That he was worthy for whom he should do this And why so For he loveth our Nation and hath built us a Synagogue Whereupon Jesus went with them and healed his servant marvelling at the Centurions words and turning about and saying unto the people that followed him I have not found so great Faith no not in Israel This great Centurion and Commander was no Jew but a Gentile one who but newly heard of Christs name and same yet he had so much Piety and Bounty as out of his very Spoyls and Gains of Warre for we read of no other Lands or Gains he had to build a Synagogue for Gods worship which the Elders of the Jews and Christ too approved as a worthy act and a sufficient inducement for our Saviour to go with him and cure his servant O that all our Centurions who have Souldiers under them and exceed or equal him in command would imitate and equal this Gospel Centurion in his pious munificence in building in stead of contriving how to deface Temples Churches Synagogues to abolish Tithes ingrosse Church Lands and Livings into their own hands then should they receive as large Encomiums of the reality and transcendency of their Faith Piety Charity from men as he did from our Saviour and the Elders of the Jews for building this new Synagogue I shall only adde for our Souldiers Officers better Information that from this example of Abraham approved in the new Testament both Divines Councils Canonists and Casuists have unanimously resolved That Souldiers ought to pay personal Tithes to Ministers out of their very Militia pay and spoyls of Warr. This was St. Augustines Doctrine DE MILITIA de negotio de artificio redde Decimas recited practised and long prescribed here in England in the excerptions of Egbert Archbishop of Yorke about the year of our Lord 750. repeated confirmed by Gratian in his Decrees Causa 16. qu. 1. f. 381 382 By all the Canonists Glossers on his Text by Angelus de Clavasio in his Summa Angelica Tit. Decima by Hostiensis Summa Rosella and other Summists Casuists in their Titles of Tithes and ratifyed by the Synod of Lingon An. 1404. apud Bochellum Decret Ecclesiae Gallicanae lib. 6. Tit. 8. c. 31. p. 967. This many excellent Christian Commanders Officers Souldiers have in several ages performed as Histories record I shall for brevity instance but in one domestick example and that a memorable one King William the first whom we usually style the Conqueror though he never claimed the Crown by Conquest but only by the last Will Testament and Donation of King Edward the Confessor in his life-time with the assent of his Nobles who was educated with preserved by him during his exile and seclusion from the Crown by the Danish usurpers and as COUSIN and HEIR to Edward the Confessor as he stiled himself in the very Title of his Laws He having vanquished and slain the perjured Vsurper Harold who set the Crown upon his own head and made himself King without any Title or due Election against his solemn Oath to Duke William made to him in Normandy which he pretended to be forced in thankfulnesse to God for this his victory whereby he gained possession of the Crown out of the Spoyls and Gains of his Warr erected a Magnificent Church and Abbey to the glory of God and St. Martin which he called de Bello or Battel Abbey in that very place where Harold was slain and this battel fought which likewise he endowed with large possessions Tithes and most ample Privileges by his Charter and therein offered up to God HIS SWORD and the royal robe which he ware the day of his Coronation there reserved as a Monument as well of his Piety as Victory After which this pretended Conqueror in the fourth year of his reign by the Counsel of his Barons through all the Counties of England caused 12. men of the most Noble wise and skilfullest in the Law to be summoned out of every shire that he might learn their Laws and Customs from them and gave them this Oath That proceeding in a right path without declining to the right hand or the left to the best of their power they should make known to him the Customs and Sanctions of their Lawes pretermitting nothing adding nothing and altering nothing in them by prevarication which they accordingly performing and King William intending to alter the Law only in one particular according to the Lawes of Norway from whence he and his Normans descended all the Barons and Grand English Enquest who presented him their Laws on Oath being much grieved at it unanimously besought him that he would permit them to enjoy their proper Laws and antient Customs under which their Fathers lived and themselves had been born and educated because they deemed it very hard for them to receive unknown Lawes and to judge of those things they knew not importunately beseeching him for the soul of K. Edward WHO HAD GRANTED TO HIM THE CROWN and KINGDOM AFTER HIS DEATH and whose Lawes they were that hee would not compell them to persevere under the Lawes of any Foreiners but their own Country Laws alone Wherefore the King taking advice consented to the request of his Barons confirming all their Lawes and Customs in Parliament without any alteration or diminution as they presented them Whereof this is the very first Law concerning the preservation of the Churches rights and Scholars from rapine Every Clergy-man and likewise all Scholars and all their Goods and Possessions wheresoever they are shall enjoy the Peace of God and of holy Church free from all forfeiture and seisure and if any shall lay hands on that which Mother Church shall require LET HIM RESTORE THAT WHICH HEE SHALL TAKE AWAY and likewise one hundred shillings in the name of a forfeiture if it be from an Abbey or Church of Religion and twenty shillings if it be from a Mother Parish Church and ten shillings if it be from a Chapel After which follow 6. other Lawes concerning the Churches peace and privileges and then these two Laws concerning TITHES Of the TITHES of the Church Of all Corn the tenth Sheaf is given to God and therefore to be paid If any shall have a herd of Mares let him pay the tenth colt he who shall have only one or two let him pay a penny for every colt Likewise he who shall have many Kine let him pay the tenth calf he who shall have but one or two let him pay a penny for every calf and he who shall make cheese let him give the tenth to God and if he shall make none the milk every tenth day Likewise the tenth Lamb the tenth Fleece the tenth Butter the tenth Pig Of BEES and all lesser TITHES In like manner also of Bees the tenth of the profit and also of Wood of Meadows Waters and Mills and Ponds and Fishings and Copses and Orchards and Gardens and Negotiations wherein Souldiery
will content such perverse and contentious Wretches but a Liberty to pay their Ministers only what they please and that in conclusion shall be just nothing as their subsequent Petitions and present Practices now manifest to God Angels and men And I doubt the Change of this antient known long approved certain Maintenance by Tithes to any other certain or uncertain way will create more sutes and troubles among people than ever our Tithes did since their first institution This was my subitan opinion of their Proposition when I first read it and shall serve for a publick answer to it now if any insist upon it to prove Tithes inconvenient and burdensom to the People and therefore sit to be totally abolished The main Objection I ever yet read or heard against Tithes is this That Tithes are a great discouragement and hindrance to Husbandmens industry and improvements since Ministers must have not only the Tenths of their Lands as they found them but likewise of their Crop Labour Industry and Improvements which is now writes Canne and others more largely one of the sorest Burthens and greatest Oppressions and Tyranny that lies upon them and discourages many from improving the Lands to the publick prejudice I answer 1. That this Objection no waies concerns Soldiers Weavers Tailors Tradesmen Townsmen and other Mechanicks who are the most and greatest Sticklers and Petitioners against Tithes but only Husbandmen and Countrey Gentlemen and Farmers living upon Tillage very few of which not one of a thousand ever yet petitioned against Tithes as such a grievous Oppression at leastwise as a Farmer for the burdensomness of Tithes but only as an Anabaptist or other Sectary out of hatred and opposition to our Ministers Callings or Persons And till the Generality or Major part of the Gentry Yeomanry and Country Farmers in each County Petition and declare against their Predial Tithes as such an intollerable Grievance no Officers Soldiers Citizens Anabaptistical Mechanicks and busie-bodies in other mens Callings and Grievances which concern them not are no waies to be heard countenanced or credited in this particular by any Powers whatsoever in point of Justice or Prudence 2ly The payment of Tithes never yet discouraged any Person either in the Land of Canaan England or other Countreys at least not any considerable number of men or any that had either true Wisdome grace honesty or love to God and the Ministrey from any sort of Tillage or improvement whatsoever out of which Tithes are paid the gain by the good husbandry and improvement being abundantly recompenced in the nine Parts over and above the Tithes And therefore till the Objectors can make good their allegation by presidents of considerable number of wise godly men and others discouraged from Tillage and Improvements meerly by the payment of Predial Tithes out of them in all former ages or of late years to the real prejudice of the Publick which they can never do this grand Objection against Tithes must be decried both as Fabulous and Ridiculous yea as Scandalous The late Petition of the Cornish Gentlemen Farmers and Yeomen where such improvements are most made to their great Charge for the continuance of Tithes being a sufficient Evidence to prove it such 3ly It is observable that the Petitioners against Tithes upon this ground are as eager Writers and Petitioners against all antient Customs Tonnage Poundage and usual moderate Impositions upon Merchandize imported or exported for the necessary defence of the Sea and Trading amounting to as much upon every pound of Merchandize as Tithes do upon Husbandmens Tillage and Improvements the charges of the Fraight Transportation and Customs in forein parts considered and to far more and that as a very great discouragement to Merchandize and Trading Which as all wise men know to be a mere fabulous untruth contrary to the experience of all States Kingdoms Republicks in the World and of Holland it self subsisting by Merchandize where they pay as high Customs or higher than our antient Legal Merchants Duties to the State amount to which never made any Merchants to give over trading So if when and where rightly imposed managed they are the greatest encouragements of Trade and Merchandize by Guarding the Seas and securing Traders against Enemies and Pirates the only encouragement to Merchant-Adventurers who must and will all give over trading when they cannot safely put to Sea without apparent losse of all they trade for by Enemies or Pirates And therefore this clamourous Objection against Tithes should have no more weight with Wisemen to suppress them than their idle clamour against all old Legal Customs Rates and Duties for the necessary defence of the Sea and Trade to abrogate them altogether to the ruine both of our Traffique Navy and Merchants too that pay them 4ly This Objection is directly made against the providence wisdom and policy of God himself who prescribed Tithes amongst his own people out of all their Tillage and Improvements and knew it would be no impediment to them his Blessing promised to their payment of Tithes being a greater improvement to them in their Crops than all their extraordinary cost and pains amounted to Wherefore it can be no impediment or discouragement to any real Saints good Husbandry or Improvement now who deserves to reap no benefit by his Labour or Improvements if God himself shall have no share or portion out of them for the maintenance of his publick worship and Ministers 5ly If there were any truth or strength in this Objection yet it extends not unto all tithes but only to such as are paid out of extraordinary chargeable Improvements as to make mere barren Heath Ling and Sands out of which no former profits naturally grew manurable for Corn or Pasture Tillage and Meadows Woods out of which most predial Tithes arise So there is a sufficient remedy against this pretended Mischief already provided in the best and strictest Statute made by the best of our Protestant Kings for the true payment of Tithes at the beginning our Reformation when Popery was banished in the Parliament of 2 E. 6. c. 13. which provides That all such barren Heath or waste Grounds which before that time have lyen barren and paid no Tithes by reason of the said barronness and now be or hereafter shall be improved or converted into arable Ground or Meadow shall from henceforth after the term and end of seven years next after such Improvement fully ended and determined pay Tithe of the Corn and Hay growing on the same and be discharged in the interim as the words import and our Judges have expounded it All which considered this Objection must be henceforth exploded and LEVELLED to the ground Now because I find a clear Design and Endeavour in sundry Anabaptists Officers Souldiers if they cannot prevail to put down Tithes upon other pretexts yet to rob the Ministers of them at present if not in perpetuity upon this pretence to sequester and convert
and thereby proclaim themselves the Greatest Hypocrites under heaven and therein as treacherous to their own Native Country and those who trusted them as the Mamalukes of Egypt the Pretorian Soldiers of Rome were to their Lords and Masters of Old which I hope they will disclaim 3ly It is a resolved case by the Law of Nature Nations and War it self as Grotius proves at large De Jure Belli l. 3. c. 6. sect 8 9 10 c. That things gained by Conquest in a War ought to redound not to the Officers Souldiers Generals who manage the War but to the Kingdom Nation whose servants they are and both Commission and pay them their wages as the Servants Apprentices gains redound to their Masters Coffers not to them Qui sentit Onus sentire debet Commodum being both a Principle in the Law of Nature Reason and in our Common Law too Hence all the Roman Generals and Military Officers brought all the Silver Gold Treasures Spoyls of War into the publique Treasury putting none of it into their private purses and all the Lands Countries they gat by Conquest were the Republiques only which bore the charges of the War not the victorious Conquering Generals or Souldiers Therefore the Officers and Army being Commissioned raised only for and constantly paied by the Parliament people for the ends aforesaid never warring on their own free cost what ever Treasures Lands Powers Spoyls they have gained by their victories Conquests are of Right the Parliaments Nations Peoples only not their own Therefore the Parliament Nation people cannot must not be over-awed used reputed by them as their meer Conquered Vassals but as their Soveraign Lords and true Proprietors of all the Territories Lands Treasures Powers they have gained by their Conquests 4ly That Conquest is no just or Lawful Title was long since resolved by the greatest Conqueror ever England yet bred even our famous British Conquering King Arthur in the greatest Parliamentary Councel ever yet held within this Isle whereat were present no lesse then 12. Kings besides King Arthur and an innumerable company of Princes Dukes Nobles Prelates of the British and most other Neighbor Nations as Geoffry Monmouth Hist. Regum Brit. l. 9. c. 12 13 14 15 16 18 19 20. records All these when Lucius Procurator of the Roman Republique came to demand that antient Tribute reserved by Julius Caesar from this Isle of Britain when first Conquered by him then in arrear and threatned to levy is by force of Arms if denied Meeting together in a great Councel or Parliament specially assembled for that end resolved That the said Rent pretended to be due to the Romans from the Britons because Caesar by reason of the Britons divisions being invited hither with his forces enforced them their Countrie being then shaken with domestique troubles to submit themselves to him by force and violence could not in Justice be demanded of them because this Tribute being gained in this manner was unjustly received Nihil enim quod vi violentia acquiritur Iuste ab ullo possidetur qui violentiam intulit For nothing which is gained by force and violence is justly possessed by any who hath offered and done the violence Irrationabilem igitur causam praetendit qua nos Jure sibi Tributarios esse arbitratur Therefore he pretends an Irrational cause whereby he supposeth we are of Right Tributaries unto him And because he presumes to exact from us id quod injustum est that which is unjust by the like reason let us demand a Tribute of Rome from him and he who shall prove the stronger let him carry away what he desires to have For if because Julius Caesar and other Roman Kings heretofore Conquered Britain he determines Tribute is now due unto him for this cause I now also think that Rome ought to render Tribute unto me because my Ancestors heretofore got it by Conquest Whereupon they all resolved to assist King Arthur with their Armes against this unrighteous Tribute and Title to it by Conquest and professed they would spend their lives in the quarrel Ipsa enim mors dulcis erit dum enim in vindicando Patres nostros in tuendo libertatem nostrant in exaltando Regem nostrum perpessi fuerimus Wherefore Conquest now can certainly be no Just no Lawfull Plea Title for any of our Officers or Souldiers which this Greatest Conqueror and this Great Councel so long since damned as unjust and Irrational To which I shall annex the Resolution of our Noble King Henry the 2d and of all the Bishops Abbots Peers Earls Barons of England assembled in a Parliamentary General Councel of the Realm at Westminster An. 1126. to determine a Controversie between Alfonso King of Castile and Sancho King of Navarre concerning divers Castles and Territories in Spain won by War and Conquest by Sancho King of Navarre from Alfonso whiles he was a Pupil and Orphan which they both submitted to their final determination who having heard both parties unanimously resolved that these Castles and Lands should be restored to Alfonso by King Sancho with all their bounds and appurtenances quia per Bellum violenter injuste abstulisset because he had violently and unjustly taken them away by War which resolution was confirmed under the Kings Great Seal and sent unto these Kings Therefore Conquest alone can be no just no legal Saintlike Right Title to any Lands Possessions Powers violently unjustly gotten claimed by Wars by our Swordmen now after these two antient famous Parliamentary Resolutions in point even between foreign Conquering Princes much lesse then between those Native Englishmen who raised waged our Army and Officers to defend not conquer them in a meer intestine civil War 5ly William Duke of Normandy Edward the 3 d Henry the 4 th Edward the 4 th and Henry the 7 th though they all came to the Crown by the Sword and Conquest of their Competitors yet they never claimed the Crown nor Kingdom by Conquest but Title only nor esteemed the English Irish or Welch a conquered Nation nor altered our antient Government Laws Liberties Parliaments or Ministers Tithes and Maintenance but confirmed them as all our Histories manifest in their Lives and Statutes made by them in the beginning of their respective reigns attest I have formerly proved in the case of William commonly stiled the Conqueror who ratified all our Liberties Laws Customs Franchises presented to him upon Oath without the least alteration diminution or prevarication to the peoples Great content Yea King Henry the 4th as Placita Coronae rot Parl. 1 H 4. n. 17. record did in the first Parliament held by him after his Conquest of Richard the 2d make this memorable Declaration to his people entred in that Roll. That he claimed the Realm and Crown of England with all their Members and Appurtenances as right heir thereto by Bloud by Descent and by the right God had given him through the ayd of his Parents
