austria But in the end upon the intervention of the Moravian Ambassadors the new King was content to yeeld to these Conditions following viz. That the Nobility in their Castles or Towns as also in their City-Houses should for themselves and their people have the free exercise of their Religion That the free exercise of Preaching might be used in the three Churches of Iserdorf Trihelcuincel and Horn. That the like freedom of Religion might be also exercised in all those Churches in which they enjoyed the same till the King 's late Edict and that the Councellors of State and other publick Officers should from thenceforth chose promiscuously out of both Religions Upon the granting of which Articles but not before they did not only take the Oath of Allegiance but gave him a Magnificent Reception in the Town of Lintz which hapned on the 17 th of May 1609. 24. No sooner were the Austrians gratified in the point of Religion but the Bohemians take their turn to require the like concerning which we are to look a little backward as far as to the year 1400. About which time we find a strong Party to be raised amongst them against some Superstitions and Corruptions in the Church of Rome occasioned as some say by reading the Works of Wickliff and by the Diligence of Piccardus a Flemming born as is affirmed by some others from whom they had the Name of Piccards cruelly persecuted by their own Kings and publickly condemned in the Council of Constance they continued constant notwithstanding to their own Perswasions Distinguished also from the rest of the Bohemians
into the hands of the Presbytery in reference unto crimes and persons and the unhandsome manner of proceeding in it for power was given unto them by the Rules of the Discipline not onely to proceed to Excommunication if the case required it against Drunkards Whore-masters Blasphemers of Gods holy Name disturbers of the peace by fighting or contentious words but also against such as pleased themselves with modest dancing which was from henceforth looked on as a grievous crime and what disturbances and disquiets did ensue upon it we shall see anon Nor were they onely Authorized to take notice of notorious crimes when they gave just scandal to the Church or such as past in that account by the voice of Fame but also to inquire into the lives and conversations of all sorts of persons even to the private ordering of their several Families In reference to which last they are required to make a diligent and strict enquiry whether men lived peaceably with their Wives and kept their Families in good order whether they use constantly some course of morning and evening Prayer in their several housholds sit down at their Tables without saying Grace or cause their Children or Servants diligently to frequent the Churches with many others of that nature And to the end they may come the better to the knowledge of all particulars it is not onely permitted by the Rules of their Discipline to tamper with mens Neighbours and corrupt their Servants but to exact an Oath of the parties themselves who are thereby required to make answer unto all such Articles as may or shall be tendred to them in behalf of the Consistory which odious and unneighbourly office is for the most part executed by those of the Laity or at the least imputed wholly unto their pragmaticalness though the Lay-elders possibly have done nothing in it but by direction from their Pastors For so it was contrived of purpose by the wise Artificer that the Ministers might be thereby freed from that common hatred which such a dangerous and saucie inquisition might else draw upon them And yet these were not all the mischiefs which their submitting to that yoak had drawn upon them by which they had enthralled themselves to such hard conditions that if a man stood Excommunicate or in contempt against the censures of the Church for the space of a twelve month he was to suffer a whole years banishment by Decree of the Senate not otherwise to be restored but upon submission and that submission to be made upon their knees in the open Church 8. These melancholick thoughts had not long possessed them when an occasion was presented to try their courage Perinus Captain of the people and of great power in that capacity amongst the multitude pretends the common liberty to be much endangered by that new subjection and openly makes head against him in defence thereof Ten years together did it struggle with the opposition and at last was almost ruined and oppressed by it For whereas the Consistory had given sentence against one Bertilier even in the highest censure of Excommunication the Common councel not onely absolved him from that censure under their Town-seal but foolishly Decreed that Excommunication and Absolution did properly belong to them Upon this he is resolved again to quit the Town and solemnly takes his leave of them at the end of one of his Sermons which he had fitted for that purpose but at the last the Controversie is reduced to these three questions viz. First after what manner by Gods Ordinance according to the Scripture Excommunication was to be exercised Secondly whether it may not be exercised some other way then by such a Consistory Thirdly what the use of other Churches was in the like case And being reduced to these three questions it was submitted to the judgement and determination of four of the Helvetian Churches to whose Decree both parties were obliged to stand But Calvin knew beforehand what he was to trust to having before prepared the Divines of Zurick to pronounce sentence on his side of whom he earnestly desired that they would seriously respect that cause on which the whole State of the Religion of the City did so much depend that God and all good men were now inevitably in danger to be trampled on if those four Churches did not declare for him and his Associates when the cause was to be brought before them that in the giving of the sentence they should pass an absolute approbation upon the Discipline of Geneva as consonant unto the Word of God without any cautions qualifications ifs or ands and finally that they would exhort the Genevian Citizenâ— from thenceforth not to innovate or change the same Upon which pre-ingagement they returned this Answer directed to the Common council of Geneva by which their judgement was required that is to say That they had heard already of those Consistorial Laws and did acknowledge them to be godly Ordinances drawing towards the Prescript or Word of God In which respect they did not think it good for the Church of Geneva to make any innovation in the same but rather to keep them as they were This caution being interposed that Lay-elders should be chosen from amongst themselves that is to say ten of them to be yearly out of the Council of two hundred and the other two for there were to be but twelve in all to be elected out of the more powerful Council of the five and twenty 9. Now for the quarrel which he had with Captain Perine it was briâ—fly this as he himself relates the story in his own Epistles Dancing had been prohibited by his sollicitation when he first setled in that Town and he resolved to have his will obeyed in that as in all things else But on the contrary this Perine together with one Corneus a man of like power amongst the people one of the Syndicks or chief Magistates in the Common-wealth one of the Elders for the year who was called Henricus together with other of their Friends being merry at an Invitation fell to dancing Notice hereof being given to Calvin by some false Brother they were all called into the Consistory excepting Corneus and Perinus and being interrogated thereupon They lyed said he most impudently both to God and us most Apostolically said At that said he I grew offended as the indignity of the thing deserved and they persisting in their contumacie I thought it fit to put them to their Oaths about it by which it seems that the Oath Ex officio may be used in Geneva though cryed down in England so said so done And they not onely did confess their former dancing but also that upon that very day they had been dancing in the house of one Balthasal's Widow On which confession he proceeded to the censure of all the parties which certainly was sharp enough for so small a fault for a fault he was resolved to make it the Syndick
being displaced the Elder turned out of his Office Perine and his Wife clapt up in Prison and all the rest exposed to some open shame So he in his Epistle to his Friend Farellus Anno 1546. Upon this ground Perinus always made himself of the opposite party and thereupon sollicited the relaxation given to Bertilier but in the end was forced together wâ—â—h the rest to submit themselves unto this yoak and the final sentence of the said four Churches was imposed upon them And so we have the true beginning of the Genevian Discipline begotten in Rebellion born in Sedition and nursed up by Faction 10. Thus was the Discipline confirmed and Calvin setled in the jurisdiction which he had aspired to But long he could not be content with so narrow a Diocess as the Town and Territory of Geneva and would have thought himself neglected if all those Churches which embraced the Zuinglian Doctrines had not withal received the Genevian Discipline for the confirming whereof at home and the promoting it in all parts abroad there was no passage in the Scripture which either spake of Elders or Excommunication but he applyed the same for justifying the Authority of his new Presbytery in which the Lay-elders were considered as distinct from those which laboured in the Word and Sacraments but joyned with them in the exercise of a Jurisdiction even that of Ordination also which concerned the Church Assuredly we are as much in love with the Children of our Brains as of our Bodies and do as earnestly desire the preferment of them Calvin had no sooner conceived and brought forth this Discipline but he caused it first to be nourished and brought up at the charge of Geneva and when he found it strong enough to go abroad of it self he afterwards commended it to the entertainment of all other Churches in which he had attained to any credit proceeding finally so far as to impose it upon the world as a matter necessary and not to be refused on pain of Gods high displeasure by means whereof what Jealousies Heart-burnings Jars and Discords have been occasioned in the Protestant Reformed Churches will be made manifest by the course of this present History Which notwithstanding might easily have been prevented if the Orders which he devised for the use of this City had not been first established in themselves then tendered unto others as things everlastingly required by the Law of that Lord of lords against whose Statutes there was no exception to be taken In which respect it could not chuse but come to pass that his Followers might condemn all other Churches which received it not of manifest disobedience to the Will of Christ And being once engaged could not finde a way how to retire again with Honour Whenas the self-same Orders having been established in a Form more wary and suspence and to remain in force no longer then God should give the oportunity of some general Conference the Genevians either never had obtruded this Discipline on the rest of the Churches to their great disquiet or left themselves a fair liberty of giving off when they perceived what trouble they had thereby raised to themselves and others 11. Now for the means by which this Discipline was made acceptable to the many Churches which had no dependance on Geneva nor on Calvin neither they were chiefly these that is to say â—irst The great contentment which it gave the Common people to see themselves intrusted with the weightiest matters in Religion and thereby an equality with if not by reason of their number being two for one superiority above their Ministers Secondly the great Reputation which Calvin had attained unto for his diligence in Writing and Preaching whereby his Dictates came to be as authentick amongst some Divines as ever the Popes Ipse dixit was in the Church of Rome Thirdly his endeavours to promote that Platform in all other Churches which was first calculated for the Meridian of Geneva onely of which we shall speak more particularly in the course of this History Fourthly the like endeavours used by Beza who not content to recommend it as convenient for the use of the Church higher then which Calvin did not go imposed it as a matter necessary upon all the Churches so necessary that it was utterly as unlawful to recede from this as from the most material Points of the Christian Faith of which more hereafter Fifthly the self-ends and ambition of particular Ministers affecting the Supremacy in their several Parishes that themselves might lord it over Gods Inheritance under pretence of setting Christ in his Throne Upon which ground they did not onely prate against the Bishops with malicious words aâ— Dieotrephes did against the Apostles but were resolved to cast them out of the Church neither receiving them amongst themselves nor suffering those that would have done it if they might Sixthly the covetousness of some great persons and Lay-Patrons of which the one intended to raise themselves great Fortunes by the spoil of the Bishopricks and the other to return those Titles to their own proper use to which they onely were to nominate some deserving person For compassing of which three last ends their followers drove on so furiously that rather then their Discipline should not be admitted and the Episcopal Government destroyed in all the Churches they are resolved to depose Kings ruine Kingdoms and subvert the Fundamental Constitutions of all Civil States 12. Thus have we seen the Discipline setled at the last after many struglings but setled onely by the forestalled judgement and determination of four neighbouring Churches which neither then did entertain it nor could be ever since induced to receive the same And we have took a general view of those Arts and Practices by which it hath been practised and imposed upon other Nations as also of those grounds and motives on which it was so eagerly pursued by some and advanced by others We must now therefore cast our eyes back on that Form of Worship which was by him devised at first for the Church of Geneva commended afterwards to all other Churches which were not of the Lutheran Model and finally received if not imposed upon most Churches which imbraced the Discipline Which Form of Worship what it was may best be gathered from the summary or brief view thereof which Beza tendreth to the use of the French and Dutch Churches then established in the City of London and is this that followeth The publick Meetings of the Church to be held constantly on the Lords day to be alike observed both in Towns and Villages but so that in the greater Towns some other day be set apart on which the Word is to be preached unto the people at convenient times Which last I take to be the grounds of those Week-day-Lectures which afterwards were set up in most of the great Towns or Cities of this Realm of England a Prayer to usher in the Sermon and another after it the frame
of which two Prayers both for Words and Matter wholly left unto the building of the Preacher but the whole action to be sanctified by the singing of Psalms At all such Prayers the people to kneel reverently upon their knees In the Administration of Baptism a Declaration to be made in a certain Form not onely of the promises of the Grace of God but also of the Mysteries of that holy Sacrament Sureties or Witnesses to be required at the Baptizing of Infants The Lords Supper to be Ministred on the Lords day at the Morning-Sermon and that in sitting at the Table for no other gesture is allowed of the men sit first and the women after or below them which though it might pass well in the Gallick Churches would hardly down without much chewing by the Wives of England The publication of intended Marriages which we call the bidding of the Bains to be made openly in the Church and the said Marriages to be solemnized with Exhortation and Prayer No Holy-days at all allowed of nothing directed in relation unto Christian Burials or the visiting of the Sick or to the Thanksgiving of Women after Child-birth all which were pretermitted as either superstitious or impertinent Actions 14. That naked Form of Worship which Calvin had devised for the Church of Geneva not beautified with any of those outward Ornaments which make Religion estimable in the sight of the people and by the which the mindes of men are raised to a contemplation of the glorious Majesty which they come together to adore All ancient Forms and Ceremonies which had been recommended to the use of the Church even from the times of the Apostles rejected totally as contracting some filth and rubbish in the times of Popery without being called to answer for themselves or defend their innocencie And as for the habit of the Ministry whether Sacred or Civil as there was no course taken by the Rules of their Discipline or by the Rubricks of the book of their publick Offices so did they by themselves and their Emissaries endeavour to discountenance and discredit all other Churches in which distinct Vestures were retained Whence came those manifold quarrels against Coaps and Surplices as also against the Caps Gowns and Tippets of the lower Clergie the Rochets and Chimeres of the Bishops wherewith for more then twenty years they exercised the patience of the Church of England But naked as it was and utterly void of all outward Ornaments this Form of Worship looked so lovely in the eyes of Calvin that he endeavoured to obtrude it on all Churches else Having first setled his new Discipline in the Town of Geneva Anno 1541 and crusht Perinus and the rest in the dancing business about five years after he thought himself to be of such confidence that no Church was to be reformed but by his advice Upon which ground of self-opinion he makes an offer of himself to Archbishop Cranmer as soon as he had heard of the Reformation which was here intended but Cranmer knew the man and refused the offer Which though it was enough to have kept him from venturing any further in the business and affairs of England yet he resoved to be of counsel in all matters whether called or not And therefore having taken Order with Martin Bucer on his first coming into England to give him some account of the English Liturgie he had no sooner satisfied himself in the sight thereof but he makes presently his exceptions and demurs upon it which afterwards became the sole ground of those many troubles those horrible disorders and confusions wherewith his Faction have involved the Church of England from that time to this 15. For presently on the account which he received of the English Liturgy he writes back to Bucer whom he requireth to be instant with the Lord Protector that all such Rites as savoured of superstition might be taken away and how far that might reach we may easily guess Next he dispatched a long Letter to the Protector himself in which he makes many exceptions against the Liturgie as namely against Commemoration of the dead which he acknowledgeth notwithstanding to be ancient also against Chrisme or Oyl in Baptism and the Apostolical Rite of Extream Vnction though the last be rather permitted then required by the Rules of that Book which said he wisheth that all these Ceremonies should be abrogated and that withal he should go forward to reform the Church without fear or wit without regard of peace at home or correspondencie abroad such considerations being onely to be had in Civil matters but not in matters of the Church wherein not any thing is to be exacted which is not warranted by the Word and in the managing whereof saith he there is not any thing more distasteful in the eyes of God then worldly Wisdom either in moderating cutting off or going backward but meerly as we are directed by his will revealed In the next place he toucheth on the Book of Homilies which very faintly he permits for a season onely but not allows of and thereby gave the hint to many others who ever since almost have declaimed against them But finding nothing to be done by the Lord Protector he tryes his Fortune with the King and with the Lords of the Council and is resolved to venture once again on Archbishop Cranmer In his Letter to the King he lets him know that in the State of the Kingdom there were many things which required a present Reformation in that to the most Reverend Cranmer that in the Service of this Church there was remaining a whole Mass of Popery which seemed not onely to deface but in a manner to destroy Gods publick Worship and finally in those to the Lords of the Council that they needed some excitements to go forwards with the Work in hand in reference to the Alteration for that I take to be his aim of the publick Liturgie 16. But not content to tamper by his Letters with those Eminent Persons he had his Agents in the Court the City the Uversities the Country and the Convocation all of them practising in their distinct and proper Circuits to bring the people to dislike that Form of Worship which at the first was looked on by them as an Heavenly Treasure composed by the especial aid of the Holy Ghost Their Actings of this kinde for bringing down the Communion-Table decrying the Reverent use of Kneeling at the Participation inveighing against the sign of the Cross abolishing all distinction of days and times into Fasts and Festivals with many others of that nature I purposely omit till I come to England Let it suffice that by the eagerness of their sollicitations more then for any thing which could be faulted in the book it self it was brought under a review and thereby altered to a further distance then it had before from the Rituals of the Church of Rome But though it had much
was no distinction of Apparel either Sacred or Civil that he refused to wear such Robes at his Consecration as by the Rules of the Church were required of him And by the Rules of the Church it was required that for his ordinary Habit he should wear the Rochet and Chimere with a square Cap upon his head and not officiate at the Altar without his Coap or perform any Ordination without his Crosier Incouraged by his refusal many of the inferiour Clergie take the like exceptions against Caps and Surplices as also against Gowns and Tippets the distinct Habits of their Order Upon this ground Archbishop Cranmer makes a stop of his Consecration and would not be perswaded to dispute with him in that particular though he much desired it He had fastned some dependance upon Dudley then Earl of Warwick and afterwards created Duke of Northumberland who did not onely write his own Letters but obtained the Kings that without pressing him any further to conform himself to those Robes and Habits the Bishop should proceed immediately to his Consecration But Cranmer weighing the importance of that ill Example held off his hand till he had satisfied the King and so cooled the Earl that Hooper was left unto himself and still continuing in his contumacy was committed Prisoner The news being brought to Calvin he must needs play the Bishop in another mans Diocess or rather the Archbishop in another mans Province But having little hope of prevailing with Cranmer who had before rejected his assistance in the Reformation he totally applies himself to the Duke of Sommerset And he writes to him to this purpose That the Papists would grow every day more insolent then other unless the differences about the Ceremonies were first composed But then they were to be composed in such a manner as rather might encourage the dissenters in their opposition then end in the reduction of them to a due conformity And to this end he is unseasonably instant with him to lend a helping hand to Hooper as the head of that Faction By which encouragement if not also by his setting on the like was done by Peter Martyr and by Iohn Alasco the first of which was made Divinity-Reader in Oxon and the other Preacher to the Dutch in London both ingaged in stickling for the unconformable party against the Vestments of the Church But they both gained as little by it as Calvin did who seeing how little he effected in the Church of England more then the getting of the name of a Polypragmon a medler in such matters as concerned him not gave over the affairs thereof to the charge of Beza who being younger then himself and of less discretion might live to see some good success of his Travails in it And he accordingly bestirred himself in this very quarrel as if the safety of the Church and the preservation of Religion had been brought in danger writing his Letters unto Grindal when Bishop of London not to insist so far on those matters of Ceremony as to deprive any of his Ministery upon that account He also signifies unto the Brethren his dislike of those Vestments and thereby strengthned and confirmed them in their former obstinacy And finally left no stone unmoved no kinde of practice unattempted by which this Church might be at last necessitated to a Reformation upon Calvins Principles whose counsels he pursued to the very last 21. But as for Calvin he had some other game to fly at and of greater nature then to dispute the lawfulness of Caps and Surplices and other Vestments of the Clergie or to content himself with altering the old Forms of Government and publick Worship The Doctrine was to be refined and all Idolatry removed whether it were Civil or Spiritual In point of Doctrine he came neerest unto that of Zuinglius as well in reference to the Sacrament as Predestination but pitched upon the last for the main concernment which was to difference his own Followers from all other Christians The straining of which string to so great a height hath made more discord in the harmony of the Church of Christ then any other whatsoever For not content to go the way of the Ancient Fathers or to rely upon the judgement of St. Augustine Fulgentius Prosper or any others which have moderated his excesses in it he must needs add so much unto those extravagancies which he found in Zuinglius as brought him under a suspition with some sober men for making God to be the Author of sin For by his Doctrine God is made to lay on our Father Adam an absolute and an unavoidable necessity of falling into sin and misery that so he might have opportunity to manifest his Mercy in Electing some few of his Posterity and his Justice in the remediless rejecting of all the rest In which as he could finde no countenance from the Ancient Fathers so he pretendeth not to any ground for it in the Holy Scripture For whereas some objected in Gods behalf De certis verbis non extare that the Decree of Adams Fall and consequently the involving of his whole Posterity in sin and misery was no where extant in the Word he makes no other answer to it then a quasi vero As if saith he God had made and created Man the most exact Piece of his Heavenly Workmanship without determining of his End either Heaven or Hell And on this point he was so resolutely bent that nothing but an absolute Decree for Adams Fall seconded by the like for the involving of all his Race in the same perdition would either serve his turn or preserve his credit If any man shall dare to opine the contrary as Castillo did he must be sure to be disgraced and censured by him as Castillo was and as all others since have been which presumed to question that determination for which himself can give us no better name than that of an Horrible Decree as indeed it is a cruel and Horrible Decree to pre-ordain so many millions to destruction and consequently unto sin that he might destroy them 22. I had not stood so long upon this particular but in regard of those confusions and distractions which by his Followers have been occasioned in the Church by their adhering to this Doctrine and labouring to obtrude it upon all mens consciences The Zuinglian Gospellers as Bishop Hooper rightly calls them began to scatter their predestinary Doctrines in the Reign of King Edward But they effected little in it till such of our Divines as had retired themselves to Basil Zurick and amongst the Switzers or otherwise had been brought up at the Feet of Calvin encouraged by his Authority and countenanced by his name commended them to all the people of this Realm for sound Catholick verities The like diligence was also used by his Disciples in all places else By means whereof it came to be generally received as a truth undoubted and one of the most necessary Doctrines of mans Salvation
Gospel did with Christ our Saviour adorned them in their Royal Robes with their Crowns and Scepters and then exposed them to the scorn of the common Souldiers the insolencies and reproaches of the raskal Rabble 28. Nor do they deal much better with them in reference to their power in Spiritual Matters which they make either none at all or such as is subservient onely to the use of the Church Calvin first leads the way in this as he did in the other and seems exceedingly displeased with King Henry the Eighth for taking to him the title of Supreme Head on Earth of the Church of England Of this he makes complaint in his Commentary on the 7 of Amos not onely telling us what inconsiderate men they were who had conferred upon him any such Supremacie but that himself was very much disquieted and offended at it And though he be content to yeild him so much Authority as may enable him to make use of the Civil Sword to the protecting of the Church and the true Religion yet he condemns all those of the like inconsiderateness who make them more spiritual that is to say of greater power in Sacred Matters then indeed they are The Supreme power according to the Rules of Calvins Platform belongs unto the Consistory Classes or Synodical Meetings to which he hath ascribed the designation of all such as bear publick Office in the Church the appointing and proclaiming of all solemn Fasts the calling of all Councils or Synodical Meetings the censuring of all misdemeanors in the Ministers of holy Church in which last they have made the Supreme Magistrate an incompetent Judge and therefore his Authority and final Judgement in such cases of no force at all Beza treads close upon the heels of his Master Calvin and will allow no other power to the Civil Magistrate then to protect the Church and the Ministry of it in propagating and promoting the True Worship of God It is saith he the Office of the Civil Magistrate to use the Sword in maintenance and defence of Gods holy Church as it is the duty of the Ministers and Preachers of it to implore their aid as well against all such as refuse obedience to the Decrees and Constitutions of the Church as against Hereticks and Tyrants which endeavoured to subvert the same In which particulars if the Magistrate neglects to do his duty and shall not diligently labour in suppressing Heresie and executing the Decrees of the Church against all opponents what can the people do but follow the Example of the Mother-City in taking that power upon themselves though to the total alteration and subversion of the publick Government For from the Principles and practice of these great Reformers it hath ever since been taken up as a Ruled case amongst all their Followers that if Kings and Princes should refuse to reform Religion that then the inferiour Magistrates or the Common people by the direction of their Ministers both may and ought to proceed to a Reformation and that by force of Arms also if need so require 29. That by this Rule the Scots did generally walk in their Reformation under the Regencie of Mary of Lorreign Queen-Dowager to Iames the Fifth and after her decease in the Reign of her Daughter we shall show hereafter And we shall show hereafter also that it was published for good Genevian Doctrine by our English Puritans That if Princes hinder them that travail in the search of this holy Discipline they are Tyrants to the Church and the Ministers of it and being so may be deposed by their subjects Which though it be somewhat more then Calvin taught as to that particular yet the conclusion follows well enough on such faulty Premises which makes it seem the greater wonder in our English Puritans that following him so closely in pursuit of the Discipline their disaffection unto Kings and all Soveraign Princes their manifest contempt of all publick Liturgies and pertinaciously adhering to his Doctrine of Predestination they should so visibly dissent him in the point of the Sabbath For whereas some began to teach about these times that the keeping holy of one day in seven was to be reckoned for the Moral part of the fourth Commandment he could not let it pass without some reproof for what saith he can be intended by those men but in defiance of the Jews to change the day and then to add a greater Sanctity unto it then the Jews ever did First therefore he declares for his own Opinion that he made no such reckoning of a seventh-day-Sabbath as to inthral the Church to a necessity of conforming to it And secondly that he esteemed no otherwise of the Lords-day-Sabbath then of an Ecclesiastical Constitution appointed by our Ancestors in the place of the Jewish Sabbath and therefore alterable from one day to another at the Churches pleasure Followed therein by all the Churches of his party who thereupon permit all lawful Recreations and many works of necessary labour on the day it self provided that the people be not thereby hindred from giving their attendance in the Church at the times appointed Insomuch that in Geneva if self all manlike exercises as running vaulting leaping shooting and many others of that nature are as indifferently indulged on the Lords day as on any other How far the English Puritans departed from their Mother-Church both in Doctrine and Practice with reference to this particular we shall see hereafter when they could finde no other way to advance Presbytery and to decry the Reputation of the ancient Festivals then by erecting their new Sabbath in the hearts of the people 30. It is reportred by Iohn Barkley in his Book called Parenesâ—s ad Scotos that Calvin once held a Consultation at Geneva for transferring the Lords day from Sunday to Thursday Which though perhaps it may be true considering the inclination of the man to new devices yet I conceive that he had greater projects in his Head and could finde other ways to advance his Discipline then by falling upon any such ridiculous and odious Counsel He had many Irons in the fire but took more care in hammering his Discipline then all the rest First by entitling it to some express Warrant from the holy Scripture and afterwards by commending it to all the Churches of the Reformation In reference to the first he lets us know in his Epistle to Farellus Septemb. 16. 1543. that the Church could not otherwise subsist then under such a Form of Government as is prescribed in the Word and observed in old times by the Church And in relation to the other he was resolved to make his best use of that Authority which by his Commentaries on the Scriptures his Book of Institutions and some occasional Discourses against the Papists he had acquired in all the Protestant and reformed Churches Insomuch that Gasper Ligerus a Divine of Witteberge by his Letters bearing date Feb. 27. 1554
acknowledgeth the great benefit which he had received by his Writings acquaints him with the peaceable estate of the Church of Saxonie but signifies withal that Excommunication was not used amongst them whereunto Calvin makes this Answer That he was glad to hear that the Church of Saxony continued in that condition but sorry that it was not so strengthned by the Nerves of Discipline as might preserve the same inviolated to the times to come He adds that there could be no better way of correcting vice then by the joynt consent of all the Pastors of one City and that he never thought it meet that the power of Excommunicating should reside in the Pastors onely that is to say not in conjunction with their Elders which last he builds on these three Reasons First in regard it is an odious and ungrateful Office next because such a sole and absolute power might easily degenerate into tyranny and finally because the Apostles had taught otherwise in it By which we see that as he builds his Discipline on the Word of God or at the least on Apostolical tradition which comes close unto it so he adventureth to commend it to the Lutheran Churches in which his Reputation was not half so great as amongst those which had embraced the Zuinglian Doctrines 31. But in the Zuinglian Churches he was grown more absolute his Writings being so highly valued and his person so esteemed of in regard of his Writings that most of the Divines thereof depended wholly upon his judgement and were willing to submit to any thing of his Prescription The Church of Strasbourgh where he had remained in the time of his exile received his Discipline with the first as soon as it was finally established in Geneva it self For it appeareth by the Letter which Gasper Oberianus sent to Calvin bearing date April 12. 1560. that the Eldership was then well setled in that Church and the Elders of it in a full possession of their power the exercise whereof they are desired to suspend in one particular which is there offered to his view This Gasper was chief Minister of the Church of Tryers so passionately affected to the name of Calvin that he accounted it for one of his greatest honours to be called a Calvinian Preacher Acquainting him with the condition of the Church of Tryers he tells him amongst other things that he found the people very willing to submit to Discipline and thereupon intreats him for a Copy of those Laws and Orders which were observed in the Consistory of Geneva to the end he might communicate them to such of the Senators as he knew to be zealously affected Calvin who was apt enough to hearken to his own desires sends him a large draught of the whole Platform as well relating to the choice of the Members either Lay or Ministers as to the power and jurisdiction which they were to exercise with all the penalties and particularities with reference unto crimes and persons which depended on it And having given him that account he thus closeth with him This summary saith he I had thought sufficient by which or out of which you may easily frame to your self such a form of Government as I have no reason to prescribe To you it appertains modestly to suggest those counsels which you conceive to be most profitable for the use of the Church that godly and discreet men who seldom take it ill to be well advised may thereupon consider what is best be to done Which words of his though very cautelously couched were so well understood by Oberianus that the Discipline was first admitted in that Church and afterwards propagated into those of the Neighbouring Provinces 32. He hath another way of screwing himself into the good opinion of such Kings and Princes as he conceived to be inclinable to the Reformation sometimes congratulating with them for their good success sometimes encouraging them to proceed in so good a work of which sort were his Letters to King Edward the Sixth to Queen Elizabeth and Mr. Secretary Cecil to the Prince Elector Palatine Duke of Wirâ—inburgh Lantgrave of Hesse But he bestirred himself in no place more then he did in Poland which though he never visited in person yet he was frequent in it by his Lines and Agents The Augustane Confession had been brought thither some years before of which he took but little notice But he had heard no sooner that the Doctrines of Zuinglius began to get some ground upon them under the Reign of Sigismund sirnamed Augustus when presently he posts his Letters to the King and most of the great Officers which were thought to encline that way Amongst which he directs his Letters to Prince Radzeville one of the Chief Palatines and Earl Marshal Spirtetus Castelan of Sunderzee and Lord high-Treasurer to Iohn Count of Tarnaco Castelan of Craco and Lord General of his Majesties Armies besides many other Castelans and persons of great power in the Affairs of that Kingdom In his first Letters to that King dated the fourth of December 1554 he seems to congratulate with him for imbracing the Reformed Religion though in that point he was somewhat out in his intelligence and thereupon exhorts him to be earnest in the propagating of the Faith and Gospel which in himself he had imprest and that he would proceed to reform the Church from the dregs of Popery without regard to any of those dangers and inconveniences which might follow on it But in his next address 1555 he comes up more close speaks of erecting a tribunal or throne to Christ setting up such a perfect Form of the true Religion as came neerest to the Ordinance of Christ. And we know well that in the meaning of his party the settling of Presbytery was affirmed to be nothing else then setting Christ upon his Throne holding the Scepter of the Holy Discipline in his own right-hand And somewhat to this purpose he had also written to the Count of Tarnaco whom in his first Letter he applauds for his great readiness to receive the Gospel But in his second bearing date the nineteenth of November 1558 he seems no less grieved that the Count demurred on something which he had recommended to him under pretence that it was not safe to alter any thing in the State of the Kingdom and that all innovations seemed to threaten some great danger to it which cautelousness in that great person could not relate to any alteration in the State of Religion in which an alteration had been made for some years before and therefore must refer to some Form of Discipline which Calvin had commended to him for the use of those Churches And no man can conceive that he would recommend unto them any other Form then that which he devised for the Church of Geneva 32. But Calvin did not deal by Letters onely in the present business but had his Agents in that Kingdom who busily
