who are all consenting to the Law and concerned that justice be duely executed on some evil Members for the good of the whole So that the several degrees and subordinations in the ancient Church of Christ even long before the first Nicene Council as there is expressed among Churchmen and Bishops against which some have made so loud and ridiculous clamors were chiefly for this end as Mr. Calvin and others have as ingenuously as truely observed that the holy correspondency of all Christians and all Churches in one Faith and Truth in one Spirit and Power might not onely be most evident to the world but most aptly carried on and preserved against all Factions Variations and Divisions that they might by these means be known to be of one heart and mind in the Lord that they might all speak the same things and walk in the same steps that what one condemned all might in the same spirit condemn what one forgave all might forgive that none might upon any private passions either excommunicate others by injurious abscission or themselves by voluntary separation or make new confederacies and associations with those who are either deserters of the Catholick Communion or justly excommunicated from it which distempers of Ignorance and Impatience and Imprudence among Christians have brought as we see this great power of the Keyes and this exercise of Christian Discipline so far into contempt that no man almost regards it from any hand every one daring to make what retortions they please and to excommunicate any one or more yea and whole Churches that do excommunicate them for any the most notorious errors and insolencies Thus as the Popes of Rome heretofore so the people now in many places challenge to themselves this power against their Neighbours and Brethren yea against their Preachers and Bishops against the Fathers that begat them and the Mother Church which did bear them So that I confesse there is not so much cause of terror as of pitty in most Excommunications as they are now managed by private and unauthoritative spirits O what sorrow what shame is it to see so Sacred so Solemn so Divine so Dreadfull an Institution vilified and nullified which was designed for the health and welfare of the Church of Christ by just and necessary severiâ—ies when it was as it ought to be soberly applyed by wise holy and impartiall Governours of the Church in the name of Christ in the Catholick Spirit or consent of all Orthodox Bishops Presbyters and people which was able to shake Heaven and Hel to open and shut the Everlasting doores of Salvation or Damnation according as the penitency or impenitency of offenders did appeare To see this flaming sword which was put by Christ into the Cherubims hand those that were the Angels of his Church to keep the way of the tree of life to see this made the scare-crow and scorne of vile men the sport of petulant and peevish Spirits who neither fear to inflict Excommunication upon whom they list as much as lies in their impotent malice nor yet to suffer it from the most Just Impartiall and Authoritative hands in the world from whom being once proudly separated they fancy they are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 out of the reach and danger of this just terror and the others true Authority as lawfull Bishops or Governours of the Church whose heavy sentence if I should incurre so far that any one true Bishop with his Clergy should passe it against me upon just grounds of my scandalous and obstinate sinning against God and his Church according to the ancient rightfull and lawfull way of such proceedings in the Name and Spirit of Jesus Christ to which all true Christians in this Church and in all the world do submit and assent I confess I should much more fear living and dying to lye under such a censure and sentence than to be condemned in my Estate Liberty or Life by any Court of humane Justice which reacheth not to the Souls eternal estate as Excommunication rightly managed doth it being a most undoubted Oracle of our Lord Jesus Christ that whose sins the Apostles and their lawful successors as Rulers of the Church do bind on Earth they are bound in Heaven Who their lawful and authoritative successors have been are and ought to be in all Ages and places of the Church is evident to all that have any fear of God or reverence of his Catholick Churches Testimony This is certain as Excommunication carries with it the joynt spirit and suffrage of the whole Church and every true Member of it either explicitly or implicitly so the regular and authoritative managing of it was ever from the respective Bishops Authority and Order as chief Pastors in every Church to whose fatherly care and Inspection with the counsel of their Presbyters the Flock of Christ is committed especially as to the discreet use of such Discipline as highly concerns the salvation or damnation the hopes or despair the binding or loosing the abscission or restauration of any part which ought not to be judged determined and executed by every private spirit of Minister or people but by such venerable Bishops and their Presbyters as have the authentick transmission of the Apostles ordinary governing power delivered to them as from Christ being in this like the Judges in commission for Life and Death though the Sentence be the Laws and the power the chief Magistrates and the transaction or publication in the Face of the County to which all the Bench of Justices the Jury and other honest Men do tacitly give their votes and assent yet is the Cognizance and Examination of the merits of the Cause and the judicial solemn Declaration of the Sentence committed specially to the Judge both in respect of his learned Abilities and known Integrity also for the Honor and Order which are necessary to be observed in proceedings of so great concernment to Mankind as are matters of Life and Death Such is the power such ought to be the procedure of all due Excommunication such they were in the purest and primitive times when all Christians all Congregations all Presbyters all Bishops all particular Churches were so united that as many Spokes make but one Wheel and many Stones one Building and many Members one Body so these made but one Church in the same Faith the same Baptism the same Ministry the same Spirit the same Order the same Power the same Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ From which Blessed Harmony and Spirituall Communion if any Christian or any particular Congregation or any part of the Church as those of the Donatistick party and the Novatians in Africa with others either proudly passionately and peevishly did separate themselves or were deservedly separated by the just censure of any part of the true Church and thenceforth falling to mangling of all by mutuall Excommunications so as to fly in the faces of their lawfull Bishops and Pastors or else turne their backs on them
and Priests of those Gods as Ceres Apollo or the Sun to Diana or the Moon to Mars Jupiter Bacchus c. by whose Divine influence and bounty they believed themselves to enjoy those good things And can any true Christian people have so base and penurious hearts as to fancy that they then honor Christ most when they part with least of their substance to his service that of all Priesthoods which have ever been in the world among civill or barbarous Nations Christs shall appeare the most beggerly and necessitous Can any true believer thus requite the Lord that bought them and gave himself a ransome for them will they compell the blessed Jesus who while he was on earth became poore to make them rich now he is risen and ascended to Glory in Heaven to suffer poverty hunger thirst nakednesse shame and contempt in his Ministers to whom Christ professeth who so giveth ought in his name as to his servant and Minister giveth to himself And no doubt who so taketh any thing from them taketh from Christ and is a robber of his Saviour So that nothing is or can be more impudent and abhorred in the sight of our God our Saviour and all good Christians than for a Nation that is fat and full ample and opulent in all plenty forraigne and domestick to debase and impoverish their Bishops Pastors and Ministers to force them to live on popular pittances and vile dependances to make them as mercenary and arbitrary hirelings to expose them to all those sordid flatteries which attend sharking necessities How must this abase that sacred Honor and Divine Authority which is and ought to be highly regarded and reverenced in true Bishops and Ministers Which of them thus haltred and tamely led by the vulgar