of the Earl of Manchester In which two Universities there was a thorough Purge to the perpetual reproach and ignominy of the Undertakers many famous and learned Doctors Heads of Houses Masters of Arts and others were turned out of their Fellowships and Colledges because they would not submit to that which was contrary to their Oaths and the Priviledges of both places imposed upon them by those who had no more authority in such things than they had to behead or rebel against their Master IX Contzenus saith these Revolutions must be done moderately and with abundance of cunning the first step being to make the followers and abetters of the contrary Opinion odious and as it were a scorn in the Countrey and this by disgracing them especially with things which seem most ridiculous absurd and hate ful to the common people either by nick-naming or any way else The scandalous Reports and Pamphlets thrown against both King and Bishop as Popish though they thought nothing less may be some sign what good use hath been made of Contzen's Observation What disgrace cast upon the decent Habits of Church and University though the first according to the Canons and the other appointed by the Statutes of the place What unseemly Titles given to Organs as Bag-pipes and what irreverent names to Churches as Steeple-houses How were the Clergy nick-named with the title of Hirelings Humane Learning as Heathenish and Scholars as professing enmity against the Gospel How Cromwel's Faction spread abroad Pamphlets against King City and Parliament 1647. that the people might take the Army for honest men is somewhat pointed at by Mr. Walker And since that What scurrilous Books hath been contrived by Needham Goodwin Milton Rogers and such like Billingsgate Authors is not unknown to to any Nor is it forgot what impertinent Reports the Long-Parliament spread amongst the People to make the King odious as that he was a Favourite to the Catholicks and those call'd Arminians which sufficiently demonstrated a Presbyterian malice since the first was false and the other no crime And this must also be laid in the dish of Archbishop Laud though Prynne and they knew that he wrote more against the Romanists than all our Brittain Presbyterians who have spent more time in the commendation of Rebellion than in the Service of God And certainly I may as well call Prynne a Stage-Player for writing his Histriomastix as he the Archbishop Papistical because he wrote so learnedly against them And as if this were not mischief enough the People must now and then be alarum'd with strange Reports of Forces from Denmark Lorraign and other strange places as if the Nation were to be conquer'd and the Natifs throats cut which if we yield yet will the ignominy only fall upon the Presbyterian Party who by their want of Allegiance would bring the King to such straits that his own Subjects were not able to defend him from their Tyranny They thought it fit for us to send aid into the Palatinate and yet unlawful for Denmark to assist his own Kinsman against his Rebellious Subjects It was convenient they thought to give help to the French against their lawful King yet held it abominable for Forraigners to give a good wish to the King of England against his rebellious people The Covenanters in Scotland might with honesty crave aid from the French King though a Roman-Catholick against their Anointed Soveraign But so must not the King of England from the Duke of Lorraign though his life endangered by his bloud-thirsty Subjects The Parliament forsooth may make a Pacification with the Irish Catholicks but the King must not harbour such a thought without grand aspersions If the King but march towards Scotland the malignity of envious tongues endeavours to blast his Reputation as not fit to wear the Crown But many thousands of the Scotch-Covenanters may come into England fight against their King kill his faithful Subjects and inrich themselves by their plundering and stealing from the honest People and for their villainies receive large rewards with the Epithet of Brethren and so they were but in Iniquity being guilty of High-Treason because marched and acted against the Kings consent who is the Supreme Authority of the three Nations And that the Supream Head may when rebell'd against for his own security and defence desire help of his Neighbours though of a different perswasion in Religion I think needs no dispute He that would lose his Kingdom quietly is as simple as the Rebel 's wicked and if his own Sword be not long enough for the tryal he may lawfully borrow his Friends If the Parliament stood so much upon their Priviledges I know no reason but that the King might maintain his Prerogative and if any Contradiction be betwixt these two they are obliged to yield to their betters Nor doth it thwart the practise of former times for the Supream Authority to desire assistance from people of a contrary Religion as may be seen by the following examples as I find them set down to my hand in a late French Treatise Aza the good King of Judaea procured assistance from Benhadad the Idolatrous King Syria And so did the Great Constantine imploy in his Armies many Heathenish Goths So were the wicked Vandals call'd into Africa by good Boniface And after this manner did Narses under the Emperour Justinian imploy the Pagan Lombards The good Arcadius Emperour of Constantinople though a Christian delivered the tuition of his young son Theodosius and the Government of the Empire till his Son came to age into the hands of Isdigerdis King of Persia a Heathen who accordingly kept his promise with the Emperour Heraclius the Emperour was beholden to the Saracens as Basilius and Constantine's sons to John Emperour of Constantinople were to Ostelzi And by these people were also Henry and Frederick Brothers to the King of Castile mainly benefited in their Wars against the French Ludouick Sforza Duke of Milan and others begg'd assistance from the Turk against the French as Maximilian of Austria did against the Venetians And if it be lawful to procure aid from Heathens certainly a Christian may seek help from those who profess Jesus Christ though in every thing they cannot absolutely agree But enough of this since the Presbyterian commits ten times more sin in Rebelling than the wickedst man can do in defending his own right though by the assistance of Turks and Infidels X. What a great stickler Robert Parsons the Jesuite was to overthrow both England and the Protestant Religion in it is well known the great States-man Cardinal D'Ossat taketh notice several times of his designs against these Kingdoms Some of his Plots and Contrivances shall follow as they were publisht by some Roman Catholicks One of his means is to alter the Municipal Laws of the Land that the Civil Laws might have sway 'T is needless to relate how the Laws have been chopped and changed by diversity of Governments not
this Blake is summon'd before the Council which so incensed Andrew Melvill that he labour'd to make it a Publick Cause and did so much That they declare it would be ill to question Ministers and boldly told King James who asked them if they had seen the Conditions of Huntly's Pardon That both he and the rest should either satisfie the Church in every point or be pursued with all extremity so as they should have no reason to complain of the over-sight of Papists And as for Blake they gave him a Declinator affirming it was the Cause of God whereunto it concerned them to stand at all hazzard and this Declinator was sent to all the Presbyteries in the Kingdom who were desired not only to subscribe it but to commend the Cause in their private and publick Prayers to God by which means they fancyed themselves so strong that they deny the King to have power to judge a man for speaking in Pulpit and that the King in what he had already done had so wronged Christs Kingdom that the death of many men could not be so grievous to them And therefore they ordain a Fast for averting the Judgements then threatning the Kirk This action so vext his Majesty that he forbad all Convocatings and Meetings but they little cared for him or his Orders for Mr. Walter Balcanquall did not only forthwith rail against the Court naming several of the chief Courtiers but desired all the well-affected to meet in the Little Church to assist the Ministry who did accordingly and Petition the King in behalf of the Kirk But the King asking them who they were that durst convene against his Proclamation was worshipfully replyed by the Lord Lindesey That they durst do no more then so and that they would not suffer Religion to be over-thrown Multitudes unmannerly thronging into the room the King departed and they went to the little Church again where Lindesey told them No course but one let us stay together that are here and promise to take one part and advertise our friends and the favourers of Religion to come unto us for it shall be either theirs or ours Upon which great clamours shoutings and lifting up of hands followed some crying to Arms others to bring out Haman for whilst the Lords were with the King being sent as above-said from the Little-Church Mr. Cranstone read to the People that story others cryed out The Sword of the Lord and of Gideon and so great were the Peoples fury rais'd on a sodain That if the Provost by fair words and others by threats had not tamed them they had done some violence These actions of the Kirkers makes the King leave the Town go to Linlithgow whereupon they resolve for Warr the Ministers agitating them Amongst the rest one John Welsh in his Sermon rail'd pitifully against the King saying He was possest with a Devil and compared him to a Madd-man and affirmed That Subjects might lawfully rise and take the Sword out of his hand In this fiery zeal they write a Letter to the Lord Hamilton desiring him to be their General telling him in it That the People animated by the Word and Motion of Gods Spirit had gone to Arms. But all came to nothing Hamilton refusing such rebellious honour carryeth the Letter to the King who orders the guilty Ministers to be apprehended who escape by flying into England and the Magistrates of Edenburgh are pardoned The overthrow of this one business strengthened the Kings Authority mightily which was also confirmed by the Assembly at Perth now better known by the name of St. John's Town The Ministry being now pretty quiet Ruthen Earl of Gowry conspired to kill the King but to his own ruin His Majesty for this Preservation orders that Thanks should solemnly be render'd to God but in this he found the Presbyters cross-grain'd denying to do any such thing for such a deliverance whereupon they were silenced yet afterwards shewing their willingness were restored In this year was King James his third son his second viz. Robert dying young Charles born afterwards King of England The next year was kept an Assembly at Burnt-Island whither Mr. John Davidson wrote a rayling Letter checking them for their cowardise