presence of Almighty GOD the Searcher of all Hearts with a true intention to perform the same as we shall answer at that great Day when the secrets of all Hearts shall be disclosed Most humbly beseeching the Lord to strengthen us by his holy Spirit for this end and to bless our desires and proceedings with such Success as may be deliverance and safety to his People and Encouragement to other Christian Churches groaning under or in danger of the Yoke of Antichristian Tyranny to joyn in the same or like Association and Covenant To the glory of God the enlargement of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ and the Peace and Tranquility of Christian Kingdoms and Common-wealths West-kirk the 13. day of August 1650. THe Commission of the General Assembly considering that there may be just ground of stumbling from the Kings Majesties refusing to subscribe and emit the Declaration offered unto him by the Committee of Estates and Commissioners of the General Assembly concerning his former carriage and resolutions for the future in reference to the Cause of God and the Enemies and Friends thereof Doth therefore declare that this Kirk and Kingdom do not own nor espouse any Malignant party or quarrel or interest But that they fight meerly upon their former Grounds and Principles and in defence of the Cause of God and of the Kingdom as they have done these twelve Years past And therefore as they do disclaim all the Sin and Guilt of the King and of his House so they will not own Him nor his Interest otherwise than with a Subordination to God and so far as he owns and prosecutes the Cause of God and disclaimes his and his Fathers opposition to the Work of God and to the Covenant and likewise all the Enemies thereof And that they will with convenient speed take in Consideration the Papers lately sent unto them from OLIVER CROMWEL and vindicate themselves from all the falsehoods contained therein especially in those things wherein the quarrel betwixt us and that party is mis-stated as if we owned the late Kings proceedings and were resolved to Prosecute and Maintain his present Majesties interest before and without acknowledgement of the Sins of his House and former ways and Satisfaction to Gods People in both Kingdoms A. Ker. 13. of August 1650. THe Committee of Estates having seen and considered a Declaration of the Commission of the General Assembly anent the stating of the quarrel whereon the Army is to fight do Approve the same and heartily Concur therein Tho Henderson A True and Exact Copy of a Treasonable and Bloody Paper called The Fanaticks New Covenant which was taken from Donald Cargill at Queens-Ferry Iune 3. 1680. one of their Field-Preachers a declared Rebel and Traitor Together with their Execrable Declaration published at the Cross of Sanquhair upon the Two and twentieth day of the said Month of June after a solemn Procession and singing of Psalms by Cameron the notorious Ringleader of and Preacher at their Field-Conventicles accompanied with Twenty of that wretched Crew WE Under-Subscribers for our selves and all that join with us and adhere to us being put to it by God our Consciences and Men Do bind our Souls with a solemn and sacred Bond lest on the one hand we should be carried away with the stream of the Apostacy and defection of the Church in this time and on the other hand lest we should not being so engaged evanish in Vanity and be without a right Rule in good Designs We have judged it our duty again to Covenant with God and one another and to publish this DECLARATION to the World of our Purposes that Men may know our most inward thoughts the Rules that we walk by and the outmost ends that we have before our eyes for this intent that those who are lovers of God zealous of His reigning in Glory and desirous of Reformation and the propagation of His Kingdom may have occasion no more to be jealous of our Intentions and others may have no ground to load us with odious and foul Aspersions but that all knowing the truth of us if they shall strive against us and Truth with us shall do it without excuse and against conviction and that those who shall join with us may do it upon solid and undoubted grounds and both they and we may expect Grace from Him Faithfully to persevere and happily to be successful in so good Purposes It is true We are not ignorant of the great unmindfulness failing counteracting and mocking that has been in our former Vows and Covenants with God and of the great Iudgments that hath and are like to follow such impious and sinful dealing with God in such weighty Matters for which we both ought and desire to be Humbled before Him which cannot but make us with great trembling of Heart enter into new ones knowing both our own weakness and readiness to relapse and the great hazard and danger of such relapses Yet the desire of recovering and preserving a remnant and the conviction of this as the most convenient mean the zeal to Gods glory and Christs reigning which is the highest