themselves sole Lords without the improper mixture of Scholastick and pusillanimous upstarts the Parliament shall void her Vpper House of the same annoyances the Common and Civill Lawes shall be both set free the former from the controule the other from the meere vassalage and Copy hold of the Clergie And wheras temporall Lawes rather punish men when they have transgress't then form them to be such as should transgresse seldomest wee may conceive great hopes through the showres of Divine Benediction watering the unmolested and watchfull paines of the Ministery that the whole Inheritance of God will grow up so straight and blamelesse that the Civill Magistrate may with farre lesse toyle and difficulty and far more ease and delight steare the tall and goodly Vessell of the Common-wealth through all the gusts and tides of the Worlds mutability Here I might have ended but that some Objections which I have heard commonly flying about presse mee to the endevour of an answere We must not run they say into sudden extreams This is a fallacious Rule unlesse understood only of the actions of Vertue about things indifferent for if it be found that those two extreames be Vice and Vertue Falshood and Truth the greater extremity of Vertue and superlative Truth we run into the more vertuous and the more wise wee become and hee that flying from degenerate and traditionall corruption feares to shoot himselfe too far into the meeting imbraces of a Divinely-warranted Reformation had better not have run at all And for the suddennesse it cannot be fear'd Who should oppose it The Papists They dare not The Protestants otherwise affected They were mad There is nothing will be remoov'd but what to them is profess'dly indifferent The long affection which the People have borne to it what for it selfe what for the odiousnes of Pâ—…elates is evident from the first yeare of Qu. Elizâ—…beth it hath still beene more and more propounded desir'd and beseech't yea sometimes favourably forwarded by the Parliaments themselves Yet if it were sudden swift provided still it be from worse to better certainly wee ought to hie us from â—…ill like a torrent and rid our selves of corrupt Discipline as wee would shake fire out of our bosomes Speedy and vehement were the Reformatiâ—…ns of all the good Kings of Juda though the people had beene nuzzl'd in Idolatry never so long before they fear'd not the bug-bear danger nor the Lyon in the way that the sluggish and timorous Politician thinks he sees no more did our Brethren of the Reformed Churches abroad they ventur'd God being their guide out of rigid POPERY into that which wee in mockery call precise Puritanisme and yet wee see no inconvenience befell them Let us not dally with God when he offers us a full blessing to take as much of it as wee think will serve our ends and turne him back the rest upon his hands lest in his anger he snatch all from us again Next they alledge the antiquity of Episcopacy through all Ages What it was in the Apostles time that questionlesse it must be still and therein I trust the Ministers will be able to satisfie the Parliament But if Episcopacie be taken for Prelacie all the Ages they can deduce it through will make it no more venerable then Papacie Most certaine it is as all our Stories beare witnesse that ever since their comming to the See of Canterbury for neere twelve hundred yeares to speake of them in generall they have beene in England to our Soules a sad and dolefull succession of illiterate and blind guides to our purses and goods a wastfull band of robbers a perpetuall havock and rapine To our state a continuall Hydra of mischiefe and molestation the forge of discord and Rebellion This is the Trophey of their Antiquity and boasted Succession through so many Ages And for those Prelat-Martyrs they glory of they are to bee judg'd what they were by the Gospel and not the Gospel to be tried by them And it is to be noted that if they were for Bishopricks and Ceremonies it was in their prosperitie and fulnes of bread but in their persecution which purifi'd them and neer their death which was their garland they plainely dislik'd and condemn'd the Ceremonies and threw away those Episcopall ornaments wherein they were instal'd as foolish and detestable for so the words of Ridley at his degradment and his letter to Hooper expressly shew Neither doth the Author of our Church History spare to record sadly the fall for so he termes it and infirmities of these Martyrs though we would deify them And why should their Martyrdom more countnance corrupt doctrine or discipline then their subscriptions justify their Treason to the Royall blood of this Relm by diverting and intaling the right of the Crown from the true heires to the houses of Northumberland and Suffolk which had it tooke effect this present King had in all likelyhood never sat on this Throne and the happy union of this Iland had bin frustrated Lastly whereas they adde that some the learnedest of the reformed abroad admire our Episcopacy it had bin more for the strength of the Argument to tell us that som of the wisest States-men admire it for thereby we might