Common-Counsell of London the Houses of Parliament the Kings Majesty himselfe and whosoever else lyes crosse in their way large as uncivilly as they have done us the companions we have in our sufferings make our other wayes insupportable injuries the more tolerable But of all the kinds of injustice whereby they have been pleased to deal against us this now in hand seems to be most strange they rest not satisfied with all they are able of themselves to speak write or print for the disgrace of our Church unlesse they scrape together and with their owne hands cast upon our face the falsest of the most wicked calumnies which our common enemies the Prelats either of old or of late have invented against us We esteemed our selves secure of this kind of dealing from those whom we knew to have solemnly sworne the defence of our Church-Government against the common enemy I professe I cannot deny myamazement to see men who pretend to more then ordinary piety fall upon their wel-deserving Brethren so openly before the Sun in contempt of God and his solemn Oath to enforce upon them old rotten calumnies which cannot but fall back upon the head not onely of the first Authors but also with encrease of shame upon the face of the malicious repeaters so much against all piety charity and wisdome You know that one of the most false and wicked pieces that of old was written against the Church of Scotland was Adamsons Declaration in the yeer 1584. it was so vile that the Author was brought to an ingenuous confession of the shamefull and wicked lyes whereof it was full King James at that very time did disclaime it under his hand divers of our Parliaments did condemne the matter of it as erroneous and wrong That pestiferous carcasse which with all possible infamy was buried so soon as borne and did lye quiet in its grave of shame till a full Climaterick of three score and three yeers our good friends have been so wise for themselves and kind to us as to dig up its stinking bones and to carry it from house to house from shire to shire over all England and where over else a printed pamphlet can goe serving their Brethren of Scotland with this curtesie according to their Covenant And least the antick face of so long buried a body should not have been looked upon by the multitude with any contentment they did choice to be at the cost of putting it in a fine new English dresse and setting upon its head the Cape of a royall title All to draw the eyes of the vulgar upon it who otherwise might have passed by it wiâ—h neglect and disdaine In this they have put themselves to a peece of pains which I never knew or heard used with any other book they do print it first in Master Adamsons owne old Scottish language and thereafter translated it in good moderne English setting before both the Title of A Declaration made by King James in Scotland concerning Church-government and Presbyters When all this was told us we made our addresse to the worshipfull Lycenser intreating that a Pamphlet so extreamly injurious to our whol Church and Nation might be smothered upon the Presse and returned to its pit where so long it had lyen in infamy we were told by him that divers persons of eminency at least for their place and present Station had strongly moved him with great importunity to give his License for its reprinting Yet that upon our so just and reasonable desires he would doe his best to stop it hereupon we rested satisfied being assured of its suppression notwithstanding within two dayes after this promise it came abroad the importunity and eminency of the persons who had drawne from the Licenser his Imprimatur with greater ease did draw from the Presse some thousands of the printed Copies and made them to be sold publikely to our small contentment While this not very pleasant morsell is lying in our stomack scarce halfe digested behold a second dish is presented to us for to helpe our concoction of the first Master Jo. Maxwell late Bishop of Rosse Excommunicate by our generall Assembly declared Incendiary by our Parliament and made unpardonable in the Propositions of Peace did write in the gall of his bitternesse a wicked Satyre against all the parts of the Government of our Church This some three yeeres agoe the Author did print at Oxford under the Title of an Answer by Letter shewing how inconsistent Presbyteriall government is with Monarchy The Cavaliers there received it with great joy being extreamly satisfactory to their spight and revengefull humour against Scotland which they did ordinarily damne and curse as the first and greatest Fountaine of all their woes In this the Lord gave testimony for us against them for by a sudden and unexpected fire almost all the Copies of that wicked Booke were destroyed before they were brought from the Printers Shoppe by the strange and remarkable accident the mouth of the Author and of his malignant friends at Oxford were so stopped that we heard very little more of that Booke from them But behold our Covenanting Brethren at London I meane some of our Antipresbyterian friends tooke the courage and charity to plucke out of the fire the remainder of the Prelats labours and misregarding not onely the sentence of men the Acts of the generall Assembly of Scotland and of the Parliaments of both Kingdomes making the man an excommunicate and unpardonable Incendiary but also the judgement of God from Heaven who to their knowledge had burnt the most of that Impression to ashes notwithstanding they will gather what was left out of the fire as a holy relict and hug it in their bosome till by a new Impression at London of some thousand copies they be enabled to make it run over all the Kingdome and so much farther as a Pamphlet hugely cryed up by their voices could flee Our diligence to search and find out the Presse the Licenser and if we had pleased the Solicitors of their former Writ made them a little more cautious in the reprinting and publishing of this but for all their warinesse it was visible enough by whose industry the Books were dispersed to the Members of Parliament and over all the City it was knowne by whose serious recommendations wings were set to the sides of that Fowle that it might flee with all diligence much farther and more quickly then the art and malice of the Malignants at Oxford were able to have carried it For my part all the revenge I wish of so grievous a wrong all the penance I would put upon the Authors and Actors therein beside the weight of that sin and shame which they have drawne upon themselves by spreading so false and so wicked lyes of them who by solemne oath they were obliged to have defended against such injuries shall be onely to collation at their conveniency my subsequent Answer with their owne beloved Writs when they have
in the Assemblies as the Lawes allow albeit not such a Tyranny as Prelats would flatter him into it is true it was ever our wish and oft our happinesse to have the King or his Commissioner amongst us at these meetings we never did dispute their capacity no more was craved then the place of a civil President and this no man did ever deny either to him or them nor a power to propound what ever they thought expedient but some of your flattering Prelates doe ascribe to the Prince a power which neither we nor our Laws may owne You give him a power to call so many as he will without all Commission from any Church to voice in all Assemblies and by the multitude of their voices to carry all You give him also a power to hinder the Assembly to debate any matter which he mislikes were it never so necessary for the very being of the Church You give him a Negative Vote to stop any conclusion were it never so consonant to the Word of God yea an affirmative Vote to carry all things in the Assembly absolutely according to his owne minde The Assembly being but his Arbitrary Court in things spirituall by whose advice the Prince who is the supream judge in all causes does determine as he findes it expedient sometimes according sometimes contrary to their judgement Such a power no ordinary either Erastian or Prelate will willingly grant to any Prince upon earth but this was one of the late Canterburian extravagancies wherein your singular zeale did much help you to your Bishoprick What you adde of our pressing the King to execute all our Acts under the paine of Excommunication we have oft told you it is a great untruth for all Scotland knowes that the furthest we went ever with any Prince in our Assembly Acts was humbly to supplicate for their civill Sanction iâ— we obtain it we blesse God and them if we cannot by any prayers perswade we sit down in grief and wait patiently upon their good pleasure Our taking in of all things temporall upon some spirituall relation The Assembly alters no Laws but only supplicates the King and Parliament to alter such â—aws as confirm evident errors and forcing the King to change his Laws though never so prejudiciall to the State your report in this will be beleeved when you have gotten grace to forsake in some measure the Spirit that now leads you The matter here you aime at but keeps it in the clouds is the proceeding of the Assembly at Glasgow against your offices and persons According to the Lawes of Popiâ—â— times The Bishops were Lords of Parliament of Councell of Exchequer of Session The Assembly did finde all this contrary to the Word of God and therefore did discharge under the paine of the censures of the Church any Minister of the Word to take upon him these civill imployments I hope the hindering of persons meerly Ecclesiastick to drowne themselves in a sea of temporall affaires is not to take cognisance of all things temporall in ordine ad spiritualia The Assembly did supplicate the King and Parliament for the abolition of the Popish and corrupt Lawes which did countenance the ambition of the Clergy the Parliament finding the Assemblies supplication just joyned with them to deale with the King to passe it his Majesty for a time misled by the flattery of Prelates refused but at last seeing the earnestnesse and cleer equity of the Assembly and Parliament their desires he was perswaded to consent to these Acts wherein all Churchmen are forbidden to take upon them civill places This is it that you call the forcing of the King and Parliament to change the Laws for the great trouble of the State this is all the Assemblies tyranizing over the King and Parliament a meer supplication to alter Popish and corrupt Lawes which both the King and the State after a little debate did finde necessary to be done To the absurdities which you call monstrously grosse Your oftrepeated quarrell against ruling Eâ—ders is absurd p. 21.22 we have spoken already you are impatient that any ruling Elder that any Commissioner from Burroughs or Vniversities should voice in Church Assemblies your expresse reason is because concilium est Episcoporum see the mans absurdity no Minister more then a ruling Elder must voice at any Assembly the decisive voice there belongs only to Bishops yet any Lay men vested with the Bishops commission may very lawfully exercise all Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction over the whole Clergy of the Diocesse neither is there any Gentleman of the Shire not any Burgesse of the City nor any Student in the Vniversity to whom a Prelate can purchase a Letter from the King but he may sit and voice decisively in all spirituall causes as a constituent Member of the Generall Assembly as well as the Bishop himself this is the doctrine and was the practise of our Prelates in Scotland You are angry p. 22. Page 22 23 24 25 26. The Assembly and Parliament with us use not to differ that the acts of our Assemblies should get so ready obedience but the matters themselves are so clear that none uses to refuse them and it is the Law of the kingdome that the Assemblies determination in matters proper to its cognisance should be obeyed if any thing new be acted which requires a civill sanction the Commissioners of the Assembly supplicate the next ensuing Parliament for their ratification which for common is easily obtained the cleer equity of the matter purchases a ready grant If there happen to be cause why the Parliament should not be satisfied the Aslembly by their reasons is perswaded to be of the Parliaments minde no such unanimous Courts in the Universe as the Parliament and Generall Assembly of Scotland they never had any difference but what bad Courtiers and Prelates procured for their owne interests put these pests of the Church and State to a corner the King Parliament and Assembly shall never differ but alwayes concurre for the strengthening and comforting one another From your 22. page to 31. Your invectives against our first Reformation are wicked you heap together what ever extream malice can invent to bring disgrace upon the first and cheife resormers of Religion from Popery you openly avow your dislike of the first Reformation in Scotland you are not ashamed to proclaim all the Reformation both of Scotland France Holland and Germany and wheresoever the work was not done by the hand of the Soveraign Prince to have been Sedition and Rebellion The first thing you undertake to prove is That we give our Assemblies power to depose and kill Kings The Vindication of Iohn Knoâ— and the first Reformers of Scotland from base calumnies for this you alledge Martin mar Prelate whoyet says no such thing and though hedid what is that to us then you cite a number of passages out of Iohn Knox his writings but is it just that John Knox Assertions long
there was no controversie in the year 1580 betwixt the Church and the Court The privie counsell had subscribed all that book with some reservation about Church rents the Generall Assemblies oft did agree to it without any exception his Majestie himselfe in the fore named year did send to the Assembly with an expresse commissioner the platform of all the Presbiteries which therafter were erected over all Scotland which against all the Prelats assaults have ever stood firme to this day so your alleagencies are exceeding false that the Presbiteries were erected without the Kings authority and that in the yeare 1580 the Government of our Church was Episcopall these are putide thredbare lyes The Generall Assembly did never allow of Abbots and Priors as Churchmen and though they pressed the great unjustice that Popish Bishops and lay Abbots should 〈◊〉 in Parliament in name of the Church to vote as the third estate The Generall Assembly did never approve of Abbots and Priors Estate without any Commission from the Church yet it was never their intention to have any of their owne number appointed by themselves to vote in Parliament in name of the Church of Scotland For when King Iames a little before his going to England was very earnest with the generall Assembly to accept of that as a favour they forseeing the snare did resolutely reject it ever til his Maje by very great dealing did draw a plurality of an unadvised Assembly to embrace that power of voting in Parliament but with a nuÌ„ber of Caveats which wise men foresaw would never be kept That Master Melvil or any Presbitery of that Land had ever any hand in impropriating or disapidating any part of the Church Rent is farre from truth But that your good Colleagues the Prelats in the Parliament 1606. made a bargaine for alienating from the Church for ever no fewer then 16. Abbays at one time I declared before About that time what the practises of the disciplinarians aâ— London might be I doe not know but this is certaine that Mr. Cartwright and all the old nonconformists in England were our deare Brethren and made a waies the Government of the Church of Scotland the measure of their desires that betwixt us and the Antiepiscopall party here was never any difference till the unhappy Separatists and their Children the Independents did make it Your invenomed invective against the present Reformation of both Kingdomes as a monstrous deformation we let it lye in your owne bosome to keep you warme till you be pâ—eased to bring all of it abroad in that Anatomie which here you promise but we expect no performance till you first have had leasure as likewise you stand engaged by your word to put the foure Limbes unto that Gorgons head of your Turkish Monarchy which some yeares agoe you set up at Oxford P. 36. The Ministers in Scotland were wont to give the King seasonable Counsell but in all wisdome and humility In your 36. p. you run upon our Assemblies for appointing Ministers to Preach pertinent doctrine and advising them who did Preach to the King and State to speake a word in season for the wee ll of Sion at that time as I shew before their was a mighty designe to advance the Catholick League for the overthrow of Queene Elizabeth and all Protestants the prime Courtiers were diligent Agents herein the men who were trusted to be watchmen to the Kings person and Family if at such a time they should have beene silent they could not have answered it either to God or man You and your gracious companions who never had a mouth to divert a Prince from any evill course were yet loud trumpets of fury in the most of your Sermons and Prayers to inflame him against his two Puritan Parliaments of Britaine but to calme him towards his innocent and Catholick trusty Subjects of Ireland That any Assembly in Scotland ever challenged the sole power of indicting fasts is in the ordinary predicament of your assertions under the spece of palpable untruths P. 37.38 No affront was offered to the King by the fast at Edinburgh Of the feast at Edinburgh p. 37. I have given in the other Treatise a full accompt only I add here that in this your relation you makeit more false then any other of your friends who write thereof the King was neither invited nor present the originall of the motion was not from the King but the French Merchants for their owne ends the Magistrates of Edinburgh did not countenance the feast for of their foure Bailies three kept the fast the appointers of that abstinence were not the Ministers but the Magistrates and the Congregationall Eldership not the supreame but the lowest judicatory of the Church the Processe against the Magistrates and the Kings great Solicitation that it might be Superceeded ar meerly fabulous I have also given a large account of your next calumnie in the other Treatis If any should Preach Treason with us he is censurable both by Church and state no man in Scotland did ever maintaine that a Minister Preaching Treason might not be conveened and punished by the Magistrate according to the Lawes All Mr. Melvils plea was that a Minister of the Church of Scotland and a member of the University of St. Andrews being priviledged by the antient and late Lawes of the Kingdome was not necessitate at the first instance to answer before the privy counsell for a passage of his Sermon which most falsly was said to be treasonable The whole case I have opened at large else where The acts of Parliament you speake of warranting an unreasonable Supremacy were procured in the yeare 1584. by that insolent Tyrant Captain Iames and the Declaration upon them was penned by Bishop Adamson also both the Acts and the Declaration were recalled by the King and Parliament That any invectives against his Majesties person for these acts were spread abroad we doe deny it we think it very possible that much might both have been spoken and written against the matter of these acts but that any man was so unmannerly as to fall upon the King himselfe before we beleeve it we must have a greater evidence then a Prelates Testimony What you say of the fugitive Ministers The Erastian and Prelaticall principles brought great trouble on the Ministers of Scotland as Spotswood relates it was thus The acts of that Parliament 1584. were so bitter and grievous to all the gracious Ministers of Scotland that many of them fled out of the Kingdome and diverse of the prime laid downe their life as it seemes of meere greife Mr. Smeeton Principall Mr. of the Uniuersity of Glasgow and Mr. Arbuthnot of the University of Aberdeen both dyed that yeare all the Ministers of Edinburgh fled to England and the cheife of them Mr. Lawson went to London Adamson Arch-Bishop of St. Andrews at that time kept great correspondence with the Bishops of England who without any
