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Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	church_n	faith_n	unity_n	2,197	5	9.0779	5	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A29318	Brethren in iniquity, or, The confederacy of Papists with sectaries, for the destroying of the true religion, as by law establish'd, plainly detected wherein is shewed a farther account of the Romish snares and intrigues for the destroying the true reformed religion, as professed in the Church of England, and established by law, and for the introducing of popery or atheism among us : clearly shewing from very authentick writers and testimonies, that the principal ways and methods whereby the papists have sought the ruine of our religion and church, from the beginning of our Reformation, to the present times, and by which they are still in hopes of compassing it, are by promoting of toleration, or pretended liberty of conscience, and that for above these sixscore years the papists have so craftily influenced our dissenters, as to make them the unhappy instruments of effecting their most pernicious designs, which they contrived for, the subverting our church and state.		1690 (1690)	Wing B4382; ESTC R6507	50,245	71

the Phanaticks that boasted to be the most avowed and irreconcilable Enemies of the Church of Rome were not only become altogether silent when they saw the Kingdom pestered with a swarm of busie and seducing Emissaries but were turned Advocates for that Arbitrary Paper whereby we were surrendered as a prey unto them and did make it their Business to detract from the Reputation of the National Ministers The Members of the Church of England wrote then above 220. Books against Popery when there were not above one or two writ by the Non-conformists as is to be seen in the late Lift or Accompt that was published of them who with a Zeal becoming their Office and a Learning which deserves to be admired did set themselves in opposition to that croaking fry and did enough by their excellent and unimitable writings to save People from being deluded and perverted if either unanswerable Confutations of Popery or demonstrative Desences of the Articles and Doctrines of the Reformed Religion can have any efficacy upon the minds of Men. And this Author farther saith Among other fulsome Flatteries made to his Majesty by an addressing Dissenter he found this hypocritical and shameful Adulation namely That if there should remain any Seeds of Disloyalty in any of his Subjects the transcendant Goodness exerted in his Declaratian would mortifie and kill them To which he might have added with more Truth That the same transcendant Goodness had admost destroy'd all the Seeds of their Honesty and mortified all their Care and Concernment for the Interest of Jesus Christ and for the Reformed Religion Their old strain of zealous Preaching against the Idolatry of Rome and concerning the coming out of Babylon my People were grown out of Fashion with them And whosoever should come into their Assemblies would think for any thing that he there heard delivered from their Pulpits that she which was the Whore of Babylon a few Years ago were now become a Chaste Spouse and that what were heretofore the damnable Doctrines of Popery were of late turned innocent and harmless Opinions And as they are already arrived to believe a Roman Catholick the best King so they may in a little time come to esteem Papists for the best Christians This and a great deal more to the same purpose you may find in this Book of smart reflections upon the Dissenters scandalous and abominable wicked Confederacy with the Papists for the subverting the true reformed Religon The Troublers of our Israel being thus plainly manifested to the World and a true Discovery made in the several Collections from whence the Evils and Miseries did principally arise that have befallen our Church and State since the days of Queen Elizabeth unto these present times and which will undoubtedly bring Ruine Confusion and Disorder on both if not seasonably and effectually redressed for so the Fountain of Truth and Wisdom tells us Matth. 12.25 That a Kingdom divided against it self is brought to desolation and every City or House divided against it self cannot stand The foregoing accounts are therefore humbly offer'd to the serious perusal of our Church and State-Physicians the Parliament and Convocation to find out and apply proper means and remedies for the preventing the farther growth of these mischiefs which not only threaten but genuinely tend and hasten to the destruction of the true establish'd Religion and of our Nation And that they may zealously go about this good work and effectually finish it it is the Interest and Duty of all good Christians to pray for them both as we are taught in that excellent Form in our Liturgy That God would be pleased to direct and prosper all their Consultations to the Advancement of his Glory the good of his Church and the Safety Honour and Well-fare of their Majesties and Kingdoms That all things may be so ordered and setled by their endeavours upon the best and surest Foundations that Peace and Happiness Truth and Justice Religion and Piety may be establish'd among us for all Generations And it is no less the Duty of all that profess themselves Members of our Church to be sincerely minded and not to be mockers with God but earnestly to seek and endeavour after the freeing us from those evils which we pray to be delivered from in our Litany viz. From all Sedition privy Conspiracy and Rebellion from all false Doctrine Heresie and Schism from hardness of Heart and contempt of God's Word and Commandments and that after the putting up these Petitions in the Church to the Throne of Grace that all who profess and call themselves Christians may be led into the way of Truth and hold the Faith in Unity of Spirit in the bond of Peace and Righteousness of Life and that God would give to us and all Nations Unity Peace and Concord and