all others besides themselves are to be excluded from Governing or chusing of Governours And amongst the ungodly that are to be thus excluded he reckons all those that will not hearken to their Pastours he means the Presbyterian Classis or that are despisers of the Lord's-Day that is all such as are not Sabbatarians or will not keep the Lord's day after the Jewish manner which they prescribe and which is condemned for Judaism by all even of the Presbyterian perswasion in the world but those of England and Scotland onely XV. If a People that by Oath and Duty are obliged to a Sovereign shall sinfully dispossess him and contrary to their Covenants chuse and Covenant with another they may be obliged by their latter Covenant notwithstanding their former and particular subjects that consented not in the breaking of their former Covenants may yet be obliged by occasion of their latter choice to the person whom they chuse Thes. 181. XVI If a Nation injuriously deprive themselves of a worthy Prince the hurt will be their own and they punish themselves but if it be necessarily to their welfare it is no injury to him But a King that by war will seek reparations from the body of the people doth put himself into an hostile State and tells them actually that he looks to his own good more than theirs and bids them take him for their Enemy and so defend themselves if they can Pag. 424. XVII Though a Nation wrong their King and so quoad Meritum causoe they are on the worser side yet may he not lawfully war against the publick good on that account nor any help him in such a war because propter fiuem he hath the worser cause Thes. 352. And yet as he tells us pag 476. we were to believe the Parliaments Declarations and professions which they made that the war which they raised was not against the King either in respect of his Authority or of his Person but onely against Delinquent Subjects and yet they actually fought against the King in person and we are to believe saith Mr. Baxter pag. 422. that men would kill them whom they fight against Mr. Baxter's Doctrine concerning the Government of England in particular HE denies the Government of England to be Monarchical in these words I. The real Sovereignty here amongst us was in King Lords and Commons Pag. 72. II. As to them that argue from the Oath of Supremacy and the title given the King I refer them saith Mr. Baxter to Mr. Lawson's answer to Hobbs's Politicks where he sheweth that the Title is often given to the single Person for the honour of the Commonwealth and his encouragement because he hath an eminent interest but will not prove the whole Sovereignty to be in him and the Oath excludeth all others from without not those whose interest is implied as conjunct with his The eminent dignity and interest of the King above others allowed the name of a Monarchy or Kingdom to the Commonwealth though indeed the Sovereignty was mixed in the hands of the Lords and Commons Pag. 88. III. He calls it a false supposition 1. That the Sovereign power was onely in the King and so that it was an absolute Monarchy 2 That the Parliament had but onely the proposing of Laws and that they were Enacted onely by the King's Authority upon their request 3. That the power of Arms and of War and Peace was in the King alone And therefore saith he those that argue from these false suppositions conclude that the Parliament being Subjects may not take up Arms without him and that it is Rebellion to resist him and most of this they gather from the Oath of Supremacy and from the Parliaments calling of themselves his Subjects but their grounds saith he are sandy and their superstructure false Pag. 459 460. And therefore Mr. Baxter tells us that though the Parliament are Subjects in one capacity yet have they their part in the Sovereignty also in their higher capacity Ibid. And upon this false and traitorous supposition he endeavours to justifie the late Rebellion and his own more than ordinary activeness in it For IV. Where the Sovereignty saith he is distributed into several hands as the King 's and Parliaments and the King invades the others part they may lawfully defend their own by war and the Subject lawfully assist them yea though the power of the Militia be expresly given to the King unless it be also exprest that it shall not be in the other Thes. 363. The conclusion saith he needs no proof because Sovereignty as such hath the power of Arms and of the Laws themselves The Law that saith the King shall have the Militia supposeth it to be against Enemies and not against the Commonwealth nor them that have part of the Sovereignty with him To resist him here is not to resist power but usurpation and private will in such a case the Parliament is no more to be resisted than he Ibid. V. If the King raise War against such a Parliament upon their Declaration of the dangers of the Common-wealth the people are to take it as raised against the Commonwealth Thes. 358. And in that case saith he the King may not onely be resisted but ceaseth to be a King and entreth into a state of War with the people Thes. 368. VI. Again if a Prince that hath not the whole Sovereignty be conquered by a Senate that hath the other part and that in a just defensive War that Senate cannot assume the whole Sovereignty but supposeth that government in specie to remain and therefore another King must be chosen if the former be incapable Thes. 374. as he tells us he is by ceasing to be King in the immediately precedent Thes. VII And yet in the Preface to this Book he tells us that the King withdrawing so he calls the murthering of one King and the casting off of another the Lords and Commons ruled alone was not this to change the species of the Government Which in the immediate words before he had affirmed to be in King Lords and Commons which constitution saith he we were sworn and sworn and sworn again to be faithfull to and to defend And yet speaking of that Parliament which contrary to their Oaths changed this Government by ruling alone and taking upon them the Supremacy he tells us that they were the best Governours in all the world and such as it is forbidden to Subjects to depose upon pain of damnation What then was he that deposed them one would think Mr. Baxter should have called him a Traitour but he calls him in the same Preface the Lord Protector adding That he did prudently piously faithfully and to his immortal honour exercise the Government which he left to his Son to whom as Mr. Baxter saith pag. 484. he is bound to submit as set over us by God and to obey for conscience sake and to behave himself as a Loyal Subject towards him
maker of them And yet because he cannot make them but of such materials as are by the two Houses prepared and proposed unto him therefore they are said in the common and modern stile to be enacted not by the King only but by the King Lords and Commons that is by the King and the two Houses also to the end that the People who are to be governed by them may as I said before the more willingly submit to them when they know that although they are called the Kings Laws as being made by him yet the materials whereof they were made were first devised debated digested and agreed on and then suggested to the King not only by the Lords but by the House of Commons also that is by their own Representatives and Trustees and consequently in effect by their own selves when they know this I say they must needs be the more willing to submit to them CHAP. VI. The Preface of our Laws doth not prove the Legislative Power to be in the Parliament The Old stile of enacting Laws why changed by Henry the VIII and why since resumed AND this and no more than this is the meaning of the modern form of prefacing our Laws and Statutes which we call Acts of Parliament when they are said to be enacted by the King Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament and by the Authority of the same which I call the modern stile because antiently it was otherwise And therefore Mr. Baxter laying so much stress as he doth upon this form of words to prove the Legislative Power and consequently a principal branch of the Soveraignty to be partly in the Parliament meaning the two Houses of Parliament doth well and wisely to say that he will not run to Records for he knows if he know any thing in that kind that this was not the stile that was anciently used in Prefacing the Acts or Statutes made by our Kings in Parliament Ab initio non fuit sic from the beginning it was not so For from the first of our Parliaments recorded by Poulton which was in the 9th of Hen. III. to the 15th of Hen. VIII this stile of Be it enacted by the King Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons in this present Parliament assembled was never used but during all that long Interval of Eleven Kings Raigns and the very many several Parliaments held by them the making ordaining and passing of Laws was in the Kings name only sometime with this addition by or with the Advice and consent of his Bishops Earls Barons c. without naming the Commons and sometimes by the advice of His Bishops Earls Barons c. at the request of the Commonalty or at the special request of the Commons and sometimes with consent of the Commons as well as of the Lords But still and always the making or enacting of the Laws is said to be by the King alone sometimes in these words We of Our meer free will have given and granted which is the stile of Magna Charta or the great Charter it self sometimes in these The King willeth and commandeth and sometimes in these It is by the King made provided and ordained This I say was the stile all along which was used in passing of Laws or Acts of Parliament until the 15th of Hen. VIII for about 300. years And then indeed it began to be changed from Be it Enacted by the King with the advice and consent of the Lords and Commons to Be it enacted by the King Lords Spiritual and Temporal and the Commons but not constantly For in the very next King's time his very first Act of Parliament Cap. 1. runs in the old stile viz. Be it enacted by the Kings Highness with the assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of the Commons And again in the same Parliament Cap. 4. it is said that at the humble Petition and suit of the Lords and Commons in that Parliament assembled the King did declare ordain and enact by the Assent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of the Commons c. In the same old stile likewise runs the first Act of Queen Mary viz. Be it ordained and enacted by the Queen our Soveraign Lady with the consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of the Commons c. The like we find in the Raign of Queen Elizabeth as may be seen in the Act of Vniformity made by Her and prefixed in our Common-Prayer-Book to another Act of the same kind made by our present King For in that of Queen Elizabeth the stile is Be it enacted by the Queens Highness with the consent of the Lords and Commons in this Parliament assembled c. And in that of our present King it is Be it enacted by the Kings most Excellent Majesty by the advice and with the consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and of the Commons in this Parliament assembled c. So that the first of the two Proofs Mr. Baxter alledgeth for the Legislative power in the Parliament as well as in the King and consequently their participating with him in the Soveraignty is not so convincingly conclusive from the stile used in the Preface to Acts of Parliament as he would have it thought to be but that it may without immodesty be contradicted though he tells us it cannot because saith he the Laws expresly speak their Authority when they say Be it enacted by the King Lords and Commons in Parliament and by the Authority of the same It is not saith he upon their Petition or Proposal only but by them or by their Authority But did the Laws anciently speak thus at all or do all of them speak thus in all our modern and later Acts I think I have given him Instances of both sorts to the contrary and such and so many Instances as must carry the Question if it be to be decided by the speaking of the Laws either in regard of their Antiquity or Plurality For as I said before all Laws made before Hen. VIII speak and speak expresly the King and none but the King to be the maker of them as may appear by the Instances before given and of many more that might have been given even as many more as there were Acts of Parliament during the Reigns of so many Kings for 300. years during which time I cannot find so much as one single instance of any Law which is said to be enacted by King Lords and Commons but by the King with the advice and consent of the Lords and Commons when most is ascribed to them I mean to the Commons for sometimes it is upon the request and sometimes upon the humble Petition of the Commons and with the advice and consent of the Lords that the Law is said to be enacted by the King So that if as I said before the question of who are the Law-makers be to be decided by the speaking of the Laws
because as he saith in the same place a full and free Parliament had owned him thereby implying That a maimed and a manacled House of Commons without King and Lords and notwithstanding the violent expulsion of the secluded Members were a full and free Parliament and consequently that if such a Parliament should have taken Arms against the King he must have sided with them Yea though they had been never so much in fault and though they had been the beginners of the War for he tells us in plain and express terms VIII That if he had known the Parliament had been the beginners of the War and in most fault yet the ruine of the Trustees and Representatives and so of all the security of the Nation being a punishment greater than any faults of theirs against the King could deserve from him their faults could not disoblige him meaning himself from defending the Commonwealth Pag. 480. And that he might doe this lawfully and with a good Conscience he seems to be so confident that in his Preface he makes as it were a challenge saying that if any man can prove that the King was the highest power in the time of those Divisions and that he had power to make that war which he made he will offer his head to Justice as a Rebel As if in those times of Division the King had lost or forfeited his Sovereignty and the Parliament had not onely a part but the whole Sovereignty in themselves IX Finally Mr. Baxter tells us Pag. 486. That having often searched into his heart whether he did lawfully engage into the War or not and whether he did lawfully encourage so many thousands to it he tells us I say that the issue of all his search was but this That he cannot yet see that he was mistaken in the main cause nor dares he repent of it nor forbear doing the same if it were to doe again in the same state of things He tells us indeed in the same place that if he could be convinc'd he had sinned in this matter he would as gladly make a publick recantation as he would eat or drink which seeing he hath not yet done it is evident he is still of the same mind and consequently would upon the same occasion doe the same things viz. fight and encourage as many thousands as he could to fight against the King for any thing that calls it self or which he is pleased to call a full and free Parliament as likewise that he would own and submit to any Vsurper of the Sovereignty as set up by God although he came to it by the murther of his Master and by trampling upon the Parliament Lastly That he would hinder as much as possibly he could the restoring of the rightfull Heir unto the Crown And now whether a man of this Judgment and of these affections ought to be permitted to Preach or no Let any but himself judge THE Bishop of Winchester's VINDICATION Of Himself from divers False Scandalous and Injurious Reflexions made upon him by Mr. RICHARD BAXTER in several of his Writings As likewise A Vindication of the Rights and Sovereignty of all Kings properly so called and particularly of the King of England's being sole Soveraign over all persons in all capacities within his own Realms and Dominions from What Mr. Baxter to justifie the Rebellion against our late King of ever blessed Memory hath in many of his False Factious and Seditious Aphorisms asserted to the contrary Together with A Proposal of a more Legal and more effectual Expedient for the keeping Popery and Arbitrary Government for ever out of England than the passing of an Act to exclude the right Heir from Succession to the Crown either now or hereafter is will be or can be LONDON Printed for Joanna Brome 1683. SECTION I. Mr. BAXTER'S Assertion at the Savoy undeniably proved upon him and consequently his Charge against the Bishop of many mistakes in his Letter in matter of fact and of his Gross mistaking charge viz. Concerning the judgment of the Nonconformists of things sinfull by Accident cleared The Bishop of Winchester's Vindication of himself from divers false scandalous and injurious Reflexions made upon him by Mr. Richard Baxter in several of his Writings CHAP. I. Mr. Baxter 's Charge against the Bishop gathered out of several Writings of his and set down in his own words MAster Baxter in his Preface to his Book called by him The true and onely way of Concord of all Christian Churches reflecting upon a Letter of mine Written and Printed near 20 years before saith There are so many Mistakes in matter of fact in it that although he had made an Answer to it yet he cast it aside for Peace sake believing that the opening of the aforesaid so many mistakes would not easily be born the rather because as he says in the words immediately foregoing he knew he had greatly incurr'd both our displeasures already to wit the Bishop of Ely's and mine for what he had said and done against our Way and that as to my particular the aforesaid Letter of mine was a proof of it Again in the same Preface to the same Book he saith You meaning the Bishop of Ely and Me to whom he addresseth that Preface have above all men I know effectually helped to bring us meaning himself and the rest of his Party under These are Mr. Baxter's complements when he speaks to me and therefore I am not to expect more Civility from him when he speaks of me as he doth in divers of his Books which I have seen and perhaps in many more of them which I have not seen for I hope all men are not bound to reade all Mr. Baxter writes But in those I have seen when he speaks of me it is neither Honoris nor Charitatis gratiâ but to reproach me either directly and in express terms or covertly and by the bye as when in his Preface to the second part of his Plea for Nonconformists he saith It was Bishop Morley 's gross mistaking charge that made him write one whole Tract or Treatise namely That of things sinfull per Accidens or by accident Again in the former part of the aforesaid Plea for Nonconformists he saith Bishop Morley advised him to reade Bilson and Hooker in whom saith he I found more than he approv'd for resisting and restraining of Kings Again in another of his printed Papers I mean that Paper which he would have taken for a Recantation of some of those Political Aphorisms I had laid to his charge though he do not name me yet he points directly at me as if I had accused him for asserting That all humane powers are limited by God which to deny as he there insinuates I do and elsewhere plainly tells me I do is to defy Deity and Humanity and consequently makes me a defyer of them both Lastly with the same ingenuity and candour he aims at me more obscurely and more obliquely indeed
the Primitive Christians but to the Dictates of right Reason also I thought there would have been no need of saying any more to prove the late War here in England to be Unlawful because I took it for granted that it was a War made against the King and that our King was our only Sovereign and that those that made the War were but Subjects meer Subjects and no more than Subjects But Mr. Baxter tells us First That the late War was not made against the King Secondly That the King was not our Sovereign at least not our sole Sovereign And Thirdly That those that made the War were not meer Subjects but had their share in the Sovereignty and that in the chiefest part of the Sovereignty namely the Legislative power as well as the King had And upon these grounds he builds his Babel of confusion and of the solidity of these grounds he is so very confident that he saith he will confess himself to have been a Rebel nay a most perfidious Rebei and that he will offer his Head to Justice as a Rebel if these grounds of his can be solidly confuted Let us try therefore whether they be so impregnable as he presumes they are or no. I for my part am so far from thinking them to be so that they seem to me to have no solidity at all in any of them We will begin with the first viz. that the late War here in England was not a War against the King and therefore could not be a Rebellion The Consequence I confess to be good But how doth he prove the Antecedent why he proves the Antecedent namely that the War was not against the King because the Parliament declared it was not against the King but only against his evil Counsellors and his Delinquent Subjects that misled him and were his Enemies as well as the Commonwealths And it was upon this account saith Mr. Baxter that I served the Parliament nor do I know saith he that I ever fought against the King unless every one of the Kings Soldiers was a King or some one of them at least From which saying of his I observe by the way that Mr. Baxter himself in obedience to the Parliament did himself personally fight against the Kings Soldiers but not against the King unless some one of those Soldiers he fought against was the King as if no body can be said to fight against the King but one that hath a personal Combat or Duel with the King And perhaps the Parliament not thinking it time yet to speak out did hope to make the People believe that they made War against Delinquent Subjects only and not against the King because they did not as the King of Syria did command their General and his Officers to fight with neither small nor great but only with the King It is true the Parliament did not so but it is true too that they did not except the King from being fought with neither nor consequently from being kill'd For as Mr. Baxter saith it is to be suppos'd those that fight would kill those with whom they fight and then what might have become of the King if Mr. Baxter had hapned to encounter him when he was a fighting with other of his Soldiers But to let this pass as spoken of occasionally only Mr. Baxter tells us that he and those that engaged with him in the late War were obliged to believe the Parliaments Declaration that it was not a War against the King because the Parliament were not only the most competent Witnesses and Judges but the chosen Trustees of the Peoples Liberties But whom or what doth Mr. Baxter mean by such Parliaments as the People are obliged to believe surely not the King Lords and Commons which is the true notion of a Parliament no nor the Lords and Commons who both of them together are but the Body of a Parliament without a Head For the reason which he gives why they the People are obliged to believe them is because they are their chosen Trustees but so are the House of Commons only and not the Lords So that whatsoever the House of Commons declare or remonstrate unto the People is to be believed to be true and just and legal and the People to act accordingly and some there will always be that will do so For Example the House of Commons in the late Kings time Voted the Duke of Buckingham this Dukes Father to be an Enemy to the publick and therefore Felton thought himself obliged to kill him and did so and for no other reason but that only For being presently apprehended and ask't why he did it Look said he betwixt the Crown and Lining of my Hat and you shall find the reason why I thought my self bound in conscience to God and in duty to my King and Country to do it And there as he told them they should they found a Paper sticht to the inside of the Lining with the aforesaid Vote of the House of Commons written upon it And this was told me by a very credible Witness Sir Tho. Alisbury then one of the Masters of Requests but formerly Secretary for the Admiralty to the aforesaid Duke who was by when he was Murder'd and heard the aforesaid Examination of Felton and his justifying of what he had done upon that account of the aforesaid Vote of the House of Commons which was taken out of his Hat and seen and read by the aforesaid Sir Tho. Alisbury I have repeated the Story of this matter of fact the rather because there have been of late divers such Votes passed in the House of Commons against several Persons of eminent Quality and Dignity who were all of them to be supposed to be innocent until they were proved to be guilty and yet before any such proof made or any proceeding against them per legem terrae or according to the Law of the Land as some of them were so all of the like quality that is all the Nobility may be condemned by a Major party of a House of Commons as Enemies to the Commonwealth or of King and Kingdom and according to Mr. Baxter's Doctrine must by the People be believed to be so and consequently they that are so Voted how many how great and how innocent soever they are they are to be exposed to have their throats cut by any Fanatical Zealot or which is worse to be torn in pieces by the inraged Rabble as the two Dewitts were lately in Holland and as Dr. Lamb was in London in the Reign of King James For it is but giving of the Word in such a season and down goes that Voted or rather that Devoted Person and is knock'd on the head before he can open his mouth to speak for himself when perhaps he is not the Man they took him for neither What is become in the mean time of Magna Charta
Where is the security thereby provided for the Lives Liberties and Properties of Free-born English-men when an arbitrary Vote of the House of Commons if it be believed as Mr. Baxter saith it must be by the People and be put in execution as Mr. Baxter cannot deny but it may be because it hath been may take away any mans life how innocent soever without any farther process or a legal proof of any crime against him For who is there that can secure himself from such a Vote or that can be secured after he is devoted by such a Vote from being killed by the next man that meets him in the Streets for there be more Feltons saith Mr. Baxter than one neither will the hanging of one discourage all the rest from hazarding their lives upon the same account as long as they are possessed and actuated with the same principle viz. that it is not only lawful but a glorious and meritorious deed to kill any man that is an Enemy to the Publick and withal that he is obliged to believe that any or as many as the House of Commons shall declare to be so are so It was high time therefore for the King to give a stop to such proceedings by dissolving the late Parliament to prevent the proscribing of all that were about him and employed by him and perhaps the remonstrating against himself also as their Predecessors had done against his Father which Remonstrance made by the then House of Commons as it was intended and made use of at first by the Presbyterians to begin and carry on their Rebellion against the King and his Party so was it made use of at last also by the Independents for the destruction of the Kings Person the pretended male-administration of the Government which was the matter of the Remonstrance being that for which he was indicted and condemned and put to death by the Independents And yet that very Remonstrance it was that Mr. Baxter in the place before quoted saith the People were obliged to believe and consequently to act thereupon as afterwards they did and yet good man he was in the mean time far from being guilty of any hurt to the Kings Person or destruction of his Power But why was he or the rest of the People obliged to believe either that Remonstrance or his Declaration of the House of Commons were they infallible that they could not be deceived themselves or were they impeccable that they could not deceive others neither the one nor the other For Mr. Baxter himself tells us it is well known that Parliaments quà tales as such are not divine religious Protestant or just That sometimes the major part in either or both Houses may be the worst And therefore I should think not always to be believed in what they declare nor always to be complied with by the People whose Trustees they are in whatsoever they command or undertake For if They be such as Mr. Baxter saith They may be may They not betray their trust and act contrary to the Interest of those that trust them Yes saith Mr. Baxter they may and consequently may saith he forfeit their power as well as Kings nay in some cases saith Mr. Baxter We are all that is the whole Nation to take part with the King against the Parliament as First If they would depose the King unjustly or change the Government or Secondly If they notoriously betray their trust in fundamentals or in points that the Common good depends on as if ever any Parliament did That we are now speaking of did and did it most notoriously there saith he the Peoples duty is to forsake them and to cleave to the King against them But who shall be Judg whether they do so or no or if there be a division betwixt those between whom the Sovereignty is divided as Mr. Baxter supposeth it is betwixt King and Parliament here in England and the one usurps or is pretended to usurp upon the other What then why then saith Mr. Baxter it belongs to the People to judg whose cause is best and to resist the usurping party But the People as he tells us in another place cannot themselves judg for themselves and therefore saith he the Constitution of the Government having made the Parliament the Trustees of our Liberties hath made them our Eyes by which We must discern our dangers And therefore as he saith a little before in the same page We are obliged to believe them as the most competent Witnesses and Judges and the chosen Trustees of our Liberties So that if there be a difference betwixt the King and the House of Commons and the House of Commons would depose the King never so unjustly or change the Government never so notoriously or betray their trust never so perfidiously yet if the House of Commons themselves will not say they do so but declare the contrary the People are to believe them and to side with them against the King yea and against the House of Lords too if they joyn with the King which how it can consist with the Doctrine of Co-ordination or with his own aforesaid Assertion that in some cases the People are to cleave to the King against the Parliament he were best to consider In the mean time thanks be to God We have a better and a more certain Rule of right and wrong and to be guided in what We are to believe and do than an arbitrary Vote of the major part of the House of Commons and that is the known Law of the Land For verissimum illud saith Grotius ubi semel à jure recessum est incerta esse omnia when we are once out of the road and rule of the Law we know not whither We are a going nor what we are a doing If therefore the question be Whether the late War was made against the King or no it is not a Declaration of the House of Commons or of both Houses either pro or con that will decide the question but Ad legem ad legem it is the Law that must do it and the Law hath done it For when the Earl of Essex in Queen Elizabeths time at his Arraignment for Treason and Rebellion against the Queen because he took up Arms without her Commission pleaded that he did it for the Queen and not against her because his meaning was only to remove Cecill and Cobham and Raleigh and other evil Councellors that were about her and were hers and the States Enemies as well as his protesting then as Mr. Baxter does now that he meant not any the least hurt to the Queens Person or diminution of her Power upon which often reiterated protestation of the Earls especially that of his meaning no hurt to the Queens Person the Sages of the Law that were Assessors to the Lords that were his Judges being askt by the Lords what was the Judgment of the Law in that Case
Pronunciarunt si quis attentaverit ita se firmare ut Rex resistere non potuerit Rebellionis tenetur c. They pronounced or declared that if any man should attempt to make himself so strong that the King should not be able to resist him he is guilty of Rebellion Item that the Law interpreteth that in every Rebellion there is a conspiracy against the Life and Crown of the King for a Rebell will never suffer the King to live or reign who may afterwards punish or revenge such his Treason or Rebellion Which Interpretation of the Law of England they confirmed First By the Imperial or Civil Law whereby to do any thing against the safety of the Prince is reputed to be Treason Secondly By the force of Reason because it cannot be but that he which hath once given Law to his King should never permit the King to recover his former authority or to live left at any time after he should revenge it Thirdly and lastly They confirmed it likewise by Examples drawn from our English Chronicles of Edward the II. and Richard the II. both which being once by force of Arms gotten by their Subjects into their Power were not long after Deposed and made away also I have repeated at large what was then said to be the Law of England by the authorised and sworn Expositors of the Laws I mean the Judges And from what was said by them then in that particular Case I observe First That Arms taken up or Forces raised by Subjects of what condition or upon what pretence soever without the Sovereigns leave or commission are in construction of Law taken up and raised against the Sovereign Secondly That such Forces so raised against whomsoever or to what end soever they are pretended to be employed are in construction of Law intended not only to take away the Kings Power but his Life also And Thirdly Because the Law presumes that those that have taken away his Power will not let him live for fear he may recover his Power and revenge himself of those that took it away from him I cannot chuse but think that the Presbyterian Party though they did not at first intend to take away the Kings life yet after they had taken away his Power and made him their Prisoner and used him so barbarously as they did whilst he was their Prisoner I cannot chuse but think I say that had not the Independents taken him out of their hands they would have taken away his life at last also though not by a formal publick judiciary Tryal as the Independents did but some way or other they would have done it For who can believe they would have suffered him to live or at least to live as a King whom They could not chuse but think they had provoked beyond a capacity of being Pardoned by him if ever he should be in a condition to be revenged of them And why should We think they would have stuck at making him away in the dark or in a Prison whom before they had so often indeavoured to kill in the open Field For it is to be supposed saith Mr. Baxter that those that fight would kill those they fight against and therefore it is to be supposed likewise say I that those that commissioned their Armies to fight against their King as the Presbyterian Parliament did the Earl of Essex did commission them likewise to kill the King if they could For I never heard that the King was excepted from being fought against and consequently from being kill'd in any of their Commissions or that so much as any private Instruction or Intimation was given to my Lord of Essex or to any of his Officers much less to all of them to spare the King such a one I mean as David gave to Joab and the Officers of his Army for the sparing of Absolom So that there was no more care taken by the Parliament for sparing of the King's life than for sparing the life of any of those whom their Armies were commissioned to sight against and kill and consequently they were commissioned to kill the King as well as any of the rest They were to fight withal And if so then not only those that commission'd those that fought against the King but those that stirred them up and encouraged them to fight against the King did stir them up and encourage them to kill the King also and if so how can the Presbyterian Clergy of those times especially the London and Parliament Preachers be excused from being intentionally guilty of the late King's death before he was actually murthered by the Independents But of all the rest how will Mr. Baxter excuse himself who tells us it is to be supposed that those that fight would kill those they fight against and consequently that those that encourage them to fight do encourage them to kill those whom they fight against and withal confesseth that he encouraged thousands to do that which the Law calls fighting against the King how will he I say excuse himself from being consequentially at least if not intentionally guilty of the late Kings Death How then can he with any ingenuity or sincerity say that he was never guilty of hurt to the Person or destruction of the Power of the King And yet he doth say so and that so confidently that he professeth likewise that if either this or that viz that if either he was guilty of hurt to the Person or destruction of the Power of the King can be proved against him he will never gain-say them that call him a most perfidious Rebell and tell him he is guilty of a far greater sin than Murther Whoredom Drunkenness and such like In the mean time he doth confess and is convinced it seems that a Rebel is a worse man and a greater sinner than a Drunkard or a Whoremonger or a Murtherer if he be indeed a Rebel though perhaps he doth not think so which is a severer sentence than I durst have pronounced upon many of those that were indeed Rebels but did not think themselves to be so but were misled by their spiritual guides who made them believe that to fight against the King was to fight for the King and that all the while they were doing God and the King good service which the greater diminution it was of their sin that were so deceived the greater aggravation it was of their guilt that did so deceive them And yet those that were the least sinners of these Rebels were according to Mr. Baxter's account greater sinners than Drunkards Whoremongers and Murtherers so that if he could as truly as he doth boldly and frequently charge most of the Episcopal Party with Drunkenness and Vncleanness and Profaneness yet seeing he cannot charge them with Rebellion against their Sovereign they will still be less evil how bad soever they are than the best of those of his
under the People and then the Sovereignty is wholly in the People and none of it in the King what Power or Authority soever is delegated unto him by the People especially if it be delegated sub conditione paenâ conditionally and upon penalty of forfeiture or any other punishment or else the Populus that is all or the whole body of the People doth subesse Regi is under the King and then the Sovereignty is wholly in the King what priviledges or immunities soever he may grant to all or any of his Subjects or however he may oblige himself by promise or oath to govern them according to the Laws of his own or Predecessors making So that the Sovereignty must either be Wholly in the People and then he that is called a King is indeed no King or it must be Wholly in the King and then the People have nothing to do with it or with any part of it Sovereignty being such a thing in the Body Politick as the Soul is in the Body Natural For as the Soul animates or enlivens the whole Body Natural not by being some of it or some part of it in one member and some part of it in another but by being as the Philosopher saith it is tota in toto tota in quâlibet parie by being all of it in all and in every one of the members according to their several capacities of receiving the several influences and operations of it in order to the preservation of the whole Body Natural so Sovereignty or the supreme Power wheresoever or in whomsoever it is it is that which animates and enlivens and actuates the whole Body Politick but not by being it self divided but by dividing and deriving its influences into all and every part of the whole Body Politick as the Sun doth its light by the dispersing of its beams or heat into and over the whole World and all the several parts of it though it self in the mean time remains wholly and entirely in its own Orb. CHAP. IX Grotius his Case hath no place in the English Monarchy where the King is sole Sovereign The Parliament never declared otherwise as Mr. B. saith they did but owned him ever to be so in their Addresses Sovereignty intitles to Majesty BUT supposing though not granting there may be and hath been somewhere or other such a division of the Sovereignty betwixt King and People as Grotius supposeth yet it is certain there is none such here in England for if ENGLAND be a Monarchy then saith Mr. Baxter himself the whole Sovereignty must be but in One only and if but in one I hope by that One he means the King and not the Pope though some of his Parasites will have him to be the Monarch of the whole Christian World in general and though he lays claim to the Monarchy of England in particular as held in Fee of him ever since King John surrendred the Sovereignty thereof to his Holiness But Mr. Baxter I am sure is not so much a Papist though in some especially of their Political opinions he doth symbolize with them as to acknowledg the Pope to be his Sovereign for then neither he nor his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those that are like-minded could be as they fain would be every one a Pope in his own Parish neither do I think he is yet so far gone in Fanaticism as that by the King whom he grants to be the sole Sovereign in a Monarchy he meaneth no other King but King Jesus as the fifth Monarchy-men do here in England and the Presbyterian Whigs do in Scotland No I do willingly absolve Mr. Baxter from being guilty of either of these extravagant absurdities but that which I charge Mr. Baxter with is this that he denies England to be a Monarchy and consequently that the whole Sovereignty thereof is in the King though he himself hath sworn it is so when he took the Oath of Supremacy as I am sure he did or ought to have done when he was Episcopally Ordained as he saith he was but it seems he hath better studied the point since or is more enlightned than he was then Or perhaps the Parliament had not then or he had not heard they had declared this Government of ours to be no Monarchy but a mixed Government because the Sovereignty was not in the King alone but in the King and Parliament that is partly in the King and partly in themselves But when and what these Parliaments were or how and when and to whom they made such a Declaration he doth not vouchsafe to tell us which is an uncivil neglect of his Readers if he can and an impudent slandering of the King and both Houses of Parliament if he cannot I say of the King and both Houses of Parliament because it is the King and both Houses that constitutea Parliament the King as the Head and the two Houses as the representative Body of the People and he may as well and as properly call that Corpus integrum or a compleat Body that hath no Head as call either or both of the Houses a Parliament without the King Now I would fain learn of Mr. Baxter when any Parliament properly so called that is the King Lords and Commons did ever declare this Kingdom to be no Monarchy or that the Sovereignty or supreme Power was not wholly in the King Nay taking the two Houses without the King or a Commissioner for the King to be a Parliament as after the King left them or rather after they had driven the King away from them they falsly pretended themselves to be taking I say the Parliament in this notion for the two Houses only without the King did ever the two Houses declare the Government of England according to the legal constitution of it to be no Monarchy or that the Sovereignty or supreme Power was not in the King I confess I never heard they did so I mean by any conjunct Declaration or by any concurring Vote of both Houses no nor so much as by the single Vote of the House of Commons which being but one and the lower of the two Houses and who are always uncovered at their Conferences with the Lords are very often by Mr. Baxter called the Parliament because as he saith they are the Representatives or Trustees of the People of England whereas indeed they are the Representatives and Trustees not of the People but of the Commons of England only unless he will say that the Nobility and Clergy or at least the Lords Spiritual and Temporal are none of the People of England for surely they are not represented by the House of Commons And therefore if Mr. Baxter were to speak of it in Latin I think he would not I am sure he should not call it by the name of Domus Populi the House of the People but Domus Plebis the House of the Commonalty or as I think
the Lawyers call it by the name of Domus Communium the House of Commons I am sure Livy who knew how to call things in Latin by their proper names as well as any man does now tells us that in a contest betwixt a Consul and a Tribune the Tribune bearing himself high upon the account of his Office the Consul said Scias te non Populi sed Plebis Romanae Magistratum esse You must know Sir that you are an Officer not of the People but of the Commonalty of Rome And yet this may be said in excuse of Mr. Baxter's mistake when he calls them the Representatives of the People that he saith no more of them than the House of Commons which he means said of it self for to the four first that Preached before them of whom I my self was one they gave each of them a piece of Plate with this Inscription Donum Populi Anglicani the Gift of the People of England by order of the House no doubt ingraven on it which perhaps they meant not to be Grammatically but Prophetically understood that is to be understood of them not as they were then but what they meant to be before they left sitting and as we saw they were after they had put down the Lords as well as the King and made themselves the High and Mighty States of England and Ireland and instead of Representatives and Trustees made themselves Lords and Masters of those that trusted them until He whom they had trusted with their Forces made himself Lord and Master of them also the People in the mean time the Free-born People of England having been made or rather having made themselves as arrant Slaves and Vassals as ever any People were unto them both But to return to what I was speaking of I do not find I say that any Parliament properly so called that is the King Lords and Commons or that both or either of the two Houses joyntly or severally did ever declare or vote the Kingdom of England to be no Monarchy or that the King of England was not the Sovereign and sole Sovereign of and in this and all other his Kingdoms and Dominions On the contrary I find that in all the Addresses made to the King as well by both Houses jointly as by either of them severally from the beginning of the War to the end of it they always acknowledged the King to be their Sovereign and themselves even in their publick and Parliamentary capacity to be his Subjects And if in their Parliamentary notion and capacity they were his Subjects I wonder in what notion or capacity they can be said to be Partners or partakers with him in the Sovereignty Besides he that will have either or both of the Houses to have a part of the Sovereignty must allow them a Title to Majesty also For Majesty and Sovereignty are Termini Convertibiles convertible terms as the Houses themselves confess when they treat the King sometimes with the title of Sovereign and sometimes with the title of Majesty as signifying by both these Words but one and the same thing namely the Supremacy of Power in the King Now I would fain know of Mr. Baxter whether if he were to Petition the House of Lords or the House of Commons or both of them he would address it to their Majesty the House of Lords or to their Majesty the House of Commons or to their Majesty the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament if he did I believe he would be laught at for his folly by them and perhaps punisht for his presumption by the King And yet if the Sovereignty be divided betwixt Them and the King as he saith it is I see no reason why the title of Majesty may not be given to Them as well as to the King or at least partly to them and partly to him though but proportionably to the division of the Sovereignty betwixt them of which if the Kings part be greater than that of the House of Lords and that of the House of Lords be greater than that of the House of Commons which I am afraid Mr. Baxter will hardly allow then if Majesty be the proper attribute of Sovereignty and Excellent a proper Epithet to Majesty then according to Mr. Baxter's distinctness of notion and expression the style of the House of Commons should be Their Excellent Majesty and the style of the House of Lords Their More Excellent Majesty as well as the Kings style is His Most Excellent Majesty and then there may be Treason against the House of Lords or against the House of Commons as well as against the King if laesa Majestas the offending or injuring of Majesty be Treason nay then we have three Sovereigns and not one only for whosoever hath any share in the Sovereignty is a Sovereign and then I wonder why we do not take an Oath of Allegiance to the two Houses as well as to the King nay I wonder much more why they of both Houses do all of them take an Oath of Allegiance to the King and cannot sit in either House till they do so Surely one Sovereign doth not owe Allegiance to another no not the least of Sovereigns to the greatest for as all Sovereigns the greatest as well as the least are equally under God so the least as well as the greatest are equally under none but God at least quatenùs so far forth as they are Sovereigns or in those things and places where and when they have a right to Sovereignty or to any part thereof CHAP. X. The King declared by an Act of Parliament injoyning the Oath of Supremacy to be the only Supreme Governour Mr. B 's sorry evasion of this Oath and Queen Elizabeths Declaration concerning it BUT what need is there of making such Collections or Inferences from the Addresses made to the King from either or both Houses of Parliament with their full subscriptions thereunto to prove that they acknowledg the King to be their Sovereign their fole Sovereign and themselves to be his Subjects his humble and loyal Subjects even in their Parliamentary capacity for in that capacity it was that they addressed themselves to him What need is there I say of insisting upon such more remote though very pregnant and concluding proofs when several Parliaments properly so called that is Parliaments consisting of the head the King and all the integral members that is of the Lords Spiritual as well as Temporal together with the House of Commons have in positive and express words and that not by a Vote Order or Ordinance but by an Act declared the King not only to be the Supreme but the only Supreme Governour of this Realm and of all other his Highnesses Dominions and Countries and that as well in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things and causes as temporal These I say are the very words of an Act of Parliament properly so called that is of a full and free of a compleat and
a secondary deduction from it And therefore 't is a vain and senceless shift of Mr. Baxter's for the avoiding of the dint of this Argument which doth jugulum causae ferire cut the very throat of his cause to say as he doth that the end of imposing and taking of this Oath was only for the excluding of all pretence to the Supremacy or to any part of the Supremacy here from abroad and not for the acknowledging the Kings sole Supremacy here at home Whereas it is indeed the Kings sole Supremacy here at home that is as it is called by the Rubrick the Oath of the Kings Supremacy and not the excluding of all foreign claim or pretence to it which to speak properly as Mr. Baxter saith he loves to do is as I said before an abjuration rather than an Oath or at most but the negative and consequent part of the Oath the affirmative and antecedent part thereof being the assertion of the whole supreme Power in the Government of this Kingdom to be in the King and King only and consequently exclusive of any pretence to it or to any participation of it by any either at home or abroad especially by any at home But why then will Mr. Baxter perhaps say was there not annexed to the positive part of this Oath an abjuration or express disowning the supreme Power or any part of the supreme Power to be in any here at home besides the King as well as there is an abjuration or an express disowning of it to be in any abroad I answer because there was no need at all of it First because he that hath sworn the Supremacy or supreme Power to be in the King only hath eo ipso in that very thing or by so swearing forsworn the being of it or any part of it in any other besides the King If it be replyed that upon this account there needed not have been any abjuration or disowning of any foreign Authority annexed to the other part of it neither I answer Secondly That although really there was no need of an express or explicit disowning or renouncing of the one more than the other because the swearing to the positive part of the Oath is implicitly and virtually a disowning or renouncing of them both yet because there had been antiently and was then and was like to be still a claim to the Supremacy here in England at least in matters Spiritual and Ecclesiastical by some that were abroad I mean by the Pope for himself and his Successors therefore the Parliament thought it meet and prudent and in some respects necessary to add or annex to the Assertion of the Kings sole Supremacy here at home an express and explicit Renuntiation of all the Right that was or could be pretended to it from abroad but did not think it to be at all necessary to add or annex the like express or explicit renuntiation of any such Power to be in any here at home because there was none then here at home so impudent as openly and avowedly to pretend to it or to any part of it For here are no Ephori no Overseers or Guardians of the State as there were in Lacedaemon nor no such Senate as there is in Venice nor no such High and Mighty States as there are in Holland For we have but One high and mighty and he is so high and mighty that there is none but the Almighty that is above him and all others in his own Dominions how much higher and mightier they may seem to be in relation to one another are equally below him and subject to him CHAP. XII From the two Houses Petitioning the King and his being free to grant or deny is proved that there is no Co-ordination beside the inconsistence of it with the Government I know there was in the beginning of the late Rebellious times a Discourse written and published to make the foolish part of the World believe for with wise and considering men I am sure it could have no weight that the two Houses of Parliament were Co-ordinate with the King and consequently not Subordinate to the King in relation to the making and repealing of Laws and the determining of all things of publick concernment for the Government of the Kingdom and consequently that according to the nature of Co-ordinates where all three could not or would not or did not agree the two that did agree were to over-rule the third that did not An excellent project or expedient as the deviser of it thought to make a Triumvirate of a Monarchy or a Republick of a Kingdom but he did not consider that it was liable to one little inconvenience namely that it was utterly and absolutely unpracticable being altogether inconsistent with the fundamental Constitution of our Government which is not to have the two Houses of Parliament always in being as the Senate of Rome was and the Senate of Venice is or to assemble and meet when and where they will and to continue as long together as they will as Grotius tells us the Ordines or States of Holland of right did even whilst They had a King But our Parliaments here in England are so far from having always an actual setled and constant being that they have no being at all but what the King gives them by his Writ of Summons neither can they assemble or meet but when he calls them nor either depart sooner or continue longer together than he will have them neither while they do by his leave and command continue together have they any Power to make any new Law or to repeal any old Law but only to pray propose or advise the making of the one or the repealing of the other by the King And this being so as undeniably it is so by the legal and fundamental Constitution of the Government I wonder when and by what Authority it came to be alter'd For supposing but not granting that a Parliament truly so called may make such a change in the fundamental Constitution of the Government as to make an Aristocracy or a Democracy of a Monarchy by the Monarchs own consent to it which I for my part think they cannot the Monarch himself in an Hereditary Monarchy being but a Trustee for his Successors but supposing I say such a change could be made by a Parliament properly so called I demand when and by what Parliament such a Change was made and whether the King did ever consent to it if not we are still where we were whatsoever Power a legal or compleat Parliament may be said or imagined to have and consequently there is not as yet at least any such Co-ordination of King Lords and Commons as the Author of the aforesaid discourse pretended there is It is true indeed that the two Houses of Parliament in the year 42 did Petition the King that he would be pleased to grant such things as they proposed unto him