guesse them weary of the present discipline as offensive to their State which is the bugge we feare but being they are Church-men we may rather suspect them for some Prelatizing-spirits that admire our Bishopricks not Episcopacy The next objection vanishes of it selfe propounding a doubt whether a greater inconvenience would not grow from the corruption of any other discipline then from that of Episcopacy This seemes an unseasonable foresight and out of order to deferre and put off the most needfull constitution of one right discipline while we stand ballancing the discommodity's of two corrupt ones First constitute that which is right and of it selfe it will discover and rectify that which swervs and easily remedy the pretended feare of having a Pope in every Parish unlesse we call the zealous and meek censure of the Church a Popedom which who so does let him advise how he can reject the Pastorly Rod and Sheep-hooke of CHRIST and those cords of love and not feare to fall under the iron Scepter of his anger that will dash him to peeces like a Potsherd At another doubt of theirs I wonder whether this discipline which we desire be such as can be put in practise within this Kingdom they say it can not stand with the common Law nor with the Kings safety the government of Episcopacy is now so weav'd into the common Law In Gods name let it weave out againe let not humain quillets keep back divine authority T is not the common Law nor the civil but piety and justice that are our foundresses they stoop not neither change colour for Aristocâ—… democraty or Monarohy nor yet at all interrupt their just courses but farre above the taking notice of these inferior niceties with perfect sympathy
their deceitfull Pedleries to gaine as many associats of guiltines as they can and to infect the temporall Magistrate with the like lawlesse though not sacrilegious extortion see a while what they doe they ingage themselves to preach and perswade an assertion for truth the most false and to this Monarchy the most pernicious and destructive that could bee chosen What more banefull to Monarchy then a Popular Commotion for the dissolution of Monarchy slides aptest into a Democracy and what stirs the Englishmen as our wisest writers have observ'd sooner to rebellion then violent and heavy hands upon their goods and purses Yet these devout Prelates spight of our great Charter and the soules of our Progenitors that wrested their liberties out of the Norman gripe with their dearest blood and highest prowesse for these many years have not ceas't in their Pulpits wrinching and spraining the text to set at nought and trample under foot all the most sacred and life blood Lawes Statutes and Acts of Parliament that are the holy Cov'nant of Union and Marriage betweene the King and his Realme by proscribing and confiscating from us all the right we have to our owne bodies goods and liberties What is this but to blow a trumpet and proclaime a fire-crosse to a hereditary and perpetuall civill warre Thus much against the Subjects Liberty hath been assaulted by them Now how they have spar'd Supremacie or likely are here-after to submit to it remaines lastly to bee consider'd The emulation that under the old Law was in the King toward the Preist is now so come about in the Gospell that all the danger is to be fear'd from the Preist to the King Whilst the Preists Office in the Law was set out with an exteriour lustre of Pomp and glory Kings were ambitious to be Preists now Priests not perceiving the heavenly brightnesse and inward splendor of their more glorious Evangelick Ministery with as great ambition affect to be Kings as in all their courses is easie to be observ'd Their eyes over imminent upon worldly matters their desires ever thirsting after worldly employments in stead of diligent and fervent studie in the Bible they covet to be expert in Canons and Decretals which may inable them to judge and interpose in temporall Causes however pretended 〈◊〉 Doe they not hord up Plefe seeke to bee porent in secular Strength in State Affaires in Lands Lordships and Demeanes to sway and carry all before them in high Courts and Privie Counsels to bring into their grasp the high and principall Offices of the Kingdom have they not been bold of late to check the Common Law to slight and brave the indiminishable Majestie of our highest Court the Law-giving and Sacred Parliament Doe they not plainly labour to exempt Church-men from the Magistrate Yea so presumptuously as to question and menace Officers that represent the Kings Person for using their Authority against drunken Preists The cause of protecting murderous Clergie-men was the first heart-burning that swel'd up the audacious Becket to the pestilent and odious vexation of Henry the second Nay more have not some of their devoted Schollers begun I need not say to nibble but openly to argue against the Kings Supremacie is not the Châ—…ife of them accus'd out of his owne Booke and his late Canons to affect a certaine unquestionable Patriarchat independent and unsubordinate to the Crowne From whence having first brought us to a servile Estate of