THE SPEACH OF THE KIRK OF SCOTLAND TO HER BELOVED CHILDREN HEu heu Domine Deus quia ipsi sunt in persecutione tuâ primi qui videntur in Ecclesia tua primatum diligere gerere principatum impedire salutem est persequi Saluatorem Bernard Alace Alace ô Lord God for they are cheesest in thy persecution who love the first and chief places and to bear rule to stay the course of salvation is to persecute the Saviour Bernard SImplicitas amentia malitia sapientia nomen habet virique boni usque adeo irridentur ut fere nullus qui irrideri possit appareat Petrarch Simplicitie now carieth the name of madnes malice the name of wisdome and good men are so derided that almost no man can be found to be derided Petrarch Imprinted in the yere 1620. THE KIRK OF CHRIST IN SCOTLAND TO HER DEARLY beloved Children wisheth purity and peace AS I your loving mother fearing to be finally deserted of my glorious Spouse the Lord Iesus and to be childles hereafter haue weeped sore in the night this time bypast my teares are on my cheekes Among all my lovers few to comfort mee my friendes haue dealt treacherously with me they are become my enemies Lament 1. 2. So would ye my dear children dolefully cry out The joy of our heart is ceased our daunce is turned into mourning the crown is fallen from our heads woe unto us that we haue sinned Lament 5. 15. 16. If ye were touched with the sense and feeling of your present estate and could by the thick shaddowes of this evening be brought to consider the comfortles desolation of that approaching night of darknes after so bright a day of visitation But so much the more dangerous is defection and the mysterie of iniquitie the more pernicious that it proceeds from so subtile beginnings as to your simplicitie ar almost insensible It is not time then for me your dolorous mother to keepe silence But love and feare presse me to put you in minde that it hath been in all ages the holy disposition happy practise of all Gods people wayting for the appearing of Iesus their Lord tēdring the weal of his spouse and taking to hart the aeternall salvation of their own soules to set continually before their eyes 1. His inaestimable goodnes towardes his Kirk 2. Her case and condition while she is militant here on earth And 3. in consideration of the one and the other the duetie required and expected at their handes wherthrough in the goodnes of God they have beene safe from that dreadfull ruine that hath overtaken the wicked And which I wish you my beloved children to escape by calling to minde in like manner at this tyme of your danger and my distresse First how wonderfull the Lordes mercies have been towards me his Kirk in this nation Secōdlie my present case crying with the complaints of a mother for help at your hands And thirdly what is due from your affection places and callings to me in whose wombe ye were conceived and by whose care ye are brought up to that which ye now are That whatsoever is commanded by the God of heaven it may be diligently done for the house of the God of heaven For why should he be wroth against the realme of the King and his sonnes Ezra 7. 23. And that Christ may say to me yet once againe Thou art beautifull my love as Tirzah comelie as Ierusalem terrible as an army with banners Cant. 6. 3. Words and motions of this sort as they have been so they will be but oyle to feede the fire of the furie of such incēdiaries as make their own earthlie particulars their highest projects for the wicked shall doe wickedlie and none of them shall understand yet by the grace of God manie shal be purified and tryed the wise shall understand The greatest wisdome of the greatest of you in other matters and your gracious countenance towards me and the meanest of your brethren at other tymes suffereth me not to doubt of your audience of any message or motiō from heaven but especiallie be my mouth which may either dis cover or prevent anie spirituall or temporall danger Now the spirit of wisdome and knowledge give unto yow all wise hearts that in the sight of God ye trying thinges that differ may approve things excellent which is above the reach of the naturall man that ye may be sincere without offence till that day of Christ your Lord mine THe riches of the unsearchable favours of my spouse towardes me have beene so greate he hath made his glorie to dwell so sensiblie in this land that I may bouldlie say Mercie and truth righteousnes and peace had never since Christs comming in the flesh a more glorious meeting amiable embracing on earth then ye have seene amongst your selves in the roughe end of this northern Yland which therfore hath justlie obteined to my no small comfort a great name among the cheefe Kirkes and Kingdomes in the World A people that sat in darknes hath seene a great light and to them who sat in the region of death light is sprung up To what nation under heaven when now the sunne of righteousnes hath shined upon the most part of the world hath the Lord communicated the Gospell for so large a time with such