the Magistrate and some of them are not ashamed to calumniate Presbyterians as if they gave as little to the Magistrate as Papists do 2. From the touchy sense that all in Authority have of any thing that diminishes or but seems to diminish their Power or to derogate from it 3. From my L. Chancellours displeasure at Mr. B. and his question proposed about the Magistrates Power of confining and Mr. H's beginning and ending his Discourse with that desire that their Lordships would not mistake Mr. B. That it 's a wonder how a Person that had any imagination at all could miss the purpose of this Discourse But yet all these objective Evidences which might have as Guides led his imagination to the true design of Mr. H's Discourse were overswayed by two more intimate Guides which like ill Ghosts haunted his imagination in the matters relating to Indulged Ministers I mean his Passion and Prejudice which habitually mis-guided him in these matters and led him out of the right way which was obvious into extravagant phantasms and imaginations which are so wild that it 's a wonder how any man who had but common sense to rectifie his imagination could give way let be with-gate to them or how he could suffer them to arise or if they had started when he was not adverting how he could behold them without laughter or indignation but that he should have entertained them and bewildered himself and his followers in following them is one of the wildest Wild-goose Chases imaginable There is one thing somewhat singular in this Authors imagination in these matters that his imagination hath a habitual mishap of missing the right way and taking the wrong I do not remember of any Person to whom I can compare him in this except one who was a Servant to a Gentleman of my Acquaintance of whom I heard his Master say that when his Servant took the guiding of the way he constantly mistook when he came where there were two ways he was sure to take the wrong way which his Master having often observed he resolved when there was any doubt of the way never to take the way which his man took but the way which he left and so he was sure not to be mistaken But yet I must give the Historian the pre-eminence in wandring for that Servant took but one wrong way at once but the Historian when he hath prosecuted one wrong imaginary way in which no foot hath trod before him and followed it out till he could win no further he immediately comes back and at the same pass where he began to wander he takes another wrong way and then another and so forth till he hath wearied himself and his followers to no purpose and which is yet worse after all these wandrings he never comes right That Servant I spoke of came back to his Master to the right way but the Author having no other Guide but his own imagination miscarried by Prejudice and Passion wanders habitually when he begins to guess at the Indulged Ministers meaning and upon a false imagination that they meant something which never came in their head he pursues after them in a way which they never took nor dreamed of and then to be sure to overtake them some way he begins again if they meant not that they meant this and then again pursues and so fashes himself in following his own fancies but for the true meaning of these Ministers he ordinarily misses it though it be most obvious to any who will not hood-wink himself Any who looks but with half an eye into this Controversie about the limits of the Magistrates and Ministers Power and into this business which was before the Council will see that it was most necessary to add what Mr. H. added to Mr. B's words both for clearing Mr. B's meaning and for preventing the Objections that the Magistrate or others for the Magistrate might make against an Assertion which seemed to exclude the Magistrate from having any Power about Church Canons or the exercise of the Ministry to which there was nothing added to clear what Power the Magistrate had in reference to matters of Religion Might they not have Objected Ye will we see take no Instructions from Magistrates nor commands to Regulate the exercise of your Ministry Ye will make Rules your selves for Regulating your Ministry but ye will admit us to make none for any thing we hear from you Ye ascribe no Power to us about matters of Religion What can the Magistrate do nothing for the Reformation and preservation of Religion and for Reforming Ministers Is the Magistrate bound up that he cannot hinder the making or execution of wrong Canons What if a Church-Assembly a Council agree upon Arrianism and resolve to Preach this to the Magistrates Subjects What if they make Canons for Idolatry for adoring Images as the 2d Nicen Council did What if they agree to publish the error of Transubstantiation and to lift up the Bread in the Eucharist to be adored by the People What if they agree upon a Church-policy manifestly contrary to the Scripture and require the Subjects to subject themselves to be ruled by these Rules of Policy of their own making Shall the Magistrate suffer his Subjects to be poisoned with Heresie Idolatry corrupt Church-mens Tyranny Can he do nothing to hinder the making of such Heretical Idolatrous Tyrannical Canons or to crush them and hinder the execution of them when they are made Must he blindly assent to all the Canons Kirk-men enact and add his Civil Sanction to them and see to the execution of them that is to promove the eternal destruction of his own Subjects Does not the confession of Faith allow to the Magistrate a Power for Reformation and conservation of Religion And our latest Confession of Faith though it assert Chap. 31. Sect. 3. That it belongs