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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A96590	The discovery of mysteries: or, The plots and practices of a prevalent faction in this present Parliament. To overthrow the established religion, and the well setled government of this glorious Church, and to introduce a new framed discipline (not yet agreed upon by themselves what it shall be) to set up a new invented religion, patched together of Anabaptisticall and Brownisticall tenents, and many other new and old errors. And also, to subvert the fundamentall lawes of this famous kingdome, by devesting our King of his just rights, and unquestionable royall prerogatives, and depriving the subjects of the propriety of their goods, and the liberty of their persons; and under the name of the priviledge of Parliament, to exchange that excellent monarchicall government of this nation, into the tyrannicall government of a faction prevailing over the major part of their well-meaning brethren, to vote and order things full of all injustice, oppression and cruelty, as may appeare out of many, by these few subsequent collections of their proceedings. / By Gr. Williams L. Bishop of Ossory.	Williams, Gryffith, 1589?-1672.	1643 (1643)	Wing W2665; Thomason E60_1; Thomason E104_27; ESTC R23301	95,907	126

Os ossis oris if you looke in pag. 59. you shall finde his double admiration that I should not be either recompenced with vengeance revealed from heaven or be made an example of the deepest severity of the justice of the land whereby I presume he means this Parliament or otherwise to be dismembred and torne in peeces by the impatient rage and indignation of the people for which direfull imprecation I wish the poore snake nothing else but that our good God would be so mercifull unto him as to restore him to his wits which I understand he scattered about the streets of Amsterdam and give him grace to repent for those intolerable treasons and abuses which he dispersed in his Pamphlets against his own Sacred Soveraigne And for his bone wherein I finde neither flesh nor marrow I shall throw it to his owne dogs to fight about it and will ever lest Thine affectionate loving Brother GR. OSSORY PSAL. 89.49 REmember Lord the rebuke that thy servants have and how we do beare in our bosomes the reproach of the mighty wherewith thine enemies have reproached thee and slandered the foot-steps of thine Anointed Arise therefore O Lord maintaine thine owne cause have mercy upon us and deliver us because we have put our trust in thee and forgive those poore seduced sheepe which know not what they doe The Contents of the severall Chapters contained in this TREATISE CAP. I. Sheweth the introduction the greatnesse of this Rebellion the originall thereof the secret plots of the Brownisticall faction and the two cheifest things they aimed at to effect their plot pag. 1. CAP. II. Sheweth the eager prosecution of our Sectaries to take off the Earle of Straftords head how he answered for himselfe the Bishops right of voting in his cause his excellent virtues and his death p. 6. CAP. III. Sheweth how they stopped the free judgement of the Iudges procured the perpetuity of the Parliament the consequences thereof and the subtle device of Semiramis p. 14. CAP. IV. Sheweth the abilities of the Bishops the threefold practice of the faction to exclude them out of the House of Peeres and all the Clergy out of all Civill Iudicature p. 19. CAP. V. Sheweth the evill consequences af this act how former times respected the Clergy how the King hath beene used ever since this Act passed and how for three speciall reasons it ought to be annulled p. 25. CAP. VI. Sheweth the plots of the faction to gaine unto themselves the friendship and assistance of the Scots to what end they framed their new Protestation how they provoked the Irish to rebell and what other things they gained thereby p. 32. CAP. VII Sheweth how the faction was inraged against our last Canons what manner of men they chose in their new Synod and of 6 speciall Acts of great prejudice unto the Church of Christ which under false pretences they have already done p. 40. CAP. VIII Sheweth what discipline or Church government our factious schismaticks do like best 12 principall points of their doctrines which they hold as 12. articles of their faith and we must all beleeve the same or suffer if this faction should prevaile p. 51. CAP. IX Sheweth three other speciall points of doctrine which the Brownists and Anabaptists of this Kingdome do teach p. 57. CAP. X. Sheweth the great bug-beares that affrighted this faction the 4 speciall meanes they used to secure themselves the manifold lies they raised against the King and the two speciall questions that are discussed about Papists p. 64. CAP. XI Sheweth the unjust proceedings of these factious Sectaries against the King eight speciall wrongs and injuries that they have offered him which are the three States and that o● Kings are not Kings by election or covenants with the people p. 73. CAP. XII Sheweth the unjust proceedings of this Faction against their fellow Subjects set downe in foure particular things p. 83. CAP. XIII Sheweth the proceedings of this faction against the Lawes of the Land the Priviledges of Parliament transgressed eleven speciall wayes p. 88. CAP. XIIII Sheweth how they have transgressed the publicke Lawes of the Land 3 wayes and of 4 miserable consequences of their wicked doings p. 94. CAP. XV. Sheweth a particular recapitulation of the reasons where by their designe to alter the government both of Church and State is evinced and a patheticall disswasion from Rebellion THE Discoverie of Mysteries OR The Plots and practices of a prevailing Faction in this present Parliament to overthrow both Church and State CHAP. I. Sheweth the introduction the greatnesse of this Rebellion the originall thereof the secret plots of our Brownisticall faction and the two chiefest things that they aymed at to effect their Plot. I Have long wandered in a region of Rebellion among seduced Subjects and discontented Peeres and now at last after I had passed the raging Seas and very hardly escaped the stormes and dangers of the furging waves I am arrived in my native soyle where I finde my selfe incompassed with farre greater stormes and more violent windes then ever I thought could be on any Land for though that Grand Rebellion which you may finde lately described was both magna mira very great and very grievous such as I supposed could not be exceeded by any humane malice yet now me thinkes I heare the Spirit saying unto mee as hee did unto Ezekiell Sonne of man stand up and I will shew thee greater abominations and a rebellion farre greater and more odious