relation to the Church and such are his Anti-monarchical Aphorisms in relation to the State which will be Thorns in the sides of both Church and State to trouble and molest them if they be not Engines to undermine or overthrow them as long as there be Baxterians in the World as there will be no doubt long after Mr. Baxter is dead and though he himself before he dies do truly and heartily as I do truly and heartily wish he may if he have not done it yet repent of having been the Author of some and Abetter of all of them As for his Anti-episcopal Aphorisms and all other his Heterodoxies relating to the established Government Discipline of the Church they have been so thoroughly canvassed and so thoroughly confuted by so many much more learned Pens than mine that as I have said already in my Preface so I say again I mean not to meddle with any of them But as for his Anti-monarchical Aphorisms because he saith I am a defier of Deity and Humanity for taking exceptions against them and for my justifying the rights of Kings against the grounds he lays for justifying the resisting of Kings by their Subjects and particularly of the late horrid Rebellion of the worst of Subjects against the best of Kings the most groundless in its causes and the most unchristian and the most inhumane in its effects that ever was in this or perhaps in any other Kingdom I thought my self concerned to enlarge my self in saying of what I have said to justifie my exceptions against those Aphorisms some of which I have before printed and now reprinted and could have printed many more and some of them as bad as the worst of those and as destructive of the established Government in all Bodies Politick especially to that of this in our Kingdom which is and hath been always taken for a Kingdom properly so called that is for a Monarchy or for such a State or Body Politick wherein the Soveraignty or Supremacy of power is in One only Mr. Baxter in order to justifying of the late Rebellion tells us it is no Monarchy because the Soveraignty is not in one only namely not in the King alone but divided betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament which he endeavours to prove First by the Testimony of both Parties principally concerned in it namely the Parliaments affirming and the King 's owning and acknowledging of it And 2dly by Reason or by Arguments drawn from the Constitution and Practice of the Government it self As to the King 's own Acknowledgment that there is such a division of the Soveraignty betwixt Him and the Lords and Commons I shall speak of it hereafter And as to the Parliaments affirming of it which he only saith they do and have done without naming any time when or what Parliaments they were that did so I have answered at large already and that not only negatively by denying that any Parliament properly so called that is consisting of King Lords and Commons did ever affirm or can in reason be supposed ever to have affirmed any such thing but positively also that all Parliaments even those that are improperly so called I mean the Body without the Head or as the two Houses only are called the Parliament even in this notion I say the Parliament hath always in all Addresses that have been made to the King by either of the Houses severally or by both Houses joyntly acknowledged the King to be their Soveraign and themselves to be his humble and loyal Subjects and that when they Address themselves to Him not as so many several single Persons or every one in his Personal capacity but as in their representative or Parliamentary capacity as they were one or both of the two Houses and how they be Soveraigns and Subjects or partly Soveraigns and partly Subjects in one and the same notion or under one and the same capacity is too subtil and airy a speculation for me to comprehend But that which I did then and do now principally insist upon for proof of the Parliaments acknowledgments of the King's Soveraignty or that the Soveraignty here in this Kingdom is in the King alone and not in the King Lords and Commons joyntly as Mr. Baxter would have it is the Oath of Supremacy whereby in as positive and as plain words as can be devised several Parliaments properly so called have declared and caused it to be sworn that the King is the only Supreme Governor of this Realm and of all other his Highnesses Dominions and Countries as well in all Spiritual and Ecclesiastical things and causes as Temporal Which I repeat again because which I did not observe before the Parliament by enjoyning Men to swear that the King is the only Supreme Governour in Spirituals as well as Temporals seems to suppose or to take it for granted that there were none that pretended to be the Kings Subjects but would willingly and readily acknowledg the King to be the only Supreme Governour in Temporals and consequently that there is no division of the Soveraignty betwixt the King and the Parliament or betwixt the King Lords and Commons For it is the Soveraignty in Temporals only that Mr. Baxter would have to be so divided for as to the Soveraignty in Ecclesiastical things or causes I believe if Mr. Baxter would tell us what lies at the bottom of his heart we should find that he thinks neither King nor Parliament have any thing to do with it and consequently that there can be no division of that betwixt them But of this we shall have occasion to speak more hereafter Now therefore having postponed the consideration of what Mr. Baxter infers for proof of his pretended Division of the Soveraignty betwixt the King and Parliament from the Kings own concessions I proceed to the examination of the Reasons he gives to prove this Kingdom to be no Monarchy or that the Soveraignty thereof is not in one only Which reasons of his are all of them reducible to this one of the Legislative power or the power of making and repealing Laws for the whole Nation which as he saith is not only a part but a principal part of the Soveraignty and therefore if this be not in the King alone but divided between the King and Parliament as Mr. Baxter saith it is the Soveraignty cannot be in the King alone but must be divided betwixt the King and Parliament CHAP. II. What is meant by the word Parliament The two Houses being called together and dismissed at the Kings pleasure are not co-ordinate or sharers with him in the Soveraignty NOW this being the summ and substance of all Mr. Baxter hath said to prove the War made by the Parliament against the King was a just War and no Rebellion and whereon he so confidently relies that he is ready he saith to offer his Head to Justice if it can be solidly confuted either as to
the Truth of it or as to the Inference he makes from it we will therefore examine First whether the Hypothesis namely that the Legislative Power is divided betwixt the King and the Parliament be true or no. And 2dly supposing not granting it to be so whether he doth rightly infer from thence that therefore the War made by the Parliament against the King was a just War and no Rebellion First then as to the Hypothesis it self so far as it supposeth the Legislative Power to be a part and principal part of the Soveraignty I grant it to be true but as it supposeth the Legislative power to be partly in the King and partly in the Parliament so as that the Laws are made by the Parliament as well as by the King I affirm it to be false For proving of which Assertion of mine and consequently for disproving the contrary Assertion of Mr. Baxters We are first to agree what is meant by the word Parliament 2dly How that which is meant by the word Parliament comes to be a Parliament or whence it hath its being what it is and its meeting when it does meet and its continuance after they are met 3dly What they do or legally can do in order to Law-making whilst they sit First then as to what is meant by the word Parliament in this Hypothesis it cannot be the King Lords and Commons because the Legislative power which is supposed to be divided betwixt the King and the Parliament cannot be supposed to be divided betwixt the King and the King as it must be if it be divided betwixt the King and the Parliament as the Parliament signifies the King Lords and Commons and therefore by the word Parliament here must needs be meant the Lords and Commons only or the two Houses as they make up that Body whereof the King is the Head And in this sence the word Parliament is always taken when the King and Parliament are spoken of together as distinct from one another as when the King is said to call or prorogue or dissolve the Parliament or the Parliament to make Addresses or to grant Subsidies to the King And in this sence I think Mr. Baxter would be thought to understand the word Parliament when he saith the Legislative power is divided betwixt the King and Parliament that is betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament Though there be many passages in this Book of his Holy Common-Wealth where speaking of the Parliament he must needs mean the House of Commons exclusively to the House of Lords as when he tells us the Parliament is to be believed by the People because they are the Peoples Representatives and Trustees where by Parliament must needs be meant the House of Commons only they and not the House of Lords being the Representatives and the Trustees of the Commons And so again when he saith the King is obliged to pass such Laws quas Vulgus elegerit which the People or Commonalty shall make choice of he must needs mean that the King must needs pass such Laws as the House of Commons will have him to pass so that the whole Legislative power is to be in the House of Commons alone exclusively to the Lords as well as to the King and to the King as well as to the Lords the King being only to declare that to be Law which the House of Commons without the concurrence of the Lords had voted to be so and this we saw and felt it come to at last and that it may not come to it again for it seems to be furiously driving that way it concerns the Lords as well as the King to consider But I will not in this debate take advantage of this notion of a Parliament I mean as it is often taken by Mr. Baxter for the House of Commons only but I will consider it as it is taken for both Houses and that not only severally but as in conjunction with one another And as thus considered the next Inquiry is how they come to be so or whence they have their Parliamentary existence and continuance I mean their being and continuing to be two Houses of Parliament and consequently whence they have the power of doing what they do or legally can do whilst they are two Houses If the Lords Temporal say they are of the Lords House by their Birth-rights because they are Lords and the Lords Spiritual say they are of the House of Lords because they are Representatives of the Clergy or because they are Bishops I answer it is true indeed they are so or have a right to be so when there is a House of Lords because they are constituting parts or members of it but neither of them can be actually and existingly of the House of Lords before there is a House of Lords and there is not nor cannot be actually a House of Lords or any existence of such an House until the King summons both the Lords Temporal and the Lords Spiritual to come and meet together at such a time in such a place and when upon such a summons or by virtue of the King's command they do come and meet together at such a time in such a place appointed and then and not till then they are a House of Lords The like may be said as to the House of Commons For if the Knights and Burgesses shall say when they are met that they are the House of Commons because they are chosen by the People to be their Representatives 't is true they are so but who gave the People leave or power to choose them to be their Representatives or to be that Body which we call the House of Commons Was it not the King could the People have done it without the King's Authority inabling them to do it or could they refuse to do it when he commanded them to do it If not then though the choice of those that are to be of the House of Commons be from the People yet the Peoples power to choose them being from the King it is that which makes them after they are chosen to be the House of Commons when they meet together which must be when and where the King pleaseth So that after they be chosen by the People to be the House of Commons or to be the representative body of the People yet are they not the House of Commons nor the representative body of the People till they meet at the time and in the place by the King appointed at least so many of them as are agreed on to be sufficient to make them act as a House or in their representative capacity The like in proportion may be said of the House of Lords also So that both Houses of Parliament as such have no existence or being at all until the King gives it them by calling them together nor continuance in being any longer than he pleaseth to continue them For
it is evident that his meaning in the words before was that the Parliament by their conquering of the King in defence of their own pretended part of the Soveraignty did not gain that part which he lost nor consequently could as he saith assume the whole Soveraignty to themselves But they did assume the whole Soveraignty even that Parliament did assume it those Lords and Commons did assume the whole Soveraignty who as Mr. Baxter saith were the Best Governours in all the World and such as whom to resist or depose is forbidden to Subjects on pain of damnation And why so Mr. Baxter because saith he they had the Supremacy that is the whole Soveraignty But whom doth Mr. Baxter mean by those the best Governours in all the World and whom all the Subjects of England were forbidden to resist on pain of damnation because they had the Supreme power I mean saith he them whom you speaking to the Souldiers called the corrupt Majority or the 143. imprisoned and secluded Members who as the majority had you know what power and the remaining Members that now sit again as many of them as are living Whereby it plainly appears that he meant the two Houses or the majority of the two Houses of Parliament in 47. and consequently that they were those that had then the Supreme power and who because they had the Supreme power were on pain of damnation not to be resisted But how came they by that Supreme Power not by having conquered the King saith Mr. Baxter in that before quoted Thesis for that saith he did not give them a right to more of the Soveraignty than they had before which was saith he but a part of it neither was that to make any change of the Government in specie and consequently the Soveraignty was still according to his Hypothesis to be in a King Lords and Commons and therefore the two Houses of Parliament or Senate as he calls them in the aforesaid Thesis could not assume the whole Soveraignty where by could not he must mean they could not de jure by right assume it that is they had no right or just title to it And what are they that assume Soveraignty without any Right or just title to it some saith Mr. Baxter call them Tyrants but what doth he himself call them He saith they may be more fitly called and you must know he loves to speak properly and distinctly Invaders Intruders and Vsurpers but are the People bound to obey or not to resist Invaders Intruders and Vsurpers upon pain of damnation No saith Mr. Baxter when it is notorious they have no title to govern them the People are not bound to obey them Now what can be more notorious than that the two Houses had not the Soveraignty at least not the whole Soveraignty whilst the King was alive and whilst he was acknowledged and treated with by them as their King as he was at that very time Mr. Baxter saith they had the Supreme Power and consequently if they had it as indeed they had it de facto in fact they held it without any title or Right to it and therefore by Mr. Baxter's own confession they had it as Invaders and Vsurpers And if notwithstanding they were Invaders and Vsurpers they were the best Governours in all the World and not to be resisted on pain of damnation as Mr. Baxter tells us in one place then are the People bound to obey notorious Invaders and Vsurpers which in another place he saith they are not but yet he saith it with such limitations and exceptions as one may see he leaves a Latitude for any man to submit to any that are in the possession of the Supreme Power whether they have any right to all or any of it or no or though they be never so much Invaders or Vsurpers of it as all of them were that succeeded one another from the beginning of the War with the late King until the Restauration of our present Soveraign As first the two Houses governing arbitrarily and independently whilst the King lived 2dly The House of Commons alone after the Kings murder and Martyrdom assuming to themselves the title of a free State or Soveraign Common-wealth 3dly Cromvel the Father making himself Master of all and of servus servorum a servant of servants becoming Dominus Dominantium a Lord of Lords of whom Mr. Baxter saith in the same Preface That he did prudently piously and faithfully and to his immortal Honour exercise the Government 4thly Cromwel the Son to whom he saith he was bound to submit as set over him by God and to obey for conscience sake and to behave himself as a loyal Subject towards him because as he saith in the same place a full and free Parliament hath owned him Hereby acknowledging First That a full and free Parliament meaning the two Houses only may own or disown whom they will to be set over them by God and consequently whom in conscience they are bound to obey whether he have an Hereditary Right to it or no For Cromwel the Son could have no such Right from his Father neither doth Mr. Baxter pretend he had any such right 2dly That without Writs issuing from the King the People may meet and choose Knights and Burgesses to be their Representatives and that they that be so chosen make up a full and free House of Commons as likewise such as the Vsurper is pleased to call Lords though they be no Lords and have not so much as one Lord truly and properly so called amongst them do make up a full and free House of Lords 3dly That two such Houses do make up a full and free Parliament And such a Parliament was that with such a Summoner of it and such a Head to it as Cromwel the Son was which were the Powers that Mr. Baxter saith were last laid by and of which together with those that were laid by before he means laid by or deposed by the Souldiery to whom he addresseth his Preface to his Holy Commonwealth he hath so excessively high an opinion that he saith he should with great rejoycings give a thousand thanks to that Man that will acquaint him with one Nation in all the Earth that hath better Governours in Soveraign Power as to Wisdom and Holiness conjunct than those that have been resisted or deposed in England Where by those Powers he so much magnifies that were resisted and deposed here in England you may be sure he means not the King nor the Kingly Government though that was the only Soveraign Power that was resisted and deposed but for ought I see or he saith to the contrary he may and doth mean all others that successively usurped and exercis'd Soveraign Power both before and after the late Kings death till his Son 's coming in and consequently not only the two Houses of Parliament before the King's death but the One House
themselves as Mr. Baxter calls it as either they are more venerable for Antiquity or considerable for Plurality the King and none but the King must be acknowledged to be the Enacter or the maker of them And truly one would think that those Laws that are most ancient and consequently nearest in time to the first Institution of Parliaments though they were not the most in number were most to be credited for speaking most properly of who they were that made them then and consequently who it is that makes them now Unless Mr. Baxter will say it was the King and King alone indeed that made the Laws in Parliament then but it is the King Lords and Commons or the King and Parliament that makes them now and consequently that the King is not so much a King now as He was then and that the constitution of the Kingdom it self is changed from Monarchical to Aristocratical But then I must ask him by whom and when this great change was made Was it by him that brought in this new stile of Be it enacted by the King Lords and Commons c. That was Hen. the VIII who was not a Man likely to give away any of his Authority or to part with any part of his Soveraignty to his own Subjects who rescued it from the Popes incroachments And yet perhaps even He meaning to make use of the Parliament for the countenancing whatever he had a mind to do though never so extravagant in it self though never so offensive to Foreign Princes his Allies or never so injurious to his own Children because he thought it would be serviceable to his own ends after he had forced the two Houses to consent to what he listed to enact to joyn them with himself in the enacting of it as well as by assenting to it to make it so much the more plausible or at least so much the less grievous unto the People Otherwise it is most certain that never any King of England after the making of Magna Charta reigned so despotically and arbitrarily as he did or whom the two Houses of Parliament stood so much in awe of as they did of Him as appears by his making them consent to the doing and undoing to the enacting and repealing of whatsoever he would have to be done or undone to be enacted or repealed And therefore it is not to be imagined that such a King as he was did mean by changing of the stile to lessen the Legislative Power it self which was in his Predecessors by admitting those whom he used as he did the two Houses of Parliament to a participation of any the least degree of Soveraignty And as he never meant to do so so they the two Houses of Parliament did not then or ever since for ought I ever heard understand that to be the meaning of the Alteration from Be it enacted by the King with the consent of the Lords and Commons to Be it enacted by the King Lords and Commons to signifie that either the Kings power as to the making of Laws was less or the Parliaments greater than it was before this alteration of stile For if it had been understood either by the King or Parliament to signifie any such thing as the King especially such a King as Hen. VIII was would never have suffered the alteration of the former to the latter So the two Houses who are jealous enough of their Power and Priviledges would never have suffered the alteration of the latter to the former again as it was altered by King Edward Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth King Henry's three immediate Successors and as it is altered by our present King in the Act of Vniformity For as the alteration of the former to the latter could not have been made without the Kings so the alteration of the latter to the former could not have been made without the consent of the two Houses neither And therefore I verily believe that if any thing at all was meant by the alteration of the former stile to the latter it was only ad faciendum Populum to gain the People that the People might more willingly receive and submit to the Laws when they were made especially such of them as might seem to pinch them in their Purses when they were said to be enacted by the Lords and Commons or by the Lords and their Representatives and consequently by themselves as well as by the King for Volentibus non fit injuria where there is consent there is no injury And yet again lest by this alteration of stile and misinterpretation of it the Kings Prerogative of being the sole Soveraign and consequently the sole Law giver might be thought to be diminished by being communicated to either or both Houses of Parliament therefore the first most ancient and withal the longest continued stile of Be it enacted by our Soveraign Lord the King by the advice and with the consent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled was presently after the first alteration of it resumed by the three next succeeding Princes as it hath been also now of late by our present Soveraign and by all of them with the consent of the Lords and Commons thereunto CHAP. VII The Laws enacted by the Authority of Parliament in what sense Why called Acts of Parliament They provide the Matter of the Laws the King gives the Form BUT withal will Mr. Baxter perhaps say with this Addition and by the Authority of the same that is by the Authority of the Parliament so that according to this former stile our Laws are said to be made and enacted by the Authority of the Parliament and consequently by the Authority of the two Houses of Lords and Commons as well as by the Kings For answer whereunto I might say in the first place that it was not till after 200. Years from the first Parliament that we read of in our Book of Statutes namely not until the Raign of Henry the VI. who owed his Title such as it was to the Parliament and to the Parliament as it signifies the two Houses only without the King for by the Authority of such a Parliament it was that is of a Body without a Head that Henry Bullingbrook was made King Richard the Second's surrender being neither voluntary nor lawful if it had been voluntary as was acknowledged by the two Houses themselves when Richard Duke of York claimed the Crown as the right Heir to it thereby acknowledging likewise that although they had de facto yet they could not de jure exclude the right Heir Howsoever their Authority being the only Title which the then present King had and held the Crown by as having not the courage either of his Grandfather or his Father to claim it by Conquest and hold it by force as they did He was willing to acknowledge he held it by Authority of Parliament as the word Parliament is taken for the two
Houses of Parliament without a King And this perhaps might be the reason why at first in that weak King's time to Be it enacted by the King with the consent of Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled was added and by the Authority of the same But this is not the Answer I rely on because this addition hath been continued ever since whereas the alteration I before spoke of did not as I have already showed And therefore 2dly to this Objection that when it is said Be it enacted by our Soveraign Lord the King by the advice and with the consent of the King Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled it is said also and by Authority of the same My Answer is that by the word Parliament is not meant the two Houses or the Lords and Commons only that is the Body without a Head but the Body with the Head to direct and govern it as the natural Head doth the Body natural and more than so for the natural Head though it directs and governs yet it doth not give its Being to the Body natural but the Parliamentary Head gives its very Being it self to the Parliamentary body as being made what it is by his Call and dissolved into what it was at his pleasure that is into so many single and private Persons as they were before as I have already shewed And truly if we mark the words well By the Authority of the same cannot be meant the Authority of those that are assembled in Parliament but of the Parliament it self wherein they are assembled which is as it is commonly truly and properly called the Kings great Council or the Kings High Court of Parliament It is by the Authority therefore of that great Council or by the Authority of that High Court that our Laws are said to be enacted But whence is it that this great Council or this High Court hath its Authority Is it not from the King Is it not from Him that makes them to be such a Council and makes them to be such a Court by his calling and assembling them together So that to say Be it enacted by the Authority of the Parliament is no more in effect than to say Be it enacted by the King in Parliament or Be it enacted by the Kings Authority in his great Council or in his High Court of Parliament For as all Inferiour Courts are and Act by the Kings Authority so is and doth the High Court of Parliament it self also for as it doth not nor cannot make it self no more than the Inferiour Courts do or can for if it did or could it might meet as often and subsist as long as they listed themselves so their acting when they are a Court is as the Actings of other Courts are if they Act as they ought to Act in and by the same Authority from whence they have their Being for Agere sequitur esse acting follows upon being as Mr. Baxter often but sometimes very impertinently tells us And therefore as in all other Courts because they are the Kings Courts the Judgments that are there given and the Decrees that are there decreed for interpreting applying and moderating of Laws already made are the Kings Decrees and the Kings Judgments because they are made by his Authority or by an Authority derived from him and delegated by Him and might if he pleased be executed by him in Person as some of them have been by some of his Predecessors so in the High Court of Parliament where Laws are to be made the Laws that are there made are the Kings Laws and that not only as being made in one of his Courts but made in a formal and solemn manner either by himself personally and immediately or by special Commission granted and authoriz'd by him to do it for him For it is the Le Roy le veult whether pronounced by himself or by any other authoriz'd by him that makes the Law So that it is the Kings Will and the King 's will only to have it a Law that makes it a Law and not any Act antecedent or subsequent of either or both the Houses of Parliament But why then are our Laws called Acts of Parliament Because as I said before they are made by the King in Parliament Yea but they are said to be Enacted by Authority of Parliament that is say I by the King's Authority in Parliament But they are said to be enacted by the Lords and Commons as well as by the King but it is not said they are enacted by the Authority of the Lords and Commons as well as by the Kings So that by enacting by Lords and Commons is meant by the Lords and Commons advising or consenting to the matter of them as appears by the indifferent use sometimes of one of the forms and sometimes of the other as I observed before Whereunto may be added that it is not unusual to ascribe the doing of a thing to Him or them that are but the advisers of it or consenters to it Thus we call that an Order of Council which is ordered by the King in Council or by the advice of his Council And thus St. Paul saith The Saints shall judge the World and Christ himself saith that his twelve Apostles shall sit upon twelve Thrones judging the twelve Tribes of Israel Yet it is certain as Christ tells us in another place that the Father hath committed all judgment to the Son and hath joyned none in Commission with him So that it is Christ and Christ done that shall absolve those that shall be absolved and shall condemn those that shall be condemned which are the proper Acts of a Judge quatenus as he is a Judge and therefore of none but him that is a Judge How then can the Saints be said to judge the World or the twelve Apostles be said to judge the twelve Tribes Why they do it by consenting to and approving of the judgment which shall be given by Christ whether it be the sentence of absolution or condemnation upon whomsoever it is pronounced So though it be the King and the King only that properly speaking doth make the Laws yet because he never makes any Laws but such as are agreed on and consented to by both Houses of Parliament therefore the two Houses of Parliament may in the same sence that the Saints are said to judge the World be said to make our Laws that is by consenting to the King 's making of them to be Laws But yet with this difference which is indeed no small one that Christ's judging of the World needs not the approbation or consent to it antecedently or consequently either of Saints or Angels but the King according to the legally established constitution of our Government cannot make a Law but the matter of it must be antecedently agreed on by both Houses of Parliament as a fit subject for the King to make a
of having any thing to do in the Government as it now is and of doing any thing towards the alteration of it by repealing or giving their votes for repealing any of those Laws that are in force against Popery or for the making of any new Laws in favour of it being as I said before excluded from sitting in either of the Houses without the consent of the major part of which Houses the King himself though he be the sole Law-giver or sole maker of our Laws properly speaking as I have proved at large already can neither make nor repeal Laws but is according to the legal constitution of this Kingdom oblig'd and has obliged himself neither to make any New Laws nor to repeal any Old ones nor to Govern any otherways than by such Laws as are in force and have been or shall be so made that is with the consent of both Houses of Parliament either by himself or by His Predecessors So that there wants nothing to perpetuate our happiness under the best Government that ever any People did or can live under but to be assured that never any change as to the species and essentials of it shall be made in it And such an assurance as far as any thing in this world can be assured the making of such an Act here for the taking of such a Test as is already made and taken in Scotland will give us of what Perswasion soever in point of Religion or of what Inclination soever in point of Government the Successor to the Crown at any time may chance to be especially after he hath taken the Coronation Oath to Govern no otherwise than by Laws made and to be made by Act of Parliament CHAP. IX The Coronation-Oath alike dispensable whether the Successor be a Papist or a Presbyterian Mr. B. 's judgment of our Government and his wish for better order in choice of Parliament-men with the Bishops judgment what ought to be their main Qualification IF it be objected that if the Successor be a Papist there is no Oath he can take but he may be and will be by the Pope easily and willingly absolved from the Sin in taking it and from the Obligation to keep it I answer first that the same Objection will be as valid against a Presbyterian as against a Popish Successor for that the Classis as well as the Conclave can dispense with the obligation of Oaths we have seen and felt too For what was the imposing of the Solemn League and Covenant but a discharging of those that took it by those that perswaded them to take it from being any longer obliged by the Oāths of Allegiance and Supremacy which they had formerly taken But Secondly my answer is that I do not ground the Assurance of the continuance of our present Government either in Church or State either wholly or chiefly upon the Successors keeping of his Coronation Oath of what perswasion soever he is or may be but upon the a version which 99. parts at least of an 100. of the whole Nation have from Popery and Arbitrary Government and upon the Laws already in force against both and upon the supposition of such a new Law to be made here as there is in Scotland for the preserving and securing of the old ones viz. That no man be capacitated to choose or be chosen to be a Parliament-man before He hath taken that or such another Oath as that which by the aforesaid Act of Parliament in Scotland is prescribed and enjoyned to be taken Which Oath why those that fear the bringing in of Popery and Arbitrary Government should not be very willing to take I can see no reason unless they would bring in something else as destructive to the present Government as Popery it self and then I see no reason neither why they should not be excluded from choosing and being chosen members of Parliament as well as the Papists are For why should any that are Enemies to the Government one way or other be put in a capacity either to undermine the foundation or to weaken the props and the Pillars of it or to make any substantial alteration in it considering as Mr. Baxter himself confesseth That for ought he sees the Government of this Commonwealth I presume he takes the word Commonwealth not as a specifical but a generical Notion as it signifies any body Politick is already ballanced with as much prudence caution and equality as the curiousest of the models that self conceited men would obtrude with so much ostentation And that by Government of this Common-wealth he means the Government of this Kingdom not as it was governed by a State before the Usurpation of Cromwel the Father or by the Army and Rump-Parliament after the deposing of Cromwel the Son but as it was to be Govern'd according to the Legal constitution by King Lords and Commons that is by a King Governing by Laws made with the consent of the Lords and Commons in Parliament I take this I say to be Mr. Baxter's meaning by that which he calls the Government of this Common-wealth because in other places he seems not only to dislike but abhor the Government of a Common-wealth in a specifical Notion that is as it signifies a Democratical or popular Government for no fewer than 20. several reasons at the end of which he saith I conclude therefore that this Ignorant impious mutable cruel violent rout shall never have my consent for the Soveraignty and in another place as I have already observed he saith that although the two Houses of Parliament as having he thinks a part of the Soveraignty may lawfully in defence of that part of theirs make War against the King or those commissioned by the King yet though in that contest they get the victory they do not thereby gain the whole Soveraignty to themselves nor cannot alter the former constitution but must have the same or some other King in his stead whereby it plainly appears that by the aforesaid Government of this Common-wealth as he cannot mean a Democratical or popular so he cannot mean an Aristocratical or a Parliamentary Government without a King And therefore if he will sibi constare hold to what he saith and not contradict Himself as he does in many other things by that Government of this Common-wealth which he saith is already ballanced with so much prudence and caution he must needs mean this political regulated Monarchy of ours which we now enjoy and consequently that it ought not to be chang'd for any other form frame or model of Government which the curiosity of self conceited men saith Mr. Baxter he might have said or the Ambition of Proud or the greediness of Covetous or the malice of Discontented or the Bigotry of Hereticks or the peevishness of Schismaticks may endeavour to obtrude upon us instead of it For preventing whereof I could wish as he doth in the same place that some
better order were taken for the Exclusion of unworthy persons from Electing or being Elected members of Parliament that so says he being out of danger of impious Parliaments chosen by an impious Majority of the People we should then build all the Fabrick of our Government on a Rock which else will have a foundation of Sand And then a multitude of errors would thus be corrected at once and more done for our happiness than a thousand of the new Fantastical devices will accomplish Euge well said again Mr. Baxter No man can more heartily say Amen than I can to this wish of yours that none were to choose or to be chosen Parliament-men but those that were worthy to choose and to be chosen nor no man can more fully concur with you in this Opinion than I do That such a Parliament so chosen would be more effectual for the Establishment of our Government upon a Rocky or impregnable foundation as likewise for the correcting of such errors and miscarriages as by reason of the ill management of the best Government are or possibly may be in it and consequently for the making of us more happy than any new Fantastically devised model of Government can do In all this I say I agree with Mr. Baxter But in the Notion of who are worthy or unworthy to choose or to be chosen I am afraid we shall differ very much for perhaps Mr. Baxter and those of his Party may think those that are Dissenters from the Government of the Church are the only worthy men to choose and to be chosen Members of the Parliament I am sure by that stir and stickling they have made in the late Elections for Knights and Burgesses in all Counties and Corporations it appears they think so Whereas I am of opinion that none but such as are conformable in point of Judgment and well inclin'd in point of Affection to the present Government both in Church and State as to the species or kind of either that is as the one is Monarchical and the other Episcopal is fit to choose or to be chosen a Parliament-man and consequently that none of those that are not well affected to the present Government are fit to choose or to be chosen though they pretend never so much to be the Godly party nay though they were indeed as good and Godly men as they say they are and would have others believe them to be For though as Moses wish'd that all the Lords people were Prophets and yet did not think them to be so so I wish that all good and Godly men were wise and prudent men also but I cannot believe they are so nor consequently that they are sufficiently qualified either to be Statesmen themselves or to discern who are fit to be Statesmen And unskilful though well meaning Workmen may be marring whilst they think they are mending and pluck down more in a day than wiser men can build up again in a year And therefore the Fabrick of our present Government being so good a one as that Mr. Baxter himself by prefering it before any new Fantastical mode or model that can be devised or obtruded upon us doth as good as confess there cannot be a better certainly the main care that is to be taken by the wisdom of the State is to prevent the alteration or change of it And consequently the main Qualification to be required in those that choose and are to be chosen to be States-men is their being obliged to maintain and uphold the present Government as it is by Law established I still mean as to the species or kind of it and then as wise and good men may find work enough without medling with removing or moving of Foundations to mend the faults that are and to prevent those that may be in the superstructure So those that are not so wise as they should be nor so good as they would seem to be and those are the men most likely to be medling will not be able to do any great harm so long as the foundations themselves are secured from being undermined or overthrown by them CHAP. X. The excluding some Persons from choosing or being chosen into Parliament no injury The Test reinforced upon this account that if the Successor consent to it it cannot but hold good IF it be objected that the making of such a Law would be the excluding of many of the Freemen and Free-holders of the People from one of the greatest of the priviledges of their Birthright namely the choosing and being chosen Members of Parliament I Answer that if the security of the Government and the Peace and Welfare of the Kingdom require it and the Majority of the Peoples representatives without which it cannot be done consent to it it is no more than in many other cases is done already Secondly I answer that in this very case All the Papists who if they be not a great number I wonder why we should be so much afraid of them all the Papists I say who are all of them Free-men and as Freemen have a right to choose and be chosen into the House of Commons and some of them by Birth to be Peers of the Realm yet are all of them excluded from both Houses and so are all Out-law'd and Excommunicated persons and such are or should be all the Sectaries that will not come unto our Churches Thirdly Did not both Houses of Parliament make it one of the conditions of Peace with the late King that none that had serv'd him against them should be capable of sitting in either of the Houses for Twenty one years to come And why might not the King with much more reason have demanded the exclusion of all those that had fought for the Parliament against Him from the same priviledge Or why may not those that will not oblige themselves by Oath to maintain the Government legally established by King Lords and Commons be much more reasonably and much more justly and equitably excluded from having any thing to do in the Government or in the making of our Laws than those that would not take the Oath of Abjuration and of being faithful to the Government as it was illegally set up without King and Lords were excluded not only from choosing or being chosen into Parliaments but from having any protection or benefit of the Laws by the upstart Free-state as they call'd themselves but were indeed no better than Rebels and Robbers It is not therefore to be doubted but that such a Law as is made in Scotland may by the same Authority respectively be made in England and in Ireland also Neither is it to be doubted but that such a Law if it were made would be the best security that can be given against the bringing in of Popery or Arbitrary Government especially if the rightful Successor will not oppose but promote the making of such a Law here as I do verily
have the King and the two Houses of Parliament to be Co-ordinates and that any of the two is to over-rule the third and consequently the two Houses of Parliament to over-rule the King if They agree and He will not this was HERL's way one of the Prolocutors of the Westminster Assembly called together by the two Houses in the Rebellious Parliament But Master BAXTER will have the Soveraignty divided betwixt the King and the two Houses or betwixt the King and the Parliament and will have it to be lawful for either of the Parties to defend its own Right by force if it be incroached upon by the other and that the People are to take part with the Party encroached upon against the Party encroaching but with this difference that They are always to believe what the Parliament declares against the King to be true because they are their Trustees not only to defend their Rights but to inform their Judgments whether they be wronged or no and because they are their Trustees not only as they are Subjects now but as they were originally or at first Contractors before they were Subjects and did then by bargain reserve unto themselves certain Priviledges and Immunities to be exempted for ever from the Kings Jurisdiction which if their Trustees whom they are to believe declare to be violated they may lawfully take Arms against the King to maintain or recover those Rights of theirs and to defend that part of the Soveraignty which the Parliament have in the Government Now putting all these things together and supposing a corrupt Majority of Parliament-men in both Houses as Mr. Baxter confesseth there may be and we know there hath been and therefore may be so again who can secure the King though he reign never so much according to Law from being always in danger of a Rebellion or the Kingdom from being always in danger of a Civil War which being the worst of Evils that can happen to any Body Politick they that sit at the helm ought above all things else to take especial care to prevent the broaching any such Principles as tend to the stirring up of the People to Sedition and Rebellion by making them believe that in some cases it is not only lawful but their duty to take up Arms against the King and that they shall do God and the King too good service in so doing Such are those Principles of Mr. Baxter before rehearsed published and owned by him in many of his Books especially in that of the Holy Common-Wealth and amongst the rest especially two of which he seems to be the Original Parent or very first Author as namely first That the Peoâ—le of England are represented by their Trustees in Parliament not only as Subjects to the King but as Contractors with the King before he was their King and before they were his Subjects for which he brings no other proof but that he takes it for undeniable And 2dly That the Soveraignty here with us is not in the King alone as the Oath of Supremacy saith it is but that it is divided betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament and for proof of this the only reason he gives is That the Legislative Power which is essential to Soveraignty is in them as well as in the King and the late King himself confessed it to be so Whether it be so or no I have already considered and examined at large and I hope have proved that the King and the King alone is the efficient cause or maker of our Laws whatsoever the two Houses may antecedently do towards the making of them CHAP. XIII The late King 's owning that the Laws are made jointly by King Lords and Commons how to be understood NEither do I think what Mr. Baxter saith the late King confesseth in his answer from York to the Parliaments XIX Propositions namely That in this Kingdom the Laws are joyntly made by a King by an House of Peers and by an House of Commons chosen by the People doth being rightly understood contradict what I have said of the making of our Laws by the King only For although to say the same thing is made solely by one and joyntly by more than one seems to be a contradiction yet if by making the same thing be meant the making of it not in the same but several sences it is no contradiction to say it is made by one and no more in one sence and yet that it is made jointly by more in another sence For example according to an instance before given It may truly be said that Christ alone shall judge the World and yet it may truly be said that the XII Apostles for so saith Christ himself and all the rest of the Saints for so saith St. Paul shall judge the World together with him because the judging of the World by Christ is meant in one sense and the judging of the World by the Saints in another For it is Christ and Christ alone or Christ and none but Christ shall judge the World as a Judge properly so called that is authoritativè or by his own inherent power and Authority But the Saints are said to judge the World approbativè by assenting to and approving of the judgment given by Christ as just and righteous so that in propriety of speech they are not to be called Judges but Assessors and Assenters only In like manner as to the making of our Laws it may be truly said that the King alone is the maker of them because it is by the King and by the King alone that they are made to be Laws which were before no Laws and yet it may truly though not so properly be said too that they are made by the King and the two Houses of Parliament because they do consent to the Kings making of them to be Laws and not only so but also because they do not only consent to the making and publishing of them after they are made Laws by the King but they must consent to have them made Laws by the King before the King can make them to be Laws And yet for all that it is the King and the King alone who by his LE ROT LE VEVLT or his FIAT doth make them to be Laws In which operative and efficacious words neither of the Houses concur with him and yet it is by those words only or alone that what was before but a Bill that is an Embryo or at most but materia disposita matter fit to be made a Law of is informed and enlivened with that obliging power and authority both directive and coactive which makes it to be a Law So that all the two Houses can be said to do towards the making of a Law is to give it a posse fieri a capacity to be made a Law but it is the King and the King only that gives it its factum esse its being made so and yet because the
King cannot by his Fiat give it its factum esse till it be agreed on by the two Houses and because the two Houses by their agreeing on it do give it its fieri posse or make it ready and fit to be made a Law therefore it may truly though not properly be said to be made jointly by the King Lords and Commons because though it be not made by the Lords and Commons but by the King only yet it cannot be made without them neither that is without their doing something antecedently without their doing whereof the King cannot make Laws And this was that and all that which the late King meant when he said that the Laws of this Kingdom were made jointly by the King Lords and Commons that is according to the old Parliamentary stile by the King with the consent of the Lords and Commons or if you will by the King but not without the consent of the Lords and Commons But I hope Mr. Baxter who would be thought the Master of propriety and distinctness of speaking will not affirm that a thing can properly be said to be done by him or them without whose consent it cannot be done For I think it is one of the main matters wherein he differs or dissents from our Church that a Priest or Minister of the Word and Sacraments cannot be ordain'd without consent of the People will he therefore deny that it is the Bishop with his Presbyters that ordains him or will he say that he is jointly ordained by the Bishop and the People Certainly none but they that lay hands upon him have any thing to do in the Act of Ordination So that it doth not follow that because a Law cannot be made without the precedent consent of both Houses of Parliament that therefore they have any thing to do properly speaking in the making of it Again supposing Mr. Baxter is of the opinion of the Protestant Churches abroad that there can be no marriage without consent of Parents and supposing that opinion to be true yet I suppose neither Mr. Baxter nor any of the Ministers of those Churches will say that it is the consent of Parents that makes the Marriage though it cannot be a Marriage without it Many other Instances of the like nature might be given but this is enough to prove the thing we have in hand namely that though in some sence it may be said that our Laws are made by the King and Parliament or by the King Lords and Commons because they cannot be made by the King without the consent of the Lords and Commons yet properly speaking it is the King alone who by his LE ROY LE VEVLT makes them to be Laws in which Law-making Act of his neither of the Houses do joyn or are joyned with him and therefore the Laws so made cannot properly be said to be made by the King and them joyntly And yet because they cannot be made by the King without their antecedent consent to them and proposing of them they may truly be said to concur To the making though not In the making of them And this and no more but this was undoubtedly the late Kings meaning when he said the Laws were made here in England by the King Lords and Commons or upon their proposing such and such Bills being first agreed upon by them to be made Laws by him CHAP. XIV The making of Laws in the Roman State applied to Vs Mr. B. 's division of the Soveraignty rectified The King 's Negative voice asserted and the Enemies of Monarchy detected THus when the Soveraignty was in the People of Rome the Senate did concur to the making of Laws for the Common-wealth but did not make them they concur'd to the making of them by consulting and debating what was fit to be made a Law by the People as having no power to make it a Law themselves the making of Laws being an Act of Soveraignty and the Soveraignty being then not in the Senate but in the People and therefore the Senate did not so much as pretend to the making of Laws but only to the proposing of Laws to be made by a higher power namely that of the People as appears by the formal and solemn stile relating to the making of Laws in those times which was this Senatus rog at Populus jubet the Senate requesteth or proposeth namely such or such a thing to be made a Law but the People commands or enjoyns it that is the People maketh what was proposed by the Senate for a Law to be a Law And as this was the stile in relation to making of Laws in a Democracy when and where the Soveraignty was in the People so à paritate rationis upon the like reason and account in a Monarchy where the Soveraignty is in One the stile ought to be Populus rog at Rex jubet the People requests and the King grants And so indeed it was as I observed before according to the ancient stile used in our Parliaments here in England in divers Acts and Statutes wherein the King is said to give or grant sometimes at the special request and sometimes at the humble Petition of the Commons Neither doth the Alteration of the Stile at the Request to with the consent argue an alteration in the species of the Government for the King is still the sole Lawmaker or Lawgiver as much as he was before and consequently as much a Monarch though less Despotical and more Political in the managery and execution of his Kingly Power having by his Predecessors and his own voluntary and gracious condescension obliged himself not to exercise his Legislative power or to make any Laws without the consent of those that are to be governed by them which though it do not make him cease to be a Monarch or to have the Soveraignty or supreme power wholly and solely in himself yet it makes him cease to be an absolute arbitrary and despotical and to become a legal regulated and Political Monarch or a King that is to govern his People by Laws Laws indeed of his own making but not without their consent to them I mean without their consent by their Representatives in Parliament together with the consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal which all of them jointly are the Representatives of the three Estates or of that whole Body Politick whereof the King is the Head And as it is he that governs the whole Body so it is he that makes the Laws to govern the whole Body which because they are not made by the King without the consent of the three Estates representing that Body therefore Mr. Baxter thinks they are made by the three Estates as well as by the King and therefore that the Soveraignty is divided betwixt the King and them and consequently that this is no Monarchy but a mix'd Government which is the same mistake that Grotius as I said before
