getting into highest place and looking on things at neerer distance they see the Impossibility of Reforming them when casting away all care and hope of it the next take up that pretext which they have quitted and with as great privat heat and as little for the publique good never leave putting for it till they have obtain'd the others place whence it consequently follows that but open this Gate once of Reformation which their shoving and justling never suffers to close again and you Introduce by it nothing but disorder and confusion I grant you yet it hath done great things in the World but undone greater and some good but far more harm and mischief these busie Reformers seeing somewhat or other which they would amend but not a hundred others which they marr in mending it whence the Wise when they see things amisse measure their Enterprises by the possibility and utility of amending them which when they find wanting they pity the Condition of poor Humanity that hath nothing so absolutely good as to be wholly exempt from fault and blame rather than vex and torment her for it by tampering so long to mend it till they marr it quite Of which over-busie so long to mend it till they marr it quite Of which over-busie folly the English Nation in particular are Tax'd it having past almost into Proverb That your English-man never knows when things are well And such Reformers as these they were who lately represented this Petition unto the Honorable House of Parliament under the name of the County of Salop though their restriction to several of the Godly party there sufficiently acquits the County and declares them to he such as one pleasantly describes A sort of hot-headed half-witted Fellows who in the vehemency of their zeal have more harm'd and mischiev'd Christian Religion than Turk Jew or Infidel ever did and have more texts of Scripture for it too than the other out of the Talmude or Alcoran who have found out a new way under the name of the Lord to abolish the memory of Jesus Christ and of that of Godlinesse all Christianity being the worst sort of Affectation affecting nothing but what is contrary and averse to all good manners and education Who are more familiar with the Lord than to stand upon Ceremonies with him and approach him with far lesse Reverence than a Serving-man does his Master or a Clown his Landlord so hating the name of Gentleman as they cann't indure God should be serv'd like one and so abhorring the name of Church as they wage war with the very stones of it like cowardly Currs who bite the stones when they cannot harm the persons confounding by it all things sacred and profane Mean time any place serves them to Preach in as any place indeed is good enough for their Preaching who teach nothing bu Sedition and Infatuation so as whilst others people Heaven with their Preaching these people Bed-I am Mean while they wave the Evangelists and flie to the explication of the Prophets the better to hide their Ignorance since ther all are almost Ignorant alike like him who when he could not run challenged an excellent Footman to flie with him Men indulgent only to their own Vices but most rigid to those of other men who call themselves pure like him who being all over defiled bragg'd He had never a spot on him and thanking God with the Pharisee for not being like other men it being the truest word they ever said in their lives for they are worse than they And now let us see whether this Character fits not our Petitioners as well as if it had been made for them by conferring their Petitions with these Animadversions of ours And first to say nothing of their Preface nor their Goodly stile all stuff'd and interlarded with Scripture phrase so senselesly alleg'd as I will not say their reading of the Scripture seems to make them mad but certainly this I dare affirm that those who read it lesse write far better and more sense than they and would never have said the paths to dwell in as they do but rather the paths to walk in according to the more proper metaphore so abusing every where the Scripture stile as Pistols phrase in the play He hears with ears would no more seem to Sir Hugh superfluous and absurd But they are those dear Saints of Jesus Christ as they speak of and therefore have the liberty of profaning the Scripture on every occasion but for their sanctity believe it who lists for me for my part I believe none to be lesse Saints than those who call themselves so the most and give me the dead and take the living he that will so it shall alwayes be in my Letanie to deliver me from the Devil in an Angels shape and I 'll deliver my self from the Devil in his own shape well enough But let us come to their Petitions and in the first four we shall observe a vehement desire they have That none but they should be admitted to the charge of the Ministry of the Command of the Army of the Government of the Common-wealth and finally to the distribution of all other Preferments and Rewards they seeming much troubled that they are not conferr'd