Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	act_v	people_n	zion_n	20	3	9.6931	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A74924	A Faithfull searching home vvord, intended for the view of the remaining members of the former old Parliament in the time of their late second sitting at Westminster. Shewing the reasonableness and justness of their first dissolution, as also the dangerous rock they formerly split upon, that so they might learn to beware for the future: But being a second time dissolved upon the like account, as so many fruitless trees twic dead plucked up by the roots. It is now presented to the officers of the army as another looking-glass wherein they may plainly see, how woefully they also have dissembled, dealt treacherously, deceitfully and wickedly both with God and man, in having so greatly apostatized from, rejected, trodden under foot, persecuted, Judas-like betrayed, and as it were crucified and kept down in the grave (as the soldiers formerly did Christ) that blessed cause and those good principles, they once so highly pretended to own ... Together with an other seasonable word by way of counsel and proposal to the aforesaid officers of the armies of England, Scotland, and Ireland. All which, is also to be seen, and read of all men loving righteousness, that thereby they may (with the army) better know how to chuse the good, refute the evil, and rightly steer their course, and bend their spirits in the future, for the exaltation of Christ, his cause, and interest, and against all the apostacy and treachery, though never so refined, that may further appear in this gloomy, dark, overturning day.		1659 (1659)	Wing F285; Thomason E774_1; ESTC R207286	59,601	45

of the same nature which you say you gave to them but are still resolved to deal treacherously and deceitfully as they did with the Cause and People of God and to go on acting by the very same carnall selfish spirit and policy as before calling to your assistance chiefly those very Persons that were the first Contrivers Promoters and Abetters of the la●e and present Apostacy whom the Lord hath had and doubtless yet hath a controversie with and would not no nor without eminent repentance will not own nor give favour in the eyes of his faithful People but rather more cause them to stink in their nostrils and are as unwilling and backward as a Bear to come to the stake to call the forementioned faithful Persons turned out of the Little Parliament and others of that publique spirit into Power for fear they will do their work too thorowly But go on as long as you will and be as Politique in your Shifts and Contrivances to uphold your carnal Interests and to keep them out as ever you can yet assure your selves the Lord who loveth righteousness and hateth iniquity and every deceitful practice and takes the wrong you have done to them and therein to his Cause as if done unto himself and hath already begun to call you to an account and to punish you for the same will never cease disappointing overturning and sending streights upon you till you acknowledge your iniquity in that very thing and well if you escape so too which so far as I yet understand you have not done to this very day And that you may the better weigh and consider what I say herein read the following Scriptures Isa 26.11 Lord when thy hand is lifted up they will not see but they shal see and be ashamed for their envy at the people the fire of thine enemies shall destroy them Also Isa 33.1 Woe to thee that spoilest and thou wast not spoiled and dealest treacherously and they dealt not treacherously with thee when thou shalt cease to spoil thou shalt be spoiled c. comp Rom. 1.31 32. and Rom. 2.3 Think not because you are a professing people and the Lord hath so many times appeared for you covering your heads in the day of battel and likewise given you houses full of good things which you filled not Deut. 6.11 that you shall alwayes have his presence and salvation with and about you though you commit iniquity and go on therein without repentance but rather consider what he saith to Israel of old who had sinned and back-slidden from him as you have done Amos 3.2 You onely have I known of all the Families of the Earth therefore will I punish you for all your iniquities Oh how greatly hath the blessed Name Cause Wayes and People of God suffered been reproached set at nought and blasphemed by your as well as by the late Old Parliaments evil mannagement of the Affairs under your hand from the first beginning of your Apostacy or turning the honest Members left behinde in the Little Parliament out of the Power to this very day How is the Enemy encouraged to lift up themselves in the hopes and expectations that they shall once more have a day to advance their Carnal Popish Superstitious wicked Interest and to tread down the Cause and People of God under their feet What might not you have done by this time for the Advancement of the Cause of God and his People not onely in our own but in other Nations had you kept growing up in the light spirit and practice of those good Principles you once so greatly pretended to own and had not through unbelief and a self-seeking self-exalting spirit so treacherously and wickedly departed from them Yea how far might we have been gotten on of our journney towards Zion had you pressed forward according to what above nine years since you * See Declar. Heathen-like called August 1. 1650. by it self or in p. 18 19. of a Book called the Fifth-Monarchy declared to the Scots wherein you say It is our prayer daily that those that fear the Lord in England and Scotland may become one in the hand of the Lord and joyn together in the Advancement of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and throwing down and trampling upon the Seat of the Beast why should not Scotland as well as England rejoyce to see the Horns of the Beast cut off that we may joyn together to hate the Whore and burn her flesh with fire as also that the Lord was about to put on the Saitns beautiful garments and to make them a praise in the Earth And likewise above six years since to the Little Parliament page 43 44 of the forementioned Book that you thought something was as the door that you were at the threshold and therefore it became you and them to life up your heads and to encourage your selves in the Lord looking upon your selves to be either the Stone it self or at least to have had somewhat of the spirit of it and that your Call of the Little Parliament was a fruit and an effect of the Stones smiting saying That some of you thought it your duty to endeavour that way not vainly looking on that Prophesie Dan. 2.44 and the Kingdom shall not be delivered to another people and that it was set upon your hearts and upon all the faithfull in the Land it may be it was not your duty to deliver it over to any other people and that that Scripture might then be fulfilling unto you Also that we were at the edge of the Promises and Prophesies and did think that God was bringing the Jews home to their station from the Isles of the Sea as once he led Israel thorow the Red Sea And although there were neither Promise for this or Prophesie we should be coveting after the best things and therefore if you were to chuse the meanest Officer in the Army or Commonwealth you would chuse a godly man that had Principles especially where trust is to be committed for you knew where to have a man of Principles and wisht that all our Magistrates were so chosen c. Wherein you speak as highly for the Work Kingdom and Interest of Christ as can almost be spoken by any in this or indeed in any other day on this side the eminent fulfilling of the Promises and Prophesies relating thereunto Now what great things might have been done towards the Calling home of the Jews Also what a glorious Presence and Salvation from the Lord might we have had upon and about us to the amazement terrour and silencing of the Enemy both at home and abroad according to Psal 48. so as they would not have dared to lift up their heads or have wagged their tongues against us as now they do Yea how many poor creatures might according to Esther 8.17 Zech. 8.22 23. have been won over to own and love the Cause and Interest of Christ that now are either turn'd Atheists or

judgement that for the saving of the Cause there was an absolute necessity to pass upon you and also how most of the good people in the Army Navy and Churches c. in the three Nations did both approve of and rejoyce therein And to say the truth there was but very few compared with the others who might then truly be said were Friends to the Cause that were dissatisfied whose dissatisfactions were not meerly because you were dissolved and the other chosen in your stead for they also complain'd of you and desired a New Representative as well as others but that it was done in such a manner as in their then apprehensions not onely made way for the General to take the Power himself but also tended to pluck up by the very roots the old way of chusing Rulers by the whole Bulk or Body of the people which they called and formerly was so the Legall Foundations which was then in their judgements and still is of some of them who understand no better how to follow the Lord in his overturning dispensations the onely legal and best way for the choice of Rulers So that all things considered setting aside the forementioned dissatisfactions of some which was onely as to the manner but not to the matter of your being dissolved which signifies little or nothing at all as to the clearing of you it plainly appears that for your unfaithfulness in and unfitness for your stewardship and not thoroughly improving the Talent which was then committed to you for God and his People you were both by his Providence and their Approbation and Consent justly laid aside Insomuch that if the now true friends of the Cause had either Light and suitable thereunto a sincere upright courageous single and lively Spirit for Christ and Righteousness as they ought to have and as the Saints shall have when the Law shall go forth of Zion to follow the Lord in his Overturning dispensations who as he hath formerly and in our Day so hath promised for the future safely to lead his People on in his work in wayes they have not gone with their feet Isa 41.2 And to bring the blinde by a way they know not and lead them in paths that they have not known c. Isa 42.16 Would lay aside the excrementitious