should have beene of the Religion of the Romane Emperours What Religion should have been upon the face of the earth Daniel and his fellows were subjects to Nebuchad-nezzar and unto Darius and yet Madame they would not be of their Religion neither of the one nor of the other For the three Children said We make it knowne to thee O King That we will not worship thy Gods And Daniel did pray publikely unto his God against the expresse Commandment of the King And so Madame ye may perceive that Subjects are not bound to the Religion of their Princes albeit they are commanded to give them obedience Yea quoth she none of these men raised their Sword against their Princes Yet Madame quoth he ye cannot deny but they resisted For those that obey not the Commandments given in some sort resist But yet said she they resisted not by the Sword God said she Madame had not given them the power and the meanes Thinke you said she That Subjects having power may resist their Princes If Princes do exceed their Bounds quoth he Madame and doe against that wherefore they should be obeyed there is no doubt but they may be resisted even by Power For there is neither greater Honour nor greater Obedience to be given to Kings and Princes then God hath commadned to be given to Father and Mother But so it is That the Father may be stricken with a Phrenzie in the which he would slay his owne Children Now Madame if the children arise joyn themselves together apprehend the Father take the Sword or other Weapon from him and finally binde his hands and keepe him in Prison till that his Phrensie be over-past Thinke ye Madame that the children do any wrong Or thinke ye Madame that God will be offended with them that have stayed their Father from committing wickednesse It is even so said he Madame with Princes that would murther the children of God that are subject unto them Their blinde zeale is nothing but a very mad phrenzie and therefore to take the sword from them to binde their hands and to cast them into prison till that they be brought to a more sober minde is no disobedience against Princes but just obedience because that it agreeth with the Word of God At these words the Queene stood as it were amazed more then a quarter of an houre her countenance altered so that the Lord Iames began to entreat her and to demand What hath offended you Madame At length she said Well then I perceive that my Subjects shall not onely obey you and not me And shall do what they list and not what I command and so must I be subject unto them and not they to me God forbid answered he that ever I take upon me to command any to obey me or yet to set Subjects at liberty to do whatsoever please them but my travell is That both Princes and Subjects obey GOD. And thinke not said he Madame that wrong was done unto you when you are willed to be subject unto GOD for it is he that subjects the people under Princes and causes obedience to be given unto them yea God craves of Kings That they be as it were Foster-Fathers to the Church and commands Queens to be Nourishers unto his People And this subjection Madame unto God and to his troubled Church is the greatest dignity that flesh can get upon the face of the earth for it shall carry them to everlasting glory Yea quoth she but ye are not the Church that I will nourish I will defend the Church of Rome for I think it is the true Church of God Your will quoth he Madame is no reason neither doth your thought make that Romane Harlot to be the Immaculate Spouse of Jesus Christ. And wonder not Madame that I call Rome an Harlot for that Church is altogether polluted with all kinde of Spirituall Fornication as well in Doctrine as in Manners yea Madam I offer my selfe further to prove That the Church of the Jewes who crucified Jesus Christ when that they manifestly denied the Sonne of God was not so farre degenerated from the Ordinances and Statutes which God gave by Moses and Aaron unto his People as the Church of Rome is declined and more then five hundred yeers hath declined from the Purity of Religion which the Apostles taught and planted My conscience said she is not so Conscience Madame said he requires knowledge and I fear that of right knowledge you have but little But said she I have both heard and read So Madame said he did the Jewes that crucified Christ Jesus reade both the Law and the Prophets and heard the same interpreted after their manner Have ye heard said he any teach but such as the Pope and his Cardinalls have allowed And you may be assured That such will speak nothing to offend their owne state Ye interpret the Scriptures said she in one manner and they in another Whom shall I believe and who shall be Judge Believe said he God that plainly speaketh in his Word And further then the Word teacheth you ye shall neither believe the one nor the other The Word of God is plain in it self And if there appear any obscurity in one place the holy Ghost which is never contrarious to himself explains the same more clearly in other places So that there can remaine no doubt but unto such as obstinately will remaine ignorant And now Madame said he to take one of the chief Points which this day is in controversie betwixt the Papists and us for example The Papists alleadge and boldly have affirmed That the Masse is the Ordinance of God and the Institution of Jesus Christ and a Sacrifice for the quick and the dead We deny both the one and the other and affirme That the Masse as it is now used is nothing but the Invention of man and therefore it is an Abomination before God and no Sacrifice that ever God commanded Now Madame who shall judge betwixt us two thus contending It is not reason that either of the persons be further believed then they are able to prove by insuspect witnessing Let them lay downe the Book of God and by the plain words prove their affirmatives and we shall give unto them the play granted But so long as they are bold to affirme and yet do prove nothing we must say That albeit all the world believe them yet believe they not God but do receive the lyes of men for the Truth of God What our Master Christ Jesus did we know by his Evangelists What the Priests do at the Masse the world seeth Now doth not the Word of God plainly assure us That Christ Jesus neither said nor yet commanded Masse to be said at his last Supper seeing that no such thing as the Masse is made mention of within the whole Scriptures You are over-hard for me said the Queen but if they were here whom I have heard they would answer you
she and hers can claim for their own but she and hers must be serviceable to those who have undone them To this end she must have People about her namely Court-Chaplains to disguise businesse unto her and so make her have a bad conception of those who are her best friends to wit the true Professors of the Truth and good Patriots in these Dominions Next her eldest son after a long and great neglect of yeelding him any help for the recovery of his own is betrayed at our corrupt Court when he is put in away to do somewhat for his own restoring c. And after this by the same Court he is sollicited to take Arms here against the onely men who really and constantly have expressed unto him and his true affection but they being stopped by the Court could not effectuate much by their good will He in wisdome refuseth to fight against his friends Since he will not his two next Brothers must be employed the eldest whereof is released from prison to that effect And so they hazard their lives and spend their blood to serve the party who hath undone their Fortunes and now strives to undo their persons The King having left London after he had been in severall places retires to Yorke where he begins to raise men against the Parliament The Scots seeing this send to him thither to intreat him to lay aside all such intentions and offer their service by way of Mediation betwixt him and the Parliament to take away all known mistakes The Scots Commissioners were not suffered to proceed any further then in the businesse and were sent back beyond the expectation of men After a long Pen-skirmishing on both sides Armies are leavied many men killed and taken at divers times on each side yea a set Battell fought where numbers of men are slain The Scots not being able any longer to see their Brethren in England destroyed and the Executioners of Ireland butchering man woman and childe the help that the innocents should have had from England being almost altogether diverted by the Intestine War and neither say nor do in the businesse under safe-Conduct send to the King and Parliament Commissioners to intercede for an Agreement But they being arrived at Court were neglected with their Commission and not suffered to repair unto the Parliament At last they are dismissed not without difficulty and having done nothing return Upon this the Scots convene the States to consult concerning their own safety and the help of their friends At this nick of time when they received many fair promises from the Court with a request to be quiet a Plot of the Papists set afoot by the Court for embroyling the Countrey is discovered by the means whereof they were incited to look more narrowly to themselves and their friends Then the Parliament of England sends to the Scots for help Upon this a Covenant is made betwixt the two Nations for the defence of the true Religion and Liberty of the Countreys with the Kings just Rights and after due preparation the Scots having setled their own Countrey enter into England with a strong Army to fight the Battells of the Lord having for scope of their Expedition The glory of God and the good of his People with the Honour of the King Here we shall observe in these our Countreys in these last yeers such Riddles of State and Church as have hardly been heard of A Protestant Prince makes one Protestant Nation fight against another for the Protestant Religion which have been thought to be of one and the same Doctrine for the main One Church thunders Curses against another Then a Prince misled with the ayd of Papists and Atheists spoyling and destroying the professors of the Truth because they professe it for the good and advancement of the Protestant Religion Next in a very short time a Prince to have all his subjects declared Rebells First he is made declare the Scots Then he is constrained to declare the Irish An Army gotten together in the Kings name declares all those that did oppose them Rebells The Parliament declares all those who in the Kings name oppose them Rebells and Traytors Farther under the Kings Authority the named Rebells in England by the King maintain a War against the declared Rebells in Ireland But the late carriage of things at Court and by the Court-Instruments at home and abroad hath solved the Riddle namely The Patent for the Rebellion in Ireland The detaining of help ordained for the repressing of it The Kings offer to go into Ireland The Cessation and bringing over of the Irish and The last-discovered Plot in Scotland all other things laid aside tell us cleerly howsoever the Proclamations and Protestations going in the Kings name be soft and smooth as the voyce of Jacob yet the hands are rough as of Esau destroying and seeking to destroy the true Religion grounded in Gods Word with the professors thereof as also the lawfull Liberty of the Countrey and bring all unto slavery Let Ireland and England say if this be not true and Scotland likewise according to its genius speak truth I shall close up all with two or three Instances of eminent men amongst the Papists Clergie to shew clearly how they stand affected to the Protestants Cardinall Pool in an Oration to Charles the fifth Emperour saith You must leave off the War against the Turks and hereafter make War against the Heretikes so names he the professors of the Truth He adds the reason Because the Turks are lesse to be feared then the Heretikes Paul Rodmek in a Book expresse tells us That the Heretikes must be put to death slain cut off burnt quartered c. Stapleton the Iesuite tells us That the Heretikes are worse then the Turks in an Oration he made at Doway Campian the Iesuite in a Book of his Printed in the yeer 1583 in Trevers declares thus in the name of his holy Order Our will is That it come to the knowledge of every one so far as it concerns our Society That we all dispersed in great numbers thorow the world have made a League and holy solemn Oath That as long as there are any of us alive that all our care and industry all our deliberations and counsells shall never cease to trouble your calm and safety That is to say We shall procure and pursue for ever your ruine the whole destruction of your Religion and of your Kingdom He speaks to the English Now it is long since we have taken this resolution with the hazard of our lives so that the businesse being already well begun and advanced it is impossible that the English can do any thing to stop our Designe or surmount it Let these few Passages satisfie for this time I wish that thou maist reap some benefit of what is written here for thy good So praying for your happinesse I rest Yours in the Lord D. B. The LIFE OF IOHN KNOX IOHN KNOX was borne in Gifford neer
Bowe-men as our Poet expresseth it Roma sagitti feris praetendit maenia Scotis And Claudian many hundred yeers before this our Poet speaking of the Legion which then was called from its Garrison on the aforesaid walls saith thus The Legion came which was placed before the utmost Britans and which bridled the fierce Scot. Lucius Florus many yeers before Claudian who wrote towards the later end of the fourth Age to wit in the beginning of the second Age and Spartianus who alleadgeth Florus writ towards the later end of the third Age. Lucius Florus the Poet is the same with the Historian who writ the short History of the Romans as judgeth Salmasius is brought in by Aelius Spartianus in the History of the Life of Adrian the Emperor saying these words I would not be Caesar to walk among the Britans and suffer the Scots morning hoar Frosts The word pruina which the Author useth doth signifie so much for it is quasi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 morning What Florus in these words here alleadged calleth in his Language Scoticas pruinas Claudian calleth Caledonias pruinas speaking of another Roman in these words And he placed his Camp in the middle of the Caledonian morning â—oar Frosts I know that commonly in Spartian of whom we have these Verses of Florus it is read Scythicas for Scoticas but wrong notwithstanding that the great Criticks have not corrected it For how I pray you can Adrian be said to suffer Scythicas pruinas who never was in the Countrie which then went under the name of Scythia yea the Romans had never any War with the Scythes for albeit the Scythes heard of the Romans Arms yet they never felt them Besides what sense had it been in Florus to say unto Adrian That he would not be Caesar to walk in Britany and endure the morning hoary Frosts of Scythia For although the Romans heard say That Scythia was a cold Countrey yet they more perfectly knew Scotland to be cold having been upon the place Now it was very easie to those who copied Books of old and hardly understood what they writ to change one letter for another namely when two letters are so like one to another as these two Vowels O O for O not being Initiall or Capitall was written formerly without the draught under it which hath been written for distinction sake as we see it commonly now thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This change of these two Vowels hath been found elsewhere then in this place of Florus by the Criticks in the same words who seeing the name of the Sea upon the Coast of Scotland written Scythicum presently mended it and made it Scoticum Then Erasmus smelled out the same fault in Ierome his Epistle to Ctesiphon against Palladius and his disciple Caelestius in these words Britannie and the Scots Nations had not then known Moses and the Prophets Erasmus finding Scythicae he changed it into Scoticae Lucius Seneca about an hundred yeers before Florus that is about fourty yeers after Christ now 1600 yeers since in his Satyre upon the death of Claudius makes mention of the Scots in the composed word Scoto-Brigantes as thus followeth He i. e. Claudius commanded the Britans beyond the known Seas and the blue Scoto-Brigantes to submit their necks to the Roman Chains This word above named hath puzzled many of the Criticks how to reade it so that a right meaning or sense might be had of these lines with the true measure of the Verse some reading it one way some another way till at last the learned Ioseph Scaliger corrected it as you have it here giving to the words a plain and easie sense and keeping the law of the Verses against which all others did faile And to this Correction of Scaliger hath submitted many learned men yet some partly for envie against the Nation of whom is here spoken partly for vanity will stand out against the truth because of the authority of this Correction at whose great and most rare Learning they are offended as the former are at any advantage that the Nation whom these words doth concern may have The Scots are called Cerulaei or blue because they used much blue in their Garments and so doth the old Scots to this day witnesse their Plaids whereof the best sort ordinarily hath the ground blue as also their blue Caps Mamertin in his Panegyrick to Maximinian tells us That the Britans had War with the Scots and Picts before Iulius Caesar entered into the Island So by these Testimonies ye see how injurious they are unto the Scots that will not have their name known till many yeers yea some hundred yeers after the entry of the Romans into the Island The Romans having setled themselves in the Island they divided the whole into two parts Their part or the South part they called Britannia major and superiour and their Provincialls went most commonly under the name of Britones although sometimes under the name of Britanni but not so oft and they were sub-divided into severall Peoples The other part of the Island without the Roman Province that is the northern part was called Britannia minor and inferiour Now all the inhabitants of this northern part who were in continuall Bickerings and Warre with the Romans and their Provincialls were called Scoti sometime Transmarins sometime Forreigners and they did consist of two chief Peoples to wit Brigantes and Picti which both were sub-divided into severall lesser Peoples of which we forbear to speak at this time So the name of Scoti was at first appellative and given to more then to one People but in successe of time appropriated to one And this is not singular in this name for the proper names of divers Peoples at first hath been appellative and thereafter appropriate to one alone I will instance onely in one for brevity sake which is this The name Franck or French at first was common to all those that stood out together for Franchise and Liberty against the Romans about the Rhyne and other parts of Germany But at length it became peculiar unto one people as we see it is at this day Moreover that the name of Scoti was appellative and given to more then one people you may cleerly see by the ordinary expression of ancient Writers in the plurall number thus Scotorum gentes Scoticae gentes when otherwise all men ordinarily both by word and writing have ever used and to this day use the singular number speaking of one people as gens not gentes populus not populi nation not nations As all the northern people of the main Land or Continent both in Europe and Asia went anciently under the name of Scythae witnesse Strabo in these words The ancients commonly called the northern people Scythes And in another place he saith The ancients did call by one name of Scythes all the known places towards the North. He means in the Continent or main Land So the northern
new Governours of their Church who were to have a Degree and Pre-eminence above their brethren to wit the Prelat-Bishops Hitherto the Church of Scotland had been governed by Monks and Priests without any such dignity or pomp I call their new Governours Prelat-Bishops to distinguish them from their former Overseers and Superintendents of the Culdees who are sometime by Writers called Bishops as they were indeed but they had no Pre-eminence or rank of Dignity above the rest neither were they of any distinct Order from the rest of their Brethren That at this time by Palladius was brought into Scotland these new kinde of Bishops it appears by the relations of the Authors following thus Palladius is thought to be the first who made Bishops that is of this new order in Scotland for till then the Churches were without Bishops governed by Monks with lesse vanity truely and outward pomp but with greater simplicity and holinesse Before him saith Hector Boece Palladius was the first of all that did bear the holy Magistrature among the Scots being made Bishop by the great Pontif or Bishop for till then by the suffrage of the people the Bishops were made of the Monks and Culdees Iohn Mair speaks thus Before Palladius by Priests and Monks without Bishops the Scots were instructed in the faith Iohn Lesley saith this Among us Scots the Bishops were onely designed by the suffrage of Monks Iohn of Fordon in his Scots Chronicle saith Before the in-coming of Palladius the Scots had for Teachers of the Faith and Ministers of the Sacraments Presbyters onely or Monks following the Rites or Customs of the Primitive Church Mark the later words for according to this saying goes the judgment of the best Divines who write the truth without any respect Whose minde Iohn Semeca declareth thus In the first Primitive Church the Office of Bishops and Priests was common to the one and the other and both the names were common and the Office common to one and the other But in the second Primitive Church the names and the Offices began to be distinguished Baleus of the Briton writers Before Palladius the Scots had their Bishops and Ministers according to the Ministerie of the sacred Word chosen by the suffrage of the people after the custom of those of Asia But those things did not please the Romans who hated the Asiaticks Baronius in his Annalls saith this The Scots gat their first Bishop from Celestine Pontif Roman Prosper in his Chronic. The Pontif Celestine sendeth unto the Scots Palladius to be their Bishop Item Vnto the Scots then believing in Christ Palladius is ordained by Pope Celestine and sent thither the first Bishop Beda in the History of England Palladius was sent first Bishop unto the Scots by Celestine Pontif of the Roman Church By these Authorities we see That the Scots before Palladius had no Bishops at all or at least their Bishops were not of any distinct Order from other Priests and Culdees by whom they were ordained and of whom they were chosen as we have touched before and so they were not as those Bishops have been with us in these later times Next let us observe That the Scots Bishops since Palladius must acknowledge themselves clients of the Roman Antichrist seeing of him they have their beginning and dependance although in words yea in some part of Doctrine they seem to disclaim him yet in many parts they shew themselves to be of his Family namely in Government for they with him Lord over the Inheritance of Christ and forsooth take unto themselves the name of Lords Spirituall as if they were Lords of the Spirits of men contrary to Gods Word wherein we are taught That the Father and Maker of Spirits is the onely Lord over them or at least Lords of Spirituall things against the expresse words of the Apostles who acknowledge themselves to be onely Ministers of the Spirit and spirituall things reputing it the greatest honour in the world to be so And Peter who after he had stiled himself no more then co-Presbyter with the rest of the Presbyters he forbids them to Lord over the sort of Christ. Then since in the first Primitive Church the Functions of Bishop and Pastor and Presbyter were undistinguished and any one of the names indifferently denoted the Office it must be confessed That the change of Government which hath entred into the Church is not immediately from Christ and his Apostles neither by Precept nor Example but contrary to Christs Will and Intention declared in his Word and according to the inventions of men serving to the exorbitant affections of avarice ambition and lust to the satisfaction of which they have domineered over the Flock of Christ like tyrants devoured the substance thereof like ravening Wolves yea what is worse they have not onely been negligent and carelesse to distribute unto the people the Word of God but also with their might and power have hindered and stopped others to make known unto Gods people the pure light of his Gospel the ordinary means of salvation and consequently so farre as in them lieth by thus starving the people of this heavenly Food send them to hell Such were these Spirituall Lords who as they have encroached upon the Spirituall Lordship of Christ Jesus over his Flock and usurped his Authority yea and opposed it flatly under the name of Spirituall Authority and Jurisdiction so have they boldly and cunningly invaded the Prerogative of civill Magistrates by their Courts and Regalities within the Dominions of Princes where they live Yea in sundry places they usurp the full Authority of Princes and in others they flatly oppose it And all this hath been done not onely of old by those who were called Romish Bishops but also in our dayes by Bishops who in some things make a shew that they disclaim their Father the Pontif Roman whom in their heart they love and respect as their actions do witnesse Although by Palladius Prelacy was brought in the Church of Scotland and by that means the Government was changed and thereafter immediately by degrees other alterations crept into the Church yet those times after Palladius till the sixth Age I mean till Augustine the Monk may be said to be golden times and pure in regard of the following dayes wherein Church-men without any restraint abandoned themselves to ambition avarice and lust neglecting altogether their Function for in these fourth and fifth Ages they were many godly and learned men who were diligent in discharging the true Duty of a Pastor as Colombe Libthac Ethernan c. Then Knitogerne who by nick-name was called Mongo because his Master Servian speaking unto him used ordinarily this expression Mon ga which in corrupt French is as much to say as My boy Palladius having brought into the Church of Scotland Hierarchie as we have said takes to his next care to provide for the maintenance of this new Degree and Order which was obtained without great difficulty both of