with his hands as Paul did to support himself and preach gratis wherefore he tells him 2 Tim. 2.4 That no man that warreth a spiritual warfare as he and other Ministers do intangleth himself with the affaires of this life that he may please or serve him who hath chosen him to be a Souldier A direct inhibition to Ministers to follow Pauls Precedent who cannot serve and please God in their Ministry if they labour day and night in Mechanick trades for their living And upon this ground which is very observable the very Apostles themselves Act. 6.3 4 5 6. Calling the multitude to them said it is not reason pray marke it that we should leave the Word of God and serve Tables much lesse work day and night at a Mechanick Trade wherefore brethren looke ye out seven men of honest report full of the holy Ghost wisdom whom ye may appoint over this businesse but we will give our selves continually to Prayer and to the Ministry of the word And the saying pleased the whole multitude From which Texts it is clear 1. That the Apostles themselves resolve that they could not exercise the very antient office of a Deacon in serving Tables attending on Widowes and other poor aged impotent Saints without neglecting or giving over preaching of the Word much lesse then can Ministers labour day and night with their hands at some Trade or other to maintain themselves and their Families without neglecting and desisting from the Ministry 2. That Apostles and Ministers of the Gospel ought to give themselves wholly and continually to prayer preaching meditation reading and other Ministerial duties and therefore must not undertake or intermeddle with secular Imployments and Callings 3. That the Apostles themselves have punctually resolved and that all the primitive Christians unanimously assented to it that it is not reason that they should leave preaching the word of God so much as to wait upon Widdowes and poor people at their tables whereupon they elected seven Deacons to discharge that office Therefore it is far lesse reason and they are most wicked and unreasonable men without faith or charity from which the Apostle prayes God deliver him and all his Ministers 2 Thess 3.2 who now urge it to enforce all our Ministers to neglect forsake their Ministry Preaching Studies now to follow handicraft Trades to get their livelihood that so they might preach freely to the people without any recompence or reward at all 2. All godly Ministers people in all ages and the very Objectors themselves of late years have extremely condemned censured our Bishops and Prelatical Clergy together with Popes Popish Prelates and Clergy men for intermedling with and executing civil Offices Imployments and worldly affairs which necessitated them to neglect the preaching of the Gospel and their Ministerial duties whereupon not only many antient and late Councils Synods but Acts of Parliament have specially prohibited them to be Privy Counsellers of State Judges Justices of the Peace Lord Chancellors Treasurers Keepers of the Privy Seal Stewards of Courts Commissioners and our very last Parliament by several late Acts disabled all Bishops from sitting as Peers in Parliament and them with all other Clergy men to execute any temporal Offices or Commissions as incompatible with their spiritual Function and an impediment to their Ministry according to the old proverbial verse Pluribus intentus minor est ad singula sensus Which I have proved at large by testimonies in all ages in my Breviate of the Prelates intolerable Vsurpation printed Anno. 1637. My Vnbishoping of Timothy and Titus and Antipathy of the English Prelacy to Monarchy and Vnity Anno 1641. Therefore to force our Ministers to become Mechanicks and give themselves wholly to worldly callings imployments incompatible with their professions must needs be an irrational unchristian Project unworthy the profession or professors of the Gospel not justifiable from Pauls example in them that would enforce it 3. If this Precedent of Paul be a sufficient argument to prove that our Ministers ought to work for their living and to preach the Gospel freely without any reward or coercive Maintenance I shall then by the self-same reason prove that all Officers and Souldiers of the Army who make this Objection and all our publick civil Officers approving it ought likewise to fight and discharge their Offices without pay or salary and to work with their own hands to get their livings without oppressing the people with any Contributions of Excises to maintain them 1. Because Ministers and they are both of one profession in several senses to wit Souldiers 2 Tim. 2.3 4. as I have formerly proved Therefore to fare both a like in respect of pay or hire 2. Because God records in Scripture Ezech. 29.18 That Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon even by Gods appointment caused his Army to serve a great service against Tyrus every head was made bald and every shoulder was â—eeled Yet had he no wages nor his Army for Tyrus for the sâ—rvice that he served against it If Nebuchadnezzer and his Army served God freely against Tyre without wages many years Should not our present Army and Officers much more serve God and their Country freely without wages True it is God gave them after their service fully ended not any Taxes or Contributions from their own Country-men or Nation but the Land and spoyle of Egypt for their wages because they wrought for him verses 19 20. And if our Officers and Souldiers will have such wages it must only be the Lands and spoyles of forein Aegyptian enemies not our Churches or Crown-Lands or Revenues formerly easing the peoples Taxes and defraying all Garrisons and ordinary publick expences which they now claim and enjoy for Arrears of pay 3. Nehemiah both a godly Souldier General and Governour of his people records this for his own honour and others imitation Neh. 5.14 15 16 17 18 19. Moreover from the time that I was appointed to be their Governour in the Land of Judah from the 20. even to the 32. year of Artaxerxes the King Even twelve years I and my Brethren have not eaten the bread of the Governor But the former Governours that had been before me were Chargeable and had taken of them Bread and Wine besides forty Shekels of Silver yea even their Servants bare rule over the people but so did not I marke the reason because of the fear of God Yea also I continued in the work of this wall neither bought we any Land as many Officers and Souldiers do now and all my servants were gathered thither unto the work Moreover there were at my Table an 150 of the Jewes and Rulers besides those that came unto us from among the heathen that were about us Now that which was prepared for me daily was an Oxe and six choyce sheep also Fowles were prepared for me and once in ten daies store of all sorts of Wine yea for all this required not I the breed that is the allowance
salary revenue of the Governor observe the ground because the Bondage was Heavy on this people and hath it not been for 17. years space or more and still is as Heavy or Heavier upon us Think upon me my God for good according to all I have done for this people Here was a worthy Governour General Magistrate Souldier really fearing God and tendering the ease liberty welfare of the people in good earnest who with all his Officers and Souldiers for 12. years space together though he and they laboured constantly in building the wall of Jerusalem and he was at so great expence each day for his own Table as Governour yet took no Free-quarter Bread Wine Money Wages or Salary from the people as other Governours Officers before them had done and that because of the fear of God because the bondage was great upon the people expecting only a reward from God I may safer argue from this Scripture Precedent Ergo all our Governours Generals Officers Souldiers fearing God during all our 17 years Wars and as long as they and our bondage shall yet continue are bound to serve their Countrey freely without taking Free-quarter Corn Wine Money wages contributions or Excises from the people and ought not to purchase any Lands and by consequence are thereupon obliged in conscience to make restitution of all the Free-quarter Pay Lands Woods Rents Rewards and publick Revenues they have received for their pay arrears or rewards of service expecting their reward only from God hereafter Than they can from Pauls example conclude that Ministers ought to preach the Gospel freely without wages And so much the rather because Sir William Lewes Mr. Denzill Holles and Col. Walter Long 3. of the XI Members falsly impeached by the Officers and Army An 1647. for engrossing much of the publike Treasure and giving no accompt of what they had received were so generous and truly Noble as in their accompts long before passed and allowed by the Commons house to demand no pay at all the first as Governour of Portsmouth the other as Collonels in the Army under the Earl of Essex Mr. Holles refusing to accept of the thousands voted him out of the Kings revenue for recompence of his former wrongfull imprisonment by the King for his Countries good service in Parliament Whose Precedents their accusers at least are as far bound to imitate in this kind as our Ministers are St. Pauls Upon which considerations I now refer the verity solidity of this argument from Pauls example to the judgements consciences of all Officers Souldiers and others formerly triumphing in it who upon second thoughts must needs disclaime their own Pay and Salaries for the future or else renounce this grand objection as ridiculous and irrational The third Objection is from the 3 Epistle of John vers 5 6 7. Where John writes to Gaius Beloved thou dost faithfully whatsoever thou dost both to the Brethren and to strangers which have born witnesse of thy Charity or Liberalitie before the Church whom if thou bring on forward on their journey thou shalt do well because that for his name sake they went forth taking nothing of the Gentiles Whence some may inferr though I hear not this Text urged by any That Ministers ought now to preach the Gospel freely to the people and to take nothing of them because John mentions some such that in his time preached to the Gentiles taking nothing of them To which I Answer 1. That this Text questionless was meant of Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles and his companions Timothy and Titus who took nothing of the Corinthians 2 Cor. 12.14 15 16 17 18. seeing Gaius was not only St. Pauls companion sometimes being converted baptized by him Act. 19.29 20.4 1 Cor. 1.14 but expresly stiled by him Rom. 16.23 Gaius mine Host and of all the Churches living then at Corinth where Paul preached freely to whose Precedent I have given a full satisfactory answer already 2. It is evident that this Gaius for some time at least lodged Paul and other Brethren being not only faithfull but charitable and liberal towards them though the other Corinthians were not so 3. St. John addes vers 8. We therefore ought to receive such that we might be fellow helpers to the truth wherein he concludes it to be a dutie incumbent upon all Christians to receive encourage accompany be charitable and liberal to the Apostles and Ministers of the Gospel thereby to be fellow-helpers to the truth which otherwise they shall much hinder So as this Scripture fully warrants my Proposition not oppugnes it The fourth Objection is the opinion of our famous English Apostle John Wickliff who held Tithes and Ministers maintenance to be meer alms whose opinion is largely defended by eminent John Hus in Mr. Fox his Acts and Monuments Edit 1640. vol. 1. fol. 602 to 605. Therefore not due to Ministers but detainable or payable only at the meer wills of the people as meer alms to beggars are which are arbitrary Whereto I Answer 1. That Tithes and Ministers maintenance are not pure alms nor so styled by Wickliff Hus Augustine or Chrysostom whom Hus citeth as if Ministers had no right unto them for their pains as a just debt hire wages or as if men might detain them at their pleasure since we are expresly not only exhorted but commanded both in the Law and Gospel to give alms to those that want them and that as Debters to them so far as our Abilities and their Necessities require Rom. 12.10 13 20. 15.27 1 Cor. 16.1 2. 2 Cor. 8. 9. throughout Heb. 13.16 1 Tim. 6.17 18 19. Ephes 4.28 Luke 18.22 23. 19.8 Gal. 2.10 compared with Deut. 15.4 to 12. Exod. 23.11 Levit. 19. Deut. 24.19 Prov. 19.19 22.9 28.27 31.20 Eccles 11.1 Dan. 4.27 Yea the Lawes and Statutes of our Land expresly enforce and compell men to contribute to the Poor as they shall be â—ssâ—ssed as well as to pay Tithes or Taxes as you may read in Rastals Abridgement and Daltons Justice of Peace Title Poor But they are styled by them Pure Alms in three other respects 1. Because they were originally given by people to the Ministers that were needie out of charitie and compassion for Gods sakeâ— as well as for their work sake 2. Because Ministers after their own wants supplied did use to distribute part of them to the poor and needy as alms and are obliged still to do it as Abbots Bishops and others did to whom lands were given in pure and perpetual Frank-almoign 3. Because they are pure alms in respect of God as all other goods of fortune are which we both begg and receive from God And in this respect they write every man as well Kings and Emperours as Ministers Priests people are beggars of God 2. As they stiled Tithes Alms in these respects so they likewise granted Alms to poor people and Tithes to be a Debt for
a young Bullock and seven Rams the same may be a Priest of them that are no Gods But as for us the Lord is our God and we have not forsaken him and the Priests which minister unto the Lord are the Sons of Aaron and the Levites wait upon their business c. For we keep the Charge of the Lord our God but ye have forsaken him And behold God himself is with us for our Captain and his Priests with sounding Trumpets to cry allarum against you The issue of this Atheistical State-policy and Sacrilegious deprivation spoliation of Gods Priests and Levites of their Suburbs Possessions Ministry by Jeroboam and his Sons is very remarkable 1 It brought ruine upon his whole Army though double the number of Abijah his host of whom they had a great advantage by an ambushment God himself smiting him and his host so that they fled before Judah and Abijah and his people slâ—w them with a great slaughter so that there fell down slain of Israel five hundred thousand chosen men 2 Chron. 13.13 to 20. The greatest slaughter in one battel that ever we read of in Sacred or prophane Stories before or since 2. It brought Captivity on his Adherents and people who were brought under at that time pursued and had their Cities taken and plundered v. 18 19. 3. It drew down this misery and fatal Judgement on himself v. 20. Neither did Jeroboam recover strength again in the dayes of Abijah and the Lord strook him and he died 4. It became sin to the house of Jeroboam even to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth 1 Kings 13.33 34. 5. It made all the succeeding Kings of Israel professed Idolaters and most of them bloudy Murtherers Vsurpers Persecutors and produced perpetual successive civil warrs between Judah and Israel 1 Kings 14.30 chap. 15.6 7 16 32. 2 Chron. 28.4 to 12. 6. It brought final captivity ruine and desolation in conclusion to the whole kingdom of Israel and the ten revolting Tribes 2 Kings 17.20 21 22 23. where this sad story is recorded And the Lord rejected all the seed of Israel and afflicted them and delivered them into the hand of spoilers until he had cast them out of his sight For he rent Israel from the house of David And they made Jeroboam the Son of Nebat King of which God thus complains Hos 8.4 They have set up Kings but not by me they have made Princes and I knew it not and Jeroboam drave Israel from following the Lord and made them sin a great sin for the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did they departed not from them untill the Lord removed Israel out of his sight as he had said by all his servants the Prophets So was Israel carried away out of their own Land to Assyria till this Day when as the Kingdom of Judah continued above 134. years after in Davids royal posterity enjoying Gods Priests Levites Prophets and Ordinances till their captivity for their sins in mocking abusing his Messengers Prophets and despising his words 2 Chron. 36.16 17. And then after 70. years captivity they were restored again to their Country re-edified Jerusalem and the Temple and with them the Priests and Levites returning from bondage were restored likewise to their Cities and Glebes of which the Kings of Judah never deprived them as Jeroboam and his Sons and the Kings of Israel who were all Idolaters did whence thus we read Ezra 2.70 So the Priests and the Levites and the Singers and the Porters the Nethinims dwelt in their Cities and all Israel in their Cities Thus seconded Neh. 11.18 20. All the Levites in the holy City were 284. and the residue of Israel of the Priests and Levites were in all the Cities of Judah every Man in his Inheritance and Neh. 13.10 The Levites and Singers that did the work were fled every one to his field In the Prophecie of Ezechiel written during the Jews Captivity in the Land of the Chaldeans Ezech. 1.1 2 3. prophesying of the re-edifiing of the Temple the dimensions and whole fabrick thereof ch 40.1 to 45. we find frequent mention of holy Chambers therein provided for the Priests and their vestments And ch 45.1 to 5. God enjoyns the Israelites by this Prophet upon their restitution to their own Land when they should divide it by Lot for an Inheritance That they should offer an holy portion of the Land an oblation unto the Lord the length thereof twenty five thousand reeds and the breadth ten thousand This shall be holy in all the borders thereof round about Of this there shall be for the Sanctuary 500 reeds in length with 500 in breadth square round about and fifty Cubits round about for the Suburbs thereof Then he addes The holy Portion of the land shall be for the Priests the Ministers of the sanctuary which shall come neer to minister unto the Lord and it shall be a place for their Houses and an holy place for the Sanctuary And the 25000. of length and 10000. of breadth Shall also the Levites the Ministers of the House have for themselves for a possession for twenty Chambers In the 47. Chapter verse 13. to the end of the Prophecy he writes of the bounds and division of the land of Canaan after their restitution according to their several tribes in relation to and imitation of the bounds and division of it formerly made and recited by Joshua out of which there was a special portion reserved for the Priests and Levites as there was in Joshua's division forecited Thus expressed Ezeck 48.8 to 15. And by the border of Judah from the East side unto the West side shall be the offering which they shall offer of 25000. reeds in breadth and in length as one of the other parts from the East side unto the West side and the sanctuary shall be in the midst of it The oblation ye shall offer unto the Lord shall be of 25000. in length and 10000 in breadth And for them even for the Priests shall be this holy Oblation toward the North 25000. in length and toward the West 10000. in breadth and toward the East 10000 in breadth and toward the South 25000 in length and the sanctuary of the Lord shall be in the midst thereof It shall be for the Priests that are sanctified of the sons of Zadock which have kept my charge which went not astray when the children of Israel went astray after Jeroboam and his calves as the Levites went astray And this oblation of the land that is offered shall be unto them a thing most holy by the border of the Levites And over against the border of the Priests the Levites shall have 25000. in length and 10000. in breadth all the length shall be 25000 and the breadth 10000. reeds And they shall not sell of it neither exchange nor alienate the first fruits of the land for it is holy unto