then either Popish Irish or any other Sect or Nation of the world hath hitherto produced and therefore I may now say with the Poet Barbara Pyramidum sileat miracula Memphis Let proud Babylon cease to boast Of her Pyramid's stately spires This Rebellion is more stange Surmounting all infernall fires No age the like hath ever bred Nor shall when these Rebels be dead The seed of it was unseasonably sowne in the Northerne storme The seed and originall of this rebellion and the originall of those Boreall blasts either why or by whom those spirits were raised is not so well knowne to me therefore how justly the King did undertake the quarrell I will not at this time determine or with what equity the Scots made their approach into England it is not my purpose to discusse yet I must needs say that our English Sectaries and Amsterdam Recusants which hated our Church and loved not our King justum quia justum onely because he is so good too good for them did from hence arripere ansam take hold of this opportunity by procuring those to proceed that were comming on and discouraging the others of the Kings side that were cowardly enough to say no worse of themselves to betray both King and Kingdome into the hands of the Invaders So the good King was now with King David brought into a strait So new I feare more the secret enemies both of Church and State that may lurke in Court then those that he

I have fully shewed and I would all Kings would read it in the Grand Rebellion But I see no reason why it may not and why it should not be retracted and annulled That the act should be annulled when the Houses shall be purged of that Anabaptisticall and Rebellious faction that contrived and procured the same to passe for these three speciall reasons 1. 1. Reason Because that contrary to all former precidents that Bill for their exclusion was as it is reported at the first refused and after a full bearing among the Lords it was by most votes by more then a dozen voices rejected and yet to shew unto the world that the factions maltee against the Bishops had no end their rage was still implacable at the same Session which is very considerable immediatly assoone as ever they understood it was rejected the House of Commons revived it and so pressed it unto the Lords that if I may have leave to speake the truth contrary to all right * For I conceave this to be an approved maxime that no light not proved forfitea by some of fence can be taken away wuhout wrong 2 Keasom In His Majesties answer to the Petition of the Lords and Commons 16 of July p. 8. it must be againe received and while the Bishops were in prison it was with what honour I know not strangely confirmed 2. Because this Bill had the Royall assent after that a most riotous tumult many thousands of men with all sorts of warlike weapons both on land and water most disloyally had driven His Majestie to fly from London that most Rebellious City not without feare for his owne safety even for the safety of his life as himselfe professeth and when they had so cunningly contrived their plot as to get some of the Kings servants and friends that were about him and imployed in the Queenes affaires to perswade Her Majesty to use all her power with the King for the passing of this Bill or else Her journey should be slaied as formerly they had altered her resolution for the Spaw and at Rochester she should understand the sense of the House to stop Her passage unto Holland whereas the passing of this Bill might make way for Her passage over and many other such frights and feares they put both upon the King and Queene to inforce him full sore against his will as we beleive to passe this harsh Bill for the exclusion of the spirituall Lords out of the House of Peeres and of all the Clergy from all Secular Judicature But Master Pym will tell us he did Ald. Gar. speech at Guild hall that it was the opinion of both Houses there was no occasion given by any tumults that might justly cause His Majesties departure To whom I answere with the words of Alderman Garroway if the Houses had declared that it had beene lawfull to beat the King out of Town I must have sate still with wonder though I should never beleive it but when they declare matters of fact which is equally within our own knowledge and wherein we cannot be deceived as in the things we have seene with our eyes if they dissent from truth they must give me leave to differ from them as if they should declare they have paied all the money that they owe unto the city or that there was * For now I understand it is pulled down no Crosse standing in Cheapside we shall hardly beleive them And therefore seeing we all remember when the alarme was given that there was an attempt from Whitehall upon the City how hardly it was appeased and how no babies thought the designe of those subtle beads that gave that false alarme was no lesse then to have caused Wite hall to be pulled downe and they that loved the King and saw the Army both by Land and water which accompanied the persons accused to Westminster the next day after His Majesties departure as if they had passed in a Roman triumph conceived the danger to be so great that I call Heaven to witnesse they blessed God that so gracioussly put it in the Kings heart rather to passe away over night though very late then hazard the danger that might have ensued the day following The meaning therefore of both Houses may be that there was nothing done which they confessed to be a tumult and no mervaile because they received incouragement as we beleeved from their defence and no reproofe that we found was made for this indignity offered unto the King but if I be constrained and in danger it is not enough for me that I am voted free and safe for if that which lookes as like a tumult as that did or as the representation of my face in the truest glasse is like my face doth come against me and incompasse me about though I may be perhaps in more safety yet I shall thinke my selfe in great feare and in no more security then His Majestie was at Edge-hill 3. 