DECLARATORY CONSIDERATIONS Upon the Present State OF THE AFFAIRS OF ENGLAND By Way of SUPPLEMENT London Printed Anno 1679. DECLARATORY CONSIDERATIONS Upon the Present State of the Affairs of ENGLAND OUR first Conversation and Discourse having produced what you see it happen'd that the diversity of Judgements which was past upon it has been the subject Matter of this second in which I said that the Censors of my writing were divided into two Classes viz. into those who condemned the Matter and the Publication of it and into them who highly approved of both but they would rather I had more enlarged my self upon some Considerations to bring the Parliament to the re-uniting of Conformists and Non-Conformists without which we must neither hope nor expect that the Papists should leave off the design that they have had in hand for these so many years of bringing Popery into England by such wayes as it even gives one a horrour but to mention The Result of our second Conversation was that we fell upon some Propositions which might give much satisfaction to the Censors of the latter Class who find no other fault in my Writing but that I was not more prolix in those things I have told you of 'T is a Subject upon which you who have frequent Conversations with Parliament Men of greatest merit and eminency ought especially to insist upon Tell them then that in truth both you and I have found the last and I hope shall find these succeeding Members to be filled with these two good designs whereof the one is to oppose themselves to that which the Papists have long been projecting Viz. To bring Popery into England whatsoever it costs them and rather than fail or miss of their project to make use of Sword Fire and Poison and to Massacre those that stand in their way to hinder them and not so much as to spare the sacred Person of the KING who is the Lords anointed and whom he hath hitherto preserved as the Apple of his Eye and whom I hope and pray he will long continue among us and those of the Royal Family if they are any obstacle to their designs You and I I say shall find them strongly engag'd in the said design and resolution of bringing it to a happy success by the establishment of the Protestant Religion in such a manner as may perpetuate it and transmit it to Posterity without any further disturbance or perplexity and which may be inviolably fastened to the crown of both this and all our other Kings that shall come after him The other design is to procure in the Civil State Peace Liberty and Riches to the People in putting bounds to Monarchical Government which altho it be the most excellent in the World hath a natural inclination to that which is Arbitrary BUT neither you nor I have as yet found that those Parliament Men have thought upon putting the Protestant Religion on its true and solid foundations whilest we saw them resolved to make it descend to Posterity in the same constitution and posture in which they find it at this day without any Change or Alteration and in that perpetual variance and discord between the Conformists and Non-Conformists and with all the Corruptions and Abuses which are known to be in the Church of England tho the confirmation and conservation of this Posture of the Church be incompatible with the design of vigorously opposing the bringing in of Popery into England and this Truth that I have delivered is indisputable to wit that the Papists will be alwayes in the attempt hope and expectation of getting in and making to be predominant the Roman Catholick Religion in the Kingdom whilest that such division of Parties shall continue with as much if not more distance animosity and hostility from the Conformists to the Non-Conformists as is found between Rome and one of these two Parties And whilest there shall be retained in the Church of England so great a nearness and affinity with her as to Ceremonies and exteriour Government THEREFORE to remove these obstacles which hinder the re-union of these two Parties so heated one against another and which makes ut dum singuli pugnant omnes vincantur and will make that the Oppositions to the designs of Rome shall never be vigorous there must be some means of Re-union found out by representing to the Parliament some Considerations and afterwards by proposing to them some Overtures grounded upon those Considerations and which tend to the Re-union and Satisfaction of both Parties The first consideration is that as in the time of King Edward the sixth the Reformation or the transferring the Roman Catholick Religion to that of the Protestant was to be made in a Kingdome where of ten persons nine of them had strong Inclinations and good Affection to Popery the first Reformers who were all of them sincere persons and had the fear of God before their eyes I say they were necessarily obliged to manage the spirits and tempers of men with all the prudent caution they could and though their work was absolutely to change the doctrine of the Church of Rome as they did and not to retain the least Nail or seed of it that may any wayes grow again but to banish out of England all the Romish Heresies and Damnable Idolatries because that was a thing might be done