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A32802 The rise, growth, and danger of Socinianisme together with a plaine discovery of a desperate designe of corrupting the Protestant religion, whereby it appeares that the religion which hath been so violently contended for (by the Archbishop of Canterbury and his adherents) is not the true pure Protestant religion, but an hotchpotch of Arminianisme, Socinianisme and popery : it is likewise made evident, that the atheists, Anabaptists, and sectaries so much complained of, have been raised or encouraged by the doctrines and practises of the Arminian, Socinian and popish party / by Fr. Cheynell ... Cheynell, Francis, 1608-1665. 1643 (1643) Wing C3815; ESTC R16168 87,143 88

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Armininians in that great point of Predestination they oppose the Reformed Churches in their doctrine about originall sin the Socinians have taught them to deny that Infants are conceived and born in sin and this is the true reason why they deny Baptisme to infants though I know they urge many other reasons to colour the businesse no man need to wonder that Baptisme of Infants is neglected by all those who deny originall sinne Pelagius of old about the yeare 420. said that it was a vaine thing to imagine that the sinnes of infants were washed away by Baptisme because they have no sin at all and therefore Heaven was set open to them The Anabaptists in the conference at Franckendale maintained that Infants were born without originall sinne nay without the least spot of sinne and therefore there was no need of their being washed in the Laver of Regeneration The Socinians tell us that Originall sinne is a meere fable a fancy They that can goe no farther then English may read a book of Free-will Predestination the first transgression subscribed in the Epistle or Preface after this manner Your brethren the Anabaptists falsly so called But I beleeve the reason why the Anabaptists are complained of at this time is because they are disobedient to Magistrates for it is commonly said that they have lately taken up Armes in rebellion against the King I must confesse I have wondred often when I have heard of this dayly complaint because I know that an Anabaptist doth not think it lawfull to be a Cutler he thinks no sword ought to be made because he conceives it unlawfull to use a sword It is well known that the Anabaptists goe to Sea without any Ordnance in their ships that they travaile without any sword by their side But if there be any fighting Anabaptist in these days I suppose the English Socinians have taught the English Anabaptists to deny those principles in practise which they maintain in dispute Who are so active in all Counsells of warre at Oxford as men that are shrewdly suspected for Socinianisme If they deny this truth their letters which are dayly intercepted will testify to their faces that they are not true to their own principles Yet I commend the Chaplaines for their Designe they would fain seise upon mens goods without force or violence and therefore they tell the people that they ought not now under the Gospell to fight for the defence of their goods and if they could perswade the people to be Anabaptists in this point then these Reverend Troopers and meek men of warre might seise upon all the peoples goods without force of Armes and so be as true to their Racovian principles as the Racovians themselves they might robbe without weapons a whole parish might be plundered by one Sermon as well as by two troopes if the people were but throughly instructed in or as we say beaten to this Conscientious slavery All the spoile of a whole towne would lye no heavier upon the conscience of one of these Chaplaines then a reare egge upon his stomack for they are not ashamed to affirme that God hath not given his people any earthly goods or possessions under the Gospell and therefore plundering is not robbing they doe but take that from men which God never gave them Mr. Webberly in the third chapter of his Treatise tells us that God hath not given his people any earthly possessions now under the new Testament they must not regard earth but look after heaven this is they say the Court-Divinity but sure the Rationall Lords that have such vast possessions should not be much taken with these raptures if they be it were good for the Lords to turne Chaplaines or step into a Cloyster and let their own Chaplaines be Lords in their roome How the Court-Chaplaines will maintain this Doctrine and not be as Anti-Monarchicall as the very Anabaptists I professe I know not they might have done well to have excepted the Crown-lands They were wont to preach at the Court that the Subjects have nothing of their own but by this doctrine they will leave the King nothing of his owne sure they mean to have all to themselves They must say that our King lives under the new Testament they will grant him to be a Christian and therefore he must not regard earthly possessions c. The King may perceive by this what good friends he hath at Court Nor doe they stick to question the Authority as well as the possessions or Revenues of Kings The Anabaptists as disobedient to a Parliament as to a King any person or Court which hath power to fine or