Simonical praier annex'd Although the Praier it self strongly prays against them For never such holy things as he means were giv'n to more Swine nor the Churches Bread more to Dogs then when it fed ambitious irreligious and dumb Prelats XV. Upon the many Jealousies c. TO wipe off jealousies and scandals the best way had bin by clear Actions or till Actions could be clear'd by evident reasons but meer words we are too well acquainted with Had his honour and reputation bin dearer to him then the lust of Raigning how could the Parlament of either Nation have laid so oft'n at his dore the breach of words promises acts Oaths and execrations as they doe avowedly in many of thir Petitions and addresses to him thether I remitt the Reader And who can beleive that whole Parlaments elected by the People from all parts of the Land should meet in one mind and resolution not to advise him but to conspire against him in a wors powder plot then Catesbies to blow up as he termes it the peoples affection towards him and batter down thir loyalty by the Engins of foule aspersions Water works rather then Engines to batter with yet thosé aspersions were rais'd from the foulness of his own actions Whereof to purge himself he uses no other argument then a general and so oft'n iterated commendation of himself and thinks that Court holy water hath the vertue of expiation at least with the silly people To whom he familiarly imputes sin where none is to seem liberal of his forgiveness where none is ask'd or needed What wayes he hath tak'n toward the prosperitie of his people which he would seem so earnestly to desire if we doe but once call to mind it will be anough to teach us looking on the smooth insinuations heer that Tyrants are not more flatterd by thir Slaves then forc'd to flatter others whom they feare For the peoples tranquilitie he would willingly be the Jonah but least he should be tak'n at his word pretends to foresee within Kenn two imaginarie windes never heard of in the Compass which threaten if he be cast overboard to increase the storm but that controversy divine lot hath ended He had rather not rule then that his people should be ruin'd and yet above these twenty yeres hath bin ruining the people about the niceties of his ruling He is accurate to put a difference between the plague of malice the ague of mistakes the itch of noveltie and the leprosie of disloyaltie But had he as wel known how to distinguish between the venerable gray haires of ancient Religion and the old scurffe of Superstition between the wholsome heat of well Governing and the fevorous rage of Tyrannizing his judgement in Statephysic had bin of more autoritie Much he Prophesies that the credit of those men who have cast black scandals on him shal ere long be quite blasted by the same furnace of popular obloquie wherin they sought to cast his name and honour I beleive not that a Romish guilded Portrature gives better Oracle then a Babylonish gold'n Image could doe to tell us truely who heated that Furnace of obloquy or who deserves to be thrown in Nebuchadnezzar or the three Kingdoms It gave him great cause to suspect his own innocence that he was oppos'd by so many who profest singular pietie But this qualm was soon over and he concluded rather to suspect their Religion then his own innocence affirming that many with him were both learned and Religious above the ordinary size But if his great Seal without the Parlament were not sufficient to create Lords his Parole must needs be farr more unable to create learned and religious men and who shall authorize his unlerned judgement to point them out He guesses that many well minded men were by popular Preachers urg'd to oppose him But the opposition undoubtedly proceeded and continues from heads farr wiser and spirits of a nobler straine those Priest-led Herodians with thir blind guides are in the Ditch already travailing as they thought to Sion but moor'd in the I le of Wight He thanks God for his constancy to the Protestant Religion both abroad and at home Abroad his Letter to the Pope at home his Innovations in the Church will speak his constancy in Religion what it was without furder credit to this vain boast His using the assistance of some Papists as the cause might be could not hurt his Religion but in the setling of Protestantism thir aid was both unseemly suspicious inferr'd that the greatest part of Protestants were against him his obtruded settlement But this is strange indeed that he should appear now teaching the Parlament what no man till this was read thought ever he had lernt that difference of perswasion in religious matters may fall out where ther is the samenes of allegeance subjection If he thought so from the beginning wherfore was there such compulsion us'd to the puritans of England the whole realm of Scotl. about conforming to a liturgie Wherfore no Bishop no king Wherfore episcopacie more agreeable to monarchie if different perswasions in religion may agree in one duty allegeance Thus do court maxims like court Minions rise or fall as the king pleases Not to tax him for want of Elegance as a courtier in writing Oglio for Olla the Spanish word it might be wel affirm'd that there was a greater Medley disproportioning of religions to mix Papists with Protestants in a Religious cause then to entertaine all those diversifi'd Sects who yet were all Protestants one Religion though many Opinions Neither was it any shame to Protestants that he a declar'd Papist if his own letter to the Pope not yet renowne'd bely him not found so few protestants of his religion as enforc'd him to call in both the counsel the aid of papists to help establish protestancy who were led on not by the sense of thir Allegeance but by the hope of his Apostacy to Rome from disputing to warring his own voluntary and first appeale His hearkning to evil Counselers charg'd upon him so oft'n by the Parlament he puts off as a device of those men who were so eager to give him better counsell That those men were the Parlament that he ought to have us'd the counsel of none but those as a King is already known What their civility laid upon evil Counselers he himself most commonly own'd but the event of those evil counsels the enormities the confusions the miseries he transferrs from the guilt of his own civil broiles to the just resistance made by Parlament imputes what miscarriages of his they could not yet remove for his opposing as if they were some new misdemeanors of their bringing in and not the inveterat diseases of his own bad Goverment which with a disease as bad he falls again to magnifie and commend and may all those who would be govern'd by his Retractions and concessions rather then by Laws of