in not opposing the ungodly telling them that the King was not sound and that Warr was more commendable than a wicked Peace But the graver sort rather pittyed and smiled at the mans madd zeal then troubled themselves to vex at him And now Queen Elizabeth dying King James the undoubted next Heir to the English Crown is at London Proclaimed accordingly whither he went to receive his Crown having thus happily united the two Kingdoms And here I shall leave off from prosecuting the Presbyterian Story in Scotland any further though I might tell you of their calling against the Kings consent an Assembly at Aberdeen to rant against Episcopal Government nor would they dissolve at the Kings command till they were proclaimed Traytors and yet did some of them scorn to acknowledge their Error and were by some of their Brethren vindicated to King James face in England the next year And many more instances of their Waspish humour in denying the Kings Authority might be shewn out of their own Historians who abound in such examples but if Symmetry will tell us the stature of the man by the proportion of his foot these may serve so much at this time to satisfie that I fear they will rather nauseate And really those who thought it a hard case that Mr. Blake should be punished for affirming in a Sermon 1596. That all Kings were the Devils Barns that the Kings heart was treacherous and that the Devil was in the Court and the guiders of it That the Queen of England was an Atheist and a wicked Woman That the Nobility and Lords were miscreants bribers degenerated godless dissemblers and Enemies to the Church That the Council were Holliglasses Cormorants and men of no Religion And in his Prayer for Queen Anne he said We must pray for her for the fashion but we have no cause she will never do us good Nor did he word it only but also rais'd Arms both Horse and Foot against the Kings consent These men I say who thought it unjust to have him questioned for such rebellious actions may also for ought I know think it strange with Buchanan that our Laws do not provide ample and honourable rewards for those who can boldly murder their Prince And yet must this Buchanan and Knox be cryed up as valiant noble bold and publick-spirited men and this present world scorned because we have no such fire-brands And whether this title is rashly thrown upon them let any ingenious man judge not only by their fore-mentioned tenets and actions against their Kings but by the answerable nurturing up of their Disciples who at the University of St. Andrews instead of Divinity Lectures had these Political or rather a ruine to
neither out of them by the Zealots then in Possession Our late Grandees made many hundred Protestations that all their actions were only for the Preservation of the Kings Person yet they most wickedly murthered him because he was a Defender of the true Faith as the ancient Sweeds martyr'd their good King Eric Stenchil because he intended to bring the Christian Religion amongst them And our Presbyterians swore in the Covenant to preserve the King yet never did in the least assist him but fought what they could against him as appears by the series of the whole Warr. When the Parliament threw by their King and Oaths in the Votes for Non-Address the Nation saw that they were then contriving his ruine And the Royalists knew that their Soveraign must be saved then or never for which purpose in 1648. they seize upon Carlisle Barwick and Pontefrait in the North whilst those of Kent grow numerous in the South Thus the Kings Party though devested of Arms and Strength bestirr themselves like faithful Subjects But what did the Brethren do Alas they acted very high too though the clean contrary way The Parliament cursing the Royal design with Bell Book and Candle contriving night and day how to bring them to distruction whilst their Associates in the Countrey and Army furiously opposed and at last as the Devil was permitted to triumph over Job proved victorious to the ruine of the Kings best friends Yet had these Zealots according to their Oaths taken up their Weapons probably the Kings murder and other following mischiefs had been stopt But God would not suffer such wicked perjured Wretches to be Authors of so much good It being miraculous which are now ceased that the madd Bulls of Spain should be so favourable to the Corps of St. James And that the Devil that delighter in mischief should wait upon a good Knight so faithfully and be so beneficial to Christianity as to pay for a Bell that the people might with more facility be drawn to Church Thus did these people for all their gude Covenant suffer their King to be murdred before their faces without moving one hand for a rescue unless you will allow the Petitioning of a few when it was too late to do any good by soft words though it was more than could be expected from those who had done him all the mischief that Sword Gun or Malice could do which puts me in mind of a passage in a Paper printed for Robert White before the decollation of his Majesty The well-known Gilb. Mabbot being Imprimatur It 's conceived absurd and hypocritical to swear the Preservation of the Kings Person as a man when at the same time a Warr is ingaged against him and he known to be in the Field subject to death by the Bullet and Sword And it is well known that some of the Souldiers said that they would kill the King asson as another man Though I do not say that the Presbyterians were the men that did actually murder him yet we know that the Rump was not free from some of that Faction and so whether any of that party consented to the stroak or no yet I am confident that most if not all of that gang brought him to the Scaffold concerning which I shall borrow a Story from an Ingenious Knight for I do not love like some of late to steal whole pages and attribute their product to mine own Brain and this may very well reflect upon the whole Presbyterian Party Some Robbers on Shooters-Hill assault an honest Gentleman yet the Thieves among themselves are divided some inclining only to bind him and leave him helpless in the adjacent Woods But others for their greater security from pursuit determin rather to murther him out-right Now I suppose an honest Jury will find both Parties guilty of and agreed in the main Design viz. Robbery The Application is so true and plain that any man will judge the Presbyterians as well guilty of High-Treason For 1. Fighting against their King 2. Voting all his Assisters to be Traytors contrary to the Law 3. Hanging and Beheading many gallant Gentlemen only for their Loyalty 4. Sequestrating the Orthodox and ruining the Church both against Law and King 5. Calling his Majesty through his Declarations scandalous impious false wicked tyrannical and what not 6. Voting the Queen a Traytor for assisting the King her Husband against Rebels 7. Ordering such abominable Propositions that a Peace could not be agitated unless the Kings best Friends were delivered up to hop headless 8. Forcing Oaths upon the People contrary to the Kings Command and the Law of the Land 9. Confining his Majesty 10. Pinding him up to such intolerable Rules and Covenants or else they will have none of him 11. Throwing him by or rather disowning him to be their King by their Votes for Non-Address 12. Voting and Fighting against those who in 1648. endeavoured to release him from his Imprisonment and save him from the Block With several other such like mad pranks as these which if not singly as most of them will yet I am confident will make Accumulative Treason which will either hang them according to their own deeds or else they murdered the Earl of Strafford and murther is death both by the Laws of God and Man I say an Indifferent Jury need never go from the Barr to consider but at the first hearing would freely find the Presbyterian Subjects as well guilty of Treason against their Soveraign as those who would not add sin to sin by Hypocrisie but impiously declared their dislike to Monarchy by a wicked Decollation Another refuge and that the last that the Brethren have is in the action of Sir George Booth That some of them were well-wishers to it I cannot because my knowledge is not Omnipotent deny but what assistance and upon what conditions they afforded to that design I shall leave for them to demonstrate I being unwilling to say what Lords utter Enemies to Episcopacy would not so much as Interest themselves in it if reports be true or at least so cowardly that they only advantaged the Kings Enemies But enough of this it being farr from my humour to be so malepert with some Nobles as the Presbyterians are impudent with his Majesty Though I am really of Opinion that had that Design taken effect we should have had our old warre renew'd again the Puritans having been once armed and imbodyed would have fought down our legal Episcopal Government and chained up his Majesty to some New-Castle or Isle of Wight-like conditions or if they had proved Maisters sent the King beyond Sea again or secured him if not yielded him up also to the Independants for what wickednesse have they not undertaken to bring about their ends whether it be true or noe that the Devils have had several conventions for the extirpating of the Franciscan Order it matters not though I am confident the Brethren seldome consult but
will defend me Difficile est Satyram non scribere nam quis iniquae Tam patiens Urbis tam ferreus ut teneat se We must be angry Who can choose but frown When Traytors thrive by a Rebellious Town If my fault be only speaking tartly the then Dr. Reynolds will assure this to be no such crime by telling them that there is sometimes a Necessity of sharp Rebukes and Mr. Hickman in this will stifly plead mine Innocency when he tells the World in these words that c If at any time I seem to depart from that meekness of spirit which is required in a Minister I shall desire that it may be considered not only what is fit for me to speak but what is meet for them to hear If I were to mention their fact who took the Reliques of Peter Martyr ' s Wife's carkase out of the Grave and after buried them in a Dunghill would you not allow me to call it Unchristian and Inhumane c. And in another place either himself or his Friends have bestirr'd themselves notably to plead the necessity and justness of my keenness by declaring to all people that If any where I have used more sharpness then is pleasing to men I shall only say that their hard grateing hath sharpned my style and made it more keen and piercing than I could have allowed my self to use towards a good-natured Adversary 'T is almost morally impossible for him who contends with a fiery and furious Antagonist sometimes not to be a little over-heated But yet I am very willing to lye under the lash of their severest Titles provided they will be so Ingenious as to distribute Justice with an equal hand If they look upon me as an hot-headed Rayler for calling them Rebels and Traytors and what can be more true I wonder how they can quit John Calvin from the same Epithet who call'd those who could not agree to his will Profane Impudent Brasen-faced Impostours Fools wicked Forgeries Perfidious Uncharitable Peevish Hang-man Plague void of Grace Knaves Serpents Devils Filthy Dog c. If they censure me as-an impudent and sawcy Fellow for calling them Hypocrites I hope they will give the same Title to John Knox the Father of the Scotch Presbytery and a great assistant to these in England This man had so got the knack of villifying that his Tongue could be no Slander Passing by those of Inferior Rank take some of his Complements to Queen Mary calling her several times a wicked Woman tells her that she was not sober merciful but cruel and wicked Mischievous false dissembling unconstant proud and a Breaker of Promises an open Traitoress to the Imperial Crown of England Nor is this all but he calls her Reign The Monstriferous Empire of a wicked Woman the yoke of the Devil her most Tyrannical Iniquity that most unhappy and wicked Womans Authority that reigneth in Gods wrath an usurped Government c. and calls his own Queen Regents actions Idolatry Avarice and Cruelty If they think me malepert for calling them Schismaticks they cannot handsomely quit Marshal Calamy Young Newcomen and Spurstow of the same guilt for terming the Reverend Bishop Hall false and confident self-confounding-man and of a confident boldness and that his Book is full of falsities and contradictions For ranting against Episcopacy as an Iron and Insupportable yoke unjust Opposition uttering words bordering upon Blasphemy A Stirrup for Antichrist to get into the Saddle Corrupt Prelates that they discountenance discourage oppose blaspheme Preaching that they are Rotten Members Sons of Belial And then thunders out strange things of their Intolerable Oppressions and Tyrannies Drunkennsss Profaness Superstition Popishness of the English Clergie and then talks of their Cruelty Tyranny scandalous Sins hateful Enormities and that the Bishops do encrease Popery Superstition and Profaneness And to make their malice compleat would gladly bear the people in hand that it hath been the Bishops great design to hinder all farther Reformation to bring in Popery and Libertinism to keep out and beat down the Preaching of the Word to silence the faithful Preachers to oppose and persecute the most zealous Professors and to turn all Religion into a pompeous outside and to tread down the Power of Godliness If they think me uncivil for hinting at their Perjury they cannot but be as angry with their Brethren in Scotland the Committee of Estates for calling that Famous Loyal and Religious Marquess of Montross several times Excommunicate Traytor Viperous brood of Satan declared Traytor whom the Church hath delivered into the hands of the Devil and the Nation doth generally detest and abhorr Impudent braggard lyer and malicious man perfidious Traytor a Child of the Devil Dissembling Hypocrite of a mean and desperate Fortune vain man miserable miscreant malicious man and accuseth him of wickedness base treacherous practises Rebellion and Treason and then fairly concludes that he is a person justly excluded from civil Society for his Treasonable Practises and Excommunicated from the Church for his abominable Transgressions And this way of Presbyterian slandring is bravely imitated by their gude Kirk who call the same noble General That Excommunicated and forfeited Traytor That wretched man that Monster of men that excommunicate wretch unnatural Man that perfidious and proud Atheist and then also concludes their Charity that he is delivered into the hands of the Devill If they have a bad opinion of me for giving them now and then some names which they think are attributed by way of Reproach they can have no better thoughts of Mr. Hickman for scornfully calling the learned Dr. Pierce a wanton wit uncharitable one that tumbles out his ugly Tropes and rowls himself in his railing Eloquence a deplorable Dilemmatist a doughty Disputant accuseth him of Malice Railing Impudence and Nonsense That his Book is full of bitter girds and scurrilous gibes and that himself foams out of his own shame and waxeth worse and worse The same party calls Mr Hobs a Prodigious Writer and Commune Dei hominum que Odium And terms the learned and ingenious Author of Tilenus Junior an Aethiopian scribler poor fellow and accuseth him of Impudence Nor is this all but throws his venom upon the late Supporter of Learning the Reverend Arch-bishop Laud by affirming that the flourishing of him was the decaying and languishing of Church and State Nor could either body well recover but by spewing out such evill instruments as he and Buckingham So that it seems in his opinion there was a necessity of murthering them both The same Gentleman can also tell you who sufficiently abused and vilified the Learned Dr. Heylin and Mr. Pierce and at last threw his malice to the purpose upon the poor sequestrated Episcopal Divines telling the World that a greater part of them were unsavory salt fit only to be cast upon the Dunghill And if reports be true he can also tell you who not long since call'd the Bishops Schismaticks and threw great reproaches upon that
Scotland by domestick dissentions stir'd up against him by Hay Creighton Bruce Graham and other Jesuites who furnished the Rebellious Nobility with moneys from Spain to carry on their designs Nor hath Ireland reason to rejoyce in their acquaintance where the Seminary Fryars of late dayes had gone so far as in Dublin it self not only to appear in their habits but also to affront the Archbishop and Maior of that City nor were they wanting to the erection of Colledges and Societies maintain'd by good Benefactors as appears by a Letter from the Council in England to that in Ireland Yet for all this hath their rebellious favourits dealt mildly with them though the Laws be severe enough and 20. years ago look'd upon this kind of mercy as a crime fit to be thrown in the face both of King and Bishop but how deservedly let any judge but Prynne whose malice and partiality is well enough known Nor need we much trouble our selves to prove the Jesuite somewhat medling their familiarity with the Anabaptists Quakers and such like Phanaticks being suspicious Of which many examples might here be shewn but that their common knowledge would make the Relation tedious only take notice that the very Weekly Gazet suspects Mr. Rogers and those of his Fraternity to have some Jesuite or Priest at the Helm with them And Mr. Rogers takes no good course to clear himself by endeavouring to vindicate the Jesuite from having any hand in our late Warrs which this following Story is sufficient to confute When the late King was murdered Mr. Henry Spotteswood riding casually that way just as his Head was cut off espyed the Queens Confessor there on Horse-back in the habit of a Trooper drawing forth his Sword and flourishing it over his own head in Tryumph as others then did At which Mr. Spotteswood being much amazed and being familiarly acquainted with the Confessor road up to him and said O Father I little thought to have found you here or any of your Profession at such a sad spectacle To which he answered that There were at least forty or more Priests and Jesuites there present on Horse-back besides himself The resultancy of this Story is home and pat and for the truth of it I referr you to Mr. Prynne Nor need we here relate the great correspondency betwixt the late Grandees and Cardinal Mazarini of which Mr. Walker gives us a hint and experience can proclaim the rest Nor is it probable that they should have no hand in the promotion of our late distractions as most beneficial to the Catholick Cause since they have been the chief fomenters of all other Wars in Christendom leaving nothing un-essay'd that may bring all into confusion as Ludovicus Lucius and others can inform you more at large Besides all this we might give some Extracts out of the Plot discovered by Andreas ab Habernfield 1640. September to Sir William Boswell the Kings Agent at the Hague and by him to the Archbishop and so to his Majesty A design managed abroad by the Pope and Cardinal Barbarino and in England chiefly by George Con a Scotch-man and the Pope's Nuncio The substance of which was that the Roman-Catholicks here should stirr up the Puritans to revenge themselves of the Bishops and the Scots should also be perswaded to Arms whence the English should so adhere that the King remaining Inferiour in Forces should be constrain'd to crave aid from the Papists which should be deny'd unless he favoured them with a Toleration which if absolutely deny'd it was contrived by sodain death to remove him But because we find the Reality of the Plot questioned by an understanding Gentleman we shall referr you to L'estrange and Prynne's Relation But let this Plot be as it will 't is more then suspicion that our Phanaticks have been beholden in many things to the Jesuite of which one example may somewhat satisfie They caus'd the Book written by Parsons Anno 1524. under the faigned name of Doleman and call'd A Conference about the Succession of the Crown which Book was condemned by Act of Parliament 35. Elizab. to be publish'd again under the title of Several Speeches delivered at a Conference concerning the Power of Parliaments to proceed against their King for Mis-government The Arguments and Precedents are meerly the same though the fashion of the Book be a little altered Parsons having made it a Dialogue and these men into Speeches And how agreeable to this Rule of King-killing they steer'd their course is impossible to be forgot as long as Memory or Record can be had in this World CHAP. IV. The helps and assistance which the Calvinist Presbyterian and Jesuite afford one another for the ruine and alteration of Kingdoms with their Plots to destroy the Government and Tranquillity of England THat the Independents should only be beholden to the Jesuits or these Fathers the sole Ingeneers of Wickedness would mainly over-cloud the Reputation of the Presbyterians who look upon themselves as active for any mischief and as cunning contrivers And therefore 't is best for them to go hand in hand each discovering to other what new Plots they have found out for the subversion of Governments By which Club they have afforded certain Rules to Politicians which have exactly been observed and followed by our late Schismaticks as is palpable by the following Observations And first we shall begin with the Plots of the Calvinists a people never negligent to promote their own Interests Of whose Sect as the Emperour Ferdinand affirm'd the proper genius is To hold nothing either Fraud or Wickedness which is undertaken for the Religion No sanctity of Oath nor fear of Dishonour hinders them A Chararacter like that given by the experienced King James to the Puritans the same with our Non-conforming Presbyterians of whom one gives this sentence Puritans and all other Sectaries who though scarce two of them agree in what they would have yet they all in general are haters of Government And to this purpose was the judgement of the wise Secretary Walsingham when to Monsieur Critoy Secretary of France he assured them to be dangerous and very popular not Zeal nor Conscience but meer Faction and Division and besides this gives a short description of their Cunning Jugling and Rebellion for which with the Jesuite they start strange Doctrines to be as an Umbrella to their Illegal proceeding Of which the learned Bancroft Mr. David Owen and an Ingenious Epistle Congratulatory under the Name of Lysimachus Nicanor will afford you many Instances Whereby you may see that the Presbyterians in their Principles and Actions have more of Rome than the late reverend Archbishop Land or his favorites Let Bayly and the spurious Irenaeus Philalethes or any others collect or steal out of him what they please The Calvinists being resolved to root the Lutherans out of the Palatinate took this following Method to bring their ends about as