imprison is by them denyed to be a godly person or a Christian court It was one of the Seditious lawes enacted by that lawlesse faction at Munster Magistratibus ac Principibus nullus subjiciatur The Socinians and Arminians think themselves as lawlesse The * Arminians say that they can willingly beare with one that conceives it unlawfull for a Magistrate to punish any Delinquent with capitall punishment though he doe not embrace this opinion out of tendernesse of conscience but only because he hath been trained up in it from his youth You see the Arminians give faire quarter to the Papists and Socinians if any man hath been nursed up in this opinion they will beare with him though his conscience be not tender They excuse Socinus in the same Chapter and say that many honest men were of this opinion before Socinus was born The Arminians and Socinians make a King of clouts and put a wooden or painted sword into his hand to affright children for they say that he must not draw bloud no not in a legall way for capitall offences The * Arminians foresaw this consequence and are content to let it passe they will not alter the confession of their faith to avoid this inconvenience In the confession of our faith say they we use none but this generall expression the power of the sword and forbeare to mention any capitall punishment because say they we doe not require all that embrace our confession to maintain that Magistrates have power to inflict capitall punishments whereby it appears that they doe plainly equivocate even in the confession of their faith or rather the declaration of their opinion Non fidei nostrae confessionem sed sententiae declarationem exhibemus they use generall and slippery termes and teach all their Sectaries the Socinians and Anabaptists need no teaching how to slip their necks out of so wide and loose a collar Reverend Iunius shewes that the Arminians teach their Sectaries to blot the name of any Prince or Magistrate out of the number of Christians and make him an Infidell if he punish the greatest offenders with death in a legall way Doe any Reformed Divines maintain this seditious tenent which will certainly ruine any State where it is generally received Did Melanchthon Bucer Calvin Beza Bullinger ever preach such doctrine nay
which spring from a Licentious and prostituted Presse Let us single out some that have lately studied this weighty controversy and it may be it will appear that they who are said to write against the King have setled established his lawfull Authority upon surer grounds and better principles then those very men who pretend to write for the King Every man is now accounted an Anabaptist if he doe not maintain Monarchy to be Iure Divino heare then what Dr. Ferne saith We confesse that neither Monarchy nor Aristocracy or any other forme is Iure Divino Nay he saith that that Power or sufficiency of Authority to govern which is the ordinance of God is to be found not only in Monarchy but in Aristocracy Sect. 3. Moreover if we consider the qualification of this governing power and the manner ofexecuting it even according to Monarchicall government Dr. Ferne grants that it is the Invention of man and hath not so much as Gods Permissive approbation till that qualification or Forme is orderly agreed upon by Men in the selfe same Sec. Be pleased now to hear Mr. Burroughes However Princes may be exasperated against Puritanicall Preachers sai M. Burroughes yet they are as much beholding to them as to any people in their kingdomes for bringing people out of conscience to obey Authority You see here the people are pressed to obey the lawfull Authority of the King out of Conscience by such as are counted Puritanicall Preachers In the answer to the observations printed at Oxford by his Majesties command I find that Monarchy is not much younger then man himselfe that Regall Power sprang first from Paternall a Regall power belonged to the Pater-familias pag. 3. as if he meant onely to conclude the subjection of the Kings children and family the Patriarchs were Patres Patriae without a Metaphor they begat their own Subjects But how came divers families to be subjected to one King or common Father why reason saith he did direct the people to choose one common Father p. 6. Monarchy then is grounded upon the peoples Reason and yet quite thorowout his book he talkes as if the people had no Reason for he tells them that there may be reasonable motives why a people should consent to slavery as the Turkes and French peasants have done he teaches them how to perish with a great deale of discretion or else how to be safe by the benefit of slavery p. 10 11. The Observatour saith that Regall dignity was erected to preserve the Commonalty It was so saith the Answerer p. 8. and when Routs became Societies they placed an head over them to whom they paid the Tribute of Reverence for the benefit of Protection What if the people be not protected must they pay no tribute God send his Majesty better Protectours then this Champion Dr. Fern discourses just as wisely when he propounds Davids rewarding of false Ziba as a pattern to our King he would perswade the King to trust Papists as false as Ziba to seise upon the estates of his good Subjects and bestow their estates upon arrant