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cause_n	church_n	england_n	great_a	1,929	5	3.0386	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A43197	Loyalties severe summons to the bar of conscience, or, A seasonable and timely call to the people of England, upon the present juncture of affairs being an epitome of the several præliminaries or gradual steps the late times took to their ... ruine, by their civil dissentions, through a needless fear of the subverting, losing, and destroying of religion, liberty of the subject, and priviledges of Parliament ... : in two parts / by Robert Hearne, Gent.	Hearne, Robert.	1681 (1681)	Wing H1307; ESTC R16702	50,264	47

Author of Peace was to be Propagated by His Ministers by the Sword OH the Blindness and wilful Obstinacy of Man Oh the Proclivity of the depraved Humane Nature to Errors and Abuses How is it that Thou Religion art thus mistaken How is it Thy Dictates and Sacred Rites are thus mis-construed and mis-applyed Dost Thou Teach Men such Horrid and Abominable Doctrines 〈…〉 That to Propagate their Empire and extend their Dominions Subjects should be absolved from Obedience to their Lawful Sovereign Princes impowering them to Depose Them or pull Them down from their Thrones take the Crown from their Heads and at last their Heads from their Bodies Dost Thou warrant Disorders Distractions and Discords in the Socieries or Communities of Men to the utter Subversion of Governments Laws and Liberties and to the totall Ruin of Kingdoms Dost Thou lead Men to Contrive the most Execrable Designes to hatch Treasons and to lay Plots and Conspiracies to Endeavour nay Perpetrate Assassinations Nay if they fail in These to kick at Authority and contemn the Laws asperse the Governor and vilifie the Government Are those Thy Precepts No no not at all nor in any wise consisting with My Nature as I am Profess'd by the Church of England Indeed Rome and Geneva may understand Me so and the World has felt they do ever understand Me so The Religion of the Church of England As I am Profess'd by the Church of England I command Her Preachers to endeavour to implant Virtue in Mens Minds To let Her Doctrine as it truly and purely is be Undefiled Orthodox and Evangelical Teaching Piety or our Duty towards God Justice or Love towards those in Society with us and primarily towards His Vicegerent our Lawful King and Governour and Sobriety or Love to our own Persons in living in the Practice of those Excellent Virtues of Temperance and Soberness which tends so much to the Glory of God and our own Comfort and Happiness Have not we then who have the Church of England for our Mother great Cause to bless God for those daily Influences of Divine Love and Comfort which we receive from Her That nothing but the Pure and Uncorrupt Milk of Sincere Piety and True Religion may be suck't from Her Immaculate Breasts But Alas What the Reverend Pious and Learned Arch-Bishop Laud said in his Speech upon the Scaffold before his Death speaking of the Church of England may be too aptly the more is our Shame applyed to Her at this Time This poor Church of England said that Reverend Prelate has Flourish't and been a Shelter to other Neighbouring Churches when Storms have driven upon them but Alas now it is in a Storm it Self and God knows whether or how it shall get out And which is worse than a Storm from without it is become like an Oak cleft to Shivers with Wedges made out of its own Body and that in every Cleft Prophaneness and Irreligion is creeping in a-pace Lib. 2. de Vitae Contem. cap. 4. while as Prosper saith Men that introduce Prophaneness are cloak't with a Name of Imaginary Religion For we have in a manner almost lost the Substance and dwell much nay too much a great deal in Opinion and that Church which all the Jesuits Machinations in these parts of Christendome could not Ruin is now fallen into a great deal of Danger by Her Own BUT hold Consider Is it Religion alone that hath thus distracted Men's Brains or is it Mistaken zeal that drives Men into these Madnesses Is there nothing else in the Grass that lyes Latitant and pricks us and makes us so uneasy Yes I fear there is a Serpent that stings us and makes us kick at Authority called as heretofore Liberty of the Subject 'T is this wounds our Stomacks Liberty of the Subject and without a little Aqua Tetramagogicon or an Indubitable Assurance of its being Preserved we cannot be at ease God God! Is there any People or Nation in Europe ever Bless'd with Greater Freedoms and more