of the Church had been as forward as he was willing there had been a better Reformation then was in his time witnesse this instance The People desired freedome to read the Scripture the then Bishops refused this unto the People Whereupon the King was petitioned in the name of the People the King grants their Petition the Bishops hearing of the Kings grant thus limit it not daring to deny it flatly That all Gentlemen should have liberty to read the Scripture since it was the Kings pleasure but for others the permission was stopped As if Yeomen and Tradesmen had not as much interest in Gods Word as Gentlemen Then remarke all those that were put to death for the testimony of the Truth in Henry the eighth his dayes were persecuted by the Bishops of the time although the blame lieth upon the Prince for albeit they had in compliance to the King renounced the Pope by word of mouth yet in effect they kept up his tyranny by his doctrine with small alteration changed his Rites and Ceremonies Canons and Laws Prelacie or Hierarchie maintained And seeing the King so opposite to the Pope they condescended that the King should bear the blasphemous Title of the Pope Head of the Church although with reluctancy and so it proved for notwithstanding all the Statutes that were made in favour of this Title taken from the Pope and attributed to the King the Bishops with cunning and subtill proceedings kept a foot the power of the Pope and so soon as they saw the occasion of Queen Marie her Reigne they freely and easily brought all back again to Rome without Maske or Limitation and ever since their successors although by the course of affairs they have been obliged to disclaim the Pope his authority yea and his doctrine in some measure yet they ever since to this day have expressed their inclinations and done their endeavours to return thither again as we all know by dolefull experience But here it may be demanded What drift or policie can it be in the Bishops to desire to be subject to Rome rather then to their Prince and Laws of the Countrey The answer is The propensitie of us all to follow evill rather then good is known namely When the evill hath the mask of worldly dignitie pomp power and pleasure which hinders it to be seen in its own colours Now the Bishops and all the rabble of that corrupt Clergy are given to Temporall howsoever unlawfull advantages as their ambition avarice and lust from the very beginning hath shewn which exorbitant passions lead men headlong without measure when once way is given unto them unlesse they meet with some lett or stop which is both lesser and slower when it is a farre off namely when it cometh from one who is possessed with the same distempers and himself of the same order of men with the Delinquent and so the Bishops of this Island had rather have to do with the Pope then with the Prince First Because of mutuall infirmity the Pope proveth more indulgent then any Prince Next The Prince is too neer them and so it is best for them to be so free of the Prince his Jurisdiction that they may be able not onely to neglect him but also to oppose him For all let that example of the Canterbury-prelat serve who made the King for the time to hold the Stirrup when he gat up upon his horse The Story is known I called a little before the Title of Head of the Church used by the Pope and then given to Henry blasphemous To lay aside all other things that may be alleadged against this Title I shall onely say this The Church is the Spouse of Christ No Spouse can be said to have any other Head but him whose Spouse she is Now if the Church should acknowledge her self to be the Spouse of any other but of Christ she were a professed Whore and Adulteresse By no means then a Prince is to be called The Head of the Church For although the civill Magistrate is obliged according to his rank and place to see the Ministers of the Church do the work of the Lord truely diligently and carefully and to make them do it according to the Will of God declared in his Word yet for all this he is nothing but a servant overseer or grass and not the Head which is a Title belonging onely to Christ wherefore Princes or Magistrates that by slavish flatterers had this Title given unto them at the first had done well to reject it as their Successors who have followed had done well likewise according to God his Will if they had not suffered this Title to have been continued unto them namely in the publike prayers where the time-serving inconsiderate Minister prayeth in the name of the Church for her Head if the Head of the Church needs to be prayed for then the influences of the Head upon the Church will be but poor and weak c. But of this enough for this place Moreover The flattering Preachers unrequired in the publike prayers in the name of the Church call the Prince forsooth The Breath of our Nostrils taking for his ground the words of Ieremy in his Lamentations Chap. 4. vers 20. Which words by the Current of the Ancients and Septuagint are to be understood of Christ Jesus True it is The Rabbins have interpreted the words of one of the Kings of Iudah to wit Iosias or Zedekias and hence some of the later Expositors have explained these words That first and literally they may be applyed to one of the Kings of Judah who were all figures of Christ to come but principally and mainly the words are to be understood of Christ Iesus by the consent of all So to attribute these words to any Prince earthly cannot be without offense to Christ For who can be said properly and well To be the Breath of our Nostrils but he who inspireth into us life that is God In like manner the inconsiderate Ministers of the Gospel abusing the Text of the eightieth Psalm which by the consent of all is understood of Christ truely and of David as a figure of Christ to come call the King The man of thy right hand this in no wayes without Blasphemie can be attributed unto any earthly Prince for none is to be said a figure of Christ as David and his Successors were by a particular dispensation But if misapplying and mistaking of Texts of Scripture will do businesse since Magistrates are said to be gods you may as well call the Prince god as the Roman Emperour was of old by some so called and now the Pope by his Court-parasites which Titile of god no Prince will suffer to be given unto him Surely as it is a very great crime not to give due respect reverence and obedience unto him whom God hath set over us for our good according to his wise Ordinance so on the other side it is a huge sin to Idolize the Prince
secretly out of the way Also Katherine Hamilton his sister was accused and being questioned upon Works she answered That none was saved by his works Then Iohn Spencer spake to her of the works of congruo and condigno to which she answered Work here work there what kinde of working is all this no works can save me but Christ's At this the King being present laughed and after conveyed her away secretly One Henry Forest a Monk of the Order of Benet and Collet as they spoke then was also accused of heresie but without sufficient proof Then he was sent to Walter Ange whom Buchanan in his Satyre against the Gray Friers called Langius to be confessed Langius having asked him by way of confession What he thought of Patrick Hamilton He answered That he was a good man and that his Articles were to be maintained Lange discovers this simple mans confession and this confession being taken for a sufficient proof the poor man was condemned to be burnt and so he was immediately after they had degraded him according to their Custom As they were leading him to the Execution-place he complained of the Fryer who had betrayed him and said Let no man trust the false Fryers after me they are despisers of God and deceivers of men They burnt him at the North Style of the Abbey Church in Saint Andrews that the Hereticks of Angus might see the fire 1558. One Andrew Oliphant accused with heat Walter Mill an ancient man and formerly a Priest and said to him being at his devotion Rise up Sir Walter He answered when he had ended his prayer My name is Walter I have been too long one of the Popes Knights for all Priests are Sirs Andrew Oliphant said to him Thou keepest my Lords too long here therefore haste He answered I must obey God before men Being questioned by Oliphant concerning Priests Marriage he answered It was Gods Ordinance That every man that had not the gift of chastity should marry but you abhor it vowing chastity which you cannot keep but take other mens wives and daughters Then being asked if there were not seven Sacraments he answered Let me have two take you the rest to your selves Being asked about the Masse he answered A Lord sendeth and calleth many to his dinner and when all is ready he causeth ring the Bell the guests come into the hall but he turning his back upon them eateth all himself And so do you Then he added The Scripture is not to be understood carnally Christ hath put an end to all carnall Sacrifices by offering once for all his body upon the Crosse. Many other Queries were put to him to which he answered stoutly Being desired to recant he told them That he was corn and not chaff I will said he neither be blown by the winde nor bruised with the Flail but I will abide both I will not recant the Truth Being commanded to go to the stake by Oliphant he answered By the Law of God I am forbidden to put hand on my self therefore put thou me to it with thy hands and then thou shalt see my resolution After he had said his Prayer he gat leave with difficulty to speak to the people standing by In his Speech he told them That although he was a great sinner yet it was for Gods Truth contained in his Word of the Old and New Testament that he suffered and that God in the abundance of his mercy towards him did honour him so far as to make him seal his Truth with his life among other of his Servants He added Dear friends as you would escape eternall death be no more seduced with lies of Arch-bishops Bishops Abbots Priors Priests Monks Friers and the rest of the Antichristian rabble but onely trust in God This was the last man that died for Religion in Scotland And by his death was given the very dead blow to Popery for by his death the people of all ranks and conditions were so moved that they made open profession of the Truth without any more dallying and presently was upon this occasion made a Covenant or Bond of mutuall defence To defend one another by Arms against the Tyranny of the Bishops and their Parties Errata THe Life Page 2. line 7. dele he P. 5. l. 38. r. ordinarily P. 6. l. 24. r. would Preface P. 4. l. 23. r. Author P. 37. l. 5. d. in P. 39. l. 12 13. r. the Kingdom was l. 25. r. ever P. 40. l. 20. r. any part P. 45. l. 8. r. grief The first Book P. 4. l. 43. r. he did p. 36. l. 3â— r. drowned p. 37. l. 7. r. used not p. 39. l. 6. r. inviolably l. 7. r. worthy p. 76. l. 47 d. from p 58. l. 33. d. not p. 73. l. 14. r. 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godly And in what honour credit and estimation Doctour Machabeus was with Christian king of Denmark Cawpmanhowen and famous men of divers nations can testifie This did God provide for his servants and did frustrate the expectation of these bloody beasts who by the death of one he meanes M. Patrick Hamilton in whom the lyght of God did clearly shine intended to have suppressed Christs Trueth for ever within this Realme but the contrary had God decreed for his death was the cause as is said that many did awake from the deadly sleep of ignorance and so did Jesus Christ the onely true Lyght shine unto many for the way taken of one And albeit that these notable men did never after M. Iohn Fyfe onely excepted comfort their countrey with their bodily presence yet made he them fructifie in his Church and raised them up Lyghts out of darknesse to the praise of his own mercy and to the just condemnation of them that then ruled To wit of the King Counsell and Nobility yea of the whole people who suffered such notable personages without crimes counted to be unjustly persecuted and so exiled others were after even so dealt withall but of them we shall speak in their own place No sooner gate the Bishops opportunity which alwayes they sought but so soon renewed they the battell against Jesus Christ. For the aforesaid leprous Bishop in the yeere of God 1534. caused to be summoned Sir William Kyrk Adam Dayis Henry Kernes Iohn Stewart of Leyth with divers others such as Master William Iohnston Advocate Master Henry Henderson Schoole-master of Edenburgh of whom some compeered in the Abbey Kyrk of Halyrud-house and so abjured and publikely burnt their Bills others compeered not and therefore was exiled But in judgement were produced two to wit David Straton a Gentleman and Master Norman Gowrlay a man of reasonable erudition of whom we may shortly speak In Master Norman appeared knowledge albeit joyned with weaknesse But in David Straton could onely be espied for the first a hatred against the pride and avaritiousnesse of Priests for the cause of his delation was he had made to himselfe one Fish-boat to go to the sea The Bishop of Murray then being Prior of Saint Andrews and his agents urged him for the tythe thereof His answer was If they would have tythe of that which his servants wan in the sea it were but reason that they should come and receive it where they got the stocke and so as it was constantly affirmed he caused his servants to cast the tenth fish in the sea again Processe of cursing was laid against him for not paying such tythes which when he contemned he was summoned to answer for Heresie It troubled him vehemently and therefore he began to frequent the company of such as were godly for before he had been a man very stubborne and one that despised all reading chiefly of those things that were godly but miraculously as it were he appeareth to be changed for he delighteth in nothing but in hearing of reading for himselfe could not reade and was a vehement exhorter of all men to concord and quietnesse and the contempt of the world He frequented much the company of the Laird of Dun Areskin whom God in those daies had marvellously illuminated upon a day as the Laird of Lawriston that yet liveth then being a young man was reading unto him in the New Testament in a certain quiet place in the fields as God had appointed he chanced to read these Sentences of our Master Jesus Christ He that denieth me before men or is ashamed of me in the midst of this wicked generation I will deny him in the presence of my Father and before his Angels At which words he suddenly being as one revived cast himselfe upon his knees and extending both hand and visage constantly to the heaven a reasonable time at length he burst forth in these words O Lord I have been wicked and justly mayest thou withdraw thy grace from me but Lord for thy mercies sake let me never deny thee nor thy Trueth for fear of death or corporall paine The issue declared that his prayer was not vain for when he with the aforesaid Master Norman was produced in judgement in the Abbey of Halyrud-House the King himselfe all clad in red being present great labour was made that the said David Straton should have recanted and burnt his Bill But he ever standing at his defence alleadging that he had not offended in the end was adjudged to the fire and then when he perceived the danger asked grace at the King which he would willingly have granted unto him the Bishops proudly answered That the Kings hands were bound in that case and that he had no grace to give to such as by their Law were condemned And so was he with the said Master Norman after dinner upon the seven and twentieth day of August in the yeere of our Lord 1534. aforesaid led to a place besides the roode of greene side and there they two were both hanged and burnt according to the mercy of the Papisticall Church To that same diet were summoned as before we have said others of whom some escaped into England and so for that present escaped the death This their tyranny notwithstanding the knowledge of God did wonderfully increase within this Realme partly by reading partly by brotherly conference which in those dangerous dayes was used to the comfort of many but chiefly by Merchants and Mariners who frequenting other countreys heard the true Doctrine affirmed and the vanity of the Papisticall Religion openly rebuked Amongst whom were those of Dondie and Lieth principals against whom was made a very strait inquisition by David Beton cruell Cardinall And divers were compelled to abjure and burne their Bills some in Saint Andrews and some at Edinburgh About the same time Captaine Iohn Berthwick Provost of Lithcow was burnt in figure but by Gods providence escaped their furie And this was done for a spectacle and triumph to Mary of Lorraine lately arrived from France as wife to Iames the fifth King of Scots what plagues she brought with her and how they yet continue such as are not blinde may manifestly see The rage of these bloody beasts proceeded so farre that the Kings Court it selfe escaped not that danger for in it divers were suspected and some accused And yet ever did some lyght burst out in the midst of darknesse for the trueth of Christ Jesus entred even into the Cloisters as well of Friars and Monks as of Channons Iohn Lyn a gray Frier left his hypocriticall habit and the den of those murtherers the gray Friers A black Frier called Frier Killor set forth the History of Christs passion in forme of a Play which he both Preached and practised openly in Sterlin the King himselfe being present upon a Good-Friday in the Morning in the which all things were so lively expressed that the