puritie fulnes prosperitie power libertie and peace The hottest persecutions had never greater puritie and power the most halcyon hereticall tymes had never more prosperitie and peace the best reformed Kirks in other places can hardlie parallel your fulnes and libertie And all these with such continuance that not onlie hath he made the truth to stay with you as he did the sunne in the daies of Iosuah but when the cloud of your iniquities did hasten it to goe downe in his mercie hath he brought back the glorious sunne by manie degrees as in the tymes of Ezekiah Oh that ye had known the long pleasant day of your visitation and in this your day the things belonging unto your peace Christ hath not onely beene one his name one in respect of his propheticall office for your information of his priesthood for the expiation of your sinnes and intercession for you but also hath displayed his banners and hath shewed himself few can say the like a soveraigne King in our Land to governe you with his owne scepter erected in his Worde to cutt off with his sword all monuments of Idolatry and superfluitie of pompous ceremonies to restore all the meanes of his worship in Word Sacraments and discipline to the holy simplicitie and integritie of the first paterne shewed in the mount frō the which by that wisdome of man which is ever foolishnes with God they had fearfully and shamefully swerved The sincerer sort of the bordering nations about you haue been so ravished with that beautie of the Lord upon your Sion with that crowne of glorie and rich diademe by the hand of
cause is the unaequal proportion seen in the Kirk where one is hungrie and starved an other drunk by reason wherof it cannot be that the state of the Kirk can long endure As he cleareth by the comparison of the proportions in Musik in common wealths and in the bodie of man wherupon he inferreth If in the bodie of the wealth Ecclesiasticall some who be the heads be so enormously overgone in riches and dignity that the weak mēbers of the body be scant able to beare them up there is a great token of dissolution and ruine shortly A third cause is the pride of Prelates declared in their great horses troupes of horsemen the superfluous pomp of their waiting men and great families To them the Lord speaketh by the Prophet Amos ch 4. Hear you fatted kine of Samaria ye that doe poore men wrong oppresse the needy the day shall come upon you c. Besides these he allegeth the tyranny of Prelates which as it is a violent thing so it cannot long indure the promoting of the unworthie and neglecting of the worthie the tribulations of outward policie cōmotions of people the refusing of correction in the Princes and Rulers of the Kirk the backsliding from righteousnes lack of discreet and learned preachers promoting of children unto Kirk offices and such other like This sermon changing the name time might seem to haue bene studied for our present estate And happy were we if we were not miscaried with the perillous opinions which he ascribes to the Prelates of that time One opinion is of them who thinke the Prelates to bee the Kirk which the Lord will alwayes keep and never forsake An other who deferred time thinking that the causes tokens before rehearsed have been in the Kirk at other times no lesse then now The third of such as say Let come what will come let us conforme our selves to this world and take our time with temporizers And the last is of such as being unfaithful beleeve not that any such thing shall come But so long as men are drunken with one or moe of those errors what hope is there of happinesse of recovery We might heare Henricus de Hassia in the yeare 1371. speaking that of our times which he said of his own That the Ecclesiasticall governours in the primitive Kirk were compared to the Sunne shining in the day time and the politicall to the Moon shining in the night But the spiritual men which now are doe neither shine in the day nor in the night But rather with the darknesse of impiety ignorance and licentious living doe obscure both the day and the night The renowned Bishop of Spalato as holy Bernard before him complaines more bitterly of that damned couple of crying sins Avarice and Ambition two monstrous beasts and ravenous Harpies which have seized upon the harts of Kirkmen in the time of peace then of the crueltie of persecution and craft of heresies which seeme to you to be the most desperate and onely evils Then saith hee speaking in the person of the Kirk was I at my highest and at my best esteeme whiles I went in a thin coat such as I was cloathed with when my spouse Christ Iesus betrothed himselfe to me c. And afterward They have thrust upon the world their owne inventions and established their own ordinances not drawn out of that testament which my spouse left to me and them namely the holy Scriptures but craftily hammered out of their own capricious projects and tending to the prejudice of your poore soules my deere children So true it is that wealth is a viperine brood of