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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A27046	A third defence of the cause of peace proving 1. the need of our concord, 2. the impossibility of it, on the terms of the present impositions against the accusations and storms of, viz., Mr. John Hinckley, a nameless impleader, a nameless reflector, or Speculum, &c., Mr. John Cheny's second accusation, Mr. Roger L'Strange, justice, &c., the Dialogue between the Pope and a fanatic, J. Varney's phanatic Prophesie / by Richard Baxter.	Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691.	1681 (1681)	Wing B1419; ESTC R647	161,764	297

in your sense who died lately and hath told me being my very dear Friend his own Judgment and the Parliament's as I now tell it you I have in the heat of the Wars heard Sir Thomas Middleton Major General Mitton and many others thus give their Judgment Yea these were for the Liturgy and full Conformity and some of them for Dr. Hammond's highest strain of Episcopacy But it s sufficient to your Cause that though the men who are yet living are the best Witnesses of their own minds yet you are resolved not to believe either them or me But let me remember you of one wide-mou●hed Witness more which will almost swallow up your credit When Cromwell and his Army and their secret Adherents in the Parliament cast out the eleven Members of Parliament first and Conquered the City and pull'd down all the Committees and disbanded all the other Forces of Massey's Army and all the Garrison and County Forces Yea before that when they layd by Essex and his old Officers and Army and abundance of the Parliament-men that had Command in Garrisons Armies c. by the self-denying Vote as it was called All this was done upon Insinuations that they were not men to be trusted being even then at the heart for the most part Episcopal And if yet you are incredulous and as distant as the other Pole I will now but intreat you to fetch one Argument from the North to draw you from your North-Pole distance and tell your self whether Major General Monk and Morgan and his Army which brought in the King and set up the Bishops again was Episcopal or Presbyterian And yet their long abode in Scotland made that Army accounted to be more Presbyterian than any Army that was in England But as King Charles saith in his Letter to Mr. Henderson No man can so hardly understand as he that would not know That the War is so odious now as that neither side will own it is no wonder when they have learned by so much Experience I would it had been so from the beginning § 28. I must allow you to ease your Fancy with the name of Singularities strange Imaginations the body of a dead man c. for want of bettet stuff But it s more strange to me that the Contention between Arminian and Calvinian Prelats and Prelatists should be talked of as so incredible when your Goliah Peter Heylin hath made it so much of the substance of his History of the Life of A. B. Laud. In what you say more of Williams you still confute your self For what say you but that selfish carnal Motives did make an A. B. fight against the King But was he therefore no Prelatist and yet an Archprelate or was he therefore a Presbyterian A. B. I again advise you not to cast all out of your Church that are ruled by selfishness and worldly interest least you leave so few as will take away the glory of your Magnitude and leave the Sectaries to vie with you for the majority And I will intreat you but to mark throughout the foresaid History of A. B. Laud how grosly and uglily your foresaid Champion describeth Laud and the chief of his Party as if Preferment and Rising were there very scope and the contriving and seeking it by all Friends and means were their very Trade of life and business in this world So that to a truly heavenly mortified Christian it must needs seem as loathsom a Character as Christ giveth the rich man Luke 16. 12. if not much more For he writeth Pride Ambition worldliness seeking to be greatest as it were the very Inscription of the Picture which he draweth As his own Letters in the Caball say the same of Williams And will you make that to be a mark of No-prelate which your Champion maketh their notorious Character Read him impartially and judge As for Arrius I had no acquaintance with him nor have I any business with him But if all my foresaid twenty Evidences fail me and I cannot know what a Parliament was what a Synod was what an Army was when I was acquainted familiarly with so many of them all How should I know whether or no that Epiphanius spake truly of the secret heart of Arrius who so openly falsly and furiously abused and persecuted his Superiour Chrysostom You shall