Ziba's men that abuse his Majesty and seek their own ends when the innocency of the Subject and treachery of these Ziba's Papists or Pickthankes is discovered yet the King must not reverse his sentence pronounced in favour of the Papists though to the ruine of good Subjects and their posterity all this Divinity is closely involved by this conscientious Doctour in the 7. Section How farre the Divines of this time differ from the doctrine of Papists is clearly shewen by Mr. Burroughes Mr. Bridge and therefore it is strange the Papists should be counted the better Subjects Mr. Burroughes doth acknowledge the Kings Supremacy The King saith he is Supreme but not Absolute because his Authority is limited both by the Law of God and of the Land For we may and ought saith Doctour Ferne to deny obedience to such commands of the Prince as are unlawfull by the Law of God yea by the established lawes of the Land for in these we have his will and consent given upon goood advice and to obey him against the lawes were to obey him against himselfe his suddain will against his deliberate will Sect. 1. For instance it is the Kings deliberate wil that this Parliament shall not be dissolved or any forces levyed without consent of both houses of Parliament as appeares by two severall Acts made this Parliament If then any take up armes either without consent of Parliament or on purpose to dissolve this present Parliament they doe certainly take up armes against the King himselfe as Dr. Ferne says because against the deliberate will of the King If any Commissions then should be issued out in the Kings name to any persons to encourage them to take up Armes without the consent of the Parliament or against the Parliament such Commissions must be interpreted to proceed from the Kings suddaine will which is not to be obeyed saith Dr. Ferne against the Kings Deliberate Will They are not the Kings friends who advise him to send forth any Illegallcommands There is another answer to Dr. Ferne intitled a fuller answer in which there is much Law and Logick viz that in a Mixt Monarchy there is a Co-ordinate Supremacy and Coordinata invicem supplent and a great many things which the common people understand not This Respondent saith as Dr. Fern doth that Monarchy is not Gods ordinance but then he tells the people their duty in plaine English namely that it is Gods ordinance that men should submit without Resistance to that kind of government which they have by consent established and therefore they must submit to this Coordinate Supremacy though it be the Ordinance of man for the Lords sake as Saint Peter saith pag. 17. Here is Submission out of Conscience for the Lords sake to all Legall Supremacy what can be desired more unlesse they would make the King an Absolute Monarch and so give him an absolute Supremacy which the King himselfe doth utterly disclaime in his answer to the 19. Propositions The zealous Divines of this very time doe abhorre the seditious practises and opinions of all Anabaptists who because the Church had not Christian Kings at first cry out with open mouth a that the Church cannot be safe if there be any King or Magistrate in the Church nay they adde that if a King turn Christian he must cease to be a King because Christianity it selfe is repugnant to Magistracy and no b Magistrate ought to look after any thing that concernes Religion They maintain that Christians ought not to have any Judiciall tryalls before Magistrates that no Christians ought to punish offendors with death or imprisonment but with Excommunication only They would not have Heretikes punished by the Magistrate c but every man should be left to his liberty to beleeve what he thinks fit just as the Arminians and Socinians dreame I
did they not constantly oppose the Anabaptists in this very point Nay was not the faction of Anabaptists raised by the Devil and fomented by Rome on purpose to hinder the Reformation begun by those worthy Reformers read that great Counsellour Conradus Heresbachius his Epistle to Erasmus and there you will see the Devill raised them up in opposition to the Reformers I know one of late preached valiantly against blessed Luther and said that Luthers book de libertate Christiana gave the first occasion to the giddy Anabaptists to be so extra vagant Lambertus Hortensius indeed hath a touch upon it but he addes withall that though Thomas Muntzer was well read in that book of Luther yet being an illiterate man he did not well understand or else did wrest that book to his purpose now if the book was not well understood and worse interpreted sure the Interpreter was in fault for if he had no learning he might have had some ingenuity or at least humility and left the book to more learned Readers or candid expositours Thomas Muntzerus Saxo erat homo ut accepi illiteratus sed ut apparebat in hoc libello egregie exercita●us scripti interpres parum Candidus We must distinguish betweene the first tumults of Anabaptisticall men and Deliberate Anabaptisme The first tumults were raised above an hundred yeares since by illiterate dreamers such as Nicholas Storke Thomas Muncer Phifer Ringus and the rest yet Muncer at that time laid a faire foundation for Servetus Socinus and the rest to build upon for he denyed the