and most acceptable duty Man can perform to God hoping for His Mercies who is witness to the Integrity of our Hearts and rightness of our Intentions that he will instruct direct accept and prosper us we go forward declaring that nothing else but what we here express is our Design I. We Covenant and Swear that we take the only true and living God Father Son and Holy Ghost to be our God and betakes our selves to the Merits and Righteousness of His Son as the alone Righteousness that can justifie us before God and that we take His Scriptures and Word to be the Object of our Faith and rule of our Conversation in all things and that we shall give up our selves to Him to be renewed instructed and in all things ruled by His Spirit according to that Word and shall earnestly endeavour by His Grace to render to Him that Love Worship and Obedience that His Word requires and His Goodness engages us to II. That we shall to the outmost of our Power advance the Kingdom of Christ established throughout the Land if at any time hereafter God shall give us this opportunity Righteousness and the true reformed Religion in the truth of its Doctrine in the purity and power of its Worship and Ordinances and its Discipline and Government and free the Church of God from the Thraldom Tyranny Incroachment and corruption of Prelacy on the one hand and Erastianism on the other And we shall to our power relieve the Church and Subjects of this Kingdom we being called thereto by His giving of us Power Power being Gods Call to do good of that Oppression that hath been exercised upon their Consciences Civil Rights and Liberties that Men may serve Him Holily without fear and possess their civil Rights in quietness without disturbance III. That we shall endeavour to our outmost the
Allegeance to Devils they being his Vicegerents and not Gods V. We then being made free by God and their own doings he giving the Law and they giving the Transgression of that Law which is the cause that we are loosed now from all Obligations both Divine and Civil to them and knowing that no Society of Men that hath Corruption in them which always is ready to beget disorders and do injuries unless restrained and punished by Laws and Government can be without Laws and Government and withal desiring to be governed in the best way that is least lyable to Inconveniencies and Tyranny We do declare that we shall set up over our selves and over all that God shall give us Power Government and Governours according to the Word of God and especially according to that word Exod. 18. v. 21. Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the People able Men such as fear God Men of Truth hating Covetousness and that we shall no more commit the Government of our selves and the making of Laws for us to any one single Person and lineal Successor we not being tied as the Iews were by God to one Family Government not being an Inheritance but an Office which must be squared not to the Interest and Lust of a Man but to the good of the Commonwealth and this kind of Government by a single Person c. being most liable to Inconveniencies as sad and long experience may now teach us and aptest to Degenenate into Tyranny Moreover we declare that these Men whom we shall set over us shall be ingaged to govern us principally by that Civil or Judicial Law given by God to his People of Israel especially in matters of Life and Death and in all other things also so far as they teach excepting only that Law viz. anent Slaves which does not agree with that Christian Liberty established in all Christendom only violated by our Tyrants and some others of late and that of Divorces and Poligamy the one being not a Law but a Permission granted upon the account of the hardness of their Hearts the other being a Sinful Custom contrair to the first institution of Marriage crept in into the Church We know that Men of Malignant and perverse Spirits that has not a higher God than a wicked King which suits only with their lustful licentiousness and it may be others with them that seemed to be of better Principles will raise an ignorant Clamour upon this that it is a Fifth-Monarchy and we Fifth-Monarchy-men and will labour to amuse the People with strange Terms and put odious names on good things to make them hateful as their way is but if this be their Fifth-Monarchy we both are and ought to be such and that according to his word VI. It being the work of the Ministers of the Gospel to preach propagate and defend the Kingdom of God and to preserve the Doctrine Worship Discipline Government Liberties and Priviledges of the same from all Corruptions and Incroachments of Rulers and all others And seeing that the Ministers of the Church of Scotland at least the greatest part of them before not only were defective in Preaching and Testifying against the Acts of these Rulers for overthrowing Religion and Reformation abjuring our Covenant made with God establishing a Government in the Church which that King calls