such Original Doct. A worthy beginning of a worthy Race Noble Ven. Sir you maintain a strange Position here That it had been better there had been no Clergy Would you have had no Gospel preached no Sacraments no continuance of Christian Religion in the World or do you think that these things could have been without a Succession of the true Priesthood or as you call it of true Ministry by means of Ordination do's not your own Church hold the same Eng. Gent. You will know more of my Church when I have told you what I find the word Church to signifie in Scripture which is to me the only rule of Faith Worship and Manners neither do I seek these aditional helps of Fathers Councels or Ecclesiastical history much less Tradition for since it is said in the word of God itself That Antichrist did begin to work even in those days I can easily believe that he had brought his Work to some perfection before the word Church was by him applied to the Clergy I shall therefore tell you what I conceive that Church Clergy and Ordination signified in the Apostolical times I find then the word Church in the New Testament taken but in two sences the first for the Vniversal Invisible Church called sometimes of the First-born that is the whole number of the true Followers of Christ in the World where-ever resident or into what part soever dispersed The other signification of Church is an Assembly which though it be sometimes used to express any Meetings even unlawful tumultuous ones as well in Scripture as prophane Authors yet it is more frequently understood for a gathering together to the Duties of Prayer Preaching and Breaking of Bread and the whole Number so Congregated is both in the Acts of the Apostles and in their holy Epistles called the Church nor is there the least colour for appropriating that word to the Pastors and Deacons who since the Corruptions of Christian Religion are called Clergy which word in the Old Testament is used sometimes for Gods whole People and sometimes for the Tribe of Levi out of which the Priests were chosen for the word signifies a Lot so â—â— Dispencer of the Christian Faith And I cannot sufficiently admire why our Clergy who very justly refuse to believe the Miracle which is pretended to be wrought in Transubstantiation because they see both the Wafer and the Wine to have the same Substance and the same Accidents after the Priest has mumbled words over those Elements as they had before and yet will believe that the same kind of Spell or Charm in Ordination can have the Efficacy to Metamorphose a poor Lay-Ideot into a Heavenly Creature notwithstanding that we find in them the same humane Nature and the same Necessities of it to which they were subject before such Transformation nay the same Debauch Profanness Ignorance and Disability to preach the Gospel Noble Ven. Sir this discourse is very new to me I must confess I am much inclined to joyn with you in believing that the power Priests Exercise over Mankind with the Iurisdiction they pretend to over Princes and States may be a usurpation but that they should not have a Divine Call to serve at the Altar or that any person can pretend to perform those Sacred Functions without being duly Ordained seems very strange Eng. Gent. I am not now to discourse of Religion it is never very civil to do so in Conversation of persons of a different belief neither can it be of any benefit towards a Roman Catholick for if his Conscience should be never so cleerly convinc'd he is not yet Master of his own Faith having given it up to his Church of whom he must ask leave to be a Convert which he will be sure never to obtain But if you have the Curiosity when you come amongst the learned in your own Country for amongst our Ordination-Mongers there is a great scarcity of Letters and other good Parts you may please to take the Bible which you acknowledg to be the Word of God as well as we and intreat some of them to shew you any passage the plain and genuine sense of which can any way evince this Succession this Ordination or this Priesthood we are now speaking of and when you have done if you will let your own excellent Reason and Discourse judg and not your Priest who is too much concerned in point of Interest I make no doubt but you will be convinced that the pretence to the dispensing of Divine things by virtue of a humane Constitution and so ridiculous a one too as the Ordination practised by your Bishops and ours who descend and succeed from one and the same Mother is as little Justifiable by Scripture and Reason and full as great a Cheat and Vsurpation as the Empire which the Ecclesiasticks pretend to over the Consciences and persons of men and the Exemption from all Secular power Noble Ven. Well Sir though neither my Faith nor my Reason can come up to what you hold yet the Novelty and the grace of this Argument has delighted me extreamly and if that be a Sin as I fear it is I must confess it to my Priest but I ask your pardon first for putting you upon this long Deviation Eng. Gent. Well this Digression is not without its use for it will shorten our business which is grown longer than I thought it would have been for I shall mention the Clergy no more but when-ever I speak of Peerage pray take notice that I mean both Lords Spiritual and Temporal since they stand both upon the same foot