devotion Riches heaped together for reverence of so great a function almost have removed the cause of reverence And lest my calamity should seeme common or my present miseries to be lesse then the greatnesse of my by-past felicities may not every feeling soule rightly affected towards unity verity mournfully deplore this my estate in the words of Nazianzen describing the case of the Kirk in his time to this meaning My mind sayes he leads me seeing there is no other remedy to flee and convoy my selfe unto some corner out of sight where I may escape frō the cloudy tempest of maliciousnesse whereby all parts are entred into deadly warre amongst themselves and that little remnāt of love which was is now consumed to nothing The onely godlines we glory in is to find out somewhat whereby we may iudge others to be ungodly One of us observes the faults of another as matters of upbraiding and not of mourning By these meanes we are growne hatefull even in the eyes of the heathen themselves and which woundeth us the more deeply we cannot deny but we have deserved their hatred with the better sort of our own our credit and name is quite lost the lesse wee are to marvell if they iudge vily of us who although wee did well would hardly commend us On our backes they also build that are leaud and what we object one against another the same they use to the utter scorne and disgrace of us all But I come now my beloved brethren to the conscience of your duty in this case which was the third and principal purpose the religion whereof will bind so many as think seriously of the exceeding bountifulnesse of God to mee his Kirk and upon my manifold crosses here on earth One common dutie of all is that seeing they be all under the guiltines of ingratitude and are become a sinfull nation loaden now with iniquities as ye have been with mercies before which doe provoke the Lord to remove his kingdome altogether from you and to give it to others that would bring forth the fruits thereof according to the constant course of the severity of his Iustice both with his own people the Iewes and with many other famous Kirkes in the East and West given over to beleeve that great lye because they received not the love of the truth and rendred not to the great King the fruits of his kingdome in due season that now before the fiercenesse of his wrath come on all of you from the house of David to the house of Levi look with melting hearts and mourning eyes upon him whom you have pierced with your iniquities Oh that yee had lights to search your hearts and hearts to repent for your sins in the evening of this your day that ye could turne unto the Lord with one heart before yee bee overwhelmed with darknesse At least if in these godlesse and devotionless dayes wherein all your wonted fasting is turned into feasting a general humiliation cannot be obtained ye that are the Lords owne and delight in his tents yee that love the beauty of Sion and have accesse to the face of God contend with him by the spirit of deprecation fill your chalmers with strong cries fill heaven and earth with the grones of his owne spirit poure out
teares day and night take hold of the king of glory wrastle with him as becomes Israel pray againe and againe with Abraham let him not depart out of your hearts nor from his owne tabernacles in this land your God lookes to be intreated loves to be importuned he is loth to leave you altogether No sudden eclipse comes upon you but like that of old when the glory of the Lord departed by degrees first from the Cherub to the doore of the house Ezek. 10. 4. then to the entry of the gate of the Lords house v. 19. then from the midst of the citie to the mountain towards the East side of the citie chap. 11. 23. Better keepe his presence now then seeke him through the streetes when hee is gone Choose rather to mourn in Sion for preuenting comfortles Babel then sitting desolate by the rivers of Babel to burst out in bitter teares in remembrance of sweet Sion The triall begins upon Pastors but ye know not upon whom it shall stay The large time of so faire occasion in the schoole of Christ requires two things now at your hands One is that yee bee able to try the spirit and to know with certainty what to follow The way to establish your selves is not with the Romans to rest upon a blinde faith receiving for truth whatsoever carries my name or authority nor with the rich man in the Gospell to wish that one may rise from the dead for your satisfaction Neither as it was in the time of Eliah to seek for a miracle from heaven nor yet to run to any on earth for decision of all questions for within and amongst your selves all are divided and without Papists are your enemies Protestants are strangers to your secrets and unacquainted with your covenants and oathes your comfort may be that your father died not intestate Let his testament bee read with attentiue reverence Search his latter will which he hath left for a plain and perfect direction to his comming againe Consider what