believe what you will and I will believe what I can But few men have ventured to cast such a slur upon S. Hierom as you do saying That Jerom himself was not a jot the better for it even for missing of a Bishoprick Medina himself hath not done him so much wrong What Bishoprick was it that he sought and missed of and when Though he joyned with Chrysostom's Adversaries I find not that he sought his Place or any other Bishops though he sowrly over-top Augustine in confidence of arguing I find not that he sought to be above him in place It 's well that you are not out of hope of Preferment your self lest you should turn Presbyterian for pardon on my smarting sharpness of speech to you as you account it while I tell you that I take you not for a better man than S. Jerom and therefore think that want of Preferment would do more with you than it did with him But this is the ordinary judgment of Worldlings who measure other men by themselves When I am dead and cannot answer for my self I doubt not but the same will be said of me though you were now forced to recede from that Censure But above all Impudencies I must magnifie theirs that charge this on the Presbyterians as such whose denominating opinion lieth in resisting all Honours Preferments Precedencies great riches c. in the Ministry save what meer Worth or Age procureth and yet they are said to be discontent because they cannot be Bishops when their Doctrine is against them The Dog that is busie about his Carrion snarleth at every one that passeth by as jealous that he would bereave him of his Feast § 29. 31. When the Question is As whether the Parliament of England be English-men or French-men I will take your return of round square and forked Atomes for a very moving Answer considering the Cause and Person But when I alledge your perversest Champion Heylin only ad hominem I will not believe that your Allegation of his Lies against Presbyterians is any more argumentum ad hominem to us than if you alledged the authority of Manesseh Ben Israel till you have proved for what cannot you do that you have a mind to do that Pet. Heylin as well as the Archbishop of York was a Presbyterian I thank you for your silence to § 32. § 33. When our Question was of the Causers of the late War and we came to recite the Principles of the Leaders of the Prelatical party what should I do more than name the men and their Books When the Bishop silenced me and forbid me to Preach in his Diocess he commended

is one that will not persecute and undo such Puritans We had divers such Presbyterian Bishops Usher Bedle Downam Davenant Hall c. And before them Grindal Abbots and the most of our Bishops for Queen Elizabeth's Reign Again I confess that it was some such Presbyterians as these that raised the Parliaments Army in England The two next Sections evincing your Errour and Calumny you pass by § 22. Is of no further use to us only about Dr. Jo. Reignolds you are a most deceived and deceiving Historian 1. You do not know c. But you might have known that there is extant in Print his Letters to Sir Francis Knowles against Prelacy for a meer Moderatorship or Presidency 2. You say Did he not live and die in full Conformity with the Church of England Answ A known falshood if a Question may be false What matter of Fact shall ever come to Posterity by such hands without falsification if Cartwright and Reignolds the leading Non-conformists of England were Conformists Sir I and hundreds more have offered long to Conform as far to the utmost as either of these did And yet we are unworthy to Preach the the Gospel of Christ for want of Conformity It may be left it prove them to be Presbyterians that will not prosecute us Learn better whether ever Dr. Reignolds did subscribe to the Liturgy and Ceremonies whether ever he took the Oath of Canonical Obedience or was not against the present Prelacy Whether he was for the Cross in Baptism c. But you verily think that were he now alive he would be as hard a Màwl of the Schismaticks and Non-conformists c. Answ 1. Of the Schismaticks no doubt for he wrote against both Prelacy and Separation 2. Wonderful What cannot you verily believe which you are but willing should be true That an Archbishop is a Presbyterian and that the Leading Non-conformist would be a Mawl of the Non-conformists when 1. Twice as much is now required of Conformists as was then 2. And Dr. Reignolds was not a man to do what he did without such Reason as would have made him constant And to requite you with as strong Confidence Sir I do not rashly but soberly and deliberately profess that were they all alive at this day the old Religious Conformable Divines themselves such as Dr. Io. White Dr. Willet Dr. Challoner