sung by the Quire on the Leads his Star then appearing I my self shewed it to very many hundreds if not thousands witness this So that the Heavens haveing now again demonstrated Him the Seas waiting on him the Earth flourishing under him what remains but that we get our selves into a readiness to receive so great a blessing from so good a God Whom in mercy he hath appointed over us as I firmly believe The Lord of Broghill I confess I advised never to right or draw sword against this King For the war of Ireland I now understood it better than formerly and therefore did believe that to his Lordship who was born there at Lismore too as I conceive and resided in that Kingdom the devices and subtleties of the Church of Rome in that Rebellion or since in the carrying on of that War were better known than to his late Majesty whose goodness by some was too too much abused seeing it not with his own eyes but hearing it by others misrepresented His Lordship who had that great advantage as to be amongst them himself which was denied his late Majesty did see that his Unholiness of Rome had onely a modest design to suppress the Protestant Religion and cheat the King of that Kingdom that he might the better be soon usurper of all the rest This I now firmly believe was the ground of the Lord of Broghills fighting in that Kingdom So never at all against the King but for him And I do the rather believe this because I never had any Commission or desire to treat him other than with all respect as a person of Honour that had great and good accomplishments For I told him that day before I went out of his presence that I believed he never was against the King Further I never had desire to apply my self to any man in that Kingdom but his good self And see now as you shall anon how God honoureth that Man above all the sword-men in that Kingdō as Oliver Cromwel only of the sword-men the most in the Kingdō of England And more than to these two onely did I never apply my self sent of Heaven to these so glorious Saints first on Earth that they may be most glorious ones hereafter in Heaven But thou Church of Rome shalt fall as anon I shall shew you God will down with thee These two Persons of Honour have and shall the most of any two Subjects in the world help down with her I had all most forgot my then last observe to his Lordship A material on it is that although every man stood up bowed and Worshipped God following the Crown and with one consent crying out O Lord we praise thee for this Crown is of Heaven come we will follow and obey it yet I say this of all people wherein no one man dissented did not seem for number to exceed four or five hundred persons which occasioned from me then this observe to his Lordship That I feared our sins and the punishment for sin would almost lay waste our Land we having so highly provoked the Lord by our too much delighted in iniquities and rebellions of all sorts which we had just ground to bewail least they consumed us But truely since I have better hopes nay firmly believe I do that if we would turn to God with all our hearts and do the things here God adviseth to by me his unworthy servant in much mercy sent unto you that you might repent finde deliverance and so live abundantly happy this number of men which as I former observed past for the whole people in the Land of which none dissented I now hope and pray will most happily prove to be that number of men which represent the whole people of the Land and yet exceed not 4 or 5 hundred persons now of this Parliament to which purpose I beseech every good mans prayers and every bad mans amendment of life and for dissenting persons in that body believe as I do there will not be found one or not one to hurt us Who can be unhappy when all agree to fear God and honour their King keeping the commandments of the one the wholesom and well constituted Laws of the other in which doing there cannot but be happiness here and ever hereafter into which good old way of thine and ours good Lord be pleased to set us that we may be certainly blest our feet being then found in the way of thy steps Thus ended all I then observed and to my Lodging I retired to the Widdow Marricks house in Youghall SECT III. VEry few dayes past but by accidental rancounter I met and fell into discourse with a Gentleman who had commanded formerly a Troup of Horse in the Parliament service we argued and to this we came whether Kings were made so originally of God or the people the latter he held I the former which I proved to him out of the Word of God that first the Choice next the Anointing of them was of God onely and his Prophets sent by his command as in Saul David and others so not at all in the people 'T is true the people were all along commanded to pray for them and to obey them when thus set up by God So we ended the discourse and quietly parted Some four dayes after one Sunday morning as I best remember having lain most of that night in Meditation Prayer about day I did see sitting at my beds foot behinde the curtain a Man sent of God whilest He continued there sitting there fell a Showre of Fire thick and in drops like Rain all about my beds foot Full in my eye was the Spirit there sitting and the fire falling down Awake I conceive my self to have been for at that very time I called to minde the Fire that came down from Heaven upon the heads of the Apostles to their inablement Anon the Spirit called me by my name Walter Gostellow I indeavoured to reply did open my mouth tried twice but my tongue doubled in my mouth and I could not bring forth my words or speak He called me the second time by my name Walte Gostellow I indeavoured the second reply but my tongue doubled as formerly and I could not speak He called me the third time by my name Walter Gostellow to which I then answered Here I am he asked and said unto me Did you see the fire come down from Heaven as a shore of Rain I replied Yes I did he then strook by the Curtain looked me full in the face so I him He wept and said unto me you do well interpret Scripture clearly referring as I believe to this That the Choice of Kings this of ours especially is onely in God and not at all in the people This over I wrote to the Lord of Broghill that nights Vision for other I cannot call it besought his Lordship that once more he would be pleased to admit me before him there and then to be present also some
the better to delude with as some have traduced me I can produce you witnesses that I have for many years since but in all comfortable humility and not otherwise spoken it Truth I will give you throughout and nothing else this book will pass far from home inquired into I believe every part of it will be observed also with desire from some with sorrow of others for its fulfill with what concerns my self and Father as to the name of Prophet I have done forget not in the book I beseech you the passage of the Goaler when he so abused and reproached me by the name of false Prophet from whose bitter words and hard usage God in his own time which is ever the best delivered me on a sudden by his Call and that nights Vision Come away bring your Papers come away it is but a little I have more to say and that is of Croppredy Church and Parish where my Father lies interred my self was Christned and then I have done this long Post-script This Parish of Croppredy is 7 or 8 miles about good Land all of it is being in a Countrey very populous Churches it hath in that one Parish four and one little Chappel of ease the Tythes of the whole as I believe rightly informed are worth 8 hundred pound per annum there doth reside officiate in those Churches now 4 Gentlemen whose Milk Pigs Eggs Nuts and Apples with other petty Tyths altogether are worth somewhat above 100 pound per annum the Corn Hay and Pease worth 6 or 7 hundred pound that is stollen from the Church first by the Roman Impropriator the Lord Abbot Bishop or what he was then called I know not stollen it is that Clergy say they what they will were the great Thieves who robbed men first by perswading our forefathers to give to Gods glory and after stole it from the Church to enrich their Abbies Covents or Orders so robbed they have the Priest of his maintenance and God of his true worship service which should alwayes have been truely maintained with that given Thieves you see they were and now pray what are we else receive we do buy and sell what they stole which in other cases less considerable we make death by the Law Fain would I see our Ministers generaly wise good and charitable I may never expect to see also their maintenance once made what certainly it ought to be good also Gentlemen if any in the World it is to you Schollers I speak when wise good and charitable doubt not you have a God and a King that will remedy this villenous knavery Theft and Sacriledge which hath undone so many and made us of the Protestant Religion loose our renown because we have followed the Church of Rome in this way of Thieving for we restore not which amongst other sins of the greatest magnitude now help to pronounce her down-fall she shall fall so shall Church Robbers doubt it not if our Saviour did but whip out those that bought and sold in his Temple what think you he will do to those that buy and sell his Temples and steal the endowments and wonder not at it that Oliver Cromwell will assist in this God hath set him up for his glory and your maintenance and for me his most unworthy servant I shall have a hand or a pen in it also you read where and what of his mercy brought me to this imploy seeing his Temples lay waste his Ministers unprovided for and the people untaught because the means is stollen from the Church if I fall short in this let me never speak more thou O Lord hast made me after dumb speak and write this for thy glory and I do truely say I love thy Temples and the place where thy honour dwels also to see thy Ministers well provided for that thy name nor the Protestant Religion be not evil spoken of but that we may by well doing invite others to be of it so communicably good to all One passage more of Croppredy and I have done here it was and about my once Fathers house also that our glorified King personally defeated Sr. William Waller a kinde defeat it was he took no pleasure in the pursuance of his enemies to death he took from him there part of his Militia the field-Guns destroyed not many of his men yet a defeat it was he recovered it not The Militia was that often dangerous knife we foolish and disobedient children cried for which haveing gotten knew not how to use but to our own as others destruction foolish and disobedient Subjects as well as Children we are found to be For with it we carry on all our committed violences and outrages yet for all that men professing and practising the Law tell us this is Law certainly they speak falsly except they mean Club-law Post-master Prideaux baiting and pursuing in the Gall of bitterness Sr. John Stowel upon his Trial part of which I heard had this expression he admired any now would oppose or indeavour to wrong the so innocent Infant-Common-wealth very finely spoken Sir your self the Father and God-father of that so newly named Innocent Babe such outcries from the mouth of some blind not yet nine dayes old P. P. or Novises in the Law would not be much wondered at neither can such deceive us we well know that sober honest men and Counsel learned in the Law for such there are go not out of the certain track and known rule of the Laws such run true all along open not the mouth to spend in vain hate to misguide us deceive us they will not fearing least we as they should catch what we pursue not and so miss of truth the onely desired good and Royal Game Magna Charta A Lawyer with a double heart and two tongues imployed the one to stifle truth the other to maintain falshood I would onely have such tongues cut out when so ill imployed to such wicked ends God never gave them for we should praise the Lord with all our hearts with our tongues next For others that cloath and inrich themselves with bribes and the wages of unrighteousness for certainly of both these wicked sorts we have had too many Lawyers such I would onely have their skins flead off them and hang'd up over that place of judicature they cause to be so evil spoken of I have read or heard that so good a course was once taken for the punishment and deter of evil Judges and such Lawyers Undeniable it is that not long since wickedness was practised and committed by a Law amongst us the Lawyer he as the witness falsly accused the Sequestrator he so condemned the Committee man he levied the Estate or sold it if the Rent was low then it was fittest for one of the Godly party to grow rich by most Trypartite as a three corner Cap all of one piece they have hanged together truely if these evil doers will not repent and bring forth better
you you would never confess your selves guilty but God sees it and forgives it too with him there is mercie if you confess and forsake your sins making all possible amends and for the time to come all your dayes walk before him in a holy obedience to this end he in mercie hath sent me to you that you might truely repent and live My next observe is the Church of Rome shall fall a Church you see she is so I ever believed her to be once a pure one in whose Churches often both in France and Spain many a good instructive Sermon to amendment of life I have heard and truely in their Churches also I have often performed I hope acceptable Devotions beseeching God that when the people came into those Churches to pray and to learn that they might go forth do and practise for the time to come better things to which end I believe our pious Fore-fathers built them pray and beseech we should for the people there assembled that God then would be pleased to hear in Heaven also send thither to officiate such Pastors and Teachers as might be most agreeable to his holy Word so more to Gods glorie and the peoples good that the people might not longer be deluded by those jugling villains which make merchandize of the Kingdom of heaven and hold the people in sinfull ignorance turning almost all their practises and miscalled Devotions into finenesses crafty frauds to inrich themselves by just one with our late temporizers are those Jesuits such a stall do they both make of the Pulpit from thence teaching damnable Doctrines contrary to the word of God calling evil good and good evil one of whose Tenents is the depose of Kings yea killing them too if they rule not according to their fancies is 't not pity the Kings of the Earth should allow either of you residence in any of their Territories fire brands you are whose damnable Tenents are so declared contrary to the King of Heavens in this I couple you together Rebels both Jesuits and Sectaries I would I could exempt the Presbyterian the froward and worst are not guiltless our late King was in the right when he advised our now Soveraign his Son not to have a prejudice against the Protestant Religion in regard of the ill measure dealt to him his Father assure your Majesty he doth it was by such done who were no true Sons of that Church the Church of England abhord as the Church of God should do all such damnable practices and wicked Tenents See here again my King was not your glorified Father a light of Heaven shining in a dark place as in the midst of a wicked and froward generation to keep your feet judgment in the way of Gods Commandments Behold now the goodness of God in letting the world see that the Protestant Religion taught no such corrupt Doctrine neither were the major part of the people of England so ill principled I have heard and from a good hand also that the reformed Churches of France did upon that Act of cuting off the King assembled their Doctors and Pastors who declared and Printed to the World as a Gentleman of Rochel of good account assured me that the word of God warranted so such damnable proceedings in Subjects and for their Reformed Church of France as the true Church of England they neither taught nor allowed any such Doctrine of Devils or practises of wicked men Behold I say how God hath freed this his Church from that asperse and this our Nation from that dishonour the lesser and inconfiderable number never yet included the greater and the wiser it was well observed by Mounsiour Causabon a learned and Honourable Father of the Church of France by King James he was invited hither and rests Honourably interred in West-minster Abby That it was the violence of the Church of Rome not our choice that hath excluded us because we could not love her errors she hath ejected our persons These are those wicked ones that had rather rend the Church than want their wills who can be content to sacrifice truth peace millions of souls Kings and all to their own ambition and covetuousness one of which sins