already here in England the Jesuit did not doubt but to see this done and verily without doubt it is for so much have they wrought upon the nice dissatisfactions even of some of the godly party that I think many of us the more our madness is to be pittied if not punished would be now very glad to accept of aid Pag. 26. not onely from a Foraigner the French but ah me the Irish any body yea the prophane common enemy to boot being for ought I see most of us very ready to joyn with any enemies that we may but ruin and overthrow our fellow-Saints and friends Pag. 27. Alack Sir it should seem our stirring forraign enemy is not wanting of some shrewd Agents of theirs even in the very Counsels and Armies of our State who are now stirring up of Feuds Divisions Rebellions amongst our selves against those whom the Lord hath appointed over us the truth on 't is the Jesuites are strange spirits and when I read a touch of the Novices that the Levelling party was a plot of theirs to put us in a cumbustion Pag. 28. O Sir how did it grieve me that it brake off so abruply that there was no more of that weighty secret discovered Pag. 29. questionless he hath revealed more of that to those who think it convenient in their deep judgements not as yet to have it vulgarly made known Pag. 30. To conclude Sir I must now pass over many most considerable Pages and passages being resolved as before said to meddle with nothing of of the Historical part of Polemo but what concerns our Party though I also confess it is impossible by way of Letter to touch upon one quarter of that which too too neerly relates to us But the Novice makes a great leap now and in a trice has us over to France and tells us many rare intervening Occurrences during his abode there indeed wonderfully as to delight and information worth a mans reading Amongst all that which must grieve us to consider was that when he came to the English Court at Germains then was there great good hopes that something might be done that yeer for the obtaining of that pretty prey of England but speedily it was annihilated I pray Sir mark the reason because our discontented Party had not wholly faln off and deserted our Parliament but that it is reserved even for this yeers work having now so gotten the start of us and such a power over our judgments by reason of our young Kings seeming penitence and compliance Pag. 31. and again the death of the old King which they so much hoped for that are now so great pretending friends to the young one they did not doubt but would very sufficiently exasperate and provoke us Pag. 32. and make us eager out of our mad malice to take in him who hath not onely followed such profane ungodly and lascivious ways as to have begot a Bastard in France Pag. 33. but his Brother also to be made a Cardinal and he himself turned downright Papist and declares that he will turn Turk or any thing to be revenged of the English not saying which of us he means Pag. 34. Pag. 35. Pag. 36. without doubt we shall be served all alike how confident soever our hitherto indiscreet resolutions have rendred him and the Pope that we will be their main aiders which in truth Sir would be a great infatuation in us if we should when we so clearly perceive such daily discoveries of horrid practises against us which are more abundantly evident in this Relation of the Novices then I have time or patience to discuss upon I have here written a letter to you but methinks it swels into a thing like a Pamphlet truly it is not so intended therefore I beseech you let none if any but old friends peruse it for it may be dangerous in these times for men of your and my profession to be known but to have been what notwithstanding they now really profess to be convinced in Liberavi animam meam I have unburthened my spirit under God to you and earnestly desire your answer to this with as much moderation as the Spirit will give you utterance and without fail good Sir be pleased to send me down the second part of Mutatus Polemo whatsoever it cost I must indeed ascribe the instrumental part of my convincement to the sound Reasons of that wonderful Relation and I discover also a certain Providence working me hereunto because it was I profess a fortnight and upwards before ever I chanced to come by the sight of Polemo that this Epistolary Tractate which herewithall I send you was brought unto me from Mr. C.H. a young Gentleman of a very noble Family and whom we take to be a great Wit in the Country who writ it to me in answer of some Queries and objections I had made concerning the present Ruptures between our Brethren and England Independent and Presbyter It seems now to me somewhat strange that his judgement should jump so even with future Discoveries it will be worth your reading though prolix onely perchance your gravity may not in all things approve of his sometimes harsh language I will not keep back so much as his superscription t is somewhat rugged at first view but take it thus as it follows So I rest Sir Yours c. P. C. To all our once Brethren and now Enemies of England and to all our Never-Enemies but dear friends of Scotland the Saints and honest Party there But in particular to my well-deserving Friend and Neighbour Mr. P. C. Minister of Ma in Essex Salvation in Christ SIR I Will not cease to write lest the Cause of England should seem to want Pen as well as Pike-men and thus much dare I boast of it that in my own opinion I am the weakest defender of it of all those that pretend any abilities to maintain it its true also there may be so much vanity in my conceit as that I may expect applause for daring to speak a word in the behalf of poor Truth To put this out of doubt I request you Sir to communicate it to none but such as your self wavering dissatisfied ones truly I more fear I may unhappily incurr offence if it were made publick for presuming to meddle with State-matters so high above the reach of a private Gentleman But if sometimes perchance I seem a little malapert in my State-reasonings Methinks I forthwith contemplate the Blessed change our mouthes were bung'd up in Kings and Bishops times the Liberty of speech wherewith we are now indulg'd which is indeed evermore to be found in a well-policed Commonwealth 1. And now it is mine intent Mr. C. to speak of those rascally people whom you would fain vindicate and of their design to conquer us which according to the Covenant they will change when they please into a necessity of defending themselves This argument I
Mutatus Polemo REVISED BY Some Epistolary Observations of a Country Minister a Friend to the Presbyterian Government Sent up to a Reverend Pastor in London Whereunto is annexed A Large TRACTATE Discussing the CAUSES betwixt Presbyter SCOTLAND and Independent ENGLAND As it was sent in a Letter inclosed to the REVISER And Penned by C. H. Esquire 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lucian Factiosus odit plus quà m duos Wisdom begins at the end London Printed for Robert White 1650. The Printer to the Reader Judicious Reader SVch I conceive only fit to peruse this following Piece I lately printed a Book entituled Mutatus Polemo or The horrible Stratagems of the Jesuits during our Civil wars c. In which there is promised a second grand Discovery which is by many far and neer very much enquired after and which I understand will be ready for the Press as soon as the Author is returned from his Circuit which in short time is expected and hearing that there were some sheets relating to that Book in the custody of some worthy men I forthwith made strict enquiry after them being not only much desirous to know what they might import but I thought also I might have been disappointed of having the second Copy at last I happily met with a Friend who not onely helped me to the sight hereof but moreover told me he could wish it were made publique which Courteous Reader I have now done partly for his desire but principally for thy satisfaction And I have been bold also to entitle it Mutatus Polemo Revised which to my judgement seems very proper for the first subject it being the pro and con arguings of an able Countrey Minister concerning that Book But for this second Piece here I dare say it will speak for it self thou canst not rightly understand either unless thou hast read Mut. Pol. yet I recommend them to thy perusall because I am confident it will wonderfully inform thee in many great mysteries and passages of these times to thy great contentment Read consider and be wise I for my part have all I lookt for if the Book selling well I shall herein have advantaged the Publique mine own and thy private good which is the earnest desire and studious endeavour of 13. Novemb. 1650. Thy well-wishing Friend R. W. Worthy Sir and dear Fellow-Labourer in the Lord JESUS CHRIST NO sooner had I cursorily run over this Book which herewithall I send you but forthwith a great controversie arose in the discourse of my minde concerning many matters as first What should ail Mr. my Stationer to send me down that piece which he knew would scarce obtain a perusal at my hands and secondly when indeed I had first scan'd it it could not by and by work upon me that it was any other but the fictitious vanity of some idle Wit yet a while I suspended that my conceit till I had once again warily con'd it over And first of all for the Title so far must I display mine own weakness to the world I profess I do not understand that Aenigma of Mutatus Polemo happily it may be a pretty conceit of the witty Novice and worth the enquiring after I beseech you Sir let us see one line of your London interpretation in your next At the first view of the Frontispiece verily I was for the present much startled when I found the Jesuite to be clos'd with the godly party of the Presbyterie and all to draw on the old Catholike Cause but turning over leaf and finding it dedicated to the Lord President I began to resolve it was meerly an invented and composed thing of some of their own party yet when again in the Epistle I finde him gravely acknowledging his deserts of a Rope and Death its true it a little stumbled me not much I confess all might be jugling yet for all this But Sir when he comes to his Reader in good sooth he grapples shrewdly with my belief and does assure us that some of our greatest Statsmen knew the reality of these thing◠already and so shall we also in another Discovery of his now fitting for the Press c. Certainly Sir the man is not mad to engage the Publike State and his particular reputation whom he sayes we