of Reconciliation upon that Condition taking themselves to be Supream forsooth and so the King obliged to pardon them but not they him or his If the King and Countrey have any desire of Peace his Propositions are neglected he being tyed either to hearken and consent to their malapert Proposals or trust to the misery of War or utterly thrown by as unworthy any more Addresses Must the Reverend and Ancient Church-government be violently pluckt down though the Bill with that concerning the Militia several times rejected by the Peers and some other up-start Invention plodded out to instruct Boyes in the mode of pratling then where must we hunt for this pretty young thing but in Scotland And who must be the Masters of the Game but a crew of domineering Zealots thrust up into a Rebellious Authority And for a small piece of Formality was jumbled up a pack of stiff Presbyterians under the Title of an Assembly dapled here and there with Independency and Anabaptism and a little to allay the censures of some people two or three were added to them of good Learning and Principles though quickly jugled out thence and other preferments as the Reverend Dr. Featly to make way for some sweet-soul'd Myrmidon And what these praepossest-Teachers constitute concerning a praejudged Government must be confirm'd by their Task-Masters the Parliament as if perform'd by a grave and learned Convocation of Divines Must his Majesty or any of his true Subjects be tryed for their lives and martyred None must be their Judges but those who are his and their mortal Enemies and bring with them a Sentence resolved upon long before the Tryal nor are the Prisoners permitted to question any of them though the Laws grant liberty to the errantest Rogue in England to except against 35. Jury-men without shewing any reason why If the Royal Family of the Stuarts be exstirpated Kingship Voted and Enacted unnecessary burthensom and dangerous and an ancient flourishing Monarchy sprouted into a many-headed Common-wealth None more fit to be the contrivers of this Confusion than those who acted not for a publick Benefit but a private Interest having run so far into Rebellion that self-preservation prompted them to be Judges as was a party in our domestick broyls it being not solid reason but because they were Moderators which changed the frame And if the Reverend Clergy must be outed their Livings then none must be their Tryers or Examiners but those Juglers of Peter's and Nye's Fraternity a sort of frantick people sworn Enemies to all Learning and Church-government and therefore the more fit to pass judgement against the other as Antagonists Thus like the Calvinists must we be Judges in our own Cause and that in things against all Law and then we are certain to remain Conquerers VI. When the People of Hildelberg who were neither satisfied with these new Teachers or Plots did Petition that the Lutheran Preachers might be setled and restored again amongst them no notice is taken of any such thing by the Superiours and so no satisfactory Answer hapned to their desires But rather on the contrary those Ministers in whose favour the people petitioned were frowned upon and censured as too hasty furious and heady Answerable to the Palatinate hath the affairs in England been carryed on all our Petitions working small effect unless scribled according to Parliamentary Interest The several Petitions from the two Universities and most Counties of the Nation at the beginning of these Wars in the behalf of Episcopacy Liturgy Church-Revenues and suppression of Schismaticks prevailed nothing with the Parliament though subscribed by the chief Nobility and Gentry in the Kingdom Nor had that of Worcestershire about 10. years after in the behalf of an able Ministry and the Universities any better luck only obtaining the formality of thanks from the Speakers mouth and after this fashion hath been the exit of others And yet with what alacrity and cheerfulness did the same men receive that Impudent Petition taken notice of by the King of a company of beggarly Rascals in London who desired that the Lords and Commons might be jumbled into one House that they might subdue the pride of the King of all which if they had not a speedy remedy they would take the cure into their own hands and destroy the disturbers of the Peace These frantick demands were pleasant to the Commons because agreeable to their desires if not set on foot by themselves the which is something probable because they owned it so farr as to present it to the Lords However it must be granted some favour that the People are permitted to present their desires though the Army themselves profest that it was the undoubted right of the People to Petition as in truth it is yet afterwards they denyed the same liberty to the London Prentises knowing their desires to be more for the Publick benefit than the Armies satisfaction so that Mr. Wharton sung not amiss when thus Petitioning the Birth-right of the Saints VII After all these Revolutions nothing appearing to harbour any signs of Tumult the people perceiving no harm done to themselves little regarded the concerns of the Church though it and the State should suffer reciprocally the Lutherans were outed of their Parochial Churches and Benefices all being delivered to the Calvinists The traceing of this Observation is not unknown to any that hath heard of a Persecution How many famous Divines were sequestred and thrust from their Livings in these unnatural Wars London should lament the expulsion of so many learned men from her and the supplying of their Places by a Band of hot-braind long-winded and Schismatical Presbyterians And as if this were not enough Oliver must add to their afflictions by one Order forbidding them to Preach or Teach School as if like the Italian he gloryed not only to kill their Bodies but Souls also And all this done because prompted by their stedfast and sure Consciences they would not swallow like our Temporizers Contradictory Oaths Whereby I may well raise this Quaere Whether those who after they have with much consideration once made a lawful Vow will keep it or those who as the Tyde serves will swear point-blanck one Oath against another rather than be kept from the shoar of Preferment or thrown from that which they have unlawfully got are most godly and honest To all these who have been put out of their Places by shew of Publick Command I might add these who were kept back by the sear'd Consciences of their ignorant and malicious Examiners a sort of people not so much fearing God and hating Covetousness if Mr. Sadler may have credit whither I referr you for satisfaction VIII The Scholars of the University who were Lutherans if they would not turn Calvinists were turned out and the Calvinists put into their places The Parallel of this is too palpable to discourse much of Oxford will never forget the Lord Pembroke's Visitation nor Cambridge that
Historian Prudencio de Sandoval tells us a memorable passage of the Conde de Salvatierra who sent a Priest to Vittoria the Metropolis of Alava a little Province in old Castile only as it were to have some discourse with the Junta but upon suspition was presently put in Prison by Diego Martinez and search'd where they found Letters to the Fryers and some other people desiring them to perswade the people to Rebellion The Scotch Stories are plentiful of Pulpit-Treasons nor must our English Tub-thumpers be exempted a sort of people more antick in their Devotions than Don Buscos Fencing-Master and can so wrincle their faces with a religious as they think it wry-Look that you may read there all the Persian or Arabick Alphabet and have a more lively view of the Aegyptian Hieroglyphicks then either Kircherus or Pierius will afford you Yet for all this outward zeal experience hath told us that the chief of them were but Time-serving Pratlers acting more for their own Interest than the Publick good and according to the prosperity of their favourites so was their passion transported and apt to be cooled again from the least dissatisfaction of a Grandee that I look upon many of them to be not only as simple but as inconsistent as that Biscayner Priest in Charles the V. time who when the Commonalty rebell'd against the Emperour took so much their part that he used to pray publickly for it and Juan de Padilla and his Wife Maria Pacheco the chief promoters of that warre by the name of King and Queen affirming all other Kings to be but Tyrants yet this zeal kept not long heat for afterwards Padilla and his Soldiers marching by where the Priest lived and some of them being quartered in his house drank him up a little barrel of wine took away a wench which he kept and did other soldier-like extravagancies which turn'd his stomach so much against them and their cause that the next Sunday he thus bespake his Parishioners You know my brethren how that Juan de Padilla marching by this place his soldiers left me not one Hen they eat up my Bacon and dranke me up a whole barrel of Wine and have taken away my Catharine with them Therefore for the future I charge you not to pray to God for him but for King Charles and his Queen Juana which are our true Kings As for the Antiquity of Lecturers if looked into it will be found to be but upstart to witt in the latter end of Queen Elizabeths time and this fashion too stoln from Geneva and here introduced by those who had no Authority unless you allow Trevers and his companions to have the sway of the English Church And what law they have for their vindicarion I know not unlesse they plead an Order of the Commons whereby any Minister was permitted to use weekly Lectures in his own Church But whether any such Authority was intrusted with the Commons or if it were whether this permitted them to thump in other peoples Pulpits lyeth out of my study though a novice in Law is able to satisfie any man in this Yet were many of these Lecturers though never