authority to change it which must needs have reference to the Laws of God according to the subsequent words of the Bishops where he explaines his meaning by judiciously asserting That Christian Kings and their Parliaments are obliged to the Laws of God and rules os Christian piety and polity too of which the whole Church in its primitive example is the best interpreter and so his position in short is this That they have no lawful authority by the Laws of God and rules of Christian piety and polity to change Episcopal Government which is a cleer evident truth to me for I consider with my self that those Laws and Rules will admit at no hand of any schism ataxy confusion or division in the Church which are contrary to true Christianity for the abounding whereof amongst the Corinthians they were so often taxed of their too much carnality and that Bishops were set up by the Apostles themselves in remedium Schismatis for the preventing of schismes and divisions and that none of those errors and heresies were so prevalent or apparent to humane eyes in the Bishops times as since their Julian extirpation for the setting up of Prsbyterian practical-jesuitism was the ground of a day of fasting and humiliation amongst the Godly rebels and a Sermon thereupon preached by our unsacred Covenanter What shall we say to those things that men should show so much pretence of goodness in appointing a day to humble themselves for the errors and heresies of the times the true proper effects of their arrogant ways of Rebellion in setting up Presbytery as a distinct Government by it self without Episcopacy in direct opposition to the practise of the Catholick Church as well as to the King and his Laws which is and hath bin the head and fountain from whence the unclean muddy streames of heresies and blasphemies have had their rise and product And yet forsooth must have the means still kept for the production of the same ends of disorder and confusion Vpon the consideration of the whole I cannot but subscribe to the great truth of the Bishops words That as no legislative power is impowered by Gods Laws to bring in either Heresie Error Superstition Schisme Faction or Confusion so neither have the King Lords and Commons any prudent moral religious or lawful Authority by those Laws or those of this English Nation and Rules of Christian Piety and Polity to change the Ancient universal and excellent Government by Bishops to any that is As new and schismatical so far worse and unsuitable to England every way If one part of the sentence be true which by Croftons silence is absolutely concluded No man need fear to affirm the other without any derogation to the legal rightful Supremacy of the King That which speakes against Schisme and faction confusion and disorder will not surely give me any lawful power to extirpate Bishops the main preventers of it by being the constant promoters of love and unity § 27. Thus I have examined the words as I found them imperfectly quoted in Croftons Discourse without that additional clause which I have set down in my true Citation of them which he most unworthily and basely had left out that so he might have some what to fill up his rambling discourse with for a true Citation would have fo confounded his understanding as immediately to have commanded him into a becoming silence and ingenuous conviction of the Bishops truths but rather then he would depart from his cavilling art and shiftings he 'l mangle the words of an Antagonist to make his own way the smoother for credulous poor mortals to set their steps in which hath brought to my remembrance the answer of a most Reverend person to the Miltonian Justifier of Regicide and Rebellion depraver of verity and breaker of the Kings Image That he p See the Image unbroken p. 153. broke sentences and truths lest he should breake for want of matter And the words of the Bishops with that additional clause in it is so cleer a truth as can no waies be darkned by a Presbyters Argumentations which was seen evident enough by Crofton himself and so very craftily left it out and therefore needs no other defence but the bare words themselves which carry truth in their forehead to the convincing of any opposer which I have no sooner done but I took a resolution to follow the mans pattern for once and turn Quaerist too Where 's the Premunire that the Bishop hath stept into now Is speaking of a known Truth confronting of King and Parliaments Suppose the Bishop had lived in Queen Maries days and had said That neither Queen nor Parliament had any lawful power by the Laws of God and Rules of Christian Piety and Polity either to change the King Edward-Reformation or to set up and establish Popery in the kingdom Was it fit for any mans mouth but a cursed Jesuits to charge him with sedition and treason against the Queen in confronting her and her Parliaments by saying black is black and white is white by asserting a known truth Blessed be God we live under a Prince that desires not to have His Supremacy stretcht so