Undisturbed Libertyes than this Kingdom of England Or Is there found from the One Part of the World to the Other one People bless'd with such a Land A Land whose Constitutions make the Best of Governments which Government is strengthned with the Best of Laws which Laws are Executed by the Best of Princes whose Prince whose Laws whose Government makes Us the Happiest of all Subjects makes Us the Happiest of all People And what a late Learned Writer said speaking in the Praise of a Land and the Admirable Blessings of it may be said of England and I shall apply it according to his Words A Land sayes he of Strength England described as it now flourishes of Plenty and of Peace where every Soul may sit beneath his Vine unfrighted at the Horrid Language of the Hoarse Trumpet unstartled at the Warlike Summons of the Roaring Canons A Land whose Beauty hath surpriz'd the Ambitious Hearts of Forreign Princes and taught them by their Martial Oratory to make their vain Attempts A Land whose Strength reads Vanity in the deceived Hopes of Conquerors and crowns their Enterprizes with a Shameful Over-throw A Land whose Native Plenty makes her the World's Exchange supplying Others able to subsist without Supply from Forreign Kingdoms In it Self Happy and Abroad Honourable A Land that hath no Vanity but what 's the sweetest of all Blessings Peace and Plenty that hath no Misery but is propagated from that Blindness which cannot see Her own Felicity A Land that flows with Milk and Honey and in brief wants nothing to deserve the Title of a Paradise The Curb of Spain The Pride of Germany the Aid of Belgia the Scourge of France the Empress of the World and Queen of Nations In fine England is the Envy of all Nations the Ambition of all Princes the Terror of all Enemies and the Security of all Neighbouring States Thus far I follow the Steps of my Learned Author in this Encomium of the Land whereof we were both † Oh Fortundt●s nimium sua si bona norint Anglos Natives BUT Alas I find at the Bottom of the Role a Blot or Blur which as it were oblitterates part of the Account for all these Blessings and Happinesses are but as so many Steps towards her Woe or as so many Gaps to let in Pride Ambition c. as Foxes and Wild-Boars to eat up and tread down these her Flowers For Alas She renders her Self miserable by Not being Compact within her Self in Unity but is apt and prone to Civil and Intestine Broyls Did Her Children but cherish Brotherly Love and Charity Vnion the best Antidore against Evils and endeavour the maintaining a good and right Understanding one with another and not suffer every Private Man's Interest to disturb Publick Peace Utility and Order the Devil himself nor the Pope and all his Instruments can or will ever harm or molest us But that 's the Colliquintida that alwayes spoyls our Pot

Answer did not satisfie Him His Graces Answer and that since they trifled he would receive no more Messages from them In the mean time Our Canon with some Horse and Foot was brought down from the Body of the Army and posted not far from the Bridge The particular Account of the Fight being by me I shall Relate it here as I have it Word for Word THe Duke having put himself in the posture above-said A Relation of the Fight in Scotland commanded the Canon to Fire which it no sooner begun to do but the Rebels who were drawn up on the other side upon a rising Ground near the Bridge threw themselves upon the Ground to avoid the Shot Those that were posted upon the Bridge Fired at first pretty briskly but after Five or Six Shot of Canon they all ran away they upon the rising beginning first Our Men immediately seized the Bridge threw into the River their Barricadoes of Stones Cart-Wheeles and the like took a piece of Canon they had and followed them up the Hill but their Number being very small the Rebels rallied and faced them but had not the Courage to come down upon them Our Men came down again to the Bridge and one Shot more of Canon made the Rebels flye to their upper Line where they stood again In the mean time my Lord General passed the Army over the Bridge and drew up upon the Rising which took up some time and before we were quite in order the Rebels advanced upon Us and to appearance in very good Order When they approach't they espied Our Canon at Our Head and thereupon immediately shifted their Order and opened in the middle thinking it seems We were obliged to Shoot strait forward but Our Canon being turned upon them as they then stood and discharged Three or Four times they