they were not in a capacity to receave it till once they were an Assembly so with Lauristons good liking they did pray and chose their Moderator and Clerke thereafter they did receive and read the Letters discharging the Assembly to which they gave present obedience and did no more at all but appointed the next meeting according to the expresse act of Parliament Lauriston after the Assembly was dissolved was so officious as by a Lyon herauld with a publike Proclamation to command them to be gone this Proclamation most falsly he did antidate as if it had beene used before the Ministers sat downe hereupon the Ministers were convened before the secret Counsell for keeping of a Conventicle contrary to the Kings command they answered as Spotswood says that they had done nothing but according to the Laws both divine and humane That the Generall Assembly had right to meet in the great necessities of the Church and the Laws of Scotland gave them expresse warrant to meet Lauriston told them that the King might delay all meetings both of Church and State Parliaments and Assemblies so long as he pleased they replyed that they could doe nothing against the Kings mind so long as they followed the expresse order of his standing Lawes When the King and state has past an act for Trienniall Parliaments and the Commissioners of shires doe meet at the day appointed to fence a Parâ—iament according to Law and long uncontroverted custome if by evill Counsell the King should not only delay but by a Proclamation put of the meeting to an uncertaine and infinite time ought these Commissioners for following the instructions of their shires according to Law and custome be lyable to any censure the case now in hand is just the same The Ministers did plead further that the privie Councell was not a competent Judicatorie to the question what was a lawfull or unlawfull Assembly that by the Lawes of the Kingdome such questions were to be decided by a lawfull Generall Assembly and not elsewhere At that time Doctor Bancroft was Patron to the naughty Preacher of Scotland who were panting for Bishopricks and as after the conference at Hampton Court he had moved the King to crush the most of the gracious Brethren of England who could not submit to Episcopacie and its Ceremonies So then did he hasten a Message to the Councell of Scotland for the condemning all who adhered to the Assembly of Aberdeen of high Treason To maintaine a power in the Church to keep an Assembly or in the State to keep a Parliament whether to begin or to continue it when the King did discharge though the Law did expresly warrant it was to oppose the Royall prerogative and could be no lesse then the highest treason especially if any did decline the Judgement of the Privy Counsell or any other Judicatorie to which the King was pleased to referre the decision of this case though the nature of the thing and the Law did require the question to bee determined in another Court For this plea a number of gracious Ministers were condemned by an Assize to be executed as Traitours but thereafter as it were of great favour and speciall grace their lives were spared yet were they all presently banished never to returne to any of the Kings Dominions while they lived All the godly and wise in the Land did cry out upon this Act of the Candidats of Episcopacie as of the highest unjustice and Tyranny All the sufferers were men exceedingly beloved Mr. Welsh and Master Forbes their oppression but some of them were very eminent Master Forbes was a man of so great learning and prudence that in Germany both higher and lower yea with King Iames himselfe and King Charles he was held while he lived in singular reputation Master Welsh was a man altogether Apostolike of rare both learning and piety The fame of this mans zeale was so great that not only the Protestants of France but the very Popish Priests and Souldiers yea the prophanest of the Court and King Lewis himselfe at the very time of his hottest persecutions did much prize and reverence him yet so great was the rage of the Bishops against him that when in his old age and great sicknesse he came over to England and according to the direction of his Phisitians did supplicate to be permitted to breath a little in his naturall aire though he was altogether unable for preaching or making any more sturre in the world it was peremptorily denyed him unlesse he should give assurance of putting his necke under the Episcopall yoke not being able to doe this he was forced to dye out of hâ—â— Country a banished man Who would not have thâ—â—â—ht that the ruine of so many gracious men might haâ—â—â—â—lly satiate the malice of a few ambitious persons Bancroft a persecutor of the Scottish Presbiterians buâ—â—â— they were not content they proceeded farther in their cruelty they moved the King to call up to London a number of more Divines who for piety zeale and learning were of greatest reputation The pretext was faire and his Majesties Letter to them courteous he required them to come up to give him their best advice how the Church of Scotland might best be settled in peace but behold Bancrofts and the Scottish Episcopaturians fraud they are brought before the King and Councell and there are posed with a number of dangerous and insnaring questions to which they declined to answer yet being much pressed they gave in their mind in writing so humbly and prudently as was possible no quarrell could be picked against any of their words yet were they all arrested to stay at London till contrary to Law and the order of the Church and the heart of all the godly their adversaries were set downe in Scotland upon their Episcopall Thrones Mr. Andrew Melvil The undoing of Mr. Andrew and Mr. James Melvils a great Light to the Scottish Nation for his free speeches after great provocation against the English Bishops and Ceremonies to which he a stranger called up by the Kings friendly Letter did owe no subjection was kept prisoner three whole yeares and then was sent over to Sedan where he lived to his death a banished man His Nephew Mr. Iames Melvil for his excellent parts in great favour with the King but unable to comply with Episcopall designes was kept out of Scotland till his dying day the rest were at last sent home but all of them as Prisoners confined to certaine places These were the first fruits of the English Prelacie in Scotland but yearly thereafter that tree did bring forth such grapes of Gomorrha among us that the Land could be at no peace till it was cut downe yea plucked up by the rootes It might have satisfied the unnaturall malice of a very wicked child P. 41. Prelaticall calumnies to have bespattered the face of his innocent mother with the halfe of the former very injurious and false calumnies yet you
change the Sabbath day of Luthers conference with the Devill When you have over-wearied both your selfe and us P. 53.54 A Declaration upon all the 12. Articles imputed to us you will yet adde as a mantissa and appendix two other points first you set down the twelve Articles of our Creed Since you are so good at the confessing of your Neighbours I would gladly know what your own faith may be what you ascribe here to us ye doe it without any ground either of reason or Authoritie your simple assertions must be the very Articles of your Creed Some yeares agoe we did see a book called Ladonsium Autocatacrisis wherein by formall and expresse testimonies not the articles of your faith for you are an avowed paucifidian but such opinions as you and your companions did preach and print are set down at large Wherein it was demonstrate that you and your bosome friends in Aberdeen and Edinburgh did hold grosser Arminianisme Popery and Tiranny then the worst of the Canterburians in England also in the beginning of this Treatise we did see under your owne hand such a confession of your faith as few of the most malignant of your party will have the impudence to subscribe it with you But be your faith what it may for it is like that times and occasions may make you hide or open yea vary and change as you find it most convenient for your purpose I am content freely to tell you my mind in all these Articles as you stile them of our Creed I never heard of the first but in your Pamphlet no Presbiterian ever dreamed of any necessity to change the government of the State that it might be conforme to the Church but many Episcopall and all Erastians doe hold the government of the Church to bee a matter of so indifferent arbitrary and changeable a nature that it may well comply and ought to be conformed to the model of every State wherein it requires to be entertained The true tenet of all approved among us so farre as I know is that the government of the Church and State are two really distinct policies both ordained of God which without his displeasure may not bee confounded nor ought not to encroach one upon another That the wrath of God will be on that Church and on these Church-men who for any advantage they apprehend can come either to the Church or to themselves will go to trouble or change any civil State be it Monarchy Aristocracie Democracy or what ever els which by the just lawes of any people is setled in a Land on the other side that God will be angry with every State and all those Statesmen who for the advancement of their owne or the States interest will goe to impede trouble or change that government of the Church which Christ in his Testament has left to his servants unto his second comming For the second we doe maintaine a parity among Ministers courting it an Antichristian ambition for any one to make himselfe Lord Bishop over the rest but this is farre from any Democracy for wee put all the Ministers of a Kingdome under the jurisdiction of a Nationall Assembly the rules whereof use to be so just and exact that where they are reverenced there is no danger of any popular confusion much lesse then where Episcopall either Tiranny or Obligarchy does prevaile For the third to our Consistories we give no Independent power these with us are all subordinate to Classicall Presbiteries and to our Nationall Assemblies wee give no power to meddle with any temporall things at all nor any Legislative power about things spirituall When they have past their Votes upon a matter spirituall according to the rules of the word of God If any Law or civill Sanction bee needfull they supplicate the Magistrate whom they never presume to command to be an executioner of their Decrees these be but your calumnies only they intreat him to make such Laws as hee finds the equity of the matter in his own conscience to require You indeed professe an inthronization of Bishops and give to them not only a directive power over the King but an authoritative to excommunicate him and if he to save his Crowne will be content that his Parliaments doe with your Thrones and Myters what they thinke expedient you print to the world that this shall bring a remedilesse and perpetuall ruine both on the King and his people themselves and their posterities For the fourth the Lawes of Scotland allow to the Generall Assembly a power to Judge of all divine truths and heresies so that if they find popish Episcopall or what ever Errours established by Acts of Parliament yet they are authorized to proceed to give their sentence from the word of God not of the Law but of the Errour to which Church-men in their ignorance have procured a Sanction as for the Law the Parliament when they sit take it into their owne consideration never any Assembly of the reformed Church dealt either with Prince or Parliament for the reclaiming of a Law otherwise then by humble supplication What you speake of a corrective power the Church of Scotland did ever disclaime it all compulsion by outward inconvenients they remitted ever to the State As for the censures of the Church no faction ever has been more prodigall of them both in doctrine and practise then you and your gracious Brethren the Prelats For the fifth we exeem no Minister who preaches Treason from the cognisance and punishment of the Magistrate only by the Laws of our Kingdome the judgement of Ministers doctrine in the first instance belongs to the Ecclesiastich Judicatory For the sixth we pretend no power to make the Magistrate adde the civill Sanction to any of our Assemblies Decrees further then his own conscience the Justice of the thing the former Laws of the Land the humble and earnest desire of the Subjects does plead for but you before your Tippets and Rotchets be laid aside will permit three Kingdomes to be consumed with fire and sword without any remedy unlesse your thrones may bee re-established King and people must be destroyed for ever And this you tell us must be and shall be but in many things wee have found you false prophets and feare not your causelesse curses For the seventh we maintain no power of the Church to reforme and preserve Religion but such as does well consist with that duty which God has laid upon the Magistrate both for the reformation of Religion and preservation of it when it is reformed For the eight wee maintaine that the sins of the Magistrate does not excuse the people for their neglect of any duty that God has laid upon them and when Superiours are resolved to live and dye in Idolatrie we thinke that every inferiour Magistrate and every person is obliged to keepe himselfe free of corruption and so farre as he is able to reforme his owne soule but not to be a publick
reformer of a Country without a lawfull calling For the ninth all the Covenants of our Land are warranted by Acts of Parliament and how ever by the misinformation of Prelats the King for a time judged them illegall yet at last he found them just and necessary according to the Laws and Customes of the Kingdome wee indeed doe maintaine when a handfull of wicked Prelats doe seduce a Prince to destroy himselfe and whole Kingdomes that in that case it is lawfull for the Nobles and States of a Land to stand upon their guard and wee cannot subscribe to these prime fundamentall Articles of your faith That the Supremacie of Britaine is so farre exalted above all Law divine and humane that the Parliaments of both Kingdomes for their most necessary defensive Armes are to be condemned by God and all men for Traitors and Rebels yet your good friends the Idolatrous murtherers of Ireland must be registred to posterity for good Catholick subjects No marvell you beleeve all this when you professe your advice to all Princes rather to admit of the worst whordomes of Rome the very Jesuitisme of Raviliack and Faux then of the Presbiteriall government Behold whither despite may carry the spirit of an excommunicate Prelate For the tenth our Assemblies meddle not with questions of State if the originall of royalty be so from heaven that men on earth had never any hand in making of a King if in any immaginable case a King be censurable such questions were never proposed so much as for debate in any Assembly of Scotland unhappy Bishops who must needs prophane the Crowns of Kings by making their Soveraignty and mysterious Prerogatives their ordinary quodlibets to be tossed as Tennis balls in their common discourse Sermons and Pamphets It was a very unhappy day for the Kings of Britaine when the feet of Prelats got first leave to touch the threshold of the Court and their evill eyes to behold the Jewels of the Crown or their soule hands to touch the hemme of the royall Robes such infaust harppies polute all things though most sacred to which they approach For the eleventh though it never came to be scanned in any Assembly yet I know no honest man of Scotland that makes question of the thing The King and Parliament has inacted the lawfulnesse of our late defensive Armes but the Acts of that Parliament are not much to your mind for they cast you out of your native Country as a prime incendiary unfit to breath more in that Aire The twelfth is but to make up the number being the same with the former The conclusion of your Articles is but a malicious railing invective very sutable to your mouth it 's contrary to reason and experience as oft wee have said before but you cannot spare Tauttologies The second part of your Appendix is your Postscript P. 55.56 No shadow of Episcopacie remaines in any well reformed Church wherein you make a large muster of your Episcopall Territories and tell us that the major part of the reformed Churches in Christendome doe retaine Episcopacie also that the removall thereof from England is the fountaine of all our present Sects you may know that all our Heresies and Sects did breed under the wings of Episcopacie the reason why now they appeare so thick in publick is not the removall of Episcopacie but the retarding of Presbiteriall government and the plague of our too too long annarchie That your Episcopacie is to be found in any reformed Church is a great untruth we grant it is to be seen in your Easterne and Westerne Churches the first of your Catalogue but you would speake a little more plainly that people may understand your mind what Westerne Church is this that you propone unto us for a patterne of Episcopacy is it any other then the good old Mother Church of Rome which many of you cry up for so true a Church that all Protestants are Shismaticks for their needlesse separation-there-from and that among Princes those are most happy who shall heale that breach and once againe make us all to be one under our holy Father the Pope the first Bishop of Christendome whom all the Bishops in Britaine and in the whole world ought by a good Ecclesiastick right to reverence as the first Patriarch the constant moderator of all Oecumenick Counsells Your Easterne Churches are those of Greece and Asia whose corruptions albeit not like to these of Rome yet are so many and grosse as none but such as you will propone them for patternes of imitation In the rest of youâ— Catalogue you are pleased to play the Herauld and Cosmographer of purpose to terrifie simple people by the many names of your large territories You know the world scornes the Rodomontades of Spain their King must not be stiled as his neighbours of France and great Britaine but he will be called the King of Castile the King of Arragon the King of Portugall the King of Leon and a large caetera of many Kingdomes yet all in Spaine Might you not have said that Episcopacie was continued in all the Lutheran Churches of Germany which will not make the third part of that Country deducing the Calvinists and Papists In your great vanity you reckon up the Earldome of Henneberg Lenning and these that follow to the number of Thirteene as if they were all great and considerable Provinces and yet put them all together they will scarce make up one fifth part of some English shires But for the matter are the Lutheran Churches esteemed by any well advised Protestants the best reformed whereof our Covenant speaks It seems the worse Churches be reformed you like them the better for they are so much neerer to your best beloved in Rome but true Covenanters are not of your mind Further what you speake of the Lutheran Churches is altogether false That in Germany or any where else among Protestants any thing which you call Episcopacie is to be sound I marvell if you should beleeve it for I pray where-ever except in England did any Protestants spoile all Pastors of all power both of Ordination and Jurisdiction to put it in the hand of one Prelat to be exercised either by himselfe or by any depute Ecclesiastick or civill as he thought fittest The Dutch Superintendens are as like to English Bishops as an Emperour in the dayes of Fabius Maximus The Dutch Superintendents are very farre from the English Bishops when the Senate ruled all to an Emperour in the dayes of Tiberius or Nero when an absolute Prince I will not say a Tirant did governe all at his pleasure The name is one but the things are essentially different and so farre distant as the East is from the West While you cast your selfe upon the Smectymnians and will still raile upon our Covenant we desiderate your piety but while you appeale to Calvin and Beza for your Episcopacie we misse your Common sence All the Episcopacie which ever you had or