alone is the root of all evil what is it then with the rest of their rabbel but I may not aggravate where God hath pardoned if we repent and bring forth better fruits This also was prophesied that their seditions and madness would at once be the scandal of the true Church of God and give advantages to the false which is the Church of Rome know you not that I speak truth Well down they must both fellow-workers of iniquity Sectaries and Church of Rome a Church you see she is call'd though adulterous and Idolatrous we read the Lord calls the people of Israel so guilty yet his people and you my people Israel when at the same time he sends his Prophets to let them know that for these very sins his punishments were hastening to come upon them yea to lay them waste and cast them out of the land as those rebellious Israelies his people so that of Rome a Church Thus we allow the greatest robber to be a true man though a notorious Thief much the better this keeps him not from the gallows to which a true man comes not but to look on and be premonished by so sad a spectacle here me thinks we might be reconciled take now the best of all sides something good in all hold it fast put that together and you have the onely true Church against which you see the gates of Hell shall never prevail and because of the strength and yet power of that Church of Rome we cannot take away the Hay and stubble and mistempered morter her Babel-builders have raised her to this height with that her confusion as her fall may be the greater the Lord himself comes to do the work down they must and this Church of Rome shall fall he hath said it But see the loving kindness of the Lord extended to the Sons of men and to that Church also in that he tells them not onely of her fall but whither they shall repair for safety even under his wings into his Church and to the Obedience of his King CHARLS STUART by the Lord now declared Defender of the Faith Here 's a visibility and Church the Gates of Hell shall never prevail against also a rule given and a sword put into the hands of the General of all his Forces Oliver Cromwell by name against whose rule and sword never shall any prosper that riseth up or is drawn first proved in Gods word for the defence of his Church now also by this his Prophesie and immediate dictate from Heaven Well what is to be done forthwith turn to this so mercifull Lord your God withall your hearts proclaim a fast and keep it truely and let us know when you do it that we may pray together God would be pleased to
what I have heard amongst the wicked rabble there of new opinionests if you will transplant any in Ireland transplant these and your Anabaptists and when they have brought these wicked ones to a true belief let them then as the Eunuchs be rebaptized amongst the Heathen send them also continue them not here to make rents in Church government for they would conform to neither had they force they told me the Lord was now coming to take the power out of wicked Governors hands and to put it into theirs and truely that power I expected would have been exercised on me for the sword-men stept up close to me when Doctor Lamb could reason no more you are mistaken in them if you think them meek they are furious and not wise I will not call them fools although their own words are they desire to live and not sin against conscience and then all cannot but be well with them you have heard how their consciences stands affected Doth not this clearly shew you that what our so late but ever blessed and wise King CHARLS Prophesied is now come to pass and fulfilled in your eyes Your disordering and tearing up by the roots the Power and Government of the Church that being laid wast contemned would bring in all sorts of wicked Athiesm Villeny and such practises speak can any of you continue to be mad will you as formerly go on what blinde for ever adding sin to sin untill your measure is made full if you will do so be sure you shall be removed cease to do evil learn to do well about it presently that this scandal may not stick upon the Professors of the Protestant Religion least they say of us as they do of the Spaniard in America that it cannot be Heaven where such bad men are so come not to their Religion but my belief is that blest America and those people will shortly have a better Religion before their eyes than that of Rome and a better people also to cohabite with than the Spaniard I know what God is doing he is fitting the Jews and Heathen to come into the Protestant Religion and I believe many of them there in America the Church of Rome shall fall To the rest of the Prophesie the two Letters promised they are now made three the first to our King the second to Oliver Cromwel the third occasioned by a Book not untill this was almost ready for the Press then through Gods blessing come to my hand and view written by Manasseth Ben-Israel the Book intituled the Hope of Israel to that Author is my third in those next ensuing Letters is the rest of the Prophesie in some things spoken to I would not swell this to a Volume which I intended for every mans pocket heart I would gladly leave the Reader with good appetite that he might not do other than be in love with the precepts and mercies of the Lord and his Prophets also which never were compared to the flat dull and tiresom empty babblings of the Priests of Baal or the Idiots of these times both unsent of God My second Letter to our Soveraign C. REX Most worthy Doctor SIR Mine of the tenth present I hope is received by you it was directed to Mounsieur Renier Bazine Merchant residing in Rue de Mavise Parroles PARIS my charge to him that forthwith he carry it to you Sir or my Soveraign and deliver it to none else which since I understand is done Sir This is to describe to you the two Ladies Frances the Elder and Elizabeth Boyl the 2 d. daughter to the Earle and Countess of Cork chosen by the Almighty Wife for our Soveraign Lord the King the the Elder Sir is lamed by a fall taken at Nurse so that she goes not but with the deepest halting that is imaginable hardly without leading she is very vertuous and some 18 years of age For the Lady Elizabeth Sir she hath the most loveliest face ever eies beheld the most of Majesty in it nothing but loveliness in every part of it Excellency throughout her hair is brown her eyes black her mouth little her teeth the best her complexion as that of the Canticles brown but most lovely and comely as ever eyes beheld her body the perfection of workman-ship none did I ever see so made as to resemble it she is aged about thirteen she dances well she speaks very good French she delights in reading serving of her God and obeying her Parents the Chaplain in that house is Doctor Mollines Son to him of the Church of France a wise and good man and of the Church of England a true Son also Sir You may not doubt the indowments of her Soul and minde whom God hath set apart to be so blest as to be our Soveraigns Queen and his delight for she cannot be other all that see her admire her outward perfections and deportments and for charity and humility two good adorns she is already eminent as a Queen Elizabeth Sir Let me be believed in a word she is a Queen of Queens and an Angel on Earth and this is my rejoycing that the Lord hath in mercie given such a Lady to my King that will go hand in hand with him in all paths of vertue and godliness that she is as well a Nursing Mother to the House of God as his most blessed Majesty by God appointed and so commanded to be a Nursing Father to us and all his now happy people Sir I spake truth to you and all of the Lords doing for our King whom as his Queen God Almighty ever bless and let their rejoycings in his good will and commands be not deferr'd to the joy of our hearts admiration and obedience of the World Let us pray God save my King CHARLS the Second and his most delightfull Queen Elizabeth both the Servants of the ever living God O my King fail not I beseech you of the most sincere performance of your Devotions by fasting and prayer every Friday and let there be no looking back nor return to any sins whatsoever let not any of a bad life that will not be reformed eat one bit of your bread or receive a favour from you more than prayers for his or their amendment and punishment where it is not conformed unto be you Sir I beseech you frequent in Devotion and receiving of the most blessed Communion of the body and bloud of our Lord to which you are to come alwayes well prepared that you eat not to condemnation O my King do you truely forgive and so pray for the very worst of your Fathers Mothers and your own Enemies God will do you right who ever lost by referring all to his Almighty power times and goodness Thus shall your Fathers Counsel be followed his ever blessed memory unparaleld good example live in you to the joy of Angels and good men Sir God is turning for you and to his own glory the hearts of all or most
CHARLS STUART AND OLIVER CROMVVEL UNITED Or Glad tidings of PEACE To all Christendom To the Jews and Heathen Conversion To the Church of Rome certain downfall The Irish not to be TRANSPLANTED Extraordinarily declared by God Almighty to the Publisher Walter Gostelow Psalm 85. vers 10. 13. Mercy and Truth are met together Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other and shall set us in the way of his steps Printed for the Author 165â— OF GOD. C. R. RESTORED AND OLIVER CROMVVEL BLESSED READER TO Dedicate this Book to any other than to whom God Almighty hath directed it I dare not it is first to all you Christian Kings and Princess more especialy our own Charls Stuart and therein it shews you That when you govern best and most pleasing to the will of the Almighty whose Vice-Royes you are And of him made rulers on Earth for the general good you then live in a general Peace into which happy condition he hath now put you that his Temples may be rebuilded his Worship and his Ministers restored with what hath been stollen from both also your Subjects Gods people well educated in his houses by his Ministers sent in the wayes of Justice Peace and Holiness without which no man shall ever see the face of God to his comfort next it shews you that the so antiently beloved Seed of faithfull Abraham the Jews are now in his best times remembred and brought into the Faith of Christ our Lord the onely Son of God whom they Crucified the fulness of the Gentiles coming in with them also to the knowledge of his Gospel his that is the onely Shilo the onely Messia by the Heathen not yet heard of by the Jews hoped for he I say comes to both making himself known in such a manner as they expect not most strange wonderfully affording them his Vice-Roy Charls Stuart for their Defence Protection he professing that Gospel now to be Preached to the whole World against whose rule and Gospel none shall ever prosper that Rebels Disobeyeth or Schismatically riseth up therefore is the Church of Rome at this time sentenced to certain down-fall The Church of Rome shall fall The poor Irish whom wicked men would have transplanted upon the same principles as obdurate Pharoah would not let the children of Israel go covetuousness and hard-hartedness God doth continue in their own Land yea under his and their own Kingly Government also to the joy of their hearts That Nation being neither such a Bear as we misapprehended them nor their skin fit to be sold by us that did it before warrant is given from God to deliver it they shall not be transplanted God now shews us That wicked Rebellion was the design contrive of a few in that bloudy and ever Rebellious Church of Rome not the allowance of the Nation this also God shewed unto our now happy and glorious King in Heaven whilest good on Earth it is proved to you in his Letters taken at Naseby written to her Majesty My Heart you will finde the Irish with you Knaves they might deceive the one they could not deceive the other And since that how hath God fully cleared their Majesties as now the Nation from any allowance of that hideous Rebellion Own it Church of Rome it will match well with the Gun-powder Treason thou didst both as many others Thy Nuntio was in Ireland yet thou shalt fall Hath not God made his late Majesties abominating that wicked act clear as the day to be none of his ollowance you know or may That Sr. Phillemon O'neal upon his Trial at Dublin though pusillanimous and timed in all other things yet when he was to give an account from whence he had his Commission God sent him a courage gave him abilities to speak boldly and truely to Gods glorie the honour of the Protestant Religion and the Kings just Vindication he took Heaven and Earth to witness he had neither Commission from King or Queen for that Rebellion he affirmed that himself with others of the Roman stamp made them that he might play the best of his own Game it further appears in that Oath imposed on those he subdued to his own obedience These are things I have had from very good hands when my self at Dublin but that Traitor was executed a little before I came thither Now see what God doth who is the searcher of all hearts the King is in Heaven the Queen declared for Heaven the Nation not to be transplanted the contrivers and aspersers of both gone to their own home or truely discovered to us by the Lord who now throws down that wicked Church Well you shall now see we must all live together in brotherly love under Kingly Government also but you will say how can these things be considering what manner of Persons we have been this book will shew you It proceeds onely from the good pleasure and mercifull loving kindness of the Almighty The Lord hath made our Salvation not our destruction his glory when all we thy people O God had sinned beyond any help then O Lord thou sayest lo I come But after how wonderfull a manner and how certain our deliverance is read and know Actions salved up with a free forgiveness are as not done and as a bone once broken is much stronger after well setting so is love after reconcilement God forgives us our iniquities and in mercy restores us our King again who deals with us being guided of God as Joseph did with his brethren when onely of God made ruler in Egypt and had power to punish according to their demerit then he treats them kindly following the example of our Lord. He forgives all past injuries he loades them with good things he weeps over them when he tells them he is Joseph least they not seeing his heart might doubt of their forgiveness he drops Tears as Bloud from pitying eyes and heart they well knew what themselves had been to him unfaithfull brethren and it s not improbable when they saw themselves by God cast under his power and dispose they might fear tremble and expect the reward of so high demerit for the affronts they had put upon Joseph But least such fears should too much sadden their unquiet Souls he weeps over them more abundantly imbraceth them afresh gives them all they stood in need of and doth not so much as once remember them of the evil measure they had dealt him so allows them no ground at all to suspect their safety whose injuries he had fully forgiven Most happy Re-union meeting that sweetens more in its return than it imbitâ—ered in its absence Protection my book commands not craves under Oliver Cromwel Protector also his conformity thereunto yet I beseech both God hath now declared him to be beloved first in Heaven as you shall read then of his King CHARLS STUART and all good men on Earth the Almighty both deputed him to be highly instrumental for the bringing of