Dr. Field Mr. Whateley Mr. Crooks Mr. Robert Bolton Dr. Preston Dr. Sibbes Dr. Stoughton Dr. Taylor with a thousand more and a thousand yea these that wrote for the old Conformity Mr. Sprint Mr. Paybody Dr. Jo. Burges Forbes yea the old Bishops themselves Jewell Sands Grindall Abbot Miles Smith c. I do firmly believe without hesitation that the generality of them would have been resolved Non-conformists at this time not changing their judgment but because of the great Change of Conformity For I know that Cornelius Burges the Learned Gataker Dr. Robert Harris and almost all the late Westminster Assembly were formerly such kind of Conformists as these were And I know the same Non-conformists now though not many would have yielded to the old Conformity Yea more I am perswaded that were Rogers Bradford Sanders c. Yea Bishop Hooper Bishop Farrar and Bishop Latimer alive now they would all choose rather to burn at a Stake again than to do what is required of us Say not that I reproach the Laws for I only speak of the matter of Fact whether they or the present Bishops were the wiser I meddle not Yea more yet I much doubt whether all the Bishops of England now would Conform themselves as Ministers do if they were put to it For I suppose you to know that they are not put to the Declarations and Subscriptions as the Ministers were nor to their Oaths But in this I am not confident but only doubt But of such old Conformists as Bolton Whateley c. I make no doubt at all 3. But your Proof is That he received Absolution according to the Church of England Answer Is this proving So would I do yea I do receive the Lords Supper according to the Liturgie Am I therefore a Conformist Doth it follow that he would swear subscribe declare use the Image of the Cross as a symbole of Christianity c. § 23. Your intimated Calumny about Popery it 's well you let fall though you confess it not § 24. We come now to the greatest of our Differences which you call my 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about a notorious matter of Fact Whether they were Presbyterians or Episcopal and ●rastians that first raised the Armies in England against the King When in the very Age that it was done such a thing can be so confiuently denied what Credit is there in some mens History I thought all these set together had been proof enough 1. That former Episcopal Parliaments began the Business and left it where those found it 2. Heylin himself sheweth fully that the difference was long working between the two sorts of Episcopal men about Arminianism favouring Papists Innovations and Propriety 3. That such as Jewel Bilson and Hooker gives us the Principles on which they did proceed And Sir Edward Sands that hath written for high Conformity and was Hooker's Pupill and bosom Friend was one of the Chief for the People interest in th●se Parliaments 4. That H●ylin and Rushworth and Fuller acquaint us That Abbot was laid by for refusing to license Sibthorp's Book and how the rest did prosecute Mainwaring 5. That we knew our selves abundance of the Parliament-men who were all of their Judgment Viz. That Moderate Episcopacy was the best Government and that the Bishops that followed Lawd did by Innovation seek to destroy both Religion and the Subjects Liberty as they thought and that it was necessary to bring down the Bishop's Power in Temporals and to get better men that would be confined more to Spiritual Government and use it better But that no Episcopacy was so necessary as that the State should be hazarded to support it This was the Judgment of almost all them that I could hear or know of 6. That even to this day 1671. there are yet about threescore of them alive besides Lords from whom the matter may be known 7. That understanding conscionable Members of the House yet living openly profess that Presbytery was fearce known among them and that there was but one known Presbyterian then in that House which was Mr. Tate of Northamptonshire an honest man 8. That when they had raised their Army in their Propositions sent to the King at Nottingham they offer the moderating of Episcopacy and not Presbytery 9 That the Earl of Fssex General the Earl of Bedford General of the Horse the Earl of Peterborough Sir John Merick Dolbiere the Earl of Stamford the Earl of Huntington the now Earl of Denbigh the Lord S. John the Lord Roberts the Lord Mandevile late Earl of Manchester the now Lord Hollis Colonel Essex Col. Goodwins Colonel Grantham Sir