shall dare to speak the word of God with all comely boldnesse and Christian freedome How can such poor and petty preachers have the confidence and courage without being ridiculous to reprove the faults of any men great or small Experience hath taught us how miserably even poor Ministers must crouch and comply for morsels of bread not onely to good Lords and Ladies but to very sorry Masters and Dames in Country as well as City who all affect this glory to be thought 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 patrones and benefactors to their preachers as to their servants not of right and duty but of almes and charity so supercilious are these gratitudes of almost all sorts of Christians when they count them not debts but gifts not a legall or a Religious Tribute to God and their Saviour but a contribution to their poor Minister the streame of whose tongue must set the mill of his teeth on work he shall feed little to his own pleasure in this if in the other he please not his gracious and inconstant contributors This station and posture of Ministers as to popular dependance and arbitrary Almes is the most intolerable turpitude and vilest dehonestation that can befall any ingenuous man in the world and most of all incongruous to those who pretend to any publick place of Government or imployment with conspicuity and under any notion of authority either Civil or Ecclesiastick Do but make for triall sake O my noble Countrymen your criminall Judges your civill Magistrates your country-Justices your Committee-men your Military officers your Bayliffs Majors and chief Burgers in the meanest Corporation make these of pittifull poor hungry thred-bare wretches let them be alwaies shifting and sharking digging or thatching spinning or weaving scraping and begging for their subsistence and living upon precarious salaries such as people list to give them for which they shall have no more legal right or claim than Mountebanks and Juglers have for those rewards from their gentle spectators and benevolous auditors would any thing I beseech you be more putid abject vile and despicable in the eyes of the people of England or any Countryâ—â—an such mushroome Magistrates such Go-by-ground Governours noâ—tanding they may possibly have the formalities of a Broad Seal a â—te Staffe a Paper or Parchment Commission will they not in time be as noysome to a Country and noxious to Justice as the dead frogs were in Egypt To avoid which deformed and ridiculous spectacles in Civill-Government doth not the wisdome of this as of every Nation either find those men invested with Honorable estates whom it chooseth to or placeth in Magistratick place and power or else if their merits be beyond their Estates are they not presently endowed with such salaries and pensions either out of the Princes Exchequer and publick Treasury or out of the emoluments and perquisites of their places as may bear out their Authority with some form of Majesty and respect At least they may redeem both their place and persons from that popular scorn scurrility and insolency which is never more malapert than when it finds want and poverty like vermine pinching the backs and oppressing the bellies of those men who undertake to rule or restraine to curb or controll common people Which is no very welcome office to the vulgar among whom true Religion finds so much to oppose so little to please or correspond as to the humors lusts fancies and passions of men that its Ministers must naturally and necessarily be subject and exposed to all manner of opposition despite and despiciency unlesse those so obvious and innate mischiefs be as in all piety and policy they ought to be avoided not onely by the conspicuity of Ministers approved learning good abilities prudent demeanour and due Authority conferred in their regular and uniform Ordination but further by that comely entertainment and competent maintenance of which common people have a more lively sense and reall tast as the dunghill-cock had of the barly-corn than of all their other internall jewels and ornaments intellectuall which will not signifie much as is evident in many hundred instances of worthy Ministers both Bishops and Presbyters in these times if people find them cloathed in thred-bare coates and almost starved by the straightnesse and tenuity of their worldly condition which aspect makes even parents themselves who are our naturall Princes and Gods very prone to be despised by their children Nor can it but ill become any ordinary Minister that is worthy of that name and office but worst of all will it suite with those who affect to be or indeed are or ought to be chief Governours and Bishops in the Church whose publick entertainment ought to be such as might extend beyond their private and domestick necessities to something of publick Hospitality Charity and Magnificence which were the proportions heretofore allowed by the noble and generous temper of the English Nation to its Clergy both Bishops and Presbyters the better to bear up their dignity and authority among the people The words of a poor man though wise are forgotten or unregarded as Solomon observes boldnesse and freedome of speech in poor men seems impudence an authoritative carriage in 〈…〉
among learned godly and wise men Nor doe I beleeve that in point of conscience they have hitherto found any great improvement of piety in themselves their families children and servants Yea I cannot but think they must be very sensible of those many breaches flawes and leakings which daily grow as upon their Country so upon their Parishes and Families by the extravagancies of their children strangenesse of their acquaintance and irreligiousnesse of their servants besides the factiousnesse of their neighbours and coldnesse of their very kindred who all affect according as they are cunning proud or simple the name of LIBERTY in Religion that is in some mens sense neither much to feare God nor to reverence Man However I wonder that any persons of great worth and prudence can with indifferency see the publique Nationall interests of Religion sinking which are the greatest jewels ornaments and honour of any Nation so as themselves may but have liberty to swim or paddle in what new pond puddle or plash of Religion they list to fancie 'T is strange to me that any persons of steady and sober brains should not easily foresee that these strange vertigo's these tempests and continuall tossings of Religion will in a short time if they have not already make the whole Nation quite giddie and as it were sea-sick even to a vomiting up of its Reformation But if there be indeed a Libertie indulged to every one for the picking and choosing what way of worship Religion Church and Ministery best likes them sure it will be the greatest honour and noblest freedome of all true English Christians to own and adhere to that solidly soberly Reformed Religion which was duly setled in this Church of England by better heads and I think as honest hearts as any either brochers or abetters of novelties can justly pretend to who as I conceive come vastly short in all their variations and new inventions of that Scripturall verity Catholick antiquity yea and of that Parlamentary authority and majesty which had once happily reformed and established Religion in this Church of England by the full counsell and free consent of all Estates Princes and People Clergy and Laity What is of late by Novellers pretended of an Apostolique rudenesse plainnesse illiteratenesse and simplicity which ought to be in Ministers of the Gospel is ridiculous unlesse these new Teachers could shew us their speciall gifts and extraordinary inspirations better than yet they have done which were indeed miraculously bestowed upon the Primitive Planters and Preachers but very superfluous in a Church so full and blest with the ordinary endowments of pious literature and all good learning both Humane and Divine as England was How childish an affectation were it in the Gentrie of England to forbeare to ride on good horses because Christ once rode upon an asse shewing that the greatest triumph of all Christians is humility lowlinesse and meeknesse How silly were it in them to expect that Asses should alwayes be able to instruct them because Balaams asse did once with great justice and a prodigious gravity rebuke his masters madnesse Much lesse should Gentlemen of worth and breeding be such silly sots and children as to fancie that every jingling hobby-horse will be sufficient to carry them to heaven No the ministery of your souls is a far greater work requiring