upon them and troubled still may they be rather than we should ever be troubled with them By which we may perceive them to be some discarded party casheer'd from the Army for their cowardice and want of discipline some rejected and excluded from the Government of the Commonwealth for their want of Talent and non-sufficiency and finally some refuse stuff and out-casts of the Ministry for their turbulency and non-conformity people of no parts nor merit at all else 't were to tax the State and the wisdom and prudent Conduct of the General and Officers for not admitting them to Charge and Imployment Such rash and stupid fellows and such Poltrons and Cowards withall as should I give the right child to the right mother which they urge more than once I could shew how they never yet had the management of affairs but that they brought them to ruine destruction nor ever fought but either they were beaten or ran-away which being so far be it from the Commonwealth to have such to reform and govern it who are hardly fit to govern a Cobblers or a Botchers shop and far be the Omen from our ever-victorious and conquering Army to have such as these mens Fortunes joyn'd with theirs or to be mix'd with those who deserve not to be named the same day a brave spirit and valiant man is mentioned No live the Commonwealth and flourish the Army still and it shall never shame nor repent us of our change of Government so long as such as these come not to govern it Men of so narrow so Ignoble minds as nothing great and generous ever entred into their brests for so 't would be a degree below servitude nothing making servitude more intolerable than
are in good hands and we may no wayes doubt but those who have so well begun will not be wanting to the perfectioning of them FINIS To the Supreme Authority of this Common-wealth of England The Honourable Court of Parliament now sitting The humble Petition of several of the Godly party in the County of Salop Sheweth THat we cannot omit the acknowledgment of all those various Providences God hath made his people in this Nation partakers of in owning our Armies and making them both formidable to and victorious over our Enemies at Sea and Land in staining the glory of the proud dedegrading unprofitable men from their stations and planting you in their room whose beginnings begin to revive our hopes That our Lord Iesus Christ will yet have in England men executing judgement and speaking the truth Certainly if you go on we doubt not but the children that are to be born will have cause to call you blessed as the repairers of our Breaches the restorers of paths to dwel in and you will render your selves of more worth and value than thousands so that your precedency of Honour and Grace will transcend your predecessors and in all probability God will establish you as so many Luminaries in your stations to shine more and more unto the day of our deliverance In hopes whereof as also of your real inclinations to hearken to the desires of the meanest Saint and of those that wish well to Truth Peace amongst the other large endeavours of others we have taken the liberty of presenting the small mite of our Proposals which we hope will be looked at amongst the thousand of Israel 1. That as God hath trusted you in a special manner with the guarding of the Truth and Gospel you will have a special eye to the propagation thereof And because there ar many idle ignorant scandalous malignant Ministers permitted that endeavour the subversion thereof as apears to many of the dear Saints of Christ to the great grief of their spirits We humbly desire that some speedy course may be taken for the ejection of such men and the setling of those that are fit and faithful for so great a work and that those may not be suffered as Preachers thereof who hate to see it prosper and stand like the Red Dragon ready to devour the child Grace as soon as born 2. That notwithstanding the sufferings of many of the People and the great deliverances vouchsafed them yet they scarcely know them as by the effects of them in any encouragement they have yet received more than the most notorious and bitterest of your Enemies It is proposed that you will have a special regard to your friends above your enemies Had the late King prevailed his friends had received large rewards as appears by his own Ingagements you and yours threatned with total destruction Oh then why should you not countenance your friends as well as your enemies theirs we hope you will not tread in the paths of your predecessors to reward evil for good but will give the right child to the right mother and suffer those now to rejoyce with you who have formerly mourned with you and will still while you are for God live and die with you 3 Because we hear many Souldiers complain who have ventured their lives from the beginning and want imployment since their willing submission to former commands of Disbanding we humbly propose That a deep inspection may be made in your Army for the ejection of those that would