the Lord. From all these Scriptures here recited at large for the Readers fuller satisfaction conviction and ease in turning to them these conclusions undeniably arise 1. That the Priests and Levits had by Gods special command precept oft repeated both Cities Houses Suburbs Lands Glebes designed to setled on them by their brethren out of all the other tribes of Israel for their habitation and the keeping feeding of their Cattel Goods Beasts and that in a very large and bountifull proportion And likewise necessary convenient houses chambers lodgings neer the Temple when first built and when re-edified afterwards which refutes the common errour of those ignorant Simpletons and illiterate New-lights who from Numb 18.20 Deut. 10.9 chap. 18.1 2. The Priests the Levites and all the tribe of Levi shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel they shall eat the offerings of the Lord made by fire and his inheritance Therefore shall they have no inheritance among their brethren the Lord is their inheritance as he hath said unto them Conclude That the Priests and Levites amongst the Israelites had no Cities houses lands suburbs or possessions of their own belonging to their Office and were expresly forbidden by God to receive or enjoy any among their brethren And hence inferr That Ministers of the Gospel ought not to enjoy any Rectories Houses Lands or Glebes Whereas all the forecited Scriptures directly record the contrary and the meaning of these seeming repugnant texts is only this That they should have no inheritance amongst their Brethren in such sort and manner as they had set out altogether in one parcel by Joshua and the rest who divided the land amongst the tribes by lot which would have hindred them from their duties but only a subsequent assignment of certain Cities houses and suburbs seattered and divided one from another in and out of every tribes inheritance that so they might perform their offices with more ease and be alwayes ready at hand in every tribe to teach and instruct the people upon all occasions 2. That the inheritance of the Cities houses and suburbs which they enjoyed were not reputed their own proper inheritance though they enjoyed the possession and profits thereof but Gods inheritance as a thing devoted and dedicated unto God himself and therefore stiled by Ezekiel an Oblation unto God and an holy portion as Histories Divines Common Civil and Canon Lawyers stile all our Rectories Church-lands and Glebes with the Charters that first setled them being given and consecrated Deo et Ecclesiae an oblation unto God and the Church 3. That these endowments and Glebes of theirs were called reputed Gods own Portion and Inheritance 1. Because given by his special command and appointment by all the tribes 2. Because originally consecrated devoted to God and to his Priests and Ministers onely in Gods right for his sake 3. Because given to promote Gods worship service glory and for an habitation support to Gods own Priests and Levites imployed wholly in his immediate service 4. That they were expresly prohibited to be sold exchanged or alienated by the Priests Levites or any others because they were reserved by and given unto God himself as an holy Portion and Oblation and to the Priests and Levites for a perpetual possâ—ssion in regard of the perception of the profits the inheritance of them residing only in God himself Therfore not possible to be justly and lawfully sold exchanged or alienated by the Priests Levites or any other mortal Powers whatsoever who could claim no power right property or disposing interest in or over them against Gods own Soveraign and sacred title 5. That these Cities Suburbs Glebes were ratably set out in and by every tribe in an equal proportion according to the multitude or paucity of their Cities as a Tenth of their Cities and lands to which their 48 Cities and Suburbs amounted as some probably conceive And yet besides these 48 Cities there were Houses and Schools of Prophets and Prophets children in nature of our Universities in Bethel and in Jericho 2 Kings 2.3 4 5 7 to 24. chap. 6.1 2 3 4. which were none of these 48 Cities 6. That none of the Kings and Princes of Judah though many of them were Idolatrous wicked and put to great extremities to raise monies to pay their Armies and Tributes to forein Invaders and Conquerors did yet ever attempt to sell or alienate the Cities Suburbs or revenues of the Priests and Levites to maintain their warrs or pay publike Debts or tributes though King Asa Jehoash Hezekiah by way of loan made bold with the Silver and Gold in the treasure of the Lords house in cases of publike extremity which might be and was afterwards re-paid 1 Kings 15.18 cap. 18.15 2 Chron. 16.2 Yea the Scripture expresly records that in the great famine in Aegypt when all others sold their lands to buy bread to King Pharaoh only the Lands of the Priests bought he not For the Priests had a Portion assigned them of Pharaoh and did eat their portion which Pharaoh gave them wherefore they sold not their Lands Gen. 47.20 to 27. 7. That the Idolatrous usurper Jeroboam out of a carnal fear and policy to keep the people from returning to their rightfull Soveraign and establish the crown on himself and his Posterity was the first man we read of and his Idolatrous sons and successors after him who cast out Gods Priests and Levites out of their offices and then out of their Cities Suburbs and Possessions which he enforced them to desert though we read not that they sold them to maintain their Warrs or pay Soldiers arrears who thereupon repaired to Jerusalem to Rehoboam the right heir and after them out of all the tribes of Israel such as set their hearts to seek the Lord God of Israel came to Jerusalem to enjoy Gods Ordinances strengthned Rehoboam and his kingdom against this persecuting usurper 2 Chron. 11.13 to 18. 8. That this his casting out of the Priests and Levites from their Offices and Pâ—ssâ—ssions making Priests of the lowest of the People and suffering every one that would to consecrate himself a Priest without a lawfull call is objected against Jeroboam by Abijah as a very high crime and provocation against God and the maintaining encouraging of Gods lawfull Priests and Levites in their Offices and setled possessions alleged by him as a certain argument of Gods presence with him and so with any other King and people and of victory successe in conclusion against sacrilegious Usurpers 9. That when Gods lawfull Priests and Levites are deprived of their Glebes and Possessions we must presently expect a base contemptible time-serving Idolatrous ignorant Priestood Jeroboams Golden Calves with their new Feasts and Sacrifices and a universal inundation of Idolatry wickedness prophanness to ensue with all the forementioned calamities which befell Ieroboams Army adherents subjects Person Family Kingdom which the Lord now set home on all our hearts that we may
brought away the Hallowed things out of mine House and also have given them unto the Levite c. According to all thy Commandements which thou hast commanded me I have not transgressed thy Commandements neither have I forgotten them I have not eaten thereof in my mourning neither have I taken away ought thereof for my Vnclean Vse nor given ought thereof for the dead but I have hearkened to the Voice of the Lord my God And have done according to all that thou hast commmanded me Look down from thy Holy Habitation from Heaven And bless thy people Israel and the Land which thou hast given us a Land that floweth with milk and honey Such a conscientious true payment of Tithes as this according to all Gods Commandements without the least Substraction or embezlement emboldens enables every particular man to make such a Prayer to God as this not only for himself but for the whole Land brings a blessing upon himself and all the Realm yea makes it a Land flowing with milk and honey and abundance of all rich blessings Besides we read in 2 Chr. 31.1 to 15. That when godly King Hezekiah had destroyed Idolatry and appointed the Courses of the Priests and Levites after their Courses every man according to his service he brought â—urings and Peace-offerings to minister and to give thanks and to praise in all the Gates of the Tents of the Lord He appointed also the Kings portion of his Substance for the burnt-offerings for the morning and evening for the Sabbaths the new Moons and set Feasts moreover he commanded the people that dwelt in Jerusalem To give the Portion of the Priests and the Levites that they might be encouraged in the Law of the Lord. And as soon as the Commandement came abroad the children of Israel brought in abundance the first Fruits of Corn Wine Oyl and Honey and of all the encrease of the field and the Tithes of all things brought they in abundance And concerning the children of Israel and Judah that dwelt in the Cities of Judah They also brought in the Tithes of Oxen and Sheep and the Tithe of holy things which were dedicated unto the Lord their God and laid them by heaps In the third moneth they began to lay the foundation of the heaps and finished them in the seventh moneth and when Hezekiah and the Princes came and saw the heaps they blessed the Lord and his People Israel Then Hezekiah questioned with the Priests and Levites concerning the heaps And Azariah the chief Priest of the House of Zadok answered him and said Since the People began to bring the Offerings into the house of the Lord We have had enough to eat and have left Plenty But did the people grow poor thereby no but much richer than before for the Lord hath blessed his people and that which is left is this great store Then Hezekiah commanded to prepare Chambers or store-houses in the house of the Lord and they prepared them and brought in the Offerings and the Tithes and the dedicate things faithfully over which Cononiah the Levite was Ruler How different was this practice of all the people and godly Saints in those daies in a chearfull bringing in their Tithes and Oblations to the Priests and Levites in abundance for their encouragement which caused King Hezekiah his Princes the Priests Levites and God himself to bless them from the sacrilegious practice of Tith-detaining Hypocritical Saints Anabaptists Quakers Sectaries and Christians in our daies who shall never receive such a blessing as this from God or good men but their curses If these Texts and Presidents will not move such hard-hearted men let them consider both this â—â—â—cept and promise of God Prov. 3.9 10. Honour the Lord with thy Substance and with the first fruits of thine encrease So shall thy Barns be filled with Plenty and thy Press shall burst out with new Wine And Mal 3.7 10 11 12. Return unto me and I will return unto you saith the Lord of hosts but ye said Wherein shall we return Bring ye all the Tithes into the Store-house that there may be meat in mine house and prove me now herewith saith the Lord of Hosts If I will not open you the windows of heaven and powr you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to receive it And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground neither shall your Vine cast her fruit before her time in the field saith the Lord of Hosts And all nations shall call you blessed for ye shall be a delight some land saith the Lord of Hosts What Christians heart though never so covetous and worldly should not these sacred promises of God the last of them recorded in the last of all the Books and Prophets in the Old Testament they being not meerly Levitical and Judaical but of eternal verity use and evangelical too excite and engage most cheerfully to pay and bring in all their Tithes and Dues to Gods Ministers now as well as to the Priests and Levites heretofore Christ himself having made like parallel promises of blessings and rewards for relieving and maintaining his Ministers in the Gospel Mat. 10.40 41 42. Mark 9.41 Phil. 4.18 19 9. That the due payment of Tithes to Gods Priests and Levites was a great encouragement to them in the law of the Lord and in the diligent execution of their duties 2 Chron. 31.3 4 5 10. And on the contrary The with-holding of them from them a great discouragement necessitating them to desert their duties and functions witnesse that memorable Text Neh. 13.10 11 12. And I perceived that the portions of the Levites had not been given them mark the consequence For the Levites and the Singers that did the work were fled every one to his field Then contended I with the Rulers and said Why is the house of God forsaken and I gathered them together and set them in their place Then brought all Judah the Tithes of the Corn and the new Wine and the Oyl unto their treasuries And I made treasurers over the treasuries Shelemiah the Priest and Zadock the Scribe and of the Levites Pedajah c. for they were counted faithfull and their office was to distribute unto their Brethren Which reason still continuing under the Gospel in relation to the Ministers and Preachers thereof Heb 13.16 17. Phil. 4.10 to 21. is a strong argument to engage all true Christians desiring the propagation of the Gospel and a painfull able Ministry duly to pay their tithes and portions to them 10. That it was the bounden duty care of Religious Kings and Governours amongst Gods own people when the people were backwards to pay and bring their Tithes and duties to the Priests and Levites to command and enforce them to do it by special Covenants and Oaths sealed subscribed by the Princes and people Neh. 9.38 cap. 10.1 to the end and likewise by positive Ordinances
sacrilegiously attempt to rob God himself and plunder his faithfull Ministers of this their ancient just hereditary sacred setled Maintenance to which our Ministers have a far ancienter better Right Title by all Laws of God and Man than they have to their new acquired Purchases and Powers established setled on them by particular Donors and Benefactors out of their own private Inheritances and Estates not the Republicks which neither the Patrons themselves nor any others nor yet the Ministers themselves can alienate from the Church as their own consciences judgements must acknowledge unlesse strangely cauterized Let them and Canne answer to that Soveraign Judge of all the Earth who will probably judge them here and shall certainly judge them eternally hereafter for all such detestable Robberies and violent Rapines if wilfully perpetrated and persevered in without repentance after timely admonition who can quickly strip both them and theirs naked of all their temporal Powers Honours Possessions Enjoyments as he did Jeroboam and his Sonnes for their turning the Priests and Levites out of their Possessions and King Ahab with his Family for seising upon Naboths Vineyard in a violent and unrighteous manner though coloured over to delude the people with an hypocritical Fast and feigned legal proceedings 1 Kings 21. We read it recorded of our Saviour Luke 12.13 14. that when one of the company said unto him Master speak to my brother that he divide the Inheritance with me He returned him this answer Man who made me a Iudge or Divider over you Let every person now sollicited by croaking Anabaptists Jesuits Quakers Souldiers or others not only to judge and divide but utterly to abolish and take away our Ministers necessary Maintenance not unnecessary Abbots or Prelates Lordly superfluities long since dissipated by Glebes and Tithes return them the self-same answer lest Christ himself at the last day condemn them for over-bold intruders into such a Supream Jurisdiction over his and his Ministers Rights and Callings too as neither God nor Man ever yet conferred on them God himself prohibiting the sale alienation substraction of his Priests and Levites necessary Glebes Tithes and by consequence of our Ministers as I have formerly observed and further informing all his that it is a snare to a man to devour holy things and after Vows to make enquiry Prov. 20.25 But of this second Argument enough the Negative part whereof I shall prove more fully hereafter by way of answer to an Objection 13. I shall make good the Proposition by arguments drawn from the New Testament it self which no wayes contradicts but confirms the lawfullness of Tithes This I have already proved from Heb. 7.1 to 12. to which I shall refer the Reader and proceed to other Texts I shall begin with Mat. 23.23 24. Luke 11.42 Woe unto you Scribes and Pharisees Hypocrites for ye pay Tithes of Mint and Annise and Cummin and all manner of Herbs and have omitted the weightier things of the Law Judgement Mercy and Faith and the love of God These ought ye to have done and not to leave the other undone Ye blind Guides which strain at a Gnat and swallow a Camel In which words our Saviour himself though he denounceth a Woe against the Hypocritical Pharisees in beeing just and carefull in paying Tithes even of Herbs and Seeds of all sorts of meanest value and yet in the mean time neglecting works of Righteousness in matters of greater worth of Charity towards man and of Faith and Love toward God himself straining at a Gnat and swallowing a Camel yet he positively resolves that they ought not to omit the due and conscientious payment even of these lesser Tithes of smallest value much lesse then of their Corn Wine Oyl Flocks Herds which were of greater worth And if the Scribes and Pharisees were no Saints but Hypocrites for omitting these weightier duties though they paid these smallest Tithes what are these Anabaptistical and other Sectarian Scribes and Pharisees who not only against all Rules of Justice and Charity towards men but of Faith and Love to God which they even renounce rob God and his Ministers not onely of all their own Tithes small as well as great but of those Tithes which others would willingly pay them and endevour totally to deprive them of those small Rectories Glebes they yet enjoy and of their Ministry too and when they have stript them stark naked of all they have would eat their very flesh and burn them with fire Certainly such are worser and greater Hypocrites than the Scribes and Pharises pretending Conscience it self for their most unconscionable dealing in this kinde Such mens throats are so wide that they can swallow not only Camels but whole Rectories Churches Steeples with their Lead Timber Bells Stone to say no more for a Breakfast all Tithes in two or three Parishes and throughout the Land for a Dinner and the publick Lands Revenues of the Crown which should defray all ordinary publick charges for the peoples ease for a Supper that they may be Supreme and every one of them like our Saviour Christ himself both a Priest Prophet and a King executing a Plurality of these three and other Offices and their Callings too all at once to enrich themselves faster than all other men This Text was much insisted on by John Hus to prove Tithes under the Gospel to be pure Alms coupling it with the former verse Luke 11.41 But rather give Alms of such things as you have and behold all things are clean unto you But certainly the Text it self proves that this referrs only to the washing mentioned in the precedent verses not to this subsequent clause concerning their payment of Tithes never stiled Almes in any Text and recorded by Matthew as a distinct Woe and Sentence of it self without any mention of Almes in the Antecedent or Subsequent verses and John Hus himself together with Augustine Chrysostom Hierom and Aquinas there cited by him from hence conclude That Tithes are lawfull under the Gospel as well as alms forsomuch as the Gift thereof unto the Priest did not cease in the time of Christ and Saint Augustine in his 219 Sermon of Paying Tithes presseth the payment of them under the Gospel as a Duty by many enforcing arguments before any Popes Decretals for payment of them or that we now call Popery was known in the world Saint Ambrose before him doing the like In Sermâ—ne Quadragesimae cited by Gratian Causa 16. qu. 7. and St. Cyprian before them both Which had John Canne either known or considered he would not with so much mistaken Ignorance and Impudence have damned Tithes as POPISH c. And the pleading for them as a pleading for Babylon and for BAAL in his New Second Voice from the Temple of Babylon or Baal which he pleaseth not of Old or New Jerusalem The next Gospel Text I shall cite is that of Gal. 6.6 Let him that is taught in the word communicate to him that