greater ability and better authority to convince men of their sins to encounter their lusts to moderate their passions to purge out their corruptions to break and soften their hearts to terrifie and appease their consciences to prepare them for God to graft them by true faith into a crucified God and Saviour to wean them from the world to win them to goodnesse to pull them out of hell and the devils snares to bring them to heaven and into the arms of Christ All which are the great works of true able and authoritative Ministers requiring other-gates workmen than are now in many places much in fashion among common people though not so in favour with the wiser and better sort of Christians in England as to prefer these mens new and various fancies before the wise constitutions the ancient customes the Catholick and Religious Orders of the Church of England established by their pious and prosperous Progenitors All the world at home and abroad sees that after all the many changes and troublesome essayes of new-modelling the civill state of this Nation yet true reason of State and publique peace doe command yea inforce us to justifie the wisdome of our Fore-fathers by bringing back matters of Soveraigntie power and government to the former plat-form and polity as to reality onely changing a few formalities Truly this makes me not despaire but when all new fangles of Religion and popular models of Churches have been tryed in vain and are found as they will be both impertinent and incompetent for the happy state of Reformed Religion in this Church and Nation we may by Gods blessing return to those pristine and primitive forms of sound doctrine uniform order and government which were never taken up by any private inventions here or elsewhere but were of Catholick observation and so no doubt of Apostolique direction and divine institution Which if all men should silently forsake and in so doing reproch not onely the Church of England but the very first Catholique and Apostolique Churches yet let me cease to live when I cease to sympathize with them in their unjust reproches and with Her in her great distresses and 't is fit my tongue should cleave to my mouth when I forbear or am afraid to pray for the peace and happy restitution of our Jerusalem I who have seen Her in such order beauty peace plenty honour prosperity and piety I who have received in her bosome and tuition so many and great mercies not onely temporall but I hope spirituall and eternall I who desire my posterity kindred friends and countrey may never have other God or Saviour than what was owned and worshipped in the Church of England no other Scriptures and Gospel than what have here been excellently preached and comfortably believed no other Sacraments than such as were here duly administred and devoutly received no other Liturgie or prayers and holy offices than such as were here both publiquely proposed and privately used no better Bishops Presbyters pastors and guides of their souls both for learned abilities exemplary life than such as I have known frequent and flourishing in the Church of England I pray God they may but have as good for better Ministers and better means of salvation as they shall not need them so they cannot have them without miracles of which God is no prodigall I should greatly sin if I should not daily sigh and weep over the Church of England if I should not poure our my soule to the God and Father of Mercies for Her since she is now counted by many as Jeremie complains an out-cast and forsaken whom no
sound saving and practicall Understanding Whence then the present lapses depressions diminutions and feared desolations are come upon and befaln this Church of England which threaten you O worthy Gentlemen and your posterity no lesse than they afflict the despised divided and dejected Clergy is a disquisition most worthy of your serious inquiry that discerning the causes which cannot be good with the consequences which must needs be bad you may endeavour with all Christian prudence and good conscience to advance those counsels and remedies which become wise men good Christians and true-hearted English which Christian counsels and pious endeavours in order to the setling of Religion in this Nation his Highnesse professed in his Speech at the dissolving of the last Parlamentary convention to have expected from them Nothing becomes any men or Nation worse than to own no setled Religion as the publick rule measure and standard of peoples piety except onely this which is one of the basest pieces of policy that ever came out of the Devils skull to professe Religion yea the Christian and Reformed with such a loosenesse and latitude as may expose it with its prime Teachers and Professors to vulgar indifferencies and insolencies yea to be profaned blasphemed baffled beggered scorned contemned according to the dictates lusts disorders and levities of popular humours and the vilest of men The first is the temper of sots and beasts who own no God the second of Machiavillians and Hypocrites who fear no God It was a good rule of the Roman policy and Heathenish piety Either pretend not to the Gods or treat them as becometh Gods CHAP. VIII THe outside or visible effects of the Church of Englands troubles and distempers are as manifest as Miriams Uzziahs and Gehazies leprosies on their fore-heads both in respect of secular contestations and Ecclesiasticall contradictions in both which this Church and Nation have been at once so involved that our miseries are not onely the more complicated cumulated and encreased but they are the lesse curable because less compliable with any impartiall way of publique Christian counsels mens hearts being so many wayes extremely divided and differently biassed not onely upon civil but even Religious differences in which the meanest and shortest-spirited men do ever affect to appeare most cruelly zealous and most uncharitably pertinacious The Rivalry and competition for Soveraign power between Princes or Peers which in former ages for many years and in various vicissitudes of civil wars afflicted this English nation were yet so far tolerable as men still preserved the unity of their perswasions and affections touching Religion amidst those deadly feuds and different adherencies in respect of civil affairs with which they were distracted which politick contests were capable of an end either by the extinction of one party or the uniting of both as it came to passe in seventh's dayes who laid the foundation for uniting the Families of York and Lancaster also the Kingdomes of England and Scotland But alas our late distractions like fire from Hell have seized not onely our Barns and Stables our Dwellings and Mansions but our Temples and Churches our Hearts and Souls Religion The Christian Religion the Reformed Religion this staffe of nationall beauty and sociall bands is broken in sunder Religion both as Christian and Reformed this is torn and mangled this is deformed and unchristened Religion whose obligations are most strict and sacred whose breaches are most wide and incurable this is wounded this is ulcerated this is gangren'd Religion whose balsam is most soveraign to close and reconcile a sinner with an offended God which professeth to worship God and Man united in one blessed Redeemer and Mediator Jesus Christ this is faln out with it self and wofully divided Religion whose aim is to unite first God and man in one band of eternal love next all Christian professors in charitable compliance one with another as members of the same body and belonging to one head this this is the poniard this the sword this the spear by which we are in England armed and animated one against another Not onely our heads in policies and our hands in power but our hearts in piety are divided Most men in England fancy they cannot be truly godly or justly hope to be saved unlesse they damn and destroy each other not onely upon civil but religious accounts The silver cord of religious love is ravelled and broken the golden girdle and perfect rule of Evangelicall charity is not onely much worn and warped but quite pulled and snapp'd in sunderâ— we war and fight kill and slay we bite and devour we persecute and oppresse each other not onely upon humane secular and momentary but upon divine spiritual and eternall pretensions So that to find out either our distempers or our cures in England we must search deeper than the skin and superficies of things the poyson is profoundly imbibed the malignity deeply diffused rising in its source from and reaching in its effects to