the rightfull K. of France and gives the Kingdome to Pepin for no other cause but that hee seem'd to him the more active man If he were a freind herein to Monarchy I know not but to the Monarch I need not aske what he was Having thus made Pepin his fast freind he cals him into Italy against Aistulphus the Lombard that warâ—…'d upon him for his late Usurpation of Rome as belonging to Ravenna which he had newly won Pepin not unobedient to the Popes call passing into Italy frees him out of danger and wins for him the whole exarchat of Ravenna which though it had beene almost immediately before the hereditary possession of that Monarchy which was his cheife Patron and Benefactor yet he takes and keepes it to himselfe as lawfull prize and given to St. Peter What a dangerous fallacie is this when a spirituall man may snatch to himselfe any temporall Dignity or Dominion under pretence of receiving it for the Churches use thus he claimes Naples Sicily England and what not To bee short under shew of his zeale against the errors of the Greeke Church hee never ceast baiting and goring the Successors of his best Lord Constantine what by his barking curses and Excommunications what by his hindering the Westerne Princes from ayding them against the Sarazens and Turkes unlesse when they humour'd him so that it may be truly affirm'd he was the subversion and fall of that Monarchy which was the hoisting of him this besides Petrarch whom I have cited our Chaucer also hath observ'd and gives from hence a caution to England to beware of her Bishops in time for that their ends and aymes are no more freindly to Monarchy then the Popes Thus hee brings in the Plow-man speaking 2. Part. Stanz. 28. The Emperour Yafe the Pope sometime So high Lordship him abovt That at last the silly Kime The proud Pope put him out So of this Realme is no doubt But Lords beware and them dâ—…fend For now these folks be wonders â—…out The King and Lords now this amend And in the next Stanza which begins the third part of the tale he argues that they ought not to bee Lords Moses Law forbode it tho That Preists should no Lordships welde Christs Gospell biddeth also That they should no Lordships held Ne Christs Apostles were never so bold No such Lordships to hem embrace But smeren her Sheep and keep her Fold And so forward Whether the Bishops of England have deserv'd thus to bee fear'd by men so wise as our Chaucer is esteem'd and how agreeable to our Monarchy and Monarchs their demeanour ha's been he that is but meanly read in our Chronicles needs not be instructed Have they not been as the Canaanites and Philistims to this Kingdom what Treasons what revolts to the Pope what Rebellions and those the basest and most preten selesse have they not been chiefe in What could Monarchy think when Becket durst challenge the custody of Rotchester-Castle and the Tower of London as appertaining to his Signory To omit his other insolencies and affronts to Regall Majestie till the Lashes inflicted on the aâ—…ointed body of the King washt off the holy Vnction with his blood drawn by the polluted hands of Bishops Abbots and Monks What good upholders of Royalty were the Bishops when by their rebellious opposition against King John Normandy was lost he himselfe depos'd and this Kingdom made over to the Pope When the Bishop of Winchester durst tell the Nobles the Pillars of the Realme that there were no Peeres in England as in France but that the King might doe what hee pleas'd What could Tyranny say more it would bee petty now if I should insist upon the rendring up of Tournay by Woolseyes Treason the Excommunications Cursings and Interdicts upon the whole Land For haply I shall be cut off short by a reply that these were the faults of the men and their Popish errors not of Episcopacie that hath now renounc't the Pope and is a Protestant Yes sure as wise and famous men have suspected and fear'd the Protestant Episcopacie in England as those that have fear'd the Papall You know Sir what was the judgement of Padre Paolo the great Venetian Antagonist of the Pope for it is extant in the hands of many men whereby he declares his feare that when the Hierarchy of England shall light into the hands of busie and audacious men or shall meet with Princes tractable to the Prelacy then much mischiefe is like to ensue And can it bee neerer hand then when Bishops shall openly affirme that No Bishop no King a trimme Paradox and that yee may know where they have beene a begging for it I will fetch you the Twin-brother to it out of the Jesuites Cell they feeling the Axe of Gods reformation hewing at the old and hollow trunk of Papacie and finding the Spaniard their surest friend and safest refuge to sooth him up in his dreame of a fift Monarchy and withall to uphold the decrepit Papalty have invented this super-politick Aphorisme as one termes it One Pope and one King Surely there is not any Prince in Christendome who hearing this rare Sophistry can choose but smile and if we be not blind at home we may as well perceive that this worthy Motto No Bishop no King is of the same batch and infanted out of the same feares a meere ague-cake coagulated of a certaine Fever they have presaging their time to be but short and now like those that are sinking they catch round at that which is likeliest to hold them up And would perswade Regall Power that if they dive he must after But what greater debasement can there be to Royall Dignity whose towring and