in orders recommended cherish'd and held up in their bold and seditious railing against the Church Book of common Prayer and the King and his Government and licence publickly given to their Pamphlets whereby many of the people were drawn to take part against their King For they having the sway or'e the Conscience which is the rudder that steers the astions words and thoughts of the rational Creature they transport and snatch it away whither they will making the beast with many heads conceive according to the colour of those rods they use to cast before them as Mr. Howell very ingeniously saith And for this cause it is that the state of Venice have a special care of the Pulpit and Press that the Priests dare not temper in their Sermons with the designs and transactions of State which the same Gentleman alloweth to be one reason why that Republick hath lasted so long in such a flourishing condition and to the benefit of this the wise and peaceful King James did agree in the Hampton Court Conference yet for all this so resolved were the Commons to carry on their designs that in 1641. they by a strong hand put several Lecturers into other mens pulpits and put the true Ministers of those Churches into aboundance of trouble because they did not at first consent to such innovations and intruders as many parishes in London are able to testifie and into what good humours that great City was preach'd by these thunderers experience hath sadly told us Nor in plain English is there any such need of these Lecturers as is pretended to by our Non-conformists for consider our Sunday-sermons with those upon our Festivals with the appointed and accidental Fasts and Thanks-giving ones and I am confident there will be as many in a year as are either well made use of or well preached Another mode they had to drive on their designes of altering the government of England confirm'd by so many wholsome Laws was to get the Lords and Commons jumbled together into one house for which purpose they put several agitators to draw up a Petition against a malignant faction and that the Peers who were agreeable to them would remove and sit and vote with the Commons professing unless some speedy remedy were taken for their satisfaction they would lay hold on the next remedy that was at hand and not to leave any means for their relief and that those who agreed not to them might be publickly declared and removed And this worshipful petition was accordingly framed and by the Commons presented to the Lords This extravagant paper was presented with the like words of a Commoner the same day that those Lords who would concurr with the Commons about the Militia would make themselves known that the dissenting Peers might be made known to the Commons These threats I say as a Royall pen informes us did so astonish many of the Lords that so many of them with indignation departed that the vote against the Kings Militia passed though it had severall times been denied before And by such like unhandsome jugling tricks as this were the rest of their designs promoted And that they really had an intent to have but one House by making the Lords sit with them a Dr. well-skilld in these times assures us out of Sr. Edward Deering's Speeches and besides this that the King himself should be but as one of the Lords and then their work was done Besides these the Presbyrerian faction had other waies to make themselves Lords and Maisters especially one without which the rest though obtain'd would not relish well with them And this it was they having oft heard from King James and he learnt it by good experience No Bishop no King cast about how to ruine the first and
then the latter they thought as it fell out accordingly afterwards would fall to their obedience with the more ease To bring this great thing about all their art was imployed But the chief of all was their old true friend and souldier Calumny by this to make the orthodox episcopal party odious to the people a way which Contzenus the Jesuite looks upon as so excellent that it is very fitting it should be endeavour'd And in this trade of vilifying our Nonconformists were so expert and sedulous that in a short while they had innumerable lying pamphlets and reports spread about the Nation that in the first year or two of this Long Parliament the hearers and believers with the relatours of these slaunders were so many and all performed with that care and celerity that Dame Report in England out-vapour'd Queen Fame in Chaucer who Had also fele up standing eares And tonges as on beest ben heares And on her fete woxen sawe I Partriche wynges redily Yet are these fictions against our reverend Church-government quite contrary to the sound and true Law of our land which will thus tell us For as much as divers questions by overmuch boldnesse of speech and talk amongst many of the common sort of people being unlearned have lately grown upon the making and consecrating of Archbishops and Bishops within this Realm whether the same were and be orderly done according to the Law or not which is much tending to the slaunder of all the state of the Clergy being one of the greatest states of this Realm c. Yet let the Laws say what they will these men will oppose and that in Ritaing waies rather then not get their end above 2000. of this faction making a tumult in London crying out they would have no Bishop nor no high Commission a bad omen to the peace of the Kingdom but a great incouragement to the Long Parliament who first sat within a fortnight after this hurry And had presently a sympathizing Petition brought them by Alderman Pennington loaden with the scrawling hands of 15000 Londoners and this forsooth against Archbishops Bishops and our Church-ceremonies though I believe if none had been subscribers but those who understood what they set their hands to that neither the Alderman nor 15000 of the rest had listed their faith and themselves in that paper which the Lord Digby call'd very well contemptible irrational and presumptious Yet did the Presbyterian faction in Parliament joy themselves thus to have brought that great City to the subjection and reverence of their new found Disciplinarian slavery and perceiving themselves thus back'd by such riches and so many men went boldly on to pull down our Reverend Church and set up their golden calves in its stead And all this pains hurly-burly alarums and warre must only be like Caligula's Army to fight for empty cochle-shels in respect of the truth glory and sincerity swaying in the English Church The first imployment of note against the Church that the Commons put themselves upon was against the Convocation contemporary with the short Parliament which they condemned as seditious dangerous against King Law Subject though the King acknowledged no such thing and one of their main reasons against this Convocation was because the clergy therein assembled perceiving how the Scots did covenant and swear against our Church-government and that our English Non-conformists were grown strong and not only corresponded with the Scots but tended the same way which would ruine our Church at last as experience proved did frame an Oath for the maintaining of our Church-Government against all Popery and its Superstition And this was called the Oath c. though the words following this c. to wit as it stands now established makes not the Oath so contemptible as our Presbytery clamoured Against this Oath the Cornmons ranted affirming the Clergy though assembled by the King's command had no power to make an Oath the which whether they had or no I shall not now dispute Only I shall have leave to think that every one thinks the best of themselves And so I suppose did the Commons when they framed the Protestation and ordered all in their own House to take it and did also recommend it to be taken all England over though the King did never consent to it nor as then had the Lords and whether the Commons by themselves have power to impose an Oath I shall not determine though report speaks the Negative And as for the Protestation it self 't is composed of such uncertain jugling materials considering the Presbyterian Notion which imposed it that a true understanding Conscience would never embrace it for these following rational Doubts waving the dispute of the Imposers authority I promise vow and protest to maintain with my life the true reformed Protestant Religion expressed in the Doctrine of the Church of England against all Popery and Popish Innovations within this Realm Dub. 1. What the Presbyterian Imposers and Framers here mean by the Doctrine of the Church of England If the Thirty nine Articles why do they not subscribe them if any thing else why do they not mention it that men might know what they swear Dub. 2. What they mean by Popery If their Articles in what sense they meant the Points held against the Calvinists by some learned men of our Church and Holland Dub. 3. What they meant by Popish Innovations within this Realm for their Writings affirm our Church-government by Bishops and Innocent Ceremonies to be so The which if they meant then none but Schismaticks would take it if otherwise why did they not explain themselves that people might not swear ignorantly As also the power and priviledges of Parliament The lawful Rights and Liberty of Subject and shall never relinquish this Promise Vow and Protestation Dub. 4. What are the power priviledges of Parliament and Rights and Liberty of Subject As for the Parliamentary priviledges they themselves never yet undertook to declare what they are And for men to swear to defend they know not what is not unlike that Messenger who swore to observe his Masters Instructions in his sealed Commission which when he had opened he found no command but to hang himself Dub. 5. Whether it is lawful to swear never to relinquish this Protestation though the King and State should afterwards have some reasons to revoke or alter all or any clause in the said Protestation as none can question their Authority in such things And then eight dayes after was a piece of paper as if dropping from its Posteriors joyned to the rump of this Protestation wherein was declared that nothing in this Oath was to be extended to the maintaining of any form of worship discipline or government nor of any rites or ceremonies of the said Church of England By which the Hauntghost of Presbyterie is easily perceived to be there domineering and 't is the humour of these men to love