the very hearts of men the venome and spite is hidden in the most retired cels and inaccessible recesses of mens souls the malice and mischief are fled for their refuge or asylum to Gods Sanctuary to the very spirits and consciences of Christians which should be the receptacles of most sacred influences the very Holy of Holyes the Heaven of Heavens in the reasonable soul in which the Oracles of God the special presence and manifestations of his Spirit are most lively to be heard seen felt and enjoyed These are either grosly darkened and defiled or garnished with false lights or swept with the Devils brooâ— lies wrapped up in hypocrisie and strong delusions guilded over with godly pretensions Here I find the greatest enemies and destroyers of the Church of England are very far from confessing or repenting of any folly pride levity ignorance lukewarmnesse lazinesse deadnesse hypocrisie malice presumption rebellion covetousnesse ambition sacriledge profanenesse coldnesse Atheism Apostasie uncharitablenesse disorderly walking disobedience or unthankfulnesse to God or man all which possibly may be in their own hearts and hands and so must needs have as great an ingrediency in our publick calamities as any mens sins in the nation They rather imploy all their wits and skill their artifices and oratory to anatomize the Church of England to dissect every part of its constitution to observe not onely the practick pulse and outward breathings of its Ministers and Professors but the very inward fibres and temper of its heart as to all its holy mysteries religious ministrations and ecclesiastick constitutions Upon the pretended inspection of which as the vitals noble parts of Religion they daily proclaim to the credulous vulgar other amazed spectators as the astonished Augurs Soothsayers were wont of old that in these they discern all the portentous omens of our afflictions all the prodigious causes and effects of our publick troubles and miseries in these they
piety than in the barren heights of uselesse sublimities Then was it that the sweet and fruitfull dews of heaven crowned those true Ministers labours with all spiritual proficiencies and heavenly blessings then was the Church of England and thousands of pious souls in it like Gideons fleece full of holy distillations or like the garden of Eden liberally watered with the rivers of God I mean the faithful endeavours of able honest and Orthodox Ministers both Bishops and Presbyters duly ordained and divinely authorized for that service then was the time common people had less of curiosity and liberty but more of piety and charity they were more kept to their bounds and inclosures but enjoyed far better pastures than they now find in the ramblings and extravagances of those commons where they have chosen to enjoy their Pastors and Preachers after their own heart Nor is this insolency of people any wonder though it be a great grief to sober Christians when they consider how far this gangrene of abused liberty hath spread among men and women too the meanest and most mechanick He or She as Tertullian observes of some bolder Hereticks and Schismaticks in his dayes dare contrary to all Primitive pattern and Scriptural precept to preach to baptize to consecrate to censure to excommunicate scorning and opposing all things that are not branded with their schismaticall marks their novell badges and factious discriminations Wherewith so soon as any silly men or women come once to be dubbed and signalized their first vow and adventure is against the whole frame and constitution of the Church of England but specially against the orderly ancient and Catholick Ministry of it which is the rind or bark of Religion by which the sap life and nourishment of it is preserved and conveyed from the root Christ Jesus to the severall branches of his Church in every place This this must by all means be peeled round stripped off and cast away under pretence of Christian liberty and a better because freer course of deriving Chirstian Religion to peoples eares and hearts by another Ministry than that Ancient Apostolick Catholick and Primitive way of an orderly ordained Ministry which consisted of Bishops Presbyters Deacons be brought in Against the constitution succession of all these as corrupt adulterous Popish Babylonish spurious and superstitious in England whole troops of plebeian spirits have been and still are engaged whose fierce onsets and encounters were at first begun and are still carried on with as great resolution and errour as his that assaulted a Windmill instead of a Giant The great alarm given by their chief leaders is First to rail bitterly against the whole Clergie and all sacred orders used in the Church of England thence they proceed to wipe off their Baptisme as vain and invalid to vomit up their Lords Supper as nauseous and superstitious to read their Creeds backward to an unbelief of all things have been preached next they cancell the Decalogue as a Judaick phylactery a legall prescription lastly they learn to account and call the Lords Prayer a kind of spell and conjuration being perfect enemies to any thing that looks like a Liturgy or set form of prayer and devotion After this with stiff necks and haughty looks they scornfully defie all ancient ordination all Catholick succession all Apostolick commission derived to any Bishops and Presbyters as Ministers of Christ altering and annulling as much as in them lies all the order descent and power of the Evangelicall Ministry both in this and all other Christian Churches since the Apostles dayes the right of resumption and redemption of which they challenge to themselves according as their severall fancies list to make themselves or others Ministers or to have none at all which is the highest pitch of their Christian liberty counting all Ministers to be but their curbs and manacles Having thus commenced Masters of mis-rule their next work is to tuâ—n the garden of God any setled Church as this of Engl. was into ruinous heaps or a very dunghil to expel the Priests of the Lord out of his Temple to make Churches of Stables and Stables of Churches to bring in the lips of bleating calves there where the calves of learned devout and eloquent lips were wont to be offered It is not liberty enough for them to separate from the Church of England and apostatize from those Ministers that baptized them unless they utterly destroy them both setting up instead of one National and renowned one uniform and flourishing Church in which were truth and order unity and beauty strength and safety all Christian gifts and graces every good word and work to admiration innumerable little swarms in severall Conventicles with Ministers strangely multiform mutable and mis-shapen in which novell confederacies both Preachers and people rather catch and hang together by chance like burres in confused knots than grow like Olive-branches or the kernels of Pomgranates with order and comeliness from the same root Christ Jesus after the methods of those ancient Churches which were the prime and exemplary branches whereto after-successions should conform themselves As these factious people are so must their new Priests and Ministers be Grave and godly Bishops with their learned Presbyters must be set aside as broken vessels that they may set up by popular and plebeian suffrages some miserable mechanicks some antick engines some pittifull praters and parasites of the vulgar who have had no higher breeding or degree in Church or State than that of poore tradesmen for the better bred and more ingenuous sort of men abhor such impudence and usurpation their shop hath been their school their hammers or shuttles or needles have been their books At last coachmen footmen ostlers and grooms despair not to become Preachers by a rare and sudden metamorphosis coming from the office of rubbing horses heeles to take care of mens souls as some Farriers in time turn Physicians It matters not how sordid how silly how slovenly how mercenary how illiterate they are provided they have cunning enough to pretend a call impudence enough to display their ignorance and hypocrisie enough by much talk of Gods grace in them to supply the reall wants of all competent ability as well as authority to be Ministers of the Gospel Yet these these O my noble Countrey-men are in many places rude intruders insolent usurpers doughty undertakers to discharge the duty of Evangelicall Ministers in any one of these you must seek and may find as they pretend a Bishop a Presbyter and a Deacon all Evangelicall power Ecclesiasticall offices and Ministeriall authority these are the new-invented Machines or Engines which the Church of England and all others since the Apostles times were not so happy as to know or use which must set up the decayed Kingdome of Jesus Christ these must propagate the glorious Gospel these must exalt Christ crucified these must consecrate for you holy Elements these must administer to you the blessed Sacraments