as to make it an Instrument of Justification of the Lawfulness of His Actings either against God or his Truth or the Defenders of true Christianity that desires to have His Supremacy carryed on and maintain'd for no other ends and purposes then those for which it was first established To make Clergy-men as well as Lay know that he is their onely Supream Governor and in case of offence that His Power will reach to the punishment of both that they shall not be exempted from the Civil Magistrates sword of Justice either by the wicked pretence of a foreign Papal superior Jurisdiction or Antimonarchical Sentence or Determination of the traiterous seditious Consistorians if they do that which is not justifiable either by the Laws of God or this Land Where 's the Bishops sedition I wonder Where 's his treason that he needs to fear to be made less by the head for as this Leaguer cants it Why he saith in affirming the defect of the Kings and Parliaments prudent moral religious and lawful power to change Episcopacy to one that is worse and far unsuitable to England every way for that is it which the Bishop saith which our unsacred Covenanter hath dared to contradict with his shabbed pratling Ay but saith Crofton The Statutes of the Kings declare against the Pope That Holy Church was founded in Prelacy by their own donation power and authority and so by the same way changeable Ergo What That they have any prudent moral religious and lawful authority to change it to a worse After what rate doth this wily Covenanter argue Can they that swear to govern a people well and according to the Laws of the Land have any of that quaternary Power to change one Government for a worse Will the people in such a case think or can
To submit our selves to the King as Supream and that for the Lords sake and did they not swear his Supremacy yea that he was the onely Supream Governor thereby implicitely denying upon Oath any Co-ordinates with him in the exercise of the Supremacy and therefore can perjury and disobedience to the Laws of our Creator be affirmed by any one not possessed with a deep frenzy to concern the glory of God It s true indeed when the Jews crucified our Savior it was out of a pretended tenderness to the glory of God and when our English-Jewish Tygres had murthered their lawful Sovereign it was meerly as they pretended for the advancement of Christs kingdom but that such actions as either of those concerned either the glory of God or the advancement of his Sons kingdom is onely a demonstration of the Assertors strong delusions for it plainly intimates unto us e See the Right Rebel p. 121. That there is a special work of Satan in it when such a strong delusion is sent unto men that they should believe such an Antichristian Lie tendred unto them under the colour of a Christian truth as the Doctrine of Rebellion is But this is just like the Second of the good of the kingdoms and therefore to that I again thus Quaere Was there not a War begun by a pack of true Delinquents got into the House of Commons and that they were such I appeal to the judgement of the Law Did not that war as all wars do tend to impoverish and oppress the Kingdom Was not this League sworn to carry it on and not to leave off whether to make defection to the contrary part or to give themselves to a detestable indifferency or neutrality in this cause of rebellion till they had fulfilled their mischeivous traiterous ends Can then that Covenant which binds people as this certainly did and doth to continue the imbroyling of a Nation or Kingdom in blood confusion perjury and Rebellion concern so much the good of it Can that which stirs up people to pursue the impoverishing taxing and inslaving of a kingdome for whither did the Rebelling and rising up in Arms and swearing men to continue therein tend but to that be affirmed by any except Frantick bedlamers to concern the good and benefit of it And lastly for the honor of the King for he and his honor are put at the fag end of all in this perfidious League I further again Quaere Is it for the honor of the King to have his subjects rebel against him Is it for the happiness of the King and his Posterity to have all his Assistants and Adherents destroyed as much as their fellow-subjects can under the black false notion of Evil Councellors and Malignants Did not the Covenant binde the takers to such things as those Let them deny it with truth if they can Can that Covenant which binds men to disloyalty and treason though hypocritically and lyingly pretending loyalty which doth not better the evil nor antidote the venome in it The devil though he appeares as an angel of light sometimes to ensnare men the more easily in his delusions yet he is but a black devil still for all that and therefore I may justly and truly make my Question thus Can that Covenant which binds men to disloyalty and treason and to break the Laws of this Land be any thing less then Antichristian And is it not therefore damnable and abominable and to be abhorred of every one that