outside shell or notion of things relating to a further carrying on of the Cause in its purity to wit the spirit of the Nation or whole body of the People which the Lord by a continued series of providential Dispensations because of the malignity of their spirits against his Cause and People hath one time after another cast out and witnessed against and on the other hand would look into the very spirit kernel and substance of things relating thereunto to wit the spirit of the good People who have gone on with the Lord in his work to this very day who desired consented and approved of your being then laid aside you were really clearly deservedly and justly cast out and to say the truth had not from that time to the very day of your second Call nor have not now the least ●●ght to sit again upon the former account which I am perswaded the Lord in due time will make manifest notwithstanding through the short-sightedness though I trust simplicity of some friends who desired and were instrumental therein you might be called to sit a second time and possibly by your selves it is apprehended that there we went out of the way at first and therefore must there begin again But if I know any thing of the minde of God as I trust through his Grace I do by the observations that I have made of his footsteps in the carrying on of his work hitherto amongst us you are all mistaken and I know you will finde it so which I doubt not but clearly to manifest in that which follows For although we had many Deliverances and Victories and the Lord eminently blest us with success and our dread was upon our Enemies both at home and abroad whilest you were sitting especially towards the latter end yet be it known unto you it was not purely for your sakes considered as you were a Parliament in the Bulk but as there was a sincere single honest spirit according to their then light acting for Christ his Cause and Interest in some among You in the Army and also in the Nation which I conceive will be granted by every discerning person who was upon the place and made observation of things and which the late General Cromwell and his then Officers do also acknowledge in the forementioned Speech to the Little Parliament Page 27. of that Book in the following words Sayes he After divers turnings of Affairs it pleased God much about the midst of the War to winnow the Forces of this Nation and to put them into the hands of men of other Principles then those that did engage at the first c. Those strange windings and turnings of Providence those very great appearances of God in crossing the designs of men to wit Hollis Stapleton and the men of that spirit among you and in the Army that he might raise up a contemptible company of men not verst in Military Affairs nor having much natural propencity to them through the owning a * If the General and Officers of the Army had kept close to the practice of this honest Principle those Officers he hath left behinde him and their pretended faithful brethren lately imprisoned in Scotland had not been served such a Monckish treacherous trick as now they are but they that deal treacherously with their Principles as also stand by and assist whilest their Brethren are imprisoned for their faithfulness thereunto it is just with the Lord to suffer or appoint others to deal treacherously with them Principle of Godlines which so soon as it came to be owned and the state of Affairs put upon that foot of Account how God blest them and all their undertakings by the raising up of that most improbable despicable contemptible means for that we must for ever own you very well known c. He goes on Page 27 28. The issues of those successes that God was pleased to give this Nation were very great things brought about besides the Dints that were upon those Nations and places where they were carried on even in the Civil Affairs to the bringing Offenders to Justice the state of this Government to the Name at least of a Commonwealth the searching and sifting of all Places and Persons the King removed and brought to Justice and many great ones with him The House of Commons the Representative of the People of England winnowed sifted and brought to a handful c. All which great things were instrumentally brought forth by the honest Party after the many strivings and contendings with a Malignant Rigid Presbyterian Neutral Corrupt Party among you as the then General and Officers also confess in Page 28. of that Book Sayes

he As the effect of that memorable Year 1648. was to lay the foundation of bringing Delinquents to punishment so it was of the Change of the Government although it be true if we had time to speak the carriages of some in Trust in most eminent Trust was such as would have frustrated to us the hopes of all our undertakings had not God miraculously prevented I mean by that closure that would have beèn endeavoured with the King whereby we should have put into his hand all that Cause and Interest we had opposed and had nothing to have secured us but a little piece of paper c. Which clearly confirms what I have said that the Lord blest us with success in our Councils and Forces as there was a sincere spirit acting for the Cause and Interest of Christ in that day and no otherwise his free grace onely excepted For when you were dissolved and the Little Parliament called there was a greater presence of God with them a terrour upon the enemy both at home and abroad especially upon the Lawyers National Clergy and all other corrupt Interests as also the hearts of most of the true friends to the Cause more rejoycing then in the time of your sitting But I let that pass and shall in the next place in some measure discover the mystery of iniquity that lay in the bottom and was working in Transactions after you were dissolved wherein lies the corrupt fountain or spring though unseen by most people from whence the late Apostacy had its rise which so caused the forementioned presence of the Lord to depart from our Councills and Forces and exposed us to the reproach and scorn of our enemies both at home and abroad and also occasioned the late distractions and divisions as between the true so the true and false professours amongst us and is as it were the pin and hinge on which all the confusion and dark apprehensions of things have had their dependance and moving from that time to this very day and is as follows For after you were dissolved and the Little Parliament were about to be chosen besides what was spoken to your selves and was desired of you by the General and Officers of the Army to wit That you would divolve your trust over to Persons of Honour and Integrity that were well known men well affected to Religion and the Interest of the Nation c. He also declared in the presence of Major Gen. Lambert Sir Gilbert Pickering Major Gen. Harrison Mr. Cradock Mr. Lockyer and others who were in a private consultation about that choice That if there were one man more faithful to the Saints and more suited to the work then another and that had not been left behinde in former dispensatious by the blessing of God he should be chosen and that Relations and all others not thus qualified should be rejected and that from this Scripture which was then mentioned by the party to whom these words were spoken to wit Hosea 11.12 Ephraim compasseth me about with lies and the House of Israel with deceit but Judah yet ruleth with God and is faithful with the Saints The first part of which Scripture he and his Officers applied to you in the forementioned Speech to the Little Parliament page 38. of that Book viz. That like Ephraim and Israel you had compassed God about with lies and deceit to wit with your Fastings and Thanksgivings and other exercises yet did not do the good you were call'd for which they had all cause to lament of but the Little Parliament were called by God to be faithfull with the Saints who were somewhat instrumentall in their Call and to be just ruling in the fear of God c. Which principle was more publickly though hypocritically declared by them in that Speech page 41. of the forementioned Book sayes he to them I confess I did never look to see such a day as this it may be nor you when Jesus Christ shall be so * If Christ indeed be King of Nations as well as of Saints as surely he is and as the Officers of the Army have both here and elsewhere acknowledged him to be and the Little Parliament was called to act upon his foundation and to do all things in his Name upon an avowed account as their Judge King and Law-giver as these their words import And the Lord by his eminent presence with and refreshing the spirits of such as were faithful among them as also rejoycing the hearts of his faithful people and striking a terror upon the enemy whilest they were sitting and endeavoured to be acting according to that blessed spirit and principle gave testimony thereunto and the Spirit of the Lord and his faithful people grieved and his presence as also their prayers withdrawn and the Nation almost ruined since they were rejected and the Lord so wonderfully overturned and blasted the designs of whatever had enmity to and was set up after it and seems by those his overturning dispensations not to be pleased till those who have dealt thus treacherously return to the real practice of this their declared principle and to own that Spirit they have so rejected Then whosoever it is that shall be either laying or building upon any other foundation or be promoting any persons into power on this side of it though never so refined do set down short of what the Lord in that day had brought us unto and are in the apostacy still and must be overturned as well as your selves and all others that have gone before them own'd as he is this day and in this world Jesus Christ is owned this day by you all and you own him by your willingness in appearing here and you manifest this as far as poor creatures can to be a day of the power of Christ by your willingness I know you remember that Scripture Psal 110.3 The people shall be willing in the day of thy power God doth manifest it to be a day of the power of Jesus Christ Having through so much Blood and Trials as have been upon these Nations made this to be one of the great Issues thereof to have a People called to the Supreme Authority upon such an avowed account God hath owned his Son by this and you by your willingness do own Jesus Christ c. I confess I did never look to see such a sight as this We have not allowed our selves in the Choice of one person of whom we had not this good hope that there was faith in Jesus Christ and love to all the Saints and thus God hath owned you and by your comming together have you owned him c. And towards the latter end of that Speech Book page 43. he further saith unto them Truly seeing things are so that you are at the edge of the Promises and Prophesies at least if there were neither promise for this nor prophesie you are to be coveting after the best things endeavouring after the best things and