which can by no persons of any right understanding be thought to be the temper of any thing that is worthy to bear the name inscription of the true God or the Christian and Reformed Religion This is not the pulse of piety nor can be the influence of Gods holy wise and peaceable spirit No Christian can be so uncatechised as not to know that these wounds and scarres which are upon the face of Religion and made by Christians of the same countrey and communion are not the marks of Christs sheep nor the characters of his Disciples who have been in all ages most eminent for all graces and vertues for all things true comely orderly just generous benigne charitable none exceeded or equalled them for mutuall love while they were neer or far off insomuch that primitive Assemblies of Bishops Presbyters and people were most lively resemblances of that Angelick Order Quire and Harmony which is in Heaven before the Throne of God and of the Lamb. This union and subordination kept up the reverence of Religion and the dignity of the Evangelicall Ministry among Christians even then when persecution most raged against them when the persons of holy Bishops and Presbyters were imprisoned banished mangled and massacred by Heathenish and Jewish persecutors yet then was the authority of Ministers looked upon as sacred and divine not from the earth but heaven not from Kings and Princes not from Parlaments and civil Senates not from Protectors and Major-Generals or new Triers much lesse from any principle or power which is now challenged by popular arrogancy and vulgar usurpation but from Christ Jesus and so from the blessed God who sent his Son and He his Apostles and other Ministers as his Father sent him for the same end and work in those measures and proportions of his Spirit which were necessary for the calling converting continuing and perfecting the Church as the Body of Christ While these continued in an holy and uninterrupted succession of undoubted Authority as Apostles Bishops Pastors and Teachers of one mind and mission of one ordination and succession they easily preserved the doctrine of Christian Religion uncorrupted the Mysteries unprophaned the Ministry unviolated the reverence of Religion unabased but these once divided against each other in opinions and factions their ranks and order broken their succession interrupted their commission counterfeited or varied their office invaded their authority doubted denied and destroyed who knowes not what spring-tides what whole seas of faction and fury of negligence and irreverence of Atheisme and irreligion must necessarily flow in upon the face of any Church when the truest and compleatest Ministers shall be questioned or scorned the dubious defective or false ones magnified by secular policy or popular levity when Lay-men shall either think there are no Ministers invested with any due authority or themselves as good as the best set up after some novell and arbitrary modes of their own invention which must not onely vye with the true ancient and Catholick ordination of 1500 years standing but justle it quite out of the Church like the bastard Abimelech who slew all the legitimate issue of Gideon his Father Who can heare with trembling or pray with devotion or receive with reverence or be reproved with patience or be comforted with peace or be terrified with judgement or mortified to any lust or moderated to any passion or confined to new obedience or won to true repentance or moved in conscience or raised in hope when he applies to any or all these duties out of faction novelty curiosity levity custome affectation or hypocrisie when he thinks the Minister that officiates hath no more power than himself or his groom and footman when he looks upon his Minister as a poor man confined to his teddar staked to his petty living dependant upon mens charity exposed to plebeian contempt at best but an almesman of the State a publick pensioner or an Evangelicall Trooper whose commission is ad placitum hominum after the will of man having no divine power or authority to his office and work no legall right or title as to certainty or perpetuity in any thing he enjoyes as his wages further than the arbitrary favours or frowns of men are dispensed to him a very trembling and precarious orator whose pulpit is like the Ara Lugdunensis soon made his scene his coffin and his sepulchre especially if either fervently praying or faithfully preaching or justly yet wisely reproving he displease any captious and peevish Auditor who hath confidence enough to make him an offender for a word and influence enough to sequester to silence yea to starve him and his family if he use an honest and innocent parrhesy or freedome of speaking such as becomes the Messenger of heaven the Minister of Christ and the Ambassadour of God When the mouths of Gods oxen are thus easily muzled when his Prophets are so cheaply despised when his neerest servants are thus despitefully used no wonder if irreverence Atheisme and profanenesse in all sorts of people attend all religious exercises as necessarily as shadows doe those grosse bodies which intervene between the sight and light which is the first sad and bad consequence following and flowing from the inconstancie and unsetlednesse of Religion CHAP. V. BEsides the decayes of Piety and Charity in mens hearts both as to the principles power and practice becoming Christians which like a Lethargick numbnesse and stupor is come upon the old stock of Christians in England together with that unsetlednesse irreverence contempt Atheisme and profanenesse which grows upon the younger sort of people who have been bred amidst these our divisions distractions and extravagancies of Religion to very much of irreligion the lusts and vanities of their minds being not any way so curbed and repressed by the incumbent majesty and authority of any such setled and uniform Religion as is necessary either to perswade men to be good or to over-awe and restrain them from being so bad as they would be Besides these mischiefes which I have already set forth to you my Honoured Countrymen there is a second sad and bad consequence which like a Gangrene or spreading Canker daily frets the spirits and as it were eats up the very substance and vitals of Religion in this Nation by reason of those endlesse and vexatious disputes which agitate the spirits and exasperate the minds of all sorts of Christians and of none so much as Ministers who are looked upon as those that expose and offer themselves to be the chief heads or Champions of Religion in their severall parties who are to undertake the combates and challenges of all opposers which truly were no very hard province if either Ministers were unanimous and mutually assisted by concurrent judgement among themselves or if they were protected by the shield of this Churches declared Doctrine and uniform profession of Religion Which heretofore was justly esteemed as sacred inviolable and invulnerable having
