care of those who are put on an inevitable necessity of defending themselves c. How far a man that is assaulted and put on an inevitable necessity of defending himself against the injuries of private men is one thing and what he may do against his Prince of whom you seem to discourse is another In this case we may apply that in Rev. 13.10 He that killeth with the sword shall be killed with the sword This is the patience and faith of the Saints P. 11. This Doctrine of Passive Obedience you say quite alters the Oath of Allegiance which requires you to be obedient to all the Kings Majesties Laws Precepts and Process proceeding from the same I do not find those words in that Oath as set forth by King James but I find what you overlook viz. I will bear Faith and true Allegiance to his Majestie his Heirs and Successors and him and them will defend to the utmost of my power against all Conspiracies and Attempts whatsoever And thus I find more particularly in a Declaration which I believe our Author hath subscribed thus amplified I do declare that it is not lawful upon any pretence whatsoever to take Arms against the King And that I do abhor that traiterous Position of taking Arms by his Authority against his Person or against those that are commissionated by him P. 11. After a large Preface little to your purpose telling us That the Church of England reserves her Faith entire for the Canonical books of Scripture which I hope you also do and that she divides her Reverence between the Fathers and the first Reformers of this Church who partly were Martyrs that died for the Protestant Religion and partly Confessors that afterward setled it And now to the business How much the Fathers would have been for a Bill of Exclusion you say we have seen already No not one word of it from the beginning nor I believe any mention of it from one Argument tending to it to the end of the Book from any of the Fathers as will shortly appear But what say our Martyrs Confessors and Reformers First he tells us what some men would have perswaded King Edward to do if they could have had their wills confirmed by Act of Parliament They shewed what they would have done if they could saith our Author They never spake such bad English as our Author doth in his Taunton-Dean Proverb Chud eat more Cheese an chad it which being interpreted is We would rebel if we had power The Duke of Northumberland indeed did cause the Lady Jane Gray's Title to be proclaimed but here the Bishops must be the men that were chiefly engaged in that designe of Exclusion whereas I read not that any of them were ever consulted with nor ever declared any thing to that purpose but in their joynt and most solemn Writings enjoyn the clean contrary as shall now appear P. 12. The Bishops in Queen Elizabeth 's time to whom under God and that Queen we owe the settlement of our Church concurred to the making of that Statute which makes it High-Treason in her Reign and forfeiture of Goods and Chattels ever after in any wise to hold or affirm That an Act of Parliament is not of sufficient force and validity to limit and bind the Crown of this Realm and the descent limitation inheritance and government thereof 13 Eliz. chap. 1. But our Author never considered the grounds and reasons of that Act Ex malis moribus bonae Leges it was the iniquity of those times and the traiterous practices of the Queen of Scots which gave occasion to that Statute for there were many Pamphlets written by Saunders and the Author of Doleman which deni'd the Title of Queen Elizabeth and proclaim'd her an Usurper and the Queen of Scots made actual claim to the Crown of England she assumed the Arms of England and other Regalia and by her Confederates endeavoured to raise a Rebellion and conspired against the life of the Queen for which causes she was condemned as may appear by her Sentence which was passed upon her viz. That divers things were compassed and imagined within this Kingdom of England with the privity of the said Queen who pretended a Title to the Crown of this Kingdom and which tended to the hurt death and destruction of the Royal Person of our Soveraign Queen Cambdens Eliz. p. 464. Leiden 1625. Such practices gave occasion to that Statute to prevent the Mischiefs that might befal Queen Elizabeth and the Nation And that Statute consists of many heads As first Whoever should compass imagine devise or intend the death or destruction or any bodily harm tending to death destruction or wounding of the Royal person of the Queen or deprive or depose her of or from the Stile Honour or Kingly name of the Imperial Crown of this Realm c. or leavy War against her Majesty within this Kingdom or without or move any Strangers to invade this Kingdom or Ireland c. or shall maliciously publish and declare by any printing writing word or sayings that our Soveraign Lady during her life is not or ought not to be Queen of this Realm c. or