to suffer us longer who pretend to the most and best of Piety to carry on a War and continue such actions as should prove so scandalous to the Protestant Religion deterring from the profession of it Such as there lived among us who could not certainly be drawn to the profession of it by our so bad example living as it were like men of dispositions onely born to cruelty and irreligion Beseeching that he would be pleased to return to us in mercy set every mans sins in order before his face to the detest of them resolving never to return to folly And that of his goodnes he would cast theÌ„ all behind his back that we might once more come into the Houses built for his Worship and Service with prepared hearts devout Souls forgiving one the other all desirous to be taught of God that we might live hereafter more according to his will revealed in his word and so knowing his good pleasure we might readily apply our selves to do it Further that the Ministers appointed to officiate in those places might be men sent from God who understanding his word aright might to us so divide it And that we might all harmoniously agree together not onely to Preach and talk down Sin but that we might all live for the time to come to serve him in sincerity of heart and in the beauty of holiness So that others observing Gods mercies towards us and our amendments towards him might also with us be drawn to glorifie our Father which is in Heaven Sometime of that Thursday after-noon I spent in that Remain of Church so praying meditating and reading and could not do otherwise Indeede the more I prayed the more I wept the more I wept the more I joyed and from my Devotions I remember not that I ever went away with a better return being very highly comforted and so assur'd that God would hear and have mercie and from thenceforth and in that place bless me giving me for consolation that a well-guided zeal for his House Worship and Service made great our own and establish'd it also That night I went home to a little House I then and there lodged at and had this dream Me thought there was a very gross and thick Darkness over the face of the whole Earth dark beyond compare I then heard a very terrible Thunder which more affrighted me and looking up to Heaven I saw a glimering Light not clear about the bigness and of the proportion of a round Table some two yards over In that Light there appeared to me as the Body of an Oak about a yard long Root it had not nor Top nor Leaves nor Fruit Full of Sangs it was and offensive Knots not fit for Timber or other use than the Fire This soon vanished yet the darkness continued but grew greater than the â—ormer and the Thunder answerable indeed so terrible that it seemed to me to waken and rouze up all the people of the Land which when risen I prayed in these words O Lord the people are now risen up and stand in readiness to do thy will wouldst thou be pleased to let them know it I beseech thee O Lord give them a sign in Heaven or from Heaven of thy good pleasure and we will readily obey thee There then appeared as formerly such another Light not clearer but bigger and as the former was over our heads about the height or distance of the Clouds having in it such a Body of an Oake as the other in this onely differing 't was bigger and more offensive As we stood thus gazing anon the Heavens began to grow light in the East as approach of day and Sun We standing as it were in the midst of the Kingdom of England the Light encreased and came on And with it rose and came toward us the most glorious Crown ever eyes beheld the richest for Jewels the most transparently cut every way the beautifullest imaginable Having in it and through it standing as the three Plumes of Feathers in the Princes Arms a bunch of Bayes or small Bay-trees beautifull for verdure bearing Berries as having Root Waiting upon this Crown came many goodly Ships which Crown Bayes and Ships came all along thus together in the Light from the East toward us the people who with fixed eyes stood looking into Heaven All which we perfectly discerning and being come almost over our heads we the people all of us with one voice gladness and consent cried out O Lord we praise thee this is of Heaven we will follow it I then looked behinde me for the former Glimmering Light and Offensive Oake in it and I saw them flying away so fast that immediately they were gone and no more to be seen The people seeing it so gone out of the Heavens reitterated the former words and said all with one consent Come this Crown is of Heaven we will follow it so bowed down and worshipped praising God The Light then went over all the Heavens towards the West and great was the Light the Crown Bayes and Ships continued in the Heavens now light all over After this immediately from the Heavens I heard most sweet and pleasing Sounds as the voice or murmur of many waters and on the Earth shining appeared nothing but Beauty and Plenty amongst the people of the Earth loving kindness and good affections all with one consent praising God Thus ravished with an over-joy I wakened and found my self very wet with tears My greatest joyes and greatest weepings seldom are divided I spent most of that night in Meditation and casting what this dream might import for truely this is but one though the most considerable as I conceive of the many I have had from Heaven demonstrating several things The next day being Fryday a day in the week which for some seven years past I have set apart though not alwayes spent God be pleased to have mercie upon me and forgive me as I ought or should for fasting and examination of my self That as I am one Fryday nearer my end so I may in one measure or another grow fitter for it in regard of the many mercies God Almighty hath been pleased to afford me from my Cradle hitherto As that he hath been pleased to preserve me from the noisom Pestilence from the violence of the War where be pleased to observe I have been committed and taken into custody three times on the Kings side and five times on the Parliaments yet never was in action or imploy on either part from so many great and eminent dangers both by Sea and Land from Men lying in wait particularly for my bloud And lastly that the Lord hath not cut me off in the midst of my sins and already given me my portion with that so sad company in Hell from whence is no returning These were certainly grounds enough for every mans Fasting and Prayer especially living in a Time when wickedness seemed to be practiced by a Law at least it was not
shining with variety of Flowers and abundant Fruitfulness the Seas their over-joy thinking it no burden to their best and well-rigged Ships to give way and bow down that all she brings from forreign and the rich returns of Trade that plough her Ocean may when so loaden in their best dress also wait upon the Crown peaceably attending suffering themselves to be led by it All which they did being Merchant Ships not Men of War And now tell me is it not pitie the greatest too that whom God hath made the more reasonable Creature Man should onely be averse and stand in Rebellion going on in disobedience to his own undoing But I may not complain as anon I shall let you see He also is or shall come in for who can resist when God will have it so He hath in store nay he is now distributing to you the greatest mercy in the world which I dare not longer conceal from all the Sons of Men but more especially from the so much belov'd of the Lord the Seed of Abraham the Jews Here 's the hope of Israel as also to the Heathen towards whom his Compassions fail not and to this our Orthodox true Protestant Religion for the honour of it to the unparalel'd joy of all good mens hearts These things observed I then applied my self to Doctor Mollines who was one of the ten Persons I desired to be present And because I knew him to be a person of good life believed him of sound judgement I made it my beseech to him That in a short time he would be pleased to give us a Sermon upon this Subject or Text He that covers his sins shall not prosper but he that confesseth and forsaketh them shall finde mercie For to me it seemed that Gods return is in mercy was onely witheld by our going on in iniquity Here also I may not omit but observe to you that before I came to the Lord of Broghills I was taken from my knees and could not go on to beseech Gods blessing upon what I had to deliver to him untill I turned to the Reading Psalms But as I was cast formerly upon the Prophet Haggai with good success for the rebuild of that Church so here I was cast upon the 84 and 85 Psalms both as full as is imaginable to any that well considers and compares what I observed out of my Dream and desire to the rebuild of Gods House Oh how amiable and how much to be delighted in is thy House how should our Souls long after thy Worship Which when I had read and considered the manner of my being cast upon them having already disputed all I intended or almost all what I would speak to that Company at the Lord Brougills I could not but conclude what I believe every well-observing man will That it was the onely Providence of God Almighty who for my further confirmation gave me those Psalms of Scripture to strengthen me and dispose others to their duty who he was willing should reap the unparalel'd blessings there assured Pray well observe it the one lets you see what desires we should have for the rebuild of worship in Gods House the other his return in mercy blessing the Land when we so fear and serve him Righteousness as that Light shall then go before him Mercy also and Truth shall meet together Righteousness and Peace shall kiss each other and so set us in the way of his steps Full to all Having done all of Interpretation in reference to my Dream I could not pass this lightly over but observe it to them as also how that God had many times shewed me several things in and from Heaven called me to the search and often advised the reading of his Holy Word giving me to understand that by so doing I should be abundantly happy and blessed In particular one time it seemed to me he took me into a great Light when all the World was in darkness he placed on each side of me an Angel of the Lord that on the right hand opened a great Book to me bid me read therein and took an Angel of Gold off that Book into his hand and put it into mine when received I folded my arms and bowed before him believing it was no other but as the Bush of Moses the presence of the Lord He then told me he gave it not to be folded up or hid but to be improved were his Talents given and so advised me to read Another time one night about the hour ten walking at the end of Broad-street in which I then and now live looking up into the Heavens and observing so great a number of Stars I called to minde the promise made to Abraham That his Seed should be as numberless as the Stars in Heaven So praising God I there stood in or near that place about half an hour where I did see the Heavens opened my Saviour on the Throne the Patriarks Prophets Apostles Martyrs Saints and Angels waiting round about it and to my comfort my own Father This I saw when I was awake and really there standing Something hath been shewed me of our ever-blessed King dead but in Heaven glorious this also I did observe to his Lordship but made no other use of it than this That forasmuch as all I ever dreamed or saw of that nature was above in the Heavens or came from thence nothing ever from the bottomless pit the Earth or Seas which gave me to believe it was the further from Delusion and much the more to be believed True because that which is of Heaven is Heavenly And although the Crown was upon no mans head yet being waited upon by the Ships it implied He was to come from beyond the Seas whose undoubted right it was And who that Man was to whom it properly belonged his Star demonstrated which at Pauls Cross appeared when there was a Sermon preached there upon the day he was born on being the same as I conceive our Lord rose on and his our Kings Birth also early in the morning as his our Saviours Resurrection whose Vice-roy certainly he this CHARLS STUART is as ye shall hear anon his Father our late King then present And as the Gentleman that preached about the hour of eleven was giving thanks to God Almighty That to our then Soveraign Lord the King and to us his Subjects was that day born a Son and Prince in whom our hopes were and assurance might be He would prove most Eminent in his Church on Earth to Gods glorie and his Majesties and our comfort So thanking God for this for I present was I looked up to Heaven and there at almost eleven a Clock in the moneth of May a most clear day very near the Sun also did I see that his Star appear which wondering at being just over as it were his place of Birth White-Hall or his Fathers head who was come to give God praise for him at the Cross which was also
ten or twelve persons by me desired He was pleased to afford me the favour so also most of the others By this time it pleased Almighty God to let me know he had deputed me to go to Oliver Cromwell and after to his Majesty that now is CHARLES STUART Charles the Second The imploy he would inform me of and for the Commission it self I must believe that from strength to strength He would inable me untill I came to perfect Peace in Zion And although the things to be done were great mighty strange and wonderfull yet for his Honour Mercy and Names sake he would bring them to pass and they should be marvellous in our eyes Thus began and thus ended my Commission of the Lord. I then bethought me of what I would say to Oliver Cromwell and thus resolved that from God I would reprove him set his sins in order before his face and tell him he was that great Deceiver the scandal of the Protestant Religion the Dishonour of our Nation a Whited wall he was a great and close Hypocrite a Man of bloud and Son of Belial and more than all this for I never loved him all this I resolved to say to him but the Lord reproved me and gave me to remember that my self prayed in my Dream That God would be pleased to let the men of the world who were desirous to do his will know it from Heaven or in the Heavens by a sign which I have given thee and they would readily obey applying themselves to walk in conformity thereunto Having thus altered me and as before again reproved me letting me know God judged not as man did He commanded me to treat and use him kindly the dispose of the heart being in the hand of God So that now from former hating of Him for so I did no man more I now cannot do other than pray for him for so I should and for all others that God would be pleased to inable him for the overcoming of all his enemies more especially his corruptions And firmly believe I do that the Lord will make Him highly instrumental for the promote and carrying on things of very high concernment for his glory to his Honour and the astonishment of the world For I know what apprehensions the most have of him both at home and abroad but God judgeth not as man doth Before the Lord of Broghill I came the second time and so began with him as you read upon Oliver Cromwell I then told him what I firmly believed the Lord put into my heart and tongue by his dictates and Visions and how that the Souldery men of Valour and Honour should submit to the King who would not onely forgive them but give unto them all so doing Indempnity Honours Preferments Lands places and Hereditaments Seal and confirm them unto them in the surest Tenure of this Kingdom as at or after that of East Greenwich Further that as the Light came on in Heavens from the East haveing in it the richest Crown ever eyes beheld the Bayes rooted and flourishing standing in that Crown as the three Plumes of Feathers in his own Arms Coronet upon which Bayes was store of Berries which implieth a provision for Posterity both waited upon by good store of Shipping so the King should come from beyond the Seas Land in the East of Kent or thereabouts and come on towards the West See thus comes the Lightning in the 24 of Matthew the 27 verse out of the East and shineth even unto the West so also shall the coming of the Son of Man be O my God and my King well I go on This would fill the Men of the Kingdom as the Heavens with rejoycing the people praising God and the Souldiery for their good affections to Gods glory and the Kings interest the Earth giving her encrease All Animosities thus taken away we should agree better than ever dwell together in brotherly love and the most sure bond of peace and great should be the praise of God Honour of the King and the Souldiery also the true Protestant Religion receive its Lustre upon the Earth and flourish beyond compare Among the Persons present I then told the Lady Frances Boyl eldest Daughter to the so excellent Countess of Cork lamed in her infancy to so much debility that she halteth the deepest imaginable but God Almighty hath been pleased to more than recompence that debility by the more noble endowments of her Soul and minde which speak her not onely in them the lively image of her most excellent Countess Mother but the dearly beloved of God her Father which is in Heaven To this Lady I say I applied my self and told her what I believe God Almighty had put into my heart and tongue That if she were present when the King came into England and so received with content in State which would not be long ere it was so she should then see waiting on him whom God had deputed for her Husband a Man unspotted of the flesh with whom she should be abundantly happy I after besought her second Daughter the Lady Elizabeth Boyl to stand forth before her I kneeled told her if she were then present she should see Him the Lord had deputed for her Husband CHARLS STUART Charls the Second King of England Scotland France and Ireland Defender of the Faith Here I could not for bear but seeing the glory of God and the Honour of this his Vice-Roy on earth to be so great I fell on my face as in the first of Corinthians the 14 and 25. And so falling down on his face he will worship God I take the God of Heaven to witness I know no other reason of it it never was the least in my intentions Since I have read the Prophet did so as in the 43 of Ezekiel the 2 verse and because the words matter and manner of his Government there is so very full to my business give me leave to observe them to you the rather because All of mine whether of Action or Interpretation are so long since past and by me this never observed untill Thursday the fourth of August 1654. as we accompt I look upon it as a further confirm to me of my so interpreting the Vision and over-ruled deportment in that action of falling upon my face the words are these And behold the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the East and his voice was like a voice of many waters and the earth shined with his glory and it was according to the appearance of the Vision I saw and I fell upon my face And so he goes on that the glory of the Lord filled his House See what his Providence hath guided me to do and all to observe to you were there but this in it it migh confirm you it is no delusion O Lord let the World as I do stand amazed love thee and fear thee for ever This done I told them I should go into