imperceptibly and without noise so as that the people who are most commonly ignorant in these matters might not be shockt at it Yet on the other hand they were forced to retain almost all the Government and exteriour service of Rome and the practice of their Ceremonies whereof a great alteration would have caused no doubt great commotions in England And in truth the people who penetrate the least into matters of belief took no notice that they had taken away Transubstantiation so long as they kept up kneeling at the Table of the Lord and retained the outward face of Hierarchy of Ceremonies observation of Festival dayes of Fasts and of Lent which are things that most affect the people which they easily swallow and wherein they make their greatest part if not their whole of Religion to consist So that the Transition of Rome to the Protestant Religion was made without noise or so much as the peoples being alarmed at the loss of their old Religion which they did only reform as they said taking away some of the Abuses that had stollen into it This was apparent in the Insurrection that broke out in Cornwal in the time of King Edward against the attempt to banish the Mass but which was presently appeased after they had informed the Male-Contents that they had made no other Alteration in the divine service than onely the translating of the Mass into English THEN we are next to observe that though these holy persons who first set their hands to the work of Reformation retained several of the practices and Ceremonies of Rome for the reasons aforesaid yet it
it was disputed against in the year 1641. By the Author of an Excellent book the title whereof is The Heritage of Bishops and who it is thought was a Bishop for he there expressly denyes their right of Suffrage and voting in the house of Peers as you may see by his words pag. 22. Dogma est pontificium quod regimen Ecclesiasticum est distinctum à civili c. That opinion which distinguishes the Ecclesiastical jurisdiction from the civil is a pure piece of Popery It is affirmed by Bellarmine libr. de Pontifice cap. 5. with an accent of so much the more assurance as it is not contested neither by the Protestant Doctors nor by those of Rome this is what that Cardinal affirms from a pure motive of interest that so he might exalt the power of the Pope above that of KINGS and Princes and that so he might exempt the Clergy from their submission to the Secular Authority Calvin agrees with Bellarmine Instit lib. 4. cap. 11. Sect 1. c. But let it not displease them though this opinion be the Idol of all the world and it hath run through all places and though not only in England but elsewhere the Ecclesiastical Courts are distinct from the Civil yet I do boldly maintaine that this opinion and this Practise is not approved of by God and is contrary to the antient practise under the legal Oeconomy and is the cause of the introduction of Popery into the world and of the disorders that have since come by it AGAIN this Model of Government made by the KING or by his Parliament is so much the more considerable as it hath an harmonious concurrence with that of the first Reformers in England and elsewhere when they made but one body of the Church and of the Republick and did put Ecclesiastical power into a meer mockery and illusion and excommunication they made of it a fantasme unless both were subordinate to the Civil power Such were Zuinglius Cranmer Ridley Hooper Martyr Bullinger Musculus Gualterus and those who succeeded them the two Bishops Wilson and Andrew Richard Hooker Dr. Stillingfleet Cameron Tilenus Rivet Vedel Maccerius Des-Marets Mastrezat Mr. Gaches in his Sermon at the ordination of Mr. Sarrau Mr. Mussard and a hundred others AS to the other overtures for the establishing of good Religion and good order in the Church it is not necessary to speak of them in particular and retaile so long as those who set at the helme of affaires know that the Reformation must begin by that of the Universities banishing out of those Schooles all the Doctrines and persons infected with the Heresies of Rome Pelagius and Socinus and putting into their places such as were in them about twenty years ago or the very Individual persons if they are yet living IT is to be wished also that these Sages of the Parliament would well consider 1. THAT the first Legislators never made Laws to the people until they had before hand throughly weighed whither their dispositions were likely to receive them and the number of the persons either who would in all probability submit voluntarily to them or who possibly might be extream averse to those laws 2. THAT as it is altogether unreasonable nay impossible to impose upon the Scotch people the Ecclesiastical Government the Liturgy and the Ceremonies of England for which fourscore and nineteen of a hundred have an Aversion the honourable Members of Parliament would do well to take the same measures in their debates and practices as to Reformation that they have a design to do in matters of Religion and since of ten persons in England that have a love and kindness for the Protestant Religion there are two thirds of them that cannot away with the Episcopal Government