that any other person or persons ought of right to be King or Queen of the same or that our said Queen is a Heretick or Schismatick Tyrant Infidel or an Vsurper of the said Crown c. these shall he guilty of High-Treason Also if any after thirty days from the Session of this Parliament and in the life of our said Queen shall claim pretend declare or publish themselves or any other besides our said Queen to have Right or Title to have and enjoy the Crown of England or shall usurp the same or the Royal Stile Title or Dignity of the Crown or shall affirm that our said Queen hath not right to hold and enjoy the same such shall be utterly disabled during their natural lives onely to have or enjoy the Crown or Realm of England in Succession Inheritance or otherwise Then follows the Case of Succession That if any person shall hold or affirm that the Common Laws of this Realm not altered by Parliament ought not to direct the Right of this Crown or that our said Queen by the Authority of Parliament is not able to make Laws and Statutes of sufficient force c. as above Yet was not the Queen of Scots condemned upon the Statute of the 13 of Eliz. but on that made in the 27 of her Reign wherein it was provided That twenty four persons at least part being of the Privy Council and the rest Peers of the Realm should by the Queens Commission examine such as should make any open Rebellion or Invasion of this Realm or attempt to hurt the Queens person by or for any pretended Title to the Crown In which Commission I find no Bishop save the Archbishop who at first refused to act nor when the whole Parliament petitioned for the Execution do we find that the
to molest another for his Religion Our Author might have gone for one of the Godly partie in those daies I do not read that there was one Law extended throughout the whole Roman Empire which was almost Vniversal but that several Kingdoms and Cities were governed by their own Laws So were the Jews and Heathen as well as Christian Subjects in their several Cities and remote Provinces As Julian told the Bishops that were of several Perswasions that they should not disturb the publick peace of the Empire and then they might enjoy their own Liberties and Religion Constantine seemed to be almost of a like perswasion for why else did he not suppress the Arian Heresie which from Alexandria infected the whole Empire He did take care to prevent Schism and Sedition among Christians that the administration of the Government might be more easie But this great man banished Athanasius into France where he remained till Constantine his Son recalled him as Eusebius in his Chronologie But what if there were some Edicts for the establishment of Christian Religion in Constantine's days nothing was confirmed by the Senate that was accounted then a needless thing Nor did the Edicts of one Emperour bind another by the same Authoritie as Constantine might have setled the Orthodox Religion Constantius setled the Arian and after him Julian the Pagan Religion I mean by his own Imperial power and Edicts For the Roman Emperour was an Absolute Monarch their Will was a Law as Gregory Nazianzen quoted by you p. 13. The Will and Pleasure of the Emperour is an unwritten Law backed with Power and much stronger than written ones which were not supported by Authority So that though he did not as you term it fairly enact Sanguinary Laws yet had he the Law of the Sword in his hands And I think it was a great mercie of God to the Christians under him that he did not by publick Edicts put the Sword out of his own hands into the hands of his Heathen Magistrates who would have written them all in bloud Therefore Mr. Baxter saies p. 20. of 4th part of his Direct Julian was a protector of the Church from Popular Rage in comparison of other Persecutors though in other respects he was a Plague Valentinian was a right Christian Emperour and when he was chosen the Souldiers were importunate that he should assume another as an Associate in the Empire he tells them It lay in you to chuse me your Emperour but being chosen what you desire is not in your power but mine it belongs to you as Subjects to be quiet and rest contented and to me as your King to consider what is fit to be done Zozomen l. 6.86 Justinian was another good Emperour and he assumed the sole administration of the Empire to himself and demands in his Novels Quis tantae authoritatis ut nolentem Principem possit ad convocandos Patres caetorosque Proceres coarctare Who can claim so great Authority as to constrain the Prince to assemble the Senate against his will And Justinian Novel 105. excepts the Emperour from the coercive power of the Law to whom says he God hath subjected the Laws themselves sending him as a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 living Law unto men And the Gloss noteth That the Emperour is the Father of the Law whereupon the Laws also are subject to