not be listed for you so long as they could find an Army with which to fight against you and the number may be made up again by those who have been your constant friends 4. That whereas many men by their fawning flatteries lie at your doors out of sinister ends to beg for places we desire that none may be admitted to any place of trust either in the Army or Common-wealth but such as are known to you for men of fidelity and integrity or else commended to you by the Certificate of five or six of your Friends that so things may be carried on more by the publick spirit of the Saints than the private spirit of any whatsoever 5. That whereas we hear many of our Nation saying to you as the children of Israel to Rehoboam take away our burthens take away our taxations we further propose That the burthen of Contribution may be laid upon those who have been the grand Incendiaries and Contrivers of the War we mean the Cavaliers it being unjust as we humbly conceive that they should cut out the work and we bear the burthen they double the tale of Brick and we do the Task O let the right child have the right Mother it will make them more willing to sit still 6. That whereas many take liberty of keeping Wakes setting up Morice Dances and other prophane Sports against which there is no particular Law we humbly desire some positive Rules may be framed for suppressing thereof 7. In regard it it generally observed that the foul Sins of Adultery and Fornication are too frequently unpunished more than before the day of our deliverance for which our Enemies reproach us sich the Act only limits the punishment to the testimony of two Witnesses that a mock may not be made of such foul sins We desire a way may be found and some special Law instituted for the punishmet thereof 8. That in regard of the freedom given to Saints in their several Churches and meetings on the Lords day is abused so that Papists and other prophane persons take liberty of contemning the Sabbath and publick Ordinances and spend the day vainly and idly in their houses or else walking in the Fields we propose That some special course may be taken of restraint that the freedom of the Saints may not be turned to the prophanation of the Lords Day 9. That the Excize may be taken away in the oppressive manner of farming it that poor people may not be bought and sold in this Nation as too frequently they are and some raise vast estates by the bargain 10. That the poor which dayly swarm in England both in City and Country begging in the Highways and at our houses to the great dishonour and prejudice of the Nation may in some due way be provided for and not suffered to wander as Vagabonds upon the face of the earth And your Petitioners shall pray c. Animadversions ON THE PETITION THere is nothing more specious than the name of Reformation and nothing less than the thing it self I mean that which the vulgar magnifie and cry up so much the disease of mens minds rather than of the Times untill their Imagination fools them into a real malady and never lets them recover afterwards the Itch of Good Times and the Ulcer of Ill most pernicious to Kingdoms and Commonwealths as alwayes Enemy to present Government Every one who would trouble the State taking it for their pretext till
THE Evill Spirit Conjur'd AND Cast out of the PARLIAMENT LONDON Printed for R. F. and are to be sold by St. Dunstans Church and in the upper I le of the New-Exchange 1653. THE Evill Spirit Conjur'd And cast out of the PARLIAMENT A Melancholly mischievous spirit having crept of late into the Parliament under I know not what pretext of Godliness as the Devil is never more Devil than when he transforms himself into an angel of light in the persons of some who craftily had counterfeited themselves good Patriots and zealous for the Religion Laws and Liberties of the Land until finding themselves in authority they presently cast off their mask and declared the spirit which was in them playing such reaks there as never did any pernicious spirit in house which was hanted and possess'd before The Lord General and others prudently perceiving it alwayes carefully vigilant for the Common good and finding how much they had abused their trust and suffrages in Electing them timely provided to cast this spirit forth before its exorbitancy should proceed so far and arrive to such a heighth as to disturb the peace of the Cōmonwealth and quite subvert the intended settlement and establishment thereof yet this not without first proceeding with such maturity in doing it to disabuse such who ignorantly else perhaps might have imagined that in lieu of a bad spirit they had cast out a good as they expected with much longanimity until it sufficiently had declar'd it self in divers Actions tending to the subversion of the Religion Laws and Liberties of the free-born people of England which they were constituted there to establish and maintain as by the seditious Preachings of those of their faction in Black-Friers c. sufficiciently appear'd they uttering more