Episcopacie among them And if we may beleeve what the Papists themselves have writt'n of these Churches which they call Waldenses I find it in a Book writt'n almost four hundred years since and set forth in the Bohemian Historie that those Churches in Piemont have held the same Doctrin and Goverment since the time that Constantine with his mischeivous donations poyson'd Silvester and the whole Church Others affirme they have so continu'd there since the Apostles and Theodorus Belvederensis in his relation of them confesseth that those Heresies as he names them were from the first times of Christianity in that place For the rest I referr me to that famous testimonie of Jerom who upon this very place which he onely roaves at heer the Epistle to Titus declares op'nly that Bishop and Presbyter were one and the same thing till by the instigation of Satan partialities grew up in the Church and that Bishops rather by custom then any ordainment of Christ were exalted above Presbyters whose interpretation we trust shall be receav'd before this intricate stuffe tattl'd heer of Timothy and Titus and I know not whom thir Successors farr beyond Court Element and as farr beneath true edification These are his fair grounds both from Scripture-Canons and Ecclesiastical examples how undivinelike writt'n and how like a worldly Gospeller that understands nothing of these matters posteritie no doubt will be able to judge and will but little regard what he calls Apostolical who in his Letter to the Pope calls Apostolical the Roman Religion Nor let him think to plead that therfore it was not policy of State or obstinacie in him which upheld Episcopacie because the injuries and losses which he sustain'd by so doing were to him more considerable then Episcopacie it self for all this might Pharaoh have had to say in his excuse of detaining the Israelites that his own and his Kingdoms safety so much endanger'd by his denial was to him more deer then all thir building labours could be worth to Aegypt But whom God hard'ns them also he blinds He endeavours to make good Episcopacie not only in Religion but from the nature of all civil Government where parity breeds confusion and faction But of faction and confusion to take no other then his own testimony where hath more bin ever bred then under the imparitie of his own Monarchical Goverment Of which to make at this time longer dispute and from civil constitutions and human conceits to debate and question the convenience of Divine Ordinations is neither wisdom nor sobrietie and to confound Mosaic Preisthood with Evangelic Presbyterie against express institution is as far from warrantable As little to purpose is it that we should stand powling the Reformed Churches whether they equalize in number those of his three Kingdoms of whom so lately the far greater part what they have long desir'd to doe have now quite thrown off Episcopacie Neither may we count it the language or Religion of a Protestant so to vilifie the best Reformed Churches for none of them but Lutherans retain Bishops as to feare more the scandalizing of Papists because more numerous then of our Protestant Brethren because a handful It will not be worth the while to say what Scismatics or Heretics have had no Bishops yet least he should be tak'n for a great Reader he who prompted him if he were a Doctor might have rememberd the foremention'd place in Sozomenus which affirmes that besides the Cyprians and Arabians who were counted Orthodoxal the Novatians also and Montanists in Phrygia had no other Bishops then such as were in every Village and what Presbyter hath a narrower Diocess As for the Aërians we know of no Heretical opinion justly father'd upon them but that they held Bishops Presbyters to be the same Which he in this place not obscurely seems to hold a Heresie in all the Reformed Churches with whom why the Church of England desir'd conformitie he can find no reason with all his charity but the comming in of the Scots Army Such a high esteem he had of the English He tempts the Clergie to return back again to Bishops from the feare of tenuity and contempt and the assurance of better thriving under the favour of Princes against which temptations if the Clergie cannot arm themselves with thir own spiritual armour they are indeed as poor a Carkass as he terms them Of Secular honours and great Revenues added to the dignitie of Prelats since the subject of that question is now remov'd we need not spend time But this perhaps will never bee unseasonable to beare in minde out of Chrysostome that when Ministers came to have Lands Houses Farmes Coaches Horses and the like Lumber then Religion brought forth riches in the Church and the Daughter devour'd the Mother But if his judgement in Episcopacie may be judg'd by the goodly chois he made of Bishops we need not much amuse our selves with the consideration of those evils which by his foretelling will necessarily follow thir pulling down untill he prove that the Apostles having no certain Diocess or appointed place of residence were properly Bishops over those Presbyters whom they ordain'd or Churches they planted wherein ofttimes thir labours were both joint and promiscuous Or that the Apostolic power must necessarily descend to Bishops the use and end of either function being so different And how the Church hath flourisht under Episcopacie let the multitude of thir ancient and gross errors testifie and the words of some learnedest and most zealous Bishops among them Nazianzen in a devout passion wishing Prelaty