desires to observe the dictates of Gods good Spirit in the sacred Canon of Scripture Undoubtedly every one that understands the true ways of advancing the glory of God the honor of the King and the good of the kingdoms will hold himself obliged and bound to desie this Covenant as the very sink of Jesuitism and high-way to hell it self and he that hath ever read and considered well the Sacred Canon and the undeniable truth of what our Carolian Martyr bid the Scotch Parliament always f See Reliquiae Sacrae Carolinae the last printed Letter ☞ remember That as the best foundation of Loyalty is Christianity so trâ—e Christianity teaches perfect Loyalty for without this Reciprocation neither is truly what they pretend to be will finde cause enough to refuse the taking of and if taken to renounce and abjure such a seditious Vow and Covenant which ties men to continue Rebels all the days of their lives for he that shall swear to extirpate a sort of men whose Function is establish'd by the great Charter of our Liberties in absolute breach of the Law and against the Command of his Prince and endeavour to bring to pass his extirpation by force of Arms which is high Treason and swear that he will all the days of his life zealously and constantly continue therein against all opposition That man by any reasonable person will be concluded a sworn Rebel and to continue by vertue of his Oath without a just renunciation a Traitor to his King as long as breath remains in his body to enable him to carry on the intentions and purposes of it And yet this is the League that such a stir and clutter is kept about some mens Christian and loyal breaking of it and though some of its unlucky Patrons are pleased to alledge for its goodness that part of the Clause of the first Article wherein it is said according to the word of God and the examples of the best Reformed Churches yet I affirm That that doth no more prove what they intend by bringing of that Allegation then the * 2 Cor. 11. 14. devils being transformed into an angel of light doth prove that he was in reality that into which he was transformed then the †Matth. 7. 15. false prophets coming to us in sheeps clothing doth prove that they are not inwardly ravening wolves then the Pharisees ‖ Matth. 23. 21. appearing outwardly righteous unto men is a convincing Argument to prove that within they were not full of hypocrisie and iniquity § 11. But lastly they tell us That they profess and declare before God and the world their unfeigned desire to be humbled for their own sins and for the sins of these Kingdoms especially that they have not as they ought valued the inestimable benefits of the Gospel that they have not laboured for the purity and power thereof and that they have not endeavored to receive Christ in their hearts nor to walk worthy of him in their Lives No it 's very true for if they had we should never have seen an ungospel-like unchristian Rebellion raised and sworn to be upholden against our gracious King painted over with a plausible pretence against some pretended evil Councellors nor an Anti-legal jugling self-contradictory League sworn for the Dathanian extirpation of the great upholders of Monarchy and it's just Rights Priviledges Preeminencies and Authorities against the several Incroachments of Papists and Presbyters of Jesuites and Sectaries They complain there indeed
own naturally deformed one appear the neater and beautifuller But I consider otherwise he could not hide his folly from being palpable and open to every person that is not possessed of a Bedlamers understanding nor his Book from being thrown into the fire by ingenuous persons rather then they would vex themselves so much as to read his lies and juglings his cavillings and sedititon his false quotations and confident language both of the judicious Assertions and person of that Learned Reverend Prelate whom this Holy Leaguer may well put to silence after the usual Presbyterian ways of Disputing for indeed it will soon make any wise man leave off medling with such notorious Salamanders who loves to live in peace and quietness and endeavour to advance the Unity of the Church and delights not to live in contention with them to kindle the fire of Combustion and Sedition both in Church and State But we will see however what the man conceived fit in his Scotized noddle to say for himself and make it the matter of his Answer to the words of the Bishop as he had filthily mangled them in his false quotation of them and that I finde upon search to be this learned one that follows with a m P. 25. of his Book But Sir have you not stretch'd too far and stept into a Premunire Little Mr. Crofton should fear to be made less by the head as guilty of Treason Sedition at the least should be thus confront King and Parliaments in what all their Statutes declare to be their own creature and constitution changeable at their pleasure even from the Statutes of Carlisle and 25. of Edward the 3. Declaring against the Pope That holy Church was founded in