shall be acquainted with hereafter and all for the confirmation of a Novell Invention But Sir let us speak impartially I profess I am personally convinced of the truth of the generality of his discovery when I see he sticks not to tell us whose Convert he was even that incomparable Divine as he indeed fitly calls him and I may add moreover that sometimes worthy friend and acquaintance of mine Mr. G. of C.C. in Oxford now in that House a Principal of which I my self was once a mean member And to be brief Sir its some little satisfaction to me that he is really a Novice as he pretends but I mean in Independencie because truly if you mark he is somewhat too acutely facete he is not sufficiently initiated in their Tone and Dialect and besides his description of Places and his so home-particularizing of so many sundry eminent persons both French Welch English and Scotch makes me think otherwise of it then a Romance Truly then if so be as he promises he will speedily undertake the Ministery I am confident he will not as indeed he may not be ashamed of the great service he hath done to the Church of God wards and his Countrey in this pithy and in my second thought serious Relation of his And now Sir let me ask leave to extract out of that piece of his some sad Observations which too nearly relate unto us who have all along been profess'd parties of the Presbyterie In truth they lye very heavy upon and oppress my spirit and concerning which good Sir I earnestly desire and in the Bowels of Jesus Christ conjure you to send down your serious and unbiassed opinion that so we of your friends in the Country by your judicious holdings forth and the workings of the Lords Spirit upon us may be rightly informed in that which we are too willing to stand in doubt of Page 1. For indeed as the Novice begins here are things discovered to my sence which have lain long buried in deep vaults below the guesses of ordinary men And now first Sir Though I could willingly pretermit and neglect that same shrewd Character which he very homely bestows on the late King and which in very truth our Brethren as well as the Independent may acknowledge to be too too like him yet I cannot but call to minde his obstinacie as he calls it especially against the Reformation and Covenant of God even during the time the Lord was pleased to make us his instruments of affliction unto him I mean all the imprisonment contempt and hardships he endured at our hands before Providence gave us power not longer over him No doubt some of his Sycophant creatures have been so
conceive you suppose they may thank you for and yet truly Sir I have an opinion that as basely fraudulent as they have ever been with England they are surely now more rationall then to expect that from a Republique which they were used to receive at the hands of Kings that we should not only thank them for the wrong they have done us but pay them also for their pains That 's for your first Quaery 2. I much muse at those whose Covenanting consciences can permit them to take part with Danish Swedish Scotch French Irish I know not how many forreign Enemies against their own Native friends Alas what is' t you would have Government well is that it or else you will resolve not to be governed If ye cannot have all ye would ye will yet still keep a stir for more then ye should or can in reason expect Nay I will put the case higher suppose it were as ye insinuate even forbidden to make profession of some certain truths Methinks men should not by and by turn Trayterous Rebels and oppose themselves to an establisht order of a Common-wealth But what truths are ye prohibited the profession of shew them and if you have not Remedy then continue Traytors in Gods Name I will not say but with a witness for my own part I would be or at least reputed to be so obedient a Commonwealths man as to yeeld to some Laws though the dictate of my reason should tell me they were perverse but it should be by my silence But blessed be the holy Name of God we are not reduced to this praedicament there is none of you but if ye will may enjoy the dearly purchased liberty of our times That 's for your second 3 Though you seem to be merry concerning some passages at our last conference yet let me tell you perchance I am not less then you seemingly take me for To speak truth I am a very good Englishman and do passionately love my Countrey maugre Covenanting pretensions to delude me but whether I am fit to be reputed as you would fain have me think you do a sound Polititian or how I should come acquainted with State Affairs by sometimes reading a Diurnall as you do this I know not questionless I have more courage then strength more zeal then knowledge to serve the Publike but were I arrived to so noble a Culmen as to say I could advance the Publike good by my single Pen which I neither dare nor can beleeve or that I could clearly demonstrate to our neighbour Hollanders or the miserably poor envassaled slaves of France that in England all things are now changed into the better under so blessed an Alteration as that of a Kingly Tyranny into a free State which hath confirmed us in a most pretious Liberty and that it is not onely apparent that in a few yeers triall it will enrich us but make us also more formidable and