Levitical Priests themselves especially after their abolition as he was a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck to whom Abraham himself and the Levites then in his loins paid Tithes of all Heb. 7.1 to 15. of which at large before Therefore he had a just Right to receive Tithes from them both before the institution and after the abolition of the Levitical Priesthood which he might have lawfully claimed exercised and his Apostles likewise in his Right though they did it not We read that Christ had a just Right Title by Inheritance and lineal descent from his Father King David to the Temporal Crown and Kingdome of Judah being therefore said by the Wise men Mat. 2.2 to be born King of the Iews an unanswerable Argument for the lawfullnesse Excellency of Hereditary Titles to Crowns and Kingdomes before that of Election only wherewith I frequently silenced vapouring Souldiers against Hereditary Kingship being the very Title of Christ himself both to his Spiritual and Temporal Kingdome and that which God instituted amongst his Church people as the best surest of all other taken up by most Heathen Nations Now though Christ neither claimed nor exercised this his Temporal Right but avoided it when the people would have made him King by force John 6.15 who yet after cryed him up for the King of Israel John 12.13 15. which even Pilate himself acknowledged when he said unto the Jews Behold your King demanded of them Shall I crucifie your King and wrote fixed this Title on his Crosse Iesus of Nazareth King of the Iews John 19.14 15 19. will or can John Canne or any other of his antimonarchical confederates hence justly infer that it was unlawfull for Christ himself Right Heir by Descent to his Hereditary Temporal Kingdome kept and thrust out thereof by usurping Herod who murthered all the infants in Bethlehem and the Coasts thereof that were two years old and under and would have murthered our Saviour himself to secure his own usurped Power Mat. 2.13 16. such is the bloody cruelty Jealousie of Usurpers to have claimed or exercised this his just Hereditary Right to the Crown or unlawfull for the people to have thrust out this bloody Intruder Herod by force from his usurped Authority and made Christ King as they intended or because Christ did then voluntarily forbear relinquish his Temporal Right to Herod will it thence necessarily follow that it is therefore unlawfull for any other Hereditary Christian King or Right Heir to a Crown kept from or thrust out of his Throne Kingdome by armed violence against the generality of his peoples desires by any aspiring usurping Herod to lay claim to his Crown Kingdome or for the faithfull natural born Subjects according to their duty Oathes Allegiance to endeavour by all lawfull means and open force to expell dethrone such Herods and Crown set up their lawfull Soveraign on the Throne of the Kingdome Doubtlesse they cannot be so absurdly stupid to affirm it seeing Jehoiadah the high Priest the Captains of Hundreds Levites Souldiers and people too thrust out and slew with the sword Athaliah the bloody Usurper of the Kingdome and Throne of Judah in the second year of her Usurpation crowned Joash the Kings Son King as the Lord had said of the Sons of David and set him upon the Throne of the Kingdome whereupon all the people of the Land rejoyced and the City was quiet as is recorded at large to their eternal Honour by God himself and for others imitation in the like case 2 Chron. 23. and 2 Kings 11. The rather because all other men by our Laws may justly lay claim to and repossesse themselves of such Lands Houses Goods as others forcibly detain or take from them against all Law Right notwithstanding Christs Non-claim to his Rightful Crown Therefore by the self-same Reason our Ministers of the Gospel now may lawfully challenge and take Tithes from the people though Christ and his Apostles did it not albeit they had a just Right and Title to them which they might have exercised had they pleased without Sin or Judaism as our Ministers do now as Paul resolves in 1 Cor. 9.4 5 6 15 18. To clear which Right from Judaism and all other cavils beyond all contradiction I shall cite only two Prophecies relating joyntly to Christs Kingdom and Ministers under the Gospel The first is Jer. 33.15 to the end In those dayes and at that time will I cause the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David and he shall execute Righteousnesse and Judgement in the Land In those days shall Judah be saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely and this is the name wherewith he shall be called The Lord our Righteousness For thus saith the Lord David shall never want a man to sit upon the Throne of the house of Israel Neither shall the Priests the Levites want a man before me to offer Burnt-Offerings and to kindle Meat-Offerings and to do Sacrifices continually Thus saith the Lord if you can break my Covenant of the day and my Covenant of the night so that there should not be day and night in their season then may also my Covenant be broken with David my Servant that he should not have a Son to reign upon his Throne therefore our Covenants Oaths to our Kings their Heirs and Successors should be as stable as inviolable and strictly observed as Gods to David and his Posterity Ps 89.3 4 34. Ps 132.11 12. Hebr. 6.17 18. Ps 15.4 Eccles 8.2 Gal. 3.15 17. and with the Levites the Priests my Ministers As the host of heaven cannot be numbred neither the sand of the Sea measured so will I multiply the seed of David my Servant and the Levites that minister unto me c. The second is Isa 66.18 to 20. I will gather all nations and tongues and they shall come and see my Glory and I will set a Sign among them and I will send those that escape of them unto the Nations and to Tarshish c. and to the Isles afar off whereof England is chief and principally intended And they shall bring all your Brethren for an Offering unto the Lord out of all Nations upon Horses and in Chariots and in Litters and upon Mules and upon swift Beasts to my holy Mountain in Jerusalem saith the Lord as the Children of Israel bring an Offering in a clean Vessel unto the House of the Lord And I will also take of them for Priests and for Levits saith the Lord From which Texts I shall observe 1. That as Christs Title to his everlasting Spiritual Kingdom under the Gospel over all the converted Gentiles as well as Jews is expresly set forth to be neither elective nor by conquest but by DESCENT HEIRSHIP and lineal succession after the flesh from King David Whence he is stiled Heir of all things Heb. 1.12 And the Lord shall give unto him THE THRONE OF HIS FATHER DAVID and HE shall reign over the House of
bellariis 5ly Repairs of this Temple from time to time out of the residue of the profits of these Lands 6ly An imprecation of divine revenge upon the Neglecters or refusers of the due payment of these annual Tithes to Diana and of the residue of the profits towards the reparation of her Temple The seventh is the memorable domestick President of Cedwalla one of our West-Saxon Kings who though a Pagan and great Plunderer even before he became a Christian or was baptised was so pious that he gave the Tenth of all his Spoyles of War and Plunders unto God about the year of our Lord 686. Which William of Malmesbury thus records Arduum memoratu est quantum etiam ante Baptismum inserviret ut omnes manubias quas jure praedatorio in usus suos transcripserat Deo decimaret In quo etsi approbamus affectum in paying Tithes improbamus exemplum in regard of his plundering Yea our venerable Beda records that such was his transcendent liberality and bounty to Gods Church and Ministers that after his Conquest of the Isle of Weight he gave to Walfred and his Clerks for the Lords use the fourth part of the Island to wit 300 Plowlands of 1200. and the fourth part of the Spoyl thereof in performance of his Vow made before his regeneration in Christ that if he conquered the Isle Quartam ejus partem fimul et praedae Deo daret Let Iohn Canne with all the several irreligious Sects and Sacrilegious Regiments of our present Tith-Oppugners Detainers Substracters seriously consider these Pagan Presidents to inform their Judgments reform their practices lest they rise up in judgement against them here to their temporal and hereafter to their eternal condemnation And if after due meditation on them their Consciences shall not secretly check censure condemn them for substracting their Tithes from God himself and his faithfull Ministers as well as some of these Pagans Consciences did them for detaining their Tithes from their Idol-Gods and Priests against the Law of Natures dictate engraven in their hearts but still pretend Conscience against the due payment of them and that out of their Gains or Spoyles of War as well as their other increase they have just cause to fear and others to suspect that their Consciences are most desperately cauterized and the Law of Nature more dangerously obliterated out of their hearts than out of these Idolatrous Pagans 5ly Agobardus who flourished Anno 830. lib. de Dispensatione c. Rei Ecclesiasticae contra Sacrilegos p. 266. Hugo de Sancto victore Erud Theol. de Sacramentis l. 1. parte 12. c. 4. lib. 2. part 9. c. 10. part 10. c. 5. and Annot. Eluc in Genes c. 4. Petrus Commestor Hist Scholast in Genes c. 26 Petrus Blesensis Epist 82. Gerold Bishop of Oldenburge in his Epistle to the Inhabitants of Wagria Helmoldus Hist Solavorum p. 92. positively affirm and since them Sir James Semple in his Sacriledge sacredly handled Stephen Nettles in his Answer to the Jewish part of Mr. Selden and Mr. Richard Mountague in his Diatribae p. 211. to 250. largely argue and assert That from the beginning of Mankind Tithes were instituted and appoin to be paid by God who instructed Adam himself and he his two Sons Kain and Abel and they their Posterity to pay Tithes and First-fruits to God of all their Increase That the First-fruits Abel offered unto God were no other but his Tithes or the Tenth of his Flocks increase That the sin of Cain causing God to reject his Offering was this That he offered to God the worst and lesse than the Tenth of the Fruits of the Ground giving him not the full proportion of the TENTH and best of his Increase as Abel did which they ground on Gen. 4.7 thus translated by the Septuagint whom Philo the Jew and the Greek Fathers generally follow If thou offer Rightly and DIVIDE NOT UPRIGHTLY in giving me my TENTH thou hast sinned hold thy peace and on Hebr. 11.4 by Faith Abel offered unto God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Vulgar Latin renders Plurimam Hostiam other Translators Vberius Sacrificium and the English A better or more excellent Sacrifice and that for quantity as well as quality than Kain This I thought fit to mention as a probable conjecture not an infallible verity To back this opinion Robert Grosted our learned Bishop of Lincoln in his Book De Cessatione Legalium written about the year 1240. p. 95 96. determines Lex naturalis exigit ut Benefactori de Bonis quae gratis dederit gratis rependatur honor veneratio unde Decimarum oblatio de Lege est naturali quia de bonis acceptis cum debeatur lege naturali repensio honoris minus quà m pars minima id est Decima quia ultra Denarium numerus non est rependi non potest Master Mountague in his Diatribae Chapter 3. page 245 246 247 c. Doctor Sclater Dr. Tillesty and others observe That God only wise being a God of Order not of Confusion doing all things in order number and due proportion hath amongst all other Numbers specially fixed upon a TENTH And thereupon the Antients heretofore both Natural Legal Pagan and Christian led by a natural and divine instinct thereunto have ever principally insisted on a TENTH in all their divine sacred Rites Mysteries Dues reserved by or rendered of them to their Gods and in all their publick civil Taxes Tributes Customes Duties imposed by or paid to their Emperors Kings Princes and Supreme Magistrates Hence God saith expresly All Tithes are the Lords Levit. 27.30 c. And how his Not by Couâ—tesie or Tolleration not by Purchase or Stipulation not by Compensation or Annexation not by Benevolence or mens free Donation but by original Right of Creation in producing every thing in its kind and of absolute Soveraign Dominion expressed in the word LORDS as a universal Rent service or acknowledgement reserved by God himself the Supreme Land-lord of all the Earth from Adam and all his Posterity to the end of the world when he gave them the Earth to inhabit and manure as mere Tenants at will under him He that is I AM himself Qui cepit nunquam desinet numquam bâ—ing vitae essentiae interminabilis tota simul perfecta possessio in aeterno suo consummato EVER POSSESSED TITHES as well as the seventh day which he saith is HIS SABBATH SINCE THEY HAD BEING which are indeed his ab aeterno suo inchoato In this Tithes were Gods not only at the time when he first challenged them by an expresse written Law and Reservation Levit. 27.30 31 32 c. but long before even when Abraham paid them and before that ever since the time of the Creation that God made any thing tithable to increase out of the earth for the use of man The time never was that Tithes were not Gods nor shall ever be that they shall cease to be his
6. c. 3. 5 E. 6 c 2. 7 E. 6. c. 11.1 Phil. Mar. c. 6.5 Eliz. c. 3.14 Eliz. c. 3.18 Eliz c. 3.22 Eliz. c. 11.23 Eliz. c. 3.31 Eliz. c. 10.35 Eliz. c. 7. 43 Eliz. c. 2. as Dalton and other Justices of Peace Tit. Poor Maimed Souldiers Therefore admit Tithes mere Alms as some would have them yet when and where detained they may be as justly levyed and recovered by coercive Laws and Statutes as Alms to the Poor and those who condemn coercive Laws for Tithes as unbeseeming the Gospel must Tax and Repeal all Laws for the Poor and for Maimed Souldiers too as such which I presume they will not do 5ly I suppose neither Canne himself who receives pay as a Chaplain to the Army out of publick Contributions from the people not from voluntary contributions of the Souldiers and all other Officers and Swordmen oppugning the coercive Maintenance of our Ministers by Tither or otherwise will maintain even unto death that the People even against their wills and Consciences too may be enforced to pay Monthly Taxes and Excises amounting to twenty times more each year than all the Ministers Tithes in England by coercive Orders and Ordinances though not made in a full free or old English Parliament nor warranted by so many indisputable Acts of Parliament as Ministers Tithes and Dues and levyed by Imprisonments Distresses Forfeitures armed violence and free quartering of Souldiers on the people though adjudged High Treason in Straffords Case in full Parliament for which he lost his Head our Ministers therefore being real Spiritual Souldiers of Jesus Christ even by the Gospels Resolution and not to go a warfare at any time on their own free cost but upon the Peoples pay wages as due to them as any Souldiers which I have formerly proved they must by the self same reason acknowledge the levying enforcing of the payment of their less Burdensom and more legal necessarie Tithes for the defence and preservation of the very Gospel Religion Gods Glory and Mans Salvation once a year by penalties forfeitures imprisonments or distresses when obstinately detained or else disclaim their own coercive Contributions first to maintain unchristian bloodie wars between Christians of the same Religion in firm unity and amity with us which are not so necessarie or commendable amongst Christians who should live peaceably with all men not make a last Trade of war Love as Brethren Lay down their Lives one for another Yea love and pray for their Enemies not murder or destroy them and beat all their Swords into Plowshares and their spears into Pruning Hooks not lifting up Sword Nation against Nation as now they do to the peril of the Gospel reproach and slaunder and learn war no more as is the Spiritual warfare of our Ministers against the World Flesh Sin Devil and all Errors Blasphemies Corruptions for the eternal Salvation not Destruction of mens Souls and Bodies too 6ly We find it long since prophecied in the Old Testament in relation to the calling to the Gentiles by and under the Gospel Isay 49.23 That the KINGS of the Gentiles should become Nursing-Fathers and their Queens Nursing-Mothers to the Church Isay 60.9 10. Surely the Isles shall wait for me and the Ships of Tarshish first to bring my Sons from far their Silver and their Gold with them And the Sons of Strangers shall build up the walls and their Kings shall minister unto thee Psal 72.10 11. The Kings of Tarshish and of the Isles shall bring Presents the Kings of Sheba and Seba shall offer Gifts yea all Kings shall down before him and then all Nations shall serve him Thus seconded in the New Testament Rev 21.24 where it is prophecied of the Heavenly Jerusalem the Church of Christ the Kings of the Earth do bring their Glory unto it Which Prophecies