Lord God they are the formost in persecuting of thee that seeme to love primacie in thy Church It is the lesse wonder then if after the fearefull executions at Cabrieres and Merindol by the instigation of some Popish Bishops they were afraid of their very name II. It is most considerable that the reformation began in France among the people but in England it began in the Court The French reformers were Priests but the English reformers under the King were Bishops and the French Priests could not prevaile with their Bishops as the King and Bishops of England over their Clergie For the higher spheres are not carried by the inferiour but the inferiour by the superiour It was much that the French Priests could get some retrogradation by their owne course against the rapidity of the higher sphere The reformation began among the people and inferiour Clergie and there it stayed Therefore the Discipline is popular and it was not easie for them that were opposed by Bishops to make Bishops In England the sacred oyntment of the Gospell was powred upon the head and thence it fell about upon all the limbs and to the hemmes of the garment In France it was powred upon some limbs onely whence because it could not mount to the Head the Discipline also wants a Head Neither could that holy dew spread so well because it descended not from the hils Certainly the Discipline of France deserveth rather compassion than invectives And to speake properly they refuse not Bishops but they want Bishops If you say that the reformation in Scotland began also among the people You know that the worke was never perfected till your late great King put the last hand to it by reforming and restoring Bishops Which if you will not acknowledge for a perfecting I am sure the French with whom you claim conformity would in the like case III. Besides the reformed Churches of France want means to maintain Bishops and with much adoe maintaine poore Lectures For although the Episcopall power be spirituall yet without temporall means it cannot keep either power or respect and not so much as subsistance Whence they gather that it is better to want Bishops than to expose Episcopacie to the scorne of adversaries IV. Also it would provoke envie and jealousie if there were two Bishops in one Dioecesse and would but draw oppression upon the weaker side V. And if a generall conversion happened which God in his mercy bring to passe two Bishops should meet in one See and neither would yeeld to his fellow A consideration which would ever keepe the erroneous Bishop from his conversion VI. The reformed Church of France living under the crosse and expecting the generall conversion is better without Bishops for it is a body prepared for obedience whensoever the Popish Bishops shall reforme the Church and themselves And once they were brought to that tryall as you may read in an Epistle of Peter Martyr to Beza The Bishop of Troyes who was borne Prince of Melfe having abjured Popery began to preach the pure Word of God in his Cathedrall Church and sent for the Elders of the reformed Church to know whether they would confirme and acknowledge him for their Bishop Which they all with one consent did and submitted themselves unto his authority There is none I dare say of all the Churches of France but would doe as much in the like case None but would obey Bishops if Bishops would reforme and obey God Till God extend so much mercy upon that Kingdome the poore Churches will stay for the leisure of the Bishops and keepe themselves in an estate fit for obedience VII Neither would their King suffer them to chuse Bishops of their own if they would attempt it For since their Synods provoke jealousie a Bishops Court would provoke more jealousie and authority continued in one man would be more obnoxious to envie and obloquie then consultations of amultitude intermitted from Synod to Synod and under severall Presidents et ad tempus Had our gracious King Charles and his Counsell the same necessitie to tolerate the Papists as Henry the IV. of France had to reward the Protestants that were a strong body and by whom he had beene promoted to the Crown yet I think not that his Majestie would suffer them to have Bishops or admit of any jurisdiction but immediately depending upon him The reformed Churches of France have no jurisdiction and looke for none and if your Presbyteries of Scotland would containe themselves in the same modestie the Covenant would go down and the King should be obeyed Of all these reasons there is none that can serve your turne wherefore our want of Bishops cannot be a president for your putting down of Bishops Since you live under no crosse and have such a gracious Defender of the faith for your Soveraigne and both the Kingdoms of this Island professe the same holy Doctrine to frame another Ecclesiasticall Discipline besides that which his Majestie alloweth and the Church hath kept for many ages it is framing two livers in a body that hath but one head and one heart For of this Island the King is