of Ceremonies among the Iews as would have made it forgot that it was ever made for man. The thinking sort of men found that tho the Principles of those Divines did not like the Jesuits make Calumny no mortal Sin that yet as the Adherents to Presbytery did calumniate the Constitution of the Church of England for bordring on Popery and the Royal Martyr for being a Fautor to it so they did by their Censorious tempers transfuse such an acid humour among the people that very much loosned the Nerves of the English good nature and distorted the English hospitality and therefore 't is but by a natural instinct that that old Pharisaical Leven is now so nauseous that probably any one suspected of an inclination to replant the old Presbytery here and its Arbitrary Power to excommunicate would too be staked down to a narrower tedder in Conversation and be it as it were excommunicated from Gentlemens Company as much as Make-bates or common Informers upon Penal Statutes The people heretofore found out that as Popery endangers men by the Priests not intending to make the Sacrament of the Eucharist when he administers it So that these as I said intended it should not be at all administred but to their own Sect and that the gesture of sitting at the Communion that they invited men to and thereby to their being rescued from the Popish Posture of Kneeling was but a sort of Sham in its way for that kneeling was the gesture used in the ancient times of the Church and the first that was ever observ'd to sit then was the Pope to express his State. The observing sort of Men then judged that as Sibthorpe and Manwaring had been exploded for going beyond their Credentials from Heaven as God's Ambassadors in straining the Prerogative of Princes these deserv'd to be so too for scruing the Power of Parliaments above Law and for thrusting down the King into the Class of The Three Estates and that as Sibthorpe was exposed to severe Animadversions from the Age for his Sermon of Apostolic Obedience shewing the Duty of Subjects to pay Tribute and Taxes to their Princes c. And p. 21. of that Sermon applying the words of Curse ye Meroz yea curse them bitterly c. to the promoting his illegal purpose they deserved to be censur'd for going on too with the Alarm of Curse ye Meroz thousands of times over when the Subjects were slack in paying Tribute to one another to dethrone their Prince They saw that those Divines in trying to salve the Phaenomena of the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and the Covenant that they had taken were in the Course of their Theology continually put to it to deliberate of Rebellion and that their very deliberation of it was ipso facto one and a thing that included the horror of a mans deliberating to kill his Father and 't was but natural for the people representative and diffusive to fancy it lawful for them silently to resume the power given to those Church-men and abused by them who were always in the Pulpit and Press lowdly trumpeting forth the Iesuitical Notion of the lawfulness of the peoples resuming the Power given to Kings and as I shall never fear that the King of Spain will ever be able to take the World in a Ginne by Campanellas advise to him in Chap. 5. of the Spanish Monarchy to employ Divines to set up the Roar of unus Pastor and unum Ovile every where for the Pope so neither shall I that mens vociferating the Clause in the Covenant viz. That the Lord may be One and his Name One and in the three Kingdoms will ever again be able to embroyl them In short any one who shall consider that in Scotland Presbytery's former Kingdom of Darkness the people have been so of late illuminated as to find the way to be Latitudinarians need never have any fears and jealousies of that Governments jus Divinum again Marching hither In the first Session of the second Parliament of this King at Edenburgh November the 16th 1669. There passed an Act wherein 't was declared That his Majesty hath the Supreme Authority over all Persons and in all Causes Ecclesiastical within this his Kingdom and that by vertue thereof the ordering and disposal of the external Government and Policy of the Church doth properly belong to his Majesty and his Successors as an Inherent Right to the Crown and that his Majesty and his Successors may settle Enact and Emit such Constitutions Acts and Orders concerning the Administration of the External Government of the Church and the Persons employed in the same and concerning all Ecclesiastical meeting and matters to be proposed and determined therein as they in their Royal Wisdom shall think fit c. And his Majesty with Advise and Consent aforesaid doth rescind and annual all Laws Acts and Clauses thereof and all Customs and Constitutions Civil or Ecclesiastick which are contrary to or inconsistent with his Majesties Supremacy as it is here asserted and declares the same void and null in all times coming This Act of Parliament is the more observable for that it declared the extent of the Regal Power in Ecclesiasticks after that in the Year 1663 An Act passed there for a National Synod under the Government of Bishops and for that Presbytery which was before like Hame the only body in Nature that doth not content it self to take in any other body but would either overcome and turn another body into it self as by victory or it self to dye and go out was then grown so amenable to the Course of Nature in all other bodies of which one is a glue to another that not satisfied with its own former consistence it did as suddenly and easily and quietly receive in the body of Episcopacy as I may say as Air takes in light and as readily as Metals themselves receive in strong waters and then it was that Episcopacy which in the Forms of Church Government seems by its weight as Gold among Metals and indeed all bodies to be the most close and solid did there greedily drink in the Quicksilver of Presbytery But tho Presbytery then was and now is considerable in the Internal part of the Government of the Church of Scotland and is likely so to be till Christ's second coming humanly speaking with a non obstante to any thing that time can cause and will be preserved in perpetuity by the means of what my Lord Bacon calls the drowning of Metals namely when the baser Metal is incorporated with the more rich as Silver with Gold yet so willing were they in Scotland to give to Caesar the real Supremacy that was Caesars that knowing the Protestant Religion can be no more there destroyed under any external form of Church Polity then as I said Gold can be destroyed in Nature they thought it more prudent to trust the Crown with a Power of melting down that on emergent occasions and altering the Superscription of its