thus the business stands between the Officers of the Army and that honest Party of that Little Parliament to this very day In doing which wicked action and therein discountenancing persecuting yea what in them lay as it were crucifying this honest Spirit in these persons who were bringing forth the forementioned good things which the Army so greatly promised declared and pretended to fight for and which you were dissolved for not doing of And the General thus setting up himself upon the Monarchical or Beast-like Foundation so contrary to former Declarations and as it were upon the ruines of the very spirit and principles which he and his Officers but a little before had so greatly pretended to own and be of themselves and also doing the very same yea worse things then for which the late King was beheaded and which they also condemned in you as also Persecuting Imprisoning and Banishing some of the forementioned faithful Friends of the Little Parliament and others of the Lords people and blaspheming the Spirit of the Lord in them saying They were acted by a giddy headed rash fanatick devillish Spirit and this for no other cause then their faithfulness to the Lord in pressing after the good things according to their forementioned declared Principles and opposing the General and his Officers backsliding from them and doing things so diametrically contrary thereunto therein falsifying their Trust and building again what they formerly had destroyed and declared against the Army and all the forementioned corrupt Interests with several Independent and * The good things they desired in those Addresses doth no more excuse their evil in addressing and thereby abetting that Tyrannical Beast-like Government then the Devils bringing Scripture in his mouth excused his wickedness in tempting of Christ some Baptized Churches by their Power Addresses and otherwayes in the mean while countenancing encouraging abetting and upholding them therein by all which the blessed Cause and work of Christ was very greatly stopt and hindered the Spirit of the Lord and his People grieved Now since these with many other wicked things that might be mentioned came to be done by that professing hypocritical generation the forementioned glorious presence that was formerly with you the Little Parliament and their Councils and Forces was withdrawn the courage of the enemy heightned the corrupt Interests before mentioned lifting up their heads and rejoycing according to Rev. 11.10 The Nations abroad contemn and scorn us the lively fresh spirit for the work and Cause of Christ which seem'd formerly to be in the Army very much choaked and lost the hearts and prayers of the remaining faithful Friends of the Cause which were formerly with and for them now grieved and engaged against them by all which the state and condition of this poor Nation was and is very greatly impaired our Land Forces wasted and consumed at Hispaniola Jamaica Mardike Flanders and elsewhere our Shipping lessened and diminished our Stores and Provisions for Sea and Land expended and very much consumed and but very very little or no profit our Magazines emptied Treasures wasted Trade in a very great measure lost and decayed as Tradesmen of all sorts and Shopkeepers many of whom are broken and are breaking every day finde by such sad and woful experience as they never did before nor in the memory of man was the lke ever known or heard of though Mr. Nye Tho Goodwin Dean Owen so called and the Officers and Messengers of above one hundred Congregations in England could tell their late Protector that they and the Nation had not eaten the Bread of Adversity nor drunk the Water of Affliction but had served God in the abundance of all things Very great new debts contracted little of old being satisfied all which sad effects with others that might be mentioned as was said before he that hath but half an eye or that runs may read is the bitter fruit of the Apostacy Treachery and Crucifying the Spirit of the Lord in the Members turned out of the Little Parliament who were bringing forth that Justice and Righteousness which the Army and good People of the three Nations were so greatly engaged in and was no other then what the faithfull Friends of the Cause are calling for in this day and will give the Lord nor them no rest till they do obtain All things going thus contrary to the sinful desires and vain expectations of the upholders and abbettors of this great Apostacy notwithstanding the many helps they had to carry it on yet as if they had been left by the Lord to studdy and procure their further destruction they not onely afresh imprison the Lords faithful people for witnessing against them but also suffer others of them to be haled before Magistrates cast into prisons forced to pay trebble dammages their goods to be seized upon and ten times more taken away then their pretended due came to for not paying of Tythes and this greatly approved of by the then General his Officers and all his worthy Addressors upholding him therein who was once the head of the Sectaries out of a carnal design to draw in the Presbyterian Cleargy to stand by his Interest who since the New Moddel and beheading the late King to this very day it is well known have been enemies to and opposers of the Lords Work and Cause that hath been and is yet further to be carryed on in these Nations Though he and his Officers not long before had as good as acknowledged in the forementioned Speech to the Little Parliament See Book page 40. 41. that the now Ministry of England as to their then and present standing derived it self and succession through the Papacy and therefore a false succession and none to be the true succession but what was through the Spirit given in that measure the Spirit is given which sayes he Christians are well able to discerne and do And yet for all this contrary to Scripture or Reason forced them to pay such Ministers as they judged were not onely destitute of a work of Grace in their hearts much less of the Spirit for that work but also derived their succession through the Papacy wherein with other things of this nature that might be mentioned it appeared their tenderness was forgotten to the Lords people under several forms as much as yours and that the cause of the people of God was despised by them Thus were things going on one the one hand and some of the Lords faithful people called Sectaries Anabaptists and Fifth Monarchy men by their Faith Prayers Appeals Prophesyings and Testimony against the Apostacy and Abettors of it counterworking and pulling down on the other which honest faithful spirit in them to the Lord his Cause and interest can will never leave working nor overturning till our Lord Jesus Christ comes whose right it is This remnant of witnessing Sectaries so called get ground all the designs and stratagems made use of to quell them and to uphold and strengthen the

else remain in the hardness wickedness and opposition of their hearts and spirits thereunto had you not declined but as was said before kept growing up in your then light as also in the frame of your spirits and actions towards that perfection that shall be in the Lords faithful People when the Righteousness of Zion shall go forth as brightness and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth and he make Jerusalem a praise in the Earth Isa 62.1 6 7. which is our duty not onely to be praying for but pressing after as well as after that perfection of light and holiness in the inward man that shall be in that day or at the Resurrection of the dead Saints when our Lord Jesus Christ shall come and all the Saints with him Zech. 4.5 comp 1 Cor. 15.23 Rev. 20.4 and how we were growing up into this Righteousness and the People according to Hosea 14.7 began to return from their oppression revive as the corn and grow as the vine and this glorious Presence and Salvation was dawning and breaking in upon us when the honest spirit which you have so rejected was encouraged and acting in the Authority of this Nation as hath been already mentioned you very well know But our too sad experience tells us that the Lord hath now cause rather to complain and say according to Isa 1.4.21 22 23. Ah sinful Nation a people laden with iniquity a seed of evil doers children that are corrupters they have forsaken the Lord they have provoked the Holy One of Israel How is the faithfull City become an Harlot it was full of judgement righteousness lodged in it but now murtherers Thy silver is become dross thy wine mixt with water thy Princes are rebellious and companions of thieves every one loveth gifts and followeth after rewards they judge not the fatherless neither doth the cause of the widdow come unto them and upon this account we have cause to lament and complain according to Lam. 2.15 16. All our enemies have opened their months against us they hiss and gnash their teeth they say we have swallowed them up certainly this is the day that we looked for we have found we have seen it comp with Job Chap. 29. Chap. 30. and this is the very state and condition that the Cause and people of God and the Nation which had once a beauty and glory upon them is brought into at this day by reason of your Apostacy Now in regard it is thus with you and the poor Nation for your sakes as it is and things are under so ill sense abroad to use your own words to the Old Parliament and the issue like to be the further displeasure and judgements of the Lord against you the dissatisfaction and sadning the hearts of his faithful people and putting all things into greater Confusion if you continue to steer your course as formerly which so far as I can yet see or hear you are resolved to do though the Cause Your selves and the Nation perish and although you therein so carry it as to give the Lord and his Faithfull People just cause to say of you as of Ephraim of old Hosea 4.17 The Army is joyned to Idols let them alone Yet