had never bin Basil terming them the Slaves of Slaves Saint Martin the enemies of Saints and confessing that after he was made a Bishop he found much of that grace decay in him which he had before Concerning his Coronation Oath what it was and how farr it bound him already hath bin spok'n This we may take for certain that he was never sworn to his own particular conscience and reason but to our conditions as a free people which requir'd him to give us such Laws as our selves shall choose This the Scots could bring him to and would not be baffl'd with the pretence of a Coronation Oath after that Episcopacy had for many years bin settl'd there Which concession of his to them and not to us he seeks heer to put off with evasions that are ridiculous And to omit no shifts he alleges that the Presbyterian manners gave him no encouragement to like thir modes of Government If that were so yet certainly those men are in most likelihood neerer to amendment who seek a stricter Church Discipline then that of Episcopacy under which the most of them learnt thir manners If estimation were to be made of Gods Law by their manners who leaving Aegypt receav'd it in the Wilderness it could reap from such an inference as this nothing but rejection and disesteem For the Prayer wherwith he closes it had bin good som safe Liturgie which he so
the injunction of his all-ruling error He alleges the uprightness of his intentions to excuse his possible failings a position fals both in Law and Divinity Yea contrary to his own better principles who affirmes in the twelfth Chapter that The goodness of a mans intention will not excuse the scandall and contagion of his example His not knowing through the corruption of flattery and Court Principles what he ought to have known will not excuse his not doing what he ought to have don no more then the small skill of him who undertakes to be a Pilot will excuse him to be misledd by any wandring Starr mistak'n for the Pole But let his intentions be never so upright what is that to us What answer for the reason and the National Rights which God hath giv'n us if having Parlaments and Laws and the power of making more to avoid mischeif wee suffer one mans blind intentions to lead us all with our eyes op'n to manifest destruction And if Arguments prevaile not with such a one force is well us'd not to carry on the weakness of our Counsels or to convince his error as he surmises but to acquitt and rescue our own reason our own consciences from the force and prohibition laid by his usurping error upon our Liberties understandings Never thing pleas'd him more then when his judgement concurr'd with theirs That was to the applause of his own judgement and would as well have pleas'd any selfconceited man Yea in many things he chose rather to deny himself then them That is to say in trifles For of his own Interests and Personal Rights he conceavs himself Maister To part with if he please not to contest for against the Kingdom which is greater then he whose Rights are all subordinat to the Kingdoms good And in what concernes truth Justice the right of Church or his Crown no man shall gaine his consent against his mind What can be left then for a Parlament but to sit like Images while he still thus either with incomparable arrogance assumes to himself the best abilitie of judging for other men what is Truth Justice Goodness what his own or the Churches Right or with unsufferable Tyranny restraines all men from the enjoyment of any good which his judgement though erroneous thinks not fit to grant them notwithstanding that the Law and his Coronal Oath requires his undeniable assent to what Laws the Parlament agree upon He had rather wear a Crown of Thorns with our Saviour Many would be all one with our Saviour whom our Saviour will not know They who govern ill those Kingdoms which they had a right to have to our Saviours Crown of Thornes no right at all Thornes they may find anow of thir own gathering and thir own twisting for Thornes and Snares saith Solomon are in the way of the froward but to weare them as our Saviour wore them is not giv'n to them that suffer by thir own demerits Nor is a Crown of Gold his due who cannot first wear a Crown of Lead not onely for the weight of that great Office but for the compliance which it ought to have with them who are to counsel him which heer he termes in scorne An imbased flexibleness to the various and oft contrary dictates of any Factions meaning his Parlament for the question hath bin all this while between them two And to his Parlament though a numerous and chois Assembly of whom the Land thought wisest he imputes rather then to himself want of reason neglect of the Public interest of parties and particularitie of private will and passion but with what modesty or likelihood of truth it will be wearisom to repeat so oft'n He concludes with a sentence faire in seeming but fallacious For if the conscience be ill edifi'd the resolution may more befitt a foolish then a Christian King to preferr a self-will'd conscience before a Kingdoms good especially in the deniall of that which Law and his Regal Office by Oath bids him grant to his Parlament and whole Kingdom rightfully demanding For we may observe him throughout the discours to assert his Negative power against the whole Kingdom now under the specious Plea of his conscience and his reason but heertofore in a lowder note Without us or against our consent the Votes of either or of both Houses together must not cannot shall not Declar. May 4. 