3 Reason p. 7 Because as the veiwer of the Observat hath very well exprest it no act of Parliament can prevaile to deprive the King of His right and authority as an attainder by Parliament could not barre the title to the Crowne from descending on King Hen. 7. nor was an act of Parliament disabling King Hen. 6. to re-assume the government of his people of any force but without any repeale in it selfe frustrate and void 7. rep 14. Calvins case an act of Parliament cannot take away the protection or the Subjects service which is due by the Law of nature 11. rep Sur de la Wares case William de la Ware although disabled by act of Patliament was neverthelesse called by Queene Elizabeth to sit as a peere in Parliament for that it seems the Queen could not be barred of the service and councell of any of Her Subjects 2. H. 7.6 a statute that the King by no non obstante shall dispence with it is void because it would take a necessary part of government out of the Kings hand and therefore I se not how this act can deprive the King of the service and councell of all his Bishops and clergy but that it is void of it selfe and needeth no repeale or if otherwise yet seeing that besides all this 13 of the Bishops were shut in prison when this act passed and their protestation was made long before this time and it was so unduly framed so illegally prosecuted and with such compulsive threats and terrours procured to be passed I hope the wisedome of the next Parliament together with their love and respect to the Church and Church-men will nullifie the same CHAP. VI. Sheweth the plots of the faction to gaine unto themselves the freindship and assistance of the Scotts and to what end they framed their new protestation how they provoked the Irish to rebell and what other things they gained thereby ANd thus the Sectaries of this Kingdome and the faction in

doth not make their hearts to tremble if their consciences were not seared to be senslesse of all fear 2. 2. To whole Nations The sin of sacriledge extendeth it selfe not onely to the persons committing it but also to the whole Nation that suffereth it as the sin of Achan was not onely a snare to catch him to be destroyed but it troubled all Israel so that they were still discomfited and never prospered till the sacriledger was punished and the Lord appeased If you say the sin is taken away when the Parliament takes these things away I answer that we must not idolize the Parliament as if it were a kinde of omnipotent Creature and like the Pope such an infallible Lord God upon earth as that their Votes and Sanctions were the supremest rule of justice that cannot be unjust because they are enacted by the whole State because as no conclusions are therefore truths because determined by a whole Counsell so no Lawes are therefore just because done by a whole Parliament but when they do agree with the common rules of truth and justice which God hath given unto men and shewed the same in his holy Word which he hath left to be the right rule of our actions And therefore if the greatest Assemblies Parliament or Counsell make not the will of God the rule to guide their proceedings thereby their Sanctions are so farre from taking away the nature of the sin that they do increase the evill and make it the more out of measure sinfull and to become a nationall sin that before was but personall and the more exceedingly sinfull when the same is confirmed by a Law so that none dares speak against it and the sinners are become senslesse in their sinnes and therefore the Prophet demandeth how any man that feareth God dares meddle with such a people that will thus justifie their sinnes saying Shall the throne of iniquitie that is any unjust course have fellowship with thee which frameth mischief by a Law And the Lord doth extremely threaten them that walke after unrighteous ordinances as that they should sow much but not reap tread the olives but not anoint themselves therewith Mich 6.15 16 Hos 5.10.11 and sweet wine but not drinke it because the statutes of Omri are kept and all the workes of the house of Achab and they walked in their counsels and the Prophet Hosea doth more fully set down the wrath of God both against the makers and the observers of all unrighteous Lawes If you say Object the Lands and Lordships of the Bishops were not the patrimonie of the Church but were onely in superstitious times given by our Kings and others unto the Churchmen and therefore now the King being in want they may be restored to the Crown again I confesse the Lands of the Church are the free bequests of godly Kings Sol. and of other pious men dead long ago with most fearfull imprecations made against all those that should seek to alter their Wils and Testaments and the Apostle saith If it be but amans Testament no man altereth it that is Gal. 3.15 no honest man ought to alter it though perhaps his Will might have been made wiser and his goods bestowed to better use for our Saviours maxime when he gave a Penny to him that laboured but one hour and but a Penny to him that had endured the heat of the day is unanswerable Is it not lawfull for me to do what I will with mine own and therefore 1. As others daily leave their estates of great amount to whom they please many times to strangers perhaps to idiots or debauched persons of wicked lives and noxious manners and yet no man grudgeth or endeavoureth to take away those just Legacies which their good Benefactours had bestowed upon these unjust men so there is no reason that any mans eyes should be evill for the goodnesse of their Ancestours unto the Clergie but that their Wils should stand to those uses after their death as intemerate as if they were now alive to dispose of their beneficence 2. They are most injurious to the King who is wise as an Angel of God and therefore holdeth this sacriledge odious to his princely heart that would seek to enrich his Crown with that which will shake it on his head and endanger all his Posteritie to such fearfull judgements as his Progenitours have denounced and God hath executed upon many Kings and Princes for the like sinnes for as Moses prayeth against the sacrilegious enemies of Levi Deut. 33.11 Smite through the loines of them that rise against him and of them that hate him that they rise not again so we finde that many ancient families having by the Statute of Dissolution taken some of the Lands and Tithes of the Church into their possessions Pierius in Hieroglyph have found the same like the Gold of Tholous or the Eagles feathers pernitiosa potentia that will consume all the feathers where they shall be mingled Who so is wise will consider these things Aelian l. 5. c. 15. Var. Hist and will not to satisfie these Anabaptisticall dregges of the people and the enemies of all Christian Religion sacrilegiously take away with Aelians boy the golden plate from Dianas Crown the Lands and Revenues of the Church but having not so learned Christ they will do that which becommeth Saints and suffer the dead to enjoy their own will in that wherein they put them to no charge and if they do intend to promote Gods service they will not rob Saint Peter to pay Saint Paul but will rather say with holy David God forbid that I should offer sacrifice to God of that which cost me nothing 15. As any wooden Preachers like Jeroboams Priests de face plebis scarce worthy to be compared with the Groomes of their stable Iob 30.8 or such