Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
Text snippets containing the quad
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A38258
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Eikōn basilikē, The pourtraicture of His Sacred Majestie in his solitudes and sufferings; Eikon basilike.
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Charles I, King of England, 1600-1649.; Gauden, John, 1605-1662.
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1648
(1648)
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Wing E268; ESTC R18840
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116,516
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280
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some mens ambitious Covetousnesse and sacrilegious Cruelty torturing with Me both Church and State in Civill distentions till I shall be forced to consent and declare that I doe approve what God knowes I utterly dislike and in My Soul abhor as many wayes highly against Reason Justice and Religion and whereto if I should shamefully and diâ—honourably give My consent yet should I not by so doing satisfie the dâ—vided Interests and Opinions of those Parties which contend with each other as well as both against Me and Epiâ—copacy Nor can My late condescending to the Scots in point of Church-government be rightly objected against Me as an inducement for Me to consent to the like in My other Kingdoms For it should be considered that Episcopacy was not so rooted and setled there as 't is here nor I in that respect so strictly bound to continue it in that Kingdom as in this for what I think in My judgment best I may not think so absolutely necessary for all places at all times If any shall impute My yeilding to them as My failing and sin I can easily acknowledge it but that is no argument to do so again or much worse I being now more convinced in that point nor indeed hath My yeilding to them been so happy and successefull as to incourage Me to grant the like to others Did I see any thing more of Christ as to Meeknesse Justice Orâ—er Charity and Loyalty in those that pretend to other modes of Government I might suspect My judgment to be biassed or foreâ—stalled with some prejudice and wontednesse of opinion but I have hitherto so much cause to suspect the contrary in the manners of many of those men that I cannot from them gain the least reputation for their new wayes of Government Nor can I find that in any Reformed Churches whose paternes are so cryed up and obtruded upon the Churches under My Dominion that eâ—ther Learning or Religion workes of Pâ—ety or Charity have so flourished beyond what they have done in My Kingdomes by Gods blessing which might make Me believe either Presbytery or Independency have a more benigne influence upon the Church and mens hearts and lives than Episcopacy in its right constitution The abuses of which deserve to be extirpated as much as the use retained for I think it farre better to hold to primitive and uniforme Antiquity than to comply with divided novelty A right Episcopacy would at once satisfie all just desires and interests of good Bishops humble Presbyters and sober People so as Church affaires should be managed neither with tyrannie parity nor popularity neither Bishops ejected nor Presbyters despised nor People oppressed And in this integrity both of My Judgment and Conscience I hope God will preserve Me. For Thou O Lord knowest my uprightnesse and tendernesse as thou hast set me to be a Defender of the Faith and a Protectour of thy Church so suffer me not by any violence to be overborne against my Conscience Arise O Lord maintaine thine owne Cause let not thy Church be deformed as to that Government which derived from thy Apostles hath been retained in purest and primitive times till the Revenues of the Church became the object of secular envy which seeks to rob it of all the incouragements of Learning and Religion Make me as the good Samaritan compassionate and helpfull to thy afflicted Church which some men have wounded and robbed others passe by without regard either to pity or relieve As my power is from thee so give me grace to use it for thee And though I am not suffered to be Master of my other Rights as a KING yet preserve me in that liberty of Reason love of Religion and thy Churches welfare which are fixed in my Conscience as a Christian. Preserve from Sacrilegious invasions those temporall blessings which thy providence hath bestowed on thy Church for thy glory Forgive their sinnes and errours who have deserved thy just permission thus to let in the wild Boare and subtill Foxes to wast and deform thy Vineyard which thy right hand hath planted and the dew of Heaven so long watered to a happy and flourishing estate O let me not beare the infamous brand to all Posterity of being the first Christian KING in this Kingdome who should consent to the oppression of thy Church and the Fathers of it whose errours I would rather with Constantine cover with silence and reforme with meeknesse than expose their persons and sacred Functions to vulgar contempt Thou O Lord seest how much I have suffered with and for thy Church make no long tarrying O my God to deliver both me and it from unreasonable men whose counsels have brought forth and continue such violent confusions by a precipitant destroying the ancient boundaries of thy Churches peace thereby letting in all manner of errours schismes and disorders O thou God of order and of truth in thy good â—ime abate the malice aswage the rage and confound all the mischievous devices of thine mine and thy Churches enemies That I and all that love thy Church may sing praises to thee and ever magnifie thâ— salvation even beâ—ore the sons of men 18. Vpon Vxbridge-Treaty and other Offers made by the KING I Look upon the way of Treaties as a retiring from fighting like Beasts to arguing like Men whose strength should be more in their understandings than in their limbs And though I could seldome get opportunities to Treat yet I never wanted either desire or disposition to it having greater confidence of My Reason than My Sword I was so wholly resolved to yeild to the first that I thought neither My selfe nor others should need to use the second if once we rightly understood each other Nor did I ever think it a diminution of Me to prevent them with Expresses of My desires and even importunities to Treat It being an office not onely of humanity rather to use Reason than Force but also of Christianity to seek peace and ensue it As I am very unwillingly compelled to defend My self with Armes so I very willingly embraced any thing tending to Peace The events of all Warre by the Sword being very dubious and of a Civill Warre uncomfortable the end hardly recompencing and late repairing the mischief of the means Nor did any successe I had ever enhaunce with Me the price of Peace as earnestly desired by Me as any man though I was like to pay dearer for it than any man All that I sought to reserve was Mine Honour and My Conscience the one I could not part with as a KING the other as a Christian. The Treaty at Uxbridge gave the fairest hopes of an happy composure had others applied themselves to it with the same moderation as I did I am confident the War had then ended I was willing to condescend as farre as Reason Honour and Conscience would gâ—ve Me leave nor were the remaining differences so essentiall to My Peoples happinesse or of such consequence as in the