1642. With these and the like deceavable Doctrines he levens also his Prayer VII Vpon the Queens departure TO this Argument we shall soon have said for what concerns it us to hear a Husband divulâ—… his Houshold privacies extolling to others the verâ—…tues of his Wife an infirmity not seldom incident to those who have least cause But how good shee was a Wife was to himself and be it left to his own fancy how bad a Subject is not much disputed And being such it need be made no wonder though shee left a Protestant Kingdom with as little honour as her Mother left a Popish That this Is the first example of any Protestant Subjects that haue tak'n up Armes against thir King a Protestant can be to Protestants no dishonour when it shal be heard that he first levied Warr on them and to the interest of Papists more then of Protestants He might have giv'n yet the precedence of making warr upon him to the subjects of his own Nation who had twice oppos'd him in the op'n Feild long ere the English found it necessary to doe the like And how groundless how dissembl'd is that feare least shee who for so many yeares had bin averse from the Religion of her Husband and every yeare more and more before these disturbances broke out should for them be now the more alienated from that to which we never heard shee was inclin'd But if the feare of her Delinquency and that Justice which the Protestants demanded on her was any cause of heralienating the more to have gain'd her by indirect means had bin no advantage to Religion much less then was the detriment to loose her furder off It had bin happy if his own actions had not giv'n cause of more scandal to the Protestants then what they did against her could justly scandalize any Papist Them who accus'd her well anough known to be the Parlament he censures for Men yet to seeke thir Religion whether Doctrine Discipline or good manners the rest he soothes with the name of true English Protestants a meer scismatical name yet he so great an enemy of Scism He ascribes Rudeness and barbarity worse then Indian to the English Parlament and all vertue to his Wife in straines that come almost to Sonnetting How fitt to govern men undervaluing and aspersing the great Counsel of his Kingdom in comparison of one Woman Examples are not farr to seek how great mischeif and dishonour hath befall'n to Nations under the Government of effeminate and Uxorious Magistrates Who being themselves govern'd and overswaid at home under a Feminine usurpation
cannot but be farr short of spirit and autority without dores to govern a whole Nation Her tarrying heer he could not think safe among them who were shaking hands with Allegiance to lay faster hold on Religion and taxes them of a duty rather then a crime it being just to obey God rather then Man and impossible to serve two Maisters I would they had quite shak'n off what they stood shaking hands with the fault was in thir courage not in thir cause In his Prayer he prayes that The disloyaltie of his Protestant Subjects may not be a hindrance to her love of the true Religion and never prays that the dissoluteness of his Court the scandals of his Clergy the unsoundness of his own judgement the lukewarmness of his life his Letter of compliance to the Pope his permitting Agents at Rome the Popes Nuntio and her Jesuited Mother here may not be found in the sight of God farr greater hindrances to her conversion But this had bin a suttle Prayer indeed and well pray'd though as duely as a Pater-noster if it could have charm'd us to sit still and have Religion and our Liberties one by one snatch'd from us for fear least rising to defend our selves wee should fright the Queen a stiff Papist from turning Protestant As if the way to make his Queen a Protestant had bin to make his Subjects more then half way Papists He prays next That his constancy may be an antidote against the poyson of other mens example His constancy in what Not in Religion for it is op'nly known that her Religion wrought more upon him then his Religion upon her and his op'n favouring of Papists and his hatred of them call'd Puritants the ministers also that prayd in Churches for her Conversion being checkt from Court made most men suspect she had quite perverted him But what is it that the blindness of hypocrisy dares not doe It dares pray and thinks to hide that from the eyes of God which it cannot hide from the op'n view of man VIII Upon His repulse at Hull and the fate of the Hothams Hull a town of great strength and opportunitie both to sea and land affaires was at that time the Magazin of all those armes which the King had bought with mony most illegally extorted from his subjects of England to use in a causless and most unjust civil warr against his Subjects of Scotland The King in high discontent and anger had left the Parlament and was gon toward the North the Queen into Holland where she pawn'd and set to sale the Crown-Jewels a crime heretofore counted treasonable in Kings and to what intent these summs were rais'd the Parlament was not ignorant His going northward in so high a chafe they doubted was to possess himself of that strength which the storehouse and situation of Hull might add suddenly to his malignant party Having first therefore in many Petitions earnestly pray'd him to dispose and settle with consent of both Houses the military power in trusty hands and he as oft refusing they were necessitated by the turbulence and danger of those times to put the Kingdom by thir own autority into a posture ofdefence and very timely sent sir John Hotham a member of the House and Knight of that county to take Hull into his custody and some of the Train'd bands to his assistance For besides the General danger they had before the Kings going to York notice giv'n them of his privat Commissions to the Earl of Newcastle and to Colonel Legg one of those imploid to bring the Army up against the ParParlament who had already made som attempts the latter of them under a disguise to surprise that place for the Kings party And letters of the Lord Digby were intercepted wherin was wisht that the K. would declare himself and retire to some safe place other information came from abroad that Hull was the place design'd for some new enterprise And accordingly Digby himself not long after with many other Commanders and much forrain Ammunition landed in those parts But these attempts not succeeding and that Town being now in custody of the Parlament he sends a message to them that he had firmely resolv'd to go in person into Ireland to chastise those wicked Rebels for these and wors words he then gave them and that toward this work he intended forthwith to raise by his commissions in the Counties neere Westchester