to Synods and Councils Ministerially to determine Controversies of Faith and Cases of Conscience to set down Rules and Directions for the better Ordering of the Publick Worship of God and Government of his Church to receive complaints in cases of male Administration and Authoritatively determine the same yet it doth not assert that though these Decrees be contrary to the Word of God that they are to be received by any and much less by the Magistrate for it 's added in that same Article Which Decrees and Determinations if consonant to the Word of God are to be received with Reverence and Submission not only for their agreement to the Word but also for the Power whereby they are made as being an Ordinance of God appointed thereto in his Word And though that same late Coâ—fession Chap. 23. Article 3. affirm that the Civil Magistrate may not assume to himself the Administration of the Word and Sacraments or the power of the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven yet he hath Authority and it is his Duty to take Order that Unity and Peace be preserved in the Church
called in question and that the hearing of Ministers depends upon their own pleasure they are better pleased to stay at home on the Sabbath than to go any where to hear any Minister and this is like to prevail with people who have not any true principle of Religion for this is an easie way and pleasing to flesh and blood Farm The Indulged Ministers do not bring forward the whole Reformation with them they have no Presbyteries Synods General Assemblies they have quit these Our godly Ancestors would have taken nothing except they had gotten all they would not have quit with a hoof and seeing it is so how should we own them or hear them who are so far degenerate from the zeal of the Ministers of Christ who lived in former times Min. This reason if it were good would cast all the Ministers who are not Indulged as well as the Indulged for they want Presbyteries Synods and General Assemblies in the fields or houses where they Preach they do not bring the whole frame of Presbyterian Government along with them where they come to Preach and if you do not disown them because they want general Assemblies c. why should you disown Indulged Ministers upon this account Will you add affliction to the afflicted And because the Lord in his righteous Judgments hath taken away these solemn Courts of his House which were great blessings to the Church and hath scattered his Servants will ye as far as in you lies deprive them of the power of Preaching the Gospel because they have not access to the exercise of Government This looks like a judicial infatuation to cast at any remnant of Gods Ordinances because ye have not all doth this look like humility or looks this like the frame of the Godly Israelites who when the stately Temple was ruined yet took pleasure in the Stones of Zion and favoured the Dust thereof 2. General Assemblies Synods Presbyteries were taken away long before the Indulgence and therefore 't is a foolish Calumny which hath no shadow of likelihood that the Indulged Ministers by accepting the Indulgence did quit these Courts for they were quit and gone before the Indulgence the Indulged Ministers got somewhat of that which they formerly had liberty to Preach without hazard in some places and to keep Church-Sessions but they quit nothing when they accepted of that 3. 'T is a great wrong done to our Ancestors to alledge that they were such humorous Fools that they would take nothing from the Magistrate if he withheld any thing which was due to the Church They did indeed desire all the Churches priviledges but they took what they could get and made the best use of it in the mean time till more came Although Queen Mary laboured to impose Popery upon the Nation and was far from granting all which She should have granted yet as they who were of the Reformed Religion were far from scrupling to seek and petition for liberty to their Ministers to Preach the Gospel so when these Petitions or any part thereof was granted they thankfully accepted of what was granted And although King James and his Heirs and Successors have a vast Supremacy setled upon them Anno 1584. Parl. 8. James 6. And though he exerted that Supremacy yet the Ministers though they found themselves deprived of their priviledges which they judged due to the Church and though several of them were imprisoned banished for their adhering to these priviledges yet they were always willing to take the liberty of Preaching the Gospel when the King granted it and when they could not get access to their own Charges they did take other Charges Mr. Bruce did not return to Edenburgh his proper Charge but to Larber When Mr. Scrimgeour Minister of Kinghorn was outed he was so glad when he heard that an honest Minister would be permitted to go to his Charge that he said O to have it but one day old I would with joy bear him on my back to have the Gospel preached to my poor people Mr. Welch a man of God when he was imprisoned in the Castle of Edenburgh for holding the Assembly at Aberdeen he was so far from refusing to take liberty to Preach from the King till he repented and restored the Churches priviledges and till the Church got all that was due that he desires the Lord Ochletree to carry a Petition from him to his Majesty intreating for liberty to Preach the Gospel And thus he owned a lawful Civil Supremacy in the King and sued for its lawful exercise in granting the liberty to Preach the Gospel even when he was suffering upon the account of his disowning the Kings spiritual or vast Supremacy Dr. Sharp after his banishment returns not to