minde nor knew not before I was taken up that I was rising nor one word of what I said before pronounced I could not but very much admire and so I did both the manner and the matter Well I then prayed and praised God for awake I was as truely as I am now the sequel will prove that I then concluded it was not at all I that did it it was the Lord who would have it so and his Prophesie it was and is Much about half a quarter of an hour after I was taken up again as formerly and spake these words Proclaim CHARLS STUART King of England Scotland France and Ireland Defender of the Faith Charls 2 d King of the whole World This CHARLS STUART shall never die the Lady Elizabeth Boyl shall never die the Queen his Mother wife to the late King already blessed shall never die the now Queen of France shall never die the King of France shall never die his Brother the Queens other Son shall never die but shall all be taken up into the Kingdom of Jesus Christ that never shall have end This spoken I was laid down again then did one M. Barret a Merchant in Bristol that deals in Leather and Skins who lodged in the same Chamber with me but in another bed call to me asked me how I did and if I was well I replied to him very well He asked me if I was asleep I said no he asked me if I knew what I said I replied yes very well he asked me if I believed what I said I told him he must give me leave to believe what the Lord caused me to speak and would have done There lodged also in the next room one John Marrick the Widdows son of that house aged about 21. With him in bed another Merchant as I take it of Bristol also or thereabouts to them both well known Those in that one bed spake to me also I replyed to them many words we had all I remember not I was anon after taken up again as formerly and spake these words OLIVER CROMVVELL shall never die the Countess of Cork shall never die the Earl her husband shall never die the Ladie Frances Boyl their eldest daughter shall never die the Lord of Broghill shall never die the Ladie Broghill his now wife shall never die but shall all be taken up into the kingdom of Jesus Christ which never shall have end I was laid down again and considered with my self What shall Oliver Cromwell never die it pleased me not But again the Lord reproved me and would have me know he judgeth not as man judgeth neither did his ways admit of any repine or contradiction Here again I spoke to the former parties but little lay still praying weeping and praising God for now I firmly believed and remembered that although these things were mightie strange and wonderfull yet by his Power for his mercie glorie and names sake he had assured me he would bring them to pass and they should be marvellous in our eyes as the Seal of my Commission was And remember I did he was now giving me the matter Again anon after I was raised as formerly and spake these words Thou Walter Gostellow shalt never die thy three Sons shall never die thy wife Anne and daughter Anne Gostellow shall never die but shall all be taken up into the kingdom of Jesus Christ that never shall have end Then shall the bodies of the Saints alreadie dead arise and be taken up into heaven also the Sheep shall go to the right hand and the Goats to the left pronounce this house a blessed house and this chamber shall for ever be called the chamber of the Great Prophet Thus have I set here down every word then pronounced by me but certainly the Dictates and good pleasure of the Lord of hosts that they be published to the world concerned by me Walter Gostellow his unworthy instrument I have not added or taken from one word that I know of nor misreported the manner But as old Eli asked Samuel after called of God by his name 3 times Samuel God had spoken unto him and given him his imploy what it was the Lord had said unto him as you may read in the 3 Chapter of that his first Book and the 17 ver and Eli there charged him that he hid nothing from him but tell him all which Samuel tels you and him in the next verse He did so hid nothing from him What follows it is the Lord let him do what seems him good and the Lord was with Samuel he grew and the Lord let none of his words fall to the groūd So all Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established a Prophet of the Lord things coming to pass as he had foretold When I heard the word Prophet knew my unworthy self to be the man O Lord thou knowest my thoughts both then and now they are at no time hid from thee I stand amazed O Lord and am silent lay my hand I do upon my mouth and my mouth upon the ground A Prophet I am unworthy O Lord yea I am unworthy to live much more unworthy of this so great honor but O Lord thou hast fashioned me make me I beseech thee always to do thy will not mine own that hath been and now is sinfull yea so hath it been all my days therefore I most humbly beseech thee to have mercy upon me O Lord the greatest of sinners nay thou wilt have mercy for thy compassions fail not and thy mercies as thy ways are past finding out The rest of that night I spent in Meditation and Prayer when day I arose not fully dressed took Pen Ink wrote all spoken but with this addition I began with a Summons and Invitation to whomsoever that they would repair the next week Thursday morning about nine of the Clock being the 12 of January to the Town and Church of Youghal there to hear a Sermon upon this Text He that covereth his sins shall not prosper but he that confesseth and forsaketh them shall finde mercy The Text was given by a Prophet of Almighty God now here in Youghall his name Walter Gostelow which Prophet will then after Sermon that day tell you all in the Church that there is an end of all the Wars in the Christian World And so I went on to finish as before Prophesied and recited Further they should that day see riding out in great state several of those Saints and this Prophet out of Town and upon the Strand of Youghall which to me as well as others was given as a sign or miracle being yet to come for the strengthning of my Faith as also for the conversion and ground of belief to the Sons and Daughters of Men. I there went on The Heathen and the Jews are now fitting by the Lord to come into his Doctrine worship and service and under his Scepter Against which word of God the Holy Bible
not to be altered the Book of Common-Prayer in some things altered and amended as by a Council lawfully called whom God shall direct shall stand and flourish all over the whole World The Doctrine and Faith of the Church of England being the purest in the World against which word of God and his sword put into the hands of this King CHARLS STUART no Power on Earth shall ever prevail that of Rome is now tumbling down and melting away like a mighty Snow-ball The King and Queen of France with that whole Nation shall ere long be converted to this Faith which Kingdom of France and all others upon the Earth under the Sun and Heavens shall be obedient to this Charls the Second and his Rule in the Kingdom of England The Lady Elizabeth Boyl second Daughter to the Earl and Countess or Cork is this Kings Wife The General of all the English Forces Oliver Cromwell shall never die so I here wrote him and could not otherwise though I tried often and varied to give him several Titles but could not the Reason you shall have anon Be pleased to observe in the pronounce of the Prophesie it is onely Oliver Cromwell all other Persons of Dignity Honour by their Titles as Signiories his onely Oliver Cromwell the Reason I promise I went on The Irish Nation should not be removed but possess their own just Rights converted to this true Faith they should be And so praying that God would enlighten them and all men that we might all live in brotherly love and Unity one with another return again into his Courts with praises and there serve him in sincerity of heart and in the beauty of holiness for so his house ought to be fitted for his service that others might be invited by us and with us to glorifie our Father which is in Heaven whose will be done on earth by men as it is by Saints and Angels in Heaven Thus I concluded writing as fast as possibly which done I could not be quiet but hasted immediately to that so every way eminently good Countess of Cork read the Paper to her and after made it my request very often sollicitous I was by my Letters that she would send her Letters abroad to invite in the Nobles Gentry and Countrey to the Town of Youghall against that day the 12 of January my self having read and communicated the whole to her Honour was by her and Doctor Mollines over-perswaded to retire for a time to my Chamber which I did But when there I could not be quiet but wrote and sent abroad to several inviting them to Youghall that 12 of January to hear as before recited all to be divulged by me that day in the Church after Sermon I continued soliciting that Countess that she would do the like untill I knew I became troublesom yea very troublesom even unto two dayes before this 12 of January did I thus be stir my self In Fine my Kinsman M Leonard Gostelow Secretary to the Earl came to me brought me back from her Honour divers of my own Letters told me weeping that the Countess and his Lord with divers others believed me certainly Mad that I would so impertinently to no purpose trouble my self and others He then asked me what I would have I told him onely the Countrey Nobles Gentry and All to come in to hear the Sermon and Prophesie that day the 12 of January He replied to me if it be company you would have trouble not your self there will be enough here for on that day will be several Horse-matches which hearing I was very much joyed and after that time never troubled my self in the least particular in that business to move further which I take God Almighty to witness untill his telling me of it it came not into my minde although I confess I had formerly heard of it but all the time untill then it was no more remembered by me than it was known to the most remortest man in the World But I shall observe to you anon the wisedom and good pleasure of God Almighty in casting and bringing to pass what fell out upon that day the day I was most active upon after the divulge of all I had to say and did say it in the Church I cannot but observe to you that when perswaded to retire to my Lodging and did so the Lord of Broghill's Physician came to me closely attended me sweat I must keep my bed not stir not write at any hand not do any thing but as prescribed all which I now see were clear Artifices of the Lord of Broghill and that otherwise-good Countess of Cork lest I should proclaim in the Church what I had penned in the Paper for to her Honour I made always my first addresses untill it pleased God to direct me to the Lord of Broghill as more considerable for the carrying on of this work of the Lords For it is the Lords and shall and will come to pass though I must tell thee Reader whosoever thou art I have met with very little other then aversness and derision if not scorn from almost All and to be called Mad hath been in many of their mouths Yet I praise God though some have endeavoured to make me the sooner Mad by very uncivil carriages and affronts no man living can say nay I challenge them to it that they divulge it if they ever saw in any of my actions or Papers which I have Copies of the most considerable and some Letters returned me ought of Levity if so let them shew it to the World spare me not I beg not their favour I scorn it it is no new thing O Lord to bestow ill and false Appellations in all ages upon men thy servants sent upon the like imploy to turn others from the errour of their ways that delight in general wickednesses To declare ought from the Lord that suites not with their fancies love and over-carnal apprehensions it must be madness in their judgements to advise the Great Rich Covetous Proud High-minded to deny themselves madness it must be Assuredly our portion is like that of our Saviours from the Scribes and Pharisees who were so they heard all that was said unto them yet being proud and covetous they derided him But thou O Lord be thy name for ever praised and so magnified thou assistest thou deliverest me thou providest for me of thy alsufficiencie rich mercie and everlasting loving-kindness which I now most humbly beseech thee may increase in me not onely in a firm dependance on thee but a walking before thee all my days in the true practice of pietie and ways of thy commandments which onely can through thy mercie deliver in all the Inundations of evil and practices of proud and obstinate Sinners from whom good Lord deliver me But I hasten Thursday the 12 of January came in bed I would not stay up I got to the Church I went took a seat in the most
Elder Brother gave me his Bond Parrole and Honour to pay those Bills of exchange given me for repayment in England This his Brother was killed in the Wars of Ireland my money not paid by him the Bills were drawn upon nor ever by that his elder Brother the principle killed and my whole debt seemingly dead also being very great My self now in Ireland I reminded this Lord of Broghill of what by Parrole he was debter to me with its consideration for 17 years upon Bill of exchange signed by his elder brother but never paid his Lordship not being at age became not bound otherwise than in point of Honour by his Parrole Truely the long time and my discontinuance beyond the Seas having made no former Application to him had worn both out of his memory but upon discourse both came to his Lordships reminde No sooner so but we consented to refer all allowances and demands of Interest to the Earl his Brother and M. Robert Boyl his youngest This done by consent his Lordship a few dayes after told me Well if my brothers to whom we have referr'd this business see no ground in Law possibly to proceed upon his Lordship haveing not given either specialty or promise since his being at age to pay the moneys so not liable in Law If thus they proceed said his Lordship to me yet come you to me and I will compose you in conscience But his Lordships brothers whom I found conscientious also in six words as I may say composed me and I have my money and these grounds I have for the taking of his Paroll my imprisonment and the preserve of his Paroll with Honour and to those that will preserve it Honour is due as here to his Lordship for the publishing of this Act I was debter either to the invite or else to the shame of others that have more of Title but less of good conscience Good Men direct into not lead out of the way I am where I was and go on to let you know that this day Thursday the 12 of January all those Persons being thus there and in such good equipage upon the same place the sign given me for my confirmation and others also is fully made good to me considering also my not commitment that day together with the great concourse of people from parts far more remote than I intended my Summons for the invite in of the Gentry and Country that day to that place for to let them know this business of the Lords Thus the work of the Lord is carried on to the greatest advantage and so brought to pass whilest we onely think to do our own wills how doth he make us to effect his Every Creature walks blindfold onely he that dwells in light sees whither they go We are for Hors-races yet see how we fall under his decrees unawares that we might the more adore the depth of his Providence For the rumore of what I had said and done that day and the next spred over the Country Post it went to Dublin in England it was in a short time and as the Cloud of Elias raised from the Sea at first appeared but as an hand-breadth so this rumour raised upon the Strand of Youghall by the Sea-side little then as it was now as