of Property But if you please I will fall immediately to discourse of the Government of England and say no more of those of our Neighbours than what will fall in by the way or be hinted to me by your Demands for the time runs away and I know the Doctor must be at home by noon where he gives daily charitable audience to an Infinity of poor people who have need of his help and who send or come for it not having the confidence to send for him since they have nothing to give him though he be very liberal too of his Visits to such where he has any knowledg of them But I spare his Modesty which I see is concerned at the Just Testimony I bear to his Charity The Soveraign Power of England then is in King Lords and Commons The Parliaments as they are now constituted that is the assigning a choice to such a Number of Burroughs as also the manner and form of Elections and Returns did come in as I suppose in the time of Henry the third where now our Statute-Book begins and I must confess I was inclined to believe that before that time our Yeomanry or commonalty had not formally assembled in Parliament but been virtually included and represented by the Peers upon whom they depended but I am fully convinced that it was otherwise by the learned Discourses lately
any Clause in a Writ or add anything to it And if any person shall be so wicked as to do any Injustice to the Life Liberty or Estate of any Englishman by any private command of the Prince the person agrieved or his next of kin if he be assassinated shall have the same remedy against the Offender as he ought to have had by the good Laws of this Land if there had been no such Command given which would be absolutely void and null and understood not to proceed from that Royal and lawful Power which is vested in his Majesty for the Execution of Justice and the protection of his People Doct. Now I see you have done with all the Government of England pray before you proceed to the decay of it let me ask you what you think of the Chancery whether you do not believe it a Solecism in the Politicks to have such a Court amongst a free People what good will Magna Charta the Petition of Right or St. Edwards Laws do us to defend our Property if it must be entirely subjected to the arbitrary disposal of one man whenever any impertinent or petulant person shall put in a Bill against you How inconsistent is this Tribunal with all that hath been said in defence of our rights or can be said Suppose the Prince should in time to come so little respect his own honour and the Interest of his People as to place a covetous or revengeful person in that great Judicatory what remedy have we against the Corruption of Registers who make what Orders they please Or against the whole Hierarchy of Knavish Clerks whilst not only the punishing and reforming misdemeanours depend upon him who may without controul be the most guilty himself but that all the Laws of England stand there arraigned before him and may be condemned when he pleases Is there or ever was there any such Tribunal in the World before in any Countrey Eng. Gent. Doctor I find you have had a Suit in Chancery but I do not intend to contradict or blame your Orthodox Zeal in this point This Court is one of those Buildings that cannot be repaired but must be demolished I could inform you how excellently matters of Equity are Administred in other Countries And this worthy Gentleman could tell you of the Venerable Quaranzia's in his City where the Law as well as the Fact is at the Bar and subject to the Judges and yet no complaint made or grievance suffered but this is not a place for it this is but the superstructure we must settle the foundation first every thing else is as much out of Order as this Trade is gone Suits are endless and nothing amongst us harmonious but all will come right when our Government is mended and never before though our Judges were all Angels this is the primum quaerite when you have this all other things shall be added unto you when that is done neither the Chancery which is grown up to this since our Ancestors time nor the Spiritual Courts nor the Cheats in trade nor any other abuses no not the Gyant Popery itself shall ever be able to stand before a Parliament no more than one of us can live like a Salamander in the fire Noble Ven. Therefore Sir pray let us come now to the decay of your Government that we may come the sooner to the happy restauration Eng. Gent. This harmonious Government of England being founded as has been said upon Property it was impossible it should be shaken so long as Property remain'd where it was placed for if when the ancient Owners the Britains fled into the Mountains and left their Lands to the Invaders who divided them as is above related they had made an Agrarian Law to fix it then our Government and by consequence our Happiness had been for ought we know Immortal for our Constitution as it was really a mixture of the three which are Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy as has been said so the weight and predominancy remain'd in the Optimacy who possessed nine parts in ten of the Lands And the Prince but about a tenth part In this I count all the Peoples share to the Peers and therefore do not trouble myself to enquire what proportion was allotted to them for that although they had an Hereditary