a guard for his own person consisting of 2000. foot and 200. horse that should be arm'd from his Magazin at Hull On the other side the Parlament forseeing the Kings drift about the same time send him a Petition that they might have leave for necessary causes to remoove the magazin of Hull to the Towre of London to which the King returnes his denial and soon after going to Hull attended with about 400. Horse requires the Governour to deliver him up the Town wherof the Governour besought humbly to be excus'd till he could send notice to the Parlament who had intrusted him wherat the King much incens'd proclaims him Traitor before the Town Walls and gives immediat order to stop all passages between him and the Parlament Yet he himself dispatches post after post to demand justice as upon a Traitor using a strange iniquitie to require justice upon him whom he then way layd and debari'd from his appearance The Parlament no sooner understood what had pass'd but they declare that Sir John Hotham had don no more then was his duty and was therfore no Traitor This relation being most true proves that which is affirm'd heer to be most fals seeing the Parlament whom he accounts his greatest Enemies had more confidence to abett and own what Sir John Hotham had don then the King had confidence to let him answer in his own behalf To speake of his patience and in that solemn manner he might better have forborne God knows saith he it affected me more with sorrow for others then with anger for my self nor did the affront trouble me so much as their sin This is read I doubt not and beleev'd and as there is some use of every thing so is there of this Book were it but to shew us what a miserable credulous deluded thing that creature is which is call'd the Vulgar who notwithstanding what they might know will beleeve such vain-glories as these Did not that choleric and vengefull act of proclaiming him Traitor before due process of Law having bin convinc'd so late before of his illegallity with the five Members declare his anger to be incens'd doth not his own relation confess as much and his second Message left him fuming three dayes after and in plaine words testifies bis impatience of delay till Hotham be severely punish'd for that which he there termes an insupportable affront Surely if his sorrow for Sir John Hothams sin were greater then his anger for the affront it was an exceeding great sorrow indeed and wondrous charitable But if it
the same scrupulous demurrs to stop the sentence of death in full and free Senat decreed on Lentulus and Cethegus two of Catilines accomplices which were renew'd and urg'd for Strafford He voutsafes to the Reformation by both Kingdoms intended no better name then Innovation and ruine both in Church and State And what we would have learnt so gladly of him in other passages before to know wherin he tells us now of his own accord The expelling of Bishops cut of the House of Peers this was ruin to the State the removing them root and branch this was ruin to the Church How happy could this Nation be in such a Governour who counted that thir ruin which they thought thir deliverance the ruin both of Church and State which was the recovery and the saving of them both To the passing of those Bills against Bishops how is it likely that the House of Peers gave so hardly thir consent which they gave so easily before to the attaching them of High Treason 12. at once onely for protesting that the Parlament could not act without them Surely if thir rights and privileges were thought so undoubted in that House as is heer maintain'd then was that Protestation being meant and intended in the name of thir whole spiritual Order no Treason and so that House it self will becom liable to a just construction either of Injustice to appeach them for so consenting or of usurpation representing none but themselves to expect that their voting or not voting should obstruct the Commons Who not for five repulses of the Lords no not for fifty were to desist from what in name of the whole Kingdom they demanded so long as those Lords were none of our Lords And for the Bil against root and branch though it pass'd not in both Houses till many of the Lords and some few of the Commons either intic'd away by the King or overaw'd by the sense of thir own Malignācy not prevailing deserted the Parlament and made a fair riddance of themselves that was no warrant for them who remain'd faithfull beeing farr the greater number to lay aside that Bill of root and branch till the returne of thir fugitives a Bill so necessary and so much desir'd by them selves as well as by the People This was the partiality this degrading of the Bishops a thing so wholsom in the State and so Orthodoxal in the Church both ancient and reformed which the King rather then assent to will either hazard both his own and the Kingdomes ruin by our just defence against his force of armes or prostrat our consciences in a blind obedience to himself and those men whose superstition Zealous or unzealous would inforce upon us an Antichristian tyranny in the Church neither Primitive Apostolicall nor more anciently universal then som other manifest corruptions But he was bound besides his judgement by a most strict and undispensable Oath to preserve that Order and the rights of the Church If he mean the Oath of his Coronation and that the letter of that Oath admitt not to be interpreted either by equity reformation or better knowledge then was the King bound by that Oath to grant the clergie all those customs franchises and Canonical privileges granted to them by Edward the Confessor and so might one day under pretence of that Oath and his conscience have brought us all again to popery But had he so well rememberd as he ought the words to which he swore he might have found himself no otherwise oblig'd there then according to the Lawes of God and true profession of the Gospel For if those following words Establish'd in this Kingdome be set there to limit and lay prescription on the Laws of God and truth of the Gospel by mans establishment nothing can be more absurrd or more injurious to