him When Vespasian was Emperour it was declared by the Senate That he might make Leagues with whom he pleased And though Tiberius Claudius or Germanicus had made certain Laws yet Vespasian was not obliged by them And Pliny in his Panegyrick to Trajan tells him how happie he was that he was obliged to nothing So that the Christians had no more pretence of having the Laws on their side under Julian than under Dioclesian Maximus or Constantius nor did they ever plead them to justifie a Rebellion against him for want of such an Advocate or Leader as our Author Gregory Nyssene tells us also what the power of the King or Emperour was he defines him to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one that hath Absolute power in himself no Master nor Equal Cont. Eunomium l. 1. So that our Author 's great Babel is fallen viz. that the Julian Christians had their Religion established by Law and that they were long possessed of it For Laws or no Laws by the Lex Regia the Emperour could reverse the old and establish new as it pleased him and for want of Laws where the word of the Emperour was there was power and none might say to him What dost thou Thus it was with Constantine and Constantius and why not with Julian And now I hope the good Christians of our Age will no longer trust to such broken Reeds as our Author puts into their hands much less that they should take up the Sword which will be no other than a broken Reed also not onely to fail them but to pierce through their sides Now if we should turn the Tables and ask our Author Whether when Jovian and Valentinian were Emperours and had made some new Edicts for the Orthodox Christians as well as against the Arians and Pagans it had been lawful for the Arians or Pagans to rebel in defence of their Religion Or to come nearer home Whether when Queen Mary had established Popery by Law in this Nation it had been lawful for the Papists to have rebelled against Queen Elizabeth they having the Laws on their side yea and questioning her Right of Succession too yet we do not read that they did contrive a General Rebellion though for ought I see our Author would have justified them when he tells us from Zozomen what men may do for the Religion whereof they are well perswaded Or neerer yet when the Long too Long Parliament pretended against the King that their Religion was in danger by Poperie and Superstition their Laws and Liberties invaded by an Arbitrary Power did they well or ill from these pretences to raise that War against the King that turned the Nation to an Aceldama Were the Laws such as could justifie that Rebellion or no If they could not then I am sure they cannot now since the late Act for Treason in the 13th of our King and a Declaration of Parliament That it is not lawful on any pretence whatsoever c And by several Statutes it is declared That the King is the Onely Supreme Governour of his Dominions over all Persons and Causes whatsoever And the power of the Sword or Militia is put into his hands as well by the Law of the Nation as of God and I trust he will not bear it in vain Having thus stript this full-fac'd Bird of a few borrowed and painted Feathers how justly is he exposed to be hooted at by every boy or dealt with as in the Apologue of such another bird that seeing the Pidgeons to be well meated and live securely he would get himself to be coloured and arrayed like one of them and feed among
shall know or hear of to be against him or any of them And I do farther swear That I do from my heart abhor detest and abjure as impious and heretical this damnable Doctrine and Position that Princes which be excommunicated or deprived by the Pope may be deposed or murthered by their Subjects or any other whatsoever And all these things I plainly and sincerely acknowledge and swear according to these express words by me spoken and according to the plain and common sence and understanding of the same words without any Equivocation or mental Evasion or secret Reservation whatsoever c. Now let any man judge whether you have not taught the Jesuits themselves how to equivocate and to make void that solemn Oath by affirming that there can be no such person as an Heir to the Crown while the King is living Your own distinction of an Heir Apparent and Presumptive seems a sufficient Confutation of your sensless Assertion Besides though it may be true of a Testamentary Heir that he is not actually so till the death of the Testator yet a Legal Heir upon whom an Estate is intailed as the Royal Crown of England is upon the next in Bloud is truly an Heir and ought to inherit And in this Opinion I am confirmed by the Apostle Gal. 4.1 who says That though the Heir as long as he is a child i.e. as long as his Father liveth differeth nothing from a servant yet he is Lord of all and if he be a Son or next in Bloud to a Prince whose Kingdom is hereditary then is he his Heir v. 7. as St. Paul argues