shame to the Realm then hurt to their enemies The black book of Hamilton maketh mention of great vassallage done at that time by the Governour and the French but such as with their eyes saw the whole progresse knew that to be a lye and do repute it amongst the veniall sinnes of that race which is to speak the best of themselves they can That winter following so nurtured the French-men that they learned to eat yea to beg cakes which at their entrie they scorned without jesting they were so miserably used that few returned into France again with their lives The Cardinall then had almost fortified the Castle of S. Andrews which he made so strong in his opinion that he regarded neither England nor France The Earle of Lenox as is said disappointed of all things in Scotland passed into England where he was received of King Henry into protection who gave him to wife Lady Margaret Dowglas of whom was borne Henry sometime husband to our Queen and Mistresse While the inconstant Governour was sometimes dejected and sometimes raised up againe by the Abbot of Paislay who before was called Chaster then any maiden began to shew himselfe for after he had taken by craft the Castles of Edinburgh and Dumbar he took also possession of his enemies wife the Lady Stanehouse The woman is and hath been famous and is called Lady Gilton her Ladyship was holden alwayes in poverty But how many wives and virgins he hath had since and that in common the world knoweth albeit not all and his bastard birds bear some witnesse Such is the example of holinesse that the flock may receive of the Papisticall Bishops In the midst of all the calamities that came upon this Realme after the defection of the Governor from Christ Jesus came into Scotland that blessed Martyr of God M. George Wischarde in company of the Commissioners before mentioned in the yeere of our Lord 1544. a man of such graces as before him was never heard within this Realme yea and are rare to be found yet in any man notwithstanding this great light of God that since his dayes hath shined unto us he was not onely singularly learned as well in all Godly knowledge as in all honest humane Science but also he was so clearely illuminated with the spirit of Prophesie that he saw not onely things pertaining to himselfe but also such things as some Townes and the whole Realme afterward felt which he forespake not in secret but in the audience of many as in their own places shall be declared The beginning of his Doctrine was in Mount Rosse therefrom he departed to Dundie where with great admiration of all that heard him he taught the Epistle to the Romanes till that by procurement of the Cardinall Robert Myle then one of the principall men in Dundie and a man that of old had professed knowledge and for the same had suffered trouble gave in the Queenes and Governours name Inhibition to the said Master George that he should trouble their Towne no more for they would not suffer it And this was said to him being in the publike place which heard he mused a pretie space with his eyes bent unto the heaven And thereafter looking sorrowfully to the speaker and unto the people he sayd God is witnesse that I never minded your trouble but your comfort yea your trouble is more dolourous unto me then it is unto your selves But I am assured that to refuse Gods word and to chase from yoâ— his messenger shall not preserve you from trouble but it shall bring you into it For God shall send unto you messengers who will not be afraid of burning nor yet for banishment I have offered unto you the word of Salvation and with the hazard of my life I have remained amongst you Now ye your selves refuse me and therefore must I leave my Innocencie to be declared by my God if it be long prosperous with you I am not led with the Spirit of Truth But if trouble unlooked for apprehend you acknowledge the cause and turne to God For he is mercifull but if ye turne not at the first he will visit you with fire and sword These words pronounced he came downe from the Preaching place In the Church present was the Lord Marshall and divers noble men who would have had the said M. George to have remained or else to have gone with them into the Countrey But for no request would he either tarry in the towne or on that side of Tay any longer But with possible expedition past to the West-land where he began to offer Gods word which was of many gladly received till that the Bishop of Glasgow Dumbar by instigation of the Cardinall came with his gatherings to the Towne of Ayre to make resistance to the said M. George and did first take the Church The Earle of Glencarne being thereof advertised repaired with his friends to the Towne with diligence and so did divers Gentlemen of Kyle amongst whom was the Laird of Lefnoreise a man far different from him that now liveth in the yeere of our Lord 1566. in manners and Religion of whom to this day yet many live and have declared themselves alwayes zealous and bold in the cause of God as after will be heard When all were assembled conclusion was taken that they would have the Church Whereto the said M. George utterly repugnedâ— saying Let him alone his Sermon will not much hurt Let us go to the Market Crosse And so they did where he made so notable a Sermon that the very enemies themselves were confounded The Bishop Preached to his Jackmen and to some old Bosses of the Towne The sum of all his Sermon was They say we should Preach Why not Better late thrive then never thrive Hold us still for your Bishop and we shall provide better the next time This was the beginning and the end of the Bishops Sermon Who with haste departed the Towne but returned not to fulfill his promise The said M. George remained with the Gentlemen in Kyle till that he gat sure knowledge of the estate of Dundie He Preached commonly at the Church of Gastonne and used much in the Barrie He was required to come to the Church of Machlyne and so he did But the Sheriffe of Ayre caused to man the Church for preservation of a Tabernacle that was there beautifull to the eye The persons that held the Church was George Campbell of Mongarswood that yet liveth Anno 1566. Mungâ— Campbell of Broâ—â—syde George Rid in Dandilling the Laird of Tempilland Some zealous of the Parish amongst whom was Hugh Campbell of Kingarcleuch offended that they should be debarred their Parish Church concluded by force to enter But the said M. George withdrew the said Hugh and said unto him Brother Christ Iesus is as mighty upon the fields as in the Church And I finde that â—e himselfe after Preached in the Desert at the sea side and
is vain and to the dead is Idolatry 8. There is no Bishop except he Preach even by himselfe without any Substitute 9. The Tythes by Gods Law do not appertain of necessity to the Church-men The strangenesse said the Sub-Prior of these Articles which are gathered forth of your Doctrine have moved us to call for you to hear your own answers Iohn Knox said I for my part praise my God that I see so honourable and apparantly so modest and quiet an Auditory But because it is long since that I have heard that ye are one that is not ignorant of the Trueth I may crave of you in the Name of God yea and I appeal your conscience before that supreme Judge That if ye think any Article there expressed contrary unto the Truth of God That ye oppose your self plainely unto it and suffer not the people to be therewith deceived But on the other side if in your conscience ye know the Doctrine to be true then will I crave your Patrocinie thereto That by your authority the people may be moved the rather to beleeve the Truth whereof many doubts by reason of your thoughts The Sub-Prior answered I came not here as a Judge but onely familiarly to talke and therefore I will neither allow nor condemne But if ye list I will reason The Sub-Prior Why may not the Church said he for good causes devise Ceremonies to decore the Sacraments and other Gods Service Iohn Knox. Because the Church ought to do nothing but in Faith and ought not to go before but is bound to follow the voice of the true Pastor The Sub-Prior It is in Faith that the Ceremonies are commanded and they have proper significations to help our Faith as the hards in Baptisme signifie the roughnesse of the Law and the oyle the softnesse of Gods mercy and likewise every one of the Ceremonies hath a godly signification and therefore they both proceed from Faith and are done in Faith Iohn Knox. It is not enough that man invent a Ceremony and then give it a signification according to his pleasure For so might the Ceremonies of the Gentiles and this day the Ceremonies of Mahomet be maintained But if that any thing proceed from Faith it must have the Word of God for its assurance For ye are not ignorant That Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God Now if that ye will prove that your Ceremonies proceed from Faith and do please God ye must prove that God in expresse words hath commanded them Or else shall you never prove that they proceed from Faith nor yet that they please God but that they are sinne and do displease him according to the words of the Apostle Whatsoever is not of Faith is sinne The Sub-Prior Will ye binde us so straight that we may do nothing without the expresse Word of God What and I ask drink Think ye that I sinne and yet I have not Gods Word for me This answer gave he as might appear to shift over the Argument upon the Frier as that he did Iohn Knox. I would ye should not jest in so grave a matter neither would I that ye should begin to hide the Trueth with Sophistrie and if ye do I will defend it the best that I can And first to your drinking I say that if ye either eat or drink without assurance of Gods Word that in so doing ye displease God and sinne in your very eating and drinking For saith not the Apostle speaking even of meat and drink That the creatures are sanctified unto men even by word and prayer The word is this All things are cleane to the cleane Now let me hear this much of your Ceremonies and I shall give you the Argument but I wonder that they compare things prophane and holy things so indiscreetly together The Question was not nor is not of meat or drink whereinto the Kingdom of God consisteth not But the Question is of Gods true worshipping without the which we can have no societie with God And here it is doubted if we may take the same freedom in the using of Christs Sacraments that we may do in eating and drinking One meat I may eat another I may refuse and that without scruple of conscience I may change one with another even as oft as I please Whether may we cast away what we please and retaine what we please If I be well remembred Moses in the Name of God saith to the people of Israel All that the Lord thy God commandeth thee to do that do thou to the Lord thy God adde nothing to it diminish nothing from it By these rules think I that the Church of Christ will measure Gods Religion and not by that which seems good in their own eyes The Sub-Prior Forgive me I spake it but in mowes and I was dry And now father said he to the Frier follow the argument ye have heard what I have said and what is answered to me againe Arbugkill gray-Frier I shall prove plainely that Ceremonies are ordained by God Iohn Knox. Such as God hath ordained we allow and with reverence we use them But the question is of those that God hath ordained such as in Baptisme are spittle salt candle except it be to keep the barne from the cold hardes oyle and the rest of the Papisticall inventions Arbugkill I will even prove those that ye damne to be ordained of God Iohn Knox. The Proofe thereof I would gladly hear Arbugkill Saith not Saint Paul that another foundation then Jesus Christ may no man lay But upon this foundation Some build gold silver and precious stones some hay stubble and wood The gold silver and the precious stones are the Ceremonies of the Church which do abide the fire and consumeth not away c. This place of Scripture is most plaine sayeth the foolish fiend Iohn Knox. I praise my God through Jesus Christ for I finde his promise sure true and stable Christ Jesus bids us not fear when we shall be called before men to give confession of his Trueth for he promiseth that it shall be given unto us in that houre what we shall speak If I had sought the whole Scriptures I could not have produced a place more proper for my purpose nor more potent to confound you Now to your Argument The Ceremonies of the Church say ye are gold silver and precious stones because they are able to abide the fire But I would learne of you What fire is it which your Ceremonies do abide And in the mean time while ye be advised to answer I will shew my minde and make an Argument against yours upon the same Text. And first I say that I have heard this Text adduced for a proofe of Purgatory but for defence of Ceremonies I never heard nor yet read it But omitting whether ye understand the minde of the Apostle or not I make my Argument and say That which can abide the fire can abide the Word of God But
particularly to every Article directed from my Lord of S. Andrews to me by Sir David Hamilton which Articles are in number nine and heere repeated and answered as I trust to his Lordships contentment 1. THe first Article putteth me in remembrance of the antiquity of the blood of my house how many Earles Lords and Knights hath been thereof how many Noble-men descended of the same house how long it continued true to God and the Prince without spot in their dayes in any manner of sort Answer True it is my Lord that there is well-long continuance of my house by Gods providence and benevolence of our Princes whom we have served and shall serve truely next to God And the like obedience towards Gods and our Princes remaineth with us yet or rather better praised be the Lords Name neither know we any spot towards our Princesse and her due obedience And if there be offence towards God he is mercifull to remit our offences For he will not the death of a sinner Like as it standeth in his omnipotent power to make up houses to continue the same to alter them to make them small or great or to extinguish them according to his own inscrutable wisdom For in exalting depressing and changing of houses the laud and praise must be given to that one eternall God in whose hands the same standeth 2. The second Article beareth the great affection and love your Lordship beareth towards me and my house and of the ardent desire ye have of the perpetuall standing thereof in honour and fame with all them that are coming of it Answ. Forsooth it is your dutie to wish good unto my house and unto them that are coming of the same not onely for the faithfulnesse amity and society that hath been between our forefathers but also for the late conjunction of blood that is between our said house if it be Gods pleasure that it have successe Which should give sufficient occasion to your Lordship to wish good to my house and perpetuity with Gods glory without which nothing is perpetuall unto whom be praise and worship for ever and ever Amen 3. Thirdly Your Lordship declareth how displeasant it is to you that I should be seduced by an infamed person of the Law and by the flattery of a forsworn Apostata that under pretence of his giving forth maketh us to understand That he is a Preacher of the Gospel and therewith raiseth Schismes and Divisions in the whole Church of God And by our maintenance and defence would infect this Countrey with Heresie alleadging that to be Scripture which these many yeeres past hath been condemned as Heresie by the generall Councells and whole estate of Christian people Answ. The God that created heaven and earth and all that is therein preserve me from seducing for I dread others many under the colour of godlinesse are seduced and think that they do God a pleasure when they persecute one of them that professe his Name What that man of the Law is we know not we hear none of his flattery his perjured Oath of Apostasie is unknown unto us But if he have made any unlawfull Oath contrary to Gods commandment it were better to violate it then to observe it He Preaches nothing to us but the Gospel if he would do otherwise we would not beleeve him nor yet an Angel of heaven we heare him sowe no Schismes nor Divisions but such as may stand with Gods Word which we shall cause him to confesse in presence of your Lordship and the Clergy when ye require us thereto And as to it that hath been condemned by generall Councels we trust you know well that all the generall Councels have been at diversity among themselves and never two of them universally agreeing in all points in so much as they are of men But the Spirit of Verity that bears testimony of our Lord Jesus hath not neither can erre For heaven earth shal perish ere one jot of it perish Beyond this my Lord neither teacheth he neither will we accept of him but that which agrees with the Word of God set forth by the Patriarks Prophets Apostles and Evangelists left to our salvation in expresse words And so my Lord to condemn the Doctrine not examined is not required For when your Lordship pleaseth to hear the confession of that mans Faith the manner of his Doctrine which agreeth with the Gospel of Jesus Christ I will cause him to assist to judgement and shall be present there at Gods pleasure that he may render reckoning of his belief and our Doctrine to the superiour Powers according to the prescription of that blood of the eternall Testament sealed by the Immaculate Lambe To whom with the Father and the holy Spirit be all honour and glory for ever and ever Amen 4. The fourth Article puts me in remembrance how dangerous it is if the Authority would put me to it and my House according to comely and common Laws and our own municipiall Lawes of this Realme and how it appeareth to the decay of our House Answ. All Laws are or at least should be subject to Gods Law which Law should be first placed and planted in every mans heart it should have no impediment Men should not abrogate it for the defence and setting up of their owne advantage If it would please Authorities to put at our House for confessing of Gods Word or for maintenance of his Law God is mighty enough in his own Cause he should be rather obeyed then man I will serve my Prince with body heart goods strength and all that is in my power except that which is Gods duty which I will reserve to him alone that is To worship him in truth and verity and as neer as I can to conform to his written Word to his owne honour and obedience of my Princesse 5. The fifth Article puts me in remembrance how woe your Lordship would be to hear to see or know any displeasure that might come to me my son or any of my House and especially in my time and dayes And as to heare the great and evill brute of me that should now in my old age in a manner begin to vary in my Faith and to be altered therein when it is time that I should be most sure and firm therein Ans. Your Lordships good will is ever made manifest unto me in all your Articles that you should be sorry to hear see or know my displeasure for the which I am bound to render your Lordship thanks shall do the same assuredly But as for wavering in my Faith God forbid that I should so do For I believe in God the Father Almighty Maker of heaven earth And in Jesus Christ his onely Son our Saviour My Lord I vary not in my Faith but I praise God that of his goodnesse now in my latter days hath of his infinite mercy opened his bosome of grace unto me to acknowledge him the eternall Wisedome his
your Majestie did know the same and the truth thereof as we were perswaded in our consciences and all them that are truly instructed in the eternall Word of our God upon whom we cast our care from all dangers that may follow the accomplishment of his eternall will and to whom we commend your Majestie beseeching him to illuminate your heart with the Gospel of his eternall Truth to know your Majesties duty towards your poore Subjects Gods chosen people and what you ought to crave justly of them againe for then we should have no occasion to feare your Majesties wrath and indignation nor your Majesties suspition in our inobedience The same God have your Majestie in his eternall saveguard At Dunbartane the 12 of August 1559. This answer directed to the Queen our Soveraigne and Francis her husband the Queen Dowager received and was bold upon it as she might well enough for it was supposed That the former Letters were forged here at home in Scotland The answer read by her she said That so proud an answer was never given to King Prince nor Princesse And yet indifferent men thought that he might have answered more sharply and not have transgressed modesty nor trueth For where they burden him with the great benefits which of them he had received if in plain words he had purged himselfe affirming That the greatest benefit that ever he received of them was to spend in their service that which God by others had provided for him no honest man would have accused him and no man could have been able to have convinced him of a lye But Princes must be pardoned to speak what they please For the comfort of the brethren and continuance of the Church in Edinburgh was left there our deare brother Iohn Willock who for his faithfull labours and bold courage in that battell deserves immortall praise For when it was found dangerous that Iohn Knox who before was elected Minister to the Church should continue there the brethren requested the said Iohn Willock to abide with them lest that for lack of Ministers Idolatry should be erected up again To the which he so gladly consented That it might evidently appeare that he preferred the comfort of his brethren and the continuance of the Church there to his own life One part of the French-men were appointed to lye in Garison at Leith that was the first benefit which they gate for their confederacie with them the other part were appointed to lye in the Canon-gate the Queen and her train abiding in the Abbey Our brother Iohn Willock the day after our departure preached in S. Giles Church and fervently exhorted the brethren to stand constant to the Truth which they had professed At this and some other Sermons was the Duke and divers other of the Queens faction This liberty of Preaching and resort of all people thereto did highly offend the Queen and the other Papists And first they began to give terrours to the Duke affirming That he would be reputed as one of the Congregation if he gave his presence to the Sermons Thereafter they began to require That Masse might be set up again in S. Giles Church and that the people should be set at liberty to chuse what Religion they would For that said they was contained in the appointment That the Town of Edinburgh should chuse what Religion they listed For obtaining hereof were sent to the Town the Duke the Earle of Huntly and the Lord Seaton to solicite all men to condiscend to the Queens minde wherein the two last did labour what they could the Duke not so but as a beholder of whom the brethren had good hope and after many perswasions and threatnings made by the said Earle and Lord the brethren stoutly and valiantly in the Lord Jesus gain-said their most unjust Petitions Reasoning That as in conscience they might not suffer Idolatry to be erected where Christ Jesus was truely Preached so could not the Queen nor they require any such thing unlesse she and they would plainely violate their Faith and chiefe Article of the appointment For it is plainely appointed That no member of the Congregation shall be molested in any thing That at the day of the appointment they peaceably possessed But so it was That we the brethren and Protestants of the Town of Edinburgh with our Ministers the day of the appointment did peaceably enjoy Saint Giles Church appointed us for Preaching of Christs true Gospel and right ministration of his holy Sacraments Therefore without manifest violation of the appointment you cannot remove us therefrom untill a Parliament have decided the Controversie This answer given the whole brethren departed and left the foresaid Earle and Lord Seaton then Provest of Edinburgh still in the Tolbuith Who perceiving that they could not prevaile in that manner began to entreat that they would be quiet and that they would so far condiscend to the Queens-pleasure as that they would chuse them another within the Town or at the least be content that Masse should be said either after or before their Sermon To the which answer was given That to give place to the devil who was the chiefe Inventer of the Masse for the pleasure of any creature they could not They were in possession of that Church which they could not abandon neither yet could they suffer Idolatry to be erected in the same unlesse by violence they should be constrained so to do And then they were determined to seek the next remedy Which answer received the Earle of Huntly did lovingly intreat them to quietnesse faithfully promising That in no sort they should be molested so that they would be quiet and make no farther uproare To the which they were most willing for they sought onely to serve God as he had commanded and to keep their possession according to the appointment which by Gods grace they did till the moneth of November notwithstanding the great boasting of the enemy For they did not onely convene to the Preaching daily supplâ—cations and administration of Baptisme but also the Lords Table was ministred even in the eyes of the very enemy to the great comfort of many afflicted consciences and as God did strongly work with his true Ministers and with his troubled Church so did not the devil cease to inflame the malice of the Queen and of the Papists with her For that after her coming to the Abbey of Halyrud-house she caused Masse to be said first in her own Chappell and after in the Abbey where the Altars before were cast down She discharged the Common-Prayers and forbade to give any portion to such as were the principall young men who read them Her malice extended in like manner to Cambuâ—kenneth for there she discharged the portions of as many of the Canons as had forsaken Papistry She gave commandment and inhibition that the Abbot of Lyndors should be answered of any part of his living in the North because he had submitted