that Cloud raised by that Prophet spread over the whole Heavens and Earth and falls upon it also what to do but even as his To glad the people and make fruitfull the Earth Publick meetings and great concourses of people fittest to disperse general mercies to the Sons of men The Irish desire to know nothing more nor enjoy any thing on Earth before their own habitations not to be transplanted and to have the Kingly Government restored Why they are ready to die of an over-joy Oh the wisdom and loving kindness of the Lord Who can do other than obey him Well the third day in Prison I am and for Treason too there I pass a moneth or six weeks no offer for inlargement On a sudden If I will go out I may but I must go presently aboard a Ship there bound for England ready to depart Many requests I made before that time that I might be sent over Prisoner to the General Oliver Cromwell to whom I was deputed but not in any hearkened unto Well Go I would yet positively I said that untill I had once more been with the Lord of Broghill and given him my Prophesie in writing under my Hand and Seal delivered and left with him the most material parts of it I would not go that done I would go and then his Lordship should dispose of me as he pleased I would afterwards in all things readily obey him His Lordships Secretary and the Earl of Corks both with me then making the offer of inlargement upon the terms as before which when I refused except upon my own terms they fairly told me I should ly there three moneths longer then be proceeded against and for Treason hang'd To which I replied Let them burn me also if they could I would not go out but upon those terms Appear to the people I would had they put me in publickly and will they take me out privatly I would appear to the people even to all that were there that I was enlarged Mad I was not the business was the Lords and he would bring it to pass and deliver whom he had sent and commissionated in the fittest time I bade them be gone told them I would do all that and more which was to leave another of my Prophesies under my own hand at the House I lodged in the Widdow Merricks written in Parchment boxed up and hanged over my Beds head in the Chamber I lodged in which I pronounced should be called the Chamber of the great Prophet for ever My Prophesie I wrote gave it to the Widdow Merricks Son in writing a Man grown he is he keeps it ten dayes or more then returned it me and told me his Mother durst not suffer it to be hanged up Here was obedience to Governours I would it had always been so Well the Ship is gone in Prison I remain my Keeper again begins new it now was not to practice some of his former Tricks upon me False Prophet he calls me a Child of his some 2 or 3 years old is also taught to call me so himself owns the teaching of it which when I desired him to forbear or else tell me upon what ground he did it he replied to me he had good grounds You are said he for the Superstitious keeping of Dayes and Times as in particular that in the time of Lent we should do well to fast pray and examin our selves that so through Gods mercies we may as you say become worthy receivers of his most blessed body and bloud for the Remission of sins at the feast of his Resurrection at Easter Nay you are for a Passion Sermon also upon good Friday as you call it when all dayes
are alike The Commemoration also of the Nativity of our Lord the Descending of the Holy Ghost and divers other Superstitious things and times all which the true Prophets of the Lord have cried down and long since declined as most abominable and Superstitious Here lay his proof when I asked him who those Prophets were he told me the Godly Ministers and Prophets the Parliament had preferred appointed to hear preach I replied little onely told him some reasons that induced me to be of that judgement yet withall it was worth his consideration to remember what became of those Children that mocked the Prophet against whom the Lord sent Bears out of the Wood to tear them in pieces and devour them Well reconciled we were he told me it should no more be so neither did his Child any more provoke me but on the contrary I loved it and the Child me Upon a short time after he told me If I were a Prophet then he was a Dog I reminded him such expressions did not well become he might in that Prophesie unhappily of himself Dogs were without when Prophets were in Heaven I observed to him he did all without reason told him I forgave him and his Son formerly and that I prayed for both that God would be pleased to forgive them It is true I did so and do so that he would be pleased to have mercy upon them He bid me keep my prayers to my self he nor his had no need of them and desired them not He was often girding at me quiet I could not be for him I saw he loathed me which made me sometimes think on those evil Spirits that though they knew it was our blessed Lord yet raging asked him why he was come to torment them before their time Good he told me I could not be because I approved not of one Mr. Wood whom the Parliament power had put in Preacher at Youghall and settled upon him an handsom Sallery of some an hundred and twenty pounds per annum His name implies he may be Timber though some suspect he is not yet fitted for the building up the House of God God be pleased to make all men wise and better Certainly the best accomplished is fittest for his service This being Sunday and my keeper going then to hear this Mr. Wood Command is given none must come to me locked up I am Things thus hightening and his prejudice encreasing against me my Bed the night before taken from under me sent for away after he came from M. Woods Sermon my bolster sheets and whatsoever I had of his taken away from me by himself so great a zeal brought he home with him from his so good Preacher M. Wood. Well to this condition being reduced my self not very well not used to such affronts not such lodgeing the season winter truely I walked and prayed most of that night abandoned I now saw my self almost by all nothing but hard usage and aversness do I meet with in all men to this business of the Lords which much troubled me And truely I might here observe to you that I besought God Almighty to direct deliver and enable me to get from under those great oppressions of men which without him I could not overcome Observe I beseech you God withdraws not our helps but for a further advantage however our hopes may seem crossed Where his name may gain we cannot complain of loss 't was so here the work was the Lords and he was pleased to assure me I should grow from strength to strength untill I arrived at perfect peace in Zion and how that for his Glory Honour Mercy and Names sake he would bring it all to pass it should be marvellous in our eyes Thus beseeching the Lord I prayed and now do pray the Reader that he firmly believe as I do it being true I had that night this Vision or Call of the Lord Come away bring your writings come away reitterated just as the people you read before did when they saw the Light and Crown in the Heavens bowed to God and it it being of Heaven they all said Come we will follow it so here Come away bring your writings come away I could here truely observe to you that although my so civil Landlord was warm that night in a good Bed I cold and had none in Bed with him such another Saint his Wife educated married from the house of the once no less zealous I believe than these two the Lord Brook whose Servants they were either both or one Yet on a sudden she riseth and runneth the strong water is fetched my Landlord very sick nay very ill his Childe had formerly been so This strong water was to be fetched out of the next Room where I was pounded up so know it I did indeed his wife told me the reason of her haste and coming Well the strong water he had and my prayers also for his amendment and Gods forgiveness to him and though he formerly bade me keep them to my self he nor his had no need of them his Child I believe fared not the worse for me for it after loved me when well himself then had them as also the strong water if of any validity God Almighty have the glory he had the recovery then but a Fool is not alwayes to be answered in his folly This I should not have observed but that it is in reverence to what himself hath very often told me he was that Thomas a Diddimus that should not believe any thing of my Prophesie untill he saw it come to pass the rather because it was against those whom God approved of and set up to his glorie therefore he took the liberty to call me Traitor as to them and false Prophet as in reverence to their Godly Ministery such was his zeal but whether well guided or of God that 's the question But I leave him in his Dog-kennel for so his then habitable house was formerly called as himself told me one time and truely me thinks upon this account and action it may well retain the former name if it hath been discontinued Dog kennel Day being come I penned a Letter presenting the whole Vision Come away bring your writings come away to the Secretary of the Lord of Broghill entreating him that he forthwith impart it to his Lord and others concerned for the ordering of affairs in those parts beseeching they would after address made to God Almighty for his guidance forthwith dispose of me as he should please to direct them to do They I humbly conceive did so for that day or the next morning I had word sent me that I might go whither I would Yet observed to me it was by that Gentleman which brought me my enlargement that I should not proclaim the King in the streets Truely I was never guilty of any such madness neither did it so much as once come into my thoughts Had I not been guided by God in
the penning of my Prophesie to do so in the Church I should never have done it but then and there wrote I could no more decline doing it than I can now to pray for all men even his and my own Enemies No they are the Commands of God which carry me on and not to conform to them I neither can chuse or dare omit SECT V. THis very morning being now the 7 day of September 1654. was I a second time rouzed and called early from my bed by a great Crack or Canon to rise and go to work to bring forth this my Book to the World in it concerned defer it I dare not though I have been by some Ministers but most of all by my other seeming Friends my Wife and Children crying to me also not to publish it all men I have yet sent to and all means hitherto failing me for money to get it out Nay I have lain these 20 dayes the most troubled and disconsolate imaginable for want of money to go on with it Tried all I know almost would have pawned what I had left that I might raise money to do it am refused by all men hitherto I know out I would have had it come before the Parliament assembled as believing it would highly dispose them to serve God their King and Country so invite the Lord to send deliverance and heal our Land But I see in this as in all other of Gods proceedings I must pray to him depend upon him abide his good pleasure his own time is the best so is his way also he will do his work himself It may be he is pleased to see what good effect the Sermon Mr. Thomas Goodwin gave them on Munday last will operate and have upon those Gentlemen as also what the Protector did after communicate unto them At the Sermon I was I heard all in particular how he well advised to turn from all sin that God would be pleased to return to us and that they those now worthy Gentlemen called of Gods goodness as I believe for the healing of our grievances For as Mr. Goodwin observed there was election of persons for works sometimes by the Lord as well as to grace and glory David might intend to build Gods House but Solomon shall You see my main rise of all this Book and unparalel'd Prophesie begins there as that Gentleman did adviseth the rebuild of his House the restore of his Ministers the giving them for maintenance what God hath given and to every man his just interest and then see how be establisheth the Land the Kings Throne which Kings Throne I wish he had fuller pressed he hath done it in some other works of his where he hath observed that the House of King Solomon was established as Davids when they thought of so did build up the house of God But he is wise he leaves that work for the Protector if he doth not know it I do he shall help to builde Gods House and bring in his King too and that will establish his own house also the most Honourable of a Subject in the World or else put me to death if this come not to pass He went on he advised them to keep us from falling into or returning to the Red-sea of bloud which we as the Israelites had passed through Let him now take the comfort of my Book and this Prophesie of the Lord Almighties as I had of his Sermon in many good observances There is an end of all the Wars in the Christian World and I hear since that Oliver Cromwel did that day tell you at a conference he was ready as a fellow-worker to carry on the work of the Lord and would do so See now to what purpose my Gun hath wakened me this morning to call you all to your duty us to pray for you that you forthwith fall to it and work as men whom God hath highly honoured and now called to be the restorers of our Religion Peace the Honour of our Nation and our King who because the best in the World God having made him so for our good happiness Bring him presently that our rejoycing be not deferr'd nor the World kept from coming into the then so gloriously professed Protestant Religion and under his so happy Goverment to which all Christendom Jews and Heathens are to conform also in Gods time which I beseech him for his name and mercy sake be pleased O Lord to hasten Now Turks and Infidels look to your selves our King is CHARLS STUART the General of all our Forces is Oliver Cromwell both the so dearly beloved of the Lord of Hosts against whose sword put into their hands as Gods Vice-Roy and his Lieutenant none drawn on Earth shall ever prevail O Lord thou hast wakened me and I will do my duty this shall now come in that formerly was not and my Book shall out in Print to the World concerned if I go naked for thou knowest O Lord it had been out before now if I had had either money to have done it credit or goods to have borrowed money on At home I continue discontented enjoy nothing because it is not published fear I do that it 's not coming out time enough the major part in Parliament will be wanting to their duty they not yet understanding what God will have done were my Book but once read by those Members for whom with Oliver Cromwell I first intended it I then should fear no Votes in Parliament contrary to Gods glory and the Kings just interest with a Parliament for divide them I can not In what a troubled condition I am at home I have shewed you opposed and deserted by all unable to effect any thing of my self See now how God works for me and carries on his own work for his own glory as assured me he would that it may be marvelous in my eyes as well as yours For to pass it must come that 's the seal of my Commission the time and way is his own secret What doth the Lord now do my self being at loss Upon the 12 of September to my unpararel comfort Oliver Cromwell doth this work of the Lords it is possible too when he intends onely to establish himself The Lord often makes us to be most highly instrumental to bring his good pleasure to pass when sinfully we may intend onely the carrying on of our own unwarrantable proud and ambitious end I know not but it was so here with him and no otherwayes but I do know that in the end thou Oliver Cromwel shalt delight to do the will of thy God and thy King in the first place also not minding thy self before thy duty performed to them in which doing thou canst not fail of being abundantly happy otherways disquieted and miserable beyond all compare The 12 of September the House door that 's shut up out go all you or the most of you whose froward principal of Presbytery or other call it what you