But if this Question of Toleration had not here been at the end of its Race and if no such thing had happened as the Declaration of Indulgence and Dissenters thereby manumitted from Penal Laws saying Soul take thy ease and presently Acting the Part of felo de se by effecting the Cancelling of that Declaration and if the Controversy were now to begin to start forward I account it would cause but a very short fermentation among us For no Books need be writ to prove the lawfulness of what an Act of Parliament hath permitted to every private Family and to a certain number of other persons to participate therein with them And if Dissentership would now call for more Toleration it s very being called on to name its Tenets in order â—o the security of the Government in granting it to more persons to assemble together in enjoying it it s very naming them would I believe soon perimere litem in the Case and some of its Tenets would perhaps appear too little and others too great to require the formality of Debate It is even ridiculous to suppose that any Iesuites and Dissenters would now dare to demand Toleration for the Principles of the Crown-Divinity of each mentioned in the Oxford Censure None of them would now dare to be Confessors of Religionary Principles that would make Kings Martyrs And as I think that the Pope needed not crave Aid from his Vatican nor the Oxford-Convocation from their Bodleian Library to confute monstrous Tenets Condemned by either for in this Case according to the words of Tertullian advers Valent. Demonstrare solummodo destruere est so I likewise think that both Popish and Protestant Recusants will be ashamed to crave Aid of Toleration from the Magistracy for Principles they are ashamed to own or indeed for any but what they shall first own and the rather when our Protestants shall recollect with what vigorous Expedition the great Owners of that Name in Germany published their Religionary Confessions as Alsted tells us in his Chronâ—logia testium veritatis where he makes mention of the Augustan Confession tendred to Charles the 5th and the States of the Empire in the year 1530 and of the Confessio Suevica in the same year and of the Confessio Basileensis in the next year and of the Confessio Helvetica in the year 1556 and of all the other great Protestant Confessions exhibited severally to the World before the year 1573. Such of our Dissenters therefore who have to this year 1684 made it their business to be Anti-Confessors by hiding many of the particularities of their Principles and giving the World cause perhaps to say Difficilius est invenâ—re quà m vincere and who yet assume the name of Protestancy will perhaps hardly think it possible for them to gain Toleration for their further being called by that Name without shewing the Title of their Principles to it As on the account of what I have said it would be a Persecution to the World for the most ingenious men to trouble it with Discourses of the lawfulness of Toleration so it would too be to trouble it with Discourses of the unlawfulness of denying Toleration to men who either deny their Principles or deny to give an account of them a duty that can plead as clear a jus Divinum for it self as any Form of Church Government and by Vertue of which Christians are to be ready always to give an answer to every man that asks them a reason of the hope that is in them with meekness and reverence There are some Principles to which it is by all agreed that 't is unlawful to give Toleration namely to those that disturb Civil Society nor would it appear otherwise than ridiculous to the hoodwink't sober Party of any Sect that when the Magistrates reprove them in those words of our Saviour yee worship yee know not what the Magistrates by tolerating them at that time should give cause to others to tell them yee tolerate yee know not what I have observed it in the Course of my reading that there is one great point of Religion on which the hinge of Loyalty doth very much turn that several Eminent Papists and Non-Conformists have not dared to speak their plain agreed sense of and as to which it may therefore seem very rational that they should and that is How far the Civil Laws of Princes or the Municipal Laws do bind the Conscience a Point that the Council of Trent could not be brought to Define and herein 't is obvious to consider that tho 't is on all hands granted that in any thing contrary to the Divine Law natural and positive those Laws do not bind the Conscience and that the jus Divinum of the Papacy Presbytery or Independency would not be caught with a why not on the holding the Question in the Affirmative that Humane Laws do bind the Conscience in things not contrary to the Law Divine yet are the Adherents to those Religionary Models conscious to themselves that in many particulars necessary to bring them into practice there must be a Sanction of thâ—m by Penal Municipal Laws and they hoping to have the Magistracy and its Power on their side and to Act in Concert with them according to that Saying of the Emperor to his Bishop Iungamus gladios and knowing that the Authority of the Magistrate to support both Religion and Loyalty and for the Custody of 〈◊〉 Tables hath as clear a jus Divinum as their Plat-forms can have and that therefore the Civil Power 〈◊〉 not let its jure-Divinity be taken too by any with a why not as it would be if the Question were held wholy in the Negative they have in their Writings been generaly obscure and short in that point and have hoped by their power and interest to keep the World from calling on them to explain But I have in my occasional Converse with some of the most learned of the Non-Conforming Clergy observed them in Discourse to speak out their minds plainly and Categorically enough that Humane Laws do not bind the Conscience and to account it an absurd thing to make any Penal Law bind the Conscience even in matters purely Civil and wherein there is no pretence of any things enjoyned concerning the Worship of God and yet where the things under Penalties enjoyned are of great importance to the State. The men of somewhat hot rather then distinguishing heads tho they know that Humane Laws are necessarily Penal and tho they believe that Oeconomics do best subsist by their Wives and Children and Servants being bound to observe those their lawful Commands by the Tye of Religion that they intended should be effectually obeyed have not considered that Politicks would likewise thereby be best preserved nor learned to distinguish the Penal Laws where the Magistrate intended to oblige the Subject in point of Fault and where only in point of the Penalty but our clear-headed and loyal hearted Sanderson who may