imployed themselves to advance his projects Amongst whom none more practical or pragmatical rather then Iohn Alasco of a Noble Family in that Country but a professed Calvinian both for Doctrine and Discipline for the promoting whereof when he had setled himself and his Church in London Anno 1550 he publisheth a Pamphlet in defence of sitting at the Holy Sacrament incouraged those who had refused conformity to the Cap and Surplice and eagerly sollicited M. Bucer a man of greater parts but of more moderation to shew himself on their behalf Driven out of England he betakes himself to the Dukedom of Saxony where he behaved himself with such indiscretion that he was fain to quit those parts and retire to Poland in which the greatness of his kindred was his best protection There he sets up again for Calvin By the Activity of this man the diligence of Vtenhorius and the compliance of some great persons upon Politick ends the Eldership is advanced in many places of that Kingdom as appears by the Letters of the said Vtenhorius bearing date Ian. 27. 1559. In which he signifies unto him that the most illustrious Prince the Palatine of Vilâ—a in Lithuania being come to the Assembly of the States which was held at Petrico resolved not to depart from thence before some Convention of the Brethren should be held there also to which as well the Elders which his Highness brought thither with him as those he found there at his coming should consult together for the establishing of a greater purity in Rites and Ceremonies to be used amongst them For which admission of the Discipline into Lithuania Calvin expresseth no small joy in his Letters to a nameless Friend in that Country bearing date Octob. 9. 1561. In which he lets him know how much he did congratulate the happiness of the Realm of Poland and more particularly of the Province of Lithuania that the Reformed Religion made so great a progress in those Countries by which addition Christs Kingdom had been much enlarged that his joy was very much increased by hearing that together with the same Religion they received the Discipline that it was not without very good cause that he used to call the Discipline the Nerves of the Church in regard of the great strength which it added to it By which last words we may perceive what kinde of Church Government it was which he commended to Ligerus before remembred under this very title of the Nerves of Discipline by which Religion was to be preserved inviolable for the times to come 33. In the Assembly at Petrico before remembred the Palatines and other great men of the Kingdom obtained a Priviledge whereby it was made lawful for them to reform all the Churches under their command to reform them in such manner as to them seemed best It was then also moved by the Count of Tarnaco that the Bishops should no longer hold their place or suffrage in the Assembly of Estates but keep themselves only to such matters as concerned the Church which though it did not take effect yet the attempt appeared so dreadful in the eye of those Prelates then present that they became more tractable and obsequious to the great State-Officers then they had been formerly And what could follow hereupon but that the great men being left to please themselves in their own Religion and the Bishops not daring to oppose not onely Zuinglianism and the Discipline but many other Sects and Innovations should get ground upon them In reference to the Discipline as it was fitted and accommodated to whole Realms and Nations they had not onely their Presbyteries as in Geneva Strasbourg and some other Cities but their Classical and Synodical Meetings as in France and Scotland wherein they took upon them to make Laws and Ordinances for the directing of their Churches after Calvins Model For in the Synod held at Tzenger in the year 1564 it was Decreed that they should use no other Musick in their Churches then the singing of Psalms after the manner of Geneva understand it so condemning that which was then used in the Church of Rome partly because the Psalms and Hymns were sung in the Latine Tongue and partly because the Priests did bellow in them as they pleased to phrase it like the Priests of Baal Concerning which we are to know that the device of turning Davids Psalms into Rhyme and Meter was first taken up by Clement Marrot one of the Grooms of the Bed-chamber to King Francis the First who being much addicted to Poetry and having some acquaintance with those which were thought to wish well to the Reformation was perswaded by the learned Vatablus Professor of the Hebrew Tongue in the University of Paris to exercise his Poetical Fancies in translating some of Davids Psalms For whose satisfaction and his own he translated the first fifty of them into Gallick Meters and after fleeing to Geneva grew acquainted with Beza who in some tract of time translated the other hundred also and caused them to be fiâ—ted unto several Tunes Which thereupon began to be sung in private Houses and by degrees to be taken up in all the Churches of the French and other Nations which followed the Genevian Platform For first in imitation of this Work of Marrot's Sternhold a Groom of the Privy-Chamber to King Edward the Sixth translated thirty seven of them into English Meeter Anno 1552 the rest made up by Iohn Hopkins and some others in the time of Queen Mary but most especially by such as had retired unto Geneva in those very times Followed therein by some Dutch Zealots who having modelled their Reformation by the Rules of Calvin were willing to imbrace this Novelty amongst the rest So as in little tract of time the singing of these Psalms in Meter became a most especial part of their publick Worship and was esteemed as necessary to the Service of God as were the acts of Prayer and Preaching and whatsoever else was esteemed most Sacred In the next place to take away all difference in Apparel whether Sacred or Civil and all distinction in the choice of Meats and Drinks he accounted it a ridiculous and ungodly thing for those which are the Heirs of all things with dominion over all the Creatures to suffer themselves to be restrained by any superstitious use of Meats Drinks or Vestments The Temples built unto their hands they were contented to make use of for their publick Meetings being first purged of Idols Altars the Bellowings beforementioned and other the like dregs of Popery though formerly they had been abused who sees not a Calvinian spirit walking in all these lines by the Priests of Baal They seem content also to allow their Ministers Meat Drink and wages condemning those which grutch them such a sorry Pittance But as for Tithes and Glebes and Parsonage-Houses they kept them wholly to themselves that being the Fish they angled for in those troubled waters and the
last were left at liberty by the Rules of the Church and used in some few places onely Of all which he not onely signified a plain dislike but endeavoured to shew the errours and absurdities contained in them for such they must contain if he pleased to think so And what could follow hereupon but an open Schism a separation from the Church a resort to Conventicles which he takes notice of in his last to Grindal but imputes it unto that severity which was used by the Bishops in pressing such a yoak of Ceremonies upon tender Consciences The breach not lessened but made wider by another Letter directed to the French and Dutch Churches at London in which he sets before them the whole Form of Worship which was established at Geneva insisteth upon many points neither agreeable to the Discipline or Doctrine of the Church of England and â—inally so restrains the power of the Supreme Magistrate that he is left to the correction and control of his under Officers Of which two Letters that which was writ for satisfaction of the English brethren bears date Octob. 24. 1567 the other Iune 21 in the year next following 43. With great Zeal he drives on in pursuit of the Discipline the Form and Power whereof we will first lay down out of his Epistles and then observe to what a height he doth endeavour to advance the same excluding the Episcopal Government as Antichristian if not Diabolical First then he tells us that to each Minister which officiates in the Country-Villages within the Signiory of Geneva two Over-seers are elected as Assistants to him and that to them it appertains to keep a watchful eye over all men in their several Parishes to convent such before them as they finde blame-worthy to admonish them of their misdeeds and finally if he cannot otherwise prevail upon them to turn them over to the censure of the Eldership which resides in the City This Eldership he compounds of the six ordinary Pastors and twelve Lay-elders the last continually chosen from amongst the Senators To whose charge and office it belongs to take notice of all scandals and offences of what sort soever within the bounds assigned unto them and every Thursday to report to the Court or Consistory what they have discovered The parties thereupon are to be convented fairly admonished of their faults sometimes suspended from the Sacrament if the case require it and excommunicated at the last if they prove impenitent To this Eldership also it belongs to judge in all cases and concernments of Matrimony according to the Word of God and the Laws of the City to repel such from the Communion as do not satisfie the Ministers by a full confession of their Faith and Knowledge And in the company of an Officer of each several Ward to make a diligent inquiry over them in every Family concerning their proficiencie in the Word of God and the ways of Godliness 44. We must next see to what a height he doth endeavour to advance this Discipline which if we take it on his word is not to be received onely as a matter necessary but to be had in equall Reverence with the Word of God Sarnixius had acquainted him with some news from Poland concerning the Divisions and subdivisions in the Churches there whereunto Beza makes his answer by his Letters of the first of November 1566 That unless some Form of Ecclesiastical Discipline according to the Word of God were received among them he could not see by what means they were able to remedy their discords oâ— to prevent the like for the time to come that he had many times admired that being warned by the confusion of their Neighbours in Germany they had not considered before this time as well of the necessity to receive such Discipline as for the strict observing of it when it was received that there was onely one and the self-same Author both of Doctrine and Discipline and therefore that it must seem strange which I would have the Reader mark with his best attention to entertain one part of the Word of God and reject the other that it was most ridiculous to expect or think that either the Laws could be observed or the Peace maintained without Rules and Orders in which the very life of the Law did so much consist that for the avoiding of some new Tyranny which seemed to lye disguised under the Mask and Vizard of the present Discipline they should not run themselves into such Anarchy and discords as were not otherwise to be prevented and finally that no severity could be feared in the use of that Discipline as long as it was circumscribed within the bounds and limits assigned unto it by the Word of God and moderated by the Rules of Christian charity So that we are not to admire if the Discipline be from henceforth made a Note of the Church every way as essential to the nature of it as the Word and Sacraments which as it is the common Doctrine of the Presbyterians so we must look on Beza as the Author of it such Doctrine being never preached in the Church before 45. But because Beza seems to speak in that Epistle concerning the necessity of admitting some certain Form of Ecclesiastical Discipline without pointing punctually and precisely unto that of Geneva we must next see what Form of Discipline he means and whether a Church-Government by Bishops were intended in it And first he tells us in a Postscript of a Letter to Knox dated the third of Iuly 1569 wherein he much congratulates his good Fortune for joyning the Discipline in his Reformation with the truth of Doctrine beseeching him to go forward with it as he had begun lest it might happen to him as it did to others either to slacken in their speed or not be able to advance were they never so willing And we know well what Discipline what Form of Government and Worship had been by Knox established in the Kirk of Scotland But secondly many of the Scots being still unsatisfied in the point of Episcopacy and not well pleased with any other Government of a late invention it was thought fit to send to Beza for his judgement in it who was now looked upon as the Supreme Pastor Successor unto Calvin both in place and power Beza considers of the Business and by his Letters of the 12 of April 1572 returns this Answer viz. That he beheld it as an extraordinary blessing on the Church of Scotland That together with the true Religion they also had received the Discipline for the bond thereof Both which he earnestly conjures them so to hold together as to be sure that there is no hope to keep the one if they lose the other which being said in reference to the Holy Discipline he next proceeds to spend his judgement in the point of Episcopacy In reference to which he first tells them this that as the
years were spent before the Pope could be assured of the love of his Subjects or they relye upon the Clemency and good will of their Prince Such issue had the first attempts of the Calvinians in the Realm of France 10. In the mean time it was determined by the Cabinet Council in the Court to smother the indignity of these insurrections that the hot spirits of the French might have time to cool and afterwards to call them to a sober reckoning when they least looked for it In order whereunto an Edict is published in the Kings name and sent to all the Parliamentary Courts of France being at that time eight in all concerning the holding of an Assembly at Fountain-bleau on the 21 of August then next following for composing the distractions of the Kingdom And in that Edict he declares that without any evident occasion a great number of persons had risen and taken Arms against him that he could not but impute the cause thereof to the Hugonots onely who having laid aside all belief to God and all affection to their Country endeavoured to disturb the peace of the Kingdom that he was willing notwithstanding to pardon all such as having made acknowledgement of their errours should return to their Houses and live conformable to the Rites of the Catholick Church and in obedience to the Laws that therefore none of his Courts of Parliament should proceed in matters of Religion upon any manner of information for offences past but to provide by all severity for the future against their committing of the like and finally that for reforming all abuses in Government he resolved upon the calling of an Assembly in which the Princes and most Eminent Persons of the Kingdom should consult together the saâ—d Assembly to be held at his Majesties Palace of Fountain-bleau on the 21 of August then next following and free leave to be therein granted to all manner of persons not onely to propound their grievances but to advise on some expedient for redress thereof According unto which appointment the Assembly holds but neither the King of Navar nor the Prince of Conde could be perswaded to be present being both bent as it appeared not long after on some further projects But it was ordered that the Admiral Collignie and his brother D' Andelot should attend the service to the end that nothing should be there concluded without their privity or to the prejudice of their Cause And that they might the better strike a terrour into the Heart of the King whom they conceived to have been frighted to the calling of the present Assembly the Admiral tenders a Petition in behalf of those of the reformed Religion in the Dukedom of Normandy which they were ready to subscribe with one hundred and fifty thousand hands if it were required To which the Cardinal of Lorrain as bravely answered that if 150000 seditious could be found in France to subscribe that paper he doubted not but that there were a million of Loyal Subjects who would be ready to encounter them and oppose their insolencies 11. In this Assembly it was ordered by the common consent that for rectifying of abuses amongst the Clergy a meeting should be held of Divines and Prelates in which those discords might be remedied without innovating or disputing in matters of Faith and that for setling the affairs of the Kingdom an Assembly of the three Estates should be held at Orleance in the beginning of October to which all persons interested were required to come All which the Hugonots imputed to the consternation which they had brought upon the Court by their former risings and the great fear which was conceived of some new insurrections if all things were not regulated and reformed according unto their desires Which misconceit so wrought upon the principal Leaders that they resolved to make use of the present fears by seizing on such Towns and places of consequence as might enable them to defend both themselves and their parties against all opponents And to that end it was concluded that the King of Navar should seize upon all places in his way betwixt Bearn and Orleance that the City of Paris should be seized on by the help of the Marshal of Montmorency the Dukes Eldest Son who was Governour of it that they should assure themselves of Picardy by the Lords of Tenepont and Bouchavanne and of Britain by the Duke of Estampes who was powerful in it that being thus fortified well armed and better accompanied by the Hugonots whom they might presume of they should force the Assembly of the Estates to depose the Queen remove the Guises from the Government declare the King to be in his minority till he came to twenty two years of age appoint the King of Navar the Constable and the Prince of Conde for his Tutors and Governours which practice as it was confessed by Iaques de la Sague one of the Servants of the King of Navar who had been intercepted in his journey to him so the confession was confirmed by some Letters from the Visdame of Chartres which he had about him But this discovery being kept secret the Hugonots having taken courage from the first conspiracie at Amboise and the open profession of the Admiral began to raise some new commotions in all parts of the Kingdom and laying aside all obedience and respect of duty not onely made open resistance against the Magistrates but had directly taken arms in many places and practised to get into their hands some principal Towns to which they might retire in all times of danger Amongst which none was more aimed at then the City of Lyons a City of great Wealth and Trading and where great numbers of the people were inclined to Calvins Doctrine by reason of their neer Neighbourhood to Geneva and the Protestant Cantons Upon this Town the Prince of Conde had a plot and was like to have carried it though in the end it fell out contrary to his expectation which forced him to withdraw himself to Bearn there to provide for the security of himself and his Brother 12. But the King of Navar not being so deeply interested in these late designs in which his name had been made use of half against his will could not so much distrust himself and his personal safety as not to put himself into a readiness for his journey to Orleance To which he could by no means perswade the Prince and was by him much laboured not to go in person till they were certified that the King was sending Forces to fetch them thence which could not be without the wasting of the Country and the betraying of themselves unto those suspicions which otherwise they might hope to clear No sooner were they come to Orleance but the Prince was arrested of high Treason committed close Prisoner with a Guard upon him the cognizance of his Cause appointed unto certain Delegates his Process formed and Sentence of death pronounced against him which questionless had
Gates and thereby got possession of that part of the City was in apparent danger to be utterly broken by the Catholick party if the Prince had not come so opportunely to renew the fight but by his coming they prevailed made themselves Masters of the City and handselled their new Government with the spoil of all the Churches and Religious Houses which either they defaced or laid waste and desolate Amongst which none was used more coursely then the Church of St. Crosse being the Cathedral of that City not so much out of a dislike to all Cathedrals though that had been sufficient to expose it unto Spoil and Rapine as out of hatred to the name Upon which furious piece of Zeal they afterwards destroyed all the little Crosses which they found in the way between Mont-Martyr and St. Denis first raised in memory of Denis the first Bishop of Paris and one that passeth in account for the chief Apostle of the Gallick Nations 17. But to proceed to put some fair colour upon this foul action a Manifest is writ and published in which the Prince and his adherents signifie to all whom it might concern that they had taken arms for no other reason but to restore the King and Queen to their personal liberty kept Prisoners by the power and practice of the Catholick Lords that obedience might be rendred in all places to his Majesties Edicts which by the violence of some men had been infringed and therefore that they were willing to lay down Arms if the Constable the Duke of Guise and the Marshal of St. Andrews should retire from Paris leaving the King and Queen to their own disposing and that liberty of Religion might be equally tolerated and maintained unto all alike These false Colours were wiped off by a like Remonstrance made by the Parliament of Paris In which it was declared amongst other things that the Hugonots had first broke those Edicts by going armed to their Assemblies and without an Officer That they had no pretence to excuse themselves from the crime of Rebellion considering they had openly seized on many Towns raised Souldiers assumed the Munition of the Kingdom cast many pieces of Ordnance and Artillery assumed unto themselves the Coyning of Money and in a word that they have wasted a great part of the publick Revenues robbed all the rich Churches within their power and destroyed the rest to the dishonour of God the scandal of Religion and the impoverishing of the Realm The like answer was made also by the Constable and the Duke of Guise in their own behalf declaring in the same that they were willing to retire and put themselves into voluntary exile upon condition that the Arms taken up against the King might be quite laid down the places kept against him delivered up the Churches which were ruined restored again the Catholick Religion honourably preserved and an intire obedience rendred to the lawful King under the Government of the King of Navar and the Regencie of the Queen his Mother Nor were the King and Queen wanting to make up the breach by publishing that they were free from all restraint and that the Catholick Lords had but done their duty in waiting on them into Paris that since the Catholick Lords were willing to retire from Court the Prince of Conde had no reason to remain at that distance that therefore he and his adherents ought to put themselves together with the places which they had possessed into the obedience of the King which if they did they should not onely have their several and respective Pardons for all matters past but be from thenceforth looked upon as his Loyal Subjects without the least diminution of State or honour 18. These Paper-pellets being thus spent both sides prepare more furiously to charge each other But first the Prince of Conde by the aid of the Hugonots makes himself Master of the great Towns and Câ—ties of chief importance such as were Rouen the Parliamentary City of the Dukedom of Normandy the Ports of Diepe and New-haven the Cities of Angiers Towres Bloise Vendosme Bourges and Poictiers which last were reckoned for the greatest of all the Kingdom except Rouen and Paris after which followed the rich City of Lyons with that of Valence in the Province of Daulphiny together with almost all the strong places in Gascoigne and Languedock Provinces in a manner wholly Hugonot except Tholouse Bourdeaux and perhaps some others But because neither the Contributions which came in from the Hugonots though they were very large nor the spoil and pillage of those Cities which they took by force were of themselves sufficient to maintain the War the Prince of Conde caused all the Gold and Silver in the Churches to be brought unto him which he coyned into Money They made provision of all manner of Artillery and Ammunition which they took from most of the Towns and laid up in Orleance turning the Covent of the Franciscans into a Magazine and there disposing all their stores with great art and industry The Catholicks on the other side drew their Forces together consisting of 4000 Horse and six thousand Foot most of them old experienced Souldiers and trained up in the War against Charles the Fifth The Prince had raised an Army of an equal number that is to say three thousand Horse and seven thousand Foot but for the most part raw and young Souldiers and such as scarcely knew how to stand to their Arms And yet with these weak Forces he was grown so high that nothing would content him but the banishment of the Constable the Cardinal of Lorrain and the Duke of Guise free liberty for the Hugonots to meet together for the Exercise of their Religion in walled Towns Cities and Churches to be publickly appointed for them the holding of the Towns which he was presently possessed of as their absolute Lord till the King were out of his Minority which was to last till he came to the age of two and twenty He required also that the Popes Legate should be presently commanded to leave the Kingdom that the Hugonots should be capable of all Honours and Offices and finally that security should be given by the Emperour the Catholick King the Queen of England the State of Venice the Duke of Savoy and the Republick of the Switzers by which they were to stand obliged that neither the Constable nor the Duke of Guise should return into France till the King was come unto the age before remembred 19. These violent demands so incensed all those which had the Government of the State that the Prince and his Adherents were proclaimed Traytors and as such to be prosecuted in a course of Law if they laid not down their Arms by a day appointed Which did as little benefit them as the proposals of the Prince had pleased the others For thereupon the Hugonots united themselves more strictly into a Confederacie to deliver the King the Queen the Kingdom from the violence of their
Kingdom Normandy was in no small danger of being wilfully betrayed into the hands of the English who therefore were to be removed or at the least to be expulsed out of Rouen before the Kings Army was consumed in Actions of inferiour consequence The issue of which War was this That though the English did brave service for defence of the City and made many gallant attempts for relief thereof by their men and shipping from New-haven yet in the end the Town was taken by assault and for two days together made a prey to the Souldiers The joy of the Royalists for the reduction of this great City to the Kings obedience was much abated by the death of the King of Navar who had unfortunately received his deaths wound in the heat of the Seige and dyed in the forty fourth year of his age leaving behind him a young Son called Henry who afterward succeeded in the Crown of France And on the contrary the sorrow for this double loss was much diminished in the Prince of Conde and the rest of his party by the seasonable coming of four thousand Horse and five thousand Foot which Monsieur d' Andelot with great industry had raised in Germany and with as great courage and good fortune had conducted safely to the Prince 22. By the accession of these Forces the Hugonots are incouraged to attempt the surprizing of Paris from which they were disswaded by the Admiral but eagerly inflamed to that undertaking by the continual importunity of such Preachers as they had about them Repulsed from which with loss both of time and honour they were encountred in a set battel near the Câ—ty of Dreux in the neighbouring Province of Le Beausse In which battel their whole Army was overthrown and the Prince of Conde taken prisoner but his captivity sweetned by the like misfortune which befel the Constable took prisoner in the same battel by the hands of the Admiral who having drawn together the remainder of his broken Army retires towards Orleance and leaving there his Brother D' Andelot with the Foot to make good that City takes with him all the German Horse and so goes for Normandy there to receive such Monies as were sent from England But the Monies not coming at the time by reason of cross windes and tempestuous weather the Germans are permitted to spoil and plunder in all the parts of the Country not sparing places either Profane or Sacred and reckoning no distinction either betwixt Friends or Enemies But in short time the Seas grew passable and the Monies came an hundred and fifty thousand Crowns according to the French account together with fourteen pieces of Cannon and a proportionable stock of Ammunition by which supply the Germans were not onely well paid for spoiling the Country but the Admiral was thereby inabled to do some good service from which hâ— had been hindred for want of Cannon In the mean time the Duke of Guise had laid Siege to Orleance and had reduced it in a manner to terms of yeilding where he was villanously murdred by one Poltrot a Gentleman of a good Family and a ready Wit who having lived many years in Spain and afterward imbracing the Calvinian Doctrines grew into great esteem with Beza and the rest of the Consistorians by whom it was thought fit to execute any great Attempt By whom commended to the Admiral and by the Admiral excited to a work of so much merit he puts himself without much scruple on the undertaking entreth on the Kings service and by degrees became well known unto the Duke Into whose favour he so far insinuated that he could have access to him whensoever he pleased and having gained a fit opportunity to effect his purpose dispatched him by the shot of a Musket laden with no fewer then three bullets in the way to his lodging 23. This murder was committed on Feb. 24. an 1562. and being put to the Rack he on the Rack confessed upon what incentives he had done the fact But more particularly he averred that by the Admirall he was promised great rewards and that he was assured by Beza that by taking out of the world such a great persecutor of the Gospel he could not but exceedingly merit at the hands of Almighty God And though both Beza and the Admiral endeavoured by their Manifests and Declarations to wipe off this stain yet the confession of the murtherer who could have no other ends in it then to speak his conscience left most men better satisfied in it then by both their writings But as it is an ill wind which blows no body good so the Assassinate of this great person though very grievous to his friends served for an Introduction to the peace ensuing For he being taken out of the way the Admirall engaged in Normandy the Constable Prisoner in the City and the Prince of Conde in the Camp it was no hard matter for the Queen to conclude a peace upon such terms as might be equall to all parties By which accord it was concluded that all that were free Barons in the Lands and Castles which they were possessed of or held them of no other Lord then the King himself might freely exercise the Reformed Religion in their own jurisdictions and that the other which had not such Dominions might doe the same in their own Houses and Families only provided that they did not the same in Towns and Cities that in every Province certain Cities should be assigned in the Suburbs whereof the Hugonots might have the free exercise of their Religion that in the City of Paris and in all other Towns and places whatsoever where the Court resided no other Religion should be exercised but the Roman Catholick though in those Cities every man might privately enjoy his conscience without molestation that those of the Reformed Religion should observe the Holy Days appointed in the Roman Kalendar and in their Marriages the Rites and Constitutions of the Civil Law and finally that a general pardon should be granted to all manner of persons with a full restitution to their Lands and Liberties their Honors Offices and Estates Which moderation or restriction of the Edict of Ianuary did much displease some zealous Hugonots but their Preachers most who as they loved to exercise their gifts in the greatest Auditories so they abominated nothing more then those observances 24. After this followed the reduction of New-haven to the Crown of France and the expulsion of the English out of Normandy the Prince of Conde and some other leading men of the Hugonot faction contributing both their presence and assistance to it which had not been so easily done had not God fought more against the English then the whole French Armies for by cross winds it did not only hinder all supplyes from coming to them till the surrendry of the Town but hastened the surrender by a grievous Pestilence which had extreamly wasted them in respect of number and miserably dejected them
be admitted to any office charge dignity or magistracy whatever if he did not profess and live conformable in all points to the Roman Religion And for a Preamble hereunto the King was pleased to make a long and distinct Narration of the indulgence he had used to reduce the Hugonots to a right understanding and of the ill requital they had made unto him by the seditions and conspiracies which they raised against him their bringing in of forraign forces and amongst others the most mortal enemies of the French Nation putting into their hands the strongest places and most flourishing parts of the Kingdom to the contempt of his authority the despising of his grace and goodness and the continual disquieting of his Dominions and the destruction of his subjects To counter-poise which terrible Edict the Princes and other Leaders of the Hugonots which were then at Rochel entred into a solemn Covenant or Association by which they bound themselves by Oath to persevere till death in defence of their Religion never to lay down arms or condescend to any agreement without the general consent of all the Commanders and not then neither but upon sufficient security for the preservation of their lives and the enjoying of that Liberty of Conscience for which they first began the war 30. But the Admiral well knowing that the business was not to be carried by Oaths and Manifests and that they wanted mony to proceed by arms advised the Rochellers to send their Navy to the sea which in a time when no such danger was expected might spoyle and pillage all they met with and by that means provide themselves of mony and all other necessaries to maintain the war Which Counsel took such good effect that by this kind of Piracy they were enabled to give a fair beginning to this new Rebellion for the continuance whereof it was thought necessary to sollicite their Friends in Germany to furnish them with fresh recruits of able men and Queen Elizabeth of England for such sums of money as might maintain them in the service And in the first of these designs there appears no difficulty the inclination of the Prince Elector together with the rest of the Calvinian Princes and Imperial Cities were easily intreated to assist their Brethren of the same Religion And the same spirit governed many of the people also but on different grounds they undertaking the imployment upon hope of spoil as Mercenaries serving for their Pay but more for Plunder In England their desires were entertained with less alacrity though eagerly sollicited by Odet Bishop of Beauvais a younger Brother of the Admiral who having formerly been raised to the degree of a Cardinal therefore called most commonly the Cardinal of Chastillon had some years since renounced his Habit and Religion but still kept his Titles By the continual sollicitation of so great an Advocate and the effectual interposing of the Queen of Navar Elizabeth was perswaded to forget their former ingratitude and to remember how conducible it was to her personal interest to keep the French King exercised in perpetual troubles upon which Reason of State she is not onely drawn to accommodate the Hugonots with Ships Corn Arms and Ammunition but to supply them with a hundred thousand Crowns of ready money for the maintaining of their Army consisting of fourteen thousand Germans and almost as many more of the natural French And yet it was to be believed that in all this she had done nothing contrary to the League with France which she had sworn not long before because forsooth the Forces of the Hugonots were raised to no other end but the Kings mere service and the assistance of the Crown against the Enemies of both and the professed Adversaries of the true Religion But neither this great lone of money nor that which they had got by robbing upon the Seas was able to maintainâ— War of so long continuance For maintainance whereof they were resolved to sell the Treasures of the Churches in all such Provinces as they kept under their Command the Queen of Navar ingaging her Estate for their security who should adventure on the purchase 31. I shall not touch on the particulars of this Warâ— which ended with the death of the Prince of Conde in the battel of Iarnar the rigorous proceedings against the Admiral whom the King caused to be condemned for a Rebel his Lands to be confiscatedâ— his Houses plundred and pulled down and himself executed in Effigie the loss of the famous battel of Mont-Contour by the Hugonots party Anno 1569 which forced them to abandon all their strong holds except Rochel Angoulesme and St. Ieanâ—d Angeli and finally to shut themselves up within Rochel onely after which followed such a dissembled reconciliation between the parties as proved more bloudy then the War The sudden and suspected death of the Queen of Navar the Marriage of the Prince her Son with the Lady Margaret one of the Sisters of the King the celebrating of the wedding in the death of the Admiral on St. Bartholomews day 1572 and the slaughter of thirty thousand men within few days after the reduction of the whole Kingdom to the Kings obedience except the Cities of Nismes Montauban and Rochel onely the obstinate standing out of Rochel upon the instigation of such Preachers as fled thither for shelter and the reduction of it by the Duke of Anjon to the last extremity the raising of the Siege and the Peace ensuing on the Election of that Duke to the Crown of Poland the resolution of the Hugonots to renew the War as soon as he had left the Kingdom and their ingaging in the same on the Kings last sickness In all which traverses of State there is nothing memorable in reference to my present purpose but onely the conditions of the Pacification which was made at the Siege of Rochel by which it was accorded between the parties on the 11 of Iuly Anno 1573 that all offences should be pardoned to the said three Cities on their submission to the King and that it should be lawful for them to retain the free Exercise of their Religion the people meeting in the same unarmed and but few in numberâ— that all the inhabitants of the said three Cities should be obliged to observe in all outward matters except Baptism and Matrimony the Rites and Holy-days of the Church that the use of the Catholick Religion should be restored in the said Cities and all other places leaving unto the Clergy and Religious persons their Houses Profits and Revenues that Rochel should receive a Governour of the Kings appointment but without Garrison renounce all correspondencies and confederacies with Forreign Princes and not take part with any of the same Religion against the King and finally that the said three Towns should deliver Hostages for the performance of the Articles of the present Agreement to be changed at the end of every three months if the King so pleased It