much encrease our courage when it shall be seen we fight not so much for the glorious advancing of one single Family as the preservation of a Publike Interest Religion and Liberty yet all this while there is not so great a praise redounds to me as you are pleased to bestow but I must wholly ascribe it to the felicity of the Times in which we have lived to see this change And yet if in high State matters my modesty bids me say I am unworthy to obtain a rank amongst politike men there is none of our Governors can deny me one amongst Commonwealths-men if my capacity be inconsiderable my publike zeal at least deserves not to be rejected briefly Sir for an answer to this third of yours I onely tell you it pittifully grieves me to see so many such English spirits as your self who are so vexed at their own good and cannot indure their happiness but would again fain be under their old yoke of Regal Tyranny any Governors but the present should seem would please you all present transactions thwarts your Politicks it would not be blasphemy for me to say that God himself cannot make the Presbytery Governors to please them because the more they are after his own heart the less will he be after theirs so much for that 4. And fourthly I cannot but vex to see how you torture men with that other Quaerie of yours not with the strength but poorness of it What had we to do what need had we to invade or make war with our Brethren Rebels of Ireland and Scotland Could not our Ambition be sated with one Kingdom Ah Sir But if our Governors had been dormant if our Cromwel had still staid at London then when all our throats had been ready to be cut ye would have roar'd louder that it had been an infatuation in them to have been so supine as to suffer the common or a forraign enemy to over run and come up to us But you have done well to stitch this Querie with a wonder from God if your men cannot beat us your children shall your little boy at York which you have made grow out of the belly of this Quaerie who cries Stale bear for want of a King is not he enough to convince us forsooth In very deed a goodly childish question and thus ye fight against our States managing of Affairs like foolish Welchmen with old Proverbs and like besotted Englishmen with new miracles because ye cannot touch it with good reasons but next ye make a Resolve upon this Quaerie and take it for granted that now surely it cannot be otherwise but that Scotland must be the Aceldama for Independents so that truly to me it seems an hard definition whether ye err more out of a pusillanimous infirmity or inveterate malice or whether ye stand more in need of the remedies of Physick or that of the Laws certainly ye are mad and ye must be whipt Really Sir it grieves me to see how ye abuse that benefit of liberty meerly against those who have procured it for ye that 's for that 5. But ye come powdring with your fifth in all post haste ye object and tell me that the States must needs receive a very great disadvantage from the rigor used towards and so consequently the discontent of a very considerably numerous party of formerly our Brethren here in England which by our harshness have been necessitated to separate from amongst us shew us where the rigor was and tell us what you mean by this word Harshness or else I shall be inforced to answer you harshly in a word It is much better to have a weak cowardly enemy to contest with then an ambitious-cold-brawling friend to preserve 6. For your sixt Sir Methinks when I maturely excogitate with my self the Slavery we have waded through and the Liberty we now may injoy those passed pains should be our present contentments either the good which now we may upon sure grounds hope for should much solace our imaginations or at least the Royall evils
bulwarks and raise their Forts against us under no other shadow or blind but that base one of Presbytery even those are now turned Enemies who are maintained and have grown great and most opulent under the protection of these our defenders they have in very warm places been nourished yea in the very Bosomes of our Governors Certainly we hope it was not the weakness but without question it is the overmuch clemency of the Masters that have been the cause of the daring aspirings of these underling servants The Parliament have hitherto but a little softly prun'd the disorder of these outragious ones by gently touching its branches and slips but if ever they mean to continue a Free state oh may they pardon my boldness they must resolve and that speedily to lay the Ax close to its trunk and root for every rational man must now conclude That more mercy to the obstinate Presbyter will be meer cruelty to our present Common-wealth They must no longer be soothed in their Villanies but chastized for their Treacheries for indeed we stand upon a ticklish vertical point and t is a choice piece of discretion in State-Governours to be able as well to know when to punish severely for an evill as to reward justly for a good service hereby they will avoid a dangerous lenity and not fall into a Timerous weakness for they must as well banish all softness as rashness in the administration of justice this is the way which they must make when they can find none else this points them out their