making a Ruffian of the Pope himself But indeed long before the Edition of that trifling Book many things had occurred so far to shake the testimony of the Witnesses as that it grew generally the Concordant voice of the Populace that on a supposal of several of the same Persons being again alive to be tryed on the Testimony of the same Witnesses before the same Judges it would not have prejudiced a hair of the heads that were destroyed by it and particularly in the unfortunate Lord Stafford's Case I have in two or three places of this Discourse speaking of the Papal Hierarchy called it Holy Church its old known term and by which I meant no reflection of scorn nor would I laugh at any Principle of Religion found among any Heterodox Religionaries that the dying groans of the holy Iesus purchased them a liberty to profess But 't is no Raillery to say that the Artifices of any dis-loyal Popish and Protestant Recusants that have so long made Templum Domini usurp on the Lord of the Temple and his Vice Gerents that is Kings and Princes will support no Church and that as it hath been observed of some Free Stones that when they are laid in a Building in that proper posture which they had naturally in their Quarries they grow very hard and durable and if that be changed they moulder away in a short time a long duration may likewise be predicted to the Arts and Principles of reason applied to support a Church as they lay in the Quarry of Nature and where the God of Nature laid them for the support of Princes and their People and è contrà In fine therefore since the Principles of the Church of England are thus laid in it as they were in that Quarry none need fear that they will be defaced by time or that a lawful Prince of any Religion here will accost it otherwise than with those words of the Royal Psalmist viz. Peace be within thy Walls and Prosperity within thy Palaces AN INDEX Of some of the Principal Matters Contained in the following DISCOURSE IN ALETTER TO THE Earl of ANGLESY HIS Lordship is vindicated from mis-reports of being a Papist and an account given of his Birth and Education and time spent in the University and Inns of Court and afterward in his Travels abroad Page 1 2 3. An account of his first eminent publick employment as Governor of Ulster by Authority under the Great Seal of England p. 4. An account of his successful Negotiation with the then Marquess of Ormond Lord Lieutenant of Ireland for the Surrender of Dublin and all other Garrisons under his Command into the Parliaments hands p. 5. An account of his being a Member of the House of Commons in England and of the great Figure he afterward made in the King's Restoration ib. Reflections on the Popular Envy against the Power of a Primier Ministre ib. and p. 6 7 8. Remarks on the Saying applied in a Speech of one of the House of Commons against the Earl of Strafford viz. That Beasts of Prey are to have no Law ib. Reflections on the rigour and injustice of the House of Commons in their Proceedings against the Earl of Strafford p 9. The Usurpers declared that tho they judged the Rebellion in Ireland almost national that it was not their intention to extirpate the whole Irish Nation p. 10. The Author owneth his having observed the Piety and Charity of several Papists p. 11. The Author supposeth that since all Religions have a Priesthood that some Priests were allowed by the Vsurpers to the transplanted Irish p. 13. An account of the Privileges the Papists enjoyed in Ireland before the beginning of the Rebellion there and of the favour they enjoyed in England before the Gun-powder Treason p. 14. Observations on the Pope's Decree March the 2d 1679. Condemning some opinions of the Jesuites and other Casuists in Pages 15 41 50 51 52 53 201. The great goodness of the Earl of Anglesy's nature observed and particularly his often running hazard to save those who were sinking in the favour of the Court p. 16. The Authors observation of the effects of the hot Statutes against Popery and Papists in Queen Elizabeth 's and King Iames his time shortly ceasing ib. The Authors Iudgment that a perfect hatred to Popery may consist with a perfect love to Papists p. 19. He expresseth his having no regret against any due relaxation of any Penal Laws against Popish Recusants p. 20. An account of the Earl of Anglesy and others of the Long Parliament crushing the Jure-Divinity of Presbytery in the Egg p. 29 30. The out-rage of the Scots Presbyterian Government observed p. 29 The People of England did hate and scorn its Yoke in the time of our late Civil Wars ib. Remarks concerning infamous Witnesses and their credibility after Pardon of Perjury or after Crimes and Infamy incurred p. 33 34 35. at large and p. 204 205. The incredibility of the things sworn in an Affidavit by such a Witness against his Lordship p. 35 36. The Principle in Guymenius p. 190. Ex tractatu de justitiâ jure censured viz. licitum est Clerico vel Religioso calumniatorem gravia crimina de se vel de suâ Religione spargere minantem occidere c. p. 37. Cardinal D' Ossats Letters very falsly and ridicâ—lously cited by an English Priest of the Church of Rome for relating that the Gunpowder Treason Plot was a sham of Cecils contrivance p 38. Father Parsons one of the greatest Men the Jesuites Order hath produced p. 40. D' Ossat in his Letters observed to have given a more perfect Scheme of the whole design to hinder King Iames his Succession then all other Writers have done ib. Observations on the Author of the Catholick Apology with a reply c speaking of his not believing that Doleman's Book of the Succession was writ by Father Parsons and that Parsons at his death denied that he was the Author of it and on Cardinal D' Ossat in his Letters averring that Parsons was Reverâ the Author of it and that Parsons made application to him in order to the defeating King James his Succession unless he would turn Catholick p. 41. D' Ossat's observing that Parsons in that Book doth often and grossly contradict himself ib. D' Ossat's commending our English Understandings for so soon receiving King Jame and so peaceably after the death of Queen Elizabeth ib. The Author grants that Papists may be sound parts of the State here as they are by Sir William Temple in his Book observed to be in Holland p. 44. The vanity of some Papists designing to raise their Interest by Calumny and Shamm ib. The Pope's said Decree of the 2d of March accuseth the Jesuites and other Casuists of making Calumny a Venial sin p. 45. The nature of a Venial sin explained ib. The Jesuites Moral Divinity patronizing Calumny is likely to be fatal to their Order p. 47. 49. The