not from the People that chuse such or such a Man to be their King but from God onely so that as the Woman cannot take away the power of a Husband from her Husband after he is her Husband so the People cannot take away the Kingly power from their King after he is their King And therefore he concludes That in case the Kingly or supreme Power should be made use of to the publick detriment he sees not how the Body meaning the whole Body politick by any just means should be able to help it self without the consent of him that hath the supreme Power What could he have said more convincingly for the Declaration of his own Opinion concerning the unlawfulness of the Peoples using Force against their King though he make use of his Kingly Power to the detriment of the publick or of the People in general And though he be such a King as he supposeth to have originally derived his Title from the free choice of the People or from the choice of a free People much less if he come in by Conquest For some multitudes saith Mr. Hooker are brought into Subjection by force Divine Providence it self so disposing for it is God that giveth Victory in the day of Battel and unto whom Dominion is in this sort derived the same they enjoy according to the Law of Nations which Law authorizeth Conquerours to reign as absolute Lords over them whom they vanquish Now this way that is by Conquest was their Dominion or Kingly Power over this Nation of ours originally derived to our present Race of Kings But may they therefore now reign absolutely and at their own Will and Pleasure as their first Predecessours who came in by Conquest did or might have done No Mr. Hooker doth not say so nor I neither but he saith and so say I too That by means of after agreement or rather by after condescensions concessions and grants of Kings it comes to pass in Kingdoms that they whose ancient Predecessours were by violence and force made Subject do by little and little grow into the sweet of Kingly Government that is a Government of Kings governing by Laws in a free and voluntary manner condescended unto And thus this Kingdom of ours of Despotical became Political by our Kings limiting and restraining themselves by Laws of their own and their Predecessours making and much more by restraining themselves from making any Laws at all but such as the Lords and Commons in Parliament should consent to And this is all the restraint that Mr. Hooker acknowledgeth our Kings to be Subject to and is this more than Mr. Baxter doth or can approve of This doth not hinder the Government to be truly Monarchical which Mr. Baxter saith it is not nor the Supremacy to be wholly in one Person both as to Ecclesiastical and secular affairs as Mr. Hooker saith it is and Mr. Baxter saith it is not So that it was not Mr. Hooker's restraining but his extending or rather acknowledging and defending the extent of the Power of all Kings in general and of the Kings of England in particular that Mr. Baxter doth not nor cannot consistingly with himself approve of We will instance in what he saith of our own King onely according as he himself desireth to be understood when he tells us that what he speaks of Kings shall be in respect of the slate and nature of this Kingdom And first he tells us That this is an hereditary Kingdom and that in hereditary Kingdoms Birth giveth right to Sovereign Dominion and that the Death of the Predecessour putteth the Successour by bloud in Seisin He adds That if it should so happen that a man without right of bloud be elected and put into possession with all the usual Ceremonies and Solemnities all such new Elections and investings are utterly void the Inheritour by bloud may dispossess him as an Vsurper the contrary opinion whereunto he saith is an unnatural conceit and an insolent position set abroach by seeds-men of Rebellion onely to animate unquiet Spirits and to feed them with possibility of aspiring to Thrones if they can win the Hearts of the People What say you Mr. Baxter is not this more in favour of such Kings as ours is than you approve I am sure it is more than you did approve when as you tell us in your Holy-Common-Wealth you were bound to submit to the present Government as set over us by God and to obey for Conscience sake and to behave your self as a loyal Subject towards them But what was that present Government It must be one or other of those Governments betwixt the late King's Murther and his Son's Restauration which in Mr. Hooker's judgment were all of them Vsurpations and consequently all that voluntarily adhered and submitted to them Rebels and Traitours because they did as much as in them lay to exclude and keep out the right Heir from the Crown in an hereditary Kingdom So that I do not wonder if Mr. Baxter found more in Mr. Hooker than he could approve as to this particular but it was not for his too much restraining the Power of the King over his People but for his restraining the Power of the People over their King by setting up what Governours and what Government they please contrary to the fundamental Institution of the Kingdom Again as Mr. Baxter might find more in Mr. Hooker than he could approve or had approved for limiting the descent of the supreme Power here with us to the next in bloud or the right Heir without exception so in regard of the supreme Power itself as it is vested in our King he might find more in Mr. Hooker than he did approve not for the restraint but extent of it and that in regard both of persons and of things And first of Persons For Mr. Hooker speaking of our King's Supremacy saith that thereby it is intended and meant to exclude partly foreign Powers and partly the Power which belongeth in several unto others contained as parts in that politick Body over which the King hath Supremacy in and by which words all Persons as well within as without the Kingdom are excluded from having any part in the Sovereignty or supreme Power here in England None without the Kingdom having any thing to doe with it and All within the Kingdom being subject to it And this is the true interpretation of the Oath of Supremacy whereby as I have proved before the King is acknowledged to be the onely supreme Governour in as well as of this Kingdom and by consequence exclusively not onely in relation to any that do pretend from abroad but also from any that may pretend at home to have any part in or of the Supremacy with him Whereas Mr. Baxter will have the Oath of Supremacy to be understood as intending onely to exclude foreign Pretenders to any Supremacy here namely the Pope and
his Successours but not to exclude some that are at home namely the Parliament from having a part of it So that in respect I mean in respect of the extent of the King's Supremacy over all Persons in all capacities Mr. Baxter might find more in Mr. Hooker than he could approve of viz. the King's Supremacy over all Persons in his Kingdom and consequently his being the onely Supreme Governour being utterly inconsistent with the division of the Sovereignty betwixt the King and Parliament which is Mr. Baxter's fundamental Principle upon which he grounds his defence of the late Rebellion and lays a foundation of the like Rebellions from Generation to Generation for the future Again as Mr. Baxter might find more in Mr. Hooker than he could approve for the extent of the King's Supremacy in regard of the Persons over whom so might he likewise in regard of the Things whereunto it is extended concerning which in the general Mr. Hooker saith Our Kings when they are to take possession of the Crown have it pointed out before their Eyes even by the very solemnities and rites of their Inaugurations to what affairs their supreme Power and Authority reacheth crowned saith he we see they are inthroniz'd and anointed The Crown is a sign of their military Dominion the Throne of sedentary or judicial the Oil of religious or sacred power So that according to Mr. Hooker the jus gladii the Power of the Sword or the right of making War as likewise of making Laws both Civil and Ecclesiastical belongs to the King's Supremacy And to both those ends as he tells us afterwards it is one of our King's Prerogatives to call and dissolve all solemn Assemblies about our publick affairs either in Church or State so that there can be no such voluntary Associations of Churches as Mr. Baxter would have nor no such Associations of the People without the King's leave as others would have no nor no making of Laws neither either in Parliament for the State or in Convocation for the Church when they are called and met together but by the King and that not onely because no Law of any kind can be made without the Royal Assent by reason of the King 's Negative without which saith Mr. Hooker the King were King but in name onely but because it is the Royal Assent that makes it to be a Law For though as the same Mr. Hooker observes Wisedom is requisite for the devising and discussing of Laws he means the Wisedom of the Lords and Commons in Parliament for the devising and discussing of Laws for the State and the Wisedom of the Representatives of the Clergy in the Convocation for the devising and discussing of Laws for the Church yet it is not that Wisedom saith he that makes them to be Laws but that which establisheth them and maketh them to be Laws is Power even the Power of Dominion the chiefty whereof saith he amongst us resteth in the Person of the King Whereunto he adds Is there any Law of Christ's which forbiddeth Kings and Rulers of the Earth to have such sovereign and supreme Power in making of Laws either Civil or Ecclesiastical Which question being virtually a negative Proposition implies that there is no Law of God to prohibit any King to doe what our King doeth that is as he positively and clearly affirms to make Laws for his own Subjects by that supreme Power that resteth in his own Person and consequently is not divided betwixt him and the Parliament no not in the making of Laws which is the onely instance given by Mr. Baxter to prove the Sovereignty or supreme Power in this Kingdom not to be in the King alone or in the King onely which as I said before is the Foundation on which he superstructs the building of his Babel or the Justification of the late Confusion and Rebellion And therefore he had reason to say he found more in Hooker than he did approve because to approve all he found in Hooker touching the supreme Power either of all Kings in general or of our own Kings in particular had been to condemn himself who is much more for the restraining and resisting of Kings by their Subjects than Mr. Hooker who as I said before hath not a word of resisting nor of restraining them neither any otherwise than as they have restrained themselves by Laws of their own making So that Mr. Hooker may still retain that honourable title which learned Men have given him of judicious Hooker whatsoever voluminous Mr. Baxter hath said upon this or any other occasion to take it away from him CHAP. III. Bishop Bilson though in an errour yet saith not so much for the resisting of Kings as Mr. B. doth The Case stated of Subjects rebelling upon the account of Religion and of other Princes assisting them AS for Bishop BILSON whom Mr. Baxter saith I advised him to reade I confess I cannot say He hath nothing for the resisting of Kings by their Subjects in any of his Books but this I can say that he hath nothing to that purpose in that Book of his which I advised Mr. Baxter to reade no nor in any of his Books hath he so much for resisting of Kings as Mr. Baxter himself in his Book of the Holy Commonwealth And therefore I wonder he should say he found more in BILSON for the resisting and restraining of Kings than he could approve Bishop Bilson was one of my Predecessours in the Bishoprick of Winchester and much more before me in Learning than he was in Time but Bernardus non vidit omnia and the learnedst and best of Men are but Men and therefore may err and good men very good men may be the apter to fall into some kind of errours both speculatively and practically by indulging too much even to their good affections And therefore I believe it was his Zeal for the true Religion and his compassion to those that were persecuted for it that made this Learned and Good Man say so much as he doth which is more than I wish he had in excuse of taking up of Arms by the French Dutch and Scotch Protestants in defence of themselves and their Religion against their several respective Princes And I think we ought to believe that it was for the same reason and not for reason of State onely that Queen Elizabeth did at the same time assist with Men Money and Arms all the aforesaid Subjects against their aforesaid Sovereigns But yet for all that I do not think that either the Queen did well in doing what she did or that the Bishop did well in writing what he writ in defence of them because I do not think they themselves I mean the subjects of those Princes did well in making that resistance which they did contrary to the Precepts of the Gospel and to the Practice of the Primitive Christians And I remember that upon this consideration during
and particularly such as are against Princes safety and honour or whose Principles tend to overthrow the honour and safety of Governours and to kindle the fire of contention and enmity or such as draw their hearers Souls into any damnable errour or sin or that perswade men against any precept of the Decalogue and consequently against any of the precepts of the second Table as well as of the first all such as these saith Mr. Baxter are to be restrained from preaching For far be it saith Mr. Baxter from any sober man to think that the Magistrate must let all men doe the evil that they will but pretend to God and Conscience for Which one saying of his makes all that he said before to justifie the preaching of his Nonconformists to signifie nothing if they be silenced or forbidden to preach for any of the aforesaid causes by him specified and acknowledged to be such as Preachers ought to be silenced for notwithstanding any pretence of conscience to the contrary So this being agreed on betwixt us the next thing in question betwixt us is whether those that are silenced are such as Mr. Baxter confesseth ought to be silenced or no for if they be he confesseth likewise that no pretence of conscience can warrant their preaching and much less oblige them to preach For the deciding of this question therefore whether those that are silenced are justly silenced or no there remains one and but one question more and that is who shall judge and finally determine whether they that are silenced be or be not such as ought to be silenced or restrained from preaching Surely they themselves must not be their own judges but who must then why who but the Magistrate saith Mr. Baxter who in Church cases and religion hath the onely publick judgment whom he shall countenance maintain or tolerate or whom he shall punish or not tolerate nor maintain but with this caution so he be not the executioner of the Clergy's sentence without or against his own conscience and judgment Where by the Magistrate I hope he means the supreme Magistrate and by his judgment he means his judgment according to Law For the Law and nothing but the Law is the declaration of the supreme Magistrate's publick judgment in giving whereof he neither is nor can be the executioner of any other man's sentence but all subordinate Magistrates whether Civil or Ecclesiastical are the executioners of the supreme Magistrate's judgment or sentence and are no farther binding or to be obeyed than they are so Now that the supreme Magistrate with the advice and consent of his great Council hath given his judgment not onely who are and who are not to be tolerated to preach in publick or in Churches appears by the Act of Vniformity as likewise that he hath given his judgment also that those who are not to be tolerated to preach in publick or in Churches are not to be tolerated to preach in private nor in Conventicles neither appears by those other Acts of Parliament whereby such preaching is forbidden and such penalties as are therein specified are to be inflicted upon the transgressours of them Lastly as those Acts of Parliament are undeniable evidences who are and who are not to be tolerated to preach either publickly or privately according to the publick judgment of the State so the reasons why such preaching and such Preachers are prohibited are declared in the Titles and Prefaces of the aforesaid Acts for example the Title to one of those Acts namely that of decimo tertio of our present King is this An Act for the safety and preservation of his Majesty's person and Government against treasonable and seditious practices and attempts and in the Preface to the said Act it is said that the Lords and Commons assembled in that Parliament deeply weighing and considering the miseries and calamities of well nigh 20 years before his Majesty's happy return and withall reflecting upon the causes and occasions of so great and deplorable confusions the growth and increase of which they say did in a very great measure proceed from a multitude of seditious Sermons Pamphlets and Speeches published with a transcendent boldness from which kind of distemper say they as the present age is not wholly free so posterity may be apt to relapse into them if a timely remedy be not provided Therefore say they We the Lords and Commons having duly considered the Premisses do most humbly beseech your Majesty that it may be enacted c. By which Title and preface it plainly appears that the Lords and Commons did believe that neither the safety of the King's person nor of the Government could be secured if such kind of Preaching and Preachers as had in the late times been the stirrers up of the People to rebellion were not restrained from preaching for the future unless they would give some such security as the Parliament should think fit to require which was their renouncing the Covenant and their subscription to the Act of Vniformity which was enacted by the King by the advice and with the consent of the Lords and Commons the year following And it was for their not conforming to this Act of Vniformity that is for their not giving that security which the Law required that they would not preach schismatically and factiously and seditiously as they had done formerly for which they were some of them deprived and all of them disabled to preach publickly in Churches and consecrated places But this Act not proving effectual enough to prevent the danger for preventing whereof it was enacted because those that were forbid to preach publickly and in Churches did preach the same doctrines in Conventicles and in corners confirming their old and making more and more new Proselytes and being more and more followed because they were forbidden to preach in publick Therefore two years after this there was another Act made by the same Authority the Title whereof is An Act to prevent and suppress seditious Conventicles and the Preface or Preamble thereof is That for the providing of farther and more speedy remedies against the growing and dangerous practices of seditious Sectaries and other disloyal Persons who under pretence of tender Consciences do at their meetings contrive Insurrections as late experience hath shewed Be it enacted c. And then tells us first what shall be taken for a seditious Conventicle namely any meeting or Assembly in any place under colour or pretence of any exercise of Religion in other manner than is allowed by the Liturgy or practice of the Church of England where there shall be five Persons or more over and above those of the same house Secondly What are to be the Penalties for the first second and third Offence and lastly who are to be the Executioners and Inflicters of these Penalties Where you see that it is the Highest secular Magistrate whom Mr. Baxter will have
such Magistrates if there were any such This opinion of Calvin and his Followers taxed by Grotius Heb 12. 15. His reason for it Nam Magistratus illi inferiorum quidem ratione habità sunt publicae personae at superiores si considerentur privati sunt Grotius de jure Belli Pacis l. 1. cap. 4. sect 6. Another passage of Grotius wherein he allows resistance of Kings Si Rex habeat partem summi Imperii partem alteram populus aut senatus Regi in partem non suam involanti vi justè opponi poterit quia catenus imperium non habet quod locum habere censeo etlamsi dictum sit belli potestatem penes Regem fore id enim de Bello externo intelligendum est cùm alioqui quisquis Imperii summi partem habeat non possit non habere eam partem tuendi potestatem quod ubl fit potest Rex suam Imperii partem belli jure amittere Grot. Ibid. This passage the ground of Mr. B's justifying the late War No such Case possible as Grotius supposeth Sovereignty indivisible The division of the Roman Empire no division of Sovereignty Our English Heptarchy such Partners in the Empire upon what account The Case when a King is conditionally elected A King thus Elected a King in title only No division of the Sovereignty in this Case as being wholly in the People Grotius inconsistent with himself An account of the changes in the Roman States in none of which ever any Division of the Sovereignty The changes of Government in that State but three properly speaking The Sovereignty not divided all the while The Senate not Co-partners in it with the Emperor as Mr. B. would have it Grotius his design in his supposed Division of the Sovereignty to justifie the Netherlands war against the King of Spain A Book of his wherein he states the Case He lodges the Sovereignty all along in the States and makes K. Philip an Vsurper os it Lib. de Antiquitate Reipub Baravicae cap. 7. page 49. This however it may perhaps justifie his Countrymen doth not reach the Case in hand This further made out The whole Sovereignty he saith was always in the States De Antiquitate Relpub Batav p. 52. Ib. p. 49. Their Kings but Titular The States according to Grotius in their war with the King of Spain did but recover what was their own before upon these grounds if true that War no Rebellion The Sovereignty of necessity either wholly in the People or wholly in the King Sovereignty or the supreme Power is that in the Body Politick which the Soul is in the natural Body No such division of the Sovereignty in England If England a Monarchy as it is the King sole Sovereign Both which Mr. B. denies though sworn by him at his Ordination The Parliaments pretended Declaration about it inquired after No such Declaration to be heard of from any Parliament The House of Commons which with Mr. B. goes for the Parliament how Representatives of the People Of Representatives at last they made themselves Lords and Masters In their Addresses they always acknowledged the King their Sovereign If the two Houses either or both have a share in the Sovereignty they would have a title to Majesty also The King declared to be the only Supreme Governour by an Act of Parliament To wit by the Act of Vniformity H. C. 460. Mr. B. slights what he cannot answer Ibid. The Oath of Supremacy not made against Papists only as he saith The use Q. Elizabeth made of that Oath She justified her self in it by a publick Declaration Camd. Eliz. p. 39 40. Three things observed from that Declaration of Hers. The Supremacy the chief Prerogative of the Crown Two parts in the Oath of Supremacy the one Assertory the other Promissory In the Assertory part two Clauses one Affirmative the other Negative The later Clause discovers Papists The former Clause asserts the Monarchy What intended by swearing the King to be the only supreme Governour The distinction which the Rubrick makes betwixt those two Clauses Vid. The form and manner of making of Deacons The first Clause is called the Oath The second is rather an Abjuration The former Clause infers the later the later not the former The Kings being the only supreme Governor excludes all pretence to the Supremacy from any other as well at home as abroad Why not an express abjuration of the Supremacies being in any at home beside the King as of its being in any abroad The 1 Reason The 2 Reason There is a claim to the Supremacy from abroad no such pretence at home A Pamphlet in the late times taxed which makes the two Houses Co-ordinate with the King The project of Co-ordination utterly inconsistent with our Government The constitution the same now as ever The two Houses Petitioning the King a proof that there is no Co-ordination The King free to grant or deny as he pleaseth An Ordinance of both Houses with Mr. B. equivalent to an Act of Parliament No legal Authority for the late War against the King Nor can any pretence justifie it Mr. B. himself appealed to Holy Com. w. p. 441. The two Houses themselves acknowledged the power of the Sword to be in the King Some Remarks upon that acknowledgment The invalidity of their Ordinances made out The King asserts the Militia Vid. the Kings Answer from York to the 19 Propositions A remarkable passage in a Sermon of Arch-Bishop Usher at the Treaty in the Isle of Wight Sir Phil. Warwick a witness to that passage An objection against its credibility answered The Parliaments own acknowledgment further made out Tâ—e mischievousness of some of Mr. B. 's writings Heresie and Schism propagated by Books though the Authors themselves repent their errors An Instance of Brown the Father of the Brownists Mr. Baxter the Founder of the Baxterian Sect. His Anti-episcopal Aphorisms past by His Anti-monarchical Aphorisms justly excepted against The Soveraignty he saith divided betwixt King and Parliament and his Reasons to prove it Of his first Proof The Parliament hath always acknowledg'd the King their Soveraign The Oath of Supremacy proves it His second Proof from the Legislative power The Legislative power solely in the King By Parliament is meant not King Lords Commons but Lords and Commons that is the two Houses Mr. B. by Parliament often understands the House of Commons and in effect lodges the whole Legislative power in them How the two Houses come to be a Parliament The Lords summoned by the King The Commons chosen by the People with the King's leave The King gives the Parliament its being and continuance as he pleaseth The two Houses therefore not co-ordinate nor sharers in the Soveraignty with the King Vid. Grotium de Antiquitate Reipub. Batavicae What hurts the Crown hurts the People The Legislative power a branch of Soveraignty How far the two Houses concerned in that They only propose Bills The Royal Assent makes
them Laws by giving them an obliging power The King alone our Lawmaker Dr. Sandersons judgment in the case His Commendation for an excellent Casuist 1 Ep. Tim. Cap. 4. v. 3. The design of Mr. B. 's Holy Common-wealth He intitles the Vsurpers to the whole Soveraignty By the King 's having lost his part Vid. H. C. Thes. 145. 363. Thes. 368. And this too against a Thesis of his own Thes. 374. Mr. B. 's Thesis further examined Who in Mr. B. 's account the best Governours in all the World See the Preface to the Holy Common-wealth Whom yet he owns to be Intruders and Vsurpers II. C. p. 86. Thesis 375. His strange shuffling and self-contradiction A short account of those Vsurpers Mr. B. 's flattery to Oliver His compliance with Richard Three Remarks upon it His Eulogy of the Vsurpers * Pref. to Holy Com. W. Mr. B. rebuked for his Extravagance and his best Governors challeng'd All that slaid and sate in Parliament not censured The Recapitulation of the Legislative power being only in the King An Objection Mr. B. 's opinion that a Soveraign though limited by compact may act for the Peoples safety against their consent And why not make Laws then for that end without their consent His reason for that opinion v. p. 119. Thes. 120. The Answer according to that Opinion Ship-Money justified upon Mr. B. 's grounds The Bishop's own answer Though Laws are not made without the Peoples consent in Parliament yet that consent doth not make them Laws Ordinances of themselves not Laws The King's Assent gives being to the Laws How the two Houses concur to the making of Laws The matter of the Laws from the Parliament the Form from the King Why the Laws said to be enacted by King Lords Commons The Modern stile of enacting Laws H. C. p. 46â— The Antient stile or form When the change began The Old stile resumed afterward Mr. B. 's Argument for the Legislative power in the Parliament from the Preface of our Laws unconclusive Holy Com. p. 462. All the Ancient and several Modern Instances against him Why Henry the VIII changed the Old stile His meaning in it could not be to part with any of his Soveraignty Nor was it so understood by either King or Parliament Most likely it was to please the People Why the Old stile resumed since An Objection Those words And by the Authority of the same when added and why The Answer By Parliament here meant not Lords Commons only without the King What meant by the Authority of the same The Parliament the King 's great Council and High Court. Their Authority from the King They act in that respect as other Courts do Why our Laws called the King's Laws Why called Acts of Parliament Advice or consent sometimes intitles to the Act. 1 Cor. 6. 2. Matth. 19. 28. Joh. 5. 22. The Saints judging the World applied to this case The difference in the Case The four Causes of our Laws viz. Efficient Matter Form and End of them explain'd What kind of Cause the Consent of the two Houses is The Legislative power and the Soveraignty in the King only Two Conclusions of Mr. B. 's upon his supposition of the Soveraignty divided The Eastern Monarchs not altogether Arbitrary What it is denominates a Monarchy No Judicatory above the King The Parliament no such Judicatory The King can do no wrong how meant Another Maxime to that purpose King David accountable to God alone and punished by him David 's Monition to Kings The Peoples priviledge of consenting to their Laws a favour at first of the Kings William the Conqueror made Laws without their consent Parliament first so called in Henry I. time An antecedent compact of the People with the King a political whimsie of Mr. B ' s. Mr. Hobbs and Mr. Baxter agree The extreme unlikelihood of the supposition Our Government at first arbitrary T is likely the Custom of not making Laws without the Peoples consent began under Henry I. with that other of not raising Mony without their consent However it was it was not by Compact but by Grant Mr. B. 's vain and false distinction of two capacities in the People as Free and as Subjects H. C. p. 459. H. C. p. 458. Some Rights he saith reserved by the People in their Contract and the Parliament their Trustees Government not alway founded upon Contract as Mr. B. saith it is A free People as well as a free Man may give up themselves to be govern'd without any reservation of Rights Several free People have done so Grotius de jure Belli ac pacis Particularly in our Government no such thing as Contract or Reservation off Rights The Peoples Rights not by bargain but by Grants of their Kings The People had no Representatives till Henry I. Vid. Daniel's Hist. Baker's Chron. Mr. B. 's supposition a meer fiction The Priviledges and Representatives the People now have are not by any antecedent Compact The Peoples being represented in a double capacity as Mr. B. fancies made an Argument by him to justifie the late Rebellion Holy Com. W. H. C. Thes. 361. The King's Coronation Oath doth not prove any such compact or Reserves c. as Mr. B. affirms This made out in three Considerations Mr. B. makes the King a King in name only He hath no authentick Record for such a Contract as he supposeth Holy Com. W. p. 377. H. C. p. 468. Nor for the Parliaments being the Peoples Trustees for their reserved Rights Were the Original constitution such as Mr. B. makes it the King would not be sole Soveraign nor Soveraign at all A brief account of the Government and its changes during the Vsurpation till the Kings Return A serious Expostulation with people for their uneasiness Numb c. 14. v. 4. No reason for it The pretended ground of it The ill effect of causless fears The Constitution of our Government The Subjects Rights and Priviledges Their representatives in Parliament The duty of those Representatives How to act as Trustees also An even Balance to be kept betwixt Prerogative and Priviledge The King compared to a Father and a Husband Two observations of Grotius De jure Belli Pacis cap. 3. p. 81. lb. p. 83. Applied to Mr. B's main principle How it came that Laws are not to be made without a Parliament When our Monarchy began to be Political Yet still a Monarchy A mistake in Polybius Grotius de jure Belli pacis lib. 1. cap. 3. Sect. 19. We are to judge of a Government not by the Managery but by the Soveraignty of it Ib. This Rule applied to the English Monarchy The happy condition of English Subjects An Account of a Sermon the Bishop preacht before the Long Parliament in commendation of the English constitution both in Church and State The reason why this Account given Church and State both subject to the Monarchy Popery and Presbytery both destructive to Monarchy Two Supremes in one Kingdom
Proposition and at last gave divers Reasons of our denial amongst which one was that It may be unlawfull by Accident and therefore sinfull You now know my Crime it is my concurring with Learned Reverend Brethren to give this reason of our denial of a Proposition yet they are not forbidden to Preach for it and I hope shall not be but onely I. You have publickly heard from a mouth that should speak nothing but the words of Charity Truth and Soberness especially there that this was a desperate shift that men at the last are forced to and inferring that then neither God nor man can enjoyn without sin In City and Countrey this soundeth forth to my reproach I should take it for an act of Clemency to have been smitten professedly for nothing and that it might not have been thought necessary to afflict me by a defamation that so I might seem justly afflicted by a Prohibition to Preach the Gospel But indeed is there in these words of ours so great a Crime though we doubted not but they knew that our Assertion made not Every Evil Accident to be such as made an imposition unlawfull yet we expressed this by word to them at that time for fear of being misreported and I told it to the Right Reverend Bishop when he forbad me to Preach and gave this as a reason And I must confess I am still guilty of so much weakness as to be confident that Some things not Evil of themselves may have Accidents so Evil as may make it a sin to him that shall command them Is this opinion inconsistent with all Government yea I must confess my self guilty of so much greater weakness as that I thought I should never have found a man on Earth that had the ordinary reason of a Man that had made question of it yea I shall say more than that which hath offended viz. That whensoever the commanding or forbidding of a thing indifferent is like to occasion more hurt than good and this may be foreseen the commanding or forbidding it is a sin But yet this is not the Assertion that I am chargeable with but that Some Accidents there may be that may make the Imposition sinfull If I may ask it without accusing of others how would my Crime have been denominated if I had said the contrary should I not have been judged unmeet to live in any governed Society It is not unlawfull of it self to command out a Navy to Sea but if it were foreseen that they would fall into the Enemies hands or were like to perish by any Accident and the necessity of sending them were small or none it were a sin to send them It is not unlawfull of it self to sell Poyson or give a knife to another or to bid another to do it but if it were foreseen that they will be used to poyson or kill the buyer it is unlawfull and I think the Law would make him believe it that were guilty It is not of it self unlawfull to light a Candle or set fire on a straw but if it may be foreknown that by another's negligence or wilfulness it is like to set fire on the City or give fire to a train or store of Gunpowder that is under the Parliament House when the King and Parliament are there I crave the Bishop's pardon for believing that it were sinfull to doe it or command it yea or not to hinder it in any such case when Quinon vetat peccare cum potest jubet yea though going to God's publick worship be of it self so far from being a sin that it is a Duty yet I think it is a sin to command it to all in time of a raging Pestilence or when they should be defending the City against the assault of an Enemy it may rather then be a duty to prohibit it I think Paul spake not any thing inconsistent with the Government of God or man when he bid both the Rulers and the People of the Church not to destroy him with their meat for whom Christ died and when he saith he hath not his power to destruction but to edification yea there are evil Accidents of a thing not evil of it self that are caused by the Commander and it is my opinion that they may prove his Command unlawfull But what need I use any other instances than that which was the matter of our dispute Suppose it never so lawfull of it self to kneel in the Reception of the Sacrament if it be imposed by a penalty that is incomparably beyond the proportion of the offence that penalty is an Accident of the command and maketh it by Accident sinfull in the Commander If a Prince should have Subjects so weak as that all of them thought it a sin against the example of Christ and the Canons of the General Councils and many hundred years practice of the Church to kneel in the Act of Receiving on the Lord's day if he should make a Law that all should be put to death that would not kneel when he foreknew that their Consciences would command them all or most of them to die rather than obey would any man deny his command to be unlawfull by this Accident Whether the penalty of ejecting Ministers that dare not put away all that do not kneel and of casting out all the people that scruple it from the Church be too great for such a circumstance and so in the rest and whether this with the lamentable estate of many Congregations and the divisions that will follow being all foreseen do prove the impositions unlawfull which were then in Question is a Case that I had then a clearer call to speak to than I have now onely I may say That the Ejecting of the Servants of Christ from the Communion of his Church and of his faithfull Ministers from their Sacred Work when too many Congregations have none but insufficient or scandalous Teachers or no Preaching Ministers at all will appear a matter of very great moment in the day of our accounts and such as should not be done upon any but a necessary cause where the benefit is greater than this hurt and all the rest amounts to Having given you to whom I owe it this account of the cause for which I am forbidden the exercise of my Ministry in that Countrey I now direct these Sermons to your hands that seeing I cannot teach you as I would I may teach you as I can And if I much longer enjoy such Liberty as this it will be much above my expectation The Bishop of Worcester 's Letter to a Friend for Vindication of himself from Mr. Baxter 's Calumny SIR I Have received that Letter of yours whereby you inform me that Mr. Baxter hath lately written and printed something with such a reflexion upon me that I am obliged to take notice of it I thank you for your care of my Reputation which next to Conscience ought to be the dearest of all things to all men especially to
this as a reason for his forbidding him to Preach where if he means that the Bishop gave him this as the onely or the principal reason he speaks without truth and against his Conscience for the first and principal reason the Bishop gave him for his forbidding him to Preach was as he well knows and as the Dean of Worcester will witness against him His Preaching before without Licence having no Cure of his own to Preach to whereunto when he replied I had promised to give him such a Licence as the Bishop of London had given him viz. Quà m diu se bene gereret durante beneplacito I rejoin'd That it was true indeed I had once promised to give him such a Licence but withall that it was as true that first I had never promised to give him a Licence if he took it before I gave it him and that for this presumption of his I had now forbidden him to Preach any more Secondly That I knew more of him since than I did at that time for first I had been credibly informed that he had abused the Bishop of London 's favour by preaching factiously though not in the City yet in the Diocese of London and I named the place to him Secondly that since that promise of mine which cannot be supposed to be other than Conditional I my self had heard him at a Conference in the Savoy maintaining such a Position as was destructive to Legislative Power both in God and Man meaning the Assertion before spoken of viz. That the enjoining of things lawfull by lawfull Authority if they might by Accident be the cause of sin was sinfull which Assertion of his with the horrible consequences of it I told him then at Worcester I had formerly told him of at the Savoy openly and before all the Company that was at the Conference whereunto all that he replied at my second telling him at Worcester was that he had used some distinctions to salve that Assertion from those consequences but what those distinctions were he did not then mention as Dr. Warmstry can witness though in this printed Address of his to his Friends of Kidderminster he saith he did tell the Bishop in what a limited and restrained sense he and his Brethren understood that Assertion which whether they did or no will appear by and by when we shall more nearly examine his printed Narrative as to that particular In the mean time though I said indeed that one that held and was likely to teach such Doctrines was not to be suffered to Preach unto the People yet this was not then alledged by me as the cause or crime for which I had forbidden him to Preach for that as I said before was His presuming to Preach without a Licence but onely as a reason why I should have thought my self not obliged by the promise I had formerly made him to give him a Licence though he had not otherwise forfeited his claim to that promise by preaching without or before he had it Lastly He might have remembred another reason I gave him why I could not have made good that promise namely those Principles of Treason and Rebellion publickly extant in his Books which I had not taken notice of till after the making of that promise and which till he should recant in as publick a manner I thought my self obliged in Conscience not to suffer him to Preach in my Diocese whereunto his answer was That whatsoever he had said or done in that kind was pardoned by the Act of Indempnity True said I so far as the King can pardon it that is in regard of its corporal punishment here in this world but it is God that must pardon the guilt or obligation to punishment in the world to come which he will not without repentance and it is the Church that must pardon the scandal which she cannot doe neither without an honourable amends made her by publick Confession and Recantation I could tell Mr. Baxter in his ear likewise that in excuse of his rebellious Principles formerly published he said That now the Parliament had declared where the Sovereign Power was he should acknowledge it and submit to it as if the King owed his Sovereignty to the Declaration of a Parliament which is as false as rebellious and as dangerous a Principle as any of his former however by what hath been said it appears that Mr. Baxter meant to impose upon his credulous Friends at Kidderminster and upon his unwary Readers by making them believe that was the onely cause for which the Bishop forbad him to Preach which was neither the onely nor the principal cause why the Bishop did so nor indeed to speak properly any cause of it at all for the onely proper cause for which the Bishop forbad him to Preach was His preaching before without the Bishop 's Licence the other which he pretends together with the third which he conceals were properly and professedly the causes why the Bishop would not take off that Prohibition or why he would not give him a Licence to Preach for the future either at Kidderminster or in any other place of his Diocese untill he should publickly retract that Position which he had openly asserted at the Conference and should publickly renounce likewise those seditious and rebellious Principles which are published in his Books And this is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth of what passed betwixt me and Mr. Baxter at Worcester before I preached at Kidderminster where whether I defamed him or he by saying so hath not grosly defamed me will appear by that which follows wherein that I might neither be deceived my self nor deceive others I have not trusted to my own memory onely as Mr. Baxter saith he doth to his but I have consulted with Dr. Gunning and Dr. Pearson two of the three that managed that Conference with Mr. Baxter and his Assistants and have seen that Assertion in the same sense that I object it and Mr. Baxter disclaims it affirmed by Mr. Baxter himself under his own hand I found Mr. Baxter at the Savoy engaged in a Dispute and I perceived that to keep himself off from that part of the Argument which would press near to the merits of the Cause he had often affirmed in his Answers That the Command of a most lawfull Act was sinfull if that Act commanded might prove to any one a sin per accidens This Assertion I did then and there presently and openly lay to his charge and when he denied it as it was most frequent with him immediately to deny what he had before affirmed the answers which he had delivered written with his own hand were produced and upon the reading of them the justice of my charge was most apparent whereupon I urged him farther that this Assertion of his was not onely false but destructive of all Authority Humane and Divine as not onely denying all power to the Church of making Canons Ecclesiastical
for the better ordering and governing of the Church but also taking away all Legislative Power from the King and Parliament and even from God himself I delivered at the same time my reason for what I said which was briefly this because there can be no Act so good of it self but may prove per Accidens or by Accident a sin And therefore if to command an Act which may prove per Accidens a sin be a sin then every Command must be a sin And if to command be a sin then certainly God can command nothing because God cannot sin and by the same reason Kings Parliaments and Churches ought not to command any thing because they ought not to sin Thus far I then charged Mr. Baxter and to this Charge he gave then no satisfaction Neither can I yet conceive it possible to give any satisfaction but by one of these two ways either by proving that the Assertion with which I charged him was never his or by shewing that the consequence I urged is not good neither of which was he then able to doe and by what he hath now been pleased to publish it is more than probable that he can never perform either of them For in his bold but weak Apology he doth not so much as pretend to shew any Invalidity in my Inference and for the Assertion with which I charged him he denies it so poorly and goes about to prove another instead of it so manifestly that he may without any injury be interpreted to yield it He saith indeed now That he told us that his Assertion made not every Evil Accident to be such as made an Imposition unlawfull But whether he ever said so before this time or no it was then clearly proved that he did assert That an Act for nothing else but because it might be per Accidens a sin could not be commanded without sin And now in his publick Appeal he hath taken a strange way to wipe off all this for he makes a very brief Narration and most notoriously imperfect and then says You know my Crime as if that were all that had been or could be objected against him Besides in the relating of this short Narrative he relies wholly upon his own memory not so much as endeavouring to satisfie himself before he presumed to satisfie others How his memory may be in other things I know not in this if it hath been faithfull to him he hath been very unfaithfull to others He relates an Answer in what terms he pleaseth and brings one Proposition as made by his Opponents in what terms he thinks fit and the Application of this answer to that Proposition he propoundeth as all his Crime whereas his Answer was far more largely given and that to several Propositions in several Syllogisms of which the Proposition which he relateth was but one or rather none so that he hath most shamefully abused his Disciples at Kidderminster with a short and partial Narrative of his Fact As for his Concurring with Learned Reverend Brethren which he would pretend to be part of his Crime and his invidious insinuation That they are not forbidden to Preach for it though he be the reason is clear He had often delivered this Assertion before the Company his Brethren had not the words of the Answer were written with his hand not with his Brethrens His Brethren had several times declared themselves not to be of his Opinion as particularly when he affirmed That a man might live without any actual sin And therefore we were so just as not to charge them with this Assertion especially considering they did shew themselves unwilling to enter upon this dispute and seemed to like much better another way tending to an amicable and fair compliance which was wholly frustrated by Mr. Baxter's furious eagerness to engage in a Disputation All his Discourse which followeth after his imperfect Narrative in justification of himself is grounded first upon a misreporting of his own Assertion secondly upon the dissembling of the several Propositions to which his Answer was so often applied thirdly upon his pretending That he says more now than that which had offended formerly which is most palpably false and in all probability if he have any memory against his own Conscience And this will presently appear by the vanity and impertinency of all those specious instances which he brings to mollifie his Assertion To Command a Navy to Sea he says is lawfull but if it were foreseen that they would fall into the Enemies hand or were like to perish by any accident it were a sin to send them Is this more than he said before or is it any defence of his Assertion at all It is not certainly because the Opponents had put it expresly in the Proposition That the Act in it self lawfull was to be supposed to have nothing consequent which the Commander of it ought to provide against and yet being so stated Mr. Baxter affirmed That if the Act might be per Accidens sinfull the Commanding of it was sin Now certainly the falling of a Navy into the Enemies hand or the perishing of it any other way if foreseen ought to be provided against by the Commander whereas Mr. Baxter's answer did import That if any Prince did Command a Fleet to Sea though he did not foresee the Fleet would fall into the Enemies hand or perish any other way yet if by Accident it miscarried that or any other way which he could not foresee or were not bound to provide against the very Command at first was sin The same reason nullifies his instances of the Poison and the Knife because the sin in selling them supposeth the murther of the buyer to be foreseen and consequently that the seller ought to prevent it but if he will speak in correspondence to his former Answer he must shew that though the seller do not foresee that the buyer will use the Poison or the Knife to his own or any other man's destruction yet if by any Accident or mistake either the buyer or any other perish by the Poison or the Knife the seller is guilty of his death His instance of setting a City on fire or putting Gunpowder under the Parliament House when the King and Parliament are there is of the same nature and needs no addition of answer but onely this that Mr. Baxter in a sense too true hath been very instrumental in setting the City on fire and in adding powder to the Parliament The rest which follows betrays the same weakness because the inconveniences are urged upon a Duty to prohibit them and his Answer did charge the Command with sin in respect of such Accidents as it was no part of the Commander's Duty to provide against It is therefore most certain that no one of those instances singly nor all of them jointly have any force in any measure to justifie that Assertion which Mr. Baxter did maintain and whereof he is accused As for that last instance