Religion and Manhood and having predispos'd his conditions with the Pope that layes claime to this Land or some Pepin of his owne creating it were all as likely for him to aspire to the Monarchy among us as that the Pope could finde meanes so on the sudden both to bereave the Emperour of the Roman Territory with the favour of Italy and by an unexpected friend out of France while he was in danger to lose his new-got Purchase beyond hope to leap in to the faire Exarchat of Ravenna A good while the Pope suttl'y acted the Lamb writing to the Emperour my Lord Tiberius my Lord Mauritius but no sooner did this his Lord pluck at the Images and Idols but hee threw off his Sheepes clothing and started up a Wolfe laying his pawes upon the Emperours right as forfeited to Peter Why may not wee as well having been forewarn'd at home by our renowned Chaucer and from abroad by the great and learned Padre Paolo from the like beginnings as we see they are feare the like events Certainly a wise and provident King ought to suspect a Hierarchy in his Realme being ever attended as it is with two such greedy Purveyers Ambition and 〈◊〉 I say hee ought to suspect a Hierarchy to bee as dangerous and derogatory from his Crown as a Tetrarchy oâ—… a Hepiarchy Yet now that the Prelates had almost attain'd to what their insolent and unbridl'd minds had hurried them to thrust the Laiâ—…â—…der the despoticall rule of the Monarch that they themselves might confine the Monarch to a kind of Pupillagâ—… under their Hierarchy observe but how their own â—…inciples combat one another and supplant each one his fellow Having fitted us only for peace and that a servile peace by lessening our numbers dreining our estates enfeebling our bodies cowing our free spirits by those wayes as you have heard their impotent actions cannot sustaine themselves the least moment unlesse they rouze us up to a Warre fit for Cain to be the Leader of an abhorred a cursed a Fraternall Warre ENGLAND and SCOTLAND dearest Brothers both in Natnre and in CHRIST must be set to wade in one anothers blood and IRELAND our free Denizon upon the back of us both as occasion should serve a piece of Service that the Pope and all his Factors have beene compassing to doe ever since the Reformation But ever-blessed be he and ever glorifi'd that from his high watch-Tower in the Heav'ns discerning the crooked wayes of perverse and cruell men hath hitherto maim'd and insatuated all their damnable inventions and deluded their great Wizzards with a delusion fit for fooles and children had GOD beene so minded hee could have sent a Spirit of Mutiny amongst us as hee did betweene Abimilech and the Sechemites to have made our Funerals and slaine heaps more in number then the miserable surviving remnant but he when wee least deserv'd sent out a gentle gale and message of peace from the wings of those his Cherubins that fanne his Mercy-seat Nor shall the wisdome the moderation the Christian Pietie the Constancy of our Nobility and Commons of England be ever forgotten whose calme and temperat connivence could sit still and smile out the stormy bluster of men more audacious and precipitant then of solid and deep reach till their own fury had run it selfe out of breath assailing by rash and heady approches the impregnable situation of our Liberty and safety that laught such weake enginry to scorne such poore drifts to make a NationallWarre of a Surplice Brabble a Tippet-scuffle and
where ever they meet kisse each other Lastly they are fearfull that the discipline which will succeed cannot stand with the Ks. safety Wherefore it is but Episcopacy reduc't to what it should be were it not that the Tyranny of Prelates under the name of Bishops hath made our eares tender and startling we might call every good Minister a Bishop as every Bishop yea the Apostles themselves are call'd Ministers and the Angels ministrîng Spirits and the Ministers againe Angels But wherein is this propounded government so shrewd Because the government of assemblies will succeed Did not the Apostles govern the Church by assemblies how should it else be Catholik how should it have Communion Wee count it Sacrilege to take from the rich Prelates their Lands and revenu's which is Sacrilege in them to keep using them as they doe and can we think it safe to defraude the living Church of GOD of that right which GOD has given her in assemblies O but the consequence Assemblies draw to them the Supremacy of Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction No surely they draw no Supremacy but that authority which CHRIST and Saint Paul in his name conferrs upon them The K. may still retain the same Supremacy in the Assemblies as in the Parliament here he 〈◊〉 do nothing alone against the common Law and there neither alone nor with consent against the Scriptures But is this all No this Ecclesiasticall Supremacy draws to it the power to excommunicate Kings and then followes the worst that can be imagin'd Doe they hope to avoyd this by keeping Prelates that have so often don it Not to exemplifie the malapert insolence of our owne Bishops in this kind towards our Kings I shall turn