the head and Religion is the heart both the which would have but one Discipline as it were one liver to disperse blood and spirit into the severall parts of the whole body with one and the same Oeconomie eyere where Certainly if France had but one heart for Religion I am perswaded they would never sticke for a different Oeconomie of Discipline And the truth is neither you nor they have a setled Discipline and therefore both need lesse to stand upon it This is the last Article of the French Discipline These things which are here contained concerning the Discipline are not so decreed but that if the benefit of the Church do require it they may be altered Neither doe the French busie their heads about points of Discipline else it would be seene in their writings But wheresoever they like the Doctrine they embrace the Discipline In the yeare 1615. my reverend Father was sent for by King Iames of glorious and blessed memory some discontented brethren in London seeing him highly favoured by his Majesty came to him with a bill of grievances to be represented to the King which my Father having perused returned it unto them againe saying That their exceptions were frivolous For Ceremonies and other points of Discipline I doe not finde you conformable with the French Whether you celebrate the holy Communion with such reverence as they do in France let your owne consciences answer You know there are two gestures of praying practised from the beginning in the Church kneeling and standing The English pray kneeling at the Communion the French standing For they sit not at the Table like the Dutch wherein the French Church of London consisting most of Wallons followeth the Dutch but walke to the holy Table and there with a reverent congey receive the Sacrament which the people taketh not
in the dish as it is with the Dutch but the Minister delivereth it to every Communicant When I received in my countrey the Minister used these words It is the body of the Lord Iesus Christ which suffered for your sinnes It is the blood of the Lord Iesus Christ which was shed for your sinnes And it is an expresse Article of their Discipline That the due reverence belonging to the holy Communion Cap. 12. Art 12 be carefully maintained The distribution of the Cup by a Lay-Deacon is worne out of use among them and whereas it was brought in in the beginning and in time of persecution it was afterwards removed Cap. 12. Art 9. by a Canon of their Discipline and by way of fact in all the Churches And whereas at the first as in all beginnings of reformation every one taught his neighbour Jbid. and for want of Ministers Lay Deacons would catechize It was declared by an Article of their Discipline That the office of those Deacons is not to preach the Word of God nor to administer the Sacraments As for the power of their Lay-Elders it is little more than the office of Churchwardens in England Their office is to look to the disorders of the flocke and give account of it to the Consistory as Church-wardens put in their Presentments in the Spirituall Court A voice they have in the Censures but the determination and pronouncing of the Censure belongs to the Minister They and the people together may admit or refuse a Minister chosen by the Synod if the King give way to it And so it must needs be where there is neither Bishop nor Living nor right of Patronage Chamier Tom. 2. Lib. 5. c. 2. Nos certe praeter electorum Ministrorum approbationem vel reprobationem nullas esse partes plebis censomus in Ecclesiastico regimine We hold indeed saith Chamier that besides approving or refusing the Ministers chosen the Laity hath nothing to doe in the government of the Church This is all the power of the Laity No mention there of ruling Elders that have alwayes the casting voice Page 424. of his Majesties large Declaration of which his Majesty saith very truly That it is a course unheard of in any Church and in any age The notable difference betweene the French Elders and the Scottish In the Yeare 1631. was justified not long since by one M. Adam Stewart a Scottishman heretofore Reader of Philosophie in Sedan who finding there the Consistory ruled as it ought to be by the Clergie of the place kept a great coyle to raise the power of the Lay-Eldership which had no such ambition and grew so violent in his course that after a long forbearance and moderation of the Ministers they were forced to excommunicate him and crave the Princes helpe who banished him out of his dominions Being put out of Sedan he went to Paris where he offered to stirre the same matter but he had no better successe there Neither shall ye finde among the Protestants of France that aversion from the Spirituall Courts which is among you For although they have more reason to hate the Spirituall Courts of Popery by whom they have suffered much yet the Canons of their Discipline allow them to resort to the Spirituall Courts to sue for their right Cap. 14. Art 8.9 10. and Protestant Advocates are allowed to plead there And which is more