past to the Castle of Edinburgh and some others of her faction At Preston met them the Duke the Earle of Argyle Huntlie came not till that the siege was confirmed Lord Iames the Earle of Glencarne and Menteth Lords Ruthuen Boyd Uchiltrie with all the Protestants Gentlemen of the West Fyfe Angus and Mearnes so that in few dayes the Army was great After the deliberation of two dayes had at Inneresk the whole Camp marched forward with Ordnance and all preparations necessary for the siege and came to Lestarrig the Palme Sunday Even The French had put themselves in Battell Aray upon the Linkes without Leith and sent forth their skirmishers who beginning before ten of the clock continued skirmishing till after four of the clock at afternoon when there was given upon them a charge by some Horse-men of Scotland and some of England But because the principall Captaine of the Horse-men of England was not present the whole Troops durst not charge and so was not the overthrow and slaughter of the French so great as it once appeared to have been for the great Battell was once at the trot but when it perceived that the great Force of Horse-men stood still and charged not they returned and gave some rescue to their fellows that fled and so there fell onely in that defeat about three hundred French-men God would not give the Victory so suddenly lest that man should glory in his owne strength The small Victory that was gotten put both the English and Scotish in over-great security as the issue declared The French enclosed within the Towne the English Army began to plant their Pavilions betwixt Leith and Lestarrig The Ordnance of the Towne and especially that which lay upon Saint Anthonies Steeple did them great annoyance against which place were bent eight Cannons which shot so continually and so just that within few dayes that the Steeple was condemned and all the Ordnance that was on it discomfited which made the English-men somewhat more negligent then it became good men of War to have been For perceiving that the French made no pursuit without their Walls they tooke an opinion that they should never issue more and that made some of the Captaines for pastime go to the Towne The Souldiers for their ease laid their Armour beside them and as men without danger fell to the Dice and Cards and so upon the Easter Munday at the very houre of noon the French issued both upon Horse and Foot and with great violence entred within the English Trenches slue and put to flight all that was found therein The Watch was negligently kept and so were the Succours slow and long in coming For the French before that any resistance was made unto them approached hard to the great Ordnance But then the Horse-men trooped together and the Foot-men gat themselves in Aray and so repulsed the French back again to the Town but the slaughter was great some say it double exceeded that which the French received the first day And this was the fruit of their security and ours which after was remedied For the English men most wisely considering themselves not able to besiege the Town round about devised to make Mounts at divers quarters of it in the which they and their Ordnance lay in as good strength as they did within the Town The common souldiers kept the Trenches and had the said mountains for their saveguard and refuge in case of any greater pursuit then they were able to sustain The patience and stout courage of the English men but principally of the Horse-men is worthy of all praise For where was it ever heard That eight thousand they never exceeded that number that lay in Camp should besiege four thousand of the most desperate throat-cutters that were to be found in Europe and to lie nigh unto them in daily skirmishing the space of three moneths and more The Horse-men night and day kept Watch and did so valiantly behave themselves that the French gat no advantage from that day back to the day of the assault whereof we shall shortly hear In this mean time was this other Band made of all the Nobility Barons and Gentlemen professing Christ Jesus in Scotland and of divers others that joyned with us for expelling of the French amongst whom the Earle of Huntlie was a prime man The Band followeth The last Band at Leith AT Edinburgh the seven and twentieth of April the yeer of our Lord 1560 yeers We whose names are under-written have promised and obliged our selves faithfully in the presence of God and by these Presents do promise That we together in generall and every one of us in speciall by himself with our bodies goods friends and all that we can do shall set forward the Reformation of Religion according to Gods Word and procure by all means possible that the Truth of Gods Word may have free passage within this Realme with due Administration of the Sacraments and all things depending upon the said Word and such like deeply weighing with our selves the misbehaviour of the French Ministers here the intolerable oppression committed by the French men of War upon the poor subjects of this Realme by maintenance of the Queen Dowager under colour and pretence of Authority The tyranny of their Captains and Leaders and manifest danger of Conquest in which this Countrey at this present standeth by reason of divers Fortifications upon the Sea-coast and other novelties of late attempted by them promising That we shall each one with another all of us together with the Queen of Englands Army presently come in for our deliverance effectually concurre joyn in one take and hold one plain part for expulsion of the said strangers oppressors of our Liberty forth out of this Realme and recovery of our ancient Freedoms and Liberties to the end that in time coming we may under the obedience of the King and Queen our Soveraigns be onely ruled by the Laws and Customs of the Countrey and borne men of the Land And that never one of us shall have privy intelligence by writing message or communication with any of our enemies or adversaries in this Cause but by advice of the rest at least of five of the counsell Again That we shall tender the common Cause as if it were the cause of every one of us in particular And that the causes of every one of us now joyned together being lawfull and honest shall be all our causes in generall And that he that is enemy to the Cause aforesaid shall be enemy to us all in so far That what person soever will plainly resist these our godly enterprises and will not concur as a good and true member of this our Common-wealth we shall fortifie the said Authority of the Councell to reduce them to their duty like as we shall fortifie the said Authority of the Councell in all things tending to the furtherance of the said Causes And if any particular debate quarrell
be found inobedient I confesse my selfe most worthy to be rejected not onely from this honour but also from the societie of the faithfull in case of my stubbornnesse For the vocation of God to beare charge within his Church maketh not men Tyrants nor Lords but appointeth them servants Watch-men and Pastors to the flock Thus ended question must be asked again of the multitude Question Require ye any further of this your Superintendent or Overseer and Minister If no man answer let the Minister proceed Question Will ye not acknowledge this your brother for the Minister of Christ Jesus your Overseer and Pastour Will ye not reverence the Word of God that proceedeth from his mouth Will ye not receive of him the Sermon of Exhortation with patience not refusing the wholsome Medicine of your soules although it be bitter and unpleasing to the flesh Will ye not finally maintain and comfort him in his Ministerie and watching over you against all such as wickedly would rebell against God and his holy Ordinance The people answered We will as we will answer to the Lord Iesus who hath commanded his Ministers to be had in reverence as his Ambassadours and as men that carefully watch for the salvation of our soules Let the Nobilitie be urged with this Ye have heard the dutie and profession of this our brother by your consents appointed to this charge as also the dutie and obedience which God requireth of us towards him heere in his Ministerie But because that neither of both are able to performe any thing without the especiall grace of our God in Christ Jesus who hath promised to be with us present even to the consummation of the world with unfained hearts let us crave of him his benediction and assistance in this work begun to his glory and for the comfort of his Church The Prayer O Lord to whom all power is given in heaven and on earth thou that art the eternall Sonne of the eternall Father who hast not onely loved thy Church that for the redemption and purgation of the same hast humbled thy selfe to the ignominious death of the Crosse and thereupon hast shed thy most precious and innocent blood to prepare to thy self a Spouse without spot but also to retain this most excellent benefit in recent memory hast appointed in thy Church Teachers Pastours and Apostles to instruct comfort and admonish the same Look upon us mercifully O Lord thou that onely art King Teacher and high Priest to thine own flock and send unto this our Brother whom in thy Name we have charged with the chief care of thy Church within the bounds of L. such portion of thy holy Spirit as thereby he may rightly divide thy Word to the instruction of thy flock and to the confutation of pernicious errours and damnable Superstitions Give unto him good Lord a mouth and wisdome whereby the enemies of thy Trueth may be confounded the Wolves expelled and driven from thy Fold thy Sheep may be fed in the wholsome Pastures of thy most holy Word the blinde and ignorant may be illuminated with thy true knowledge Finally that the degrees of Superstition and Idolatry which now resteth within this Realme being purged and removed we may all not onely have occasion to glorifie thee our onely Lord and Saviour but also daily to grow in godlinesse and obedience of thy most holy will to the destruction of the body of sin and to the restitution of that image to the which we were once created and to the which after our fall and defection we are renewed by participation of thy holy Spirit which by true Faith in thee we do professe as the blessed of thy Father of whom the perpetuall increase of thy graces we crave as by thee our Lord King and onely Bishop we are taught to pray Our Father c. The Prayer ended the rest of the Ministers if any be and Elders of that Church present in signe of their consent shall take the elected by the hand The chiefe Minister shall give the Benediction as followeth God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath commanded his Gospel to be Preached to the comfort of his Elect and hath called thee to the Office of a Watch-man over his people multiply his graces with thee illuminate thee with his holy Spirit comfort and strengthen thee in all vertue governe and guide thy Ministerie to the praise of his holy Name to the propagation of Christs Kingdom to the comfort of his Church and finally to the plaine discharge and assurance of thine owne conscience in the day of the Lord Jesus to whom with the Father and with the holy Ghost be all honour praise and glory now and ever So be it The last Exhortation to the elected TAke heed to thy selfe and unto the flock committed to thy charge feed the same carefully not as it were by compulsion but of very love which thou bearest to the Lord Jesus Walk in simplicity and purenesse of life as it becometh the true servant and the Ambassadour of the Lord Jesus Usurpe not dominion nor tyrannicall authority over thy brethren be not discouraged in adversity but lay before thy self the example of the Prophets Apostles and of the Lord Jesus who in their Ministery sustained contradiction contempt persecution and death fear not to rebuke the world of Sin Justice and Judgement If any thing succeed prosperously in thy Vocation be not puft up with pride neither yet flatter thy self as that the good successe proceedeth from thy vertue industrie or care But let ever that sentence of the Apostle remain in thine heart What hast thou which thou hast not received If thou have received why gloriest thou Comfort the afflicted support the poore and exhort others to support them Be not carefull for things of this life but be fervent in prayer to God for the increase of his holy Spirit And finally behave thy selfe in this holy vocation with such sobriety as God may be glorified in thy Ministery And so shalt thou shortly obtaine the Victory and shalt receive the Crowne promised when the Lord Jesus shall appeare in his glory whose omnipotent Spirit assist thee and us to the end Sing 23. Psalme As the servants of God uprightly travelled to have vice punished and vertue planted so did the devill ever stirre up some in the contrary of both There was a Law made against fornicators and adulterers that the one and the other should be Carted thorow the Towns and so banished till that their repentance was offered and received And albeit this was not the severity of Gods Law especially against adulterers yet was it a great bridle to the malefactors whereat the wicked did wonderously storme It chanced that one Sanderson a Fletcher or Boutcher was deprehended to have put away his lawfull wife under colour that he was lawfully parted after the manner of the Papisticall Religion and had taken to him another in his house The complaint and slander proposed
but to live upon that which was appointed ought not to be mollified according to the living of other common men who might and did daily augment their Rents by some other industry When such reasons were laid before them they got none other answer but The Queen can spare no greater Sums Oft was it cryed out in their ears O happy servants of the Devill and miserable servants of Iesus Christ if after this life there were nor Hell nor Heaven For to the servants of the Devill these dumbe Dogs and horrid Bishops To one of those idle bellies I say ten thousand was not enough but to the servants of Christ that painfully preach his Evangell a hundreth will suffice how can that be sustained One day in reasoning of this matter the Secretary burst out in a piece of his collor and said The Ministers have thus much payed unto them by year who ever yet said to the Queen Grand mercies for it was there ever a Minister that gave thanks to God for her Majesties liberalitie towards them One singled and answered Assuredly I think that such as receive any thing gratis of the Queen are unthankfull if they acknowledge it not both in heart and minde But whether the Ministers be of that rank or not I greatly doubt gratis I am sure they receive nothing and whether they receive any at all from the Queen wise men may reason I am assured that neither third nor two parts ever appertained to any of her Predecessors within this Realm these thousand years last past neither yet hath the Queens Flatterers better title to that which she usurpes be it in-giving to others or taken it to her self then the souldiers who crucified Jesus Christ had to divide his Garments amongst them And if the truth may be spoken she hath not so good Title as they had for such spoile ought to be the reward of such men And in that point the Souldiers were more gentle than the Queenes Flatterers for they parted not the Garments of our Saviour till that he himself was hung upon the Crosse but her Flatterers do part the spoil whilest that poor Christ is yet preaching amongst you But the wisedome of our God taketh tryall of us by this meanes knowing well enough what the Court faction have purposed to do Let the Papists who have the two parts some that have their thirds free and some that have gotten Abbeys and few Lands thanke the Queen and King Placebo Domine the poore Preachers will not yet flatter for feeding of their bellies These words were judged proud and intollerable and ingendred no small displeasure to the Speaker This we put in memory that the posterity to come may know that God once made his truth to triumph but because some of our selves delighted more in darknesse than in light God hath restrained our freedom and put the whole body in bondage yea the greatest Flatterers have not escaped so free as they supposed yea the latter plagues appear yet to be worse than the first Be mercifull unto us O Lord and deal with us not according to our deservings but look thou to the equitie of the cause which thou hath put in our hands and suffer not iniquitie to oppresse thy Trueth for thy own names sake O Lord. In this mean while to wit in February 1561. was Lord Iames first made Earl of Murray and then marryed one Agnes Keith daughter to the Earl Marshall The marriage was publike in the Church of Edinburgh at the blessing of the marriage they both got one admonition to behave themselves moderately in all things For said the Preacher to him The Church of God hath received comfort by you and by your labours unto this day In the which if hereafter you shall be found fainter then you have been formerly it will be said That your Wife hath changed your nature The greatnesse of the Bankquet and the vanitie used thereat offended many Godly There began the Masking which from yeer to yeer hath continued since Master Randolph Agent for the Queen of England was then and sometime after in no small esteem with our Queen For his Mistris sake she did drink to him in a Cup of Gold which he possessed with great joy more for the favour of the giver then of the gift and value thereof and yet it was honourable The things that then were in handling betwixt the two Queens whereof Lethington Secretary Cecill and Master Randolph were Ministers were of great weight as we will after heare This Winter the Earl of Bothwell the Marquis D'albuff and Lord Iohn of Coldingham committed ryot in Edinburgh and disordered the whole Town brake Cuthbert Ramseyes Gates and Doors searched his House for his Daughter in law Alison Craige And this was done in despight of the Earl of Arrane who was suspected to have been in love with the said Alison the horrours of this fact and the veritie of it highly commoved all godly hearts The Assembly and also the Nobilitie for the most part were in the Town and so they concluded to crave justice and so they did as by this subsequent supplication doth appear To the Queens Majestie Her secret Councell Her Highnesse faithfull and obedient Subjects The professors of Christ Iesus his holy Evangell wish the Spirit of righteous judgement THe fear of God conceived of his holy Word the naturall and unfained love we bear unto your Majestie the duetie which we owe to the quietnesse of our Country and the terrible threatnings which our God pronounceth against every Realm and Citie in the which horrible Crimes are openly committed and then by the Committers obstinately defended compells us a great part of our Subjects humbly to crave of your Majesties upright and true judgement against such persons as have done what in them lye to kindle Gods wrath against this whole Realm The impiety by them committed is so haynous and so horrible That as it is a fact most vile and rare to be heard of within the Realm and principally within the Bowels of this Citie So should we thinke our selves guiltie of the same if negligently or yet for worldy fear we put it over with silence and therfore your Majestie may not think that we crave any thing while that we crave open Malefactors condignly to be punished But that God hath commanded us to crave and also hath commanded your Majestie to give to every one of your Subjects for by this Lynk hath God knit together the Prince and people that as he commands honour fear and obedience to be given to the powers established by him so doth he in expresse words command and declare what the Prince oweth unto the Subjects to wit That as he is the Minister of God bearing the sword for vengeance to be taken on evill doers and for the denfence of peaceable and quiet men so ought he to draw the sword without partialitie so oft as in Gods Name he is required thereto Seeing so it
avoyding of Inconveniences This Summer there came an Embassadour from the King of Sweden requiring marriage of our Soveraigne to his Master the King His entertainment was Honourable but his Petitions liked not our Queene one whit for as yet she could not resolve to be Wife to the King of Sweden having been lately Queen of France And yet she refused not one much inferiour to a Soveraigne King The Earle of Lennox and his Wife were committed to the Tower of London for traffiquing with Papists the young Laird of Barre was a stickler in that businesse and was apprehended with some Letters which was the cause of his and their trouble The Earle of Murray made a private journey to Hawicke upon the Fayre day thereof and apprehended fifty Theeves of which number were seventeen drowned others were executed in Iâ—dburgh the principall were brought to Edinburgh and there suffered according to their merits upon the Burrow Mure. The Queene was no whit content of the prosperitie and good successe that God gave to the Earle of Murray in all his enterprises for she hated his upright dealing and the Image of God that evidently did appear in him but at that time she could not well have been served without him The assembly of the Church at Midsommer the four and twentieth day of Iune 1562. approached in the which were many notable heads handled concerning good Order to be kept in the Church and for the Papists and for the Idolatry of the Queen which troubleth the former good order Some Ministers such as Master Iohn Sharpe had left their charges and entered into other Vocations more profitable for the belly against whom were Acts made although this day they have not put them in execution The tenour of the Supplication read in open audience and approved by the whole Assembly to be presented to the Queens Majesty was this To the Queens Majesty and her most honorable Privy Councell The Superintendents and Ministers of the Evangell of Christ Iesus within this Realme together with the Commissioners of the whole Churches desire Grace and Peace from the Father of our Lord Iesus Christ with the Spirit of righteous Iudgement HAving in minde that the fearfull sentence pronounced against the Watch-men that see the Sword of Gods punishment approach and do not in plain words forewarn the people yea the Princes and Rulers that they repent we cannot but signifie unto your Highnesse and to your Councell That the state of this Realme is such for this present that unlesse redresse and remedy be shortly provided Gods hands cannot long spare in his anger to strike the Head and the Tayle the inobedient Prince and sinfull People For as God is unchangeable and true so must he punish in these our dayes the grievous sins which before we reade he hath punished in all Ages after that he hath long called for repentance and none is showne And that your Majesty and Councell may understand what are the things we desire to be reformed we will begin at that which we know assuredly to be the Fountain and Spring of all other evils that now abound in this Realme To wit That Idoll and base service of God the Masse the fountain we call of all Impiety not onely because many take boldnesse to sin by reason of that opinion which they have conceived of that Idoll to wit That by vertue of it they get remission of their sins But also because that under this colour of the Masse are Whores Adulterers Drunkards Blasphemers of God of his holy Sacraments and such other manifest Malefactors maintained and defended For let any Masse-sayer or earnest maintainer thereof be deprehended in any of the fore-named crimes no execution can be had for all is done in hatred of his Religion And so are wicked men permitted to live wickedly cloked and defended by that wicked Idoll But supposing that the Masse was occasion of no such evils yet in it self it is so odious in Gods presence that we cannot cease with all instance to desire the removing of the same as well from your selfe as from all others within this Realm Taking Heaven and earth yea your own Consciences to record That the obstinate maintenance of that Idol shall in the end be to you destruction of soul and body if you do not repent If your Majesty demand Why that now we are more earnest then we have been heretofore We answer our former silence no wayes excused Because we finde our selves frustrate of our hope and expectation which was That in processe of time your Majesties heart should have been mollified so farre as ye would have heard the publike Doctrine taught within this Realme by the which our further hope was That Gods holy Spirit should so have moved your heart that you would have suffered your Religion which before God is nothing but abomination and vanity to be tryed by the true Touch-stone the written Word of God And that your Majesty finding it to have no ground nor foundation in the same should have given that glory unto God that you would have preferred his Truth to your own preconceived vain opinion of what antiquity that ever it hath been whereof we in part now discharged can no longer keep silence unlesse we would make our selves criminall before God of your blood perishing in your own iniquity for we plainly admonish you of the danger to come The second thing that we require is Punishment of horrible vices such as are Adultery Fornication open Whoredome Blasphemy Contempt of God of his Word and Sacraments Which in this Realme do even so abound that sin is reputed to be no sin And therefore as we see the present signes of Gods wrath now manifestly appear so do we forewarn that he will strike ere it be long if his Law without punishment be permitted thus manifestly to be contemned If any object That punishment cannot be commanded to be executed without a Parliament we answer That the Eternall God in his Parliament hath pronounced death to be the punishment of Adultery and for Blaspheming whose Act if we put not in execution seeing that Kings are but his Lievtenants having no power to give life where he commands death as that he will repute you and all others that foster vice patrons of Impiety so will he not fail to punish you for neglecting the execution of his judgements Our third request concerning the poor who be of three sorts The poor labourers of the ground the poor desolate Beggers Orphans Widows and Strangers and the poor Ministers of Christ Jesus his holy Evangel which are so cruelly used by this last pretended Order taken for sustentation of Ministers that their latter misery farre surmounteth the former for now the poore labourers of the ground are so oppressed by the cruelty of those that pay their hire that they for the most part encroach upon the poore in whatsoever they pay unto the Qâ—een or to any other As for the