is most agreeable to his wisedome what makes most for his honour for the edification of your owne soules for the restraint of the liberty of the flesh and for the comfort of a distressed conscience without respect to the appearances of wisedome and humility among men or to that which seems most to serve to your worldly credit that wooes your flesh or courts your carnall senses for this will bee a meager consolation when the horrors of God are upon your soules ready to be presented before his Iustice Continue in the things yee have learned and are perswaded of knowing of whom yee have learned them Have yee attained by a conscientious use of prayer hearing meditation conference unto a perswasion of that which is now in debate have ye an inward witnes testifying to your soules that your teachers by their fidelity the effectual blessing of God upon their labours have caried with thē the seale of their ministery Then cōtinue bee not caried about with every wind of doctrine to the hellish disturbance of the heavenly peace of your soules In the time of tentation ponder with your hearts what better warrants yee have for some practises of religion more substantiall in mens estimation and whether the motives of the one alteration may not as wel inforce the other As ye should be able to try your selves whether ye are in the faith or not which Paul requireth of the whole Kirk of Corinth so should ye have skill to try the spirits whether they be of God or not For such are perverted as are ever learning never come to the knowledge of the truth And as in respect of the time yee ought to be teachers and to be able to edifie every one another in the most holy faith so are yee charged by the Apostle Peter to be ready to give an account even to your enemies of that hope which is in you He that hath faith can try himselfe can try the spirits and teach others and give a reason both of his hope and practise before the adversary The other is that once having gained a godly resolution of the truth you suffer nothing earthly to divert you from the profession maintenance of the same It is now high time for you who have been hearing of Christ so many yeares to be put to your trial how yee have learned Christ to give proof of your passive obedience when the Lord calles you no lesse then of your active Offences schismes troubles persecutions have been in all times in every period of the Kirk hath opened a back doore for a worldling to slip forth at Others before us have had their own trials these in the dispensation of God are now made ours Hee hath never been a Christian in action that hath not been a martyr in affection And let the world still sit in the chaire of the scorners that professor that will not bee a ceremoniall confessor would refuse to bee a substantiall martyr The smallest threed of the seamlesse coat of thy Saviour the lowest hem of his garment the least pin or latchet of that heavenly tabernacle may be a matter of a glorious and comfortable suffering to thee And the lesse the cause be it being Christs cause the more rare acceptable is thy testimony The heart may be sound and voyd of Idolatrie and yet the outward action of adoration may prove Idolatrous Knowledge is greater and Christ now more glorious by confessions martyrdomes prescription of time and profession of all nations then in the primitive times He that now counteth it no religion to renounce a Christian rite and receive an Antichristian in place therof would not have spared of old to set Antichrist himself in the throne of Christs kingdome We are unthristie bankerupts wasting that thesaurie unworthily every penny whereof was painfully and narrowly gathered together The worthy martyrs of preceding times and glorious instruments of reformation if they were alive in these decaying dayes how would they bee ashamed of so degenerated children How ready would they be in your places to suffer for the name of Christ Or if yee had lived in their troublesome times spoyled of your goods hated of the world pinched in prison sequestrate from wife house and children looking every houre for death consider what would have been your thoughts of infidelity your words of blasphemy your deeds of defection If it please my glorious head to call you to suffer for his name let your care bee as Peter hath taught you 1. to sanctifie him in your hearts and not to feare the feare of men 2. to bee ready with your mouthes to make apologie to every one that craveth a reason of your hope and 3. to have a good conversation in Christ that they who speak evill of you may be ashamed And let your comfort be 1. a good cōscience arising upō two grounds One that ye suffer for wel doing the other that the