right in their Lands yet it was so clog'd with Tenures and Services that they depended as to publick matters wholly on their Lords who by them could serve the king in his Wars and in time of Peace by leading the people to what they pleased Could keep the Royal Power within its due bounds and also hinder and prevent the people from Invading the Rights of the Crown so that they were the Bulwarks of the Government which in effect was much more an Aristocracy than either a Monarchy or Democracy and in all Governments where Property is mixt the Administration is so too And that part which hath the greater share in the Lands will have it too in the Jurisdiction And so in Commonwealths the Senate or the People have more or less Power as they have more or fewer possessions as was most visible in Rome where in the beginning the Patricii could hardly bring the People to any thing but afterwards when the Asiatick Conquests had inricht the Nobility to that degree that they were able to purchase a great part of the Lands in Italy the People were all their Clients and easily brought even to cut the throats of their Redeemers the Gracchi who had carried a Law for restoring them their Lands But enough of this before I will not trouble myself nor you to search into the particular causes of this change which has been made in the possessions here in England but it is visible that the fortieth part of the Lands which were at the beginning in the hands of the Peers and Church is not there now besides that not only all Villanage is long since abolished but the other Tenures are so altered and qualified that they signifie nothing towards making the Yeomanry depend upon the Lords The consequence is That the natural part of our Government which is Power is by means of Property in the hands of the People whilest the artificial part or the Parchment in which the Form of Government is written remains the same Now Art is a very good servant and help to Nature but very weak and inconsiderable when she opposes her and fights with her it would be a very Impar congressus between Parchment and Power This alone is the cause of all the disorder you heard of and now see in England and of which every man gives a reason according to his own fancy whilest few hit the right cause some impute all to the decay of Trade others to the growth of Popery which are both great Calamities but they are Effects and not Causes And if in private Families there were the same causes there would be the same effects Suppose now you had
in the Property of the Peers and Church whose Lands five parts of six have been alienated and mostly is come into the same hands with those of the King and Peers have inherited likewise according to the course of nature their Power But being kept from it by the established Government which not being changed by any lawfull Acts of State remains still in being formally whereas virtually it is abolished so that for want of outward Orders and Provisions the people are kept from the Exercise of that Power which is faln to them by the Law of Nature and those who cannot by that Law pretend to the share they had do yet enjoy it by vertue of that Right which is now ceased as having been but the natural Effect of a Cause that is no longer in being and you know sublata causa tâ—llitur I cannot say that the greater part of the people do know this their condition but they find very plainly that they want something which they ought to have and this makes them lay often the blame of their unsetledness upon wrong causes but however are altogether unquiet and restless in the Intervals of Parliament and when the King pleases to assemble one spend all their time in Complaints of the Inexecution of the Law of the multiplication of an Infinity of Grievances of Mis-spending the Publick Monies of the danger our Religion is in by practices to undermine it and the State by endeavours to bring in Arbitrary Power and in questioning great Officers of State as the Causers and Promoters of all these Abuses in so much that every Parliament seems a perfect State of War wherein the Commons are tugging and contending for their Right very justly and very honourably yet without coming to a Point So that the Court sends them packing and governs still worse and worse in the Vacancies being necessitated thereunto by their despair of doing any good in Parliament and therefore are forced to use horrid shifts to subsist without it and to keep it off without ever considering that if these Counsellers understood their Trade they might bring the Prince and People to such an Agreement in Parliament as might repair the broken and shipwrack'd Government of England and in this secure the Peace Quiet and Prosperity of the People the Greatness and Happiness of the King and be themselves not only out of present danger which no other course can exempt them from but be Renowned to all Posterity Noble Ven. I beseech you Sir how comes it to pass that neither the King nor any of his Counsellors could ever come to find out the truth of what you discourse for I am fully convinced it is as you say Eng. Gent. I cannot resolve you that but this is certain they have never endeavoured a Cure though possibly they might know the Disease as fearing that though the Effects of a Remedy would be as was said very advantagious