who neither cared for them nor their sitting nor any else that would not dance after them and Geneva For they are resolved for Jack Presbyter and therefore being informed that the Lords Order for the Common-Prayer had been read in Churches and not their Declaration they drew up an Order and sent it to be printed enjoyning that their aforesaid Declaration should be read in all Churches And so severe were they in this point that they put Dr. Haywood of St. Giles to some trouble for not permitting their Order to be read though he had not only his own Conscience and the Lords Order but the Law of the Land to testifie his justness And what more ridiculous then to astonish the people into discontents and sidings by reading to them at the same time two contrary Orders and that of the Commons being quite against the Laws of the Land Thus did the Commons batter down Religion as Captain Jones in the Poet did the Jesuites more by strong hand then reason yet had they left one thing undone which was the extirpation of Episcopacy root and branch to bring which villany about they Voted them to have no place in the House of Lords nor to meddle with any secular affairs But here before they went any further they were somewhat troubled at the King because he being then in Scotland had sent Mr. Warwick Orders to draw up five Congé d'Eslire's for five new Bishops there being then so many Sees vacant but in this strait Mr. Stroud thinks it fitting to Petition the King to stop these five till they had dispacht the charge against the other Bishops Yet what need they care whether the King make Bishops or no since they are resolved never to acknowledge them to be so for they can with the same ease cut off all as one Therefore seeing the King for Bishops they bend themselves more resolutely against them and so prepare their charge against those formerly accused and for the Champions to mannage this Combate Pymme and St Johns by the commendations of one another are chosen The death of the first is noys'd by report and the honesty of the latter is not unknown to any The Parliament was something stopt in their proceedings against Bishops by the Irish Rebellion yet having taken some breath they sent a message to the Lords desiring that the 13. Bishops might speedily come to answer And not long after as an incouragement to the factious they released Simmonds a Printer who had been in custody for printing a Book against the Common-Prayer yet the very same day was Walker the Iremonger imprisoned only for Printing a Book concerning Mr. Prynne though the first deserved as much hanging as the latter Imprisonment and from these men the Bishops might well expect good justice But still they sit and Vote in the House of Lords which vext the Sectaries to the guts because they could not tell how to get them out handsomly for they had no great confidence in their Articles of Canons and Constitutions and whilest they Voted there the Orthodox Party would still exceed At last some ill spirit or other put it into the noddles of Isaac Pennington Captain Ven and such combustible humours to raise such tumults against the Reverend Fathers the fear whereof should either keep them from the House or bring some ruine sacrilegiously to be acted upon them And accordingly up cometh the Rabble of London to the Parliament House crying out No Bishops no Bishops And at last got the Bishop of Lincoln then going to the House with the Earl of Dover into the midst of them where they had like to have squeez'd him to death And having thus begun many hundreds of them come again the same day with Swords and Staves causing great uproars both in Westminster and London not only to the affrightment of the Bishops but the King and Queen and the next day also assaulted Westminster Abby These Tumults obtain'd the end of their Contrivers keeping the Bishops from the House pelting of them with stones as they endeavoured to go By which they drew up a Petition to the King how that the Tumults kept them out and therefore protested against all things that should be done in the House of Peers in time of their thus violent seclusion Which did trouble the Parliament so much that one Mr. Weston of the Commons House thought he had spoke bravely when he moved that the Bishops might be sent to Bedlam But Glyn and others were cleerly for High Treason which accordingly was done and ten of them sent to the Tower and two to the Black Rod. And thus their businesse being don the great tumults ceas'd the Presbyterians sang Victoria whilst the reverend Church of England lay in the dust miserably trod upon by a Schismatical zeal yet had they they nothing to accuse the Bishops of and so were forced to release them all but two against one of which they could say nothing for if they could they would and whether the cry of the others bloud be yet stopt I know not How were the Country cheated with swarms of Petitions against this Ecclesiastical Order yet in this none more ridiculous then the Londoners One troup of Tradesmen petition against Bishops and their reason was because their being was the decay of trading and in the clause of all gave a notable lash at the House of Lords Nor is this all but the very Porters 15000 said to be in number Petition too and affirm that they cannot indure the weight of Episcopacy any longer and therefore must have redress Nay the very women by the pushing on of their hot-headed associates thought themselves so much concerned in these Church-affairs that they must petition too And these as fit persons to apprehend Chuch-government as the simple Cockney country-businesse who thought a bush hung about with black moles skins to be a black pudding tree yet these sort of Fanaticks are apt to have abominable discretions for thus the Scots some years before in their Petition against the Common Prayer Book begun it thus We Men Women and Children and Servants having considered c. Most miraculous Children Born like Adam at the top of understanding O the happiness to spring from the loins of a Covenanter who as it was said of the Lady Margaret can bring forth men instead of children Certainly these children were akin to that boy of Cracovia in Poland which had not only teeth but spake the first day of its birth but when he received Christianity lost that faculty And probably had these covenanting Children women and such like known more of Christianity then these did they had never acted so violently against Church-government Or it may be they were somewhat related to that other child born in the same City which spoke distinctly at half a year old yet nothing but mischief was by it uttered distruction to all Poland and that
leaving the Government of all to the Lords of his Parliament Which impudence of theirs hurryed them on so farre that they never left fighting till their King was murder'd but how uncertain Thus are the best men violently opposed by the wicked though the vertue and patience of the former might in reason mollifie the latter to obedience How wishedly will some pitty the case of Argalus and Parthenia the patience of Gryseld in Chaucer the misery and troublesome adventures of the Phanatick Lovers in Cleopatra Cassandra Amadis de Gaul Sidney and such like Yet all these as meer Romantick as Rablaise his Garagantua And yet with an unmoved apprehension can peruse the lamentable murder of Edward the Second of England and James the first and Milcolumb the first of Scotland the cutting off the head of good King Alpinus the poisoning of Fergusius the third by his own Queen and her stabbing her self the strangling of Malvinus by his own Queen and the throat-cutting of King Fethelmachus by a Fidler and besides these the martyrdome of old Queen Ketaban in Persia The stabbing of Henry the fourth in France The sacrilegious poisoning of the Emp. Henry the seventh in Italy The miserable death of Mauricius the Emp. with his Wife and five Children by the wicked Phocas And can read the fatall stories recorded by Boccace with lesse grief then the deplorable narrative of Arnalte's love to Lucenda And the patience of the good King Henry the sixth who being grievously struck by a murthering Varlet only made this Reply Forsooth and forsooth being his words for most earnest expression never using an oath ye do fouly to smite a King anointed so May be farre out-rivall'd by some with the misfortunes and hardship of some inchaunted Lover in Ariosto Parismus the two Palmerins or Mirrour of Knighthood And for the horrid murther of his late Majesty experience tells us that many have been so farre from contracting grief that they have so much triumphantly rejoiced at it that they have thought an action of so much wickednesse to have been honourable to them and their posterity for ever Thus have we come short to our Ancestors in fidelity and Loyalty by studying all occasions to rebell against our King They rather then undergo the ignominions title of Nithing i. e. a knave or a night-filcher swarme to the Service of their King we on the contrary rather then not be branded with the wicked name of a Traytor will court all occasions by our Rebellion to make our selves meritorious to a pair of Gallows And so to conclude this assertion I shall tell you that the Parliament wanted all the qualifications to make a warre really espousable No warre being lawful unlesse it be commanded by the Supream Authority the which the Parliament was not but the King if the Laws of our Land be an authentick Standerd And secondly the occasion of the Warre must be just which was wanting on the Parliaments side all their specious pretences being false and ridiculons their reasons suggested to the people to beget a Warre being to as small purpose as the Duke of Burgundy to quarrell for a cart-load of Sheep-skins or the two Brethren neer Padua about the disposal of the Starrs and Firmament And suppose their jealousies had been true yet it was Treason in them to warre against the Supream Authority the King according to the Laws of our Land and damnable according to the word of God Let Buchanan and such as he by supposing the Apostles and the Spirit to deal with us like Hypocrites evince to the contrary For if the Apostle Paul commandeth the Christians to be obedient to their Heathen and Tyrannical Kings who made it their sport to persecute Christians and that for Conscience-sake telling them that their power was of God certainly we are bound to obey a Christian Prince whose authority can be no lesse If we perceive our selves grieved resist we cannot but by Prayers and Obedience To which purpose the ancient Chaucer instructs us who certainly in this sung according to the rule of his time and therein neither false Law nor Gospel Lordes hestes may not be fayned They may wel be wayled and complained But men must nedes unto her lustre obey And so wol I there nis no more to sey The primitive Christians when collected into great Armies were honoured for their obedience never rebelling against but fighting or quietly living under their Heathen Kings as Tertullian will satisfie more at large But now we are so farre from being peaceable in a Christian Government that if occasion of rebellion cannot handsomly be pluckt by the fore-top yet we can create reason to our selves though upon a serious reflection we acknowledge such endeavours to be unjust Thus the Army when in obedience to the Parliament it had conquer'd and ruin'd the King and Kingdome and by the assistance of the sword and Satan had made themselves Lords and Masters over their