Protestants are allowed to exercise jurisdictions and procurations under the Clergie of Rome Ibid. Art 10. if so be they do not concerne that which they call spirituality Also to be farmers of Tithes Art 2. Priories and Church-demeanes Which sheweth that when they forbid Pastors to possesse any land under the title of Pastors Cap. 1 art 40 it is not because they disallow that the Church should possesse demeanes But because in the present povertie and paritie if some few had Livings and the rest none they conceive it would breed envie and factions in the Church As for Holy-dayes they observe reverently the dayes of Christmas Easter Ascension and Pentecost And where they have Sermons upon Week dayes as at Charenton by Paris upon Thursdayes they will change the day when there is a Holy-day of some note in the weeke This is Calvins counsell upon that point I would have you constant in refusing Holy-dayes yet so Calvini Epistola ad Montbelgardenses In festis non recipiendis cuperem vos esse constantiores sic tamen ut non litigetis de quibuslibet sed de iis tantum quae nec in aedificanonem quicquam factura sunt superstitionem prima ipsa facie prae se ferunt Nam in papatu magna celebritate Conceptionem Ascensionem Virginis coluerunt that you picke not a quarrell with every Holy-day but with those onely that are not at all for edification and beare a stamp of superstition in the front And he giveth them for example the feasts of the Conception and Ascension of the blessed Virgin which are also refused by the English Church But generally of all Holy-dayes the French Discipline commandeth Cap. 14. Art 21. that No scandall shall bee committed by working on dayes appointed to rest according to the Kings Edict And it were to bee wished that the Scots were no more refractarie to their good King the pious Defender of their Faith than the French Protestants are to their Soveraigne though of contrary religion even in those points of Ecclesiasticall Discipline How they stand affected in all points of Ceremonies and outward Order you may see by their Confession presented to the Emperour and the Princes of Germanie Wee acknowledge that both all Churches Confess Eccles Gallicar inter Opuscula Calvini Fatemur tum omnes tum singulas Ecclesias hoc jus habere ut leges et statuts sibi condāt ad politiam communem inter suos const ituendam cum omnia in domo Dei ritè ordine fieri oporteat Ejusmodi porto statutis obedientiam deferendam esse modò ne conscientias astringant neque superstitio illis adhibeatur Qui hoc detrectent cerebrosi pervicaces apud nos habentur and every Church have that right to make Lawes and Statutes for themselves to establish a publike Order among their own people since all things must be done in the House of God decently and with order and that obedience must bee yeelded to such statutes so they doe not binde the consciences and no superstition be mingled with them Those that will doe against this we hold them peevish and stubborne people You have heard Beza before perswading the English brethren to obedience unto their Prelates In the same Epistle hee tells them That the Surplice is of no such importance that the Ministers should leave their function Blza ad quesdam Anglicar Ecclesiarum fratres Non videntur ista tanti momenti ut propterea vel Pastoribus deserendum potius sit Ministerium quam ut vestes
A LETTER OF A FRENCH PROTESTANT TO A SCOTISHMAN OF THE COVENANT VVherein one of their chiefe pretences is removed which is their conformitie with the French Churches in points of Discipline and Obedience LONDON Printed by R. Young and R. Badger 1640. A LETTER OF A FRENCH PROTESTANT TO A SCOTISHMAN OF THE COVENANT SIR AS there hath been for many ages a great relation between France and Scotland for matters of State the like hath been in matters of Religion betweene the Protestant Churches of both the Kingdomes ever since the reformation But I wish that our example be not mistaken and abused to our disparagement and your mine and the perpetuall disgrace of Christian Religion For whereas in one of your Petitions to his Majestie you are confident Alledged in the large Declaration of his Majestie pag. 417. that your neighbour-Churches will approve all your proceedings your neighbour-Churches of France have solemnly disapproved all your proceedings and herein given good satisfaction to his Majestie For it was ever farre from our wishes that your conformitie with the reformed Churches of France should be mis-applied as a pretence of your expulsing of your Bishops much lesse a president for you to take armes against your gracious Soveraigne Wherefore I will endeavour to remove that false colour set upon the violent counsels of the Covenant and shew to the world that for your differences with Episcopall authoritie which are now broken into a quarrell you had neither president nor incouragement from us And since it pleaseth his Majestie in the beginning of his Royal Declaration to make this one of his two ends to manifest his justice and piety to the