both to King and People and to themselves yet possibly such a Reformation might not consist with the Merchandize they make of the Princes Favour nor with such Bribes Gratuities and Fees as they usually take for the dispatch of all Matters before them And therefore our Counsellors have been so far from suggesting any such thing to their Master that they have opposed and quashed all Attempts of that kind as they did the worthy Proposals made by certain Members of that Parliament in the beginning of King Iames's Reign which is yet called the Undertaking Parliament These Gentlemen considering what we have been discoursing of viz. That our old Government is at an end had framed certain Heads which if they had been proposed by that Parliament to the King and by him consented to would in their Opinion have healed the Breach and that if the King would perform his part that House of Commons would undertake for the Obedience of the People They did believe that if this should have been moved in Parliament before the King was acquainted with it it would prove Abortive and therefore sent three of their number to his Majesty Sir Iames a Croft Grandfather or Father to the present Bishop of Hereford Thomas Harley who was Ancestor to the Honourable Family of that Name is Herefordshire and Sir Henry Nevill who had been Ambassador from Queen Elizabeth to the French King These were to open the matter at large to the King and to procure his leave that it might be proposed in Parliament which after a very long Audience and Debate that wise Prince consented to with a promise of Secresie in the mean time which they humbly begged of His Majesty However this took Vent and the Earl of Northampton of the House of Howard who ruled the Rost in that time having knowledg of it engaged Sir R. Weston afterwards Lord Treasurer and Earl of Portland to impeach these Undertakers in Parliament before they could move their matters which he did the very same day accompanying his Charge which was endeavouring to alter the established Government of England with so eloquent an Invective that if one of them had not risen and made the House acquainted with the whole Series of the Affair they must have been in danger of being impeached by the Commons but however it broke their designe which was all that Northampton and Weston desired and prevented Posterity from knowing any of the Particulars of this Reformation for nothing being moved nothing could remain upon the Journal So that you see our Predecessors were not ignorant altogether of our condition though the Troubles which have befallen this poor Kingdom since have made it much more apparent for since the Determination of that Parliament there has not been one called either in that King's Reign or his Son 's or since that hath not been dissolved abruptly whilst the main businesses and those of most concern to the publick were depending and undecided And although there hath happened in this Interim a bloody War which in the Close of it changed the whole Order and Foundation of the Polity of England and that it hath pleased God to restore it again by his Majesty's happy Return so that the old Government is alive again yet it is very visible that its deadly Wound is not healed but that we are to this day tugging with the same difficulties managing the same Debates in Parliament and giving the same disgusts to the Court and hopes to the Country which our Ancestors did before the Year 1640. whilst the King hath been forced to apply the same Remedy of Dissolution to his two first Parliaments that his Father used to his four first and King Iames to his three last contrary to his own visible Interest and that of his people and this for want of having Counsellors about him of Abilities and Integrity enough to discover to him the Disease of his Government and the Remedy which I hope when we meet to Morrow Morning you will come prepared to enquire into for the Doctor says he will
gate and therefore I conceive it not to be imaginable that either Christ or his Apostles did ever account that the true Religion should be planted in the World by the framing of Laws Catechisms or Creeds by the Soveraign Powers and Magistrates whether you call them Spiritual or Temporal but that it should have a Progress suitable to its beginning for it is visible that it had its Original from the Power and Spirit of God and came in against the stream not onely without a Numa Pompilius or a Mahomet to plant and establish it by humane Constitutions and Authority but had all the Laws of the World to oppose it and all the bloudy Tyrants of that age to persecute it and to inflict exquisite torments on the Professors of it In Nero's time which was very early the Christians were offered a Temple in Rome and in what other Cities they pleased to be built to Jesus Christ and that the Romans should receive him into the number of their gods but our Religion being then in its purity this was unanimously refused for that such a God must have no Companions nor needed no Temples but must be Worshipped in Spirit and Truth The Successors to these good Christians were not so scrupulous for within some Ages after the Priests to get Riches and Power and the Emperors to get and keep the Empire for by this time the Christians were grown numerous and powerful combined together to spoil