concerning Kings and likewise Kings of Isles in particular and no other sorts of Governors which is observable have been most eminently verified of the Kings and Queens of this Isle and Realm of Britain beyond all the Kings Queens Regions Isles and Kingdoms in the world besides to the eternal Honour of that late rejected abjured form of Kingly Government derived from Gods own form of Kingly Government over the whole world and of Christs Royal Government over his Church both Militant and Triumphant and of this our Isle where God blessed our Church and Kingdom 1. with three such worthy Heathen Kings in Succession Arviragus Marius and Coylus who though they embraced not the Christian Faith here preached soon after our Saviours Ascension by James the Son of Zebedee Simon Zelotes Peter Paul Aristobulus and Philips twelve Disciples wherof Joseph of Aramathaea who honourably interred our Saviour was chief Yet they courteously entertained them permitted them freely to preach the Gospel to their people gave publick entertainment to the persecuted Christians resorting hither as to a safe and peaceable Sanctuary when they were forcibly expelled out of all other Kingdoms and Countries throughout the world and Roman Empire by bloody Persecutors bestowed Lands and a comfortable Maintenance on the Preachers of the Gospel at Glastonbury where they built the first Christian Church in the world and were the first Kings and Kingdoms in the world who gave publique Reception Protection Countenance Maintenance to the Preachers and Professors of the Gospel as not only our own Historians but two forein Writers namely Polydore Virgil Hist Angl. l. 2. and Cardinal Baronius himself Annal. Tom. 1. An. 95. n. 5. with Spondanus in his Epitome of him records 2ly With the first Christian King we read of publickly baptised professing and establishing the Christian Faith builded endowed Churches and Ministers with Glebes and other Maintenance to wit our famous King Lucius who about the year 187. as Matthew Paris Matthew Westminster the History of Rochester and others record Possessiones et Territoria Ecclesiis et viris Ecclesiasticis abundanter conferens Chartis Munimentis omnia communivit Ecclesias vero cum suis Coemiteriis ita constituit esse Liberas ut quicunque Malefactor ad illa confugeret illaesus ab omnibus remaneret a good Policy at that time to draw Pagans to frequent the Church and hear the word to convert them both from their Paganism and evil Lives He not only giving all the Lands and Possessions belonging to the Pagan Temples and Priests to the Churches and Ministers of the Christians Sed quia majorem honorem illis impendere debuerat augmentavit illas amplioribus agris et mansis omnique libertate sublimavit as Galfridus Monmuniensis and Gervasius Tilburiensis affirm Here was a true Nursing Father indeed to Gods Church and Ministers 3ly With the first Christian Queen we read of in all the world to wit Queen Helena Daughter and Heir to King Coel and Mother to Constantine the Great who was a carefull Nursing Mother and Bountifull Benefactor to the Church and Ministers
of Christ as Eusebius in the life of Constantine Ambrose Oratio in Obitum Theodosii Baronius in his Annals and Speed in his History of Great Britain p. 156. record Whence she was stiled in antient Inscriptions Venerabilis ET PIISSIMA AUGUSTA both for her extraordinary Piety and her converting of Constantius her Husband to the love and protection of the Christian Religion and the Professors of it who by her means creeping out of the Dens and Caves wherein they were hid began to exercise their Devotions publickly and TO RE-EDIFIE THE OLD RUINATE CHURCHES which Dioclesian the persecuting Emperour had levelled to the very ground in all places and TO ERECT NEW She herself at her own cost erecting a Stately Church over our Saviours Sepulchre at Jerusalem famous till this very day 4ly With the first Christian Emperor in the world even that famous Constantine the Great born and elected Emperour in this Island educated in the Christian Faith by his pious Mother the best the Greatest Nursing Father the Church of God ever yet enjoyed in the world For first He destroyed the two Grand Persecutors of the Christian Religion Maxentius and Licinius with their Adherents and demolished all the Idol-Gods and Monuments of Idolatry throughout his Dominions 2ly He reduced all the exiled Christians driven out of their Countries into desolate Islands Caves Dens Desarts restored them their lost Possessions established Christian Magistrates throughout his Empire encouraged protected the Christians in all places in the publick Profession of their Religion and suppressed the Heresies and Schismes that sprung up amongst them by Councils and publick Edicts 3ly He caused all the Churches in this Isle and elsewhere which by the Decrees of Dioclesian were levelled in all places to the very ground which some Atheistial Anabaptists and Jesuitical Incendiaries even in these pretended glorious times of Piety and Reformation endeavour to do again to be re-edified and new ones to be founded throughout his Dominions himself erecting most Magnificent Temples to Gods honour as King David did out of holy zeal and love to God not Popish superstition as some now censure it 2 Chron. 22 5. c. 29.1 2 3. both in Rome it self Ierusalem Hostia Neapolis Hirapolis Constantinople and other Cities endowing them with ample possessions and all other Churches with convenient Glebes Mansions and Revenues 4ly He encouraged protected advanced Godly Ministers Learning and Religion by setling a competent maintenance on them both for their livelihood and encouragement most preferring esteeming rewarding the best deserving of them And by this means so laid the foundation of the Christians security and the Churches maintenance that the same hath stood under the Protection of Christian Kings and Princes ever since And albeit many Caesars his Successors have often attempted to shake it by their Authorities and the sharp Instruments of Heretiques have dangerously undermined it yet hath it born out the storms of all their boisterous assayes and stood in the strength that this Emperor first laid it as Speed and others observe And for these blessed fruits of this prime Nursing Father of Gods Church he had then and ever after these most Glorious Titles conferred on him by the Christians and Ecclesiastical Writers Most Blessed Emperour most Pious Sacred Divine Most happy Redeemer and Restorer of Romes City and the whole World from Paganism Tyranny Persecution and founder of the Churches Peace Which those shall never enjoy who labour to demolish and extirpate what he thus founded and established 5ly God hath blessed our Church and Isle as Io. Capgrave in his Prologue Sir Hen. Spelman in his Epist Dedicatory to his Councils and the Author of Fasciculus Temporum record with more Kings Queens who for their extraordinary Piety incredible Zeal liberal Alms manifold works of Mercy incomparable Humility and contempt of the World their munificent magnificent and admirable Bounty to the Ministers and Saints of God and in building adorning endowing Churches with Tithes and Glebes and some of them for suffering Martyrdome for defence of Religion by Pagan Invaders were justly Reputed and Kalendred in the Church of God for Saints though infected with some superstititions of those blinder times which the age wherein they lived may excuse and their other vertues over-ballance and delete than any other Isle Region or Kingdom throughout the world how Great or Populous soeber There being no less than Twelve of our antient Saxon Kings Crowned with Martyrdom by Infidels and Ten of them Canonized for Saints for their transcendent Holiness and no less than thirty Kings and Queens within 200 years space who laying down the Height of their worldly Power Crowns and Glory that they might gain heaven by force betook themselves to a devout retired religious Life according to the devotion of those times in some private Monasteries for the most part builded and endowed by themselves or else went as Pilgrims to Rome then reputed famous for Her Piety Besides multitudes of the Royal Progeny who followed their examples both in their Piety Charity and Bounty to the Church And amongst others of our antient Kings King Ethelwolfe gave not only the Tenth out of all his goods and Chattels but likewise of all the Lands and Houses of his whole Realm to the Church His Sonne incomparable King Alfred founder or at least Restorer and Enlarger of our famous Vniversity of Oxford though he was for the most part taken up with Warres and Military affairs by reason of the Danes invasions fighting no lesse than 52. set battels with them for the most part with glorious success yet out of an Ardent zeal to God in emulation of Zacheus he gave no lesse than half of his annual Rents and spoils of war besides in pious uses to wit for relieving the poor both at home and abroad for maintaining rewarding Scholars Ministers building schools of Learning maintaining professors of divers Arts and Sciences in them especially in Oxford and devoted no lesse than the third part of his time to wit eight hours every natural day to his sacred studies and devotions Besides the time he spent in his Military imployments Civil Government and enacting Laws of most excellent use by advise of the wisest men which have continued ever since So as Asser Menevensis in Egercituesse in his life Spelman and others give this Brief Character and Encomium of his Excellencies O Stuporem omnium aetatum Aluredum cujus dum Religionem intuemur nunquam exiisse videatur Monasterio Dum Bella Militiam nullibi versatus fuisse unquam nisi in Castris dum Scripta ejus Lucubrationes vitam transiisse in Academia dum Regni Populique sui administrationem nihilo unquam studuisse nisi in Foro Senatu Justitiae promovendae Legibusque bonis Sanciendis Of which good Laws of his extracted out of the Old and New Testament for most part this for the due payment of Tithes and Oblations to Ministers was one cap. 38.
DECIMAS Primigenia adulta tua DEO DATO O that all those Militarie victorious Commanders who boast of like victories as he obtained would imitate him in these his Vertues Bounty Liberalitie both to our Universities Scholars Ministers and promulging Edicts for the due payment of their detained Tithes and Dues and then they should be Chronicled for SAINTS INDEED as well as the forenamed Kings of which there was not one in three in former Ages as Sir Henry Spelman observes WHO DID NOT ADORN AUGMENT ENRICH THE CHURCH IN SOME THINGS even during their very wars instead of making a mere prey and spoyl of her as some late SAINTS have done to maintain the warres and enrich themselves In which Sacrilegious Rapines if any shall persevere to the utter ruine of the remaining Glebes Tithes Maintenance of all our Ministers and Churches too the prime Honour of our Nation ECCLESIA Faemina Lana as some have designed and would engage them to do to render our Religion Nation and those who shall give their Votes thereto for ever execrable Let them take heed that instead of inducing the Ministers and godly people really fearing God throughout our three Nations to forget Monarchy and be in love with their New Military Government they do not necessitate them and most others too thereby by comparing their Irreligious Church-Robberies and Sacrilegious Rapines against the very Laws even of War and Conquest it self in an Enemies Country and detestable to very Heathens as Grotius proves at large to love and honour Kings and Monarchs more than ever as the only Nursing-Fathers to Gods Ministers Church People under the Gospel and to esteem others not comming in by the Door into the Sheep-fold but climbing up by Storm some other way to be but Theeves and Robbers who come not but to Steal Kill and to Destroy whatever the Bounty Piety and Munificence of these and other our Kings have built and setled on the Clergy for Gods Honour and maintenance of his worship and thereby engage them so to act speak and peremptorily resolve as all the Israelites and Godly Levites Priests People twice did in a like case 2 Chron. 11.13 14 15 16 17. 1 Sam. 8.3 5 19 20. If any here object these Kings and Queens were more Popish Superstitious than really Religious Admit they were in some things as too much doting upon Monkery not Monarchy or worldly wealth or Power which some condemn in others when most guilty of and applauding it in themselves yet their very Bounty and profuse munificent Building Monasteries and Nunneries whereof King Edgar alone built no less than 47. endowed them with large Revenues and intended to make them up 50. had he lived besides what they bestowed in building adorning endowing maintaining all Cathedral and Parish Churches and Chapels for the support and honour of their superstitious Religion should eternally shame all those pretended Saints who will be at no cost at all to maintain and propagate what they now call the True Religion and the faithfull Ministers of the Gospel but instead thereof will by mere Force and Rapine against all Rules of Law Justice Piety Equity and war it self plunder if they can the remaining Materials and Fabricks of our Churches which those Kings or their Successors and other antient Benefactors built for Gods Honour and the small surviving Lands Rectories Glebes Tithes Pensions Dues which our Ministers yet enjoy by their sole Bounty Piety Gift Laws without any real charge injurie oppression or obligation to any Mortals now surviving them But to take off the stain of Popery wholly from our Kings which was no disparagement to their commendable Charity and Bounty Consider in the sixth place that God hath honoured us with the first Christian King in the Universe Henry the 8 th who durst not only question but by Publick Laws and Statutes abolish and renounce the Popish usurped Antichristian Power and with it all Popish Shavelings Abbots Priors Monks Nunnes and many Popish Doctrines Ceremonies and restored the People to the use of the Holy Scriptures in their own Native Language Whose example encouraged other Kings Princes Churches to do the like Who though he seised upon Abby Lands as given to mere Superstitious Persons Orders Vses repugnant to Gods word and the Popes mere Creatures and Supporters yet he continued the Lands Glebes Tithes and Maintenance of the Bishops and other Ministers and augmented it and our Vniversities Revenues also out of the Abbies Spoyles which yet could not exempt him from the publick censure of some Protestants for selling or rteaining most of their Lands and Impropriations for his own use which say they he should have rather converted to other lawfull sacred uses according to the will of the first Donors And Mr. Purchas writes That the Monks unrighteous coveting and the Popes appropriating of the Tithes of some Thousands of our best Benefices unto Abbies and Monasteries and robbing the Ministers of them to whom only they were given by God himself and the first Donors for their Maintenance to the great prejudice both of the Ministers and People was one principal cause that by a Divine Judgement and Providence beyond all mens expectation the Pope and they were both suppressed together on a suddain even by him who not long before had justified his usurped Supremacy against Luther and for which he had received this ominous Title from the Pope DEFENDER OF THE FAITH God grant our New Defenders of the Faith do not as ill requite those Persons Powers who first commissioned them with their Arms to defend our Faith Church Religion against Iesuites Papists and their Confederates in the Field as King Henry did the Pope after this new Motto 7ly That our God blessed honoured us with the first incomparable Protestant King in the world no Papist but a REAL SAINT beyond any of his years in this or former Ageâ— even young KING EDWARD THE SIXT the first King I read of who by publick Laws and Statutes suppressed banished all Popish Pictures Ceremonies Superstitious Monuments Practices Abuses throughout his Dominions and established the true worship Service Sacraments Ministers and Ministry and Gospel of Christ throughout his Dominions for which all Ages shall call him blessed no waies embesselling or diminishing the Churches Glebes Tithes or Revenues and enacting a New excellent Law for Tithes recovery when detained But God taking him suddenly from hence to a better Kingdom and his Successor Queen Mary defacing deforming his blessed Reformation and restoring both the Pope and Popery again almost to its former height except in point of Monkery which the defacing of the Monasteries prevented 8ly God then blessed our Church and Kingdom with an unparallel'd Protestant Princesse Queen Elizabeth a Nursing Mother to the Church who demolished the whole Body of Popery with the Popes revived usurpations again by publick Acts established the reformed Religion again in greater beauty and purity than at first banishing