scandalous and scurrillous things in the Pulpit there than ever did the Play-house against which they preacht so much Which action of his Excellency and others was received with so general applause and satisfaction of all as the Bels were rung for joy and the smiles outwardly appearing on every face did sufficiently declare the inward Iubilee of their hearts The twelfth of December being render'd as Celebrous by it and worthy to be ever celebrated with Bels Bonfires and Thanksgiving as was the fifth of November for the happy deliverance of the Parliament before For what true born Englishman would not rejoice who loved his Country and the honour of his Nation to see that spirit cast out of the Parliament that had been so pernicious to the Common-wealth had it been longer tolerated it would not have left the least footsteps or memorials of its Antient Religion Lawes and Liberties and had done actions so manifestly shamefull and injurious to the Grief of the other Members of the House who more prudent and conscientious were joined with them and forcibly hurryed away by the impetuous torrent of those who were agitated by this spirit as would have call'd an Infamy upon our Nation not only from the remotest parts of the VVorld but even from the Barbarians themselves who for all their barbarism were never so unjust as they Who would not rejoice to have that spirit disauthorized which was so unworthy its authority as whilest the grave Reasonings and prudent Discourses of other Parliaments were the admimiration of all neighbouring Nations this spirit as if it were besotted with its place which ordinarily renders others wiser to the indignation of all the wiser sort would rise up with its Hat at its fingers ends like a School-boy saying Grace and instead of all other Reason and Discourse say forsooth That notwithstanding all that could be said his spirit told him it was so and so And if this was not declining to the spirit of Tyranny let any one be Judge when Stat proratione voluntas my Reason is my Will is the highest point of Tyranny as can be imagined Who finally would not rejoyce to have that spirit cast out and silenced who would have silenc'd all but it self and shortly Enacted that it should be a crime for any one to laugh or be merry under the pretence of Godliness forsooth only to render Religion irksome odious and burthensom unto all which being of it self a chearfull thing as the holy Scripture testifies Hilarem datorem diligit Deus c. that God loves the chearfull Giver they on the contrary would make it so sullen and melancholly a thing as our Nation alwayes of a gay and jovial disposition would never brook nor endure it Religion being not to be given and administred unto us as a Medicin with loathing and bitterness but as our meat and daily food savoury and pleasant to the tast to delight the palat and provoke the appetite For the farther discovery of this spirits mischievous disposition and pernicious machinations and designes I remit the Reader to these following Animadversions written some moneths before its casting out of the Parliament as a presage of what should afterwards ensue where though then I struck at them thorough others sides I being alwayes most cautious not to offend those in authority being also premonished that furor est scribere contraeos qui praescribere possunt yet now I dare confidently draw the Curtain which shadowed it before and invite them to the reading it themselves with this avow de te Fabula narratur that it was meant by them whose custom it was for the deceiving of the people to suborn some of their own Faction to Petition them to do that which they were resolved to doe before Mean time let us congratulate with his Excellency and the rest and sing Panegyriques in his praise for this great Action and if I may say it greater than all his other Victories the other being only over men but this over the infernal spirit the other not being without bloodshed and making of Widdows and Fatherlesse but this preserving us from it and the Calamities of a new Warre which this fiery spirit would have driven us unto might he have been let go on And if any demand what we should doe with him now he is cast out of the Parliament by my Advice as those Devils who were cast out by our Saviour together with the Swine which they possessed afterwards were all precipitated into the Sea so I could wish they might be all shipt and sent away by Sea from the Old to New England as a just punishment for their attempting to have made a New England of the Old However since such spirits as these are not only cast out by Prayer and Fasting but somtimes by force and violence as Cor. Agripp testifies let us not only pray but use our utmost endeavors as we have done for the expelling him that this spirit serve us not as that wicked one did in the Gospel who being cast out and the house clean swept of him did but wander about a while and afterwards returned seven times more wicked then he was before but of this we need take no care things