bring into the way of Truth all such as have erred and are deceived none of us may be found such wretched self-condemners in our Practice and wicked Prevaricators with God and the Church as to act directly contrary to what we pray for in the promoting of a Connivence Toleration or Libertinism which will establish Schism propagate and multiply Heresies breed Discord and Divisions and will also impower and commission Satan to sow his tares and to seduce multitudes from the ways of Truth Peace Unity and Righteousness and when people are left at Liberty in matters of Religion to do what seemeth good in their own eyes they seldom do what is good in the Lord's eyes but are laid open to great Temptations of being drawn away into the paths of the most dangerous errors Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that which he alloweth Rom. 14.22 Be not deceived God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap Gal. 6.7 St. Paul's Prophecy of the Downfal and Suppression of seducing Separatists or Dividers 2 Tim. 3.8 9. Now as Jannes and Jambres Aegyptian Magicians withstood Moses so do these also resist the Truth men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the Faith But they shall proceed no further for their folly shall be manifested as theirs also was FINIS

is ours now is the fatal blow given to the Protestant Religion in England See this in Bishop Saunderson's Preface to his first Volume of Sermons A great deal more to this purpose may be seen in Dr. Stillingfleet's Preface to his Excellent Book entitled The Vnreasonableness of Separation And though he Printed this Book in the Year 1681. yet as if he had on him the Spirit of Prophecy when he wrote it he hath fully discovered the Popish Intrigues and exposed to publick View their Designs and ways of proceeding as they are now managed against our Church in Concurrence with the several Dissenting Parties who have been made from the Infancy of the Reformation the Instruments to effect their Contrivings The Advice that the late Earl of Sh ry and the Lord Cl d gave the late King in Company with the Grand Cabal in the Year 1671. which Cabal were Bu m Sh ry Ar ton L dale H is and Cl d taken out of the Dream or Gambol WHilst a confused Chat in the Cabal Had many mov'd none heard but speak did all A little Bobtail'd Lord Vrchin of State A Praise-God-bare-bones Peer whom all Men hate Amphibious Animal half Fool half Knave Begg'd Silence and this pur-blind Counsel gave Blest and best Monarch that e'er Sceptre bore Renown'd for Honour but for Vertue more The Lord spake last hath well and wisely shown That Parliaments nor new nor old nor none Can well be trusted longer for your State And Glory of your Crown hates all Check-mate That Monarchy may from his Child-hood grow To Man's Estate France hath us shown You know Monarchy is Divine Divinity it shows That he goes backward that not forward goes Therefore go on let other Kingdoms see Your Wit 's their Law that absolute Monarchy A mixt hodge-podge will now no longer bear Caesar or nothing you are now brought here Strike then Great Sir for these Debates take Wind Remember that Occasion 's bald behind For Gain is sure in this if wisely play'd And sacred Votes to the Vulgar not betray'd But if the rumour once should get on Wing That we consult to make you absolute King The Plebeians Head the Gentry forsooth Would streightway snore and have an aching tooth Least they I say should your great Secret scent And you expose in nulling Parliament I think it safer and a better skill To obviate than overcome an ill For those that head the Herd are full as rude When the humour takes as th' following Multitude Wherefore be quick in your resolves and when You have resolv'd execute quicker then Remember your Great Father lost the Game By slow procedure mayn't you do the same An unexpected unregarded Blow Wounds more than ten made by an open Foe Delays do danger breed the Sword is your's By Law declar'd what need you other powers We may Impolitick be judg'd or worse If we cann't make the Sword command the purse No Art nor Courtship can your Rule so shape Without a force it must be done by Rape And when 't is done to say they cannot help Will satisfie enough the gentle Whelp Phanaticks they 'll to Providence impute Their Thraldom and immediately grow mute For they poor silly Souls think the Decree From Heaven on them although from Hell it be Wherefore to gull them do their hopes fulfil With Liberty they are halter'd at your Will Give them but Conventicle room and they Will let you steal their English Man away And heedless be till you your Nets have spread And pull'd down Conventicles on their Head Militia then and Parliaments Casheer A formidable standing Army rear To mount you up and up you soon will be They 'll fear who ne'er would love your Monarchy And if they fear no matter for their hate To Rule by Love becomes a sneaking State Lay by all Fears care not what People say Regard to these will your Designs betray When bite they cann't what hurt can barking do And in short time we 'll spoil their barking too Make Coffee-Clubs talk more of humble things Than State Affairs and Interest of Kings Thus spake that ridgling Peer when one more grave That had much less of Fool but more of Knave Cl d. Began Great Sir it gives no small content To hear such Zeal from you ' gainst Parliament Wherefore though I an Enemy no less To Parliaments than they my self profess Yet let me tell you 't is a harder thing Than they suggest to make you absolute King Old Building to pluck down believe it true More danger in it hath than building new And what shall prop your Superstructure till Another you have raised to suit your Will An Army shall say they content but stay From whence shall this new Army have its Pay For easie and gentle Government awhile Appear must to this Kingdom to beguile The Peoples Minds and so to make them free For raising old and making better new For Taxes with new Government all will blame And put the