Betters then I say when they were at the top of their prosperity they do seriously professe that the Parliament did justifie many extraordinary strange and doubtlesse in respect of the letter of the Law very illegal actions viz. Their taking up Armes raising and forming Armies against the King fighting against his person imprisoning impeaching arraigning trying and executing him cutting off his Head banishing his Children abolishing Bishops Deans and Chapters took away Kingly Government and the House of Lords broke the Crowns sold the Jewels Plate Goods Houses and Lands belonging unto the Kings of this Nation erected extraordinary High Courts of Justice and therein impeached arraigned condemned and executed many notorious enemies to the publick peace when the Laws in being and the ordinary Courts of Justice could not reach them These were strange and unknown practises in this Nation and not at all justifiable as is conceived by any known Laws and Statutes Thus have you the judgment of a ruling Army against their Masters and themselves though this their repentance was but to vindicate another infidelity But here after all this it may be objected that though some factious spirits of the Parliament have been too incroaching upon the King and the chief Incendiaries of these Warres yet why should I lay all this upon the Presbyterian account To which there needs no tedious reply if we do but consider that these factious people were all Non-conformists from whom if examples may be held for proofs as Schismaticks a self-conceited giddy hot-headed zeal and by consequence Rebellion is as inseparable as pride from Menecrates or Children when gallanted up in new cloathes For my part I am apt to believe that the Bloud of many thousand Christians shed in these warrs and before cryeth loud against Presbytery as the people only guilty of the first occasion of quarrel And that they have been the chief occasion of other slaughters may be credited not only from forraign stories but the authentick judgment of the ever great
were so farre for liberty of subject and Conscience that they hoped by their hands that God would fulfill the desires of him who prayd to Almighty God in the Kirk of St. Andro That He would carry through the good cause against all his Enemies especially against Kings Devils and Parliaments Are not these precious souls to promote the Holy League or to put forward the cause of Muntzer or John a Leyden Well if you will have any more of this Caledonian doctrine Then what do you think Was not he a dapper Covenanter that could thus twit his late Majesty We must not lose you and the Kingdome by preferring your Fancies and groundlesse affections before sound reason you should complain to the heart that the head is much distempered The Lyon must be cured of the Kings Evill Is not this a pretty reflection fitting to prompt a Rumper to do what he will against a King But if this be not enough Bradshaw may pick a small vindication from the Covenanters who thus assure Kings that The people may be well enough without them for there was NONE TILL Cains days Happy souls that have the sole power of understanding Scripture and History Nor is their knowledge stinted here only but they can as if they had a strange spirit of Divination even know the hearts of their betters for thus one of their Grandees R. B. from the Pulpit could assure his Beloved that the Lord hath forsaken our King and given him over to be led by the Bishops the blind brood of Anti-Christ who are hot Beagles hunting for the blood of Gods Saints Is not this fit stuff from the jaws of an hot-headed Covenanter I can tell you also that when his Majesty sufficiently provoked by these furious Rebells went himself to reduce them to obedience one of these Tub-Pratlers told his Hearers that they of the Holy Covenant were like Israel at the Red sea and Pharaoh and his host comming upon them And another H. R. was as forward as any of them when he compared the King to a Wicked Italian who delighted to kill men both in soul and body And was not the King highly beholden to these his gude Subjects And had no the reason to thank Mr. Cant. for his good opinion of and wishes for him when in his Sermon at Glascow he could dapperly pray to God To take away the Kings Idolatry But words are but winde and therefore deeds must do the feat for obtaining of which they think themselves obliged to vindicate any manner of murder or bloodshed Thus one of their Zealots highly applauding John Feltons stabbing the Duke of Buckingham God hath chalked out the way unto you God offer'd himself to guide you by the hand in giving this first blow will you not follow home The sprinkling of the blood of the Wolfe if we can follow the Lord in it may prove a means to save us c. But because the life of a Subject is too small a recompence for their Revenge the pouring out of Sacred Royall bloud would not be amisse as appears by the words of a Covenanting Brother Tell the Head it 's sick presse the people to Arms to strike the BASILIKE VEIN since nothing but THAT will cure the pleurisie of your Estate And is not this a good way to plead for Zion Is it not an hard case that none but these blood-shot eyes can discern the Pattern in the Mount Would not a man think King Charles the I by these Characters to be a stranger Monster than ever Aldrovandus heard of And can any man think that these Kirkers spoke like subjects when they publickly declared that We deserve and expect a proper word to their betters Approbation and Thanks from his Majesty And all this only for Rebellion according to Mr. Andrew Ramsey Minister of Edenburgh his Doctrine viz. That it was Gods will that the primitive Church should confirm the Truth by suffering and that now the truth being confirm'd It 's his will that we defend the Truth by Action in Resisting TYRANTS And what was meant by this word Tyrants the Time when the word was spoke doth sufficiently demonstrate And so little respect have these Brethren to the Supream Powers that a great Grandee well known in England if you say but Thomas Cartwright did thus proudly give his judgement concerning this Question Whether the King himself might be Excommunicated That Excommunication should not be exercised upon Kings I utterly mislike And how exactly these Disciplinarians Quadrate with the Jesuites in Politicks the learned Mr. Corbet under the Name of Lysimachus Nicanor hath Ingeniously discover'd which Book so handsomly exposed the Zealots that the Author being after murthered by the Irish Robert Bayly that Scavinger of Presbytery betwixt snarling and rejoycing could not refrain from crying out O the judgement of God! The Aethiopians paint the Devil white and look upon our Europians as not beautiful because not of their black and obscure Complexion And our dark-souled Puritans censure all Vertue and Loyalty as abominable because contrary to their Principles which perswades them to espouse such Maxims as these I. That it is lawful for Subjects to make a Covenant and Combination without the King and to enter into a Band of mutual defence against their King and all persons whatsoever II. After a Law is made and confirmed yet if the Subjects or rather as appears by practise if onely a part of them protest against such established Law or Laws Then that doth void all obedience to those Laws and the Protestors are discharged from any obligation to live under them although the Protestations and the validity of them be not discussed before the competent Judges of them III. A number of men being the greater part of the Kingdome because they are the greater may do any thing what they themselves do conceive to be conducible to the glory of God and the good of the Church notwithstanding of any Laws standing in force to the contrary And that these especially met in a Representative Assembly may not onely without the Authority of the King but against the express Commandement of the King and his Council and Judges declaration of it to be against the Laws of the Land sit act and determine of things concerning the Church and State as if there were neither King Council or Judges in the Land and several other such like dangerous positions as these whereby they ruin and destroy Kingdomes Which can never be upon a sure foundation as long as such Bonte-feu's are tolerated Schism being the chief overthrower of Nations Upon these Principles our English Presbyterians rebell'd against their Soveraign and upon the same account their Neighbours did in Scotland and then trudg'd forwards to the assistance of their Southern associates declaring the necessity of such a Rebellion Unless we will either Betray our Religion Liberties and Laws and all that we and ours do possess
Kings Oath and other mens Oaths must submit to the Laws of the Land I know no reason but the Covenant should too being expresly against them So that either the Covenant must null the Laws or the Laws the Covenant If the first then farewell Poulton since the swearing of Presbytery can make those Statutes useless if the latter then adieu Covenant and Presbytery not forgetting the League and since that the names of the Parliament-men subscribers in Parchment a great sign of the Loyalty and good Religion of the present Commons who in this have excell'd all other Parliaments for many Generations past let others commend themselves for me that were burnt by the hands of the Hangman in London by Authority of Parliament a Supream Power to that which made and forced it But that you may see the folly of some Oaths and how the Swearers are sometimes even necessitated to smooth them over with a gentle Interpretation and a slender performance I shall tell you one story Bretislaus or Bisetislaus Son to Udalricus Duke of Bohemia fell in love meerly by report for as then he had not seen her with Jutha Daughter to the Emperour Otho II call'd Ruffo To obtain her he goeth under the shew of Religion to Ratisbone or Regenspurg where she was in a Monastery and after some contrivances gets her on Horseback and gallops away with her to his Father and by her own consent marryed her The Emperour enraged at this raiseth an Army and solemnly swears a mischief to Bohemia and never to return with his Army till he had placed his Throne in the midst of that Countrey Against him Bretislaus and his Father raise Forces the Son also swearing to carry fire into the middle of Germany and that so near the Imperial Court that Caesar himself should be constrain'd to shut his eyes for the greatness of the light and splendour of those flames The Armies drawing near together and preparing for battel The Lady Gutta grieved that so much blood should be shed for her sake tearing her hair and face exposed her self to all danger by running betwixt the two Armies and over-whelm'd with sorrow having found out the Emperour earnestly pleads in behalf of her husband the strength of Love the Child within her c. With which Caesar was so moved to compassion that with tears he told her of his willingness