Prelacy by their own Donation Power and Authority and so by the same way changeable Where is Sir the Kings Prerogative why not Supremacy Would not that word have choak'd you over all persons in all causes Ecclesiastical What is become of your oath of Supremacy Can you make this peremptory determination as your self calls it consist with it any more with your Covenant Hath a gracious King lately advanced you to debase nay dethrone him and his Parliament too And then tells his Readers a story How it hath been observed to be the fatall chance of the Bishops of England to run themselves into a Premunire The man would fain make people believe that Bishops are Seditious persons and in particular his Reverend Antagonist and therefore the best course will first be to consider what the Bishop hath said and then see whether it amount to the Sedition supposed by the Leaguing Rhodomantado and in order thereunto I shall begin with the first particle of the Bishops words That Kings Lords and Commons have no prudent moral religious and lawful authority to change an ancient universal Church-Government by Bishops to any that is As new and schismatical So far worse and unsuitable to England every way and see whether they may be found to be either contrary to truth or a derogation to His Majesties legal Supremacy and therefore first that they have no prudential authority to change Episcopal Government much less swear to extirpate them root and branch is evident not onely by the desperate excommunicating antimonarchical brasen tricks and practises of the Godly partie forsooth in Scotland against the excellent King James in walking direct contrary to his Royal Commands and stirring up the people in Rebellion against him because he did not submit himself to their traiterous imperious humours and making him for his own safety to flie out of his own capital City of Edinburgh but also by that Kings famous Motto No Bishop no King and by the sad woful experience of the truth thereof by the late never to be forgotten Rebellion in 1642 and the Regicidian genuine issues and effects of it knowest thou not Sir John Presbyter the undeniable truth of that Assertion of the noble L'estrange which he put forth to the view of the world That m See his Interest mistaken or The holy Cheat pag. 88. by those very Troops that cryed down Bishops was the King murthered Knowest thou not Sir John what the wise King James said to Dr. Reynolds's desire at the conference at Hampton Court for the rearing up a domineering Tyrannical Presbytery within this Kingdom if not then I shall for once declare it unto your Honor the Royal Answer ran thus n See the Conference at Hampton Court p. 81. Stay I pray you for one seven years before you demand that of me and if then you finde me pursey and fat and my wind-pipes stuffed I will perhaps harken to you for let that government be once up I am sure I shall be kept in breath then shall we all of us have work enough both our hands full but Dr. Reynolds till you finde that I grow lazie let that alone If Kings and Parliaments have a mind never to be quiet and to be alwaies in a combustion I know no better advice can be given them then for to set and rear up this Presbytery but if they desire to keep themselves in rest peace and unity they 'l find I am confident no prudential authority to extirpate Episcopacy by a Baal-Berith and bring an headless currish Presbytery in its room but will abandon the Covenant that o See Mr. L'estrange his Interest mistaken p. 35. popular Sacrament of Religious disobedience as the very poison of hell and the secret underminer of the Regal Authority and Supremacy but then § 25. Again secondly that they have no religious authority for as for moral authority that is an authority secundum morem according to former custom their authority is so altogether in the negative there that its in vain to blot any paper with an answer but I say that they have no religious authority to change Episcopal government is evident too in regard of the Apostolicalness and primitive use thereof by the Apostles while they lived in commanding obedience and controuling the subordinate governors and their disorders as well as the peoples in the several Churches they planted and enjoyning the same to be done by his Episcopal deputies at Ephesus and Creet and in them all their successors in the Episcopal office in those several Churches over whom they had their jurisdiction Certainly he that tells me that p 1 Tim. 3. 1. he that desires the office of a Bishop desires a good work gives me no religious nor lawful authority to vow and swear with an Anti-regal Oath to extirpate it and make an exchange for one of the plagues of Egypt to overwhelm us instead of that That the Apostle said the one and that therefore for that very reason Kings and Parliaments have no religious authority to do the other None but a Crofton and his crafty companions would ever have had the confidence to deny it which makes me proceed to the next thing and that is § 26. That they have no lawful