were some other reasons besides what are alledged by him that made him forbear the Printing of it for whereas he saith It was for peace or for peace sake that he laid it aside or forbore printing it because having already that is before my publishing of the aforesaid Letter greatly incurr'd the Bishop of Ely 's displeasure and mine by what he had said and done against our Way he believed the opening of so many mistakes in matter of fact as were in that Letter would not easily be born and for that reason he laid aside that Answer of his to that Letter of mine I cannot believe that this was the onely or indeed any reason at all of his so doing I mean it was neither his love of peace in general nor his fear of giving me any farther provocation in particular that made him suppress that pretended Answer For first if he were of so peaceable a disposition or so great a lover of Peace as he would seem to be he would not have spent so much of his time in writing so many Volumes to keep up and increase Schism and Separation in the Church together with Faction and Sedition in the State as he hath done Which might be made to appear yet farther from the manner as well as the matter of his writing which is so Magisterial and with that contempt undervaluing and vilifying of those he writes against or that write against him and sometimes with such exasperating and provoking language as very ill becomes him that pretends to be a Peace maker And perhaps in such a style was that Answer of his written if he writ any answer at all to the aforesaid Letter of mine and then perhaps too some wiser Friend of his might advise him to forbear printing of it at least at that time namely at the King 's first coming in against one that came in a little before him and was sent by him and had been all the while the King was abroad in Exile with him and for him and had newly received some more than ordinary marks of his Majestie 's favour from him These or the like considerations to these being suggested to him might peradventure at that time prevail with him rather wholly to suppress or at least to defer the printing of that Answer of his if there were any such answer than thereby so unseasonably to provoke me more whose displeasure he saith he had greatly incurr'd by what he had said and done against the Bishop of Ely 's way and mine as if the Bishop of Ely and I had a Way of our own wherein no body walked but our selves I would therefore fain know what he calls the Bishop of Ely's way and mine and for his speaking and acting against which he had so greatly incurr'd that Bishop's and my displeasure Is it a new or a newly found out Way or a way of our own devising as Mr. Baxter's way is of his a way that never any walked in before nor none but himself doth walk in yet nor will I believe ever walk in hereafter For it is neither Episcopal nor Presbyterian nor wholly Independent nor any of any other denomination either ancient or modern that I ever heard of but partly of all and partly of none of them But Ours I mean the Way which the Bishop of Ely and I do walk in is no By-path not a Way of Sufferance or Toleration onely such as Mr. Baxter and all the Nonconformists plead for but the Good old way the King 's the Church of England's way nay the Catholick Churches High-way the Way wherein all the Primitive Fathers Saints and Martyrs and all the Orthodox Christians in all Ages untill the last before this of ours have gone before us I mean the Government of the Church by Bishops teaching all and nothing else but what was taught by Christ and his Apostles in point of Doctrine and commanding nothing which God has forbidden nor forbidding any thing which God has commanded in the outward Administration of God's publick Worship and Service but making use of that liberty and power that God hath left to his Church in order to Decency and Uniformity and Edification and consequently in order to that Unity and Concord which Mr. Baxter doth so much pretend to desire and plead for This and no other but this is the Way of the Church of England and this and no other but this is the Way which the Bishop of Ely and I do walk in and would have all men else that are born within the pale of our Church to walk in also And therefore as we cannot chuse but be sorry for those that are led or kept out of this way both for their own and the Churches sake so we cannot chuse but be displeased too with those that not onely refuse to walk in it themselves but endeavour and doe what they can to draw others from it and to keep those that are gone out of it from returning again into it by making and preaching and printing Pleas and Apologies for Nonconformists which can have no other end consequentially at least if not intentionally but to confirm them in their Non-conformity And surely he that would not forbear to doe this and to doe it over and over again being so prejudicial and destructive to the peace of the Church and State as We have experimentally found it to be He I say that would not forbear to doe this for the publick peace sake nor for fear of offending the King and the Parliament the makers of those Laws against those things and persons he so loudly and so boldly pleads for did not in all probability for peace sake and much less for fear of displeasing Bishop Morley forbear to publish what he had written in answer to that Letter of the Bishop's which would have been much less provoking by specifying though not proving some of those many mistakes he now chargeth him with without naming any of them and consequently as much as in him lies imposing upon his Readers especially such as are ill-affected to Bishops an implicit belief that there are indeed many very many mistakes in the Bishop's Letter and perhaps gross ones too and such as Mr. Baxter could have named and proved also but being a man of so peaceable so patient and so meek a disposition as he is he did for peace sake and because he would not provoke the Bishop to be more displeased with him than he was already forbear to doe so Credat Judoeus non Ego Believe it who list for me as he faith And therefore he must give me leave to think upon better considerations that he never writ any Answer at all to my Letter So that all the Reply I need to make to this general unattested and unproved Charge of Mr. Baxter is to oppose my bare Negative to his bare Affirmative for Affirmantis est probare He who affirms a thing ought to prove it which
the three Disputantsfor the Common-Prayer-Book against Mr. Baxter and his Assistants which Attestation of theirs being printed and published twenty years ago and never since contradicted or so much as questioned by any of the contrary party no not so much as by Mr. Baxter himself to this day I hope there needs no other proof of the truth of it And if that Attestation be true then it is evident that Mr. Baxter did affirm and maintain as well as he could from first to last in the Conference That the command of a thing lawfull in it self by lawfull Authority was unlawfull if by Accident it might be the occasion of Sin though it were not commanded under an unjust penalty and though that evil whereof it might be the occasion by Accident were not such as the Commander was obliged to provide against For all this he thatdenies the aforesaid Major Proposition of the last of the aforesaid three Syllogisms as Mr. Baxter did must needs grant and consequently must he needs grant and assert also if he will not contradict himself That any command of anything though never so lawfull in it self by what Authority soever it is commanded is unlawfull if it may be the occasion of Sin though per Accidens onely and though that Accidental Sin or evil be such as the Commander either did not or could not foresee or was not obliged to provide against it For all this is consequentially and necessarily affirmed and asserted by him that denies the aforesaid Major Proposition for no other reason but because the Command may by Accident be the Occasion of Sin But if Mr. Baxter shall say he gave another reason for his denial of the aforesaid Proposition namely that such a Command though never so lawfull in it self might become unlawfull if it were commanded under an unjust penalty I confess he did but most illogically and irrationally because one of the conditions of the Command which the Proposition affirms and Mr. Baxter denies to be lawfull is that it must not be commanded under an unjust penalty and the reason why Mr. Baxter denies it to be lawfull is because it is or at least it may be commanded under an unjust Penalty which is all one as if he had said that which is not so is so because it may be so This reason therefore being so expressly excluded as it is from being any reason at all why the Proposition which Mr. Baxter denied should be or could be denied with any shew or colour of reason there was nothing left him to resort to or rely on as his last refuge but his first reason namely because such a command though it was not commanded under an unjust penalty yet it might be the occasion of Sin per Accidens and therefore unlawfull to be commanded which being given for a reason for his denying of the aforesaid Proposition of the last Syllogism he could not mean it of such an evil per Accidens as that the commander ought to provide against because it was another of the Conditions expressly required by the Proposition it self to make a Command lawfull that as it should not command any thing evil in it self so it should not command any thing neither though never so good in it self that might by accident be the occasion of such an evil as the Commander ought to prevent or provide against so that the occasion of evil in that sense per Accidens could not be the reason why Mr. Baxter denied the Proposition and therefore by evil per Accidens in relation to this Proposition and his denial of it he must needs mean such an evil per Accidens as was neither commanded under an unjust penalty nor such as the Commander was obliged to hinder or prevent Whence it follows that Bishop Morley's charging him with asserting That the command of that which is lawfull in it self is unlawfull if it may by Accident be the occasion of Sin was not as Mr. Baxter saith it was a gross mistake or any mistake at all though he had not asserted it in terminis or in express terms as he did often when he gave it for the first of his reasons why he denied the Major Proposition of the first of the aforesaid Syllogisms CHAP. IX His instances of Things lawfull in themselves becoming unlawfull by Accident Impertinent to the present business FRom hence it follows likewise that all those Instances which Mr. Baxter assigns and alledges in his Narrative to his friends at Kidderminster to free himself from the Assertion I charge him with and which his denial of the aforesaid Proposition doth necessarily and manifestly convince him of are all of them frivolous and impertinent and not so onely but fraudulent and scandalous and injurious also I mean those instances which he gives of such evils per Accidens as make the Commands of things good and lawfull in themselves to become evil and unlawfull As saith he To command out a Navy to Sea is not unlawfull in it self but if it were foreseen they would fall into the enémies hands or were like to perish by any Accident and the necessity of sending them were small or none it were a Sin to send them Again saith Mr. Baxter it is not unlawfull of it self to sell poison or to give a knife to another or to bid another to doe it but if it were foreseen he must mean by him that sells the poyson or gives the knife that they will be used to poyson or kill the buyer he might have added or any body else it is unlawfull He goes on and saith It is not of it self unlawfull to light a Candle or set fire on straw but if it may be he should have said if it be foreknown to him that by another's negligence or wilfulness it is like to set fire to the City or give fire to a train of Gun-powder that is under the Parliament House when the King and Parliament are there I crave the Bishop's pardon saith he for believing it were Sinfull to doe or command it You have it Mr. Baxter you have the Bishop's pardon not onely for believing as you say you do in this last but in all the former particulars which you instance in also And I do assure you the Bishop believes them all as much as you do and so I am confident do all the Episcopal Party in England for they are all of them notoriously and unquestionably true and are undoubtedly sufficient to prove the Command of a thing lawfull in it self to be unlawfull if the Commander foresees it will be by Accident the cause or occasion of such an evil or mischief as he ought to prevent But what is this to the proving the Command of a thing lawfull in it self to be unlawfull if it may be by Accident the cause or occasion of some such evil as the Commander doth not foresee or is not bound to prevent For such a Command it must be that
and therefore more inclined or perhaps necessitated to weaken and impoverish and keep them under as Pharaoh did the Israelites by laying heavy burthens upon them and oppressing them more than otherwise they would have reason or perhaps a will to doe that they may not be able to rise up against them when such Demagogues as our Schismatical Preachers are have a mind to stir them up to doe so Who secondly doe what they can to rob Subjects of that inestimable reward which God hath promised to all such as suffer wrongfully and yet patiently or as St. Peter phraseth it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as it becomes Christians and not onely so but thirdly do engage them instead of suffering less wrongfully to hazard the suffering of more rightfully from their Princes if they do not prevail in their Rebellion and to a certainty of suffering infinitely much more from God whether they prevail or not if they die in or after their rebellion without repentance And now I think I have sufficiently justified the reasonableness of my exception to that Aphorism of Mr. Baxter's which he saith he wonders Bishop Morley did except against by having proved it to be false in both the particulars that are asserted in it As first That all unlimited Governours are Tyrants and 2dly That no unlimited Governour or Tyrant hath a right unto his Government and consequently that the Subjects of Vnlimited or Tyrannical Governours are not obliged to obey them but may resist them at least for defending of themselves against them both which particulars having proved to be false I hope I have sufficiently vindicated my self also from that horrible calumny of being a defier of Deity and Humanity and an Enemy to God to Kings and to all mankind as Mr. Baxter out of his abundant Zeal and little charity saith I am and would make his unwary Readers believe me to be not from any thing I say my self but from what he is pleased to say for me and then as if I had said it my self to infer from it the calumny which he before intended but could not tell how to doe it otherwise to fix upon me Of which disingenuous and insincere artifice of his as I said before we have seen several Instances already and shall see more hereafter CHAP. XIV That Scripture Rom. 13. for the unlawfulness of resisting asserted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 properly rendred to Resist and implies more than simply Not to obey Our Translation Vindicated against Mr. B. and others who censure it and vary from it as he often doth ANd yet before we proceed any farther we are to take notice of and remove a shrewd Remora or obstruction out of the way which Mr. Baxter hath laid to take away from us the authority of one of the principal places of Scripture whereon we ground our doctrine of the Vnlawfulness of resisting of Sovereigns by their Subjects in any case or upon any provocation whatsoever and that is the 13 Chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans and in that Chapter especially upon the 2d Verse whereof the words in Greek are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which by our last and by our most authentical Translation are rendred in English thus Whosoever resisteth the power viz. the Sovereign Power or the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the higher power as it is called in the verse before resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation And it is against our Translation of some words or rather of one of the words in this Verse that Mr. Baxter makes this objection not against the word power nor as Sovereign power is meant by it though contrary to St. Paul's meaning and the truth of the Roman History he will have the Sovereign Power there meant not to be in the Emperour alone but in him and the Roman Senate also as he faith it is in the King and Parliament here in England and one as truly as the other neither doth he except against the translation of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the word damnation though it always doth not signifie so severe a judgment but he tells us that the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not properly translated by the word resisting And why so because saith he There is a Resistance contrary to Subjection and that is forbidden and there is a Resistance not contrary to Subjection and that is not forbidden Might he not as well have said there is an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to resist contrary to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be subject and there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to resist not contrary to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be subject And therefore St. Paul did not speak properly when he opposed the one unto the other and yet St. Paul tells the Corinthians who were Grecians that he spoke more languages than they all and no doubt understood the propriety of them as well as they did Howsoever we are sure that St. Paul understood God's meaning and how to express it so as he would have it to be understood neither is it to be doubted but that a commissioned Company of so many learned men as were employed in the last and most accurate Translation of our English Bible did very well understand St. Paul's meaning as he expressed it in Greek and knew how to render it as properly in English as any one private man ought in modesty to think he can or could have done especially if he be no greater a Critick in the Greek language than Mr. Baxter appears to be by the several Instances a learned man gives of his many gross mistakes of the meaning of several Greek words quoted by him in his Church History which I would not have observed but that I find Mr. Baxter so full and fond of his mendings of the magnificat I mean his frequent and needless finding fault with our Churches Translation And truly I could wish that even such as are more skilfull in the Original Languages in which the Scriptures were written than Mr. Baxter seems to be would forbear in their popular Sermons and in their English Treatises to censure so boldly as some of them do such and such places of Scripture as they have or take occasion to speak of as either not truly or not properly translated in our Bibles when there is no necessity for their so doing and when they may thereby give occasion to their unlearned Auditours or Readers to doubt of any other and perhaps of all other places of Scripture as well as of those by them quoted and censured viz. Whether they be truly or properly translated or no which may bring them at length to question and doubt of the truth of the whole written word of God and whither that may bring them God knows perhaps to Quakerism or some other kind of Fanaticism or perhaps to downright Atheism And therefore I say I
God nor from the fundamental Contracts of the Commonwealth he must mean where there are such fundamental contracts nor from any of his own publick promises nor to make Laws against God's Laws or the common good whereunto if he had added though he be free from being questioned or quarrelled with for it by his Subjects hitherto I could have been content to have gone with him in his Politicks but no farther for as to what he adds in his next and some other of his following Aphorisms as 1. That the same natural Person may be both Sovereign and Subject and that as Sovereign he may pardon others and as Subject he may be punished himself 2. That Sovereignty is divisible so that some part of it may be in the King and some part in others of the same Body Politick or as in his own words A mixt Commonwealth is that in which the other two or all three forms of a Commonwealth viz. Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy are so conjunct that the Supremacy is divided among them sometimes equally and sometimes unequally 3. That it may be called a Monarchy where one hath not the sole Sovereignty and that England is such a Monarchy 4. That the Existence of the natural Person or Persons of Sovereigns or of such as have the Sovereignty is not necessary to the existence of a Commonwealth but the natural existence of Subjects is necessary So that there may be Subjects that are Subjects to no-body and consequently Subjects that are no Subjects or a Body without a Head which is really no body at all either in a natural or political capacity These and the like Assertions of Mr. Baxter I take not onely to be falsities but self contradictions and yet upon some of these absurd suppositions if not upon all of them he endeavours to justifie the late horrid Rebellion or as he calls it the late War against the King And upon the same grounds he may and consequentially dath horresâ—o referens I tremble at the thought of it the cutting off his head also For if he were not a Monarch but in name onely as Mr. Baxter saith he was not and therefore had but a part in the Sovereignty as Mr. Baxter saith he had not And if he that hath but a part of the Sovereignty be a Subject as well as a Sovereign as Mr. Baxter saith he is and as a Subject may be punished as Mr. Baxter saith he may why might not the Democratical Independents justifie what they did to him afterwards as well as the Aristocratical Presbyterians could justifie what they did to him before I mean their making War against him and their buying selling and imprisoning of him and taking away all that he had from him but his life onely and that in all probability they would have done also if he had not been taken away from them as he was by the Independents who had been their Servants untill then but then began to think of making themselves their Masters by getting the King's Person out of their power into their own but still proceeding upon the same Presbyterian Principles from the first to the last I mean upon the aforesaid Assertions of Mr. Baxter which are all of them inconsistent with the very being or essential Constitution of any Body Politick whatsoever For first there can be no Body Politick without some to govern as well as others to be governed and of those that govern ne detur processus ad infinitum That we may not run upon an endless errand one or more that are Sovereign or Supreme And therefore the Existence of the natural Person or Persons of Sovereigns or him or them that have the Sovereignty is as necessary to the Existence of a Commonwealth or any Body Politick as the natural existence of Subjects is Otherwise there might be Subjects which were Subjects to no-body and consequently no Subjects at all which is as absurd as to say there may be the Existence of a Body without the Existence of the Head of that Body which was one of Mr. Baxter's aforesaid Assertions Again in all Bodies Politick He or they that have the Sovereign Power are above all the rest of the body whereof they are Sovereigns and therefore cannot be Subject to any or all of them and if so then the same natural Person cannot be both a Sovereign and a Subject too which was another of Mr. Baxter's aforesaid Assertions Again if he that is a Sovereign cannot be a Subject as it is a contradiction in adjecto to say he can be then he cannot be questionable or punishable for any thing he does as Mr. Baxter saith he may be Again Sovereignty is a thing which is in its own nature indivisible so that in whomsoever it is it is Wholly and in whomsoever it is not wholly it is not at all and consequently cannot be divided either equally or unequally as Mr. Baxter likewise saith it may be Finally that it may be called a Monarchy where One hath not the sole Sovereignty is true because that which is not a Monarchy may be called a Monarchy but that it may truly be so called is false as it is false likewise that the Kingdom of England is such a Monarchy as Mr. Baxter in the last of his aforesaid Assertions saith it is But of the two last of these Particulars I shall have occasion to speak more at large when we come to examine whether the Body Politick of England be such a mixt Body Politick as Mr. Baxter saith it is and whether the Sovereignty thereof be not in the King alone but so divided as he affirms it to be betwixt the King and the Parliament upon which Supposition onely he justifies or presumes to justifie the late Rebellion to have been a just war against the late King Whereby it plainly appears that even in Mr. Baxter's own opinion where the Sovereignty is not divided but wholly in one and the same person as it is not onely in all Despotical but in all Kingdoms properly so called whether Despotical or Political or wholly in one and the same Coetus or Assembly whether Aristocratical or Democratical it ought not it cannot be resisted without shattering in pieces the very essential constituting parts of the Common-wealth by dividing the members from the head which is all that I am concerned to prove at present namely that Subjects resisting their Sovereign is inconsistent with the very being of a Body Politick of what Species or denomination soever it is CHAP. XVI Resistance inconsistent with peoples well being as proving the occasion of Civil War A case put by Grotius and several Instances proposed by him which seem to allow Resistance examined and cleared AGain suppose it were not Inconsistent with the Being yet if it be inconsistent with the Well-being of the Body Politick or Common-wealth for Subjects to resist or rise up in Arms against their Sovereign that is enough to prove
their Preachers to joyn with a factious ambitious and discontented Party of the Nobility Gentry and Commons in a Rebellion against our late Sovereign Lord of ever blessed memory upon as false and groundless a pretence as that was against the King of France For as there the People were made to believe by their Popish Preachers that their Religion was in danger and that their King was an Hugonott or Presbyterian though as I said before he indeed was as he prosessed himself to be a very zealous and rigid Papist and had given more than proof enough that he was so Even so our People here were by their Presbyterian and other their Schismatical Preachers made to believe that the Protestant Religion here was in very great danger and that Popery was very likely to be brought in because the King was a Papist or Popishly affected at least whereas it was evident to all the world both by his Profession and his Practice that he was as truly a zealous and devout Protestant as any the best of his Protestant Subjects and moreover as resolute a defender of the Protestant Faith as it is setled and established by Law in the Church of England against both Papists and Schismaticks as any King could or ought to be I might add as knowingly so too as ever any King was but his Father onely And yet thousands of his Subjects were made to believe that he was a Papist in his heart and upon that account were perswaded and engaged to fight against him nay many of them were made to believe that the Protestant Religion it self as it was established by Law was but disguised Popery and that the Common Prayer Book was but the Popish Missal or Mass Book translated into English and that the Bishops with all the Episcopal Clergy were an Antichristian Hierarchy and were or would be all of them Vassals to the Pope as soon as they had an opportunity safely to profess themselves to be so Now if the People could be made to believe as we see they were that such a King as He was and such a Church as Ours is were Popish or Popishly affected against all Evidence both of reason and of sense to the contrary what is there that they cannot be made to believe and consequently what security can there be for Kings from their Subjects either for their Power or their Persons or for Subjects from their fellow Subjects or for preserving of the publick Peace for a moment onely If there be any one I say any one case of any kind in any degree wherein Subjects may be allowed without scruple of Conscience to take up Arms against their Sovereign that one as I said before shall always be pretended and believed to be the Case as often as the contrivers and trumpeters of Sedition and Rebellion will have it to be so though there be no ground or reason at all for it as it is evident there was not in either of the aforesaid Instances or Examples I know there were other pretences besides that of Religion to justifie the Rebellion against the late King as his breach of Trust his violation of Laws his bringing or endeavouring to bring in Arbitrary Government and as Mr. Baxter would have it to be believed though Grotius thinks it incredible that any King in his wits should do so his professing himself an Enemy to the whole body of the People by making War against them all as if he meant to be a King without Subjects and finally whatsoever was thought to be most likely to make either his Person or his Government or both to be feared and hated by the whole Nation though really and truly there was no more ground for any of them than there was for his purpose of bringing in Popery which though the Grandees of the Faction knew well enough yet they knew too that it would serve their turn as well as if it were true if the People could be made to believe it was so and withall that they might lawfully nay that they were bound in conscience with their Lives and Fortunes to defend themselves their Wives and Children from being made slaves for that 's the style it must run in by the King or his Evil Counsellours who ought to be brought to condign punishment by force if it cannot be done by Law against which the People were made to believe the King did protect those Evil Counsellours of his And by this means was that Good that Godly that Gracious that Just and every way Vertuous King of ours brought first to be rebell'd against and at last to be murthered by his own Subjects in his capital City and before his own Palace gates And thus may the best Prince that ever was will be or can be in the World be exposed traduced and ruined and the best Government in the World be brought to confusion and dissolution and all the Subjects for fear of an imaginary slavery be made Slaves indeed to those whom they helped to make them so there being no way to secure any Prince State or People from being always obnoxious to these fatal mischiefs but the maintaining of this Axiom or Maxim of true Policy as Sacred and inviolable viz. That Sovereigns are not forcibly to be resisted by their Subjects in any case or upon any provocation whatsoever And that this Maxim may be kept Sacred and inviolable as being the Palladium the Preservative of the publick peace and of the very being as well as of the well-being of Humane Society it ought to be the special care of him or them that have the Supreme Power to forbid under very severe penalty the printing preaching or any way infusing or insinuating into the ears or hearts of the People any Doctrine to the contrary as being not onely false and erroneous but dangerous and Seditious also so seditious and so dangerous that if the Sovereign have not power to secure himself from the Pulpit and the Press or if he do not make use of that power I am afraid that it is not his Scepter nor his Sword that will be able to secure him from his People or his People from themselves I mean from cutting the throats of one another The End of the Second Section SECTION III. The late War in England against the King proved to have been a Rebellion whatever Mr. Baxter plead or argue in defence or justification of it CHAP. I. The late War proved to have been made against the King and consequently to be Rebellion The Parliaments Declaration discuss'd together with the danger of Arbitrary Votes The Judges opinion in the Earl of Essex his Case in Queen Elizabeths time The Presbyterian Clergy charged with the Rebellion AND thus having as I conceive sufficiently proved it to be unlawful for Subjects to rise up in Arms against their Sovereign in any case or upon any provocation whatsoever as being not only contrary to the Precepts of the Gospel and the Practice of
Party if They were Rebels as I think They have acknowledged themselves to be by suing for and taking out their Pardons for their Rebellion Neither can the Bishops and the Episcopal Clergy be so answerable to God and the World for the dissoluteness debauchery and Profaneness of those of their Party were it as general and as great as Mr. Baxter would have it believed to be as the Schismatical Clergy are for the Rebellion against the King their Sacrilege against God and for the plundering and murthering of their fellow Subjects by those of their Party because none of them can say with any colour of truth or credibility that any of our Clergy did ever incourage any of our Party to be dissolute or debauch'd or profane or blasphemous or Atheistical in any kind or in any degree much less did We commend them for being so or pray to God to make them so or thank God because they were so but We can say and say it truly that the Schismatical Clergy were not only Rebels and the greatest of Rebels themselves but did what they could by preaching and praying and fasting and thanksgiving to make the whole Nation as they did all that were their Proselytes to be Rebels if at least the fighting of Subjects against their Sovereign be Rebellion or if those that are guilty of hurt to the Person of the King or destruction of his Power be Rebels as Mr. Baxter saith they are CHAP. II. The Destruction of the King's Power by the Presbyterians as afterwards of his Person by the Independents c. proves the late War to have been made against the King and consequently to have been Rebellion whatever the Parliament declared to the contrary NOW that all those that fought and that commissioned and encouraged others to fight in the late War were guilty of the Destruction of the King's Power is so undeniably evident and apparent that it needs no proof Unless Mr. Baxter will say that the King never had any Power at all for I am sure they brought him to that pass by that War that he had no power at all at last witness his condition at Holmby where he was so far from having the Power of a King that he had not the Liberty of a Subject neither as to the liberty of his Person or of his Conscience For they would not allow him one of his own Chaplains to assist him in the service of God And to this diminution or rather annihilation of power was that good King brought by those who were all of them commissioned by the Presbyterian Parliament and many thousands of them encouraged by Mr. Baxter himself as Mr. Baxter himself confesseth so that if those that were guilty of the destruction of the King's Power were Rebels as Mr. Baxter saith he will not gainsay but they were then Mr. Baxter and those of the Presbyterian Party were all of them Rebels For it was whilst that Party was in power and it was by that power of theirs that the King's Power was destroyed and he left utterly unable to defend himself against the Independents Anabaptists and other Fanaticks who after his Power was destroyed by the Presbyterians destroyed his Person also And therefore supposing but not granting that neither Mr. Baxter nor any other of the Presbyterian Party had intended any hurt to the King's Person yet that will not absolve them from being guilty of the hurt that was done unto his Person or of the King's murther no more than those Thieves who as Salmasius saith having robbed and disarmed a man and left him bound hand and foot to be devoured of wild Beasts because they do not actually hurt or kill him themselves can be said not to be guilty of his death if afterward by a Lion or a Bear or a Wolf he be destroyed and devoured And thus much for proof that the late War was made against the King notwithstanding the Parliament as Mr. Baxter calls it declared to the contrary and consequently was a Rebellion properly so called as likewise for proof that those that were engaged or did engage others in that War whatsoever their intentions were or might be they were all of them guilty of the destruction of the King's Power and consequently perfidious Rebels and worse than Whoremongers Drunkards and Murtherers in Mr. Baxter's own judgment notwithstanding his Protestation to the contrary We have done skirmishing with Mr. Baxter's fordorn-hope and a forlorn-hope it was indeed if he did hope he could induce any to believe not only against their reason but against their sence also that which verily I believe he doth not believe himself namely that the late War was not made against the King I am sure he did not at least he was not bound to believe it as he saith he was because his and the Peoples Trustees for their Liberties that is the House of Commons had declared it was not unless he will say that the House of Commons is such a body of men as is either infallible or impeccable so that whatsoever they or the major part of them declare must needs be so as they declare it to be and that the People are bound to believe it to be so because they have no other way to inform themselves but by their Trustees and because these are such Trustees as they are sure will not cannot betray the trust reposed in them and yet Mr. Baxter himself saith as I noted before that the Major part of both Houses may be the worst and such as the People are bound to take part with the King against them How then can he with any ingenuity or hope to be believed say that he and the People were bound to believe that the late War was not made against the King because one or both Houses of Parliament had declared it was not And yet this is the only Argument he brings for the proof of it But truth will out sometimes before a Man is aware and though he takes never so much care to suppress it For whereas in the place before quoted Mr. Baxter though he confesseth he fought against the Kings Soldiers yet he affirms he fought not against the King thereby implying that he thought it unlawful to fight against the King though not against those commissioned by him yet in another place he saith it is no resisting of Power but of Injustice to fight against the King and his Soldiers for the common good thereby implying that to fight against the Kings Soldiers or his Army is to fight against the King or that it is as lawful to fight against the one as against the other and consequently it is evident that notwithstanding the Parliaments Declaration to the contrary Mr. Baxter himself did believe the late War to be made against the King and must therefore have been at least in this particular an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one self-condemn'd in pretending he did and was bound to believe
it was not made against the King but against his evil Councellors and other his Delinquent Subjects only CHAP. III. Another ground of Mr. B's justifying the late War that according to our constitution the King is not sole Sovereign disproved The Act for the rebel-Rebel-Parliaments sitting censured All Kings properly so called not accountable to the People but to God only AND this doth farther appear by the little confidence he himself seems to have in this Topick For supposing as he had all the reason in the World to suppose that the aforesaid Declaration of the Parliament as he 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 abusively and falsly calls it would signifie nothing with considering and understanding men as to the justifying of the late War from being a down-right Rebellion as indeed it was he seems to quit this as an indefensible Out-work and retires to that which he thinks to be a much stronger Hold and which if he can maintain he thinks that though he should grant the late War to have been made against the King yet it was not could not be a Rebellion because it was not made by Subjects against their Sovereign For the King of England saith he according to the constitution of our Government is not our sole Sovereign but there be others that be partners with him in the Sovereignty it self and of this he is so very confident that he saith in positive and express terms that if any man can prove that the King was the highest power in the time of those Divisions He will offer his head to justice for a Rebel Which saying of his seems to require some animadversion upon it as not being an absolute denyal of the Kings Sovereignty or of the Kings being the highest Power but of his being Sovereign or highest Power during those times of division only which seems to imply that he was even in Mr. Baxters opinion the Sovereign or highest Power before those times of division And if this be his meaning as it must be if there be any meaning at all in those words then it is not from the Constitution of the Government as Mr. Baxter saith it is that the King I mean our King of England is not the Sovereign or the highest Power always and in all times and to all intents and purposes but it was from the Alteration of the essential Constitution of our Government and from the iniquity of those Times and Persons that made that alteration that the King did not nor could not then exercise those Acts of Sovereignty or Supreme Power which was as legally invested and as inseparably inherent in him even then as ever it was before For though the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Power might and was yet the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Authority was not nor could not be taken from him but by taking away his Life also Unless Mr. Baxter will say and there seems to be some such secret intimation in that saying of his I last quoted that the King himself gave away his Sovereignty or that he made his two Houses of Parliament partakers with him in it when he passed an Act for their sitting until They themselves should be willing or content to be dissolv'd I confess this was a very great alteration in the very fundamental constitution of the Government and I confess the King passed such an Act the very great streights he was then in together with the minatory importunity of the two Houses backt by the insolent and tumultuous behaviour of the Multitude necessitating him as it were to do that which never any of his Predecessors did before him and I hope never any of his Successors will do after him I mean to pass such an Act as that was Although that Act gave neither of the Houses singly nor both of them jointly any whit or jot of more Power but only of sitting longer than what They or their Predecessors had before or their Successors now have And I hope Mr. Baxter will not say that is a Power to repeal Acts to make Ordinances of equal validity and obligation with Acts without the Royal Assent to them to raise Armies and Monies to maintain them upon their fellow-subjects and against their fellow-subjects and against the King himself also Did the Act that gave them a Power to sit until they thought fit to be dissolved give them Power to do all or any of these things before specified and many other as bold as bad and as illegal as any of those were or because they had leave to sit as long as they listed had they leave to do what they listed also No no it was their ingrateful and ungracious abuse of the Kings too gracious favour to them that was the cause of all those evils that afterwards upon that occasion befel Him and the whole Royal Family and all his Loyal Subjects And therefore of all the Acts that ever that good King did I take the passing of the aforesaid Act for the sitting of the two Houses not during his but their own pleasures to be the worst not only in point of prudence and policy as most prejudicial to the Crown and Government in general but in point of Right and Justice also to all and every one of the rest of his Subjects I mean as many of them as were capable of chusing and of being chosen Parliament-men who were all of them by the passing of this Act excluded from having what was due to them in either of those capacities and consequently from the Rights and Priviledges of Free-born Englishmen as long as those Parliament-Men that were then in being should please to sit and that might be ar was as We saw afterwards as long as they lived or at least as long as they could I mean till the Army which they raised made them to rise whether they would or no and yet there want not some that say they are still in being But to return from this digression because it is not upon this particular occasional alteration of the Government that Mr. Baxter doth openly and professedly ground his denyal of the Kings Sovereignty here in England but upon the fundamental and essential constitution of the Government it self and consequently he denies England to be a Kingdom and our King to be a King properly so called For he himself defines a Kingdom to be such a Common-wealth or body Politick as hath but one Person only for its Sovereign So that according to this definition all Kingdoms that are Kingdoms indeed are Monarchies and all Kings that are Kings indeed or Kings properly so called are Monarchs I say Kings properly so called because some have been called Kings who were really no Kings as the Kings of Sparta or Lacedaemon were who were but Generals of their Armies only the Sovereign Power of the State being in those that were called the Ephori or Overseers to whom those they called their Kings were
immediately from God I wonder by what right or authority they can pretend to take that from him which not they but God hath given to him Surely they will not say they may do it whether God will or no and of Gods Will that they should do so or may do so They can have no declaration or signification but either from some plain positive standing Rule in Scripture or from special extraordinary and immediate Revelation such as Abraham had for the sacrificing his Son Isaac or as Jehu had for the destroying the House of Ahab But as to this latter as I hope Mr. Baxter is not yet Fanatick enough to pretend so I am sure he can find no such declaration or signification of Gods Will for the former I mean in the Scriptures either of the Old or New Testament as They were always and universally understood by the first and best Christians It is true indeed that in the Scripture God hath commanded Kings or Sovereign Princes to govern according to his and their own Laws too that are conformable unto his and threatned them if they do not and punished them when they have not But where or in what place of the Old or New Testament hath God appointed or permitted all or any of the People to do so I mean to punish their Kings by Deposing them or by taking any part of the Kingly Power he had given them away from them Surely God did not only foresee but foretell that many of the Kings of his own People the Jews would be some of them Idolaters and some of them Murtherers and Adulterers and some of them Tyrants and great oppressers of their Subjects as appears by Samuels Speech unto them at the Election of Saul their first King but he doth not give them or any order of Men among them there or any where else any either commission or permission authoritatively to enquire into their Kings Actions or to call them to an account for them And therefore the Kings of Juda and Israel were Kings indeed and so are those Kings whether Despoticall or Politicall whether Successive or Elective which have no ordinary standing legal Power or Judicatory above them whereunto they are Subject and accountable as the Lacedaemonian Kings were unto the Ephori and therefore were no Kings indeed but in name and in title only But there is no such legal ordinary standing Power or Judicatory here in England above our King for Rex in regno suo non habet superiorem imò nec parem the King in his own Kingdom hath none above him no nor equal to him is a Maxim of our Law and therefore our King must needs be a Sovereign and a sole Sovereign according to Mr. Baxters own Principles and Concessions For this is one of Mr. Baxters own Principles that every Commonwealth or Body Politick must have a Sovereign the form of a Commonwealth saith he being the relation of Sovereign and Subjects to each other as likewise this is another of his Aphorisms or Principles that the Sovereign of one Common-wealth must be one and but one and by but one he must needs mean but one Person or but one Caetus or Company of men and consequently in which soever of them it is it must be solely and wholly so that to be Sovereign and not to be sole Sovereign seems to be a contradiction in adjecto From whence I argue that if there must be a Sovereign or Supreme Power in every State or Body Politick and that be the Sovereign or Supreme Power which by the Legal Constitution hath no Superior Power above it then the Regal is the Sovereign or Supreme Power in England because according to the Legal Constitution of this Kingdom there is no Power Superior to it or Predominant over it but all other Powers are derived from it and Subordinate and Subject and Subservient to it Again if the Sovereign of one Commonwealth State or Kingdom must be One and but One only then if the King of England be a Sovereign as having no Superior he must needs be he must be a sole Sovereign also Neither do I see how either of these Conclusions can with any colour of reason be denyed but by assigning some Power in some Person or Persons which by the Legal and Fundamental Constitution of this Kingdom is above the King or at least equal to him But as it is a Maxim of our Law as I said before that Rex in regno suo non habet superiorem the King in his own Kingdom hath none above him so it is a Maxim too that he hath not parem neither none equal to him so that according to our Law as there is none to judg him because he hath no Superior so there is no Way of trying him because he hath no Peers those whom We call Peers being his Subjects though They are Pares or Peers in relation to one another CHAP. V. The English Monarchy asserted against Mr. B. who would have the Kingdom of England to be a mixt Commonwealth My Lord Chief Justice Cook 's judgment on the point THIS one would think were enough to prove the King of England not only to be our Sovereign but our sole Sovereign and consequently the Kingdom of England to be properly and indeed as it hath always been accounted both at home and abroad a Monarchy or a Government in chief by one and by one only No saith Mr. Baxter it hath not always been accounted to be so For it hath been a Controversie saith he having spoken before of Monarchy Aristocracy and Democracy to which of these forms our English Commonwealth was and is to be reckon'd and the uncertainty of this saith he was one cause of our Wars Whereunto I answer that I never heard nor I verily believe ever any body else did hear of any such Controversie here in England at least as to the Civil Government As to the Ecclesiastical Government indeed of the Church there hath been a Controversie betwixt us and the Church of Rome whether the King or the Pope be the Governor in chief of it as likewise betwixt us and the Presbyterians whether the King or a National Synod ought to have the Supreme managery of it But as to the Civil Government of the State there was never any question made for ought I ever heard by any of the otherwise Dissenting Parties but that it was Monarchicall and that the King was the sole Sovereign of it and in it before that Rebellious Parliament set up for a share in the Sovereignty which they did not at first neither but did in all their Addresses to him acknowledg him to be their Sovereign and that not as they were particular Persons only but as they were the representative Body of all the Commons of England neither did the House of Peers ever make the least doubt of doing so also nor of taking the Oath of Allegiance as to their
Sovereign So that there being then no controversie of the Kings Sovereignty over the whole Nation whether diffusively or representatively considered nor consequently whether this Kingdom were a Monarchy properly so called or no this Controversie I say there being then no such controversie in being could not be one of the causes of the War as Mr. Baxter saith it was I am sure it was none of the causes then pretended And yet I am apt enough to think that the contrivers and promoters of the War that were then leading-men in the House of Commons and some of them in the House of Lords also did from the very beginning design and intend a real change and alteration of the Government it self though They openly pretended but a reformation of abuses that were in it only I mean they did intend to turn the Monarchy into an Aristocracy and to make a Duke of Venice of the King as appears by the 19 Propositions which when they thought themselves strong enough to own they made to him But this They concealed for a long time from the main Body of their Party for fear it might alienate most or many of them that had any thing of Loyalty or Conscience from them Or if they did communicate this arcanum this secret of their grand design to any it was only to those whom they were sure of as desiring such a change of the Government as themselves did and whose help they were to make use of for the bringing of it about I mean the popular Presbyterian and other Schismatical Preachers and perhaps Mr. Baxter was one of them Otherwise I should wonder how he comes to say as he doth the Parliaments have affirmed it namely the Kingdom of England to be a mix'd Commonwealth For sure by Parliament he meant Parliament-men for Parliaments say nothing but by Votes or Orders of the respective Houses and I verily believe there never was any such Vote pass'd in either of them if there were he should have done well to have named those Parliaments or at least some one of those Parliaments that had affirmed the Kingdom or as he calls it the Commonwealth of England not to be Monarchical but a mixed Government which no doubt he would have done if he could being so desirous as he seems to be to have it so But I can tell him of one who was Speaker of the House of Commons and as Learned a one in the Laws and Legal Constitutions of this Realm likewise as knowing what were the Powers and Priviledges of both Houses of Parliament as ever was before or since Him in the Chair and that was my Lord Cook who saith and saith it positively as a known and undoubted truth That this Kingdom of ours is a Monarchy and Monarchy successive by inherent Birth-right adding that of all others it is the most absolute and perfect Form of Governments excluding Interregnums and with it infinite inconveniences And now what say you Mr. Baxter Do you not think this Oracle of our Law for so I think he is esteemed by those of his Profession do you not think I say that he understood the Legal and Fundamental Constitution of this Kingdom as well as you do or any of those foreign Lawyers or Divines whose judgments perhaps you may rely on and be misled by I name Divines as well as Lawyers because some of the Protestant as well as Popish Divines have done what they can to lessen the Power of Kings the latter to make them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to make them accountable and subject to the Pope and the former to make them accountable and subject to the People to their own Subjects which is as dangerous and much more dishonourable than the other CHAP. VI. Calvin answered who though he allows not private Persons to resist yet requires it of some Magistrates whom he supposes the Guardians of the Peoples Liberty No such Magistrates as he supposeth nor doth he say there are and if there were they would be extremely inconvenient to the publick This Opinion taxed by Grotius who yet himself supposing the Sovereignty shared betwixt the King and People in some case allows resistance AND yet this so dangerous and so dishonourable a subjection of Kings to their own Subjects doth Mr. Calvin the Patriarch of the Presbyterians approve of I call him the Patriarch of the Presbyterians because he was the first that after 1500 years Government of the Church by Bishops invented and set up a Government of the Church by a Parity of Presbyters without Bishops and this and this only can properly and truly be called Calvinism whatsoever he holds besides even the most rigid of his Tenets having been held by some of the Schoolmen and some of the Fathers also But this Calvin I say though otherwise a very Learned and as our judicious Hooker saith of him incomparably the wisest man that ever the French Church did enjoy since the hour it did enjoy him though he doth not allow of the resisting of Kings even the worst and most tyrannical of Kings by such of their Subjects as are but private men and consequently not by the generality of the People yet Si qui nunc sunt saith he populares Magistratus ad moderandam Regum libidinem constituti quales olim erant qui Lacedomoniis Regibus oppositi erant Ephori quâ etiam fortè potestate ut nunc res habent funguntur in singulis Regnis tres Ordines quum primarios conventus peragunt adeò illos serocienti Regum licentiae pro officio intercedere non veto ut si Regibus impotenter grassantibus humili Plebeculae insultantibus conniveant corum dissimulationem nefariâ perfidiâ non carere affirmem quia Populi libertatem cujus se Tutores Dei ordinatione positos nôrunt fraudulenter produnt I have put down this passage of Calvins in his own words which for the English Readers sake may be thus translated If there be now saith he any such popular Magistrates constituted I presume he meant legally constituted or appointed by Law for the moderating or restraining the lust or unbridled appetites of Kings such as were of old time the Ephori to the Lacedaemonian Kings and which Power also as things now are perhaps the three Orders or Estates have in several Kingdoms when they meet in Parliament I am so far from forbidding them saith he to interpose their Authority for restraining the raging licentiousness of Kings that if they do but connive at them when they impotently domineer and insult upon the poor Commonalty I do affirm that connivence of theirs is a nefarious persidiousness because they do fraudulently betray the Peoples Liberty whereof they know they are made the Guardians by Gods appointment In which passage of Mr. Calvins wherewith he concludes his Book of Institutions I observe that he speaks not with that confidence and clearness as he useth