all humane Laws and Penalties so long as they wear their swords by their sides for defrauding our Ministers of their lawfull Tithes and Dues let them then chew the cudd upon this Evangelical Precept backed with the strongest coercive power both in Heaven and Earth 1 Thes 4.6 Let no man go beyond or defraud his brother much less then his Minister in any thing therefore not in Tithes due by Divine and humane Right mark the reason Because that the Lord is the avenger of all such things as we have forewarned and testified And what vengeance God will take of such who defraud their Brethen and Ministers of their debts and necessitate them to sue them at the Law to recover their Rights he resolves in the 1 Cor. 6 7 to 11. Now therefore there is utterly a fault among you because you go to Law to wit before Heathen Judges or without just cause one with another the greatest if not only fault being in the Defrauder and Detainer why do ye not rather take wrong why do ye not rather suffer your selves to be defrauded Nay why do you wrong and defraud and that your Brethren and which is more rob your Ministers yea but what harm or punishment will follow on it Mark it O all ye Saint-seeming Hypocrites who are guilty of it Know ye not That the unrighteous who thus wrong and defraud their Brethren and Ministers which is worse shall not inherit the Kingdom of God Be not deceived neither Theeves nor covetous and such are all those who rob and defraud their Ministers of their Tithes and Duties shall not inherit the Kingdom of God no more than Fornicators Idolaters c. with whom they are here coupled Let all those then who are guilty of this damning sin which disinherits them of Gods Kingdom now seriously repent and reform it with all such who have abetted or confederated with them herein that so I may adde with the Apostle in the next words And such were some nay all of you but ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified in the name of our Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God And now to cloze up this Chapter I shall desire all Anti-Tithers who have already in their heady Resolutions resolved to abolish not only all our Ministers Tithes and antient Dues established by the Lord himself in the Old and New Testament with all the forecited Laws Statutes Ordinances for the true and due payment of them but all other coercive maintenance for their future subsistence if not their very Rectories Glebes and Fabricks of our Churches devoted for a prey by divers sadly and seriously to consider these ensuing particulars 1. That herein they shall shew themselves not only worse by thousands of Degrees than our forementioned Kings and Queens who built and endowed our Churches with Glebes Tithes and a liberal Maintenance and worse than the most of all their Ancestors Protestants or Papists who have hitherto continued confirmed established them by successive Laws but even worse than the worst of Turks and Infidels who alwaies heretofore and at this very day have and do allow their Mahometan and Pagan Idolatrous Priests in all places a liberal competent setled Salarie and erect magnificent Temples to Mahomet and their Idols exceeding most of our fairest Christian Churches both for beauty and number as you may read at large in Pulchas Pilgrimage Alexander ab Alexandro Hospinian De Origine Templorum and others And to give you one instance for all There are no lesse than 700 Moschees or Saracinical Temples in Fesse a Mahometan City in Barbary the chief whereof is Carven being a full mile and an half in compasse It hath 31 Gates great and high the Roof is 150 yards long and 80 broad the Steeple very high the Ornaments rich and stately Round about it are divers Porches containing 40 yards in length and 30. in breadth About the Walls are Pulpits of divers sorts wherein the Masters and Priests of their Law read to the People such things as they think pertain to their Salvation The Revenue of this Temple alone Anno 1526. was no lesse than 200. Duckets a day of old rents The chief Church in Morocco is bigger though not altogether so fair as that of Fesse and hath a Tower so high that the Hills of Azâ—fi being 120. miles distance may be seen from thence as Leo Purchas and Heylin write These Temples and others are adorned with marble Pillars and curious Mosaicks carved works of all sorts Their Priests and Readers of the Law have a liberal Stipend with Books and lands likewise allowed them and are had in very high estimation and Reverence both with their Kings Magistrates People the Califfs there receiving likewise the tenth Measure of Corn yearly from the People Besides which Tenths they have many Colleges and Schools of Learning very Majestically built and richly endowed Those therefore who pretend themselves Saints of the highest New-form and yet would deface the beautifull Churches our pious Ancestors erected for Gods worship strip our Ministers naked of all Glebes Tithes setled Maintenance so as they shall not be able to live comfortably and provide for their Families have in truth denyed the Faith and are worse than these Turks and Infidels 1 Tim. 5.8 2ly That hereby they shall make both our Religion and Nation to stink in the Nostrils of all forein Protestant Churches Papists Turks Infidels who by the very light of Nature have condemned Sacrilege and Church Robbers Acts 19.37 Give extraordinary advantage to Jesuites Papists and other Atheistical Seducers to reduce the People either to Popery or mere Atheism Give all the Enemies of God and our Religion occasion both to rejoyce and blaspheme and extraordinarily scandalize and grieve the hearts of all true Godly Ministers and Protestants really affected to our Religion throughout our three Nations 3ly That they will herein exceed all our late suppressed Prelates and their High Commission Courts in Tyranny Cruelty Injustice by undoing all or most of our Godly Ministers and their Families at one fatal blow instead of relieving them in their present Necessities under which many of them sadly groan by depriving them of their Livelihood without any legal Conviction of the least crime but only that they are Ministers of the Gospel and receive Tithes and thereby draw upon their Heads not only the cryes and clamours of these oppressed ones here with all the formentioned Curses and judgements denounced against Tith-Detainers but also that sad irrevocable sentence of Condemnation before Christs Tribunal at the last day Matth. 25.41 Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels for I was hungry and ye gave me no Meat I was thirsty and ye gave me no Drink I was not a Stranger but your Minister and ye took me not in but cast me and mine out of those Rectories and Benefices your Ancestors gave and setled on me
naked and ye cloathed me not nay stripped me naked of all my cloathing and Livelihood and would neither relieve nor maintain me your selves nor permit others to do it in an antient legal way And then what can you answer or to whom can you resort for protection from this inevitable just Charge and Doom of Damnation for all eternity 4ly Consider seriously the exemplarie punishment executed upon Ananias and Saphyra Acts 5.1 c. with that fearfull judgement of retaliation denounced against all plundering Enemies of the Church of Christ Isay 33.1 Wo unto thee that spoylest and thou wast not spoyled and dealest treacherously and they dealt not treacherously with thee when thou ceasest to spoyl thou shalt be spoyled and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously they shall deal treacherously with thee Seconded by Obadiah 15. As thou hast done it shall be done unto thee thy reward shall return upon thine own head And if any fondly conceit as many do that the Swords and Power of an Army shall bear them out against the Lord of Hosts himself let them consider that of Psal 33.16 There is no King saved by the multitude of an Host themselves have seen it by late experience neither is any mighty man delivered by great strength Jeroboam the Idolatrous Usurper had an Army of no lesse than eight hundred thousand chosen men to make good his usurped Title against Abijah Davids right Heir yet when he had cast out the Priests of the Lord from their Suburbs and Possessions and made him Priests for his Calves of the lowest of the people he was vanquished by a far smaller Army and no lesse than five hundred thousand of his forces slain in one dayes battel and the Lord soon after smote him that be dyed 2 Chron. 13 Oreb Zeba and Salmunna the Princes and Generals of the Midianites when they entred into the Land of Israel to destroy it had an Army like unto Grashoppers for multitude and they and their Camels were without number Judges 6.5 6. Yet when they said Let us take to our selves the Houses of God in possession they were totally routed by Gideon and his 300. men having only Trumpets and Lamps and perished at Endor and became as dung for the earth Judg. 7. 8. Psal 83.9 10 11 12. Senacherib invaded Judah with a victorious and numerous Army above treble the Number to any Army in our daies Yet when he trusted to the strength of his Army and bid defiance to the God of Heaven as those do now who oppugn and spoil his Ministers of their inheritance God sent his avenging Angell which cut off all the mighty men of valour and the Leaders and the Captains and one hundred fourscore and five thousand of his souldiers in one night and when they arose early in the morning behold they were all dead corps so he returned with shame of face into his own land and when he was come into the house of his God his own Sonnes that came out of his own bowels slew him there with the sword 2 Kings 19.35 36 37. 2 Chron. 32.21 The two proud surly Captains with the fifty armed troopers at their heels who came in a violent manner but to fetch down Elijah the man of God from an hill to King Ahaziah were destroyed with fire from Heaven and the third Captain only saved who fell on his knees before him and besought him for his own and his fifties lives and used him like a man of God without any rudeness or plunder 2 Kings 1.9 10 c. To lesson all souldiers and Captains now to reverence Gods Ministers and do his Prophets no harm in their Persons Callings or Estates Else he who rebuked Kings and miraculously slew those Captains and their Troopers for their sakes will avenge their quarel now as well as in former ages And if former victories and successes have and do puff them so far up with pride or security as to think they may now reduce our Ministers like Conquered vassals to such poverty as to enforce and make them eat the very crumbs under their Tables insteed of feeding at their own let them remember that one memorable President wherewith I have quelled many usurping souldiers of the greatest Conqueror and Abuser of Kings I ever yet read off in the world and Gods retaliation upon him for his Tyranny and inhumanity after the Conquest of no less then 70. Kings and who now living hath conquered the tenth part of that number thus recorded to all Posterity Judg. 1.5 6 7. And Iudah fought against Adonibezeck in Bezeck and they slew the Canaanites and Perazites And Adonibezeck fled and they pursued after him and caught him and cut off his Thumbs and great Toes And Adonibezeck said threescore and ten Kings having their thumbs and great toes cut off have gathered their meat under my Table As I have done so God hath requited me and they brought him to Ierusalem and there he died It is very dangerous for any Conquerers to make ill Presidents of Tyranny or Rapine because they have power in their hands to do it Mark what a Wo and judgement God denounceth against such Mich. 2.1 2 3 4 Wo to them that devise iniquity upon their beds when the morning is come they practise it Because it is in the power of their hand And they covet fields and they take them by violence and houses and take them away So they oppress a man and his house even a man and his heritage Nay Ministers now and their Heritage as well as other mens But mark what follows immediately Therefore thus saith the Lord Behold against this family do I devise an evil from whence they shall not remove their necks neither shall they be hauty for this time is evil In that day shall one take up a Parable against you and lament with a dolefull lamentation and say we be utterly spoiled He hath changed the portion of my people as some now would change our Ministers How hath he removed it from me turning away Lord It is most perilous for any by meer Arbitrary Votes will and violence to seiz on change divide any other mens lands houses inheritances especially Gods Ministers it will prove as bad as a cup of poison to them they shall vomit them up again with a vengeance And though their excellency mount up to the Heavens and their Head unto the Clouds yet their triumphing shall be but short and their joy but for a moment They shall perish for ever as their own dung They which have seen them shall say Where are they They shall fly away as a dream and shall not be found The eyes which saw them shall see them no more neither thall their place any more behold them mark the reason because they have oppressed and violently taken away an House which they builded not Job 20.4 to 20. How much more the Houses Glebes Tithes of God and his Ministers Let this sad consideration then
Tithes in their Fines and Rents and if they have a godly able Minister to instruct them for their Salvation and spiritual Weal they must hire and pay him out of their own private purses only while their Land-lords or others purse up their Tithes whereon now their Ministers live without further charge unto them and which is more chargable they must pay their Ministers share of Taxes and other publick Payments to boot out of their own purses and estates which now are defrayed wholly by Ministers themselves And so instead of hoped Ease by Abolishing Tithes they shall but draw a causless perpetual Charge on themselves and their Posterities as our New Projectors have done by the sale of all the Crown Lands and Revenues to themselves and their Friends and Souldiers at easie rates to enrich themselves which should have defrayed all publick Ordinary Charges as they ever have done which now must be raised out of the peoples private purses only whiles these New Statesmen and Souldiers purse up and enjoy the publick Revenues which should defray them and Tax the impoverished Nation at what extraordinary uncessant Rates they please and then dispose of them at their pleasures when levyed to themselves and their Creatures the only way to make our Taxes both Easeless and Endless to the peoples utter ruin and their own extraordinary enriching by their spoils 5ly The poor people in every Parish will lose the charitable relief they receive from their Ministers who in many places were and still are a grest relief to the poor and impotent by their liberal Charity and Hospitality now much decayed by heavy and endless Taxes and unconscionable Substractions of their Tithes by Sectaries Souldiers and lawless Covetous Earth-wormes 6ly I must truly inform and tell all such Farmers Tenants and other deluded Countreymen who think to gain much ease and profit by the abolishing of Tithes for the future they shall soon repent of and be doubly burthened hereafter to the uttermost improved value of them in the augmentation of their Taxes to the Souldiers who will be harder new Iron Land-lords Tithe-lords to them than their Ministers now are This was St. Augustines observation long ago recorded by Gratian Bochellus with many others and made good by many practical Experiments in former and latter ages His words are these Our Ancestors did therefore abound with plenty of all things Because they gave Tithes to God and rendred Tribute to Caesar Modo autem quia decesserit Devotio Dei accessit Indictio Fisci Nolumus partire cum Deo Decimas modo tollitur totum Hoc tollit fiscus quod non accepit Christus That is But now because our devotion to God in paying Tithes is departed the Sequestration of the Exchequer is come both on Tithes and Lands We would not pay our Tithes unto God now the whole is taken away in Taxes and Sequestrations The Exchequer sweeps away that which Christ doth not receive And how many have found this true in our dayes by Sequestrators and Swordmen who have sequestrâ—d all the Profits of their Lands as well as their Tithes and the Ministers Tithes and Glebes to boot He addes This is a most just Custome that if thou wilt not give God his Tenth thou shalt be reduced to a Tenth of thy Estate Et dabis impio militi quod non vis dare Deo et sacerdoti and thou shalt be forced to give that to a wicked Souldier which thou wilt not give to God and thy Pious Minister This the whole Synod of Lingon in France Anno 1404. declared for and observed as a truth in those daies And Angelus de Clavasio in his Summa Angelica Tit. Decima sect 20. in his time Petrus Blesensis Arch-Deacon of Bath who flourished about the year of our Lord 1160. writes thus to the Cistertian Monks who had then procured from the Pope a Bull of Exemption from paying Tithes out of the Lands and Possessions of their Order Epist 82. ad Cistercienses You know that Covetousness is the root of all Evil yet it is said and we relate it with tears that this Mother of Transgression this Mistris of Ambition this Captain or Ringleader of Iniquity this Wagoner of Mischief this Cutthroat of Vertues this Original of Sedition this Sink of Scandals hath dared to break in even to your Congregation the Votes and Tongues of all men would be loosened into the commendation of your Sanctity if you did not forcibly snatch away that which is anothers If you did not take away Tithes from Clergy-men This is a Convectio or Rapine little enough but that which doth not a little dishonest your life By the Testimony of the Scriptures they are the Tributes of needy Souls And what is this injurious Immunity that you should be exempted from the payment of Tithes to which the Lands were subject before they were yours and which are hitherto rendered to Churches not out of respect of Persons but by consent of the Territory mark now the just punishment upon them for this their Covetousness and exemption from Tithe-paying Milites Galliarum sibi jus Decimarum usurpant c. The Souldiers of France usurp to themselves the Right of Tithes and have no regard of your Privileges Eas a vobis potenter extorquent They extort them from you by the Power of the Sword Adversus eos debetis insurgere non adversus Clericos aut Ecclesiasticos Clericos You ought to rise up against them but not against Clergy-men Or the Churches of Clergy-men Laurentius Bochellus recites inserts it into his Decret Eccles Gall. l 6. Tit. 8. c. 19. p. 966. printed An. 1609. From which Authorities I must tel all Country Farmers and others now busling to exempt themselves by the power of the Souldiers from paying their antient due setled Tithes to their Ministers that they shall at last but only change the hand and be enforced to pay Tithes with a Witness to the Souldiers even by obtaining their desires Whiles I was a late close Prisoner in Pendennys Castle in Cornwall under Souldiers I never yet knew why I heard some Officers there who had purchased Crown-lands in Cornwall not for Mony but Arrears of pay amongst other their New Projects oft times peremptorily saying We will have all Tithes put down Whereupon I told them they should have done well to have added Saint James his advise to their peremptory words and wills which he much censures by saying as they ought to do If the Lord will we will do this or that James 4.13 14 15 16. Which I thought they durst or could not subjoyn to their former words because it was both against the will and command of God that Ministers Tithes should be put down especially by Souldiers who received far above the tenth part of them in Monthly Taxes for their pay and from whose practice of receiving constant pay for their Military service the Apostle proves the lawfulness of Ministers Tithes and Salaries under the