and provocations the King resolved to proceed in his former indifferency hoping thereby to break the Hugonots without blows and bloud-shed and thereby to regain the good opinion of his Popish Subjects To which end he was pleased to grant such priviledges to the Hugonot Faction as they durst not ask and never had aspired unto in their greatest heats which he conceived he had more reason to do in the present pinch then any of his Predecessors had in far less extremities For the Hugonots had not onely brought in a formidable Army of Switz and Germans under the conduct of Prince Casimir one of the younger sons of Frederick the Third then Elector Palatine but had also made a fraction in the Court it self by drawing Francis Duke of Alanzon his youngest Brother to be Head of their Party who brought along with him a great number of Romish Catholicks who then past under the name of the Male-contents To break which blow and free his Kingdom from the danger of so great an Army he first capitulates to pay the Germans their Arrears amounting to a million and two hundred thousand Ducats to gratifie Prince Casimir with the Signory of Chasteau-Thierry in the Province of Champaigne with a Pension of fourteen thousand Crowns and a Command of a hundred Lances To confer the Government of Picardie with the strong Town of Perrone on the Prince of Conde and settle on his Brother the Duke of Alanzon the Provinces of Berry Touraine and Anjou together with one hundred thousand Crowns of yearly Pension and made him also Duke of Anjou foâ— his greater honour And then to pacifie and oblige the Hugonots if such men could be gained or pacified by acts of favour he grants unto them by his Edict of the 14 of May 1576 that they should peaceably enjoy the exercise of their Religion together with full power for erecting Colledges and Schools for holding Synods of Celebrating Matrimony and Administring the Sacraments with the same freedom as was used by his Catholick Subjects that those of the Reformed Religion should be permitted to execute any Places or Offices and enjoy any Dignities of what sort soever without such distinction betwixt them and the rest of that Nation as had been of late times observed that in each Parliament of France a new Court should be presently erected consisting equally of Judges and Officers of both Religions and they to have the Cognizance of all Causes which concerned the Hugonots that all sentences past against the Admiral the Count of Montgomery and the rest of that party should be revoked and made null and the eight cautionary Towns being all places of great strength and consequence should remain with the Hugonots till all these Articles were confirmed and the Peace concluded 38. The passing of this Edict gave great scandal to the Catholick party which thereupon was easily united by the Duke of Guise into a common Bond or League for maintainance and defence of their Religion apparently indangered by those large Indulgences by the first Article whereof they bound themselves for the Establishment of the Law of God in its first Estate to restore and settle his holy Service according to the Form and Manner of the Catholick Apostolick Roman Church and to abjure and renounce all errors contrary thereunto Then followed many other Articles relating to the preservation of the Kings Authority the maintainance of the common liberties and Priviledges of their Country the mutual defence of one another in defence of this League against all persons whatsoever the constancy of their obedience to any one whom they should chuse to be the Head of their Conâ—ederacie and finally the prosecuting of all those without exception who should endeavour to oppose and infringe the same And for the keeping of this League they severally and joyntly bound themselves by this following Oath viz. I swear by God the Creator laying my hand upon the holy Gospel and under pain of Excommunication and eternal Damnation that I enter into this holy Catholick League according to the Form thereof now read unto 〈◊〉 â—nd that I do faithfully and sincerely enter into it with a will either to command or to obey and serve as I shall be appointed â—nd I promise upon my life and honour unto the last drop of my bloud never to depart from it or transgress it for any command preâ—ence excuse or occasion which by any means whatsoever can be represented to me And as the Hugonots had puâ— themselves under the Protection of the Queen of England and called the â—â—â—mans to their aid so they resolved according unto this example to put themselves under the Patronage of the Catholick King and to call in the Forces of the King Pope and the Princes of Itâ—ly if their occasions so required The news of which conâ—edeâ—acy so amazed the King that he proceeded not to the performance of those Indulgences contained in the Eâ—iâ—t of the 14 of May which seemed most odious and offensive in the eyes of the Catholicks so that both sides being thus â—xaâ—perated against one another and each side jealous of the King the old confusions were revived the disorders multiplyed and all things brought into a worse condition then at his first coming to the Crown For though the Catholick King had willingly consented to be head of the League yet to bâ—â—ak â—ff all such dependance as was by that means to be fastned on him by the rest of the Leaguers the French King findes himself necessitated to assume that honour to himself And thereupon in the Assembly held at Blois having in vain tryed many ways to untie this knot he publickly declared himself to be the Principal Head and Protector of it with many specious protestations that he would spend his last breath in a cause so glorious as the reducing of his people unto one Religion which as it raised many jealousies in the mindes of the Hugonots so it begot no confidence of him in the hearts of their opposites 39. Hereupon a new War breaks out and a new Peace followeth by which some Clauses in the former Edict were restrained and moderated though otherwise sufficiently advantagious to all those of the Reformation so as now hoping that all matters were accorded between the parties the King pretends to betake himself wholly to his private Devotions falls on the institution of a new Order of Knighthood called The Order of the Holy Ghost commends his Brother for a Suâ—ter to the Queen of England to keep him out of harms way for the time to come and finally failing of the project procureth his advancement to the Dukedom of Brabant and to be made the General-Governour of the Belgick Provinces which had withdrawn themselves from their Obedience to the King of Spain 40. But in the midst of these devices the Leaders of the Hugonots are again in Arms under colour that the former Edict had not been observed but in plain truth upon a clear and manifest experience that Peace
in which they come up close to Calvin and the Rules of Geneva First therefore taking them for Zuinglians in the point of the Sacrament and Anti-Lutherans in defacing Images abolishing all distinction of Fasts and Festivals and utterly denying all set-Forms of publick Worship they have declared themselves as high in maintainance of Calvins Doctrines touching Predestination Grace Free-will c. as any sub-lapsarian or supra-lapsarian which had most cordially Espoused that Quarrel For proof whereof the Writings of Vrsine and Parcus Alsted Piscator and the rest Professors in the Schools of Heidelberg Herborne and Sedan being all within the limits of the Higher Germanâ— might be here produced did I think it necessary But these not being the proper Cognizances of the Presbyterians and better to be taken by their actings in the Synod of Dort then in scattered Tractates I shall take notice onely of those points of Doctrine which are meer Genevian in reference to their opposition to Monarchical Government a Doctrine not unwelcome to the Zuinglian Princes in either Germany because it gives them a fit ground for their justification not onely for proceeding to reform their Churches without leave of the Emperour whom they must needs acknowledge for their Supreme Lord but also for departing from the Confession of Ausberge which onely ought to be received within the bounds of the Empire 5. First then beginning with Vrsine publick Professor for Divinity in the Chair of Heidelberg he thus instructs us in his Commentary on the Palatine Catechism Albeit saith he that wicked men sometimes bear Rule and therefore are unworthy of honours yet the Office is to be distinguished from their persons and that the man whose vices are to be detested ought to be honoured for his Office as Gods Spiritual Ordinance which is a truth so consonant to the Holy Scriptures that nothing could be said more piously in so short a position But then he gives us such a Gloss as corrupts the Text telling us in the words next following That since Superiours are to be honoured in respect of their Office it is therefore manifest that so far onely we must yeild obedience unto their commands as they exceed not in the same the bounds of their Offices Which plainly intimates that if Princes be at any time transported beyond the bounds of their Offices of which the people and their popular Magistrates are the onely Judges the Subjects are not bound to yeild obedience unto their commands under pretence that they are past beyond their bounds and have no influence on the People but onely when they shine within the compass of their proper Spheres 6. More plainly speaks Parcus who succeeded him both in place and Doctrines out of whose Commentary on the 13 Chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans the following propositions were extracted by some Delegates and Divines of Oxon when the unsoundness of his Judgement in this particular was questioned and condemned by that University First then it was declared for a truth undoubted That Bishops and other Ministers or Pastors in the Church of Christ both might and ought with the consent of their several Churches to Excommunicate or give over to the power of Satan their Superiour Magistrates for their impiety towards God and their injustice towards their Subjects if they continued in those errours after admonition till they gave some manifest signs of their repentance 2. That subjects being in the condition of meer private men ought not without some lawful calling either to take arms to assault a Tyrant before their own persons be indangered or to deâ—end themselves though they be indangered if by the ordinary Magistrates they may be defended from such force and violence 2. That Subjects being in the condition of meer private men may lawfully take Arms to defend themselves against a Tyrant who violently shall break in upon them as a Thief or Ravisher and expedite themselves from the present danger as against a common Thief and Robber when from the ordinary Magistrates there appeareth no defence or succour 4. That such Subjects as are not meerly private men but are placed in some inferiour Magistracy may lawfully by force of Arms defend themselves the Common-wealth the Church and the true Religion against the pleasure and command of the Supreme Magistrate These following conditions being observed that is to say if either the Supreme Magistrate become a Tyrant practiseth to commit Idolatry or blaspheme Gods Name or that any great and notable injustice be offered to them as that they cannot otherwise preserve their consciences and lives in safety conditioned finally that under colour of Religion and a Zeal to Iustice they do not rather seek their private ends then the publick good And this last Proposition being so agreeable to Calvins Doctrines he flourisheth over and inforceth with those words of Trajan which before we cited out of Buchan when he required the principal Captain of his Guard to use the Sword in his defence if he governed well but to turn the point thereof against him if he did the contrary 7. Building their practice on these Doctrines we finde the Palatine Princes very forward in aiding the French Hugonots against their King upon all occasions In the first risings of that people Monsieur d' Andelot was furnished with five thousand Horse and four thousand Foot most of them being of the Subjects of the Prince Elector Anno 1562 when he had out newly entertained the thoughts of Zuinglianism and had not fully settled the Calvinian Doctrines But in the year 1566 when the Hugonots were upon the point of a second War he joyns with others of the German Princes in a common Ambathe by which the French King was to be desired that the Preachers of the Reformed Religion might Preach both in Paris and all other places of the Kingdom without control and that the people freely might repair to hear them in what numbers they pleased To which unseasonable demand the King though naturally very Cholerick made no other answer then that he would preserve a friendship and affection for those Princes so long as they did not meddle in the Affairs of his Kingdom as he did not meddle at all in their Estates After which having somewhat recollected his Spirits he subjoyned these words with manifest shew of his displeasure that it concerned him to sollicite their Princes to suffer the Catholicks to say Mass in all their Cities With which nipping answer the Ambassadors being sent away they were followed immediately at the heels by some of the Hugonots who being Agents for the rest prevailed with Prince Iohn Casimir the second Son of the Elector to raise an Army in defence of the common Cause To which purpose they had already furnished him with a small sum of money assuring him that when he was come unto their Borders they would pay down one hundred thousand Crowns more towards the maintainance of his Army Which promises perswading more then the greatest Rhetorick
Bishops of Leige some to the jurisdiction of the Archbishops of Rheims and Colen and others under the Authority of the Bishops of Munster Of which the first were in some sort under the Protection of the Dukes of Burgundy the three last absolute and independent not owing any suite or Service at all unto them By means whereof concernments of Religion were not looked into with so strict an eye as where the Bishops are accomptable to the Prince for their Administration or more united with and amongst themselves in the publick Government The inconvenience whereof being well observed by Charles the Fifth he practised with the Pope then being for increasing the number of the Bishopricks reducing them under Archbishops of their own and Modeling the Ecclesiastical Politie under such a Form as might enable them to exercise all manner of spiritual jurisdiction within themselves without recourse to any Forreign Power or Prelate but the Pope himself Which being first designed by him was afterwards effected by King Philip the Second though the event proved contrary to his expectation For this enlargement of the number of the Sees Episcopal being projected onely for the better keeping of the Peace and Unity of the Belgick Churches became unhappily the occasion of many Tumults and Disorders in the Civil State which drew on the defection of a great part of the Country from that Kings obedience 14. For so it was that the Reformed Religion being entertained in France and Germany did quickly finde an entrance also into such of the Provinces as lay nearest to them where it found people of all sorts sufficiently ready to receive it To the increase whereof the Emperor Charls himself gave no small advantage by bringing in so many of the Switz and German Souldiers to maintain his Power either in awing his own Subjects or against the French by which last he was frequently invaded in the bordering Provinces Nor was Queen Mary of England wanting though she meant it not to the increasing of their numbers For whereas many of the Natives of France and Germany who were affected zealously to the Reformation had put themselves for Sanctuary into England in the time of King Edward they were all banished by Proclamation in the first year of her Reign Many of which not daring to return to their several Countries dispersed themselves in most of the good Towns of the Belgick Provinces especially in such as lay most neer unto the Sâ—a where they could best provide themselves of a poor subsistance By means whereof the Doctrine of the Protestant and Reformed Churches began to get much ground upon them to which the continual intercourses which they had with England gave every day such great and manifest advantage that the Emperour was fain to bethink himself of some proper means for the suppressing of the inconveniences which might follow on it And means more proper he found none in the whole course of Government then to increase the number of the former Bishopricks to re-inforce some former Edicts which he made against them and to bring in the Spanish Inquisition which he established and confirmed by another Edict bearing date April 20. 1548. Which notwithstanding the Professors of that Doctrine though restrained a while could not be totally suppressed some Preachers out of Germany and others out of France and England promoting underhand those Tenents and introducing those opinions which openly they durst not own in those dangerous times But when the Emperour Charles had resigned the Government and that King Philip the Second upon some urgent Reasons of State had retired to Spain and left the Chief Command of his Belgick Provinces to the Dutchess of Parma they then began to shew themselves with the greater confidence and gained some great ones to their side whom discontent by reason of the disappointment of their several aims had made inclinable to innovation both in Church and State 15. Amongst the great ones of which time there was none more considerable for Power and Patrimony then William of Nassaw Prince of Orange invested by a long descent of Noble Ancestors in the County of Nassaw a fair and goodly Territory in the Higher Germany possest of many good Towns and ample Signories in Brabant and Holland derived upon him from Mary Daughter and Heir of Philip Lord of Breda c. his great Grand-fathers Grand-mother and finally enriched with the Principality of Orange in France accruing to him by the death of his Cozen Rene which gave him a precedencie before all other Belgick Lords in the Court of Brussels By which advantages but more by his abilities both for Camp and Counsel he became great in favour with the Emperour Charles by whom he was made Governour of Holland and Zealand Knight of the Order of the Fleece imployed in many Ambassies of weight and moment and trusted with his dearest and most secret purposes For Rivals in the Glory of Arms he had the Counts of Horne and Egmond men of great Prowess in the Field and alike able at all times to Command and Execute But they were men of open hearts not practised in the Arts of Subtilty and dissimulation and wanted much of that dexterity and cunning which the other had for working into the affections of all sorts of people Being advanced unto this eminencie in the Court and knowing his own strength as well amongst the Souldiers as the common people he promised to himself the Supreme Government of the Belgick Provinces on the Kings returning into Spain The disappointment of which hope obliterated the remembrance of all former favours and spurred him on to make himself the Head of the Protestant party by whose assistance he conceived no small possibility of raising the Nassovian Family to as great an height as his ambition could aspire to 16. The Protestants at that time were generally divided into two main bodies not to say any thing of the Anabaptists and other Sectaries who thrust in amongst them Such of the Provinces as lay toward Germany and had received their Preachers thence embraced the Forms and Doctrines of the Lutherâ—â— Câ—â—â—ches in which not onely Images had been still retained â—ogether with set-Forms of Prayer kneeling at the Communioâ— the Cross in Baptism and many other laudable Ceremonies of the Elder times but also most of the ancient Fasts and Fâ—â—tivals of the Catholick Church and such a Form of Eccleâ—â—tical Polity as was but little differing from that of Bishops which Forms and Doctrines being tolerated by the Edicts of Paussaw and Ausberg made them less apt to work disturbance in the Civil State and consequently the less obnoxious to the fears and jealousies of the Catholick party But on the other side such Provinces as lay toward France participated of the humour of that Reformation which was there begun modelled according unto Calvins Platform both in Doctrine and Discipline More stomacked then the other by all those who adhered to the Church of Rome or otherwise pretended to the peace
Blessed Virgin and that too on the very Festival of her Assumption when the like outrages were committed in other places For not content to jeer and taunt them in the Streets as they passed along they follow them into the principal Church of that City where first they fall to words and from words to blows and from blows to wounds to the great scandal of Religion and the unpardonable prophanation of that holy Place 31. But this was onely an Essay of the following mischief For on the same day Sennight being not onely more numerous but better armed they flocked to the same Church at the Evening-Service which being ended they compel the people to forsake the place and possess themselves of it Having made fast the Doors for fear that some disturbance might break in upon them one of them begins to sing a Psalm in Marots Meter wherein he is followed by the rest that such a holy exercise as they were resolved on might not be undertook without some preparation which fit of Devotion being over they first pulled down a massie Image of the Virgin afterwards the Image of Christ and such other Saints as they found advanced there on their several Pedestals some of them treading them underfoot some thrusting Swords into their sides and others hagling of their Heads with Bills and Axes In which work as many were imployed in most parts of the Church so others got upon the Altars cast down the sacred Plate defaced the Pictures and disfigured the paintings on the Walls whilst some with Ladders climbed the Organs which they broke in pieces and others with like horrible violence destroyed the Images in the Windows or rather brake the Windows in despight of the Images The Consecrated Host they took out of the Pixes and trampled under their feet carouse such Wine as they brought with them in the sacred Chalices and greased their shooes with that Chrysome or anoynting Oyl which was prepared for some Ceremonies to be used at Baptism and in the visiting of the sick And this they did with such dispatch that one of the fairest Churches in Europe richly adorned with Statues and massie Images of Brass and Marble and having in it no fewer then seventy Altars was in the space of four hours defaced so miserably that there was nothing to be seen in it of the former beauties Proud of which fortunate success they brake into all other Churches of that City where they acted over the same spoils and outragious insolencies and afterwards forcing open the doors of Monasteries and Religious Houses they carryed away all their Consecrated Furniture entred their Store-houses seized on their Meat and drank off their Wine and took from them all their Money Plate and Wardrobes both Sacred and Civil not sparing any publick Library wheresoever they came a ruine not to be repaired but with infinite sums the havock which they made in the great Church onely being valued at four hundred thousand Ducates by indifferent rates The like outrages they committed at the same time in Gaunt and Oudenard and all the Villages about them the severalties whereof would make up a Volume let it suffice that in the Province of Flanders onely no fewer then four hundred Consecrated places were in the space of ten days thus defaced and some of them burnt down to the very ground 32. The news of these intolerable outrages being posted one after another to the Court at Brussels occasioned the Governess when it was too late to see her errour in sending back her Spanish Souldiers and yeilding to the improvident dismission of the prudent Cardinal by whose Authority and Counsel she had so happily preserved those Provinces in peace and quiet and then she found that she had good reason to believe all the information which Count Mansfield gave her touching a plot of the Calvinian party in France from whence came most of these new Preachers to imbroyl the Netherlands which till that time she looked on as a groundless jealousie But as it is in some Diseases that when they are easie to be cured they are hard to be known and when they are easie to be known they are hard to be cured so fared it at that time with these distempers in the Belgick Provinces which now were grown unto that height that it was very difficult if not almost impossible to finde out a remedy For having called together the great Council of State and acquainted them with the particulars before remembred she found the Counts of Mansfield Aremberg and Barlamont cheerfully offering their assistance to reduce the people to obedience by force of Arms but Egmont Horne and Orange whose Brother Count Lodowick was suspected for a chief contriver of the present mischief of a contrary judgement so that she could proceed no further and indeed she durst not for presently a secret Rumour was dispersed that if she did not so far gratifie the Covenanters and their adherents that every man might have liberty to go to Sermons and no man be punished for Religion she should immediately see all the Churches in Brussels fired the Priests murthered and her self imprisoned For fear whereof though she took all safe courses for her own security yet she found none so safe as the granting of some of their demands to the Chief Conspirators by which the Provinces for the present did enjoy some quiet But this was onely like an Intermission in the fit of an Ague For presently hereupon she received advertisement that those of the Reformed party were not onely suffered to take unto themselves some Churches in Machlin Antwerp and Tournay which till then had never been permitted but that at Vtrecht they had driven the Catholicks out of their Churches and at the Bosch had forced the Bishop to forsake the City as their holy Fathers in Geneva had done before them And in a word to make up the measure of her sorrows and compleat their insolencies she had intelligence of the like Tumult raised at Amsterdam where some of the Reforming Rabble had broken into a Monastery of the Franciscans defaced all Consecrated things beat and stoned out the Religious persons not without wounding some of the principal Senators who opposed their doings 33. Provoked with these indignities she resolves upon the last remedy which was to bring them to obedience by force of Arms and therein she had no small encouragement from the King himself and good assurance of assistances from such Princes of Germany as still adhered unto the Pope The news whereof so startâ—es the chief of the Covenanters that they enter into consultation of Electing a new Prince or putting themselves under the power of some potent Monarch by whom they might be countenanced against their King and priviledged in the cojoyment of their Religion It was advised also that three thousand Books of Calvinian Doctrine should be sent into Spain and dispersed in the chief Cities of it to the end that whiâ—st the King was busied in looking to his
Palatinate crossed over the Mose an Army of the French Hugonots should fall into Artois to give the Spaniards the more work by this treble invasion But the French Forces being followed at the heels by some Troops of Horse whom the King sent after them were totally defeated neer the Town of St. Vallery their Chief Commanders brought to Paris and there beheaded Count Hostrat with his Forces had the like misfortune first broken and afterwards totally vanquished by Sancho d' Avila one of Alva's Generals Onely Count Lodowick had the honour of a signal Victory but bought it with the death of his brother Adolph whom he lost in the Battail though afterwards encountring with the Duke himself he lost six thousand of his men besides all his Baggage Ordnance and Ammunition hardly escaping with his life And now it is high time for the Prince to enter who having raised an Army of eight and twenty thousand Horse and Foot increased not long after by the addition of three thousand Foot and five hundred Horse which the French Hugonots out of pure Zeal unto the Cause had provided for him takes his way toward Brabant which he had marked out for his Quarters but there he found the Dukes whole Army to be laid in his way whom he could neither pass by nor ingage in fight the Duke well knowing that such great Armies wanting pay would disband themselves and were more safely broken by delay then battail onely he watched their motions and ingaged by parties in which he always had the better And by these Arts so tired the Prince that in the end he was compelled to dissolve his Forces and retire once more into Nassaw But whilst the Duke was thus imployed in securing the passages of the Country which lay next to Germany he left the Ports and Sea-Towns open to the next Invadour Which being observed by William de March Baron of Luma who with few Ships kept himself upon the Seas out of Alva's reach he suddenly seized upon the Brill a Port of Holland where he defaced such Images as he found in their Churches omitting no irreverence unto any thing which was accounted Sacred but otherwise so fortified and intrenched the Town that it proved impregnable This hapned on Palm-Sunday Anno 1570 and on the Sunday following being Easter-day the Spanish Garrison is turned out of Vlushing the chief Port of Zealand by gaining of which two places it might not be unfitly said that they carried the Keys of Holland and Zealand at their Girdles and were inabled by that means to receive succours from all Parts and Nations which lay towards the Sea as they after did 40. The loss of these two Ports drew along with it a defection of most of the strong Towns in Holland which at the instigation of the Baron of Luma put themselves under the command of the Prince of Orange and at his motion took the Oath of fidelity to him from him they received their Garrison Shipping and Arms and to him they permitted the disposing of all places of Government making of Laws and the distributing of the Revenues which belonged to the Clergy To him such multitudes repaired out of France and England besides Auxiliary Scots that within less then four months a Navy of one hundred and fifty Sail lay rigged in Vlushing and from thence spoiled and robbed all Merchants of the Spanish party Nor were the Dukes Affairs in much better order in the parts next France in which Count Lodowick with the help of some French Hugonots had made himself Master of Mons the chief City of Haynalt which seemed the more considerable in the eyes of Alva because the French King openly but for different ends had avowed the Action By whose permission Gasper Colligny the great Admiral of France and one of the chief Leaders of the Hugonot party had raised an Army in the Borders consisting of six or seven thousand men which he put under the command of the Lord of Iâ—nlis who had before conducted the French Succours to the Prince of Orange But Ienlis being defeated by Don Frederick the Dukes Eldest Son and the Prince of Orange wanting power to relieve the besieged the Town was re-delivered into the hands of the Spaniards upon terms of honour and Lodowick retires to Dilemberg the chief Town of Nassaw 41. The Prince of Orange in the mean time animated by the General revolt of almost all the strong Towns in Holland raised a new Army of no fewer then eleven thousand Foot and six thousand Horse with which he entred into Brabant possest himself of some of the principal Towns and suffered others to redeem themselves with great sums of money with which he satisfied his Souldiers for their pains and hazard in the obtaining of the rest Dendermond and Oudenard two strong Towns of Flanders which had made some resistance he both stormed and plundered the Souldiers in all places making spoil of Churches and in some tyrannizing over the dead whose Monuments they robbed and pillaged But none fared worse then the poor Priests whom out of hate to their Religion they did not onely put to death but put to death with tortures and in some places which fell under the power of the Baron of Luma hanged up their mangled Limbs or Quarters as Butchers do their small Meats in a common Shambles which spoils and cruelties so alienated the affections of all the people that his power in those parts was not like to continue long and having failed of his attempt in relieving Mons crossed the Country into Holland as his surest receptacle on whose retreat the Duke recovers all the Towns which he had taken in Brabant and Flanders follows him into Holland and besiegeth Harlem in which the Souldiers to demonstrate of what Sect they were made a meer Pageant of Religion for setting up Altars on the Bulwarks they dressed them with Images and representations of the Saints and being attired in Copes and Vestments they sung Hymns before them as if they were offering Devotions After which mockery they brought out the resemblances of Priests and Religious persons made of straw whipt them and stabbed them into the body and finally cutting off their heads flung them into the Leaguer Sometimes they also placed the Images of Christ and many of the Saints against the mouth of the Cannon with many other Arts of the like impiety for which they were brought to a dear reckoning when the Town was taken at which time most of them were either put to the Sword or hanged or drowned 42. Frederick the Prince Elector Palatine had hitherto ingaged no further in the Belgick troubles then the rest of his Neighbours But now he doth more cordially espouse the quarrel upon some hope of propagating the Calvinian Doctrines which he had lately introduced into his Dominions And being well affected to the House of Nassaw and knowing what encouragements the Calvinian Faction in the Netherlands had received from them cheerfully hearkened to such
desires though the Prince of Orange openly appeared for them they were resolved no longer to expect the lazie temper of Authority but actually took possession of some of the Churches in Brabant Gelderland and Flanders and openly exercised that Religion which till then they had professed in secret nor durst the Estates do any thing in vindication of their own Authority considering what necessary use they might have of them in the present War against Don Iohn and from how great a person they received incouragement But in the midst of this career they received a stop for the Confederates being vanquished by Don Iohn at the battail of Gemblack Brussels and all the Towns of Brabant submitted themselves one after another to the power of the conquerour Philipivil a strong Town of Haynalt Limburg and Dalem with some others not so easily yeilding were either forced by long siege or some violent storming or otherwise surrended upon capitulations During which Sieges and Surrendries the Prince of Orange who had escaped with safety from the battail of Gemblack was busied in establishing his Dominion on the Coast of Holland In which designe he found no opposition but at Amsterdam constant at that time even to miracle both to their old Religion and their old Obedience But being besieged on all sides both by Sea and Land they yeilded on condition of enjoying the free exercise of their former Faith and of the like Freedom from all Garrisons but of Native Citizens But when they had yeilded up the Town they were not onely forced to admit a Garrison but to behold their Churches spoil'd their Priests ejected and such new Teachers thrust upon them as they most abominated But liberty of Religion being first admitted a confused liberty of opinions followed shortly after till in the end that Town became the common Sink of all Sects and Sectaries which hitherto have disturbed the Church and proved the greatest scandal and dishonor of the Reformation 46. Holland had lately been too fruitful of this viperous brood but never more unfortunate then in producing David George of Delfe and Henry Nicholas of Leiden the two great Monsters of that age but the impieties of the first were too gross and horrid to finde any followers the latter was so smoothed over as to gain on many whom the Impostor had seduced The Anabaptists out of Westphalia had found shelter here in the beginning of the Tumults and possibly might contribute both their hearts and hands to the committing of those spoils and outrages before remembred In imitation of whose counterfeit piety and pretended singleness of heart there started up another Sect as dangerous and destructive to humane Society as the former were for by insinuating themselves into the heart of the ignorant multitude under a shew of singular Sanctity and Integrity did afterwards infect their mindes with damnable Heresies openly repugnant to the Christian Faith In ordinary Speech they used new and monstrous kindes of expressions to which the ears of men brought up in the Christian Church had not been accustomed and all men rather wondered at then understood To difference themselves from the rest of mankinde they called their Sect by the name of the Family of Love and laboured to perswade their hearers that those onely were elected unto life Eternal which were by them adopted Children of that Holy Family and that all others were but Reprobates and Damned persons One of their Paradoxes was and a safe one too that it was lawful for them to deny upon oath whatsoever they pleased before any Magistrate or any other whomsoever that was not of the same Family or Society with them Some Books they had in which their dotages were contained and propagated first writ in Dutch and afterwards translated into other Languages as tended most to their advantage that is to say The Gospel of the Kingdom The Lords Sentences The Prophesie of the Spirit of the Lord The publication of peace upon earth by the Author H. N. But who this H. N. was those of the Family could by no fair means be induced or inforced by threatnings to reveal But after it was found to be this Henry Nicholas of Leiden whom before we spake of Who being emulous of the Glories of King Iohn of Leiden that most infamous Botcher had most blasphemously preached unto all his followers that he was partaker of the Divinity of God as God was of his humane nature How afterwards they past over into England and what reception they found there may be told hereafter 50. By giving freedom of Conscience to all Sects and Sectaries and amongst others to these also the Prince of Orange had provided himself of so strong a party in this Province that he was able to maintain a defensive War against all his opposites especially after he had gained the Ports of Brill and Vlushing which opened a fair entrance unto all adventurers out of England and Scotland For on the Rumour of this War the Scots in hope of prey and plunder the English in pursuit of Honour and the use of Arms resorted to the aid of their Belgick Neighbours whose absolute subjugation to the King of Spain was looked on as a thing of dangerous consequence unto either Nation And at the first they went no otherwise then as Voluntiers of their own accord rather connived at then permitted by their several Princes But when the Government was taken into the hands of the States and that the War was ready to break out betwixt them and Don Iohn the Queen of England did not onely furnish them with large sums of money but entred into a League or Confederation by which it was agreed That the Queen should send unto their aid one thousand Horse and five thousand Foot that they should conclude nothing respecting either Peace or War without her consent and approbation that they should not enter into League with any person or persons but with her allowance and she if she thought good to be comprehended in the same that the States should send the like aid unto the Queen if any Prince attempted any act of Hostility against her or her Kingdoms and that they should furnish her with forty Ships of sufficient burthen to serve at her pay under the Lord Admiral of England whensoever she had any necessary occasion to set forth a Navy and finally not to insist upon the rest that if any difference should arise amongst themselves it was to be referred and offered unto her Arbitrament And to this League she was the rather induced to grant her Royal assent because she had been certainly advertised by the Prince of Orange that Don Iohn was then negotiating a marriage with the Queen of Scots that under colour of her Title he might advance himself to the Crown of England And yet she ventured neither men nor money but on very good terms receiving in the way of pawn the greatest part of the rich Jewels and massie Ornaments of Plate which anciently