ever aimed at was most immoderate and the most moderate Episcopacie that can be conceived is a meere human invention which has no ground at all in the word of God which in all times and places has proved unhappy to the Church and which at this time is talked of by some for no other end but to be a new beginning and step to such a Prelacie as may be serviceable to the Prince as before for the advanceing of his Prerogative in Church and State above all Law and reason How ridiculous is it to heare most immoderate spirits talke of moderation to speake of a moderate Episcopacie a moderate Popedome a moderate Tyranny is to tell us of a chast Bordell an honest cousinage a meeke murther and such like repugnancies men now are no more childish to be couzened by your distinctions out of their Covenant FINIS Good Reader BEE intreated to pardon sundry literall faults and many mispunctations and some other grosser typographicall faults which corrupt the sence An ANSWER to the DECLARATION AS Every passion when too much stirred The opposites of Presbytery blinded with malice have hurt themselves and no others by the reprinting of this Declaration has a power to send up vapours and mists for darkning the light of the minde so especially anger and malice doe dazle and blinde the eye of reason Too much wrath devests men so farre of understanding as to make them take up such Armes against an Enemy which cannot hurt him but fail not to pierce themselves and their best friends with dangerous wounds The opposites of Presbyteriall government be they Independents or Erastians or who ever when after all other devices they thinke fit for the helpe of their cause to reprint here and put in the hand of people the old and forgotten calumnies formerly invented and spread by the SCOTS excommunicate Prelates by such weapons they will not be able to effect what they intend yet by such practises they cannot faile in the heart of intelligent beholders to wound their owne reputation proclaiming either grosse ignorance or very malicious fraud in this their offer to abuse the simplicity of people with writs which are fraughted with most notorious lyes Concerning the Title This writ of Adamsons is paralell to Balcanquals large Declaration A Declaration made by King JAMES in Scotland They who have acquaintance with the SCOTS affaires of that time doe know this writ to have no more relation unto King JAMES then the late large Declaration had to King CHARLES both carry the name of Kings but the specious pretence of a royal title was not able to save the true Authors of either from the just censure which they deserved by such false and malicious slandering of their Mother-Church and native Country Doctor Balcanquall for his wicked service in penning that large Declaration in King CHARLE's name was condemned as a Lyar and Incendiary and so stands registred both in that generall Assembly a The Generall Assembly at Edinburgh 1639. p. 9. the Assembly resenting the great dishonour done to God our King this Church and â—â—â—ole Kingdome by the Book called A larg Declaration have collected some amongst many of its false grossâ— and absurd passages They did supplicate to have Toâ—â—or Balcanquall the knowne Author cited for exemplary punishment and Parliament of Scotland b The secord Parliament of Kin Charles p. 29. the Booke called Al arge Dâ—craration was found to be full of lyes and known untruths and therefore the Parliament ordaines the Authoâ—s and spreaders thereof to be most severely punished to discourage all such underminers of his Majesties throne and abusers of his royall name by prefixing the same to such scandalous and dishonourable Treatises ibi p. 126. the Act against the five incendiaries Doctor Walter Balcanquall c. which King CHARLES by the advice of his Houses here did lately ratifie c Second Parliament of King Charles p. 72. whereunto it was an wered by the English Commissioners that his Majesty doth in the name of a King promise to publish the said Acts as is above specified The Bishop Adamsor for the like disservice in King James pretended Declaration does not also remaine in the Records of the Assemblies and Parliaments of Scotland â—ignmatized with the same Note of perpetuall infamy nothing impeded but his publicke Declaration of repentance That King James Adamson confesseth himself to be the Author notwithstanding of all his favour to Episcopacy was neither the Author nor approver of this Declaration I demonstrate thus First Master Patricke Adamson upon his death-bed put it under his hand with a solemn Oath that he himselfe was the Author of that Wryt which hee had drawne by the direction of the Chancellour and Secretary two very wicked Courtiers d The recantation of Patrick Adamson Bishop of St. Andrewes Whereas I am burdened to be the setter forth of the Booke called the Kings Declaration wherein the whole order of the Church is condemned and traduced I protest before God that I was commanded to write the same by the Chancellour for the time but chiefly by the Secretary another great Courtier contrary to the minde of the King o King Iames did disclaim it Secondly when the Commissioners of the generall Assembly the very next yeere at the Parliament of Lithgow did complaine to the King of the many false and wicked aspersions of that Declaration His Majesty did take such notice of their grievances that with his owne hand he did write a new Declaration much differing from the former which he told them was not his but the Archbishops e These animadversions and supplications being presented to his Majestie by the Ministers the King tooke paines himselfe by the space of foure and twenty houres to take him to his Cabinet and with his owne hand both wrote and penned this Declaration following word by word Ibid. the Bishop of St. Andrewes his own Declaration c. Thirdly What ever in it is contrary to Presbytery is condemned by posterior Parliaments the Acts of Parliament upon which this Declaration is grounded and which it doth interpret were all annulled some few years thereafter and the Presbiterian government which this writ tendeth to disgrace was compleatly set up by the King and States of Parliament to the great joy of the whole Land f Twelfth Parli of King James the 6. 1592. Act 1. our Soveraigne Lord and Estates of this present Parliament ratifies and approves the generall Assembly appointed by the said Kirke and declares that it shall be lawfull to the Kirk and Ministers every yeere at the least and ofter pro re nata as occasion and necessity shall require to hold and keepe generall Assemblies and also ratifies and approves the Synodall and Provinciall Assemblies to be holden by the said Kirk and Ministers twice every yeere as they have beene and are presently in use to doe within every Province of this Realm as also
ratifies and approves the Presbyteries and particular Sessions appointed by the said Kirke with the whole Jurisdiction and discipline of the same Kirke agreed upon by his Majesty in conference had by his Highnesse with certaine of the Ministers conveened to that effect also determines and declares the said Assemblies Presbiteries and Sessions their jurisdiction and discipline to be in all times comming most just and good notwithstanding of whatsomever Statutes Acts Canons civill or municipall Lawes made in the contrary Item the Kings Majestie and Estates declares that the 129. Act of the Parliament holden at Edinbrough the 22. of May 1584. shall no wayes be prejudiciall nor derogate any thing to the priviledge that God has given to the Spirituall Officers in the Kirke concerning heads of Religion matters of Heresie Ezcommunication collation deprivation of Ministers or any such like essentiall Censures specially grounded and having warrant of the Word of God Also abrogates Cassis and Annuls the Act of the same Parliament 1584. yeere granting Commission to Bishops and other Judges constitute in Ecclesiasticall causes to receive his Highnesse Presentations to Benefices to give collation hereupon and to put order in all Ecclesiasticall causes his Majestie and Estates declares this Act to be expired and in time comming to be null and therefore ordains all Presentations to be directed to the particular Presbiteries More needs not be said for the confounding and filling with shame the faces of them No more is needfull for a satisfactory Answer who in the reprinting of this Pamphlet could have no other intention but to grieve and disgrace them whom by word they call Brethren but in heart and workes they evidently maligne as enemies without any cause Adamson the true Father confesseth it to be a Bastard and supposititious birth wholly composed of lyes and slanders King James disclaimes it and puts a new Declaration in its place the States of Parliament in King James his presence and with his open allowance abolished the Acts whereupon it was founded rooting out Episcopacy which it dothplant and building up Presbyteries and Synods which it professeth to demolish Yet for more abundant satisfaction The points of the wryt let us consider its particular parts It containes first a Preface Secondly an explanation of foure Acts of the Parliament at Edinbrough Pag. 1. It is hazardous for a 〈◊〉 Prince to take â—pon himself â—the faults of â—his Officers 1584. Thirdly an enumeration of some foureteene intentions ascribed to the King In the Preface there is a narrative of the causes of the subsequent Declaration all resolves upon the alledged Lyes of some evill affected persons labouring to impaire his Majesties honour and fame Upon this we remark that the late unhappy tricke of Courtiers and Prelâ—tes is no lesse ancient then this Declaration it was the ordinary custome of these ungrate and imprudent men to charge the backe of the King with their owne faults the bones of Kings are supposed by Sycophants to be so strong that no burden is able to bow much lesse to breake them As King Charles has ever been â—â—o ready and willing to take upon himselfe the guilt of his servants upon what ever hazard the same was his Fathers condition yet with this difference King James was willing to beare his Servants burdens till he found they pinched but so soone as they began to presse him any thing sore he was so wise and just to himselfe and others that he laid them alwayes over upon the neck of those whom in reason it concerned to beare them The people had an high esteeme of Ki. Iames his vertues About that time the fame of Kings James his Learning Piety and personall vertues did florish at home and abroad the wel-affected who chiefly are aymed at were so far from impairing his personall reputation that in their very censure of this Declaration they give unto him an excellent testimony g Vide An Answer to the Declaration Their indignation was onely against the Court and upon just grounds But at that same time his Court was so exceedingly corrupted that the good men in the whole Isle both English and Scots did lament it Captain James Stuart by his cunning crept up to be Chancellour became so insolent a Tyrant that neither the greatest nor the most innocent had security either of their life or Estate h Spotswoods History lib. 6 p. 179. â—eere 1584. this severity was universally disliked but that which shortly ensued was much more hatefull Ibid. Maines and Drumwhassill were hanged the same day in the publick street of Edenborough the Gentlemens case was much pittied Maines his case especially all that were present in their hearts did pronounce him innocent these cruell and rigorous proceedings caused such a feare as all famiâ—iar society was in a manner left no man knowing to whom be might safely speake Arran in the meane time went on drawing into his owne hand the managing of affairs for he would be sole and supream over all Ibid. p. 177. Master Andrew Pullert Master Patrick Galloway Master James Carmichal Ministers were denounced Rebels and fled into England Master Andrew Hay compeered and nothing being qualified against him was upon suspition confined to the North the Ministers sent Master David Lindsay to the King with their supplication but Arran sent him prisoner to Blacknesse where he was detained forty seven weeks The Ministers of Edenborough hearing of this for sook their charge and fled into England so as Edenbrugh was left without any Preachers Master Robert Pont likewise flying was denounced Rebell The best Ministers were forced to leave the Kingdome The Duke of Lennox whose power with the King was greatest had lately come over from the Guisians in France though the man himself was of a very good and meeke nature yet he had his instructions and dependance from the Authors and instruments of the French Massacres he made it his worke to further the interest of France to the prejudice of England he corresponded with the French and Scots Traffiquers for Queene Maries deliverance out of prison yea for her returne to the throne of Scotland in an association with her Son k The Collection Sir Esme Stuart was sent by Queen Mother of France and the Guisians to seduce the young King to subvert Religion violate the amity between England and Scotland to procure an invasion for the delivery of the Queen of Scots then in captivity to make the King content to be associate with her in the government to alienate his heart from the Ministry he had his continuall intelligence and instructions from France These things which all the Writers of that time do record did so fill the hearts of all good people with feares for changes both of Religion and Lawes that neither English nor Scots did spare to expresse them in their ordinary discourses l Vide supra h. Unto this frightment of the people the Acts of Parliament procured by the
forenamed Masters of the Court did much adde for the allaying whereof this Declaration was penned but to no purpose as Spotswood himself tels us m Spotswoods Story lib. 6. p. 177. This Declaration gave not much satisfaction so great was the discontent For no satisfaction was ever taken till both the Duke Chancellour Secretary and Archbishop Adamson were banished the Court and the acts of Parliament of their invention abolished as noxious and evill There was never any Warrant for Printing of this Writ What is here said of King James his command to publish this Declaration I do not find it verified in any Register either of the Church or Kingdome of Scotland that hath fallen in my hand but if any such command did come from him at that time of his minority and great tentation through the continuall evill offices of them that then managed his Counsels it were a case no more strange then these which often since we have seen in both Kingdomes many Proclamations and Declarations by false and wicked informations have been drawne from King James and King Charles and many other Princes which upon better advisement have been called in and buried the Proclamation concerning sports and playes upon the Sabbath the Service-Book and Book of Canons the Declarations of the Rebellion of the Parliaments of both Kingdomes we all know For my part I love not to rake out â—f the grave the carcases of these buried Writs for the infamy of the Prince or the prejudice of the Subject We shall sâ—y no more to the preface Pag 2. come to the interpretation of these offensive Acts of that Parliament at Edenburgh 1584. As for the first Act the explanation here made upon it did no way remove its offence for both the Act and its explanation attribute to the Ministers only the administation of the Word and Sacraments without any mention at all of any discipline this seems to have been one chiefe cause why the worshipfull Licenser was pressed with so much importunity to give his Imprimatur to this Writ as if this passage had been a demonstration of King James his Erastianisme but let the world take notice of the grossenesse of this mistake by this short information The Commissioners of the generall Assembly King James was far from Erastianisme were required by his Majesty at the Parliament of Lithgou 1585. to give him in the grounds of their grievances against the Acts of the Parliament at Edenbrugh 1584. here explained n Collection Master Andrew Melvill had been plaine with the King divers dayes at length the King desired the Ministers to exhibit in writ what exceptions they had against the Parliament held in Anno 1584. whereupon they exhibit to the King these animadversions following In their Animadversion upon the Act now in hand they did shew his Majesty that the power of Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction and Church-Censures did belong to them by divine right no lesse then the power of preaching the Word and Celebrating the Sacraments o Animadversions The power of the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven consisteth not onely in preaching and administration of the Sacraments but also in jurisdiction and removing of offences out of the Kirk of God and excommunication of the disobedient to be pronounced by these that are officers of the Church our warrants out of the Word of God for this part of the liberty of the Church we are to bring forth when your Majesty pleaseth Also that the Lawes of the Kingdome ever fince the Reformation did ratifie that their right p Ibid. This Act restricted the liberty granted byother Acts of Parliament of before concerning discipline and correction of manners which were established by a Law in the first yeer of your Majesties Reigne and that hitherto they had bin in peaceable possessioÌ„ thereof q Ibid. There is a spirituall jurisdiction where of the Office-bearers within the Kirk in this Realm have been in peaceable possession and use these twenty four yeer by past whereof followed no trouble but great quietnesse in the Kirke and Common-wealth The King in his Reply to this animadversion does not deny any of these Alleageances yea he declares under his hand that he did not intend to take from Church Officers any part of the Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction but onely so to regulate the execution of Discipline that some part thereof might be put in the hand of Prelates this was the onely point in controversie r The Kings Declaration the first Act maketh onely mention of the preaching of the Word Sacraments not thereby to abrogate any good further policy and jurisdiction in the Kirke but allanerly to remit a part thereof to the Acts ensuing and the most which as yet are not agreed upon nor concluded I intend God willing to cause to be perfected by a godly generall Assembly Whence it appeares how far his Majesty was from all Erastianisme though his affection to prelacy at that time was too great which yet he changed quickly thereafter as we shall see anon The explanation of the second Act The sum of the next Paragraph consists of a Narrative and Ordinance builded thereupon the Narrative has the alledged misbehaviours of some Ministers Master Andrew Melvile alone is named as joyning in conspiracies with Rebels against the King as Preaching seditious Doctrine and disclaining the King and Counsell of State for his Judges The Ordinance is concerning the Kings Supremacy divers things are here jumbled together confusedly and odiously to these two purposes by the Abbot of Dunfermeling Secretary for the time the Penner of this passage as Adamson the writer of the rest confesseth Å¿ Adamsons recantation The Secretary himselfe penned the second Act of Parliament concerning the power of Judicatories to be absolutely in the King and that it should not be lawfull for any Subject to reclame from the same under the penalty of the Act which I suppose was treason Concerning the first Master Melvill his worth Master Andrew Melvils case the Narrative is most untrue as I shall make good by undeniable evidence Master Melvil was an excellent Divine the principall professour of Divinity in the University first of Glasgow and then of S. Andrewes full of piety eloquence and learning of all sorts so eminent in zeale for the truth that his remembrance is yet very precious not in Scotland alone but in other reformed Churches his heroicke courage made him an eye-sore to the Masters of the Court whose wickednesse he and his Schollars according to their place and duty did masculously oppose From this it was and nothing else that an Accusation was invented against him as for seditious and treasonable words against the Kings Mother Queen Mary then prisoner in England When he came to his Answer upon his solemne Oath Cleer grounds for his justification he denied his Charge t The Collection I Master Andrew Melvill protest before God and his elect