stedfast heighth rests upon the unmovable foundations of Justice and Heroick vertue then to chaine it in a dependance of subsisting or ruining to the painted Battlements and gaudy rottennesse of Prelatrie which want but one puffe of the Kings to blow them down like a past bord House built of Court-Cards Sir the little adoe which me thinks I find in untacking these pleasant Sophismes puts mee into the mood to tell you a tale ere I proceed further and Menenius Agrippa speed us Upon a time the Body summon'd all the Members to meet in the Guild for the common good as Aesops Chronicles averre many stranger Accidents the head by right takes the first seat and next to it a huge and monstrous Wen little lesse then the Head it selfe growing to it by a narrower excrescency The members amaz'd began to aske one another what hee was that took place next their chief none could resolve Whereat the Wen though unweildy with much adoe gets up and bespeaks the Assembly to this purpose That as in place he was second to the head so by due of merit that he was to it an ornament and strength and of speciall neere relation and that if the head should faile none were fitter then himselfe to step into his place therefore hee thought
Jeroboams policy he made Religion conform to his politick interests this was the sin that watcht over theIsraelites till their final captivity If this State principle come from the Prelates as they affect to be counted statists let them look back to Elutherius Bishop of Rome and see what he thought of the policy of England being requir'd by Lucius the first Christian King of this Iland to give his counsel for the founding of Religious Laws little thought he of this sage caution but bids him betake himselfe to the old and new Testament and receive direction from them how to administer both Church and Common-wealth that he was Gods Vicar and therfore to rule by Gods Laws that the Edicts of Caesar we may at all times disallow but the Statutes of God for no reason we may reject Now certaine if Church-goverment be taught in the Gofpel as the Bishops dare not deny we may well conclude of what late standing this Position is newly calculated for the altitude of Bishop elevation and lettice for their lips But by what example can they shew that the form of Church Discipline must be minted and modell'd out to secular pretences The ancient Republick of the Jews is evident to have run through all the changes of civil estate if we survey the Story from the giving of the Law to the Herods yet did one manner of Priestly government serve without inconvenience to all these temporal mutations it serv'd the mild Aristocracy of elective Dukes and heads of Tribes joyn'd with them the dictatorship of the Judges the easie or hard-handed Monarchy's the domestick or forrain tyrannies Lastly the Roman Senat from without the Jewish Senat at home with the Galilean Teâ—…rarch yet the Levites had some right to deal in civil affairs but seeing the Euangelical precept forbids Church-men to intermeddle with worldly imployments what interweavings or interworkings can knit the Minister and the Magistrate in their several functions to the regard of any precise correspondency Seeing that the Churchmans office is only to teach men the Christian Faith to exhort all to incourage the good to admonish the bad privately the lesse offender publickly the scandalous and stubborn to censure and separate from the communion of Christs flock the contagious and incorrigible to receive with joy and fatherly compassion the penitent all this must be don and more then this is beyond any Church autority What is all this either here or there to the temporal regiment of Wealpublick whether it be Popular Princely or Monarchical Where doth it intrench upon the temporal governor where does it come in his walk where does it make inrode upon his jurisdiction Indeed if the Ministers part be rightly discharg'd it renders him the people more conscionable quiet and easie to be govâ—…'d if otherwise his life and doctrine will declare him If therfore the Constitution of the Church be already set down by divine prescript as all sides confesse then can she not be a handmaid to wait on civil commodities and respects and if the nature and limits of Church Discipline be such as are either helpfull to all political estates indifferently or have no particular relation to any then is there no necessity nor indeed possibility of linking the one with the other in a speciall conformation Now for their second 〈◊〉 That no form of Church government is agreeable to Monarchy but that of Bishops although it fall to pieces of it selfe by that which hath 〈◊〉 sayd yet to give them play front and 〈◊〉 it shall be my task to prove that Episcopacy with that Autority which it challenges in England is not only not agreeable but tending to the destruction of Monarchy While the Primitive Pastors of the Church of God labour'd faithfully in their Ministery tending only their Sheep and not seeking but avoiding all worldly matters as clogs and indeed derogations and debasements to their high calling little needed the Princes and potentates of the earth which way soever the Gospel was spread to study ways how to make a coherence between the Churches politic and theirs therfore when Pilate heard once our Saviour Christ professing that his Kingdome was not of this world he thought the man could not stand much in Caesars light nor much indammage the Roman Empire