with the Hedg of good Discipline of wholsom Laws of gracious Government with the Brazen Wall of thy Almighty and miraculous protection never people had more exquisite rules of justice thou hast not left us to the mercy of a rude Anarchy or a Tyrannical violence but hast regulated us by Laws of our own asking and swayed us by the just Scepters of moderate Princes How hast thou made us members of a Church as pure for Doctrine and Discipline as any that either is See Art 6. of the Church of England or has been these fifteen hundred years a Church which has no other rule of Faith and Practice than the holy Scriptures A Church that receives for Canonical neither more nor less than those Books of whose Authority there was never any doubt A Church that professes the same Faith and no more than what all Christians have made the Badge and Symbol of theirs namely Art 8. that which is briefly compiled in the Apostles Creed explained in those others stiled the Nicene and Athanasian A Church wherein are used the same Sacraments Christ left in his Art 25. and no other A Church the Administration of whose Worship and Sacraments are in a Language understood by all those that are concerned in them as St. Paul commanded 1 Cor. 14. and those performed with such Rites as are consonant to the Word of God and the direction of the same Apostle 1 Cor. 14.40 in decency and order Lastly we are members of a Church which above all other Constitutions in the Christian World enforces the great duty of obedience and submission to Kings and all that are in authority under them and this not only for wrath but for Conscience sake Thus O Lord hast thou courted us by thy favours in the miraculous restoring and gracious preserving hitherto the breath of our nostrils thine Anointed Servant and under his protection the solemnities of thy Sacred Ordinances the establishment of our Laws and the enjoyment of our Interests Thus hath the vigilant eye of thy Providence out of the Window of Heaven watcht over this Nation for good not an hellish Pioneer could mine under ground but thou hast spied him out nor a dark-Lanthorn offer to deceive midnight but thou hast descried it not a Plot not a purpose of evil could look out but thou hast discovered it and glorified thy mercy in our deliverance And now what service what obedience what thankfulness must such a Defender such a Protector such a deliverer expect from a people so wonderfully obliged But O my soul what deplorable retributions have we made When God gave us great and long prosperity like Jeshurun we waxed fat and kicked against him When he threw us into horrid confusions from which we saw little hope of arising even in the time of that distress did we trespass yet more against him When by miracles of mercy he turned our Captivities we soon returned to our wallowing in our former or greater filthiness Even while he has of late appeared for us by discovering the Plots and Contrivances of our implacable enemies of the Romish Faction we have been in the mean time and that most impudently by our sins fighting against heaven and against him Vice formerly like an old Curtesanguilty of her own witheredhess durst not walk abroad without a borrowed Mask They are frontless Zimries that bring Whores to their Tents in the face of all Israel Yet such is the debauchedness of the Age wherein we live that he is look'd upon as a cowardly sinner that is ashamed to shew his face though the spots of his guilt be written there we even dare noon-day to witness our ungodliness and do our villanies as the Pharisees gave their Alms to be seen of men O the Oaths and blasphemies that are to be heard in each Corner of our Streets It is not only a fashionable sin and the Mode of the vain Gallants but it is spread among the Herd the brutish among the People are got to it the very Vagabond and he that has scarce a rag to his back will swagger with his Oaths O that that Name which is Reverend to Angels and terrible to Devils O that that Name we have been so oft delivered by from the hands of our Enemies should be so profaned A complaint we have cause to sill up with tears more than words Have we so learnt Christ as only to swear by him Will neither the mercies received nor those we expect charm our lips from such a Rebellion What drinkings what staggerings what reelings are to be seen in all parts of our Land This deluge of excess has drown'd the face of the earth and risen many Cubits above the highest Mountains of Religion and good Laws What extortings what defraudings what oppressings of the poor what covetings even the pretenders to a further Reformation look asquint with a Sacrilegious eye upon the small remnant of the Churches Patrimony what repinings what traducings of Magistracy what Atheistical discoursings of a Deity It is deplorable to see how these sinners are set down in the seat of the Scorner and since they cannot argue resolve to laugh all Piety out of countenance Yet alas were these the sins of ignorance of infirmity they might be worthy of a pious pity But O the high hand of our presumptuous offences we draw iniquity with the strings of vanity and shoot up those hateful shafts against heaven Did we sit in darkness and the shadow of death as too many Pagan and Popish Regions do these works of darkness would be less intolerable But now that the glorious Sun of the Gospel has darted its Rays has shined so long bright in our faces nay even now when God has declared visibly for us What can we plead against our own confusion O God! where shall we appear when thy very favours aggravate our Crimes and thy Judgments What pious soul can consider all this and much more and not fear that all these mercies are but fore-runners of some greater miseries that all our preservations are but reservations to some more signal destruction How justly may heaven give us over into the hands of our enemies depopulate our Cities destroy our whole Nation like Sodom and make us the scorn and Proverb of all succeeding Generations Dan. 9. But O our God let thine anger and fury be turned away from thy Jerusalem thy holy Mountain O Lord hear O Lord forgive O Lord harken and do Defer not for thine own sake O our God for thy City and thy people that are called by thy Name But what speak I of not deferring to a God of mercy who is more ready to give than we to crave more loth to strike than we to smart and when he must Complains Why will you die O house of Israel To a God who in despite of all our sins of all our impieties of all our ingratitudes does still continue his favours does still preserve us from our Adversaries that