will is not clear for the glory of God and Honour of his King but our Sovereign CHARLES STUART whose power unquestionable right with Parliament Oliver Cromwell takes into his own hand suffers it not to come into yours onely he remembers very well when you formerly forced it from the King into a Parliament onely where God and our Laws had never placed it How you abused it Though your pretentions Oaths and Votes at the first were high deep and many to the contrary all that you might not be distrusted his person and his honour also you would preserve yet see misimployed this Militia you did and turned it was to the destruction of his person honour the last you first wounded him in that you might the better kill him in his body done it was to the perpetual shame of them that did it profess you what you will for Religion Presbytery Anabaptism Independency or any thing that is unwarrantable distinctions multiplied with your Novelties and successes Truely my charitie leads me to believe there were some Gentlemen refused to settle the Militia in the hands of Oliver Cromwell that it might the sooner return into those hands which their consciences are now troubled that they ever forst it from which unhappie Act I am of opinion first set us together by the ears most hastened and so enabled the Contrivers of that unnatural War which the Lord in mercie hath now put an end to If such another Vote engage us not afresh from returning to which Red sea of Bloud good Lord deliver us as Mr. Thomas Goodwin preached advised and prayed But this Militia is now safe where it should be in the hands and power of the best Subject Oliver Cromwell for the warrantable interest of the best of Kings his Master Charls Stuart See how the ways of God are past finding out O Lord never any man lost by referring all to thy good time and best way I do not in the least doubt thee Oliver Cromwell I know God hath or will fit thee for the work who onely hath thus directed and over-ruled that his name may have the glorie and thy person the greater honor forsaking all on earth for the command of heaven The interest in the Militia is a Crown-Jewel which God will have thee O Cromwell not suffer to be divided from the Crown but give it to the supply and making of a better than that which bad men have by violence taken and shared amongst the Self-deniers as they call themselves But thou Oliver Cromwell wilt prove thy self one they onely promised to do what thou canst not but do make him a Glorious King for by thy means God will have it so Distrust him not you Members yet dissenting who have a clear mind to do the work of the Lord. Obey God and your King with him Gods Word and the known Laws of the Land will best direct in both Comply with Oliver Cromwell he is for the service of God and his duty to his Kings just interest with a Parliament you understand not how highly God will make him subservient to both My Book is coming to you to let you know how much we are mistaken in him and how transcendently much we are for ever obliged to our mercifull God whose work this is alone to the amazement of the World both for time and manner his goodness making it marvelous in our eyes I could not sleep the night of that active day the instrument for subscription was presented God keeping me waking to his glory and my own content for as his Gun and Call hath set me to work at other times so here I rose and wrote this Letter to Oliver Cromwell the very next morning because but short I here give it you that you may see my actions are all above-bord and that this work on Earth comes from above in Heaven to pass it must come God will have it so Sr. Yesterdays actings last nights wakings and this day God directing hath set these words upon this paper for your Lordships observe Prudence it is not to trust the Militia in those hands who after they had forced it from whence God Almighty had placed it whatsoever they pretended used it to the distroying of him Sir you are not of these bad men beloved neither is there clear thoughts in all of them to do good some are not fit to be trusted Pray God amend them all Sr. Part with nothing out of your own power that is or may be mis-inployed hurt the Church of God or Regal rule You are of Heaven directed doubt it not in the least to be highly sub-servant to both have courage Sir fear not the least I know you are hated and not understood by the most who would destroy you Sr. I had a Book ready to publish 20 dayes or more before the Parliament opened the highest imaginable for your advantage and effecting what God will have done by the turning of good men to comply with you in all things and not to fear any ill because God is on your side Sr. All my friends have abandoned me and money I could not get to Print it most men conceiving this Parliament would ruin you so hang me if I sided with you Thus deserted and opposed by all I could not get it out but I see God works for me when man opposeth so doth he for you Go on Sir you are blest of Heaven Your most faithfullest W. Gostelow Septemb. 13. 1654. This Letter I sent to that hand I have sent divers others which I know are delivered to his Lordship so sure as God is in Heaven my Commission is from thence and that the effect will shew you all from thence deputed I am And now you Honourable Members of this Parliament who may if you will readily apply your selves to be good just mercifull and wise live the Honour of our Nation the beloved of God of our King and of all good men your selves may have the Honour to be such a Parliament so wise so just so well constituted so for ever renowned as those will be if you should be wanting to your devoirs which is the applying of your selves to the extirpation of all villany and the giving to every men his just interest to which ends we have chosen you and should all pray that God would so of his mercy inable you by such a Parliamēt our already glorified King adviseth in his last words our now so abundantly happy Soveraign his Son ever to be ruled by for Parliaments so principled would readily apply themselves to give the King his just rights as truely as they would to every subject theirs which doing King people and Kingdom could not be other than mutually happy and blest living in rules of Justice and loving kindness the strongest hold-fasts And now this thy Call O Lord and workings when my self at my wits end is like that afforded me of bring thy Papers and come away A deliverance it is
like that of the Apostle Peter when the Prison door was set open for him and his Irons fell off so was the effect of that Call Come away the doors are opened to me the very next day But close up my mouth O Lord I may not complain every defer of thine is as my self suspended for a further good I know it thy own time and workings have none like them Thou wilt make discoveries of men and let us see as well who would be good if there were no law as who would practice wickedness by a law doth not God Almighty put us often into his sive several wayes also discovering the Wheat from the Chaff pray we must believe we must that all works for the best to them that fear God and patiently abide his good pleasure Return I must go on to my former intentions yet this believe me in you worthies of Parliament this insert was not begot by either of the Protectors two speeches to your good selves for I take God Almighty to witness I had not then read either of them Inlarged from Prison I gather in all my material papers as commanded which were not a few I now see them of very great concernment for the carrying on of this work I believe I wrote in Prison then twice as much as this Book and twice over also This Call thus directing Come away bring your Papers come away was certainly of God Well my self gotten out of Prison and my Papers gotten into my possession I hasten for England and in Easter week 1654. came to my own house where I now do and have resided twenty years being in Broadstreet near the Church over against Gresham Colledge at which Church once but not long enough officiated that so eminent and renowned Doctor Oldsworth but thank you invisible Parliament and such Oakes our then wicked Governours you sequestred imprisoned and destroyed him as you did hundreds and thousands of others God sent unto you of which you were unworthy but you could not help it the Jews your brethren did so persecute those sent unto them and aud truely you could not but follow the worst of examples the best are to be conformed to by these which are wiser men and therefore a true Parliament You long since as your actions have been the dishonour of the Protestant Religion and the Nation all the World over and future times will never call you a sober Parliament but as we desire not to believe you were English men so well constituted Parliaments for time to come will look upon you as upon Lots wife a lasting monument of her shame for looking towards Sodom when God had set her face towards salvation But I go on SECT VI. HAving passed a few dayes in my house I could not be in longer quiet untill I took me a lodging near Saint Jame's his house attending all opportunities and possible means to speak with the General whom not meeting with I wrote unto him several times to give him to understand that I had received of the Lord the most considerable and highest things imaginable to communicate to his good self being therein concerned as much as any and to whom from prison in Youghall God had pleased to send me for that very purpose therefore besought him to hear me After much attendance and not a few disappointments I had first at White-Hall the opportunity onely to speak to him made my self known to him but he had not the conveniency at that time to hear me in the things I so much desired yet then told me he would speak with me That further opportunity I had not though continued seeking it it and reminded him by Letters of his promise untill one Saturday in June a little before the death of the Portugal when and where it pleased Almighty God to afford me a most convenient one at Hampton Court and his Lordship there pleased to hear me out to the full affording me both his patience and attention too as I firmly believe There was present Sr. Gilbert Pickering and a Gentleman or two more whom I knew not for all which I returned as in duty Obliged first to God next to his Lordship all possible prayers and humble thanks And now least any thing might scape his Lordships observe which it is possible did my recital he hath this second review of it but printed more particularly for the World of men in it so highly concerned for I cannot be quiet untill to them I publish it also this being a light not to be hid the universal splendor of the Protestant Religion must break forth also the obedience of men to the Lord who I conceive and believe is now coming in mercy and wayes of making himself known to the Christian World Jews and Heathen in mercy but in judgement to others for the evil doer shall not abide in this so great and wonderfull a change On earth whom is the Lord pleased to make his Viceroy for rule his favour and loving kindness is the highest to our King CHARLS the Second CHARLS the Great CHARLS the good King of the whole World these are the words and declared pleasure of the ever living and our most mercifull God which I dare not conceal nor longer keep uncommunicated but must publish them to all concerned to have an end of all the Wars in the Christian World with the rest in the Prophesie is certainly considerable I confess after I had wrote to the General I could not but also do so to his Majesty my King the import of both refers onely to my duty in the discharge of which I onely can have quiet The Original of all Letters to them I have being to each five in all ten in any of them not the least thing advised to but as I conceive and so believe the minding both of them to the perform of such their duties as are most acceptable with God Almighty the one how to rule well the other so to obey things the most to be desired of good Kings good Subjects of which I wish the whole world were made up of I have therefore in the end of the book given two of those Letters to publick view that at once my inward thoughts may appear to the excite of walking as best becomes the most excellent of Kings and the highest of Subjects where the meanest also have to observe that in fearing God and honouring their King they are blest here and ever so to be hereafter omitting it miserable to all eternity From which sin of Rebellion because compared with that of witchcraft we have good reason to pray The Lord be pleased to deliver us especially when covetuousnes is joyned therewith the root of all evil sins which some men therefore will have the World justly condemned as a Witch in the end to be burnt because it and its lying vanities hath so bewitched us as to prefer them before the ever living God and our walking according to his
of his adversaries to whom he renders vengeance at the same time Remember I have warned you and believe me also I could not have any quiet untill I had done so Thus in all ages God hath sent his Prophets to forewarn before he consume a people or in mercy deliver them I have done my duty do you yours repent and live The number was but few I told you though all that were then in being who when they saw this Crown in heaven worshipped God and said This is of Heaven we will follow it Which when done with my self hear we did pleasant sounds in Heaven and saw the earth shine with plenty amongst men good will all praising God and participating those blessings I once more tell you they were but a small number make haste be you of it Before judgement is gone out repentance is seasonable but you may cry to late From this Citie was the Kingdom fyrced let O Lord if it be thy good pleasure the inhabitants tears and thy mercy spare it from an heap of ruin a City that hath been and yet is the harlot mother of Bastard conceptions and prodigious births confusion she hath brought forth that hath filled the world and land to her dishonour with God and men Spare us O Lord we beseech thee and have mercy upon us even upon us also thy most unworthy servants Here I have ended but because God hath as I formerly observed to you of his wise delay suspended the publishing of this book for his own time which certainly is the best and fittest as also that my Dependency on him may be the more as his mercies the greater when deliverance afforded us I must yet a little go on and one insert more be pleased to allow me it being for the General good Let me therefore present your eye and entertain your ear as of Gods mercy he hath done mine for your benefit upon the day and night of the 5. of November last being our Lords day on which we did commemorate Gods deliverance afforded us from the Gun-powder Treason I dare not but do it mark it it is considerable of the Lord himself being the Lord of Hosts who hath delivered us doth deliver us and will deliver us all good grounds to trust him and a set Text of Scripture it is for that day to be Treated on A good Act of Parliament we have for the thankfull and perpetual commemoration of that so great a mercy that God was pleased then and so to deliver Our so good so wise so well-accomplished King and his posterity to sit upon his Throne and to sway the Scepter of these Kingdoms for ever as we see God hath now so appointed whose ways admit of no variation or shadow of turning Deliver he did we see the house of Peers and Persons of Honour in duty waiting upon their King Deliver he did the wise and learned Authors of the Protestant Church and Religion with them also the Judges both together the best interpreters of his word and his Laws Deliver he did also those Worthies of the house of Commons called thither by their King and sent thither by the wise obedient and then quiet people of the land who were and because so shared in that deliverance and long enjoyed they and we the Blessings that succeeded of peace order riches beauty in Religious worship of God Almighty in his Churches to the wonder as well as to the envie of the world Here was a Parliament of Gods and good mens choise and blessing For Majesty and Honour well met together And this when so he delivers from that horrid unparrall'd Treason until those times the like not heard of And what to do I beseech you but to let us see how precious in his sight we are when met together as those to fear God honour our King love brotherly love all applying our selves to live and do according to his will revealed in his word and our known Laws the onely rule we should go by and conform unto applying our selves to these not to our own willdered thoughts for confusion covetuousness rebellion irreligion murder of those people whose persons peace and propriety we come to preserve and maintain not for our self-ends to kill that we may divide the spoil Something like him I have heard of in the Church of Rome who upon the words spoken in a vision to the Apostle S. Peter Arise kill and eat all things are now Common to please the then Pope of Rome at difference with the Venetians gave this gloss upon that Text that is saith he your Holiness may make War with the Venetians kill them and devour their estates up and do it arise take kill and feed upon them Thus his unholiness suitable Cleargy force mis-interpretations of holy Writ to their own and others destruction Peter's successors they pretend to be and in the worst of things they certainly follow him nay exceed him draw their sword they do cut not off the ear onely with Peter but the heads of Kings and Potentates which wicked action our Lord reproves healing the person wounded when but an ear to let us see his Kingdom was not to be carried on by the sword and shew us he doth he had no need of a fighting Clergy he made no Apostle to offer violence no Bishop in Buff with back-sword to help on with Presbytery no Priest or Deacon to kill and supplant that he might get his more pious and therefore more peaceable brothers living because it is better than his own which when he hath by violence gotten he inricheth himself but starves or poysons those he pretended to feed better and do more good for both in body and soul No these are not the men fit to build God a Church he needs no such hackers or hewers in Field or Pulpit such furious fighters and rash zealous Clergy Go on to imitate Peter further the very next apprehension of danger they deny their Lord and Saviour for swearing him also if once in custody or times of persecution come upon them then they are Sidonians or Samaritanes no more Jews and they have a Temple not yet dedicated to any God which you their profitable master so they get by you shall call them and it what you please for they are resolved to side with the seeming strongest to get by so doing Cura Romana non capit ovem sine lana Oh! and have not we such Peters if but one too many but the more the pitie well I have shewed you what those furious boote-feux have done set us and the Christian World on fire I would to God I could shew you them imitating that blessed saint Peter repenting which would be not onely ours the Churches and their own rejoycing at the conversion of such sinners there is joy in Heaven and though by words actions misunderstood they have engaged us with Curse ye Meros so carried on the cause falsly perswading they are the Lords