for the honour of Christ and the use of Christian people for the Service of God and the Glory of the Nation no they must be so pillaged and stripped that they are exposed to the injuries of Wind and Weather and at last left so bare and naked without covering as well as repaire that they must necessarily drop down with their own weight daily mouldring away and burying themselves in their own rubbish out of which some wretched Sacrilegists aim to extract and scrape some profit to their private purses by a most prodigious kind of prodigality and unthrifty thrift which reduceth the cost of many thousands of pounds and the publick Monuments of Piety and Honour to a pedling private gain or a three-half-penny account sacrificing so many sumptuous piles of many hundred yeares duration to the Purses Kitchins and Bellies of some pittifull and proling Reformers all which sacred and stately Structures were once consecrated to Gods Glory and dedicated to the publick celebration of holy Duties and Mysteries in the Name and for the Honour of our Saviour Jesus Christ Can you O my noble and honoured Countrey-men imagine that sober Ecclesiasticks or others among the Papists are so blind as not to see these sad Events and to foresee their own Calamities in other Countreys if they should give way to some mens rude reformings If a sober and setled Reformation such as was sometime so conspicuous and renowned in the Church of England if this did heretofore any way invite or incline many Romanists to embrace it as some did with the safety of their civill Profits and Honours as well as the Advantages of Gods Truth and Piety and if the unjesuited Papists could have found in their hearts as many did to apply to that Reformation of Religion which preserved together with the Sanctity Integrity and Majesty of true Religion the honest Interests of deserving Church-men as well as of other Christians from those popular Rapines and sacrilegious Exorbitances to which the Envy Basenesse Rusticity and Covetousnesse of vulgar Spirits are prone to be transported yet certainly now they cannot but with Shame Horrour and Disdain look upon speak or think of those boundlesse and bitter Reformations which some in later years have aimed at and endeavoured in England which will endure 1. First no Liturgy or Uniformity of Devotions in publick holy Celebrations by which to avoid those either Defects or Excesses those Partialities and Prejudices those Improprieties and Scandals which necessarily attend holy Duties and the minds of people while all Prayers and solemn Consecrations are left to the Varieties Sufficiencies or Deficiencies to the private and extemporary confidences of every Man and Minister that lists to officiate 2. Next it will endure no Ancient and Authentick Ordination of Ministers nor any degree of Eminency Order or Government among the Clergy but all must be left to a Presbyterian parity or higglede pigglede of Preachers yea and People too in which Young and Old Gray and Green Novices and Veterane Ministers must be levelled and jumbled together Notwithstanding God and Nature Age and Yeares Gifts and Graces Prudence and Gravity Piety and Policy have distinguished them and made them fit to be superiour and subordinate in Reason and Religion in Piety and Policy as Fathers and Sons yet these must all be blended and confounded in I know not what new consistory Chaos which at every meeting creates its raw Moderators and unexperienced Presidents turning by a continuall Circumgyration and multiplied Epicycles its Heads into Tayles and its Tayles into Heads its rulers into ruled and it s ruled into rulers 3. Last of all the new Modes of some mens Reformings will not endure that any Church-men as Ministers should have any thing certain or setled as their own whereon to feed unlesse it be their nailes and fingers ends no nor any constant either Mansions where they should dwell or Churches where they should meet with Christian Congregations to worship and serve the God of Heaven in that Order and Beauty of Holinesse which becomes his Name his People and Publick Service in times of Peace and Plenty CHAP. XXV IF such odious scandalous and sacrilegious Proportions of some mens Reformations were any way disputable or less discernable in every City Town and Corner almost of the Land to which as Cuckoes in April this evil Bird of Sacriledge is flown every where crying with its harsh and unwelcome note Give give yet there is one instance of its malignity and deformity so great so visible that as it cannot be hid so I cannot be silent of it even in that imperiall chamber that overgrown Metropolis of this Nation the Rich and Renowned the Opulent and Populous City of London where that vast and stately Temple which was once dedicated to the honour of the true God and the service of our blessed Saviour distinguished by the name of the great Apostle of the Gentiles S. PAUL whose Gospel sounded even to this Island this Church I say hath engraven upon its Ruines and written on its dust the dreadfull Characters of what thousands will interpret either a sacrilegious Covetousnesse or a great contempt of Religion or a Negligence and Indifferency as to any sense of publick Honor Nationall Renown there being not the like spectacle to be seen in all the Christian World All which both Forraigners and Domesticks present Age and Posterity will be prone to impute to the exceeding Disgrace and Reproch of that large luxuriant City which hath nothing in all that mighty forrest of buildings comparable to that magnificent pile on whose unrepaired and in a few years irreparable Ruines the irreligion of some mens Reformations besides the dishonour of that City that I say not of the whole Nation will be so written and recorded in the heaps of many generations that no time will wholly remove the one or obliterate the other Especially when it shall be remembred how vast a charge was not many years since laid out and how great a progresse was made by the Art Industry Piety Munificence Care Cost and Honour of that City and the whole Nation toward the reparation of that stupendious Masse three parts of four were so admirably restored even beyond their primitive beauty and strength that they needed not to fear the teeth of Time nor the corrosions of that fuliginous aire for many hundreds of years such Cost and Art conspired to its Restauration and Preservation that in all probability Pauls might have lasted a Monument of pristine Piety and modern Magnificence the Crown and Honour of that City as long as the world endured nor should have suffered any other fate than that which threatens in not many centuries of years to shake heaven and earth But now alas all this great Care and Cost is for the most part quite lost and run to wast for want of adding a little more to have gloriously completed what was generously begun What ingenuous soul not eaten up with
an envious Eye and a sacrilegious Spirit did not find vehement Regrets honest Pity and sharp Remorses in his heart when he saw that goodly Temple of God turned to a stable by a military either necessity or liberty when passing by he discerned all the scaffolds which supported those ponderous arches till the sides of the Building were confirmed pulled down not without the danger and dread of those which removed them to burn or sell them when after this he beheld the lead which covered it flayed off by piece-meal and turned to private advantages when last of all he was afraid to passe through the Isles or come near the Arches of that great structure for fear it should fall upon him and oppresse him with those horrid heaps which every moment threatned to fall their cement being dissolved by rain and weather To this Tragick posture is that stately structure reduced which was the noblest ornament of that great and renowned City as it were the centre of its stability magnificence and honour yea it was justly reckoned among the chiefest visible instances of the Christian glory and renown of this Nation while both Natives and Strangers beheld it not without a sacred horrour and unwonted admiration I pray God the Ruine of that Church be not a presage of other Ruines which will be more unwelcome to many of that City when their seiled Houses shall become ruinous heaps I know there are of later years so many pedlars and enterlopers in Religion that they are in danger to spoile the grand trade of true Reformation which ought to be carried on by a publick joynt stock of Christian Counsel and Charity for their gainfull godlinesse aims not onely to make all Ministers of the Church so mean and miserable that they shall have just cause to envy the poorest pesants and the meanest mechanicks but they further design to reduce all our material Churches or Houses of God in the Land to such sordid deformities that these shall have cause to envy not onely the spruce and costly Houses of these thrifty Reformers but their very Barns and Stables which they will have more substantiall and in better repair yea more decent and cleanly than our Churches into which Christians as Gods Harvest are frequently gathered together to serve and worship their Saviour to praise adore and admire the God of Heaven While there is no end of the Cost and Curiosity the Beauty and Richness of their private Dwellings yet are these Church-worms these moths of Reformation ever murmurnig repining at what charge is bestowed even by other men either long since or late upō our Churches and with a most supercilious demurenesse and affected zelotry the better to colour over or conceal their sacrilegious spirits they are heard very oft to cry out To what purpose is this wast this excessive yea superstitious cost What need is there of such goodly stones such stately pillars such massive timber such costly coverings