reformed Churches abroad these reformed Churches are bound in dutie of thankfulnesse to shew how they rest satisfied of his Majesties justice and pietie For my part although I am happily engrafted into the body of the Church of England I may be admitted in this case to speake as a Frenchman borne that knoweth the tenets of that Church better then strangers that would abuse the example of the French to their owne ends And I am assured in my conscience that when I was adopted by the Church of England I was not removed into another Gospel This also I may affirme of mine owne knowledge that the French Divines and other godly men that travell into England returne home with great satisfaction seeing the soundnesse of doctrine and decencie of order so well matched together and joyne their hearty praises with the Te Deum and Magnificat of our Quires praising God chiefly because they see the puritie of the Gospel and the Royall Authority linked together with a most neere interest in their mutuall conservation The conformitie which you claime with the French is triple with their doctrine with their discipline and in the present quarrell with their actions And the French will heartily embrace a Christian conformity with you so farre as you shall not draw their necessitie into counsell nor their faults into example As for the conformitie in doctrine blessed be God that among all the reformed Churches of Europe there is neither deformity nor difformity in that point All the reformed Churches professe the same holy faith with you and of that faith the Kings Majestie is Defender of which he hath lately published many solemne protestations to the great satisfaction of all good Christians both within and without the Kingdome Here let all that love Gods glorie and the union of his Church upon earth Ezra 7.17 say Blessed be the Lord God of our fathers who hath put such a thing as this in the Kings heart Psal 61.7 The Lord prolong the Kings life O prepare mercy and truth that may preserve him It were superfluous to prove the consent of all reformed Churches with the Church of England in points of doctrine None of them but will say as much to the English Prelates as Beza to Bishop Grindall * Beza epist 8. ad Grindal Episcopum Londmensem Gallicas vestras Ecclesias in omnibus fidei capitibus consentire arbitramur Wee hold that the French Churches agree with yours in all points of faith He that set forth all the Confessions of the Reformed Churches in one volume hath not lost his praise for concealing his name Never was a more precious harmonie none more like a heaven upon earth such an evident consent needeth rather praises to God then proofes As for points of Discipline the difference of some Churches from that of England if charity were on both sides ought to set forth the consent in points of faith with more reverence and admiration As Irenaeus writing to Victor about the different Fasting of the Eastern and Western Churches 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The difference of Fasting saith he confirmeth the union in faith For that in such a difference of climats nations manners and policies there should be such an union in faith It is the Lords doing and it is marvellous in our eyes A main point of difference pretended by the Covenanters is the superioritie of Bishops for I will not search into your other aimes which you affirme to be Antichristian and contrarie to the Word of God wherein I see not how you can claime conformitie with the French Churches The French indeed have no Bishops but they never put downe Bishops nor induced others to put downe Bishops And you know that our Saviour puts a difference between breaking of commandements Matth. 5.19 and teaching men so Now to have Bishops is a commandement and none of the least for it is an Apostolicall order Suppose then that the French breake it yet they doe not teach men so And I will endeavour to shew you that they teach men otherwise and that it is necessitie not choice that keepeth them from Episcopall order But the Scots break that commandement and teach men so and represent the Antichrist in no other habit then a Rochet and a Miter That the French Divines doe not teach men so and allow not the abolishing of Bishops it may easily bee justified For in the matter of Geneva there was more Politicall then Theologicall reasons for refusing their Bishop The Bishop of Geneva was also their Prince who had such power there as the Duke in Venice and was rather Governour then Soveraigne For the people had that right to elect foure Syndics These you have in a book called Le Citadin Genevois and give them full power It is the 22. Article of their authenticall Charter And without the counsell consent and expresse will of those Syndics and of the Citizens none was to be absolved or condemned in the Citie It is the 14. Article of their Charter Before any Bishop was admitted hee swore to observe and maintaine these liberties and so did the last Bishop Ann. 1523. Who afterwards being found to treat with the Duke of Savoy to deliver the Citie into his hands a great uproare arose in the Citie which the Bishop