considering on the other hand that he likewise calls to such a back-sliding people as you are to return unto him and upon their return hath graciously promised he will heal their back-sliding and love them freely Jer. 3.22 comp Hos 14.4 And not knowing though you have gone on so long in the hardness of your hearts but he may yet pour out a spirit of grace and supplication upon you and give you to look upon his Cause and Faithfull Remnant whom you have so rejected and as it were Pierced and Crucified and to mourn and be in bitterness for the same as one is in bitterness for his first-born as also to return to the real practice of your forementioned honest Principles it being better with you then then now and to cause Judgement so visibly to return unto Righteousness as that all the upright in heart may follow it and be encouraged to venture their Lives with you as formerly against the Common Enemy which as things now stand they cannot but be very unwilling to do And likewise having though I have so searched to the quick and spoken plainly a desire to be merciful as my heavenly Father is merciful and to be instrumental so far as he shall assist to pluck you out of this deep ditch you have plunged your selves into and that whether you will hear or whether you will forbear you may be left without excuse As also that I may discharge my love and duty towards the Blessed Cause of Christ the Saints and the Land of my Nativity I shall in all sincerity and faithfulness lay before you what according to my present Light and Vnderstanding will if any thing recover the forementioned Cause the Saints Your selves and this almost ruined Nation out of that sad and perishing condition that by reason of your Apostacy and treacherous dealing with your former honest principles they are brought into and will engage the forementioned Glorious Presence and Salvation of the Lord to be with and about us as in former dayes in order to which though in and of my self I am very unworthy and unable to advise in a business of so high and weighty a concernment as this is I counsel and propose as followeth First endeavour to be humbled for repent of and to turn from every particular personal sin and iniquity that you have been in the committing of for if you or I or any other regard iniquity in our hearts or wilfully live in the practise of any known sin the Lord will not hear our prayers nor accept of any thing we do for him wherein his Name and Glory is concerned Psal 66.18 Prov. 15.8 9. Isa 1.11 to 20. Therefore if there be any such thing as false musters or Dead pay or wherein soever wrong hath been done or sin committed do so no more As also restore back to those of whom you have bought Debenters at cheap rates somewhat proportionable to your great gains thereby if they be living and if dead then to the Widdows Children or Kindred related to them that are left behinde them As also to be sure to promise nothing to any for the future either of a publick or private nature but what is in the power of your hand to do and have a real intention thorowly and speedily to perform and herein be growing up into that holy frame mentioned Zeph. 3.13 The Remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity nor speak lies neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouths c. And what I say to you in this particular I say to my self and to all others fearing the Lord for the People whom the Lord will delight to use in his Work must be a sincere upright self-denying holy people therefore let us not hide our

1.17 to 20. 5. These persons thus called together having more light faith and communion with God then formerly they had in the work of the latter dayes and that they are called unto as I conceive they have and laying Jesus Christ the Foundation on which they intend to Build as also consulting with and managing all their Affairs according to the Scriptures as is their judgement founded upon the same Deut. 17 18 19 20. Deut. 4.6 7 8. 2 Tim. 3.16 and not onely theirs but of most of the Friends of the Cause as also assented to by your selves and all the Great Lawyers and all others present at the * Sir Thomas Widdrington having presented your Protector with a Robe afterwards delivered him a Bible and among other expressions said It is a Book of Books and besides other things it conteins in it both Precepts and Examples for good Government Alexander so highly valued the Books of his Master Aristotle and other great Princes other Books that they have laid them every night under their Pillows these are all but Legends and Romances to this one Book a Book to be had alwayes in remembrance I finde it said in part of this Book which I shall desire to read and it is this Deut 17.18 19 20. And it shall be when he sitteth upon the Throne of his Kingdom that he shall write a Copy of this Law in a Book out of that which is before the Priestt and Levites and it shall be with him and he shall read therein all the dayes of his life that he may learn to fear the Lord his God and to keep all the words of this Law and those statutes to do them that his heart be not lifted up above his Brothren and that he turn not aside from the Commandment to the right hand or to the left to the end he may prolong his dayes in his Kingdom he and his Children in the midst of Israel In which words you acknowledge that the Scriptures ought to be the foundation of both the Government and Laws of this Nation which though after this you decline from and therein adde Apostacy to Apostacy yet do justifie all others that shall go on therein and proceed according to Scripture Quualifications for the choice of Rulers according to Exod. 18.21 Hosea 11.12 Speech made by Sir Thomas Widdrington then Speaker of your Petition and Advice Parliament at the second Inauguration of your late General in the Protectorall Government is the duty of all Gods Magistrates to do Having also the concernments and welfare of the Nation upon their hearts more then their own will I hope whilest they are Sitting carry it so self-denyingly graciously and uprightly and with such tenderness towards all fearing the Lord esteeming none because of this or that judgement further then their sincerity and faithfulness to the Cause and Interest of Christ appears and will endeavour to do all things both at home and in other Nations so for the honour of him who is their and our Judge King and Lawgiver as also your own and the Nations real good and likewise with the approbation and consent of the faithful Friends of the Cause to carefully provide for the future well Government of the Nation by the hands of other faithfull Persons against they rise as you will have no occasion if your hearts be sincere and upright with God indeed and have grace to deny your selves to maintain any enmity in your spirits towards them so as to despise reject and turn them out as you did before but will rather encourage rejoyce in and bless God for them And whatsoever your politique shifts and devices may be to avoid it hither you must come at last for without this be done let the foundation you lay as to future Governments and the Persons you call to build thereon in the outward appearance be never so pure or so much for Christ yet it is and you will finde it so but a false Conception a Bed too short a Covering too narrow a Plaister that though it may skin over will not thorowly heal the wound that your Apostacy and treacherous dealing with your Principles hath made upon you for the first foremenoned Cause of the Lords displeasure against you must be taken away or else no sound cure can be expected neither indeed would such as are faithful had they a true understanding of things and did seriously weigh and consider what hath been already and might further be said in this business dare to come in and assist you till this work were done for fear lest the House that in the simplicity of their hearts they would be building should fall upon their heads and the Lords thus dealing with you is no other then according to the usual method he goes in in matters of this nature Prov. 28.13 He that covereth his sin shall not prosper but he that confesseth and forsaketh his sin shall have mercy Remember what became of Cain who retain'd his wicked spirit after he slew his Brother Abel Gen. 4. to verse 14. Of the Ongregation of Israel who out of such a spirit as you are acted by would have stoned Caleb and Joshua for opposing their going back into Egypt and pressing them to go on the Canaan Numb 14.23.32.43 Of Corah Dathan and Abiram and the two hundred and fifty famous renowned Princes of the Congregation and the people joyning with them in opposing the spirit of the Lord in Moses and Aaron upon the account with the former and how all these remaining in the wickedness of their spirits in opposition to the spirit of the work of the Lord in his little Remnant in that day must not prosper but their Carkasses fall in the wilderness dye of the Plague fall before their enemy the ground open and swallow Korah and his company up alive Numbers 16.2.31 32. Josephs Brethren who out of the wickedness and enmity of their spirits towards him cunningly endeavoured all they could to make him away and sold him into Egypt must lay aside their enmity and own and acknowledge their iniquity therein to him and beg pardon for the same or else no peace or prosperity for them could be expected Gen. 50.17 to 21. Ephraim and Israel having committed whoredom Begot strange Children Revolted from and Dealt treacherously against the Lord as you have done and the Lord having rebuked them and threatned that they should fall in their iniquity that he would be as a moth and rottenness to them as he hath hitherto been to you yet they went on and the Text sayes would not frame their doings to turn unto their God because the spirit of whoredoms was in the midst of them as it is with you but instead of returning to the Lord in a right manner as to the very thing wherein they had displeased him It is said When Ephraim saw his sickness and Judah saw his wound then went Ephraim to the Assyrian and sent to King Jareb as you have