the worst it is more tolerable to have one ill Governour in chief than many and the worst of Monarchies is better than the best of Oligarchyes because it is easier to satisfie the lust the cruelty the avarice or any other inordinate appetite of one than of many especially of many that have no body to controll them as the Ephori had not And such it seems Calvin supposeth there are or ought to be in all Kingdoms at least those that are his followers believe that to have been his meaning namely that though it be unlawful and damnable for private Subjects to resist the King or supreme Governour yet it is not only lawful but laudable for such Magistrates as are supposed to be Guardians of the Peoples Liberties redigere Reges in ordinem to reduce their Kings and that by force if it cannot be done otherwise and to keep them within the bounds of Law and Equity according to their discretion And no doubt they were the followers of Calvin whom Grotius speaks of when he says Inventi sunt nostro saeculo viri eruditi quidem illi sed temporibus locis nimiùm servientes qui sibi primùm ita enim credo deinde aliis persuaderent ea quae jam dict a sunt locum habere in privatis non etiam in magistratibus inferioribus quibus jus esse putant resistendi injuriis ejus cujus summum est imperium imò peccare eos ni id faciant Quae opinio admittenda non est There are men saith he in this age of ours which was next to that of Calvins learned indeed but too much serving the times and places wherein they live who having first been perswaded themselves for so I charitably believe did afterwards perswade others that what I have before spoken of meaning the unlawfulness of resisting of Sovereigns by their Subjects is to be understood of private men and not of inferior Magistrates also whose Right they think it is to resist the injuries of him that hath the supreme Power nay that they sin if they do not Which opinion saith he is not to be admitted he might have said is to be detested as being such a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such a root of bitterness as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it springs up will 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 turn all up-side down wheresoever it is admitted But what was Grotius his reason why this opinion was not to be admitted Why because saith he though those Magistrates are in relation to their Inferiors publick Officers yet in relation to their Superiors they are but private Persons especially in relation to the Supreme from whom all inferior Magistrates derive their Power And yet they were such Magistrates who drove their Bishop out of Geneva who was their Prince their Sovereign Prince as well as their Bishop before Calvin came thither indeed but I do not find that ever he blamed them for it But doth not Grotius himself allow of the resisting of Kings by their Subjects in several Cases Yes he doth so but not without contradicting himself and the Apostolical Doctrine and Practise in one of them as I have already observed and as to the rest I have spoken already also excepting the last but one of them only And that is when the King hath but a part of the Sovereignty and the People or the Senate hath a part of it also for then saith he if the King invade that part which is not his or which doth not belong to him he may justly be resisted because as to that his Power doth not extend which saith he I do think may be truly affirmed though the Power of the Sword or of making War be said to be in the King for that is to be understood in relation to a foreign War only Whereas otherwise whosoever hath a part of the Sovereignty cannot but have a right to defend his part of the Sovereignty whereby it may so happen that the King may by the Law of Arms lose that which was his own part of the Sovereignty I have set down this passage of Grotius both in his own words and mine at the full length because it is upon Grotius's supposition and resolution in this case that Mr. Baxter grounds the justice of the Parliaments War against the King and the injustice of the Kings against the Parliament and that with so great a confidence that he saith he is willing to forfeit his head if he be disproved in either We will therefore First Examin whether there can be such a Case as Grotius supposeth or no Secondly If there be such a Case Whether that be the case in England as Mr. Baxter saith it is CHAP. VII The Case which Grotius supposeth not possible The Sovereignty not to be divided Instances in the Roman Empire A King conditionally elected no King indeed but in Title only In all the changes of the Roman State no division of the Sovereignty AND first as to the first of these Particulars I mean the Supposition it self namely the division of the Sovereignty or Supreme Power the very possibility whereof that there should be such a thing in any Body Politick whatsoever seems to be a contradiction in terminis in down-right terms to what Grotius himself affirms to be an inseparable property of Sovereignty namely that it is quid per se indivisum a thing of it self undivided and by quid per se indivisum a thing of it self undivided he must needs mean id quod suâ naturâ est indivisible that which in its own nature is indivisible or something that cannot be divided because otherwise to say that Sovereignty or Supreme Power est quid per se indivisum is a thing of it self undivided should not distinguish it from any other subordinate Power which may be actu or per accidens indivisum actually or by accident undivided though potentiâ and per se potentially or of it self it may be divisible into never so many parts or particles Now if Sovereignty be as according to Grotius it is per se indivisum quid a thing of it self undivided or suâ naturâ indivisibile that which in its own nature is indivisible I cannot see with what congruity of reason it can be said to be divided as Grotius in the very same period saith it may be sivè per partes potentiales sive subjectivas either by its potential or its subjective parts For as for that division of the Roman Empire per partes subjectivas by its subjective parts when the Eastern part of it was governed by one and the Western by another and the Northern perhaps by a third as it was by the three Sons of Constantine there was indeed a division of the Empire and a fatal one it was but there was no division of Sovereignty for every one of the three was a Sovereign in his own part or portion of the Empire just so as during the Heptarchy
an intire Parliament I mean the Act of Vniformity wherein the Parliament doth not only declare its own sense and judgment concerning the Kings sole Supremacy but prescribes an Oath to be taken by all that are to be admitted to teach the People what they are to think of the King I mean all that are to be admitted into holy Orders whereby they are injoyned to testifie and declare in their Conscience that the King is the only Supreme Governour of this Realm and I hope Mr. Baxter hath more reverence for Parliaments than to say or think that the Parliament did injoyn men to swear that which they did not themselves believe to be true especially those of the House of Commons who I think do all of them take the Oath of Supremacy And yet this so clear so evident and so irrefragable a proof of the Parliaments acknowledgment of the Kings sole Supremacy Mr. Baxter is pleas'd to slight as if it signified nothing calling it a sandy foundation for though he be pinched to the quick with this Argument yet he makes as if he felt it not and perceiving there was no help for him in Logick or Metaphysicks he makes use of a figure in Rhetorick which is either not to take notice of what they cannot answer or if they cannot chuse but take notice of it to slight or scoff at it as if it were not worth the answering or taking notice of And yet that he may not seem absque omni ratione insanire to have no pretence or show of reason for his slighting or rejecting of it he tells us that this Oath was made in relation to Papists only and was injoyned to be taken for the discovery of those that were suspected to be so Surely if we look to the first enacting of that Oath and the primary or original cause of it it was not for the distinguishing of Papists from Protestants for they were Papists in Henry the VIII's time and as great Persecutors of the Protestants as any were in those times that compiled and consented to the enacting and enjoyning of that Oath but it was to distinguish Papists from Papists Papists that would from Papists that would not acknowledg the Kings Supremacy And for the same end and purpose the same Oath was renewed in Queen ELIZABETHS time in the beginning of her Reign for the distinguishing of loyal from disloyal Papists as appears by the reasons she gave why She did not impose that Oath upon any of the Barons or House of Lords though many of them were then Papists because she did not as she said make any doubt of their loyalty but she caused it to be administred to the Popish Prelates and other Ecclesiasticks who had almost all of them plerisque omnibus saith Cambden taken it in her Father's time but refusing it then were deprived of their spiritual promotions for so doing lest they might teach the People to do so also and perhaps do more than so that is from denying her Supremacy in Spirituals to proceed to the denying of it in Temporals also which we see they are now come to not by their Popish but Presbyterian Teachers For preventing whereof and for obviating the scandalous interpretations that were made of it as that thereby she the Queen arrogated a Power unto her self sacrâ in Ecclesiâ celebrandi of performing divine Offices in the Church Illa edito scripto saith Cambden she published a Declaration wherein she affirms se nihil aliud arrogare quà m quod ad coronam Angliae jam olim jure spectavit that she arrogated nothing to her self but what anciently belonged of right to the Crown of England Scilicet se sub Deo summam supremam gubernationem potestatem in omnes Regni Anglici Ordines sive illi sunt Ecclesiastici sive Laici habere quodque nulla extranea potestas ullam in eos jurisdictionem vel authoritatem habeat aut habere debeat Namely that she under God had the supreme Government and Power over all orders of men in England whether Ecclesiasticks or Laicks and withal that no foreign Power had or ought to have any Jurisdiction or Authority over any of them From which Declaration published by that pious and prudent Prince it is observable First That the aforesaid Oath of Supremacy was intended by Her as well for the asserting of her own Supremacy over all Orders of men in her own Kingdom in all their capacities as it was for the disclaiming and renouncing any foreign Jurisdiction that was or could be pretended or claimed over all or any of her Subjects in any capacity whatsoever Secondly From this Declaration of Hers it is farther to be observed that she will have her own Sovereignty and Supremacy in omnes Ordines Regni over all Orders and Estates of men here at home to be asserted and sworn to before they shall swear to disclaim and renounce all foreign Authority and Jurisdiction And with very good reason because it would have done her and will do her Successors very little or rather no good at all for their Subjects to renounce all Sovereignty from abroad as long as they are taught or suffered to be taught that there are any other Sovereign or any other invested with any part of the Sovereignty here at home but their Kings only Lastly From the aforesaid Declaration we may observe also that the Queen by the Injunction of the Oath of Supremacy professeth to claim nothing to be acknowledged or sworn to but what de jure and jam olim what anciently and of right did belong to the Crown of England and consequently that the Supremacy or Sovereignty over all Estates or Orders of men in England was from all Antiquity that is as I conceive from the beginning of Monarchy or ever since there were Kings in England and that not ex dono Populi by gift of the People or compact with the People but jure by right and by what Right not jure Electionis but Hereditatis not by right of Election but of Succession and jure Coronae by right of the Crown as being inseparably annexed to the Crown or rather inherent in the Crown there being none as I have already proved that can properly be called a King or Crowned Head whether by Succession or Election but he must be the supreme and sole Sovereign over all in his own Kingdom Which as to our Kings here in England as it was acknowledged by those Parliaments that enacted the Oath of Supremacy before the War so is it by the Act of Vniformity since the War or since the Kings return and consequently since the Crowns restauration to those Prerogatives that are of right belonging to it of which the Supremacy or Sovereignty over all in the Kingdom inclusively as well as in relation to all without the Kingdom exclusively is the chiefest For if there be any either within or without the Kingdom either superior over
him or equal to him or partaker in any part of the Sovereignty with him he cannot be said to be the only supreme Governour of this Realm and of all other his Dominions and Countries as by the Act of Vniformity those of the Kings Subjects that are to teach all the rest of their fellow Subjects are obliged not only to say but swear he is nor is it so much as to be imagined that the King Lords and Commons would have obliged any to take such an Oath if they themselves had not believed the whole subject matter of it to be true CHAP. XI The Oath of Supremacy further explained The Kings being declared the sole supreme Governor cuts off all pretence at home as well as foreign claim I say the whole subject matter of it for there be evidently two several distinct parts of that Oath both of which every one of them that takes it is equally obliged to swear unto of which the first is Assertory and the second Promissory In the former he that swears asserts the Kings Sovereignty affirmatively affirming him to have the sole supreme power over all Persons in all Causes within his Realms and Dominions and then negatively by denying any foreign Power or any without his Dominions to have any Jurisdiction over any of his Subjects or to have any thing to do within his Dominions And it is in regard of the latter of these two clauses only that this Oath can be said to be enacted and imposed for the discovery and conviction of Papists and that not of all Papists neither but such Papists only as believe the Pope to have the supreme Power over all Christians in Spirituals at least if not in Temporals whose Subjects soever they may be in Temporals But as to the former of these two Clauses in the Assertory part of this Oath which affirms the King to be sole Sovereign or that he is the Only supreme Governour in this Realm it seems principally if not wholly to be intended to assert the Government of this Kingdom to be Monarchical and to make it be acknowledged to be so For by swearing that the King is the only supreme Governour of this Realm c. they do virtually and by necessary consequence swear also that all other Governours within the Realm as they do severally and joyntly derive their Power of governing from him so they are joyntly as well as severally subordinate unto him and therefore none of them either severally or joyntly co-ordinate with him Because if any of them or all of them in any capacity were so or believed by the Parliament to be so the Parliament by enjoyning men to swear the King is the only supreme Governour of this Realm must needs be chargeable with enjoyning Perjury or which is worse with compelling others to swear that to be truth which they themselves do not believe to be so which cannot be avoided but by concluding that the Injunction of the Oath of Supremacy by Parliament is a Declaration of Parliament that this Kingdom is a Monarchy properly so called because the Sovereignty or supreme Power is in one Person only namely in the King and if in him only then in him wholly also And that this was the Parliaments meaning in prescribing and enjoyning that Oath of Supremacy may farther and if it be possible more undeniably and demonstratively be made to appear it is very observable that in the Rubrick prefixed before the Administration of that Oath which Rubrick is a part of the Act of Parliament as well as the Oath it self it is said the Bishop shall cause The Oath of the Kings Supremacy And against the Power and Authority of all Foreign Potentates c. to be administred c. It is observable I say that in the aforesaid Rubrick there is a clear and a very notable distinction made betwixt the two first Clauses of the Assertory part of the Oath namely betwixt the Clause affirming the King to be the only supreme Governor of this Realm and the Clause denying any foreign Prince Person Prelate or Potentate to have any Jurisdiction Power Superiority or Authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm The distinction I say by the Rubrick made betwixt the two Clauses is very notable for it is the first of them only that is called by the Rubrick the Oath of the Kings Supremacy whereas the latter is said to be against the Power and Authority of all Foreign Potentates and therefore is more properly to be called an Abjuration than an Oath And yet it is this Abjuration only that Mr. Baxter will have to be meant by the Oath of Supremacy whereas this abjuration is not the Oath of Supremacy it self but a Deduction only from the Oath of Supremacy For because the King is the only supreme Governour of this Realm therefore neither Pope nor any other foreign Prince Prelate or Potentate can claim or pretend to any Supremacy or part of Supremacy here in this Kingdom So that he that can truly swear the one may safely per modum sequelae by way of consequence swear the other also But though the truth of the former doth necessarily infer the truth of the latter yet the truth of the latter doth not necessarily infer the truth of the former For though it be never so true and never so undoubtedly acknowledged to be so that no Foreigner or none without the Realm of what quality or denomination soever doth or can justly pretend to the supreme or any part of the supreme Power either Civil or Ecclesiastical here in England yet supposing the supreme Power to be divided as Grotius supposeth it may be in some Kingdoms and Mr. Baxter saith it is here in this Kingdom it will not follow I confess that the King is or that the Parliament that made this Act and enjoyned this Oath to be taken did thereby acknowledg the King to be the only supreme Governour of this Realm But the Parliament by injoyning the Oath to be taken and those that take it not only abjurare to abjure or for swear all foreign jurisdiction but jurare to swear positively and plainly That the King is the only supreme Governour of this Realm over all Persons in all Cases and Capacities do evidently declare that They themselves believe and acknowledg the King to be so and consequently whatsoever division there may be of the supreme Power in other Kingdoms yet in this there is none For the first the most immediate and most natural deduction from this Proposition viz. The King is the only supreme Governour of this Realm is the excluding all others in this Realm from having any thing to do with the supreme Government of it And therefore the swearing to this Proposition alone is called by the Rubrick the taking of the Oath of the Kings Supremacy the following abjuration of all foreign Authorities being but a deduction and that not a primary but
but hence it will not follow that he was bound to do so nay thence it will follow that neither he nor any of his Predecessors were bound to do so for then they that were the boldest in their demands that ever met and sate in Parliament would have claimed it as of right and not Petition'd for it as they did at least if they had vouchsafed to have Petition'd for it they would have called their Petition a Petition of Right which they did not So that by very Petitioning the King to grant those things which they proposed as agreed on by both Houses they acknowledged that the King was not bound by any Law Custom or Precedent from his Predecessors to consent to what both Houses had agreed on and consequently that there was no such Co-ordination betwixt the King Lords and Commons by the fundamental Constitution of this Kingdom as by the aforesaid Aâ—â—hor was pretended to be And therefo 〈…〉 in his answer to the Petition of the 〈…〉 the 19 Propositions which they pretend humbly to desire but indeed peremptorily press him to grant tells them That to say he is obliged to pass all Laws that shall be offered unto him by both Houses howsoever his own Judgment and Conscience shall be unsatisfied wiih them is to broach a new Doctrine a point of Policy as proper for their present business as destructive to all rights of Parliaments adding that it was out of a strange shamelesness that they would forget for sure there being so many Lawyers among them some of them could not chuse but remember it a Clause in a Law still in force made in the second year of King Henry the V. wherein both Houses of Parliament acknowledg that it is of the Kings Regality to grant or deny such of their Petitions as pleaseth himself And if it were so and acknowledged by both Houses of Parliament to be so in Henry the V's time I would fain know in what Kings Reign or by what Kings consent that Act or the aforesaid Clause in that Act which was in force so lately comes to be repeal'd or whether any Law or Act of Parliament can be either made or repealed without the Kings consent CHAP. XIII An Ordinance of both Houses no Law and consequently no legal Authority for the late War against the King The Militia or the Power of the Sword acknowledged by the two Houses themselves to be in the King A Sermon of Arch-Bishop Ushers in the Isle of Wight Preached to the same Purpose NOT a Law perhaps may Mr. Baxter say properly so called but an Ordinance of both Houses may and that without the Kings consent to it nay notwithstanding the Kings declaring and protesting against it oblige all the People of England to do or not to do what the two Houses will have them as much as any Law consented to by the King ever did or can do nay and may repeal any Law made by the King by the advice and with the consent of both Houses any Law or Custom to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding But per quam Regulam by what Rule Mr. Baxter By what Law of God or man can this be done Why by an Ordinance of both Houses which is equivalent at least to an Act of Parliament properly so called and so it had need to be Mr. Baxter and more too to warrant the doing of such things such horrible mischiefs and Villanies as have been done against God by Sacriledg against the King by Rebellion and by Subjects against their fellow Subjects by plundering and imprisoning and murdering one another of which side soever they were for all will be put to the account of them that had no authority I mean no legal and just Authority to warrant them to do what they did And therefore Mr. Baxter you were best be very sure that the two Houses had Authority to make such a War as they did not only without Commission from the King but against the King and to engage you and by you to engage so many thousands as you say they did in it You were best I say be very sure of it for it is not your head or your neck only which you say you are willing to hazard upon that account but your soul it self and the Everlasting Woe or Welfare of it that lies at stake for it Be not deceiv'd God is not to be mocked It is not the Confederacy of the two Houses it is not the Covenanting of the two Nations that can justifie either their commanding or their being obeyed in any thing which God hath forbidden or not allowed them to command or to be obeyed in by some known Law of his own or of the Land neither of which I am sure can be produced by them Moreover it is not the redressing of Grievances had they been as many or more and as great or greater than the House of Commons in their virulent and malicious Remonstrance to the People represented them to be nor the Reformation of Religion though there had been much more need of it than there was no nor the truly intending as well as pretending never so good or never so necessary an End for the publick Good either spiritual or temporal of the whole Nation that can justifie the Means they made use of if they had not Authority to make use of them I mean in their taking of the Sword out of the Kings hands where the Law of God and of the Land had placed it and taking it into their own notwithstanding Gods and mans Law to the contrary For the proof of the first part of which Assertion of mine I appeal to Mr. Baxter himself for amongst his many false and impious and pernicious Aphorisms he hath this true one that it is not lawful for a Nation to fight for the preservation of their Religion or their worldly goods and liberties without just authority and licence Whereunto he adds by way of exposition and illustration of his meaning That it is but a delusory course of some in these times that write many Volumes to prove that Subjects may not bear Arms against their Princes for Religion as if those that were against them did think that Religion only as the end yea or Life or Liberty would justifie Rebellion or that the Efficient Authorizing Cause were not necessary as well as the Final Where bearing Arms against Princes is warrantable quoad fundamentum as to the ground of it this will warrant it quoad finem as to the end of it A good End must have a good Ground Again for proof of the latter part of my Assertion namely that the Sword or the Power of making War was by Law in the Kings hand and not in theirs I appeal to the Acknowledgment of the two Houses themselves who after they had setled the Militia before the War was actually begun yet knowing and being conscious to themselves that they had done it illegally
and by usurpation of the Kings Authority without any Commission or leave from him for the doing of it they make it one of the 19 Propositions they sent to the King when he was at York in the year 42. That his Majesty would be pleased to rest satisfied with that course that the Lords and the House of Commons have appointed for the ordering of the Militia until the same shall be farther setled by a Bill by which Proposition they do plainly confess First That they had taken the Sword by having ordered the Militia of the Kingdom Secondly That they had no Commission or leave from the King for it by saying it was done by their own appointment Thirdly That they knew they had intrenched upon his Authority by so doing Why else should they desire his Majesty would be pleased to rest satisfied with what they had done in that particular at least pro tempore at the present until the same that is the ordering of the Militia should be farther setled by Bill Whereby Fourthly They confess that the Power of setling it and consequently of making any use of it was not in them as yet by Law until by a Bill consented to by the King it were made a Law and consequently that the Ordinances of both Houses as they call'd them did not nor could not make any thing they ordered to be done legal or obligatory to the whole Nation And hence or from this consciousness of the insufficiency of their own Authority to justifie either before God or the World the lawfulness of doing what they had done and meant to do it was that they so earnestly and so often press'd the King to pass their Ordinances into Acts. For though they did what they could to make the poor deluded People believe that their Ordinances were as legal as valid and as obligatory as Acts for the draining of their Purses and exposing of their Persons yet by their being so desirous as they were even after their victory and when the King was their Prisoner to legitimate their spurious Ordinances by turning them into Acts it is evident they did not themselves believe what they and their Preachers made the People to believe concerning the validity of any of those Ordinances especially that for taking up of Arms as if the Power of the Sword and ordering of the Militia of the Kingdom to fight for whom and against whom they pleased and upon what account they pleased had been in them which by what I have said it doth not only appear it was not but that they knew it was not but was and always had been in the Crown as the King tells them in his answer to the aforesaid Proposition of the two Houses telling them that he will no more part with his Right in the Militia than with his Crown and indeed when he parts with the one he doth in effect part with the other also for as the Crown upon his head is the Emblem of his Sovereignty so the Sword and the Scepter that are always when he appears as a King carried before him are the Emblems of the two supporters of his Crown or of his Sovereignty the Sword the Emblem of his supreme Military and the Scepter the Emblem of his supreme Civil or judiciary Power and both of them signifie that he is the fountain of all Power and that there is no Power that can be legally exercised within any of his Realms and Dominions but what is derived from him and exercised immediately or mediately by him and for him And that this is true in Divinity as well as by the Law of the Land in relation to our King I will cite the Authority of a Casuist whom Mr. Baxter seems to have a great reverence for and esteem of though he were a Bishop and more than a Bishop I mean Arch-Bishop Vsher whose Reduction of Episcopacy Mr. Baxter seems to approve though the Arch-Bishop himself as I have been informed would not own it to be his This Great and Good man I say preaching before the last King at the Treaty in the Isle of Wight did in that Sermon of his positively and in plain terms more than once or twice affirm the King our King to be the fountain of Power under God within his own Dominions and that therefore no Power could lawfully be assumed or made use of by any upon any pretence whatsoever but as it was derived by Commission from the King These were his very words whereunto he added This is true Doctrine were the King a Papist or a Pagan and much more when he is as our King is a Christian King an Orthodox Christian King and that not in profession only but in practice also And then having somewhat inlarged himself in speaking of the Kings personal Vertues and Graces both moral and spiritual Now said he some that hear me may think I flatter him indeed I do not but I confess that what I have said of him I have said to comfort him for never any man of his quality had more need of it both in regard of the unworthy usage he hath had and the unworthy condition he is now in which I hope said he will last no longer For this as he then added is the 49th year of his Age and at the end of the 49th year began the year of Jubilee among the Jews and then every bondman was made free and every Prisoner was set at liberty and every one that had been kept out of possession was restored to it And if said he We be not worse than Jews it will be so with us now also Haec audivimus magnum illum virum non magis verè quà m fortiter animosè disserentem these things we heard that Great man discoursing of with no less courage and resolution than with truth And I have repeated it so often upon several occasions both at home and abroad for his honour that I verily believe these for the most part were the very same words or very near the very same numerical words as well as the identical sence of that passage of his Sermon which I have repeated And although I cannot produce many Witnesses to attest the truth of what I have here said as to this particular there being but one besides my self at least that I can remember now living that heard that Sermon yet that One is one of that credit and reputation with the generality of good men that he is multorum instar as good as a great many to make any thing he attests upon his own knowledge to be believed and this was so notable a passage to be delivered at such a time and in such a place by One that was nominated not by the King but by the Commissioners for the Parliament to be sent for thither that I am sure Sir Philip Warwick could not chuse but take special notice of it as I think every body did that heard it and
therefore I am sure he cannot forget it or at least will remember it assoon as he is put in mind of it And to him I appeal for the verifying of what I have said as to this particular But if any man shall notwithstanding Sir Philip Warwick's attestation think it to be incredible that the two Houses of Parliament being then in their Zenith should indure any such thing to be said so much to their reproach and condemnation of their cause and of all their proceedings without any animadversion upon him that said it I answer it was partly because they were then in their Zenith so high advanced and so highly elevated with the success God had for our sins and for their obduration permitted them to have that they despised what any man did or could say against them and partly because they could not have taken notice of it without inflicting some punishment or other upon him for it which they could not have done he being a man of such eminency not only in regard of his quality but much more in regard of his learning and sanctity and in regard of the very great reputation he had thereby acquired both at home and abroad without exposing themselves to the envy and hatred of the whole World and without doing themselves any good by it and therefore all things considered they thought it best to take no notice at all of it as for ought I ever heard they did not Howsoever what I affirm that pious and learned Arch-Bishop said whether he said it or no is true namely that the Power of the Sword or the Power of making War though for their own defence only or for never so good an end was not in the two Houses but in the King and in the King only as they did themselves acknowledg because at that very time and at that very Treaty one of the prime Articles which they mainly insisted on was to have the Sword for so many years to be put into their hands by the Kings passing of an Act of Parliament to that purpose and for their raising of mony during that time for the support and exercise of that Power in what proportion they thought or should think fit upon their Fellow-Subjects all which they had done before by virtue of their Ordinances only which either they did or did not think to be a legal and sufficient Authority for their taking of the Sword and using it as they did If they did think so why might not the same authority have been sufficient for the continuance of it and if so what need was there of an Act for the trusting them with it but for a time only But if they did not think their own Ordinances to be a legal and sufficient Authority for their taking of the Sword and taxing of the People and the exercising all those other Acts of Arbitrary Power which they did for so many years together by vertue of their own Ordinances only why then habemus confitentes reos We have their own confession not only that they took the Sword which neither the Law nor the King had put into their hands and therefore were Vsurpers of the Regal Authority but had made use of it against the King or which is all one against those that were commissioned by the King and therefore were Traytors and Rebels as likewise that their own Ordinances were not legally sufficient to justifie their so doing and consequently that they have not such a Legislative Power as Mr. Baxter saith they have and which he is so confident of as that he offers his head to the Block if the reasons he gives for the proof of it be disproved which I am now in the last place to try whether I can do or not The end of the third Section SECT IV. England a Monarchy and the Soveraignty solely in the KING prov'd against Mr. Baxter as also that neither the Parliaments concurrence as the Peoples Representatives to the making Laws nor their being Trustees for the Peoples Rights gives them any share in the Soveraignty CHAP. I. The mischief of Schismatical Books Mr. Baxter 's Anti-episcopal and Anti-monarchical Aphorisms The Soveraignty not divided as Mr. B. saith betwixt KING and Parliament Prov'd by the Parliaments acknowledgments and by the Oath of Supremacy AND first thanks be to God and the King that Mr. Baxter is not Lugdunensem causam dicturus ad aram that he is not to plead his cause at the Kings-Bench Barr. For God knows that all the hurt I wish him is that no more hurt may be done by Him and for this end and for this end only it was that I silenced him from preaching and for this end and for this end only it is that I would have him prohibited from writing or at least from publishing what he writes until he is licensed by Authority to do so For when he hath published such pernicious Principles against the legal constitution of the Church and State as he hath done in divers of his Books especially in that of the Holy Commonwealth it is too late and to very little purpose to say as he doth say of some of them that he would have them taken pro non scriptis as if they had not been written For Serò medicina paratur Cùm mala per long as invaluêre moras that is Physick comes too late when ill humors through long delays have got too great a head An Arch-Heretick may by Gods mercy be himself reconcil'd to the Truth and become Orthodox and an Arch-Schismatick may by the same mercy be reconciled to the Church and become Conformable and yet that Heresie that was broached by the one and that Schism that was introduced by the other may be propagated and perpetuated by their Books and by their Disciples from Generation to Generation to the Worlds end and if Master Baxter will needs have a secondary Original sin I think this is that which may most properly be so called Our Countryman Brown who would needs have our Church of England to be no Church was himself convinced of this error so that he not only became a Member but a Minister of the Church of England and as I have been informed died Parson of a Parish called A-Church in Northamptonshire But did Brownism dye with him No there are Brownists still and will be God knows how long perhaps till Doom's day put an end to the World and all the Divisions that have been are or shall be in it So that as nothing can be more criminal than to be the Author of a Schism Sect or Heresie so nothing can be more dangerous than to suffer the spreading and growth of them especially of such of them as are destructive in their natural tendency whatsoever the intention of the Authors and Abettors may be to the peace and welfare of the established Government either in Church or State And such say I are Mr. Baxter's Anti-episcopal Aphorisms in
as when he saith unto them Come they must come so when he saith unto them Go they must go according to the legal and established Constitution of our Government Which being so I wonder how the two Houses can be said to be co-ordinate with the King or how the Soveraignty can be said to be divided betwixt the King and the two Houses when neither of them are Houses till he makes them to be so nor continue to be Houses any longer than he will have them to do so Indeed if the two Houses of Parliament were Bodies that were always in being as the Senate of Rome was and as the Senates of Venice and Genoa now are or such as might assemble and meet together when and as often as they pleased and continue together as long as they pleased as the States of Holland may and do now and as Grotius tells us they might and did even then when they had Kings such he means as were called Kings but were no more Kings indeed than those of Sparta were as Grotius himself tells us in the same place if I say our two Houses of Parliament were such a Senate as were always in being or might be so when they pleased and continue so as long as they pleased there might perhaps be some pretence for their having some part in the Soveraignty But when they have no being at all till the King gives it them by calling them together and are reducible to what they were before that is to no being again whensoever he pleaseth to dismiss them I cannot imagine in what sence the two Houses of Parliament can be said either to be Co-ordinate with the King or to have any share in the Soveraignty or Kingly power I am sure that according to the established constitution of our Government as they have not yet so it is and always will be in the Kings power to prevent their Usurpation of any such power as long I mean as he keeps the power of calling and dismissing that is of making and unmaking them in his own hands and confequently of acting any thing in their Parliamentary capacity to the prejudice of the Crown or of the People I say to the prejudice of the Crown or of the People because what is really prejudicial to the Crown is really prejudicial to the People also howsoever or by whomsoever the People may be and are often made to believe otherwise and are not to be convinced of their error but by their feeling only CHAP. III. The Legislative power solely in the King How far the Parliament concerned in making Laws Dr. Sanderson 's judgment of it Mr. B. ascribes the whole Soveraignty to the Vsurpers upon the Kings loss of his Part against a Thests of his own BUT although it be the King's Summons of them or calling of them together that makes them to be the two Houses and consequently that inables them to act as the two Houses or in their Parliamentary capacity and although they cease to be two Houses or to have any power to act in a Parliamentary capacity when the King pleaseth to dismiss them yet because Mr. Baxter may say that as long as they are two Houses or as long as the King permits them to sit together in their Parliamentary capacity they have a Legislative power or right of making Laws together with the King for the whole Kingdom and consequently are partakers of the Soveraignty with the King also the making of Laws for the whole Nation being undoubtedly one of the Essentials of the Soveraignty or supreme power We are therefore in the 3d. place to inquire what the two Houses do or legally can do as to the making of our Laws and whether that be enough to entitle them to be properly called Legislators or if I may so speak Collegislators with the King All that ever I heard that either of the two Houses severally or both of them joyntly could legally do in order to Law-making is but the framing and proposing or offering unto the King such Bills or materials as they think fit to be made Laws by the King if he think them fit to be made Laws also Here is the two Houses Non-ultra hitherto they may go but no further And sure it is not the proposing of any thing to be made a Law that is the making of a Law or that can prove the Proposers to be the Law-makers especially if he to whom they propose it may choose whether he will make it a Law or no as there was never any doubt made but he might before the rebellious Parliament in the late Kings time broached the contrary together with many other Anti-monarchical Paradoxes to justifie their own Anti-monarchical and rebellious Practices against the known Laws Customs and Constitutions of this Kingdom of which this was one of the most essential that as the Houses had a liberty to pass and propose Bills to the King so the King might as he saw cause or thought fit make or not make them to be or not to be Laws by giving or not giving his Royal assent unto them For it is the Kings Fiat or the stamp of Royal Authority upon them that makes those Bills to become Laws obliging all the Kings Subjects to the obedience of them or for non-obedience to the Penalties appointed by them So that the Bills are but the materia ex quâ the matter out of which Laws may be made but the forma per quam the formalis ratio or intrinsecal and specifical form by which what were before Bills become Laws is the obliging power which the King by his Fiat breaths into them as God doth the Soul into the Body to make it a living and a rational Creature And therefore Mr. Baxter who being so Metaphysical a man as he is as he must needs know that it is forma or causa formalis the form or formal cause per quam res est quod est which makes every thing to be what it is must needs know too and if he have any ingenuity confess likewise that from whence and whence only the Laws have their obliging power which is formalis ratio Legis that which makes Law to be Law from thence and thence only those Laws must have their being also and consequently if it be the King's Fiat only that gives those Bills that are by the two Houses presented to him an obliging power over the whole Nation thereby making them of Bills to become Laws the King and none but the King must needs be the sole efficient or maker of those Laws For as Forma est causa per quam res est quod est so Efficiens est causa à quâ res est quod est As the Form is the cause by which the thing is what it is so the Efficient is the cause from which the thing is what it is by introducing that form which makes it to be what it is
If therefore the Law hath its obliging power which is its form or that which makes it to be Law from the King and the King only the King and the King only must needs be the efficient and sole efficient cause of Law and consequently the whole Legislative power must needs be in him only unless Mr. Baxter can prove that the two Houses of Parliament can of themselves and by their own Authority only make their Bills to be Laws or at least that they joyn with the King in making them to be so For if it be the Kings own arbitrary consent only which makes that to be a Law which was no Law before he consented to it then must it needs be confessed that the King is the sole efficient of all Law and consequently the only Law-giver in his own Kingdom according to the determination of the very learned judicious and truly pious and conscientious Casuist Doctor Sanderson Bishop of Lincoln who in his Lecture de Legum humanarum causâ efficiente speaking of our King hath these very weighty and remarkable words Cùm illa sola censenda sit cujusque rei causa efficiens principalis sufficiens quae per se immediatè producit in materiam praeparatam introducit eam formam quae illi rei dat nomen esse etsi ad productionem istius effectûs alia etiam concurrere oporteat vel antecedere potiùs ad praevias dispositiones quò materia ad recipiendam formam ab agente intentam aptior reddatur omninò constat quotcunque demùm ea sint quae ad legem recte constituendam antecedenter requiruntur voluntatem tamen principis ex cujus unius arbitratu jussione omnes Legum Rogationes aut ratae habentur aut irritae esse solam adaequatam publicarum Legum efficientem causam Seeing saith he that is to be held the principal efficient and sufficient cause of every thing which of it self and immediately produceth and introduceth into the matter prepared for it that form which giveth name and being to that thing though for the producing of that effect other things also must concur or rather precede as previous dispositions to make the matter fitter to receive the form intended by the Agent to be introduced into it it is certain for all that how many soever the things are that are antecedently requisite for the constituting of the Law the Will of the Prince on whose alone arbitrary consent or dissent the ratifying or rejecting of such Laws as are tendred unto him doth depend is the sole and adequate efficient cause of all publick Laws This I say was the judgment of that very learned pious and very judicious Casuist Dr. Sanderson concerning the only proper adequate subject of the Legislative power here in England who was Professor of Casuistical Divinity in the University of Oxford as long as the Rebellious Parliament would suffer him to be so and who would in all probability if he might have been suffered to have continued some few years longer have left us a truer and more exact and compleat body of Casuistical Divinity than any the World hath been so happy as to see yet and in which the World hath more need to be truly and thoroughly instructed in order to peace here and happiness hereafter than in any other part either of Polemical or Dogmatical Divinity the Essentials of the Creed excepted only But that very reason it was for which the Vsurpers of the Regal power in those times would not suffer so vigorously an Opposer and so strongly and clearly a Convincer of that Trayterous and Tyrannical Vsurpation of theirs to be a publick Professor and Standard of that truth which they were concern'd the People should be kept ignorant of or made to believe the contrary as they were by such Preachers as they who could not endure sound Doctrine heaped up unto themselves after their own Lusts and by such Casuists and Writers of Political Aphorisms as Mr. Baxter was whose business it was to make the People believe the Vsurpation of an Arbitrary power and Tyranny to be an Holy Common-wealth for such was the Government here which Mr. Baxter in his Preface to that Book of his calls the best Government in all the World affirming those that were then the Governours namely the two Houses of Parliament without the King not only to have a part of the Supremacy or Soveraignty but to have all the Supremacy or whole Soveraignty and therefore such as whom to resist or depose is forbidden saith he to Subjects upon pain of damnation They are his own words in the before-cited place which one would think were hardly to be reconciled with what he affirms in the place we are now examining viz. That the Supremacy or Soveraignty is divided betwixt the King and them and consequently that they have not the Supremacy but a part of it only But for answer to this Objection perhaps he will say as indeed in effect he doth say that although before the War betwixt the King and them they had but a part of the Soveraignty only yet the King having by force endeavour'd to take their part from them and being overcome by them he had lost his own part which jure belli by right of War did accrue to them and so they became the Possessors of the whole Soveraignty though the King was then living But he had ceased to be King saith Mr. Baxter because he had entred into a state of War with his People and consequently by Mr. Baxter's Logick had lost his part of the Soveraignty But who was to have his part of the Soveraignty supposing him to be justly deprived of it Those that had the other part of it by whom he was conquered No saith Mr. Baxter for if saith he a Prince that hath not the whole Soveraignty be conquered by a Senate that hath the other part and that in a just defensive War that Senate cannot assume the whole Soveraignty but supposeth that Government in specie to remain and therefore another King must be chosen if the former be incapable CHAP. IV. Mr. B. 's high strain in commending those for the best Governors in all the World whom yet he owns to be Intruders and Vsurpers His compliance with Richard remarkt His high commendation tax'd and challenged The Recapitulation WHat he means by the last words of this Thesis viz. Another King must be chosen if the former be incapable I know not unless he means that the former King though he had lost his part in the Soveraignty and ceased to be King by being conquered by the Parliament in a just War yet he might be capable of being King again if the Parliament thought fit to choose him which having used him as they had done Mr. Baxter no doubt wished as heartily as he thought it likely they would do But whatsoever Mr. Baxter meant by these last words of this Thesis