formerly ib. The Author shews that none need be afraid of any Roman Catholick Prince who was formerly a Protestant from p. 174 to 177. Non-Conformist Divines not scrupling the lawfulness of what the Conformists do but were ashamed to confess their error p. 175. 'T is a shame for such Divines to censure the belief of Religionary Notions in a high born Prince p. 176. By the falsity of such Divines Principles as many hundreds of thousands were here stain as were bare hundreds put to death in the inglorious Reign of Queen Mary ib. A Confutation of one Argument brought for London's being desigâ—edly fired by many Popish Persons p. 181. The Author's Iudgment that the fermentation that hath been in the Kingdom will not prove destructive but perfective to it p. 183. The Author's Iudgment that all Policy Civil or Ecclesiastical will be accounted but Pedantry that Postpones the Consideration of the building Capital Ships and their Maintenance and Equipage p. 184. That Religion-Traders are really of the Trade of Beggars p. 184. More concerning the breaking of the Trade of Beggars and of Court-Beggars ib. The reason why our English Mininisters of State have not writ their Memoires as those of France have done p. 185. The Author of the present State of England observed to say in Part 2d that the yearly Charge of his Majesty's Navy in times of Peace is so well regulated that it scarce amounts to 70,000 l. per Annum p. 185. What the Lord Keeper Bridgman in his Speech to the Parliament in the year 1670 saith that from the year 1660 to the late Dutch War the ordinary Charge of the Fleet communibus annis came to 500,000 l. per Annum and that it cannot be supported with less ib. The Author believes that the ordinary Naval Charge hath in no years since amounted to less than 200,000 l. per Annum besides the vast Charge in building new Ships and rebuilding old and the Charge of Summer and Winter Guards and of Convoys and Ships against Argier p. 186. Since the year 1669 the King hath enriched the Kingdom with a more valuable Fleet than it had before ib. The manifold payments to the Vsurpers amounted to one entire Subsidy in each Week of the Year and what the Kingdom paid before exceeded not usually one Subsidy or 15 th in two or three years space ib. The nature of our old gentle way of Assessments called Subsidies ib. Instead of the demanding of 5 Members from the Parliament above 400 were forcibly secluded from it ib. Taxes afterward levied in the name of a House of Commons when there were no Knights of the Shire for 26 English and 11 Welch Counties and but one Knight of the Shire in other 9 Counties and only the full number of Knights of the Shire for 4 Counties and when York Westminister Bristol Canterbury Chester Exeter Oxford Lincoln Worcester Chichester Carlisle Rochester Wells Coventry had no Citizens and London 1 instead of 4 and Glocester and Salisbury alone had there full number and when by a parcel of about 89 permitted to fit the whole Clergy as well as Layety of England was taxed ib. and p. 187. The Vsurper by his own Authority only laid a Tax of 600,000 l. per Month on the Nation p. 187. He afterward had a giving Parliament that Calculating the Charge of the Nation found 400,000 l. per Annum necessary for the Navy and Ports and settled on him in all 1,300,000 l. per Annum ib. Their helping him into the Power to break the Balance of Christendom as he did hath entailed on the Nation for ever a necessity of labouring hard to support the publick Government ib. A Descant on the saying of Dulce bellum inexpertis from p. 187 to p. 189. A Calculation of the number of the People now living who are inexperts i. e. who are now alive that were born since the year in which our Wars ended or were then Children viz. of such years as not to have experienced or been sensible of the miseries and inconvenience of the War and a Calculation of what numbers of those who lived in 1641 are now dead and what proportion of those now living who lived in that time of the War did gain by the War and of the number of such inexperts in Ireland and Scotland p. 188 189 190. The Vsurpers seized into their hands about a Moiety of the Revenue of the Kingdom p. 190. 'T is observed that presently after the discovery of the Gun-Powder Treason the Parliament gave King James 3 Subsidies 7 Fifthteenths and 10 ths of the Layety and 4 Subsidies of the Clergy and what they amounted to The Author shews how just and natural it was for the Parliament believing that Plot so to do p. 191 194. An intimation of the reason of so much hatred in France against the Earl of Danby p. 192. The Authors belief that the future Warlike State of Christendom will necessarily prompt all Patriots instead of studying to make men unwilling to promote publick supplies to bend their Brains in the way of Calculation to shew what the Kingdom is able to contribute to its defence and how to do it with equality ib. The judgment of Sir W. P. that if a Million were to be raised in England what quota of the same should be raised on Land Cattle personal Estate housing ib. The Iudgment of the same Author cited for the second Conclusion in his Political Arithmetick viz. that some kind of Taxes and publick Levies may rather encrease than diminish the Common-wealth p. 193. An account of the exact Roman Prudence in the equality of Taxes under the Ministry of the Censors appearing from the Civil Law ib. The great care and exactness of the leading men in Queen Elizabeth's Parliaments to Calculate the Levies and to render the same equal ib. The disproportionate Taxes laid by the Vsurpers on the Associated Counties and others have caused the weight thereby to aggrieve many of those places ever since ib. Lilly the Astrologer complaining that whereas he was Taxed to pay about 20 s. to the Ship money he was in the year 1651 rated to pay about 20 l. annually to the Souldiery ib. The Author's belief and reason about Republican Models necessarily growing more and more out of fashion p. 194 195. Observations on the great Clause of proponentibus legatis in the Council of Trent p. 195. The preserving of orderly proportion in the Revenue of the Prince and the Priest and with respect to number weight and measure under the times of the Gospel agreed on by Divines to be referred to by Ezekiel in Vision from the 40th Chapter to the end of his Prophecy p. 196. How Augustus his great Tax or Pole helped to confirm the Christian Religion p. 197. The Author's opinion that future legal and equal Taxes will have the effect of strengthening the Protestant Religion ib. Observed that the Parliament may be justly said to be indebted to the Crown for that great