his own Charge but to Edenburgh when permitted In the Reign of King Charles the First they begin with a Petition to be free of Innovations afterward they Petition for an Assembly they were not of that opinion that they would seek or take nothing from the King except he would right all that was wrong in the Government and Worship at the first The famous Assembly of Divines which met at Westminster and composed the Confession of Faith Catechisms Directory for Worship c. when called together by the Parliament in the year 1643. they were not only all nominated by the Parliament but the Prolocutor was named and chosen to them by Ordinance of Parliament also they were limited so as to meddle only with the exercise of dogmatick power and that only in such matters as should from time to time be proposed to them by the Parliament and in case of difference among themselves they were to receive directions from the Houses of Parliament and beside many other things that Ordinance of the Lords and Commons provides in the close that they in that Assembly shall not assume to exercise any Jurisdiction Power or Authority Ecclesiastical whatsoever or any other power than is herein particularly expressed Yet these Divines did not refuse to sit because of the limitations and restraints although divers of these cannot but be looked on as incroaching too much upon that Assemblies liberty As also the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland did approve of the said Assembly sent their Commissioners to it who took the Oath of the Assembly and their sitting in that Assembly was approved as the Printed Acts of our Assembly do fully bear I shall here insert a Paper intituled Certain Considerations and Cautions agreed upon by the Ministers of London and Westminster and within the Lines of Communication June 19. 1646. According to which they resolved to put the Presbyterian Government in Execution upon the Ordinance of Parliament heretofore published by Authority Printed by T. R. and E. N. WE Ministers of Christ resident within the Cities of London and Westminster and lines of Communication having seen and read an Order of the Honourable House of Commons Assembled in Parliament bearing date June 9. 1646. requiring and enjoyning
which flows from any sinful Supremany but that he could not do His 5th supposes that they have accepted of the Instructions which is a false supposition and before refuted The paying of money to the Clerks in his Parenthesis pag. 106. was not worth the mentioning These Clerks seek it not by the Prelates Authority but upon the Councils appointment backed with charges of horning and whether it be rather eligible to pay a little mony or to be put to the horn and taken with caption let any sober person judge The scruples that the Author and some others have put in the peoples heads about paying of Stipends to the Conformists and Sessors have wasted some peoples Estates and tends to waste their Consciences for when they are quartered on and eaten up and plundered they are driven to do what they thought sinful and this disposes them to do things that are truly sinful upon temptations and when they are by necessity driven to pay they who wait for their halting alledge they have no Conscience and if they were put to it in other things they would do all that would be required of them Pag. 106. we have his 9th head of Arguments in which he undertakes to prove That the acceptance of the Indulgence is against our Covenants but he hath not proven either here or elsewhere That the Practice of the indulged Ministers was a breach of Covenant The Particulars which he brings to prove this charge have been all refuted above and it 's needless and would be tedious to the Reader to repeat the same things For what he saith page 107. in his fifth Section of the design of the Indulgers to divide though it were proven it would make nothing against the practice of the indulged Ministers for what they did did no ways tend to division They declared themselves before the Council to be of the same Judgment they were of before and they still preach the same Doctrine are for the same Worship Discipline Government They are against Popery Prelacy Error Schism c. as they were before the Indulgence The Covenant obliges to continue in adhering to the good things and opposing the evils mentioned in it but does not oblige the Covenanters that they shall accept of no favour or of a righting of any wrong done to them except they get all the same favour and right done to them at the same time but I remember I spoke of this before Pag. 107. We have his 10th head of Arguments where he undertakes to prove That the indulged Ministers condemn themselves His first particular to prove this is false the indulged Ministers acceptance of the relaxation of the Civil Restraint does not condemn either field or house-meetings In his second he grants That all the Indulged Ministers except one condemn the Supremacy as an usurpation but saith he they have accepted that which purely floweth from the Supremacy and refers to his third head of Arguments Ans 1. This one whom he excepts if he had been alive would have answered for himself but seeing he is at rest I am obliged to do him right in shewing what was his sense of the Supremacy and I shall the rather do it because the Author of the Cup of cold Water says He hath beat his brains to shape a beautiful Mask for the Supremacy and to put a sufferable sense upon it and seeks to seat the eyes of others The Author of the Cup of cold Water casts him as no Seer and not only rejects him from being the man of his Counsel but directs all the servants and people