Religion So that however the German Emperors or other Kings have levied all those Warrs on thir Protestant Subjects under the colour of a blind and literal observance to an Oath yet this King had least pretence of all both sworn to the Laws of God and Evangelic truth and disclaiming as we heard him before to be bound by any Coronation Oath in a blind and brutish formality Nor is it to be imagin'd if what shall be establish'd come in question but that the Parlament should oversway the King and not he the Parlament And by all Law and Reason that which the Parlament will not is no more establish'd in this Kingdom neither is the King bound by Oath to uphold it as a thing establish'd And that the King who of his Princely grace as he professes hath so oft abolisht things that stood firm by Law as the Star-chamber High Commission ever thought himself bound by Oath to keep them up because establisht he who will beleiv must at the same time condemn him of as many perjuries as he is well known to have abolisht both Laws and Jurisdictions that wanted no establishment Had he gratifi'd he thinks their Antiepiscopal Faction with his consent and sacrific'd the Church government and Revennues to the fury of their covetousness c. an Army had not bin rais'd Whereas it was the fury of his own hatred to the professors of true Religion which first incited him to persecute them with the Sword of Warr when Whipps Pillories Exiles and impris'nments were not thought sufficient To colour which he cannot finde wherwithall but that stale pretence of Charles the fifth and other Popish Kings that the Protestants had onely an intent to lay hands upon Church-revennues a thing never in the thoughts of this Parlament 'till exhausted by his endless Warrupon them thir necessity seis'd on that for the Common wealth which the luxury of Prelats had abus'd before to a common mischeif His consent to the unlording of Bishops for to that he himself consented and at Canterbury the cheif seat of thir pride so God would have it was from his firm perswasion of thir contentedness to suffer a present diminution of thir rights Can any man reading this not discern the pure mockery of a Royalconsent to delude us onely for the present meaning it seems when time should serve to revoke all By this reckning his consents and his denials come all to one pass and we may hence perceav the small wisdom and integrity of those Votes which Voted his Concessions at the I le of Wight for grounds of a lasting Peace This he alleges this controversie about Bishops to be the true state of that difference between him and the Parlament For he held Episcopacy both very Sacred and Divine With this judgement and for this cause he withdrew from the Parlament and confesses that some men knew he was like to bring againe the same judgement which he carried with him A fair and unexpected justification from his own mouth afforded to the Parlament who notwithstanding what they knew of his obstinat mind omitted not to use all those means and that patience to have gain'd him
which made him much the fitter man to raigne But they who suffer as oppressors Tyrants violaters of Law and persecutors of Reformation without appearance of repenting if they once get hold againe of that dignity and power which they had lost are but whetted and inrag'd by what they suffer'd against those whom they look upon as them that caus'd thir sufferings How he hath bin subject to the scepter of Gods word and spirit though acknowledg'd to be the best Goverment and what his dispensation of civil power hath bin with what Justice and what honour to the public peace it is but looking back upon the whole catalogue of his deeds and that will be sufficient to remember us The Cup of Gods physic as he calls it what alteration it wrought in him to a firm healthfulness from any surfet or excess wherof the people generally thought him sick if any man would goe about to prove we have his own testimony following heer that it wrought none at all First he hath the same fix'd opinion and esteem of his old Ephesian Goddess call'd the Church of England as he had ever and charges strictly his Son after him to persevere in that Anti-Papal Scism for it is not much better as that which will be necessary both for his soules and the Kingdoms Peace But if this can be any foundation of the kingdoms peace which was the first cause of our distractions let common sense be Judge It is a rule and principle worthy to be known by Christians that no Scripture no nor so much as any ancient Creed bindes our Faith or our obedience to any Church whatsoever denominated by a particular name farr less if it be distinguisht by a several Goverment from that which is indeed Catholic No man was ever bidd be subject to the Church of Corinth Rome or Asia but to the Church without addition as it held faithfull to the rules of Scripture and the Goverment establisht in all places by the Apostles which at first was universally the same in all Churches and Congregations not differing or distinguisht by the diversity of Countries Territories or civil bounds That Church that from the name of a distinct place takes autority to set up a distinct Faith or Government is a Scism and Faction not a Church It were an injurie to condemn the Papist of absurdity and contradiction for adhering to his Catholic Romish Religion if we for the pleasure of a King and his politic considerations shall adhere to a Catholic English But suppose the Church of England were as it ought to be how is it to us the safer by being so nam'd and establisht when as that very name and establishment by his contriving or approbation serv'd for nothing els but to delude us and amuse us while the Church of England insensibly was almost chang'd and translated into the Church of Rome Which as every Man knows in general to be true so the particular Treaties and Transactions tending to that conclusion are at large discover'd in a Book intitld the English Pope But when the people discerning these abuses began to call for Reformation in order to which the Parlament demanded of the King to unestablish that Prelatical Goverment