contrary to above 30 Acts of Parliameat The King himself protesting against it as far as Oxford by his publick Proclamation as engaging the takers in Acts of high Treason Doth our Leaguer think that when 290 Voices are taken away out of 600 that the remaining part hath as great a power as when they were all together Or doth he think that the Kings silence or his Protestation doth not adde or diminish the authority of the thing sworn But I must needs say indeed l See Croftons Berith-Anti-Baal p. 51 Suppositions are sufficient supports to a man of fancy who all along this Discourse plays at Bo-peep begging what must never be granted while his Nose is between his eyes which I leave him to see at large his ignorance and folly his seditious and treasonable Principles against His Gracious Sovereign § 37. Crofton citing out of his Analepsis p. 12. That the two Houses of Parliament are Co-ordinate and Sharers in the Legislation of England and the Bishop asking p. 148. What and can they legally exercise this power without yea against the Kings consent being out of his nonage and not out of his wits This furious offspring of Smec cries out p. â—9 That they may do it without the Kings consent none do or can deny it common practice with the peoples constant obedience doth plainly manifest it as also the Protestation of May 1641. never doubted as to the validity of Authority which you say was precarious but Resolves of the House declare to have been Authoritative The Votes Resolves Orders and Ordinances of one or both Houses do proclaim it And the Priviledges of Parliament That the King can take no notice of what is debated or voted ordered or acted by them until it be by themselves formally presented unto His Majesty And the very nature of Co-ordinate power if the Doctor understands it with their Actings in case of his absence by minority or otherwise doth determine it As to the exercise of it against the Kings consent I shall conclude nothing but commend Mr. Prynn's Sovereign Power of Parliaments to your serious study And the Legislative power of their Votes Debates Resolves Orders or Ordinances were never gainsaid by His Majesty O Lump of wickedness and sedition What do or can none deny that the Two Houses may exercise that Vtopian Fiction their fancied imaginary Legislative power without the Kings consent Why is your lawless Assertion so true think you that it is past all contradiction Alas poor Presbyter why do you hug up your self so in your own delusions It s pity you should go on uncontroul'd in your wild positions and therefore I le try for once what I can say against it Are the Two Houses any better then the Kings Subjects If you say otherwise the Law affixes the deserved name of Traytor upon your forehead Can they convene and assemble together in the House without the Regal Summons Are they any more then the Kings own creature Can they stay one minute there when met together to debate or consult of any thing without His Majesties free leave Can the creature do any thing what he please without the Creators consent Suppose they should as your Long-Parliamentidol did reproach their Sovereign maintain five trayterous Antimonarchists in their treason and villany hatch a Conspiracy and bring forth Rebellion cannot the Creator have so much power over his forlorn creatures as with the breath of his mouth immediately to command their speedy departure by a dissolution Oh Crofton Crofton beware of the perjurious consequence and stop your mouth left the Ax for your treason make no difference between your own and those heads of your fellow-rebels on London-bridge But this is a Scotized Assertion an opinion of m See Bish Garden 's Anti-Baal-Berith p. 151. Seminary Presbyters who have been the Protoplasticks of a rebellious generation both in Church and State agreeable to their all along rebellious practises by vertue of their legislative power which our profound Lawyer saith they have and which they may he averrs exercise without the Kings consent and so by consequence they may rebel against their Head kill and murther His loyal Subjects imprison and impoverish others take away His Imperial Dignities and Pre-eminences from Him seize upon His Forts Ports Magazines and Towns and plague and oppress their fellow-English-men by seizing on their goods and estates how and in what proportion and maner they please send armed men through perjury to fight against their lawful Sovereign leave out the defence of his person out of their Commissions impose what cursed Leagues and Covenants they please all actions of high treason by the known Laws of this Land without His Majesties consent sell and imprison Him until He agree to their imperious humors and demands and Christen their Actions too like a pack of dissembling false hypocrites with the title of Reformation Loyalty Advancing the Glory and promoting the kingdom of Jesus Christ yea play the devil for Gods sake and all this they claim a right and lawful authority to do by force and vertue of their Idoliz'd Diana