back to the Primitive and pure times which the objecters would have the rule of reformation to us Not an assembly but one Bishop alone Saint AMBROSE of Millan held Theodosius the most Christian Emperor under excommunication above eight moneths together drove him from the Church in the presence of his Nobles which the good Emperor bore with heroick humility and never ceas't by prayers and teares till he was absolv'd for which coming to the Bishop with Supplication into the Salutatory some out Porch of the Church he was charg'd by him of tyrannicall madnes against GOD for comming into holy ground At last upon conditions absolv'd and after great humiliation approaching to the Altar to offer as those thrise pure times then thought meet he had scarse with-drawne his hand and stood a while when a bold Arch-deacon comes in the Bishops name and chaces him from within the railes telling him peremptorily that the place wherein he stood was for none but the Priests to enter or to touch and this is another peece of pure Primitive Divinity Thinke yee then our Bishops will forgoe the power of excommunication on whomsoever No certainly unlesse to compasse sinister ends and then revoke when they see their time And yet this most mild though withall dredfull and inviolable Prerogative of Christs diadem excommunication servs for nothing with them but to prog and pandar for fees or to display their pride and sharpen their revenge debarring men the protection of the Law and I remember not whether in some cases it bereave not men all right to their worldly goods and Inheritanees besides the deniall of Christian buriall But in the Evangelical and reformed use of this sacred censure no such prostitution no such Jscariotical drifts are to be doubted as that Spirituall doom and sentence should invade worldly possession which is the rightfull lot and portion even of the wicke dest men as frankly bestow'd upon them by the al-dispensing bounty as rain and Sun-shine No no it seekes not to bereave or destroy the body it seekes to saue the Soule by humbling the body not by Imprisonment or pecuniary mulct much lesse by stripes or bonds or disinheritance but by Fatherly admonishment and Christian rebuke to cast it into godly sorrow whose end is joy and ingenuous bashfulnesse to sin if that can not be wrought then as a tender Mother takes her Child and holds it over the pit with scarring words that it may learne to feare where danger is so doth excommunication as deerly and as freely without money use her wholsome and saving terrors she is instant she beseeches by all the deere and sweet promises of SALVATION she entices and woos by all the threatnings and thunders of the Law and rejected Gosspel she charges and adjures this is all her Armory her munition her Artillery then she awaites with long-sufferance and yet ardent zeale In briefe there is no act in all the errand of Gods Ministers to man-kind wherein passes more loverlike contestation betweene CHRIST and the Soule of a regenerate man lapsing then before and in and after the sentence of Excommunication As for the fogging proctorage of money with such an eye as strooke Gehezi with Leprosy and Simon Magus with a curse so does she looke and so threaten her firy whip against that banking den of theeves that dare thus baffle and buy and sell the awfull and majestick wrincles of her brow He that is rightly and apostolically sped with her invisible arrow if he caÌ„ be at peace in his Soule and not smel within him the brimstone of Hell may have faire leave to tell all his baggs over undiminish't of the least farding may eat his dainties drinke his wine use his delights enjoy his Lands and liberties not the least skin rais'd not the least haire misplac't for all that excommunication has done much more may a King injoy his rights and Prerogatives unflowr'd untouch'd and be as absolute and compleat a King as all his royalties and revenu's can make him And therefore little did Theodosius fear a plot upon his Empire when he stood excommunicat by Saint Ambrose though it were done either with much hauâ—…y pride or ignorant zeale But let us rather look upon the reformed Churches beyond the seas the Grizons the Suisses the Hollanders the French that have a Supremacy to live under as well as we where do the Churches in all these places strive for Supremacy where do they clash and justle Supremacies with the Civil Magistrate In France a more severe Monarchy then ours the Protestants under this Church government carry the name of the best Subjects the King has and yet Presbytery if it must be so call'd does there all that it desires to doe how easie were it if there be such great suspicion to give no more scope to it in England But let us not for feare of a scarre-crow or else through hatred to be reform'd stand hankering and politizing when GOD with spread hands testifies to us and points us out the way to our peace Let us not be so overcredulous unlesse GOD hath blinded us as to trust our deer Soules into the hands of men that beg so devoutly for the pride and gluttony of their owne backs and bellies that sue and sollicite so eagerly not for the