Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A43687
|
The last speech, of that pious and [lear]ned divine Mr. John Hicks who was executed at Glassenbury, Octob. 1685.
|
Hickes, John, 1633-1685.
|
1685
(1685)
|
Wing H1880; ESTC R216814
|
9,258
|
11
|
THE LAST SPEECH Of that Pious and â—…ned Divine Mr. JOHN HICKS Who was Executed at Glassenbury Octob. 1685. I Suppose the spectators here present expect I should speak something before I leave this sanguinary stage and passe through my bloudy sufferings by which my immortal spirit will be speedily transported into an invisible and eternal world And I conclude they have different resentments thereof that some resent them with much joy with high exaltations and triumphs others with equal griefe and sorrow that to the one I am a most pleasant spectale and they behold mee with high complacencye and delight that to the other I am a mouthfull and unpleasant one and that they behold me with no lesse pittye and compassion concerning the first I can say I freely forgive them and heartily pray that God most mercifully and gratiously will prevent their mourning through miserye not onely here but to eternity hereafter Concerning the other I will say weepe for your sins and for the sins of the Nation for the highest rebellions that ever were committed against the eternal God Lament bitterly for those sins that have been the meritorious cause of the late terrible judgment which I feare will provoke God to breake in upon this Nation with an inundation and overflowing deluge of judgments which are farr more tremendous and dreadfull and for sympathizeing with me in drinking this bitter cup appointed for mee I return you most humble and hearty thanks and earnstly desire God to flow into and fill your souls with all celestial and spiritual consolations Some thing I must say before I die to purge and clear my self from some false accusations layed to my charge as that I was ingaged with Capt. Bloud in rescueing of Capt. Mason when he was sent down from London to Yorke to be tryed for high treason that I was the man that kild the Barber of that Citty who travelled with them and also that I was with him when he stole the Crown Now as I am a dyeing man and upon the brinck of a stupendious eternity the reallity and truth whereof I firmely believe without any mentall reservation or the least equivocation I do declare in the presence of the all seing God that impartial judge before whom in a little time I must appeare that I never saw nor converst with Tho. Bloud from the yeare 1656. till after he had stolen the Crown which was in the year 1671 or there about in the yeare 1672. Nor was ever in the least ingaged with him in any of his treasonable plotts or practices 'T is true I being most injuriously wrongfully involved in greate troubles of another nature of which I have given an account to the world in a printed narrative and which is notoriously known in the country where then I lived by some which were grand enemies to me for my preaching I was perswaded to apply my self to Mr. Bloud to procure by his intercession his 〈◊〉 Maiesties grace and favour for me Accordingly he brought me into his Royal presence whilest I was in it his Majestie exprest himself with great clemency and mercy towards me without expressing one word of what I am charged with after Mr. Bloud came from his Majesty he continuing a little longer with him then I did he told me he had granted me my pardon which I did most thankfully accept knowing it would free me from all penalties and troubles I was obnoxious to which were occasioned by my nonconformity I then ingaging him to take out my pardon he told me he would put me into one with several others that had been ingaged with him in several treasonable designes and actions at which I was troubled fearing it might be imputed to me thereby though I did acquiesce therein for the present yet God knows I have often 〈◊〉 reflected upon it with great regret and dissatisfaction If Mr. Bloud did informe the late King for this end to make himself the more considerable he endeavouring to bring in as many of his party as he could to accept their pardon that they might be rendred utterly unable of Plotting any further mischief against his Person or Government or any other that was ingaged with him in any of his treasonable attempts I appeal to God in it he hath done me an irreparable wrong Also after the same manner do I declare that I was never the least ingaged with any party in plotting designing or contriving any treason or rebellion against the late King and particularly that I was altogether unconcerned and unacquainted with that for which the Lord Russel and others suffered and as much a Stranger to the last against the present King till it was ready to be put in Execution and whereas it was reported of me That at Tanton I perswaded the late Duke of Monmouth to assume the title of King I do as solemnly declare that I saw not the said Duke nor had any converse with him till he came to Shipton Mallet which was 13 days after he landed and several days after he had been at Tanton It is also false that I rode to and fro in the West to perswade men to go into his Army and rebell against his present Majesty for I was in the East Country when the Duke landed and from thence I went directly when he was at Shipton Mallet not one man accompanying me from thence thither As I have live so I dye owning and professing the true reformed Christian commonly called the Protestant Religion which is founded upon the pure written word of God onely which I acknowledge likewise to be comprehended in the thirty nine Articles of the Doctrine of the Church of England This Religion I have made a rational and free choise of and have heartly imbraced not onely as it protests against all Paganisme and the Mahometan Religion but against the corruption of the Christian especially in its essentials And I humble and earnestly pray unto God that by his infinite wisdom and almighty power he would prevent not only the utter extirpation but the least diminution thereof by the groweth and prevalency of what is contrary to it in the utter abhorrence whereof as I have lived so now I dye and for that end the Lord make the professors of it to live more up to its principles and rules and bring their hearts and conversations more under the Governing power of the same I dye also owning my Ministerial Nonconformisty for which I have suffered so much and which now doth obstruct the Kings grace and mercy to be manifested and extended to me for as I chose it not concerning which I now appeal to God as a dyeing man from sullennes or humour or a factious temper or from principles of Education or for secular interest or worldly advantage but purely from the dictates of my own conscience and as judging it to be the cause of God and to have more of divine truth in it then that which is contrary thereunto so