I mean the House of Commons presently after the Kings death yea and both the Cromwels also of which the former was resisted though not deposed and the latter was both resisted and deposed together with the several mock-mock-Parliaments in both their times and the last mock-Parliament of all which by the admirable conduct and courage of that ever to be renowned and ever to be remembred Souldier and Servant of God the King and his Country I mean General MONK was shatter'd in pieces never to be sodred or re-united in order to restoring of the Soveraign Power to its only true and right owner the King For as for all or for any of the rest of those Soveraign Powers as Mr. Baxter calls them and which he magnifies so much they were as far from having any right to Soveraign Power as they were from being the best Governours in all the World as Mr. Baxter most falsly and I had almost said most impudently saith they were For let him name that which he thinks to have been the best of those Governments or Governours betwixt the assuming and usurping of the Soveraign Power by the two Houses of the long Parliament and the present King 's coming home And I will undertake as old as I am if God spare me life and health to demonstrate that they were not only as arrant Traytors and Rebels as ever were in the World but that in the managery and exercise of their usurped Power they carried themselves as hypocritically and blasphemously towards God in the use of his Name and his Ordinances as insolently insultingly and barbarously towards their King not only in their buying and selling and imprisoning of Him but even in their Addresses to him and treating with Him and withal as arbitrarily as despotically as injuriously and every way as tyrannically towards their Fellow-Subjects in taking away their Goods their Liberties and their Lives not only without but against Law as ever any Governours did whether justly or unjustly so called either in this or any other Nation But when I say this I would not be understood to mean what I say of all that sate in both or either of the two Houses of Parliament that made War against the King for I do verily believe there were many and I know there were some both of the Lords and Commons that after the King was driven away stayed and sate in both Houses and did what they could to hinder the rebellious and outragious proceedings of the factious Party which was predominant in the one House as well as in the other But the Tyde was too strong and those good Men too few to stemm the current or to prevent the overflowing of it as it did over all the banks and boundaries of Obedience to the Laws as well as of Allegiance to the King And therefore as Mr. Baxter when he tells us the two Houses of Parliament were the best Governours in all the World he tells us too that by the two Houses he means the Majority of the two Houses so when I say they were Vsurpers and Traytors and Rebels and as ill Governours or Managers of their usurped power as ever were before them in this or in any other Kingdom I mean the Majority of those two Houses only Which it was not my purpose to say so much of as I have said at present but my just indignation at Mr. Baxter's extravagant magnifying such men as they were hath carried me out of the way I was in which was to prove that neither those nor any other two Houses of Parliament can properly and truly be said to share with the King in the Soveraignty or Supreme Power upon the account of theirs as well as the Kings Legislative Power in making Laws for the whole Kingdom which as I have already proved is the Kings Act only by making Bills to be Laws by his FIAT or Assent to them thereby giving them that enlivening and obliging power which they had not before and which makes them to be Laws and this being solely the King's Act without any Act of either or both of the Houses in conjunction with it it is the King alone that makes the Law or that makes that to be a Law which was not a Law before how fit soever it might be to be made a Law whereof the King is the only final Judge also from whom there lies no appeal to either or both the Houses so that whatsoever Preparatory Act or Acts of either or both Houses may be necessary in order to the making of Laws antecedently to the King's Fiat yet it is the King's Fiat only that makes them to be Laws especially it being at his choice whether he will make them to be Laws or not after the two Houses have done what legally they can do towards it CHAP. V. Vpon Mr. Baxter 's grounds the KING may make Laws in some Cases without the consent of the two Houses Ship-mony justified upon the same grounds It is the King's Assent that makes Laws The Parliaments concurrence wherein it lies IF it be objected that as the two Houses cannot make a Law without the Kings Assent so neither can the King make a Law without the Consent of the two Houses and that therefore the two Houses as well as the King are the Law-makers For answer hereunto I will not say as Mr. Baxter seems to say when he puts the Question whether if the People will not consent to that which is necessary for their own Preservation the Soveraign may not do it against their wills and answers he may do it though he be not an absolute but a limited Soveraign and limited by Covenant that is as he expresseth himself in other places by an antecedent compact with the People when they chose or admitted him to be their Soveraign and consequently that even such a Soveraign notwithstanding such a compact as for instance that he will not nor shall not make any Law without the Nobilities and Peoples consent may of himself and without their consents make such a Law as is necessary for their Preservation or that he judgeth to be so for in this case he is and of necessity must be the only Judge whether it be necessary for their Preservation or no and therefore if he judge it to be so he may according to Mr. Baxter's opinion not withstanding any compact or Constitution to the contrary make such a Law not only without but against their consents as Mr. Baxter words it because saith he that Soveraign is God's Officer for the ends of Government and therefore cannot lawfully be restrained by the People from preserving them because the People have no power above God and because it is still to be supposed that the People desire their own Preservation and therefore mistakingly resist the means which else they would consent to This is one of Mr. Baxter's Political Aphorisms which if it be true my Answer to the aforesaid
Objection might be this That although the Parliament or the two Houses of Parliament cannot make any Laws without the Kings consent yet the King may make Laws without their consent in some cases namely when the publick safety is concerned that such a Law or such Laws should be made though one or both of the Houses will not consent to it In such a Case I say not according to mine own but Mr. Baxter's opinion such a Law or such Laws may be made by the King without nay against the consent of both Houses and à paritate rationis for the same cause and by the like reason Mony may be raised if without raising of Mony a Naval Force for example as may be sufficient for the preservation of the Kingdom from imminent dangers by a foreign Invasion cannot be had and then according to Mr. Baxter's Hypothesis what can be said against raising of Ship-money by the late King he being the Judge of the greatness and imminency of the danger and that it could not stay for a Parliamentary Supply there being no Parliament then sitting and the greatest Extraparliamentary Judicatory of the Nation having been advis'd with by the King and given him their opinions that he might legally do what he did certainly these things considered if Mr. Baxter's Aphorism be true the King 's raising or indeavouring to raise Ship-Mony without consent of Parliament was not so hainous a violation of the legal constitution which he was obliged or had obliged himself to govern by especially after it was by his consent condemned in Parliament as to be made as it is by Mr. Baxter one of the principal causes of his siding with the Parliament in Rebellion against the King For if the King were maximè dignus istâ contumeliâ indignus illequi faceret tamen if he did never so much deserve this affront yet it did not become Mr. Baxter to give it him not only because by the highest Judicature then in being it was declared to be legal but because according to Mr. Baxter's own judgment declared in this Aphorism the King might have done it supposing it necessary for the Preservation of the publick though it had not been legal But this shall not be my Answer to the aforesaid Objection I remember what I have said before upon another Occasion viz. that A mischief is better than an Inconvenience which I think is a maxime of our Law and the meaning of it is as I conceive that it is better to run the hazard of a very great Evil which possibly may but is very unlikely will befall us than for the avoiding or preventing of it to make use of such a Remedy as frequently may be and probably will be made use of when there is no such Occasion for it or need of it And so that which was used as a Remedy for the present may prove a Malady for the future in the Consequence of it And therefore for answer to the aforesaid objection I will not say that the King can make Laws to oblige the whole Nation without the consent of both Houses of Parliament though never so much for the publick good or never so necessary for the preservation of the whole Kingdom but this I will say that though such Laws cannot be made without their consent yet it is not they nor their consenting to them that makes them to be Laws For then either the Bills would be Laws assoon as they were passed by both Houses or the being passed by the two Houses must oblige the King to pass them also but neither of these is true according to the legal and fundamental constitution of our Government as appears not only by the constant Practice to the contrary but by the frequent and importunate Addresses made unto the late King by the two Houses of the rebellious Parliament to make their Ordinances to be Laws by his consent to them which certainly being so high as they were then they would never have done if they had thought that either their Ordinances were Laws or had the Obligatory power of Laws before the King gave it to them or that he might not if he would refuse to give it So that it being not only the Kings consent but his free arbitrary and voluntary consent that gives being to all Laws the Legislative Power properly so called must needs be in the King and in the King only The Legislative Power I say properly so called I mean the very making of that to be Law which is Law abstracting from whatsoever it is that goes before or that follows after it is made for certainly neither of them can be essential to the making of it and yet both of them may be very requisite for the making of the Laws to be such as may the more willingly be obeyed by the People Now by what goes before the making of Laws here with us I mean the considering debating and agreeing of both Houses what shall be proposed to the King by them to be by him made to be Laws and by what follows after the King by his Le Roy le veult hath made them Laws I mean the solemn Preface or Preamble to them whereby it is declared that there was a concurrence of the Lords and Commons to the making or enacting of them because the subject matter of them was prepared and agreed on by the Lords and Commons and then and not till then proposed to the King by them to be made Laws by him So that the subject matter of our Laws is and always must be from the two Houses or at least from their agreement and consenting to it And in this respect it is that they may be said to concur to the making of our Laws though they do not make them For it is as I said before not the Matter ex quâ res est out of which a thing is made which is prepared and proposed by the Houses but the Form per quam res est by which a thing is what it is which is wholly from the King that makes what the Houses propose to him to be made a Law to be a Law which although he may do or refuse to do as he pleaseth yet because he can make nothing to be Law but what by the Agreement of both Houses is propos'd to him to be made a Law by him and consequently though our Laws are not nor cannot be made by them yet they are not nor cannot be made without them neither therefore I say they do concur to the making of them though they do not make them They concur to the making of them because the Legislative matter or the matter whereof Laws are made and must be made is from them but they do not make them because the form whereby they are made to be what they are is not at all from them but solely and wholly from the King and consequently he is the sole efficient or
Law of in their Opinions if he please and if it be so in his opinion also So that the King is finally the only and sole Judge whether what is agreed on and propos'd by them as fit to be made a Law be fit to be made a Law or no and if he thinks it fit to be so it is he and none but he that by his Le veult makes it Law So that to conclude this Point the thing proposed whether by King or either of the Houses is the Matter or material cause ex quâ or out of which the Law is made the Efficient or the causa à qua whereby or by whom the matter of the Law is made to be a Law is the King and the King only the Formal cause or the cause per quam res est quod est by which a thing is that thing which it is or that whereby it actually becomes and is effectually made to be a Law is the Kings declaration of his Assent or Will to make it a Law by those Nomothetical or Legislative words pronounced by himself or in his Name Le Roy le veult the Final cause or the cause propter quam Res est for which or for the sake whereof a thing is is Bonum Publicum the Publick good So that the consent of the two Houses to what is proposed to be made a Law is but that which we call Causa sine quâ non a Cause without which a thing is not to be which indeed is a condition rather than a cause but such a condition as is so necessary for disposing of the matter to receive the form that the efficient cannot introduce the form without it though he be not necessitated to introduce the form by it that is it is such a condition as without which the King cannot make what is so conditioned to be a Law though it do not necessitate him to make that to be a Law which is so conditioned so that as I said before it is but Causa sine quâ non only which is indeed no cause at all And this I think enough to prove the Legislative power to be in the King and in the King only and consequently that the Soveraignty upon this account is not divided betwixt the King and the two Houses either equally or unequally or that they have any part of it or share in it And yet upon this Supposition and upon this supposition only Mr. Baxter concludes first that the Kingdom of England is no Monarchy And Secondly that the Parliament's defending of their own part of the Soveraignty against the Kings Invasion of it was a just War and no Rebellion By the first of which Conclusions he seems to think that there is no Monarchy but where the Government is Despotical and Arbitrary ubi Arbitria Principum as Justin saith pro Legibus sunt where the Will of the Soveraign is the Law of the Subject And such indeed were the first especially the Eastern Monarchies of the World and yet not altogether so neither as appears from the 7th compared with the 15th Verse of the 6th Chapter of the Prophecy of Daniel for as in the former of those Verses we find there was a consultation by a Senate or Parliament of all the Presidents Governours Counsellors and Captains of the Kingdom of Persia for the making of a Decree or Law by the King which he did by his signing of it so in the latter of those Verses we find also that it was a standing Law of or amongst the Medes and Persians that no Decree or Statute made by the King with the advice of an Assembly of the chief Men of his Kingdom could be changed or repealed without the consent as I presume they meant of those that advised the King to make it So that there were or might be some fundamental unchangable Laws or Rules even in the most absolute and most despotical Monarchies for such was the Persian if ever there were any and yet you see there was a Law by which the King himself was obliged And probably the like was in the former or first Monarchy that of the Chaldeans or Assyrians also For as Darius here so Nebuchadnezzar there called all his Princes and great Men when he made a Decree that all that would not fall down and worship the Image he had set up should be cast into the fiery Furnace Dan. 3. 12 c. CHAP. VIII The English Monarchy asserted The King under no Judicatory Accountable to God alone That Laws are not to be made without the Peoples consent in Parliament was from the favour of the Kings THE Truth is that it is not the Governing by Law or without Law that makes the Government to be Monarchical but the governing of One over all whether his way of Governing be Arbitrary Despotical or Legal and Political Ours indeed is Legal and Political but for all that it is Monarchical because it is but One that governs us all He governs indeed and is obliged and hath obliged himself by his Coronation Oath to govern by Law but it was not his Coronation Oath that made him King for all our Kings are as much Kings before they take the Oath as they are after the taking of it Neither is it their governing by Law that gives them their Right nor their not governing by Law that can take away their Right they have unto their Crowns for then there must be some Judicatory above them to judge betwixt them and their People whether they have forfeited their Right or no and if they have to take the forfeiture of it And if there be such a Judicatory it is indeed no Monarchy though it may be called a Kingdom as that of Sparta was as I have proved at large already Mr. Baxter therefore if he will prove this Kingdom of ours to be no Monarchy he must prove there is some such standing Judicatory here amongst us as the Ephori were in Sparta If he saith the Parliament is such a Judicatory He must prove it to be a Court or Judicatory always in being as that of the Ephori was and as the Senate of Venice is and not such a one as must not meet but when the King calls them and must be gone when he bids them and such a Judicatory is our Parliament according to the Legal Constitution of this Kingdom And how such a King as ours can be liable or obnoxious to such a Judicatory as this which he may make or unmake as he pleaseth so as to be question'd or tried or judged or condemned by it as the Spartan Kings might be and were by the Ephori and as the Dukes of Venice may be and have been by their Senate let Mr. Baxter tell us if he can For my part I cannot imagine the Practicability of it I mean the practicability of it de jure as to right in any Case or upon any Provocation whatsoever
And therefore when our Law saith the King can do no wrong the meaning is not as I conceive that the King cannot do that or command that to be done which is really a wrong or injury to any or perhaps to many or all of his Subjects as David did when he numbred the People for which sin 70. Thousand of them were swept away by the Plague in three days But the meaning of that Maxime in our Law I say as I humbly conceive is that if the King should do or cause to be done never so great a wrong yet he is not legally accountable or questionable or punishable for it by any power on Earth and much less by any of his own Subjects Whereunto another Maxime of our Law seems to be a Witness which tells us that the Crown takes away all defects or that he who is King is not chargeable with or answerable for whatsoever he hath done amiss And hereunto the Law of God bears witness also For in this sence it was that King David confessing those two great sins of Adultery and Murder unto God saith Against Thee Only have I sinned not as if he thought he had not sinned very highly and heinously too against Bathsheba and Vriah by defiling the one and murdering the other but because he was not accountable to or punishable by any but God for it Any other Man of the Nation that had committed either of those Crimes must by God's own Judicial Law have been put to death for it without mercy How came it to pass then that David who was notoriously guilty of both those capital Crimes was never called to account for either or both of them The reason is plain because there was none that had Authority to call him to an account for it not any other King for all Kings properly so called are equal as to the right of non-subordination to one another and Par in parem non habet Imperium a Peer or equal hath no right of Authority over his equal or Peer and much less Inferior in Superiorem an Inferiour over his Superiour for such are Subjects of all Qualities and in all Capacities in relation to their Soveraigns But did David then escape unpunished No for God who is only their Superiour and therefore the only Judge of Kings did question and arraign and judge and condemn and punish him for it though not by shedding his blood for the blood that he had shed yet by shedding the blood of his darling Son Absolom which was more grievous than the shedding of his own blood would have been to him as appears by his so often and so passionately wishing he had dyed for him Be wise therefore O ye Kings and be learned O ye Judges Ye that are Supreme Judges here on Earth and think not because you cannot be punished by Men therefore you shall not be punished at all if you deserve to be so for Reges in ipsos Imperium est Jovis the Almighty God's rule and authority is over Kings themselves could a Heathen man say The exemption of Kings from being punished by Men doth make them the more obnoxious to be punished by God either here or hereafter and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is a fearful and terrible thing to fall into the hands of the living God But of the punishment which Kings are to expect from God I have spoken before as likewise why Kings who are Monarchs or Kings indeed cannot be question'd or called to account for any thing they have done or may be supposed to have done amiss because they have no Superiour That which I am now doing is to prove our King to be a Monarch because he hath no Superiour nor is ever a whit the less a Monarch because according to the legal Establishment or constitution of our Kingdom our Kings cannot make Laws for their Subjects without the consent of their Representatives that is without their Subjects own consents in Parliament For I demand how comes it to pass that they cannot Is it not because they did at first out of their meer grace and favour to their Subjects give away the Power they had formerly of doing otherwise William the Conqueror from whom our Kings ever since derive their Right and Title to the Crown could and did make Laws for the People without asking or having their antecedent consent to them It is true the Conqueror himself when he was crowned King took an Oath to govern justly and afterwards he took an Oath to observe the Antient Laws of the Realm established by his Noble Predecessors the Kings of England and especially those of Edward the Confessor as Daniel tells us but it is true too as the same Historian tells us He brought in the Customes of Normandy so that the main stream of our Common Law with the practice thereof saith the same Author flowed out of Normandy notwithstanding all Objections that can be made to the contrary And it was the Son of this Conqueror Henry the First who because saith the same Author he would not wrest any thing by an Imperial Power from the Subjects took a course to obtain their free consents to serve his occasions in their General Assemblies of the three Estates of the Land which he first convoked at Salisbury in the Fifteenth Year of his Reign which had from his time the name of Parliaments according to the manner of Normandy And in all probability as this was the beginning of our Kings not raising of Money so was it likewise of their not making of Laws but with the consent of the Representatives of their People in Parliament But whether it began then or sooner or later I am sure it must be the Kings granting of it that made it to be what it is I mean the legal way of proceeding in order to the making of Laws by our Kings for the Government of their People A most excellent way indeed but such a one as whosoever may have been the deviser or advisers of it it could never have been established as it is but by the King 's voluntary and arbitrary consent to it I say his arbitrary as well as his voluntary consent to it because it was in his power whosoever the King was that granted it first not to have granted it if he would CHAP. IX Mr. B. 's whimsey of an antecedent Compact between the King and People Their consent to the making of Laws when ever brought in a thing of Grant not of Contract Their double Capacity as Mr. B. fansies and states it FOR to think there was any Government here in England before that of Kings or that the People when they were under no Government at all did or could unanimously consent to be governed by one whom they should choose to be their King upon such or such conditions and with such or such limitations reserving to themselves such or such
Rights Liberties and Priviledges as it should not be in the King's power to take from them and which it should be lawful for them to defend by force if he attempted to do so and all this by vertue of an Original antecedent compact or contract with their King when they chose him to be so This I say is but a Political whimsey of Mr. Baxter's who thinks he sees Visions when he doth but dream Dreams For although those that are under one kind of Government may change it for another whether lawfully or unlawfully for a better or for a worse I now dispute not yet for a Multitude that are under no Government at all which is Mr. Hobbs his Hypothesis as well as Mr. Baxter's to meet all together at one and the same time and in one and the same place and then and there all and every one of them to agree upon one kind of Government and upon the choice of the same individual Person or Persons to govern them I think it considering the variety and contrariety that there is in several Mens Intellectuals and Affections to be the next degree to impossible for to say the Major part did conclude the Minor is to suppose a Government before there was a Government there being nothing in Nature supposing all Men to be originally and equally free why any one Man should be deprived of his natural freedom without his own consent by never so great a plurality of others that are otherwise minded The beginning therefore of all Dominion and Government next to that of the Paternal was no doubt the subduing of the weaker by the stronger who governed those whom they had subdued arbitrarily and despotically as the Romans Saxons Danes and Normans successively did the Inhabitants of this Island when they master'd them at first though afterwards they governed them by Laws but by Laws imposed upon them and not antecedently consented to or proposed by them When this way of proceeding was first brought in is not expresly set down for ought I can find in any of our Historians I am sure it was not so ab initio from the beginning as appears by the contrary practice during the Government of this Island by all the aforesaid Nations before the Conquest nor by the Normans after the Conquest until the Raign of the aforesaid Henry the First if it were so then for that is not expresly as to the making of Laws recorded neither But because it is expresly recorded that it was that King who did first call together such an Assembly as was then first and hath been ever since called a Parliament I mean an Assembly consisting of all the three Estates and not of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal only as was the Custom in former times and because his End in constituting and calling together such an Assembly was to let the People see that he would not take away their Money from them as his Predecessors had done when and how and to what degree they pleased but would be content with what the People themselves should by Representatives of their own choosing willingly and freely of their own accord think fit to give him believing that the Money so given would be as much and perhaps more but certainly much more easily raised and less grudgingly paid than what might by force against their wills be extorted from them This I say being one of the Ends why that wise and prudent Prince did first constitute such an Assembly for the more easie and plausible pretence of raising of Money by the consent of those that are to pay it it is more than probable that another of his Ends was to make the People more willing to submit and to be obedient to the Laws when they were made by making such a Constitution as required the Peoples consent to the making of them before they were made which Constitution hath been continued ever since But that it was at first by Grant from the King after he was actually King and not by any antecedent Compact betwixt the People before they were Subjects and Him whom they chose or meant to choose for their King before he was King is evident from the unanimous consent and testimony of all our Historians who never make mention of any other form of Government here in this Island but that of Kings and of Kings succeeding immediately one to another without any Interval or Interposition of any other form of Government wherein the People were at liberty to choose what Government and what Governours and upon what conditions they pleased But as the Governours of this Nation were always Kings so the People were always Subjects and never spoken of in any other capacity but of Subjects which I note and desire the Reader to take special notice of to convince him of the vanity and falshood of Mr. Baxter's distinction between the two several Capacities wherein as he saith the People are represented by the Parliament For first saith he the Parliament representeth the People as Free and 2dly as Subjects As the Parliament representeth the People as Subjects so saith he they can do nothing but humbly manifest their grievances and Petition for Relief but as the Parliament representeth the People as free so they are to secure the People's Rights and Liberties as their Trustees But what are those Rights and Liberties that the Parliament as they are the Trustees for the People are to secure to them and to maintain for them Why such saith he as when they were Free and before they were Subjects they reserved to themselves by an antecedent Compact or Covenant upon a conditional performance whereof they were content to become Subjects For I take it for undeniable saith Mr. Baxter that the Government is constituted by Contract and that in the Contract the People have not absolutely subjected themselves to the Soveraign without reserving any Rights and Liberties to themselves but that some Rights are reserved by them and exempted from the Princes power and therefore that the Parliament are their Trustees for the securing of those exempted Rights and so represent the People as Free so far as that Exemption signifies CHAP. X. Mr. B. 's Compact and Reservation of Rights canvassed The Peoples Rights by Donation of the Kings They had no Representatives till Henry the First THIS Mr. Baxter saith he takes for undeniable but I say and have already proved that in saying so he is very much mistaken whether by Government he means all Government in general or the Government of this Kingdom of ours in particular For first as to Government in general it is not true that it hath always been grounded upon an antecedent compact or contract or that the People have not sometimes subjected themselves absolutely to their Soveraigns without reserving to themselves any Rights Liberties or Priviledges for the contrary hereof is so certain and so evident that nothing can be more
as appears by what I have already said not only of Paternal but of Regal Government and that not only under the first Kings quorum Arbitria pro Legibus erant whose wills and pleasures past for Laws but under all Kings that have ever since and do now govern arbitrarily and despotically as many do in all parts of the World none of which can be imagined to have made any such contract with their People or their People with them as Mr. Baxter speaks of The like may be said of Conquerors and the People subdued by them If Mr. Baxter replies that it is of such a People as are free and sui Juris at their own disposal only that he speaks when he saith that there is no such People that do absolutely subject themselves unto their Soveraign without reserving any Rights or Liberties to themselves I say this is false also whether he mean that no such People can do so or that no such People have done so For first if a Man that is free may make himself a Servant to whomsoever he will and such a Servant as shall be wholly at the disposing of his Master without reserving any thing of Liberty or Propriety unto himself as we see it was ordinary for Men to do not only among the Gentiles but among the Jews themselves insomuch that some of them chose to continue Bondmen when by the Jubilee they might have been made free And why may not any number of Men whether they be a City or a Nation being free and sui Juris or at their own disposing give themselves up if they will and think it to be best for them to be arbitrarily governed by some other more powerful State or Prince without any antecedent compact condition or reservation 2dly That any free People may do so it is evident because some free People have done so for example the People of Campania a Province of Italy being then a free State subjected themselves to the People of Rome in this form of words Populum Campanum Vrbemque Capuam Agros Delubra Deûm Divina Humanaque omnia in vestram Patres Conscripti ditionem dedimus We surrender and give up into your power Lords of the Senate the whole People of Campania and the City Capua our Lands the Temples of our Gods in a word all whatever concerns either Church or State God or Man Et quid obstat saith Grotius what hinders why any other People may not subject themselves and all that they have to any one powerful Man or Prince in the same manner Certainly saith he there were many Nations that did so and lived very happily under such a Government so that if Mr. Baxter thinks that there never was any Government submitted unto by any free People but upon an antecedent contract and a reserve of some Liberties and Priviledges to themselves to be always exempted from the Jurisdiction of Him or them to whom they became Subjects He is much mistaken But if by Government he means the Government of this Nation of ours in particular when he saith he takes it for undeniable that it was constituted by Contract and that in the Contract the People have not absolutely subjected themselves unto the Soveraign without reserving any Rights and Liberties unto themselves exempted from the Princes power for the securing of which the Parliament are their Trustees If this be his meaning I say I demand of Him first when was this Nation of ours a free People and when was it under any Government but that of Kings surely never since that of the Romans who governed them as a Province arbitrarily and despotically by their Lieutenants whom they sent hither and so did their British Saxon and Danish Princes for the most part for ought appears in any of our Historians to the contrary or if some of them governed by Laws as Ina Alfred and some others of the Saxon Kings and Canutus the Dane did yet the Laws whereby they governed were all of them made by themselves after they were Kings and not by way of compact with their Subjects No more were the Laws of Edward the Confessor himself which were the Subject matter of Magna Charta or the great Charter containing all the Rights Immunities and Liberties of the People but not as bargained for by them before their admitting of any of their Kings to be Kings but indulged unto them and conferr'd upon them by the Donation and Concession of their Kings who partly of their own accord and partly by the Advice of the Lords and Bishops of their Council did make those Laws in favour of the People not only without being aforehand obliged by Compact or Contract with the People to do so but without so much as advising with them or any Representatives of theirs when they did so there being no such Parliaments and consequently no such Representatives of the People as there are now until the Raign as I said before of Henry the First after the Conquest for He was the first of our Kings say our Chronicles that instituted the form now in use of the High Court of Parliament for before his time only certain of the Nobility and Prelates of the Realm were called to consultation about the most important affairs of the State but he caused the Commons also to be Represented by Knights and Burgesses of their own choosing and made that Court saith the Historian to consist of three parts the Nobility the Clergy and the Common People representing the whole Body of the Realm So that before this there were no Representatives of the Peoplé of their own choosing to be their Trustees for the securing to them their pretended reserved Rights and Exemptions by an antecedent contract or compact made betwixt them and him that was to govern them whilst they were yet free and before he was their Governour and therefore this supposition of such a compact or contract betwixt the King before He was King and the People before they were his Subjects here in this Kingdom which Mr. Baxter saith he takes for undeniable is undeniably a meer fiction of his own Imagination and Invention and consequently whatsoever is by him grounded upon this supposition is not only fallacious but altogether false and fictitious also CHAP. XI Mr. B. 's Justification of the late Rebellion from this Compact c. The King's Coronation-Oath doth not prove any such Compact c. nor can it be proved by any authentick Record The state of affairs during the Vsurpation BUT true and undeniably indeed true it is that the People of England have now and have had long for many Generations even from Henry the First 's time such Priviledges Liberties and Immunities as are contained and specified in Magna Charta and such Representatives in Parliament for the asserting of those Priviledges and to see that no Laws should be made for them without their consent to them but that they
have or ever had them by an antecedent compact with the King before they were his Subjects is that which I affirm to be false and consequently that Mr. Baxter's distinction of the Peoples being represented in Parliament in a double capacity namely either as they are now that is as they are Subjects or as they were as first that is as they were before they were Subjects is frivolous and fictitious for they never were nor are now represented in Parliament any otherwise than as Subjects only And as such Mr. Baxter confesseth that neither they nor their Representatives can do more than complain if they be grieved and humbly Petition the King that they may be relieved But as their Representatives in Parliament are the Peoples Trustees they do represent them saith Mr. Baxter not as Subjects but as they were before they were Subjects when as Freemen they did contract for the reservation of such Priviledges and Immunities unto themselves which the King was not to violate or take away from them or if he did attempt to do so those Representatives of theirs as Trustees were to do what they could even by force if they could not by fair means to maintain and preserve or to vindicate and recover those aforesaid reserved Priviledges and Immunities and that the People were obliged to assist them against the King in so doing And upon this undeniable supposition as he calls it he endeavours to justifie the late Rebellion insomuch that he saith he thought he should have been a Traytor to the Parliament if he had not taken part with them This supposition therefore being of so very great importance as that upon the truth or falsity thereof the justification or condemnation of the late War and consequently of the Bodies and Souls of all those that were engaged in it doth by Mr. Baxter's own confession wholly depend he ought to have been very sure that it had been indeed undeniably true in point of Fact and that it could by undeniable Records be demonstrably evidenced to be so For it is not his taking it to be undeniable as he saith he doth can prove it is so or will make it believed to be so neither are the Oaths of Kings nor the Charters and Laws in which they have expressed their consent to govern according to those Charters and Laws together with the antient Customs of the Nation that can prove there was either at first or at any time since any such compact or contract as Mr. Baxter supposeth to have been betwixt the People before they were Subjects and the King before he was King and that there were such reserves of such and such Rights and Priviledges antecedently conditioned for by one of the Parties and consented to by the other upon penalty of forfeiture of the Crown upon breaking of the Covenant to such or such a degree and that the Parliament were to be the Peoples Trustees for the securing of the performance of the antecedent Covenant or Contract and might make War with the King for the breach of it and that the People were obliged to assist them in it All which Particulars Mr. Baxter supposeth to be the subject matter of his supposed antecedent Compact or Contract betwixt the Kings of England and their People and thinks he hath proved it because our Kings swear at their Coronation that they will govern according to the Laws already made by the Kings their Predecessors and that shall be made afterwards by themselves in Parliament But first as I have observed already Are not our Kings Kings before the taking of the Oath Was not out present King so de jure by right many years before he came home and was he not so de facto in fact as well as de jure by possession as well as by title two years before he was crowned after he came home and consequently before his taking of the Oath 2dly Is there any thing in the Oath obliging him to the keeping of it upon penalty of forfeiture of his Regal Power and Dignity or for the discharging of his Subjects from their Allegiance to him if he do not keep it 3dly Is there any mention or Intimation in that Oath of the Parliaments or any other Trustees for the People to judge betwixt them and the King whether he keeps the contract or no and to question and punish him if he do not as the Ephori might do and did punish the Kings of Sparta because indeed they were no Kings but in name only and no more than so would our Kings be neither if there were any such antecedent contract as Mr. Baxter supposeth there is or if the Parliament were such Trustees for the People as he supposeth them to be But it is not his supposing will serve the turn for the proof either of the one or of the other but he must produce authentick and undeniable Records to verifie and evidence the truth and certainty of both For example he must in the first place produce some such authentick undeniable Record wherein it is averred that at such a time the People being then free did stipulate and contract with him whom they meant to choose to be their King saying as he supposeth them to say We choose You and your Family successively to rule us on these and no other terms Accept these terms or We accept not you Upon which Terms consented to by him and so being chosen by them he obligeth Himself saith Mr. Baxter and all his Successors that will rule that is if they will not be deposed to rule upon that foundation And upon some such formal contract as this it is that he takes it for undeniable that the Government of this Kingdom of ours was at first constituted which if he could make it appear by any authentick Record as I am sure he cannot yet that would be but one half of the work he hath to do For supposing but not granting that once upon a time no Man knows when there was such a contract betwixt the People whilst they were free and their King that was to be that they should have such or such Rights Priviledges and Immunities reserved to them and that the King upon breach of his part of the Covenant should forfeit his Right to them supposing I say but not granting all this to be true yet if he cannot produce some other as Authentick a Record to prove that the Parliament were by that antecedent supposed compact or contract agreed upon by both Parties to be Trustees and such Trustees for the reserved Rights and Liberties of the People as might in case they were to such or such a degree violated by the King or his Ministers legally do what the late Parliament did namely make Laws without the King and make War against the King or those that were commissioned by the King he shall never be able to excuse them from being in the highest degree guilty of
a most illegal and insolent and impudent Invasion and Vsurpation of the Kings authority in the one nor of a most Trayterous avowed and bold-faced Rebellion against the Person as well as the Soveraignty of the King in the other and consequently that all that assisted them whether it were with their hands or with their tongues with their Swords or with their Pens with their prayers or with their Purses were as arrant Traytors and Rebels as they were Whereas if Mr. Baxter can make it evidently to appear that there was such an Original constitution of Government by such a compact or contract betwixt the People on the one part and the King and his Successors on the other part and that by virtue of the said Original constitution the Parliament was appointed and agreed on by both Parties to be such Trustees for the People as he saith the Parliament was we are now speaking of and that they might legally do what that Parliament did for the discharging of their Trust If he can make this I say evidently appear from any authentick Record I must and will confess that the Government here with us is indeed no Monarchy and that not only for the reason given by Mr. Baxter because the whole Soveraignty is not in one Person namely in the King but partly in the King and partly in the Parliament but also because according to Mr. Baxter's supposition the Soveraignty is not at all in the King but wholly in the Parliament as it was in the Ephori in Sparta and as it is now in the Senate of Venice But thanks be to God it is not come to that yet though it were once very near coming to it when they had gotten an Act to sit as long as they listed and took upon them to make Laws to raise Mony and to make War and consequently to play REX as we say by exercising all the Acts of Soveraignty and by pressing the King to devest himself of them by making another Act not only to justifie what they had done but to enable them to do the same things for one and twenty Years more And by that time the Monarchy would have been like an old Almanack worn out of date and either an Aristocracy or rather a Democracy not only set up but setled instead of it as we saw it was assoon as the Monarchy by the Murder of the then Monarch seemed to be quite down the House of Commons assuming and usurping to themselves the whole Government of the Kingdom without King or Lords which the Lords as well as the King ought to remember calling themselves a free State and behaving themselves as such both at home and abroad for the short time of their Raign which was until their Servant made himself their Master by making use of that Army for the pulling of them down which they were forced to keep in pay at the excessive charge of the People for the keeping of themselves up And then They and the People too saw and felt the difference between a legitimate and legal Monarchy and the despotical Arbitrary Government of an Vsurped Tyranny which made them wish and pray and long for the Return of the right Heir and the restoring of the right Government having found by woful experience that every change they had made was first from good to bad and then from bad to worse and lastly from worse to worst of all I mean the Rump-Parliament that so having made tryal of them all they might be the more careful to hold fast the best if God should be pleased to restore it to them again which in his infinite goodness and mercy he hath done and that in a strange and almost miraculous manner by making the Thieves fall out amongst themselves in dividing of the spoyl that so the true Owner might have what they robb'd him of again The End of the Fourth Section SECT V. An Expedient proposed for the preservation of our Government and Religion as now by Law Established from Arbitrary Power and Popery or Presbytery c. without Exclusion of the Right Heir CHAP. I. People bugbear'd with Popery and Arbitrary Government The Priviledges of English Subjects by the Favour and Grants of their KINGS Their Representatives in Parliament Grotius thwarts Mr. B. in his main Principle AND now one would have thought that being so lately delivered from so base and shameful as well as heavy and grievous a Bondage we should not so soon have forgotten what we suffered under a Succession of various Tyrannies nor so soon have been weary of our Quails and Manna as to be so desirous as many of us seem to be to return to the same or perhaps if it be possible to a worse Bondage than that they were under before and to that end there be some that do as good as say one to another as that rebellious backsliding and ever-murmuring Generation of the Jews did Let us us make us a Captain and let us return into Egypt And why so why so soon so weary of well-being Is there any Nation under heaven in a better nay in so good a condition as we are Are not we the only People of Europe that are in Peace when all our Neighbours are in War with one another Doth not every one of us from the highest to the lowest enjoy the Liberty of his person the Propriety of his gooods and the fruit of his Industry without having any of it without his own consent taken away from him So that if ever it might be said of any it may now most emphatically be said of us Happy are the people that are in such a case Yes may some men say if we were sure to continue always as we are but we are afraid we shall not we are afraid of Popery we are afraid of Arbitrary Government which may take away all we have from us that is or ought to be dear to us But why should we fear where no fear is Is not our Religion our Liberty and our Properties secured unto us by the Laws and by such Laws as can never be repealed but by our own consents Did not such a needless fear as this make us rebell against our late Gracious Soveraign Lord the King and by that Rebellion make our fellow Subjects nay the basest and vilest and meanest of our fellow Subjects to be Lords over us And if ever we come into such a slavery or any slavery at all again it must be by such a Rebellion produced by such a pretended fear or by a Foreign Invasion invited by our divisions amongst our selves that must be the cause of it Never was there a better Constitution of a Government than ours is nor ever was there better security for the keeping of it as it is than we have Never were there Subjects that had more and greater or so many and great Priviledges as the Subjects of England have neither do our Kings
deny them to be of right due unto them as appears by the late Kings answer to the Petition of Right but due unto them not by capitulations and contracts with them before they were Subjects but either by Donations or by Concessions of our Kings to them when they were and as they were their Subjects Neither is it denied but that the People now have and of right ought to have Representatives in Parliament of their own choosing But that this was not nor could not be always so and that it was by the Kings meer Grace and favour when it first began to be so appears by what I have already observed concerning the first Parliament properly so called here in England instituted by Henry the first and as Daniel one of the most judicious of our English Historians tells us after the manner of Normandy But that ever since it hath bin so I deny not neither namely that the People have had have and ought to have such Representatives in Parliament of their own choosing but to represent them not as they were no body knows when as Freemen before they had Kings or were under any Government at all but as they are now and have been ever since and were long before there were Parliaments I mean as Subjects and consequently such as Mr. Baxter confesseth have no other lawful way of redressing their Grievances if they have any though never so great or so many but their Representatives complaining and petitioning the King for the relief of them and that either by desiring him to put the Laws in execution already made in favour of them as they did in the late Kings time by the Petition of Right or to Enact if need be new Laws for explanation and confirmation of the old ones or to punish those by whom the Legal Rights and Priviledges of the People have been Violated All this I grant the Peoples Representatives in Parliament may and if there be cause for it ought to do and that not as they are the Peoples Representatives only but their Trustees also nay and more than this namely not to promote or give their consent to the making of any such Laws as may be prejudicial to the publick though they may seem to gratify or may seem to be serviceable to the People nor to hinder the passing of such Acts as are really for the Peoples good though perhaps to the Major that is the most unwise and least judicious part of the People themselves they may seem to be otherwise And therefore their Representatives and Trustees as they are to consent or dissent so are they to judge for them what is or what is not to be consented to by them in behalf of them They are not always the best Husbands for the People that are most sparing of their Purses especially when the refusing to part with some may hazard the loss of all Neither is every thing that is got from the King a gain to the Subjects for the King's power may be too little to protect as well as too great to oppress them and according to the present conjuncture the former is much more to be feared than the latter And therefore the best service that can be done for the People by their Representatives in Parliament is to keep the Balance even betwixt the Prerogatives of the Soveraign and the Priviledges of the Subject by not indeavouring to intrench upon the one or to enhance the other but always and above all things to remember that as they are themselves Subjects so they are Representatives of Subjects and Trustees for Subjects as they are Subjects and therefore are not to treat the King as if they were Coordinate or Copartners with him in the Soveraignty but as it becomes Subjects and the Representatives of Subjects and such as have the honour of being there in that capacity and have the liberty of promoting or hindring the Laws that are to be made for those they represent from the meer Grace and Favour and Goodness of the King and his Predecessors and therefore the King is not by them nor by those they represent to be esteemed to be less a King or less their King or less their Soveraign than he was before no more than a Father is less a Father or hath less the Authority of a Father the kinder and more indulgent he is unto his Children or a Husband hath less of the Authority of a Husband the kinder or more indulgent he is to his Wife And therefore it is well and prudently observed by Grotius first Non desinere summum esse imperium etiamsi is qui imperaturus est promittat aliqua subditis aut Deo etiam talia quae ad Imperii rationem pertineant Soveraignty or Soveraign power doth not cease to be Soveraignty or Soveraign power though the Soveraign do restrain himself either by promise to his Subjects or by Oath to God even in such things as are essential to the Government And therefore Secondly he observes likewise that Multùm falluntur qui existimant cùm Reges Acta quaedam sua nolunt rata esse nisi à senatu aut alio coetu aliquo probentur partitionem fieri potestatis They are very much deceived saith he that think that because there be some Acts that Kings will not have to be ratifyed unless they are approved or consented to by a Senate or some such assembly that therefore there is a partition of the Soveraignty Mark that Mr. Baxter and tell me whether any thing can be more apparently contradictory to your Main Principle of the Soveraignty's being divided betwixt our Kings and their Parliaments and to the main and only reason you give for it namely that our Kings do not or if you will cannot make Laws for the People without their Parliaments or without the Peoples Representatives in Parliament consent to them For the only reason why they cannot is because they have obliged themselves by promise to their People and by Oath to God at their Coronation that they will not For ab initio non fuit sic from the beginning of our English Monarchy it was not so as I have at large shewed and as I have proved likewise that this and all other Priviledges of the People had their beginning from the bounty and goodness of our Kings to their People when they were their Subjects and not from any bargain or contract of the People before they were Subjects with any of their Kings as Mr. Baxter fondly as well as falsly imagins without any proof or offer of proof out of any of our Historians or Records for it Whereas the truth is that all our Kings except the Brittish of whom we know nothing of certainty I mean all our Kings of the Saxon Danish and Norman Races coming in by Conquest were not only Monarchs but Despotical Monarchs that is such as governed arbitrarily without any Laws at all but that