Kingdom sure into a Flame For Tyranny hath no such lovely look To take Men with unless you hide the Hook And no Bait better bides than present Ease Ease but their Taxes and do what you please Wherefore all wild debates laid by from whence Shall Money rise to do this vast Expence Call our first thoughts thus well resolved we In other things much better shall agree Join then with Mother-Church whose Bosom stands Ope to receive you stretching both her Hands Close but this Breach and they will let you see Her Purse as open as her Armes shall be For Sacred Sir by guess I do not speak Of poor she 'll make you rich and strong of weak At Home Abroad no Money no nor Men She 'll let you lack turn but to her agen And let me add Great Sir you know its Season Salts all the Notions that we make in Reason And now a Season is afforded us The best e'er came and most propitious Besides the Summs the Catholicks will advance You know what offers you are made by France And to have Money and no Parliament Most fully Answers your design'd intent And thus without tumultuous bruit or huff Of Parliaments you 'll Money have enough Which if neglected now there 's none knows when Like opportunity may be again For to Extirpate what combined be Both Civil and Religious Liberty There 's Money enough you 'll have to exalt the Crown Not stooping Majesty to the Country Clown The triple League I know will be objected As if that ought to be by us respected But who to Heretick or Rebel pay'th The Truth engag'd by solemn Faith Debaucheth Vertue by those sacred things The Church profaneth and abuseth Kings Faith Justice Truth Plebeian Vertues be Look well in them but not in Majesty For publick Faith is but a publick Thief The greatest Cheat in Nature's vain Belief The Judgment of several eminent Presbyterian Divines concerning the usefulness of an established Vniformity in the Church for the Preservation of the

believe that it is with extream unwillingness and reluctancy of Heart that we are brought to differ from any thing which your Majesty hath thought sit to propose And though we do no way doubt but that the unreasonable Distempers of Mens Spirits and the many Mutinies and Conspiracies which were carried on during the late intervals of Parliament did reasonably incline your Majesty to endeavour by your Declaration to give some allay to those ill Humours till the Parliament assembled and the hopes of Indulgence if the Parliament should consent to it especially seeing the Pretenders to this Indulgence did seem to make some Titles to it by virtue of your Majesty's Declaration from Breda Nevertheless we your Majesty's most Dutiful and Loyal Subjects who are now returned to serve in Parliament from those several Parts and Places of your Kingdom for which we are chosen do humbly offer to your Majesty's great Wisdom That it is in no sort advisable that there be any Indulgence to such Persons who presume to dissent from the Act of Uniformity and the Religion establish'd We have also considered the Nature of the Indulgence proposed with reference to these Consequences which must necessarily attend it It will establish Schism by a Law and make the whole Government of the Church precarious and the Censures of it of no moment or consideration at all It will expose your Majesty to the restless importunity of every Sect or Opinion and of every single Person also who shall presume to dissent from the Church of England It will be a cause of increasing Sects and Sectaries whose numbers will weaken the true Protestant Profession so far that it will at least be dissicult for it to defend it self against them And which is yet farther considerable Those numbers which by being troublesome to the Government find they can arrive to an Indulgence will as their numbers increase be yet more troublesome that so at length they may arrive to a general Toleration and in time some prevalent Sect will at last contend for an Establishment which for ought can be foreseen may end in Popery It is a thing altogether without precedent and will take away all means of convicting recusants and be inconsistent with the method and proceedings of the Laws of England Lastly it is humbly conceived that the Indulgence proposed will be so far from tending to the peace of the Kingdom that it is rather likely to occasion great disturbance And on the contrary that the asserting of the Laws and the Religion established according to the act of Vniformity is the most probable means to produce a setled Peace and Obedience throughout the Kingdom Because variety of professions in Religion when openly divulg'd doth directly distinguish men into Parties and withal gives them opportunity to count their numbers which considering the Animosities that out of a Religious Pride will be kept on foot by the several Factions doth tend directly and inevitably to open Disturbance Nor can your Majesty have any security that the Doctrine or Worship of the several Factions which are all governed by a several Rule shall be consistent with the Peace of the Kingdom And if any Persons shall presume to disturb the Peace of the Kingdom we do in all humility declare That we will for ever and in all occasions be ready with our utmost endeavour and assistance to adhere to and serve your Majesty according to our bounden Duty and Allegiance These impregnable and unanswerable Reasons did the excellent Members of that House alledge against Toleration Reasons full and clear carrying with them all the advantages of strength and evidence and as Dr. Tompkins said deservedly of them in his Pleas for Toleration discussed These renowned Gentlemen did then shew that they were able with their Pens to give an account of that Cause for which very many of themselves and Fathers did honourably draw their Swords and knew very well how to assert that Church by all the Rules of Christian Prudence as well as they did formerly set inimitable patterns of Christian Courage in suffering for it In these we may see and admire how