You seem to grant that this is the Law-sence of the words Heirs and Successors in an Act of Parliament as in the Duty of Excise granted to the King his Heirs and Successors But an Oath of Allegiance you say ought to be conceived in plain words and in the common sence of those words Which I should think to be that which the Lawyers that penned that Oath and the Lawgivers that enjoyned it did intend and unless you will justifie Papists in their Equivocations and absolve them from the obligation of that Oath it cannot be taken in any other but the Law-sence Well say you if it be so and so it must be let them be sure to keep it in that sence in which they have or should take it at sixteen years of age in the Court-Leet viz. I will be true Liegeman and true faith and troth bear to our Soveraign Lord the King that now is and to his Highness Heirs and lawful Successours Kings and Queens of this Realm of England To which you add this pitiful and worse than Jesuitical Evasion It is plain to every body that no one certain or known person in the world hath any interest at present in the Oath of Allegiance besides his Majesty that now is For which you give this as a Reason which is none at all For who shall be King or Queen of England hereafter none but God himself knows And if God by whom Kings reign had not wonderfully restored his Majesty we should have had none at this time But God by a Miracle hath restored the right Heir against all oppesition Pag. 21. He brings in another Objection against the Bill of Exclusion fetched from the Common-Prayer to which I perceive he is no great Friend viz. No Church of-England-man can be for it with a good Conscience being to the prejudice of his R. H. because we there pray that God would prosper him with all happiness here and hereafter Now by the way no such words as here and hereafter are expressed though we grant they are implied under the word All. But we especially though not onely intend it to that happiness which flows from the Spirit and grace of God and may bring him and all the Royal Family to Gods everlasting Kingdom and as a means thereunto that he would endue them with his holy Spirit and enrich them with his heavenly Grace You say No man in the Communion of the Church of England prays that Prayer more heartily than you do But if you do indeed think him to be a Julian and your self such as those Christians that sayd their Prayers backward that prayed him to death and would not so much as desire his conversion this would certainly be a Curse in the mouth or heart of any Protestant And I hope there are no such in the Communion of our Church though you intimate that they were all such in the Primitive Church and that we should be such also for p. 96. you say You find not one single wish among the Antients for Julian's conversion but all for his down-right destruction It is a good Rule that Pro quibus orandum pro iis laborandum We should by a meek and Christian behaviour inforce our Devotions for 't is the Prayer of the Righteous man that availeth much If we could thorowly inspect the Arguments that prevailed for the reputed defection of that Prince I believe the unchristian behaviour of those who oppose his Succession was most cogent And who knows but our amendment moderation and meekness might yet reclaim him But to pray coldly without faith for what you say p. 22. there is no hope and to act contrary to your Prayers is to beg a denial And I hope many others pray more heartily than you do For when we pray God to indue him with his Holy Spirit c. we pray that he may return to the Protestant Religion and not that he may be exposed to an invincible Temptation and a kind of necessity to extirpate it as you maliciously accuse us Nor are we to distrust the power of divine Grace either to restrain or sanctifie those whom we pray for and so to limit the Holy One of Israel as if he had not the hearts of Kings in his hand or had no rule over the Governours of the world Cambden p. 5. of his Remains reports that when Brithwald the Monk was troubled about the Succession the Bloud Royal being almost extinguished he heard a voice saying The Kingdom of England is Gods Kingdom and God will provide for it And why should not we acquiesce in the same Divine Providence P. 79. You argue against a Popish Successour à possibili because he may be a Persecutor Some have accounted both our present Soveraign and his Father of blessed memory such they sent the One out of the world with an Exit Tyrannus though the meekest and most gracious Prince in the world and what the effects of a Bill of Exclusion as some men would manage it may be is dreadful to consider But as you suppose the Popish Successessour may be so I suppose he may not be a Persecutor And for the proof of this I appeal to your Friend Plato Redivivus who in p. 207. gives an instance in the Prince of Hanover who was perverted to the Roman Church went to Rome to abjure Heresie and returning home