with lead when we may serve God at a cheaper rate full as well nay farre better in a Barn or Stable in a common Hall or Parlour Alas God dwels not in Temples made with hands nor is he pleased with such prodigall expences in order to his worship how much more acceptable were it to him if this money were bestowed on the Poor those living Temples of Gods Spirit These are the penurious Principles which some whining Reformers use to save their purses yea and to fill them as occasion serves with the spoiles both of Churches and Church-men too which some men I believe have already done without giving that ever I heard any portion as Almes to the Poore and for hire some poor labouring men have been so conscientious Christians that they would not be employed or hired by them on any terms to pull down Churches lest they should do the work and receive the wages of iniquity I cannot but answer these men according to their folly and presumption the rather because they pretend Religion and Reformation of all things to a spirituall way of worshipping and serving God which they understand may reach their Hands Eyes Tongues Heads and Hearts but not their Purses That is their Noli me tangere the peculiar and reserve exempted from Gods claim and title not contained in any Commission of Religion yea precisely excluded out of the new Copies and Schemes of Reformation drawn different from all ancient Originalls of Judaick or Christian Devotion by men that are very wise in their owne eyes and very wary to save their purses I pray God they be as carefull to save their souls That these new Masters may not too much triumph in their own fancies they may please to understand that we other Christians who love to serve God in the beauty of holinesse and handsomnesse who are ambitious to honour God and his worship with our substance we are not so uncatechised as not to know almost as well as these supercilious and parsimonious censors that the Divine Immensity is so farre from dwelling in a comprehensive or inclosed manner in Houses made with hands that the Heaven of Heavens cannot containe him he onely is his own Heaven a Center and Circumference fixed in and full of himself alone comprehensive of his own incomprehensible excellencies yet under favour of these Seraphick Teachers the high and holy one that inhabits eternity delights to dwell among the Sons of men not onely in humble Spirits contrite Hearts and believing Souls by the speciall and invisible residence of his Grace and Spirit but also in such visible manifestations as are specially circumscribed by times and places where it may not unproperly be said the Lords name is placed while there it is solemnly called upon blessed and praised by the Congregation of the Lords people who meet together to worship the Lord in such places as not onely fit their own conveniencies best but carry some proportion to their affections Honour Reverence Devotion and Relation toward their great God and glorified Saviour even before the sons of men who by the light of Nature require and expect that the Divine Majesty should be worshipped not in places of profane and common use but such as are specially separated from them and dedicated or consecrated to holy Services agreeable to that relation they bear to the most holy God as houses of Prayer and so houses of God such as the blessed Apostles and the Lord Jesus himself disdained not to frequent among the Jews as the place of publick worship consecrated to God 'T is true our God needs not such Houses as to his Omnipresence but he requires them so far as they are evidences of our respects to him Nor are Churches onely intended for the conveniences of Christians to meet together that they may sit warm and dry but they serve further to expresse when God gives us Peace and Plenty that high esteem and honour we bear to our God also the love we
Priests and Preachers If others like no locall Churches as Superstitious Popish Jewish Heathenish who had all such like grosse and materiall Temples which are needlesse to those that are themselves living Temples of the holy Spirit and need not that any men should teach them in Piles of Wood and Stone or out of Desks and Pulpits down down even to the ground with these Steeple-Houses these Hornets and Wasps nests the rubbish if it will not sell will at least mend the high-waies to Markets and spare the Town or Country Charges of digging gravel the Bels Stones and Timber will turne to good money the Common-wealth may need them they will save taxes a while Thus will some men boldly dare if they might have their will to take away both the Foal and the Asse with Dominus opus habet or rather Dominus opus non habet the Lord of Heaven needs not these things so much as some that long to be our Lords on Earth Last of all that I may search this Fistula to the bottome if any that are young and lusty full-fed and frolick shall dislike to have any lazy poor people to be maintained as Moths and Leeches Teeks or Vermine gratis upon the publick Almes and Charitable Foundations presently as if they quite forgat that themselves might be so Aged Poor and Feeble that they might be glad of such constant relief or as if they did not remember how many of their Fathers and Mothers their Grandsires and Grandames have lived and dyed either in some such Almes-House and Hospitall or have been kept at the Town Charges away with all the Lands and Houses of Almes-Houses and Hospitalls those drones nests where they neither have dayly service of God nor frequent Prayers Sermons and Sacraments as Cathedral Churches had which either are most-what demolished or in a faire way to drop down and be destroyed Whither I beseech you will not this Gangrene of covetous and sacrilegious Humor spread Who will give any thing living or dying to any good work of durable Piety or Charity when he shall see nothing is like to be secure Were it not high time to examine what the Sin of Sacriledge is whether there be any such Sin since so many holy and learned men affirm it in word and yet so many others of godly pretentions in deed own no such thing If it be found to be a Sin it must needs be a dreadful Monster like Python or Hydra with a very great paunch and many wide mouths a Gigantick Sin that fights against God defies Heaven devours things sacred dares to rob the Poors bellies and starve their souls It is not to be checked or stopped but by some publick Censure Decree and Detestation declaring it to be a Sin injurious to God reprochful to any Religion as Heathenish Jewish Christian and Reformed dishonourable to any Nation desolating to the Church destructive to Ministers and people to Piety Charity Learning and Industry No Bank or Rampart is sufficient to keep out this black and dead sea when once it hath undermined the common principles of Gratitude Reverence and Worship toward God of Justice and Righteousnesse toward Men which it is very like to do when I find D. B. a man of my own Coat and Calling a profâ—ssed Presbyter or Minister heretofore according to the Ordination of the Church of England who hath the character of holy Oders by Bishops hands still upon him unrenounced when I say such men come to be proctors and promoters patrones pleaders and solicitors in any case for alienating of those Church-lands which belonged to the Bishops Deans and Chapters the issue indeed of difficult distressed and turbulent times which it may be Necessity rather than choise drove some men to yet this in cool blood must be applauded by a grave O that so he a late purchaser may have part of that blâ—ssed Corban which he knows did sometime belong to his Mother this Church and to his Fathers the Bishops of it whose right to keep what they had by Law was I suppose once undoubtedly as good as any that thisor any man can plead for what it seems he never yet had possession of Sure it was as just for those to have kept their Estates as it can be for him to get part of it he cannot strengthen his own private and purchased Title but he must justifie their 's more who had received and enjoyed them as publick Ministers Governours and officers of the Church upon a publick both civil and sacred Title First from the pious Donors who doubtless had as St. Peter tells Ananias a power to give what was their own as they did to God and his Church by valid Acts in Law and such deeds as exprest their last Will and Testament which St. Paul tells us no man ought to disannull Secondly especially considering in the next place that what was so given was no way to the prejudice of the publick Thirdly yea by publick Permission Approbation