their new Goddess lately come down from Jupiter their phanatick frenzical whimsie of Legislative power And because these things have been done and justified with impudence beyond example by n See Presbytery Popish not Episcopacy p. 6. a Tumultuary Rabble that pretended to be a Parliament and their graceless adherents therefore this Leaguer concludes the Lawfulness of the Act done and the Justifiableness of re-acting the same again But A facto ad jus non valet argumentum is an old and a true Position To argue from the Action done the lawfulness thereof becomes a subtile Sophister a Trappanner and Cheater more then a sound Scholar or a Disputant As for the Two Houses Legislative power so called or their Co-ordinacy therein with their by them sworn ONELY Supream Governour I have said so much already concerning that grand delusive Cheat and Fiction that a question will now be enough against it How can the two Houses be affirmed by any having regard to the Rules and Customes of the Realm to have the whole or a Co-ordinacy or share in that which the very Prologues to the Acts and Statutes denies them to have any right or claim to either in Possession or Reversion As for the Protestation I told you before Silence gives consent and his Majesties suffering such a thing to be done by them under his nose without a Prohibition argues plainly his Tacit fiat to it but yet proves not at all their supposed Legislative power or Coordinacy in the same with their Head nor the legality of their exercise of it without the Kings consent It 's true the Bishop tells you It was precarious and personal upon this just Ground and Foundation o P. 278. That the two Houses had not power to make or take or impose any Oath contrary to the Laws of England which they were trusted to observe
Parliament was to raise Credit for three purposes That those ends were ended take away the end and the means thereto are to no purpose and therefore the three ends of the Act being determined it agreeth with Law and Reason the Act should end the Law rejecting things unprofitable and useless That the Writ of Summons was the Basis and Foundation of the Parliament that those men would be called a Parliament having abated quashed and made nothing of the Writ whereby they were Summoned and Assembled that if the Writ be made void the Process is void also That that house must needs fall where the Foundation is overthrown that Sublato Fundamento opus cadit the Foundation being taken away the work falls is both a Maxime in Law and Reason And let him but seriously meditate on the Arguments used by the learned Author of the Royalists defence to prove that The persons at Westminster who call themselves the Parliament of England are not the two Houses nor so much as Members of the Parliament and then tell me whether he is of Drakes minde still That the Long-Oppressive Tyrants are yet in continuance and not legally dissolved by their cursed Regicide Nay Mr. Prynne himself whom he stiles by an Emphasis That Profound Lawyer is clearly against him and Drake too not onely holding with Judge Jenkins their Legal dissolution by the Kings Martyrdom but also tells us That the Kings Personal absence from his Parliament heretofore and of late was reputed very prejudicial to it and his calling away some Lords great Officers and other Members from it in his life time a high way to its present Dissolution which also gives a Bastinado and word of Correction to Croftons frantick denial of the Kings Presence or his absence to add or abstract to the Authority of Parliament Mr. Prynne Lawyer-like tells us also in another place That the Act for the continuance of the Long-Perjured Treasonable Plotters and Contrivers of Murther Sacriledge Treason and Rebellion was made by the King as their Sovereign Lord Declaring and Enacting mark that and the Lords and Commons as joyntly assenting thereunto which absolutely confounds Croftons other Whimsie of the two Houses Supream Legislative power See his True and perfect Narrative Page 27 37. Buzze Buzze Mr. Crofton Where are you Do you honour a person so far as to adorne him with the Epethite of Profound and yet not believe him but go on in your simplicity breathing forth deceit the folly of fools when he hath done you the honour of a Profound Confutation Surely you minde so much his Sovereign power of Parliaments which he wrote in the time that his Zeal without knowledge had overpowred him because pleasant and delectable reading for your Seditious minde that you care not for considering his subsequent Treatises which be sent forth into the world when the Puritanical zeal began to leave him And thus Mr. Crofton supposeth the two Houses into a Non-Entitie as to their damnable Treasons and Enormous Practises by the temper they were then in by their being Parliament men and having some certain Priviledges which were not time after time answered by the Royal Grant to learn them Absaloms Trepan of Rebellion against their King with a Sacred Covenant betwixt their teeth nor yet to teach