endure wicked Princes as we do Inundations or Scarcitie which are of Gods sending These you say p. 20. are full and pregnant proofs and I think ad hominem cogent for if as you observe from Eusebius the Empire was to descend as other Paternal Inheritances then it must be more unlawful to resist or exclude a Prince from enjoying his Inheritance than any private person And then surely no sound Christian could have joyned in an Address to Constantius to exclude a person appointed as it were by the Voice of God as you say of Constantine that he was declared absolute Emperour by the 〈◊〉 and long before that by God himself the great King of all p. 21. And St. Augustine says the same viz. God that gave the Empire to Constantine gave it to Julian Onely by the way I do not think that your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 neither will in the sence of the Greek Fathers bear your interpretation of the Law of Nature for 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is often used by Greek Authors for Custom And I believe that Father whom you mention intended no more than a Right of Succession for two or three Generations which carried the name of a Law as it doth also in our Common Law where Consuetudo Lex est And it is well known that when the Heirs of the Emperors have been living the Roman Souldiers have created their Emperours out of Obscure Families but these are no Patterns for us Christians to follow nor for us in this Nation above others For William the Conqueror claimed the Crown not so much by his Sword as by Right of Succession if you will believe the Author of that Fanatical book called The Rights of the Kingdom to King Edward whose Kinsman he was and his Heir by Will as appears by the Laws of St. Edward and William p. 197. So that in this respect the Descent of the Crown of England is much more firm and established than that of the Empire having been continued through more Generations and confirmed by many Laws which whoever shall infringe takes off the Government from its Hinges and leaves all to Confusion For when a private Estate is intailed on a man and his Heirs it is necessary that to bar the Heir and alienate the Estate the original Intail must be cut off and then he that is in possession may dispose of the Inheritance to one or more And perhaps this was the intent of the Bill for Exclusion to make it an Act for the Dissolution of Monarchy and reduce us to a Commonwealth again And it were better we should suffer some Inconveniencies if the Will of God be so which yet are uncertain than against the Will of God to do things unjust and draw more certain troubles on our own heads For in the Contest between the Houses of York and Lancaster when the first alway pleaded the Right of Descent the other alleadged the Acts of Parliaments there were infinite troubles which cost the lives of above 200000 men whereof eight were Kings and Princes forty Dukes Marquesses and Earls besides Barons and Gentlemen and after all the Kingdom fixed on this Maxime Jus Sanguinis nullo Jure dirimi possit i. e. The Right of Bloud cannot be abrogated by any Law And the Author of the Rights of the Kingdom says that in the days of Henry the Third and Richard the First when was a motion of some great men that a Bastard might inherit the Parliament at Merton cried out Nolumus leges Angliae mutare p. 264. Therefore I wonder that the same Author p. 98. making a Supposition That if any one man of all the Commons in Parliament should usurp the Crown with all its dues He mentions not the whole House for that hath been done already What should I what may I do saith he and answers Nothing but mind my Calling and attend the Judgment of the highest Court that I know that may command my Body and Judgement much It is a Maxime in our Law That the King never dies The King and his Heirs are looked on in the eye of the Law as an Individual and to prevent Tumults and Disputes they are joyned in most of those Acts that concern the Dignity of the Crown and publick Peace and the Son hath sometime been Crowned in his Fathers life-time Yet we plead not Providence in the long continuance of the Succession nor the Law of the Land upon which for other matters you lay the stress of your whole Discourse but upon the Law of God Deut. 17.8 where it was ordained as a Statute of Judgment i. e. say Fagius and Munster a firm and immutable Law and as the Vulgar Sanctum Lege perpetua That IF A MAN DYE WITHOVT CHILDREN THE INHERITANCE MVST BE GIVEN TO HIS BRETHREN And Ainsworth from Solomon Jarchi says The Brother of him that was dead or his Brothers seed shall inherit All this hath been observed by the Law of Nations where Kingdoms are hereditary That as it is unjust so it hath been always unhappie to alter the Succession and even in private estates the disinheriting the right Heir hath been very much condemned and