now I see no cause to repent of or to recede and depart from it not questioning but God will own it at the last day of judgment If no more had been required after the late Kings restauration to qualifie Ministers for publique preaching then was after the first Reformation to the time of Charles the First probably I might have satisfied my self there with and not have scrupled conformity thereto But the terms and conditions thereof by a Parliamentary Law in 1662 being made not onely new but so strict and severe I could never yet have satisfaction in my own conscience after all endeavouts used for a complyance therewith and submission thereunto To say nothing of the Covenant which I never tooke the renouncing of my ordination and giving unfeingend assent and consent have been always to difficult and hard for me to come up to And I do very well remember about 14 years ago entring into a discours with Mr. Patrick Sheriden then an Irish Dean and who was my contemporary in Dublin Colledge concerning conformity which he much endeavoured to perswade me to I urged the severity of the fore mentioned conditions against it and after some debates and reasonings I told him I did believe they were contrived designedly and on purpose to keep us out of the Church and to prevent our publick Ministry to which he ingeniously replyed he judged it was for said he a Bishop in Ireland whose name I have forgott told and the very same But though I could not wade through and conquer those difficulties yet I censure not those that have done it and I believe after all the hottest disputes the most vehement debates and violent contests betwixt conformists and conconformists here there are of both that will be glorified in heaven hereafter According to that 19 Article of the Church of England a visible Church is a congregation of faithfull men in the which the pure Word of God is preached the Sacraments duely administred according to Christs ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same so with such Churches I have held the most intimate communion and which such were I to live could hold it as occasion should require I would not therefore be so incorporated with any such Church as to exclude me from and render me uncapable of holding communion with other Churches I was never strictly bound up to any forme of Ecclesiastical Government that under which pure and undefiled Religion doth flowrish that which contenances and cherisheth reall practical holiness and advanceth the Kingdom of God in the World I can approve of submit to and peaeably live under were I to live I do approve of the ancient and present forme of civil Government English Monarchy I am fully satisfied with and I doe also declare that it is not warrantable for subjects to take up Arms and resist their Lawfull and rightfull Soveraign Princes and therefore had I not been induced by several things I have read and heard to belive the late Duke of Monmouth was the legitimate Son of his Father Charles the Second I had never gone into his Army judging without this I could not be free the guilt of rebellion which I always resolved to keep my self clear from and though his Father denyed he was married to his Mother I thought it might be answered with this that Kings and Princes for State reasons the depth whereof can not be fathomed by their subjects may affirme or denye things which without them they would not do and make even their naturall affections to truckle and stoope thereto I exhort all to abhor treasonable plots and practices to have all rebellion in the highest detestation to make the plain text of Sacred writ their rule to walk by in honouring obeying and living in subjection to rightfull Kings and not suddenly to receive nor to be suddenly imprest with evil reports and defamatious of them also not rashly to be the Spreaders and Propagaters of the same I desire God to forgive all my enemies and to give me a heart to forgive them which are many some mighty and all most malitious particularly Barret of Fovent who betrayed me and proved so treatherous to James Dun his old and intimate Friend I dye grievously afflicted that I should prove the occasion of the great sufferings of so many persons families but this hath fallen under the just and wise ordering of the divine providence as Davids going to Abimelech for some releif did when it proved the occasion of his death and all the Priests with the destruction of men women and Children in the Citie But who shall say unto God what dost thou The care of my most dear wife and many dear children I cast upon God who I hope will be better then the best of Husbands unto her and better then the best of parents unto them God knows how just and legall a right my wife hath unto her estate to him therefore I commit her to defend her from the violence and oppression of many particularly of a most inhumane and unnatural Brother but no wonder if he will lay violent hands upon his Sisters Estate that layd them so often on his own Father I dye a deeply humbled self judging self condemning sinner loathing and abhorring my many and great iniquities and my self for them earnestly desiring full redemption from the bondage of corruption under which I have groaned many years longing for a perfect conformity to the most glorious holy God the onely infinitely pure being thirsting for a perfect effusion of his image through all the powers and faculties of my soul panting after perfect spiritual light life and liberty and a consummated love to my dearest Jesus the all comprehending good and to be satisfied with his love for ever a vigorous and a vehement zeal for the Protestant Religion which a beleif of the Dukes legitimacy hath involved me in that for which I am condemned And tho it hath brought me to this ignominious death yet blessed be God that by sincere repentance and true faith in the bloud of Jesus there is a passage from it to a glorious eternal life and from those bitter sorrows to the fullness of sweetest joy that is in his presence and from those sharp bodily paines to those most pure pleasures that are at his Right hand for ever more Blessed be God that such a death as this cannot prevent and hinder Christs changing my vile body and fashoning it according to his most glorious body at the general resurrection day I am now going into that world where many darke things shall be made perfectly manifest and clear and many doubtfull things shall be resolved with plenary satisfaction given concerning them all disputes and mistakes concerning treason and schisme shall there be at an end cease for ever Many things that are innocent lawfull laudable often have foul markes and black characters stampt and fixt upon them here but shall be perfectly purified