begun to Run again their Commander Robert Hamilton being one of the first and our Dragoons and the Highlanders advancing upon them it was a perfect Rout and they fled all wayes Our Men pursuing them Of the Rebels there were Seven or Eight Hundred killed and Eleven or Twelve Hundred taken which were afterwards brought prisoners to Edinborough THE Lord General behaved himself with extraordinary Conduct and Bravery and all the Officers Gentlemen and Souldiers carried themselves with great Chearfulness and Resolution But above all the Mercy of Almighty God was most signal in that tho the Rebels were near Seven Thousand Yet were they totally defeated without any loss to His Majesties Forces save of Two or Three private Sentinals Killed and some few Wounded THUS was extinguisht that furious Flame of Rebellion fed by Presbyterian Doctrines and Zeal to the destroying of so many poor Souls who obstinately refused the Mercy of their Prince and Dyed Martyrs as they call them for the Doctrine of King-killing I pray God divert them from such like Practices for the future and make them know That without Honouring the King we do not Fear God NOW to proceed to a Second Remark which is Episcopacy spoken against the great Hatred these sort of Men have had and now have against Episcopacy as well as Monarchy For as in those late Times the Bishops were ever an Eye-sore to the Scots and the Presbyterian Faction here and therefore the Church of England in its Government Liturgy Common-Prayer and Ceremonies was termed direct Popery and could not be entertain'd as any thing else and therefore to throw down this Rome as they called it destroy the Members of this Church and at the last the Head too was what was suitable to a Good Conscience and consistent with the Liberty of the Subject and the Protestant alias Presbyterian Religion So now adayes Men are so bold to call it the like and will not stick to say the King is a Papist and the Professors of this our Religion of the Church of England Romish or Popishly affected Nay it is publickly asserted That there is not one Bishop in England who was advanced to their Episcopal Dignity by any Protestant but Popish Hand And therefore say they They must needs have a great relish of that Leaven And as the Parliament in those times began to throw their Bolts at the Bishops and to shew their Dislike to that Reverend Apostolical Order and to that Authority and Honour which is due to them and their Right of Sitting in that August-Assembly they Vote That no Bishop should have any Vote in Parliament nor any Judicial-power in the Star-Chamber nor be concerned in any Temporal Matters c. So of late in the Tryal of the Earl of Danby the Commons in Parliament Vote the Bishops useless nay The Bishops Right of Sitting in capital Causes Disputed disown their Right of Sitting there upon Capital Causes c. They Dispute their Right of Sitting at that time and at all times of Session and divers Papers flew about concerning the Right of the Lords Spiritual to Sit in the Lords House or Vote in matters Judicial and others è contra were disperst abroad to the vilifying their Reverence and beating down their undoubted pretensions But the Wisdom and Prudence of Our Gracious Sovereign knowing well enough by sad Experience That they were Treading in the same Steps with their Old Fathers who began at the Church in order to the better subverting the State put an end to the Session After which we have but little News of them the Anti-Episcopates or Presbyters holding their Fingers in their Mouths and standing as mute as Metamorphosed Niobes SINCE the Mutterers against Episcopacy were thus silenced the Clergy have been pretty quiet tho sometimes we meet with a little Piece or two of Controversial Points thrown into their Closets or sent to them by the New found way of Dispatch and that 's the most they can do now They would have their Old Darling bear sway and would be dancing to Westminster to the Assembly of Grave Divines of which some Hugh Peters or Faringdon may be President I should say Moderator But here 's the Plague They have no long Triennial nor meet with such Concessions tho indeed they have had too many very gracious and great ones of late which have been too much abused as we shall take Notice of hereafter as their Fore-Fathes did nor have they a Durante Voluptate Parliament else you would find they would do glorious Things for the Good People of the Land and the Lord's Cause In Truth had these great Antagonists of the Bishops but what they Merit for either their scandalous stigmatizing them in private in their Conversations as well as in exposing them to the World with their spiteful Censures the Punishment which their Patrons Pryn and Burton and Bastwick Suffered in the late Times is too great a Favour and too mild a Resentment AND now I must hasten to Generals only I cannot choose but take Notice That these Times or the Men of them as if they were driven by the pure Dictates of a