my purpose to relate It is sufficient that we have presented to the eye of the Reader upon what principles the Netherlands were first embroyled whose hands they were by which the Altars were prophaned the Images defaced Religious Houses rifled and the Churches ruinated And finally by what party and by whose strange practices the King of Spain was totally devested of all those Provinces which since have cast themselves into the form of a Common-wealth 59. Which being thus shortly laid together in respect of their Politicks we must look back and take another view of them in their Ecclesiasticks In which we shall finde them run as cross to all Antiquity as they had done to Order and good Government in their former Actings And the first thing we meet with of a Church-concernment was the publishing of their Confession of their Faith and Doctrine Anno 1565 or thereabouts as many national and provincial Churches had done before but differing in many great points from that of Ausberg and therefore the less acceptable unto the Lutheran party and the more distasteful to the Romish In which Confession to be sure they must hold forth a parity of Ministers in the Church of Christ they had not else come up to the Example and designe of the Mother-City which was to lay all flat and level in the publick Government For in the XXXI Article it is said expresly that for as much as concerns the Ministers of Gods holy Word in what place soever they shall execute that Sacred Calling they are all of them to enjoy the same Power and Authority as being all of them the Ministers of Jesus Christ the onely Universal Bishop and the onely Head of his Body which is the Church And for the Government of the Church it was declared to be most agreeable to that Sacred and Spiritual Polity by God prescribed in his Word that a Consistory or Ecclesiastical Senate should be Ordained in every Church consisting of Pastors Elders and Deacons to whose charge and care it should belong that true Religion be preserved sound Doctrine preached and that all vitious and lewd livers should be restrained and punished by the Churches Censures For turning which Aerian Doctrines into use and practice they did not only animate all Orders and Degrees of men not to admit their new Bishops where they were not setled or to expel them where they were but alienated and dismembred all such Lands and Rents by which they were to be maintained This they conceived the readiest way to make sure work with them for when the maintainance was gone the Calling was not like to hold up long after And this being done as they had first set up their Consistories in Antwerp and such other Cities in which they were considerable for power and number so by degrees they set up their Presbyteries in the lesser Towns which they united into Classes and ranged those Classes into National and Provincial Synods In which they made such Laws and Canons if some of their irregular Constitutions may deserve that name as utterly subverted the whole Frame of the ancient Discipline and drew unto themselves the managery of all Affairs which concerned Religion 60. But that they might not be supposed therein to derogate from the Authority of the Civil Magistrate they are content to give him a coercive power in some matters which were meerly Civil and therefore in plain terms condemn the Anabaptists for seditious persons Enemies to all good Order and publick Government But then they clog him with some Duties in which he was to be subservient to their own designs that is to say the countenancing of the Sacred Ministry removing all Idolatry from the Worship of God the ruinating and destroying of the Kingdom of Antichrist And what they meant by Antichrist Idolatry and the Sacred Ministry is easie to be understood without the help of a Commentary Which Duties if the Magistrate shall discharge with care and diligence he would ease them of much labour which otherwise they meant to take upon themselves if not they must no longer stay his leisure nor expect his pleasure but put their own hands unto the work and so it was delivered for good Doctrine by Snecanus a Divine of West-Friesland for which see lib. 8. num 23. Which though it be the general Doctrine of all the party yet never was it preached more plainly then by Cleselius a Calvinian of Rotterdam who openly maintained that if the Magistrates took no care to reform the Church that then it did belong to the common people And they as he informs us were obliged to do it even by force and violence not onely to the shedding of their own but their Brethrens blood So principled it could be no marvail if they turned out the Bishops to make room for their own Presbyteries defaced all Churches that retained any thing in them of the old Idolatries and finally pulled down even the Civil Magistrate when his advancing did not stand with their ends and purposes Flacius Ilyricus the founder of the Stiff or Rigid Lutherans had led the way unto them in the last particular By whom it was held forth for a Rule in all Church-Reformations that Princes should be rather terrified with the fear of Tumults then any thing which seemed to savour of Idolatry or Superstition should either be tolerated or connived at for quietness-sake Concurring with him as they did in his Doctrines of Predestination Grace Freewil and things indifferent they were the better fitted to pursue his Principles in opposition unto all Authority by which their Councils were controuled or their Power restrained And by this means the publishing of their Confession with these Heads and Articles they did not onely justifie their exorbitancies in the time then past but made provision for themselves in the times to come 61. In such other points of their Confession as were meerly doctrinal and differing from the general current of the Church of Rome they shew themselves for the most part to be Anti-Lutheran that is to say Zuinglians in the point of the Holy Supper and Calvinists in the Doctrine of Predestination In which last point they have exprest the Article in such modest terms as may make it capable of an Orthodox and sober meaning For presupposing all mankinde by the Fall of Adam to be involved by Gods just judgement in the Gulph of Perdition they make them onely to be predestinate to eternal life whom God by his eternal and immutable counsel hath elected in Christ and separated from the rest by the said Election But when the differences were broken out betwixt them and such of their Brethren which commonly past amongst them by the name of Remonstrants and that it was pretended by the said Remonstrants that the Article stood as fair to them as the opposite party the words were then restrained to a narrower sence then the generality of the expression could literally and
Pastimes and that the afternoon was spent in such imployment as was most suitable to the condition of each several man Nor was the morning so devoted to Religious uses but that in some of their good Towns they kept upon that day the ordinary Fairs and Markets Kirk-Masses as they commonly called them which must needs draw away a great part of the people to attend those businesses to which their several Trades and Occupations did most especially oblige them What alterations hapned in the change of times we shall see hereafter 64. Nor was that portion of the day which they were pleased to set apart for Religious Duties observed with much more reverence by those in the Church then it was by others in the Market the head uncovered very seldom and the knee so little used to kneeling as if God had created it for no such purpose And whereas once Tertullian did upbraid the Gentiles for their irreverence in sitting before some of those Gods whom they pretended to adore so might this people be reproached for using the same posture in all acts of Worship but that they do it purposely to avoid all outward signes of Adoration even in the Sacrament of the Supper in which it cannot be denyed but that our Saviour is more eminently present then in any other Divine Ordinance of what name soever they are so fearful of relapsing to their old Idolatries if by that name they may be called that they chuse rather to receive it in any posture sitting or standing yea or walking then reverently upon their knees For so they have ordained it in another Synod mentioned by Daniel Angelocratur in his Epitome Consiliorum By the decrees whereof it was left at liberty to receive that Sacrament standing sitting or walking but by no means kneeling And kneeling was prohibited Ob 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 periculum for fear of falling into a new kinde of Idolatry which was never thought of in the world till they found it out that is to say Bread-worship or the Adoration of Bread it self The Conference at Hampton-Court hath told us somewhat but obscurely of these Ambling-Communions but I never understood them rightly till I saw this Canon For Canon they will have it called though most uncanonical More of the like stuff might be produced from the Acts of their Synods but that this little is too much to inform the Reader how different they are both in their Discipline and Doctrine in point of speculation and matter of practice from that which was most countenanced by the piety of the Primitive times and recommended to them by the constant and uniform tradition of the ages following 65. As is their work such is the wages they received and as the reverence is which they give to Christ in his holy Sacrament such is the honour which is paid them by the common people They had abolished the daily Sacrifice of Praise and Prayer which might have been continued though the Mass was abrogated disclaimed the hearing of Confessions the visitation of the Sick and Sacerdotal Absolution as inconsistent with the purity of their Profession took away all the annual Festivals with their Eves and Vigils and in a word reduced the whole Service of their Ministry to the Sunday-Morning Which hardly taking up the tenth part of time expended formerly by the Priests on Religious Offices they were so conscientious as to rest contented with little more then the tenth part of those yearly profits which by the Priest had been received They had besides so often preached down Tythes as a Iewish maintainance improper and unfit for Ministers of the holy Gospel when they were paid unto the Clergy of the Church of Rome that at the last the people took them at their word believe them to be so indeed and are spurred on the faster to a change of Religion in which they saw some glimmering of a present profit Of these mistakes the Prince of Orange was too wise not to make advantage giving assurance â—o the Land-holders and Country-Villagers that if they stood to him in the Wars against the Spaniard they should from thenceforth pay no Tythes unto their Ministers as before they did The Tythes in the mean time to be brought into the common Treasury toward the charges of the War the Ministers to be maintained by contributions at an easie rate But when the War was come to so fair an issue that they thought to be exempted from the payment of Tythes answer was made that they should pay none to the Ministers as they had done formerly whereby their Ministers in effect were become their Masters but that the Tythes were so considerable a Revenue to the Common-wealth that the State could not possibly subsist without them that therefore they must be content to pay them to the States Commissioners as they had done hitherto and that the State would take due care to maintain a Ministry By means whereof they do not only pay their Tythes as in former times but seeing how much the publick allowance of the State doth come short of a competencie thoughby that name they please to call it they are constrained as it were out of common charity if not compelled thereto by order to contribute over and above with the rest of the people for the improvement and increase of the Ministers maintainance But as they Bake so let them Brew to make good the Proverb And so I leave them for the present till we have traced the Presbyterian practices and positions both in England and Scotlâ—nd but in Scotland first to that point of time to which we have deduced their successes in these Belgick Provinces and then we shall hear further of them as they come in our way The end of the third Book AERIVS REDIVIVVS OR The History Of the PRESBYTERIANS LIB IV. Containing Their beginning Progress and Positions their dangerous Practices Insurrections and Conspiracies in the Realm of Scotland from the year 1544 to the year 1566. 1. CRoss we next over into Scotland where the Genevian Principles were first reduced into use and practice In which respect the Presbyterians of that Realm should have had precedencie in the present story not onâ—ly before any of their Brethren in the Belgick Provinces but even before the French themselves though nearest both in scituation and affection to the Mother-City For though the Emissaries â—f Geneva had long been tampering with that active and unquiet people yet such a strict hand was held upon them both by Francis the First and Henry the Second his Successor that they durst not stir till by the death of those two Kings they found the way more free and open to pursue those counsels which by the industry of those men had been put into them before which time the Scots had acted over all those Tumults Riots and Rebellions in which not long after they were followed by the French and Netherlands But howsoever I have purposely reserved them to this time and
had they stood to that they had been unblameable but finding by the Subscriptions which they had received from all parts of the Kingdom that they were nothing inferiour to their Adversaries in power and number they were not able to hold long in so good an humour Howsoever it was thought expedient for the avoiding of Scandal that they should first proceed in the way of supplication to the Queen and Council in which it was desired that it might be lawful for them to meet publickly or privately for having the Common-prayers in the vulgar tongue that the Sacrament of Baptism might be administred in the same Tongue also the Sacrament of the Lords Supper in both kindes according to Christs Institution and that a Reformation might be made of the wicked lives of Prelates Priests and other Ecclesiastical persons The Queen of Scots was in the mean time Married to the Daulphin of France upon whose head it was desired by the French that at the least the Matrimonial Crown should be solemnly placed and that all the French Nation should forthwith be naturalized in the Realm of Scotland For the better effecting whereof in the following Parliament the Queen Regent thought it no ill peece of State-craft so far to gratifie the Petitioners in their desires as to license them to meet in publick or private for the exercise of their own Religion so that it were not in the City of Edenborough or the Port of Leith for fear some Tumult or Sedition might ensue upon it But not content with this Indulgence they were resolved to move the Parliament for an Abrogation of all former Laws made against Sects and Heresies by which they might incur the loss of Life Land or Liberty and that none of their profession should be condemned for Heresie unless they were first convinced by the Word of God to have erred from the Faith which the holy Spirit witnesseth to be necessary to mans Salvation 11. But hereunto they could not get the Queens consent And thereupon they caused a Protestation to be drawn and openly pronounced in the face of the Parliament in which it was declared amongst other things that neither they nor any other of the Godly who pleased to joyn with them in the true Faith grounded upon the Word of God should incur any danger of Life or Lands or other particular pains for not observing such acts as have passed heretofore in favour of their Adversaries or for violating such Rites as have been invented by man without the Commandment of God that if any Tumult or Uproar should happen to arise in the Realm or that any violence should be used in reforming of such things as were amiss in the state of the Church the blame should not be laid on them who had desired that all things might be rectified by publick Order And finally that they pretended to no other end but onely for the reforming of such abuses as were found in Religion and therefore that they might no otherwise be thought of then as faithful and obedient Subjects to Supreme Authority And now the Scheme begins to open the Town of Perth by some called St. Iohnstone declared in favour of the Lords of the Congregation which name they had took unto themselves the news whereof was so unpleasing to the Queen that she commanded the Lord Ruthuen a man of principal Authority in the parts adjoyning to take some order for suppressing those Innovations in Religion which some busie people of that Town had introduced To which he answered That he was able if she pleased to force their bodies and to seize their goods but that he had no power to compel their Consciences which answer did not more displease the Queen then it encouraged those of the Congregation who now from all parts flocked to Perth as a Town strong by scituation well fortified and standing in a fruitful Country from whence they might receive all necessaries if any open force or violence should be used against them 12. Knox in the mean time had retreated to his charge at Geneva not thinking fit to tempt that danger by an unseasonable return which he had so narrowly escaped at his being there He onely waited opportunity to go back with safety and would not stir though frequently sollicited by his Friends in Scotland In so much that means was made to Calvin by especial Letters to re-ingage him in the Cause Which Letters were brought to him in the Month of November Anno 1558. And that it may appear what influence Calvin had upon all the counsels and designes of the Congregation he is advertised from time to time of their successes of the estate of their Affairs whether good or bad in so much that when the Queen Regent had fed them with some flattering hopes Calvin is forthwith made acquainted with their happiness in it And who but he must be desired to write unto her that by his Grave counsel and exhortation she might be animated to go forward constantly in promoting the Gospel But though these Letters came to Calvin in the Month of November yet we finde not Knox in Scotland till the May next following when those of his party had possessed themselves of the Town of Perth though he loved Calvin well and the Gospel better yet all that a man hath he will give for his life and Knox was dearer to himself then either of them But unto Perth he comes at last on the fifth of May. In the chief Church whereof he preached such a thundring Sermon against the Adoration of Images and the advancing of them in places of Gods publick Worship as suddenly beat down all the Images and Religious Houses within the Precincts of that Town For presently after the end of the Sermon when almost all the rest of the people were gone home to dinner some few which remained in the Church pullâ—d down a glorious Tabernacle which stood on the Altar broke it in pieces and defaced the Images which they found therein Which being dispatched they did the like execution on all the rest in that Church and were so nimble at their work that they had made a clear riddance of them before the tenth man in the Town was advertised of it The news hereof causeth the Rascal Multitude so my Author calls them to resort in great numbers to the Church But because they found that all was done before they came they fell with great fury on the Monastery of Carthusian Monks and the Houses of the Preaching and Franciscan Fryars beginning wiâ—h the Images first but after spoyling them of all their provisions Bedding and Furniture of Houshold which was given for a prey unto the poor And in the ruinating of these Houses they continued with much force and eagerness so that within the compass of two days they had left nothing standing of those goodly Edifices but the outward Walls 13. It was reported that the Queen was so inraged when she heard the news that she vowed
That the Iews dealt not so with any of their Princes and that there was no example to be found in Scripture to shew that subjects may so use their Governours as is there pretended To all these he returns his particular answers and in this sort he answereth to them that is to say That there is nothing more dangerous to be followed then a common custom That the example is but singular and concludeth nothing That as God placed Tyrants to punish the people so he appoints private men to kill them That the Kings of the Iews were not elected by the people and therefore might not deal with them as they might in Scotland where Kings depend wholly on the peoples Election And finally that there were sundry good and wholesome Laws in divers Countries of which there is no example in holy Scripture And whereas others had objected That by St. Pauls Doctrine we are bound to pray for Kings and Princes The Argument is evaded by this handsome shift That we are bound to pray for those whom we ought to punish But these are onely velitations certain preparatory skirmishes to the grand encounter the main battail followeth For finally the principal objection is That St. Paul hath commanded every soul to be subject to the higher Powers and that St. Peter hath required us to submit our selves to every Ordinance of man whether it be unto the King as to the Supreme or unto such as be in Authority by and under him And hereunto they frame their Answer in such a manner as if they knew Gods minde better then the Apostles did or that of the Apostles better then they did themselves 11. The answer is that the Apostles writ this in the Churches infancy when there were not many Christians few of them rich and of ability to make resistance As if said he a man should write to such Christians as are under the Turk in substance poor in courage feeble in strength unarmed in number few and generally subject unto to all kinde of injuries would he not write as the Apostles did who did respect the men they writ to their words not being to be extended to the body or people of the Common wealth For imagine saith he that either of the Apostles were now alive and lived where both the Kings and people did profess Christianity and that there were such Kings as would have their wills to stand for laws as cared neither for God nor Man as bestowed the Churches Revenues upon Iesters and Rascals and such as gibed at those who did profess the more sincere Religion what would they write of such to the Church Surely except they would dissent from themselves they would say That they accounted no such for Magistrates they would forbid all men from speaking unto them and from keeping their company they would leave them to their subjects to be punished nor would they blame them if they accounted not such men for their Kings with whom they could have no society by the Laws of God So excellent a proficient did this man shew himself in the Schools of Calvin that he might worthily have challenged the place of Divinity-Reader in Geneva it self 12. To put these Principles into practice a Bond is made at Stirling by some of the chief Lords of the Congregation pretended for the preservation of the Infant-Prince but aiming also at the punishment of Bothwel and the rest of the Murtherers The first that entred into this Combination were the Earls of Athol Arguile Morton Marre and Glencarne with the Lords Lindsay and Boyd to which were added not long after the Lords Hume and Ruthen this Ruthen being the Son of him who had acted in the Murther of David Risio together with the Lairds of Drumlanrig Tulibardin Seffourd and Grange men of great power and influence on their several Countries besides many others of good note The Earl Murray having laid the plot obtained the Queens leave to retire into France till the times were quieter committing to the Queen the Government of his whole Estate that so if his designe miscarried as it possibly might he might come off without the least hazard of estate or honour Of this conspiracie the Queen receives advertisement and presently prepares for Arms under pretence of rectifying some abuses about the Borders The Confederates were not much behind and having got together a considerable power made an attempt on Borthwick Castle where the Queen and Bothwel then remained But not being strong enough to carry the place at the first attempt Bothwel escaped unto Dunbar whom the Queen followed shortly after in mans apparel Missing their prey the Confederates march toward Edenborough with their little army and make themselves Masters of the Town But understanding that the Queens Forces were upon their march they betook themselves unto the field gained the advantage of the ground and thereby gave her such a diffidence of her good success that having entertained them with a long parley till Bothwel was gone off in safety she put her self into their hands without striking a blow 13. With this great prey the Confederates returned to Edenborough in the middle of Iune and the next day order her to be sent as Prisoner to Lâ—chlevin-house under the conduct of the Lords Ruthen and Lindsay by whom she was delivered in a very plain and sorry attire to the custody of Murray's Mother who domineered over the unfortunate Lady with contempt enough The next day after her commitment the Earl of Glencarne passeth to the Chappel in Halyrood house where he defaceth all the Vestments breaks down the Altar and destroys the Images For which though he was highly magnified by Knox and the rest of the Preachers yet many of the chief Confederates were offended at it as being done without their consent when a great storm was gathering towards them by the conjunction of some other of the principal Lords on the Queens behalf To reconcile this party to them and prevent the Rupture Knox with some other of their Preachers are dispatched away with Letters of Credence and instructions for attoning the difference But they effected nothing to the benefit of them that sent them and not much neither to their own though they had some concernments of self-interest besides the publick which they made tender of to their considerations A general Assembly at the same time was held in Edenborough with which upon the coming back of these Commissioners it was thought necessary to ingratiate themselves by all means imaginable And thereupon it was agreed that the Acts of Parliament made in the year 1560 for the suppressing of Popery should be confirmed in the next Parliament then following that the assignation of the Shires for the Ministers maintainance should be duly put in execution till the whole Patrimony of the Church might be invested in them in due form of Law which was conditioned to be done if it could not be done sooner in that Parliament also Some other points of huge
men Calvin then dead and Theodore Beza then alive in the point of Church-Government After which premises he fell upon this conclusion That none ought to bear any Office in the Church of Christ whose titles were not found in the holy Scripture That though the name of Bishop did occur in Scripture yet was it not to be taken in that sence in which it was commonly understood That no Superiority was allowed by Christ amongst the Ministers of the Church all of them being of the same degree and having the same power in all Sacred Matters That the corruptions crept into the Estate of Bishops were so great and many that if they should not be removed Religion would not long remain in Purity And so referred the whole matter to their consideration 31. The Game being thus started and pursued by so good a Huntsman it was thought fit by the Assembly to commend the chase thereof to six chosen Members who were to make report of their diligence to the rest of the Brethren Of which though Melvin took a care to be named for one and made use of all his wit and cunning to bring the rest of the Referrees to his own opinion yet he prevailed no further at that time then under colour of a mannerly declining of the point in hand to lay some further restrictions upon the Bishops in the exercise of their Power and Jurisdictions then had been formerly imposed The sum of their report was to this effect Viz. That they did not hold it expedient to answer the Questions propounded for the present but if any Bishop was chosen that had not qualities required by the Word of God he should be tryed by the General Assembly That they judged the name of a Bishop to be common to all Ministers who had the charge of a particular flock and that by the Word of God his chief function consisted in the Preaching of the Word the Ministration of the Sacraments and the exercise of Ecclesiastical Discipline with the consent of the Elders That from amongst the Ministry some one might be chosen to oversee and visit such reasonable bounds besides his own flock as the General Assembly should appoint That the Minister so elected might in those bounds appoint Preachers with the advice of the Ministers of that Province and the consent of the flock which should be admitted and that he might suspend Ministers from the exercise of their Office upon reasonable causes with the consent of the Ministers of the bounds This was the sum of the Report and that thus much might be reported to begin the game with great care was took by Melvin and his Adherents that neither any of the Bishops nor Superintendents which were then present in the Assembly being eight in number were either nominated to debate the points proposed nor called to be present at the Conference But somewhat further must be done now their hand was in And therefore that the rest might see what they were to trust to if this world went on they deposed Iames Patton Bishop of Dunkelden from his place and dignity without consulting the Lord-Regent or any of the secret Council in so great a business 32. The next Assembly makes some alteration in propounding the question and gives it out with a particular reference to their own concernment in this manner following that is to say Whether the Bishops as they were in Scotland had their Function warranted by the Word of God But the determining of this question was declined as formerly Onely it was conceived expedient for a further preparative both to approve the opinions of the Referrees in the former Meeting and to add this now unto the rest That the Bishops should take to themselves the service of some one Church within their Diocess and nominate the particular flock whereof they would accept the charge News of which last addition being brought to the Regent he required by a special Message either to stand to the Conclusions before mentioned which were made at Leith or else devise some other Form of Church-Government which they would abide And this fell out as Melvin and his Tribe would have it For after this there was nothing done in the Assemblies for two years together but hammering forming and reforming a new Book of Discipline to be a standing Rule for ever to the Kirk of Scotland But possible it is that the design might have been brought to perfection sooner if the Regent had not thought himself affronted by them in the person of his Chaplain Mr. Patrick Adamson whom he had recommended to the See of S. Andrews For the Election being purposely delayed by the Dean and Chapter till the sitting of the next Assembly Adamson then present was interrogated whether he would submit himself unto the tryal and undertake that Office upon such conditions as the Assembly should prescribe To which he answered That he was commanded by the Regent not to accept thereof upon any other terms then such as had been formerly agreed upon between the Commissioners of the Kirk and the Lords of the Council On this refusal they inhibit the Chapter from proceeding in the said Election though afterwards for fear of the displeasure of so great a man their command therein was disobeyed and the party chosen Which so provoked those meek and humble-spirited men that at their next Meeting they discharged him from the exercise of all Jurisdiction till by some General Assembly he were lawfully licensed And this did so exasperate the Regent on the other side that he resolved to hinder them from making any further Innovation in the Churches Polity as long as he continued in his place and power 33. But the Regent having somewhat imprudently dismissed himself of the Government and put it into the hands of the King in the beginning of March An. 1577 they then conceived they had as good an opportunity as could be desired to advance their Discipline which had been hammering ever since in the Forge of their Fancies And when it hapned as it was not long before it did they usher in the Design with this following Preamble viz. The General Assembly of the Kirk finding universal corruption of the whole Estates of the body of this Realm the great coldness and slackness in Religion in the greatest part of the Professors of the same with the daily increase of all kind of fearful sins and enormities as Incests Adulteries Murthers committed in Edenborough and Stirling cursed Sacriledge ungodly Sedition and Division within the bowels of the Realm with all manner of disordered and ungodly living which justly hath provoked our God although long-suffering and patient to stretch out his arm in his anger to correct and visit the iniquity of the Land and namely by the present penury famine and hunger joyned with the Civil and Intestine Seditions Whereunto doubtless greater judgements must succeed if these his corrections work on Reformation and amendment in mens hearts Seeing also the bloody exclusions of
the cruel counsels of that Roman Beast tending to extermine and rase from the face of all Europe the true light of the blessed Word of Salvation For these causes and that God of his mercy would bless the Kings Highness and his Regiment and make him to have a happy and prosperous Government as also to put in his Highness heart and in the hearts of his Noble Estates of Parliament not onely to make and establish good politick Laws for the Weal and good Government of the Realm but also to set and establish such a Polity and Discipline in the Kirk as is craved in the Word of God and is contained and penned already to be presented to his Highness and Council that in the one and in the other God may have his due praise and the age to come an example of upright and Godly dealing Which Act of the Assembly pass'd on the 24 of April 1578. 34. The Discipline must be of most excellent use which could afford a present remedy to so many mischiefs and yet as excellent as it was it could obtain no Ratification at that time of the King or Parliament which therefore they resolve to put in practise by the strength of their party without insisting any further on the leave of either In which respect it will not be unnecessary to take a brief view of such particulars in which they differ from the Ancient Government of the Church of Christ or the Government of the Church of England then by Law established or finally from the former Book of Discipline which themselves had justified Now by this Book it is declared That none that bear Office in the Church of Christ ought to have Dominion over it or be called Lords That the Civil Magistrates are so far from having any power to Preach administer the Sacraments or execute the Censures of the Church that they ought not to prescribe any Rule how it should be done and that as Ministers are subject to the judgement and punishment of Magistrates in External things if they offend so ought the Magistrates submit themselves to the Discipline of the Church if they transgress in matter of Conscience and Religion That the Ministers of the Church ought to govern the same by mutual consent of Brethren and equality of power according to their several Functions That there are onely four ordinary Office bearers in the Church that is to say The Pastor Minister or Bishop the Doctor the Elder and the Deacon and that no more ought to be received in the Word of God and therefore that all ambitious Titles invented in the Kingdom of Antichrist and his usurped Hierarchy which are not of these four sorts-together with the Offices depending thereupon that is to say Archbishops Patriarchs Chancellours Deans Archdeacons c. ought in one word to be rejected That all which bear Office in the Church are to be elected by the Eldership and consent of the Congregation to whom the person presented is appointed and no otherwise That the Ordination of the person so elected is to be performed with Fasting Prayer and the Imposition of the hands of the Eldership Remember that Imposition of hands was totally rejected in the former Book That all Office-bearers in the Church should have their own particular flocks amongst whom they ought to exercise their charge and keep their residence 35. But more particularly it declares That it is the Office of the Pastor Bishop or Minister to preach the Word of God and to administer the Sacraments in that particular Congregation unto which he is called and it belongs unto them after lawful proceeding of the Eldership to pronounce the sentence of binding and loosing as also to solemnize Marriage between persons contracted being by the said Eldership thereunto required That it is the Office of the Doctor simply to open the mind of the Spirit of God in the Scriptures without making any such application as the Minister useth and that this Doctor being an Elder ought to assist the Pastor in the Government of the Church by reason that the Interpretation of the Word which is the onely Iudge in Ecclesiastical matters is to him committed That it is the Office of the Elder that is to say The Lay-Elder for so they mean both privately and publickly to watch with all diligence over the flock committed to them that no corruptions of Religion or manners grow amongst them as also to assist the Pastor or Minister in examining those that come to the Lords Table in visiting the sick in admonishing all men of their duties according to the Rule of the Word and in holding Assemblies with the Pastors and Doctors for establishing good order in the Church the Acts whereof he is to put in execution That it is the Office of the Deacon to collect and distribute the goods of the Church at the appointment of the Elders amongst which he is to have no voyce in the common Consistory contrary to the Rules of the former Book That all Ecclesiastical Assemblies have a power lawfully to convene together for that effect That it is in the power of the Eldership to appoint Visitors for their Churches within their bounds and that this power belongs not to any single person be he Bishop or otherwise That every three four or more Parishes may have an Eldership to themselves but so that the Elders be chosen out of each in a fit proportion That it is the Office of these Elderships to enquire of naughty and unruly Members and to bring them into the way again either by Admonition and threatning of Gods Iudgements or by Correction even to the very Censure of Excommunication as also to admonish censure and if the case require to depose their Pastor if he be found guilty of any of those grievous crimes among which Dancing goes for one which belongs to their cognizance The Errors committed by the Eldership to be corrected by Provincial Assemblies and those in the Provincials by the General The maintainance and assisting of which Discipline and the inflicting of Civil punishments upon such as do not obey the same without confounding one Iurisdiction with another is made to be the chief Office of Kings and Princes And that this Discipline might be executed without interruption it was required that the Name and Office of Bishops as it then was and had been formerly exercised in the Church of Scotland as also the Names and Offices of Commendators Abbots Priors Deans Deans and Chapters Chancellors Archdeacons c. should from thenceforth be utterly abolished and of no effect Which points and all the rest therein contained being granted to them all right of Patronages destroyed that popular Elections may proceed in all their Churches and finally the whole Patrimony of the Church in Lands Tythes or Houses permitted to the distribution of the Deacons in every Eldership they then conceive that such a right Reformation may be made as God requires 36. This Book of Discipline being presented to