satisfaction of Christ and what Doctrine is Fundamentall if the satisfaction of Christ be not the Socinians make it their grand designe to perswade men that Jesus Christ hath not truly and properly satisfied for our sinnes The Heresy of the Anabaptists was not backed with any strength of Argument nor methodically digested till Servetus and Socinus set to work I must then look upon Servetus and * Socinus as the maine pillars of Deliberate and Refined Anabaptisme Luther must be excused for he was not guilty at all it was an occasion snatched and not given snatched by Muncer not given by Luther when the Anabaptists urged Luthers authority for Luther did utterly disavow any such sense as they put upon his book nay he abhorred their Designe and opposed their faction even at their very first rise When Muncer was stepped aside to Melhusium Luther wrote against him to the Senate and desired them to beware of the woolf in a Sheeps skin this was very early in the yeare 1524. and upon the Lords day as Bullinger assures me In the yeare 1525. and the sixth of Novemb. the Anabaptists were so confident of their own strength that they challenged any Reformed Minister to dispute with them but when they were ready to dispute one of the Anabaptists cryed out Sion Sion rejoyce O Hierusalem they were presently in such a tumult that they were forced to remove to another place yet the Senate Zuinglius and other learned men were so patient as to argue with them three dayes together and when the Anabaptists saw themselves confuted by the evident demonstrations which Zuinglius produced out of the word of God one of them had a designe beyond all the rest he said Zuinglius was a learned man and could prove any thing but saith he O Zuinglius I adjure thee by the living God to speak thy conscience and tell the truth I will quoth Zuinglius thou art a seditious clowne since milder answers will not serve the turn I speak plain and home Upon the 15. day of November 1525. the Senate made a decree against the Anabaptists and declared that Zuinglius had convinced them clearely confuted the Anabaptists and therefore they would proceed severely against all Anabaptists Now about this time Servetus the great Grand-father of Faustus Socinus as hath been shewen began to perk up for Servetus was put to death in the yeare 1553. because he had been a blasphemer for thirty yeares together so it seemes he began to vent his blasphemies as soone as Thomas Muncer himselfe about the yeare 1523. Theodorus Strackius being to set forth the History of the Anabaptists slides on a sudden into a long story of Servetus that monster of Men and enemy of God nay as he saith of the whole true Godhead in the sacred Trinity this Servetus that he might shew his good inclination towards the fanaticall sects of these times saith Strackius hath endeavoured to make the Baptisme of Infants not neglected only but abominated I dare not mention his other blasphemies at which I think the very Devills tremble There are so many severall sects both of Socinians and Anabaptists who have runne away with their mouths full of Anabaptisticall and Socinian blasphemies that we must let them all passe for Sectaries of Servetus and Socinus though some of them are farre more dangerous then others The Anabaptists maintaine some opinions which are as welcome to the Papists and Iesuited party in England as other parts are to the Socinians the Anabaptists did dreame at first of an unwritten Word and a very subtile one too such as the Pope and Jesuites dreame of and such visions and Revelations as the Priests boast of The Designe of the Anabaptists pleased the Papists well because they endeavoured to root out Protestant Princes and Ministers the Papists knew full well that no Church or State could stand without Magistrates and Ministers There is one Iohannes Angelius who commends Servetus and saith he spake nothing but what David George and such like Saints have delivered this Jesuited Politician you see hath praises to spare for Servetus one of the most abominable horrible Anabaptists of all others as reverend Bullinger observes lib. 2. contra Anabaptistas cap. 12. because there are 12. or 13. sects of Anabaptists in his account and Servetus was one of the worst sort but he saith David George went farre beyond even Servetus himselfe The truth is these two were guilty of sublimed Anabaptisme deadly Socinianisme though David George differed from Soci●us in a point or two Now what good friends the Iesuites are to the Socinians hath been already shewen what Patrons the Arminians are of Anabaptisme the Professours of Leyden declare This being premitted let us sadly enquire whether our late writers doe encline to the Anabaptists and Socinians in the great point about the Authority of Princes and Magistrates For I know it is commonly said that though the first Reformers did oppose the Anabaptists in this point yet the men that seeme to be most zealous for a Reformation in these unhappy dayes are arrant Anabaptists in this point We live in an angry time and men will speake passionately when they are provoked and vexed I will not therefore take upon me to justify the angry expressions of the most judicious writer much lesse can I ever mention those bastard-Pamphlets without indignation