Kings nomination and refused to Consecrate others named by him At which the King as he had good reason being angry banished him out of his Kingdom But how this was resented at Rome and what troubles ensued thereupon to this Realm the Historians of that Age have sadly recorded After Henry the First came Stephen and after him Henry the Second A potent and warlike Prince who besides England held Normandy Anjou Poitou c. Yet this potent King was strangely disquieted by Thomas Becket Archbishop of Canterbury A man abundantly stored with an ambitious turbulent and ungrateful Spirit as appeared by his disowning the Investiture of the King by whose favour and bounty he was promoted and receiving his Pall from the Pope At which the King being enraged exiled him out of him Dominions but he fled to Rome the Sanctuary in those days always open for such Traitors where he was not only entertained to the great grief of the King but countenanced encouraged and bid hearthy welcom by Pope Alexander the Third who vindicated the quarrel for indeed it was his own at so high a rate that this great Prince partly through necessity and fear of the power of the Keys which made wonderful clinking in those times and partly being perswaded by some Prelates Matth. Paris In Hen. Secund. p. 117. gave this Archbishop a meeting in hopes of a reconciliation at Froncevaux and did that which no man would have believed for he held the Bridle of Beckets horse and that proud Prelate not contented to have received the honour once alighted on purpose that the King should pay him submission twice as he also did Thus that Priest practised Apostolick humility After this Triumph highly applauded at Rome Becket returned into England full of glory Where instead of bringing Peace he was the Bearer and Proclaimer of an Excommunication and Sentence of deposition of the Archbishop of York and his Adherents for Crowning the young King in his absence The King being in Normandy and hearing of these procedures of the Archbishops sent four of his Attendants to require him to absolve those he had so unjustly excommunicated and take off his Suspensions from others Which command he refusing to obey the King began to lament his condition This moved the same four whom he had sent before to return into England and finding the Archbishop in the Church of Canterbury some say at the High Altar at three a clockiin the Afternoon calling him Traitor slew him No sooner did the news of this arrive King Henry still in Normandy but he shew'd a great deal of sorrow for it and though he protested his innocency as to the fact yet he sent an Embassie to the Pope to make satisfaction But the testy old man was so enraged that he would not so much as vouchsafe his Embassadours to kiss his feet but in great wrath spake of Interdicting the whole Kingdom which in those days was looked upon as the sending all the English into Hell The dread of which forced this Magnanimous King to buy his Absolution at a dear rate acquitting not only his right of investing but likewise engaging to keep two hundred men of Arms in pay for the service of the Holy War and the Popes Assigns to be the receivers And to make the satifaction compleat the Majesty of this great Monarch to the wonder of the world must be so far debased as to be stript naked and whipt by a company of Monks And that such Rebels as Becket might never want encouragement in succeeding Ages the Pope did not only defend him whilst he lived but Canoniz'd him when he was dead King Henry being gathered to his Fathers his Son Richard surnamed Cor de Lion succeeded him not only in his Throne but in his troubles too That Prince for the better securing Normandy was resolved to fortifie the Castle of Andeli See Mat. Paris p. 175. At which Walter Archbishop of Rouen being displeased immediately Interdicts all Normandy and flies to Rome where he found as kind entertainment as ever Becket did And now what must the King do Alas submit to contest was in vain for such was the fear of an Interdict in those times that there was nothing which the Pope could not obtain of Princes and Nations if he did but threaten them with it But above all that in the Reign of King John was the most dismal when England remained under the Interdict six years three months and an half Not only the King and his Court but all the People of the Nation were Excommunicated and that not for Heresie not for any Crime of theirs but for a quarrel between the King and the Pope about Investitures Collations and Money matters Matth. Paris in Johan p. 217. Then saith Matthew Paris who was an Eye-witness of all that disorder all the Sacraments of the Church ceased in England saving only the Confession and Communion of the Host in the last necessity and Baptism of little Children Then were the Dead carried out of Towns as if they had been Dogs and buried in High-ways and Ditches without Prayers and without Service of Priests Yet this not producing the end it was designed