against Wars and Rumors of Naval Wars when we are dejected with the shame of our Civil Wars having occasioned the Neighbouring World to augment its Naval Force and consequently too our own vast perpetual Charge in the augmenting ours is that by the necessary encrease of our industry we are capable of defraying it and herein Providence is but just in treating us in the Confinement to our Island as the Dutch do Idlers sent to their Work-houses where care is taken that if they do not the Work appointed them the Sea will come in upon them and 't is well for us that accordingly as is shewn in the 8th Chapter of Sir W. P's Political Arithmetick there are spare hands enough among the King of England ' s Subjects to earn Two Millions per Annum more then they now do and there are employments ready proper and sufficient for that purpose His expression of the spare hands of the English minds me how we who did before our Commotion only pay to our Kings the 6 th part of the spareable part of our Estates for that was what Mr. Vaughan afterward Lord Chief Iustice declared in the House of Commons to be the proportion that men were to be taxed in the old gentle way of Assessments called Subsidies were forced upon those manifold payments to the Usurpers that amounted to one entire Subsidy in each Week of the Year when as what we payed before exceeded not usually one Subsidy or 15 th in two or three years space And afterward when instead of the demanding of Five Members from the Parliament above 400 were forcibly secluded from it most Exorbitant Taxes were Levyed in the Name of a House of Commons in which instead of 508 Members as the legal Complement of its number and of 78 Knights of Shires for England and 12 for Wales there were no Knights of the Shire at all sitting in that House for these 26 English and 11 Welch Counties following viz. Bedfordshire Cornwal Cambridgeshire Derbyshire Devonshire Dorsetshire Essex Glocestershire Hartfordshire Herefordshire Lincolnshire Lancashire Middlesex Monmouthshire Norfolk Northumberland Oxfordshire Surry Shropshire Southampton Suffolk Somersetshire Sussex Westmerland Warwickshire Yorkshire Anglesey Brecknock Cardiganshire Carmarthinshire Carnarvanshire Denbighshire Flintshire Glamorganshire Pembrokshire Montgomeryshire Radnorshire and but one Knight of the Shire in each of the 9 following Counties Berkshire Cheshire Huntingtonshire Kent Leicestershire Northamptonshire Staffordshire Wiltshire Worcestershire and only the full number of Knights of the Shire in Buckinghamshire Nottinghamshire Rutlandshire Merionethshire And York Westminster Bristol Canterbury Chester Exeter Oxford Lincoln Worcester Chichester Carlile Rochester Wells Coventry had no Citizens in the House and London had only 1 instead of 4 and Glocester and Salisbury alone of all the Cities in England had their full Number and by a parcel of about 89 permitted to sit was the whole Clergy as well as Layety of England Taxed Nor is it to be forgot that after the great Usurper by his own Authority only laid a Tax of 60,000 l. per Month on us he afterward found a giving Parliament that Calculating the Charge of the Nation judged it in the whole to amount to 1300,000 l. per Annum whereof 200,000 l. for the Protectors support 400,000 l. for the maintenance of the Navy and Ports and 700,000 l. for the Army as we are told out of the History of the Iron Age printed in the year 1656 and that they who grudged the best of Kings the ordinary yearly Revenue of less then half a Million were brought to settle more then double that Sum on the worst of Usurpers viz. 1,300,000 l. per Annum and that by their helping him into the Power to break the Ballance of Christendome as he did they have entailed on us and our Heirs a necessity of labouring hard for ever to expiate the Guilt and Folly of their idle Politicks The Plenty and Pride and Idleness here that occasioned our Civil Wars and the Tessera of one of the Roman Emperors Militemus and the various discriminating words and signs of Religion have brought us to the Tessera of another of them which will stick by us namely Laboremus But as 't is to be seen in Scobels Collection of Acts Anno 1656. cap. 6. in the humble Petition and advice of Cromwel's Parliament the 7th Paragraph which Enacts the Revenue mentions nothing in particular of the 1,300 000 l. yearly to be settled for the Protectors support but provides that as a constant yearly Revenue for the support of the Government and the safety and defence of these Nations by Sea and Land 1000000 l. be settled for the Navy and Army and 300,000 l. in general for the support of the Government I should not dilate on the Subject of those past Calamitous Times of our Country but that so great a Number of those who experimented them and were Actors or Sufferers therein is now dead that this Age wants the Poize or Ballast of their experiences to keep it steddy and secure from being overset by Waves of Sedition or Winds of Doctrine There are several Latine Sayings about War of which the Pedantly Citation is nauseous as was particularly Sorbiers valuing himself on the Motto of Pax bello Potior but there is another saying familiar to Grammar Schools whence the most Oracular Men in Cabinets of State may and indeed ought to take their Measures and Estimates of the probable Continuance of the publick Peace in any Country and that is from the Consideration of the Numbers of the Inhabitants that never felt the misery of War and that saying is Dulce bellum inexpertis a saying that was thought to give an Ornament to the Monumental Inscription of our Harry the 3 d among the Westminster Monuments the Epitaph of which Prince whose Reign moved so much in the bloody Track of War being there thus Tertius Henricus jacet his pietatis amicus Ecclesiam stravit istam quam post renovavit Reddat ei munus qui Regnat Trinus unus Tertius Henricus est Templi conditor hujus 1273 Dulce bellum inexpertis And long before that obtained as a Latin Adage it was one in Greek viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and it is well said in Vegetius De Re militari lib. 3. cap. 14. Nec confidas satis si tyro praelium cupit Inexpertis enim dulcis est pugna And in Pindar 't is said 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. dulce bellum inexpertis ast expertus quispiam horret si accesserit cordi supra modum the sense of this weighty Adage Horace applyes to the Contracting Friendship with Great Men Dulcis inexpertis cultura potentis amici Expertus metuit And no doubt but the reason that induced the Romans to place their Tyrones in the Van of the Battel was that their not knowing all the uncertainties and horrors of War would contribute to their eagerness in the onset Partly to this purpose Mr. Hobs in his Behemoth or History of our