humi serpentes poor abjects as Job speakes of The sonnes of villaines and bondmen more vile than the earth they crawle upon are fit enough to be their teachers and beggarly pensioners so any place a thatched barue a littered stable What prayers and Sermons please these men or an ample Cow-house is thought by these to be very fair and fit to be the House of Him that was borne in a stable and laid in a manger and any service prayers without sense such as our Saviour blames and preaching without learning without truth such as their Euthusiasts conceive in illa hora quicquid in buccam venerit without any further studie of meditation is justified to be most acceptable to God witnesse the Authour of one argument more against the Cavaliers where that great Scholar in his own opinion railes against our grave Bishops and most impudently reproacheth a very reverend man of known worth and great learning by the scandalous epithite of The ceremonious Master of Baliol Colledge Doctour Lanrence whom for a most learned and pious Sermon preached before the King upon these

the eager prosecution of our Sectaries to take off the Earle of Straffords head how he answered for himselfe the Bishops right of voting in his cause his excellent vertues and his death 1. 1. Impediment THey get Master Pym the grand father of all the purer sort and a fit instrument for this designe in the name of the House of Commons and thereby of all the Commonalty of England The Earle his charge to charge Thomas Earle of Strafford of High-Treason a high charge indeed and yet no lesse a crime could serve the turne to turne him out of their way because nothing else could subdue that spirit by which he was so well able to discover the plots and to frustrate the practices of all the faction of Sectaries for as the Jewes were no wayes sufficient to answer Saint Stevens arguments but onely with stones so these men saw themselves unable to confute his reasons and to subdue his power but onely by putting him to death and cutting off his head for that fault which Pym alleadged he had committed But then I demand how this great charge of high Treason shall be made good against him It is answered How sought to be proved that England Scotland and Ireland and every corner of these three Kingdomes must be searched and all discontented persons that had at any time any sentence though never so justly pronounced against them by him that was so great a Judge Yet conceited to be otherwise by themselves must now be incouraged and countenanced by the faction and most likely by this grand accuser to say all that they know and perhaps more then was true against him for what will not envy and malice say or what beast will not trample upon the Lion when they see him groveling and gasping for life in an unevitable pit and it may be compassed with so many mastife dogs I meane his enemies and discontented witnesses as were able to teare more then one Lion all to peices so by this meanes they are enabled to frame neare thirty Articles against him ut cum non prosint singula multajuvent that the number might amnze the people and thinke him a strange creature that was so full of haynous offences and so compassed with transgressions But si satis accusasse quis innocens The Earle his answer if accusations were sufficient to create offenders not a righteous man could escape on earth therefore the Law condemneth no man before he be heard what he can answer for himselfe and the Earle of Strafford comming to his answer made all things so cleare in the Judgment of the common hearers and answered to every article so well that his enemies being Judges they much applauded his abilities and admired at his Dexterity whereby he had so finely untied those Gordian knots that were so fouly contrived against him and as his friends conceived had fairely escaped all those iron nets which his adversaries had so cunningly laid my popular countreyman with the rest of the more learned Lawyers had so vehemently prosecuted to insnare him in the linkes and traps of guiltinesse and in breife the Lords who as yet were unpoysoned by the leavened subtilty of this bitter faction could finde not any one of all those articles to be Treason by any Law that was yet established in this Land sic te servavit Apollo so God delivered him as he thought and his friends hoped out of all these troubles Yet as a rivelet stopped will at last prove the more violent The nature of malice viresque acquirit ibidem and recollect a greater strength in the same place so rage and malice hindered of their revengefull desires will turne to be the more implacable quia malitia eorum excaecavit eos because the malice of men bewitcheth them and hath no end till it makes an end of its hated foe therefore those men that hated and maligned the Earle like the Jewes that because their tongues could make no reply to the just defence of the holy Martyr Act. 7.51 guashed upon him with their teeth and stopping their eares ran upon him with one accord all at once because they had no Law nor learning to make those articles treason they say with the Poet hac non successit aliâ aggrediemur viâ seeing we failed herein we will attempt another way and to that end they frame a Bill of attainder against him and this if it passe by the major part of both Houses and have the royall assent will bring him to his iust deserved death and herein I will not say they shewed themselves worse then the Iewes because that when their malice was at the hichest pitch against Christ they said we have a Law and by our Law he ought to dy and these haters of the Earle seeing they had no Law will have a Law to be made that shall bring him unto his death because the House might have reasons which my sence cannot conceive Yet some of his friends have said that after a former prosecution according to Law to make a new Law where there was none before to take away a mans life is almost as bad as the Romance Law The rubs of the Bill how taken away that I read of to hang him first and then judge him afterward to whom I assented not and not many lesse then 60 worthy Members of the House of Commons would never yeild to passe that Bill it had a greater rub among the Lords where it is not thought upon any slight conjectures it had never passed but that this rub must be taken away by a new device for that the faction judging some of them might be more timorous then malicious and remembring that primus in orbe Deos fecit timor feare is a powerfull passion that produceth many strange effects the Apprentices and Porters Water men and Car-men and all the rascall rout of the ragged Regiment were gathered together by some Chedorlaomer came as they did against Christ with swords and staves without order with great impudency to awe them and to cry for Iustice against him and this was done and done againe and againe untill the businesse that they came for was done a course not prevented that may undoe all Justice and bring us all to be undone And yet all this will not do this deed untill the King passeth His assent The Kings great paines to search out the truth for as yet the new Law of orders and ordinances without the King was not hatched and the good King having so graciously so indefatigably taken such care and such paines in his owne person every day to heare and see all that could be laid unto his charge and how he had answered each particular was so just and of such tender and religious conscience that he was not satisfied as men conceived with the weight of those reasons that were produced to passe the same therefore here I finde another Stratageme used such as