those glorious Worthies came up to the Greatness of themselves and of the Argument and indeed they were both worthy of one another they to defend and that to be defended And as nothing was ever better penn'd than those Reasons so there was scarce ever a better occasion The best Church in Europe was then bore witness to by the best House of Commons which ever sat in this Nation And these Votes shall ever remain as a lasting Monument not only of their Zeal and Religion but of the incomparable Endowments and Abilities of those who drew them up A LETTER OF THE MINISTERS Of the CITY of LONDON Presented the First of January 1645. to the Reverend Assembly of Divines sitting at Westminister by Authority of Parliament against TOLERATION To our Reverend Learned and Religious Brethren the Prolocutor and the rest of the Divines assembled and now sitting at Westminster by Authority of Parliament these present Reverend and beloved Brethren WE are exceedingly apprehensive of the desirableness of the Church's Peace and of the pleasantness of Brethrens Vnity knowing that when Peace is set upon its proper basis viz. Righteousness and Truth it is one of the best possessions both delectable and profitable like Aaron's Ointment and the Dew of Hermon It is true by reason of different lights and different sights among Brethren there may be dissenting in opinion yet why should there be any separating from Church Communion The Church's Coat may be of divers colours yet why should there be any rent in it Have we not a touchstone of Truth the good word of God and when all things are examined by that word then that which is best may be held fast but first they must be known and then examined afterward If our dissenting Brethren after so many importunate Entreaties would have been perswaded either in zeal to the Truth or in sincere love to the Church's Peace and Vnity among Brethren or in respect to their own reputation by fair and ingenuous dealing or in conscience to their promise made with the Ministers of London now five years since or any such like reasonable consideration at last to have given us a full Narrative of their Opinions and grounds of their Separation we are perswaded they would not have slood at such a distance from us as now they do But they chose rather to walk by their own private lights than to unbosom themselves to us their most affectionate Brethren and to set themselves in an untrodden way of their own rather than to wait what our covenanted Reformation according to the Word of God and Examples of the best Reformed Churches would bring forth But the offence doth not end here it is much that our Brethren should separate from the Church but that they should endeavour to get a warrant to authorize their separation from it and to have

Lord Viscount Stafford That they designed to bring in Popery by Toleration as may be seen in his Trial. And now let any impartial Person judge who did most effectually serve the Papist Designs those who kept to the Communion of the Church of England or those who fell into a course of Separation I will allow what Mr. Baxter saith That they might use their Endeavours to exasperate the several Parties against each other and might sometimes press the more rigorous Execution of Laws against them but then it was to set them at a greater distance from us and to make them more pliable to a General Toleration And they sometimes complained That those who were most averse to this found themselves under the Severity of the Law when more Tractable Men escaped which they have weakly imputed to the Bishops when they might easily understand the true causo of such a Discrimination But from the whole it appears That the grand Design of the Papists for many Years was to break in pieces the Constitution of the Church of England which being done they flattered themselves with the hopes of great Accessions to their Strength and Party and in order to this they inflamed the Differences among us to the utmost height on purpise to make all the dissenting Parties to join with them for a General Toleration which they did not question would destroy this Church and advance their Interest And it is a most unfortunate Condition our Church is in That those who design to bring in Popery and the Dissenters who made so great bustles in the late King's Reign to keep it out should now both conspire towards the Destruction of our Church and use all their Art and Industry to undermine and blow up this strongest Bullwork of the Protestant Religion This Reverend and most Learned Person hath also well observ'd how subtilly the Romanists have managed our indiscreet Dissenters Zeal against the Church of England under a pretence of opposing Popery to be one of the more likely ways to bring it in Many Instruments and Engines they made use of in this Design many ways and times they set about it and although they met with several Disappointments yet they never gave it over And is it not very strange that when they can scarce appear for themselves others out of meer Zeal against Popery should carry on their Work for them This seems to be a great Paradox to unthinking People who are carried away with meer Noise and Pretences and hope those will secure them most against the fears of Popery who talk with most Passion and least Understanding against it whereas no persons do really give them greater Advantages than these do For where they meet with intemperate Railings and gross Understandings of the State of the Controversies between them and us the more subtle Romanists will let such alone to spend their Rage and Fury and when the heat is over they will calmly endeavour to let them see how grosly they have been deceived in some things and so will the more easily make them believe they are as much deceived in all the rest And thus the East and West may meet at last and the most furious Dissenters who would be looked upon as the greatest Adversaries to Popery become the easiest Converts This I do really fear will be the