which without Scripture had usurpt over us strait as Pharaoh accus'd of Idleness the Israelites that sought leave to goe and sacrifice to God he layes faction to thir charge And that we may not hope to have ever any thing reform'd in the Church either by him or his Son he forewarnes him That the Devil of Rebellion doth most commonly turn himself into an Angel of Reformation and sayes anough to make him hate it as he worst of Evils and the bane of his Crown nay he counsels him to let nothing seem little or despicable to him so as not speedily and effcteually to suppress errors and Scisms Wherby we may perceave plainly that our consciences were destin'd to the same servitude and persecution if not wors then before whether under him or if it should so happ'n under his Son who count all Protestant Churches erroneous and scismatical which are not episcopal His next precept is concerning our civil Liberties which by his sole voice and predominant will must be circumscrib'd and not permitted to extend a hands bredth furder then his interpretation of the Laws already settl'd And although all human laws are but the offspring of that frailty that fallibility and imperfection which was in thir Authors wherby many Laws in the change of ignorant and obscure Ages may be found both scandalous and full of greevance to their Posterity that made them and no Law is furder good then mutable upon just occasion yet if the removing of an old Law or the making of a new would save the Kingdom we shall not have it unless his arbitrary voice will so far slack'n the stiff curb of his prerogative as to grant it us who are as free born to make our own law as our fathers were who made these we have Where are then the English Liberties which we boast to have bin left us by our Progenitors To that he answers that Our Liberties consist in the enjoyment of the fruits of our industry and the benefit of those Laws to which we our selves have consented First for the injoyment of those fruits which our industry and labours have made our own upon our own what Privilege is that above what the Turks Jewes and Mores enjoy under the Turkish Monarchy For without that kind of Justice which is also in Argiers among Theevs and Pirates between themselvs no kind of Government no Societie just or unjust could stand no combination or conspiracy could stick together Which he also acknowledges in these words That if the Crown upon his head be so heavy as to oppress the whole body the weakness of inferiour members cannot return any thing of strength honour or safety to the head but that a necessary debilitation must follow So that this Liberty of the Subject concerns himself and the subsistence of his own regal power in the first place and before the consideration of any right belonging to the Subject VVe expect therfore somthing more that must distinguish free Goverment from slavish But in stead of that this King though ever talking and protesting as smooth as now sufferd it in his own hearing to be Preacht and pleaded without controule or check by them whom he most favourd and upheld that the Subject had no property of his own Goods but that all was the Kings right Next for the benefit of those Laws to which we our selves have consented we never had it under him for not to speak of Laws ill executed when the Parlament and in them the people have consented to divers Laws and according to our ancient Rights demanded them he took upon him to have a negative will as the transcendent and ultimat Law above all our Laws and to rule us forcibly by Laws to which we our selves did not consent
for his high misgoverment nay fought against him with display'd banners in the field now applaud him and extoll him for the wisest and most religious Prince that liv'd By so strange a method amongst the mad multitude is a sudden reputation won of wisdom by wilfulness and suttle shifts of goodness by multiplying evil of piety by endeavouring to root out true religion But it is evident that the chief of his adherents never lov'd him never honour'd either him or his cause but as they took him to set a face upon thir own malignant designes nor bemoan his loss at all but the loss of thir own aspiring hopes Like those captive women whom the Poet notes in his Iliad to have bewaild the death of Patroclus in outward show but indeed thir own condition 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Hom. Iliad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And it needs must be ridiculous to any judgement uninthrall'd that they who in other matters express so little fear either of God or man should in this one particular outstripp all precisianism with thir scruples and cases and fill mens ears continually with the noise of thir conscientious Loyaltie and Allegeance to the King Rebels in the mean while to God in all thir actions beside much less that they whose profess'd Loyalty and Allegeance led them to direct Arms against the Kings Person and thought him nothing violated by the Sword of Hostility drawn by them against him should now in earnest think him violated by the unsparing Sword of Justice which undoubtedly so much the less in vain she bears among Men by how much greater and in highest place the offender Els Justice whether moral or political were not Justice but a fals counterfet of that impartial and Godlike vertue The onely grief is that the head was not strook off to the best advantage and commodity of them that held it by the hair an ingratefull and pervers generation who having first cry'd to God to be deliver'd from thir King now murmur against God that heard thir praiers and cry as loud for thir King against those that deliver'd them But as to the Author of these Soliloquies whether it were undoubtedly the late King as is vulgarly beleev'd or any secret Coadjutor and some stick not to name him it can add nothing nor shall take from the weight if any be of reason which he brings But allegations not reasons are the main contents of this Book and need no more then other contrary allegations to lay the question before all men in an eev'n ballance though it were suppos'd that the