authority and their incroachments upon the civill power and their pretended independencie from any but the Pope whereby they make regnum in regno another kingdome in every kingdome But although I would not clip their wings so short as Calvin would have yet I wish for your owne good that the Churches of Scotland would yeeld to Bishops as much power as Calvin doth even the power of censures and of presenting and ordaining Priests c Calvin tractat de necessitate reformandae Ecclesiae Potestatem nominandi ordinandi retincant justum illud serium doctrinae vitae examen restituant quod sanè multis saeculis obsolevit Let Bishops retaine the power of naming and ordaining Priests Let them restore that just and serious examination of doctrine and life which is growne out of use many ages agone It is not then the use but the abuse of Bishops that Calvin and the Reformed Churches of France reject And were it in their power they would not put downe Bishops They onely crave the reformation of Religion and are ready to submit themselves to Episcopall power Zanchius above all the Outlandish Writers is expresse upon that point who indeed is no Frenchman but of the like Discipline This is his Protestation That before God and in his conscience Hier. Zanch. Thesib de vera reformandarum Ecclesiarum ratione Testor me coram Deo in mea conscientia non alio habere loco quà m Schismaticorum illos omnes qui in parte reformationis Ecclesiarum ponunt nullos habere Episcopos qui authoritatis gradu supra fuos compresbyteros emineant ubi liquidò possunt haberi Praeterea cum D. Calvino nullo non anathemate dignos censeo quotquot illi Hierarchiae quae se Domino Jesu submittit subjici nolunt he holds them all for no better then Schismatickes that set this downe as a part of reformation of the Churches to have no Bishops that have any eminence of degree and authoritie above their true fellow-Priests where they may well be had And besides that he holds with * That place cited out of Calvin is in his Treatise de necessitate reformandae Ecclesiae Calvin that they are all worthy of any execration that will not submit themselves unto that Hierarchie that submitteth it selfe unto the Lord Jesus Christ Here is a coard with two strings the authority of two worthy men together The same Zanchius saith a little before Hee that will receive and follow the use and the opinion of the universall Church Ibid. Qui universalis ominium locorum temporum usque ad hanc aetatem usum sensum Ecclesiae certum habet sequiturque interpretem facilè intelligit diversos gradus Presbyterorum Episcoporum in gubernatione Ecclesiastica esse secundum Dei verbum semper fuisse Proinde ubi vigent non esse abolendos ubicunque iniquitas temporum eos abolevit aut non tulit esse restituendos in all times and places unto this age for a certaine interpreter of Gods word will easily understand that the severall degrees of Priests and Bishops in the Ecclesiasticall government are and ever were according to Gods word and therefore where they stand still they must not bee abolished And where the contrarietie of times hath abolished or not suffered them they must bee set up againe This was also the tenet of Martin Bucer who assisted the reverend Bishops of England in the reformation And although he lived in a Church where Ministers were equall hee delivereth himselfe plainly a Bucer tract de reformanda Ecclesia qui invenitur tom 11. constitut Imperial Annitendum itaque ut ea omnino procurationis Ecclesiasticae ratio ordinatio quam Canones Episcopis Metropolitanis praescribunt restituatur servetur We must endeavour that all the manner and distribution of Ecclesiasticall government which the Canons prescribe unto Bishops and Metropolitans bee restored and maintained Beza himselfe who preferred equalitie before superioritie in the Church yet hath declared his dislike of those that resisted Episcopall power where it was established For in an Epistle of his to some brethren of England that would bee ruled by him rather then their Bishops at home hee b Beza Epist 12. ad quosdam Anglicarum Ecclesiarum fratres Hortamur ut omni animorum exacerbatione depositâ salvâ manente doctrinae ipsius veritate sanâ conscientiâ alii alios patienter ferant Regiae Majestati clementissimae omnibus Praesulibus suis ex animo obsequantur exhorteth them that leaving all bitternesse as long as the truth of the doctrine and puritie of conscience was safe they would beare one another with patience and obey the Queenes most gracious Majestie and all their Prelates with a free heart And writing to Bishop Grindall hee commends his c Idem Epist 23. ad Episcop Grindal Quòd tu igitur quorundam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pertulisti Reverendissime vir in eo sanè insigne patientiae lenitatis Christianae specimen edidisti quo majore posthac poenâ digni erunt qui porro authoritatem tuam aspernabuntur Christian lenitie and patience