in pieces and the whole royall Prerogative devolved upon the head of the Parliament yet the aforementioned supremacy is so high an injustice that no gracious member of either House would ever be perswaded to touch it though it were put in their fingers for beside the everting of all the Lawes whereupon Monarchy since the first foundation has stood it would so shake the groundstones of all the Lawes of the Kingdome as would hazard the overthrow no lesse of the Parliament then of the King and with them all the Judicatories and rights of the Land our unhappy Brovilons fit for nothing so much as to confound all things would be in a faire way to bring the whole Church and State to such a Chaos and hodge podge as no creature without Gods extraordinary assistance should ever againe be able to bring their confusions to any tolerable order Secondly The Supremacy here mentioned favours Episcopacy but not Erastianisme they should doe well to consider that whatever supremacy is aimed at in the Writ yet the Erastian designe will not be much helped thereby for it is expresly provided therein that the ordinary Ecclesiastick Judicatories shall cognosce all Ecclesiasticke causes g Printed Declaration p. 3. Neiis it his Majesties intention to take away the lawfull and ordinary judgment of the Church but rather to preserve encrease and maintaine the same and as there is in the Realme Justices Constables Sheriffes Provosts Bailiffes and other Judges in temporall matters so his Majesty alloweth that all things may be done in order and a godly order may be preserved in the whole Estate the Synodall Assemblies by the Bishops or Commissioners for the places vacand to be convened twice in the yeere to have the Ordering of matters belonging to the Ministry and their estate no word at all to import that any civil Commissioners may determine upon any affaires meerly Ecclesiasticall it is true that the ordinary Judicatories here named are put under the foule feet of the Prelats and this seems to have been the maine aime both of the Act and of its interpretation yet hereby the Erastian principles are nothing furthered for as by the Covenant and Laws of both Kingdomes the roots of Episcopacy are now pluked up so it s well knowne that neither Presbiterians nor Independents were ever more zealous for the establishing of Ecclesiastick jurisdiction by a divine right in the hand of Church Officers then the Episcopall party at least those of them who understood and minded their owne principles Thirdly King James against the Erastians if all this will not satisfie we desire those who hold out this passage as advantageous for the Ecclesiastick power of the Magistrate in prejudice of the Presbytery to know that when the Ministers did complaine to King James of this seeming prejudice he gave them his owne Declaration which he promised should be as authentick as that Act of Parliament hh Kings Declaration Now I say and declare which Declaration shall be as authentick as the Act it selfe that I for my part shall never neither my Posterity ought ever cite summon or apprehend any Pastor or Preacher for matters of Doctrine in Religion salvation beresies or true interpretation of the Scriptures but according to my first Act which confirmeth the liberty of Preaching the Word Ministration of the Sacraments I avow the same to be a matter meere Ecclesiasticall and altogether impertinent to my calling therefore never shall I nor never ought they I meane my Posterity to acclaime any power of jurisdiction of the foresaid which caused their griefe and much more authentick then Adamsons Interpretation of that Act assuring them that neither himselfe nor any of his successors should ever claime the Cognizance nor the power to determine in any cause meerly Ecclesiasticall ii Vide sapra hh avowing that Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction did belong onely to the Church officers which neither himselfe nor any of his heires should ever crave nor ever ought to crave as belonging to them King James revoked what here is published Finally we desire them to know if Princes promises and Declarations under their hands seeme not to them sufficient security that whatever in the present passage does appeare to spoile the Church Assemblies of a full and plenary Jurisdiction was all recalled and past from by King James the very next yeer for he did consent unto that transaction of Archbishop Adamsons whereby the Arch-prelate devests himselfe of all jurisdiction and submits himselfe to the authority of the Assembly renouncing all liberty of appeale to any other person or Judicatory in the earth kk Spotswoods History lib. 6. p. 184. yeer 1586. A transaction was made in this sort That the Bishop by his hand writing should labour to carry himselfe as a moderate Pastor ought labouring to be the Bishop described by Saint Paul submitting his life and Doctrine to the Judgement and censure of the generall Assembly without any reclamation provocation or appellation from the same in any time comming what should have moved the King to hearken to a mediation so prejudiciall both to his owne authority and the Episcopall jurisdiction cannot well be conjectured whatsoever the reason was the Bishop did set his hand to the things proposed by the Assembly But to stop all mouths which from Scotland would bring any colour of warrant King Charles also for an Erastian Supremacy in the last Parliament of Scotland which was ratified by King Charles with the hearty consent of his good Subjects of England the finall determination of all Ecclesiasticke Causes whatsoever is referred to the Nationall Assembly as to the onely proper and competent Judge ll Second Parliament of K. Charles Act 4. p. 6. 8. The Kings Majesty having graciously declared that it is his royall will and pleasure that all questions about Religion and matters Ecclesiasticall be determined by the Assemblies of the Church and that for preservation of Religion generall Assemblies rightly constitute as the proper and competent judge of all matters Ecclesiasticall hereafter be kept yeerly and oftner pro renata as also that Kirk Sessions Presbyteries and Synodall Assemblies be constitute and observed according to the order of this Kirk which Act the estates now convened by his Majesties indiction raâ—ifies approves and confirmes in all points and gives thereunto the strength of a Law and Act of Parliament whoever will call this Act of Parliament into question must be content to have the King and his Parliaments of both Kingdoms for their first and chiefe opposites The explanation of the next Act is also large and confused The sum of the next Paragraph it contains a discharge of all Church Assemblies and meetings not authorized by Law particularly it discharges the Nationall Assemblie and Classicall Presbytery upon the allegeance of some enormous practises of these two meetings Consider first the discharge and then its reasons Church-assemblies established in Scotland on a
Divine Right with the allowance of King James and K. Charles in divers Parliaments Concerning the discharge of Church meetings not authorized by Law the Commissioners did shew the King that Church meetings were necessary to be kept being mm Animadversions we offer Vs to prove by good Warrants of the Word of God that it is lawfull to the Ecclesiastiall Estate to Convocate Assemblies and to hold the same and to appoint and order place and time for convening of the same to troat upon such matters as concerne the Kirk affaires which no wayes impaireth your Majesties civill and royall jurisdiction but rather fortifieth and decoreth the fame cōmanded of God and being such means without which the Churches and societies of the Saints could not subsist in their necessary purity and order in the time of the greatest persecutions Christians did meet in their Assemblies both for worship and discipline though the imperiall Lawes did discharge such conventions In France and Poland where the Princes are enemies to Religion yet the Protestants are permitted to keep their Assemblies for Discipline greater and smaller of all sorts as they have occasion no lesse then their meetings for the Word and Sacraments His Majesty in his reply does not deny the Commissioners allegeance onely he required a intermission of the named meetings for a short time till the whole plat-forme of Church government according to the Word of God might be finished hereby nn The Kings Declaration My meaning and Declaration is that they shall cease while a setled Policie and Jurisdiction be established according to the Commission and line of Gods Word yeelding that he beleeved the Church ought to have its owne government according to the prescription of the holy Scripture to which he purposed to submit and agree as indeed he did the yeer following agreeing to that course which the Assembly at Saint Andrewes tooke with Bishop Adamson without all contradiction and ever thereafter permitting the Ministers without any interruption to enjoy all their Ecclesiastick meetings in peace yea some few yeeres after as oft I have said he did establish by Act of Parliament the whole plat-forme of government according to their mind which abode untouched till the evill advice of the English Prelats moved him to make some breaches in that wall which thanks be to God are now fully repaired King Charles in person having lately ratified in Parliament the meeting of all our Assemblies from the lowest to the highest so fully as our hearts could wish Beside the divine right of our Church meetings for Discipline the Commishoners did demonstrate to the King the good humane right thereof in Scotland producing to him an Act of his owne first Parliament for the nationall Assembly and finall determination of all Ecclesiasticall appeales therein oo Anamadversions concerning the generall Assembly of the Kirke there is an Act the first year of your highnesse reigne ratifying the authority thereof and decerning appellations to be devolved thereto as to the last judgement of matters concerning the Kirk his Majesty likewise could not but well remember that the whole modell of Presbyteries and their proceedings had been oft in debate before him and the Counsell Table also that some few yeeres before he had sent to the generall Assembly at Clasgow his expresse order for the erection of Presbyteries in all the Shires of the Kingdome pp The Acts of the generall Assembly Instructions to our trusty and welbeloved William Cunningham of Caprinton directed by us with the advice of the Lords of our secret Counsell to the generall Assembly conveend at Gasgow April 20. 1581. followes the List of 50. Presbiteries 12. Parishes or thereabouts making up one Presbitry whence the Church came to be in a very peaceable possession of all her Assemblies nationall provincial classicall and congregationall without any controlment onely in that houre of darknesse as generally then it was called there was a short eclipse but that did quickly passe over neither did any interruption of these Church meetings come thereupon However The reprinters of this Declaration seem to be contemners of Oaths Lawes and al rights divine and humane we cannot but observe the disposition of those who with so great care and zeale set out in this paper to the world for imitation the example of a Prince although in the hour of tentation out of the which he was immediately delivered for pulling down and discharging of Presbyteries and Assemblies when established by Law and quietly possessed by a cleere Right both divine and humane We trust the honourable Houses of Parliament are farre from their mind else we should have but small comfort though we should see the Ghurch government here setled both by Law and possession for it seems that the publishers of this Writ would have us to despaire of any security to keep whatever now may be gotten Oaths Covenants Lawes Possessions must be no stronger then bonds of flax and ropes of straw which the fire of these mens wrath when ever it comes upon them will easily burne and burst asunder but it is well that Princes and Parliaments are not capable to be miscarried by the private passions of so unconstant and perfidious persons The reasons of the Act doe follow for the putting downe of the Classicall Presbytery a great misbehaviour is alledged The Presbytery of Edinburgh took upon them to diswade the Feasting of the French Embassadour and did enter in Processe with the Magistrates who at the Kings desire contrary to their advice did keepe that Feast a long and odious story of that matter is here deduced and borrowed from hence both by Spotswood in his History and Maxwell in his Issachars burthen but the truth is this A full account of the French Banquet as I finde it extracted out of the Records of the Church of Scotland by a very reverend and faithfull hand That time was one of the most sad and dangerous seasons that this Isse hath seene it was but a little after the Massacres of France and a little before the Spanish Armada about the very instant when the Catholicke League was hatched for the rooting out of Protestant Religion and all Protestant Princes especially Queene Elizabeth At this time it was when two or three French Embassadours one after another came over from France to Scotland with Instructions from the chief contrivers of that unholy League qq Vide supra Also Spotswoods history lib. 6. fo 180. year 1585. then came that holy League as they called it to be discovered which the Pope the Spanish King with the Guises and others had made to extirpate reformed Religion the Queene of England understanding her selfe to be principally aymed at c. Also the Collection Monsieur de la Motfenellon and Maningvill were sent from the King of France to strengthen the Kings faction to procure Lenox his returne to withdraw the King from the Lords The Court was then very corrupt exceeding tyrannous
generall Assembly after that conference at the name of Episcopacy kkk The Acts of the Assembly third Session of the Assembly at Perth 1572. In the heads agreed upon at Leeth are found certaine names as Archbishop c. which were thought scandalous and offensive to the ears of many of the Brethren appearing to sound towards Popery therefore the whole Assembly with one voice protests that they intend not by the using of any such names to consent to any kind of Popery or Superstition and wishes rather the said names to be changed into others that are not slanderous nor offensive And likewise protests That the said heads agreed upon be onely received as an interim till further and more perfect Order may be obtained at the hands of the Kings Majesty Regent and Nobility for the which they will presse as occasion shall serve and ever after at any shadow of the thing that the following Assemblies did not rest till both â—â—e name and thing till both the shadow and all the parts of the substaÌ„ce were disavowed They had indeed for a time some wrastling with the Court about this matter yet at last as I have said in the yeer 1592. they got the King and Parliament perswaded to passe such Acts as did cast out of our Church and State Episcopacy both root and branch substance and shadow As these Acts of Parliament were first made by King James and the States of Scotland and now also ratified by King Charles so both the Houses of the Parliament of England cannot but approve thereof having joyned themselves by Oath and Covenant with Scotland to extirpate the unhappy root of Episcopacy which has been the great cause of the most mischiefes which in this last Age hath befallen Brittaine The third crime for which the general Assembly behoved to be put down It was no fault in the Assemblies that they called to Fasting was their indicting of soleme Fasts in which seditions tumults against the King were promoved consider that the quarrell is not simply for the Fasts but their evill use to raise seditions and tumults certainly that custome of our Church wherby from the beginning of the Reformation to this day every Church meeting from the general Assembly to the smallest Congregationall Eldership had power as they found cause to indict a publick Fast within their owne bounds is very innocent and necessary for the well being of the Church As for the alleaged abuse of these Fasts to sedition and tumults Guilty Consciences hate Fasts without cause it is a meer calumny the matter I beleeve was this About the time of the penning of this Writ the â—â—alous Ministers in all their exercises especially in the dayâ—â— of publick Fasting did make mention in their Sermons and Prayers of the wickednesse of the Land for which the wrath of God was much feared by the godly the Leaders of the Court conscious of their owne guiltinesse took themselves to be particularly pointed at and for this did hate extreamly every zealous Preacher as if all their Sermons and Prayers had been invectives for stirring up of the people against them while in truth these gracious men did nothing but their duty containing themselves within the lines of all needfull moderation but to wicked men in their pride and impatience the least touch of the Word of God is an intolerable wound The explanation of the last Act The sum of the next Paragraph containes the maintainance of Episcopacy in the highest degree it puts in the hand of the Bishop the whole spirituall Jurisdiction of his Diocesse to be exercised by him alone although with the advice of some few whom he shall please to choose for his Counsellours it imports that all his Jurisdiction flowes from the King and in the exercise thereof it makes the Bishop answerable onely to the King and them whom his Majesty shall appoint in an Assembly of his owne framing it makes the Bishops also Lords of Counsell and Parliament Upon this passage I marke first The Reprinters of this De claration make no conscience of their Covenant the conscience and honour of these men who with so great importunity required the reprinting of this Declaration and to make its operation the more effectual in the hearts of simple people would be at the cost to change the language thereof to set it downe first in Scotch and then in English a piece of paines so farre as I know never taken with any other Writ this diligence demonstrates the mens humour I can hardly say whether more scornfull of the Scots and their language or passionately desirous to disgrace that Church though it were with the exalting of Episcopacy and if as I suppose they have taken the Covenant this encreaseth my wonder how any who have solemnly sworne to defend the reformation of the Church of Scotland and to endeavour the extirpation of Prelacy can in a sudden become so zealous and put themselves to so great pains in disgrace of the Scottish reformation to advance Presacy If either Independency or Erastianisme have power to let loose the Reines of conscience so far we confesse the Scots have been too simple in beleeving that Oathes and Covenants in plaine matters which admit no ambiguity nor plurality of senses had beene farre straiter bonds among all who had the estimation of honest men and in whom there could be found the least sparkle of any ingenuity or truth Consider secondly that King James as I have said did give it under his hand to the Commissioners of the Church the yeer following that this Declaration was none of his but the work of Adamson of Saint Andrewes lll Vide supra and that this man at last was convinced of his errour confessing upon Oath and subscription Episcopacy to be a grosse corruption a stirrop for the Pope to ascend to his Antichristian saddle an errour which he had learned and wherein from time to time he was entertained by the English Prelates mmm Adamsons Recantation The last Article contained the establishing of a Bishop which hath no warrant in the Word of God but is grounded upon the policy and invention of man whereupon the primacy of the Pope or Antichrist is risen which is worthy to be disallowed and and forbidden Thirdly whatever here is said of Bishops is not now controverted in the Parliaments of both Kingdomes and in the solemne League of both Nations it is expresly condemned as all doe confesse if any anti-covenanting Malignant require a further debate when they will they may have a hearing and an answer Fourthly when the Commissioners of the church did declare to King James King James his ful and honest Declaration against Erastianisme that the government of the Church was not a Matter civill which did belong to the Magistrate to exercise and that it was unlawfull for his Majesty to appoint any of his Commissioners to governe the House of God that this were with the
happinesse who retard impedit the erection of such a government The retarders of goverment are enemies to themselves welfare of England nothing will more conduce for the honour and welfare of the Land no mean will be more effectuall to keep all people in peace and obedience to the Lawes to promove the comfort of all who are truly pious then the hearty concurrence of the Church and State in setting up at last and maintaining the government of the reformed Churches according to the Word of God Beleeve it this discipline is neither hatefull nor terrible to any but to these alone who know it not or else are conscious to themselves of a wilfull and obstinate resolution to abide in some errour or vice without the controlement of any censure The Recantation of PATRICK ADAMSON sometime pretended Bishop of St. Andrewes directed to the Synod conveened at St. Andrewes April 8. 