Hannibal could not invent to effect this hard talke what to perswade mildnesse to become severe or to cause a just and most clement Prince so full of mercy so prone to pardon where there is a fault and so loth to punish but where he must by the Law of Justice the greatest fault to yeeld to put him to death that was in many things so excellent in his life the taske was to procure his assent to passe this Bill and how shall this be done as the Man of God could not be perswaded by any man but by a Man of God a Prophet by a Prophet so now the Bishops that were good men men of conscience and set apart by God to resolve and satisfie weake and tender consciences are thought fit to be sent unto this good King to perswade him as men supposed that to prevent a greater mischiefe he might justly passe this Bill and either 6. or 4. of the prime Prelates are requested by the Lords to goe unto the King to assay how far they can prevaile with him herein and so they went and how they dealt with His Majestie I do not fully understand but am informed by some that went that they assured him he ought to satisfie himselfe in point of Law by his Judges and of State by his Councell how they did any otherwise in any other thing rectify his Conscience in point of divinitie which belonged unto themselves I cannot tell But though I thinke no man can justly lay the least tittle of blame upon the just King no not the Earle himselfe as himselfe professed for yeelding to such and so earnest perswasions of I know not how many reverend Bishops wise Counsellours grave Judges and the flower of all his people to passe that Bill whatsoever it was Yet to say what I conceive with their favour The Bishops right to vote in any cause of my brethren the Bishops in the prosecution of this cause I am perswaded that they had no reason to withdraw themselves from the House and to desert their owne right when the Bill or the Iudgment was to passe against the Earle upon this slight pretence alleaged against them by the haters of the Earle and no lovers of the Bishops that a Clergie-man ought not to have any vote or to be present at the handling of the cause of bloud or death for they might know full well when my Lords grace of Yorke did most clearely manifest this truth that the first inhibition of the Clergy to be present and assistant in causa sanguinis or judicio mortis in the Canon of Innocent the third as I remember for I am driven to fly without my bookes was most unjust onely to tie the Bishops to his blinde obedience to the apparent prejudice of all Christian Princes by denying this their service unto them and it is no wayes obligatory to binde us that are by the Lawes of our Land not onely freed but also injoyned to abandon all the unjust Canons that are repugnant to our Lawes and derogatory to our Kings and to renounce all the usurped authority of the Pope for I would faine know what Scripture or what reason Pope Innocent can alleadge to exclude them from doing that good service both to God and their King which in all reason they can or should be better able to do then most others and I am sure that neither in the old nor in the new Testament nor yet in the Primitive Church untill these subtle Popes began thus to incroach upon the rights of Princes to take away the prerogatives of Kings and to domineer over the consciences of men this exclusion of them from the highest act of Justice was never found The Prophets and Apostles judged in the case of life and death for did not Moses Joshua Samuel Eliah Elizaus Jehoida and others of the Priests and Prophets of the Old Testament and S. Peter also the Prince of the Apostles in the New Testament judge in the case of bloud and pronounced the sentence of death against Malefactors as when Ananias and Sapphira were suddenly brought unto their end by the judgement of the Apostle and if they be able and fit to judge of any thing then why not of this If you say Ob. because they are the advocates of mercy the procurers of pardon the preachers of repentance and men that are made to save life and not to put any one to death or to bring any man unto his end I answer Sol. that they are therefore the fittest men to be the Judges both of life and death for who can better and more justly judge me to death then he that doth most love my life It is certaine he will not condemne me without just cause even as God that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the father of mercies and even mercy it selfe is the fittest and most righteous Judge that can be found both of death and damnation because his mercy and goodnesse towards his creatures will not permit his severity against sinne though never so detestable to his purity Clergy how fit to be Judges to doe the least injustice to their persons so our love of mercy and pitty will not suffer us to doe any thing that shall transcend the rules of justice and equity and as our inclination to mercy prohibits us to condemne the innocent so our love to justice and our charge to preserve it will not permit us to justifie the wicked for the Scripture teacheth us that he which justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the innocent that calleth the evill good and the good evill that spareth Agag and killeth Naboth are both alike abominable unto the Lord. And therefore notwithstanding this unjust Canon I never finde in any of our Histories that the Bishops did ever withdraw themselves and quit their votes in this case either before or after save onely from the 10th yeare of Richard the 2d unto the 21th yeare of the raigne of the same unfortunate King which they did not because they could not justly be present but because they had just reasons to be absent as you may finde it in the Annales of his time therefore I know not how to palliate their facility of yeilding way to those Non-Canonicall Lords to produce those non-obliging Canons Non Canonicall Lords which they abhorred in all that made not for the furtherance of their designe to exclude them from doing this which was one of their chiefest duties for who knoweth not the Lord Say and Lord Brooke and others of the Lords to hate all Canons even the old Canons of the Apostles as inconsistent with their new rules of independent government and yet herein to exclude the Bishops votes in the judgement of this man and the passing of this Bill which being admitted might perhaps have turned the scales they will take hold of the unjustest Law and alleadge one of the worst of Canons a Canon against reason and most repugnant