case of many Thousands amongst us who now pass for the most zealous Protestants if ever which God forbid that Religion should come to be uppermost in England It is therefore of mighty Consequence for preventing the return of Popery that people rightly understand what it is for when they are as much afraid of an innocent Ceremony as of real Idolatry and think they can Worship and Adore the Host on the same grounds that they may use the Sign of the Cross or Kneel at the Communion when they are brought to see their mistake in one Case they will suspect themselves deceived in the other also For they who took that to be Popery which is not will be apt to think Popery it self not so bad as it was represented and so for want of right Vnderstanding the Differences between us may be carried from one extream to the other For when they find the undoubted Practices of the Ancient Church condemned as Popish and Antichristian by their Teachers they must conclude Popery to be of much greater Antiquity than really it is and when they can trace it so very near the Apostles times they will soon believe it setled by the Apostles themselves For it will be very hard to perswade any considering Men that the Christian Church should degenerate so soon so universally as it must do if Epsscopal Government and the use of some significant Ceremonies were any parts of that Apostacy Will it not seem strange to them that when some humane Polities have preserved their first Constitution so long without any considerable alteration that the Government instituted by Christ and settled by his Apostles should so soon after be changed into another kind and that so easily so insensibly that all the Christian Churches believed they had still the very same Government which the Apostles left them Which is a matter so incredible that those who can believe such a part of Popery could prevail so soon in the Christian Church may be brought upon the like Grounds to belives that many others did so mighty a prejudice doth the Principles of our Church's Enemies bring upon the Cause of the Reformation And those who forego the Testimony of Antiquity as all the Opposers of the Church of England must do must unavoidably run with the Papists which the Principles of our Church do lead us through For we can justly charge Popery as an unreasonable innovation when we allow the undoubted Practices and Government of the Church for many Ages after Christ And the Excellent Learned and most pious Prelate Bishop Saunderson hath observ'd That those who reject the usages of our Church as Popish and Antichristian when assaulted by Papists will be apt to conclude Popery the old Religion which in the purest and primitive Times was professed in all Christian Churches throughout the World whereas the sober Church of England Protestant is able by the Grace of God with clear Evidence of Truth to justifie the Church of England from all imputation of Heresie or Schism and the Religion thereof as it stood by Law established from the like imputation of Novelty And in this he professes to lay open the inmost thoughts of his Heart in this sad Business before God and the World And he further saith The Dissenting Brethren were great promoters of the Roman Interest among us in the late Times of Usurpation by putting their helping hand to the pulling down of Episcopacy And saith he 't is very well known to many what rejoicing that Vote brought to the Romish Party how even in Rome it self they sung their Io-Paeans upon the tidings thereof and said triumphantly Now the Day

evil Rom. 13.4 And God hath deputed you for the punishment of evil-doers and for the praise of them that do well 1 Pet. 2.19 There be some that would blot out half your Commission and restrain this good and evil to eivil good and to evils only against Men But this is against that general Rule Non est distinguendum ubi lex non distinguit Where the Law doth not distinguish there must not we distinguish Tell me I beseech you shall it be lawful for Magistrates to punish those that destroy Mens Souls Shall they be blamed for suffering Men to draw away people from Obedience to the Laws of the Land and to themselves and not also for suffering Men to draw away People from the Truth of the Gospel and from the ways of God such as Hymineus and Philetus who overthrew the Faith of some and their words eat as a Canker Shall Christian Magistrates take up the Maxim of Tiberius Deorum injurias Diis curae esse Let God himself take care to vindicate himself from Injuries committed against God as for me I will just like Gallio take care of none of these things Can Christian Ears endure such Language Doth not God Prophesie Isaiah 49.23 That in the New-Testament Kings shall be our Nursing-fathers and Queens our Nursing-mothers And how can a ChrisTain Magistrate discharge that Duty aright if he hath not Power from God to punish those that would poison the Souls of his weak Children with Heresies and soul-destroying Opinions Object Will you allow the Magistrate to Tyrannize over Mens Consciences Answer By no means but I believe it is the Duty of Magistrates to keep Men from infecting their Subjects with soul-destroying Errours If thou hast an heretical Opinion have it to thy self and the Magistrate will not nay cannot meddle with thy private Conscience But if thou labourest to Infect others with thy grace-destroying Opinions I doubt not but the Magistrate is bound to keep thee from spreading thy Infection to the undoing of the Souls of his Subjects If he may lawfully shut up a Man that hath the Plague upon his Body that he may not Infect others why not a Man that hath the Plague of heresie upon his Soul that so he may not destroy the Souls of Thousands Shall a Master of a Family have nower to put away a Servant that is tainted with a gross Opinion and yet not be called a Tyrant over that Servants Conscience And shall not the Chief Magistrate of a Kingdom have power to put out of his Kingdom at least shut up from doing hurt one that is his Subject and polluted with blasphemous heretical idolatrical Opinions Is not the Kingdom the Magistrates House and Family In another Sermon before the Commons Octob. 