them to be unparellel'd Seditious Corah's under a visard and masque of Sanctity And thus he supposeth the two Houses into an Entitie as to their yet Legal continuance by vertue of their being animated by an express Statute Law which one openly averring to continue them yet in being was immediately sought after and caught and by an Order of the whole Body of the two Houses was Voted Seditious and his openly averring to be burnt by the New-turn'd Presbyter Doctor Dunne But Crofton hath another dart to shoot at the Bishops but it s so pittiful blunt and dull that let him aim never so well at his mark yet there 's no great fear of hurt to be received by it and what should it be but this And thus he i. e. the Bishop profoundly supposeth a Parliament swearing qua Parliament in the fullest formality and profession of their National Capacity was a personal Covenanting Say ye so The Bishop did but as you say plainly suppose the former but you tell us he doth profoundly suppose this latter And why pray now is it such a profound supposition Because the Bishop affirmes the swearing of the Absolonian Tribe the factious part of the Two bloody Houses without and against the consent of Majesty to be but a personal Covenanting for that the true English of the Bishops undeniable assertion T is a profound cavil indeed of yours I must confess Certainly the Bishop might well suppose your black Cabale into a non-entity by that one Law The Petition of Right as to their legal swearing without his Majesties consent as easily and truly as assert this irrefrageable proposition that the Body cannot act without the Head But because the prattles of a Parliament swearing qua Parliament as if he would out face the Sun with his mistakes and juglings I shall bring this subsequent counter-poyson as an Antidote against the venom infused by an ungodly seditious pack of Puritanical knaves into the peoples minds to keep them fast to themselves against their Prince with Treasonable delusive principles and that is first The Two Houses when every one met together and assembled in the House much less your remaining half of them are not a Parliament but onely a part thereof without the Kings presence or concurrence And secondly That this Belials brat the Covenant was sworn and taken by but a part of them too when the rest were like Loyal Subjects gone out of their bloody denns to the service of their Master and so the meaning of his words bears but this diminutive conclusion That the Covenant was taken and sworn but by a sad part of a part of a Legal Parliament which verifies the words of the learned Judge Jenkins That by the abuse and misunderstanding of this word Parliament you and your cross grain party have miserably deceived the people That the Bishop supposeth the swearing of the rotten putrified members the stinking part of a part of a rightful Parliament who were tainted above measure with Treason and Rebellion without the consent and concurrence therein of the Onely Supream Legislator to be but a personal Covenanting and what can we term a Covenant sworn without and against authority but personal and with the due Epethite Rebellious annexed unto it I am ready enough to grant you k See p. 51. of Crofton Book But that the Bishop doth any where affirm a Parliament swearing qua Parlialiament that is the King and all the Lords and Commons to be but a personal Covenanting Is the Sophistical groundless inference of him who knoweth the Bishop doth not so much as mention it but give a Presbyter an inch and he will be sure to take an ell If the King gives
and shameless Semaiah a h Pag. 49. Runegado an Apostate Presbyter a i Pag. 51. man of Fancy k Pag. 61. An envious Runegado and Apostate l Pag. 63. A shifting Runegado and a m Pag. 67. subtile Sophister and yet behold and wonder this is the man that cries The Lord deliver him from rendring Railing for Railing The Bishop having said in his Anti-Baal-Berith Page 191. That the late Primate of Armaghs Reduction of Episcopacy was propounded not in order to binde the hands of or limit Bishops in England and Scotland but as a condescension and expedient to disarm and binde the hands of Presbyters and People Crofton in answer thereunto thus profoundly Quaeres * Pag. 13. Sir Who told you that this was the politick stratagem of that pious Bishop Did not Bishop Wren It would make a man mad and t' would make a man laugh to see such pitiful arguings used in a rejoynder to an Antagonist and yet to be believed as excellent and invincible by some people to hugge themselves up in their delusions Just as if a man should make such a like Quaere to him Who told people that it was little Mr. Croftons Politick stratagem not onely to whipp his maid behinde but before too Did not the Church-Wardens and several other of the Parishioners of that Parish where that noble Ministerial act was done to administer somewhat to the maids necessities So again The Bishop having said That the League which Joshua and the Rulers of the people made with the Trappanning