of Adultery of Witchcraft and to seek the restitution of Gleibes or Manses to the Minister of the Church and of the reparation of the Churches and thereby they thought to have pleased the Godly that were highly offended at their slacknesse The Act of Oblivion passed because some of the Lords had entresse but the Acts against adulterie and for the Manses and Gleibes were so modified that no Law and such a Law might stand in eodem predicamento To speak plain no Law and such Acts were both alike The Acts are in Print let wise men read and then accuse us if without cause we complain In the progresse of this corruption and before the Parliament dissolved Iohn Knox in his Sermon before the most part of the Nobilitie began to enter in a deep discourse of Gods mercies which that Realme had felt and of that ingratitude which he espied in the whole multitude which God had marvellously delivered from the bondage and tyrannie both of body and soule And now my Lords said he I praise my God through Jesus Christ that in your own presence I may powre forth the sorrows of my heart yea your selves shall be witnesse if I make any lie in things by-past from the beginning of Gods mighty Works within this Realme I have been with you in your most desperate temptations Aske your own Consciences and let them answer you before God if that I not I but Gods Spirit by me in your greatest extremity willed you not ever to depend upon your God and in his Name promised unto you victory and preservation from your enemies so that onely ye would depend upon his protection and preferre his glory before your lives and worldly commoditie in your most extreme danger I have been with you Saint Iohnstouâ— Cowper-More and the charges of Edinburgh are yet recent in my heart yea that dark and dolorous night wherein all you my Lords with shame and feare left this Town is yet in my minde and God forbid that ever I forget it What was I say my Exhortation unto you and what is fallen in vain of all that ever God promised unto you by my mouth ye your selves live and testifie There is not one of you against whom death and destruction was threatned perished in that danger and how many of your enemies hath God plagued before your eyes shall this be the thankfulnesse that ye shall render unto your God To betray his Cause when ye have it in your own hands to establish it as you please The Queen sayes you will not agree with us aske ye of her that which by Gods Word ye may justly require and if she will not agree with you in God you are not bound to agree with them in the Devill Let her plainly understand so farre of your mindes and steal not from your former stoutnesse in God and he will prosper you in your enterprises But I can see nothing but a recalling from Christ Jesus that the man that first and most speedily fleeth from Christs Ensigne holdeth himselfe most happy yea I hear some say That we have nothing of our Religion Established neither by Law nor Parliament Albeit the malicious words of such can neither hurt the truth of God nor yet us that thereupon depend yet the speaker of this Treason committed against God and against this poore Common-wealth deserves the Gallows for our Religion being commanded and so established by God is received with this Realme in publike Parliament And if they will say That it was no Parliament we must and will say and also prove That that Parliament was also as lawfull as ever any that passed before it within this Realme I say if the King then living was King and the Queen now in this Realm be lawfull Queen that Parliament cannot be denyed And now my Lords to put end to all I hear of the Queens marriage Dukes Brethren to Emperours and Kings strive all for the best gain But this my Lords will I say note the day and beare witnesse after Whensoever the Nobilitie of Scotland who professe the Lord Jesus consents that an Infidell and all Papists are Infidels shall be Head to our Soveraigne ye do so farre as in you lyeth to banish Christ Jesus from this Realme yea to bring Gods vengeance upon the Countrey a plague upon your selves and perchance you shall do small comfort to your Soveraigne These words and this manner of speaking was judged intollerable Papists and Protestants were both offended yea his most familiars disdained him for that speaking Placeboes and Flatterers posted to the Court to give advertisement That Iohn Knox had spoken against the Queens Marriage The Provest of Glencludan Douglas by sirname of Drumlangrig was the man that gave the charge That the said Iohn should present himselfe before the Queen which he did immediately after Dinner The Lord Uchiltrie and divers of the faithfull bare him company to the Abbey but none past in to the Queen with him in the Cabinet but Iohn Arskin of Dun then super-intendent of Angus and Mernes The Queen in a vehement fume began to crie out That never Prince was used as she was I have said she born with you in all your rigorous manner of speaking both against my selfe and against my Uncles yea I have sought your favours by all possible means I offered unto you presence and audience whensoever it pleased you to admonish me and yet I cannot be quit of you I Vow to God I shall be once revenged and with these words scarce could Marnocke one of her Pages get Handkirchiefs to hold her Eyes drie for the Tears and the howling besides womanly weeping stayed her Speech The said Iohn did patiently abide all this fume and at opportunitie answered True it is Madame your Majesty and I have been at divers controversies into the which I never perceived your Majestie to be offended at me but when it shall please God to deliver you from that bondage of darknesse and errour wherein ye have been nourished for the lack of true doctrine your Majestie will finde the libertie of my tongue nothing offensive without the preaching-place Madame I thinke few have occasion to be offended at me and there Madame I am not Master of my selfe but must obey him who commands me to speak plaine and to flatter no flesh upon the face of the Earth But what have you to do said she with my marriage If it please your Majestie said he patiently to hear me I shall shew the truth in plaine words I grant your Majestie offered unto me more then ever I required but my answer was then as it is now That God hath not sent me to awaite upon the Courts of Princes or upon the Chamber of Ladies but I am sent to preach the Evangell of Jesus Christ to such as please to hear it hath two points Repentance and Faith Now Madame in preaching repentance of necessity it is that the sinnes of men be noted that they may
men to be Monks and women to be Nuns but now all things are so changed that we cannot discerne the Earle from the Abbot nor the Nunne from him that would be esteemed the Nobleman so that we have gotten a new order of Monkes and Nunnes But said he seeing you are not ashamed of that unjust profit would to God that you had therewith the Kowll the Vaile and the Tayle joyned withall that so you might appear in your own colours This libertie did so provoke the choler of Lethington that in open audience he gave himself to the Devill If that after that day he should regard what became of the Ministers but he would do what he could that his companion should have a share with him And let them bark and blow said he as loud as they list And so that was the second time that he had given defiance unto the servants of God Whereupon arose whisperings and complaints although the Flatterers of the Court complaining that men were not charitably handled might not since be reproved in generall albeit men were not specially taxed that all the world might know of whom the Preacher speakes whereunto was this answer made Let men be ashamed publikely to offend and the Ministers shall abstain from specialities but so long as Protestants are not ashamed manifestly to do against the Evangell of Jesus Christ so long cannot the Ministers of God cease to crie that God would be avenged upon such abusers of his holy Word Thus had the servants of God a double battaile fighting upon the one side against the Idolatry and the rest of the abominations mentioned by the Court and upon the other part against the unthankefulnesse of such as sometimes would have been esteemed the chief Pillars of the Church within the Realme The threatnings of Preachers was fearfull but the Court thought it self in such security that it could not miscarry The Queen after the Banquetting kept a dyet Monsieur Luserie a Frenchman who had been accustomed with her malady before being her Physitian and therefore she for the second time made her progresse in the North and commanded to Ward in the Castle of Edinburgh the Earle of Caithnes for a Murther committed by his servants upon the Earle Mershals men he obeyed but he was suddenly released for such blood-thirsty men and Papists such as he is are good subjects thought at Court Thy Kingdom come O Lord for in this Realme is nothing amongst such as should punish vice and maintain vertue buâ— abomination abounding without Bridle The Flatterers of the Court did daily enrage against the poor Preachers happiest was he that could invent the most bitter taunts and disdainfull mocking of the Ministers and at length they began to jest at the Terme of Idolatry affirming that men knew not what they spake when they called the Masse Idolatry yea some proceeded further and feared not at open Table to affirme That they would sustaine the Argument that the Masse was no Idolatry These things coming to the ears of the preachers they were proclaimed in publike Pulpit of Edinbugh with this complaint directed by the speaker to his God O Lord how long shal the wicked prevail against the just how long wilt thou suffer thy Self and thy blessed Evangell to be despised of men Of men we say that boast themselves Defenders of the truth for of thy manifest and known Enemies we complain not but of such as unto whom thou hast revealed thy light for now it cometh to our Ears that men not Priests we say but chief Protestants will defend the Masse to be no Idolatry if it so were miserably have I been deceived and miserably alas O Lord have I deceived thy people which thou knowest O Lord I have ever more abhorred then a thousand deaths But said he turning his face towards the Room where such men as had so affirmed sate If I be not able to prove the Masse to be the most abominable Idolatry that ever was used from the beginning of the world I offer my self to suffer the punishment appointed by God to a false Preacher And it appeareth unto me saith the Preacher that the Affirmers should be subject to the same Law for it is the truth of God that you persecute as a blasphemy and it is the invention of the Devill that obstinately against his Word you maintaine whereat albeit you now flute and flyre as if so be all that were spoken were but winde yet am I all fully assured as I am assured that my GOD liveth That some that hear this your defection and railing against the truth and the servants of God shall see a part of Gods judgement powred forth upon this Realm and principally upon you that fastest cleave unto the favour of the Court for the abominations that are by you maintained Albeit that such vehemency provoked tears from the eyes of some yet these that knew themselves guilty in a mocking manner said We must recant and burne our Bill for the Preachers are angry The generall assembly holden in Iune 1564. approached unto the which a great part of the Nobilitie of those that are called Protestants convened some for assistance of the Ministers and some to accuse them as we shall after hear A little before these troubles which Sathan raised in the Body of the Church began one David an Italian to be great in the Court the Queen used him for Secretary for things that appertained to her secret affairs or elsewhere great men made suit unto him and their suits were the better heard But of his beginning and progresse we delay now further to speak and refer it unto another fitter occasion of time and place because that his end will require the description of the whole The first day of the generall Assembly neither the Courtiers nor the Lords that depended upon the Court presented themselves in Session with their Brethren whereat many wondred One ancient and honourable man the Laird of Lundie said Nay I wonder not at their absence but I wonder that at our last Assembly they drew themselves apart and joyned not with us but drew from us some of our Ministers and willed them to conclude such things as were never proposed to the publike Assembly very prejudiciall to the Liberty of the Church and therefore my judgement is That they shall be informed of this offence which the whole Brethren have conceived of their former Fact Humbly requiring That if they be Brethren that they would assist their Brethren with their presence and counsell for we had never greater need And if they be minded to fall back from us it were better we knew it now then afterwards Thereto agreed the whole Assembly and gave Commission to certaine Brethren to signifie the mindes of the Assembly unto the Lords which was done that same afternoon The Courtiers at the first seemed a little offended that they should be as it were suspected of defection yet neverthelesse upon the morning
Lethington that is the chief Head wherein we never agreed but of that we shall speak hereafter What will ye say as touching the moving of the people to have a good opinion of the Queens Majesty and as concerning obedience to be given to her Authority as also of the form of Prayer which ye commonly use My Lord saith he more earnestly to move the people or yet otherwise to pray then heretofore I have done a good conscience will not suffer me for he who knows the secrets of hearts knows That privately and publikely I have called to God for her conversion and have willed the people to do the same shewing unto them the dangerous state wherein not onely she her self stands but also the whole Realm by reason of her indurate blindnesse That is said Lethington wherein we finde the greatest fault your extremity against her Masse in particular passeth measure ye call her a slave to Sathan ye affirm that Gods vengeance hangs over the Realm by reason of her impiety And what is this else but to raise up the hearts of the poeple against her Majesty and against them that serve her Then there was heard an acclamation of the rest of the flatterers that such extremity could not profit The Master of Maxwell said in plain words If I were in the Queens Majesties place I would not suffer such things as I hear If the words of Preachers said Iohn Knox shall be alwayes wrested in the worst part then will it be hard to speak any thing so circumspectly providing that the truth be spoken which shall not escape the censure of the calumniator The most vehement as ye speak and most excessive manner of Prayer that I use in publike is this O Lord if thy good pleasure be purge the heart of the Queens Majestie from the venome of Idolatry and deliver her from the bondage and thraldom of Satan into the which she hath been brought up and yet remains for the lack of true Doctrine and let her see by the illumination of thy holy Spirit That there is no means to please thee but by Iesus Christ thy only Son and that Iesus Christ cannot be found but in thy holy Word nor yet received but as it prescribes which is To renounce our own wisedom and preconceived opinion and worship thee as it commands that in so doing she may avoid the eternall damnation which is ordained for all obstinate and impenitent to thee and that this poor Realm may also escape that plague and vengeance which inevitably followeth Idolatry maintained against thy manifest Word and the light thereof This said he is the form of common Prayer as your selves can witnesse Now what is worthy of reprehension in it I would hear There are three things in it said Lethington that never liked me and the first is Ye pray for the Queens Majesty with a condition saying Illuminate her heart if thy good pleasure be Wherein it may appear That ye doubt of her conversion Where have ye the example of such Prayer Wheresoever the examples are said the other I am assured of the Rule which is this If we shall ask any thing according to his Will he shall grant us And our Master Christ Jesus commands us to pray unto our Father Thy will be done But said Lethington Where ever finde ye any of the Prophets so to have prayed It sufficeth me said the other my Lord that the Master and Teacher both of Prophets and Apostles hath taught me so to pray But in so doing said Lethington ye put a doubt in the peoples heads of her conversion Not I said the other but her own obstinate rebellion causeth more then me to doubt of her conversion Wherein said he rebells she against God In all the actions of her life said M. Knox but in these two Heads especially The former is That she will not hear the Preaching of the blessed Evangel of Jesus Christ. 2. That she maintaineth that Idol the Masse She thinks not that rebellion said Lethington So thought they said the other that sometimes offered their children unto Molech and yet the Spirit of God affirms That they offered them unto devils and not unto God And this day the Turks think they have a better Religion then the Papists have and yet I think ye will excuse neither of both from committing rebellion against God neither yet can ye do the Queen unlesse ye will make God to be partiall But said Lethington Why pray ye not for her without moving any doubt Because said the other I have learned to pray in faith now faith ye know depends upon the Word of God and so it is that the Word teacheth me That prayer profiteth the sons and daughters of Gods Election of which number if she be one or not I have just cause to doubt and therefore I pray that God would illuminate her heart if his good pleasure be so to do But yet said Lethington ye can produce the example of none that so hath prayed before you Thereto I have already answered said Iohn Knox But yet for further declaration I will demand a question which is this Whether ye think that the Apostles prayed themselves as they commanded others to pray or not who doubts of that said the company that were present Well then said Iohn Knox I am assured that Peter said these words to Simon Magus Repent therefore of this thy wickednesse and pray God That if it be possible the thoughts of thy heart may be forgiven thee Here we may cleerly see That Peter joynes a condition with his Commandment That Simon should repent and pray to wit If it were possible that his sin might be forgiven for he was not ignorant that some sinnes are unto death and so without all hope of repentance or remission And think ye not my Lord Secretary said he but that same doubt may touch my heart as touching the Queens conversion that then touched the heart of the Apostle I would never said Lethington heare you or any other call that in doubt But your will said the other is no assurance to my conscience And to speak freely My Lord I wonder if yee your self doubt not of the Queens conversion for more evident signes of Induration have appeared and do appear in her then Peter outwardly could have espyed in Simon Magus for albeit sometimes he was a Sorcerer yet joyned he with the Apostles beleeved and was baptized And albeit That the venome of Avarice remained in his heart and that he would have bought the holy Ghost yet when he heard the fearfull threatnings of God pronounced against him he trembled desired the assistance of the Prayers of the Apostles and so humbled himself so farre as the judgement of man could peirce like a true penitent and yet we see that Peter doubts of his conversion Why then may not all the godly justly doubt of the conversion of the Queen who hath used Idolatry which is also most odious