iniquitie Esay 29.20 21. to turne aside the just for a thing of nought to take advantage of a word or to catch men for one syllable to charge them with high Treason to bring them unto death so many Reverend Bishops to such a shamefull end was more malicious than ever I finde the Jewes were to the old Prophets or the Pagan Tyrants unto the Primitive Fathers nor do I beleeve you can parallell the same charge in any Historie yet 3. 3. How they were committed to prison For this one necessitated Act of the Bishops the House of Commons do suddainly upon the first sight thereof charge twelve of them with high Treason they were not so long in condemning it as the Bishops in composing it and accordingly the Lords commit them unto Prison And if this was Treason I demand why could they not prove it so to be Or if it was not why should such an House Flos medulla regni the greatest and the highest Court of Justice from which the King consenting with them there lieth none appeal but onely to the Court of Heaven accuse them of high Treason I would not have that Court to charge a man with any thing that were not most true for certainly whosoever unjustly compasseth my death is justly guiltie of death himselfe when as the Poet saith Lex non justior ulla Quàm necis artifices arte perire suâ It may be they would have us to believe this Treason was not proved nor the charge so fully followed as they intended out of some mercie to save their lives but I could sooner believe they rejoyced to see them fear and were glad of their mistake that they might charge them and by such a charge cast them into prison that so they might the more easily worke their designe to cast them out of the Parliament which now they have soon effected and procured an Act for their exclusion And you must know that to cast out from doing good or serving God is a worke of the devill and not of God so the wicked Husbandmen did cast out the right Heir of the vineyard out of his own inheritance The consequences of this Act. so the Jewes did cast out the blinde man and all that professed Christ out of their Synagogue But you may better judge of this good Act by these consequences which are like to be the fruits thereof 1. Hereby they are all made incapable to do any good either for Gods honour or their neighbours benefit 1. Made incapable of doing any good by executing justice or pronouncing judgement in any cause in any temporall Court and justice which long agon hath fled to heaven and wanders as a stranger here on earth must be countenanced and entertained onely by the sonnes of men by secular Lords and Gentlemen and the Spirituall Lords the Servants of God and messengers of heaven must have nothing to do with her not because they are not as well able as any other to do justice but because the others cannot endure to let them see it for fear they should hinder their injustice and therefore justice and judgement are like to speed well on earth when their chiefest friends are banished from them and it may be worldlings oppressours or most ignorant youthes rather than any just understanders of their natures must be their Judges 2. 2. Made unable to defend themselves Hereby they are made unable to defend themselves or their calling from any wrong their respect was little enough before and their indignities were great enough and yet now we are exposed to far greater miseries and to unresistable injuries when a Bishop hath not so much Authoritie as a Constable to withstand his greatest affronts But hoc Ithacus velit this is that which the devill and his great Atreidesses his prime champions to enlarge his kingdom would fain have our soules to remain among Lions and all the meanes of defence to be taken from us our enemies to be our judges and our selves to be murdered with our own weapons In the time of Poperie there were many Lawes de immunitate clericorum whereby we were so protected that the greatest Prince could not oppresse us as you may finde in the Reigne of King John and almost in all our Histories and when we renounced the Pope God made Kings our nursing fathers and Queenes our nursing mothers and we putting our selves under their protection have been hitherto most gratiously protected but now by this Act we are left naked of all defence and set under the very sword of our Adversaries and as the Psalmist saith They that hated us are made Lords over us to callus to assesse us to undo us 3. 3. Debarred of that right that none else are Hereby they are made more slavish than the meanest Subject and deprived of that benefit and priviledge which the poorest Shoomaker Tailor or any other Tradesman or yeoman hath most justly left unto him for to be excluded debarred and altogether made uncapable of any benefit is such an insupportable burden that it is set upon no mans shoulders but upon the Clergie alone as if they alone were either unworthy to receive or unable to do any good 4. 4. Made more contemptible than all others Hereby they are made the unparalleled spectacle of all neglect and scorne to all forraigne people for I can hardly believe the like precedent can be shewed in any Age or any other Nation of the world no not among the very Infidels or Indians for in former times the Bishops and Clergie-men were thought the fittest instruments to be imployed in the best places of greatest trust and highest importance in the Common-wealth and Kings made them their Embasladours as the Emperour Vas lentinian did S. Ambrose and our own Chronicles relate how former times respected the Clergie and how our Kings made them both their Counsellors and their Treasurers Chancellors Keepers of the Great Seal and the like Officers of the chiefest concernment as Ethelbert in the yeer of Christ 605. saith I Ethelbert King of Kent Vt refert in tract atu suo de eposeopatu p. 61 62. M. Theyer Sir Henry Spelman p. 118. with the consent of the Reverend Archbishop Augustine and of my Princes do give and grant c. and the said Ethelbert with the Queen and his Son Eadbald and the most Reverend Prelate Augustine and with the rest of the Nobilitie of the Land solemnly kept his Christmasse at Canterbury and there assembled a Common Counsell Tam cleri quàm populi as well of the Clergie as of the people and King Adelstan saith Idem p. 403 I Adelstan the King do signifie unto all the Officers in my Kingdom that by the advice of Wolfelme my Archbishop and of all my Bishops In the great Councell of King Ina Anno 712. the edicts were enacted by the Common Counsell and consent Omnium Episcoporum principum Idem p. 219. procerum Comitum