22. 1644. Pag. 26. Mr. Calamy preached thus This is a certain Rule That all the Sins of the Kingdom which are committed by your Connivence or Allowance are the Parliament-Sins and they call for a Parliament Repentance and therefore I beseech you search and try your hearts and consider how far you are accessary to the Sins of the Kingdom that so you may be wrought up not only to a personal but a Parliament Humiliation If you do not labour according to your Duty and Power to suppress the Errors and Heresies that are spread in the Kingdom all these Errors are your Errors and these Heresies are your Heresies they are your Sins and God calls for a Parliamentary Repentance from you for them this Day You are the Anabaptists you are the Antinomians and it is you that hold That all Religions are to be Tolerated c. These are your Errors if they spread by your Connivence for the Sins of old Eli's Sons are imputed to Eli himself And when the Israelites had profaned the Sabbath Nehemiah told the Nobles of judah That it was they that did profane it because they suffered the people to profane it Nehem. 13.17 Mr. Richard Baxter in his Holy Common-wealth Addition to Pref. Prop. 6. London Printed for Tho. Vnderhill saith It was none of the old Cause that the People should have Liberty and the Magistrate should have no Power in all Matters of God's Worship Faith and Conscience and as it is not the old Cause so it is not a good cause for First it contradicteth the express Revelation of the Will of God in the Holy Scriptures Moses had to doe in Matters of Religion as a Magistrate and so the Ruling Elder that assisted him and so had the Kings of Isruel and Judah as it is well known insomuch that in Asa's Days they covenanted to put him to Death that would not seek the Lord God of Israel Law and Providence are quite changed if toleration of false Worship and other abuses of Religion tend not to the Ruine of the Common-wealth It tends also to the destruction of the Church and Mens Souls if all hae leave to do their worst to Preach up Infidelity Mahometanism Popery or any other false Doctrine or Worship against the great and necessary Truths I leave it therefore to the Judgment of all Men that are not fast asleep in their security and utterly unacquainted with the advantages of the Papists whether this design of engaging the Magistrate by a Fundamental Constitution not to meddle with Matters of Faith and Worship but leave them all to Christ alone be not the present setting up of Popery in England and the delivering all the Fruit of our Labours Prayers and Victories into the Papists Hands ' Object But Liberty for Popery and Prelacy is still excepted Answ By whom But if there had been an exception against Popery c. put in it would have been to little purpose as long as a general Rule is laid down that condemneth that Exception For if it be the standing Rule That Matters of Religion and Faith and all Matters of Worship are out of the Magistrates Power to say then that Popery shall be excepted from Liberty is to say The Magistrate shall intrude into the proper Office of Christ to restrain the Papists Mr. Matthew Newcomen in a Sermon before the Parliament Sept. 12. 1644. Page 31. saith No Reformation of Religion now now nothing will satisfie some but a Toleration of all Religions and all Opinions Church-Government and Discipline is to some a Fiction to others a Tyranny and Persecution Ah Brethren this is a provocation and will be a provocation for this God may turn us into the Wilderness again Page 36. We are come to down-right Libertinism There are two Opinions which if encouraged will open a Door to Turcism Judaism Atheism Polytheism any monster of Opinion The one is That every Man is to be lest to the Liberty of his own Religion an Opinion most pernitious and destructive as to the Souls of Men so to the Common-weal of the Kingdom That Liberty of believing what Men will or of holding what Faith they please is no other than a Liberty of Erring and of erring in a matter

5. It seems utterly impossible if such a Toleration should be granted that the Lord should be one and his name one in the three Kingdoms Art 2. 6. This will palpably hinder the Reformation of Religion Inevitably divide one Kingdom from another and unhappily make Factions and Parties among the people contrary to this League and Covenant of which evil offices whosoever shall be found guilty are reputed in the words of the Covenant Incendiaries Malignants or evil Instruments to be discovered that they may be brought to publick Trial and receive condign Punishment Art 4. and 5. These are some of the many considerations which make deep impression upon our Spirits against that great Diana of Independents and all the Sectaries so much cried up by them in these distracted times viz. A Toleration A Toleration And however none should have more rejoiced than our selves in the establishment of a brotherly peaceable and Christian Accommodation yet this being utterly rejected them we cannot dissemble how upon the forementioned grounds we detest and abhor the much endeavoured Toleration Our bowels our bowels are stirred within us and we could even drown our selves in tears when we call to mind how long and sharp a travel this Kingdom hath been in for many years together to bring forth that blessed fruit of a pure and perfect Reformation and now at last after all our pangs and dolours and expectations this real and thorough Reformation is in danger of being strangled in the birth by a lawless Toleration that strives to be brought forth before it Wherefore Reverend and beloved Brethren we could not satisfie our selves till we had made some discovery of our thoughts unto you about this matter not that we can harbour the least jealousie of your zeal fidelity or industry in the opposing and extirpating of such a root of gall and bitterness as Toleration is and will be both in present and future ages but that we may what lies in us endeavour mutually to strengthen one anothers resolutions against the present growing evils and that our Consciences may not smite us another day for sinful silence or sluggish deficiency in any point of duty tending to the Glory of Christ Honour of the Truth Peace of the Church Perfection of Reformation Performance of our Covenant and benefit of present and succeeding Generations From Sion Coll. London Decemb. 