his own Government and so not God's contrair to our Covenant Against inacting of that Blasphemous so Calvin calls that Supremacy of Henry the Eighth upon which this Prerogative is founded and from which it is derived and is no less if not more jnjurious to Christ and inslaving to his Church and Sacrilegious Prerogative given to a King over the Church of God and against the other Acts and Incroachments of His Church and hindred others also who were willing and would have testified against them and censured some that did it for which together with the other Causes in their Trust and Administration we may say God hath left them to do worse things but also hath voted in that Meeting which they are pleased to call an Assembly of Ministers but how justly let Men judge an Acceptation of that Liberty founded upon and given by vertue of that blasphemously arrogated and usurped Power and hath appeared before their Courts to accept of that Liberty and to be enacted and authorized there as Ministers and so hath willingly for this is an elicit Act of the Will and not an Act of Force and Constraint translated the Power of sending out ordering censuring for as they accept of their Liberty from them so they submit to their Censures and Restraints at least all of them who were yet tried with it and others of them appeared and acknowledged before their Courts that they would not have done these things that they were charged with if they had thought it would have offended them Ministers departing from the Court of Christ and subjection to the Ministry to the Courts of Men and subjection to the Magistrate which had been impious and injurious to Christ and His Church though they had been Righteous and Lawful Rulers and by their changing of Courts according to common Law hath changed their Masters and of the Ministers of Christ are become the Ministers of Men and bound to answer to them as oft as they will and as by the acceptation of this Liberty in such manner they have Translated the Power so they have given up and utterly quit the Government and a succession of a Presbyterian Ministry for as these were not granted them of their Masters so they Exercise their Ministry without them and so by this as the Ecclesiastick-Government is swallowed up in the Civil if the rest had followed them the Ministry should have also been extinct with themselves and the whole Work of Reformation had been buried in Oblivion not so much as the remembrance of it kept up These together with the other of their Commissions in Preaching the lawfulness of paying that Tribute declared to be imposed for the bearing down of the true Worship of God which they falsly termed Seditious Conventicles and their advising these poor Prisoners to subscribe the Bond and consequently could not but so advise all others if put to it for the hazard that Men were in will not make a real change of the morality of that Action and beside the rest may be put to it upon the same hazard and so if the one should advise which consequently they must do and the other should subscribe this would altogether close that door which the Lord hath made use of in all the Churches of Europe for casting off the Yoke of the Whore and restoring the Truth and Purity of Religion and Reformation and freedom of the Churches and should have stopped all ingress for Men when once brought under Tyranny to recover their Liberty again These Ministers then not being followers of Christ who before Pontius Pilate gave a good Confession which was that he was a King
all that are unchast in thoughts words and behaviour and all that makes no Conscience of their way and whosoever loveth and maketh a lye shall tremble that day when they shall enter into Eternity when it shall be said as it was to Dives Thou in thy Lifetime hadst thy good things and Lazarus his bad things For except a Man be born again he can in no wise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven We take up the Book of the Holy Scripture at the Lords command and for a Testimony of our Dissatisfaction at the abounding Corruptions both of Translators and the Press and likewise for a Testimony of our desires and intentions for a new Translation and Impression free of the foresaid and other abuses we to our power reform our own Books and sayes that the word of God needs no humane Art we hold that the Word of God is laid the Foundation of this new Building and shortly it shall become the head Corner stone of the Building over both Kirk and Stater Kirk-Men and States-Men so that Scripture towards the end of the Rev. of Iohn shall be fulfilled And I saw Heaven opened and behold a white Horse and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True and in Righteousness he doth Iudge and make War his Eyes were as a flame of Fire and on his Head were many Crowns and he had a new Name written that no Man knew but he himself and he was Cloathed with a Vesture dipt in Blood and his Name is called the word of God And first to shew that we take