for the Balaam of Rome proceeds to curse the King by name and finally to pronounce sentence of Deposition against him discharging all his Subjects of their Oaths of Allegiance and sends his Legat to Philip Angust King of France that for the remission of his sins he should invade the Realm of England with force of Arms and giving to all those that would attend him in that Conquest forgiveness of all theirs and the same graces as to them that visit the Holy Sepulchre Whereupon Philip to obtain pardon of his sins or rather to make himself Master of this Land raised a mighty Army whilst Innocent by his Creatures was labouring to engage the English against their own King By this means King John was strangely and suddenly weakned and utterly disabled to hold his Kingdom and seeing strong invasions from without and daily revoltings within to open Insurrections and every man now counted a Saint and Martyr that would fight against him and considering that the Popes Bulls like Magick Spells had let loose many turbulent Spirits not to be laid again but by him that raised them After much debate and with a heart full of anguish and rage at last resolves to prostitute his Crown and Dignity to Pandulph the Legate that he might receive it again from him as from the Popes hands and be protected by him Thus the Pope taking advantage of this poor Princes misery made him a Vassal to his own greatness and his Kingdom a prop to uphold St. Peters Chair For these pretended Successors of that great Apostle fish not for Souls but for Empire even with the destruction of Millions if their own Doctrine be true which says that all that die under the Interdict without some special grace or priviledge and that not to be had without ready
delight in bloud Let me rather direct the discourse to our selves the fault is our own if we perish Heaven has not nor will not be wanting if we do but our parts And therefore that Iniquity may never be our ruine that God may never repent of his protecting and delivering of us let us resolve for the future to be in good earnest Pious to our God Loyal to our King and Loving and Charitable one towards another Let our Repentance be a real 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a devesting of our selves of all those sinful habits with which we have provoked Heaven let each man rend his heart with sorrow for his own sins and the sins of his People let every man ransack his own soul and life and offer an holy violence to all those sinful Corruptions that may hinder heavens protecting of us and let not these resolutions end with the day let us not think it enough to forbear a meal or to hang down our heads like a Bull-rush for a day but let us break the bonds of wickedness and in a true contrition of soul vow and perform better obedience Let our Loyalty be such as it ought true and ingenuous let no murmurings nor complainings find entertainment in our breasts It is the trick of Mutineers of impenitent Covenanters to say the former days were better than these And if they once come to wear their teeth in their Tongues as Shimei did they will do what they can to have the Trumpet at their mouths as Sheba had Let not us that decry Romes Supremacy make a Pope of an Anarchy God himself says By me Kings Reign not by the Pope nor by the People In a word let us not be less free in exposing our Lives and Estates for the preservation of our King and Country than our Adversaries are to destroy both It is a pity but his Neck should hang in suspence with his Conscience in a halter who scruples to venture all for his King the Church and his Country Lastly Let us learn to be unanimous it is by our disunion our Enemies are so strong Were we but so wise as to stand as a City that is compact together and not fall out about Circumstances and Points of less moment while we agree in the main substance the Skirts of the Scarlet Whore had been rent to pieces ere this and the Walls of Babylon with the Trumpet of the Gospel would have long since fallen down as Jericho at those of the Sanctuary To conclude Let us keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace and though we may differ in Opinions let us not differ in our Affections but unite against these common Enemies of our Interest and make our hearty Prayers to God that he may still continue his mercies infatuate and defeat the Counsels of these our bloudy and unparallel'd Adversaries continue the light of the Gospel to us and our Posterity bestow his abundant blessings upon his Sacred Majesty and this present Parliament make us all happy here and eternally happy hereafter AMEN FINIS Books newly Printed for and sold by Thomas Fox at the Angel in Westminster Hall A Sermon preached at the Funeral of the Right Honourable William Lord Paget Baron of Beaudesert c. by John Heynes M.A. and Preacher of the new Church Westminster quarto stitch'd A seasonable advice to all true Protestants in England in this present posture of affairs discovering the present designs of the Papists c. by a sincere lover of his King and Country quarto stitch'd Holy Rules and Helps to Devotion both in Prayer and Practice in two parts Written by the Right Reverend Father in God Bryan Duppa late Lord Bishop of Winton in the time of his Sequestration Twelves bound The Legacy of the Right Reverend Father in God Herbert Lord Bishop of Hereford or a short determination of all Controversies we have with the Papists by Gods holy Word The second Impression Corrected with additions by the Author Quarto stirch'd Grand Cyrus compleat a Romance Folio Clelia a Romance Folio Dr. Peter Heylins Geography Folio Farindons Sermons in three Volumes Folio Pharamond a Romance Folio Queen Elizabeths last Speech and thanks to her last Parliament after her delivery from the Popish Plots c.