omnium sapientum seniorum populorum totius regni per praeceptum regis Inae and in the second Charter of King Edward the Confessour granted to the Church of Saint Peter in Westminster How former times respected the Clergie it is said to be Cum concilio decreto Archiepiscoporum Episcoporum Comitum aliorumque suorum optimatum with the councell and decree of the Archbishops Bishops Earles and other Potentates And so not onely the Saxon Kings but the Norman also ever since the Conquest had the Bishops in the like or greater esteem that they never held Parliament or Counsell without them And surely these Princes were no Babes that made this choice of them neither was the Common wealth neglected nor justice prejudiced by these Governours And whosoever shall reade mores gentium or the pilgrimage of Master Purchas Livie Plutarch Appian and the rest of the Greek and Latine Histories I dare assure him he shall finde greater honour given and farre lesse contempt cast upon the Priests and Flamins the Prophets of the Sybils then we finde of this faction left to the Servants of the living God who are now dealt withall worse than Pharach dealt with the Israelites that took away their straw and yet required their full tale of brickes for these men would rob us of all our meanes and take away all our Lands and all our rights and yet require not only the full tale of Sermons and Service as was used by our Predecessours but to double our files to multiplie our paines How the Clergie are now used and to treble the Sermons and Service that they used to have of our forefathers more than ever was done in any Age since the first Plantation of the Gospell and when we have done with John Baptist the utmost of our endeavours like a shining and a burning lampe that doth waste and consume it selfe to nothing while it giveth light to others they onely deal with us as Cartiers use to do with their packe horses hang bels at their eares to make a melodious noise but with little provander lay heavie loades upon their backes and when they can bear no more burdens take away their bels withdraw their praises call them Jades exclaim against their lazinesse and then at last turne them out to feed upon the commons and to die in a ditch and thus we have now made the Ministers of Christ to be the emblems of all miserie and in pretending to make them more glorious in the sight of God we have made them most base in the eyes of all men And therefore the consequence of this Act is like to prove most lamentable when the people considering how that hereby we are left naked of all comfort and subject to all kinde of scorne and distresse and how that this being effected is but the praeludium of a farre greater mischiefe they will rather with no great cost make their children of some good Trade and their children will choose so to be than with such great costland more care and yet little hope to bring them up to worse condition than the meanest of all Trades The Clargie alone are deprived of Magna Charta or the lowest degree of all rustickes when as they can challenge and it shall not be denied them to have the priviledges of the Law and a propertie in their goods which without their own consent yielded in their persons or their representours cannot be taken from them and the Clergie onely of all the people in this Kingdom shall be deprived of the right and benefit of our great Charter which so many famous Kings and pious Princes have confirmed unto us and when we have laboured all the dayes of our lives with great paines and more diligence to instruct our people and to attain to some competencie of meanes to maintain our selves and our families we shall be in the power of these men at their pleasure under the pretence of Religion contrarie to all justice to be deprived of any part of our freehold when we shall have not one man of our own calling to speak a word in our behalfe on no Seat of Justice throughout the whole Kingdom O terque quaterque beati queis ante ora patrum contigit oppetere O most miserable and lamentable condition of Gods Ministers I must needs speak it though I should die for it and if some did not speak it I thinke the stones would crie against it and proclaim it better for the Clergie were their hope onely in this world never to have been borne or at least never to have seen a book then to fall into the hands and to be put under the censure of these men that do thus love Christ This Act more prejudiciall to to the future times than now by hating his Ministers who as I said before by this one Act are made liable to undergo all kinde of evils which shall not onely fall upon the present Clergie for were it so our patience should teach us to be silent but also to the increase of all prejudices to the Gospell more than my foresight can expresse in all succeeding Ages And therefore I may well say with Jeremie Jer. 5.9.29 Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this And we need not wonder that such plagues calamities and distresses have so much encreased in this Kingdom ever since the passing of this Act and yet the anger of the Lord is not turned away but his hand is stretched out still and I fear his wrath will not be appeased till we have blotted this and wiped away all other our great sinnes and transgressions with the truest teares of unfained repentance These are like to be the consequences of this Act and yet our good King who we know loved our Nation and built us a Synagogue and was as I assure my selfe most unwilling to passe it was notwithstanding over-perswaded considering where thirteen of the Bishops were even in prison and in what condition all the rest of them stood in question whether all they should stand or be cut down root and branch to yield his assent unto the Act though if the case in truth were rightly weighed not much lesse prejudiciall to his Majestie than injurious to us to be thus deprived of our right How the King hath been used ever since this Act passed and exposed to all miseries by excluding us from all Civill Judicature and I would to God the King and all the Kingdom did continually consider how his Majestie was used ever since the confirmation of this Act for they no sooner had excluded the Bishops and Clergie out of their right but presently they proceeded and prosecuted the designe ever since to thrust out the King from all those just rights and prerogatives which God and nature and the Lawes of our Land have put into his hands for the government of this Kingdome neither was it likely to succeede any other wise as