18. 1645. Subscribed by us your affectionate Brethren and Fellow-labourers in the work of the Ministery to whom Truth and Peace is very precious Sir Fr. Walsingham's Letter to Monsieur Critoy concerning the Queen's Proceedings against both Papists and Puritans SIR WHereas you desire to be advertiz'd touching the proceedings here in Ecclesiastical Causes because you seem to note in them some Inconstancy and Variation as if we inclined sometimes to one side and sometimes to another and as if that Clemency and Lenity were not used of late that was us'd in the beginning All which you imputed to your own superficial Vnderstanding of the Affairs of this State having notwithstanding Her Majesty's doing in singular Reverence as the real Pledges which she hath given unto the World of her Sincerity in Religion and of the Wisdom in Government well meriteth I am glad of this occasion to import that little I know in that Matter unto you both for your own Satisfaction and to the end you may make use thereof towards any that shall not be so modestly and reasonably minded as you are I find Her Majesty's Proceedings to have been grounded upon two Principles The one That Consciences are not to be forced but to be won and reduced by force of Truth with did of Time and use of good means of Instructions and Perswasion The other That Causes of Consciences when they exceed their bounds and grow to be matter of Faction lose their Nature and that Sovereign Princes ought distinctly to punish their Practices and Contempt though coloured with the pretences of Conscience and Religion According to these Principles Her Majesty coming to the Crown utterly disliking the Tyranny of Rome which had used by Terrour and Rigour to settle Commandments of Mens Faith and Consciences tho' as a Princess of great Wisdom and Magnanimity She suffered but the Exercise of one Religion yet her Proceedings towards the Papists was with great Lenity expecting the good Effects which Time might work in them and therefore Her Majesty revived not the Laws made in the 28th and 35th of her Father's Reign whereby the Oath of Supremacy might have been offered at the King's pleasure to any Subject so he kept his Conscience never so modestly to himself and the refusal to take the same Oath without further Circumstances was made Treason But contrariwise Her Majesty not liking to make Windows into Mens Hearts and secret Thoughts except the abundance of them did over-flow into overt and express Acts or Affirmations tempered Her Law so as it restraineth every manifest Disobedience in impugning and impeaching advisedly and maliciously Her Majesty's Supream Power maintaining and extolling a Foreign Jurisdiction And as for the Oath it was altered by Her Majesty into a more grateful Form The hardness of the Name and Appellation of Supream Head was removed and the Penalty of the refusal thereof turned only to disablement to take any Promotion or to exercise any Charge and yet of Liberty to be reinvested therein if any Man should accept thereof during his Life But after when Pius Quintus Excommanicated Her Majesty and the Bulls of Excommunication were published in London whereby Her Majesty was in a sort proscribed and that thereupon as upon a principal motive or preparative followed the Rebellion in the North yet because the ill Humours of the Realm were by that Rebellion partly purged and that she feared at that time no foreign Invasion and much less the attempt of any within the Realm not back'd by some potent Power and Succour from without She contented her self to make a Law against that special Case of bringing in and publishing any Bulls or the like Instruments whereunto was added a Prohibition upon pain not of Treason but of an inferiour degree of punishment against the bringing of the Agnus Dei's and such other Merchandice of Rome as are all known not to be any essential part of the Romanists Religion but only to be used in practice as Love-tokens to inchant and bewitch the Peoples Affections from their Allegiance to their natural Soveraign In all other Points Her Majesty continued her former Lenity But when about the Twentieth Year of Her Reign She had discovered in the King of Spain an intention to invade Her Dominions and that a principal part of the Plot was to prepare a Party within the Realm that might adhere to the Foreigner and that the Seminaries began to blossom and to send forth daily Priests and professed Men who should by Vow taken at Shrift reconcile her Subjects from their Obedience yea and bind many of them to attempt against Her Majesty's Sacred