Gibeonites was to the damage of no honest men but themselves Crofton cries out †Pag. 48. Was the Oath of the Gibeonites no way to the injury of honest men Was it no injury to Israel to loose four Cities out of their inheritance given them by the Lord Whereas the Bishop had said It was to the injury of no honest men but themselves which two last words Crofton very cunningly leaves out to make his Readers believe the convincing force of his Arguments But alas he knew to set down the whole Proposition was not for his turn of disputing but would have broke the neck of his cause and design and made it evident to every one that he was a meer shifting caviller one that was minded more to quarrel with an Antagonist then to answer him by good Reasons and Arguments which practise of his brings to my remembrance the like cavilling tricks and shiftings of the most learned Bishop Mountagues Puritanical Informers in the very self-same case who thereupon told them that the setting down of his whole passage and Proposition f See his Appeal to Cesar p. 145. Stood not with their prime purpose of calumniating directly it gave check to their detraction in chief and so they passed it slightly over § 20. So again The Bishop having said That g See his Anti-Baal-Berith p. 146. a King though never so Supream and Free yet may not Vow and Covenant to the diminution of his own just Sovereignty and Authority and Power which is his by Law Crofton thinks fit to give no other answer but this †Pag. 32. Which all people of the world must and will contradict and leaving out like a wrangling Sophister the principal Clause and Hinge of the Bishops Sentence on which hangs the force of the preceding words which is this And necessary for his high calling to protect the Church and State himself and his good Subjects And doth he or any one in his wits think that any Prince may Vow to diminish that whereby his Subjects are defended to extenuate and give away that Power he hath given him by God to Preserve and Protect those people over whom by the same God he is set as Ruler and Supream To cast his Subjects in a maner out of his Protection and give leave to others to Domineer and Tyrannize over them and do them what rapine and mischief they will and he himself sit still as a Cipher Certainly those people that are in such a case may well cry out of an Egyptian slavery and sadly proclaim to their great grief and sorrow both of heart and minde That every man doth that which seems right in his own eyes as though there were no King at all in Israel That a Prince may vow the diminution of his own just Sovereginty and power which is too hard for his Subjects to bear and when such diminution tends to their ease and benefit no body indeed in the world I think will deny but that is nothing at all to what the Bishop saith But that a Prince may not Covenant the diminution of his own just Soveraignty and Power necessary for his high calling to protect his Subjects which and which alone is what the Bishop says is a truth as cleer as the Sun and in that case our Presbyters all people in the world that must and will contradict it must beyond dispute be such people as belong to the world in the Moon § 21. Again the Bishop having set down p. 149. That the two Houses alone no nor the King alone or with them have any Legislative power to decree or execute what is unrighteous against God or man The Shifter answers with a * p. 32. So that the Legislation is founded in the piety and justice of the decree and rebellion against authority is acquitted by the iniquity of the command not at all caring to consider that what the Bishop saith in those words must needs have reference to the Law of God and his meaning thus that by that Law neither King nor two Houses joyntly or severally have any lawful power to decree or execute what is unrighteous for its impossible that that Reverend Prelate should ever forget what he hath read in the Scriptures of wickedness established by a Law and the possibility of Governors Legislative power to execute †Isa 10. 1 unrighteous decrees by the Woe that by God himself is pronounced unto them that decree such Nay the very language of the Bishop in that assertion of his doth convince me cleerly that he was wholly guided by this very Scripture in what he said which Crofton so much carps at and so as I just now said must needs have reference to the lawfulness of such power for such ends and purposes by the Law of God which expresly hath prohibited it and pronounced a woe against the Actors of it But hark what the man makes a matter of complaint of why that Rebellion by the Bishops saying oh how loyal he is all of a sudden and fearful of maintaining any Rebellious principles not above eight lines before he hath point blanck affirmed nay and as though it were a convincing truth too what I shall prove before I have done with him not onely to be sedition and rebellion but an open denial of the Supremacy Power and Authority of His Most Sacred Majesty but le ts hear what he can say for himself