Isa 60.22 I the Lord will hasten it in his time And could believe no other but that those late wonderfull Revolutions and Overturnings did loudly call upon them to be looking out that way and to be considering what was next to be done by them in order to a further going on with the Lord as Instruments of his pleasure in the bringing forth these things And knowing very well that the Lord eminently owned his people and his presence was wonderfully with them whilest there was a zealous pressing after Righteousness and strong endeavours used by some among you and in the Army to get the most godly faithful men into all places of Trust in the Army Navy and elsewhere who would brow beat and punish wickedness and countenance and endeavour to promote goodness and good men and that nothing prosper'd and went on to purpose till this blessed course and way was taken Witness the Victory obtained by the Eastern Association Sectarian so called Horsemen chiefly and Foot at Marston Moor against Prince Rupert and his Army Also after the New Moddel at Naseby Fight Afterwards in the West Then at Preston in Lanckashire against Duke Hamilton and the Scottish Army The subduing of Ireland and Scotland The Fleet also beating the Dutch and so on till the last Battel at Worcester They were very much carried forth to desire and endeavour that all things for the future might run in that channel without which they were considently perswaded as well they might that the Lords former presence would not be with our Councels and Forces as it was before but would forsake them Now there being at that time a Corrupt Malignant Neutral Presbyterian party among you in the House as there hath been all along and was to the very day of your Second Dissolution who were unsuitable to the work you were called to do and that knew not * Let the Army beware of this Joseph but rather closed with wicked men and enemies they did so oppose and hinder that the Righteousness and Justice and putting faithful men into places of Trust so greatly desired and promised could not be effected as it ought to be Insomuch that when the late General Cromwel came from Worcester several persons eminent for Godliness of the Congregations in and about London and others came to him Desiring that he would employ his utmost endeavours to get you to improve the great Mercies and Victories which the Lord had bestowed upon us as also to answer the expectations of his people in doing the good things promised In answer to which he replied beside other as bad expressions of you That there was no more hopes of drawing on the Parliament thereunto meaning you then was of making a bar of iron become a Lute string and desired that they with the Congregations to which they did relate would seek unto the Lord to know his pleasure in what was to be done and to let him know what upon such seeking should be set upon their hearts whereof you shall hear more afterward And would likewise say of you at other times that there was not above five or six of you in the House which more plainly appeared in your second sitting that had either a heart or minde to do any good thing which words were occasioned by several other good people who came to him for help complaining That they had waited upon you day after day till their hearts aked their legs were weary and they almost undone and could get little or nothing from you but a company of fair promises Others saying That when you did any thing for them it was for the most part so long first that they had almost as good have been without it And was it not too much so in your second sitting Many also were the complaints of the Countrey people and others against you upon the same account some of them saying That you were a company of corrupt self-seeking persons that minded your own Interest more then any thing else which they said was manifested by giving and receiving gifts to and from one another out of the Spoils of the Enemy that ought to have been brought into the Lords Treasury for the discharging of Publick Debts and the further carrying on of his work withall And that you preferr'd your Kindred Relations Friends Servants and Flatterers whether wise men or fools honest men or knaves into places of Trust and so it was in your second sitting witness Nedham and others contrary to the Qualifications so much pretended to in that day wherefore you being acted by such a corrupt self-seeking spirit little or no good at all could be expected from you All which being too sadly known to the forementioned good people of the several Congregations they proposed to the General c. as being the result of what was set uptheir hearts after seeking the Lord. That a short time of six moneths or thereabouts might be put to your sitting and that in the interim care might be taken for the Qualifications of persons to be elected to succeed in the Government which might be furnished by the Lord for the further carrying on of his work which you had not enough of * Were you not as short of spirit for the work in your second sitting as before spirit nor it seems of honesty to go on in withal And to say the truth upon this account among other the like things that might be mentioned was there a general out-cry amongst most of the friends of the Cause in the three Nations for a New Representative as so called in that day and for your Dissolution the Generall as you have heard by himself together with the Officers of the Army as well as others complaining of you and both privately and publiquely among themselves and elsewhere breathing out their desires for your Dissolution and that such faithful persons might come into the Power as would indeed bring forth the good things promised as may more plainly appear in a Letter sent by the Officers of the Army in England to Lieutenant General Fleetwood in Ireland after you were dissolved shewing the reasons thereof signed by Major General Lambert Major Generall Disbrow Commissary Generall Whaly Major General Harrison Collonel Saunders Collonel Hacker Collonel Rich Captain Farley Major Packer Major Wiggan and others As also in a Speech made by General Cromwel in his own and in the names of the Officers of the Army to the Members of the Little Parliament in the Council Chamber before their Sitting likewise shewing the grounds and necessity of their dissolving you and by way of encouragement to them to sit in both which are several Particulars laid to your Charge with which whosoever shall compare your late spirit and actions it will very plainly appear that you were rather worse in your late second sitting then in the time of your first I shall first begin with the * Both the Letter and Speech may be seen in a Book called

to Settlement yet your spirits too much closed with that spirit that here they so complain'd of and could not endure to hear of such faithful persons coming into power as would indeed preserve the Cause witness your late voting Major General Harrison uncapable of future employment c. and resolved as formerly to recruit the House with men of the same spirit as your-selves And therefore no wonder the Army and the good people declare their dissatisfaction with and rejoyce in your Dissolution as before Yet in this very thing hath the Army done worse themselves as you may see afterwards New Representative before or to proceed in one line considerable in it before it had lain three years before you yet when the Army came to their close considerations instead of protracting you made as much preposterous haste on the other hand to put it on without consideration or care had in the Qualifications of the Act you were about to assert and provide for the security of the Cause but would have thrown it back into the hands of them we first fought with which had they suffered you to have done they should have been rendred the worst people in the world and have become Traytors both to God and man 4. That the Interest of the People of God was grown cheap with you and not laid to heart a also if they came to Competition of things the Cause even among your selves was even almost in every thing going to the ground and saw plainly and evidently that in some Critical things the Cause of the people of God was a despised thing and therefore not yours but the hands of other men must be trusted with it 5. That if any body were in Competition for any place of real and signal Trust it was a hard and difficult thing to get any thing to be Carried without making parties without things indeed unworthy of a Parliament and not as it ought to be 6. That you * Alderman Atkins his saying in the House in the time of your late sitting That Mr. Sympson was an Anabaptist and would not Christen Children nor give the Sacrament as he called it to the people also as ignorantly seconded by Sir Arthur Haslerig saying He believed the Sacrament was a converting Ordinance and that the Ministers of Mr. Sympsons judgement were not the Ministers you intended to own With other the like arguments to keep him out of Bishopsgate As also keeping Mr. Feak out of Christ Church so called though formerly put in by your Order and continuing Mr. Jenkins there who was formerly sequestred and imprisoned by you upon the Scotch Engagement and lately refused to read your Declaration against Sir George Booth yet gave thanks when he was overcome together with your hasty Vote for the continuance of Tythes with other things of this nature that might be mentioned plainly declares you to be acted by the same spirit in owning carnall Interests in opposition to the Friends of the Cause as you were before discountenanced the business of the poor People of God in Wales who had watching over them men like so many Wolves ready to catch the Lamb as soon as it was brought out into the world that you signally threw that business under foot to the discountenancing of the honest people there and to the countenancing of the Malignant Party of this Commonwealth which they say was as perfect a trial of your spirits as any thing which many had felt by sad experience 7. That they found you never intended good to the people of God to wit that comprehension of them under the several forms of godliness and that your tenderness was forgotten to them all though that by their hands and means it was through the blessing of God you then sat where you did and Affairs had been instrumentally brought to that issue they then were brought to which was but an ill requital Page 34. 