in the sight of the most jealous God and still continues in the same yet she despises all threatnings and refuseth all godly admonitions Why say ye That she refuseth admonition said Lethington she will gladly hear any man But what obedience said the other to God or to his word ensues of all that is spoken unto her or when shall she be seen to give her presence to the publike Preaching I think never said Lethington so long as she is thus used And so long said the other yee and all others must be content that I pray so as I may be assured to be heard of my God that is That his good will may be done either in making her comfortable to his Church or if that he hath appointed her to be a scourge to the same That we may have patience and she may be bridled Well said Lethington Let us come to the second head Where finde ye that the Scriptures calls any the bond slaves of Satan or that the Prophets of God spake of Kings and Princes so irreverently The Scripture said Iohn Knox saith That by nature wee are all the sonnes of wrath Our Master Christ affirmes That such as doe sinne are servants to sinne and that it is the onely Sonne of God that sets men at freedome now what difference there is betwixt the sonnes of wrath the servants of sinne c. And the slaves of Satan I understand not except I be taught And if the sharpnesse of the terme offend you I have not invented that phrase of speech but have learned it out of Gods Scriptures for these words I finde spoken unto Paul Behold I send thee unto the Gentiles to open their eyes that they may turne from darknesse unto light and from the power of Sathan unto God Mark the words my Lord and stirre not at the speaking of the holy Ghost And the same Apostle writing to his Scholler Timothius sayes Instruct with meeknesse those that are contrary minded if that God at any time will give them repentance that they may know the truth and come to amendment out of the snare of the Devill which are taken of him at his will If your Lordship do rightly consider these sentences you shall not onely finde my words to be the words of the holy Ghost but also the condition which I use to adde to have the assurance of Gods Scriptures But they speak nothing against Kings in Scripture in speciall said Lethington and your continuall crying is The Queens Idolatry The Queens Masse will provoke Gods vengeance In the former sentence said the other I hear not Kings and Queens excepted but all unfaithfull are pronounced to stand in one rank and to be in bondage to one Tyrant the Devill But beleeve me my Lord you little regard the state wherein they stand when you would have them so flattered that the danger thereof should neither be knowne neither yet declared to the people Where will you finde said Lethington that any of the Prophets did so use Kings Queens Rulers or Magistrates In more places then one said the other Ahab was a King and Iezabel a Queen and yet what the Prophet Elias said to the one and to the other I suppose you are not ignorant That was not cried out before the people said Lethington to make them odious unto their subjects That Elias said Doggs shall lick the blood of Ahab said Iohn Knox and eate the flesh of Iezabell the Scriptures assures me but that it was whispered in their Eares or in a Corner I read not but the plain contrary appears to me which is that both the people and the Court understood well enough what the Prophet had promised for so witnessed Iehu after that Gods vengeance had stricken Iezabell These were singular motions of the Spirit of God said Lethington and appertaineth nothing to our age Then hath the Scripture said the other deceived me for Saint Paul teacheth me that whatsoever is written within the holy Scriptures the same is written for our instruction And my Master saith That every learned Scribe brings forth of his Treasure both things old and things new and the Prophet Ieremy affirmes That every Realme or Citie that likewise offends as then did Ierusalem should likewise be punished Why then that the facts of ancient Prophets and the fearfull judgements of God executed before us upon the disobedient appertain not unto our age I neither see nor yet can understand But now to put an end to this Head my Lord saith he the Prophets of God have not spared to rebuke Kings as well to their faces as before the people and subjects Elizeus feared not to say to King Iehoram What have I to doe with thee get thee to the other Prophets of thy Mother for as the Lord of Hostes liveth in whose sight I stand if it were not that I regard the presence of Iehosaphat the King of Iudah I would not have looked toward thee nor seene thee Plaine it is that the Prophet was a Subject in the Kingdome of Israel and yet how little reverence he giveth to the King we heare Ieremy the Prophet was commanded to Cry to the King and Queene and to say Behave your selves lowly execute justice and judgement c. or else your Carcasses shall be casten to the heate of the day and unto the frost of the night Unto Conias Sullim and Zedekias he speaketh in speciall and shewes to them in his publike Sermons their miserable ends and therefore yee ought not to thinke strange my Lord said he albeit the servants of God taxe the vices of Kings and Queenes even as well as of other offenders and that because their sinnes be more noysome to the Common-wealth then are the sinnes of inferiour persons The most part of this reasoning Secretary Lethington leaned upon the Master of Maxwells Breast who said I am almost weary I would some other would reason in the chief head which is yet untouched Then the Earle of Mortoune Chancellor commanded Master George Hay to reason against Iohn Knox in the head of obedience due to Magistrates who began so to doe Unto whom Iohn Knox said Brother that ye shall reason in my contrary I am well content because I know you to be both a man of learning and of modesty but that you shall oppose your selfe unto the Trueth whereof I suppose your owne conscience is no lesse perswaded then is mine I cannot well approve for I would be sorry that yee and I should be reputed to reason as two Schollers of Pythagoras to shew the quickenesse of our wit as it were to reason on both parts I protest here before God That whatsoever I sustaine I doe the same in conscience yea I dare no more sustaine a proposition knowne to my selfe untrue then I dare teach false Doctrine in the publike place And therefore Brother if Conscience move you to oppose your selfe to that Doctrine which yee have heard out of my mouth in that
doubt Festus did understand pronouncing these words Hast thou appealed to Caesar Thou shalt go to Caesar. As if he would say I as a man willing to understand the truth before I pronounce sentence have required of thee to go to Ierusalem where the learned of thine own Nation may hear thy Cause and discern in the same The controversie standeth in matters of Religion thou art accused as an apostate from the Law as a violator of the Temple and a transgressor of the Traditions of their Fathers in which matters I am ignorant and therefore desire information by those that be learned in the same Religion whereof the question is and yet dost thou refuse so many godly Fathers to hear thy cause and dost appeal to the Emperor preferring him to all our judgments of no purpose belike but to delay time Thus I say it might have appeared that Paul did not onely injury to the Judge and to the Priests but also that his cause was greatly to be suspected partly for that he did refuse the judgement of those that had most knowledge as all men supposed of Gods Will and Religion and partly because he appealed to the Emperour who then was at Rome far absent from Ierusalem a man ignorant of God and enemy to all vertue But the Apostle considering the nature of his enemies and what things they had intended against him even from the first day he began freely to speak in the Name of Christ did not fear to appeal from them and from the Judge that would have gratified them They had professed themselves plain enemies to Christ Jesus and to his blessed Evangell and sought the death of Paul yea even by factions and treasonable conspiracy and therefore by no means would he admit them either as Judges in his cause or auditors of the same as Festus required But grounding himself upon strong reasons to wit That he had not offended the Jews neither against the Law but that he was innocent therefore that no Judge ought to give him into the hands of his enemies grounding I say his Appellation upon these reasons he neither regarded the displeasure of Festus neither yet the brute of the ignorant multitude but boldly did appeal from all cognoscance of them to the judgement of the Emperour as said is By these two examples I doubt not but your Honours do understand That it is lawfull to the servants of God oppressed by tyrannts to seek remedy against the same be it by appellation from their sentence or by imploring the help of Civill Magistrates For what God hath approved in Ieremy and Paul he can condemne in none that are so dealt withall I might alleadge some History of the primitive Church serving to the same purpose as of Ambrose and Athanasius of whom the one would not be judged but at Millan where that his Doctrine was heard of all his Church and received and approved by many And the other would in no wise give place to those Councells where he knew that men conspiring against the Truth of God should sit in Judgement and Consultation But because the Scriptures of God are my onely foundation and assurance in all matters of weight and importance I have thought the two former testimonies sufficient as well to approve my Appellation reasonable and just as to declare to your Honours That with safe conscience ye cannot refuse to admit the same If any think it arrogancy or foolishnesse in me to compare my self with Ieremy and Paul let the same man understand That as God is immutable so is the Verity of his glorious Evangell of equall dignity whensoever it is impugned be the members suffering never so weak What I think touching mine owne person God will reveal when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed and such as with whom I have been conversant can witnesse what arrogancy or pride they espie in me But touching the Doctrine and cause which that adulterous and pestilent Generation of Antichrists servants who will be called Bishops amongst you have condemned me I neither fear nor shame to confesse and avow before man and Angel to be the Eternall Truth of the Eternall God And in that case I doubt not to compare my self with any member in whom the Truth hath been impugned since the beginning For as it was the Truth which Ieremy did Preach in these words The Priests have not known me saith the Lord but the Pastors have treacherously declined and fallen back from me The Prophets have Prophesied in Baal and have gone after those thingâ— which cannot helpe My people have left the fountain of living Water and have digged to themselves pits which can contain no water As it was a truth That the Pastors and Watch-men in the dayes of Isaiah were become dumb dogs blinde ignorant proud and avaricious And finally as it was a truth That the Princes and the Priests were murtherers of Christ Jesus and cruell persecutors of his Apostles so likewise it is a truth and that most infallible That those who have condemned me the whole rabble of the Papisticall Clergie have declined from the true Faith have given ear to deceivable spirits and to doctrine of devils are the stars fallen from the heaven to the earth are fountains without water and finally are enemies to Christ Jesus denyers of his vertue and horrible blasphemers of his death and passion And further As that visible Church had no crime whereof justly they could accuse either Prophets or the Apostles except their Doctrine onely so have not such as seek my blood other crime to lay to my charge except That I affirm as alwayes I offer to prove That the Religion which now is maintained by fire and sword is no lesse contrarious to the true Religion taught and established by the Apostles then is darknesse to light or the devill to God And also That such as now do claim the title and name of Church are no more the elect Spouse of Christ Jesus then was the Synagogue of the Jews the true Church of God when it crucified Christ Jesus condemned his Doctrine and persecuted his Apostles And therefore seeing that my Battell is against the proud and cruell hypocrites of this age as that Battell of those most excellent instruments was against the false Prophets and malignant Church of their ages Neither ought any man to thinke it strange that I compare my self with them with whom I sustain a common cause Neither ought your Lordships judge your selves lesse addebted and bound to me calling for your support then did the Princes of Iuda think themselves bound to Ieremy whom for that time they delivered notwithstanding the sentence of death pronounced against him by the visible Church And thus much for the right of my Appellation which in the bowells of Christ Jesus I require your Honours not to esteem as a thing superfluous and vain but that ye admit it and also accept me in your
So served Darius giving into the power of Daniel the Idol to be broken and his enemies to be cast to the Lions So served Nebuchad-nezzar by a terrible Law forbidding all that were in his Realme to blaspheme God Herein therefore do Kings serve the Lord in so farre as they are Kings when they do those things to serve him which none except Kings be able to doe He further proceedeth and concludeth That as when wicked Kings do raigne impiety cannot be bridled by Laws but rather is tyranny exercised under the title of the same So is it a thing without all reasons That Kings professing the knowledge and honour of God should not regard nor care who did defend nor who did oppugne the Church of God in their Dominions By these words of this ancient and godly Writer your Honours may perceive what I require of you to wit To represse the tyranny of your Bishops and to defend the innocents professing the Truth He did require of the Emperour and Kings in his dayes professing Christ and manifestly concludeth That they cannot serve Christ except that so they doe Let not your Bishops think that Augustine speaketh for them because he nameth the Church Let them reade and understand That Augustine writeth for that Church which professeth the Truth and doth suffer persecution for the defence of the same which your Bishops do not but rather with the Donatists and Arrians do cruelly persecute all such as boldly speak Christs Eternall Verity to manifest their impiety and abomination But thus much we have of Augustine That it appertaineth to the obedience and service which Kings owe to God as well now in the time of the Gospel as before under the Law to defend the afflicted for matters of Religion and to represse the fury of the persecuters by the rigour and severity of godly Laws For which cause no doubt Isaiah the Prophet saith That Kings should be nourishers of the Church of God that they should abase their heads and lovingly embrace the children of God And thus I say your Honours may evidently see That the same Obedience doth God require of Rulers and Princes in the time of the Gospel that he required in the time of the Law If you do think that the Reformation of Religion and defence of the afflicted doth not appertain to you because you are no Kings but Nobles and States of a Realme in two things you are deceived First In that you do not advert That David requireth as well that the Princes and Judges of the earth to be learned and that they serve and fear God as that he requireth that Kings repent If you therefore be Judges and Princes as no man can deny you to be then by the plain words of David you are charged to be learned to serve and fear God which ye cannot do if ye despise the Reformation of his Religion And this is your first errour The second is That ye neither know your duty which ye owe to God neither yet your Authority which of him ye have received if ye for pleasure or fear of any earthly man despise Gods true Religion and contemn your brethren that in his Name call for your support Your duty is to hear the voyce of the Eternall your God and unfainedly to studie to follow his Precepts who as is before said of speciall mercy hath promoted you to Honours and Dignity His chief and principall Precept is That with reverence ye receive and embrace his onely beloved Son Jesus That ye promote to the uttermost of your powers his true Religion and That ye defend your brethren and subjects whom he hath put under your charge and care Now if your King be a man ignorant of God enemy to his true Religion blinded by Superstition and a persecuter of Christs members Shall ye be execused if with silence ye passe over his iniquity Be not deceived my Lords ye are placed in Authority for another purpose then to flatter your King in his folly and blinde rage to wit That as with your bodies strength riches and wisedom ye are bound to assist and defend him in all things which by your advice he shall take in hand for Gods glory and for the preservation of his Common-wealth and subjects so by your authorities counsell and admonition ye are bound to correct and represse whatsoever ye know him to attempt expressely repugning to Gods Word Honour and glory or what ye shall espie him to do be it by ignorance or be it by malice against his subjects great or small Of which last part of your obedience if you defraud your King ye commit against him no lesse Treason then if ye did extract from him your due and promised support when by his enemies unjustly he were pursued But this part of their duty I fear do a small number of the Nobility of this age rightly consider neither yet will they understand that for that purpose hath God promoted them For now the common song of all men is We must obey our Kings be they good or bad For God hath commanded it But horrible shall the vengeance be that shall be poured forth upon such blasphemers of God his holy Name and Ordinance For it is no lesse blasphemy to say That God hath commanded Kings to be obeyed when they command impiety then to say That God by his Precept is author and maintainer of all iniquity True it is God hath commanded Kings to be obeyed but like true it is That in things which they commit against his glory or when cruelly without cause they rage against their brethren the members of Christs body he hath commanded no obedience but rather he hath approved yea and greatly rewarded such as have opposed themselves to their ungodly commandments and blinde rage as in the examples of the three Children of Daniel and Abdemelech it is evident The three Children would neither bow nor stoup before the golden Image at the commandment of the great King Nebuchadnezar Daniel did openly pray his windows being open against the established Law of Darius and of his Councell And Abdemelech feared not to enter in before the presence of Zedechias and boldly to defend the cause and innocency of Ieremy the Prophet whom the King and his Councell had condemned to death Every one of these facts should this day be judged foolish by such as will not understand what God doth require of his children when his Verity is oppugned or his glory called in doubt such men I say as prefer man to God and things present to the heavenly inheritance should have judged every one of these stubborn inobedience foolish presumption and singularity or else bold controlling of the King and his wise Councell But how acceptable in Gods presence was this resistance to the ungodly commandments and determinations of their King the end did witnesse for the three children were delivered from the Furnace of fire and Daniel
standeth my singular comfort this day when I hear that those bloody tyrants within the Realme of England doth kill murther destroy and devour man and woman as ravennous Lions now loosed from bonds I lift up therefore the eyes of mine heart as my iniquity and present dolour will suffer and to my heavenly Father will I say O Lord those cruell tyrants are loosed by thy hand to punish our former ingratitude whom we trust thou wilt not suffer to prevail for ever but when thou hast corrected us a little and hast declared unto the world the tyranny that lurked in their boldned brests then wilt thou break their jaw-bones and wilâ— shut them up in their caves again that the generation and posterity following may praise thy holy Name before thy Congregation Amen When I feel any taste or motion of these promises then think I my self most happy and that I have received a just compensation albeit I and all that to me in earth belongeth should suffer present death knowing that God shall yet shew mercy to his afflicted Church within England and that he shall represse the pride of these present tyrants like as he hath done of those that were before our dayes And therefore beloved brethren in our Saviour Jesus Christ hold up to God your hands that are fainted through fear and let your hearts that have in these dolorous dayes sleeped in sorrow awake and hear the voyce of your God who sweareth by himself That he will not suffer his Church to be oppressed for ever neither that he will despise our sobâ— to the end if we will row and strive against this vehement winde I mean if that ye will not run back headlong to Idolatry then shall this storm be asswaged in despight of the devill Christ Jesus shall come with speed to your deliverance he shall pierce thorow the winde and the raging Seas shall obey and bear his feet and body as the massie stable and dry land Be not moved from the sure foundation of your faith For albeit that Christ Jesus be absent from you as he was from his disciples in that great storme by his bodily presence yet is he present by his mighty power and grace He standeth upon the mountain in security and rest that is his flesh and whole humanity is now in heaven and can suffer no such trouble as sometimes he did And yet he is full of pity and compassion and doth consider all our travell anguish and labours wherefore it is not to be doubted but that he will suddenly appear to our great comfort The tyranny of this world cannot keep back his coming more then the blustering winde and raging Seas lett Christ to come to his disciples when they looked for nothing but present death And therefore yet again I say beloved in the Lord Let your hearts attend to the promises that God hath made unto true repentant sinners and be fully perswaded with a constant faith That God is alwayes true and just in his performance of his promises You have heard these dayes spoken of very plainly when your hearts could fear no danger because you were nigh the land and the storm was not yet risen that is Ye were young Scholars of Christ when no persecution was felt or seen But now ye are come into the midst of the Sea for what part of England heard not of your profession and the vehement storm whereof we then almost in every Exhortation spake of is now suddenly risen up But what Hath God brought you so far forth that you shall both in souls and bodies every one perish Nay my whole trust in Gods mercy and truth is to the contrary For God brought not his people into Egypt and from thence thorow the Red Sea to the intent they should perish but that he in them should shew a most glorious deliverance Neither sent Christ his Apostles into the middest of the Sea and suffering the storm to assault them and their Ship to the intent they should there perish but because he would the more have his great goodnesse towards them felt and perceived in so mightily delivering them out of the fear of perishing giving us thereby an example that he would do the like to us if we abide constant in our profession and saith with-drawing our selves from superstition and idolatry We gave you warning of these dayes long ago For the reverence of Christs Blood let these words be noted The same Truth that spake before of these dolorous dayes forespake also the everlasting joy prepared for such as should continue to the end The trouble is come O dear brethren look for the comfort and after the example of the Apostle abide in resisting this vehement storm a little space The third Watch is not yet ended remember that Christ Jesus came not to his disciples till it was the fourth Watch and they were then in no lesse danger then you be now for their faith fainted and their bodies were in danger But Christ Jesus came when they looked not for him and so shall he do to you if you will continue in the profession that you have made This dare I be bold to promise in the Name of him whose Eternall Verity and glorious Gospel ye have heard and received who also putteth into my heart an earnest thirst God knoweth I lie not of your salvation and some care also for your bodies which now I will not expresse Thus shortly have I passed thorow the outragious tempest wherein the disciples of Christ were tempted after that the great multitude were by Christ fed in the desert omitting many profitable Notes which might well have been marked in the Text because my purpose is at this present not to be tedious nor yet curious but only to note such things as be agreeable to these most dolorous dayes And so let us now speak of the end of this storm and trouble in which I finde four things chiefly to be noted First That the disciples at the presence of Christ were more afraid then they were before Secondly That Christ useth no other instrument but his Word to pacific their hearts Thirdly That Peter in a fervency first left his Ship and yet after feared Fourthly and lastly That Christ permitted neither Peter nor the rest of his disciples to perish in that fear but gloriously delivered all and pacified the Tempest Their great fear and the cause thereof are expressed in the Text in these words When the disciples saw him walking upon the Sea they were afraid saying It is a Spirit and they cryed through fear It is not my purpose in this Treatise to speak of spirits nor yet to dispute Whether spirits good or bad may appear and trouble men Neither yet to enquire Why mans nature is afraid of spirits and so vehemently abhorreth their presence and company But my purpose is onely to speak of things necessary for this time And first let us consider