for bearing with the selfe-conceited pride of some and saith that they shall deserve a greater punishment that will reject againe his authoritie I confesse this was much from Beza who was none of the best friends to the Episcopall degree but yet his desire of concord in the Church and obedience to publike order was greater then his aversion from Bishops And I wish that many among you were no worse disposed The latter Divines among the French are very expresse upon this point My Reverend Father Doctor Du Moulin in his * Peter Du Moulin in his Buckler of the faith upon the 30. Article of the French Confession Sect. 124. Buckler of the Faith is altogether for Episcopacie and proveth the Antiquitie of it and that it begun a yeere after our Saviours death And sheweth how the Apostles were the founders of that order sending the Reader to the 32 Chapt. of the booke of Prescriptions by Tertullian where hee reckoneth the Apostolicall Churches whose Bishops were established by the Apostles And whereas it is alledged against the Episcopall degree that there was in the Primitive Church two Bishops in one Towne hee tells you that in all the Antiquitie it is hard to find three or foure examples of two Bishops in one Towne Ibid. for the generall custome was against it as Theodoret Chrysostome and Hierome upon the first to the Philippians witnesse and Saint Austin in his 110th Epistle There also hee complaineth as farre as hee may of the disorders that follow equalitie relating and allowing the just objections of the English Clergie in these words They say AND THAT WITH GOOD REASON that no societie no family no common-wealth can prosper without some degrees of superioritie and that it is so among the Angels and in the government of the universall World That God established degrees
illas assumant vel gregibus omittendum publicurn pabulum potius quam ita vestitos Pastores audiant Jbid. De geniculatione in Coena De cantu Ecclesiae Crucis consignatione Puerorum baptizandotum interrogatione non est magnopere laborandum rather than weare that garment and the people should leave the publike food of Gods Word rather than heare the Pastors that weare it Likewise for kneeling at the Communion Church-musicke the Crosse in Baptisme and asking questions to children in Baptisme He thus delivereth his opinion De his non est magnopere laborandum One should not trouble himselfe much about such things And Calvin praiseth Hooper for opposing himselfe manfully against the Extreme Vnction but blameth him for being too obstinate against the Cope and Surplice The French Protestants keepe their zeale of religion for higher matters Calvinus Bullingero pag. 98. Edit onis Genevensis an 1576 than a Surplice or a Crosse in Baptisme and wonder much that for such small things you would parallell them with Antichrist that maintaine the same holy Faith with you But if those ceremonies be a yoke upon your consciences the yoke is removed and his Majesty is graciously pleased not to urge them upon you which would never have bin granted if the King and his Councell had thought them to be in their nature necessary and binding the conscience And though Episcopall order which the King will have you to receive were a yoke upon your consciences Thinke on the other side that rebelling against your Soveraign is a staine upon your consciences And you are no good Divines if you choose rather a foule staine then a light yoke Neither doe you consider that you may suffer a wrong in your Christian liberty without wronging your conscience as Beza saith very worthily Beza Epistola eadem Possunt ae etiam debent multa tolerari quae tamen non recte praecipiuntur Many things may yea and must be borne with which are not rightly injoyned For spirituall libertie lieth not in the outward act but in the intention and beliefe If a thing wicked in it selfe be injoyned unto us it must neither be obeyed in the act nor assented unto in the understanding and the will But if the thing be indifferent in it selfe and yet seeme in the judgement inconvenient we may and must do it and neither wrong our libertie nor our conscience for in such cases our actions are limited though our consciences be free and the superiour power may binde us in foro exteriori and leave us free in foro interiori wherein Christian libertie lieth Spirituall libertie Calvin Instit. l. 4 c. 20. Art 1. Spiritualis libertas cum politica servitute optime stare potest and politicall bondage will stand very well together saith Calvin And let not the consequence trouble you As long as the thing commanded is lawfull in it selfe we are not answerable of the consequence that may follow but they that command it and we that move in the inferiour orbe of obedience must quietly follow the motions of the higher spheare of authoritie To pull against it inconsiderately under pretence of Gods service is dashing the second Table against the first and breaking both That man abuseth Christian libertie Beza Epist. 