Henry Cholmley and so through the rest of the Colonels were no Presbyterians though the Lord Say Lord Brook and the Lord Wharton were not Episcopal 10. That except these three last named all the Parliament's Lord-Lieutenants through England that ever I could hear of were men accounted Episcopal and Conformable and these three were not accounted Presbyterians but honest godly Independents or neither 11. That their Major Generals in the several Parts of the Land were commonly Episcopal and Conformable men yea the Earl of Stamford Sir William Waller Mr. G. Brown Mr. G. Massey Mr. Lawghorn Ferdinando Lord Fairfax Mr. G. Pointz Mr. G. Morgan Sir Thomas Middleton Mr. G. Mitton Sir John Gell c. 12. That the Synod at Westminster at first were all Conformists except about nine or ten As Doctor Hammond telleth them in his Answer to the London Ministers 13. That the Scots themselves as may be seen in a late Answer to the Bishop of Dumblanes Accommodation do profess That as England never was Presbyterian so they never supposed that they should immediately be such but only put into the Covenant the general words of Reforming according to the word of God and the Example of the best Reformed Churches That they might engage them further to enquire what is the Reformation which is most agreeable hereunto that so in time they might attain it So that when the said Bishop now Archbishop of Glasgoe being known to me citeth my own words and other mens to prove that the Assembly or Parliament never intended the Renunciation of Episcopacy but of the English exorbitant Prelacy the Scots Presbyterians deny it not but answer as aforesaid 14. That it is a commonly known thing that the Covenant came in not only after the Wars were begun but when the Parliament was brought so low as to seek to the Scots for aid And that Presbytery was little known in England till the Scots brought in the knowledge of it 15. And it was a notorious thing that the Parliament yielded to Presbytery and to exclude Episcopacy at last not because they thought that a moderate Episcopacy was not lawful and best but because they had no way to hold up their Wars without which they thought they had no way to uphold themselves but by the help of the Scots and such as were against Episcopacy And because they had seen the Prelacy fly so high and now to be so strong against them that they had no hope of moderating it but fear'd it would bear down all Insomuch that Mr. Thomas Coleman gave the Covenant to the Lords with this open profession That it signified not the Renunciation of Episcopacy 16. And it is a notorious thing that before the Parliament 1640 there were not so many Non-conformable Ministers in England Presbyterians Independents and Anabaptists altogether as there were Counties in the Kingdom And 17. It is known that few of those few had any hand in raising or promoting the War Mr. Dod in Northamptonshire Mr. Ball in Staffordshire Mr. Langley in Cheshire poor Mr. Barnet of Uppington in Shropshire Mr. Oliver Thomas and Mr. Wrath in Wales that quickly died as almost all the rest did Mr. Augier in Lancashire Mr. Slater Mr. Root and a few more in all England And 18. It is known that when necessity had drawn them to please the Scots and take the Covenant the Parliament would never be drawn though they made Ordinances for it to appoint any to settle Presbytery in the Counties in execution of their Ordinances But purposely delayed and never did it except in London Lancashire Warwickshire and a few more places 19. And it is known that the Ministers of England themselves were but few of them indeed Presbyterians and therefore were the backwarder to set up that Discipline And therefore our Worcestershire Agreement to concur in all that the three Parties are agreed in did the more easily and generally take and that the People themselves were so generally against Presbytery except some of the stricter sort that they never would submit to it And so de facto it was never indeed set up save in the few places forenamed 20. Lastly It is visible that the Reasons of the Parliament's War published in their Remonstrances and Declarations do suppose their Consent to Episcopacy and mention nothing of a change And that the Lawyers of the House as Judge Brown Selden Glin c. were generally Episcopal Erastians that thought Episcopacy lawful as being from the Soveraign Power which they thought might appoint Church Government as he please As Dr. Stillingfleet's Irenic pleads and as the Kings late Acts in Scotland intimate so far as to determine that all the external Government belongs to the King And I will not believe though you should swear it that the King is a Presbyterian I did think that these Twenty Evidences set together would have proved to any sober man that on both sides it was Episcopal men and Episcopal Erastians that raised the first War in England But all this Evidence notwithstanding this is to you the strangest Paradox in Historical Transactions