no longer into the Heavens I then run and hasted to get from under that vail that I might again look up where I was so much ravished above in the Heavens so pressing forward that I might get from under the vail and so I was taken from the ground and so moved untill I came beyond the vail which impeded my sight being got from under it I looked up again into Heaven where I saw what I cannot utter or set out unto you Help me O Lord my soul is too narrow to express that glory and ravishment thou shewedst me there and then the Heavens yet opening I saw a beautifull place much about the bigness of a quadrangle of a Colledge and in such a figure also within which sate some four and twenty persons all in order as being in four straight lines from side to side so adorning the whole they were all arrayed in long white robes richly Crowned they were and he that late in the middest the richest on each hand of him sate also one very richly arrayed and Crowned all of them in order and beauty beyond any expression I was given to understand it was the coming of the Son of man I can say no more onely tell you what it was not there was in it no disagreeing no confusion no striving for priority no supplanting of one the other all obedience all beauty all holiness every one continuing in his own station lovely throughout beyond all compare or expression certainly it was to let me see that at hand his coming is for the conversion of sinners if they would but get themselves in readiness to receive and meet him with prepared hearts he would come and dwell with them in beauty and holiness for our amendment or else take them to himself unto either of which happy conditions O Lord fit us and we shall be fitted I end believing God hath now made this book fit for the press and you Observe to amendment of life Help out O Lord with the book and into thy favourable loving kindness the sons of men this day is the first leaf of this book Printed to finish which if thou help not O Lord I cannot give it birth I have not this day on penny in the world yet I doubt not by thy providence this very day to carry on thy work this book nor thy power and loving kindness to effect the whole Prophesie in it contained And now O Lord be thou pleased to help so thy most unworthy servant and carry on this thy great work strange and mighty to thy own glorie and good of all men as I set forth the truth of all and desire from the bottom of my heart that thou O Lord mayest have the glory of all and we men the comfort O Lord I may not doubt thou wilt do it for thy glory mercy and name sake I see it already done as thou hast promised though it be thus strange yet it is thy work and thou wilt do it that it may become marvellous in our eyes Thus I end in the very words which ends my own Commission in truth also be pleased O Lord to help all men of thy goodness as thy most indeared yet unworthy servant From my House the 10 of Novemb 1654. Walter Gostelow A POST-SCRIPT Clearing the Author from Guilt of Pride or Falshood WHat my Book conceived in sin and before born or come into the World but five sheets out and in three of them shall I be suspected to be guilty of pride and falsehood Certainly I will bestir my self the rather because a wise and good man tells me he fears the good intented to Gods glory Religious luster and the Kings interest will all suffer in the publishing of it and upon these grounds he perswaded me to desist from Printing which I can no more refuse to do than I can to breath live what shall I wound any of these in the least Three things as precious to me as had I ten thousand lives they should all not come into the scale with one of them Moreover I have presented it in my intentions to the Lord Protector for his protection and defence and shall I not present it innocent I know him set up to be a terrour to the evil doer and deceitfull man but to calumniated injuriously oppressed honest and innocent men a Protector and comfortable Defender with all reverence and humility be it spoken thy glory O Lord shall have the praise of this happy Post-script I know it is for a farther good to me as well as for the worlds clearer satisfactions by such seeming oppositions and wise delays hath thy Providence reserved it and me in the fittest time to become publick and for the fullest discovery of truth it is now made much longer than formerly intended that all things time and circumstances may be fully examined and clearly inquired into if there may or can be made appear any ground for suspected delusion or visible falshood I fear neither the charge as Gunpowder makes a noise but you shall quickly see it turned into smoke and and vanish I am to demonstrate unto you why I should not justly be condemned of pride for these words in the 55 page O Lord let the World as I do stand amazed love thee and fear thee for ever what Arguments of innocency brought to convince of evil be pleased to look back but two pages the 53. and so on you have the reason of those words God of his providence guiding me at that very time to so full a Scripture which I there observed for my confirmation in that my over-ruled deportment of falling upon my face Haveing read that portion of Scripture not till then known to me 7 months after done and my self then penning what I there Printed I could not but in a thankfull obedience with all possible humility in my private Chamber fall upon the ground and praise the Lord for it I beseech you let it not be laid to my charge as pride be pleased to read it rather O Lord let the whole World as we all should do stand amazed at thy goodness therefore praise and love thee for ever This will take me in and I have what I intended there The next is in the 56 page where I say I expected more alteration already ready than I have yet seen and believe I did the Summer past would have made the certain things to come to pass much more apparent before now than they yet are Here confessing my self mistaken is inferred I clearly demonstrate that sent of God as one of his Prophets I cannot be for they are alwayes guided in words of truth and certainty I could refer you to what follows and fasten this yet non-accomplishment upon your selves by reason of your continuance in sins and impieties and well might too but apply I will my self to satisfie reasonable men in all possible wayes and things yet observe before I end that very Section in the two last pages
fruits making their conversion to appear as good Zacheus did when truely converted who shewed it by his words and actions If I have wronged any man I restore to him fourfould and for the rest of my goods I give the one half of them to the poor you have it in the 19 of Luke verse 8. if they would nor thus uprightly turn repent live truely they should uprightly and perpendicularly hang together as being brethren in iniquity and this I believe would be pleasing to God and man whom they have injured and are indebted to you wicked Judges Committees and Lawyers repent of your Club-Law too long practised upon the persons Estates of men of worth and honour imprisoning the one devouring the other tell me if you can from whence had you these presidences for Law not from God he is a God of mercy not from his word that 's a word of truth not from our well constituted and better known Laws those are for defence not offence Come I will tell you whence you are you say you are of the seed of Abraham but you do the works of you Father the Devil and if I mistake not it was to men of your profession and practise our Saviour said so that could not erre Some gave that for Law which was not when time was they did help to undo a good King and run a way after others of you have played the same game since and it is not improbable will shew us such a trick also but stay a little and take some of my counsel before you stir what you gave and took for Counsel was too dearly bought neither worth what 't was sold for nor at all fit to be followed those you have destroyed or decoyed of your own party will shortly tell you so be you ruled by me for the time to come if you go on to practice in the Law do in all your cases and causes as I have done in this of mine presented in this book Open it aright carry it one no other ways present it not falsly in any one circumstance speak the whole truth which done pray to God Almighty that he would be pleased to give you a sentence in favour if in truth and uprightness of heart be assured he will desire onely that the Lord may have the glory of it and man his Creature the benefit of his just but mercifull and righteous judgements My imploy is not to flatter any one of you or others I never spoke word to Sir John in my life the accomplishments of a judge was found upon that Trial as well as others to be in the Prisoner at the Bar Sir John Stowel in his fixed heart was sincerity resolution and uprightness in his head was wisdom and discerning in his mouth and tongue were the words of truth the Grand jury were those worthies that gave hin what you Mr. Post-Master Prideaux laboured to beguile him of the benefit of his Articles not you onely but the rest of the Black Robe that quacked after you the decoy upon his left hand all of you stole a heard of Goats you are Hoofs and Horns you have for offence in the very end of my Prophesie if you repent not you see the place you are doomed to as well as the condition you are found in when others are taken up into the Kingdom of Jesus Christ that never shall have end the Sheep that then stand before the Judge of all men shall go to the right hand but the Goats to the left will any of you evil doers ye go on to sin against conscience for the accursed love of the World do no more so hear and take my counsel make not haste haste haste Post-haste to be Rich run not into destruction covetuousness is known to be the root of all evil Do you Sr. for the time to come nay let us all do as new born Babes desire the pure milk of the Gospel not your Law may we become O Lord as little Children Infants unspotted of the flesh the World and the Devil thus being Heaven is then open to us and that 's a Kingdom For your Infant Common-wealth truely it died almost as soon as born or named I fear not Innocent also how have you lead me out of the way I must return to Croppredy where I was named an Infant From Croppredy-Field his Majesty went into the West the same Summer there God gave him such another success but greater over a greater number out of their hands he took all the Militia but their persons go free not a man perisheth by his good will Who would not have expected that these mercies God having cast his Enemies into and under his own dispose and all pardoned who would not I say have presumed these carriages of mercy and unparalell'd clemency would have won his Subjects to a better obedience than forthwith to fight him afresh O my God I heard his majesty speak these words at Southam in Warwick-shire the very day before Edge-hill fight he being then and there importuned presently to hang 80 men that night taken To perswade him to it thus some reasoned the Lord of Essex is near you the present doing it will deter your Enemy make his men that love you not run away whose fear if not affection will be your great advantages they were so many and so powerfull that thus counselled as indeed my good King had but his good conscience mercy and a few persons of Honour on his side of which very small number was the Lord Henry Wilmot and the Lord Willowby Son to the Earle of Linsey whose Father was mortally wounded the next day at Edge-hill of which he died in a few dayes after nay so bold and so pressing were these in his presence that they told him Sir if we must take these Rebels and you pardon them when can you hope to see an end of this Rebellion they went on to importune him to hang but 70 of them yet still to do it presenlly as therein being his advantage his Majesty wisely and mercifully replied his design was to make a conquest of their judgements and affections by clemency and forgiveness and not to murder their persons they grew more impatient pressed him then to hang 60. his Majesty found out wise delays for not doing of that presently to 50 to 40 to 30 to 20 they fell still his Majesty stood unmoveable at last some of them swore as I take it thereby to dispose him that passing the other day by Coventry the Enemy had taken and hang'd four of his men to second him another said they had hang'd five of his more of them went on three of theirs two of anothers his Majesty to get rid of them and it may be to enquire into the truth of it also first I did so told thē he would presently take an order with them now see the order taken by him twelve inlarged and of them continued not a man suffered in his