ground whereof they alledged amongst other things not onely the oppression of the Church in general but the danger wherein the Kings Person stood by a company of wicked men who laboured to corrupt him in Religion as well as manners 52. But no man laid more hastily about him or came better off then Walter Belcanqual another Preacher of that City Who in a Sermon by him preached used some words to this purpose That within this four years Popery had entred into the Countrey and Court and was maintained in the Kings Hall by the Tyranny of a great Champion who was called Grace which Adjunct they gave ordinarily to their Dukes in Scotland but that if his Grace continued in opposing himself to God and his Word he should come to little Grace in the end The King at the first hearing of it gives order to the General Assembly to proceed therein Which being signified to Belcanqual he is said to have given thanks to God for these two things first For that he was not accused for any thing done against his Majestie and the Laws But principally because he perceived the Church had obtained some Victory And for the last he gave this reason That for some quarrel taken at a former Sermon the Council had took upon them to be Iudges of a Ministers Doctrine but now that he was ordered to appear before the Assembly he would most joyfully submit his Doctrine to a publick Tryal But those of the Assembly sending word to the King that they could not warrantably proceed against him without the business were prosecuted by some Accuser and made good by witnesses the King was forced for fear of drawing any of his Servants into their displeasures to let fall the cause But Belcanqual would not so give over The Kings desisting from the prosecution would not serve his turn unless he were absolved also by the whole Assembly who had been present at the Sermon This was conceived to be most reasonable and just for having put it to the vote his Doctrine was declared to be â—ound and Orthodox and that he had delivered nothing which might give just offence unto any person The King begins to see by these particulars what he is to trust to But they will presently find out another expedient as well for tryal of their own power as his utmost patience 52. A corrupt Contract had been made betwixt Montgomery before mentioned and the Duke of Lenox by which it was agreed That Montgomery should be advanced by the Dukes Intercession to the Archbishoprick of Glasgow and that Montgomery in requital of so great a favour should grant unto the Duke and his Heirs for ever the whole Estate and Rents of the said Archbishoprick upon the yearly payments of One thousand pound Scotch with some Horse Corn and Poultry No sooner had the Kirk notice of this Transaction but without taking notice of so base a Contract they censured him for taking on him the Episcopal Function The King resolves to justifie him in the Acceptation unless they could be able to charge him with unfoundess of Doctrine or corruption of manners Hereupon certain Articles are preferred against him and amongst others it was charged that he had said The Discipline was a thing indifferent and might stand the one way or the other That to prove the lawfulness of Bishops in the Church he had used the Examples of Ambrose and Augustine That at another time he called the Discipline and the lawful Calling of the Church the triefls of Policy That he said the Ministers were captious and men of curious brains That he charged them with sedition and warned them not to meddle in the disposing of Crowns and that if they did they should be reproved That he accused them of Pasquils Lying Backbiting c. And finally he denyed that any mention of Presbytery or Eldership was made in any part of the New Testament For which and other Errours of like nature in point of Doctrine though none of them sufficiently proved when it came to tryal it was resolved by the Assembly that he should stand to his Ministry in the Church of Stirling and meddle no further with the Bishoprick under the pain of Excommunication But not content with ordering him to give off the Bishoprick they suspend him on another quarrel from the use of his Ministry To neither of which sentences when he would submit as being supported by the King on one side and the Duke on the other they cited him to appear before the Synod of Lothian to hear the sentence of Excommunication pronounced against him This moved the King to interpose his Royal Authority to warn the Synod to appear before him at the Court at Stirling and in the mean time to desist from all further Process Pont and some others make appearance in the name of the rest but withal make this protestation That though they had appeared to testifie their obedience to his Majesties warrant yet they did not acknowledge the King and Council to be competent Iudges in that matter and therefore that nothing done at that time should either prejudge the Liberties of the Church or the Laws of the Realm Which Protestation notwithstanding they were inhibited by the Council from using any further proceedings against the man and so departed for the present 54. But the next general Assembly would not leave him so but prosecute him with more heat then ever formerly and were upon the point of passing their judgement on him when they were required by a Letter missive from the King not to trouble him for any matter about the Bishoprick or any other cause preceding in regard the King resolved to have the business heard before himself But Melvin hereupon replyed That they did not meddle with any thing belonging to the Civil Power and that for matters Ecclesiastical they had Authority enough to proceed against him as being a Member of their Body The Master of the Requests who had brought the Letter perceiving by these words that they meant to proceed in it as they had begun commanded a Messenger at Arms whom he had brought along with him to charge them to desist upon pain of Rebellion This moves them as little as the Letter and he is summoned peremptorily to appear next morning that he might receive his sentence Next morning he appears by his Procurator and puts up an appeal from them to the King and Council the rather in regard that one who was his principal Accuser in the last Assembly was now to sit amongst his Judges But neither the Appeal it self nor the Equity of it could so far prevail as to hinder them from passing presently to the Sentence by which upon the specification and recital of his several crimes he was ordained to be deprived and cast out of the Church And now the courage of the man begins to fail him He requires a present Conference with some of the Brethren submits himself to the Decrees of the Assembly
his last Book against Learned Whitgift That the want of the Elderships is the cause of all evil and that it is not to be hoped that any Commonwealth can flourish without it but also that it is no small part of the Gospel yea the substance of it 9. And if it proved to be a part of our Saviours Gospel what could the brethren do less then pretend some Miracles for Confirmation of the same and to what Miracles could they pretend with more shew of Sanctity and manifestation of the Spirit then to the casting out of Devils Cambden inform us in this year that the credulity of some London-Ministers had been abused by a young Wench who was pretended at that time to be possessed of the Devil But I rather think that the London-Ministers were confederate with this Wench then abused by her considering the subsequent practice in that kinde of casting out Devils by the Puritan Preachers to gain the greater credit to their Cause for in this very year they practised the casting of a Devil out of one Mildred the base Daughter of Alice Norrington of Westwell in Kent Which for all the godly pretences made by Roger Newman and Iohn Brainford two of the Ministers of that County who were parties to it was at the last confessed to be but a false imposture Dr. Harsnet who afterward dyed Archbishop of York informs us also in his Book against Darrel that there were at this time two Wenches in London that is to say Agnes Bridges and Rachel Pinder who publickly were given out to be so possessed and it is possible that one of them may be she whom Cambden speaks of Under which head may be also ranged the dispossessing of one Margaret Gooper at Ditchet in the County of Sommerset about ten years after 1584. But all inferiour to the Pranks which were played by Darrel with whom none of the Puritan Exorcists is to hold comparison of which we are to speak hereafter in its proper place The Papists have been frequently and justly blamed for their impostures in this thing and no terms are thought vile enough to express their falshoods But they were onely pious frauds in the Presbyterians because conducing to such godly and religious ends in the advancing of the Scepter and Throne of Christ by the holy Discipline And it is strange that none of all their Zealots have endeavoured to defend them in it as well as Cartwright laboureth to excuse their unlawful meetings from the name of Conventicles that being as he tells us too light a word to express the Gravity and Piety of those Assemblies in which Sacraments are Administred and the Gospel Preached If so all other Sectaries whatsoever may excuse themselves from the holding of Conventicles or being obnoxious to any penal Laws and Sanctions upon that account because they hold their Factious and Schismatical Meetings for the self-same ends And then the Queen must be condemned for executing some severity on a Knot of Anâ—baptists whom she found holding the like lawless Meetings in the year next following 10. For so it was that many of those Forreigners which resorted hither from the Belgick Provinces and were incorporated into a distinct Society or Congregation differing both in Government and Forms of Worship from the Church of England did by degrees withdraw themselves from her Communion and held their Conventicles a part from the rest of that body Of these some openly declared themselves for the Sect of the Anabaptists others would needs be Members of the Family of Henry Nicholas who had been once a Member of the Dutch Church under Iohn â—lasco called commonly the Family of Love Of which we have spoken in the History of the Belgick troubles Lib. 3. Numb 46. And not content to entertain those new Opinions and devices amongst themselves they must draw in the English also to participate with them who having deviated from the paths of the Church were like enough to fall into any other and to pursue those crooked ways in which the cunning Hereticks of those times did and had gone before them But such a diligent eye was had upon all their practices that they were crossed in the beginning For upon Easter-day about nine in the Morning was disclosed a Conventicle of these Anabaptists Dutch-men at an House without the Bars of Aldgate whereof twenty seven were taken and sent to prison and four of them bearing Fagots at St. Pauls Cross recanted in form following viz. Whereas I N N being seduced by the spirit of Error and by false Teachers his Ministers have fallen into many damnable and detestable Heresies viz. 1. That Christ took not flesh of the substance of the Blessed Virgin Mary 2. That Infants horn of faithful Parents ought to be Rebaptized 3. That no Christian man ought to be a Magistrate or bear the Sword or Office of Authority 4. And that it is not lawful for a Christian man to take an Oath Now by the Grace of God and through Conference with good and Learned Ministers of Christ his Church I do understand and acknowledge the same to be most damnable and detestable Heresies and do ask God here before his Church mercy for my said former Errors and do forsake them recant and renounce them and abjure them from the very bottom of my heart And further I confess that the whole Doctrine and Religion established in this Realm of England as also that which is received and practised in the Dutch Church here in this City is sound true and acording to the Word of God whereunto in all things I submit my self and will most gladly be a Member of the said Dutch Church from henceforth utterly abandoning and forsaking all and every Anabaptistical Error 11. This gave a stop to many of them at their first setting out But some there were who neither would be terrified with the fear of punishment or edified by the Retractation which those four had made continued in their former courses with great pertinacity insomuch that on the 21 of May being Whitson-Eve no fewer then eleven of that Sect all Dutch that is to say one man and ten Women were condemned in the Consistory at St. Pauls to be burned in Smithfield And though great pains was taken to reclaim them from those wicked Errors yet such was their obstinacie and perversness that one Woman onely was converted The râ—st had so much mercy shewed them as to be banished the Realm without further punishment which gave the greater resolution to the rest of their company to be more practical then before in promoting their Heresies Which put the State upon a just necessity of proceeding more severely against some of them then by Bonds and banishments Two of the same Nation and Opinions being burnt in Smithfield on the second of Iuly where they dyed with very great horror exprest by many roarings and cryings but without any signe or shew of true Repentance Before the executing of which sentence Iohn Fox the
Free Exercise of Gods true Religion and his promoting of his Gospel 17. These Premises being laid together he comes at last to this conclusion as to assure her in plain terms but with all humility That he could not with a safe Conscience and without the offence of the Majesty of God give his assent to the suppressing of the said Exercises much less send out any Injunction for the utter and universal subversion of the same that he might say with the Apostle That he had no power to destroy but onely to edifie that he could do nothing against the Truth but for it And therefore finally that if it were her Majesties pleasure for this or any other cause to remove him out of his place he would with all humility yeild thereunto and render again unto her Majesty that which he had received from her For to what purpose as he said should he endeavour to retain a Bishoprick or to gain the world with the loss and hazard of his Soul considering that he which doth offend against his Conscience doth but digg out his own way to Hell In which respect he humbly desires her to bear with him if he rather chuse to offend her earthly Majesty then the Heavenly Majesty of Almighty God But not content with such an absolute refusal and setting her at such a distance from Almighty God he takes upon him to advise her to discharge her self of the concernments of the Church or not to manage it at the least with so high a hand as she had done hitherto Fitter it was as he conceived it That all Ecclesiastical matters which concerned Religion the Doctrine and Discipline of the Church should be referred unto the Bishops and the Divines of this Realm according to the example of all Christian Emperours and the godly Princes of all ages in the times before her And this he further pressed upon her by her own Example in not deciding any questions about the Laws of the Realm in her Court or Palace but sending them to be determined by her Judges in the Courts of Westminster and therefore by the self-same Reason when any question did arise about the Discipline and Doctrine of the Church within her Dominions the ordinary way must be to refer the same to the Decision of the Bishops and other chief Ministers of the Church in Synodicall Meetings and not to determine of them in the Court by the Lords of her Council 18. But notwithstanding his refusal to conform to her will and pleasure on the one side and this harsh Counsel on the other which must needs be unwelcome to a Prince that loved and understood her own Authority so well as his Mistress did he might have kept his Bishoprick with her Majesties favour which he appeared so willing to resign unto her He might I say have kept them both having so many great Friends about the Queen who appâ—oved his doings if a breach had not happened about this time betwixt him and Leicester the mighty Patron and Protector of the Puritan Faction occasion'd by his denying at the Earls request to alienate his goodly House and Mannor of Lambeth that it might serve for a retiring place to that mighty favourite And hereunto he did contribute further as was said by others for refusing to grant a Dispensation to marry one which was too near of kindred to him clearly within the Compass of those degrees which seemed to him to be prohibited by the Word of God This Leicester thought he might command and was exceedingly vexed not to finde obedience in one who had been raised by him and depended on him Upon which ground all passages which bâ—fore were shut against his Enemies were now left free and open for them and the Queens ears are open to their informations as the passages were unto her person By them she comes to understand what a neglect there was of the publick Liturgy in most parts of the Kingdom what ruine and decay of Churches what innovations made already and what more projected by which she would be eased in time of all cares of Government and finde the same to be transferred to the Puritan Consistories She was told also of the general disuse of all weekly Fasts and those which annually were required by the Laws of the Realm and that instead thereof the Brethren had took upon them according to the Arrian Doctrine to appoint solemn and occasional Fasts in several places as at Leicester Coventry c. in defiance of the Laws and her own Prerogative Touching which last she gave another hot Alarm to Archbishop Grindal who in a long Letter did excuse the matter as not being done by his allowance or consent though it could not be denyed but that it had been done by his connivance which came all to one so that the Accusation being strong his Defences weak and no Friend left about the Queen who durst mediate for him for who durst favour him on whom Leicester frowned the Archi-Episcopal Jurisdiction was sequestred from him conferred upon four Suffragans of the Province of Canterbury and he himself confined to one of his Country-houses till the Queens â—â—rther pleasure should be signified to him Which Sequestration must needs happen before the beginning of the Convocation which was held this year the Pesidency whereof was then devolved on the Bishop of London by reason of Grindals incapacity to perform that Service 19. For on the sixteenth day of Ianuary it pleased the Queen to call a Parliament to be held at Westminster in which some things occurred of great importance in order to the Presbyterian History which we have in hand The Puritans following the Arrians in that particular as in many others had openly decryed all set and determinate Fasts but then ascribed more merit unto those of their own appointing then any Papists do to those of the Popes Ordaining They had also much took off the edge of the people from the Common-prayer-book but â—â—st especially from the Litany none of the meanest Pieces in it which â—ill that time was read accustomably in the House of Commons before the Members setled upon any business But in the beginning of this Parliament it was moved by one Paul Wentworth in the House of Commons that there might be a Sermon every Morning before they sate and that they would nominate some day for a solemn Fast. How the first motion sped I have nowhere found but may conclude by the event that it came to nothing because I never heard that any thing was done in puisance of it till the late Long Parliament where the like Toy was taken up for having Sermons every Morning in the Abbey-Church But that about the Fast being made when more then half the Members were not present at it was carried in the Affirmative by fifteen voices And thereupon it was ordered as the Journal tâ—llâ—â—h us That as many of the House as conveniently could should on the Sundâ—y fortnight following assemble and meet
their Bishop to whom the planting of so many Dutch Churches in the principal City and other of the chief Towns of his Diocess had given trouble enough To the Petition of the Kentish Ministers which concerned himself he was required to answer at the Council-Table on the Sunday following Instead whereof he lays before them in the Letter That the Petitioners for the most part were ignorant and raw young men few of them licensed Preachers and generally disaffected to the present Government That he had spent the best part of two or three days in labouring to reduce them to a better understanding of the points in question but not being able to prevail he had no otherwise proceeded then the Law required That it was not for him to sit in that place if every Curate in his Diocess might be permitted so to use him nor possible for him to perform the Duty which the Queen expected at his hands if he might not proceed to the execution of that power by her Majesty committed to him without interruption That he could not be perswaded that their Lordships had any purpose to make him a party or to require him to come before them to defend those actions wherein he supposed that he had no other Iudge but the Queen her self and therefore in regard that he was called by God to that place and function wherein he was to be their Pastor he was the rather moved to desire their assistance in matters pertaining to his Office for the quietness of the Church the credit of Religion and the maintainance of the Laws in defence thereof without expecting any such attendance on them as they had required for fear of giving more advantage to those wayward persons then he conceived they did intend And thereunto he added this protestation That the three Articles whereunto they were moved to subscribe were such as he was ready by Learning to defend in manner and form as there set down against all opponents either in England or elsewhere 39. In reference to the paper of the Suffolk Ministers he returns this answer It seemeth something strange to me that the Ministers of Suffolk finding themselves agrieved with the doings of their Diocesans should leave the ordinary course of proceeding by the Law which is to appeal unto me and extraordinarily trouble your Lordships in a matter not so incident as I think to that honourable Board seeing it hath pleased her Majesty her own self in express words to commit these causes Ecclesiastical to me as to one who is to make answer unto God and her Majesty in this behalf my Office also and place requiring the same In answer unto their complaint touching their ordinary proceedings with them I have herewith sent your Lordships a Copy of a Letter lately received from his Lordship wherein I think that part of their Bill to be fully answered Touching the rest I know not what to judge of it but in some points it talketh as I think modestly and charitably They say they are no Iesuits sent from Rome to reconcile c. True it is neither are they charged to be so but notwithstanding they are contentious in the Church of England and by their contentions minister occasion of offence to those which are seduced by Jesuits and give the Sacraments against the form of publick Prayer used in this Church and by Law established and thereby increase the number of them and confirm them in their wilfulness They also make a Schism in the Church and draw many other of her Majesties Subjects to a misliking of her Laws and Government in Causes Ecclesiastical So far are they from perswading them to obedience or at the least if they perswade them to it in the one part of her Authority it is in Causes Civil they disswade them from it as much in the other that iâ— in Causes Ecclesiastical so that indeed they pluck down with the one hand that which they seem to build with the other 40. More of which Letter might be added were not this sufficient as well to shew how perfectly he understood both his place and power as with what courage and discretion he proceeded in the maintenance of it Which being observed by some great men about the Court who had ingaged themselves in the Puritan quarrels but were not willing to incur the Queens displeasure by their opposition it was thought best to stand a while behind the Curtain and set Beal upon him of whose impetuosity and edge against him they were well assured This Beal was in himself a most eager Puritan trained up by Walsingham to draw dry-foot after Priests and Jesuits his extream hatred to those men being looked on as the onely good quality which he could pretend to But being over-blinded by zeal and passion he was never able to distinguish rightly between truth and falshood between true Sanctity and the counterfeit appearance of it This made him first conceive that whatsoever was not Puritan must needs be Popish and that the Bishops were to be esteemed no otherwise then the sons of Antichrist because they were not looked upon as Fathers by the holy Brotherhood And so far was he hurried on by these dis-affections that though he was preferred to be one of the Clerks of the Council yet he preferred the interest of the Faction before that of the Queen Insomuch that he was noted to jeer and gibe at all such Sermons as did most commend Her Majesties Government and move the Auditory to obedience not sparing to accuse the Preachers upon such occasions to have broached false Doctrine and falsly to alledge the Scriptures in defence thereof This man had either writ or countenanced a sharp Discourse against Subscription inscribed to the Archbishop and presented to him and thereupon caused speeches to be cast abroad that the three Articles to which Subscription was required should shortly be revoked by an Act of the Council which much encreased the obstinacy of the self-willed Brethren But after fearing lest the Queen might have a sight of the Papers he resolved to get them out of his hands and thereupon went over to Lambeth where he behaved himself in such a rude and violent manner as forced the Archbishop to give an acconnt thereof by Letter to the Lord Treasurer Burleigh who hitherto had stood fair towards him in these following words 41. I have born saith he with Mr. Beals intemperate speeches unseemly for him to use though not in respect of my self yet in respect of Her Majestie whom he serveth and of the Laws established whereunto he ought to shâ—w some duty Yesterday he came to my house as it seems to demand the Book he delivered unto me I told him That the book was written unto me and therefore no reason why he should require it again especially seeing I was assured that he had a Copy thereof otherwise I would cause it to be written out for him Whereupon he fell into very great passions with me which I think
wretched Popish priests and the Convocation-House of Devils and Belzebub of Canterbury the chief of these Devils The like Reproaches they bestow on the Common-Prayer of which they say That it is full of Corruption and that many of the Contents thereof are against the Word of God the Sacraments wickedly mangled and prophaned therein the Lord's Supper not eaten but made a Pageant or Stage-play and that the Form of publick Baptism is full of Childish Superstitious Toys So that we are not to admire if the Brownists please themselves in their separation from a Church so polluted and unreformed from men so wicked and prophane from such a Cinque of Satan such a Den of Devils But much less can we wonder that the Papists should make use of these horrible Slanders not only to confirm but encrease their Party By shewing them from the Pens of their greatest Adversaries what ugly Monsters had the Government of the Church of England from what Impieties they were preserved by not joyning with them One I am sure that is Parsons in his Book of Three Conversions reports these Calumnies and Slanders for undoubted Truths That Martin Mar-Prelate is affirmed by Sir Edwine Sandys to pass in those times for unquestion'd Credit in the Court of Rome his Authority much insisted on to disgrace this Church and finally that Kellison one of later date doth build as much upon the Credit of these Libels to defame the Clergy as if they had been dictated by the same Infallible Spirit which the Pope pretends to Such excellent Advantages did these Saints give unto the Devil that all the Locusts in the Revelation which came out of the Pit never created so much scandal to the Primitive times 28. To still these Clamours or at the least to stop the mouths of these Railing Rabshecha's that so the abused people on all sides might be undeceived as good a course was took by Whitgift and the rest of the Prelates as Human Wisdom could devise For first A grave Discourse is published in the year next following entituled An Admonition to the People of England in answer to the slanderous Untruths of Martin the Libeller But neither this nor any other grave Refutal would ever put them unto silence till they were undertaken by Tom Nash a man of a Sarcastical and jeering Wit who by some Pamphlets written in the like loose way which he called Pasquill and Marsorius The Counter-Scuffle Pappe with a Hatchet and the like stopped their mouths for ever none of them daring to deal further in that Commodity when they saw what Coyn they should be paid in by so frank a Customer Mention was made before of a sorry Pamphlet entituled The Complaint of the Commons for a Preaching-Ministry which Penry seconded by another called by the Name of A Supplication for Preaching in Wales In both which it was intimated to all sorts of people That the Gospel had no free passage amongst us That there was no care taken for Preaching the Word of God for the instruction of the people for want whereof they still remained in darkness and the shadow of death For the decrying of which scandalous and leud suggestions Order was given unto the Bishops to take the Names and Number of the Preachers in their several Diocesses and to present a true and perfect Catalogue of them in the Convocation which was then at hand By which Returns it will appear That at this time when so much noise was made for want of Preaching there were within the Realm of England and the Dominion of Wales no fewer than Seven thousand four hundred sixty three Preachers and Catechisers which last may be accounted the best sort of Preachers for the instruction of the people Of which great Number there were found to be no fewer than One hundred forty five Doctors in Divinity Three hundred forty eight Batchellors of Divinity Thirty one Doctors of both Laws Twenty one Batchelors of the same Eighteen hundred Masters in Arts Nine hundred forty six Batchelors of Arts and Two thousand seven hundred forty six Catechisers So that neither the number of bare Reading-Ministers was so great nor the want of Preaching so deplorable in most parts of the Kingdom as those Pamphlets made it the Authors whereof ought rather to have magnified the Name of God for sending such a large Encrease of Labourers in his Heavenly Husbandry as could not any where be parallel'd in so short a time there passing no more than Thirty years between the first beginning of Queen Elizabeth's Reign and the rendring of this Account to the Convocation 29. And that the Parliament might receive the same satisfaction a most excellent and judicious Sermon was Preached at St. Paul's Cross on Sunday the ninth of February being the first Sunday after their Assembling by Dr. Richard Bancroft being then Chaplain to the Lord Chancellor Hatton preferred within some few years after to the See of London and from thence to Canterbury In the performance of which Service he selected for the Theam or Subject of his Discourse 1 Iohn 4.1 viz. Dearly beloved believe not every spirit but try the spirits whether they be of God for many false prophets are gone out into the world In canvasing which Text he did so excellently set forth the false Teachers of those times in their proper colours their Railing against Bishops their Ambition their Self-love their Covetousness and all such Motives as had spurred them on to disturb this Church as satisfied the greatest part of that huge Congregation touching the Practises and Hypocrisies of these holy Brethren He also shewed on what a weak Foundation they had built their Discipline of which no tract or footsteps could be found in the Church of Christ from the Apostles days to Calvin and with what Infamy the Aerian Hereticks were reproached in the Primitive times for labouring to introduce that Parity which these men designed He further laid before them the great danger which must needs ensue if private men should take upon them to deny or dispute such matters as had been setled in the Church by so good Authority Against which troublesome Humour many Provisions had been made by the Canons of Councils and the Edicts of Godly and Religious Emperors To which he added the necessity of requiring Subscription in a Church well constituted by all the Ministers of the same which he justified by the example of Geneva and the Churches of Germauy to be the best way to try the spirits whether they be of God or not as his Text required Next he insisted on the excellency of the Common-Prayer-Book applauded by the Divines of Foreign Churches approved by Bucer Fox Alesius the Parliaments and Convocations of this Kingdom and after justified by Arch-bishop Cranmer against the Papists by Bishop Ridley against Knox and by divers others showing withall the many gross Absurdities found in extemporary Prayers to the great dishonour of God and the shame of Religion Hence he proceeds to justifie
Kirk within this Realm or that presently bears or shall hereafter bear Office therein shall be charged by every particular Presbytery where their residence is to subscribe the Heads of the Discipline of the Kirk of their Realm at length set down and allowed by Act of the whole Assembly in the Book of Polity which is registrate in the Assembly-Books and namely the Heads controverted by Enemies of the Discipline of the Reformed Kirk of this Realm betwixt this and the next Synodal Assemblies of the Provinces under the pain of Excommunication to be executed against the Non-subscribers and the Presbyteries which shall be found remiss and negligent herein to receive publick rebuke of the whole Assembly And to the effect the said Discipline may be known as it ought to be to the whole Brethren it is ordained That the Moderator of each Presbytery shall receive from the Clerk of the Assembly a Copy of the said Book under his Subscription upon the Expences of the Presbytery betwixt this and the first day of September next to come under the pain of being openly accused in the face of the whole Assembly 41. This Preparation being made they present their whole desires to the King in the following Parliament convened at Edenborough in the Month of Iune 1592. In which it was proposed 1. That the Acts of Parliament made in the year 1584 against the Discipline of the Kirk and the Liberty thereof should be abrogated and annulled and a Ratification of the Discipline granted whereof they were then in practise 2. That the Act of Annexation should be repealed and restitution made of the Church's Patrimony 3. That the Abbots Priors and other Prelates bearing the Titles of Kirk-men and giving Voices for the Kirk without Power and Commission from the same should not be permitted in time coming to give Voice in Parliament or convene in the Name of the Kirk And 4. That a solid Order might be taken for purging the Realm of Idolatry and Blood wherewith it was miserably polluted On the second and third of these Desires the King took longer time of deliberation as being points of great concernment to Himself and others touching the main of their Estates But He resolved to give them satisfaction in the first and last It was answered therefore to the first part of the last Article That saying of Mass receiving of Iesuits Seminary Priests and Trafficking Papists against the King's Majesty and Religion presently professed should be a just cause to infer the pain of Treason with this Proviso notwithstanding That if the Iesuits and Seminary Priests did satisfie the Prince and the Church the foresaid Penalty should not be laid on the Receivers And to the second part thereof concerning Blood it was answered That the same should be remitted to the Courts of Justice In like manner it was answered to the first branch of their first Proposal That the said Statutes should be no ways prejudicial nor derogatory to the Priviledges that God had given to the spiritual Office-bearer in the Church concerning Heads of Religion matters of Heresie Excommunication Collation or Deprivation of Ministers or any such Ecclesiastical Censures grounded and having warrant of the Word of God But to the second branch thereof he gave his Plenary assent according to the tenor of the Act here following which in regard it contains the sum of all their Projects for life-time then past and the ground of all their Insolencies for the times ensuing it shall not grieve me to subjoyn nor be troublesome to the Reader to pass it over if he have not patience enough to go thorow with it Now the tenor of the said Act is as followeth At the Parliament holden at Edenborough June 5. in the Year of God 1592. 42. Our Soveraign Lord and Estates of this present Parliament following the Laudable and Good Example of their Predecessors hath ratified and approved and by the tenor of this present Act ratifies and approves all Liberties Priviledges Immunities and Freedoms whatsoever given and granted by His Highness his Regents in His Name or any of His Predecessors to the True and Holy Kirk presently established within this Realm and declared in the first Act of His Highness Parliament the 20 th day of Octob. 1579. And all and whatsoever Acts of Parliaments and Statutes made of before by His Highness and His Regents anent the Liberty and Freedom of the said Kirk and specially the first Act of Parliament holden at Edenborough the 24 th of October in the year of God 1581 with the whole particular Acts there mentioned which shall be as sufficient as if the same were here mentioned and all other Acts of Parliament made since in favour of the true Kirk and such like ratifies and approves the general Assemblies appointed by the said Kirk and declares That it shall be lawful to the Kirk and Ministers every year at least or oftner pro re natâ as occasion and necessity shall require to hold and keep general Assemblies providing that the King's Majesty or His Commissioners with Him to be appointed by His Highness be present at ilk general Assembly before the dissolving thereof to nominate and appoint time and place when and where the next general Assembly shall be holden And in case neither His Majesty nor His Commissioners be present for the time in that Town where the next general Assembly is holden then and in that case it shall be lesum to the said general Assembly by themselves to nominate and appoint time and place where the next general Assembly of the Kirk shall be kept and holden as they have been used to do in times by-past And also ratifies and approves the Provincial and Synodal Assemblies to be holden by the said Kirk and Ministers twice ilk year as they have been or presently are in use to do within every Province of this Realm And ratifies and approves these Presbyteries and particular Sessions appointed by the said Kirk with the whole Discipline and Jurisdiction of the same agreed upon by His Majesty in conference had by His Highness with certain of the Ministers convened to that effect of the which Articles the tenour followeth 1. Matters to be intreated in Provincial Assemblies 43. Their Assemblies are constitute for weighty matters necessary to be intreated by mutual consent and assistance of Brethren within the Province as need requires This Assembly hath Power to handle order and redress all things omitted or done amiss in the particular Assemblies It hath Power to depose the Office-bearers of the Province for good and just causes deserving deprivation And generally these Assemblies have the whole Power of the particular Elderships whereof they are collected 2. Matters to be intreated in the Presbyteries The Power of the Presbyteries is To use diligent labours in the bounds committed to their charge that the Kirks be kept in good order To enquire diligently of naughty and ungodly persons and to travel to bring them into the way