of God to stand aloof from him as one who stands not in the Counsel of God who will seduce pervert and insnare whose breath is contagious and whose speech bewrays him to have the botch of the Court-Creed running upon him Thus he Stigmatizes deposes and excommunicates him satis pro imperio quisquis es It seems the Author of the Cup of cold Water hath neither known that Minister nor yet his opinion concerning the Supremacy and so he hath ignorantly rushed into a multitude of absurdities The Minister whom he thus abuses was a godly able painful Minister of the Gospel and his memory is savoury to those who were acquainted with him he was well versed in Polemick Divinity a man who would not be affrighted or boasted with toome empty words I think I see how he would have smiled at the Author of the Cup of cold Waters Eccho alas it was not Eccho's but Ergo's which he regarded it was not empty sounds whether direct or reflex but sound Reason which would have prevailed with him As for his singular opinion it is true in his answer to the Countrymans Scruples he declares That he doth not think the Supremacy claimed by the Magistrate to be a spiritual Supremacy and gives several Reasons why he conceives it cannot be expounded in that sense but it 's as true that he is so far from putting a beautiful Mask upon the Supremacy That he declares this absolute power established in the King and his Successors to do what they will in Church-affairs without either Council or Parliament is and will be matter of astonishment and that the Act of establishing it is more dangerous than if it did establish Erastianism or the spiritual Supremacy And the Reason of this is clear because although Erastus ' did absurdly imagine That the Magistrate might himself exercise Ecclesiastical Functions or imploy others to exercise these Functions in his name yet he was so far from thinking that the Magistrate might dispose upon and order things sacred according to his pleasure that he hath often declared That he ought to order things sacred according to the prescription of the word of God In his answer to Beza pag. 125. of that Edition printed at Amsterdam Anno 1649. after he hath ascribed all the Government of the Church to the Magistrate he adds Yet as in taking the care of things profane it is not lawful to the Magistrate to pass the bounds of Equity Justice and Honesty that is the prescription of the Laws and Statutes of the Common-wealth so in disposing and ordering things sacred or things pertaining to the worship of God it is far less lawful for the Magistrate in any part to depart from the Prescription of the word of God which he ought to follow as a rule in all things and never to decline from it even in a hairs breadth Whereas by this Act of Supremacy saith the Minister who answered the Countrymans Scruples a King if he will may bring in Popery yea overturn all Religion without consent either of Council or Parliament as we may see in the example of Jeroboam who caused Israel to sin by setting up a Worship of his own devising Is this a beautiful mask shaped for the Supremamacy the Author of the Cup of cold Water should be ashamed and humbled for these absurdities that through misinformation he hath run into is it not strange that one
he refers to the judgment of the Reader pag. 159. I apprehend the Historian durst not for his Conscience conclude that it was sinful to hear or that it was a Duty to withdraw from hearing the Indulged Ministers he knew and his Conscience put him to declare that the acceptance of the Indulgence and the Councils Order as he calls it settling the Indulged Ministers did not make it sinful to hear these Ministers for he confesses that notwithstanding of the settling of these Ministers by the Councils Order yet if there were no other to be heard they not onely might be Lawfully heard and joyned with but they should and ought to be heard See the stating of the Question in his 28 Questions But though he durst not positively conclude the sinfulness of hearing the Indulged Ministers yet the poor People thinks that he hath done it and they are run so far from hearing the Indulged Ministers that they are without his cry to bring them back though there were no other to hear And too many by these questions about hearing are become careless of all hearing and some place their Religion in no hearing It had been good for many they had never intermedled with these questions about hearing for they are by the wind of Erroneous and Schismatical Doctrines driven from the Publick Worship of God And they take the profanation of the Sabbath in despising the Publick Ordinances to be a piece of tenderness and Religion and if the Lord prevent it not they are like to turn Quakers Pagans Atheists and to shake off the very form of Religion both in publick private and secret The Lord in mercy pity and prevent the ruine that the poor People are blindly running upon Page 159. He proposes Objections to be answered The first Objection should have been proposed thus Ministers of the Gospel who are Ordained and admitted Ministers of their respective Congregations and Ministers who not having access to these Congregations where they were Ordained Ministers are invited by desolate vacant Congregations to Preach the Gospel to them and who upon their invitation and consent of the Ministers concerned come to help these destitute desolate Congregations should not be disowned discountenanced deserted while they are doing the Work of the Ministry to which God hath called them by these People who invited them to Preach the Gospel to them But the Indulged Ministers were either Ordained c. oâ— invited