them to the use of the Army for the pretended ease of the people in their future taxes I shal for the cloze of this Proposition and prevention of this detestable impious Sacrilegious plot against our Ministers and Religion too propound and answer all such specious Arguments Pretences as may be produced by them to delude the people veil over the execrable Impiety and take off the odium of this prodigious Villany First they may and will suggest that they have some ancient punctual Presidents to warrant countenance justifie this their Project As namely the practical example of Charles Martel King of France who about the year of our Lord 730. as the Marginal Authors report having perpetual wars and seldom or never peace in his Kingdom Ideo res Ecclesiarum suis Militibus in stipendium contulit maxima ex parte did thereupon bestow the Lands Revenues Rents and Tithes too as the Act of Restitution with others prove of Parish-Churches Monasteries Bishops Deans and Chapters upon his Souldiers for their Pay and Arrears for the greatest part And surely upon a very Godly and just reason as John Canne and some Army-Officers will swear thus expressed in his Decree recorded in Goldastus and Mr. Selden ut subveniatur necessitatibus Publicis et Salariis Militum pro Dei Ecclesiae bono statu Reipublicae uniuscujusque propria pace pugnantium That he might relieve the Publick Necessities and pay and reward the Souldiers fighting for the Church of God and the good of the State of the Common-wealth and the proper peace of every one as our Officers and Souldiers now say they do And is it not then most just they should have all the Lands Glebes and Tithes of the Church King Common-wealth and of every particular Person too who have fought all this while for them and their defence To this they may chance to adde the President of the Templers and Hospitalers who being no part of the Clergy but Religious Souldiers imployed only to fight in the defence of the Church were by special Bulls and Grants of several Popes exempted from paying any Tithes at all to any Ministers out of the Lands belonging to their several Orders Because they fought for the Church against her Enemies as Turks Saracens and other Infidels Therefore there is great reason equity all our Officers and Souldiers who have lately fought or are now or hereafter fighting for the Church against her Enemies and Malignants should be totally and finally discharged from paying any Tithes at all out of their Old or New Purchased Lands Leases Cattel Estates Spoyls Pay or other increase Besides most of our Army-Officers and very many of the Souldiers are extraordinarily gifted inspired from Heaven and constant Speakers or Preachers transcending all Black-coated Ministers yea the undoubted new Ministers and Priests of Jesus Christ as many deem them So as they may be truly stiled a chosen Generation a Royâ—â— Priesthood yea Army of Priests being made Kings and Priests by Christ himself to God the Father as John Canne hath published in his Voyce p. 24 27 28 29. Therefore they may not only enter into our Ministers Churches Pulpits and dispossess them of them as he there asserts and presseth them to put in execution but be capable in right equity justice to receive all their Tithes to their own use Nay one step more John Canne in his Voyce p. 27. thus peremptorily concludes I will affirm and abide by it since it hath pleased the Lord to draw out the hearts of some Souldiers and others who were never brought up at Universities to learning publickly to preach which is not above 10 or 12. years the People of this Common-wealth have had more true Light and glorious Discoveries of Christ and his Kingdom than all the Nations Ministers ever before made known to them since first they took their calling from the Sea of Rome till this Day On the contrary the greatest Heresies and Blasphemies which have been in the world have been broached by Ministers and Scholars whereas Lay-men at the same time have been sound in the Faith and zealously earnest against such abominable Doctrines Therefore there is just ground that both our Vniversities and all Colleges for Advancement of Learning should be suppressed as the very poyson bane subversion of Religion Church and Common-wealths as some Souldiers and the Anabaptists generally deem them and their Lands as well as Bishops Deans Chapters and Ministers Glebes and Tithes sold or conferred on the Officers and Souldiers of the Army for their better encouragement reward and supportation to propagate defend Religion and the Common wealth A design now eagerly prosecuted by some To which let them receive this Answer before hand since I intend not any future Treatise of this nature 1. That I never read of any pious Generals Armies Officers or Souldiers in Scripture the rule of Faith and Manners that spoyled the Church or Ministers of their Lands and Tithes to maintain their wars or enrich reward themselves but we find it expresly recorded of Abraham the Father of all the Faithfull that he paid Tithes even of the Spoyls of the first Wars to the first Pâ—â—â—st we find in Scripture unto Christ himself both in the Old and New Testament for other Christian Souldiers imitation The like we read of David and all his Officers Captains of the Army with sundry others fore-cited whose Presidents are more obliging and commendable than Charles Martels 2ly That it was the Custom use and pious practice of many Pagan Warlike Nations as the Romans Graecians Carthaginians Tyrians Saxons to do the like who consecrated the Tenths of all their Spoyls to their Idol-Gods and Priests as we may read at large in Mr. Seldens History of Tithes and Review c. 3. and in Mr. Richard Mountague his Diatribe thereon ch 3. Therefore they are worse than Pagans who neglect not only to pay their Ministers the Tenth of their Spoyls but will even spoyl them of their Glebes and Tithes besides 3ly It is very observable and let our Souldiers and Officers consider it in good earnest That God himself specially consecrated and devoted the future Spoyls a Sacrifice for and to himself and all the Spoyls City of Jericho the very first City taken by the Israelites in the Land of Canaan as a sacred First-fruits and kind of Tenth for the use of his Sanctuary and Priests in these memorable words Josh 6.17 18 19. And the City shall be devoted even it and all that is therein except Rahab and her Family and House Lord Whereupon when the City was taken they burnt it and all that was in it as a Sacrifice to the Lord But the Silver and Gold and the Vessels of Brass and of Iron they put into the Treasury of the House of the Lord v. 24. But Acban a covetous plundring Souldier seeing among the rich Spoyls of the City a goodly Babylonish Garment and two hundred Shekels of
the Souldiers possessing them should be all restored and so they were accordingly and those Harpyes robbed of their Sacrilegious prey Let the late Purchasers of such Tithes and Lands remember it and think of a possible if not probable Act of Resumption in case they make no voluntary restitution 4ly Let them consider the large Revenues the Popish Clergy at this day enjoy in France amounting to above 12. Millions of Annual Rents at a moderate value besides mony and oblations as Bodine Thuanus Hist l. 28. Ioannes de Laety Descriptio Galliae c. 17 18. record To which I might adde the extraordinary great Revenues of the Popish Clergy in Spain recorded by Lucius Marineus Siculus Ioannes de Laet in his Hispaniae Descriptis cap. 20. Jo. Boterus in his Hist Universalis and of the Popish Clergy in the Kingdom of Naples in Italy registred by Thomas Segethus De Principibus Italiae p. 121. Which they still enjoy notwithstanding their manifold Wars without sale or Diminution for their Soldiers pay And will it not be an intollerable Impiety Sacrilege dishonor for Protestant Souldiers and our new Republick not to allow our Ministers so much as their inconsiderable remaining Rectories Glebes Tithes to support our Religion and instruct and save the Peoples Souls 5ly The reason rendred by Martel and others That the Officers and Souldiers deserve the Lands and Tithes of the Church and Ministers because they fight for the defence of the Church is very strange and just the self-seeking Plea and Practice of sundry of our Officers and Souldiers at this day scarce to be parallel'd in any Age 1. They were raised for the Defence and Preservation of the late Kings Person Posterity and just Rights of his Crown Ergo in discharge of this Trust they have most justly sentenced beheaded the King outed dis-inherited his Posterity and seized upon all the Crown-Lands and Revenues in his three Kingdoms for their own use pay support reward and inheritance 2ly They were raised and fought for the preservatirn and defence of the Kingdom Parliament and Members Privileges and Laws and Liberties of England Therefore they have justly by armed violence invaded subverted them all disposed of all the Common wealth and Revenue of the Nation to themselves and their Instruments to support themselves and their usurped Arbitrary Power and Government over us and may null and pull down not only our Old but their own New-created Parliaments and State-Councils as they stile them and change both Government Governors at their pleasure 3ly They fought for the particular Defence Peace Safety of every mans Person and Estate in our three Kingdoms Therefore they may seize upon and dispose of all their Persons Lands Estates at their pleasures and impose what Taxes Excises Imposts they list and exercise a legislative absolute Arbitrary and Tyrannical Power over them without a lawfull Parliament to eat them quite out of all Lastly They fought for our Church Ministers Religion Ergo they may subvert them all and seise upon all Church-Lands Revenues Rectories Glebes Tithes yea Churches and Church-yards too for to reward support and pay the Army and possess themselves of what ever our Ancestors setled on the Church and Ministers to instruct and save the Peoples Souls as a just Salary for killing their Christian Brethrens Bodies and destroying the peoples Souls and Bodies too Certainly the worst Enemies they fought against would not could not have done worse than this nor yet so bad This certainly is a Devastation Destruction not a Defence or Preservation of what they were raysed and payed to protect an Invasion and Depredation not a Patronage and Protection a Remedy more destructive than the worst Disease War Enemy who could but have stript us of no more had they conquered us than these our new armed Defenders of the Faith Church King Parliament Laws and Liberties have done or intend to do as many fear It was John Baptists Evangelical Precept to all Souldiers whatsoever Do violence to none in Person Lands or Estate much lesse to Ministers privileged by the Law of War from Violence and to be content with their Wages without seising sequestring invading the Lands Estates Glebes Tithes Persons of Ministers King and Members or any others they fought for who never raised nor waged Souldiers to deprive them of their Patrimonies Estates Callings Rights Laws Liberties Privileges of Parliament Government Governours but only to secure them in the full possession of them all This new Martial law and practice then is both irrational and unevangelical fitter for professed Theeves Turks and Pyrates than Christian Souldiers and far different from the foresaid Christian Souldiers practice in former Ages who as they would by no means be engaged by their Pagan Emperors or Generals commands to fight against any of their Christian Brethren choosing rather to obey God their Supream Emperour than Men So the famous Thebean Legion of Christian Souldiers and their Officers under Julian the Apostate when he commanded them to bring forth their Arms against the Christians returned him this most Heroick Answer worthy to be written in Golden Letters briefly fully and elegantly expressing the Duty of every true Christian Souldier in all Ages and Cases Offerimus nostras in quemlibet hostem manus quas sanguine innocentium cruentare nefas ducimus Dexterae ipsae pugnare adversus Impios Inimicos sciunt laniare pios et Cives nesciunt Meminerimus nos and O that our Army-Officers and Souldiers would remember it likewise Pro Civibus potius quam adversus Cives arma sumpsisse Pugnabimus semper pro Iustitia pro pietate pro innocentium salute not for Kings Bishops Deans Chapters Ministers Lands Revenues Tithes Estates the things now fought for Haec fuerunt hactenus pretia periculorum Pugnavimus pro fide quam quo pacto conservemus tibi Imperatori Si hanc Deo nostro non exhibemus O that this Resolution were now engraven in every Army-Officers and Souldiers heart our Ministers then needed not to fear the losse of their Tithes Rectories Churches nor our Universities Colleges Corporations or any other the disinheris on of their Lands Laws Liberties Powers by Military Rapines violences and usurpations 6ly The Exemptions of the Hospitalers and Templers Lands from paying of Tithes was a meer Papal Innovation and Devise which Canne who pleads so much against Tithes upon this mistake that they are Popish and all his Confederates should be ashamed to own and imitate The Israelites Gods own people during their possession of Canaan had many forein and Civil wars in most of their Judges Kings and High Priests successive Reigns and Roman Governours over them yet we never read that any of their Generals Officers or Souldiers fighting for their Churches Priests and Religions Defence against forein or Domestique idolatrous Enemies pretended the least Exemption of their Lands or Estates from paying all their antient forementioned accustomed Tithes to the Levites Priests and Poor
nor any Christian Souldiers else but the Popish Templers and Hospitalers for the Lands conferred on their Orders not for their private Inhabitances And if Souldiers be obliged to pay Tithes of all their Spoyls and Gains of war as I have abundantly proved much more then of their real and personal Estates as well as any others not in armes especially where they are well paid and war not on their own expences but other mens purses Amongst the Jewes we never read of any Taxes Tributes or Contributions imposed on the Cities Houses Lands or Tithes of the People and Levites for the maintenance of wars or pay of Souldiers from which even Artaxerxes a heathen Conqueror exempted them by an express Decree Ezra 7.24 Yet they received Tithes of all their Kings Generals Captains Souldiers as well as Peoples Lands and increase both in times of war and peace But our Army-Officers and Souldiers now receive above the Tithes of all our Ministers Tithes Glebes in Monthly Taxes and Contributions by arbitrary illegal Impositions without their or Consents in Parliament contrary to their antient Privileges all former Presidents and our Laws Therefore there is all Equity and Justice they should receive the Tenths both of their Lands Goods and Gains of war too and that no Officers or Souldiers should be exempted from Tithes as the Templers and Hospitalers were who had no other Pay or Salaries but their Lands and received no constant Contributions from the Clergy Xenophon that famous learned Greek Heathen Commander having made the most Noble retreat we ever read of in Story out of the upper part of Asia with ten thousand men through mountains frost and snow in memorie of his thankfullness to the Gods for this safe return separated the Tenth of all the Spoyls that his Army had gained in the wars and by general consent commited them to the Captains to be dedicated to Apollo and Diana That for Apollo was layd up at Delphos in the Athenean Treasury but with that other Tenth Dianas share Xenophon himself purchased a Peece of Land and built thereon a Temple and an Altar to Diana and appointed the Tenth of the yearly increase forever unto it This Pagan Commander and his Captains and Souldiers were so far from exempting their Lands from Tithes to their Idol Deities that they Tithed the very Spoyls of their wars to them and built and endowed a Temple to Diana with Lands and Tithes out of their own Lands and Estates for ever Which shall for ever silence and shame those Christian Army-Officers Souldiers Templers and Hospitalers who would exempt not only their Spoyls but their Lands and Estates from all Tithes to God and his Ministers because they are Souldiers and pretend to fight for their Defence 7ly This Reason that they should enjoy not only their own but our Ministers Tithes because they are an Army of Preachers and Priests and more Officers Souldiers in the present Army Preachers or Speakers as they phrase them than ever in any Army in the world before hath frequently minded me of that saying of Pope Gregory the first which famous Bishop Jewel much insisted on concerning Antichrist The King of Pride Antichrist is at hand and which is an horrible Thing to be spoken Sacerdotum est praeparatus Exercitus an Army of Priests is prepared to gard and usher him in Certainly I never heard nor read of such an Army of Priests as our Army now is before wherein there are not only some hundreds of disguised Popish Antichristian Priests and Jesuites as most wisemen conceive under the disguise of Souldiers preaching venting many notorious Errors Blasphemies and Antichristian Tenents to infect the Army and Nation too but many preaching Colonels Captains Officers Souldiers of all sorts not a preaching General as some say too And among others one of these Army-Preachers not long since published a Book with this Title Antichrist with us by John Spittle-house a member of the Army printed at London 1648. which intimated to me at first sight that Antichrist was in the Army and truly if they proceed as Canne would have them to usurp our Ministers Office Rectories Glebes Tithes Churches to themselves and Suppresse our Ministers Churches Parishes as Antichristian I shall then justly suspect and others will confidently conclude they are the very Army of Priests prophecied of by Pope Gregory who shall forcibly usher and bring in Antichrist the King of Pride who exalteth himself above all that is called God or Worshipped that is above Kings Lords Parliaments and all Civil and Ecclesiastical Powers whatsoever as Expositors resolve into our Church and re-establish him in his Throne 8ly I never read in the Old Testament or New that Christ Authorized Commissioned or sent out any Captains or Souldiers to preach the Gospel or made choyce of such to be his Apostles and Ministers of the Gospel Surely had this been a part of their duty as Christian Officers and Souldiers John Baptist Christs forerunner would have instructed those Souldiers who came purposely to and demanded of him what shall we do in another manner than he did and said unto them Go and preach the Gospel and instruct the ignorant Souldiers and people publickly where ever you quarter in the first place and then Do violence to no man and accuse no man falsly and be content with your wages The only precepts he gave them Which our Army-Officers and Souldiers since they turned Preachers have much forgotten and neglected I read of 2. devout Centurions in the New Testament eminent for their faith piety Charity and of one devout Souldier yet neither of them a publick Preacher The first of these Colonels or Centurions built a Synagogue for the Jews and others to meet and preach in who were Priests and Ministers but I read not he ever preached in it publickly himself The latter Centurion is thus characterized Acts 10.1 2. That he was a devout man and one that feared God with all his House which gave much Alms to the people and prayed to God continually but doubtlesse he never preached for then it would have been there recorded that he preached continually as well as prayed Yea he was so far from this that when the Angel of God came to him in a vision he sayd Thy Prâ—yers and thine Alms not thy preaching therefore he preached not at all or if he did God accepted it not but disliked it as against his word and will are come into remembrance before God And now send men to Joppa and call for Simon Peter he shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do Whereupon he presently sent two of his Servants and a devout Souldier continually waiting on him but not on preaching for the Apostle Peter to preach to him his Friends and Family who repairing to him Cornelius goeth forth to meet him falls down at his feet worshippeth him talks with him brings him into his House where many were come together relates his vision