1591. BRETHREN UNderstanding the proceedings of the Assembly in my contrair and being now with-holden by sicknesse from presenting my selfe before you that I might give confession of that Doctrine wherein I hope God shall call me And that at his pleasure I might depart in the unity of Christian Faith I thought good by Writ to utter the same unto your wisdomes and to crave your godly wisdomes assistance not for the restitution of any worldly pompe or preheminence which I little respect but to remove from me the slanders which are raised in this Countrey concerning the variance of Doctrine especially on my part wherein I protest before God that I have onely a single respect to his glory and by his grace I shall abide herein unto my lives end First I confesse the true Doctrine of Christian Religion to be publickly taught and rightly announced within this Realme and detest all Popery and Superstition Like as blessed be God I have detested the same in my heart the space of thirty yeeres since it pleased God to give me the knowledge of the truth wherein I have walked uprightly as well here as in other Countries as the Lord beareth me record untill these last dayes wherein partly for Ambition and vain-glory to be preferred before my Brethren and partly for Covetousnesse to possesse the pelfe of the Kirk I did undertake this Office of an Archbishop wherewith justly the fincerest Professours of the Word have found fault and have condemned the same as impertinent to the office of a sincere Pastor of Gods Word And albeit men would colour the same and imperfections thereof with divers cloaks yet the same cannot be concealed from the spirituall eyes of the faithfull neither yet can the men of God when they are put to their conscience dissemble the same Next I confesse that I was in an erronious opinion that I beleeved the Government of the Kirk to be like unto the Kingdomes of the earth plaine contrary to the command of our Master Christ and the Monarchy whereby the Kirk is Governed not only to be in the person of our Saviour Christ as it is but in the Ministers who are nothing but vassals under him in an equality amongst themselves Thirdly that I married the Earle of Huntlie contrary to the command of the Kirk without the confession of his Faith and profession of the sincere Doctrine of the Word I repent and crave pardon of God That I travelled both by reasoning and otherwise to subject the Kirk-men to the Kings Ordinance in things that appertaine unto Ecclesiasticall matters and things of conscience I aske God mercy whereupon great enormities have falne forth in this Countrey That I beleeved and so taught the Presbyteries to be a foolish invention and so would have it esteemed of all men which is an Ordinance of Christ I crave God mercy Further I submit my selfe to the mercy of God and judgment of the Assembly not measuring my offences by my owne selfe nor by the infirmities of my owne ingyne but by the good judgement of the Kirk to the which alwayes I subject my selfe and beseech you to make intercession to God for me and to the King that I may have some meanes to live and consume the rest of this my wretched time for winning of whose favours which foolishly I thought thereby to obtaine I committed all these errors As where I am burthened to be the setter forth of the Book called The Kings Declaration wherein the whole order of the Kirk is condemned and traduced I protest before God that I was commanded to write the same by the Chancellour for the time but chiefly by the Secretary another great Courtier who himselfe penned the second Act of Parliament concerning the Power and Authority of Judicature to be absolutely in the King and that it should not be lawfull for any Subject to reclaime from the same under the penalty of the Act which I suppose was treason Item Where it is alledged that I should have condemned the Doctrine anounced and taught by the Ministry of Edinbrough concerning obedience to the Prince I confesse and protest before God that I never understood nor yet knew any thing but sincerity and uprightnesse in the Doctrine of the Ministry of Edinbrough in that point nor in any other Further I confesse I was the Authour of the Act discharging the Ministers Stipends that did not Subscribe these Acts of Parliament wherewith God has justly recompenced my selfe As for any violent course it is knowne well enough who was the Author thereof and my part was tryed at the imprisonment of Master Nicholl Dalgleish Master Thomas Jack and others Moreover I grant I was more busie with some Bishops in England in prejudice of the Discipline of our Kirk partly when I was there and partly by our mutuall intelligence since then became a good Christian much lesse a faithful Pastor Neither is there any thing that more ashameth me then my often deceiving and abusing of the Kirk heretofore by Confessions Subscriptions Protestations c. which be farre from me now and ever hereafter Amen Sic subscribitur Your brother in the Lord M. PATRICK ADAMSON As where your wisdomes desire to have my owne opinion concerning the Booke of the Declaration of the Kings intentions the same is at more length declared in the Confession which I have exhibited already wherein I have condemned all the whole Articles therein contained like as by these presents I doe condemne them As where ye require what became of the Books of the Assembly all which I had preserved whole unto the returning of the Lords and Ministry out of England And if I had not preserved them my Lord Arran intended to have made them be cast into the fire and upon a certaine day in Falkland they were delivered to the Kings Majesty the Bishop of N. accompanied with Master Henry Hamilton rent out some leaves and destroyed such things as made against our Estate and that not without my owne speciall allowance As for the Books which I have set forth I have set forth
nothing except a Commentary upon the first Epistle of Paul to Timothy which I did direct to the Kings Majesty and kept no example beside me and understand that Master John Geddy got the same from the King and lent it to Master Robert Hepburne Further I wrote nothing but onely made mention in my Preface upon the Apocalips that I should write a Booke called Psyllas which being prevented by disease God would not suffer me to finish and the little thing that was done I caused to destroy it And likewise I have set forth the Book of Job with the Apocalyps and the Lamentations of Ieremy all in Verse to be printed in English As for my intention I am not disposed or in ability to write any thing at this time and if it please God I were restored to my health I would change my Style as Cajetanus did at the Councell of Trent As for Sutlivins Booke against the forme and order of the Presbyteries so far am I from being partner in that worke that as I know not the Man nor ever had any intelligence of the Worke before it was done so if it please God to give me dayes I will write in his contrary to the maintenance of the contrary confession Prayes the Brethren to be at unity and peace with me and in token of their forgivenesse because health suffereth me not to goe over to the Colledge where presently ye are assembled which I would gladly doe to aske God and you forgivenesse that it would please you to repaire hither that I may doe it here Moreover I condemne by this my subscription whatsoever is contained in the Epistle Dedicatory to the Kings Majesty before my Book on the Revelation that is either slanderous or offensive to the Brethren Also I promise to satisfie the Brethren of Edinborough or any other Kirk within this Realm according to good conscience in whatsoever they find themselves justly offended and for what is contrary to the Word of God in any speeches actions or proceedings which have past from me And concerning the Commentary upon the first Epistle of Paul to Timothy because there are divers things therein contained offensive and that tend to allow of the estate of Bishops otherwise then Gods Word can suffer I condemne the same The pages before written directed by me Mr Patrick Adamson and written at my commandement by my servant Mr Samuel Cunninghame and by his hand drawne in the blanks I subscribe with my own hand as acknowledged by me in sincerity of conscience as in the presence of God before these witnesses directed to me from the Synodall Assembly because of my inability to repaire toward them James Monypenny younger of Pitmilly Andrew Wood of Strawthy David Murray Portioner of Ardet Mr David Russell Mr William Murray Minister of Dysart Mr Robert Wilkie David Forgison with divers others Sic subscribitur Mr PATRICK ADAMSON David Forgison witnesse Master Nicol Dalgleish James Monypenny of Pitmilly witnesse Andrew Wood witnesse Master Ro. Wilkie witnesse David Murray witnesse Master David Russell Master David Spence Master John Caldcleuch Master William Murray Master Patricks owne Answer and Refutation of the Bookfalsly called The Kings Declaration I Have enterprized of meere remorse of conscience to write against a Booke called A Declaration of the Kings Majesties intentions Albeit it containeth little or nothing of the Kings intentions but my owne at the time of the writing thereof and the corrupt intentions of such as were for the time about the King and abused his Minority Of the which Booke and contents thereof compiled by me at the command of some chiefe Courtiers for the time as is before written I shall shortly declare my opinion as the infirmity of sicknesse and weaknesse of Memory will permit First in the whole booke is nothing contained but assertions of lyes ascribing to the Kings Majesty that whereof he was not culpable For albeit as the times went his Majesty could have suffered these things to have been published in his Realme yet his Majesty was never of that nature to have reviled any mans person or to upbraid any man with calumnies whereof there is a number contained in that Book Secondly in the Declaration of the second Act of Parliament there is mention made of Master Andrew Melvill and his preaching wrongfully condemned in speciall as factious and seditious albeit his Majesty hath had a lively tryall of that mans fidelity and truth in all proceedings from time to time True it is he is earnest and zealous who can abide no corruption which most unadvisedly I attribute to a fiery and salt humour which his Majesty findeth by experience to be most true for he alloweth well of him and knoweth things that were alleaged upon him to have been false and contrived treacheries There are contained in that second Act of Parliament diverse other false inventions for to defame the Ministry and to bring the Kirk of God in hatred and envy with their Prince and Nobility burthening and accusing the Ministers falsly of sedition and other crimes whereof they were innocent As likewise it is written in the same act and Declaration thereof that soveraigne and supreame power pertaineth to the King in matters Ecclesiasticall which is worthy to be condemned and not to be contained among Christian acts where the power of the Word is to be extolled above all the power of Princes and they to be brought under subjection to the same The fourth act condemned the Presbyteries as a judgement not allowed by the Kings Lawes which is a very slender argument for as concerning the authority of the Presbytery we have the same exprest in the Gospell of Matthew chap. 18. where Christ commandeth to shew the Kirk which authority being commanded by Christ and the Acts of Parliament forbidding it we should rather obey God then man and yet the Presbytery lacked never the Kings authority for the allowance thereof from the beginning save onely in that hour of darknesse when he was abused through evill company As for any other thing that is contained in this Act against any Order or proceedings of the Presbytery it is to be esteemed that nothing was done by the Presbytery without wisdome judgement and discretion And so hath received approbation againe by the Kirk whereunto also I understand his Majesty hath given allowance ratifyed and approved the same which should be a sufficient reason to represse all mens curiosity that either have or would yet finde fault with the same The last Article containeth the establishing of Bishops which hath no warrant of the Word of God but is grounded upon the Policy of the invention of Man whereupon the Primacy of the Pope or Antichrist has risen which is worthy to be disallowed and forbidden because the number of Elderships that have jurisdiction and oversight as well of visitation as admission will doe the same farre more Authentickly godly and with greater zeale then a Bishop whose care commonly is not upon God and
compared page with page if they find not a satisfactory reply to every materiall passage then with my good leave let them rejoyce in their work and goe on to recommend to more hands the serious perusall of these two notable peices but if so it fall out that they find it demonstrate to their owne hearts satisfaction that these imputations whereby they esteemed the honour of the Scottish Presbytery to be most grievously and irrecoverably wounded to be nothing but most impudent calumnies then I trust they will be entreated to repent of their rashnesse and hereafter to be more slow in publishing or recommending infamous Libels against Nations and Churches to whom justice though piety and charity had both been lost did oblige them to be friendly before they have tryed from some who can informe what truth may be in these things which onely enemies in the heat of their rage and revenge of supposed and mis-apprehended wrongs have invented and spread It had indeed been convenient that this Answer had come sooner abroad and followed the lyars closer at the heels but the delay was none of my fault The Work for some time was in another far fitter hand when necessary diversions had hindred it there to be so much as begun and I was called unto it before I could purchase and cast over a good many Writs whereupon my discourse was necessarily to be grounded time did slide over when I came to be ready I found the Presse so much in work or the work-men in idlenesse that I was much dis-appointed of my hopes of so quick a dispatch as sometimes I have found but if what I have done be well it will not I hope come so late as to be quite out of season I may confesse to you to whom I was wont to communicate the greatest of my secrets that although at the beginning I was much averse from medling at all with this taske yet when once I entred upon it it became to me a very pleasant labour not onely in regard of the pregnant occasion it put in my hand to make the lyes and malice of the malignants the impudence and rashnesse of the Sectaries against us cleere as the noon day but specially for the opportunity which divine providence did offer so faire as I could have wished of bringing to light before the whole Isle the oppressed innocency of many most precious Divines who had been halfe martyred in Scotland and lay still buried too much in oblivion under their sufferings also of rectifying the mis-apprehensions which the Prelaticall party had bred in many well meaning minds both in this Isle and over Sea by their grosse mis-representations of all the opposition which in the Church of Scotland had heen made to their tyrannous oppressions I was glad to be drawn by unadvisednesse of adversaries to let the world know the plaine truth of that 17. day of December of the Assembly at Aberdeen 1505. of the tumult at Edinborough 1637. and of many more remarkable passages of our Ecclesiastick History which the Prelats during their Reigne and lately also in their rage for their ruine were wont to set out in no other habit then of monstrous tragedies I was also glad of this nick of time when the Presbyteriall Government was comming to be set up over all England and when a little stumbling-block was apt to make many fall to be put to the cleering of a number of practicall passages in all the parts of that government wherein the experience of Scotland cannot but give light to all who will follow not them so much as the Word of God and sound reason which first led them into their way of Presbytery and still has kept them therein notwithstanding of all the fraud of all the force which the Court and clergy has imployed sometime to cheat sometime to beat them out of that path It was to me a pleasant service and abundantly recompensive of it selfe to open the prisons wherein the unjustice of Prelats had too too long inclosed the names and reputations of the most gracious instruments in our Church condemning them so far as was in their power to lye in darknesse and stink unto the worlds end I was not a little glad to be imployed in bringing forth and ushering up to the stage of this vast theater whereupon now we stand those great and noble names of John Knox John Willock Andrew and James Melvils Robert Bruce John Welsh Thomas Smeiton Iames Lauson David Black and divers others from whose saces a great light does shine and from their fame a most fragrant odour for the refreshing of all that comes neer them whose senses are not either very dull or much corrupted I was also content with another part of my taske to throw downe to the dust of just contempt and wel-deserved disgrace the unhappy and infamous wretches Adamson Spotswood Maxwell Balcanquell and others who by the steps of very evill actions and great disservices to their mother Church and Country had all of them at least in hope perked themselves up upon the pinacles of the highest honours both of our Church and State that in the indignation of God whom they had greatly provoked they might be tumbled downe into the more fearfull and exemplary pits of ruine Many of these stories I learned from your loving and kind discourse in my very childhood of late I have endeavored to my power to encrease and make certaine that part of my knowledge by searching the chiefe Fountaines thereof as I had opportunity for all that I say in my answer I beleeve if I be put to it I can give good enough authorities and if any more be needfull to be said if I were beside you and that living magazine of our whole Ecclesiastick History most Reverend Master Catherwood I know whence I should be abundantly furnished however what here I subjoine out of the little store I had at hand I submit it to your judgement and rest Your most deservedly loving Brother and Scholler R. BAILY Worster-House Iuly 29. 1646. The Contents of the first Treatise Issachars Burden will stumble no solid and advised mind p. 1. The Author of it is an excommunicate Prelat and Incendiary obstinate in wickednesse p. 2. The most malicious enemy to the Parliament of England that ever yet has written p. 3. A favourer of grosse Popery and Arminianisme p. 4 5 6. Scotlands old Obligations to England p. 7. Englands late Obligations to Scotland p. 8 9. The Independents and Erastians in publishing this Book are many wayes faulty p. 10. The Title Issachars Burden is a doltish reproach of this present Parliament p. 11. the groundlesse calumnies of the title Page p. 12. the discordall concord of Prelats Erastians and Independents in the point of Supremacy ibid. the publishing of this Book is a grievous injury to the Parliament p. 13. a false and mad prophesie p. 14. the whole Treatise is but an extract of the most false and venomous
Apostates ibid. Caesaro papisme is an Antichristianisme worse then that of the Pope p. 33. Prelats and Erastians their Sympathy and Antipathy p. 34. King James against all toleration of heresies or schismes p. 35. Also much contrary to our present Anarchy p. 36. The retarders of government are enemies to themselves and to the welfare of England p. 37. The Recantaâ—ion of Patrick Adamson pretended Archbi of St. Andrews p. 37 Mr. Patrick Adamson's owne Answer and refutation of the Booke falsly called The Kings Declaration p. 41. Two pious and propheticall Letters of Mr. Jo. Welsh which he wrote out of his prison after the sentence of death was pronounced against him and other gracious Ministers for their testimony against Erastianisme Prelacy p. 45. The Authors out of which the chiefe testimonies of the subsequent Vindication are taken The Acts of Parliament printed at Edinborough by Robert Walgrave in the yeer 1597. The Acts of the second Parliament of King Charles printed at Edinborough by Robert Young 1641. The Acts of the generall Assembly at Edinborough 1632. printed at Edinborough by Evan Tyler 1642. One of the Registers of the Church of Scotland Manuscript A collection out of the Registers of the Church of Scotland by Mr. David Catherwood wherein beside other things are Mr. Andrew Melvils processe the Animadversions of the Commissioners of the generall Assembly upon Adamsons Declaration delivered to the King Also a Reverend Divines censure at that time upon the same Declaration Also King James his true Declaration Knox History Altare Damascenum Adamsons Recantation Mr. Welsh his Letters The Ecclesiastick History of Scotland written by John Spotswood pretended Archbishop of St. Andrewes licensed for the Presse under the hands of Secretary Stirling and Windebank Issachars Burden under the name of an Answer to a Letter c. Also Sacrâ— Sancta Regum Majestas both printed at Oxford 1644. by Mr. John Max well pretended Bishop of Rosse THE UNLOADING OF ISSACHARS BURTHEN WHen from divers good hands it was brought to me Issâ—chars burthen will stuâ—ble no solide and advised minde that Presbyteriall Government began to be evil spoken of by many to be suspected by some who hitherto had not been unfriends to it through the occasion of a late Pamphlet Intituled Issachars burthen which some Sectaries with all care and diligence doe put in the hands of the prime Members of both Houses of Parliament and others whom they conceive to have any influence in the affaires either of Church or State either of City or Countrey The word of the old Philosopher came in my mind a short sighted man is a quick judge who sees few things does soone and rashly give out his sentence That this namelesse Pamphlet printed by a Malignant at Oxford and reprinted by the industry of Sectaries at London should be able to open the mouth or touch the heart of any considerate man with the least suspition against the Government of the Reformed Churches seemes to me a little strange and will doe so as I suppose to others who shall be pleased to consider with me some circumstances of that writ first the Author secondly those whom he professes to taxe thirdly its Publishers fourthly the matters contained therein The Author of it is a man infamous an Excommunicate Prelate and inâ—endiagy The Author as uncontroverted fame since its first publication at Oxford makes manifest is Mr Iohn Maxwell late Bishop of Rosse from whose gracious pen a little after this did drop another piece of the like benigne quality Sacro-Sancta-Regum majestas they must be of a greater then ordinary credulity who can admit this mans testimony-against the Church of Scotland for by the most solemn judicatories of that Land he is declared infamous by the generall Assembly for many grievous offences he with some other Prelates were delivered into the hands of Satan but for more treasonable crimes this man by the Parliament of that Kingdome was declared an incendiary a Censure put upon no other Prelate but him alone These no more heavie then just sentences were so farre from bringing him to any shew of repentance A man obstinate and obdured in wickednesse that they filled his heart with bitternesse and rage to doe speak and write what ever masice hightned to the uttermost could dictate In that most scurrilous and invenomed Satyre Lysimachus Nicanor his pen was thought to be principall for this he got a warning from heaven so distinct and loud as any uses to be given upon earth to reclaime him from his former errours with his eyes did he see the miserable man Iohn Corbet who took upon him the shame of penning that rable of contumelious lies against his Mother Church hewed in pieces in the very armes of his poore wife this Prelate himselfe in the meane time was striken down and left with many wounds as dead by the hand of the Irish with whom he had been but too familiar All this did not humble his stout spirit so dangerous is it to be put in the hands of the Devill by the servants of God according to their Masters warrant for no sooner did he recover of his wounds but he went for Oxford of purpose to cast â—oyl in that flame in the first kindling whereof he had beene a prime instrument How little faith ought to be given to this man I might shew by seven years old Stories A man very corrupt in doctrine it s well known that he above all men living did move and encourage Canterbury to force upon Scotland the Liturgy and Canons what ever Popery or Tiranny is found in either he was a prime Author and full consenter thereto the erroneous Tenents of the Canterburian party especially their grosse Popery in the heads of Transubstantiation Iustification and Purgatory were according to his minde as the supplement of Ladensium Autocatacrisis demonstrates how neare he and his two most intimate friends Forbes and Synserfe were to the open profession of Popery does appeare by the avowed defection to Rome of their chiefe Scholars and most familiar dependents Forbes his Sonne Synserfe his brother Menteith the great Achates of all the three Bishops But leaving these elder stories The most malicious enemy to the Parliament of England that ever yet has written behold what new stuffe he layes out in his two Pamphlets in matters of State these are his maximes all resistance to Kings in any imaginable case of the most extreame Tyranny is simply unlawfull though the Religion Lawes Liberties of whole Kingdomes were totally subverted Let Princes doe what ever miseniese can come in the heart of the worst men subjects are to suffer all and have no right allowed by God to make any opposition farther then by teares and prayers (a) Sacro-Sanct p. 19. All opposition by force resisting of Kings by Armes whether in a defensive or offensive way is against God and unlawfull ibid. p. 66. They commit the highest Treasons against God man