caveats sworne unto by their owne mouthes 4. Whether in the sight of God they thinke the maintainers of the reformed religion or the late formalists more faithfull in their callings and consâ—ientious in their conversation And therefore if it be not Pharisaisme to pronounce of the fidelity of my pastors by their conforming to ceremonies and extreme malice to think that men in all other things studying to approve themselves to God and the King durst be bold to resist in these without conscience for respect to any popular opinion 5 Whether that meeting of Perth be one of my lawfull Assemblies justificable in the sight of my Lord and Saviour and the constitutions thereof concluded for Canons to bee urged upon pain of deprivation whereupon Ministers are removed from their charges and many soules famished for whom he gave his life for not conforming to a platforme blank as yet and scarcely drawen in the Idea of their own imaginations 6 What warrant from Christ my King and me can be pretended for bringing my ministery and me under this new bondage in the persons of intrants forced at their admission to sweare and subscribe 1. That they shall not onely maintaine his Maiesties prerogative in causes ecclesiasticall which what it is or what is the extent thereof they doe not well understand but also the present governement of the Kirk and jurisdiction Episcopall in all places where they shall have opportunity either of privat conference or publick preaching and that they shall bee carefull by reading to informe themselves to the end they may be the more able to withstand all adversaries opposite to the same 2. That they shall bee obedient to their Ordinary and all other superiours in the Kirk speak of them reverently and in all their prayers privat and publick commend to Gods protection their estate not allowed by me 3. That they shal subject theÌ„selves to the present orders pretended to bee the ordinances of the Kirk and to the orders which shall be established by consent of the sayd Kirk meaning assemblies framed and over ruled by Prelates and to procure due reverence to the same at the hands of others by all the means which they caÌ„ use 4. That if they coÌ„travene any of these poynts they shall be content without making any contradiction to bee deprived of their ministery and to be reputed perjured and infamous persons for ever And by these oathes and subscriptions that they would consider what mischiefes may bee wrought in the after ages when they are dead and gone 7 Whether it were more pertinent to deale with their brethren by reason or authority Ye are made shepheards and not strikers This is a new and uncouth sort of preaching which will inforce faith by strokes Pride effectuates one thing and discipline another Favour should be more used then severitie exhortations more then threatnings love more then law But by such forms it is easie to disoern who are they that seeke their owne and who the things of Iesus Christ sayth the Canon law their owne paterne 8 By what conscience reason or law they have deserted their flocks and pastorall charges entred into civil place and pompe breaking the caveats and contrary to their alledged commission for keeping of ministers in quietnesse and peace and vindicating the Kirk from poverty and contempt have they taken upon them the power of both swords against the whole subjects of the kingdome and summarily to confine ward imprison discharge silence suspend deprive autorize and exauctor at my ministers at their pleasure If the Lord should cause a terrible finger to come forth and write these and a thousand other their presumptuous dittaes upon the wall over against them where they use to sit Balthazar-like in their sacrilegious pompe abusing the furniture of his house their brightnes would change their thoughts would trouble them so that the joynts of their loynes would loose and their knees would smite one a-another I have borne them but to my griefe and shame They have given me cause to pronounce the curses of Iob upon the day of their birth For they neither care to bee esteemed bastards themselves nor to brand me with the marke of an harlot They prove Loammi and would have me to prove Apostaticall Had these my forlorne hopes but one sparkle of true love to my spouse or me they would resolve with Nazianzen to undergo Ionas punishment for stilling of this tempest and to preferre my peace to their own preferment What can I doe but mourne intreat protest rebuke expostulate I call therefore heaven and earth their owne soules the testimonies of al who have been acquaint with them and their proceedings to beare witnesse against them Beseeking exhorting them by the salvation of their own souls by the tender mercies of Christ by the precious drops of his blood by that excellent price of their redemption if there be any consolation in Christ if any comfort of love if any fellowship of the spirit if any love to his glory to his blood to his Gospell and if there be any pitty in their hearts to the breasts which they have sucked to this sinfull land and their owne native kingdome to returne to God to repent them of their course to leave off to allow to defend to urge that yea and persecute for that which of late they were wont to condemne and even now almost could hardly have tollerated Let them forbeare any longer as