Worshippers these Sons of Belial and Children of Darkness c. Thus they asperse the Ministry and endeavour to draw an Odium upon the Clergy which is the readiest means to induce men to have a low regard of Religion it self for as a wise Writer of late times said when once the Dispensers of Religion fall into Contempt it must be a strong Arm and more than that of Flesh that can bear up Religion it self and keep that from falling too I hope and pray with a Reverend Prelate in a late learned Sermon upon this Subject That God will not remove our Candlestick from among us as he threatned the Church of Ephesus tho 't is too much to be feared our Impenitency and the disregard we have of Gods Ministers and the Diversity of Sects and Opinions amongst us may be sufficient enough to occasion it What Judgments the Angel denounced against those Four Churches in the Revelations Chap. 2. I desire every Son and Daughter of our Church to consider Read the Severals and I doubt not but you 'll soon find how little a Disproportion there is betwixt Us and Them Tho I fear the last viz. Thyatira may be too much our lively Image The several Schismes Sects and Divisions which have been broached fomented and continued about Religion in this Kingdom of England have been as I said before the immediate Reasons that brought men to have a low regard of Religion it self and the Causes of the great Decay of Christian Piety in the Land We may attribute what we will to the State and say what we please of the Government when it is the Immorality and Vice of the Cymes which makes the Almighty angry with us and threaten to cut us off And now Impiety Irreligion rides Tryumphant Immorality sways its Scepter in the Hearts of men and therefore let the Charmer charm never so wisely men lend but Adders Cares and will not regard And therefore Admonitions are but vain and Advice but Bubbles Correption and Rebuke pisht at and reckoned but as Childish Flattery or painted Mask Nothing can be then expected but such like Reparties which I will take from the to-be-admired * Vide Quale's Boanerges and Barnabas Boanerges and so conclude Tell not me of Hell Devills or damned Souls to enforce me from those Pleasures which they nick-name Sin 'T is true I have not led my life according to the Pharisaical Square of the Opinions of God's Ministers neither have I found Judgments according to their Prophecies whereby I must conclude that God is wonderfully merciful or they wonderfully mistaken How often have they thundered Torment against my Voluptuous life and yet I feel no pain How bitterly have they threatned shame against the Vaunts of the Vain-glorious Yet find they honour How fiercely have they preach't destruction against my Cruelty And yet I live What Plagues against my Swearing Yet not infected What Diseases against my Drunkenness And yet sound What danger against Procrastination Yet how often hath God been found upon the Death-bead What Damnation to Hypocrites Yet who more safe What Stripes to the Ignorant Yet who more Scot-free What Poverty to the Sloathful Yet they prosper What Falls to the Proud Yet stand they surest What Curses to the Covetous Yet who richer What Judgment to the Lascivious Yet who more pleasure What Vengeance to the Prophane the Censorious the Revengeful Yet none live more unscourged Who deeper Branded than the Lyar Yet who more Favoured Who more threatned than the Presumptuous Yet who less punish'd Thus they run thro a Catalogue of the several Kinds of Enormous Sins which are most predominant in our depraved Natures and believe not what the Church doth pronounce on each of them but as Bugbeares and therefore say they thus we are fool'd and kept in awe by the strict fancies of these Pulpit-men whose Opinions have no Ground but what they gain from Popularity But let these bold blustring Sinners but read the fifth Chapter of Isaiahs Prophecy and there they will find the miserable Woes entailed on the Wicked as likewise Jer. 4. Deut. 29.2 Chron. 