evills with so great unkindnesse they were loadned with so many calumnious and contumelious aspersions the Reformation of Religion their greatest aime went so farre back before their eyes that their provocations were great to provide at last for themselves while something yet at home did remain to them to be preserved But beholding visibly in their retreat and provision for themselves the certain ruine of their unadvised friends they chused rather to put up with patience all their sufferings and quietly to wait on till the ruine of the Enemy and setling of their brethrens estate by their help might open the eyes of all and bring the most perverse to Repentance for their misbehaviour towards the instruments of their welfare especially when they did see the invincible fidelity of the Scots unbrangled with the greatest temptations Though in all their late unexpressible extremities they had received no assistance at all from England nor much importuned them for it though to their greatest griefe they did see the Gangren of Heresie and Schisme without the application of any true remedy overspreading all England so fast that the infection of Scotland with this Pestilence seemed unavoidable though the current of affaires did seem to run in that channell that the person and family of the King the authority of the Parliament the Liberties of the City and Kingdome might be cast ere long into no mall hazard our Army also and Nation for no other cause but their constant resolutions to keep to their first principles did seem to stand in a very neer possibility to be to ally destroyed yet for all this they were farre from any rash or unjust conclusion their eyes were towards the Lord they did wait for his deliverance and when by him an opportunity was put in their hands to right themselves with the disadvantage of others yet they did mannage that occasion with so much justice wisedome dexterity and successe that all the world they hope is satisfied with their honesty as of men who minded nothing more then the saving of the whole Isle from these calamities that visibly were imminent the re-establishing of the King in his throne the confirming of the Parliament City and Country in all their rights the setling of Religion and peace according to the word of God and the Lawes of the Land and their owne quick returne to their homes in very easie and equitable termes enriched with nothing so much a with a conscience of well deserving with the blessings of all England with the commendation of Neighbour nations and with the hopes of the Posterities favourable construction of their whole deportment in this great action That such a people as this should be traduced and defamed by contumelious Libels in England and that at London with the contentment or patience of any it would seeme a matter very strange if the most absurd and strange things were not here long agoe become common The third circumstance considerable The Independents and Erastians in printing and publishing this book are many waies faulty is the instruments and present publishers of this writâ— That a Bishop at Oxford should have been countenanced in writing a Satyre against the Scots whom all the Malignants did hare as the chiefe and first Authors of the miscarriage of their great designe we doe not marvaile but that at London our sworn and covenanted Brethren should be avowed proclaimers of Scotlands disgrace it is a peece of singular and unexpected unkindnesse Our Brethren whether Independents or Erastians or both who have procured this Edition and with so much sedulity make it passe from hand to hand though they had been pleased to cast behind their backs all the good offices which this last century of yeares have past betwixt the Kingdomes though they had banished all gratitude towards the Scots for their late actions and sufferings though their conscience had permitted them to have trod under foot all the Oaths and Covenants whereby they stand expresly tyed to defend the Reformation of the Church of Scotland against the common Enemy Yet I would know of them how they are become thus unadvised to let their indignation against the Scottish Presbytery swell up so high as for their hatred thereunto to venture the destruction of the Parliament of England to declare all the Members of both Houses at Westminster damnable Traitors because dying in the act of Rebellion without Repentance but all who have perished on the Malignant side to be a kinde of Martyrs as being unjustly killed for their duty to God and the King to bring back Bishops to the house of Lords to put into their hands alone and that by Divine Right all the Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction of the whole Church of England And if they were resolute in their hatred of Presbytery thus far to miscarry I would further know if either the Erastians or Independents have any principles for the reduction of Poperty for the re-erection in England of Abbots Cardinals and Popes And if men against their owne principles must needs run thus mad yet that they should be permitted to act according to their madnes in the day-light under the eye and nose of so wise just and prudent a Parliament it is and will be long hereafter a matter of very great admiration especially to them who at the same time did behold some other writs for much smaller reflections purged with the hand of the Hangman by fire in many publique places and their publishers how well deserving soever otherwise both of Church and State stigmatized with notes of high infamy These three considerations are but proemicall the fourth concerning the particular matter of the Treatise is the principall If I should examine every thing it would be tedious yet shall I touch upon every passage that I conceive to be materiall This second Edition has a new Title Page The title Issachars burthen is a doltish reproach of this present Paliament and some additions in the Preface In the very inscription Issachars burthen there is a salt Gybe at the present Government that which the Proverbe wont to appropriate to the Peasants of France that they were strong Asses willing to beare all Burthens so they might live in peace in that fat soyle by this good Patriot is contumeliously applyed to England it now is the Asse crouching under two burthens if Presbyterie be the one the Parliament must be the other these be the two unsupportable burthens pointed at along all the Authors Writs the two light burthens which he every where cryes up are Monarchy scrued up to the highest pinne of Tyrannicall Prerogative and Episcopacy in all its Papall Priviledges both well fastned upon the Asses back by the cords of a Divine Right who ever for the love of peace in a plentifull Land will set their shoulders under this double burthen are Issachars Asses indeed but truly the Scots have not merited this commendation for their Land is not among the most plentifull nor have their
Treatise is but an extract of the most false and venemous parts of Spoiswoods story and an English rod or spurre for the sides of such a presumptuous Prophet we shall say no more to the Preface In the Treatise it selfe you draw your discourse to foure heads the Church Session or Congregationall Eldership the Classicall Presbytery Provinciall Synod and generall Assembly upon some of these foure you draw in what ever disgracefull Story you have either heard or read of any Churchmen of Scotland opposite to your way The great fountaine of all your bitter waters is that cistern which Spotswood of St Andrewes did endeavour all his life time to gather together in that Collection the Authors great intention was to heap up all things he conceived might make the Presbyteriall Government hatefull and the Episcopall lovely but being certain of great contradiction from many who knew as much in affairs as himselfe and were much more willing to speak truth without disguise he kept in this book while he lived that it might not see the light till after his death when he was not to be argued with for any of his lying and malicious Narrations This Manuscript falling in your hands you draw out of it what is most venemous and or that stuffe make up this present booke There are long agoe in Scotland prepared sufficient Antidotes against the poison of the whole story wherby any man may be furnished without difficulty towards the full confutation of your extracts but the grossenesse of your Lyes did cry so loud at this time for an answer that the patience of many good people admitted not of so long a delay as that I could be furnished from a far with any materials yet out of the small store of my knowledge and memory of the affaires you speake of and by some few helps which my present accomodations doe furnish I will venture to give you a sudden answer which I hope shall prove satisfactory enough to all ingenuous Readers who will not affect to cavill if there shall be found any materiall defect reply when you will you shall have a rejoynder Upon your first head of Church Sessions you spend your first three pages wherein you make us ascribe to our Congregationall Elderships much undue and tyrannick power Page 1. The Church of Scotland gives no more power to congregationall Elderships then both the Independents and Erastians doe allow To this I answer in generall First That we give no more power to congregationall Elderships then the Churches of France or Holland of New-England ascribe to them both in their doctrine and daily practise Secondly the power we ascribe to them cannot be challenged either by Independents or Erastians for the Independents great plea with us is about the defect that we give not power enough to that Court with our excesse herein they were never offended as for the Erastians they will not question with us about any power which the Parliament will be pleased to allow unto that Eldership now your selfe doth know that our Church Sessions practise not any power but that which the Acts of our Parliament do warrant our liberty there is not astricted to any certaine enumerate cases but I dare say that in many yeares we will not have occasion in our Congregationall Elderships to meddle in any case which even this Parliament hath not already allowed or will not as I conceive be willing upon the first Emergency to allow I grant you Prelates are here our opposites The ground of the Prelates quarrell is absurd but how justly let equitable men judge you tell us that congregationall Elderships ought to have no power at all because forsooth the whole power of all spirituall jurisdiction must reside in the Bishop alone It is your principle that in all the Preachers and in all the Congregations of the whole Diocesse yea of the whole Kingdome there is not so much power as to give to any man for what ever crime a publike admonition yet any Lay man in the Kingdom or out of the Kingdom whom the Bishop is pleased to make his Officiall or Chancellor may keep a Court in any part of the Diocesse and therein passe a sentence of Excommunication against the best Pastors and chiefe Members of any Congregation because the Scots since their first Reformation could never by any Art nor by any Force be gotten inslaved to such a Tiranny therefore it is that you your Colleagues and your Fathers have been offended with them and in your anger have invented these calumnies which here you are pleased to object The first particular crime which ye lay to our charge is The Prelates give much more Ecclesiasticall power to Laymen then we to ruling â—lders That we doe give some power of spirituall jurisdiction to ruling Elders and that by a Divine Right We grant the charge and thinke it easie to demonstrate the warrant of our Tenet both from Scripture and the practise of all the ancient and all the reformed Churches but it is needlesse here to digresse into that debate for this is not your maine quarrell with us that we give some power or jurisdiction to those you call Lay-Elders but that we ascribe any part of jurisdiction to any at all beside the Bishop for you know it is an Article of the Prelaticall Creed That a preaching Elder hath no more interest in jurisdiction then a lay Elder that for this kinde of power Priest and people are all alike That neither of them of themselves by vertue of their office have any dram thereof yet by vertue of a Commission from the Bishop either of them is capable of a pleni-potency and are able to doe the acts of the highest spirituall jurisdiction what the Iesuites were wont to ascribe unto the Pope in the Church universall That the Bishop takes to himself in his own Diocesse he and he alone by Divine right is the head the sun the fountaine the onely receptacle of all spirituall jurisdiction which he keeps to himselfe or communicates to be execute by others for the time the measure the persons according to his own good pleasure The Erastian principle is only different in this that they pull the Pope and the Bishop out of the chaire that there may be roome to set downe the Magistrate in their place What you speak of the Deacons it is a mistake We grant to Deacons no power of jurisdicton we wish there were Doctors in populous congregations page 2. In some few congregations Elders have a dispensation for a time for albeit they be present in the Eldership to receive their directions for the poore yet they doe not voice in any well governed Eldership nor do they claime any power in jurisdiction Concerning Doctors that populous Congregations wants them it comes not from any designe but for want either of meanes or of Idoneous and willing persons What you speake of the yearely election of Elders the matter is this There is
not in any Congregation of Scotland which I doe know a yearly election of Elders but in populous Cities where the Elders are many and diverse of them unable to attend that charge without the hurt of their estate the most of them being Merchants and Tradesmen who must travell for their livelyhood they have a liberty to be free from that service every two yeere if so they be content to attend upon a call every third yeere the Levites attended the service of the Temple but a few months in the yeare What is right or wrong in this custome of some few of our Congregations we are willing to debate it and as it shall be found just or unjust to keep or change that practise for in such things we love not to be contentious In your three last Sections yee do cast upon the Eldership in hand a rabble of incongruous practises Page 3. No Eldership inflicts any civill punishment although the Magistrate in the Eldership doth so sometimes what you bring of pecuniary mulcts imprisonments banishments jogges cutting of haire and such like it becomes neither you to charge nor us to be charged with any such matters No Church-assembly in Scotland assumes the least degree of power to inflict the smallest civill punishment upon any person the Generall Assembly it selfe bath no power to fine any creature so much as in one groat It is true the Lawes of the Land appoint â—ecuniary mulcts imprisonment joggs pillories and banishment for some odious crimes and the power of putting these Laws in execution is placed by the Parliament in the hands of the inâ—eriour Magistrates in Burroughs or Shires or of others to whom the Counsel Table gives a speciall Commission for that end ordinarily some of these civill persons are ruling Elders and sit with the Eldership So when the Eldership have cognosced upon the scandall alone of criminall persons and have used their spirituall censures only to bring the party to Repentance some of the Ruling Elders by vertue of their civill office or commission will impose a Mulct or send to Prison or stocks or banish out of the bounds of some little circuit according as the Acts of Parliament or counsell do appoint it But that the Eldership should imploy its Eccclesiastick and Spirituall power for any such end none of us doe defend That either in Scotland or any where else in the world the haire of any person is commanded to be cut by any Church judicatory for disgrace and punishment is as I take it but a foolish fable That any person truely penitent is threatned in Scotland with Church censures for non-payment of Monies is in the former Category of calumnies But suppose that all your alleagations were true Bishops confound miserably the spirituall and civill office yet how congruously does a challenge of this kind come from your mouth do you think that all civill imployments are incompatible with spirituall offices How many Ministers did you get to be Iustices of Peace you your selfe were a judge of Common-pleas your colleague S. Andrewes was Chancellor of the Kingdom you know the Treasurers white staffe was very neer to your hands and for the missing of it what stir you made Many of you were Lords of Councel and all of you Lords both of Parliament and temporall Lordships and Regalities where your Baylies kept Court in your names diverse of your Coat with your good liking have been Secretaries of State Keepers of the Privy Seale Leger Ambassadors with forraign Princes your brethren over Sea in France and Spaine Germany and Italy are Admirals of Royall Navies are Generals of Land forces are Princes of Temporall Estates according to these principles that I thinke you doe approve according to your Cannons in Scotland and your ordinary practise in England Great summes of mony were exacted in your spirituall Courts and pocketed up for private uses how many have been excommunicate there for non-payment of a shilling and refused absolution till their fine was payed with increase what do you speak to us of a pecuniary mulct of a very small and unconsiderable value taken up by the Magistrate and imployed only in pious uses Why doe you speak to us of cutting of Beards when your Prelates doe burne the cheeks how many gracious soules have been starved to death in your Episcopall dungeous how many thousands have you banished out of Bricaine out of Europe for no fault at all but their zeale to the truth of God how many hundred thousand hath your pride and obstinacy in error caused to be slaine within these seven yeares in the next age ignorant men may be pardoned to deny these things but it were great impudence this day to deny them when yet we do sticke in the Pit of these troubles wherein the madnesse of you Prelates hath cast us Your objection about the Baptisme of Bastards is vain We refuse Baptism to no insant where either of the Parents will undertake for Christian education for we refuse not that Sacrament to any of them if either of the Parents profesie Repentance and undertake for the Christian education of their child but the ground of your quarrelling in this Point is that we cannot follow your Popish Doctrine that we refute to professe the actuall regeneration of all baptized Infants and that we dare not put all unbaptized persons in the state of unregeneration and damnation Your next head concerns the Classicall Presbytery Page 4 5. No Prince pleads for any exemption from Ecclesiastick jurisdiction your first Objection against it which a little thereafter and oft elsewhere you do ingeminate is That the King and his family are subject to its Jurisdiction I would gladly know if among the rest of the Prelaticall absurd ties this were one That Christian Princes and Magistrates are fully exempted from all Ecclesiastick jurisdiction sometimes your party would seem to speake so as if every Magistrate at least every Prince were such a God upon earth that none might say to any of them Sir what are you doing though they were running to hell themselves and drawing at their heels all they were able This is so grosse a flattery that all advised Princes abhorre it and confesse themselves to be subject to Ecclesiasticall Discipline as well as others for they know if they should exempt themselves from this part of Christian religion they should presently be in hazard or loosing the benefit of all the rest for Christianity is a body of Articles so straitly joyned that either all must be received or none You your selfe though among the absurdest of all your faction do confesse so much as any Presbyterian in the world did ever thinke of you say that the Crowne and Scepter is subject not only to the directive power of the Church expound the Church as you will for a Congregationall Classicall or Nationall Eldership it is alike for the present Question but also to the authoritative power of the same whereby the