in that manner as it is at this day established at least the Liturgy and the Ceremonies it would be to act contrary to Reason and to continue division disorder and animosities if they did continue the imposition of them 3. THAT this was the thought of Mounsieur de Thou in his Preface to Henry the fourth that it was to sin against Reason and the Peace of the Kingdome to think of being able to bring those of the Reformed Religion to the Communion of Rome and that the onely consideration of their great number ought to perswade the KING to give them as much Religious as Civil liberty 4. THAT as to England it ought also to be the Opinion of its Legislators For it hath it hath been that of all the great men both within and out of England of a Burleigh a Walsingham a Bacon Lord Verulam a Shaftsbury and a Hollis It has been likewise the Opinion of the Papists themselves and of Strangers that have come over into England and have made an exact search and inquiry into the humours the genius and number of those people that adhere to the reigning Religion and of those that are contrary to it My Lord Castlemaine against Dr. Floyd speaks of the Prelates as of persons that have lost their Senses to set upon the Persecuting of those that are much more numerous than themselves They would be punishing for Conscience where above half of the Nation is openly of a perswasion contrary to theirs and three fourths of the remaining parts care not a Fiddle-stick for them SORBIERE in his Voyage into England sayes the Churches are built after the Protestant way and are only great Auditories with Galleries particularly for the use of preaching and some small Cantle of the Liturgy For the people have an aversion for it and the Religion which is at this day received from the State is the least followed in pag. 58. he sayes indeed the Presbyterians are those that have re-established the KING upon his Throne and it is that for which they now reproach him being so persecuted as they are ABOVE all the Italian Historian Siri is express in his History di Currenti tempi La puritana cice che professando il Calvinismo nella sua rigida para forma constituisie la parte l'altre che con odio sempre implacabile alla Religione Catholica The meaning is that the Puritans are that part of the people both the most holy and the most numerous as also the most powerful and most rich and that have the greatest aversion to the Roman Catholick Religion All these considerations and all these testimonies are they not sufficient to perswade our Legislators to make a Reformation adjusted to the great number of the Puritanical people of England and who exceed the others not onely in number but also in purity of Doctrine and exactness of Life and Manners BUT the incongruity of making the Essay of Reformation in the time of KING Edward the sixth to pass for a full and compleat Master-piece that ought not to be touched again is no less than when the tenth part of the people of England and the thousandth part of the Protestants would fain pass for the
was a thing far from their thoughts to be willing to have the Infallibility of Rome be according to their first resolutions accounted unalterable as if what had been once Established should not need to be touched over again since they only designed to give the first draught as it were of the Reformation adjusted to the posture of England in their time not to what they could have wished but to what they were able to do for as we learn by some Letters of Calvin and Peter Martyr the first Reformers did promise themselves much that their Successors would go from those first Rudiments of Reformation to that which should be a more perfect and exact work when the people should be more illuminated and the number of Protestants should be greater Et sic à talibus Rudimentis sayes Calvin in his Epistle to the English men where he calls those Rudiments tolerabiles ineptias incipere licuit ut doctos tamen probosque graves Christi Ministros ultra eniti aliquid limatius purius quaerere consentaneum foret The first Reformers acted in that manner as persons carry themselves in the first Establishments of States and Kingdomes wherein the Legislators do not propose to make a perfect Model of Government which neither can nor ought to suffer a change from good to better And so it is in the first Invention of Arts as of Paper Printing concerning Navigation Painting or any other curious work c. in which it is never to be expected that one should attain the height of perfection at one dash or Essay and where oftentimes what the first Inventors have projected is not practicable by those that come after them BUT those who have succeeded the first Reformers have not trod in their good steps nor have they been influenced by the Interests of Heaven but by those of this World As five or six hundred persons of the Clergy the Bishops Deans and Canons have got into the possession of two thirds of the Ecclesiastical Revenues they are now become Zealous Opposers of the work of a more perfect Reformation and block up all the Avenues to all attempts of dividing the Benefices more equally than they are and which are enjoyed by a very small inconsiderable number