to Peace but that his Oath obliged him to the contrary She told him that her husband had sworn too but that he should consider the vanity of that Religion which alloweth of and giveth place to wickedness since Oaths should not strengthen the foundation of sin and mischief Well Peace is made they having found out as they thought a way to keep them both from Perjury the Emperour going to Boleslau then held to be the middle of Bohemia where a Throne being made with a few stones he sits him down as Conquerour And Bizetislaus for so some also call him to save his Oath went into Germany and the Emperour being by set fire to a few Cottages and spoil'd two or three little Fields for which damages he presently satisfied paying the value The Brethren think they have got another salvo for their honesty when they would make people have a good opinion of the Covenant because several of the Royalists took it and in this accusation Crofton is impudent to a Wonder especially to his Betters But is it any honour to the Independent Engagement against King c. nay the Covenant too because some great Presbyterians took it The truth is the Presbyterians by the fortune of Warr becoming Masters seiz'd upon the Revenues of those who had been faithful to his Majesty not suffering many of them to Compound but upon abominable terms for their Estates unless they would take the Covenant to boot which shews the implacable malice of the Puritans who in this like the Italian made it their business to destroy the soul too And this may serve to shew what small reason they have to demand Toleration of those whose Consciences they formerly so wickedly forced Which horrid act will remain as a mark of Ignominy upon this Faction to Eternity And in behalf of the Royalist I shall afford you another Story which will apply it self Emuanuel King of Portugal with-held from a Bishop his Revenues The Bishop complains to the Pope who sends a Legat either to perswade the King to Restitution or Excommunicate him and upon the Kings refusal the latter was denounced and so the Legat departs towards Rome again The King enraged at this Sentence mounted on Horse-back to follow the Legat and having over-taken him drew out his Sword threatning to kill him unless he would absolve him which was done and the King return'd to his Court The Legat being got to Rome and told the Story of his Journey The Pope was very angry and sharply checkt him for absolving the King to whom the Legat reply'd Most holy Father had you been in danger of your life as I was you would have given the King absolution double and treble No People rails more against the Pope and a Jesuite than a Puritan and yet in their destructive Principles of Government none agrees more with them Tell them but of the Pope's Excommunicating of Kings and disingaging their Subjects from any more obedience to them and you shall hear nothing but roaring against Antichrist and Babylon and stories of the Whore Beast Horns and enough to fright Children out of their Wits Yet if you tell them that they are guilty of the same by dispensing with the Peoples Oaths to their Kings and Bishops then will they call it the Cause of God the Interest of Jesus Christ and a good sign that they are the true Saints of God and the sureness of their Election thus though seeming mortal Enemies are they united to destroy the Civil Power If the latter Oath especially when wickedly and villainously impos'd cannot take away the Obligation of the former and that agreeable to the cause as the Reverend and Learned Patron of the Church saith whose single testimony is of more worth than the opinion of a whole Assembly of Covenanters I cannot conceive how a company of Noddles being but a piece of a Parliament pratling at Westminster and in active Rebellion against their King can quit honest men for Knaves can ease themselves from their Oaths and Subscriptions to Kingly and Episcopal Obedience by an after-Imposition of a contradictory and wicked Oath But it may be they may suppose that if Hortensius shed tears for the death of a Lamprey If Macarius Abbot of Alexandria penitentially tormented himself in Bryars and Thorns six Moneths or seven years for the death of a Flea If the Aetolians and Arcadians Warr'd together for a wild Boar If the Carthaginians and the People of Piraca for a Sea-Rovers ship If the Scots and Picts for a few Dogs If Charles Duke of Burgondy
the 9 Lords was not unsignificant viz. That if he look'd for any preferment he must comply with them in their waies and not hope to have it by serving the King Words of such a Mandrake-sound that they would have astonished a Roman ear whose generosity and vertue made them raise a Temple to Fidelity But all bonds of obedience and loyalty were hurld off by these sons of contradiction and Majesty it self so farr disrepected that Martin could with confidence wipe his lips with the whore in the Proverb and think he had done no wrong when he affirmd that the Kings Office is forfeitable and that the happiness of this Kingdome doth not depend upon him or any of the Royall branches of that stock and this was seconded by that worshipful Champion Sir Henry Ludlow who peremptorily said that he was not worthie to be King of England Nor are these words unbefitting the Father of such a known Son as Edmud Ludlow one of the Kings noted Tryers and an immortal Enemy to all goodnesse Church-government and literature Nor did the whole Parliament speak little lesse then the former when they affirmed he had no negative vote call'd all his Actions illegall and his Letters Declarations and Proclamations scandalous and false forbidding people to be obedient to him upon pain of displeasure declaring all such as did to be Traitors Taxing him with an intention towards Popery O implacable Malice foisted into the world by these his back-friends and spread abroad with abundance of impudence and malice by their zealous Myrmidon and Journy-work-jobber Prynne one that if he had lived amongst the Malabars in the East-Indies where long eares is a Token of honour comlinesse and bravery would have been held a man of no great credit But the best on 't is Pryn's scandalous pamphlet call'd the Popish Royall Favourite i. e. the King was many years ago learnedly and industriously answer'd to the Honour of his Majesty honesty of the undertaker and discredit and confusion of the Mercury-admiring accuser And therefore Mr. Baxter was somewhat to blame to cull such false trifles out of Prynne to prove the King reconcileable to Rome though he believes he was no Papist and this ten years after the Kings Beheading But to return to the Parliament who will yeild to none in bitterness against his Majesty who protest to him when no nearer York then New-Market That they would make use of that power which they had for their security and professing in the same paper that it was not words that could secure them And what their intention was in this may be gathered by voting some few daies before That the Nation should be put into a posture of Defence and only by Authority of Parliament And all those Extravagancies were acted by the Parliament in opposition and discredit to the King before his Majesty had so much as one man either in offensive or defensive Armes in a publick way So that he might well admire at those who charg'd him to be the first beginner and raiser of this Warre Thus the Kings mildnesse gave encouragement to those furious spirits who never left plotting till they had fill'd England with more villanies then Rome is in the vacancy of her Popedome or Tacitus could reckon up in the front of his History and this by their unjust dealings with him by warre and such like wickednesses though they might have consulted the Apothegm of that great Goth Athanaricus being good Divinity Law and Reason that A King is a earthly God and whosoever rebels against him is guiltie of his own death Nor doth the great Father of the Church intimate to us lesse obedience to our Kings then the former But these men cared little for reason or authority in any but themselves as appears by those impudent and irrational Propositions sent to the King at New Castle when they were Masters and had him in hold whereby he would be but a King of clouts and the Nobility and Gentry of his party bound to hop headlesse Articles so palpably wicked that an Italian through his Majesty looks upon them as distructive both to Church and State Nor could lesse be expected from these men in the height of their Pride and prosperity when at the beginning of these wicked Warres long before the stroak at Edghill The good King weeping as it were over the approaching ruine of his Subjects earnestly endeavours to perswade the Parliament to a Reconciliation in the lamentable breathings of Tancredi to the violent Rinaldo Dimmi che pensi far vorrai le mani Del civil sangue tu dunque bruttarte E con le piaghe ind egnede ' Christiani Trafiger Cristo ond'ei son membra e perte c. Ah non per Dio vinci te stesso Tell me what mean you now Will you yet stain Your hands in your friends bloud by Civill Warre And by your killing Christians now again Pierce Christ his side of whom we members are c. Ah no for Gods sake conquer your passion Desiring that they might both lay down their Armes and recall all their papers against each other upon an appointed day and so enter into a Treaty But they being carryed along with a Spirit of contradiction like the Scotch Presbyter who railing against King Church and Government and being commanded by King James to speak either sense or come down replyed like himself I say man I 'se nowther speak sense nor come down They I say resolved to run counter absolutely declare that they will not think of peace till the King have taken down his Standard left his Armies repair'd to the Parliament that so justice might be done upon those who had adhear'd to them and how by this his Majesty himself could escape they having some few daies before taxed him with most mischievous Tyranny I know not And in the same paper the lands of all those who were of the Kings party were forfeited and I think it is not unknown how they were disposed on afterwards Nor need we doubt but those men who without Blushing could Vote the Queen a Traitor would not care to draw up some blood into their faces soe they might have their revenge on his Majesty And whether this clause For the preservation of his Majesties person was voted to be left out in the New modled Commission the Commons and my Lord Fairfaz know best and what the meaning of such a seclusion was the revolution of a few years did fully import Thus did the English use the King as the Scots did their James the third who hated him as Mr. Drummond informes us because he got the love of his people by Piety and Justice and having taken up armes against him would not hearken to any termes of reconciliation unlesse he freely resigned the title of his Crown and Realm in favour of his Son then in theirs Hands and voluntarily deposed himself