8. That though many words had been spoken to you for the Regulation of the Law so much groaned under in that posture it then was in yet many months together was not time enough to pass over one word call'd incumberances and this they say they found was your then spirit and complexion 9. That they saw your intendment was to perpetuate your selves and men of that spirit which some understood from your-own mouths from your own designs who could not endure to hear of being dissolved the which had you been a Parliament never violated sitting as free and as clear as any ever sat in Englaud yet to go about to perpetuate your selves they thought was so great a breach of Trust as greater could not be Page 35. That you did not proceed in wayes that were honest and safe to the Nation in providing Qualifications of the Act of a New Representative so as to keep out Presbyters or Neuters to put the power into whose hands they having deserted the Cause and Interest upon the Kings account and upon that closure between them and the Neighbour Nation was to have delivered up the Cause into the hands of Interessed and Byast men who had little affection to the Cause and when the General and Officers made such objections as to the danger of this proceeding that you could not but assent unto yet answer was made as before that nothing would save the Nation but the continuance of your selves in Power Page 36. That you would not though the Government was in that unsettled condition and things being under so much ill sense abroad and so likely to come to confusion in every respect if it went on so answer the General and Officers desire to divolve the Trust then in your hands over to persons of honour and integrity that were well known men well affected to Religion and the Interest of the Nation which they told you and had been confest by you was no new thing when these Nations had been under the like burly burlies and distractions which they offered to you out of the deep sense they had of the good of these Nations and the Cause of Christ which in all likelihood had been lost had the Power been longer continued in your hands But the answer still was that nothing would save the Nation but the Continuance of that Parliament Page 36 37. 12. That you dealt * You dealt as cunningly and deceitfully with the Friends of the Cause in your second Sitting as formerly with the Army for upon the Quakers Petition among others against Tythes you took the advantage one Morning when several whom you thought would oppose you were absent and voted the continuance of them though as it is reported that business of Tythes was not to have been debated till about four dayes after and thus did you carry it in putting Mr. Canne by from writing the Intelligence and placing Nedham in his room and how you likewise dealt treacherously with the Army a second time is very well known which juggling trapanning practises of yours among

as I have said elsewhere If I were to chuse the meanest Officer in the Army or Commonwealth I would chuse a godly man that hath Principles especially where Trust is to be committed for I know where to have a man of Principles I believe if any of you should chuse a servant you would do so and I would all our Magistrates were so chosen that may be some effects of this it is our duty to chuse men that fear the Lord to praise the Lord yea such as the Lord forms for himself and he expects not praises from others c. In all which are good words spoken and principles laid down as if he and his Officers fully intended to persevere in the practice of them but may not the true Friends of the Cause to the great grief and sadness of their spirits say of them as the Lord concerning Israel of old Deut. 5.28 29. They have well said all that they have spoken but oh that their hearts and tougues had gone together that there had been indeed such a heart in them as in sincerity to have kept to the real practice of those blessed principles then had it been well with them and with the poor Nation upon that account But notwithstanding these golden words and pretences the Lord my self and others knows that there was at the same time yea some time before these words were spoken as in the seed of the serpent against the seed of the woman or in the spirit of Saul and his followers against the spirit of David and his followers so a spirit of enmity and hatred secretly lodging in the breasts of the then General Major Gen. Lambert Major Gen. Disbrow Sir Gilbert Pickering Coll. Whaly Coll. Goff Dean Owen so called and others against several of those honest men who were afterwards turned out of the Little Parliament who were faithful Friends to the Cause of God and indeed above others and that upon Scripture grounds for the Advancement of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and most suited to those good things which the General and Officers in the foregoing Speech do seem so much to press after whose principles they seemingly most owned and whose assistance they greatly desired pretending to be of one heart with them in the dissolving of you and choice of the other yet for no other cause then their pressing to be acting up to these principles in reality and power was this enmity against them which will afterwards appear so plainly as he that runs may read it For notwithstanding the forementioned pretences and promises of chusing none but what were faithful with the Saints and most suited to the work yet was there such persons who were of a contrary spirit and principle purposely chosen and packt together viz. Coll. Montague Coll. Barton Coll. Mathews Sir William Roberts Alderman Tichborn and others and those the greater number as that when the forementioned good things came to be done and the remaining more refined oppressions which lay upon the good people and others to be taken away they did so oppose and hinder the honest party in the House that very little or nothing at all could be done for them the General Ma. Gen. Lambert and the forementioned persons secretly owning of and holding a Correspondency with this corrupt Party all the while which was such unheard of juggling deceit and wickedness that when I most seriously and thorowly set my self to consider of it I cannot but cry out with a holy detestation and abhorrency in my spirit both of it and them and say Oh! the Hypocrisie Treachery Villany Wickedness and abominable unrighteousness that lies hid in the bottom of the late and present Apostacy and that surely the Lord who loveth righteousness and hates iniquity and every false way will not let so great and not to be parallel'd wickedness pass unpunisht without some more eminent publick repentance for the same then hath yet been * If this wretched envious spirit did not yet remain would they since your second Dissolution have been so forward to take into their New Council Lawrence Strickland Tichborn Hewson Clark and others of that corrupt part of the Litttle Parliament who left the House and went to deliver up their pretended power to the General upon which he was made Protector and promoted and abetted the late Apostacy and do what they can as it were to stave and keep off the faithful Friends of the Cause who are well known to be men of integrity and well affected to the Interest of the Nation which your not endeavouring to divolve the Trust in your hands upon was one of the great grounds why they pretendedly dissolved you The Lord who wil not be mocked nor his faithful people whom both you and they have cheated and dealt unrighteously and hypocritically with all will not long bear such wicked actions at their hands manifested by them and it will be well for them if the aforesaid enmity to the true spirit of their forementioned profest and declared principles and to these very persons and others like them who through grace in some measure are endued therewith doth not yet remain untaken away for herein in a great measure will lye the contest for the future for either this hypocritical self-seeking treacherous envious spirit in the remaining Officers of the Army that have now power in their hands must be put away and they really united to what they have so greatly profest and declared and what they have so pretended to dissolve you for nor doing of which they have not been to this very day or else there will be no peace from the Lord and his faithful people with them and all their shrowding themselves under your wasting decaying wing had you been sitting or under a power that is more refined then you if short of the spirit they have so rejected and as it were crucified and endeavoured to keep down in the grave as the Souldiers did Christ in the dayes of his Humiliation can save them from the wrath of God and the Lamb and his faithful followers I shall now return to speak a little further how and for what cause it was that the forementioned presence of the Lord departed from and went not forth to own and prosper the Councells and Forces of this Nation as before As I said before when you were dissolved and the Little Parliament called upon the avowed account of the Son of God and to be acting upon his foundation as he is King of Nations and to do all things in his Name as their and our King Judge and Law-giver Isa 33.22 as you may see by the forementioned Speech they were called to do and the persons of the aforesaid honest spirit and principle who for some time till the fish was caught and the bird taken were seemingly owned were labouring as it were in the very fire to bring forth in reallity what the General and his Officers so pretended to in words and to own