that ever saw the light A serious Confutation of it would have shewed you to be in a delirium c. Answ You have hit on the best Confutation of it in those words that the Cause was capable of For now ignorant strangers and Posterity may possibly think that a man would not so confidently deny a notorious thing without some ground But what are those grounds for it is almost all one as to dispute whether the English War was between Protestants or between English-men Why 1. you say That the Spirit of Presbytery and Non-conformity was stirring in those Parliaments though not known by those Names Answ Nay then there is no dealing with you in History We judge of mens Hearts by their Professions and direct practice and take him for conformable that saith he is so and actually conformeth But you see deeper into the Spirit So you may say that it was the Spirit of Socinianism that workt in the Arminians as others say it was the Spirit of Popery that workt in A. Bishop Laud and his Party and others say that it is the Spirit of Democracy that worketh in popular Princes and the Spirit of Rebellion that workt in Hooker and the Spirit of Independency that worketh in the Presbyterians and the Spirit of Anabaptism that worketh in the Independents and so Bagshaw and his Brethren say it is the Spirit of Conformity that worketh in us And so whatever Errour a man runs not as far from as frightned or furious Adversaries do he must be said to have the Spirit of that Error As if a Pythagorean should tell you that you have the Spirit of Ajax Thraso or of some Brute Sir we plain people have hitherto taken a Presbyterian to be one that holdeth That the Church is and ought to be governed by Sessions Classes and Synods the lesser subordinate to the greater to which there lieth an Appeal

and these composed of Pastors in parity and ruling Elders conjunct and that not for meer Concord but direct Regiment These are Presbyterians in the sense of Beza and Saravia Downam and Gors Bucer Bilson Hooker and all that have written on it Whom though I differ from I take to be commonly the most sober religious strict and understanding sort of Christians together with the New England moderate Independents that I know who make up a party in the world And I take my self to be under a rational disparagement to differ from them so far as I do though for truth 〈…〉 will bear that disparagement But now forsooth we have ●●●● professing Episcopacy and Conformity in Parliements that have the Spirit of Presbytery And it was Archiepiscopal and Episcopal Presbyt●●ians that began the War Just as among the Pa●●sts the poor Jansenists yea the persecuting ●●●● are said to have the Spirit of the Ca●vinist● Ergo they are Calvinists deny it who dare 2. You prove it fully by saving Did you never hear that when these Parliaments we●e in their full Cry against the Duke of Buckinghum they secretly moved him to make Dr. Breston Archbishop and then all Complaints should be hushed Answ What still untruths 1. Produce your credible proof if you are able 2. Could a Parliament which doth all things by the major Vote transact such a Business secretly Could it have been proved would not the Duke of Buckingham have alledged it against his Adversaries 3. Would Heylin himself have silenced such a thing and emplyed the contrary if it had been true 4. Would Mr. Thomas Ball that Florid full Historian in the Life of his Tutor Dr. Preston have omitted it when he advanced his Reputation as high in outward respects as possible 5. But what if all this had been true Oportuit fuisse memorem Truth shameth the cunningest and most confident Adversaries Doctor Preston was conformable And is it a proof that the Parliament had the Spirit of Presbytery if they would have had a Conformist made Archbishop Thus we have still your first description of Presbyterians viz. Such Conformists as would be Archbishops and such Parliaments as would have Archbishops We call Archbishops Bishops and so Episcopal and you call them Presbyterians And are we not there like to agree well of the Thing that are not agreed of the Name 6. But he that knoweth that Abbot was then Archbishop of C. will hardly believe you that the Parliament would have had Dr. Preston put in though it be nothing to the purpose What you say of the Infection from Geneva hath this sense Geneva infected the English Fugitives with Presbyterianism Ergo the Parliament 1642 were Presbyterians We deny the Consequence For 1. They infected not all England 2. Nor those individual persons 3. They that were infected were non-conformable Ministers who were after silenced or trodden down by the Bishops and had not any Votes in Parliaments Next when I tell you That Parliament Militia Army