heard you say that you have often wondered why none ever moved in the House of Lords that the Proceedings there against Arch-Bishop Laud might be took out of their Iournal as well as those against the Earl of Strafford were which was to me an Indication that you would have consented to such a Motion Mr. Fox in his Boâ—k of Martyrs in one Volume p. 1085. in the Story of the life and death of the Lord Cromwel who was Vice-Gerent to Harry the 8th for Ecclesiastical Affairs brings many instances of the cruel injustice by Acts of Attainder that many Great and Excellent Men suffered and hath these words in the Margent Examples of men falsly Accused and Iudged and â—aith in that p. Not that I here speak or mean against the High Courts of Parliament of this our Realm c. to whom I always attribute their due Reverence and Authority but as it happens sometimes in General Councils which tho they be never so general yet sometimes they may and do erre so they that say Princes and Parliaments may be misinformed sometimes by some Sinister Heads in matters Civil and Politick do not therein derogate or impair the High Estate of Parliaments but rather give wholesome Admonitions to Princes and Parliament Men to be more Circumspect and Vigilant what Council they shall admit and what Witnesses they do Credit This passage out of our pious Martyrologer makes me with a just Compassion to the Merits of several Illustrious Persons to call to mind the severity of the Votes of a Loyal Parliament against them It was with great precaution and solemnity that the Athenian Wisdom fastened the name of Enemy on any one and of which the frequent imposition and on slight occasions and on persons not known to have done any Act of Hostility to the Kingdom would make the word lose the Odium of its signification as many Words and Phrases have done and to import no more stated hatred or enmity in any man to his Country than do the expressions of Course put into Writs of Prohibition or Mandamuses to our Bishops and their Officials viz. Of intending our disherison or machinating against our Crown and Dignity mean any thing of Treason in them which yet the words so expresly import Tully tells us in his Offices that the Original use of the Word Hostis for one who was perduellis came from the lenity of the Romans hostis enim saith he apud majores nostros is dicebatur quem nunc peregrinum dicimus and according to this acception of the Word Enemy for Stranger I shall venture to say that I think they were Strangers to the Earl of Hallifax and persons misinform'd as Mr. Fox his Expression was who in the late Loyal House of Commons did think him to be hostis patriae and whom they who know him do know likewise to bear no Enmity to any part of the Creation of God and to be one that is so far from any inclination to injure his Country for his Prince that either or his Prince or his Country he would not injure the most abject Member of Mankind How shamefully void of sense have I observed some few querulous people here to be who have professed to doubt that a very honourable man hath of late remitted somewhat of his fervour in the defence of our Religion and Laws who hath so long on every occasion in every place been such an unwearied Agonist for both and one who would not fear to be an Athanasius contra mundum whenever he should in his Province be lawfully called to be its Antagonist and that with contempt too even of the Bribe of Popularity and of the continuance of whose confirm'd and obstinate habit of an Heroical Love to his Country they who have long known him have never doubted but have agreed in this point of his perseverance in what Tully calls the pietas in patriam to pronounce as the warier Arminians do concerning Grace viz. that there is a State of Grace attainable in this life from which it is difficult if not impossible to fall away With as little Art and faint Colours as I have here drawn the Picture of this Great Man any one will say it is very like the Earl of Radnor and the truth is considering that this same pietas in patriam and the inflexible observation of Justice have not been so much incarnate in the lives of later Christians as of ancient Heathens nor perhaps so legible in their Writings and therefore as if that Practice of Piety had been too among Pancirols Res deperditae Boccaline held it a proper Advertisement That all the Princes of the World should beseech Apollo that he would insert into their People the love of their Country when I would occasionally in discourse do Justice to this Great Exemplar of it I endeavour to whet my imagination with thoughts out of the Roman Authors and do think of Coâ—tumacy in Vertue according to Pliny's using that word in a good sense and of the inexplebilis virtutis veraeque laudis homo and of the forementioned sooner making Crimen honestum quam turpem Catonem and of the multa terribilia Piso Contemsit dum speciosum mentis suae flecti non vult rigorem and of what is in Valerius Maximus of Scipio Africanus quem Dii immortales nasci voluerunt ut esset in quo se virtus per omnes numeros hominibus efficaciter ostenderet and of Ciceros accounting the pietas in patriam to be the via ad Caelum Some here who Correspond with Sir W. I. asking me if I had not heard that you were prayed for at Mass in Ireland I told them I had and that the Earl of Essex mentioned the same in the House of Lords and that your Lordship replied that if any well meaning Papists in their Mass-house or Iews in their Synagogue or Mahumetans in their Mosc unask'd and unsought to pray'd for you you would be glad to be the better by their Devotion tho yet you believed that none of them did ever yet supplicate Heaven in your behalf I told my friends here that if that thing had been true and tho on the account of what hath been beforementioned I believed it not to be so in the least yet they would soon cease to infer thence that your Lordships love for the Protestant Religion was diminished if they would reflect on the Case of Rawlins White in the Acts and Monuments where it appears that the Bishop of Landaff in the Year 1555. just before he Condemned the said Rawlins to the Fire as an Heretick ordered a Priest to say a Mass for him and as that Bishop in vain Courting him a little before to abandon the Protestant Faith and then asking him how he dâ—d and how he found himself inclined the poor Captive replied Rawlins you lâ—ft me and Rawlins you find me and Rawlins I will continue that thus constant your Lordship will prove to your Religion and your self upon any