the Word of God in every point to be our Rule the sum and end of our so much reproached and mocked at Exercise Fasting and Prayer will be found in the Book of Psalms Be thou exalted O God above the Heavens and let thy glory be above all the Earth It is written in the Acts of the Apostles It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us but they usurping Supremacy says by the Authority of the General Assembly allows these Psalms to be sung in Congregations c. which we renounce And more we think the Psalm Book in Meeter and no other thing ought to be within the broads of the Bible but the simple Scriptures of Truth the Psalms may be had in a Book by themselves We are so reproached and calumniate that we are forced to make our defence and shew that we have mourned fasted and prayed many a day and many a night this last Winter many times in the open Fields in Frost and Snow while our Cloaths were frozen upon us and our Feet frozen in our Shooes as the Town of cursed Borronstonness can witness and all this to find out the causes of our Lords tarrying when those who are now calling us Devils were turning themselves upon their Ivory beds like a door upon the Hinges eating the fat and drinking the sweet at their own ease And when we were driven thence by Persecution we took our selves to the Fields holding still by our duty where many Women did offer themselves to the Work with whom our spirits was many a time burdened whom we could not put away as our blessed Lord dealt with Iudas whom he knew would betray him without manifest causes We stayed not with them but on solemn days such as Sabbaths and appointed times for publick meeting but when they took their rest betwixt hands we continnued still in Fields nights and days fasting and praying for two or three days together several times and it was always their fear we should propose some question to try them for Separation and that night before we was taken we warned them that the Soldiers would come and told them to use their freedom we saw them also a mile off an hour before they came and none of them would go away and after we were brought in hither after some several days Fasting and Prayer we being warned by the Holy Ghost followed Esther's advice and continued from eight a Clock of the morning the 24 day of the 5 Month till the 27 at four afternoon Fasting and Praying we sent them word likewise to Fast and Pray and when we sent them the answer of our Prayers in the writ they called us Devils Thence we fasted till the 28 day at night and thence till the 30 at night waiting still to see if they would recover but they waxed still worse and we were forced to write this to vindicate our carriage towards them Walter Ker. Iohn Gibb David Iamison Iohn Young This is Exactly Compared and Collationed with the Principal Copy by me WIL. PATERSON Cl. Sti. Concilii FINIS A Catalogue of some Books Printed for Io. Hindmarsh at the Golden-Ball over against the Royal-Exchange in Cornhill THE Antiquity of the Royal Line of Scotland farther Cleared and Defended against the Exceptions lately offer'd by Dr. Stillingfleet in his Vindication of the Bishop of St. Asaph By Sir George Mackenzie His Majesty's Advocate for the Kingdom of Scotland The Moral History of Frugality with its opposite Vices Covetousness Niggardliness Prodigality and Luxury Written by the Honourable Sir George Mackenzie late Lord Advocate of Scotland A Memorial for His Highness the Prince of Orange in Relation to the Affairs of Scotland Together with the Address of the Presbyterian-Party in that Kingdom to His Highness And some Observations on that Address By two Persons of Quality An Account of the Present Persecution of the Church in Scotland in several Letters The Case of the Present Afflicted Clergy in Scotland truly represented To which is added for Probation the attestation of many unexceptionable Witnesses to every Particular and all the Publick Acts and Proclamations of the Convention and Parliament relating to the Clergy By a Lover of the Church and his Country An Historical Relation of the late Presbyterian General Assembly held at Edinburgh from October 16. to November 13. In the Year 1690. In a Letter from a Person in Edinburgh to his Friend in London Vid. Cargil and Sanchars Covenant at the end * That is this noise of Prisoners yet preserved alive So the Preacher applied his Doctrin The truly learned Advocate for the King †Illud tamen generaliter observandum quod Iurisdictio nunquam privative sed cumulative delegaâ—i potest non est quasi transitio juris de unâ— persona in aliam sed tantum mandata jurisdictio quod non obstante Delegatione adhuc remanet in delegante Considering the violent and cruel temper of their Enemies * Compare this with the Sanchar Declaration and Cargil's Covenant at the end of this Paper * That is the same Punishment which the Law provides against such a Criminal Art eod II. Art 3. ejusdem Art 10. Act 92. Ses. II. Iac. 6. * Vid. Cargils Covenant and Sanchar Declaration