to plead in their behalf yet would not her Majesty be prevail'd upon in favour or out of fear of them to doe the true Religion and the Church so much wrong as to grant them any Indulgence She did not like the Hobbian Politicks of the present age nor would she adventure upon the displeasing of God and the making him her enemy to gratifie them and gain their Friendship by establishing so great a sin as Schism or Toleration is but having a good Cause and trusting in God for a Blessing on it she was so far from giving them any Indulgence out of fear of their great numbers of which they boasted not a little that she proceeded against them with greater courage and resolution and immediately before the Spainish Invasion she moved the Parliament against them and gave order to the then Lord Keeper Puckering to warn the Parliament not to hearken to them which accordingly he did in his speech in the house of Lords in the following words Especially you are commanded by her Majesty to take heed that no ear be given nor time afforded to the wearisome Sollicitations of those that are commonly called Puritans wherewithal the late Parliaments have been exceedingly importun'd which sort of men while in the giddiness of their Spirits they labour and strive to advance a new Eldership they do nothing else but disturb the good repose of the Church and the Common-wealth which is as well grounded for the Body of Religion it self and as well guided for the discipline as any Realm that professeth the Truth And as the present case standeth it may be doubted whether they or the Jesuits do offer more danger or be more speedily to be repressed For albeit the Jesuits do empoison the hearts of her Majesty's Subjects under a pretext of Conscience yet they do it but closely and only in privy corners but these men do both publish in their printed Books and teach in all their Conventicles sundry opinions not only dangerous to the well setled State and Policy of the Realm by putting a Pique between the Clergy and the Laity but also much derogatory to her sacred Majesty and her Crown as well by the diminution of her antient and lawful revenues and by denying her highness Prerogative and Supremacy as by offering peril to her Majesty's safety in her own Kingdom In all which things however in many other points they pretend to be at War with the popish Jesuits yet by the Separation of themselves from the unity of their fellow Subjects and by abusing the sacred Authority and Majesty of their Prince they do both join and concur with the Jesuits in opening the door and preparing the way to the Spanish Invasion that is threatned against the Realm And 't is worth the observation says Dr. Heylin in his History of the Preshyterians pag. 280. That the Puritans were then most busie as well in setting up their Discipline as in publishing railing and seditious Pamphlets when the Spaniards were hovering on the Seas with their terrible Navy at what time they conceived and not improbably that the Queen and Council would be otherwise busied than to take notice of their practices or suppress their doings or rather that they durst not call them into question for their words or actions for fear of alienating the affections of so strong a party as they had raised unto themselves The serious apprehension of which mischievous counsels prevail'd so far on Leicester and Walsingham that they did absolutely renounce any farther intercession for them professing that they had been horribly abused with their Hypocrisie And it is as observable that their so much boasted of great numbers immediately did abate when the Laws were executed upon them and they presently submitted as soon as they did perceive that the Government would no longer trifle with them and endure their insolencies So likewise as Dr. Tompkins observes in his Pleas for Toleration discuss'd It happened in King James I. his days their loud clamours were presently silenced as soon as ever the King declared himself resolute at the Conference at Hampton-Court Nor would the Act of Uniformity made in the Year 1662 have had any less effect if it had not been accompanied with a general discourse at the same time of a Toleration to follow immediately upon it the hopes of which hinder'd many Nonconformists from conforming However the awe of this Act and the levying sometimes a Shilling for absenting from the Church wrought ry good effects insomuch that in most places where Fanaticks did greatly abound they were reduced to conformity and in a great City of this Nation containing fourteen Parish Churches as a Divine of good note that lived in it hath publish'd to the World there were not above six or seven that absented from the Church till the Popish and Fanatick interest in Conjunction together procured a Toleration in 1672 which drew them away from the Church again but upon the cancelling of that mischievous Indulgence and the using of a little severity in levying from some few of them their Shillings for absenting from Church they repair'd as formerly to their Parish Churches and a Dissenter was very rarely to be found So that although King Charles the second in his Indulgence declared that in twelve Years the Severities of the Laws had not work'd the desired end in bringing Dissenters to close with the Church of England and that King James the second in his Declartion for Toleration asserts That all the endeavours that have been used in the last four reigns for bringing this Kingdom to an Vnity in Religion have been ineffectual it was not because the means were defective or insufficient for the working this design but because the Laws which were enacted for this purpose were so much neglected or so often intermitted which if they had been steadily or constantly put in execution would have thoroughly cured the Nation of Divisions but when they were only upon some short and sudden fit put in execution and such frequent Connivences and Indulgences given afterwards to countenance and impower the Ring-leaders of the several Sectaries to seduce from the Church and to propagate and increase their Parties it could not be expected that the dissenting Parties should close with the Church And as the Learned Dr. Burnet now the Right Reverend Bishop of Sarum well notes in his reflections on the Declaration for Liberty of Conscience pag. 3. We can see no reason to induce us to believe that a Toleration of Religion was proposed with any other design but either to divide us or to lay us asleep for the destroying us The Popish Party as he rightly says Since Queen Elizabeth's gentle reign has been ever restless and has had credit enough at Court during the three last reigns not onely to support it self but to distract and divert us by somenting of our differences and by setting on Toleration c. and as he further judiciously observes while such intermitting Methods were