that there was three causes why the disciples knew not Christ but judged him to be a spirit The first cause was The darknesse of the night The second was The unaccustomed vision that appeared And the third was The danger and the tempest in which they so earnestly laboured for the safeguard of their selves The darknesse I say of the night letted their eyes to see him And it was above nature that a massie heavy and weighty body of a man such as they understood their Master Christ to have should walk go upon or be born up of the water of the raging Sea and not sink And finally the horrour of the tempest and great danger that they were in perswaded them to look for none other but certainly to be drowned And so all these three things concurring together confirmed in them this imagination That Christ Iesus who came to their great comfort and deliverance was a fearfull and wicked spirit appearing to their destruction What here happened to Christ Jesus himself that I might prove to have chanced and daily to happen to the verity of his blessed Word in all ages from the beginning For as Christ himself in this their trouble was judged and esteemed by his disciples at the first sight a spirit or phantasticall body so is the Truth and sincere Preaching of his glorious Gospel sent by God for mans comfort deliverance from sin and quietnesse of conscience when it is first offered and truely preached it is I say no lesse but judged to be heresie and deceivable doctrine sent by the devill to mans destruction The cause hereof is the dark ignorance of God which in every age since the beginning so overwhelmed the world that sometimes Gods very Elect were in like blindenesse and errour with the reprobate As Abraham was an Idolater Moses was instructed in all the wayes of the Egyptians Paul a proud Pharisee conjured against Christ and his Doctrine And many in this same our age when the Truth of God was offered unto them were sore afraid and cryed against it onely because the dark clouds of ignorance had troubled them before But this matter I omit and let passe till more opportunity The chief Note that I would have you well observe and mark in this preposterous fear of the disciples is this The more nigh deliverance and salvation approacheth the more strong and vehement is the temptation of the Church of God And the more nigh that Gods vengeance approacheth to the wicked the more proud cruell and arrogant are they Whereby it commonly cometh to passe That the very messengers of life are judged and deemed to be the authors of all mischief And this in many histories is evident When God had appointed to deliver the afflicted Israelites by the hand of Moses from the tyranny of the Egyptians and Moses was sent to the presence of Pharaoh for the same purpose such was their affliction and anguish by the cruelty which newly was exercised over them that with open mouthes they cursed Moses and no doubt in their hearts they hated God who sent him alleadging That Moses and Aaron was the whole cause of their last extreme trouble The like is to be seen in the Book of the Kings both under Elisha and Isaiah the Prophets For in the dayes of Ioram sonne of Achab was Samaria besieged by the King of Syria In which Samaria no doubt albeit the King and the most multitude were wicked there was yet some members of Gods Elect Church which were brought to such extreme famine that not onely things of small price were sold beyond all measure but also women against nature were compelled to eat their own children In this same City Elisha the Prophet most commonly was most conversant and dwelt by whose counsell and commandment no doubt the City was kept For it appeareth the King to lay that to his charge when he hearing of the piteous complaint of the woman who for hunger had eaten her own son rent his clothes with a solemne Oath and vow That the head of Elisha should not stand upon his shoulders that day If Elisha had not been of counsel That the city should have been kept Why should the King have more fumed against him then against others But whether he was the author of the defending the City or not all is one to my purpose for before the deliverance was the Church in such extremity that the chief Pastor of that time was sought to be killed by such as should have defended him The like is read of Hezekiah who defending his City Ierusalem and resisting proud Sennacherib no doubt obeying the counsell of Isaiah at length was so oppressed with sorrow and shame by the blasphemous words of Rabshakeh that he had no other refuge but in the Temple of the Lord as a man desperate and without comfort to open the disdainfull letters sent unto him by that hauty and proud tyrant By these and many Histories mo it is most evident that the more nigh salvation and deliverance approacheth the more vehement is the temptation and trouble This I writ to admonish you that albeit yet you shall see tribulation so abound that nothing shall appear but extreme misery without all hope of comfort that yet you decline not from God And that albeit somtimes ye be moved to hate the messengers of life that therefore ye shall not judge that God will never shew mercy after No deare Brethren as he hath dealt with others before you so will he deal with you God will suffer tribulation and dolour abound that no manner of comfort shall be seen in man to the intent that when deliverance commeth the glory may be his whose onely word may pacifie the tempest most vehement He drowned Pharaoh and his Army He scattered the great multitude of Benadad And by his Angel killed the hoste of Sennacharib And so delivered his afflicted when nothing appeared to them but utter destruction So shall he do to you beloved Brethren if patiently ye will abide his consolation and counsell God open your eyes that ye may rightly understand the meaning of my writing Amen But yet peradventure you wonder not a little why God permitteth such blood thirsty tyrants to molest and grieve his chosen Church I have recited some causes before and yet more I could recite but at this time I will hold me content with one The justice of God is such that he will not poure forth his extreme vengeance upon the wicked unto such time as their iniquity be so manifest that their very flatterers cannot excuse it Pharaoh was not destroyed till his own houshold servants and subjects abhorred and condemned his stubborn disobedience Iesabel and Athalia were not thrust from this life into death till all Israel and Juda were witnesses of their cruelty and abominations Iudas was not hanged till the Princes of the Priests bare witnesse of his Traiterous Act and iniquitie To
Word from the whole Realme of England But be thou mindefull O Lord that it is thy Truth which we have professed and that thy enemies blasphemeth thy holy Name and our Profession without Cause Thy holy Gospel is called heresie and we are accused as traytors for professing the same Be mercifull therefore O Lord and be salvation unto us in this time of our anguish Albeit our sins accuse and condemne us yet do thou according to thine own Name We have offended against thee Our sins and iniquities are without number and yet art thou in the midst of us O Lord albeit that tyrants bear rule over our bodies yet thirsteth our souls for the comfort of thy Word Correct us therefore but not in thy hot displeasure spare thy people and permit not thine inheritance to bâ— in rebuke for ever Let such O Lord as now are most afflicted yet once againe praise thy holy Name before thy Congregation Represse the pride of those blood-thirsty Tyrants consume them in thine anger according to the reproach which they have laid against thy holy Name Pour forth thy vengeance upon them and let our eyes behold the blood of thy Saints required of their hands Delay not thy vengeance O Lord but let death devour them in haste Let the earth swallow them up and let them go downe quick to the hells For there is no hope of their amendment the feare and reverence of thy holy Name is quite banished from their hearts and therefore yet again O Lord consume them consume them in thine anger and let them never bring their wicked counsells to effect but according to the godly powers let them be taken in the snare which they have prepared for thine elect Look upon us O Lord with the eyes of thy mercy and shew pity upon us thy weak and sore oppressed Flock Gather us yet once again to the wholesome treasures of thy most holy Word that openly we may confesse thy blessed Name within the Realme of England Grant this O heavenly Father for Christ Iesus thy sons sake Amen If on this manner or otherwise as God shall put in our hearts without hypocrisie in the presence of our God respecting more his glory then our private wealth continually we poure forth our complaint confession and prayers Then so assuredly as our God liveth and as we feel these present troubles shall our God himself rise to our defence he shall confound the counsels of our enemies and trouble the wits of such as most wrongfully troubleth us He shall send Jesu to execute his just judgments against Idolators and against such as obstinately defendeth them Yea the chiefe men of our times shall not escape the vengeance and plagues that are prepared for their portion The flatterers and maintainers of her abominations shall drink the cup of Gods wrath And in despite of the Devill shall yet the glory of Christ Jesus and the brightnesse of his countenance so shine in our hearts by the presence of his grace and before our eyes by the true preaching of his Gospel that altogether we shall fall before him and say O Lord thou art our God we shall extoll thee and shall confesse thy Name for thou â—ast brought wonderous things to passe according to thy counsels which albeit appear to be farre off yet are they true and most assured Thou hast brought to ruine the palaces of tyrants and therefore shall the afflicted magnifie thee and the City of tyrannicall Nations shall fear thee Thou hast been O Lord a strong defence to the poor a sure place of refuge to the afflicted in the time of his anguish This no doubt dear Brethren shall one day be the song of Gods Elect within the Realm of England after that God hath poured forth his vengeance upon these disobedient and blood-thirsty tyrants which now triumpheth in all abominations and therefore yet again beloved in the Lord Abide patiently the Lords deliverance avoyding and flying such offences as may separate and divide you from the blessed felloâ—ship of the Lord Jesus at his second comming Watch and pray resist the â—ivell and row against this vehement tempest and shortly shall the Lord come to the comfort of your hearts which now are oppressed with anguish and care but then shall ye so rejoyce that through gladnesse you shall say Behold this our God we have waited upon him and he hath saved us This is our Lord we have long thirsted for his comming now shall we rejoyce and be glad in his salvation Amen The great Bishop of our souls Jesus our Lord so strengthen and assist your troubled hearts with the mighty comfort of his Holy Ghost that earthly tyrants nor worldly torments have no power to drive you from the hope and expectation of that Kingdom which for the Elect was prepared from the beginning by our heavenly Father to whom be all praise and honour now and ever Amen Remember me dear Brethren in your daily prayers The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all Amen Yours with sorrowfull heart JOHN KNOX The Copie of A LETTER Delivered To Queen Mary Regent OF SCOTLAND FROM IOHN KNOX Minister of Gods Word in the yeer of our Lord 1556. and thereafter augmented and explained by the Author in the yeer of our Lord 1558. To the most Excellent Princesse MARY DOVVAGER Regent of Scotland MADAME THE cause which moved me to present this my Supplication unto your Majestie enlarged and in some places explained being in the Realm of Scotland in the Moneth of May 1556. I caused to be presented to your Majesty is the incredible rage of such as beare the Title of Bishops who against all justice and equitie have pronounced against me a most cruell sentence condemning my Bodie to Fire my Soul to Damnation and all Doctrine taught by me to be false deceivable and Hereticall If this injury did tend to me alone having the testimony of a good conscience with silence I could passe the matter being assured that such as they curse and expell their Synagogues for such causes shall God blesse and Christ Jesus receive in his eternall societie But considering that this their blasphemy is vomited forth against the eternall Truth of Christs Evangell whereof it hath pleased the great mercy of God to make me a Minister I cannot cease to notifie as well to your Majestie as to them That so little am I afraid of their Tyrannicall and surmised sentence that in place of the Picture if God impede not my purpose they shall have the Body to justice that Doctrine which they Members of Satan blasphemously do condemne Advertising your Majestie in the mean time That from them their sentence and tyrannie and from all those that lift to maintain them in the same I do appeal to a lawfull and generall Councel beseeching your Majesty to take in good part that I call you for witnesse that I have required the libertie of
the matter shall come to triall it shall be easily seen for whom the most godly and most ancient Councels shall most plainly speak I will prove by a Councell That of more authority is the sentence of one man founded upon the simple Truth of God then is the determination of the whole Councell without the assurance of the Word But that all their determinations which we oppugne are not onely maintained without an assurance of Scriptures but also are established against the truth of the same yea and for the most part against the Decrees of the former Councels I offer my self evidently to prove But now to the rest of the former Letter Letter AN Oratour and Gods Messenger also might justly require of you now by Gods hand promoted to high dignity A motherly pitie upon your subjects A justice inflexible to be used against murtherers and common oppressours A heart void of avarice and partiality A minde studious and carefull for maintenance of that Realm and Common-wealth above whom God hath placed you and by it hath made you honourable with the rest of vertues which not onely Gods Scriptures but also Writers illuminated onely with the light of Nature require in Gods Rulers But vain it is to crave reformation of manners where Religion is corrupted for like as a man cannot do the office of a man till first he have a beeing and life so to work works pleasant in the sight of God the Father can no man do without the Spirit of Iesus Christ which doth not abide in the hearts of Idolaters And therefore the most godly Princes Jâ—siah Hezekiah and Jehosaphat seeking Gods favour to rest upon them and upon their people before all things began to reform the Religion for it is as the stomack within the body which if it be corrupted of necessitie it infecteth the whole body And therefore often I repeate that which to be done is most necessary if your Majestie pretend to reign with Christ Iesus Then it behoveth you to take care of his true Religion which this day within your Realm is so deformed that no part of Christs Ordinances remain in their first strength and originall puritie which I praise God to me is lesse difficile to prove then dangerous to speak And yet neither the one nor the other I fear partly because the love of eternall life quencheth the terrour of temporall death and partly because I would with Saint Paul wish my self accursed from Christ as touching earthly pleasure for the salvation of my brethren and illumination of your Majestie which thing Work and very deed and not bare writing shall witnesse and declare if I may purchase the liberty of tongue but fourty dayes onely Additon THe wise and facund Democritus had sometimes a familiar sentence that Honest it was to commend such works as were worthy of praise but to praise things that were wicked could not proceed but from a deceivable minde and Themistius a Philosopher of great fame seeing the Hall of Iovinian the Romane Emperour replenished with flatterers said Of their manners it may be espied that more they worship the Scepter and the purple then God signifying that they little regarded whether the Emperour were godly or ungodly so that they might retain themselves in favour with him Albeit that those were Ethnicks and neither had the knowledge of God as we pretend neither had given so plain a confession to declare themselves enemies to all iniquity as we have done by Baptisme and by our whole profession of Christianity yet do their words condemne no small number of us and chiefly such as be conversant with Princes for who in these miserable dayes judgeth himself to have offended albeit he praise allow and maintain whatsoever the Princes and upper powers devise yea although it bee to oppresse and to spoil the poor to pull from them their very skins and as the Prophet sayeth To break their bones and to cut them in pieces as flesh for the Caldron or Pot. Yet I say That the Princes shall not lack Judges to cry It is right It is for the Common-wealth for the defence of the Realm and ease of the Subjects so that the state of times is even now such as when the Prophet complained saying The Princes ask and the Judge is ready to give not his own but the life and blood of the poor How soon a great man hath spoken the corruption of his minde he hath his flatterers ready to applaud and confirm whatsoever he speaketh And let the Princes be of what Religion they please that is all one to the most part of men so that with abnegation of God of his honour and Religion they may retain the friendship of the Court But alas how miserable be Princes that so are abused and how contageous a pestilence be such flatterers to Common-Wealths Empires and Realms God hath declared even from the beginning to paint out the mischief which from them proceedeth to such as give ear unto them The ancient Writers compare them to Harlots to Ravens and to most ravenous Beasts and not without cause For as Harlots can never abide that their lovers should return to repentance and sobernesse of minde so cannot flatterers sustain that such as they deceive shall come to right judgement And as Ravens pike out the eyes of dead carions and as ravenous Beasts devour the same so do flatterers being more cruell pike at the eyes of living men and blinding the eyes of their understanding and judgement do expose them to be devoured in body and soul to Satan This we have by prophane Writers onely but the holy Spirit teacheth us this infallible Trueth That where iniquitie reigneth in a Common-wealth and none is found boldly and openly to reprehend the same that there shall sudden vengeance and destruction follow For thus it is written and pronounced by the Prophet Ezekiel Shalt thou not judge the Citie of blood which hath made Idols Whose Rulers shed blood to the uttermost of their power They have despised my holy things they have devised iniquitie and have performed the same The conjuration of Prophets hath gathered up the riches and whatsoever is precious within the same The Priests violently have torn and rent my Law The people of the Land hath wrought deceitfully They have oppressed the poor and have done violence to the stranger without judgement and I have sought of them a man to repair the hedge and to stand in the gap before me but I have found none Therefore have I poured forth my wrath upon them and in the fire of my hote displeasure I have consumed them Advert Madam for these are not the words of mortall man but of the eternall God and were not spoken against Ierusalem onely but against every Realm and Nation that so offendeth The sins that here be named are Idolatry in all avarice and crueltie in the Princes and Rulers conjuration of