and come with consent of the Ministers concerned c. And therefore they should not be deserted while they are doing the Work of the Lord to which these respective Congregations invited them If he had thus proposed the Argument he could not have evaded the force of it but it is his way to make Objections so as he may leave some way for himself to escape The true state of the Question is Whether these respective Congregations should disown and reject these Ministers of the Gospel whom they had invited and with consent of the Ministers concerned had received and appropriate to themselves to whom they had submitted and whom they had countenanced in the exercise of their Ministry Now why should they reject them as if they had nothing to do with them whom they received Why should they disown them whom they owned and whom they desired to own them Why should they withdraw from hearing these whom they invited to Preach to them Should they leave them because they Preach the Gospel to them While this Author calls in question if the Indulged Ministers be Lawfully called and appropriate Pastours of this Church he calls in question if this Church have any Pastours for they were Ordained by laying on of the hands of the Presbytery according to the Order of the Gospel and if this make them not Pastours of this Church I would know who are Pastours of it As for his second Objection taken from Mr. Livingston's Advice to hear Mr. John Scot an Indulged Minister he had better forborn to mention it than to have past it with such Answers as he gives Mr. Livingston whom he acknowledges an eminent Seer and Servant of Christ advised to hear the Indulged This Historian advises to withdraw from hearing the Indulged And it 's no disparagement to the Historian to say that Mr. Livingston's Advice was preferable to this Historians Advice who for Learning Piety Prudence Experience and Age was far inferiour to Mr. Livingston The onely thing which Mr. Livingston missed so far as I remember was a Testimony and if he had been well informed of the Testimonies which the Indulged Brethren gave upon several occasions and particularly before the Council and of the consonancy of their Practice to their verbal Testimony and their former Principles he would have been much confirmed in advising to hear Indulged Ministers The Historian says that he does not certainly know whether this Advice of Mr. Livingston proceeded from want of full information of Circumstances or from Ignorance of the Magistrates design or from fear that Field-meetings would cease but he inclines to the last because Mr. Livingston speaks not of his Peoples going to the Field-meetings Answ We have seen that any Light which this Historian hath gotten from Circumstances is darkness And I am very confident if Mr. Livingston had lived to see what Erroneous and Schismatick inferences this Historian hath made from the information which he hath gotten of many Circumstances and had seen the horrid Divisions and Confusions following upon these Erroneous dividing Doctrines he would either have judged that that Circumstantial Light was darkness or if it was light that this Historian did draw darkness out of light But I know no Circumstance of any importance which could make any thing against the Indulgence which was unknown to Mr. Livingston Mr. Livingston was a wiser man than to take his measures of judging of the Lawfulness or Unlawfulness of hearing Indulged Ministers from the Magistrates designs and intendments Though Ministers and People were clear that the Magistrate had an ill design in permitting or allowing Ministers to Preach the Gospel and People to hear or in permitting Masters of Families to pray in their Families or in permitting Physicians to cure Diseased People yet no rational man who is not blinded with Humour or some prejudice will conclude from the Magistrates ill design which is his Act and no way approved but disapproved by these Ministers Masters of Families Physitians that it 's unlawful for them to Preach Pray or Cure Diseased Persons Mr. Livingston's fears that Field-meetings would cease it seems have been better founded than the Historians confidence that they would continue And though it cannot be supposed that Mr. Livingston was an Enemy to Field-meetings yet none who knew him will think that he was so fond of the Fields that he would have preferred the Fields to a Kirk if the Kirk could have contained all who were to hear him And seeing he speaks nothing of Field-meetings it seems he had not learned that
no magistrate's sending ministers to preach c. doth make them no ministers of Christ Did Ezra cease to be a Scribe and minister of the Lord because Artaxerxes and his seven Councellers sent him to do the work of a Scribe in Judah and Jerusalem Ezr. 7.13 14. For as much as thou art sent of the King and of his seven Councellors Pr. If Artaxerxes had destroyed the Temple and the Worship of God Ezra would not have taken any benefit of such a Decree and Commission Min. What warrant have you for that if Nebuchadnezzar who destroyed the Temple had made a Decree That the Priests and Levites and people should return and worship God at Jerusalem would they have been such fools to refuse to return till Nebuchadnezzar were dead and some other King made such a Decree Did Jeremiah reject the favour which was appointed by Nebuchadnezzar Jer. 39.11 12. and conferred upon him by Nebuzaradan Jer. 40.4 who had burnt the House of the Lord 2 King 25.9 Pr. But these were Heathens who had never professed the true Religion and so had not backslidden Min. The backsliding of Rulers makes them not incapable of doing good afterward Manasseh had been Religiously educated and became monstrously wicked and yet was an instrument of Reformation afterward and Judah did not refuse to serve the Lord because Manasseh who had so fearfully fallen away did command them to serve the Lord 2 Chron. 