of persons They labour to perswade those that have the rule over them that what the Non-conformists call but a breaking forth or rude Essay of Reformation in the time of Cranmer and Ridley was a perfect work and Masterpiece which ought not to be medled with any more unless by a greater affinity with Rome Above all they labour to infuse into the minds of these Crowned heads that the KING at the head of the Convocation and even by his sole Power and Authority can give Laws to the Church independantly on His Parliament and so by that means to continue an Ecclesiastical Empire seperate from the Civil and to make it rest upon that small number of the Clergy which possesses the two thirds of Ecclesiastical Revenues TO be short as the Successors of Cranmer and Ridley saw that the design of those glorious Martyrs could not take its effect but by depriving them of their Empire and of all their fat Benefices they have acted just quite contrary to what they had in their Eye to be brought to pass for instead of getting further and further from the Doctrine and practices of Rome they have been alwayes advancing more and more to them whereas the first Reformers in retaining some of the Ceremonies of Rome did principally intend by that nearness of affinity with it to draw over those of that Communion to their own and not to impose them with rigour on the Protestants those who have come after them have turned a means of Peace and Reconciliation into an Apple of discord division and Schisme Whereas the first Reformers had pulled down the Altars these have set them up again Whereas those above all things aimed to respect the Churches beyond Sea and to keep a strict Union and Friendship with them their Successors have banished them both from their Society and Communion and have turned Calvin into redicule and fanaticisme Their Animosity is so far carried out against the Churches of France that Henry Dodwell has maintained to Dr. Tillotson that the Reformed Churches in France had better by much have kept in the Communion of the Church of Rome than be governed as they are without Episcopal ordinations AS to the Overtures to a Re-union it is to be expected from the Wisdom of the Parliament that they will do all that their first Reformers would have done if they were alive at this day for a perfect establishment of the Protestant Religion against the attempts of Rome and that they will act the Reverse to what the Successors of the first Reformers have practised which has been continually to oppose and bring obstacles to the good designs of both KING and Parliament who would have made no doubt before this time a Reformation of the Abuses of the Church of England As when the House of Commons has made what they have oft attempted preparatory Acts to give bounds to the immeasurable Jurisdiction of the Bishops to give them Assistants to take away the plurality of Benefices and to reduce Chapters to a better pass and usage than they are at this day which nourishes onely idleness and sloth And when in the 13. year of Q. Eliz. there was a Statute made which obliged Ministers onely to subscribe to the Articles concerning Doctrine the corrupt party of the Church of England alwayes rendred fruitless and insignificant all these fair Overtures of Union and even have trampled upon the Models proposed by the good Bishops Vsher and Hall and with heat and transport opposed the Establishment of that excellent Model which our gratious KING CHARLES the II. proposed at the time of his Restauration to the Crown and which it could be wished that the Parliament would again take into their serious Consideration as the onely remedy to re-unite both Parties and to settle the Protestant Religion upon its firm and natural Basis and render it impenetrable to all the designs and attempts of the Papists THIS Model is so much the more excellent as it is formed upon that of the People of God among whom the Church and Republique were Synonimous terms and the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction was not distinct from the Civil for the Sacrificers as such were not invested with any Jurisdiction Naturaliter Sacerdotibus sayes Grotius de Imperio summarum Potestatum cap. 9. sect 3. nulla jurisdictio competit quare etsi Sacerdotes habuerunt jurisdictionem non habuerunt ut Sacerdotes sed ut Magistratus AND it is therefore to be hoped and expected from the Wisdome of the Parliament whose designs have been of late vigorously seen to oppose Popery that they would banish this Maxim of a Collaterality of Iurisdictions which establishes it mightily in the world Methinks it is so much the more Erronious as