34. Perhaps I have played the Divine too long and have tired you with these sad Reflections I shall therefore enlarge no further but only add one word by way of Admonition and conclude Let not O England an improvident Carelesness cast out all Fear of approaching Danger Hast thou not for these many years nuzzled in the Bosome of Habitual Peace when thy Neighbours were in the Flames of War Be not deceived a long Peace makes a Bloody War and the Abuse of continued Mercies makes a sharp Judgment The stalled Oxe that wallows in his plenty and waxes wanton in his Ease is not far from slaughter Didst thou not laugh Invasion to scorn and was not affrighted at Conspiracies Didst thou want good Laws or did those Laws want Execution Didst thou not stand the Glory of the World and the Envy of all Nations Did not thy Prophets give lawful warning and like true Baptists preach Repentance How hast thou lived that now these Prophecies are fulfilled and that now thou beholdest the Vialls of thy angry God ready to be powred forth Didst thou think that Pride could not demolish the Towers that defend thee Nor drunkenness dry up the Sea that Walls thee Nor the Flames of Lust dissolve the Ord'nance that protects thee O England Since mercies could not allure thee let these threatning Judgments now at length enforce thee to a true Repentance Quench the Firebrand which thou hast kindled Turn thy Mirth to true Mourning and thy Feasts of Joy to Humiliation and pray with thy Church That from all Sedition privy Conspiracy and Rebellion from all false Doctrine Heresy and Schisme from Hardness of Heart and Contempt of His Word and Commandments God would deliver us Amen FINIS THE POST-SCRIPT SINCE the Composing the foregoing Discourse the Parliament of Scotland was Convogued where the Duke of York sat Commissioner impoured to touch those Acts with the Royal Scepter which passed there Voted by men of unbyast Principles and Loyal Intentions No sooner do we find them placed in their Seats but satissyed with the Royal Pleasure in the Commissioner and undisturbed with the daily Murmurings about Exclusion Exclusion the English-man's Character of a Popish Successor no way sympathizing with Their Loyal Minds They presently Vote the publication of those Memorable Acts for the Lineal Legal Succession in That and consequently This Kingdom Oh Brave Scots Now you have quitted your selves like Men and have shewed this to be the Year of Regeneration and consequently Salvation Now you shame our Pretended Loyallists who make the world believe that their Zeal and Devotion for the Royal Family deserves Admiration and merits the name of Unparalle●'d when the Curtaine drawn it is Squint-eyed and byast Now it is that you have played the true antient Scot not filled with Anti-monarchy and Rebellion or influenced by the Factious Spirits of Disaffected English nor moved with the malicious Thunder-bolt of Seditious and Rebellious Meroz but a Legal Succession according to the Proximity of Blood the Liberty and Freedom of The true Kirk of God as now established is and shall be your Uninterrupted Resolve What doth or will this do but eternize your Names and make you memorable in the Chronicles of Fame Now you have quitted your selves like true Israelites and the God of Israel prosper all your Consultations AH But Brother and Fellow-Subject sayes the Scot to the English-Man Yee make Mickle to dee with yee 'r Evidences c. we Hang them Here as fast as they come in The Dee'l is in yee for Plotting and Swearing In Troth a Man cannot Live with yee for Evidencing wee'se not come among yee Yee speak Treason and yee 'll not be Tryed but when and whare and by what Jury yee please But yee 'r Protestant-Joyner Colledge has found That the Law will have its Force and that tho London could afford him an Ignoramus-Jury Oxford would not Veritas est magna praevalebit Truth will prevail Peace must be maintained and Offenders punish't Incendiaries must be suppressed and Murmurers silenced Whatever the Reverend Evidence could deposite in Verbo sacerdotis to invalidate the King's Evidence and to wash off the Ethiopian Blackness of Treason and Villany he still found That Verbum Justiciae Veritatis foyled him and that he ought not as he had set His Hand to the Plough to look back Methinks the Consideration of His Life and Being as one told him should have Taught Him That to say his Prayers Hebrew-fashion was unbecoming His Coat In Troth Yee are all Mad and what shall I say Yee 'll ne're leave Plotting till yee 're all Potted But look upon the fore-going Discourse and yee 'le find necessary Cures to Heal this Plotting-Itch