for if the life of Christ be hid to this world much more is his Scepter unoperative but in spirituall things And thus liv'd for 2 or 3 ages the Successors of the Apostles But when through Constantines lavish Superstition they forsook their first love and set themselvs up two Gods instead Mammon and their Belly then taking advantage of the spiritual power which they had on mens consciences they began to cast a longing eye to get the body also and bodily things into their command upon which their carnal desires the Spirit dayly quenching and dying in them they knew no way to keep themselves up from falling to nothing but by bolstering and supporting their inward rottenes by a carnal and outward strength For a while they rather privily sought opportunity then hastily disclos'd their project but when Constantine was dead and 3 or 4 Emperors more their drift became notorious and offensive to the whole world for while Theodosius the younger reign'd thus writes Socrates the Historian in his 7th Book 11. chap. now began an ill name to stick upon the Bishops of Rome and Alexandria who beyond their Priestly bounds now long agoe had stept into principality and this was scarse 80. years since their raising from the meanest worldly condition Of courtesie now let any man tell me if they draw to themselves a temporall strength and power out of Caesars Dominion is not Caesars Empire thereby diminisht but this was a stolne bit hitherto hee was but a Caterpiller secretly gnawing at Monarchy the next time you shall see him a Woolfe a Lyon lifting his paw against his raiser as Petrarch exprest it and finally an open enemy and subverter of the Greeke Empire Philippicus and Leo with divers other Emperours after them not without the advice of their Patriarchs and at length of a whole Easterne Counsell of 3. hundred thirty eight Bishops threw the Images out of Churches as being decreed idolatrous Upon this goodly occasion the Bishop of Rome not only seizes the City and all the Territory about into his owne hands and makes himselfe Lord thereof which till then was govern'd by a Greeke Magistrate but absolves all Italy of their Tribute and obedience due to the Emperour because hee obey'd Gods Commandement in abolishing Idolatry Mark Sir here how the Pope came by S. Peters Patrymony as he feigns it not the donation of Constantine but idolatry and rebellion got it him Yee need but read Sigonius one of his owne Sect to know the Story at large And now to shroud himselfe against a storme from the Greek Continent and provide a Champion to beare him out in these practises hee takes upon him by Papall sentence to unthrone Chilpericus
their deceitfull Pedleries to gaine as many associats of guiltines as they can and to infect the temporall Magistrate with the like lawlesse though not sacrilegious extortion see a while what they doe they ingage themselves to preach and perswade an assertion for truth the most false and to this Monarchy the most pernicious and destructive that could bee chosen What more banefull to Monarchy then a Popular Commotion for the dissolution of Monarchy slides aptest into a Democracy and what stirs the Englishmen as our wisest writers have observ'd sooner to rebellion then violent and heavy hands upon their goods and purses Yet these devout Prelates spight of our great Charter and the soules of our Progenitors that wrested their liberties out of the Norman gripe with their dearest blood and highest prowesse for these many years have not ceas't in their Pulpits wrinching and spraining the text to set at nought and trample under foot all the most sacred and life blood Lawes Statutes and Acts of Parliament that are the holy Cov'nant of Union and Marriage betweene the King and his Realme by proscribing and confiscating from us all the right we have to our owne bodies goods and liberties What is this but to blow a trumpet and proclaime a fire-crosse to a hereditary and perpetuall civill warre Thus much against the Subjects Liberty hath been assaulted by them Now how they have spar'd Supremacie or likely are here-after to submit to it remaines lastly to bee consider'd The emulation that under the old Law was in the King toward the Preist is now so come about in the Gospell that all the danger is to be fear'd from the Preist to the King Whilst the Preists Office in the Law was set out with an exteriour lustre of Pomp and glory Kings were ambitious to be Preists now Priests not perceiving the heavenly brightnesse and inward splendor of their more glorious Evangelick Ministery with as great ambition affect to be Kings as in all their courses is easie to be observ'd Their eyes over imminent upon worldly matters their desires ever thirsting after worldly employments in stead of diligent and fervent studie in the Bible they covet to be expert in Canons and Decretals which may inable them to judge and interpose in temporall Causes however pretended 〈◊〉 Doe they not hord up Plefe seeke to bee porent in secular Strength in State Affaires in Lands Lordships and Demeanes to sway and carry all before them in high Courts and Privie Counsels to bring into their grasp the high and principall Offices of the Kingdom have they not been bold of late to check the Common Law to slight and brave the indiminishable Majestie of our highest Court the Law-giving and Sacred Parliament Doe they not plainly labour to exempt Church-men from the Magistrate Yea so presumptuously as to question and menace