the other two In whose behalf when it was moved by one Mr. Wroth That the House should be humble Suitors to Her Majesty for the releasing of such of their Members as were under restraint it was answered by such of the Privy-Councellors as were then Members of the House That Her Majesty had committed them for causes best known to Her self and that to press Her Highness with this Suit would but hinder those whose good it sought That the House must not call the Queen to an account for what she did of Her Royal Authority That the Causes for which they are restrained may be high and dangerous That Her Majesty liketh no such Questions neither did it become the House to deal in such matters Upon which words the House desisted from interposing any further in their behalf but left them wholly to the Queen by whom Wentworth was continued Prisoner for some years after 24. In the same Parliament one Morrise Chancellor of the Dutchy of Lancaster proposed unto the House That some course might be taken by them against the hard courses of Bishops Ordinaries and other Ecclesiastical Judges in their several Courts towards sundry godly Ministers and painful Preachers who deserved more encouragement from them They also spake against Subscription and the Oath Ex Officio and offered a Bill unto the House against the imprisonment of such as refused the same Of this the Queen had present notice and thereupon sends for Coke then Speaker of the House of Commons but afterwards successively Chief Justice of either Bench to whom she gave command to deliver this Message to the House that is to say That it was wholly in Her Power to call to determine to assent or dissent to any thing done in Parliament That the calling of this was only that the Majesty of God might be more Religiously observed by compelling with some sharp Laws such as neglect that Service and that the safety of Her Majesty's Person and the Realm might be provided for That it was not meant they should meddle with matters of State or Causes Ecclesiastical That She wondered that any should attempt a thing so contrary to Her Commandment and that She was highly offended at it and finally that it was Her pleasure That no Bill touching any matters of State or for the Reformation of Causes Ecclesiastical should be there exhibited On the delivery of which Message Morrise is said to have been seized on in the House by a Serjeant at Arms but howsoever seized on and committed Prisoner kept for some years in Tutbury Castle discharged from his Office in the Dutchy and disabled from any Practise in his Profession as a common Lawyer Some others had prepared a Bill to this effect That in lieu of Excommunication there should be given some ordinary Process with such sute and coertion as thereunto might appertain that so the dignity of so high a Sentence being retained and the necessity of mean Process supplied the Church might be restored to its ancient splendor Which Bill though recommended somewhat incogitantly by one of the Gravest Councellors of State which was then in the House was also dashed by Her Majesty's express Command upon a Resolution of not altering any thing the quality of the times considered which had been setled in the Church both by Law and Practise Which constancy of Hers in the preserving of Her own Prerogative and the Church's Power kept down that swelling humour of the Puritan Faction which was even then upon the point of overflowing the banks and bearing down all opposition which was made against them 25. And that they might be kept the better in their natural Channel she caused an Act to be prepared and passed in this present Parliament for retaining them and others of Her Subjects in their due obedience By which it was Enacted for the preventing and avoiding of such Inconveniencies and Perils as might happen and grow by the wicked and dangerous Practices of Seditious Sectaries and Disloyal persons That if any person or persons above the age of sixteen years should obstinately refuse to repair to some Church Chappel or usual place of Common-Prayer to hear Divine Service established or shall forbear to do the same by the space of a Month without lawful cause or should move or perswade any other person whatsoever to forbear and abstain from coming to the Church to hear Divine Service or to receive the Communion according to the Laws and Statutes aforesaid or to come or be present at any unlawful Assemblies Conventicles or Meetings under pretence of Religious Exercise contrary to the Laws and Statutes made in that behalf or should at any time after forty days from the end of that Session by Printing Writing or express Words or Speeches advisedly and purposely go about to move or perswade any of Her Majesty's Subjects or any other within Her Highness Realms and Dominions to deny withstand or impugn Her Majesty's Power and Authority in causes Ecclesiastical united and annexed to the Imperial Crown of the Realm That then every person so offending and convicted of it should be committed unto Prison without Bail or Main-prise till he or they should testifie their Conformity by coming to some Church Chappel or other place of Common-prayer to hear Divine Service and to make open submission and declaration of the same in such form and manner as by the said Statute was provided Now that we may the better see what great care was taken as well by the two Houses of Parliament as by the Queen Her self for preserving the Honour of the Church the Jurisdiction of the Bishops and the Royal Prerogative in both it will not be amiss to represent that Form to the eye of the Reader in which the said Submission was to be delivered The tenour whereof was as followeth viz. 26. I A. B. do humbly confess and acknowledg That I have grievously offended God in contemning Her Majesty's godly and lawful Government and Authority by absenting my self from Church and from hearing Divine Service contrary to the godly Laws and Statutes of this Realm and in using and frequenting disordered and unlawful Conventicles and Assemblies under pretence and colour of exercise of Religion And I am heartily sorry for the same and do acknowledg and testifie in my Conscience That no person or persons hath or ought to have any Power or Authority over Her Majesty And I do promise and protest without any dissimulation or any colour of means of any Dispensation That from henceforth I will from time to time obey and perform Her Majesty's Laws and Statutes in repairing to the Church and hearing Divine Service and do mine utmost endeavour to maintain and defend the same 27. This Declaration to be made in some Church or Chappel before the beginning of Divine Service within three Months after the conviction of the said Offenders who otherwise were to abjure the Realm and to depart the same at such time and place as should be limited
About this time one of the Ministers named Rosse uttered divers Treasonable and Irreverent speeches against His Majesty in a Sermon of his preached at Perth for which the King craved Justice of the next Assembly and he required this also of them That to prevent the like for the times ensuing the Ministers should be inhibited by some Publick Order from uttering any irreverent speeches in the Pulpit against His Majesty's Person Council or Estate under the pain of Deprivation This had been often moved before and was now hearkned to with as little care as in former times All which the King got by it was no more but this that Rosse was only admonished to speak so reverently of His Majesty for the time to come as might give no just cause of complaint against him As ill success he had in the next Assembly to which he recommended some Conditions about the passing of the Sentence of Excommunication two of which were to this effect 1. That none should be excommunicated for Civil causes for any Crimes of leight importance or for particular wrongs offered to the Ministers lest the Censure should fall into contempt 2. That no summary Excommunication should be thenceforth used but that lawful citations of the Parties should go before in all manner of Causes whatsoever To both which he received no other Answer but That the Points were of too great weight to be determined on the sudden and should be therefore agitated in the next Assembly In the mean time it was provided That no Summary Excommunication should be used but in such occasions in which the Safety of the Church seemed to be in danger Which Exception much displeased the King knowing that they would serve their turn by it whensoever they pleased Nor sped he better with them when he treated severally than when they were in the Assembly The Queen of England was grown old and he desired to be in good terms with all his Subjects for bearing down all opposition which might be made against his Title after her decease To which end he deals with Robert Bruce a Preacher of Edenborough about the calling home the Popish Lords men of great Power and Credit in their several Countreys who had been banished the last year for holding some intelligence with the Catholick King Bruce excepts only against Huntley whom the King seemed to favour above all the rest and positively declared That the King must lose him if he called home Huntley for that it was impossible to keep them both And yet this Bruce was reckoned for a Moderate man one of the quietest and best-natur'd of all the Pack What was the issue of this business we shall see hereafter 42. In the mean time let us pass over into France and look upon the Actions of the Hugonots there of whose deserting their new King we have spoke of before And though they afterwards afforded him some Supplies both of Men and Money when they perceived him backed by the Queen of England and thereby able to maintain a defensive Warr without their assistance yet they did it in so poor a manner as made him utterly despair of getting his desired Peace by an absolute Victory In which perplexity he beholds his own sad condition his Kingdom wasted by a long and tedious Warr invaded and in part possessed by the Forces of Spain new Leagues encreasing every day both in strength and number and all upon the point of a new Election or otherwise to divide the Provinces amongst themselves To prevent which he reconciles himself to the Church of Rome goes personally to the Mass and in all other publick Offices which concerned Religion conformed himself unto the directions of the Pope And for so doing he gives this account to Wilks the Queen's Ambassador sent purposely to expostulate with him upon this occasion that is to say That Eight hundred of the Nobility and no fewer than Nine Regiments of the Protestant Party who had put themselves into the Service of his Predecessor returned unto their several homes and could not be induced to stay with him upon any perswasions That such of the Protestants as he had taken at the same time to his Privil-Council were so intent on their own business that they seldom vouchsafed their presence at the Council-Table so that being already forsaken by those on whom he relyed and fearing to be forsaken by the Papists also he was forced to run upon that course which unavoidable necessity had compelled him to and finally that being thus necessitated to a change of Religion he rather chose to make it look like his own free Act that he might thereby free the Doctrine of the Protestants from those Aspersions which he conceived must otherwise needs have fallen upon it if that Conversion had been wrought upon him by Dispute and Argument for hearkening whereunto he had bound himself when he first took the Crown upon him If by this means the Hugonots in France shall fall to as low an ebb as the Fortunes of their Brethren did in England at the same time they can lay the blame on nothing but their own Ingratitude their Disobedience to their King and the Genevian Principles that were rooted in them which made them Enemies to the Power and Guidance of all Soveraign Princes But the King being still in heart of his own Religion or at least exceeding favourable to all those that professed the same he willingly passed over all unkindness which had grown between them and by his countenance or connivence gave them such advantages as made them able to dispute the point with his Son and Successor whether they would continue Subjects to the Crown or not 43. In the Low-Countreys all things prospered with the Presbyterians who then thrive best when they involve whole Nations in Blood and Sacriledg By whose example the Calvinians take up Arms in the City of Embden renounce all obedience to their Prince and put themselves into the Form of a Commonwealth This Embden is the principal City of the Earl of East-Friesland situate on the mouth of the River Emns called Amasus by Latin Writers and from thence denominated Beautified with a Haven so deep and large that the greatest Ships with full sail are admitted into it The People rich the Buildings general fair both private and publick especially the Town-Hall and the stately Castle Which last being situate on a rising-ground near the mouth of the Haven and strongly fortified toward the Town had for long time been the Principal Seat of the Earls of that Province The second Earl hereof called Ezard when he had governed this Countrey for the space of sixty years or thereabouts did first begin to introduce the Doctrines of Luther into his Estates Anno 1525. But being old he left the Work to be accomplished by Enno his eldest Son who first succeeded in that Earldom and using the assistance of Hardimbergius a Moderate and Learned man established the Augustine Confession in the
City of Embden and afterwards in all places under his command prohibiting the exercise of all Religion but the Lutheran only Which Prohibition notwithstanding some Anabaptists from the Neighbouring Westphalia found way to plant themselves in Embden where liberty of Trade was freely granted to all comers which allured thither also many Merchants and Artificers with their Wives and Families out of the next-adjoining Provinces of Holland Zealand and West-Friesland then subject to the King of Spain Who being generally Calvinians in point of Doctrine were notwithstanding suffered to plant there also in regard of the great benefit which accrued unto it by their Trade and Manufactures But nothing more encreased the Power and Wealth of that City than the Trade of England removed from Antwerp thither on occasion of the Belgick Troubles and the great fear they had conceived of the Duke of Alva who seemed to breathe nothing but destruction unto their Religion And though the English Trade was removed not long after unto Hambourgh upon the hope of greater Priviledges and Immunities than they had at Embden yet still they kept a Factory in it which added much to the improvement of their Wealth and Power insomuch that the Inhabitants of this Town only are affirmed to have Sixty Ships of One hundred Tun a-piece and Six hundred lesser Barks of their own besides Seven hundred Busses and Fishing Boats maintained for the most part by their Herring-fishing on the Coast of England 44. Having attained unto this Wealth they grew proud withall and easily admitting the Calvinian Doctrines began to introduce also the Genevian Discipline connived at by Ezardus the second the Son of Enno in respect of the profit which redounded by them to his Exchequer though they began to pinch upon him to the diminution of his Power In which condition it remained till his marriage with Catharine the Daughter of Gustavus Ericus King of Sweden who being zealously addicted to the Lutheran Forms and sensible of those great Incroachments which had been made upon the Earl's Temporal Jurisdiction by the Consistorians perswaded him to look better to his own Authority and to regain what he had lost by that Connivence Something was done for the recovering of his Power but it went on slowly hoping to compass that by time and dissimulation which he could not easily obtain by force of Arms. After whose death and the short Government of Enno the second the matter was more stoutly followed by Rodolphus the Nephew of Catharine who did not only curb the Consistorians in the exercise of their Discipline but questioned many of those Priviledges which the unwariness of his Predecessors had indulged unto them The Calvinians had by this time made so strong a Party that they were able to remonstrate against their Prince complaining in the same That the Earl had violated their Priviledges and infringed their Liberties That he had interposed his Power against Right and Reason in matters which concerned the Church and belonged to the Consistory That he assumed unto himself the Power of distributing the Alms or publick Collections by which they use to bind the poor to depend upon them That he prohibited the exercise of all Religions except only the Confession of Ausberg And that he would not stand to the Agreement which was made betwixt them for interdicting all Appeals to the Chamber of Spires Having prepared the way by this Remonstrance they take an opportunity when the Earl was absent arm themselves and seize by force upon his Castle demolished part of it which looks toward the Town and possest themselves of all the Ordnance Arms and Ammunition with an intent hereafter to employ them against him And this being done they govern all Affairs in the Name of the Senate without relation to their Prince making themselves a Free-Estate or Commonwealth like their Belgick Neighbours 45. Extreamly moved with this affront and not being able otherwise to reduce them to a sense of their duty he borrows Men and Arms from Lubeck to compel them to it With which assistance he erects a Fort on the further side of the Haven to spoil their Trade and by impoverishing the people to regain the Town The Senate hereupon send abroad their Edicts to the Nobility and Commons of East-Friesland it self requiring them not to aid their own lawful Prince with Men Arms or Money threatning them if they did the contrary to stop the course of all Provisions which they had from their City and by breaking down their Dams and Sluces to let the Ocean in upon them and drown all their Countrey Which done they make their Applications to the States of Holland requiring their assistance in that common Cause to which they had been most encouraged by their Example not doubting of their Favour to a City of their own Religion united to them by a long intercourse of Trade and resemblance of Manners and not to be deserted by them without a manifest betraying of their own Security All this the States had under their consideration But they consider this withall That if they should assist the Embdeners in a publick way the Earl would presently have recourse for some aid from the Spaniard which might draw a Warr upon them on that side where they lay most open Therefore they so contrived the matter with such Art and Cunning that carrying themselves no otherwise than as Arbiters and Umpires between the Parties they discharged some Companies of Soldiers which they had in West-Friesland who presently put themselves into the Pay of the Embdens and thereby caused the Earl to desist from his Intrenchments on the other side of the Haven After which followed nothing but Warrs and Troubles between the City and the Earl till the year 1606. At what time by the Mediation of the English Ambassador and some other Honourable Friends the differences were compromised to this effect That all the Ordnance Arms and Ammunition which were found in the Castle should be restored unto the Earl That he should have to his own use the whole Profit of the Imposts which were laid on Wine and half the benefit of those Amercements or Fines which should be raised upon Delinquents together with the sole Royalties both of Fishing and Hunting And on the other side That the Embdeners should have free Trade with all the Profits and Emoluments belonging to it which should be granted to them by Letters Patents But for admitting him to any part of the Publick Government or making restitution of his House or Castles the ancient Seat of his abode as there was nothing yeelded or agreed on then so could he never get possession of them from that time to this Which said we must cross over again into the Isle of Brittain where we shall find the English Puritans climbing up by some new devices and the Scottish Presbyterians tumbling down from their former height till they were brought almost to as low a fall as their English Brethren AERIVS REDIVIVVS OR The
History OF THE PRESBYTERIANS LIB X. Containing A Relation of their Plots and Practises in the Realm of England Their horrible Insolencies Treasons and Seditions in the Kingdom of Scotland from the Year 1595 to the Year 1603. THE English Puritans having sped so ill in a course of violence were grown so wise as to endeavour the subverting of that Fort by an undermining which they had no hope to take by storm or battery And the first course they fell upon besides the Artifices lately mentioned for altering the posture of the Preacher in the Spittle-Sermons and that which was intended as a consequent to it was the Design of Dr. Bound though rather carried under his Name than of his devising for lessening by degrees the Reputation of the ancient Festivals The Brethren had tryed many ways to suppress them formerly as having too much in them of the Superstitions of the Church of Rome but they had found no way succesful till they fell on this which was To set on foot some new Sabbath-Doctrine and by advancing the Authority of the Lord's-Day Sabbath to cry down the rest Some had been hammering on this Anvil ten years before and had procured the Mayor and Aldermen of London to present a Petition to the Queen for the suppressing of all Plays and Interludes on the Sabbath-day as they pleased to call it within the Liberties of their City The gaining of which point made them hope for more and secretly to retail those Speculations which afterward Bound sold in gross by publishing his Treatise of the Sabbath which came out this year 1595. And as this Book was published for other Reasons so more particularly for decrying the yearly-Festivals as appears by this passage in the same viz. That he seeth not where the Lord hath given any Authority to his Church ordinarily and perpetually to sanctifie any day except that which he hath sanctified himself And makes it an especial Argument Argument against the goodness of Religion in the Church of Rome That to the Seventh-day they had joyned so many other days and made them equal with the Seventh if not superior thereunto as well in the solemnity of Divine Offices as restraint from labour So that we may perceive by this what their intent was from the very beginning To cry down the Holy-days as superstitious Popish Ordinances that so their new-found Sabbath being left alone and Sabbath now it must be called might become more eminent Some other Ends they might have in it as The compelling of all persons of what rank soever to submit themselves unto the yoak of their Sabbath-rigors whom they despaired of bringing under their Presbyteries Of which more hereafter 2. Now for the Doctrine it was marshalled in these Positions that is to say That the Commandment of sanctifying every Seventh day as in the Mosaical Decalogue is Natural Moral and Perpetual That when all other things in the Jewish Church were so changed that they were clean taken away this stands the observation of the Sabbath And though Jewish and Rabinical this Doctrine was it carried a fair shew of Piety at the least in the opinion of the common people and such as did not stand to examine the true grounds thereof but took it up on the appearance such as did judg thereof not by the workmanship of the Stuff but the gloss and colour In which it is not strange to see how suddenly men were induced not only to give way unto it but without more 〈…〉 the same till in the end and that in very little time it grew the most bewitching error the most popular infatuation that ever wa◠infused into the people of England For what did follow hereupon but such monstrous Paradoxes and those delivered in the Pulpit as would make every good man tremble at the hearing of them It being preached at a Market-Town as my Author tells me That to do any servile work or business on the Lord's day was as great a sin as to kill a man or commit Adultery In Somersetshire That to throw a Bowl on the Lord's day was as great a sin as to kill a man In Norfolk That to make a Feast or dress a Wedding-Dinner on the same was as great a sin as for a Father to take a Knife and cut his Child's throat And in Suffolk That to ring more Bells than one on the Lord's day was as great a sin as to commit a Murther Some of which Preachers being complained of occasioned a more strict enquiry into all the rest and not into their Persons only but their Books and Pamphlets insomuch that both Arch-bishop Whitgift and Chief Justice Popham commanded these Books to be called in and neither to be Printed nor made common for the time to come Which strict proceedings notwithstanding this Doctrine became more dispersed than can be imagined and possibly might encrease the more for the opposition no System of Divinity no Book of Catechetical Doctrine from thenceforth published in which these Sabbath-Speculations were not pressed on the People's Consciences 3. Endearing of which Doctrines as formerly to advance their Elderships they spared no place or Text of Scripture where the Word Elder did occurre and without going to the Heralds had framed a Pedigree thereof from Iethro from Noah's Ark and from Adam finally So did these men proceed in their new Devices publishing out of Holy Writ both the Antiquity and the Authority of their Sabbath-day No passage of God's Book unransacked where there was mention of a Sabbath whether the Legal Sabbath charged upon the Iews or the Spiritual Sabbath of the Soul from sin which was not fitted and applied to the present purpose though if examined as it ought with no lesse reason than Paveant illi non paveam Ego was by an ignorant Priest alledged from Scripture to prove that his Parishioners ought to pave the Chancel And on the confidence of those Proofs they did presume exceedingly of their success by reason of the general entertainment which those Doctrines found with the common people who looked upon them with as much regard and no less reverence than if they had been sent immediately from the Heavens themselves for encrease of Piety Possest with which they greedily swallowed down the Hook which was baited for them 4. A Hook indeed which had so fastned them to those men who love to fish in troubled waters that by this Artifice there was no small hope conceived amongst them to fortifie their Side and make good that Cause which till this trim Device was so thought of was almost grown desperate By means whereof they btought so great a bondage on all sorts of people that a greater never was imposed on the Iews themselves though they had pinned their Consciences on the Sleeves of the Scribes and Pharises But then withall by bringing all sorts of people into such a bondage they did so much improve their Power and encrease their Party that they were able at the last to oppose
thereof Should our Meetings be in the Name of Man Are we not to take up our selves and to acknowledg our former errors and feebleness in the Work of the Lord It is time for us now when so many of our worthy Brethren are thrust out of their Callings without all order of just proceedings and Jesuits Atheists and Papists are suffered countenanced and advanced to great Rooms in the Realm for the bringing in Idolatry and Captivity more than Babylonical with an high hand and that in our chief City Is it time for us I say of the Ministry to be inveigled and blind-folded with pretence of the preferment of some small number of our Brethren to have voice in Parliament and have Titles of Prelacy Shall we with Sampson sleep still on Dalilah's knees till she say The Philistines be upon thee Sampson c. Which Letter speaks the words of Davidson but the sense of others who having the like discontentments privately whispered them in the ears of those who either seemed zealous for Religion or Factiously enclined to make new Disturbances in this unsetledness of Affairs In which conjuncture it was no hard matter for them so to work upon men's Affections as to assure them to themselves and to be ready to flye out upon all occasions especially when any powerful Head should be offered to them 34. Of the last sort was the Conspiracy and Treason of the Earl of Goury Son of that William Earl of Goury who had been executed for surprizing the King's Person at Ruthen-Castle Anno 1584. And though this Son of his had been restored by the King to his Blood and Hononrs one of his Sisters married to the Duke of Lenox another placed in the Attendance of the Queen and that his Brother Alexander was advanced to a Place in the Bed-Chamber yet all these Favours were not able to obliterate the remembrance of the Execution so justly done upon their Father By nature he was Proud Aspiring and of a Mind greater than his Fortune Ill principled in the course of his Education which made him passionately affected to the Disciplinarians of whom he was ambitious to be thought a Patron To this man they apply themselves who by the loss of their Authority or Tyranny rather measured the Fortunes of the Church as though Religion could not stand if their Empire fell To him they frequently insinuated their Fears and Jealousies the King's aversness from the Gospel his extraordinary Favour to the Popish Lords his present Practises and Designs to subvert the Discipline the only Pillar and Support of the Kirk of Scotland not without some Reflections on the death of his Father whose Zeal to God was testified by the loss of his Life which cryed aloud for vengeance both to God and Man By which insinuations they so wrought upon him that he began to study nothing but Revenge and to that end engaged his Brother Alexander a fierce young man and of a very daring Spirit in the practise with him He also held intelligence with such of the Ministers as were supposed to be most discontented at the present Transactions but most especially with the Preachers of Edenborough who could not easily forget the Injuries so they must be called which they had suffered from the King for some years last past The like intelligence he kept with many Male-contents amongst the Laicks preparing all but opening his Design to few but opening it howsoever to Logen of Restalrig in whom he had more confidence than all the rest 35. Concerning which it was averred by one Sprot a Notary as well upon Examination before the Lords of the Session as his Confession at the Gallows Anno 1608 That he had seen a Letter written by this Logan to the Earl of Goury in which was signified That he would take part with him in revenge of his Father's death That to effect it he must find some way or other to bring the King to Fast-Castle That it was easier to be done by Sea than Land and that they might safely keep him there till they had given advertisement of it to the other Conspirators For proof of which Confession being free and voluntary he told the people on the Ladder that he would give them a Sign which he performed by clapping his hands three times after his turning off by the Executioner It was affirmed also by Mr. William Cowper a right godly man then being Minister at Perth and afterwards made Bishop of Galloway That going to the House of the Earl the Hereditary Provost of that Town not many days before the intended Treason he found him reading a Book entituled De Conjurationibus adversus Principes containing a Discourse of Treasons and Conspiracies against several Princes of which he was pleased to give this Censure That most of them were very foolishly contrived and faulty in some point or other which was the reason that they found not the desired effect By which it seems that he intended to out-go all former Conspirators in the contrivance of his Treason though in the end he fell upon a Plot which was most ridiculous not to be parallel'd by any in that Book which he so much vilified The Design was To draw the King to his House in the Town of Perth under pretence of coming secretly to see a man whom he had lately intercepted with Letters and some quantity of Gold from Rome and having brought him to some remote part of the House to make sure work of him The King was then at Falkland-Castle and going out betimes on Tuesday the fifth of August to take his pleasure in the Park he is met by Alexander who tells him of the News of Perth and that a speedy posting thither would be worth his travel The King comes thither before Dinner accompanied with the Duke of Lenox the Earl of Marre Evesking the Captain of his Guard and some other Gentlemen all of them in their Hunting-Coats as minding nothing but a Visit to the Nobleman Thus is he brought into the toyl but they shall only hunt him to the view and not pull him down 36. The King 's own Dinner being ended the Lords fall to theirs which Alexander takes to be the fittest time to effect the Enterprise and therefore takes the King along with him to an upper Chamber But seeing Eveskin at his heels he willed him to stay behind and made fast the doors Being brought into a Chamber on the top of the House the King perceived a man in a secret corner and presently asked Alexander if he were the Party who had brought the Letters and the Gold But Alexander then changed his countenance upbraided him with the death of his Father for which he was now brought to make satisfaction and therewith left him to the mercy of the Executioner I shall not stand on all particulars of the story the sum whereof is briefly this That the King having having by much strugling gained a Window a corner whereof looked toward the
Vniversities than for simple Auditories Which said Instructions bearing date at Windsor on the 10 th of August 1622 opened the way to the suppression of that heat and fierceness by which the Calvinists had been acted in some years fore-going 29. During which Heats and Agitations between the Parties a Plot was set on foot to subvert the Church in the undoing of the Clergy and there could be no readier way to undo the Clergy than to reduce them unto such a Beggerly Competency for by that name they love to call it as they had brought them to in all the rest of the Calvinian or Genevian Churches This the design of many hands by whom all passages had been scored in Cotton's Library which either did relate to the point of Tythes or the manner of payment But the Collections being brought together and the Work compleated there appeared no other Name before it than that of Selden then of great Credit in the World for his known Abilities in the retired Walks of Learning The History of Tythes writ by such an Author could not but raise much expectation amongst some of the Laity who for a long time had gaped after the Church's Patrimony and now conceived and hoped to swallow it down without any chewing The Author highly magnified the Book held unanswerable and all the Clergy looked on but as Pigmies to that great Goliah who in his Preface had reproached them with Ignorance and Laziness upbraided them with having nothing to keep up their Credit but Beard Title and Habit and that their studies reached no further than the Breviary the Postills and the Polyanthea Provoked wherewith he was so galled by Tillesly so gagged by Mountague and stung by Netles that he never came off in any of his Undertakings with more loss of Credit By which he found that some of the Ignorant and Lazy Clergy were of as retired Studies as himself and could not only match but over-match him too in his own Philology But the chief Governours of the Church went a shorter way and not expecting till the Book was answered by particular men resolved to seek for reparation of the wrong from the Author himself upon an Information to be brought against him in the High Commission Fearing the issue of the business and understanding what displeasures were conceived against him by the King and the Bishops he made his personal appearance in the open Court at Lambeth on the 28 th day of Ianuary 1618 where in a full Court he tendred his submission and acknowledgment all of his own hand-writing in these following words My Lords I most humbly acknowledg my Error which I have committed in publishing The History of Tythes and especially in that I have at all by shewing any Interpretations of Holy Scriptures by medling with Councils Fathers or Canons or by whatsoever occurrs in it offered any occasion of Argument against any Right of Maintenance â—ure Divino of the Ministers of the Gospel beseeching your Lordships to receive this ingenuous and humble acknowledgment together with the unfeigned Protestation of my grief for that through it I have so incurred both His Majesty's and your Lordships Displeasure conceived against me in behalf of the Church of England JOHN SELDEN This for the present was conceived to be the most likely Remedy for the preventing of the Mischief but left such smart Remembrances in the mind of the Author as put him on to act more vigorously for the Presbyterians of which more hereafter by whom he seemed to be engaged in the present Service 30. But it is now high time for us to cross over St. George's Channel and take a short view of the poor and weak Estate of the Church of Ireland where these Designs were carried on with better Fortune A Church which for the most part had been modelled by the Reformation which was made in England But lying at a greater distance and more out of sight it was more easily made a prey to all Invaders the Papists prevailing on the one side and the Puritans on the other getting so much ground that the poor Protestants seemed to be crucified in the midst between them Some Order had been taken for establishing the English Liturgy together with the Bible in the English Tongue in all the Churches of that Kingdom which not being understood by the natural Irish left them as much in Ignorance and Superstition as in the darkest times of the Papal Tyranny And for the Churches of the Pale which very well understood the English Language they suffered themselves to be seduced from the Rules of the Church and yeelded to the prevalency of those zealous Ministers who carried on the Calvinian Project with their utmost power In order whereunto it was held necessary to expose the Patrimony of the Bishops and Cathedral Churches to a publick Port-sale that being as much weakned in their Power as they were in Estate they might be rendred inconsiderable in the eyes of the people Hence-forward such a general devastation of the Lands of the Church that some Episcopal-Sees were never since able to maintain a Bishop but have been added to some others two or three for failing to make up somewhat like a Competency for an Irish Prelate The Bishoprick of Ardagh was thereupon united unto that of Kill more but the Cathedral of the one together with the Bishop's House adjoyning to it had been levelled with the very ground the other in some better repair but neither furnished with Bell Font or Chalice The like union had been also made between the Bishopricks of Clonfert and Killmare Ossery and Kilkenny Down and Connour Waterford and Lismore Cork and Rosse c. and was projected by the late Lord Primate between the See of Kilfanore and that of Killallow not to descend any more particulars of the like Conjunctions 31. Such also were the Fortunes of the Rural Clergy whose Churches in some places lay unrooted in others unrepaired and much out of order The Tythes annexed for the most part to Religions Houses fell by the ruin of those Houses to the Power of the Crown and by the Kings and Queens of England were aliened from the Church and by them became Lay-Fees The Vicaridges generally so ill provided that in the whole Province of Connaught most of the Vicars Pensions came but to forty shillings per annum and in some places but sixteen only And of such Vicaridges as appeared to be better endowed three four or five were many times ingrossed into one man's hands who neither understood the Language nor performed the Service In which respect it was no marvel if the people took up that Religion which came next to hand such as did either serve most fitly to continue them in their former Errors or to secure them in the quiet enjoyment of those Estates which they had ravished from the Church and still possessed by the Title of the first Usurpers In which estate we find the Church of Ireland at the death