24. ad peregrinarum Ecclesiarum in Anglia fratres Consequitur eum abuti Christianae libert t is beneficro qui vel suis Magistratibus vel praepositis suis sponte non paret in Domino nec conscientiam fratrum aedificare studet or rather is yet sold under sinne that will not with a free will obey in the Lord his Magistates or Superiours and seeketh not to edifie the consciences of his brethren saith Beza But though it were a thing granted that the orders imposed upon you by his Majestie are not indifferent but ungodly and Antichristian Are you therefore allowed to defend Religion with rebellion Will ye call the Divell to the helpe of God Sure it is a prodigious kinde of Christian libertie for a subject to draw his sword against his Soveraigne You that stand so much upon the point of conscience Ought ye not to be subject for consciences sake Rom. 13.5 Were your Soveraigne unjust and froward and his commands injurious unto God Had ye instead of our pious Defender of the faith a fierce Dioclesian Illud solis precibus et patientia sanari potest Nothing will mend it but prayers and patience Beza ibib It is Beza's counsell to the discontented brethren of England conformable to that of S. Peter For it is better if the will of God be so that ye suffer for well doing 1 Pet. 3.17 then for evill doing If the Soveraigne come to kill the subject for his religion The subject must yeeld him his throate not charge his Pike against him Calvin lived in the time of the hottest persecutions and had credit enough to have made the people to take armes to defend the libertie of their consciences But this is his doctrine If we be persecuted for godlinesse by an impious and sacrilegious Prince Let us first of all remember our sins which no doubt are corrected by God with such scourges Calvin Instit l. 4. c. 20. art 29. Si ab impio sacrilego Principe vexamur ob pietatem subeat primum delictorum nostrorum recordatio quae talibus haud dubâ—e Domini flagellis castigantur Inde humilitas impatientiam nostram fraenabit Succurrat deinde haec cogitatio non nostrum esse hu jusmodi malis mederi hoc tantum esse reliquum ut Domini opem imploremus cujus in manu sunt regum corda regnorum inclinationes This will bridle our impatience with humilitie Then let this thought come into our minds That it is not our part to mend such evils And this only remaineth unto us even to call upon Gods helpe in whose hand are the hearts of Kings and the inclinations of Kingdomes And whereas in the same Chapter he teacheth that in case the King command any thing contrary to Gods command we must obey God rather then men he will not have Christians to fight for righteousnesse but to suffer for righteousnesse Ibid. art vlt. Hac nos cogitatione consolemur illam tum nos praestare quam Deus exigit obedientiam dum quidvis perpetimur potius quam a pietate deflectamus Let this thought comfort us saith he that we yeeld unto the King that obedience which God requireth when we suffer any thing rather than turne aside from Godlinesse And how the good man was averse from taking armes against a Soveraigne under pretence of religion he sheweth it in his Epistle to Francis the first of France If any saith he under colour of the Gospell trouble your state Calvin Epist ad Franciscum 1. Regem quae este ante Institutiones Quod si qui sub praetextu Evangelii tumultuantur quales hactenus in regno tuo fuisse non compertum est sunt
leges legum poenae quibus pro meritis graviter exerceantur Modò ne interim Evangelium Dei ob scelestorum hominum nequitiam male audiat and hitherto there hath beene none such in your Kingdome there are lawes and penall statutes to represse them severally according to their deserts so that in the meane while the Gospell of God be not defamed for the malice of wicked men And after many just complaints to the King for the fearefull executions used against his partie Ibid. Sin vero ita aures tuas occupant malevolorum susurri ut nullus sit reis pro se dicendi locus importunae vero illae Furiae te connivente semper vinclis flagris equuleis sectionibus incendiis saeviunt Nos quidem ut oves mactationi destinatas ad extrema quaeque redigemur sic tamen ut in patientia nostra possideamus animas nostras manum Domini fortem expectemus quae indubie in tempore aderit he endeth thus We indeed like sheepe kept for theslaughter may be brought to any extremity yet still we will possesse our soules in patience and looke for the mightie hand of God which certainly will assist us in due time These are the armes the forces and the munitions which the Church of that time opposed to their Soveraigne in time of persecution And not to loade this Epistle with testimonies of the late French Writers The Churches of France have lately declared to his Majesties Ambassador there their utter dislike of the insurrection of Scotland under pretence of a Covenant with Christ But I see an objection comming which as farre as I can ghesse hath prevailed with many to draw them to the present insurrection That let the French Churches give never so good counsell of obedience yet their actions