they desired to take shame to themselves and that they were now as ever equally endeared to the good Old Cause and utter enemies to all Tyranny and Oppression c. but that they would have gone on to endeavour with all their might to have brought things to that perfection and state they were in when the forementioned presence and glory of the Lord was with and upon us to wit either to the choyce of the same or other persons of that honest spirit and principle who were formerly turned out of the Little Parliament who have not since defiled their Garments with the late Apostacy or if they have have repented publickly for the same the departing from and rejecting of which spirit and principle by the then and now builders was the onely chief Cause of the Lords so withdrawing his presence from their Councels and Forces since that time In order to which several faithful friends to the Cause in discharge of their consciences and duty as they then apprehended to serve the Lord in that present juncture of affairs did draw up and by the hands of Major Mallery Lieutenant Collonel Pinchin Captain Cust and others present to Lieutenant General Fleetwood and the General Council of Officers a paper called the Good Old Cause Stated which holds forth that the Army themselves did formerly declare for and approve of that very spirit and principle and such persons to be in Power as is before mentioned and therein was desired Now whether it was that the spirit of the Army which was so deeply drenched and as it were over head and ears in the late Apostacy like old Bottles could not bear the new wine to wit the self-denying spirit in the forementioned persons turned out of the Little Parliament and in others like them that was the reason they were not called again or what the matter was but to be sure if they and the people who called you had been right and clear in their understandings or had had a true hint or taste upon their spirits of that Blessed Excellent Lively Spirit that shall execute the Justice and Righteousness that shall be when the Law shall go forth of Zion and our Lord Jesus Christ and his Saints shall reign in Righteousness Isa 32.1 They would have walked in that matter less by sence and more by faith have trusted God and never called you But so it came to pass that through the darkness and short-sightedness of some of the Friends of the Cause and according to their desires you were called together again to take your former Power as being in the outward appearance the onely visible Legall Authority in the Nation The best expedient to root out the Monarchicall Protectorall Government To raise * Indeed you were very good at raising money and Soldiers to secure your selves and at going to Feasts prepared out of the Orphans money by the carnal vain Magistrates of the City to bribe and blinde you that you might not search into and purge out the foolish apish corrupt practices and oppressive Customs that are amongst them and from framing the Government of the City in the way of a Commonwealth as you had declared the Government of the Nation to be And at voting the continuance of Tythes and therewith your wicked Ordinance for trebble dammages at raising Enemies to the Cause under Collonel Thomson to ballance and put a check upon the faithfull Friends thereof at perpetuating your selves as before by filling up your House with new Members at owning corrupt Interests and preferring corrupt persons into places of Trust contrary to your own Votes and Declarations at discountenancing the business of the friends of the Cause to the countenance of the enemies thereof at dealing deceitfully with the Army and Friends of the Cause as backward to reform the Law as also to divolve the Trust lately in your hand over into the hands of faithful men as formerly you were and as ready to do the same yea worse things then in the severall foregoing Particulars is charged against you But as for the Cause of Christ according to the true intent and spirit of it the Just Civil and Religious Liberties of the good People and providing Persons of a more excellent spirit for Government to promote and bring this forth you understood it not nor laid it to heart no more then the Army and therefore very unmeet to be continued but dissolved as formerly Money And to prevent future War and Bloudshed Maintain the Good Old Cause the Liberties and Freedoms of the good people in the things of God relating to the Conscience until such time as a better Moddel of Government should be found out so that here was your then Second call and Standing by all which it is probable you might apprehend the Lord did own you notwithstanding you retained the same spirit as before and that during the time of your more then six years dismission from your former Power had onely been putting you as formerly Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon to eat grass with the Beasts of the Field Dan. 4.25 or made you as ordinary men that so you might the better understand and know that the most High ruled in the Kingdoms of men and gave them to whomsoever he would thereby to humble and make you better Now seeing you were once more brought together into the Power not called thither by Malignants Presbyterians or the late new Court Party who profess to remain in that spirit but by some of the faithfull Friends of the Cause and the Army who as they say though honest men think otherwise are returned from their Apostacy to do the forementioned good things till such time onely as a better Moddel was found out who in case you answer'd not what you were called for had also the same power to take from you again what they had so committed to you you should not have been high minded but feared and been looking about you and considering whether the same or a worse spirit had not been in you now then formerly and have taken heed of doing the same or worse things that so caused the Friends of the Cause and the Army to complain of you and so greatly desire your Dissolution and a New Representative to come in your places For if during the time of your almost seven years Dismission from your former Power you had only been like unto Nebuchadnezars stump Dan. 4.15 rooting in the earth and bound as it were about with iron and brass and had not repented and broken off your former sins and evils charged upon you by the Army and others and grown better by the shame and affliction of being so laid aside but still remained as at your first Dissolution you could not honestly expect that the Friends of the Cause who called you onely to do those good things which the Army pretendedly dissolved you for not doing of would take it well at your hands or bear you herein because the former glory and

that so they might hot hinder your corrupt design of advancing and perpetuating your selves And just so was it in the last Free Parliament so called summoned by his Son Richard your late Protector chosen as was his Fathers by the Clergy and * And this also you did contrary to your former declared Spirit and Principle in your Speech to the Little Parliament See Book pag. 42. where you acknowledge that the whole Bulk of the People of this Nation were not fit to chuse or be chosen Rulers till the Spirit was more poured forth and they thereby brought to own the Interest of Jesus Christ spirit of the Nation most of whom were enemies to and opposers of the Cause of God and his People and what endeavours you used by writing Letters and sending your Emissaries and Agents to the several Burroughs and Corporations to get your Kindred Relations Servants Flatterers and mercenaries whether wise men or fools honest men or knaves to be chosen for that end and to keep the faithful friends of the Cause from being chosen another evil complain'd of in the Old Parliament and yet how the Lord blasted you in all your vain hopes and expectations from them and for the preservation of your selves and the honest Interest you were still necessitated to dissolve them you very well know in all which you not onely dealt deceitfully treacherously and wickedly with your former honest Principles but doubtless did worse then the Old Parliament would have done and the great kindness you pretended to shew unto the good People in dissolving them doth not in the least excuse your great evil in laying such a wicked Foundation as necessitated you to call such unworthy Persons to be building upon it And I appeal to any honest faithful unbyast person to judge whether your late unbelieving treacherous carriage since the second Dissolution of the Old Parliament in framing your new Council of Safety so called mostly with those very Persons that were the promoters abettors of the late Apostacy as also casting several faithful friends of the Cause out of the City Militia and placing in their stead such as Alderman Tichborn Alderman Pack Alderman Viner Alderman Atkins Alderman Foot Alderman Chiverton and others who have likewise bowed the knee unto and abetted the aforesaid wickedness doth not declare you notwithstanding your many late Prayers Tears Fastings shews of Repentance and also Professions of your sincere intentions to return to own and advance the Cause of Jesus Christ to be still acted by the very same if not a worse spirit then before Fourthly Did the Old Parliament in their second Sitting so carry it as if the Interest of the People of God was grown cheap with them and not laid to heart and discountenanced their business that came before them to the discountenancing of them and countenancing the Malignant Party and as if they never intended good to the people of God So did you and worse For you stood by and upheld your Old Protector whilest he confirmed a former wicked Ordinance and therewith all those cursed Popish Oppressive Laws contrary to Scripture or Reason for imprisoning the Lords People taking away their goods and forcing trebble dammages from them for non-payment of Tythes and this out of an unbelieving carnal design to quiet the National Clergy and draw them to your Interest though known enemies to the Cause of Christ which hath been is and ought further to be carried on in these Nations whereby several poor Families of the Lords people have been almost ruined and undone and how they were many times discountenanced and overthrown in their business by reason of your countenancing and abetting those corrupt Interests you very well know Did the Old Parliament do evilly in their late Sitting in keeping Mr. Sympson out of Bishopsgate so long and so unwillingly voting his readmission at last as also in being so negligent and backward in doing right to Mr. Feake in restoring him to the Meeting-house by Newgate Market where he formerly preached and was placed by their Order and afterward unrighteously turned out by the late Apostacy As also in voting Major General Harrison uncapable of future publick employment So did you For after the Old and Little Parliament were dissolved you first turned Mr. Sympson and Mr. Feake out of those places and cast them into prisons for their faithfulness to the Cause of Christ and your forementioned honest Principles and witnessing against your back-sliding from them and suffered if not ordered Mr. Lee Mr. Jenkins and others who are known enemies to the Cause to come into their places and there continued them keeping the others out till the late Sitting of the Old Parliament who though long first restored Mr. Sympson but Mr. Peake if there be a keeping close to the former honest spirit and orders thereupon was and is unrighteously kept out both by them and you to this very day And how you likewise took Maj. Gen. Harrison's Commission from him or otherwise put him by his Command in the Army as also inhumanely and unworthily sent him