Confirmation and Acceptance Fourthly wherein the whole Nation Church and State hath a publick right and common interest as things given for the good Order and Honor of the Nation as it is Christian Fifthly and lastly adde to the personal right of the Donors and Possessors also to the publick right of the whole Nation that highest right paramount which all learned and impartial men have ever judged to be in God either in such things as he is pleased precisely to demand of us as he did the First-born the First-fruits many Sacrifices and Oblations besides the Tithes of all and some Cities with their Suburbs for his Ministers of old or in those things which he hath left in our free Will and Gratitude to Vow Offer Give Dedicate to his Service or to his Son Jesus Christ as the wise men at first did their Myrrh Gold and Frankincense which certainly no men would have taken from that holy Babe who would not with Herod have taken away his life By which holy Liberalities we Christians may honor our God and Saviour with our substance and not serve them only with that which costs us nothing nor is God in these to be mocked if once we have vowed and devoted them to him as we ought to pay our Vowes so we ought not to break and frustrate either our own or others Dedications to God who is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Asylum of all not to be violated in the least kind Who ever doubted but that God accepted and owned as his peculiar those things which any men consecrated as means fitting to advance the good ends of his Glory and publick Service in the right Teaching Ordering and Governing of his Church in instituting and supporting his Ministry and in relieving his Poor All which being so very necessary for the Church and so agreeable to the Word of God they must needs be strangely avaritious who think it superstitious for any man to give of his Lands or other Estate to
resumption be taken from him not as forfeited or evicted by Law but ex mero placito out of Will and pleasure to relieve some publick necessities or to advance some godly design Would not he lift up his voice like a Trumpet beyond any Stentor against Parlaments House or Houses and Committees seem they never so zealous and reforming as very unjust unreasonable and injurious to him his Family children no less than now he inveighs against the Town or City whether Town or City it is dubious now they have no Bishop whose seat of old made a City however an ancient Corporation for not letting him have quiet possession of his precious Purchase In which it seems they are not satisfied of his right no more than I or any man can believe that he hath better cards now to shew for this Estate than the Bishops had in Law Conscience and Merit when they were deprived of them yet they are and have been long silent they make no publick complaints or proclamations which are a kind of alarme to parties to divide mens judgements and to provoke to war all suits of Law being but civiller warrings and must at last be executed by the posse comitatus by open force if the sentence given be obstructed Which publick Motion and Commotion against a whole city or Town is more than ever the Bishops jointly or severally did as to begin that which he calls by a vulgar mistake and calumny Bellum Episcopale which if it were onely se defendendo in order to defend themselves not from any judicature or just punishment for their faults but onely to preserve what they had honestly gotten and lawfully enjoyed for some years and never forfeited any more than their pious Predecessors who many hundred of years had them in quiet possession possibly it might have seemed to some men as lawful a War in Bishops under lawful authority as any Presbyterian War could be to dispossess them of their legal rights as unforfeited enjoyments of which this plaintiff having purchased a good buccoon and craving for more we see makes so loud and great a noise as if the Earth must be moved out of its place and Jupiter might not take his rest in Heaven till this complainant have right done him according to his mind who seeks to retain even whole Parlaments three Nations and all Mankind to be his Counsel of his Advocates yet would he be most impatient not presently to stop the mouth of any Bishop Dean or Prebend if as St. Paul they should begin to plead yea but to peep or mutter their losses and indignities which they must not call injuries but publick justice done upon them before they had sinned as Sacrifices propitiatory to appease some angry Presbyterian brethren and to make way for this Purchaser 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Quis coelum terrae non misceat mare coelo Clamet Melicerta perisse Frontem de rebus No Satyrick cento's are sufficient to perstringe so great partialities I see some men are so black that they cannot blush Are not those Ministers justly ensnared in the briars and thorns of secular Conflicts and Law-suits who dare to entangle themselves yea and to justifie that as done to others every way their betters which they cannot endure should be done in the least measure to themselves May I not call God and Man to be Judges and Heaven and Earth to be Witnesses in the case Hath D. B. a better title to a part than L. B. had to the whole Is mony and purchase a better title and surer tenure than merit and publick gift as a reward of Learning and Worth Had L. B. possession by fraud or force any more than D. B or had L. B. any more forfeited his Estate then D. B. hath unless long and undoubted succession and present lawful possession were crimes deserving Confiscation Were not those Laws which were heretofore made and for many Centuries confirmed in the most serene and peaceable times by unanimous Princes Peers and people nemine absente aut contradicente as just valid and complete in point of right as any new Acts or Ordinances could be which were made as all the world knows in broken and bleeding times and to which the supreme Magistrate as the Plaintiffe very well knows never gave his consent first or last because in conscience as he told them he could not fearing it seems the sin of Sacriledge yea and of Perjury having sworn at his Coronation to preserve the Rights and Liberties of the Church and his Clergy as much as any mens What pitty it was this Casuist had not in time been the last poor Kings Confessor How blest large and benign a soul hath this pleader that can presently resolve all conscience into power and right into might whose rule seems to be not the Word of God or the Laws of men but the Will of those that have the strongest sword upon which presumption no doubt he went when he so eloquently and effectually declaimed against Deans and Chapters I know his grand Asylum is the Plenipotency if not Omnipotency as he supposeth of the two Houses of Parlament guided by the honesty and integrity of their intentions I will with him presume that they did intend all things for the best that finding the North wind had raised a great storm they thought it necessary to lighten the Ship of what they thought might best be spared in order to the publick peace and that which they counted the Supreme Law Salus publica And being all Lay-men much acted at that time by Presbyterian Influences and Interest who promised to steer the Ship much better and with more right from God than any Prelates had done they cast Bishops Deans Prebends and Chapters c. with their Houses Lands and Revenues over-board in the present distress and tempest not for that they disliked them so much as because they could not safely keep them and carry on their other interests of publick safety These and the like reasons of State may possibly be alledged in behalf of those Lay-men who had then work enough upon their hands and who were to get wages to pay their Workmen with the least grievance to the publick But this plaintiffe as a Learned Doctor Grave Divine must passe a stricter scrutiny finer sieve There is usully made a great difference between such as take interest and those that are necessitated to give it so there may be between these sellers and this purchaser who makes himself so peremptory a Casuist in so great and disputed a Case concerning the Rights of God his Church and his Ministers towards whom all men should have alwayes a most tender regard and Clergy-men chiefly so as to do Gods Prophets and their Brethren or Fathers no harme since their injuries do more immediately redound to the reproch of their profession their Saviour and their God As in all cases of common justice so specially in the Rights of Church-men who are