it is to be feared they have peevishly been doing to fight against God to kick against the pricke to vaunt themselves proudly in the glory of their munition Their craft is knowen can they dance naked in a net and think not to be seen The seams of their black policies are sewed with white threed If they shall persist to stop their eares against all admonitions to harden themselves in rebellion against God still to proceed in their truculent breathings Thrasonicall boasts and tyrannous executions and shall for their backes and bellies and the making up of their houses make havock of the puritie of Gods truth and the liberty of the kingdom of his sonne As the Lord lives that sees them he shal yet harden their hearts more and at last shall tread them in the wine-presse of his wrath and there shal be none to deliver them Now my petitioÌ„ backed with the authority of a mother to your honors is that for the glory of Christs kingdom in this land the adorning of his majesties crowne quietnes of his loyal subjects the endles praise of your selves and flourishing of your honorable estate and the particular comfort of the Ministers and congregations within this realme in this time of distresse felt and feared I may by your timous intercession at his gracious majesties hands and uttermost endevours debtfull to God from your place obtaine how soone occasion may be offered 1 A sufficient and ready execution of former actes of Parliament made against the fearful blasphemy of Gods
generation which knew not the Lord nor yet the work which he had done for Israel A generation not onely unthankfull but contumelious against that glorious work of God worthie instruments therof and therefore ready to bless that which the Lord hath cursed and to build that which he hath destroyed For is there not start up of late within my skirts a new sect of shameless mishapen formalists my indignation cannot bear such monsters who blush not to joyne with my enemies the papists in breathing out reproachful obloquies against your reverend fathers and brethren Calvin Beza Knox etc. as though their zeale against Romish idolatrie the deformities whereof by new colours are now beginning to seeme beauties had been excessive and by disparaging their credite to bring the truth preached by them in suspition and that glorious work of reformatiō wherin they were so worthy instruments into question He that is the keeper of Israell vindicat his owne cause from the blasphemous mouth and uncouth stratageme of this generation of vipers Finally that the Lord might shew that he left nothing undone haue ye not experienced the blessing of Abraham hath he not blessed them who blessed you and cursed them who cursed you he hath been not onely our sunne but our shield What instrument framed against you hath prospered What tongue arysing against you hath not the Lord cōdemned that all the world might know that God was your saviour and the strong God of Iacob your avenger Your forraigne enemies haue bene made the objects of your pitie and so many as haue rent my bowels within have perished tragically in their own divices No sooner began they till now to reedifie the cursed walls of Iericho but they have beene buried under the ruines of them All which hath proceded of his own good pleasure If ye should say that the cause were any worthynes in your selves above other nations not onely my spouse Christ and his faithfull servant Moses would cry out against you but all the world that knowes what ye are in other respects would laugh you to scorne The Lord who shewes mercie on whom he will shew mercie hath done it It is wonderfull in my eyes and should have moved the most obdured and stonie hearts amongst you to melt answerably to spend themselves to his honour in the duties of holines and righteousnes which alas ye have not done as now shall appeare by the sequel of your iniquities casting me your poore mother into so great a doole desolation which is the second point of your Christian consideration propounded in the beginning Would God it might please him to blesse your senslesse soules with a holy remembrance of that which ye once were and from whence ye are fallen Ye would surely finde that as in manners and conversatiō from small beginnings by degrees ye are now come to great abominations so both in the lyfe of your profession and in the outward worship of God ye are further fallen from that which of late ye were then now your case is distant from that which ye feare To let pass the desperate profaness of many crying sins even beyond the cry of Sodome considering all the circumstances of the mercie of God of the meanes and space graunted to you to repent by continuall importunitie deaving the eares of divine justice that had not the Lord had respect to some of his secret ones who kneele before him day and night to continue his gracious favour with you misregarded of the world but my chariots and horsmen had he not a purpose to prevent the insolencies of my enemies I have sayd I would scatter