of their own will and pleasure or by such Laws as they made with or by the advice of such as they thought fit to advise with which were never any of the common People or any Representatives for them until after the Norman Conquest And then indeed the Despotical began to be a Political Monarchy by Henry the first 's constituting of such a Parliament as we now have and by his Successors granting and confirming the Great Charter and by all of their obliging themselves successively to continue to the People the Priviledges granted unto them by that Charter and to govern by such Laws as have been made by their Predecessors or shall be made by themselves with the consent of the Peoples Representatives in Parliament By these Grants I say and concessions and condescensions of our former Kings and by the confirmation of them by their Successors c. the Monarchy which was at first Despotical is become Political being changed from an absolute and arbitrary to a regulated and Legal Government yet so as it is still a Monarchy that is it is still the Government of one over all and one who is accountable to none under God which are the only essentials requisite to the constituting of Monarchy the Governing Arbitrarily or Legally with or without Laws being but Accidentals to it only CHAP. II. The English Government a Monarchy however managed The excellency of our Constitution set forth NO more is the subordinate Managery of it in such a manner as may seem to have something of Aristocracy or Democracy mingled with it which saith Grotius was the cause of Polybius his Error Qui ad mixtum genus reipub refert Romanam rempub quae illo tempore si non actiones ipsas sed jus agendi respicimus merè fuit popularis Who will have the Roman Common-wealth to have been a mixt form of Government when it was meerly popular or Democratical because he looked at the managery of it only and not at the Authority whereby it was managed not considering that both the Authority of the Senate quam ad Optimatum regimen refert which Polybius refers to an Aristocratical and that of the Consuls also which he refers to a Regal or Kingly kind of Government subdita erat Populo were at that time equally subject unto the People and consequently notwithstanding this shew of mixture in the managery of that Government the Government it self was not a mixt Government in relation to the Soveraignty of it or to the fountain of Power in it which gives not only the formal denomination but the Essential specification to all Political Governments whatsoever Grotius therefore what he saith of the error of Polybius in judging the Roman to have been a mixed Commonwealth when it was not will have it be understood of all those Writers of Politicks who upon the same grounds are mistaken as Polybius was For idem de aliorum Politica scribentium sententiis saith Grotius dictum volo qui magis externam speciem quotidianam administrationem quà m jus ipsum summi Imperii spect are congruens ducunt suo instituto What I said of Polybius saith he I would have to be understood of other Writers of Politicks who think the looking at the outward and ordinary administration of Affairs rather than at the right it self of the Supreme Power to be more agreeable and conducing to their end in writing that is to the derogating from the Supreme Power of Monarchy either by imbasing it with the mixture of some less noble species of Government with it or to weaken and enfeeble it by dividing of it For what other can be the meaning of these words of Grotius than this either as they are in the Text or in relation to the context And if this be his meaning what could he have said more pertinently to prove the Government here in England to be a mere Monarchy and consequently the Soveraignty to be wholly in one person not withstanding any thing Mr. Baxter hath said or any man else can say to the contrary And that it is not now as it was at first an absolute arbitrary and Despotical but a regulated legal and Political Monarchy we owe to the meer grace and favour of our Kings and I wish that as it was gratia gratis data a grace freely given on their parts so it may be gratia gratos faciens a grace that may make us grateful on our parts also And certainly it would be so if the Subjects of England did but know or would but consider in how much more happy a condition they are or may be if they will and would be if it were not for their seditious Preachers than any other Subjects in the World are or ever were I had almost said or indeed can be under what Government soever if they be not situated as we are Because no Government upon the Continent can be safe from being suddenly invaded and over-run by its confining Neighbours if he or they that have the Supreme Power be not enabled to raise such Forces and Mony to pay them without staying for the advice or consent of his or their Subjects as may be sufficient to defend them from their Enemies and which being raised may be made use of for the oppressing of their Subjects Whereas we being Islanders intrenched and surrounded by the Ocean and consequently not being in danger of being suddenly surprized and over-run by any from abroad our Kings have obliged themselves to raise no Mony without which no formidable Forces can be raised and maintained by any Taxes or Impositions upon their Subjects without their own consent in Parliament thereby securing both the liberty of their Persons and Property of their Goods unto them and that they shall never be put to any charge but for the necessary defence of themselves and for their own safety and welfare as well as for the Honour of the King and their Country This together with many other Priviledges which the Subjects of this Kingdom have above all other Subjects in the World that I know or ever heard of made me presume when I was One of the four first that was appointed to preach to the House of Commons of the Long Parliament in the late King's time to tell them and to endeavour to prove unto them that the Constitutions both of Church and State as they were here by Law established abstracting from the ill managery which might be in either through the faults or frailties of some particular men were both of them the best in their kind that were in the Christian World that of the State for the reasons before specified and that of the Church because it was the only Church now extant that professed and maintain'd both the Apostolick Doctrine and Apostolical Government All other Christian Churches in the World East West North and South failing either in the one or in the other or both of them and
felt of late whilst the Presbytery exercised in Scotland and in England laid claim to the same power For indeed Popery and Presbytery though they look divers ways with their Heads yet they are tied together like Samson's Foxes by their Tayles carrying the same Firebrands of combustion wheresoever they come I mean the same Principles of Sedition and Rebellion against Soveraign Princes and Estates if they will not be ruled by them And therefore as our Kings Predecessors to redeem themselves and their People from the slavery of the Papacy did wisely and couragiously drive out Popery so it is not to be doubted but his Majesty that now is to prevent the same or a worse bondage to the Consistory will with the same wisdom and courage keep out the Presbytery as being indeed where it governs in chief as it would do wheresoever it is a bondage by so much worse and more ignominious than Popery by how much worse it is to be subject to many Tyrants than to one and by how much less it is ignominious for a King to be a Vassal to a foreign Prince than to all or any of his own Subjects But thanks be to God we have no reason to fear that either our King or Parliament will ever think of introducing either Popery or Presbytery to be predominant here amongst us having had so sensible an experience formerly of the one and lately of the other especially being already possessed as we are of such an Ecclesiastical Government as was instituted by Christ and his Apostles universally received and approved by the Primitive Christians and by Law established amongst our selves a Government pretending to no power at all above the King nor to no power under the King neither but from him and by him and for him a Government enjoyning active obedience to all lawful commands of lawful Authority and passive obedience when we cannot obey actively forbidding and condemning all taking up of Arms offensive or defensive by Subjects of any quality or in any capacity against their Soveraign whatsoever he be either in regard of his Intellectuals or his Morals or his Religion in any case upon any pretence or upon any provocation whatsoever Finally such a Government as hath no relation to any foreign Prince or State to protect or assist it from abroad nor any foundation in the Body of the Common People to rise up for it or with it at home but having all its dependence under God upon the Crown and all its security in and by the Law and consequently if at any time it happens to transgress against either as some times by the faults or frailties of particular men I will not deny but it may yet even then or in that case it will easily be corrected and reduced into order and that by the ordinary course of Justice without charging the Subject or endangering the Peace of the Kingdom by levying a War to suppress it and without fear of an Invasion from abroad or an Insurrection at home in defence of it which cannot in the same case be probably affirmed of either of the former Having therefore such an excellent constitution of Government both Civil and Ecclesiastical as we have and both of them by Law established that which we have to do in the first place is to be thankful to God for it who hath not dealth so with any other Nation and then not only to live quietly and peaceably and contentedly under it for the present but to do what we can in our several places and stations for the upholding and perpetuating of it that our Posterity may have cause to bless God for it and for us also And to that end in the first place to mark those as the Apostle advises us that make divisions amongst us by libelling the Government either of the Church or State either in their Pamphlets or in their Pulpits and to mark them so as to set a Mark upon them as men not to be followed but avoided by us though they pretend never so much care of us or kindness to us For such as these they were who as the Apostle tells us in the aforesaid place did then as these do now 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple And the way not to be deceived by them is not to hearken to them by resorting to their illegal Conventicles and forsaking our own Legal Assemblies and Congregations as the manner of some is Hebr. 10. 25. And what manner of Men those are that do so another Apostle tells us They are murmurers complainers walking after their own Lusts and their mouth speaketh great swelling words having mens Persons in admiration because of advantage Whereunto to compleat the Character of them he adds These he they that separate themselves sensual not having the Spirit which is as much as if he had said though there be none that do more or do so much pretend to purity or having the Spirit as the Separatists do the only cause of their separation being as some of them say the sensuality and want of the Spirit in those from whom they separate yet indeed the cause of their separation is because themselves are sensual and have not the Spirit or because they know not what spirit they are of for as there be many kinds of Spirits so there be many kinds of sensuality also for Pride and Envy and Malice and Slander and especially speaking evil of Dignities and covetousness and every other inordinate or immoderate Affection are sensualities as well as carnal Lust and Drunkenness and so is Separation it self also For when one saith I am of Paul and another I am of Apollos are you not carnal saith the Apostle And are not say I all that are carnal sensual So that it is not Mens saying or thinking they have the Spirit will prove they have the Spirit nor their calling themselves the Godly Party will make them to be the Godly party but their very being of a Party proveth them to be Schismaticks and their being Schismaticks proveth them to be ungodly I am sure every one of the Parties appropriating the Spirit unto it self and being so divided as they are both in Doctrine and Worship amongst themselves is a demonstration that they are not inspired or guided by one and the same Spirit or that they have not the Spirit of Vnity nor consequently the Spirit of Sanctity nor of Holiness neither how boldly or boastingly soever they may pretend to it But Mundus vult decipi the World hath a mind to be deceived for as long as there are Broachers of lies there will be Believers of lies for as the Father of lies tempts some to be the Teachers so he tempts others to be the Believers of them And therefore unless the Spirit of falshood and division and sedition be by the Spirit of truth of unity and of concord cast
out of them that seem to be possessed with him which is above all things to be wished and prayed for or those that are so possest be kept from infecting others by teaching and printing with that intolerable licence as they do and have done for so many years together we are not to expect to be long without another Civil War and whether the effects of that will not be as bad or worse than the former no man can tell I am sure we are not always to expect miracles I mean such a miraculous deliverance as we have once had from so many several sorts of arbitrary and Tyrannical Governments as that War brought us to or rather as we our selves brought our selves to by that Rebellion and as such a rebellion as that was may and nothing but such a rebellion as that was can probably and humanely speaking bring us to again CHAP. IV. An Expedient proposed to secure the Government both in Church and State viz. some such Law as the Scotch Test. The Heir of the Crown 's being a Papist or a Presbyterian c. comes much to the same pass FOR the preventing whereof why should not we follow the example of the Scots in that which is good as well as we did follow their example in that which was evil We took such a Covenant as they did in order to the making and helping us to make such a War against our King and theirs as they did and for the alteration of the Government and Religion established by Law in both Kingdoms And why should not we make such a Law as they have now made for the preservation of their Government and Religion as it is now by Law established amongst them why should not we I say make such a Law for the maintenance and preservation of the Government and Religion established by Law amongst Vs also I mean such a Law whereby all Men are disabled and made uncapable of any Office or Place of Power and Trust either Military or Civil or Ecclesiastical as likewise of being chosen themselves or of choosing others to be Members of Parliament as will not take such a Test and Oath as they have taken in Scotland that is never to give their consent to the Alteration either of the Religion or of the Government either in Church or State as it is there by Law established Such a Law as this and no worldly means but such a Law as this will secure us and our Posterity from all that we fear or pretend to be afraid of especially from Arbitrary Government and Popery and from Presbytery too For the Heir of the Crown may be a Presbyterian or an Independent or an Antinomian or an Anabaptist or a Socinian and may be every whit as great a Zealot and as much a Bigot in any of those perswasions as any Papist can be in his and consequently be as zealous and industrious to promote bring in and set up his Religion for the Only or at least for the Predominant Religion of the State as any Papist can be to bring in Popery and consequently to suppress all of any other perswasion but his own and that perhaps with as bloody a persecution as ever any Papist did when he hath as much power to do it Of this One of the Sects hath given us proof more than enough already I mean the Presbyterians who for the setting up of their Dagon instead of the Ark of God and for the abolishing of Monarchy in the State as well as Episcopacy in the Church entred into that Antichristian League and Covenant with the Scots whereby both Nations were ingaged in a bloody War with and against one another of which the execrable effects as no Act of Oblivion can ever make to be forgotten so can they never be remembred without horror nor indeed should be remembred without detestation of the procatarctical or promoting causes of it of which the most principal and most energetical was that Presbyterian Solemn League and Covenant for the setting up that Idol of theirs the Presbyterian Government for which they were so peremptorily and pertinaciously zealous and ambitious that in all their Treaties with the late King one of the conditions of Peace always was the abolishing of Episcopacy and setting up Presbytery instead of it without consenting whereunto and without taking of the Covenant as the Scotch Presbyterians did refuse the late King so the English Presbyterians would if they might have had their will have refused the present King to reign over them as might be made appear by the Consultation had amongst the Grandees of that Party to that purpose till they found it would be in vain to stand upon such terms the Noble and never to be forgotten General the late Duke of Albemarle being resolved to bring in the King as a King without condition and therefore as well for that as for his whole most prudent as well as loyal and couragious Conduct in that great affair I think that which was said of Fabius Maximus may be as properly and truly verified of him Vnus homo nobis cunct ando restituit rem That is One Man by his wary conduct hath restored our State and welfare And I wish it were engraven in Golden Letters upon his Tomb ad sempiternam rei memoriam for an everlasting Memorial But to return unto what I was speaking of what I have said already is enough to prove that a Presbyterian Heir of the Crown would do what he could to bring in and set up the Presbyterian Government which can no more consist with Monarchy in the State than it can with Episcopacy in the Church and make us all Presbyterians as well as a Poâ—ish Heir would to bring in Popery and to make us all Papists And that they would not suffer any that would not conform to them and comply with them is evident not only by what they did against us that were as they call'd us Cavaliers and Malignants but against their own Brethren in Iniquity the Independents and all the rest of the Sectaries their Fellow-Rebels against the King and Companions in Arms against Us all of whom they would have suppressed as well as they did Us if it had been in their power to do so as appears by their Books Sermons and Addresses to that which they call'd a Parliament against them And what the Presbyterians did against us and would have done against the Independents by the Parliament the Independents did against them by the Army And so no doubt would any other of the Schismatical Parties have done against all the rest that were not of their perswasion if they had got the power into their hands But none of them may some of their Friends say would have been so cruel as the Papists who hold it not only lawful but meritorious to put Hereticks that is all that are not Papists to death Did not the Presbyterians and Independents and the
believe and as all reasonable men have reason to believe he will because he did not only consent to but promote the making of that Law in Scotland And if he be willing not only to consent to but to promote the making of such a Law here why should we not believe that he intends and resolves to keep it and maintain it also whatsoever his own private perswasion in point of Religion may be for the present for God may and I hope will perswade Japheth to dwell in the Tents of Shem or continue to be for the future For if he did not intend and resolve it should be kept when it is made and consequently that Popery and Arbitrary Government should be kept out by it nothing could be more imprudent than to promote the making of such a Law whereby all that have or are to have interest in the making and repealing of Laws and in all places of trust and power Civil Military and Ecclesiastical in both Kingdoms are to be obliged by Oath never to consent to the alteration of the Government as it is now by Law established nor consequently to the bringing in either of Popery or Arbitrary Government which Oath when they have taken as they cannot be dispens'd with for the breaking it if they would so they would not if they could being such as are to be supposed to be enemies both to Popery and Arbitrary Government and therefore such as would do what legally they could for keeping out of both though they were not sworn and much more being sworn to do so And therefore it is not to be supposed that the Successor intends or means to attempt the bringing in of either of them if he be willing such a Law should be made as will make it exceedingly difficult if not utterly impossible for him to do it Let us try therefore whether He will not consent to the making of such a Law here as willingly as he has done in Scotland and let the consenting or not consenting to the making of such a Law here as there is there and the taking or refusing to take such an Oath as by that Law is prescribed to be taken by those that are to choose or to be chosen Members of Parliament for the future be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the mark of trial whereby to Judge who are friends and who are enemies to the present Government and who are most likely to desire and endeavour an alteration of it CHAP. XI Some of Mr. Baxter 's Principles grounds of Rebellion An unhappy Instance of difference about Priviledge betwixt the two Houses of Parliament AND thus I have done with what I thought my self especially concern'd to do namely the justifying of my Exceptions against those Political Theses in Mr. Baxter's Holy Commonwealth whereby he endeavours to justifie the Rebellion against the late King and to countenance and encourage any Rebellion upon the same grounds against this or any other of our Kings for the future For first if the Soveraignty was divided then betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament so it is now and so it will be always as long as the present constitution of our Government shall continue Secondly if where the Soveraignty is divided they that have any share in it may by force of Arms defend their part of it against whosoever attempts to take it from them Thirdly if the two Houses are to be believed and assisted by the People whensoever they shall declare that the King takes away or attempts to take away their part of the Soveraignty all which are Mr. Baxter's Political Aphorisms or Maxims of State doth it not follow that when and as often as there is a corrupt Majority in both Houses as Mr. Baxter grants there may be and we by woful experience have found there has been doth it not follow I say from these Principles of Mr. Baxter's that the People not only may but are obliged to rebel and take up Arms against the King whensoever a factious Majority in both Houses shall declare there is though really there is no such cause as they pretend there is to do so Nay if there be but such a factious ill principled or ill affected Majority in the House of Commons only For it is the House of Commons which Mr. Baxter means when he talks of the Peoples Representatives and Trustees whom they are to believe and whom they are to assist And they are says he the Representatives and Trustees of the People not only in the Condition of Subjects as the People are now but likewise in the Condition of Contracters as they were before they were Subjects and as such did by contract reserve to themselves such and such Priviledges and Exemptions from Regal Jurisdiction which the House of Commons as they are their Trustees in that Notion are bound to defend as they the People are bound to assist the House of Commons in defending of them And the representing the People by the House of Commons under this Notion together with their having a part of the Soveraignty as well as the House of Lords is by necessary consequence from Mr. Baxter's principles to justifie the Peoples making War not only against the King but against the King and House of Lords also if they shall not agree to whatsoever the House of Commons shall propose as an Original reserved right of their Representees as they were Contractors and before they were Subjects And of their Original reserved rights they may pretend to as many as they please for it is but their saying they are so and the People must believe them to be so because they are not their Representatives only but their Trustees also and therefore it is by their Eyes says Mr. Baxter that the People are to see and by their Ears that the People are to hear and by their Declarations that the People are to judge whether their Rights and Priviledges be invaded or no and whether they be such rights and priviledges as were granted by our Kings after they were Kings to their People as graces and favours to their Subjects or such as were contracted for with Him that was to be King before he was King by those that were to be his Subjects before they were his Subjects For it seems by Mr. Baxter's distinction that the People may take Arms against the King to defend or recover the one but not the other And therefore it were to be wished that we had an Authentical Catalogue of those we may fight for that we may not be Rebels before we are aware as likewise it were to be wished also that we had a Catalogue of the Priviledges of both Houses of Parliament that knowing them we might take the better heed of offending against any of them especially considering how great a crime it may be and how great a punishment it may deserve if either or both the Houses are partakers of the Soveraignty
with the King As likewise for another and in my humble opinion a very weighty and important reason namely to prevent the Kings not being able to govern by Parliament though he be never so willing and desirous to do so as when there is a difference betwixt the two Houses concerning priviledge there the order is that whatsoever business they are about of what concernment or importance soever it must cease and nothing must be done until the difference concerning Priviledge be decided which being no other way to be decided but by one of the Houses yielding to the other for neither the King nor the Judges are admitted to umpire betwixt them if after Conference upon conference they finally adhere on both sides as they did in the case of Dr. Sherleys appealing to the House of Lords from a Decree in Chancery wherein one of the House of Commons was concern'd there is no more to be done that Sessions though Hannibal were ad portas knocking at the City-gates though the business they were about before were of never so publick or never so necessary a concernment as indeed that which we were about then was namely the passing of an Act for securing the Government both in Church and State by taking such a Test as the aforesaid Test that was lately enacted to be taken in Scotland and which would undoubtedly have past in the Lords House at that time if some that desired an alteration in both had not thrown that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that stone of offence betwixt the two Houses which as it was done to hinder what we were a doing then so that or the like may be done at any time by either of the Houses to make any Parliament useless and fruitless though there be never so present or so great need of it and though the King and the People do never so much desire the contrary unless there be some means devised and consented to by both Parties to adjust the difference betwixt them as there is betwixt all other differing Parties but these only or unless the Priviledges of each of the Houses be so particularly enumerated and cleerly stated by the consent of both of them that there may not be any difference betwixt them upon this account for the future If I have been too bold in saying what I have said in relation to either of the two Houses of Parliament I humbly beg pardon of them both for Si peccavi peccavi honestâ mente if I have offended in it I have done it out of an honest meaning I am sure I did not intend to lessen the dignity or power or priviledges of either of them Good luck have they with their Honour but all that I said upon this Subject hath been to vindicate the Kings Soveraignty over all His Subjects of all denominations and in all capacities whatsoever which I am sure may well enough consist with whatsoever Power or Priviledge can by the legal constitution of this Kingdom be claim'd by either or both Houses of Parliament CHAP. XII The Kings making our Laws no disparagement to the Parliament The several ways of justifying the taking up Arms against the King The danger of Mr. B. 's Principles that way WHereunto if it be objected that by making the King sole Law-giver or the sole Law-maker I seem to take away the greatest of all the Priviledges the two Houses have and which it most concerns all the People of England they should have I answer it were true indeed that I did so if by saying the King is the sole Law-giver or the sole maker of our Laws I meant he could make what Law he pleas'd but when I say withal that although whatsoever is Law is made by the King to be Law yet he cannot make any Law or any thing to be Law without the consent of both Houses to it or to his making of it by giving to Caesar what is Caesar's by giving to the King what belongs to the King I take away nothing from either of the Houses that belongs unto them or what is requisite for them to have for the securing of themselves and the People from Arbitrary Government for which end it is abundantly sufficient that the dissent of either of the Houses can hinder the making of any Law though the consent of both of them cannot make a Law for that would destroy the Monarchy not by dividing the Soveraignty betwixt the King and the two Houses which is really impossible but by vesting the Soveraignty wholly in the two Houses and consequently by taking it wholly from the King whereas the power to hinder the making of Laws without their consent being vested in the Houses and the power of making Laws with their consent being vested in the King the Soveraignty and Majesty that is due to a Monarch is reserv'd to the Prince and as great power and Authority as Subjects are capable of is communicated to the two Houses and their Liberty and Property which is due to them is secured to all the People which blessed frame and temper of our English Government is such as no wiser can be devised nor no better can be desired and such as no Nation but ours under Heaven is or can be unless it be situated as ours is so happy as to enjoy and therefore such a one as if it were well understood and seriously considered by us it would make us first to be truly and heartily thankful to God for it Secondly to live obediently quietly and contentedly under it and consequently not only to be content but desirous that such a Law as I before spake of should be made to prevent the alteration or change of it into any other form or frame of Government whatsoever And in the mean time not to give ear or credit to any of those seditious Preachers or Pamphleteers who do what they can to disaffect the People to this excellent Government as it is by Law established and only to this end that as they have once already so they may now again make such an alteration in this Government as to turn the Monarchy into a State and Episcopacy into Presbytery which because they think it cannot be done now but as it was done then namely by a Rebellion therefore as they did always so they do still maintain that it is lawful for Subjects in some cases to take up Arms against their Soveraign though some of them take one way to prove it lawful and some another for some will have a middle kind of power betwixt the King and People to be Vmpires or Arbitrators between them whose Arbitrement if the King will not submit to they may by force compel him with the assistance of the People and the People are bound to assist them in so doing this is CALVIN's way whereunto he adds that fortassè Ordines Regni in Angliâ that perhaps the Parliament in England are this middle sort of Magistrates Others will
observeth to have been the error of Polybius in judging the Roman to have been a mixed Government and the Soveraignty or supreme power thereof to have been divided betwixt the Consuls the Senate the People when saith Grotius the Government was indeed meerly popular or Democratical And the cause of this mistake in Polybius saith Grotius was his respiciens ad actiones ipsas non ad jus agendi his looking at the things that were done not at the authority whereby they were done whereas if he had consider'd that what was done either by the Consuls or by the Senate was done by an authority derived from the People signified nothing if it were not ratified by the People he would have been convinc'd that the Soveraignty or supreme power was wholly in the People consequently that it was a meer Democracy and not a mixed Government In like manner Mr. Baxter looking only at the things that are done by the 3. Estates in Parliament as to their concurrence to the making of Laws subordinate managery of other parts of the Government not considering by whose Authority they do what they do and that all that they do signifies nothing unless it be ratified by the King erroneously at least if not fallaciously concludes the Soveraignty or supreme power it self to be divided betwixt the King and the 3. Estates or betwixt the King the 2. Houses of Parliament whereas their very Parliamentary being consequently the power of their Parliamentary acting is derived from the Supremacy of power inseparably and indivisibly and incommunicably inherent in the King But although the Soveraignty it self or original fountain of all power in a Monarchy be indivisibly incommunicably in the person of the King yet the streams that issue or flow from that fountain may be and are and of necessity must be divided communicated so as may be most serviceable for the several uses the whole body Politick or the whole body of the Kingdom may have of it And as this Supreme or Soveraign Power though it be always indivisibly inherent in the King as the fountain of it may have its several streams divided communicated so in the exercise of its several Acts operations it may be in all Political Kingdoms it is limited determined in some more in some less but in none more nor so much for the good of the Subject without prejudice to the Soveraignty Majesty of the King than in this of ours where the People by their Representatives are not only admitted to propose what they would have to be made Laws but where no Law can be made but what they propose or consent to though they do not make it though it be in the Kings power to refuse the making of it because the Laws we have already are sufficient to secure all their Rights unto the People as long as they are in force in force they will be until the People themselves do consent to the repealing of them For the King as he can make no new Law so he can repeal no old Law without the consent of the Representatives of the People who most certainly will never give their consent for repealing of Magna Charta or the Petition of Right or any other Law now in force for the securing any of their just Rights and Privileges So that the Kings Negative is not nor cannot be prejudicial to the Interest of the People but it is absolutely necessary for the preservation of Monarchy For if the King could not refuse to make what the 2. Houses propose to be Laws the Soveraignty would be wholly in them not at all in him Nay he would be so far from having the Soveraignty of a King that he would not have the liberty of the meanest of his Subjects that sits in the House of Commons in giving his I or No according to the dictate of his own Reason and Conscience which as it is every private mans right by nature as he is a reasonable Creature so it is the Kings right by Nature and Prerogative too as he is a King it being impossible to be a King without it And therefore those that say the King is bound to pass all those Laws quas Vulgus elegerit which the People or Commonalty shall make choice of or that he is but one of the three Co-ordinates therefore may be overvoted by the other two or that he hath but a part of the Soveraignty and therefore cannot over-rule those that have their parts in the Soveraignty as well as he or that he may not prorogue or dissolve Parliaments when he thinks fit to do so All these are Enemies not only to the well-being but to the very being of Monarchy and that not of absolute or despotical Monarchy only but of Political or Paternal Monarchy also And therefore though they cajole and flatter the People never so much they are the greatest Enemies they have and as such the People ought to look upon them would do so if they were not like Beasts without understanding nay worse than Beasts without sence and memory of what they have so often and so lately suffered by listning to the same Songs of the same Sirens or sweet Singers that have so often deceived them But if the People cannot or will not understand the things that belong unto their peace yet Be wise O ye Kings and be learned O ye Judges of the Earth be wise for the Peoples sake be wise for your own sakes also For if you do not prevent the raising raging of those waves the Pilot as well as the Passengers will be swallowed up by them And there is no way to prevent the raising of those Waves nor the raging of them when they are raised but by rebuking the Winds that raised them for if it were not for those boysterous Winds that puff them up there would be no such swelling Waves as we see there are In the mean time I hope I have said nothing for the justifying of my self from being a Defier of Deity and Humanity and from being an Enemy to God to Kings and to all Mankind as Mr. Baxter saith I am because I maintain it to be Vnlawful for Subjects to resist their Soveraigns in any cause or upon any provocation whatsoever and for the confutation of Mr. Baxter's erroneous and seditious Aphorisms or Principles to the contrary I hope I say I have said nothing in order to either of these ends that will give any just offence to such as are judicious and impartial Friends to Truth and do really wish and desire the continuance of the Peace and welfare of their Country and then for such as are contrary minded I care not what they think or say of me The End of the Fifth Section SECTION VI. The rest of Mr. Baxter's Reflexions called to account as concerning the Bishop's advising him to reade Hooker and
acquitted ANd first it was very just and very equitable also in relation to what was passed I mean if they had been enjoyned silence for the future by way of punishment onely for the mischief they had done by Preaching formerly which was such as I cannot think of without horrour nor they should not think of without a thankfull acknowledging it for a very great Mercy and Favour from God and the King that they had onely the Liberty and opportunity of doing more mischief taken away from them when their Lives might most justly have been taken away for the mischief they had done before For it is upon this account that Mr. Br. himself justifies Solomon's deposing Abiathar the High-Priest who was the next person in dignity to the King himself amongst the Jews because he might have taken away his Life saith Mr. Baxter as well as the Priesthood for his siding with Adonijah in his Rebellion And might not our King upon the same account have taken away Mr. Baxter's own Life and the Lives of all the rest of the Non-conforming Ministers as Mr. Baxter calls them namely for siding with the Rebellious Parliament and not onely for siding with it themselves but for stirring up all the People to side with it also against his Father and himself And ought they not then to acknowledge the taking away of but their Livings which they had never any legal right to and their liberty to preach which they had so horribly abused ought they not I say to acknowledge it to have been at least a just if not a very favourable punishment for their former offences and equitable too as well as just and favourable it being but the doing that unto them justly and legally which they had most unjustly and illegally done before to all the Conformable Clergy by thrusting them out and intruding themselves into their places Again as the depriving and silencing of the Nonconformists considered as a punishment for what they had done before was not onely just and equitable but favourable also So considered as a Caution against what they might doe for the future it was not onely prudent and expedient but as things then stood absolutely necessary for the securing of the publick Peace both in Church and State and consequently the safety and welfare both of Prince and People For We had reason to believe it was neither a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it was neither a remorse for what they had done nor a change of Mind either in their judgments or affections in order to what they would doe that made any of the Nonconformist Parties give way to the King 's coming home as he did but onely their disability to hinder it partly by reason of the irreconcileable differences among themselves and partly because the Army was no longer in their Power but especially because the over ruling Wisedom of the divine Providence would have it to be so And therefore as we were not to thank them for that blessed change that was made so much against their Wills both in the Church and State so were we not to trust them neither with having any thing to doe either in the one or in the other especially in the Church without giving some assurance beforehand that they would not preach and act as they had done formerly And the Assurance which by the King and his great Council was thought fit to be given by them was first a renouncing of the Covenant and secondly to declare their Assent and Consent to whatsoever by the Act of Vniformity is required of them either of which if they refused to doe they did as good as tell us in plain terms what we were to expect from them namely that they thought themselves bound by their Covenant to pursue the ends of it whensoever there should be an opportunity for it and in the mean time by their praying and preaching to disaffect the People as much as they could to that way of publick Worship which they themselves refused to comply with and submit to And can any man think it was safe for us or consistent with the publick Peace either in Church or State to suffer such men to continue in their stations or to be permitted to harangue the People as they were wont to do They themselves when they were in Power though it was by Vsurpation onely thought it not onely lawfull and prudent but necessary also for the upholding of their illegal and usurped Authority to deprive and silence all our Clergy that would not take their Covenant and submit to their Directory And is it not as lawfull and prudent and necessary too for Us in order to the securing of the legal both Civil and Ecclesiastical Government to deprive and silence those that will not renounce that Covenant whereby they are obliged to ruine both or that will not join with us in the publick Worship of God as it is prescribed in the Book of Common-Prayer Certainly if it were prudent and necessary for Them in their Circumstances then to doe the one it must needs be as prudent and necessary for Vs in our circumstances now to doe the other even themselves being Judges to say nothing of the unlawfulness of what they did unto Us as being unjust in itself and having nothing to warrant it but an usurped Power and the lawfulness of what we do unto them as being just in it self and being authorized and commanded to be done by that Power which We are legally obliged to obey I know Mr. Baxter and others of the Dissenting Party use often to alledge and mainly to insist upon what the King promised them at BREDA and made them hope should be done for them when he came home But they know or ought to know that those promises whatsoever they were as they were meant by the King so they were to be understood by them to be obliging so far forth onely as they should be approved and consented to by his great Council the Two Houses of Parliament without whose Advice Approbation and Consent they knew the King could repeal no old Law that was in force against them nor make any new Law in favour of them Either of which the two Houses were so far from advising him to doe that the House of Commons gave him unanswerable reasons lately reprinted why nothing of that kind could be done without hazarding a relapse both of Church and State into as bad or perhaps a worse condition than that which it was newly come out of For the preventing whereof it was the House of Commons the Representatives of the People and not the Convocation the Representatives of the Church that upon mature deliberation devised and drew up that Bill which being assented to by the Lords they presented to the King to be made a Law as it was by the King's Fiat to oblige and be imposed upon all that are or pretend to
be of the Clergy before they be permitted to preach unto the People or to have the Education of Youth here in this Kingdom and this is the Law called the Act of Vniformity After the making of which Law by the Advice and with the Consent of both Houses of Parliament it is to no purpose to alledge or insist upon any former Promise made by the King and made by him but conditionally onely that is if he were or should be so advised by his Parliament and not otherwise And indeed for them or any Agents of theirs to desire any thing of the King before he came home as to the repealing of any old Law or the making of any new Law without or against such Advice or Consent of Parliament or any otherwise than conditionally if the Parliament would consent to it was a high breach of the highest Privilege of both Houses of Parliament in those that did desire it then or do now complain it was not done when they knew it could not be done by the King alone and saw the Parliament would not consent to it and therefore I say still to insist upon any such promise made by the King must needs be a very great Affront to both Houses of Parliament unless they be of Mr. Baxter's opinion who as I have before observed notwithstanding his magnifying the Power of Parliaments by dividing the Sovereignty betwixt the King and them affirms that in some cases the King may make a Law not onely without but against the consent of the People if it be for their good because it is to be supposed saith he they would have consented unto it if they had known it to be so which how far it may intrench on the Power of Parliaments I leave it to them to consider I am sure I dare not be so bold with them CHAP. VII The Act of Vniformity why made Some other probable Reasons for Nonconformity and not Conscience altogether as Mr. Baxter saith it is BUt to return to what we have in hand the King having by advice and with the consent of both Houses of Parliament first passed an Act of Oblivion to quiet mens Minds for what was passed to prevent our falling again into as bad or perhaps a worse condition for the future if ill principled and ill affected Preachers were permitted to blow the trumpet of Sedition and Rebellion as they had done formerly His Majesty did by the Advice and with the Consent of the said both Houses of Parliament enact the aforesaid Act of Vniformity thereby providing that none should be admitted or permitted to preach to the People or to teach their Children that would not subscribe and conform to what was required to be subscribed and conformed unto by that Act. Which was no more than they have already consented to by their Representatives in Parliament and consequently to the Penalties for refusing to conform to it also which was neither loss of Life nor Limb nor Liberty nor any part of their Goods but onely their forbearing to preach untill they were better informed and could bring themselves to comply both in Judgment and Practice with what their Duty and Obedience to the Law required of them as some of the learnedst and generally thought to be as conscientious as any of them namely Bp. Reynolds and Dr. Connant did as perhaps many other learned and conscientious men did also But they were not one of an hundred will Mr. Baxter say in comparison of those that did not nor could not conform True I confess as to those that did not but whether all that did not could not is a thing with Mr. Baxter's good leave may be doubted whatsoever he hath said to the contrary as when he saith that to think any that do not conform would not conform if they could with a good Conscience is to think them all to be Fools or mad Men for preferring Poverty before Plenty Want before Wealth Contempt before Honour and Respect and Imprisonment before Liberty which no man in his Wits either would or ought to do if he might chuse whether he would so or no without sin And therefore Mr. Baxter thinks we must needs grant it is nothing but fear of sinning against God that makes the Nonconformists not that they will not but that they dare not conform to what the Laws of the Land as well as of the Church require of them As if all the Nonconforming Ministers that were put out of the Livings they were in or that by reason of their Inconformity are uncapable of any Preferment in the Church are therefore all of them men of Conscience and that whatsoever they ought to doe and will not or will doe and ought not it is for Conscience or for Conscience sake onely or for fear of sinning against God if they did what they doe not or did not what they doe that is if either they did conform when they are commanded or did not preach when they are forbidden But is there or can there be no other cause of their not doing what they should doe and their doing what they should not doe but Conscience onely May it not be peevishness in some and perverseness in others May it not be Pride and Ambition in the Leaders and Ignorance and Obstinacy in those that are led by them I remember that when Bishop Brownrig who is one of the few Bishops that Mr. Baxter vouchsafes to speak well of and I went together to the Treaty with the late King at the Isle of Wight he being one of the Three Divines named by the Parliament and I one of the Three named by the King though very unworthy I confess to be so when that learned Bishop I say and I went together in his Coach towards the Isle of Wight I remember not now upon what occasion it was but I remember very well that I ask'd his Lordship whether he knew Mr. Calamy and he answered me he did and had known him from his first coming to Cambridge Pray my Lord said I was he always a Nonconformist No said he far from it in his practice as well as in his judgment even untill the beginning of these times How came he then said I to be so suddenly and so strangely changed from what he was Why said the Bishop he saw the Tide was turning and having a good opinion of his own parts he thought if he was one of the foremost in coming in he might be one of the foremost if not the foremost of all the Leaders of the whole Party as you see said he he is adding that the hope to be head of a Faction was a powerfull Temptation And why might not the same Temptation prevail with many others that thought as well of themselves as Mr. Calamy did and consequently might have the same hopes that he had But why then may it be said did not the same men when the Tide turned again at
to justifie himself and those of his Nonconforming Brethren for preaching as they do though the Law have forbidden them to do so but the Popish Priests may pretend to also for their justification in the Execution of their Priestly Office in Conventicles of their own persuasion or for the gaining of Proselytes to their own Religion I. As first for example may not a Romish Priest say and say it truly as Mr. Baxter doth That he holds the sacred Office of the Ministry or Priesthood consisteth in an obligation to doe the work and an Authority to warrant him therein and that both these are essential to the Office as likewise That Kings and other Magistrates are not by Ordination to give this Office nor by Degradation to take it away But what then May not the King forbid a Popish Priest to exercise his Priestly Function here in England and punish him if he do though he cannot degrade him or make him to be no Priest And if this may be done to a Popish Priest without degrading him why may it not be done by the same Authority to a dissenting or Nonconforming Minister without degrading him also Yea and without taking away any thing that is essential to his Office For it is not the obligation to doe but to be qualified and willing to doe the work of a Minister that is essential to his Office neither doth his Ordination give him Authority to doe the work of a Minister any otherwise or any longer than he doeth it as it ought to be done So that this Argument drawn from the Obligation of a Minister to doe the work of a Minister after he is ordained if it prove any thing it proves either more or less than Mr. Baxter would have it namely that either Popish Priests may and ought to exercise their Priestly Office here in England though by Law they are forbidden or else that the Nonconforming Ministers may not nor ought not to exercise their Ministerial Office being forbidden to doe so by the same Authority and especially for the same Reasons also namely for being Disturbers of the publick Peace and holding such Principles as are destructive to Monarchy the one teaching the Division of the Sovereignty betwixt the King and another Foreign Prince that is betwixt the King and the Pope and the other teaching the Division of the Sovereignty betwixt the King and the Parliament that is betwixt the King and his Subjects II. Neither is Mr. Baxter's second Argument for the Nonconforming Ministers being obliged to exercise their Ministry though they are by Law forbidden to doe it so peculiar to them but that if it had any force in it any man that hath been ordained and thereby been consecrated and devoted to the Ministerial Function may lay claim to it and make use of it though he have done or may doe never so much hurt by the exercise of it because he will be guilty of Sacrilege saith Mr. Baxter if he do not and of the highest degree of Sacrilege that can be it being much more sacrilegious saith he to alienate consecrated Persons than consecrated Things from the Service of God And for proof thereof he tells us That our Canons enquire after all such as alienate themselves from the Ministry to which they were ordained and turn to other Callings adding We dislike not that Canon but we wish our observance of it might be thought but a pardonable fault As if this Canon which forbids men to quit their Ministerial Calling and to betake themselves to any other Lay Profession did oblige all those that are Ministers or have been ordained to be Ministers to continue in the exercise of their Ministerial Function though by lawfull Authority and for never so just cause they are forbidden to doe so because forsooth he will be guilty of Sacrilege if he do not so that he that is once ordained and thereby consecrated to serve God in the Ministry though he be never so heretical or schismatical or fanatical in point of Opinion or never so factious or seditious or rebellious or lewd or debauched in point of Practice he must not be forbidden to doe the work he was ordained to doe or if he be forbidden he must not forbear to doe it notwithstanding because it will be the highest degree of Sacrilege except Apostasie it self if he do So that this Argument proves nothing neither or as much for the worst as it doth for the best that ever were ordained III. The like may be said of Mr. Baxter's third Argument also which is a deduction from several Texts of Scripture obliging those that have taken upon them the Ministry of the Gospel to be diligent and faithfull and constant in the preaching of it All which places must be understood with this exception unless they be lawfully and by their lawfull Superiours forbidden to doe it Otherwise there will a Floodgate be opened for the bringing in all manner of Heresies and Schisms into the Church and of Faction and Sedition and Rebellion into the State as we have found by our own experience it hath done lately into our own Church and State and will doe so again if such Arguments as these can prevail with us to repeal our Laws and to grant a Licence or rather a licentiousness of Preaching to Men so principled and so affected as Mr. Baxter himself and those he pleads for have shewed themselves to be and will not yet give us any security that they will not preach and doe hereafter as they have done formerly IV. But his fourth main Reason as he calls it why those he pleads for must preach though they be forbidden is a main one indeed if it were a true one namely That they should sin against the Law of Nature it self nay even the great radical Law of Nature so far as to be guilty of the murthering of mens Souls if they did not preach though they be forbidden by what Authority or for what cause soever for so he must mean or else he saith nothing to the purpose and if he means so he condemns the King and Parliament for forbidding so many hundreds or thousands as Mr. Baxter saith are silenced because they will not conform and consequently for doing what they can to make so many hundreds and thousands to sin against the radical Law of Nature and to be guilty of murthering God knows how many Mens Souls But Kings and Parliaments Mr. Baxter may say are but Men and Men that may err in commanding what God hath forbidden and in forbidding what God hath commanded as they do saith he in this particular and are not therefore to be obeyed as the Apostles did not and professed they would not obey the High Priest and the Sanhedrim when they did forbid them to preach any more in the name of Christ the like saith he the Primitive and Orthodox Christians did though the Pagan and Arian Emperours forbad them to doe so