the least if the Oath were to be interpreted otherwise than in the Imposers sense and under this Conclusion it may be properly added that where that sense is sufficiently manifest in the words it is exactly to be stood to as Sanderson hath well shewed in his second Lecture of the aforesaid Subject and where having shewed how we must take heed that we impose not on the Oath we have taken or any part thereof other sense than that which any other Pious and Prudent Man and who being unconcerned in the Business is of a freer Iudgment may easily gather out of the Words themselves he saith That we become without question guilty of the heinous Crime of Perjury if that milder interpretation which encouraged us unto the Oath chance to deceive us And in his 6th Lecture § 7. he saith As it is one kind of Perjury to strain the words during the Act of Swearing unto another Sense than that wherein they are understood by the Auditors so it is another kind of Perjury having sworn honestly not to proceed sincerely but to decline and elude the strength of the Oath tho the words be preserved with some new forged inventions variously turning and dressing the words to cloak the guilt of their Consciencâ—s as Tacitus saith of some and he concludes that Section by saying That where the words of an Oath are so clear in themselves that among honest men there can be no quâ—stion of their meaning the Party swearing is obliged in that sense which they apparently afford and may not either in swearing or when he hath sworn stretch those words upon the last of his Interest by any studied interpretations There appeared nothing more detestable to the Eye of the old Civil Law then fraud and trick and particularly the destroying the true Sense and meaning of a Law by a cavilling fraudulent interpretation that retains the words but confounds the ends for which the Law was made and accordingly 't is said in the Digests In fraudem legis facit qui salvis verbis legis sententiam ejus circumvenit But this in the Case of an Oath was more abominated and accordingly Cicero tells us that Fraus adstringit non dissolvit perjurium And if the Civil Law was afterward so provident for the honour of Humane Nature as to determine in the Case of an unask'd free gift that Cum in arbitrio cujuscunque sit hoc facere quod instituit oportet eum vel minime ad hoc prosilire vel cum venire ad hoc properaverit non quibusdam excogitatis artibus suum propositum defraudare tantamque indevotionem quibusdam quasi legitimis velamentis prolegere any one may judge how much it abhorred any thing of fraud in the evading of the payment of a due subjection to Sovereign Power acknowledged by what the thinking Heathens term'd Sacramentum as if the most eminent or only thing emphatically Sacred and religiously to be observed I should not since the Extermination of the Iesuites Doctrine of Equivocating have thought it worth while so much to dilate on this plain Conclusion before the publishing a Pamphlet in our Metropolis in the Year 1680 called An Account of the New Sheriffs holding their Office made publick upon reason of CONSCIENCE respecting themselves and others in regard to the Act for Corporations and in which ACT tho the Lawgivers meaning of the Oath thereby imposed is most apparently manifest out of the Words yet the Author of that Casuistical Pamphlet makes it lawful to take the Oath and subscribe the Declaration and not in the literal strict Construction but in an imaginary sense topp'd upon the Lawgivers and that nothing but a vitiated fancy or injudicious mind could imagine I was sorry to hear that that Pamphlet was writ by a Non-Conformist Divine and that in a Conjuncture when the Magistrates of that City were so hot against the name of Popery any men should be so zealous for the Thing called Iesuitism and that any men by attempting to rivet Equivocation into their Model of Protestancy should at once endeavour to rob us of the Energy of the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and of the Test it self and to make the sacredness of all Oaths whatsoever to evaporate Let any sober Person of the Dissenters Party but seriously read that Pamphlet so scandalous to Protestancy and it cannot but give him the Alarm of coming out from among them for that he must do that would come out even from the Iesuitick Equivocation If there were not a Church of England Protestancy in that Loyal City I may without unjust reflection say it that Magistrates who were Accessory to the erecting that Paper-Monument to Equivocation and to the trying to help it to a jus Divinum and to be a part of pure Religion and undefiled could bring little honour to our Metropolis by calling it a PROTESTANT CITY on its Monument of Stone As we find in the Book of Iudges that all that saw that inhumane Butchering and Quartering out into pieces of the Levites Wife by her own Husband cried out and said There was no such thing done or seen since the time that the Children of Israel came up out of the Land of Egypt until that day I believe it may be affirmed that never in any PROTESTANT City in the World since the time that it was free'd from the Egyptian Servitude of the Papal Impositions was any such barbarous butchering of the Obligation of an Oath by Equivocation in a printed Case sent about the Kingdom by the pretended Espousers of Protestancy ever done or seen And according to the saying that Nisi serpens serpentem comederit non fit draco it may be said that the most superlative and dreadful outraging of Oaths cannot be compassed but by the Consciences of pretended Protestants digesting the old Equivocation of the Iesuites When I consider this therefore that the false Protestant Discusser of that CASE of CONSCIENCE of the SHERIFFS doth determine that by taking up Arms against the King mentioned in the Oath is to be meant against HIS RIGHTFUL GOVERNMENT and that the Oath must be taken in the SENSE or MEANING of the Major part of both Houses that passed it and then makes their meaning so opposite to their words and do recollect what is so clearly laid down in my Lord Chancellor Hatton's Treatise concerning Statutes and the Expositions of Acts of Parliament viz. That the Assembly of Parliament being ended functi sunt officii and that as to all of the lower House who are by Election their Authority is returned to the Electors so clearly that if they were altogether assembled again for interpretation by a voluntary Meeting eorum non esset interpretari and that then the interpretation of the Statutes falls into the hands of the Sages of the Law and when I consider that great Caution of Sanderson in his said Book that where we depart from the words of an Oath to the intent it must be well proved that