Major Generals c. were no Presbyterians You answer me That you meddle not with Lay-men Answ And what need we more were not the Parliament Lay-men And was it not the Parliament that raised the Militia and the Armies and that gave Commissions to Major Generals c. And was it not the Lay-men that were the Commanders and Souldiers that fought against the Armies of the King And yet all this was an Historical Paradox to you But you say The dissenting Brethren were most guilty in blowing the Trumpet Answ 1. Suppose that were true all that you can say were but this That one Episcopal Party raised a War against the King and the other Party because some Non-conformists blew the Trumpet or perswaded them But if Episcopal men are so unstable and simple to be drawn into such a War by a few Non-conformists why do you not acknowledge it But you question whether there were ●hen so few Presbyterians in England because a thousand subscribed a Petition in King Jame 's time Answ This is to write History by conjecture against notorious matter of fact I named you the men I can name you those in the Assembly of Divines Mr. Nie Mr. Goodwin Mr. Simpson Mr. Bridge Mr. Boroughs Mr. Philips Mr. Greenhill and Mr. Caryl after all Independents and Mr. Ash a Presbyterian Name me many more English Non-conformists if you can And name me as many more in the Land then I have named if you can But a thousand subscribed the Petition Bancroft and your other such Conformists tell you that it was not so and that most of them Conformed then or soon after You can believe such men when it serveth your turn The truth is many Conformed and the rest were dead and gone Do you think there were many Non-conformists alive in 1642 who subscribed that Petition when King James came in If Mr. Dod were I suppose not many more But did they not increase and multiply Answ Excellent History Did not we live in the Country with them Should we not have known them Name them as I do They were all consumed to the number that I mention except some that went into New England And of these named divers came back out of Holland Death and Conformity had almost made an end of them when they wonderfully revived from among your selves Know you not that this is the grand hope of your present Generation from old Experience that Non conformity will be but res unius aetatis But Reason Conscience Scripture Duty and Sin will for all that be still the same As to your doubt whether England infected not Scotland Heylin in his Life of Land will tell you plainly They might at last encourage them but it was not for Presbytery but for that which they called Propriety Liberty and Safety from Popery These were the frights of the Episcopal great men of those times But as for any Ministers to infect Scotland hence with Presbytery when it there prevailed and here were next to none at all it is a ridiculous fancy But now you pretend to speak sence and tell me That one of the Propositions sent to the King after Edge-Hill was to abolish Archbishops Bishops c. Ans Unhappy still 1. But how long since after Edge-Hill Fight Was it not long after at the Treaty of Uxbridge that you mean And was that before the raising of the Army 2. Was not the Proposals at Nottingham sent by the Earl of Essex a little before the raising of the Army A surer Proof against you that then they were not for Presbytery but restrained Episcopacy 3. Even at Uxbridge Treaty many thought that another frame of Moderate Episcopacy would not be well set up till the present Frame was taken down 4. And even then they said nothing that I know of for Presbytery 5. But the truth is they saw by that time that they could not stand but by the help of those that were against the Bishops the Scots the Independents and the unwilling

Conformists that desired a Deliverance But this proveth not that the Parliament was Presbyterians then much less that they were so before the Wars But you that meddle not with Lay-men remember that Lay-men sent those Propasitions You next tell me of Alderman Pennington and the Apprentices Answ 1. Few of those Apprentices knew what Presbytery was but were exasperated against Episcopacy for the sake of the present Bishops as the common people be now within these nine years thinking that it 's they that silence their Teachers and cause all our Divisions But alas little knew they what Church-Government to desire But most that were in judgment against Episcopacy were Independents and Separatists then And how inconsiderable a number in London were those Apprentices 2. And our Question is not what Party of Lads or Apprentices or Women did clamour against Bishops But what Party it was that raised the War Did these Lads give the Earl of Essex his Commission