unfortunate And yet p. 22. you say the Fathers had the Conscience to set aside such a Title They could not do it with a good Conscience the thing being in it self evil for as the Law of God forbids to countenance a poor man in his Cause so doth it also to defraud the rich or follow a multitude to do evil neither to speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment None of us would judge it reasonable to be deprived of his right contrary to Law and why then should we think it lawful to deprive another of that right to which we owe the preservation of our own Athenagoras more clearly shews what was the consent of the Fathers in this case We pray for your Empire and that the Son as it is just may succeed in his Fathers Throne And yet they both were Pagans But what would the Consent of Fathers and the sense of the primitive Christians signifie against the Decree and Laws of Heaven who cannot more plainly declare his will to us than by the voice of Nature by his written Word by pointing out as by his finger in his Providence in making Heirs to Kingdoms as well as other Estates by a long and legal discent and as St. Augustine said God that gave the Empire to good Constantine gave it also to Julian So Tertullian Inde est Imperator unde Homo antequam Imperator And Irenoeus By whose command they were born Men by his they are ordained Kings And yet all this Crack of the Fathers and Primitive Christians and p. 31. the whole Christian world produceth nothing but a flash of Rhetorick from an Invective in Gregory Nazianzen against Julian from which if we appeal to the same Author in a more temperate and Christian Zeal when he delivered himself
counted the Grievance of a great Partie P. 82. Old Bracton appears again and is made to eat his own words for whereas he had said of the King That every one is under him and he under none but God and that he can have no equal in his Kingdom for so he should lose his command because one equal hath no power over another now he is made to contradict himself That Rex est sub lege quia lex facit Regem c. which is utterly false not onely because the Kings Predecessors came in by Conquest but also because it is the Royal Assent that passeth all Bills into Laws Mr. Baxter answers this p. 14. part 4. of Christian Directory That Lex being taken for the signification of the Soveraigns will to oblige the Subject the Law doth not make the King but the King the Law For which he quoteth Grotius lib. 8. p. 195. Neminem sibi imperare posse à quo mutatâ voluntate nequeat recedere And Grotius quotes S. Augustine Imperatorem non esse subjectum Legibus suis And doubtless this is true in every Free Monarchie as England is by Historians and Lawyers granted to be Now consider that Bracton wrote in the Reign of Henry the Third when his Earls and Barons often confederated and rose actual War against him and made him to capitulate with them having got the strength of the Nation in their hands in favour of whom he seems to write and calls them the Kings higher Court not as some higher than the King but than other of the Kings Courts Yet was this no Parliament for the Commons are not mentioned by Bracton Now let any judge when Bracton was in the right and when in the wrong opinion by what followeth in the same Chapter for as our Author blames the Doctor for not reading on so do I much more blame him because he came nearer to it And thus Bracton says Si autem ab eo peccatur locus erit supplicationi quod factum suum corrigat emendat quod si non fecerit satis sufficit ei ad poenam quod Dominum expectet Vltorem Nemo quidem de factis suis praesumat disputare multo fortius contra factum suum venire i. e. If the King do offend there is libertie of petitioning that he would amend what is amiss which if he will not do there is no punishment for the King but to expect God to be his Avenger but let no man presume to dispute of his doings much less to make opposition against what he doth And this is agreeable to that Scripture Eccles 8.4 Who may say to him What dost thou If therefore we should grant it to be true what Bracton says according to practice rather than Law in those lawless times yet Now as Plowden as great a Lawyer as Bracton says the Case is altered And the Oath of Supremacie against the Pope which Bracton would by no means admit and the Oath of Allegiance and Act of Parliament for not taking up Arms on any pretence whatsoever would have quite overthrown Bracton's Opinion if he had not done it himself Our Author seems to apply the Premises onely against a Popish Successor and freely grants that when he is lawfully possest of the Crown he is inviolable and unaccountable as to his own person and ought by no means to have any violence offered to him p. 84. To what purpose then hath he given Instances of reproach proachful and provoking Language Prayers and Devotions that helpt on his death all for his Destruction none for his