that it likewise includes a congruous judgment and internal affection in the which there is a kind of inward testifying before God and therefore the solid Office of HONOVRING doth chiefly depend on the inward acknowledgment of any ones worth or excellence And afterward referring to the express Command in St. Peter of honouring all men he saith Vix quisquam reperitur in quo non possimus aliquid observare in quo nobis est superior si ex humilitate judicium feramus Phil. 2. 3. and then speaking of impious men saith Quatenus boni aliquid habent justum ejus testimonium non est ipsis denegandum He afterward in his Chapter concerning rash judgment shewing that it is a Sin and how saith 1. 'T is a Sin of Levity against Prudence 2. 'T is contrary to the Principles of Nature Quod tibi non vis fieri c. for no man is willing that his Neighbour should judge rashly of him and his Actions 3. It diminisheth the good of ones Neighbour and opposeth his Right for that every man hath as much right to his good Fame as to a depositum in any mens hands till he himself has by his actings took it away 4. It begets contempt of ones Neighbour Rom. 14. 3. 10. by which means it happens that he is held unworthy of beneficial employments 5. 'T is an Vsurpation of the judgment and Authority of God who judgeth of hidden things and in that Chapter raising the Question Whether and how doubtful matters are to be interpreted in the better part he answers 1. That what is doubtful as to things ought to be weighed according to reason without inclining to either part 2. That what is doubtful as to Persons wherein their good or ill repute is concerned is absolutely to be interpreted in the better part 1 Cor. 3. 5. and that at least in such a Case we are not to judge ill of our Neighbour and further That we are so in common Offices or Duties to demean our selves to him as if he were an upright man since the contrary doth not appear to us This is the judgment of Charity And in his Chapter De exemplo bono scandalo he saith That there must of necessity be Sin in every Scandal because the ruine or Spiritual detriment of ones Neighbour is therein concerned He there moreover doth inculcate one great point of Morality in order to the avoiding of Scandal and saith Damnanda horrenda est illa perversitas judicii qua solent multi quorundam labentium Casu aut hypocriseos detectione alios professionem similem facientes hypocritas idcirco pronunciare Hoc est enim planè Diabolum imitari in piis accusandis iniquâ suspicione gravandis Job 1. 11. And having said all this may I not ask if he honoureth his Prince who doth not think him wise enough to choose his Religion When the fate of our Princes is usually to fix their Marriages with Relation to the wellfare of the State and when their Favourites are so seldom permitted by the Populace to lie quiet in their Bosoms and that 't is a Princes Lot thus not to be like others able to choose his Wife or his Friend shall he not choose his God since that Verse in Phil. 2d referred to saith In lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves doth he observe that Precept who esteems not his Prince as fit to be trusted with the freedom of choosing his way to Heaven and the judgment of discretion as himself since there are many qualifications of Excellence for the discharge of the Regal Office that claim preference of a Princes Orthodoxy in the belief of the Mysteries of the Gospel doth he honour all men and particularly give honour to whom honour is due who when he sees the whole World agreed in the Fact of his Princes Heir being most signally perhaps beyond any one of the Age blest with those qualifications shall instead of testifying by words and actions such his Excellence and intrinsic worth and wherewith God hath honoured him try to exclude him from the Throne A Great Philosopher of our Nation and one who hath writ Philosophically of the Passions tells us That the value or worth of a man is as of all other things his price that is to say so much as would be given for the use of his Power and therefore is not absolute but a thing dependant on the need and judgment of another and then tells us That an able Conductor of Souldieâ—s is of great price in time of War present or imminent And any one that will consider what the present War-like State of the World abroad is and that by necessity of Nature in the growing populous World we must expect the peremptory noise of Wars and Rumours of Wars to be more and more calling on our attention will probably be of opinion that the High-born Lawful Princes of great Martial Talents will be the best Heirs and Successors Heaven can send any Countries That Author somewhat suitably to Ames his Notion of Honouring saith The manifestation of the value we set on one another is that which is commonly called honouring and dishonouring To value a man at a high rate is to honour him at a low rate is to dishonour him And I may add that an heroical Habit of Courage in any Prince is the more valuable or intituled to honour because it is by necessity of Nature accompanied with the highest Clemency and gentleness it being the excessive fear of danger that puts Cowardice on Cruelty The Author I refer to says likewise That to be descended from Conspicuous Parents is honourable because they more easily attain the Aids and Friends of their Ancestors On the contrary to be descended from obscure Parentage is dishonourable With how great an honour then and reverential awe ought we to think of the great Claim of Birth-right the next Heir of the Crown hath which may be lineally and successively derived from the British Scotish Danish Saxon and Norman Princes above two thousand years which is more ancient than any Prince in the World can shew and when God who finished his Work-man-ship of the World in Six days hath been two thousand years in making up the Hereditary Glories of this Line can we without horror think of any ones dishonouring it by breaking in on its Succession under pretences of Religion or honouring God when so many Fountains of Royal Blood have been filling this Sea of Honour two thousand years will a few men by their poor Sculls project to empty it or with the Breath of Sophisms to turn the Great Purple Tide that hath born down the World before it so many years But it is not only the thought of the Aides that the next Heir of the Crown may have from the Friends of his Ancestors that may make his Descent from Conspicuous Parents so justly to be honoured as was said but the sight of all the Lines of the Great