But you find none that said any thing against their Petition but the Lord Digby Answ And hath not he forsaken you also 1. Where did you seek to find it Not in the Parliament Journal sure else you might have found more 2. The truth is the Episcopal Parliament themselves perceiving what Party they must trust to opposed not those Petitions because the Petitioners might serve their turns and I doubt were too well contented with them But as no man must say that the King had the Spirit of Popery because he was willing that the Papists should help him So no man can prove that the Episcopal Parliament had the Spirit of Presbytery or were against Episcopacy it self because they were willing to be helped by all sorts who on a sudden were fallen out with Bishops The truth is the suspending and silencing of Ministers and the cropping the Ears and stigmatizing Prin with Burton and Bastwick had suddenly raised in the London Apprentices and others a great distate of the Bishops though they knew little of any Controversies about Church-Government at all When you say that Episcopacy or rather Bishops Lands was the Palladium c. 1. Episcopacy was not so till after the Army was raised It was so no doubt in the private designs of some particular men Apprentices and Women in the City and Kingdom that is all that were against it desired it should fall And many that were Episcopal desired that it should rather fall than the Abuses of it continue by such men as they thought would else ruine Church and State thinking that there was no other way to save them so far did different apprehensions about Propriety Liberty Popery and Arminianism carry men from one another who were all for Episcopacy But forget not 1. That it is the major Vote of the Parliament and not a few secret designers within or without doors that is the Parliament 2. That it was the Parliament that raised the Militia and Armies 3. That this Parliament was not at that time against Episcopacy Therefore your talk of the Isle of Wight so long after is liker a Jest than serious Besides that you seem ignorant of the Parliament resolved to accept of the Kings Concessions as Prins long Printed Speech will shew you and therefore immediately before they should have voted that closure were pulled out by Cromwell who had secret intelligence what they were going to do 2. And your oblivion caused you by your Parenthesis to contradict what you have hitherto said your self For if it were Bishops Lands rather than Bishops that they would have down it implyeth that they were not Presbyterians nor against Episcopacy Would you make an English-man of this age believe that none of your own Church have an appetite to Bishops Lands Try them and they will confute you more effectually than I can Do you think that of the Multitude that now drink and ●rant and roar and whore and rob there are none whose Consciences could be content that Bishops fell that they might have their Lands you will say perhaps these are not truly for Episcopacy Ridiculous Must we write Histories out of mens secret thoughts and hearts and call men only what they are conscientiously and in sincerity Who knoweth another mans sincerity but God Come into London or go among these Gallants and tell them that they are not Sons of the Church if you dare Hearken whether they talk not more for Bishops than for any other Sect Whether they do not curse and damn the Presbyterians and Fanaticks and their Conventicles and deride their Preaching and praying and say as bad of them as you can wish them Though I know that too great abundance since our silencing are fallen off from you to Infidelity or Atheism and to make a Jest of the Sacred Scriptures and the Papists say that very many thousands are turned to them yet I speak of those that still call themselves Protestants of the Church of England Really if you will take none to be of your Church that would sell the Bishops Lands or none that are not conscientiously for you I doubt your Church yet will prove invisible and as little as some of the housed Sects And if that will serve your turn I pray deal equally and let the Sectaries also have leave to say of any of their Party that killed the King or were guilty of Treason he was not truly one of us The War was first called Bellum Episcopale by the Parliament-men because they thought or said that Land and his Adherents were the Causes of it by seeking to reduce the Scots to their will and to set up Altars and other Innovations in England But not because the Parliament at that time renounced Episcopacy it self As to the particular Members of the Armies I confess I did know them better than you I speak not of Fairfax or Cromwell's Army but of Essex's And it s well