them abroad I would make their remembrance to cease frō amongst men save that I feared the furie of the enemie lest their adversaries should waxe proud And which is principall did not the Lord for his own names sake and the praise of his mercy spare me we had long since beene consumed and the enemy had entered within my gates To let passe that lukewarmenes careles mediocritie in the matters of God that neutrall adiaphorisme in my affaires which hath in it a native and proper power to hasten at the hand of God the removall of my candlestick and to bring in the famine of the word For how can the Lord without indignatiō suffer men to esteeme basely of the least circumstance which he willeth to be observed And not to insist in that fall from your first love decay of your wonted zeale secret indevotion even in true christians where is that wonted power and demonstratiō of the spirit in preaching that cheerfulnes in holy exercises that circumspect walking before God in all your wayes that preparation to divine dueties that spirit of deprecations that spiritual profite of hearing communicating meditation and conference that consciencious diligence in winning of others working upon your acquaintāce to bring them within the bosome of my love that jealousie over your hearts that indignation against errours idols Apostates Is not the life of religion condemned under the names of hypocrisie singularitie melancholie simplicitie puritanisme etc. And the light thereof either smothered under the ashes of this errant tyme◠or put in a theefes bowet so that the godly now born down with a bastard modestie and spirituall pusillanimitie dissemble and conceale the grace of God for eschewing the shame offence of the world which the wicked not long since did simulat and counterfeyt for currying of credite with me and my follovvers But leaving all these I come to complaine of the alteration made upon my outvvard face and goverment May not I novv as once the vvorld becomming Arrian poure out my sighes and vvonder hovv so suddenly I am changed from that vvhich I vvas and become that vvhich novv I am All the rites of Rome are not more odious to many novv then my present ceremonial cōstitutiō vvas to them of late The formes and fruites of preaching fearfully changed the crystalline fountaines of holy Scripture troubled with the mudd of mans putide learning the ministration of the Sacraments brought in under a new guise of mans shaping the painfull ministerie turned into a busie Lordship and these who are set over soules should warre unto God are become seculars intangling themselves with the affaires of this life nothing but a pompous shadow for Gods simple service Demas Diotrephes are become the paterns of wisdome and praeeminence Chrysostome is thrust out and Arsatius placed in his rowme beloved Liberius is set a syde and lightlied Foelix is set to feede the flock pratling tymeservers are become preachers powerfull pastors put to silence plaine and frequent preaching reproved a redd liturgie commended Alevite for a Preist and lesse then a levite for mouth and messenger to Gods people Non residents with their flattering varlots sit in the chaires of dignitic fed with pluralitie of benefices and painfull promoovers of the Kingdome of Christ and subverters of Antichrist
with ignorance the mother of devotion borne down and despised Labourers vexed with angvish of Spirit loyterers live in wealth ease In the tyme of confusion wicked men attayne to honours and that seat of dignitie wherof in a peaceable common wealth they dispared in the tyme of trouble they hope to procure Commandes are cancelled Canons are made commandes And as Gerson complained in his tyme a Monke more severely punished for going without his cowle then for comitting adulierie or sacrilege Or as Chaucer the Fryer more bound to his habit then a man to his wife The duties of Ministers and edification of Christians tyed to the sensâ—es practise of trifling ceremonies And hence we see it is that old hypocrites are become professed Atheists Philadelphian professors are come to a Laodicean temper Papists wax insolent and obstinate the faithfull pastors either put froÌ„ the building of the Sanctuarie or forced to build with the one hand and with Nehemiah to beare off these corruptions with the other the people through publick contradictions and present practises contrary to late preachings know not what way to incline But as usually it falleth out in multitudes when they are shaken with contrarie doctrines and tossed betwixt errour and trueth from being doubtfull in questions moved about religion their hearts in end are opened and themselves made naked to receive everie corruption vanitie As the contentions about Eutyches opinion thrust out Christ and brought in Mahomet Yea except the Lord restreyne and stay they rush into Atheisme in opinioÌ„ and Epicureisme in conversation where through the lyfe of religion is utterly extinguished The case of religion herein not being unlike unto that of the miserable