having concluded a Truce of Twelve years with the States United wanted Employment for his Army and that he might engage that King with the greater confidence he reconciles himself to the Church of Rome and marries the Lady Magdalen Daughter to the Duke of Bavaria the most potent of the German Princes of that Religion which also he established in his own Dominions on the death of his Father This puts the young Marquess to new Counsels who thereupon calls in the Forces of the States Vnited the Warr continuing upon this occasion betwixt them and Spain though the Scene was shifted And that they might more cordially espouse his Quarrel he took to Wife the Sister of Frederick the fifth Prince Elector Palatine and Neece of William of Nassaw Prince of Orange by his youngest Daughter and consequently Cousin-German once removed to Count Maurice of Nassaw Commander-General of the Forces of the Sates Vnited both by Sea and Land This kept the Balance eeven between them the one possessing the Estates of Cleve and Mark and the other the greatest part of Berge and Gulick But so it was that the old Marquess of Brandenbourgh having setled his abode in the Dukedom of Prussia and left the management of the Marquissate to the Prince his Son left him withall unto the Plots and Practises of a subtil Lady Who being throughly instructed in all points of Calvinism and having gotten a great Empire in her Husband's Affections prevailed so far upon him in the first year of their Marriage Anno 1614 that he renounced his own Religion and declared for Her 's which he more cheerfully embraced in hope to arm all the Calvinians both of the Higher and the Lower Germany in defence of his Cause as his Competitor of Newbourgh had armed the Catholicks to preserve his Interest 15. Being thus resolved he publisheth an Edict in the Month of February Anno 1615 published in his Father's Name but only in his own Authority and sole Command under pretence of pacifying some distempers about Religion but tending in good earnest to the plain suppression of the Lutheran forms for having spent a tedious and impertinent Preamble touching the Animosities fomented in the Protestant Churches between the Lutherans and those of the Calvinian Party he first requires that all unnecessary Disputes be laid aside that so all grounds of strife and disaffection might be also buried Which said he next commands all Ministers within the Marquissate to preach the Word purely and sincerely according to the Writings of the holy Prophets and Apostles the Four Creeds commonly received amongst which the Te Deum is to go for one and the Confession of Ausberg of the last Correction and that omitting all new glosses and interpretations of idle and ambitious men affecting a Primacy in the Church and a Power in the State they aim at nothing in their Preachings but the Glory of God and the Salvation of Mankind He commands also That they should abstain from all calumniating of those Churches which either were not subject to their Jurisdiction nor were not lawfully convicted of the Crime of Heresie which he resolved not to connive at for the time to come but to proceed unto the punishment of all those who wilfully should refuse to conform themselves to his Will and Pleasure After which giving them some good Counsel for following a more moderate course in their Preachings and Writings than they had been accustomed to in the times fore-going and in all points to be obedient to their principal Magistrate he pulls off the Disguise and speaks plainly thus 16. These are saith he the Heads of that Reformation which is to be observed in all the Churches of Brandenbourgh that is to say All Images Statua's and Crosses to be removed out of the place of publick Meetings all Altars as the Relicks of Popery and purposely erected for the Sacrifices of the Popish Mass to be taken away that in their room they should set up a Table of a long square Figure covered at all times with a Carpet of Black and at the time of the Communion with a Linnen Cloth That Wafers should be used instead of the former Hosts which being cut into long pieces should be received and broken by the hands of those who were admitted to communicate at the holy Table That ordinary Cups should be made use of for the future instead of the old Popish Chalice That the Vestments used in the Mass should be forborn no Candles lighted in any of their Churches at noon-day No Napkin to be held to those that received the Sacrament nor any of them to receive it upon their knees as if Christ were corporally present The sign of the Cross to be from thenceforth discontinued The Minister not to turn his back to the people at the Ministration The Prayers and Epistles before the Sermon to be from thenceforth read not sung and the said Prayers not to be muttered with a low voice in the Pulpit or Reading-Pew but pronounced audibly and distinctly Auricular Confession to be laid aside and the Communion not to be administred to sick persons in the time of any common Plague or Contagious Sickness No bowing of their knee at the Name of Iesus Nor Fonts of stone to be retained in their Churches the want whereof may be supplied by a common Bason The Decalogue to be repeated wholly without mutilation and the Catechism in some other points no less erroneous to be corrected and amended The Trinity to be adored but not exprest in any Images either carved or painted The words of Consecration in the holy Supper to be interpreted and understood according unto that Analogy which they held with the Sacrament and other Texts of holy Scripture And finally That the Ministers should not be so tyed to preach upon the Gospels and Epistles that were appointed for the day but that they might make choice of any other Text of Scriptures as best pleased themselves Such was the tenour of this Edict on which I have insisted the more at large to show the difference between the Lutheran and Genevian Churches and the great correspondence of the first with the Church of England But this Calvinian Pill did not work so kindly as not to stirr more Humours than it could remove For the Lutherans being in possession would not deliver up their Churches or desert those Usages to which they had been trained up and in which they were principled according to the Rules of their first Reformation And hereupon some Rupture was like to grow betwixt the young Marquess and his Subjects if by the intervention of some honest Patriots it had not been closed up in this manner or to this effect That the Lutheran Forms only should be used in all the Churches of the Marquissate for the contentation of the people and that the Marquess should have the exercise of his new Religion for Himself his Lady and those of his Opinion in their private Chappels 17. But the
main business of these times were the Commotions raised in Transylvania Hungary Austria and Bohemia by those of the Calvinian Party which drew all the Provinces of the Empire into such confusions as have disturbed the Peace thereof to this very day For laying down the true Original thereof we may please to know that Ferdinand the younger Brother of Charles the fifth succeeding on the death of Maximilian the Emperor in the Dukedom of Austria and afterwards attaining by Marriage to the Crown of Hungary and Bohemia which he was not born to endeavoured to oblige his Subjects in all those Dominions by a connivance at such Deviations from the Church of Rome as were maintained by those who adhered to Luther and held themselves to the Confession of Ausberg which afterwards was ratified by Imperial Edict Followed therein by Maximilian the second who succeeded him in his Estates and being a mild and gracious Prince not only showed himself unwilling to challenge any Power over Souls and Consciences but was pleased to mediate in behalf of his Protestant Subjects with the Fathers at Trent amongst whom he incurred the suspition of being a Lutheran But Rodolphus the eldest of his Sons and his next Successor was of a different temper from his Father and Grandfather a profest Enemy to all that held not a Conformity with the Church of Rome which he endeavoured to promote with such terrible Edicts as threatned nothing but destruction unto all gain-sayers He had five Brethren at that time but none of them the Father of any children which made him cast his eyes on Ferdinand of Gratts Son of Charles Duke of Gratts and Nephew of Ferdinand the Emperor before remembred Who going to Rome in the Year of Iubile Anno 1600 obliged himself by Oath to the Pope then being to extirpate all the Protestants out of his Dominions which upon the instigation of the Iesuits he did accordingly by pillaging and banishing all of the Augustan Confession thorough Styria Carinthia and Carniola though they had paid for the Freedom of their Conscience a great sum of Money 18. This so endeared him to Rodolphus that he resolved upon him for his next Successor and at the present to estate him in the Realm of Hungary as a step unto it In which Design as he was seconded by the Pope and Spaniard so questionless it had been effected if Matthias the Emperor's Brother and next Heir had not countermined them by countenancing those of the Calvinian or Reformed Religion who then began to seem considerable in the eye of that Kingdom To carry on which Spanish Plot to the End desired the Prelates of Hungary in an Assembly held at Presburgh Anno 1604 published a Decree without the consent of the Nobility and Estates of the Kingdom for the burning or perpetual banishment of all such as were of the Reformed Religion Which having been entertained in the Realm of Poland found no great difficulty in crossing the Carpathian Mountains and gaining the like favourable admission in this Kingdom also Against which Edict of the Bishops a Protest is presently made by the Estates of the Realm under the Seal of the Palatine the chief Officer of it By whom it was publickly affirmed That they would with just Arms defend themselves if they should be questioned for the Cause of Religion Which notwithstanding Beliojosa one of the Emperor 's chief Commanders in the Realm of Hungary first got into his hands the strong Town of Cassovia standing upon the borders of Transylvania And that being done he did not only interdict all those of the Reformed Religion from making any uses of them as they had done formerly but he inhibits them from having Sermons in their private Houses from reading in the holy Bible and from the burying of their dead in hallowed places 19. Nor staid he there but pick'd a needless quarrel with Istivon â—otscay a great man of that Countrey two of whose Castles he surprised and razed and thereupon provoked him to become â—his Enemy For being so provoked he takes upon himself the Patronage of his Native Countrey then miserably oppressed by the German Soldiers calls himself Prince of Transylvania confederates himself with the Turkish Bassa's and thrived so well in his Designs that he compelled the Emperor to recall his Forces out of Transylvania and procured Liberty of Conscience for all his Followers For being assisted by the Turks he encountred the said Beliojosa cuts off 6000 of his men and sends a great part of the Enemy's Ensigns to the Visier Bassa as a sign of his Victory Which Blow he followed by a Proclamation to this effect viz. That all such as desired Liberty of Conscience and to live free from the Corruptions and Idolatries of the Church of Rome should repair to him as to their Head and that he would allow to each of them Five Dollars weekly Which Proclamation did not only draw unto him many thousands of the common people together with a great part of the Nobility and Gentry but tempted many of the Emperor's Soldiers to forsake their General and joyn themselves unto his Party Strengthned wherewith he makes himself Master of Cassovia in which he changed not only the Religion but the Civil Government insomuch that many of those which were addicted to the Church of Rome were presently slain upon the place and most of the rest turned out of the City together with the greatest part of the Church-men the Bishops and the Emperor's Treasurer Upon which fortunate Success a great Party in the Vpper Hungary declare in favour of his Cause violently break open the Religious Houses compel the Fryers to put themselves into fortified places and finally to abandon Presburgh the chief Town of that Kingdom and to flye for shelter to Vienna as their surest Refuge 20. After this Basta the Lord-General of the Emperor's Forces obtained the better of them in some Fortunate Skirmishes which rather served to prolong than to end the Warr. For Botscay was grown to so great strength and made such spoil in all places wherever he came that Pallas Lippa his Lieutenant was found to be possessed at the time of his death of no fewer than Seven hundred Chains of Gold and One hundred thousand Ducats in ready money which he had raked together within less than a year This Treasure coming into Botscay's hands by the death of Lippa he mightily encreased his Army with which he took in many strong Towns and brought in some of the Nobility of the Vpper Hungary sending his Forces into Styria Austria and Moravia which he spoiled and wasted Insomuch that the Emperor being forced to send Commissioners to him to accord the Differences could obtain no better Conditions from him but That Liberty of Conscience and the free exercise of the Reformed Religion should be permitted to all those who demanded the same and that himself should be estated in the Principality of Transylvania for the term of his life And though the Emperor
by the Name of Calixtins from the use of the Chalice and Subutraque from communicating in both kinds against all opposers Their Adversaries in the Church of Rome reproached them by the Name of Adamites and sometimes of Piccards imputing to them many Heterodoxies and some filthy Obscenities of which they never proved them guilty In this condition they remained till the preaching of Luther and the receiving of the Augustin Confession in most parts of the Empire which gave them so much confidence as to purge themselves from all former Calumnies by publishing a Declaration of their Faith and Doctrine Which they presented at Vienna to the Arch-Duke Ferdinand about ten years before chosen King of Bohemia together with a large Apology prefixt before it By which Confession it appears that they ascribe no Power to the Civil Magistrate in the Concernments of the Church That they had fallen upon a way of Ordaining Ministers amongst themselves without recourse unto the Bishop or any such Superior Officer as a Super-intendent And finally That they retained the use of Excommunication and other Ecclesiastical Censures for the chastising of irregular and scandalous persons In which last Point and almost all the other Branches of the said Confession though they appeared as sound and Orthodox as any others which had separated from the Church of Rome yet by their symbolizing with Geneva in so many particulars it was no hard matter for the whole Body of Calvinianism to creep in amongst them the growth whereof inflamed them to such desperate courses as they now pursued 25. For this they laid a good Foundation in the former year 1609 when Matthias with his great Army was preparing for Prague they found the Emperor in some fear from which he could not be secured but by their assistance and they resolved to husband the conjuncture for their best advantage In confidence whereof they propose unto him these Conditions viz. That the free exercise of Religion as well according to the Bohemian as the Augustin Confession might be kept inviolable and that they which professed the one should neither scoff or despise the other That all Arch-bishopricks Bishopricks Abbotships and other Spiritual Preferments should be given to the Bohemians only and that Ecclesiastical Offices should be permitted to Protestant Ministers as in former times That it should be lawful for all men in their own Bounds and Territories to build Churches for their own Religion and that the Professors and Patrons of the Vniversity of Prague should be joyned to the Consistory as in former times That all Political Offices should be indifferently permitted unto men of both Religions With many other things of like weight and moment in their Civil Concernments But the Emperor was not yet reduced to that necessity as to consent to all at once He gratified them at the present with a Conformation of their Civil Rights but put off the Demands which concerned Religion to the next Assembly of Estates conniving in the mean time at the exercise of that Religion which he could not tolerate 26. But the Calvinian Calixtins or Confessionists call them which you will perceiving a strong Party of the Catholicks to be made against them appointed a General Assembly to be holden in the City of New Prague the 4 th of May to consult of all such Matters as concerned their Cause protesting publickly according to the common Custom of that kind That this Assembly though not called by the Emperor's Authority aimed at no other End than his Service only and the prosperity of that Kingdom that both the Emperor and the Kingdom too might not through the Perswasions of his Evil Councellors be brought to extream peril and danger This done they send their Letters to the new King of Hungary the Prince Elector Palatine the Dukes of Saxony and Brunswick and other Princes of the Empire beseeching them That by their powerful intercession with His Imperial Majesty they might be suffered to enjoy the exercise of their own Religion which they affirmed to differ in no material Point from the Confession of Ausberg Following their blow they first Remonstrate to the Emperor how much they had been disappointed of their hopes and expectations from one time to another and in fine tells him in plain terms That they will do their best endeavour for the raising of Arms to the end they might be able with their utmost power to defend him their Soveraign together with themselves and the whole Kingdom against the Practises of their Forreign and Domestick Enemies According to which Resolution they forthwith raised a great number both of Horse and Foot whom they ranged under good Commanders and brought them openly into Prague They procured also that Ambassadors were sent from the Elector of Saxony and the Estates of Silesia a Province many years since incorporated with the Realm of Bohemia to intercede in their behalf This gave the Emperor a fair colour to consent to that which nothing but extream necessity could have wrested from him 27. For thereupon he published his Letters of the 14 th of Iuly 1610 by which it was declared That all his Subjects communicating under one or both kinds should live together peaceably and freely and without wronging or reviling one another under the pain and penalty of the Law to be inflicted upon them who should do the contrary That as they who communicated under one kind enjoyed the exercise of their Religion in all points throughout the Kingdom of Bohemia so they which did communicate under both kinds should enjoy the field without the lett or interruption of any and that they should enjoy the same till a general union in Religion and an end of all Controversies should be fully made That they should have the lower Consistory in the City of Prague with Power to conform the same according to their own Confession That they might lawfully make their Priests as well of the Bohemian as of the German Nation and settle them in their several Parishes without lett or molestation of the Arch-bishop of Prague and that besides the Schools and Churches which they had already it might be lawful for them to erect more of either sort as well in Cities as in Towns and Countrey Villages He declared also that all Edicts formerly published against the free exercise of Religion should be void frustrate and of none effect and that no contrary Edict against the States of the Religion should either be published by Himself or any of his Heirs and Successors or if any were should be esteemed of any force or effect in Law and finally That all such of His Majesty's Subjects that should do any thing contrary to these His Letters whether they were Ecclesiastical or Temporal persons should be severely punished as the Troublers of the Common Peace 28. The passing of this Gracious Edict which the Confessionists were not slow of putting into execution exceedingly exasperated all those of the Catholick Party who thereupon called in the
Arch-Duke Leopold Bishop of Passaw and one of the Emperor's younger Brothers Which Invitation he obeyed entred the Countrey with an Army of Twelve thousand men makes himself Master of New Prague and attempts the Old But he found such resistance there that K. Matthias with a powerful Army came time enough to their relief and dislodged the Besiegers Which Aid he brought them at that time not out of love to their Religion or their Persons either but only upon some Advertisement which had been given him of Duke Leopold's purposes of getting that Kingdom to himself as formerly Matthias had extorted the Realm of Hungary in despight of the Emperor But meaning to make sure work of it he prevailed so far that the Emperor resigned unto him that Kingdom also to which he was cheerfully elected by the Estates of the Countrey before the end of this year Anno 1610. And within two years after was raised to the Imperial Dignity on the death of his Brother Advanced unto which Power and Height he governed his Dominions with great Moderation till the year 1617. When being Himself and all his Brothers without hope of Children he cast his eyes upon his Cousin Ferdinand then Duke of Gratzi a Prince wholly acted by the Jesuits whom he adopted for his Son declared him for his Successor in all the Patrimony and Estates belonging to the House of Austria and in the year 1618 put him into the actual possession of the Realms of Hungary and Bohemia but not with any such formality of Election unto either of them as in his own case had been observed 29. This gave encouragement to some of the Catholick Party to take offence at some Churches lately erected by those of the Reformed Religion â—â—d either totally to deface them or to shut them up Complaint hereof is made unto the Emperor but without any remedy So that being doubly injured as they gave it out they called an Assembly of the States that order might be taken for the preservation of Religion and their Civil Rights both equally endangered by these new encroachments The Emperor disallows the Meeting commanding them by Proclamation to dissolve the same Which so exasperated some hot spirits that the Emperor's Secretary and two of his principal Councellors were cast headlong out of the Castle-Windows And though all three miraculously escaped with life yet the Conspirators conceived the Fact to be so unpardonable that they could find no means of doing better but by doing worse For hereupon they set a Guard of Soldiers on the Baron of Sternberge Governour of the Castle and Kingdom they secure Prague displace all the Emperor 's old Councellors and totally clear the Kingdom of all the Jesuits and presently as well by Letters to Matthias himself as by a publick Declaration scattered in all parts of the Kingdom they justifie themselves and their actings in it Which done they nominate Two and thirty persons of their own Perswasion to have a superintendency over all Affairs which concerned that Kingdom whom they called by the name of Directors and enter into a Solemn League or Covenant to defend each other against all persons whatsoever without excepting either King or Emperor For punishing these Insolencies on the one side and preserving the Malefactors on the other from the hands of Justice a terrible Confusion first and afterwards a more terrible Warr breaks out amongst them In the first heats whereof the Emperor Matthias dyes and Ferdinand is lawfully elected to succeed in the Empire To stop the course of whose good Fortunes the Bohemian Confederates renounce all Allegiance to him proclaim him for no King of theirs nor so to be acknowledged by the Princes and Estates of Germany 30. But their new Governours or Directors as they called them being generally worsted in the Warr and fearing to be called to a strict account for these multiplyed Injuries resolve upon the choice of some Potent Prince to take that unfortunate Crown upon him And who more like to carry it with success and honour than Frederick the fifth Prince Elector Palatine the Head of the Calvinian Party Son-in-law to the King of England descended from a Daughter of the Prince of Orange and by his Wife allyed to the King of Denmark the Dukes of Holstein and Brunswick three great Lutheran Princes These were the Motives on their part to invite him to it and they prevailed as much with him to accept the offer to which he was pushed forward by the secret instigation of the States United whose Truce with Spain was now upon the point of exspiration and they thought fit in point of State-craft that he should exercise his Army further off than in their Dominions And unto these it may be added He had before incurred the Emperor's Displeasure on a double account first for projecting the Confederacy of the Chiefs of the Calvinists whom they called the Princes of the Vnion for defence of themselves and their Religion And secondly for demolishing the Fortifications which were raised at Vdenhaine though authorized by the Placart of Matthias himself for which he was impleaded in the Chamber of Spires Upon which Motives and Temptations he first sends forth his Letters to the Estates of Bohemia in which he signified his acceptance of the Honour conferred upon him and then acquaints K. IAMES with the Proposition whose Counsel he desired therein for his better direction But King IAMES was not pleased in the precipitancy of this rash adventure and thought himself unhandsomely handled in having his Advice asked upon the post-fact when all his Counsels to the contrary must have come too late Besides he had a strong Party of Calvinists in his own Dominions who were not to be trusted with a Power of disposing Kingdoms for fear they might be brought to practise that against Himself which he had countenanced in others He knew no Prince could reign in safety or be established on his Throne with Peace and Honour if once Religion should be made a Cloak to disguise Rebellions 31. Upon these grounds of Christian Prudence he did not only disallow the Action in his own particular but gave command that none of his Subjects should from thenceforth own his Son-in-law for the King of Bohemia or pray for him in the Liturgy or before their Sermons by any other Title than the Prince Elector At which the English Calvinists were extreamly vexed who had already fancied to themselves upon this occasion the raising of a Fifth Monarchy in these parts of Christendom even to the dethroning of the Pope the setting up of Calvin in St. Peter's Chair and carrying on the Warr to the Walls of Constantinople No man more zealous in the Cause than Arch-bishop Abbot who pressed to have the News received with Bells and Bonfires the King to be engaged in a Warr for the defence of such a Righteous and Religious Cause and the Jewels of the Crown to be pawned in pursuance of it as appears plainly by his Letters to Sir
Saxon Weimar were taken Prisoners the Bohemian Ordnance all suprised Prague forced to yeeld unto the Victor the King and Queen compelled to flye into Silesia from whence by many difficult passages and untravelled ways they came at last in safety to the Hague in Holland Nor is it altogether unworthy of our observation That this great Victory was obtained on a Sunday morning being the 8 th of November and the 23 d Sunday after Trinity in the Gospel of which day occurred that memorable passage Reddite Caesari qua sunt Caesaris that is to say Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesars Which seemed to judgâ— the Quarrel on the Emperor's side Hereupon followed the most Tragical or rather most Tyranical Execution of the chief Directors who had a hand in the Design the suppressing of the Protestant Reformed Religion in all the Emperor's Estates the falling back of Bethlem Gabor into Transylvania the proscribing of the Prince Elector and his Adherents the transferring of the Electoral Dignity together with the Upper Palatinate on the Duke of Bavaria the Conquest of the lower Palatinate by the King of Spain and the setting up of Popery in all parts of both In which condition they remained till the restoring of Charles Lodowick the now Prince Elector to the best part of his Estate by the Treaty of Munster 1648. 35. Such was the miserable end of the Warr of Bohemia raised chiefly by the Pride and Pragmaticalness of Calvin's Followers out of a hope to propagate their Doctrines and advance their Discipline in all parts of the Empire Nor sped the Hugonots much better in the Realm of France where by the countenance and connivance of King HENRY the 4 th who would not see it and during the minority of LEWIS the 13 th who could not help it they possessed themselves of some whole Countreys and near Two hundred strong Towns and fortified places Proud of which Strength they took upon them as a Commonwealth in the midst of a Kingdom summoned Assemblies for the managing of their own Affairs when and as often as they pleased Gave Audience to the Ministers of Forreign Churches and impowred Agents of their own to negotiate with them At the same Meetings they consulted about Religion made new Laws for Government displaced some of their old Officers and elected new ones the King's consent being never asked to the Alterations In which licentious calling of their own Assemblies they abused their Power to a neglect of the King's Authority and not dissolving those Assemblies when they were commanded they improved that Neglect to a Disobedience Nay sometimes they run cross therein to those very Edicts which they had gained by the effusion of much Christian Blood and the expence of many Hundred thousand Crowns For by the last Edict of Pacification the King had granted the free exercise of both Religions even in such Towns as were assigned for Caution to the Hugonot Party Which liberty being enjoyed for many years was at last interrupted by those very men who with so much difficulty had procured it For in an Assembly of theirs which they held at Loudun Anno 1619 they strictly commanded all their Governours Mayors and Sheriffs not to suffer any Jesuit nor those of any other Order to preach in any of the Towns assigned to them though licensed by the Bishop of the Diocess in due Form of Law And when upon a dislike of their proceedings the King had declared their Meetings to be unlawful and contrary to the Publick Peace and had procured the Declaration to be verified in the Court of Parliament they did not only refuse to separate themselves as they were required but still insisted upon terms of Capitulation even to a plain justifying of their actings in it 36. These carriages gave the King such just offence that he denied them leave to send Commissioners to the Synod of Dort to which they had been earnestly invited by the States of the Netherlands For being so troublesome and imperious when they acted only by the strength of their Provincial or National Meetings what danger might not be suspected from a general Confluence in which the Heads of all the Faction might be laid together But then to sweeten them a little after this Refusal he gave them leave to hold an Assembly at Charenton four miles from Paris there to debate those points and to agree those differences which in that Synod had been agitated by the rest of their Party Which Liberty they made such use of in the said Assembly that they approved all the Determinations which were made at Dort commanded them to be subscribed and bound themselves and their Successors in the Ministry by a solemn Oath Not only stedfastly and constantly to adhere unto them but to persist in maintenance thereof to the last gasp of their breath But to return to the Assembly at Loudun They would not rise from thence though the King commanded it till they had taken order for another Assembly to be held at Rochel the chief place of their strength and the Metropolis or principal City of their Common-wealth Which General Assembly being called by their own Authority and called at such a time as had given the King some trouble in composing the Affairs of Bearn was by the King so far disliked and by especial Edict so far prohibited that they were all declared to be guilty of Treason who should continue in the same without further Order Which notwithstanding they sate still and very undutifully proceeded in their former purposes Their business was to draw up a Remonstrance of their present Grievances or rather of the Fears and Jealousies which they had conceived on the King's journey into Bearn This they presented to the King by their own Commissioners and thereunto received a fair and plausible Answer sent in a Letter to them by the Duke Des Diguiers by whom they were advised to dissolve the Assembly and submit themselves unto the King Instead whereof they published a Declaration in defence of their former Actions and signified a Resolution not to separate or break up that Meeting until their Grievances were redressed 37. It hapned at the same time that the Lord of Privas a Town in which the Hugonots made the strongest Party married his Daughter and Heir to the Viscount of Cheylane and dying left the same wholly unto his disposal Who being of different perswasions from the greatest part of his Vassals altered the Garrison and placed his own Servants and Dependents in it as by Law he might This moved the Hugonots of the Town and the Neighbouring Villages to put themselves into a posture of Warr to seize upon the places adjoining and thereby to compel the young Noble-man to forsake his Inheritance Which being signified to the King he presently scored this insolence on the account of the Rochellers who standing in defiance of his Authority was thought to have given some animation unto the Town of Privas to commit
those out-rages Doubly affronted and provoked the King resolves to right Himself in the way of Arms. But at the instant request of Des Diguiers before remembred who had been hitherto a true Zealot to the Hugonot Cause he was content to give them Four and twenty days of deliberation before he drew into the Field He offered them also very fair and reasonable Canditions not altogether such as their Commissioners had desired for them but far better than those which they were glad to accept at the end of the Warr when all their strengths were taken from them But the Hugonots were not to be told that all the Calvinian Princes and Estates of the Empire had put themselves into a posture of Warr some for defence of the Palatinate and others in pursuance of the Warr of Bohemia Of which they gave themselves more hopes than they had just cause for In which conjuncture some hot spirits then assembled at Rochel blinded with pride or hurried on by the fatality of those Decrees which they maintained to be resolved upon by God before all Eternity reject all offers tending to a Pacification and wilfully run on to their own destruction For presently upon the tendry of the King's Proposals they publish certain Orders for the regulating of their Disobedience as namely That no Agreement should be made with the King but by the consent of a General Convocation of the Chiefs of their Party about the payment of their Soldiers Wages and intercepting the Revenues of the King and Clergie toward the maintenance of the Warr. They also Cantoned the whole Kingdom into seven Divisions assigned to each of those Divisions a Commander in Chief and unto each Commander their particular Lieutenants Deputy-Lieutenants and other Officers with several Limitations and Directions prescribed to each of them for their proceeding in this service 38. This makes it evident that the King did not take up Arms but on great necessities He saw his Regal Authority neglected his especial Edicts wilfully violated his Gracious Offers scornfully slighted his Revenues Feloniously intercepted his whole Realm Cantoned before his face and put into the power of such Commanders as he could not trust So that the Warr being just on his part he had the more reason to expect such an issue of it as was agreeable to the Equity of so good a Cause He had besides all those Advantages both at home and abroad which in all probability might assure him of the End desired The Prince Elector Palatine had been worsted in the Warr of Bohemia and all the Princes of the Union scattered to their several Homes which they were hardly able to defend against so many Enemies so that there was no danger to be feared from them And on the other side the King of Great Britain whom he had most cause to be afraid of had denied assistance to his own Children in the Warr of Bohemia which seemed to have more Justice in it than the Warr of the Hugonots and therefore was not like to engage in behalf of strangers who rather out of wantonness than any unavoidable necessity had took up Arms against their Lawful and Undoubted Soveraign At home the Rochellers were worse befriended than they were abroad I mean the Common-wealth of Rochel as King LEWIS called it The whole Confederacy of the Hugonots there contrived and sworn to they had Cantoned the whole Realm into seven Divisions which they assigned to the Command of the Earl of Chastillon the Marquess De la Force the Duke of Soâ—bize the Duke of Rohan the Duke of Trimoville the Duke Des Diguer and the Duke of Bouillon whom they designed to be the Generalissimo over all their Forces But neither he nor Des Diguers nor the Duke of Trimoville nor Chastillon would act any thing in it or accept any such Commissions as were sent unto them Whether it were that they were terrified with the ill success of the Warr of Bohemia or that the Conscience of their duty did direct them in it I dispute not now So that the Rochellers being deserted both at home and abroad were forced to rely upon the Power and Prudence of the other three and to supply all other wants out of the Magazine of Obstinacy and Perversness with which they were plentifully stored Two instances I shall only touch at and pass over the rest The town of Clerack being summoned the 21 of Iuly 1621 returned this Answer to the King viz. That if he would permit them to enjoy their Liberties withdraw his Armies and leave their Fortifications in the same estate in which he found them they would remain his faithful and obedient Subjects More fully those of Mount Albon on the like occasion That they resolve to live and dye not in obedience to the King as they should have said but in the Vnion of the Churches Most Religious Rebels 39. Next let us look upon the King who being brought to a necessity of taking Arms first made his way unto it by his Declaration of the second of April published in favour of all those of that Religion who would contain themselves in their due obedience In pursuance whereof he caused five persons to be executed in the City of Tours who had tumultuously disturbed the Hugonots whom they found busied at the burial of one of their dead He also signified to the King of Great Britain the Princes of the Empire and the States of the Netherlands That he had not undertook this Warr to suppress the Religion but to chastise the Insolencies of Rebellious Subjects And what he signified in words he made good by his deeds For when the Warr was at the hottest all those of the Religion in the City of Paris lived as securely as before and had their accustomed Meetings at Charenton as in times of peace Which safety and security was enjoyed in all other places even where the King's Armies lodged and quartered Nay such a care was taken of their preservation that when some of the Rascality in the City of Paris upon the first tydings of the death of the Duke of Mayenne who had been slain at the Siege of Mont-albon amongst many others breathed nothing but slaughter and revenge to the Hugonot Party the Duke of Mounbazon being then Governour of the City commanded their Houses and the Streets to be safely guarded so that no hurt was done to their Goods or Persons And when the Rabble being disappointed of their Ends in Paris had run tumultuously the next day to Charenton and burned down their Temple an Order was presently made by the Court of Parliament for the re-edifying it at the King 's sole Charges and that too in a far more beautiful Fabrick than before it had But in the conduct of the Warr he governed not his Counsels with like moderation suffering the Sword too often to range at liberty as if he meant to be as terrible in his Executions as he desired to be accounted just in his Undertakings But