by scandalous articles and all irreverent demeanour to seeke to drive her out of My Kingdomes lest by the influence of her example eminent for love as a Wife and Loyalty as a Subject she should have converted to or retayned in their love and Loyalty all those whom they had a purpose to pervert The lesse I may be blest with her company the more I will retire to God and My owne Heart whence no malice can banish Her My enemies may envy but they can never deprive Me of the enjoyment of her vertues while I enjoy My self Thou O Lord whose Iustice at present sees fit to scatter us let thy mercâ—â— in thy due time reunite us on earth if it be thy will however bring us both at last to thy heavenly Kingdome Preserve us from the hands of our despitefull and deadly enemies and prepare us by our sufferings for thy presence Though we differ in some things as to Religion which is my greatest temporall infelicity yet Lord give and accept the sincerity of our affections which desire to seek to find to embrace every Truth of thine Let both our Hearts agree in the love of thy selfe and Christ crucified for us Teach us both what thou wouldst have us to know in order to thy glory our publique relations and our soules eternall good and make us carefull to doe what good we know Let neither Ignorance of what is necessary to be knowne nor unbelief or disobedience to what we know be our misery or our wilfull default Let not this great Scandall of those my Subjects which professe the same Religion with me be any hindrance to her love of any Truth thou wouldst have her to learne nor any hardning of her in any errour thou wouldst have cleared to her Let mine and other mens constancy be an Antidote against the poyson of their example Let the Truth of that Religion I professe be represented to her Iudgment with all the beauties of Humility Loyaltâ—â— Charity and Peaceablenesse which are the proper fruits and ornaments of it Not in the odious disguises of Levity Schisme Heresie Novelty Cruelty and Disloyalty which some mens practises have lately put upon it Let her see thy sacred and saving Truths as Thine that she may believe love and obey them as Thine cleared from all rust and drosse of humane mixtures That in the glasse of thy Truth she may see thee in those mercies which thou hast offered to us in thy Sonne Iesus Christ our onely Saviour and serve thee in all those Holy duties which most agree with his holy doctrine and most imitable example The experience we have of the vanity and uncertainty of all humane Glory and greatnesse in our scatterings and Eclypses let it make us both so much â—he more ambitious to be invested in those durable honours and perfections which are onely to be found in thy self and obtained through Iesus Christ. 8. Vpon His Majesties repulse at Hull and the fates of the Hothams MY repulse at Hull seemed at the first view an act of so rude disloyalty that My greatest enemies had scarce confidence enough to abeâ—t or owne it It was the first overt Essay to be made how patiently I could beare the Losse of My Kingdomes God knows it affected me more with shame and sorrow for others then with anger for My selfe nor did the affront done to Me trouble Me so much as their sinne which admitted no colour oâ— excuse I was resolved how to beare this and much more with patience But I foresaw they could hardly conteine themselves within the compasse of this one unworthy act who had effrontery enough to commit or countenance it This was but the hand of that cloud which was â—oone after to overspread the whole Kingdome and cast all into disorder and darknesse For t is among the wicked Maximes of bold and disloyall undertakers That bad actions must alwayes be seconded with worse and rather not be begun then not carried on for they think the retreat more dangerous then the assault and hate repentance more then perseverance in a Fault This gave Me to see clearly through all the pious disguises and soft palliations of some men whose words were sometime smoother then oyle but now I saw they would prove very Swords Against which I having as yet no defence but that of a good Conscience thought it My best policy with patience to bear what I could not remedy And in this I thank God I had the better of Hotham that no disdain or emotion of passion transported Me by the indignity of his carriage to doe or say any thing unbeseeming My self or unsutable to that temper which in greatest injuries I think best becomes a Christian as comming nearest to the great example of Christ. And indeed I desire alwaies more to remember I am a Christian then a King for what the Majesty of one might justly abhor the Charity of the other is willing to bear what the height of a King tempteth to revenge the humility of a Christian teacheth to forgive Keeping in compasse all those impotent passions whose excesse injures a man more then his greatest enemies can for these give their malice a full impression on our souls which otherwaies cannot reach very far nor doe us much hurt I cannot but observe how God not long after so pleaded and avenged My cause in the eye of the world that the most wilfully blind cannot avoid the displeasure to see it with some remorse and fear to own it as a notable stroke and prediction of divine vengeance For Sir Iohn Hotham unreproached unthreatned uncursed by any language or secret imprecation of Mine onely blasted with the conscience of his owne wickednesse and falling from one inconstancy to another not long after paies his owne and his eldest Sons heads as forfeitures of their disloyalty to those men from whom surely he might have expected another reward then thus to divide their heads from their bodies whose hearts with them were divided from their KING Nor is it strange that they who imployed them at first in so high a service and so successfull to them should not find mercy enough to forgive Him who had so much premerited of them For Apostacy unto Loyalty some men account the most unpardonable sinne Nor did a solitary vengeance serve the turne the cutting off one head in a Family is not enough to expiate the affront done to the head of the CoÌ„mon-weale The eldest Son must be involved in the punishment as he was infected with the sinne of the Father against the Father of his Country Root and branch God cuts off in one day These observations are obvious to every fancy God knows I was so farre from rejoycing in the Hotham's ruine though it were such as was able to give the greaâ—est thirst for revenge a full drought being executed by them who first employed him against Me that I so farre pitied him as I thought he at first acted more against the light