Conversion threatning to kick him and from Zozomen encouraging the Assassination of him when Julian was in quiet possession of the Empire P. 94. You quote a Saying of Asterius How great a resort is there from the Church to the Altars c. This is answered by Bishop Bilson p. 502. of Christian Subjection You find saith he that multitudes ran from Christ to Paganism after Julian to Arianism after Valens but do you find that the Godly did rebel against them What presumption is this in you to controul the Wisdom and Goodness of God sifting his Church by the rage and fury of wicked Princes and crowning those that be his as patient in Trial and constant in Truth Were you throughly perswaded that the hearts of Kings are in the hands of God and that the hairs of our heads are numbered so that no persecution can apprehend his which he disposeth not for the experience of their faith or recompence of their sins you would as well honour the Justice of God in erecting Tyrants that our unrighteousness may be punished in this world as embrace his Mercie in giving rest to his Church by the favour of good Princes Experto Crede This good Bishop says We have these twenty seven years endured all sorts of calamities that may befal men in exile therefore charge not us to be worldly minded p. 501. See Mr. Baxter to this purpose part 4. of the Christian Directory What our Author says concerning Passive Obedience p. 85. c. shall be considered anon P. 89. He is very angry that the Doctor should reflect on some dangerous Pamphlets as that of the History of Succession The Dialogue between Tutor and Pupil and another that affirms That Parliaments should sit till they have done that for which they were called And contrariwise so far commends the treasonable Popish book of Doleman as that it was impossible to write a Historie of Succession without borrowing from it Their Tools are so dull they must needs be beholding to the Philistines to set an edge on them upon their Whetstones of Lyes and Forgeries Quam bene conveniunt P. 91. The Thebaean Legion like a malus Genius meets him again and for their sakes he is resolved rather to die a Murtherer than a Martyr for p. 85. he puts the Case though he confesseth it to be a rare Case for bad Princes seldom stoop so low as to be Executioners of their own cruelty But the Question is if they should How far notwithstanding men may endeavour to save themselves without breach of their Allegiance and of that true Faith and Loyaltie which they ought to bear of life and limb and terrene honour If they have a mind to know they may ask advice i. e. How far notwithstanding the Oath of Allegiance men may resist their Prince For the Authors part he is resolved already but will not discover to every one what is in his heart if he thought it unlawful to resist the Kings person in case he should offer violence to a Subject he would certainly have published it but his Silence speaks his Consent Now if the King be forced for his defence to take an armed Guard as our Late Soveraign was And our Author with other Malecontents that think themselves highly wronged because they are not rewarded according to their deserts should meet him with another Armed Company and fight him he may kill his person
193. as it is marked in my Copy is verbatim this Speaking of the Duke Let him attempt the Crown notwithstanding an Act of Parliament for his Exclusion he is all that while but attempting to make us miserable if he be not excluded he doth it certainly we exclude onely his Person not his Posterity And WE WILL NOT ENTAIL A WAR VPON THE NATION THOVGH FOR THE SAKE AND INTEREST OF THE GLORIOVS FAMILY OF THE STVARTS Is not this spoken Dictator-like Did Cromwel say more when he bragg'd that he had the Parliament in his pocket Then We will have this and we will not have that We will proclaim the Family of the Stuarts Traitors and we will have our own will His premise is this If the Duke be not excluded he doth certainly make us miserable by entailing a War upon the Nation which may be false if the ancient Proverb be true Gen. 22.12 In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen it was spoken when the knife was lifted up to make Isaac a Scrifice and we know that the burning bush was not consumed But the Conclusion is certainly most impious We will not entail a War up-the Nation though for the sake and interest of the glorious Family of the Stuarts To let pass that Irony of THE GLORIOVS FAMILY OF THE STVARTS The plain sence of the words to a Logician is this Rather than not exclude the Duke of York who will certainly make us miserable we will exclude the glorious Family of the Stuarts This is as much as need to be said at present to cure the preiudice of a deluded and unthinking people as Mr. Hunt calls them Had. Mr. Hunt's Preface and Postscript come to my hands before I had well-nigh finished my Answer and sent some sheets to the Press the rest