Officers that represent the Kings Person for using their Authority against drunken Preists The cause of protecting murderous Clergie-men was the first heart-burning that swel'd up the audacious Becket to the pestilent and odious vexation of Henry the second Nay more have not some of their devoted Schollers begun I need not say to nibble but openly to argue against the Kings Supremacie is not the Châ—…ife of them accus'd out of his owne Booke and his late Canons to affect a certaine unquestionable Patriarchat independent and unsubordinate to the Crowne From whence having first brought us to a servile Estate of Religion and Manhood and having predispos'd his conditions with the Pope that layes claime to this Land or some Pepin of his owne creating it were all as likely for him to aspire to the Monarchy among us as that the Pope could finde meanes so on the sudden both to bereave the Emperour of the Roman Territory with the favour of Italy and by an unexpected friend out of France while he was in danger to lose his new-got Purchase beyond hope to leap in to the faire Exarchat of Ravenna A good while the Pope suttl'y acted the Lamb writing to the Emperour my Lord Tiberius my Lord Mauritius but no sooner did this his Lord pluck at the Images and Idols but hee threw off his Sheepes clothing and started up a Wolfe laying his pawes upon the Emperours right as forfeited to Peter Why may not wee as well having been forewarn'd at home by our renowned Chaucer and from abroad by the great and learned Padre Paolo from the like beginnings as we see they are feare the like events Certainly a wise and provident King ought to suspect a Hierarchy in his Realme being ever attended as it is with two such greedy Purveyers Ambition and 〈◊〉 I say hee ought to suspect a Hierarchy to bee as dangerous and derogatory from his Crown as a Tetrarchy oâ—… a Hepiarchy Yet now that the Prelates had almost attain'd to what their insolent and unbridl'd minds had hurried them to thrust the Laiâ—…â—…der the despoticall rule of the Monarch that they themselves might confine the Monarch to a kind of Pupillagâ—… under their Hierarchy observe but how their own â—…inciples combat one another and supplant each one his fellow Having fitted us only for peace and that a servile peace by lessening our numbers dreining our estates enfeebling our bodies cowing our free spirits by those wayes as you have heard their impotent actions cannot sustaine themselves the least moment unlesse they rouze us up to a Warre fit for Cain to be the Leader of an abhorred a cursed a Fraternall Warre ENGLAND and SCOTLAND dearest Brothers both in Natnre and in CHRIST must be set to wade in one anothers blood and IRELAND our free Denizon upon the back of us both as occasion should serve a piece of Service that the Pope and all his Factors have beene compassing to doe ever since the Reformation But ever-blessed be he and ever glorifi'd that from his high watch-Tower in the Heav'ns discerning the crooked wayes of perverse and cruell men hath hitherto maim'd and insatuated all their damnable inventions and deluded their great Wizzards with a delusion fit for fooles and children had GOD beene so minded hee could have sent a Spirit of Mutiny amongst us as hee did betweene Abimilech and the Sechemites to have made our Funerals and slaine heaps more in number then the miserable surviving remnant but he when wee least deserv'd sent out a gentle gale and message of peace from the wings of those his Cherubins that fanne his Mercy-seat Nor shall the wisdome the moderation the Christian Pietie the Constancy of our Nobility and Commons of England be ever forgotten whose calme and temperat connivence could sit still and smile out the stormy bluster of men more audacious and precipitant then of solid and deep reach till their own fury had run it selfe out of breath assailing by rash and heady approches the impregnable situation of our Liberty and safety that laught such weake enginry to scorne such poore drifts to make a NationallWarre of a Surplice Brabble a Tippet-scuffle and
themselves sole Lords without the improper mixture of Scholastick and pusillanimous upstarts the Parliament shall void her Vpper House of the same annoyances the Common and Civill Lawes shall be both set free the former from the controule the other from the meere vassalage and Copy hold of the Clergie And wheras temporall Lawes rather punish men when they have transgress't then form them to be such as should transgresse seldomest wee may conceive great hopes through the showres of Divine Benediction watering the unmolested and watchfull paines of the Ministery that the whole Inheritance of God will grow up so straight and blamelesse that the Civill Magistrate may with farre lesse toyle and difficulty and far more ease and delight steare the tall and goodly Vessell of the Common-wealth through all the gusts and tides of the Worlds mutability Here I might have ended but that some Objections which I have heard commonly flying about presse mee to the endevour of an answere We must not run they say into sudden extreams This is a fallacious Rule unlesse understood only of the actions of Vertue about things indifferent for if it be found that those two extreames be Vice and Vertue Falshood and Truth the greater extremity of Vertue and superlative Truth we run into the more vertuous and the more wise wee become and hee that flying from degenerate and traditionall corruption feares