given him an Empire over Kings and Nations and do yet continue the possession thereof to him and though the falsity and cheat is discovered even by the Romanists themselves yet it is not in the Power of that to shake it Chap. 5. A Continuation of the same subject in somewhat a more exact manner That the Decretals have established the Pope to be Governour in Chief of the Catholick Church Chap. 6. Tho the Pope be an earthly Prince not only in his own Territory but also in the states of others and he may by a just title keep an Empire over them and have the priority of them yet it is not by the possession of that earthly Empire either over them or in his own Territory that he makes himself considerable in the World but it is by this deceit and illusion of Words Ecclesiastical and Spiritual under the mantle of which he conceals his earthly Empire Chap. 7. A Resolution of that Question Why the Popes do prefer the possession of their Empire by frauds tricks and impostures under the disguise of those words Ecclesiastical and Spiritual power to the possession which they might lawfully have under its true name of earthly Empire in the same manner as Princes possess theirs Chap. 8. Of Religious and Civil Adorations Of those which the Popes did formerly give to Emperours and of that which Emperours and Kings give to him now at this day Of the sin that is in it that the presence of the Ecclesiastical power doth make those Adorations and kissings of the Foot to be criminal but its absence makes them Innocent Chap. 9. Of the Agreement and difference of the Pope's Empire with that of the Roman Emperours That he is the true and also in some manner the legitimate Successor of those and possesses the same Empire Chap. 10. Of the Artifices preparatory to the Introduction of the Decretals which the Popes have made great use of to dispose the people to submit themselves to their Empire or power Ecclesiastical Chap. 11. Of the Artifice of the Popes to prevent the discovery of the Decretals Imposture in securing to themselves the fidelity of the secular Clergy and in creating another Clergy far more numerous Chap. 12. Of the Artifices and reasonings of Baronius who confessing the Popes immediately after the Introduction of the Decretals to be infamous and Abominable persons draws from thence an Argument to exalt so much the more the Authority of the Church of Rome and to inhaunce the Valuation of its Truth its Holyness Infallibility and Perpetuity Chap. 13. A touch of some considerable Legends and Impostures in the Annnals of Baronius to raise the Jurisdiction Ecclesiastick above the Civil and to justifie the Power of the Popes to dispose of Empires and Kingdomes and to depose Emperours and Kings By which a judgement may be made of the entire piece of the Annals and of the sincerity of the Author in all his work In a word as the Annals of Baronius are nothing else thâ—n the History of the power Ecclesiastick and of its Establishment in the world so likewise the overthrowing of that power is the refutation of all Baronius Chap. 14. That the presence of the Ecclesiastical power in the world submits to the Pope reasonably and naturally the Civil power and justifies the Excommunication and deposition of Kings and Emperours Chap. 15. That the Hypothesis of an Ecclesiastical power is more reasonable according to the practices of Rome than the manner in which the Protestants have used it Chap. 16. That the Religion of Rome is nothing else but the people's adhearing to the Pope with an examen of that Maxim that there is no Salvation for those who are separated from the Pope and have no Communion with him Chap. 17. Continuation of that abusive Maxim that there is no Salvation out of Communion with the Pope Chap. 18. Continuation of the same matter by a method that is more powerfully destructive of that abusive Maxim of Rome and by Arguments that come near to a demonstration Chap. 19. A clear demonstration that before the Refusal that Gregory the first made to the title of Universal Bishop and before the Introduction of the Decretals the Pope was not acknowledged Governour in cheif of the Catholick Church But that the Power Ecclesiastick which reign'd then was partaged and possessed in Common by the Bishops of great Seas Chap. 20. Of the Artifices of the Popes to dispose the people to submit themselves to their jurisdiction at the time of the dissolution of the Roman Empire and the Expulsion of the Lumbards by the French Chap. 21. Of the Impostures and Cruelties which the Popes have exercised in the prosecution of the Holy-War to submit King and people to their Empire or power Ecclesiastick Chap. 22. That the greatest men of the Communion of the Church of Rome who pass in the esteem of Protestants and Popish Doctors for persons of Learning integrity and piety and who also have not dissembled the corruption of the Popes and the Roman Church have yet notwithstanding contributed more to the exaltation of the Ecclesiastical power and to the building up the Empire of the Pope in the Territories and States of others than those who have been sold to the Interests of Rome or who have imitated the Popes in the Impurity and filthiness of their Lives Chap. 23. Of the Vanity and Nullity of the eminent Authority of the Church and Councils in that manner that the Doctors of both Communions spake of it Chap. 24. Of the Irriparable faults committed by the first Reformers Chap. 25. An Examen of that received Maxim by the Doctors of both Communions that Excommunication is an Ordinance of Jesus Christ altogether as necessary to Salvation as the Word and Sacraments And that it is retained by vertue of the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven and the power of binding and loosing FINIS