give to the Scots a president to take armes for the defence of their religion And this is likely that which made the Covenanters say in one of their Petitions to his Majesty Pag. 417. of his Majesties large Declaration that the neighbour Churches would approve all their proceedings I might answer that the case is not alike the two Courts of Great Britaine and France being so different in Religion and the Scots not being prest to alter their Religion as the French were for a long time But because there can be no just cause to take armes against a lawfull Soveraigne two things may be said to that objection First that to take counsell of a friend you must take him when he is in cold blood not when he is drawing his sword Looke to the opinions and behaviour of their Divines not to the actions of some rash heads Next if you look how they have done you must look also how they have sped and you shall have little encouragement to follow their example But not to wrong my Countreymen If you read their History from the yeare 1560. when the civill warres begun you shall finde that most part of the time their warres had such and so important occasisions as your party cannot bring for the present disorders Henry the II. of France died about the yeare 1560. leaving foure sonnes under age the eldest whereof Francis the II. raigned little above one yeare and his brother Charles the IX was some ten yeares old when he began to raigne During the minority of these Kings the Queene mother by the assistance of the house of Guise excluded the Princes of the blood from the protection of the Kings person and kingdome which was their right The Princes being Protestants and finding a discontented party who for the space of wellnigh forty yeares had suffered a most fierce persecution easily drew to their side all the Protestants of France and so twisted their interests with the interest of Religion that they never made a peace for themselves alone but for the whole party By which severall peaces they got Edicts in their favour and places of defence and grew a considerable party King Charles the IX being come to age and finding a troubled State sought to quench with blood the fire kindled in his kingdome and by a treacherous match of his sister with the young King of Navarre got the Heads of the Protestants to Paris and there slew them This was the famous feast of S. Bartholomew 1572. upon which and some moneths after there was above fourescore thousand of the Protestant party killed in cold blood throughout all the kingdome This usage though it cannot justifie the Protestants for taking armes afterwards for their defence yet it taketh away great part of the reproach it being no wonder if those that have suffered more than nature can beare will doe more than duty can justifie Charles the IX being dead two yeares after the Massacre Henry the III. succeeded who being of a milder temper than his brother the Protestants enjoyed some quiet for a while which his Popish subjects disliking or rather his mother whose ordinary course was to keep her authority by publike divisions the League began presently for the extirpation of the Protestant party without the Kings consent yet the King being a timorous man was drawne to it perforce in the end In the meane while the King of Navarre and the rest of the Protestants stood upon their defence I will not determine whether they ought to have yeelded their throats to the slaughter the persecution being not raised against them by their Soveraigne but by a Covenant of his subjects with the Pope and the King of Spaine before the King had given way to it But the King himselfe soone justified their armes for perceiving that the League was a yoke upon his owne necke which devested him of his right and brought into the kingdome another authority than his own he renounced the League and called the King of Navarre and the Protestants to his aid who did him faithfull service with great alacrity and valour till the King being dead in the yeare 1589. the right of the Crowne fell to the Head of their party the King of Navarre whom by Gods blessing and their valour they raised to the Throne and helped him not onely with their sword but maintained him with their purses and did him such services as could not be repaid King Henry the IV. having removed from the League all pretences of bearing armes against him as an Hugonot by forsaking the reformed Religion to our infinite griefe and losse And seeing his Protestant party justly discontented granted them liberty of Religion and a lease for yeares of certaine places of safety which as the French Protestants expound it would have been to no purpose had it not been to defend themselves by way of armes when they should be vexed So they did afterwards when King Lewis now reigning redemanded those places and would continue the lease no longer Till the reigne of King Lewis the armes of the Protestants were either justifiable or excusable But their wars in his time were neither and they prospered accordingly