the same did cut it and cast it into the fire notwithstanding that some of the Princes I think not all made request in the contrary But the Prophet was charged by God to write again and to say to Iehoiakim Thus saith the Lord Thou hast burnt this Book saying Why hast thou written in it according to this sentence Assuredly the King of Babylon shall come and shall destroy this land and shall make it void of men and beasts Therefore thus saith the Lord of Jehoiakim the King There shall not be one left alive to sit in the Seat of David Their carkases shall be cast to the heat of the day and to the frost of the night whereby the Prophet did signifie the most vile death and most cruell torment and I shall visite the iniquity of himself and of his seed and servants And I shall bring upon them and upon the inhabitants of Ierusalem and upon all Iudah all the calamities which I have spoken against them Albeit they would not hear This is not written Madame for that time onely but to assure us That the like punishment abideth the like contemners of what state condition or degree that ever they be I did write unto you before having testimony of a good conscience That I did it in the fear of my God and by the motion of his holy Spirit for the request of the faithfull brethren in things lawfull and appertaining to Gods glory I cannot but judge to be the voice of the holy Ghost But how ye did accept the same my former writing I do not otherwise then by conjectures understand whether ye did reade it to the end or not I am uncertain One thing I know That ye did deliver it to one of your Prelats saying My Lord Will ye reade a Pasquill As charity perswadeth me to interpret things doubtfully spoken in the best sense so my duty to God who hath commanded me to flatter no Prince on the earth compelleth me to say That if no more ye esteem the Admonition of God then the Cardinalls do the scoffing of Pasquills that then he shall shortly send you messengers with whom ye shall not be able on that manner to jest If my person be considered I grant my thâ—eatnings are no more to be feared then be the merry sports which fearfull men do father upon Pisquillus in Rome But Madame if ye shall deeply consider That GOD useth men yea and most commonly those that be of lowest degree and most abject before the world to be his Messengers and Ambassadours not onely to notifie his will to the simple but also to rebuke the most proud Tyrants and potent Princes then will ye not judge the liquor by the outward appearance and nature of the vessell For ye are not ignorant That the most noble Wine is inclosed within the Tun made of Fraile wood and that the precious oyntment is often kept within the pot made of Clay If further ye shall consider that God will do nothing touching the punishment of Realms and Nations which he will not reveale to his servants the Prophets whose tongues he will compell to speak somtimes contrary to the appetites and desires of their own hearts and whose words he will perform be they never so unapparent to the judgement of men If these ye do deeply weigh then will ye fear the thing which presently is not seen Elias was but a man as Saint Iames doth witnesse like to his Brethren and yet at his prayer was Achab the Idolater and all Israel with him punished three yeares and six moneths God shutting up the heaven that neither rain nor dew fell upon the earth the space afore written And in the end God so wrought by him that Baals Priests were first confounded and after justly punished And albeit that Iesabel sought his blood and by oath had determined his death yet as she was frustrate of her intent so could she not keep her own bones from the dogs which punishment the Prophet God so ruling his tongue had before appointed to that wicked woman Albeit Madam that the Messengers of God are not sent this day with visible miracles because they teach none other doctrine then that which is confirmed with miracles from the beginning of the world yet will not he who hath promised to take charge over his poor and little flock to the end suffer the contempt of their Embassage escape punishment and vengeance For the truth it self hath said He that heareth you heareth me and he that contemneth you contemneth me I did not speak unto you Madam by my former letter neither yet do I now as Pasquillus doth to the Pope and his carnall Cardinals in the behalf of such as dare not utter their names but I come in the name of Christ Jesus affirming that the Religion which ye maintain is damnable Idolatry the which I offer my self to prove by the most evident testimony of Gods Scriptures And in this quarrell I present my self against all the Papists in the Realm desiring none other Armour but Gods holy Word and the liberty of my tongue God move your heart to understand my Petition to know the truth and unfeinedly to follow the same Amen REVEL JOH 21. I am the beginning and the end I will give to him that is a thirst of the well of the water of life freely He that overcommeth shall inherit all things and I will be his God and he shall be my son But the fearfull and unbelceving and the abominable and murderers and whoremongers and sorcerers and idolaters and all lyers shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone which is the second death JOHN KNOX THE SERVANT OF JESUS CHRIST In preaching of his Holy Evangell To the benevolent Reader desireth grace and peace with the spirit of righteous judgement WOnder not Christian Reader that all my studie and travell within the Scriptures of God these twenty yeers I have set forth nothing in expounding any portion of Scripture except this onely rude and indigested Sermon preached by me in the publike audience of the Church of Edinburgh the nineteenth day of August Anno 1565. That I did not in writing communicate my judgement upon the Scriptures I have ever thought my self to have most just reason for considering my self rather called of my God to instruct the ignorant comfort the sorrowfull confirm the weak and rebuke the proud by tongue and lively voyce in these most corrupt dayes then to compose Books for the age to come seeing that so much is written and by men of most singular erudition and yet so little well observed I decreed to contain my self within the bounds of that Vocation whereunto I found my self especially called I dare not deny lest that in so doing I should be injurious to the Giver but that God hath revealed unto me secrets unknown to the world and also that he hath made my tongue a Trumpet to forewarn
of the flesh or the pride of life Now seeing that these are not of the Father but of the world how can it be that our souls can feed upon chastitie temperance and humility so long as that our stomacks are replenished with the corruption of these vices Now so it is that willingly flesh can never refuse these forenamed but rather still delighteth it self in every one of them yea in them all as the examples are but too evident It behoveth therefore that God himself shall violently pull his children from these venemous breasts that when they lack the liquor and poyson of the one they may visite him and learn to be nourished of him Oh if the eyes of worldly Princes should be opened that they might see with what humour and liquor their souls are fed while that their whole delight consisteth in pride ambition and lusts of the stinking flesh We understand then how God doth visite men as well by his severe judgements as by his mercifull visitation of deliverance from trouble or by bringing trouble upon his chosen for their humiliation And now it resteth to understand how man visiteth God Man doth visite God when he appeareth in his presence be it to the hearing of his Word or to the participation of his Sacraments as the people of Israel besides the observation of their Sabbaths and daily oblations were commanded thrice a yeer to present themselves before the presence of the Tabernacle and as we do and as often as we present our selves to the hearing of the Word for there is the footstool yea there is the face and throne of God himself wheresoever the Gospel of Jesus Christ is truely Preached and his Sacraments rightly ministred But men may on this sort visite God hypocritically for they may come for the fashion they may hear with deaf ears yea they may understand and yet never determine with themselves to obey that which God requireth And let such men be assured That he who searcheth the secrets of hearts will be avenged of all such For nothing can be to God more odious then to mock him in his own presence Let every man therefore examine himself with what minde and what purpose he cometh to hear the Word of God yea with what ear he heareth it and what testimony his heart giveth unto him when that God commandeth vertue and forbiddeth impiety Repinest thou when God requireth obedience Thou hearest to thine own condemnation Mockest thou at Gods threatnings Thou shalt feel the weight and truth of them albeit too late when flesh and blood cannot deliver thee from his hand But the visitation whereof our Prophet speaketh is onely proper to the sons of God who in the time when God taketh from them the pleasures of the world or sheweth his angry countenance unto them have their recourse unto him and confessing their former negligence with troubled hearts cry for his mercy This visitation is not proper to all afflicted but appertaineth onely to Gods children For the reprobates can never have accesse to Gods mercy in time of their tribulation and that because they abuse as well his long patience as the manifold benefits they receive from his hands For as the same Prophet heretofore saith Let the wicked obtain mercy yet shall he never learn wisdome but in the land of righteousnesse that is Where the very knowledge of God aboundeth he will do wickedly which is a crime above all others abominable for to what end is it that God erecteth his Throne among us but that we should fear him Why doth he reaveal his holy will unto us but that we should obey it Why doth he deliver us from trouble but that we should be witnesses unto the world that he is gracious and mercifull Now when that men hearing their duty and knowing what God requireth of them do malapertly fight against all equity and justice what I pray you do they else but make manifest warre against God yea when they have received from God such deliverance that they cannot deny but that God himself hath in his great mercy visited them and yet that they continue wicked as before what deserve they but effectually to bee given over unto a reprobate sense that headlong they may runne to ruine both of body and soul It is almost incredible that a man should be so enraged against God that neither his plagues nor yet his mercy shewed should move them to repentance but because the Scriptures beareth witnesse of the one and the other let us cease to marvell and let us firmly beleeve that such things as have beene are even presently before our eyes albeit many blinded by affection cannot see them Ahab as in the book of the Kings it is written received many notable benefits of the hand of God who did visit him in divers sorts sometimes by his plagues sometimes by his word and sometimes by his mercifull deliverance He made him king and for the Idolatry used by him and his wife he plagued whole Israel by Famine He revealed to him his Will and true Religion by the Prophet Elijah he gave unto him sundry deliverances but one most speciall when proud Benhadad came to besiege Samaria and was not content to receive Ahabs gold silver sons daughters and wives but also required that his servants should have at their pleasure whatsoever was delectable in Samaria True it is that his Elders and people willed him not to hear the proud Tyrant But who made unto him the promise of deliverance and who appointed and put his Army in order who assured him of victory The Prophet of God onely who assured him That by the servants of the Princes of the Provinces who in number were onely two hundred thirty and two hee should deface that great Army in the which there were two and thirty Kings with all their Forces and as the Prophet of God promised so it came to passe victory was obtained not once onely but twice and that by the mercifull visitation of the Lord. But how did Ahab visite God again for his great benefit received Did he remove his Idolatry did he correct his Idolatrous wife Iezabel No we finde no such thing but the one and the other wee finde to have continued and increased in former impiety But what was the end hereof The last visitation of God was That dogs licked the blood of the one and did eate the flesh of the other In few words then wee understand what difference there is betwixt the visitation of God upon the Reprobate and his visitation upon his Chosen the Reprobate are visited but never truly humbled nor yet amended the Chosen being visited they sob and they cry unto God for mercy which obtained they magnifie Gods Name and after declare the fruits of repentance Let us therefore that hear these judgements of our God call for the assistance of his holy Spirit that howsoever it pleaseth him to visit us that we may stoop under his mercifull hands and
because their Gownes were Red. In this fourteenth age did flourish the great Scholastick Iohannes called Scotus from his Nation and Duns from the place of his Birth for he was born in the Town of Duns in the Mers he was a great Opposer of Thomas of Aquin his Doctrine his Sectaries were called Scotists his Epitaph was thus Scotia me genuit Anglia suscepit Gallia edocuit Germania tenet In the beginning of the fifteenth age there was a great Schisme in the Romish Church Pope against Pope yea sometimes there were three Popes at one time fighting one against another and excommunicating one another this Schisme lasted about thirty yeers and by the Councell of Constance Martin the fift was made Pope and the rest defeated There was one Iohn Fogo a Monke of Milros who in Scotland defended the Election of Martin by the Councell against Benedict alias Peter de Lune During this forenamed Schisme many taking occasion of the opennesse of the times began boldly and freely to speak against the bad Doctrine Government and Lives of the Church-men and that not only in private discourse but they also preached it publikely as Iohn Wickliffe in England Iohn Hus and Ierome of Prague in Bohemia who spoke before the people freely of the Tyrannie of the Government of the Clergie the corruption of their Doctrine and wickednesse of their lives In those dayes also there were some in Scotland who feared not to make known to the people the Truth of God as namely Iames Resby and Paul Craw among others who suffered Martyrdom for the Truth About this time the Carthusians were brought from England into Scotland and had built unto them a Monasterie at Perth In this Age the Universitie of Saint Andrews was set up chiefly by the means of Henry Wardlaw Bishop of the place that in some kinde the Schools of Learning might not bee altogether wanting which formerly had flourished for so long a time among the Culdees and of later yeers had quite decayed this good did Wardlaw As his Predecessor William Trail had built the Castle of the same City So his Successour Iames Kenedy built the old Colledge likewise called Saint Salvator his Colledge Patrick Grahame that came after him was the man that brought into Scotland the Title of Primate Metropolitane and Archbishop by Bull of Sextus quartus From the first Preaching of the Gospel till Palladius the Church of Scotland was happy without Bishops From Palladius to King Malcolme his days the Bishops had no distinct Diocesses or Parishes from King Malcolme till Patricke Grahame they were without Archbishops this Title and higher rank of Authoritie did not succeed well with Grahame for the other Bishops could suffer no Superiour under the Pope namely so neer them hitherto having rejected all the pretentions of the Archbishop of York The inferior Clergie also were afraid of the increase of the Authority of the Man whom they conceived austere and rigid and so by the Faction of the corrupt Court and disordered Clergy poor Grahame lost the Title he had procured with the Benefice and one Shevez got his spoyl and what a sweet Bird Shevez was the Stories of that time doe sufficiently manifest Robert Blacater seeing the Bishop of Saint Andrews now a Metropolitane and Archbishop obtains from Alexander the sixt a Bull whereby he is made Archbishop also and hee had under him the Bishops of Galloway Argyle and Isles which new dignitie angred the Archbishop of Saint Andrews above the losse of his Vassals for to have a Companion in equall dignity set up beside him was hard but he must digest the Pill since the Pope will have it so Lastly David Beaton brought in the Title of Cardinall into Scotland who hath beene the onely man that hath born that Title in this Countrey and how it did speed with him the following Historie will tell you As in the beginning of the fifteenth age the Schisme for the Papacie opened thorow Christendom many mens mouthes and busied their Pennes to set forth the corruption of the Church and the Vices of the Clergie even so in the beginning of the sixteenth age those that fought for the Bishoprick of Saint Andrews by their dissention gave occasion to many in Scotland to speak in publike and private of the corruption of Church-mens Lives Government and Doctrine in Scotland which coming to the Popes ears presently he sent unto the King Iames the fourth a Sword with the Title of Protector of the Faith as if all Christian Princes were not in dutie bound to protect the Faith in Christ but the Faith whiâ—h the Pope would have the King to protect was his erroneous Doctrine and Tyrannicall Authoritie Some few yeers after this Henry the eighth was declared by the Pope Defender of the Faith and had the Sword likewise Iames the 4 of Scotland being dead now by the corrupt Courtiers the yong inconsiderate King Iames was made beleeve That the conferring of this new Title by the Pope did bring unto him a great preheminence yea the Court Sycophants did not stick to call it A new Royaltie when in effect it was nothing else but a new note of his Vasâ—allage to Rome and by the accepting of the Sword he did engage himself to make warre for Rome and so he did indeed for sundry men after this during his short Reign were persecuted and suffered death for the Truth of Christ. This is the second remarkable Badge of slavery put upon our Princes by the Pope the former was their Anointing by him as wee have seen before Here be pleased with me to remark That of all the Bishops of Scotland before the Reformation namely since they were made Lords of certain places and had particular Diocesses you cannot finde one who had any care of the true Charge of Pastor for their whole studie was to raise their power and to encrease their means for the upholding of their power and to effectuate this more easily and fully they kept both Prince and people in dark ignorance of Gods Will and Word But because they must seem to do somwhat for the name sake of Bishops they caused to build walls of Temples and Chappels set up images and pictures richly dressed to content the eyes and brought into the Church Instruments of Musick and artificiall Singing with great skill to content the ear Also they brought in sweet perfume and incense for the smell so the most subtill senses were thus satisfied And to make a shew to keep under the senses which are more grosse there must be some kinde of Fasting enjoyned to the people and chastenesse to the Church-men But how and to what purpose these two last have been kept all men know But kept or not all is one all these Ordinances which the Bishops set up for Religion have been discovered by Gods mercy to be not onely without Warant in Gods Word but plainly contrary to the same Of all the Bishops of Scotland in time of Reformation there was
onely one or two who embraced the Truth all the rest were either professed persecutors of Gods Children and open enemies of the Truth or else they were given altogether so to satisfie their bellies and lusts that they had no care of Religion witnesse George Creichton in the name of all the rest Bishop of Dunkell who confessed truly That he had lived a long time Bishop and never knew any thing of the Old or New Testament Impietie Ignorance and Wickednesse came to such height among the Church-men of all ranks degrees and professions that God being after so long patience in a manner vexed with them did stirre up the people to chase them from the service of his House and to put others in their places as you will see in this following Historie whereunto I referre you And I shall close up this discourse with one or two passages worthy to be known whereby you may see the learning of the Church-Doctors in those dayes and how they did imploy the knowledge they had to abuse the poor people The first Passage is this One Richard Marshall Prior of the Blackefriers at Newcastle in England preached in Saint Andrews That the Pater-noster should be said to God onely and not to the Saints The Doctors of Saint Andrews offended at it made a Gray frier called Tottis preach against Marshall his Tenet which hee did thus taking his Text out of the fift of Saint Matthew Blessed are the poore in spirit Seeing we say Good day Father to any old man in the Street we may call a Saint Pater who is older then any alive And seeing they are in Heaven we may say to any of them Our Father which art in heaven And seeing they are holy we may say to any of them Hallowed be thy name And since they are in the Kingdom of Heaven we may say Thy kingdom come And seeing their will is Gods Will we may say to any of them Thy will be done But when the Gray Fryer preaching came to the fourth Petition Give us this day our dayly bread he was hissed at and so was constrained not onely to leave off Preaching but also to leave the City for shame Yet among the Doctors then assembled the Dispute continued about the Pater for some would have it said to God formaliter and to the Saints materialiter others to God principaliter to the Saints minus principaliter others primariò to God secundariò to the Saints others would have it said to God taking it strictè and to the Saints taking it latè Notwithstanding all these Distinctions the Doctors could not agree upon the businesse A fellow called Tom servant to the Sub-Prior of Saint Andrews one day perceiving his Master much troubled with some businesse and as he conceived weighty said to him Sir what is the matter of this your trouble The Master answered We cannot agree about the saying of the Pater The fellow replied To whom should it be said but to God alone The Master answers again What shall we do then with the Saints The fellow duplies Give them Ave's and Credo's enough that may suffice them and too well too If this was good Divinity God knows The second passage likewise is very well worth the knowing and to this purpose very fit which fell out about the same time with the former that is about the first beginning of the Reformation A little before the death of George Wischard there came home from Rome a fellow charged with very many holy Reliques and new things of great vertue as he gave out but the things were not to be had nor any benefit by the sight or touching of them without moneys Now upon a holy day in a village neer Hadington this Romish Pedler did open his pack to try if he could vent any of his Wares among the Countrey people Among other commodities the good Merchant did shew unto the people there was a Bell of much value by reason of its great vertue which he gave out to be this That if any two parties had any difference which could not be otherwise decided but by Oath the truth of the Oath was to be made known by this Bell for said he when any one sweareth laying his hand on this Bell if he swear true he shall after the Oath sworn remove his hand easily from from the Bell without any change to the Bell But if he that sweareth having his hand upon the Bell sweareth falsly his hand will stick to the Bell and the Bell will rive asunder Now we must tell you That already there was a rift in the Bell which this Romipete did affirm had happened by a false Oath of one that had sworn having his hand upon the Bell. At this tale the poor simple people were astonished and fell in admiration But among them was one Fermer who had some light of the Truth of God he drawing neer the Romish Merchant desired to have the Bell in his hand to see it neerly This desire was granted unto him Then he takes the Bell and looks on it expressing great admiration at first but immediately thereafter he asked at the Romipete if he would suffer him to swear in presence of the company having his hand upon the Bell for he had minde to take an Oath upon a weighty businesse The man could not refuse him Then said the Farmer to the company Friends before I swear you see the rift that is already in the Bell and how big it is and that I have nothing upon my fingers to make them stick to the Bell. With this he sheweth them his hand open then laying his hand upon the Bell he did swear this I swear in the presence of the living God and before these good people That the Pope of Rome is Antichrist and that all the rabble of his Clergie Cardinalls Archbishops Bishops Priests Monks with the rest of the crew are Locusts come from hell to delude the people and to withdraw them from God Moreover I promise They will return to hell Incontinent he lifted up his hand from the Bell before them all and said See friends that I have lifted up my hand freely from the Bell and look unto the rift in the Bell it is one and the same without change this sheweth according to the saying of this Merchant That I have sworn truth Then this poor fellow went away and never was more seen in Scotland nor any other of his kinde who brought Reliques or other like toyes from Rome Many more of this kinde might be alleadged but let these suffice to demonstrate the miserable ignorance from which God in his mercy hath delivered us To whom be praise and glory for this and all other benefits With this I end the Preface that you may come to the History it self 1553. PAtrick Hamilton was three and twenty yeers of Age when he suffered After his death his brother German Iames Hamilton of Levinston was accused likewise but the King did cause to convey him