to be judge in Church cases and of whom he is to tolerate and countenance and whom he is not to tolerate but to punish it is he I say who by and with the advice and consent of his great Council of Lords and Commons hath judged all such aforesaid Assemblies to be seditious Conventicles and consequently all the Preachers in them to be seditious Preachers and I hope Mr. B. will not deny because he hath granted it already that all seditious Preachers are to be restrained and if they are to be restrained and restrained by those that are the proper Judges whether they ought to be restrained or no certainly there can be no reason to excuse and much less to justify the preaching of those that are so restrained after they are restrained and during such their restraint and therefore all those reasons alledged by Mr. Baxter in the aforesaid Book of his called An Apology for the Nonconformist Ministers are to no purpose as to the proving of that which they are alledged to prove namely the obligation of those silenced Ministers to preach in Conventicles whom he pleads for though they be silenced and silenced by those whom he confesseth to have authority to silence them and whom he confesseth likewise to be the proper judges whether they are to be silenced or no and though that for which they are forbidden to preach in Conventicles is because such meetings and such preachings are seditious and dangerous as to the safety of the King's Person as well as of his Government which Mr. Baxter confesseth in a place before quoted to be one cause why men may be justly restrained from preaching and how they that are justly restrained from preaching can be obliged to preach Mr. Baxter is to prove when and how he can In the mean time all that I can imagine Master Baxter hath to say is that though they preach in Conventicles yet they do not preach Sedition or any thing that may disaffect their Hearers either to the King or to the Government But what if they that sit at the helm and whose office and duty it is to take care nè quid detrimenti Respublica capiat That the Commonwealth get no harm or come to no damage do believe and have reason to believe that you do and will preach that in private now which they know you have preached openly and often heretofore and have no reason to think but that you are the same men still that you have been always even since the very beginning of the Reformation that is such as have been always and ever will be undermining the established Government of the Church and State may they not I say that sit at the Helm in order to the securing of the publick peace of the Kingdom and safety of the King may they not in point of justice nay ought they not in point of prudence and conscience too upon the aforesaid consideration to forbid such meetings And if they may and ought to forbid them the very Meetings themselves after they are forbidden are seditious whatsoever they say or doe when they are met because by the Eye of the Law they are looked upon as meeting to doe that for the doing whereof the Law forbids them to meet And whereas one of Mr. Baxter's chief reasons why they were obliged in conscience to preach though they are forbidden it because they shall be guilty of the murthering of Souls if they do not the murthering of such Souls he means as might have been saved by their preaching and do perish for want of it one of the main reasons why the King by advice of his great Council hath forbidden them to preach is to prevent the murthering of Souls and Bodies too by their preaching I mean the Souls and Bodies of such as are by them and their preaching disaffected to the Government both in Church or State and made ready and resolute to undermine and overturn both whensoever there shall be an opportunity of so doing which they would never have thought of if it had not been for such Preachers and such preaching Mr. Baxter confesseth he incouraged many thousands to ingage in the late War which if it were a Rebellion as no doubt it was though perhaps he did not think it to be so was to engage them Bodies and Souls whether they kill'd or were kill'd in a damnable action And who can tell whether he and those that are principled as he is may not even now be encouraging many thousands more to doe as they did then when the like opportunity shall invite them to it the rather because Master Baxter himself hath told us that as yet be cannot see that he was mistaken in the main cause nor dared to repent of it nor forbear to doe the same if it were to doe again in the same state of things that is if there were or if there should be such a War betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament as there was then he would encourage as many thousands as he did then to engage against the King And hath not the King having such fair warning given him good reason to prevent the making of Parties by men that are thus minded and that not for his own sake onely nor onely for their sakes that may be endangered in their bodies and their goods for adhering to him but even for their sakes also who may by such Preachers and preaching be persuaded and encouraged to rebell against him and consequently not onely to a hazard of the loss of their lives but to a certainty of the loss of their Souls without repentance which is hardly to be hoped for those that dye in an Act of sin especially so great as that of Rebellion And therefore for this reason onely if there were no other those that are silenced ought not to preach for fear of murthering of Souls by their preaching which is all I have to say to this particular and which if it be not enough I hope one or other of those my reverend Brethren the Bishops to whom Mr. Baxter addresseth his Plea for the liberty of the Nonconformists to preach notwithstanding their being silenced by Act of Parliament will more fully and more at large examine and confute that Treatise of his for this reason at least if there were no other nè si nullus ex ipsorum numero contradicat omnes cum illo consentire videantur Lest if none of their number should gainsay him they may all be thought to comply and agree with him and so he and those he pleads for will perhaps boast they do if none of them say any thing to the contrary CHAP. XI Mr. B 's Reflexion upon the Bishop concerning Master Jone 's his being put out of the Duke's service taken to task and sent to Elymas the Sorcerer One thing true in it that the Protestant Religion may be preserved better without the Nonconformists than with them
AND now I am come at last to the consideration of the last of those injurious Reflexions which in the beginning of this Book I observed to have been made upon me by Mr. Baxter and for the confutation of which I principally intended all that I have written though many other things which I thought not of at first occasionally falling in have made that which I meant should be but a small Tract to swell into a large Volume but now I am in and have gone so far I must go through with it The Reflexion therefore which I am now to speak of is in Mr. Baxter's Answer to Dr. Stillingfleet's Sermon towards the end of it the words are these I must say that when some Prelates made it their great business to silence shame and ruine us and drive us far enough from persons of power undertaking to preserve the Protestant Religion better without us than with us and after all cry out themselves that we are in danger of Popery by their own Pupils and Disciples whose instruction they undertook men will have leave to think of this awake and to judge of Causes by Effects These I say are the words of that Reflexion which I complain of as intentionally aimed at me though obliquely and by circumlocution onely especially in the latter part of it For as for the former part of that saying of his where he speaks of some Prelates that made it their great business to silence shame and ruine them that is him and the rest of the Dissenters though I doubt not but he means me for one of those Prelates and one of the chief of them because he tells me and the Bishop of Ely in plain terms that we two of all he knows have effectually helped to bring them under yet I do not take my self to be peculiarly concern'd in this whether it be truly or falsly averr'd by him and therefore though I could tell him and tell him truly and prove it too that I never made it any of my business to shame or ruine him or any of the Dissenters or to silence any more of them than by Law I was not onely allowed but obliged to silence though I could say this I say and more too to prove that I never did any the least injury to any of them but have shewed kindness to some that had dealt hardly with me namely to Mr. Langley of Pembroke College who having gotten into my Canonry of Christ's Church in Oxford never allowed me one penny out of it during above 12 years I was abroad nor after I came home made me any recompence yet thinking I was one would doe good for evil he had the confidence to write to me and to intreat me to befriend him for the renewing of a Lease he held of Magdalen College as being their Visitor I did it for him Though I say I could make proof of this yet I will not insist upon it that which I except against is a false and injurious reflexion upon me particularly being contained in the words that follow viz. driving us that is him and those of his Party far enough from Persons of power undertaking to preserve the Protestant Religion better without us than with us and after cry out themselves that we are in danger of Popery by their own Pupils and Disciples whose instruction they undertook themselves and then concludes men will have leave to think of this awake and to judge of causes by effects This I say is the Reflexion I complain of as false and injurious and as being my self more particularly aimed at in it than any other of the Prelates he before spake of For though here as well as there he makes use of the plural number as if he meant what he saith of more than one yet that which he saith of them he knew would be understood by those by whom he would have it to be understood to be meant of me or if not of me onely yet of me principally and especially because he and others perhaps of his Party had heard from Mr. JONES and others from them that I had caused the said Mr. Jones to be put out of the Duke of York's service having been before a Chaplain to his Royal Highnesses Family to his Family I say for he was never any of the four that were properly and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by way of eminence called the Duke's Chaplains but onely one of the two who were daily to efficiate in the Duke's Chapel to the Houshold whether He or the Dutchess were there or no so that Mr. Jones was not so great a man either in place of attendance or in grace and favour with either of their Highnesses that either his stay could hinder or his remove could further any design that I or any man else might have had upon the Duke or Dutchess in order to the seducing or perverting both or either of them in matter of Religion And yet this Mr. Jones was the man and I verily believe the onely man Mr. Baxter thought of though he speaks in the plural number here also as if we the Prelates had driven them that is all or many of them far enough from persons of Power Now I would fain know of Mr. Baxter what one man of their Party was ever driven away by any of the Prelates from any person of Power or was ever said to be so but this Mr. Jones onely who was never thought to be one of their Party whilst he was in the Duke's service I am sure he profess'd the contrary and if he had not I am sure he could not have been admitted into the Duke's service as no man else could either into the Duke's or into any other persons of power the Law not made by the Prelates but by the King in Parliament I mean the Act of Vniformity having made all of that Party as long as they were of that Party uncapable of being Chaplains or Schoolmasters in Noblemens or in any great mens Houses and therefore there was no need of the Prelates driving them farther from persons of power than the Law had driven them already Neither was it for his being one of them though perhaps he was one of them in his heart that Mr. Jones was put out of the Duke's service but for behaving himself otherwise than he ought to have done in it but how that was I forbear to say because he is dead onely I must say that I was neither Judge nor Witness nor Plaintiff nor Defendant nor any way a party in the case no nor knew not any thing of the matter it self or of the cause of it untill after it was done as Dr. Killigrew then Clerk of the Closet to the Duke and Dr. Turner then and now one of the Duke's Chaplains will I doubt not be ready to testify if it were tanti worth the while to call them to it But first that it was this Mr. Jones
become of Mr. Baxter in the mean time And yet surely Confession and Contrition ought to precede forgiveness both in foro Poli and in foro Soli too and as well with men as with God And truly it would have been more for Mr. Baxter's own credit and for the Kings and Churches satisfaction if it had been so I mean if he had publickly Recanted what he ought and as he ought to have Recanted both in point of judgment and practise a great deal sooner than he did as either before the Kings coming home which had been indeed the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the most proper and most acceptable time or at least assoon as he had the first opportunity for it after the Kings coming home And such an opportunity he had if he could have found in his heart to have made use of it I mean that time when the King was graciously pleased though he knew well enough what Mr. Baxter had written and done against his Father and himself to give him leave to Preach before him in the Chappel-Royal Then then I say was the time and there the place for him publickly and humbly and solemnly upon his Knees to have prefaced his Sermon or ensuing Discourse with a self-accusing self-condemning Exomologesis or Confession made in his own and in the name of his whole Party I mean the contrivers abettors and promoters of and actors in that most unchristian and inhumane Conspiracy and Rebellion against the late King and ended it with a quorum pars magna fui of which company I my self made a great part which would have become him much better speaking of sins inconsistent with a true faith then the Harangue he made against drunkenness and swearing and Atheism and profaneness and loosness of life without saying any thing at all against Hypocrisie or lying or standering or pride or malice or covetousness or sedition or rebellion as if those sins were not inconsistent with true faith as well or as much as the former But those he knew were thought to be the sins of those of the Kings and these of those of his own party as if our sins and not theirs and consequently we and not they the Kings and not the Parliaments Party had been the cause of that unnatural War and consequently of all those horrible mischiefs that were done in it together with all the dismal consequences and effects of it and so indeed in a late Book of his he is not afraid nor ashamed to tell us in plain terms But this Sermon of his was made it seems before he was convinced he had sinned in incouraging so many thousands as he saith he did to the War against the King so that the time of his Recantation was not yet come though I presume he stayed not so long before he sued out his Pardon Well but when the time was come when he thought fit to publish that Paper which he calls a Recantation which was eight or nine years after he had Preached the aforesaid Sermon before the King let us see what manner of Recantation it was or whether it was such a one as can make an impartial and judicious peruser of it believe without doubting that it is so sincere as an ingenuous and voluntary Recantation ought to be For besides the tardiness of its coming forth which I noted before and which argues some other motive besides conviction of conscience for the publishing of it it is farther observable First That the wording of it wants that clearness and plainness which an ingenuous Recantation ought to have and Secondly That it is so clog'd and restrained and limited and shackled as it were with such and so many exceptions and conditions and proviso's that such a muddy-brain'd man as I am cannot tell what to make of it And first as to the want of clearness in the wording of it when he speaks of all he pretends to Recant in that paper he doth not say I profess my repentance that ever I held it but that ever I published it he might have said as well and perhaps as truly I am sorry that Bishop Morley's collection of so many false and pernicious Aphorisms out of that Book hath made me profess my repentance for the publishing of them Howsoever it is not his professing his repentance for the publishing of them can prove he repents the holding of them or that he is not still of the same judgment because though he be so it is not safe for him to profess himself to be so every 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is not a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there is a difference betwixt times and seasons that may be safe or seasonable to be said or done or written and published at one time that can be neither seasonable nor safe at another So that we cannot conclude Mr. Baxter to be of any other mind now than he was before from his saying that he is sorry no nor from his being sorry indeed that he had formerly declared his judgment as he did Again as the want of clearness and plainness in the wording of that pretended Recantation may make the sincerity so the clogging of it with so many proviso's may make the ingenuity thereof to be suspected as if it had been extorted and not voluntary For it looks as if he that makes it were afraid he had overshot himself and said too much or might be thought by those of his own Party to have said too much in that little he had said before and therefore he adds the subsequent proviso's which if what he had declared before was real and sincere are all of them needless and impertinent and worse than needless and impertinent if he means to limit and restrain what he said before by them as he seems to do especially by the first and last of them For as in the first of those Proviso's he tells us he doth not reverse all the matter of that Book which he told us before he did Recant and that not only for some by-passages in it but in respect of the very scope of it so in the last of those Proviso's he protests against the judgment of Posterity which all sincere and ingenuous Writers do usually appeal unto as likewise against the judgment of all others that were not of the same time and place he should have said of the same Party and Perswasion also as to the censuring either of that Book of his or the revocation of it as being ignorant of the true causes of them both and then concludes that these things provided viz. if he may be allowed to except as much of the matter of the Book he pretends to Recant from being reversed as he pleaseth and upon condition that neither the Book nor the Recantation of it be censured by any but by whom he pleaseth he did vouchsafe to publish that Paper which he would have taken for a Recantation to which aforesaid Proviso's I wonder he did not
add one more That he might be allowed whensoever he saw cause for it or had need of it to substitute one Proposition instead of another a false one instead of a true one or a true one instead of a false one and then to infer what he pleased from it for so as he hath done often in other places so he hath done once in this scrap of a Recantation also making me to say that there were some lawful Governors unlimited by God and thence inferring that I was a defier of Deity and Humanity when what I said was that of lawful Governors some were unlimited by men but of this I have said enough before and as I think I have said enough now touching the insufficiency of this recantation to prove that Mr. Baxter is really and seriously otherwise minded in point of judgment than he was when he published these Aphorisms which I have now Reprinted Neither can the contrary hereunto be concluded from any or all of those glorious or rather vain-glorious professions of Loyalty he makes in behalf of himself and of his own Party in the fourth Chapter of the second Part of his Non-Conformists Plea for Peace which can signifie nothing unless he and they do renounce those disloyal and seditious Principles which in his Book of the Holy Commonwealth he makes use of to justifie the War made by the two Houses of Parliament against the late King as first That this Kingdom of England is not a Monarchy and consequently that the Sovereignty is not wholly in the King Secondly That the Sovereignty is divided betwixt the King and the two Houses of Parliament Thirdly that the two Houses of Parliament may lawfully take Arms and make War with the King in defence of their own part of the Sovereignty and of the trust reposed in them by the People and that the People may and ought to assist them when they do so Fourthly That the People are represented in Parliament not only as Subjects for so he confesseth their Representatives are only to complain and supplicate for them but as Contractors before they were Subjects with him that was to be their King before he was King for the reservation of such or such rights franchises and priviledges to be for ever exempted from the Kings and his Successors jurisdiction for the preservation of which if they were invaded or indeavour'd to be taken away by the King or any of his Successors the Parliament not only as Representatives but Trustees also for the People might by force if they could not do it otherwise resist and restrain the King from so doing Finally there be many other cases specified by Mr. Baxter in that Book of the Holy Commonwealth wherein Kings may as he saith be lawfully resisted by their Subjects whence he concludes the War made by the Parliament against the late King to have been purum piumque Duellum a just and a lawful War and consequently such a War as may be made at any time hereafter upon the same Premisses or by vertue of the same Principles and therefore he tells us in plain terms not only that he did not but that he durst not repent of having been engaged in it himself nor for having engaged so many thousands as he confesseth he did in it not then perhaps but hath he not repented of it since Videtur quòd non because not having yet renounced any of those Principles or Premises from whence he infers the Conclusion he is still to be supposed to hold the conclusion he infers from them nay and that he will hold it still and do as he did then upon the like occasion for so he tells us himself in the place before quoted where he saith that as he durst not repent of what he had done in the aforesaid War so he could not forbear the doing of the same if it were to do again in the same state of things 'T is true indeed he tells us in the same place that if he were convinced he had sinned in what he had done he would as willingly make a publick Recantation as he would eat and drink when he is hungry or thirsty But neither he nor any of the Non-Conformists that ever I heard of hath as yet made any such a publick Recantation and therefore we may rationally and charitably enough too conclude that they are still of the same Judgment they were then and consequently that their Practice will be the same it was then when the like opportunity invites them to it which though I hope it will never be yet we are not sure but it may be and therefore ought not to be too confident and secure that no such thing will be For mine own part I must confess as I always have been so I am still of this opinion that ever since the Reformation there have been and are two Plots carrying on sometimes more openly and sometimes more secretly the one by those that call themselves the only true Catholicks the other by those that call themselves the only true Protestants and both of them against the Government as it is established by Law both in Church and State And as there always hath been so there ever will be Plotting by both these Parties until both of them be utterly disabled and suppressed for as for making Peace with either of them I take it by reason of the perverseness of the one and peevishness of the other and the pride of both to be a thing not to be hoped for I am sure the way proposed by Mr. Baxter in his Book called The true and only way of Concord of all Christian Churches will never do it which Book of his though as I said in my Preface I did not intend to answer as being abundantly and superabundantly confuted before it was written yet because in his Address of it to the Bishop of Ely and me he seems desirous to know what we think of it in reference to the end proposed by it I will tell him plainly and in a few words what is my opinion of it viz. that it is so far from being what he saith it is The true and only way of Concord in all Churches that I verily believe that if all the Churches in the World were actually in as perfect Peace and Concord both in themselves and with one another as ever they were or ever can be humanly speaking here in this World that which he calls the true and only way of Concord if it were or could be admitted would in a very short time introduce such and so many unavoidable and irreconcileable differences and dissentions both speculative and practical as well in matter of belief as in manner of worship that there would be no such thing to be seen as order or unity or peace in all the Churches of any one Province or Kingdom and much less in all the Churches of the Christian World This National Church of ours therefore being
according to the legal establishment thereof of so sound so healthful so orderly and so well compacted a constitution as it is and which by long experience we have found so agreeable to the established Government of the State that we cannot make any alteration in the one without great disordering of the other Let us not give ear to any of those Church and State Mountebanks or Empericks who if we let them alone a little longer will never leave mending till they have marr'd all Mr. BAXTER'S Recantation referred to page of the Conclusion Printed 1670. at the end of a Book of His called The Life of Faith after a Catalogue of Books Written and Published by the same Author LET the Reader know that whereas the Bookseller hath in the Catalogue of my Books named my Holy-Commonwealth or Political Aphorisms I do hereby recall the said Book and profess my Repentance that ever I published it and that not only for some by-passages but in respect of the secondary part of the very scope Though the first Part of it which is the defence of God and Reason I recant not But this Revocation I make with these Proviso's 1. That I reverse not all the Matter of that Book nor all that more than ONE have accused As e. g. the Assertion that all Humane Powers are limited by God And if I may not be pardoned for not defying DEITY and HUMANITY I shall prefer that ignominy before their present Fastus and Triumph who defie them 2. That I make not this Recantation to the Military fury and rebellious pride and tumult against which I wrote it nor would have them hence take any encouragement for impenitence 3. That though I dislike the Roman Clergies writing so much of Politicks and detest Ministers medling in State matters without necessity or a certain call yet I hold it not simply unbeseeming a Divine to expound the fifth Commandment nor to shew the dependance of humane Powers on the Divine nor to instruct Subjects to obey with judgment and for Conscience sake 4. That I protest against the judgment of Posterity and all others that were not of the same TIME and PLACE as to the mental censure either of the BOOK or the REVOCATION as being ignorant of the true reasons of them both Which things Provided I hereby under my hand as much as in me lyeth reverse the Book and desire the World to take it as non Scriptum April 15. 1670. R. B. ACT Anent Religion and the TEST August 31. 1681. Made in the Third PARLIAMENT of Our Most High and Dread Sovereign CHARLES the Second Holden at EDINBURGH the 28 day of July 1681. By his Royal Highness JAMES Duke of Albany and York c. His MAJESTIES High Commissioner for holding the same Referred to Section V. OUR SOVERAIGNE LORD With His Estates of Parliament Considering That albeit by many wholsom Laws made by his Royall Grand-father and Father of glorious memory and by himself in this and His other Parliaments since His happy Restauration the Protestant Religion is carefully asserted established and secured against Popery and Phanaticism Yet the restless Adversaries of our Religion doe not cease to propagat their errours and to seduce His Majesties Subjects from their duty to God and Loyalty to his Vice-gerent and to overturn the established Religion by introducing their Superstions and delusions into this Church and Kingdom And knowing that nothing can more encrease the numbers and confidence of Papists and Schismatical dissenters from the Established Church than the supine neglect of putting in Execution the good Laws provided against them together with their hopes to infinuat themselves into Offices and places of trust and publick Imployment THEREFORE His Majesty from His Princely and pious zeal to maintain and preserve the true Protestant Religion contained in the Confession of Faith recorded in the first Parliament of King James the Sixth which is founded on and agreeable to the written word of GOD DOETH with advise and consent of His Estates of Parliament Require and Command all his Officers Judges and Magistrats to put the Laws made against Popery and Papists Priests Jesuits and all persons of any other Order in the Popish Church especially against sayers and hearers of Mass Venders and dispersers of forbidden Books And Ressetters of Popish Priests and excommunicat Papists As also against all Phanatick Separatists from this National Church Against Preachers at House or Field-Conventicles and the Ressetters and harbourers of Preachers who are Intercommuned Against disorderly Baptisms and Marriages and irregular Ordinations and all other Schismaticall disorders To full and vigorous execution according to the Tenour of the Respective Acts of Parliament thereanent provided And that his Majesties Princely care to have these Laws put in Execution against those Enemies of the Protestant Religion may the more clearly appear HE DOETH with advise and consent foresaid STATUT and ORDAIN That the Ministers of each Paroch give up in October Yearly to their respective Ordinaries true and exact Lists of all Papists and Schismatical-withdrawers from the publick Worship in their respective Paroches which Lists are to be subscribed by them and that the Bishops give in a double of the saids Lists Subscribed by them to the respective Sheriffs Stewards Bailies of Royalty and Regalitie and Magistrats of Burghs To the effect the said Judges may proceed against them according to Law As also the Sheriffs and other Magistrats foresaids are hereby ordained to give an account to his Majesties Privy-Council in December yearly of their proceedings against those Papists and Phanatical Separatists as they will be answerable at their highest peril And that the diligences done by the Sheriffs Bailies of Regalities and other Magistrats foresaids may be the better enquired into by the Council the Bishops of the respective Diocesses are to send exact doubles of the Lists of the Papists and Phanaticks to the Clerks of Privy Council whereby the diligences of the Sheriffs and other Judges foresaids may be controlled and examined And to cut of all hopes from Papists and Phanaticks of their being imployed in Offices and Places of publick Trust. IT IS HEREBY STATUT and ORDAINED that the following Oath shall be taken by all Persons in Offices and places of publick Trust Civil Ecclesiastical and Military especially by all Members of Parliament and all Electors of Members of Parliament all Privy-Counsellors Lords of Session Members of the Exchequer Lords of Justiciary and all other Members of these Courts all Officers of the Crown and State all Arch-Bishops and Bishops and all Preachers and Ministers of the Gospel whatsoever all Persons of this Kingdom named or to be named Commissioners for the Borders all Members of the Commission for Church Affairs all Sheriffs Stewards Bailies of Royalties and Regalities Justices of the Peace Officers of the Mint Commissars and their Deputs their Clerks and Fiscals all Advocats and Procurators before any of these Courts all Writters to the Signet all Publick Nottars and
Vid. a vindication of the Primitive Church in answer to Mr. B 's Church History A remark in general upon those who censure our Translation The danger and vanity of such bold censures Some examples of Mr. B 's thus doing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a city with him stands for a Market town Because he would have no Bishop of more than one congregation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not properly rendred he saith to resist To resist is more than not to obey Vid. Holy Common-wealth p. 37. p 377. So to resist God is more than not to obey him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to resist are both Military Terms Our Translatours of St. Paul 's judgment as Mr. B. is not What meant by Resisting Resistance impious and irreligious Irrational also as inconsistent with the being of a Body Politick The necessity of a Supreme power in all Bodies Politick That Supreme power unquestionable The reason of this grounded upon Nature Grotius his testimony Monarchy God's government Mr. B 's just and loyal opinion of the Sovereigns power Vid. Holy Com. p. 72. Spoiled by his following Aphorisms H. C. p. 73. H. C. p. 87. Aph. 79. H. C. p. 87. 88. H. C. p. 74. Vpon these suppositions Mr. B. justifies the late Rebellion And by consequence the King's murther The Independents as justifiable as the Presbyterians Those Assertions of Mr. B 's taken to task Resistance inconsistent with the well-being of Bodies Politick As being an occasion of Civil War the worst of evils No small matter in Mr. B 's opinion that will excuse resisting Grotius puts a case but contradicts himself and the Primitive Christians in his answer to it De jure belli pacis lib. 1. c. 4 p. 104. A passage of his before cited concerning the Primitive Christians compared with this He himself in effect disallows his own Answer De jure Belli ac pacis p. 112. Some instances of his wherein Resistance may seem lawfull examined Thâ—se Instances of his are of Kings and nâ— Kings The third Instance The fourth Instance Those Instances but seeming Exceptions The Law of non-resisting the foundation and preservative of humane society Other reasons for non-resistance Resistance unlawfull even in Grotius his Case An Instance from the Holy League in France The Catholick Religion the pretence there The like Instance from our late Rebellion in England The Protestant Religion the pretence here Other pretences made use of for the late Rebellion The doctrine of Non-resistance recommended The Bishops grounds to prove the late War unlawful Mr. B's contrary grounds to justifie it His confidence of these grounds H. C. p. 489 490. The first of them confidered H. C. 476. ad sinem istius pagine The Parliaments Declaration Ibid. Mr. B. personally ingaged in the War The Parliaments design in that Declaration * 2 Chron. 18. v. 30. Mr. B's own confession in the case H. C. p. 422. H. C. p. 471. By Parliament Mr. B. means the House of Commons The ground of Felton's Murthering the D. of Buckingham a Vote of the House of Commons The dangerous consequence of such Votes No man safe in such cases The Remonstrance of the House of Commons made use of for the destruction of the Kings Person Hol. C. p. 489 Parliaments not infallible nor impeccable by Mr. B's own confession Holy Com-w pag. 437 438. And in some cases to be deferred by the People Ibid. Holy Com-w pag. 439. Mr. B's inconsistence in the resolution of such cases The Law a sure Rule * In Prolegom de jure Belli Pacis The E. of Essex his case in Q. Elizabeths time The Judges Opinion in that case * Cambd. Eliz. ad Ann. 1601. A threefold confirmation of that their opinion Three Observations drawn from thence The Presbyterians would have done what the Independents did had they been let alone Holy Com. p. 422. The Kings Person excepted in none of their Commissions The Presbyterian Clergy taxed as to the late Kings Death Fid. Evangil Armatum Mr. B. particularly charged Hol. Com. p. 489 490. Notwithstanding his confidence Ibid. Rebellion as Mr. B. owns a greater sin than Murther Whordom Drunkenness c. Some were Rebels who did not think themselves so The Schismatical Clergy under a just reproof The King's Power destroyed in the late War The Presbyterian Party who destroyed his Power by Mr. B 's own confession Rebels Nor consequently can they be absolv'd from the guilt of the King's murther The late War then was made against the King And that though the Parliament declared it was not H. Com. p. 419. Mr. B. proved to believe so himself Another Topick of Mr. B 's that the late War was not Rebellion Because the King he saith is not sole Sovereign Mr. B 's bold offer Vid. Praef. to Holy C. prope finem What Mr. B 's meaning is in denying the King to be the highest Power in the time of our divisions The King's Power taken from him his Authority remained good The Act which the King past for the Parliaments sitting Gave them no more Power than they had before The worst Act that blessed King ever did Mr. B grounds his denyal of the Kings Sovereignty upon the constitution of the Government His definition of a Kingdom H. C. p. 85. The Lacedaemonian Kings only titular The Government there Aristocratical All Kings indeed unaccountable to the Reople Even Political Kings who are obliged to govern by Law And though Kings by Election only All such Kings accountable to God only The Question The Answer 1 Reason The People upon their choice part with all the Power they had Valerian 's Reply in the like case Vid. Zozom lib. 6. cap. 6. 2 Reason A King so chosen hath hic Kingly Power immediately from God and not from the People as Mr. B. grants Nothing in Scripture for People to controul their Kings The state of the Jewish Kings Our King according to Mr. B 's own Principles a sole Sovereign Holy Com. p. 61. Ibid. p. 62. The King hath no Superior to judg him nor Peers to try him Mr. B. starts a Controversie which form of Government the English is H. C. p. 87. This Controversie never heard of till the late times The rebell-Rebell-Parliament modest at first The secret design of some from the first to change the Government Mr. B. makes the Kingdom of England a mixt Common-wealth H. C. p. 87. My Lord Cook 's judgment in the Case In the Preface to his fourth Book of Reports His judgment to be preferr'd before foreign Lawyers and Divines Calvin the Patriarch of the Presbyterians What properly Calvinism Calvin condemns Resistance of Kings by private men but obliges some sort of Magistrates to it His wariness in expressing himself The three Estates have no such Power as he supposeth Perhaps a salvo for a Lye Calvin himself doubts whether there be any such Magistrates as he speaketh of No such Magistrates by God's Ordinance The inconvenience and mischief of
them for the King 's coming home The security the government required of them Their own measure meted to them The King's Promise at Breda discharged As being conditional Their carriage an affront to the Parliament Mr. B 's boldness with Parliaments The reason of the Act of Vniformity The penalty of not conforming Some have conformed Why the rest did not whether for Conscience as Mr. B. saith Bp. Brownrig's account of Mr Calamy 's not conforming A probable reason why some refused offers of preferment To wit to indear themselves to their party Many stood out in hopes of a Toleration Supposing it is out of Conscience they do not conform yet they are justly silenced The Popish Priests have the same Plea as Mr. B 's Nonconforming Ministers And that upon Mr. B 's own Reasons Vid. Apology for the Nonconformist Ministry p. 14. ibid. p. 15. As from the Obligation of holy Orders From their being consecrated to God's service ibid. p. 20. From scriptural Authority From the guilt of murthering souls if they do not preach Pag. 45. Plea for Non-con's Ministry No such necessity of preaching now as in the primitive times The Homilies of the Church recommended for excellent Sermons The efficacy of those Homilies maintained An Argument drawn from their own repetitions of Sermons Mr. B 's murther of Souls a phantasm The assistance of Nonconformists offered gratis Apol. p. 16. Why not to be accepted The Popish Priests under a greater obligation of preaching Neither of them to be permitted According to Christ's own Caveat and S. Paul 's order to Titus The like practised at the beginning of the Reformation Themselves serv'd the Church of England-men so What Preachers to be silenced by Mr. B 's own sentence * Vid. True and onely way to concord part 3. Third part of True and onely way of conc p. 121. 122. The Ministers Mr. B. pleads for are such as he confesseth ought to be silenced The Magistrate the Judge in this case saith Mr. B. Vid. Third part of Book of Concord pag. 140. The Law is a declaration of his Judgment What kind of Preachers tolerated what not is there set down With the reasons of such restraint A descant upon those reasons The security which the Law requires from Preachers The ground of the Act against Conventicles What are seditious Conventicles Who seditious Preachers Mr. B 's Apology for them falls to ground The very Conventicles whatever people doe there are seditious One main reason of forbidding them to prevent the murthering of Souls * Holy Com. Wealth p. 486. This Mr. B. charged particularly with upon his own confession Ibidem The words of the Reflexion The Bishop not peculiarly concern'd in the former part of those words The latter part of them particularly aimed at the Bishop Mr. Jones a Chaplain to the Duke's Family not to his Person Mr. Jones the man intended by Mr. B. The Bishop no way concerned in his being put out of the Duke's service Some reasons that Mr. Jones is meant by Mr. B. for one that was driven away Vid. The Premonition to the true and onely way of Concord And that the Bishop of Winton is meant by the Prelate who drove him away The false account which Elymas the Sorcerer gives of Mr. Jones 's removal Mr. B. perhaps the Godfather of that Pamphlet Elymas a Comment upon Mr. B 's Text. The Protestant Religion to be preserved better without the Dissenters than with them The condition of the Church of England as to Dissenters Object 1. The Answer Object 2. The Answer Mr. B ' s. Recantation as to the Time very tardy His Sermon before the King The manner of his Recantation Not clearly worded Clog'd with Proviso's His vain-glorious professions of Loyalty Some of his disloyal Principles He justifies the late War Most likely that he is of the same judgment still Two Plots carrying on Mr. B 's true and only way of Concord
one that had so little time left to spare from his more pressing and more important concerns was likely to enquire after every Book that came out in Print and to see whether he was concerned in it or no and it seems Mr. Baxter thought so and therefore sent me by Mr. Walton that Book in the Preface whereunto he saith he did purposely write that Treatise in answer to the gross mistaking charge of Bishop Morley which I had never seen nor heard of before nor perhaps should ever have seen or heard of it at all if Mr. Baxter himself had not sent it to me and which if he had sent me sooner I would not have said as I have done in the foregoing Chapter that he had not given so much as any one Instance of the many mistakes he saith there were in my printed Letter as indeed he did not where he speaks of them to me nay he saith he had laid aside an Answer he had written to that Letter for peace sake that he might not by opening or publishing so many mistakes of mine give me any farther cause of being displeased with him And yet two years before mark the ingenuity of the man he had published a whole Book consisting of sixty four Propositions besides Quoeries purposely intended then though he doth not say so in plain terms till two years after for an Answer to Bishop Morley 's gross mistaking charge though neither then nor since neither there nor any where else hath he yet told us what that gross mistaking charge is but leaves it to be guessed at or collected out of the Title page to that Treatise which he saith he purposely writ for an Answer to it wherein whether he hath dealt justly and candidly either with me or with his readers I am now to consider and examine after I have premised out of what I have already said two or three short preliminary Observations Whereof the first is this That it was not nor could not be for peace sake nor because he would not give me any farther provocation as in his Preface to his Book of Concord he pretends it was that he laid aside the Answer he saith he had made to my printed Letter for then he would not without any farther provocation on my part have afterwards printed a whole Book on purpose to convince me of one of the many mistakes in that Letter or rather to expose me to the World for having been guilty of so gross a mistake as he calls it A second observation is this That naming but one of those many mistakes he saith there were in that Letter of mine he doth implicitly confess that he could name no more because by aggravating that as much as he can he declares he would not have forborn to specifie the rest if there had been any more to be specified And consequently which I would have to be observed in the third place That if this which he calls a gross mistake be no mistake at all of mine but a very great Mistake or rather a very great Calumny of his as I doubt not but I shall prove it is Mr. Baxter had no reason to charge that Letter of mine with so many mistakes nor I any reason to thank him for concealing of them CHAP. IV. His dreadfull Title page wherein he ushers in this Charge examined and retorted upon himself NOw whether that which Mr. Baxter calls a gross mistaking charge be indeed such a charge as he would have it to be believed it is he should in the first place have in plain and express terms set down that charge of mine as I have set it down my self in that Letter wherein he saith that gross mistaking charge is For in all debates betwixt rational and ingenuous men whether in point of opinion or in matter of fact the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or thing in question ought to be clearly stated and agreed on betwixt the differing Parties before they can proceed to the proving or disproving of any thing that is in difference betwixt them But this as I said before Mr. Baxter hath not done but onely affirmed that such a gross mistaking charge there is of Bishop Morley's and that he hath written and published such a Treatise in answer to it leaving his Readers as I said before to guess at what that Charge is or rather what he would have it thought to be and that is as may be collected from the Title page to that Treatise which he calls an Answer to that charge the Bishop's misreporting the judgment of Nonconformists of things sinfull by Accident to make men believe that the Nonconformists Asserted That whatsoever may be the occasion of sin to any must be taken away or that nothing may be imposed which men may take scandal at or by Accident turn to sin And he adds That to save mens Souls from the guilt of believing this misreport the Treatise following saith the Title page was published as likewise to help those to repentance who have polluted their Souls with falshood and uncharitableness by believing and seconding such reports This I say is the Title page prefixed to the aforesaid Treatise and a very notable one it is Never any Pope's Bull came forth with a more dreadfull bellowing against all that shall say write preach print or report or that shall believe any thing that is said written printed preached or reported by any body else concerning any of the Nonconformists though never so truly or never so well attested if any Nonconformist especially such a one as Mr. Baxter one of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one of those who seem to be Pillars shall please to disown it For in that case saith Mr. Baxter not onely the reporting any such thing is a gross mistake but the believing such a report doth so pollute mens Souls with falshood and uncharitableness that they cannot be saved from the guilt thereof unless that ensuing Treatise of his do help them to repent of it So dangerous a thing it seems it is not onely to report but to give credit to any thing that is reported to the prejudice either of the doctrine or practice of any of the Godly party as if they could not err in either which is in effect to assume unto themselves a more than Popish Infallibility which is the worst of the Popish errours as being the ground and foundation of all other heresies or errours that are held by them And yet they that would be thought the most zealous Antipapists do really though not professedly sympathize with the Papists in this which is the Root and in several of the most pernicious Branches and false doctrines growing out of this Root as appears speculatively by Mr. Baxter's Politick Aphorisms and practically by what was acted by the Nonconformists before and in and after the late Rebellion against the best of Kings by the worst of Subjects I mean during the Vsurpation of the
Sovereignty first by both Houses and then by one of the Houses of Parliament and afterwards by Cromwell and his Son and lastly by the Rump or the fag-end or worst part of but one of the two Houses Again as they sympathize with the Papists in some of the worst of their doctrines and practices to draw more to them so they imitate them also in making use of the same arts and artifices for keeping of those whom they have made their Proselytes from revolting from them For as the Romish Confessours do terrifie and fright their Converts by forbidding them upon the penalty of being guilty of mortal sin to hear or reade and much more to give any credit to any thing that is written or spoken to confute or disparage any of their doctrines or practices so I know not what other ends Mr. Baxter could have in prefixing so terrifying and terrible a Title to so petty a Treatise but to fright those that have been seduced by him from making use of their own reason to bring them into the right way again by hearkening to or believing of any thing that is or can be said or written by any of us to his prejudice or to the prejudice of any thing that hath been asserted by him by telling them beforehand that it is no less than a damnable sin to believe that he or the Nonconformists asserted any such thing as Bishop Morley by a gross mistake imputes to him and the rest of the Nonconformists and therefore that he writ the following Treatise on purpose partly to save mens Souls from the guilt of believing and partly to help them to repentance that have polluted their souls by believing that gross mistake or misreport of the aforesaid Bishop Whereunto he adds in another place that it was the fear he should die with the guilt of silence upon him if he had not published the aforesaid Treatise in order to the aforesaid ends that made him write it and publish it as if the salvation of so many mens souls had depended upon it which if Mr. Baxter himself did believe to be true then wo be to all those that died in the belief of the truth of Bishop Morley's charge before the publishing of this Treatise and wo to Mr. Baxter himself for publishing this Treatise no sooner For the first Edition of this his admirable both 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of this his severeign both Antidote to prevent and Restorative to recover those Souls that were otherwise in danger to be lost for ever for believing or for not repenting their belief of Bishop Morley's charge was not published untill the year 76 which was 14 years at least after Bishop Morley's charge was printed And how did Mr. Baxter know but that many hundred Souls during that long interval might be infected with that so dangerous a sin of believing the truth of that Charge and die in that belief without repentance merely for want of being helped to it by this so efficacious or none-such a remedy as is prescribed by him in this Treatise Again how could Mr. Baxter himself tell but that he might have died in less than 14 years which is double the age of a man in Law especially considering the dying condition he so often tells us he is in and was in many years before And then I would fain know how his deferring so long to publish this so sovereign an Antidote and Remedy against so malignant and Soulkilling a disease could consist either with the charity he owes to other mens Souls or the care of his own For if it be true that when he did publish it it was as he tells us it was For fear of dying with the guilt of silence upon him why should not the same cause have produced the same effect sooner Truly Mr. Baxter had little care of his own as well as of other mens Souls in the mean time if he himself believes what he would have other men to believe namely that the believing of Bishop Morley's mistaking Charge is of so very dangerous a consequence to those that die without repentance for their believing of it And therefore I verily believe that this was but an hyperbolical strain of Mr. Baxter's Rhetorick to enhance the grossness of Bishop Morley's mistaking Charge and to make his Readers more averse from believing of it and withall to make the Bishop himself the more odious to all the Nonconformists by insinuating that what the Bishop had affirmed to be the assertion of Mr. Baxter he had affirmed to be the judgment of all the Nonconformists For why else doth he entitle the Treatise which he saith was purposely written to Answer that gross mistaking Charge of Bishop Morley why doth he intitle it I say The judgment of the Nonconformists as if what I had laid to his charge I had laid to the charge of all the Nonconformists or as if what I had said he had maintained in the Conference at the Savoy concerning things sinfull per Accidens I had said all the Nonconformists had maintained it also which I never said nor never thought they did CHAP. V. Mr. B ' s. Assertion of things sinfull by Accident not charged by the Bishop upon all or any of the Nonconformists as he pretends it to be The English and Scotch Presbyterians censured Why all Religions tolerated in Holland FOr indeed I know not what the judgment of Nonconformists if by Nonconformists he mean all the Nonconformists is in this or in any other particular except it be in being Dissenters from the Government and discipline of our Church as it is by Law established no nor what is the judgment of all the Nonconformists of any one species or kind of them whether Presbyterians or Independents or Anabaptists or Antinomians or any other of any one denomination as to this particular And therefore I could not I am sure I did not say this or that was the judgment or that this or that was asserted by the Nonconformists unless Mr. Baxter will say that He and all the Nonconformists are and must be always of the same mind and judgment and consequently that what I said was asserted by him I must needs mean it to be asserted by them all also As if he were to all the Nonconformists what the Pope is to all the Papists virtually their whole Church and therefore as all Papists professing to believe as the Church believes must needs believe as the Pope believes so all Nonconformists because they agree with him in Non-conformity must therefore needs be of his mind in all things else also because he takes upon him to be their head or at least to be their mouth or Advocate General for all of them as appears by the Title he gives to those two Books of his which he calls The first and second part of the Nonconformists Plea for Peace as if they all spake by his mouth or had