deliverance from present hard passages and is the only means to stay up our state from point of falling which these men hope they have reduc't it to So that if ever this Government whereof these troublesome fellows have suffered us hitherto to see but the Picture should shoot forth and appear yet more transparently glorious to all the world which it will do when these selfish Remora's are once removed it would certainly ow the main part of its birth and vigor to that most necessary piece of justice of cripping and cutting off these superfluous-hasty overgrowing branches And I cannot but wonder what makes these men all abroad awake to dream so as they do of Empire and dominion certainly they are very unfit ones to bear rule for we see so far would they have been from being good Masters that they will not be so much as tolerable servants verily they must give us better examples of obedience before we intend to submit to them if their hopes should come to pass as God forbid to be our Dominators The truth on 't is they are not valiant though they now seem so fool-hardy there 's nothing in the world hath made them thus malapertly desperate but the goodness of our Parliament In a word they are the superfluities of a Common-wealth Members I cannot brook to call them but if they be they are fit to be cut off from a Common society and of all men in the world most fit to people and set up their Dagon discipline amongst wild Bores in a Desart And yet the Image and shadow of this their new stampt Form of Religion is that wherewith they hope they shall in time be able to cheat all the world to speak truly they are the Pharises of the earth they make clean the out-side of the Cup the shell of Religion but are full of Pride Avarice and Filth within They make a fairer shew with their wickedness then some do with reall goodness it self To what end think ye have those Pulpit-squawlers of theirs heretofore so much exclaimed against the Prelatical-lawn sleeves but that their Giddy-Duncery would not permit them to be of the number of those vaunting yet learned Bishops and thus they seemed to despise the others vain-glorious insolence yet not out of a pious humility but an emulating Pride For I challenge the whole rabble of those Rabsheka Rabbies and all consciously obedient meek-spirited men to witness whether the Generality of these Priestly-Presbyter-Lurdanes above fifty to one are not a company of seditiously covetous insolently proud wretchedly lecherous and non-sensically dull Idols There is scarce a Priest of them that is not either a Traytor to his country a gryping usurer or a ridiculously Proud ignorant and yet for all this there are a company of honest Godly and yet seduced poor souls that make a judgement of the sanctity of these impostors meerly from the out-side and external appearance of their feigned humility and sniffling Hypocrisy but let them look upon them with an unbyassed judgement and observation and they shall soon find them to be the stirrers up of Rebellion and Mutiny workers of iniquity powerful in their malice daring to lift up their polluted hands to heaven imploring what Why that God would be pleased to send another more bloody war amongst his poor people Monstrum horrendum horresco referens and what is it makes them so impiously mad I le tell you when they were permitted to eat some of their elder-brother-Bishops fat-Cathedrall morsels t was all well it went down sweetly but since authority hath converted it to better more pious and publick uses what say they to 't now nothing but Church robbing and sacriledge is heard in their mouths Though they would have the name Bishop confounded into Presbyter yet the large maintenance they concieve very fit to be still kept up I le undertake if the yong man will but make them a promise of being Abby-lubbers that they shall be all Bishops Deans Canons Archdeacons c. they shall then Roare up his most sacred Majesty in their Pulpits ten degrees above their most holy Covenant or Kirk and anathematize all that do not sincerely acknowledge him the Lords annointed and the next if not equal to Jesus Christ such as these they are and yet they cease not with all their might to pretend devotion for truth when they only make it their main vertue superstitiously to cry up their Scotch Presbytery founded on policy to debase the present English authority raised by providence O how valiantly will they raile nonsence in a Pulpit when they think there is no man able to answer them Their zeal which according to the meaning of the Spirit of God ought to devour themselves they imploy to set on fire and ruine the republike by their Jesuitical fomentations They are now effronted and become daringly bold to oppose Authority in a most insolent manner and all their doting scruples forsooth must pass currant for positive Doctrines they are too impudent to ask pardon for their preterite villanies they will rather ask leave to commit more that so they may as we say sin with Authority against the present Government These Impostors begin now to appear to the world in their genuine species they are now generally lookt upon as men who have onely put on the vizard of a specious formal devotion that under that they may the more cunningly cheat the poor silly people into