33.16 Pr. Manasseh repented Minist But do ye think that if he had commanded Judah to serve God or the Lords Priests to sacrifice to the Lord before he repented that these commands should have been rejected because he was not truly penitent It 's the duty of all Kings whether they be penitent or not to command the Lords ministers and people to serve God The Orthodox ministers who had been banished in the time of the Arrian Persecution and Athanasius among the rest did not refuse to return to the exercise of their ministry upon the Edict of Julian the Apostate who had been a professed Christian and turned Pagan and a despiteful enemy and mocker of Christ and tho' he made that Edict for ill ends yet these godly zealous Servants of God made use of it Ye may read the History in Zozomens Church-History Book 5. Chap. 5. where he shews that he afflicted the Church in all things most bitterly and grievously except that he recalled the Bishops and Priests which were banished in the time of Constantius and that it was said he gave not that command out of mercy or pity but that either they by their mutual contentions might fight against the Church by an intestine War and so fall away from their own Laws and Institutions or that he might wrong the Estimation of Constantius and might raise up hatred against him through the whole Empire c. And Georgius Horsnius in his Ecclesiastick History Pag. 93. saith That Julian recalled Athanasius from Banishment to the place of one George an Arrian a most naughty man who had been slain a little before Athanasius's return There is no man more famous for Learning and Zeal and stedfastness in the Church-History than Athanasius and I am sure if ye have read the History of Julian the Apostate ye will be ashamed to say that any of our Rulers are so ill as he was and yet none of these holy and Learned ministers made any scruple to obey his command when he called them to the work of their ministry If many would compare their practices with the Scripture-rule and examples in Scripture and in Church-History they would find that what they take for light and zeal is but ignorance and an humourous peevishness who would have thought that ever any who had been members of the Church of Scotland that besides the obligation common to them with other Protestant Churches are by solemn Covenants obliged to extirpate Schism and maintain the Kings person and authority would have so far degenerate as to place their zeal and Religion in scarring at the Preaching and Hearing of the Gospel because the ministers who preach it are permitted and allowed to preach it by the magistrates who are bound as magistrates as Christians as Protestants to permit allow countenance protect by their authority the Preaching of the Gospel in this Kingdom Farm Sir I desire ye would return to answer what is said against the Ministers in that sixth Article of the Band. Min. As for what they say of Ministers submitting to the Magistrates censures and saying they would not have done the things they were charged with if they had thought it would have offended them it 's a confused charge and it is not easie to guess what they mean they cannot prove that any of those Ministers have done any thing that will import an acknowledgment that the Magistrate hath power of inflicting Ecclesiastick Censures or of making Ecclesiastick Canons And as for Civil Restraints of Imprisonment and Banishment if they condemn submission to these they will condemn all who have been imprisoned and banished and among the rest the Ministers who went to Holland who did not only passively submit to Banishment but also by their Subscription engaged not to return If any Minister hath done any thing which warrantably might have been forborn or which might have been done as conveniently or more conveniently at another time in another place in a way that would not have irritated or provoked the magistrate if such a person hath made the foresaid acknowledgment who can with reason condemn it for we owe thus much even to any private person whom we should not needlesly provoke to anger if we can conveniently help it but the contrivers of this bond and those who go their way are for needless provocations of the magistrate and if there be many ways of doing what is right upon the matter they will chuse the way that is irritating to the Rulers because it is irritating and shun that way which will not provoke the magistrate as if it were a duty to provoke the magistrate to wrath And if any have needlesly provoked them they will not allow him to give an innocent soft answer to turn away their wrath But it is no wonder that they who are for overthrowing the magistrate and the Government be against all things that make for peace with them or may tend to pacifie them when they are angry and be for grievous words and things which may stir up strife and put evil betwixt the magistrate and subjects What they add That these ministers have departed from the Courts of Christ and subjection to the ministry are meer calumnies Do they think that ministers appearing before the magistrate when called that by the magistrates Civil allowance of the peaceable exercise of the ministry they might without disturbance preach the Gospel in such or such places will prove that these ministers have departed from the Courts of Christ and have changed their Courts and so by common Law have changed