out into open Warr. But finding no occasion they resolve to make one and to begin their first Embroilments upon the sending of the new Liturgy and Book of Canons to the Kirk of Scotland For though the Scots in a general Assembly held at Aberdeen had given consent unto the making of a Liturgy for the use of that Kirk and for drawing up a Book of Canons out of the Acts of their Assemblies and some Acts of Parliament yet when those Books were finished by the Care of King CHARLES and by his Piety recommended unto use and practise it must be looked on as a violation of their Rights and Liberties And though in another of their Assemblies which was held at Perth they had past five Articles for introducing private Baptism communicating of the sick kneeling at the Communion Episcopal Confirmation and the observing of such ancient Festivals as belonged immediately unto Christ yet when those Articles were incorporated in the Common-prayer-Book they were beheld as Innovations in the Worship of God and therefore not to be admitted in so pure and Reformed a Church as that of Scotland These were the Hooks by which they drew the people to them who never look on their Superiors with a greater reverence than when they see them active in the Cause of Religion and willing in appearance to lose all which was dear unto them whereby they might preserve the Gospel in its native purity But it was rather Gain than Godliness which brought the great men of the Realm to espouse this Quarrel who by the Commission of Surrendries of which more elsewhere began to fear the losing of their Tithes and Superiorities to which they could pretend no other title than plain Usurpation And on the other side it was Ambition and not Zeal which enflamed the Presbyters who had no other way to invade that Power which was conferred upon the Bishops by Divine Institution and countenanced by many Acts of Parliament in the Reign of K. IAMES than by embracing that occasion to incense the people to put the whole Nation into tumult and thereby to compel the Bishops and the Regular Clergy to forsake the Kingdom So the Genevians dealt before with their Bishop and Clergy when the Reforming-Humour came first upon them And what could they do less in Scotland than follow the Example of their Mother-City 3. These breakings-out in Scotland smoothed the way to the like in England from which they had received encouragement and presumed on Succours The English Puritaus had begun with Libelling against the Bishops as the Scots did against the King For which the Authors and Abettors had received some punishment but such as did rather reserve them for ensuing Mischiefs than make them sensible of their Crimes or reclaim them from it So that upon the coming of the Liturgy and Book of Canons the Scots were put into such heat that they disturbed the execution of the one by an open Tumult and refused obedience to the other by a wilful obstinacy The King had then a Fleet at Sea sufficiently powerful to have blockt up all the Havens of Scotland and by destroying that small Trade which they had amongst them to have reduced them absolutely to His Will and Pleasure But they had so many of their Party in the Council of Scotland and had so great a confidence in the Marquess of Hamilton and many Friends of both Nations in the Court of England that they feared nothing less than the Power of the King or to be enforced to their obedience in the way of Arms. In confidence whereof they despise all His Proclamations with which Weapons only He encountred them in their first Seditions and publickly protested against all Declarations which He sent unto them in the Streets of Edenborough Nothing else being done against them in the first year of their Tumults they cast themselves into four Tables for dispatch of business but chiefly for the cementing of their Combination For which they could not easily bethink themselves of a speedier course than to unite the people to them by a League or Covenant Which to effect it was thought necessary to renew the old Confession excogitated in the year 1580 for the abjuring of the Tyranny and Superstitions of the Church of Rome subscribed first by the King and His Houshold-Servants and the next year by all the Natives of the Kingdom as was said before And it was also said before that unto this Confession they adjoined a Band Anno 1592 for standing unto one another in defence thereof against all Papists and other professed Adversaries of their Religion This is now made to serve their turn against the King For by a strange interpretation which was put upon it it was declared That both the Government of the Church by Bishops and the Five Articles of Perth the Liturgy and the Book of Canons were all abjured by that Confession and the Band annexed though the three last had no existency or being in the Kirk of Scotland when that Confession was first formed or the Band subjoined 4. These Insolencies might have given the King a just cause to arm when they were utterly unprovided of all such necessaries as might enable them to make the least show of a weak resistance But the King deals more gently with them negotiates for some fair accord of the present differences and sends the Marquess of Hamilton as his chief Commissioner for the transacting of the same By whose sollicitation he revokes the Liturgy and the Book of Canons suspends the Articles of Perth and then rescinds all Acts of Parliament which confirmed the same submits the Bishops to the next General Assembly as their competent Judges and thereupon gives intimation of a General Assembly to be held at Glasgow in which the point of Church-Government was to be debated and all his Condescentions enrolled and registred And which made most to their advantage he caused the Solemn League or Covenant to he imposed on all the Subjects and subscribed by them Which in effect was to legitimate the Rebellion and countenance the Combination with the face of Authority But all this would not do his business though it might do theirs For they had so contrived the matter that none were chosen to have voices in that Assembly but such as were sure unto the side such as had formerly been under the Censures of the Church for their Inconformity and had refused to acknowledg the King's Supremacy or had declared their disaffections to Episcopal Government And that the Bishops might have no encouragement to sit amongst them they cite them to appear as Criminal persons Libel against them in a scandalous and unchristian manner and finally make choice of Henderson a Seditious Presbyter to sit as Moderator or chief President in it And though upon the sense of their disobedience the Assembly was again dissolved by the King's Proclamation yet they continued as before in contempt thereof In which Session they
best assistance to the lawful Ministers for the receiving and enjoying of their Glebes and Tythes With an Injunction to all Sheriffs Mayors and other Ministers of Iustice to be aiding to them and to resist by force of Arms all such as should endeavour to disturb them in their lawful possessions But this served rather for a Declaration of His Majesty's Piety than an Example of His Power For notwithstanding all this Care his faithful Subjects of the Clergy in all parts of the Realm were plundred sequestred and ejected for the Crime of Loyalty some of them never being restored and others most unjustly kept from their Estates till this present year Anno 1660. 32. In the other Proclamation he forbids the tendring or taking of the Covenant before remembred Which Proclamation being short but full of substance shall be recited in His Majesty's own words which are these that follow Whereas saith he there is a printed Paper entituled A Solemn League and Covenant for Reformation and Defence of Religion the Honour and Happiness of the King the Peace and Safety of the Three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland pretended to be ordered by the Commons in Parliament on the 21 of September last to be printed and published Which Covenant though it seems to make some specious expressions of Piety and Religion is in truth nothing else but a Traiterous and Seditious Combination against Vs and against the established Religion and Laws of the Kingdom in pursuance of a Traiterous Design and Endeavour to bring in Forreign Forces to invade this Kingdom We do therefore straightly charge and command all Our loving Subjects of what degree or quality soever upon their Allegiance that they presume not to take the said Seditious and Traiterous Covenant And We do likewise hereby forbid and inhibit them to impose administer or tender the said Covenant as they and every of them will answer the contrary at their utmost and extreamest perils Such was the tenour of this Proclamation of the 9 th of October which though it served for a sufficient testimony of His Majesty's Prudence yet it prevailed as little as the other did For as the Two Houses did extend their Quarters and enlarge their Power so were the Subjects forced more generally to receive this yoak and to submit themselves to those Oaths and Covenants which they could neitâ—â—r take for fear of God's and the King's Displeasure and dared not to refuse for fear of losing all which was dear unto them So that it was esteemed for a special favour as indeed it was for all those which came in on the Oxford Articles to be exempted from the taking of this leud and accursed Covenant by which they were to bind themselves to betray the Church and to stand no further to the King than as he stood for the defence of that Religion which they then allowed of and of those Liberties which they had acquired by what way soever 33. And to say truth it was no wonder that the Presbyterians should impose new Oaths when they had broken all the old or seize upon the Tythes and Glebes of the Regular Clergy when they had sequestred the Estates of the Loyal Gentry and intercepted the Revenues of the King and Queen And it would be no wonder neither that they should seize on the Revenues of the King and Queen when they were grown to such a high degree of impudence as to impeach the Queen of Treason and were resolved of having no more Kings to comptroll their Actions They had already voted for the making of a new Great Seal though so to do was made High Treason by the Statute of K. EDWARD the third that they might expedite their Commissions with the more Authority and add some countenance of Law to the present Warr. Which must be managed in the Name of the King and Parliament the better to abuse the people and add some Reputation to the Crime of their undertakings And being Masters of a Seal they thought themselves in a capacity of acting as a Common-wealth as a State distinct but for the present making use of His Majesty's Name as their State-holder for the ordering of their new Republick But long He must not hold that neither though that was locked up as a Secrete amongst those of the Cabala till it was blurted out by Martin then Knight for Berks. By whom it was openly declared That the felicity of this Nation did not consist in any of the House of STVART Of which His Majesty complained but without reparation And for a further evidence of their good intentions a view is to be taken of the old Regalia and none so fit as Martin to perform that Service Who having commanded the Sub-dean of Westminster to bring him to the place in which they were kept made himself Master of the Spoil And having forced open a great Iron Chest took out the Crowns the Robes the Swords and Scepter belonging anciently to K. EDWARD the Confessor and used by all our Kings at their Inaugurations With a scorn greater than his Lusts and the rest of His Vices he openly declares That there would be no further use of those Toys and Trifles And in the jollity of that humour invests George Withers an old Puritan Satyrist in the Royal Habiliments Who being thus Crown'd and Royally array'd as right well became him first marcht about the Room with a stately Garb and afterwards with a thousand Apish and Ridiculous actions exposed those Sacred Ornaments to contempt and laughter Had the Abuse been script and whipt as it should have been the foolish Fellow possibly might have passed for a Prophet though he could not be reckoned for a Poet. 34. But yet the mischief stayed not here Another visit is bestowed upon these Regalia not to make merry with them but some money of them Mildmay a Puritan in Faction and Master of the Jewel-House by his Place and Office conceived that Prey to belong properly to him and having sold the King must needs buy the Crowns But being as false to his new Masters as he was to his old he first pickt out the richest Jewels and then compounded for the rest at an easie rate The like ill fortune fell unto the Organs Plate Coaps Hangings Altar-Cloaths and many other costly Utensils which belonged to the Church all which were either broke in pieces or seized upon and plundered for the use of the State Amongst the rest there was a goodly Challice of the purest Gold which though it could not be less worth than 300 l. was sold to Allyn a decayed Gold-Smith but then a Member of the House at the rate of 60 l. The Birds being flown the Nest is presently designed to the use of the Soldiers who out of wantonness and not for want of Lodging in that populous City must be quartered there And being quartered they omitted none of those shameless Insolencies which had been acted by their Fellows in other Churches For they not only
the Government both of Church and State Some Hugonots which afterwards were took in Gascoyne and by the Marshal of Monluck were exposed to torture are said to have confessed upon the Rack that it was really intended to kill the King together with the Queen and the two young Princes and having so cut off the whole Royal Line to set the Crown upon the head of the Prince of Conde But Charity and Christianity bids me think the contrary and to esteem of this report as a Popish Calumny devised of purpose to create the greater hatred against the Authors of those Wars 27. But whether it were true or not certain it is that the design was carryed with such care and closeness that the Queen had hardly time enough to retire to Meux a little Town twelve Leagues from Paris before the whole Body of the Hugonots appeared in sight from whence they were with no less difficulty conducted by the Switz whom they had suddenly drawn together to the Walls of Paris the Switz being charged upon the way by no fewer then eleven hundred Horse and D' Andelot in the head of one of the parties but gallantly making good their March and serving to the King and the Royal Family for a Tower or Fortress no sooner were they come to Paris but the Hugonots take a resolution to besiege the City before the Kings Forces could assemble to relieve the same To which end they possessed themselves of all the passes upon the River by which provisions came into it and burned down all the Wind-mills about the Town which otherwise might serve for the grinding of such Corn as was then within it No better way could be devised to break this blow then to entertain them with a Parley for an accommodation not without giving them some hope of yeilding unto any conditions which could be reasonably required But the Hugonots were so exorbitant in their demands that nothing would content them but the removing of the Queen from publick Government the present disbanding of the Kings Forces the sending of all strangers out of the Kingdom a punctual execution of the Kings Edict of Ianuary liberty for their Ministers to Preach in all places even in Paris it self and finally that Calice Metz and Havre-de-grace might be consigâ—ed unto them for Towns of caution but in plain truth to serve them for the bringing in of the English and Germans when their occasion so required The Treaty notwithstanding was continued by the Queen with great dexterity till the King had drawn together sixteen thousand men with whom the Constable gives battel to the Enemy on the 10 of November compels them to dislodge makes himself master of the Field but dyed the next day after in the eightieth year of his age having received his deaths wound from the hands of a Switz who most unmanfully shot him when he was not in condition to make any resistance 28. In the mean time the City of Orleance was surprised by the Hugonots with many places of great importance in most parts of the Realm which serving rather to distract then increase their Forces they were necessitated to seek out for some Forraign aid Not having confidence enough to apply themselves to the Queen of England whom in the business of Newhaven they had so betrayed they send their Agents to sollicite the Elector Palatine and prevailed with him for an Army of seven thousand Horse and four thousand Foot to which the miserable Country is again exposed Encouraged with which great supplies they laid Siege to Chartres the principal City of La Beaue the loss whereof must of necessity have subjected the Parisians to the last extremities The chief Commanders in the Kings Army were exceeding earnest to have given them battel thereby to force them from the Siege But the Queen not willing to venture the whole State of the Kingdom upon one cast of the Dice especially against such desperate Gamesters who had nothing to lose but that which they carryed in their hands so plyed them with new Offers for accommodation that her conditions were accepted and the Germans once again disbanded and sent back to their Country During which broyls the Town of Rochel strongly sâ—ituated on a bay of the Ocean had declared for the Hugonots and as it seems had gone so far that they had left themselves no way to retreat And therefore when most other places had submitted to the late Accord the Rochellers were resolved to stand it out and neither to admit a Garrison nor to submit to any Governour of the Kings appointment in which rebellious obstinacy they continued about sixty years the Town being worthily esteemed for the safest sanctuary to which the Hugonots retired in all times of dangeâ— and most commodious for the letting in of a forraign army when they found any ready to befriend them in that cause and quarrel The standing out of which Town in such obstinate manner not only encouraged many others to doe the like but by the fame thereof drew thither both the Admiral and the Prince of Conde with many other Gentlemen of the Hugonot Faction there to consult about renewing of the war which they were resolved on To whom repaired the Queen of Navarre with the Prince her Son then being but fifteen years of age whom she desired to train up in that holy war upon an hope that he might one day come to be the head of that party as he after was And here being met they publish from hence two several Manifests one in the name of all the Hugonots in general the other in the name of that Queen alone both tending to the same effect that is to say the putting of some specious colour upon their defection and to excuse the breaking of the peace established by the necessity of a warre 29. This rapture so incensed the King and his Council that they resolved no longer to make use of such gentle medicines as had been formerly applyed in the like distempers which resolution was the parent of that terrible Edict by which the King doth first revoke all the former Edicts which had been made during his minority in favour of the Reformed Religion nullifying more particularly the last capitulations made only in the way of Provision to redress those mischiefs for which no other course could be then resolved on And that being done it was ordained and commanded That the exercise of any other Religion then the Roman Catholick ever observed by him and the King his Predecessors should be prohibited and expresly forbidden and interdicted in all places of the Kingdom banished all the Calvinist Ministers and Preachers out of all the Towns and places under his Dominion and within fifteen days upon pain of death to avoid the Realm pardoned through special grace all things past in matters of Religion but requiring for the future under pain of death a general Conformity to the Rites of the Catholick Church and finally ordained that no person should
propositions as were made to him at the first by Count Lodowick his Ministers and alter by the Agent of the Prince himself He had sent some aid not long before to support the Hugonots But now his Souldiers being returned from France and grown burdensome to him are drawn together into a body and with the help of some others out of France and Germany compound an Army of seven thousand Foot and four thousand Horse with which he sends Prince Christopher a younger son under the conduct of Count Lodowick and his Brother Henry But they had scarce entred within the Borders of Gelderland where they expected an addition of fresh Forces from the Prince of Orange when they were set upon by Sanchio d' Avila before mentioned and routed with so great a slaughter that almost all the whole Army were either taken prisoners remedilesly wounded or slain outright and as for their three Generals Lodowick of Nassaw Grave Henry and the young Prince Christopher they were either slain fighting in the battail or trampled under the Horses Feet or finally stisled in the flight as they crossed the Fens the last more probable because their bodies were not to be found on the strictest search 43. But not withstanding this misfortune neither the Prince Elector nor the Prince of Orange could be moved to desert the Cause which by the temptation of revenge was grown dearer to them For after this we finde Prince Casimir another of the Palatine Princes in the Head of an Army raised for assisting the Confederates in the Belgick Provinces by which name they began to be commonly called after the death of Requesenes who had succeeded Alva in the publick Government but wanting time before his death to settle the command in some trusty hands till some Supreme Officer might be sent unto them from the Court of Spain the Government devolved for the present on the Council of State and was invaded afterwards by the States themselves whose Deputies assembling in the Council-house or Court of Brussels made up the body of that Council which governed all Affairs both of Peace and War But great contentions growing betwixt them and the Souldiers and those contentions followed on either side with great animosities the Prince of Orange had a most excellent opportunity for the establishing of his new Dictatorship over Holland and Zealand and some of the adjoyning Provinces of less name and note But being weary at the last of their own confusions and more impatient of the insupportable insolencies of the Spanish Souldiers an Association is first made in the Provinces of Brabant Flanders Artois and Haynalt By which it was agreed in Writing and confirmed by Oath that they should mutually assist each other against the Spaniards till they had cleared the Country of them And with these Provinces consisting for the most part of such as were counted Catholicks Holland and Zealand with the rest though esteemed heretical did associate also which Union is called commonly the Pacification of Gaunt because agreed on in that City and was so much insisted on by the Heads of the Leaguers that it was counselled by the Prince not to admit of Don Iohn for their Supreme Governour till he had ratified and confirmed that Association 44. But because there was no mention of maintaining the Kings Authority or preserving the Catholick Religion in the Originals of the League it was found necessary to provide for both by some explication to take away the envy and suspition of that great disloyalty which otherwise must have fallen upon them And by that explication it was thus declared viz. that they would faithfully from thenceforth maintain the League for the conservation of their most Sacred Faith and the Roman Catholick Religion for preserving the Pacification made at Gaunt for the expulsion of the Spaniards and their adherents their due obedience to the Kings most excellent Majesty being always tendered According to which explication it was confirmed by Don Iohn under the name of the perpetual Edict with the Kings consent who thought his own Authority and the Roman Religion to be thereby sufficiently provided for but he found the contrary For when the Prince of Orange was required to subscribe to the Pacification with the addition of two Clauses for constancie in this Religion and the Kings obedience he refused it absolutely assuring such as moved it to him that the Provinces under his command or consederacie with him were barred in Conscience from subscribing to the preservation of the Romish Faith And at this time it was that he merrily told the Duke of Arescot who was one of the Delegates that there was not more Calvism on his head then there was Calvinism in his heart He well foresaw that the agreement betwixt Don Iohn and the Estates of the Country would not long continue and he resolved to make some advantage of the breach whensoever it hapned Nor was he any thing mistaken in the one or the other for discontents and jealousies encreasing mutually between the parties Don Iohn leaves Brussels and betakes himself to the Castle of Namure for fear of an Assassinate as it was given out which was intended on his person which so incensed the Estates that by a general consent a Dictatorian or Soveraign power was put into the hands of the Prince of Orange by the name Ruart according to the priviledge and practice of the Brabanters in extreme necessities Invested with which power he instituteth a new face of Government both in Brussels it self and many of the Towns adjoyning modelled after the Example of Holland and Zealand He demolished also the great Fort at Antwerp which had been raised with so great Pride and Ostentation by the Duke of Alva The like done also in demolishing the Castles of Gant Vtrecht Lisle Valenciennes and some other places performed by such alacrity by them that did it as if they had shaken off the Yoke of some Forreign servitude An Oath was also framed for renouncing all obedience to Don Iohn their Governour and people of all sorts compelled to take it for the refusal whereof by the Iesuits of Antwerp a Rabble of Calvinian Zealots on the day of Pentecost forced open the doors of that Society plundred their houses of all things Sacred and Prophane and set the Father on board a Ship of the Hollanders with great scorn and insolencie to be landed in some other Country 45. The like done also to the Fathers of Tournay Bruges and Maestricht banished on the same account from their several Cities with whom were also exiled in some places Franciscan Fryars in others many secular Priests who would not easily be perswaded to abjure their Loyalty By whose departure divers Churches were left destitute and unprovided of incumbents to instruct the people which so increased the confidence and hopes of the Calvinians that they not onely petitioned the Estates for liberty of Conscience but for the publick use of Churches in their several Territories but being refused in their
leaving the Reader for his further satisfaction to the History of the Reformation not long since published in which they are laid down at large in their times and places 9. Nor did they work less trouble to the Church in those early days by their endeavouring to advance some Zuinglian Doctrines by which the blame of all mens sins was either charged upon Gods will or his Divine Decree of Predestination These men are called in Bishop Hooper's Preface to the Ten Commandments by the name of Gospellers for making their new Doctrines such a necessary part of our Saviours Gospel as if men could not possibly be saved without it These Doctrines they began to propagate in the Reign of King Edward but never were so busie at it as when they lived at Geneva or came newly thence For first Knox publisheth a book against an Adversary of Gods Predestination wherein it is declared That whatsoever the Ethnicks and ignorant did attribute to Fortune by Christians is to be assigned to Gods heavenly Providence That we ought to judge nothing to come of Fortune but that all cometh by the determinate counsel of God And finally that it would be displeasing unto God if we esteem any thing to proceed from any other and that we do not onely behold him as the principal cause of all things but also the Author appointing all things to one or the other by his onely Counsel After came out a book first written in French and aâ—terwards by some of them translated into English which they called A brief Declaration of the Table of Predestination In which is put down for a principal Aphorism That in like manner as God hath appointed the end it is necessary that he should appoint the causes leading to the same end but more particularly That by virtue of Gods will all things are done yea even those things which are evil and execrable 10. At the same time came out another of their books pretended to be writ Against a privy Papist as the Title tells us wherein is maintained more agreeably to Calvins Doctrine That all evil springeth of Gods Ordinance and that Gods Predestination was the cause of Adams fall and of all wickedness And in a fourth book published by Robert Cowley who afterwards was Rector of the Church of S. Giles near Cripplegate intituled The confutation of Thirteen Articles it is said expresly That Adam being so perfect a creature that there was in him no lust to sin and yet so weak that of himself he was not able to resist the assault of the subtile Serpent that therefore there can be no remedy but that the onely cause of his fall must needs be the Predestination of God In which book it is also said That the most wicked persons that have been were of God appointed to be wicked even as they were That if God do predestinate a man to do things rashly and without any deliberation he shall not deliberate at all but run headlong upon it be it good or evil And in a word That we are compelled by Gods Predestination to do those things for which we are damned By which Defenders of the absolute Decree of Reprobation as God is made to be Author of sin either in plain terms or undeniable consequence so from the same men and the Genevian Pamphlets by them dispersed our English Calvinists have borrowed all their Grounds and Principles on which they build the absolute and irrespective Decree of Predestination contrary to the Doctrines publickly maintained and taught in the Church of England in the time of King Edward and afterwards more clearly explicated under Queen Elizabeth 11. Such was the posture of affairs at Queen Elizabeths first coming to the Crown of England when to the points before disputed both at home and abroad was raised another of more weight and consequence then all the rest and such as if it could be gained would bring on the other Such as had lived in exile amongst the Zwitzers or followed Knox at his return unto Geneva became exceedingly enamored of Calvins Platform by which they found so much Authority ascribed unto the Ministers in the several Churches as might make them absolute and independant without being called to an account by King or Bishop This Discipline they purposed to promote at their coming home and to that end leaving some few behind them to attend the finishing of the Bible with the Genevian Notes upon it which was then in the Press the rest return a main for England to pursue the Project But Cox had done their errand before they came and she had heard so much from others of their carriage at Frankfort and their untractableness in point of Decency and comely Order in the Reign of her brother as might sufficiently forewarn her not to hearken to them Besides she was not to be told with what reproaches Calvin had reviled her Sister nor how she had been persecuted by his followers in the time of her Reign some of them railing at her person in their scandalous Pamphlets some practising by false but dangerous allusions to subvert her Government and others openly praying to God That he would either turn her heart or put an end to her days And of these men she was to give her self no hope but that they would proceed with her in the self-same manner whensoever any thing should be done how necessary and just soever which might cross their humours The consideration whereof was of such prevalency with those of her Council who were then deliberating about the altering of Religion that amongst other remedies which were wisely thought of to prevent such dangers as probably might ensue upon it it was resolved to have an eye upon these men who were so hot in the pursuit of their flattering hopes that out of a desire of Innovation as my Author tells me they were busied at that very time in setting up a new Form of Ecclesiastical Polity and therefore were to be supprest with all care and diligence before they grew unto a head 12. But they were men of harder metal then to be broken at the first blow which was offered at them Queen Maries death being certified to those of Geneva they presently dispatched their Letters to their Brethren at Frankfort and Arrow to which Letters of theirs an answer is returned from Frankfort on the third from Arrow on the 16 of Ianuary And thereupon it is resolved to prepare for England before their party was so sunk that it could not without much difficulty be buoyed up again Some of their party which remained all the time in England being impatient of delay and chusing rather to anticipate then expect Authority had set themselves on work in defacing Images demolishing the Altars and might have made foul work if not stopped in time Others began as hastily to preach the Protestant Doctrine in private Houses first and afterwards as opportunity was offered in the open Churches Great multitudes of people resorting to
them without Rule or Order To give a check to whose forwardness the Queen sets out her Proclamation in the end of December but which she gave command That no Innovation should be made in the State of Religion and that all persons should conform themselves for the present to the practices of Her Majesties Chappel till it was otherwise appointed Another Proclamation was also issued by which all preaching was prohibited but by such onely as were licensed by her Authority which was not like to countenance any men of such turbulent spirits The news whereof much hastned the return of those Zealous Brethren who knew they might have better fishing in a troubled water then in a quiet and composed Calvin makes use also of the opportunity directs his Letters to the Queen and Mr. Secretary Cecil in hope that nothing should be done but by his advice The contrary whereof gave matter of cold comfort both to him and them when they were given to understand that the Liturgie had been revised and agreed upon That it was made more passable then before with the Roman Catholicks and that not any of their number was permitted to act any thing in it except Whitehead onely who was but half theirs neither and perhaps not that All they could do in that Conjuncture was to find fault with the Translation of the Bible which was then in use in hope that their Genevian Edition of it might be entertained and to except against the paucity of fit men to serve the Church and fill the vacant places of it on the like hopes that they themselves might be preferred to supply the same 13. And it is possible enough that either by the mediation of Calvin or by the intercession of Peter Martyr who wrote unto the Queen at the same time also the memory of their former Errors might have been obliterated if Knox had not pulled more back with one hand then Calvin Martyr and the rest could advance with both For in a Letter of his to Sir William Cecil dated April the 24 1559 he first upbraids him with consenting to the suppressing of Christs true Evangel to the erecting of Idolatry and to the shedding of the blood of Gods most dear children during the Reign of Mischievous Mary that professed Enemy of God as he plainly calls her Then he proceeds to justifie his treasonable and seditious book against the Regiment of Women Of the truth whereof he positively affirmeth that he no more doubteth then that he doubted that was the voyce of God which pronounced this sentence upon that Sex That in dolour they should bear their children Next he declares in reference to the Person of Queen Elizabeth That he could willingly acknowledge her to be raised by God for the manifestation of his glory although not Nature onely but Gods own Ordinance did oppugn such Regiment And thereupon he doth infer That if Queen Elizabeth would confess that the extraordinary Dispensations of Gods great mercy did make that lawful in her which both Nature and Gods Laws did deny in all women besides none in England should be more ready to maintain her lawful Authority then himself But on the other side he pronounceth this Sentence on her That if she built her Title upon Custom Laws and Ordinances of men such foolish presumption would grievously offend Gods Supreme Majestie and that her ingratitude in that kind should not long lack punishment To the same purpose he writes also to the Queen Herself reproaching her withal That for fear of her life she had declined from God bowed to Idolatry and gone to Mass during the persecution of Gods Saints in the time of her Sister In both his Letters he complains of some ill offices which had been done him by means whereof he was denyed the liberty of Preaching in England And in both Letters he endeavoured to excuse his flock of late assembled in the most godly Reformed Church and City of Geneva from being guilty of any offence by his publishing of the book the blame whereof he wholly takes upon himself But this was not the way to deal with Queens and their Privy Counsellors and did effect so little in relation to himself and his flock that he caused a more watchfull eye to be kept upon them then possibly might have been otherwise had he scribled less 14. Yet such was the necessity which the Church was under that it was hardly possible to supply all the vacant places in it but by admitting some of the Genevian Zealots to the Publick Ministery The Realm had been extreamly visited in the year foregoing with a dangerous and Contagious Sickness which took away almost half the Bishops and occasioned such Mortality amongst the rest of the Clergy that a great part of the Parochial Churches were without Incumbents The rest of the Bishops twelve Deans as many Archdeacons Fifteen Masters of Colledges and Halls Fifty Prebendaries of Cathedral Churches and about Eighty Beneficed-men were deprived at once for refusing to subâ—â—â—â— to the Queens Supremacy For the filling of which vacant places though as much care was taken as could be imagined to stock the Church with moderate and conformable men yet many â—ast amongst the rest who either had not hitherto discovered their dis-affections or were connived at in regard of their parts and learning Private opinions not regarded nothing was more considered in them then their zeal against Popery and their abilities in Divine and Humane studies to make good that zeal On which account we find the Queens-Professor in Oxford to pass amongst the Non-Conformists though somewhat more moderate then the rest and Cartwright the Lady Margarets in Cambridge to prove an unextinguished fire-brand to the Church of England Wittingham the chief Ring-leader of the Frankfort-Schismaticks preferred unto the Deanry of Durham from thence encouraging Knox and Goodman in setting up Presbyterie and sedition in the Kirk of Scotland Sampson advanced unto the Deanry of Christ-Church and not long after turn'd out again for an incorrigible Non-Conformist Hardiman one of the first twelve Prebends of Westminster deprived soon after for throwing down the Altar and defacing the Vestments of the Church And if so many of them were advanced to places of note and eminence there is no question to be made but that some numbers of them were admitted unto Countrey-Cures by means whereof they had as great an opportunity as they could desire not onely to dispute their Genevian Doctrines but to prepare the people committed to them for receiving of such Innovations both in Worship and Government as were resolved in time convenient to be put upon them 15. For a preparative whereunto they brought along with them the Genevian Bible with their Notes upon it together with Davids Psalms in English metre that by the one they might effect an Innovation in the points of Doctrine and by the other bring this Church more neer to the Rules of Geneva in some chief acts of Publick Worship For to