of all to love true Religion your just interest brotherly love in which onely we can be happy in that good way and best example I beseech God be you the first and most eminent I may not doubt of it for whom God Almighty hath reserv'd nay declared such everlasting loving kindnesses Sir I do truely tell you I could with the most ardent desire greatest hazard endeavoured to have hang'd or murdered all your Enemies but God hath reproved me I can now do nothing with more delight than to pray for them yet let 's not trust them that 's a folly I beseech God to deliver us from the wisdom of the Serpent is not denied though the innocency of the Dove be injoyned both most excellent for imitation Sir I have no intelligence more than with the common it is believed that some dayes since from Holland came expresses of the confirmation of peace I believe after this summer within a short time there will be an end of all the Wars in the Christian world Sir I have seen letters reporting your affairs at Ratisbon to be well advanced and in good condition humane wisdom the strength of allies and confederates for the probable carrying on or promoting of your just interest may not be neglected or refused but Sir I do hope Nay believe that the Almighty will do this great work for the good of all without bloudshed if we give over to abuse his mercy and provoke not his wrathfull indignation then for his mercy honour name sake he hath promised to bring all these things to pass for you this Land Protestant Religion and although mighty strange and wonderfull these things are yet he will do it for the reasons above and it shall be marvelous in our eies as in my first Papers you have it at full consisting of ten sheets numbred in the margent as they should be read Sir the time is now at hand in May you shall see the fulfilling of another part of that Prophesie which the Lord was pleased to have spoken by me his most unworthy Servant and Prophet the not transplanting of the Irish Nation I beseech you Sir let Doctor Earls first read my Letters for I spell ill write ill and point not well he is a good man let him also chuse your Clergie and be you Sir advised by him God Almighty be pleased to preserve you give you abundantly of his grace mercie and wisdom and with it all things that good is Sir So prayes the humblest and unworthiest of the servants of the Lord my God and you my King April 21. 1654 Walter Gostelo My second Letter to the PROTECTOR O. C. Most excellent Sir MY belief as my hopes is that what your Lordship was pleased to say unto me I shall in the best fittest time reap the speaking with you I did return to my Lodging at Saint James the Tuesday I promised your good self but there I met with this affront as to have it disposed of in my absence contrary to my order and expectations affronts in other places also Indeed Sir I meet with little else but aversness to good in men I have since expected your Lordships Command or the happiness of seeing you neither yet come to hand or eye did not the goodness of God from the mouth of such as his Providence guided me to hear Preach let me see what I am to expect from man though of my own Religion my Spirits would fail me the Jews so ill treated the Prophets sent to them in their times and we no better follow their bad examples My Lord be not backward to hear and consider the great good the Lord is pleased to do and bring to pass for the honour of the Protestant Religion the general good of all men amongst whom more particularly our Soveraign CHARLS STUART and your good self so sure as the Heaven is over my head and the Earth under my feet I do believe his Majesty and some others of which number you are to be blest with long life honour as much as mortality is capable of here everlasting happiness hereafter My Lord as these things are the decree of heaven so are they to all assured the strongest Obligations of the strictest obedience upon Earth I have already wrote to my King I could not do otherwayes First to let him know what God is pleased to assure shall be done for him next to minde him of his dayly duty how that without holiness no man shall ever see the face of God to his comfort Further that he forgive all his Fathers Mothers and his own Enemies for no man yet ever lost by referring all to God in this he will best imitate his glorified Father certainly in Heaven who prayed dying for forgiveness to those that put him to death For the remitting of the highest injuries we have the best of patterns our Lord himself My Lord if I have any other end than the glory of God the honour of the Protestant Religion the discharge of my duty to the command of my God in my desire to speak with you then do thou O Lord whom I believe hath deputed me to these very ends never suffer me to see your face Therefore good my Lord be not backward to let me speak with you which done as God shall direct I shall afterwards haste as concerned into other Kingdoms to those in Ireland and this when communicated to your good self I have done my duty and shall I presume then have quiet and after see the fulfill of all to Gods glory who for his name and mercy sake hath assured me he will bring it to pass and it shall be marvelous in our eyes My Lord I ever shall continue to pray that God would bless and preserve you to the overcoming of all your Enemies but more especialy your corruptions So prayes the unworthiest of the Lords servants and yours S r Walter Gostelow At my house in Broadstreet May 25. 1654. A POST-SRIPT MY Lord be pleased to allow this Post-script I dare not omit it your Lordship hath heard me and now read my Prophesie I believe divers others also that of Elenor Channel who was sometimes taken dumb a Prophesie very highly considerable failing out in a time much about mine the matter one with mine sent upon that imploy of the Lords to your good self as most considerable in this Kingdom disquieted as I was untill she had communicated or made known the whole to you onely addressed Now because it is so very full and falls in such a conjuncture of time with mine and but short I have printed it at the end of this My Lord I well remember you were pleased after the good Admonition given me to serve God and to walk according to his will revealed in his word to let me understand your self formerly had and now lately also some things presented unto you which were since come to pass also but to rely on Visions or Revelation we
should not having the more sure word of God the Scriptures to rest on good counsel it was I agree all and the best to avoid delusion the Prophesie being the Lords I cannot have a dis-esteem of one word of that My Lord is not all I have said unto you agreeable to the word of God Is it not your duty to fear God Honour and obey your King to assist the rebuild of Gods House the restore of his Ministers and their maintenance not to side with those that are given to change to be in love with all men also with justice mercie and forgiveness to seek first the Kingdom of Heaven and its righteousness and then all other things less considerable unpursued shall be given unto you My Lord do this and live for ever happy Now because its possible this hath not been done by you certainly not by the Nation see God sends his Prophets unto both and that you may know they are his they bring nothing contrary to Scripture 't is true they come to you in a unwonted and seeming strange way the reason of that is this To persons of Honour or a people the Lord intends mercy too it hath been his accustomary manner of proceeding to such he sends his Prophets that they may repent and live and shall Gods mercy your own happiness and the Kingdoms welfare become our contempt your destructions if not harkned unto No God forbid do you as all others what I have advised too and be happy Nay you shall do it There is a Gentleman of known worth and Honour his name I will not Print his Paper I have with this Gentleman God hath sent me acquainted very lately my Lord this person of good accomplishments tells me of a Vision he had some time since and in it how he saw the King and your Lordship on one side of the water Moderators on the other debating upon the 39 Articles of the Church of England from Article to Article the word Protestant Religion was much insisted upon and discussed it was whether in so large a sence you intended it as to take in the Sectaries and disturbers of the peace of that Church and this Kingdom so to comprise all my Lord in fine there was so much said to his Majesty and such clear satisfaction given to your Lordship by such as sate as Moderators that it brought your Lordship to a most humble and thankfull submission and so bowing before his Majesty you came both into one Boat where the King kindly and with good affection imbraced you and so went away both together in good understanding That done this Gentleman heard the Bells generaly ring saw the bone-fires and great was the acclamations as well as the rejoycings of the people in the Land My Lord make all this good do you Proclaim as well as pray God save the King and then the people will pray and say God save the best of Subjects and the honourablest of Souldiers O. Cromwell Amen say I God preserve both The PROPHESIE and Message of ELNOR CHANNEL sent to the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell April 19. 1654. 1. PEace be to this House and Peace be to the whole Kingdom and the peace of God be with us for ever 2. The God of Abraham the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob hath opened the mouth of the Dumb to speak for peace the Sword must be stayed the World draweth toward an end and the knots of peace and love must be made in all the Christian Lands 3. Sir You have taken upon you to be a Protector of your Lords Vineyard but he requireth that you should make the Hedges and the Walls of it which is peace and love and the true Gospel and that you Protect the Stuart to plant his Vine-yard 4. If a man fall into the hands of a Creditor if his Creditor be one of Christs servants he will not take body and goods if his Body payes the Debt his Heir shall have the Inheritance REader observe this ELNOR CHANNEL Arise Evans my self with others I have heard of all agreeing and sent unto Oliver Cromwell Protector upon this very imploy the rebuild of Gods House the return of his Ministers the restore of the King the Promote and declare of a General Peace through the Christian World the Conversion of the Jews the Protestant Religion more Glorious than ever with its fruits of peace and love amongst all men we I say whom God hath sent to promote and declare these things of his mercy for you coming to pass are all of the Protestant Religion the true Church of England no Papists no Schismaticks no abettors to any faction whatsoever yet as in duty bound we continue to pray for the Conversion of all them and more to the true Religion which Gods Word shews you as well as our Prophesies now tells you is the Protestant and shall be now more conspicuously glorious than ever The Defenders of which Faith is CHARLS STUART and Oliver Cromwell United AN ADMONITION to Covetuous and therefore miserable men WHat Compassion left the Christian World and fled into America Certainly the Gospel follows he hath said it that is the word of Truth whose Compassions fails not through the world that shall be preached happy America most happy Exchange hath thou made for thy Clay and Dirt the surface of that Earth is not so Barren Thorny Stony as our hearts which stick to thy Ore as to our All Thou wisely sents it from thee as a Servant to do thy will it 's unhappily become our Master whilest we neglect and contemne the onely Jewel to purchase which we should sell all this Gospel Teacheth better things than you formerly have either heard or we practised covetuous and miserable comforters are you all more than thirty of you in six Moneths solicitation not lend so much money as to Print this Book which I told you was so highly to Gods glory the Kings interest and the Worlds general good with the honour of the Protestant Religion to all which you pretend good affection but to promote any of them this ready answer no money would you borrow to set up Gods Kingdom he can do that without you our mony is to set up our own let him look to his we and you to our own callings I can value your Estates worth at least 150 thousand pounds your persons I cannot value at more than so many 0000000000 miserable men bring forth better fruits for the time to come know that mercy neglected leaves room for judgement follow me Reader and I will in the next place shew thee better Jews than these were therefore God sends them his Gospel to guide their feet in the wayes of his Commandments which are Compassion and loving kindness it is the mercifull that shall finde mercie Misers you are going out of the world also you shall shortly finde if your treasure be laid up in Heaven for there it perisheth not but I may not
have mercie upon you and now so direct all your Counsels to his glorie for the promotion of the true Protestant Religion the just interest of all men beseeching God for his guidance in all things and times for the best doubt not then but we shall all live together in brotherly-love and the Land be blest The King presently invite home when come a general Council assemble to reform all amiss in the Church and House of God begin here and you do what God by our late King by Haggai by Zacharie by his Prophets and by me now sent unto you the most unworthiest of all advise too You see we all agree in the way it is undoubtedly the only course to remedy all amiss Thus to promote Gods glorie your Soveraigns Honour and to preserve his posterity hath been the most of your pretensions now let it be the best and speediest of your practises do this and live the envy of the World wicked men and Devils but the joy of Saints and Angels also the dearly beloved of the Lord and good-men you will be or else put me to death I will neither run nor hide my self to avoid it Walter Gostelow dwelling in Broad-street assures you of it God having first assured him for manner and matter as you read The next in order is the poor Irish shall not be transplanted see here is the Bears skin you divided before taken into power to dispose of Your cruel Act was that after last May it must be death for any not qualified as you there please to set down if taken on this side the River Chanon Mercifull men you are just too as you would have us misbelieve but pray what is become of your selves are not some of you gone thither the Irish Nation is not God put it into the heart of Oliver Cromwell to turn you out that would be turning of others out that you might divide the spoil which your selves make no they shall not be transplanted to Gods glorie and my comfort this part of his Prophesie is fulfilled already as well as his sign given me for the strengthning of my Faith and yours here also you see God judgeth not as man doth there are hundreds and thousands of that Nation I firmly believe and I have good ground for it also which hate that Rebellion as they did the Contrivers of it and the Actors of all Rebellion the Devil his instruments with this poor and oppressed Nation I have spent some time I know this to be true and now to their comfort I here assure it them in Print they shall not be transplanted they and the Land also may be made much better by our good example peaceably and loveingly co-habiting the Land affords room enough and would be made good too if wise-men sate at Helm which I assure them shortly will in the mean time and at all times I advise them to the remedy of two things to speak truth and not to give themselves to idleness stealing the Devil being the Father of all lies and the other his forge for all villanies our own good example in this may much the sooner remedy both for the former they hate many of us and use it as a rod of our own making for to scourge us with for the latter our pride and covetuousnes makes them chuse rather to steal and hang laze and starve than work for their beggerly proud Schismatical Lord-like usurpers There is a great increase of a sort of seeming strict and consciencious living people gotten thither they call them Anabaptists in Cristmas week 1653. to Youghall came one they called Doctor Lamb this Wolf cast many there then upon their backs into the water to hear as well as see what he did I went he told them that to be sprinkled onely as used in England made us no more Christians then those were that liv'd in France Rome or Spain Nay no more than such as lived in the remotest place of the World and had never heard of Christ 't was what he did our Saviour onely injoyned and our Lord himself was not baptized untill about 30 years of age believing first also truely at this I could not keep silence I observed our Saviour alwayes believed and was baptized when he pleased and for the Church of England certainly he traduced and falsly slandered them this Doctor further added wicked men having power in their hands had for these many years persecuted the true people of God which they were laboured also to suppress his Ordinances which was to baptize believe as they did only it is long to tell you more what I said in the defence of my faith and Church in fine two of his party Sword men in that place stood up and close to me also and told me we had no Church in England seeing what it was like to come to force of Argument I went out and staid with others to see the two then to be ducked the woman near sixty years old could hardly be gotten down she hanged so about this Doctor Lamb when in the water under water he could not get her the man Young by name dived like an old duck Doctor Lamb after he had well werted them laught at both all this I saw and heard these things I hope will be amended when I was in prison I wrote to the Lord of Broghill that I would witness those words spoken by Lamb to the slander of Gods word and his Church it is before you Gentlemen these things require a remedy you imagine not what a strange sort of cattle we have in Ierland for Religion mercifulness civility you may finde better in America and upon my conscience many of them will be sooner converted to the Protestant Religion than too many of those Saints will cease to be villains to the great dishonour of the Protestant Religion and deterring of those poor people to come in to it I am ashamed of it that men which pretend to piety should have so little my Land-lord the Goaler is a Saint to some of them yet what you have read of him is true preachers and wise men they have amongst them as they call them that will tell you me they have I am sure of it that there is no Hell and that their consciences never yet troubled them though they daily swear whore drink drunk besides other wickednesses indeed what not for sin by links is made a chain to this they came their conscience ought not to trouble them for who ever yet resisted Gods will for your Ministers which tell you this and that story out of what they call the word of God it is but to this end that they may the better pick your pockets when you are amazed and over-awed by them and so went on I do tell you Moyses was no more a Prophet than the rest of the Magitians onely more cunning in smiting them first they were all alike say these I am afraid to tell you