to Prisons and Banishment upon the same account with the former and to this very day endeavour all you can to keep him and other faithful friends out of Publick Employment unless they comply with your selfish corrupt practises and own you as indeed returned from your Apostacy when it is not so you very well know which with many other things of this kinde that might be mentioned declares plainly that the interest of the people of God is grown cheap with you and not laid to heart and their business discountenanced to the countenance of the Malignant Party and that you intend good to the people of God no further then your own interest and safety will stand therewith and therein also are worse then the Old Parliament Fifthly Did the Old Parliament manifest their Spirit and Complexion to be corrupt by their backwardness in proceeding to regulate the Law which was then and to this day is so much groaned under as that many moneths together you say was not sufficient to pass over one word called incumberances So did you and worse by many degrees For when the forementioned honest Party of the Little Parliament had voted a new Body or Moddel of the Law for the speedy ending of Law Suits with little charge as also the abolishing and taking away the then and now corrupt oppressive Court of Chancery wherein was depending twenty three thousand Causes where some had lain five some ten some twenty some thirty years and more to the undoing of many families and had appointed a Committee for the bringing of Sir John Lenthal Chief Jaylor of the Vpper Bench Prison and all other corrupt persons imployed in Publick Trust to an account for the evil management of their Trust and had made some good progress therein to the suspending or casting the aforesaid Sir John Lenthal out of his place among other good things they were doing for

on in the hardness wichedness and slavish fearfulness of your hearts and spirits and through the advice and perswasion of Philip Nye Tho. Goodwin Dean Owen so called and the forementioned Ineendiaries upon carnal politique considerations be still upholding carnal Interests and the Old Corrupt Oppressive Customs and Practises relating either to Magistracy or Ministery that hath no warrant in Scripture which hath brought all the divisions confusion and miseries upon the Nation and the better to carry on this your wicked design shall continue in your rejecting the true spirit of your forementioned honest Principles in those faithfull Persons turn'd out of the Little Parliament and in others with them who as was said before are spirited and principled if any to bring forth good to the Nation and shall rather proceed to moddel your future Councels with Malignants Neuters Presbyters or unconverted Apostate Protectorians such as Tichbern Lawrence Strickland Whitleck Clark and others of that spirit be it known unto you you are Apostates still though the form you come under in the outward appearance be never so specious and the Protestations and Declarations you make and set forth be never so glorious and taking upon the people and the faithful Friends of the Cause if they intend to retain their former integrity and faithfulness both to the Lord and it cannot dare not own or touch with you but according to Numb 16.21.26 must separate and stand at a distance from you as before lest they be consumed in all your sins And although by your more refined Machevilian Devices and the many Professors yea Pastors and Members of Churches you may gain thereby to your Interest as also by the strength of your Armies and Navies you may think to bear up and to stout it out a little longer against the Lord his Cause and his faithful Remnant and the very spirit of your former honest Principles yet know that when you have done all you possibly can do to uphold your selves therein the spirit of the Lord in his forementioned faithful Remnant as it hath already begun to do will according to Isa 28.17 further overflow and look into your hidling place and see your sin as if written in your foreheads and to have a lye in your right hand and so will go on to abhor and blow upon you and by degrees will bring you down as your old and late Protectors with their Parliaments and the late Old Parliament and so shall you become as a shameful spewing a by-word and a reproach not onely in our own but the Nations round about us If God be God as surely he is and Righteousness be Righteousness and the Scriptures are the dictates of his Blessed Spirit and he ever had a glorious Cause on foot in England leading us out of Babylonish and Antichristian Bondage towards that glorious freedom and liberty that the Saints who have the first fruits of the Spirit and the whole creation groans travelleth in pain for and waits to be delivered into and shall eminently be when Zion shall fully be delivered Antichrist destroyed the Jews called and our Lord Jesus Christ and his Saints according to Isa 32.1 2. shall Reign and Rule in Righteousness in the world all which as is mentioned in pag. 2. of this Book shall certainly be fulfilled in the latter dayes it must be so unless the Lord be more merciful to you then ordinarily he is to others that have sinned against and back-slidden from him as you have done which you have no reason to expect he being so much concern'd for the recovery of his Name and Glory to do some eminent remarkable thing against such a perfidious hypocritically Apostate professing Generation as you have been and are that thereby he not onely may keep the feet of his faithful witness-bearing people from slipping and encourage them to fear and trust in him for the future but that also all others may hear and fear and do no more so wickedly And that the Common Enemy may not have the least encouragement from what I have said to believe that now all shall be their own and that the Lords lifted up hand against you is in order thereunto I further declare my present apprehensions are that although the Lord may make use of them as his Rod to rebuke and scourge you not onely for not bringing forth that good but also contrary to your Declarations doing worse things your selves then for which you sought with and beheaded their King as also cast out and banished his Posterity yet the Lord hath a people in this Nation whom he hitherto hath kept and I trust will keep faithful to the end to his Blessed Cause and those good Principles you have so treacherously departed from whom he will by his Almighty Power and Providence so preserve out of their hands that they shall never be able to overcome or have their wills upon them but they shall go on in the power of his Spirit Isa 59 19. and Mal. 4.2 3. with life power and an undaunted spirit in that blessed Work and Cause that for some years together hath with such wonderful success been carried on against them Neither do I see in the midst of all the confusions distractions fears and straits you are encompassed with the least ground to believe that the Lord will cast away the Cause and Interest of his Son to make way for a carnal Man and that wicked Generation whom he hath so many times subdued as the people of his Curse to bear Rule in this Nation and therein send us back to Egypt or Babylon any more but rather is thereby removing that which stands in the way and hinders his faithful people from going to Zion Wherefore if the Lord hath so punisht you a professing People who in the outward shew may be said to be the green tree and caused you thus to fall before the spirit of his Cause and faithful people and so to disappoint and bring to nought all that you contrive and act against them then how shall they who are a wicked Generation who should they prosper would set up wickedness by a Law and may truly be termed the dry tree be able to prevail against them And if you who by your profession are called a righteous people scarcely be saved where shall they who may be said to be the ungodly and sinners appear The present dispensations that are upon you gives not the least ground to believe that they shall bear rule any more therefore let them set their hearts at rest Surely the Lord would never give his people that light faith and communion with himself and such tastes of sweetness in their spirits in that Communion in the discovery Isa 33.17 18. of the glory that according to the Promises and Prophesies is to be revealed in the latter dayes and so much love to his Cause and Work that hath been formerly and is yet on foot though not so visible as once it was leading thereunto and so owned their Testimony against you in bringing you down for opposing of them or shewen us all these things as the wife of Manoah said to him Judges 13.23 if he intended to cast them away or deliver them up either into your or the common enemies hand Would the Lord who stiles himself a faithfull promise Covenant keeping God and that cannot lye ever bid his people Isa 62.6 7. not to keep silence and give him no rest till he establish and make Jerusalem a praise in the earth if he did not really intend to do so or have begun to put on the Saints Beautiful Garments and to make them a praise in the earth not for their righteousness or Goodness but for his own Names sake As also plagued Israel of Old for not pressing forward but endeavouring to go back to Egypt and will not he who hath a fulness of the spirit and love to his work and all power in his hand to do it and hath already laid the Foundation of Zions welfare carry it on and lay the top-stone also Surely he will And the Rage and Tumults of the Carnal Apprentices and others at this day for the bringing in Charles Stuart and saying They will lose their lives every one of them rather then they will have such men to Rule as will take away the corrupt Customs and Practices that are among them is an eminent hint to me that the very Day of the setting Christ and his Saints upon his holy Hill of Zion is at hand yea so upon us that none can put it off and being so fully satisfied in my Spirit it is so I shall conclude with the following Scriptures Esther 6.13 And Zeresh Hamans wife and his wise-men said unto him If Mordecai be of the seed of the Jews before whom thou hast begun to fall thou shalt not prevail against him but shalt surely fall before him Psal 2. Why do the Heathen rage and the People imagine a vain thing The Kings of the Earth set themselves and the Rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his Anointed saying Let us break their Bonds assunder c. THE END