woman in Plutarch whoÌ„ her suters divided amongst themselves in members because that every one could not have her whole Thus she perished and they were disappointed What may be the finall event your synnes may make you justly to feare what it shall be the alpowerfull God who rules all events knowes well This ye may see at least that pulpits and schooles taverns and alehouses towne and village Gath Askelon are all busied with these broyles Which make me the daughter of Sion to complaine and in doole to deplore that in so distressed a case there is no compassion in my sonnes That of so many whome I have brought forth and brought up there be so few to coÌ„fort me almost none to guide me or take me by the hand Yea after tryall I finde that my own ministers and domestickes beholding the invention of their own heades concupisence of their own hearts without respect to God or his word are the prime authors of my calamitie actors of this my mischief according to the bitter complaint of the godly learned of old searching the causes of all the abuses wherwith the glorie of the christian Kirks my sisters in the tyme of their peace hath beene blemished or defaced I will content me with two witnesses who speaking of their own tymes directly point at ours taxing the enormities of the Kirks then paint out in lively colours our present corruptions that we may see the coincidence of the course of synne and may feare the similitude of judgements The one is learned Gerson about the yeare 1420. who observed two principall causes of the sicknesses soares of the Kirk in his tyme. One was the neglecting of the lawes of God and direction of Scriptures and the multitude of mans inventions No tongue sayth he is able sufficiently to expresse what evill what daunger what confusion the contempt of holy Scriptures which doubtlesse is sufficient for the government of the Kirk for otherwayes Christ had beene an unperfect Lawgiver and the following of humane inventions hath brought into the Kirk For proof hereof he addeth let us consider the state of the cleargie to which heavenly wisdome should have beene espoused But they have committed whordome with that filthie harlot earthly carnall and divelish wisdome so that the estate of the Kirk is become meerely brutish monstrous heaven is below and earth is above the spirit obeyeth and the flesh commaundeth the principall is esteemed as accessorie and the accessorie as principall Yet some shame not to say that the Kirk is better governed by humane inventioÌ„s then by the divine law and the law of the gospell of Christ which assertioÌ„is most blasphemous For the Euangelicall doctrine by the professors of it did inlarge the bounds of the Kirk and lifted her up to heaven which these sonnes of Hagar seeking out that wisdome which is from the Earth haue cast down to the dunghill And that it is not wholly fallen and utterly overthrowne and extinct it is the great mercy of our God and Saviour The other cause of the Kirks ruine he observed to be the ambition pride and covetousnes of Bishops and their Hierarchy He â—pareth not to say that in imitation of Lucifer they will be adored and worshiped as God Neither doe they think themselves subiect to any but are as sonnes of Belial that have cast off the yoke not enduring whatsoever they doe that any should ask them why they doe so they neither feare God nor reverence men Hence was it that not onely hee but innumerable others of the wise men holyest of the Kirk longed and looked for a reformation a long time before Luther was borne wishing that all things were brought back to that estate they were in the tyme of the Apostles And what wonder that perceiving among our selues the same causes and many the like effects we tremble for feare of a more dangerous â—ecidivation The other witnes is Nicolas Orem a man learned pithic who in a sermon before Pope Vrban the fyft in the yere 1364 noteth among many moe these causes of the approaching miserie of the Kirk The profanitie of the Kirk beyond the synagogue we know sayth he how Christ rebuketh the Pharises the cleargie of the Iewes for covetousnes 1. for that they suffered doves to be sould in the temple of God 2. for that they honoured God with their lipps and not with their heart and because they sayd but did not 3. for that they were hypocrites To the first then let us see whether it be worse to sell both Kirk and sacraments then to suffer doves to be sould in the temple To the second there be some who neither honour God with their heart nor with their lipps who neither doe well nor say well neither doe they preach any word at all but be dumbe doggs not able to barke impudent doggs that never have ynough And truely there be also some whose intollerable pride malice is so manifesty and notoriously kindled up like a fyre that no cloke nor shadow of hypocrisie can cover it But are so past all shame that it may be well verified of them which the Prophet speaketh Thou hast gotten the face of an harlote thou wouldest not blush An other