that you have so much modesty as not to deny that they were Episcopal or no Presbyterians But you venture to say of those yet living That they were so whilst they assisted in the support of the late Cause I have not so far renounced my Reason and Experience as to fall in with your account And if we persevere in this new Doctrine we shall be as distant as the two Poles Answ Now you are at your Strength your Confidence and Resolution to believe or say you believe as you do is all the life of your Cause It is now taken for no dishonour to the greatest Lords to say that they are for Episcopacy There are yet living the Earl of Bedford the Earl of Denbeigh the Earl of Stamford the Lord Grey of Warke the Lord Hollis the Lord Asthey the Lord Roberts the Earl of Anglesey though he be no Souldier Major General Morgan Mr. G. Massey Sir John Gell and many more Enquire of themselves or any that know them whether they were ever Presbyterians or against a moderate Episcopacy Sir William Waller was most called a Presbyterian

Whether I be good or bad learned or unlearned Let this be determined with him as he will I am so ignorant and bad that I will not now trouble him with much contradiction But the question is 1. Whether the two thousand Ministers were justly Silenced 2. And whether if they wilfully though so Silenced desert the Ministry to which they were Devoted and Consecrated they will not be guilty of damnable Sacriledge and Perfidiousness If the man will speak to purpose to this question it is like that some one will confute his Defence of so great a sin when I am past this unpleasant Military Work A Note on Varney's Book against the Dissenters from the Church of England INstead of Confuting it I commend the reading of it to such as would see which side hath Phanaticks It declareth that J. Varney hath by Faith pulled down the Devils Kingdome and that King Charles 2. shall be Emperour of all Nations by whom Christ will govern them greater than Turk Pope or French And the way is The Dissenters from the Government of the Church of England must be made Hewers of wood and Drawers of Water and must pay all Taxes and Payments of the Land to maintain the Forces that shall preserve the Land against them Like Decimation Notes on Mr. Le Strange 's Casuist uncased I Have had some gentle Touches from this Musical band heretofore which I found not my self obliged to answer Nor shall I now say any more than this I. That he that fetcheth his chief Stings and Scorns from a Book and the leaf of another Book about twenty years or longer at least revoked and obliterated sheweth that if with Austin we wrote Retractations such men would turn all to reproach II. That I make not Mr. Le Strange 's judgment the measure of my Repentance or Retractations III. That I have never had the Schooling of him and so never taught him to understand my Writings and therefore undertake not that things congruous shall not seem contradictions to him But I can reconcile more than he can For instance 1. My Disputation of Scandal Plea Second reconcileth what he dreamed was contradiction about imposing things evil by accident 2. I can reconcile the Kings having power about the circumstances yea and substance of Religion and yet that he hath none but what he had from Christ But I have not leasure for such work as this IV. Mr. Le Strange quite mistakes the Non-Conformists Question as the Reflecter doth as if Hissing and Stinging were disputing He seemeth to make the Question to be Whether I be not a giddy mutable self-contradicting Fool and Knave Let him in that believe what pleases himself Our Question is Whether Silencing Fining Imprisoning the Non-Conformists be the way of Peace and of the desired Concord of Protestants Yea Whether Concord be possible on those Terms and they will ever end our sad Divisions Notes on a Dialogue between the Pope and a Phanatick MR. L. Strange's Dialogue minds me of this for it is a Book not to be forgotten The Scope of it is to shew that the Non-Conformists are designing to Destroy the King that their Principles are rebellious that they have so far prevailed already that we must have no King or no Parliament which yet being needful and the genius of the Parliament thus corrupted the King must choose his own Councellors and take the choice from the People to this sense and all the Loyal Subjects must give their hands and list or engage themselves to defend the King against these Conspirators Just the Meal-Tub Plot But my Second Plea was written to answer such as this and I leave the fuller Answer to those that are more concerned in it So much against this Regiment of Accusers Turba gravis Paci placidaeque inimica qui●ti FINIS * Alas then there is no remedy