our Holy Religion to make it fit for the Government of this World to introduce into it all the Ceremonious follies and Superstitions of the Heathen and which is worse the Power of Priests both over the Persons and Consciences of Men. I shall say no more of this but refer you to innumerable Authors who have treated of this Subject particularly to a French Minister who hath written a Book Entituled La Religion Catholique Apostolique Romaine instituee par Nume Pompile and to the incomparable Machiavel in his Posthume Letter Printed lately in our Language with the Translation of his Works But I have made a long digression and to come back again shall onely desire you to take notice when I say that anciently Popery was no inconvenience in this Kingdom I mean onely Politically as the Government then stood and do not speak at all of the prejudice which mens Souls did and will ever receive from the Belief of those impious Tenents and the want of having the True Gospel of Jesus Christ preached unto them but living in perpetual Superstition and Idolatry The consideration of these Matters is not so proper to my present purpose being to Discourse onely of Government Notwithstanding therefore as I said before that Popery might have suited well enough with our old Constitution yet as to the present Estate which inclines to Popularity it would be wholly as inconsistent with it and with the Power of the Keys and the Empire of Priests especially where there is a Forreign Jurisdiction in the case as with the Tyranny and Arbitrary Power of any Prince in the World I will add thus much in Confirmation of the Doctor 's Assertion That we ought to prevent the Growth of Popery since it is now grown a Dangerous Faction here against the State Noble Ven. How can that be I beseech you Sir Eng. Gent. Sir I will make you Judg of it your self I will say nothing of those foolish Writings that have been put forth by Mariana Emanuel Sa and some others about the lawfulness of destroying Princes and States in case of Heresie because I know all the conscientious and honest Papists of which I know there are great numbers in the World do not only not hold but even abhor such cursed Tenents and do believe that when the Pope by Excommunication hath cut off any Prince from the communion of the Church can go no further nor ought to pretend a Power to deprive him of his Crown or absolve his Subjects from their Oaths and Obedience But I shall confine my self to the present condition of our Papists here You know how dangerous it is for any Kingdom or State to have a considerable wealthy flourishing party amongst them whose interest it is to destroy the Polity and Government of the Country where they live and therefore if our Papists prove this Party you will not wonder why this People are so eager to depress them This is our Case for in the beginning of Queen Elizabeths reign there was an alteration of Religion in our Country which did sufficiently enrage the Holy Father at Rome to see that this good Cow would be Milked no longer He declares her an Heretick and a Bastard his Sanctity not having declared null that incestuous Marriage which her Father had contracted before with his Brothers Wife and which that King had dissolved to Marry her Mother and afterwards Excommunicated our Queen depriving her as much as in him lay of the Kingdom some of the Zealots of that Party having a greater terrour for those Thunder-bolts than I believe many have now began to Conspire against her and Plots grew at length so frequent and so dangerous that it was necessary as the Parliaments then thought to secure the Queen by making severe Laws against a People who did not believe themselves her Majesties Subjects but on the contrary many of them thought themselves in Conscience obliged to oppose and destroy her and although that Excommunication as also the pretended doubtfulness of the Title both died with that renowned Queen yet a new desperate Conspiracy against the King her Successor and the whole Parliament ensuing not long after her decease those rigorous Laws have been so far from being repealed that very many more and far severer have been since made and are yet in force Now these Laws make so great a distinction between Protestants and Papists that whereas the former are by our Government and Laws the freest People in the World the latter are little better than slaves are confined to such a distance from their Houses are not to come near the Court which being kept in the Capital City mostly deprives them from attending their necessary occasions they are to pay two third parts of their Estates annually to the King their Priests are to suffer as Traitors and they as Felons for harbouring them in fine one of us if he do not break the Municipal Laws for the good Government of the Country need not fear the King's Power whereas their being what they are is a breach of the Law and does put them into the Princes hands to ruine them when he pleases nay he is bound by Oath to do it and when he does it not is complained against by his People and Parliaments take it amiss Now judge you Sir whether it is not the interest of these People to desire and endeavour a change whilest they remain under these discouragements and whether they are not like to joyn with the Prince whose connivance at the inexecution of