grounds policies hypocritically gilded over with the paint of Conscience Reformation Religion Propagation of the Gospel c. which makes the Design more detestable both to God and all good men The second sort of Tithe-Oppugners are professed Anabaptists Dippers Seekers Quakers and other blasphemous Sectaries and Heretiques lately sprung up amongst us many of which have crept into the Army for their greater security and the better accomplishment of their dangerous destructive Designs against our established Government Magistrates Laws but especially against our Religion Church Ministers Ministry their Tithes and Glebes Scarce one of a thousand of these poor Sneaks were of ability to pay any Tithes of late and those of this prevailing Faction who have crept into Sequestrations Offices Imployments of late and thereby gained any Estates for the most part have enriched themselves by sequestred Tithes Glebes Bishops Deans Chapters Lands and Revenues which these hungry Harpyes have most greedily preyed upon not out of any real grounds of Piety or Conscience as they pretend which I could yet seldom or never find in any of them but out of an unsatiable greedy HOLY HUNGER OR THIRST in the Poets sence after Gold Gain Spoyl the Revenues of our Church and an implacable bitter Enmity against our Ministers Persons Callings whether Presbyterians the chief Butt against whom their Malice is bent or Independents of a more moderate strain whose Ministry is the main Fort they level all their present power against to raze it even to the very Foundation now prosecuting the total abolition not only of their present Tithes Glebes but of all other future coercive maintenance in lieu of them only to subvert their Ministry and quite starve if they cannot violently storm them out of it This is most perspicuous not only by their manifold former libellous Pamphlets against our Ministers Calling and the late Ordinances for Tithes which I have elsewhere collected refuted but by their fresh Petitions both against their Tithes and Ministry too as Antichristian Jewish Popish c. especially by John Canne the old Amsterdam Anabaptists Second Voyce from the Temple or Synagogue of Satan rather newly dedicated to those he stiles The Supream Authority of the Nation wherein he exhorts and stimulates them by all the Art Rhetorick Motives false Arguments he can muster up to do execution and take vengeance upon Babylon to wit the National Ministry Church-worship Government of England as he explains it p. 2. till it be wholy desolate not a Stone left upon a Stone till it be thrown down To take a most effectual and certain course to starve and famish these Antichristian Idols by taking away the Food and Maintenance whereby hitherto as at this present they are nourished fed and left alive and more particularly their Tithes To repeal all Laws and Statutes formerly made whereby the Whore hath lived deliciously and proudly and keeps on to this Day her Whorish attire To make the Whore desolate and naked by making no Act or Law to stand in force which doth yield any relief to her To set themselves in array against her by the Armies power no doubt which he alludes to bend their Bow fan and empty her To set upon this work speedily in good earnest as it seems they do whiles it is to day And why so Because the Lord himself hath by a Call more than ordinarie called them to this more than ordinary Imployment if he could have proved it by Scripture or Law it had been more worth than all his Pamphlet put this fair or rather foul opportunity into their hands hath commanded his sanctified ones and called his Mighty ones the Army-Officers to fulfill his pleasure upon this great Whore the Church and Ministry of England and SION is in travel and ready to bring forth this Monster of Desolation and Confusion which if they neglect or delay then mark how he briefly menaces them with the Fates of their late Predecessors I would think you should never be sitting in that House but be thinking still on those who sate there before you and why not as well on Faux and the Gunpowder Traytoâ—s as those since there seems another Powder-plot in the Vault to blow them up intended by Canne and his Confederates if they fail in accomplishing this their desired work whom the Lord hath lade aside as despised broken Idols and Vessels wherein his Soul had no pleasure And why As they knew not their Generation-work which he excites them to neither were faithfull to the interest of Jesus Christ God is no respecter of Persons as men sow so they shall reap Ex ungue Leonem ex cauda Draconem You may see by these passages and his whole Pamphlet pursuing them what these malicious inhuman barbarous irreligious hypocritical Anabaptists aym at in their present violent prosecutions against Tithes even utterly to starve famish subvert extirpate our Ministers Ministry Church Worship Government and make our Land a mere Spoyl Desolation as their Predecessors did Munster and some parts of Germany whiles in their power But let Canne and his Anabaptistical Confederates remember what tragical ends their New King John with all his Princes Grandees Officers Prophets Followers came to in conclusion in Germany And what fatal ruine befell Jack Cade Iack Straw Wat Tyler Sharp and other levelling Companions who had the self-same Designs against our English Laws Lawyers Clergy Tithes Glebes as He and they have now animated thereto by the new-dipped Iesuites and other Romish Emissaries lately crept into their Anabaptistcal Fraternity to further this their Infernal Gunpowder-plot against our Church Religion Ministers Magistrates Government Laws and let them thereupon repent of desist from abominate this their Diabolical wicked Design lest they incur the self same punishments in conclusion by stirring up God and all the whole Nation against them as most accursed Rebels Traytors Instruments of Satan yea that very Antichrist and Whore of Rome they pretend they are blindly acting against whose designs in truth they are but accomplishing in the highest degree I must here observe and desire all others to take notice of three things First that in Cannes Voyce and in all other late Pamphlets Petitions of the Anabaptists wherein they seem to vent their most passionate zeal against Antichrist Babylon the Whore of Babylon their chief Instruments and Supporters I cannot find so much as one Clause or Syllable against Iesuites Popish Priests Papists Romish Emissaries or exciting the execution of any Laws or Statutes formerly made against them but the whole stream bent of them all is only against the Godly Ministers Ministry worship of the Church of England the Presbyterian Government and our present Church-worship the only Babylon Whore Antichrist they intend and fight against not the Pope and Church of Rome 2ly That they are so far from pleading against the Pope Popish Priests Iesuites and urging the execution of the good Oaths Laws made by late and former
then in England to advance their own power profit 2ly It is evident by Rob. Parsons and other Jesuites old Project for Reformation of England when they should get power in it To take away all Lands Manors Benefices and setled Maintenance of the Church from the English Clergy and Universities and make all Ministers and Scholars mere Pensioners and Stipendiaries at their pleasure◠set up Itinerary Preachers fixed to no particular Church like our wandring Quakers Anabaptists Sectaries of late instead of Parochial Pastors of which more anon 3ly Alfonsus de Vargas Toletanus in his Relatio ad Reges Principes Christianos De Stratagematis Politicis Societatis Jesu ad Monarchiam Orbis terrarum sibi conficiendam printed 1641. cap. 40 to 51. proves at large out of the Jesuites own printed Defence and other Writings That these new Doctors of no Conscience no Faith no honesty or shame have perswaded the Emperour and other Kings against their Oaths Trusts Duties Charters the Law of Nations and all Divine and Human Laws that it was lawfull for them upon a pretext of Necessity for the ease of the people and Maintenance of their Wars Souldiers to alienate the Lands Revenues Maintenance of Abbies Religious men and of the Church upon Souldiers for the defence of their Bodies and of the Church that so themselves might gain a share of them for the advantage of their own Societies contrary to the wills intentions of the first Donors and Founders Whereupon he thus justly jeers them cap. 46. p. 222. That the institution of the Jesuites Society peculiarly tends to this that their Colleges should be instituted and Society maintained out of the ruines of the Church and rapines of other mens Goods à quibus Societatis Institutor et Conditor Ignatius cum etiamnum ad legionem bellator esset minime alienus fuisse nec a solita Militum rapacitate quicquam demutasse sine ulla ejus contumelia creditur etsi autem Militiam mutavit ac simul cum Sociorum ne dicam furum manipulo Christo Imperatori Sacramentum dixit non propterea rapinam omnem ejerare necesse habuit c. he remaining a PLUNDERER still after he became a SAINT Seeing the Prophe◠Isay seemeth thus to prophecy both of his Rapine and Wound in his halting Legg cap. 33. Tunc dividentur Spolia multarum praedarum Claudi diripient rapinam Therefore no wonder this Spirit of Rapine continues in his Disciples who doubtlesse have infused the self-same Spirit of Rapine into our Anabaptists and Souldiers into whose Societies they have secretly insinuated themselves somenting and intending to lengthen out our wars so long of purpose to make a prey of our remaining Church-Revenues Rectories Tithes and College lands too at last as they have done of other Church-Revenues already dissipated out of a pretext of Necessity as is most transparant to all Intelligent peoples eyes thereby to destroy our Religion by devouring our Ministers Churches Patrimonies the probable if not inevitable consequence of this Jesuitical project if effected as is most apparent by this notable passage of Roderyck Mors formerly a Grey Fryer in his Complaint and Supplication to the Parliament of England about 37 H. 8. after the Dissolution of Monasteries pertinent to my purpose and as worthy consideration now as then Ye that be Lords and Burgesses of the Parliament House writes he I require of you in the name of my poor Brethren that are Englishmen and Members of Christs Body that ye consider well as ye will answer before the face of Almighty God in the day of judgement this abuse and see it amended When Antichrist of Rome durst openly without any visor walk up and down thorowout England he had so great favour there and his Children had such crafty wits for the Children of this World are wiser in their Generation than the Children of Light they had not only almost gotten all the best Lands of England into their hands but also most part of the best Benefices both of Parsonages and Vicarages which were for the most part all improved to them And when they had the gifts of any not improved they gave them unto their Friends of the which alwaies some were learned for the Monks found of their Friends Children at School And though they were not learned yet they kept Hospitality and helped their poor Friends And if the Parsonages were impropred the Monks were bound to deal Almesse to the poor and to keep Hospitality as the writings of the Gifts of such Parsonages and Lands do plainly declare in these words In puram Eleemosynam And as touching the Almesse that they dealt and the Hospitality that they kept every man knoweth that many thousands were well relieved of them and might have been better if they had not had so many great Mens Horse to feed and had not been over-charged with such idle Gentlemen as were never out of the Abbies And if they had any Vicarage in their hands they set in some time some sufficient Vicar though it were but seldom to preach and to teach But now that all the Abbies with their Lands Goods and impropred Parsonages be in temporal mens hands I do not hear tell that one half peny worth of Alms or any other profit cometh unto the people of those Parishes Your pretence of putting down Abbies was to amend that was amiss in them It was far amiss that a great part of the Lands of the Abbies which were given to bring up learnned men that might be Preachers to keep Hospitality and give Alms to the poor should be spent upon a few Superstitious Monks which gave not XL. pound in Alms when they should have given CC. It was amiss that the Monks should have Parsonages in their hands and deal but the XX. part thereof to the poor and preached but once in a year to them that paid the Tithes of Parsonages It was amiss that they scarcely among XX set not one sufficient Vicar to preach for the Tithes that they received But see now how it that was amiss is amended for all the Pretence It is amended even as the Devil amended his Dams Leg as it is in the Proverb when he should have set it right he brake it quite in pieces The Monks gave too little Alms and set unable Persons many times in their Benefices But now where xx pound was yearly given to the poor in more than C. places in England is not one meals meat given This is a fair Amendment Where they had alwaies one or other Vicar that either preached or hired some to preach Now is there no Vicar at all but the Farmor is Vicar and Parson altogether and only an old cast away Monk or Frier which can scarcely say his Mattins is hired for xx or xxx shillings Meat and Drink yea in some places for Meat and Drink alone without any wages I know and not I alone but xx M. mo know more than D. we may now adde 5000. Vicarages
and Friends for to recover the said Realm which Realm was upon the point to be undone for want of Government and abrogating of the Laws and Customs of the Realm And that it was not his will that any should think that he would by way of Conquest disinherit any one of his Heritage Franchise or other Right which he ought to have nor to out or deprive any man of that he had or should have by the good Laws or Customes of the Realm all which he confirmed by a special Act before 1 H. 4. c. 1. but only those who were against his good purpose and the common profit of the Realm and were guilty of all the evil come upon the Realm and were adjudged guilty thereof in that Parliament as Sir William Le Scroop Sir Henry Green and Sir John Bassy whose Lands only he would have by Conquest as forfeited by their Treasons Whereupon the Commons thanked the King and praysed God that he had sent them such a King and Governour Upon all which Considerations and the Resolution of learned Grotius with others quoted by him That by the very Laws of War even those who are conquered by foreign Enemies ought to enjoy by permission of the Conquerors their own Laws Liberties Magistrates Religion and a share in their Government much more in such a Civil War as ours where the Souldiers Generals can pretend no Conquest over those who raised waged them for their just defence against Conquest and Invasion of their Laws Liberties Government Magistrates Rights Privileges I hope those vaporing Officers Souldiers who have formerly cried up pleaded practised this pretended Title of Conquest amongst us and used many of their former Masters Raisers and the whole Nation more like to conquered enslaved People than their fellow Christian Brethren and Freeborn Englishmen who have paid them so well for all those Services they imployed them in wiâ—l henceforth totally renounce this their false usurped Injurious Plea Title and no more persist under pretext thereof to deprive our Ministers Church Peers Parliaments Nation of their very Native Freedomes Liberties Franchises Rights Laws Government Lands Possessions which they were purposely commissioned waged and by all Sacred all Civil Obligations Trusts Oaths Vowes Protestations perpetually engaged to defend against the least violation or Innovation without their free and full consents in a due and lawfull Parliament freely elected by them not forcibly obtruded on them without their choise or privity Yea I trust they will be so just so righteous towards me so great a Sufferer by under them only for discharging my Conscience and bounden duty towards my God our Church and Native Country of England as no waies to be angry with me or Injurious towards me for this my New Gospel Plea interwoven with a Legal and Rational for the Lawfulness and Continuance of the antient setled Maintenance and Tithes of the Ministers of the Gospel and the good old Fundamental Laws and Liberties of the Nation which their present busie Endeavours to abolish alter subvert beyond yea against their Trusts Commissions Callings have necessitated me now to publish to the world to preserve our Church State Ministry from new Combustions and Impendent ruine but rather found a Retreat from these their Heady Proceedings which I fear the Jesuites with their Confederates the Anabaptists have engaged them so deeply in to work as well their own as the publick speedy ruine both of our Church Religion State Ministry Nation and excite them to use the self-same deportment words to me who have no private design nor interest of my own or other mens in this my voluntary undertaking but only the publique Safety and Weal as enraged David did once to Abigail when she diverted him from his rash bloody resolution to destroy Nabal and his family for a Churlish Answer returned to him for his Kindness 1 Sam. 25.32 33. Now blessed be the Lord God of Israel which sent thee this day to meet me and blessed be thy advice and blessed be thou which hast kept me this day from coming to shed bloud and to avenge my self with my own hand But if they shall by Gods permission cast me again bound hand and foot into another fiery Fornace for this my faithfull Service or not falling down and worshipping that Golden or rather Wooden Image which they have or would now set up I doubt not but that Gracious God who hath so miraculously preserved me in delivered me out of so many fiery Trials and Fornaces heretofore will do the like again hereafter and that in such a visible eminent manner as shall enforce them at last to use those words unto me as Nebuchadnezzar did unto Shadrac Meshac and Abednego after their miraculous preservation in the midst of the fiery Fornace into which the most valiant men of his Army cast them bound by his unrighteous Command to their own immediat destruction by the flame without the least hurt to them Dan. 3.28 Then Nebuchadnezzar spake and said Blessed be the God of Shadrac Meshac and Abednego who hath sent his Angel and delivered his Servants that trusted in him and have changed the Kings word and have yielded their bodies that they might not serve nor worship any God or Idol except their own God This being an undoubted Truth which I have ever hitherto found experimentally true from and in my former causelesse Oppressors whose Erronious Practices vices I have reproved recorded by God himself and the wisest of all Mortals Prov. 28.23 He that rebuketh a man for his faults plainly shall afterwards find more favour than he that flattereth him in them with the Tongue And that saying of the truth it self in such cases of difficulty and concernment to the reprover will ever prove an experimental verity wherewith I shall conclude my Plea which I desire may be deeply engraven in the Hearts Spirits of all timorous base unworthy Christians who dare neither speak nor write their Consciences nor Discharge their Duties in these times of danger and will wrong both their Consciences Country Posterity yea shame their God Nation Religion to save their Estates Lives as they fondly conceit when they will lose all with their souls to boot by their base carnal fears Math. 16. 24 25 26. Luke 17.33 If any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his Crosse and follow me For whosoever will Save or shall seek to Save his life so Luke records it shall Lose it and his Tithes Lands Liberties with it and whosoever will Lose his Life for my sake shall find it For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole World and Lose his own Soul Or what shall a man give in exchange for his Soul I shall cloze up all with this notable Passage of our own learned Writer John Sarisbury against such Religious Hypocritical Cistersian Monks who in his age sought exemption from payment of Tithes and seised upon the Ministers Dues about the year 1170.