before any Assemblies were in Scotland should be laid to their charge But what may those absurd asserions of Iohn Knox be he sayes as you alledge that the Nobility of Scotland who are borne Counsellours of the Kingdom and by the Laws have great priviledges may represse the fury and madnesse of a misled Prince I grant this to you must be a great Heresie who makes it one of the Articles of your faith that though Princes were as mad as ever Nero and should openly avow their desires to overturn all the sworn Lawes of their State and to kill without any cause all their Subjects yet for the Nobility or whole States of Parliament to make the smallest opposition or to goe one haires breadth beyond a naked supplication were no lesse then a damnable Rebellion and Treason but beleeve it the subjects of Scotland will not take off your hand such maximes without some Argument for their truth Iohn Knox is alledged to say that the Commonalty may bridle the cruell beasts and resorme Religion but what does it concerne the generall Assembly whatever power the Lords or Commons have by the Law or usurpe against the Law The matter whereof Iohn Knox is speaking is this The body of Scotland in the yeare 1557. were true and zealous Protestants the Masse and Images were to them Idols long before the governour and protector of the Kingdom Duke Hamilton was for the Religion At his first Parliament he did authorize some good beginnings of Reformation the Cardinall and Clergy at this grew mad and found means to translate the government from the Duke to the Queens Mother sister to the Duke of Guize and Cardinall of Lorain in the time both of the Duke and Queen Mothers Regency the cruelty of the Bishops was unsufferable They took divers of the most zealous Preachers and Professors men and women and publikely without any Commission from the Magistrate onely for their zeale to the truth of God did burne them quick as Hereticks After many yeers patience the people at last seeing no end of the Prelates fury did cause write Letters to some of their most wicked persecutors telling them that if they gave not over to murther their Brethren themselves should taste of that Cup of which they forced others to drink All the Reformation which the people at that time practised was to keep themselves pure from most vile Idolatry and in private to heare the Word of God purely preached They made no publike Reformation till first they had openly supplicated the Queen and gotten her allowance and a promise of an Act of Parliament in the yeare 1558. which promise when the Protestant Nobility Gentry and Commons did presse in face of Parliament it was not denyed by the Queen but cunningly put off upon assurance that all their desires at the first conveniency should be granted in the meane time she received their Protestation for a Liberty to live in their reformed Churches separate from Popish Idolaters and promised in due time to give to the Protesters full satisfaction Though you have brought together all the malicious a persions which your predecestors the Popish Prelates and Priests were wont at these very times to heap upon the heads of our blessed Reformers yet shall you never be able to leave any stain upon that happy work though here and elsewhere you spue out your dispight against it The Reformation of Scotland was begun by publique Authority in the first Parliament of Queen Mary the yeare 1542. holden by the Governour the Earle of Arran a Protestant for the time the setting up of it in publique was avowed and protested for in face of Parliament 1558. with the Queen Regents evident allowance and without the opposition of any but in the next Paâ—liament 1560. the whole Estates without the contradiction of any but three Popish Lords did set up by Law the whole body of that Religion which since by Gods mercy we have ever peaceably possessed except so farre as wicked Prelates have troubled us It is true The suspension of the Queene Regenâ—s authority was an act of the State which did nothing I rejudice the Soveraignty that Queen Regent notwithstanding of her good countenance and faire promises was forced by the privy Instructions of her wicked Brethren Guize and the Cardinall of Loraine to oppose Reformation wherein fore against her own minde as at her death shee professed shee went so farre as to bring in many thousands of the French to conquer and subdue the Land They began to the terror of the whole Isle to fortifie Leith and other Maritime places they exercised an evident tyranny both in Church and State and overthrew the Laws and liberties of the Nation which forced the cheise of the Nobility for the casting off of this yoak of stavery from the Church and State and preventing the danger which threatned the whole Isle to enter in a covenant of defence both among themselvs and with the Queen of England but without the least prejudice to the just authority of their Soveraign then Queen of France as it after appeared for when by the blessing of God and the helpe of the English they had ejected the French usurpers they did heartily receive and obey the Queen so soon as she came from France For the justification of all this I could bring formall testimonies out of Spotswood himselfe What you say of the deposition of Queen Regent from her Authority it is false that any Church Assembly did ever meddle with it lesse or more it was the Act of the three Estates how just let any judge She was the first woman as I remember that ever in Britain had the government of the State it belonged not to her by any right the Lawes provided that charge for Duke Hamilton but she and the Prelates couzend him out of his right and long possession she became not only a violent persecuter of all the faithful against the Law and her own promises but also went about evidently by violence and force of Arms to subdue the land to the tyranny of strangers much of this shee did albeit at the direction of her Brethren of Loraine yet without all commission from our Soveraigne her daughter When no supplication nor remonstrance could stop her the Estates of the Land being all denounced Rebels and Traitors by her did passe an Act not for depriving her of her Regency but for the suspending of her Authority till the next Parliament or till shee altered the course of her tyrannous government with an expresse protestation that the authority and power of the King and Queen of France their Soveraignes should remain to them sacred and inviolable This act of the Statewhether right or wrong what does it concerne the generall Assembly of the Church be it so that a Minister or two being called for advice did give their assent to this action which is the furthest our Enemies alledge yet what hath this to doe with our Church government
complaint of the Scottish Ambassadour were able easily to get an affront put upon a Presbiterian fugitive but if ye will beleeve Spotswood Mr. Lawson was a man so eminent both for piety and prudence that it can hardly be supposed any thing could escape him in preaching which might deserve the Queenes displeasure how ever that excellent man did dye at that time in London as it seemes martyred by the injuries of the Scottish and English Prelates which doubtles did helpe to bring downe that vengeance upon the Prelaticall State in England which our eyes now doe behold For the further evincing of the intollerable miscarriages of the General Assemby P. 39. The case of Iames Gibson you bring three other stories p. 39.40 all are faults alleadged against single Mininisters which were they never so great and true ought not to be laid upon the Assembly but see how all are misreported the first concernes Iames Gibson a zealous Country Minister who Preaching in a very troublesome time spoke more rashly of the King then became him the words that you ascribe to him we may not take them at your hand for in the same matter by Spotswoods owne Testimony you are guiâ—ty of a great untruth you avow that the King caused complaint to be made to the Assembly of this man But by no intreaty could obtaine any punishment to be inflicted upon him Spotswood says the contrary that the Assembly did proâ—ounce the mans words to be slanderous and therefore suspended him from his Ministry and while they were in further agitation of his cause that he fled into England doubtles for feare of his life what became of him thereafter I know not only I have read in a good Author that what here you insinuate of his favouring Hacket and Copinger is a very false calumny The next you speak of is Mr. Master David Black his case David Blacke Minister of St. Andrews a man of great piety and prudence his name is yet very savoury in that Towne though there be in it some three or foure thousand people yet so great was the zeale wisdome and diligence of Mr. Blacke that during all the time of his Ministry there no person was seen either to beg or prophane the Sabbath day in all that Congregation This man being delated to the secret counsell by a very naughty person that in a Sermon he had spoken disgracefully of the King was willing to have appeared and cleered himselfe of that calumny but finding that it was not his person which was aimed at but a quarrell with the whole Church in him sought for by the misleaders of the Court he thought meet to appeale not simply from the King but from the King and secret counsell to the King and Generall Assembly as to the proper and competent Judge appointed by the Law for matters of Doctrine While this question is in agitation a great storme did fall upon the Church from the seventeenth day of December which made Mr. Blacks cause be laid aside yet a little thereafter for to please the King the Commissioners of the generall Assembly did passe upon that gracious man a sentence severe enough removing him from St. Andrews to some obscure corner where he passed the rest of his dayes P. 40. A cleaâ—e vindication of the assembly at Aberdeen in the yeare 1605. Your third story is of the Ministers who went to Aberdeen the year 1605. upon them you make a tragick Narration a guâ—â—ty of the most treasonable rebellion Your rashnes is great at these times to bring up to the sight these things which for the honour of many did lye long buried but since it is your wisdom to make the world know whereof with your friends advantage they might have been ignorant the matter was this It was the custom of Scotland ever from the Reformation to keep generall Assemblies twice or at least once every yeare After some debates in the yeare 1592. it became a Law and an Act of Parliament agreed to unanimously by the King and States and accordingly it was practised without any interruption that the Generall Assembly should meet at least once a yeare and appoint when all other actions were ended the day and place for the next yeares meeting In the yeare 1602. the Assembly in the Kings presence and with his advice did appoint the day and place of their next meeting in the yeare 1603. His Majestie at that time going to England tooke upon him to prorogat the Assembly till the same day and place of the yeare following 1604. of this prorogation there could be no necessity but his Majesties meere pleasure When the Dyet of the yeare 1604. did come the affaires of the Church did greatly call for an Assembly yet it was his Majesties will to make a second prorogation 〈◊〉 the fifth of July 1605. This was much to the hurt griefe and feare of all the godly yet they indured it but when the Dyet of the yeare 1605. was come His Majestie did not only prorogate the third time but also made the day of the next meeting â—â—tertaine and inderinite This gave an allarme to the whole Kingdome all the world did see the Kings designe to bring the English Eâ—iscopacie and all their Ceremonies upon the Church of Scotland also the mistery of popery was then working vehemently a mighty faction of popish Lords were still countenanced among us immediate correspondence with the Pope by the chiefe States-men was much surmised and afterward was found to be too true Scotland had no considerable Bâ— warke either against English or Romish corruptions but their generall Assemblies if these were removed the poore Church lay open to the inundation of what ever Antichristianisme the Court was pleased to send in The generall Assembly besides its divine right was grounded upon so good Lawes as Scotlanâ couâ—d afford but â—o that at the end of the present Assembly the Dyet of the next should alwayes be appointed however his Majesties designe to put downe the generall Assembly was evidently seen by aâ— intelligent men yet so long as he prorogate it to a certaine day men were quiet but so soon as he commanded the third dyet to be deserted and that to an uncertaine and infinite time they to whom the welfare of the Church was deare did awaken and found it necessary to keepe the Dyet appointed in the second prorogation at Aberdeen Iuly 2. or 5. 1605. The Commissioners of the Presbiteries in their way to Aberdeen advised with Chancellor Seaton the prime Magistrate of the Kingdome in the Kings absence and were incouraged by him to goe on yet so soon as any of them came to the place A Gentleman the Lord of Lauristone came to them with a warrant from the King and privy Counsell and discharged them to keepe any Assembly there yet the will of the King and Counsell was not intimated to them in convenient time for when the King and Counsells Letter was presented they shew
the worst of all your Mothers children must have leave to poure more of your excrements upon her head From your page 41. to the 46. you would make the world believe that the Church of Scotland does excommunicate good men and tender consciences for a dissent in the smallest points of Religion and does persecute for such differences with all the rigour of temporall afflictions Secondly you affirme that the Assemblies of that Church take upon them to make Traitours whom they will and to cast out of the Court whether the King will or not the greatest and best men with whom they are displeased Thirdly that these Assemblies doe alter the Lawes of the Kingdome at their pleasure Surely if strangers who know not the Constitution and customes of that Church were disposed to believe all you say they could not but by your relations he brought to a very evill opinion of your mother whom you an unnaturall son so vildly slander but it is good that men here are so rationall as not to take upon trust the naked assertions of a malicious enemie The discipline of Scotland is farre from all rigour and Tiranny For the first a complaint of rash Excommunication and persecution therupon is very impertinent from your mouth it is not so long that yet it can be forgotten since you and your Colleagues did allow your Officialls and others to excommunicate good people for trifles yea for no offence at all but their zeale to God and the good of their Country your Cannons in all the three Kingdomes are extant your cruelties are fresh in imprisoning banishing Pilloring stigmatizing the worthiest men for contradicting you in any one of your numerous ceremonies and traditions As for the Church of Scotland that it did ever meddle to trouble any in their goods Liberties or persons it 's very false what civill penalties the Parliament of a Kingdome thinkes meet to inflict upon those who are refractory and unamendable by the censures of a Church the state from whom alone these punishments doe come are answerable and not the Church That Excommunication in Scotland is inflicted upon those who cannot assent to every point of Religion determined in their confession there is nothing more untrue for wee know it well that never any person in Scotland was Excommunicate only for his difference of opinion in a Theologick tenet Excommunication there is a very dreadfull sentence and therefore very rare these last forty yeares so farre as I have either seen or heard there has none at all been Excommunicate in Scotland but some few trafficking Papists and some very few notoriously flagitious persons and five or six of you the Prelates for your obstinate impenitency after your overturning the foundations both of our Church State and one most rigid and pragmatick Brownist who for all that could be done or said would needs make it his worke to perswade all he was able by discourse Letters and spreading of books that in Scotland there was neither a Church nor any Ministery nor any Ordinance In Scotland wee count the spirituall Judgement of Excommunication most heavie but any temporall inconvenience that follows upon it is not very considerable for first there is not any civill hazard at all to any excommunicate man who will suffer himselfe to be brought to any measure of repentance Secondly were they never so impenitent ther is no harme can come to them as I remember a whole yeare after the long processe and finall sentence of ExcoÌ„munication Thirdly after a yeares coÌ„tumacy though the Letter of the Act of Parliament be heavy yet I appeale to any who has lived in Scotland among the very few whom they have knowne Excommunicate how many did they ever heare to have been hurt in their goods imprisoned or banished I am sure that Huntly Arrole and Angus and the other popish Lords though for their plotting to undermine the State their persons after Excommunication have been secured yet no penny of their estates went to the Kings Exchequer or to the hands of any of their unfriends but as the ordinary custome is upon the pretext of a small composition what ever the Letter of the Law takes from them it is all put in the hand of such of their friends whom they doe most trust Scotlands guilt may well be too much indulgence but of any excessive rigour towards spirituall oftenders they will bee condemned by none that knowes them P. 42.43.44 A narration of the roads of Ruthven and Stirling Your other imputation that our generall Assembly takes upon it to be judge what is Treason and who are fit to bee Counsellours nothing is more false But here you doe us the favour to prove your Alleageance by a long story to which I have given a full answer in the other Treatise At that time of King James minority Spotswood himselfe being witnesse our State was miserably misguided the Tyrannie of Captaine Iames supported too much by the favour of the Earle of Lennex was very grievous both to Church and State I touch but upon one instance The greatest subject of the Kingdome and at that time neerest to the King in blood was Iames Hamilton Earle of Arran a very gracious and most brave man before his sicknesse without any fault at all so much as alleaged for he was uncapable at that time of any crime being vinted with a distemper that made him keep his house and hindred him from meddling with any affaires of State yet was he spoiled by the fraud and violence of Captaine Iames Stewart of all his Lands and honour This violent oppressour was made Earle of Arran and Chancelour of the Kingdome At that time the designe was cleere and confessed to bring Queen Mary out of her prison in England to set her againe upon her Throne to advance the Catholique League which then was newly made betwixt the Guises King Iames his grand Uncles and the King of Spainâ— for the destroying Queen Elizabeth and the whole Protestant party For the preventing of these mischiefs the prime Nobility found it absolutely necessary to have the advancers of these counsels removed from the minor King What ever fault was in this action the Assembly is unjustly charged therewith Their advice was never sought thereto only halfe a yeare after it was done his Majesty sent a speciall Command to the Assembly for their approbation thereof for as by divers of his Letters to all the neighbour Princes he did signifie his good liking of that action so in all the great Courts of the Kingdome hee required it to be approved The privy Councell the convention of Estates the generall Assembly by his Majesties expresse Commission did all assent to his will It is true Captaine Iames so soon as he crept in againe into Court did change the young Kings mind but the event of that alteration was a more horrible confusion both of Church and State The Earle of Gowry was beheaded as a littâ—e before the Earle