to shoot himselfe too far into the meeting imbraces of a Divinely-warranted Reformation had better not have run at all And for the suddennesse it cannot be fear'd Who should oppose it The Papists They dare not The Protestants otherwise affected They were mad There is nothing will be remoov'd but what to them is profess'dly indifferent The long affection which the People have borne to it what for it selfe what for the odiousnes of Pâ—…elates is evident from the first yeare of Qu. Elizâ—…beth it hath still beene more and more propounded desir'd and beseech't yea sometimes favourably forwarded by the Parliaments themselves Yet if it were sudden swift provided still it be from worse to better certainly wee ought to hie us from â—…ill like a torrent and rid our selves of corrupt Discipline as wee would shake fire out of our bosomes Speedy and vehement were the Reformatiâ—…ns of all the good Kings of Juda though the people had beene nuzzl'd in Idolatry never so long before they fear'd not the bug-bear danger nor the Lyon in the way that the sluggish and timorous Politician thinks he sees no more did our Brethren of the Reformed Churches abroad they ventur'd God being their guide out of rigid POPERY into that which wee in mockery call precise Puritanisme and yet wee see no inconvenience befell them Let us not dally with God when he offers us a full blessing to take as much of it as wee think will serve our ends and turne him back the rest upon his hands lest in his anger he snatch all from us again Next they alledge the antiquity of Episcopacy through all Ages What it was in the Apostles time that questionlesse it must be still and therein I trust the Ministers will be able to satisfie the Parliament But if Episcopacie be taken for Prelacie all the Ages they can deduce it through will make it no more venerable then Papacie Most certaine it is as all our Stories beare witnesse that ever since their comming to the See of Canterbury for neere twelve hundred yeares to speake of them in generall they have beene in England to our Soules a sad and dolefull succession of illiterate and blind guides to our purses and goods a wastfull band of robbers a perpetuall havock and rapine To our state a continuall Hydra of mischiefe and molestation the forge of discord and Rebellion This is the Trophey of their Antiquity and boasted Succession through so many Ages And for those Prelat-Martyrs they glory of they are to bee judg'd what they were by the Gospel and not the Gospel to be tried by them And it is to be noted that if they were for Bishopricks and Ceremonies it was in their prosperitie and fulnes of bread but in their persecution which purifi'd them and neer their death which was their garland they plainely dislik'd and condemn'd the Ceremonies and threw away those Episcopall ornaments wherein they were instal'd as foolish and detestable for so the words of Ridley at his degradment and his letter to Hooper expressly shew Neither doth the Author of our Church History spare to record sadly the fall for so he termes it and infirmities of these Martyrs though we would deify them And why should their Martyrdom more countnance corrupt doctrine or discipline then their subscriptions justify their Treason to the Royall blood of this Relm by diverting and intaling the right of the Crown from the true heires to the houses of Northumberland and Suffolk which had it tooke effect this present King had in all likelyhood never sat on this Throne and the happy union of this Iland had bin frustrated Lastly whereas they adde that some the learnedest of the reformed abroad admire our Episcopacy it had bin more for the strength of the Argument to tell us that som of the wisest States-men admire it for thereby we might guesse them weary of the present discipline as offensive to their State which is the bugge we feare but being they are Church-men we may rather suspect them for some Prelatizing-spirits that admire our Bishopricks not Episcopacy The next objection vanishes of it selfe propounding a doubt whether a greater inconvenience would not grow from the corruption of any other discipline then from that of Episcopacy This seemes an unseasonable foresight and out of order to deferre and put off the most needfull constitution of one right discipline while we stand ballancing the discommodity's of two corrupt ones First constitute that which is right and of it selfe it will discover and rectify that which swervs and easily remedy the pretended feare of having a Pope in every Parish unlesse we call the zealous and meek censure of the Church a Popedom which who so does let him advise how he can reject the Pastorly Rod and Sheep-hooke of CHRIST and those cords of love and not feare to fall under the iron Scepter of his anger that will dash him to peeces like a Potsherd At another doubt of theirs I wonder whether this discipline which we desire be such as can be put in practise within this Kingdom they say it can not stand with the common Law nor with the Kings safety the government of Episcopacy is now so weav'd into the common Law In Gods name let it weave out againe let not humain quillets keep back divine authority T is not the common Law nor the civil but piety and justice that are our foundresses they stoop not neither change colour for Aristocâ—… democraty or Monarohy nor yet at all interrupt their just courses but farre above the taking notice of these inferior niceties with perfect sympathy