being called for with all expedition that the Printer might not be prejudiced by the edition of other Tracts on this subject I should have taken a more particular view of all that is contained in them whereas I can now onely cursorily make a few Remarks and leave the Reader to judge Ex ungue leonem We live saith he p. 150. in an Age of mystery and prodigie producing things monstrous and unnatural and our language must be agreeable to the things we speak And so it is very obscure and yet unnatural But I shall endeavour to drag this Author to the light and present him with his three heads The first is his Invective against the Clergy This poureth forth flouds of Contempt upon the whole Order The second is his Justification of the late Vnnatural War and this Head breaths out an horrible and infectious stink The third his endeavour to promote another such War as that was And this Head casteth out Firebrands and Swords to alarm and arm all the Malecontents in the Nation for a resistance of their Governours I know he doth not want his lurking holes and Subterfuges to hide these monstrous deformities but all in vain Treason will out and Magna est veritas prevalebit The first Head breaths out a contempt of the Clergie to which he makes way by a Preamble that will rather aggravate than excuse the Crime 1. Our Author complains that his honest design as he calls it to serve the Church hath been by many perverted p. 1. of the Preface and p. 5. that some have endeavoured to set his two Discourses viz. his Argument for Bishops and his Postscript at variance that the first was written to set off the latter with some advantage and that the Author designed to get from the Argument a more pardonable libertie of inveighing against the Church-men in the Postscript Habetis consitentem Reum Doubtless the Argument did not effect that grateful Acknowledgement from the Bishops which he expected They knew him perhaps to be a mercenary man one that had or would write as much falsely against them as he had done truly for them if it might tend to his better advantage and therefore he was resolved to pull down what he had built up and to seek more beneficiary Patrons Let us therefore consider who they were that thus resented and complained of Mr. Hunt p. 5. If it had been says he the conceit of the Popish Faction onely and not also of those Gentlemen whom I principally designed to serve and in them the Church of England c. Here it is as plain as if it had been written with a Sun-beam that he means the Bishops who were mostly if not onely concerned in that Argument But how maliciously doth he suggest that they were influenced by the Popish Faction who p. 6. he says had corrupted some of our Church-men with Principles that subvert our Government and betray the Rights of our people They have debauched the manners of our Church-men and lessened their Athoritie and Esteem with the people The Order is inslaved by collation of Preferments upon less worthy men Qui beneficium accepit libertatem amisit Is not this a stout Advocate for Bishops that tells the world that those of that Order indefinitely are contemptible slaves that have sold their Libertie for Preferment that they are corrupted in their Principles to the subverting of our Government and betraying the Rights of the people and so debauched in their manners as that they have lessened their esteem and authoritie with the people Is not this the old Censor Morum or Cato Redivivus And is it possible that a learned man should thus prevaricate and contradict himself so grosly as it were in the same breath Let not Mr. Hunt think to evade this and say he speaks this of our younger Divines of which we shall hear enough by and by to make all good mens ears tingle at the horrid falsehood of it he speaks this of the Order and particularly of the dignified men of that Order of these it is that he speaks p. 7. for he is not yet come to his distinction of young and old Divines those that are inslaved by the Preferment they have and those that seek Preferment by other arts of which anon That they lick up the Vomit of Popish Priests and whatever is said maliciously by them against the first Reformers is daily repeated by now come in our young Clerks out of the Pulpit with advantages of immodestie and indiscretion Now for our young Divines whom p. 50. of the Postscript he calls good-natur'd Gentlemen of the Clergie Tom Triplet is the onely young man that I knew who was so lasht after he came from the University Old Gill never laid on so unmercifully as this Demagogue doth p. 9. We have a sort of young men that have left nothing behind them in the Vniversitie but the taint of a bad example and brought no more Learning with them thence than what serves to make them more assured and more remarkable Coxcombs who will undertake to discourse continually of the Interest of Religion of which they have no manner of sense and of the