of Morton sundry Gentlemen of good quality most innocent were hanged many of the prime Noblemen Gentlemen and Ministers were forced to flee for their lives out of the Kingdome till all of them joyning together did ride in Armes to Stirling and by violence though without hurt to any mans person did the second time remove those Courtiers and for ever after kept them from the King to the full quieting both of Church and State This Rode of Stirling was much more cried out upon by the wicked Prelates and Courtiers then the former of Ruthven yet was it approved for good service to the King and State not only as the former by the privie Counseâ—l and convention of States but also by the ensuing Parliament and so it remaines unquarrelled unto this day Your third complaint is P. 45. The Assembly repeales no lawes but supplicates the Parliament to recall their ratifications of Ecclesiasticall corruptions that the generall Assemblies doe alter what the Law has established all your examples hereof are The Votes of the late generall Assembly at Glasgow condemning the civill places of Church-men pronouncing the very office it selfe of Bishops to be unlawfull in the Church and crying downe the high Commission Court Here you fall upon the Parliament of England as fooles and Traitours for letting themselves bee perswaded by the Scots to swallow downe their wicked Covenant To all this our Apologie is briefe what ever power our generall Assembly possesses is all well allowed by the King and Parliament The acts of that Assembly you complaine of are all ratified by the State the order of our proceeding is appointed by Law all matters Spirituall and Ecclesiastick are first determined by the generall Assembly if the nature of the things require a civill Sanction the Votes of the Assembly are transmitted to the Parliament if a Generall Assembly have voted an Errour or any thing that 's wrong and that corruption hath been ratified by an Act of Parliament a Posterior generall Assembly recognosces the matter and finding an errour in Religion notwithstanding of the prior votes both of the Assembly and Parliament does condemne it and appoints Commissioners to represent the reasons of their vote to the next Parliament with an humble supplication to annull these Acts and Laws which did confirme the condemned corruption This has been the method of proceeding in Scotland since the first erection of a generall Assembly in this way were all the Errours of Popery first condemned in the Assembly before the Parliament did recall their old Lawes whiâ—â—â—â—nfirmed them The forme of this proceeding established by the Parliament it selfe does not import any subordination either of the lawes or the Parliament to the Assembly P. 46. It meddles with no civill Courts At this place p. 46. you bring us another story whereupon you make tragick out-cryes of the Assemblies insolent usurpations it seems you thought that this your book should never have come from Oxford into the hands of any Scottish man who knew the Custome of the Judicatories of Scotland I doe marvell much at your impudence that you should speake of the Assemblies incroaching upon the Lords of Session or medling with any Civill cause which the Law commits to any temporall Judicatory there is no better harmony in the world then alwayes has been in Scotland between the civill and Ecclesiasticall Judicatories no interfeiring was ever among them but what the Bishops made You indeed in your high Commission did take causes both civill and Ecclesiasticall to your Cognisance from all the Courts of the Kingdome and did at your pleasure without and contrary to all known Lawes finally determine them without any appeale but to the King by whom you were sure ever to be best beâ—eeved For the story in hand The case of Mr. John Graham I am content Spotswood be Judge as he relates it the matter was thus Mr. Iohn Graham one of the Lords of Session or Judges of the Common Pleas a very false and dishonest man intended an action against some poore men to put them from their Lands for to effectuate his purpose he seduced a publique Notary dwelling at Stirling and perswaded him to subscribe a false Writte upon the which the poore men by a decree of the Lords of Session were removed from their possessions The oppressed soules cryd out of their injurie and intended action against the Notary for his false Writ they got him arrested and imprisoned The Minister of the bounds Mr. Patrick Simpson whom King James and all Scotland knew to be a most learned zealous and pious Pastor as was in the whole Isle dealt with the Prisoner to confesse the truth after some conference he confessed all and declared how Mr. John Graham had sent his Brother to him with a false Writte which hee did subscribe an assize was called the poore Notary upon his own cousession was condemned and hanged Mr. John Graham as covetous and false so a most proud man would not rest satisfied but presently summoned Master Patrick Simpson to appeare before the Lords of Session as a seducer of the honest Notary to lye against his owne life Mr. Patrick was ready to cleare his own innocencie whereof all were well perswaded but shamefully wronged by an impudent man in his good name he caused cite him before the Assembly as a slanderer of a Minister in the work of his calling the Lords of Session not content that any of their number should be called before the Assembly for any action depending in their Court did send som of their number to the Assembly for to debate the whole matter The Assembly told them that they would not meddle with any thing that was civill nor which belonged to their Court that they intended to take no notice of their decrees at Mr. John Grahams instance to cast the poore 〈◊〉 out of their Land whether it was right or wrong nor the notaries Instrument wherefore he was hanged whether it was true or false They told them also that whatsoever they had to say to Mr. Patrick Simpson hee was to answer them as they should thinke fit in due time and place the Assemblies question was alone about the slander of one of their Members whom Mr. Iohn Graham did openly challenge as a Seducer of a Notary to beare false witnesse They had cited Mr. John Graham before them to make this good that so they might censure Mr. Patrick Simpson as a man unworthy of the Ministry or if Mr. John Graham's challenge was found a meere calumny that he might bee brought to repentance for it in acknowledging of his wrong Let any equitable man judge how insolent the Assemblies proceeding in this action was for a time there was some controversie about this matter betwixt the Assembly and the Session but at last all was amicably composed and God decided the question with the violent death and publick disgrace of Mr. Iohn Graham What ye subjoyne of King Iames trouble to the
unlawfull correction follow after according to the Word of God no man in Scotland did ever assert such things but the Question was as Spotswood himselfe states it Whether the Counsell was a competent Judge to Malter Melvils doctrine in prima instantia these were the expresse tearmes e Spotswoods Story fol. 175. yeer 1583. l. 6. he affirmed that what was spoken in Pulpit ought first to be tryed by the Presbytery and that neither the King nor Counsell might in prima instantia meddle therewith Master Melvill did protest for the liberties of the Church ratified by law avowing that as civil actiōs could not be called from before the ordinary Judicato ies to the Counsell Table though the King by his Letters should command it so causes meerly Ecclesiasticall should not be brought from the Presbyteries and Synods at least in the first instance He did also protest that the liberties of the Vniversity should not be violate for it was a priviledge of old conferred and very lately confirmed both by King and Parliament that no member of the University should be called before any Judicatory to the time their cause was heard and discussed within the University it selfe f Second Book of Discipline p. 25. Although Kings and Princes that be godly sometimes by their owne authority when the Kirk is corrupted and all things out of order place Ministers and restore the true service of the Lord after the example of some godly Kings of Juda and divers godly Emperours and Kings also in the light of the new Testament yet where the Ministry c. whether these Protestations were treasonable and dissonant from the Lawes and constant practice of Scotland will appeare more anon so much of the narrative The Ordinance pretended to be made upon occasion of Master Melvils misbehaviour What Supremacy is Irwfull was the Act of the Kings Supremacy over all persons That none should decline his Highnesse Authority Where it is to be observed that the contrivers of this Declaration while they endeavour to shew the occasion and rise of that second Act from Master Meloil and other Ministers their stirring up of people to Rebellion against their native King and their refuling to acknowledge the Soveraigne judgement for a godly quietnesse and order in the Common-wealth to appertaine to his Highnesse care and solicitude And it being professed in the same Declaration concerning that Act that his Majesties intention was onely to represse that immunity priviledge and exemption invented by the Pope to exempt himselfe and his Clergie from all judgement of Princes Yea the Declaration expressy waveth th Question of the Kings Supremacy in judging of cause Ecclesiasticall as not belonging to that present condition of affaires the Question being neither concerning heresies interpretation of Scripture the lawfull and ordinary Ecclesiasticall Judgement for preserving and maintaining Church Discipline nor concerning the power of Synods but concerning some of the Ministry joyning themselves as is there pretended to Rebels and disquieting the State These things considered it will appeare that as this Declaration infinitely wrongeth these learned and godly Ministers who were far from any disloyall doctrines or popish tenents concerning the immunity of Ministers from all judgement of Princes in matters belonging to quietnesse and order in the Common-wealth so it doth not cleerly hold forth that which peradventure was intended and is endeavoured in point of the Magistrate his supremacy in Ecclesiasticis by some who were very solicitous to have this Declaration reprinted whose principles suffer them not to rest satisfied with that measure of power which in a reformed and well constructed Church doth by the Word of God and by the Doctrine of the ancient and reformed Churches belong to the civill Magistrate in reference to Religion and causes Ecclesiasticall wherein also their power is further enlarged in extraordinary cases when the ordinary wayes and meanes of reformation cannot be had Some hopes it seemes there were to find in this Declaration another kind of Supremacy which is now the idol of many mifinformed minds which is also hightned farre above the moderate interpretations which were given by Doctor Bilson and Doctor Vsher I meane such a supremacy The Erastian Supremacy is more then a Turkish tyranny as makes the Magistrate the head and fountaine of all Jurisdiction Civill and Ecclesiastick which makes all powers within His Dominions to be but rivolets and streames derived from his Ocean making all the members of all Courts Spirituall and Civill to be but Commissioners at pleasure of the Prince putting all Lawes under his arbitrement and the Legislative power in his brest alone changing Parliaments into his arbitrary Counsels for matters of State as generall Assemblies for matters of the Church putting it in his free will to lay aside for ever both Parliaments and Assemblies and to set up in their places what Courts they thinke expedient for all causes of all persons that they may if so it be their pleasure commit the finall decision of all Ecclesiastick causes to some few Church and Statesmen of their owne nomination under the title of a High Commission or to two or three either of the Church or State under the name of Delegats or to any one Gentleman alone under the name of a Vicar generall also they may devolve the last determination of all civill causes upon a few favourites whether of the long or short Robe under the stile of a Star Chamber or Counsell Table or Cabinet counsell or private Juncto If this be the supremacy which the reprinters of the Declaration aime at we grant that many Prelats and Courtiers have alwayes been of their mind but I assure them the Scots Divines did ever abhorre such slavish maximes such a supremacy has alwayes been the fundamentall Law in the grand Segniors Port at Constantinople it has been for many yeers the possessed Prerogative of the French and Spanish Monarchs also from their example it has been the aime and endeavour not onely of other Kings but almost of all Princes and Soveraigne States how pettie soever so much is a sovereigne despotick and uncontroleable Domination naturally beloved by all who are in any neernesse or hope to attaine it But it is a morsell that has stuck with so many in the swallowing and poysoned so many in the digestion though swallowed downe that few who are wise will adventure any more to taste of it notwithstanding if the appetite of the publishers of this Writ will not be satisfied with any thing lesse then such a Supremacy let them be pleased to consider First If either King or Parliament admit of it it wil overthrow both and the whole Nation with them that this kind of supremacy will fall upon a subject where their harts wil be loath it should lodg it wil be found rather a part of the royall Prerogative then any Priviledge of Parliament and although according to their good friends last warning to the City the Crowne were broken
Pope to take in his hand both the Swords nnn Animadversions To confound the Jurisdiction Civill and Ecclesiasticall is that thing wherein all men of good judgement have justly found fault with the Pope of Rome who claimeth to himselfe the power of both the swords which is as great a fault to a Civill Magistrate to claime or usurpe and especially to judge upon doctrine errours and heresies he not being placed in Ecclesiasticall function to interpret the Scriptures the warrant hereof out of the Word of God we are ready to bring forth his Majesty did put it under his own hand that these things were far from his thoughts that he was no Judge either of doctrine or heresie or of the interpretation of Scripture that neither he nor his Parliament did meddle w th Excommunication that they had pronoūced the excommunication of Mountgomery to be null not as Judges of the cause but as witnesses of the informality of the processe he confessed that Jesus Christ was the onely head and Law-giver of his Church and that if he should claime to himself or his heirs any thing meerly Ecclefiastick which the Word of God has put in the hands of Church officers that if he or any man should suspend or alter any thing which the Word of God did remit onely to them he avowed that these attempts in himselfe or any other would be nothing else but as he speaks the sinne of Idolatry and a transgression against all the three Persons of the Trinity against the Father in not trusting the words of his Son against the Son in not obeying him but taking his place over his head ooo Kings Declaration Never shall I nor ever ought my Posterity acclaime any power or Jurisdiction in a matter meerly Ecclesiasticall as to the Commissioners not Ecclesiasticall they are joyned to give their advices and not to interpose their authority while Christ sayes Dic Ecclefias and one onely man did steale that dint against the Bishop of Glasgow in a quiet holl the Act of Parliament reduceth the sentence for informality and nullity of processe not as Judges whether the excommunication was grounded on good and just causes or not but as witnesses that it was unformally proceeded and to end shortly this my Declaration I mind not to cut away any liberty granted by God to his Church I acclaime not to my selfe to be judge of doctrine or true interpretation of Scripture my intention is not to discharge any Jurisdiction in the Kirke that is conforme to Gods Word nor to discharge any Assembly but onely that these shall be holden by my License and Counsellours my intention is not to meddle with excommunication neither acclaime I to my selfe or my heirs power in any thing that is meere Ecclesiasticall and not adiaphoron nor with any thing that Gods Word hath simply devolved in the hands of his Ecclesiasticall Kirk and to conclude I confesse and acknowledge Christ Jesus to be head of his Church and Lawgiver to the same and whatsoever persons doe attribute to themselves as head of the Church and not as members to suspend or alter any thing that the Word of God hath onely remitted to them That man I say committeth manifest Idolatry and sinneth against the Father in not trusting the words of his Son against the Son in not obeying him and taking his place against the holy Ghost the said holy spirit bearing the contrary record to his conscience against the holy Ghost because against the Spirits Testimony in his own conscience I hope they who are so earnest to have King James heard in this cause though in a false and suppositious Writ will be content to hear him in his true Declaration under his own hand The third part of the Writ containes an enumeration of his Majesties intentions The pretended intentions were not the Kings but the Prelats concerning them we need adde little to what is said onely consider first that Adamson the Author of the Writ assures us that there is nothing or little here of the Kings intentions ppp Recantation I have enterprized of meere remorse of conscience to write against a Book called The Declaration of the Kings Majesties intentions albeit it containeth little or nothing of the Kings intentions but of my own in the time of the writing thereof and the corrupt intentions of such as for the time were about the King and abused his minority in the whole Book is nothing contained but assertions of lyes ascribing to the Kings Majesty that whereof he was not culpable I grant I was more busie with some Bishops in England in prejudice of the discipline of our Kirke partly when I was there and partly since by mutuall intelligence then became a good Christian much lesse a faithfull Pastor being that he did here set downe onely his owne intentions and these of the Courtiers and Prelates at that time of their highest pride and greatest oppression of the religious party Secondly The Reprinters of this Writ seeme to bee perjured men and either hypocrits or Apostates the errours and faults that appeare in these intentiōs are of two kinds Prelaticall and Erastian For the first not onely the Author did recant them but also as we have now often said King James with the States Assembled in Parliament did expresly condemne them and at this time they stand condemned in the whole Isle by King Charles in his Parliament of Scotland and by both the Houses of the Parliament of England who ever now wil tak the patrociny of the Prelaticall war doth set his face against the King and Parliaments of both Nations and if he be a member of Parlia in either Nation whoaccording to his place must needs have sworn the National Covenant for his endeavor to establish what by his Covenāt he was boūd to his power to have extirpated Let him be cast with ignominy out of these honourable Senates as a false and perjured hypocrite planting by deed what by Oath and Covenant he promised to eradicat or else an Apostate repenting and retracting while now he is set in Parliament what at his entry upon oath he promised that he might be permitted to sit downe such perjured whether hypocrisie or apostacy cannot but be abominable both to God and all ingenuous men As for the Erastianisme of these intentions Cesaro-Papisme is Antichristianisme worse then that of the Pope whereby the Bishops are made pleni-potentiaries in the Church by vertue of a Commission from the Magistrate we have shewed at length how farre King James disclaimed this errour as a grievous sinne against the Father Son and holy Ghost for the thing it selfe makes the Magistrate head of the Church and fountaine of all Ecclesiastick Jurisdiction This Cesaro-papisme is an Antichristianisme so much worse then that of the Pope as more uncontrolable and remedilesse the servants of God in their wrastlings against the Antichistianisme of the Pope and Prelats had often times great