for we know full well from the practise of all former parliaments that seeing the three States are subordinate unto the king p. 48 in making lawes wherein the chiefest power consisteth they may propound and consent but it is stil in the kings power to refuse or ratifie and I never read that any parliament man till now did ever say the contrary but that if there be no concurrence of the king in whom formally the power of making of any law resideth ut in subiecto to make the law the two Houses whose consent is but a requisite condition to compleat the kings power are but a livelesse convention like two cyphets without a figure that of themselves are of no value or power but ioyned unto their figures have the full strength of their places p 19 20 21 which is confirmed by the viewer of the Observations out of 11. Hen. 7.23 per Davers Polydore 185. Cowell inter Verbo prerog Sir Tho. Smith de republ Angl. l. 2. c. 3. Bodin l. 1. c. 8. for if the kings consent were not necessary for the perfecting of every act then certainly as another saith all those Bills that heretofore have passed both Houses The Letter to a Gentleman in Gloucester shite p 3 and for want of the Royall assent have slept and beene buried all this while would now rise up as so many lawes and statutes and would make as great confusion as these new orders and ordinances have done And as the Lawyers tell us that the necessity of the assent of all three states in Parliament Lamberts Archeion 271. Vid. he Viewes p. 21. is such as without any one of them the rest doe but loose their labour so Le Roy est assentus c●o faict un act de Parliament and as another saith Nihil ratum ha● betur nisi quod Rex comprobarit nothing is perfected but what the King confirmeth But here in the naming of the three States I must tell you that I find in most of our Writers about this new-borne question of the Kings power a very great omission that they are not particularly set downe that the whole Kingdome might know which is every one of them and upon this omission I conceive as great mistake in them that say the three States are 1. the King 2. the House of Peeres 3. Which hee the three States of England the House of Commons for I am informed by no meane Lawyer that you may find it upon the Rowles of Hen. 5. as I remember and I am sure you may find it in the first yeare of Rich. 3. where the three States are particularly named and the king is none of them for it is said that at the request Speed l 9 c 19 p. 712. Anno 1 Ric. 3 and by the assent of the three estates of this Realm that is to say the Lords Spirituall the Lords temporall and Commons of the Land assembled it is declared that our said Soveraign Lord the king is the very undoubted king of this realm wherein you may plainly see the king that is acknowledged their Soveraigne by all three can be none of the three but is the head of all three as the Deane is none of the Chapter but is caput cepituls and as in France and Spaine so in England I conceive the three estates to bee 1. the Lords Spirituall that are if not representing yet in loco in the behalte of all the Clergie of England that till these anabaptisticall tares have almost choaked all the Wheat in Gods field were thought so considerable a party as might deserve as well a representation in Parliament as old Sarum or the like Borough of scarce twenty Houses 2. The Lords Temporall in the right of their honour and their posterity 3. The Commons that are elected in the behalfe of the Countrey Cities and Burroughs and what these three States consult and conclude upon for the good of the Church and kingdome the king as the head of all was either to approve or reiect what he pleased and though we finde with some difficulty as the viewer of the Observations saith where the Parliament is said to be a body consisting of King Lords and Commons ergo without the king there is no Parliament yet herein the king is not said to be one of the three states but the first and most principall part that constitutes the body of the parliament p. 2● 25. H 8 21. but John Bodin that had very exactly learned the nature of our parliament both by his reading and conferring with our English Embassador as himselfe confesseth saith the States of England are never otherwise assembled no more then they are in the Realmes of France and Spaine then by parliament write and the states proceed not but by way of supplications and requests unto the king Bodin de repub l. 1. c. 8 and the states have no power of themselves to determine or decree any thing seeing they cannot so much as assemble themselves nor being assembled depart without expresse commandement from the king In all this and for all the search that I have made I finde not the king named to be one but rather by the consequence of the discourse to bee none of the three but as I said the head of all the three states for either the words of Bodin must bee understood of two states in all the three kingdomes which then had beene more properly termed as we call them either the two Houses or the Lords and Commons or else they must be very absurd because the three states if the king be one of them can not bee said to be called by parliament writs when as the king is called by no writ nor can hee be said to supplicate unto himselfe or to have no power to depart without leave that is of himself Therefore it must needs follow that this learned man who would speake neither absurdly nor improperly meant by the three states 1. The Lords Spirituall 2. The Lords Temporall 3. The Commons of the kingdome and the King as the head of all calling them consulting and concluding with them and dismissing them when he pleased And Will. Martyn saith King Hen 1 at the same time 1114. devised and ordained the manner and fashion of a Court in Parliament appointing it to consist of the three estates of which himselfe was the head so that his lawes being made by the consent of all were not disliked of any these are his words And I am informed by good Lawyers that you may finde it in the preambles of many of our Statutes and in the body of some other Statutes and in some Petitions especially one presented to Queene Elizabeth for the inlargement of one that was committed for a motion that he made for excluding the Bishops out of the House of peeres Such is the difference betwixt Queene Elizabeths time and our times the three states are thus particularized and the Lords Spirituall are nominated