testimony of one man in his own cause affirming could be of any moment to bring in doubt the autority of a Parlament denying But if these his fair spok'n words shall be heer fairly confronted and laid parallel to his own farr differing deeds manifest and visible to the whole Nation then surely we may look on them who notwithstanding shall persist to give to bare words more credit then to op'n deeds as men whose judgement was not rationally evinc'd and perswaded but fatally stupifi'd and bewitch'd into such a blinde and obstinate beleef For whose cure it may be doubted not whether any charm though never so wisely murmur'd but whether any prayer can be available This however would be remember'd and wel noted that while the K. instead of that repentance which was in reason and in conscience to be expected from him without which we could not lawfully re-admitt him persists heer to maintain and justifie the most apparent of his evil doings and washes over with a Court-fucus the worst and foulest of his actions disables and uncreates the Parlament it self with all our laws and Native liberties that ask not his leave dishonours and attaints all Protestant Churches not Prelaticall and what they piously reform'd with the slander of rebellion sacrilege and hypocrisie they who seem'd of late to stand up hottest for the Cov'nant can now sit mute and much pleas'd to hear all these opprobrious things utter'd against thir faith thir freedom and themselves in thir own doings made traitors to boot The Divines also thir wizzards can be so braz'n as to cry Hosanna to this his book which cries louder against them for no disciples of Christ but of Iscariot and to seem now convinc'd with these wither'd arguments and reasons heer the same which in som other writings of that party and in his own former Declarations and expresses they have so oft'n heertofore endeavour'd to confute and to explode none appearing all this while to vindicate Church or State from these calumnies and reproaches but a small handfull of men whom they defame and spit at with all the odious names of Schism and Sectarism I never knew that time in England when men of truest Religion were not counted Sectaries but wisdom now valor justice constancy prudence united and imbodied to defend Religion and our Liberties both by word and deed against tyranny is counted Schism and faction Thus in a graceless age things of highest praise and imitation under a right name to make them infamous and hatefull to the people are miscall'd Certainly if ignorance and perversness will needs be national and universal then they who adhere to wisdom and to truth are not therfore to be blam'd for beeing so few as to seem a sect or faction But in my opinion it goes not ill with that people where these vertues grow so numerous and well joyn'd together as to resist and make head against the rage and torrent of that boistrous folly and superstition that possesses and hurries on the vulgar sort This therefore we may conclude to be a high honour don us from God and a speciall mark of his favor whom he hath selected as the sole remainder after all these changes and commotions to stand upright and stedfast in his cause dignify'd with the defence of truth and public libertie while others who aspir'd to be the topp of Zelots and had almost brought Religion to a kinde of trading monopoly have not onely by thir late silence and neutrality bely'd thir profession but founder'd themselves and thir consciences to comply with enemies in that wicked cause and interest which they have too oft'n curs'd in others to prosper now in the same themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I. Upon the Kings calling this last Parlament THat which the King layes down heer as his first foundation and as it were the head stone of his whole Structure that He call'd this last Parlament not more by others advice and the necessity of his affaires then by his own chois and inclination is to all knowing men so apparently not true that a more unlucky and inauspicious sentence and more betok'ning the downfall of his whole Fabric hardly could have come into his minde For who knows not that the inclination of a Prince is best known either by those next about him and most in favor with him or by the current of his own actions Those neerest to
Bishops should have the confidence heer to profess himself so much an Enemie of those that force the conscience For was it not he who upon the English obtruded new Ceremonies upon the Scots a new Liturgie with his Sword went about to score a bloody Rubric on thir backs Did he not forbidd and hinder all effectual search of Truth nay like a beseiging Enemy stopd all her passages both by Word and Writing Yet heer can talk of faire and equall disputations Where notwithstanding if all submit not to his judgement as not being rationally convicted they must submitt and he conceales it not to his penaltie as counted obstinate But what if he himself and those his learned Churchmen were the convicted or the ostinate part long agoe should Reformation suffer them to sit Lording over the Church in thir fatt Bishoprics and Pluralities like the great Whore that sitteth upon many Waters till they would voutsafe to be disputed out Or should we sit disputitg while they sate plotting and persecuting Those Clergimen were not to be driv'n into the fold like Sheep as his Simily runs but to be driv'n out of the Fold like Wolves or Theeves where they sat Fleecing those Flocks which they never fed He beleeves that Presbytery though prov'd to be the onely Institution of Iesus Christ were not by the Sword to be set up without his consent which is contrary both to the Doctrin and the known practice of all Protestant Churches if his Sword threat'n those who of thir own accord imbrace it And although Christ and his Apostles being to civil affairs but privat men contended not with Magistrats yet when Magistrats themselves and especially Parlaments who have greatest right to dispose of the civil Sword come to know Religion they ought in conscience to defend all those who receave it willingly against the violence of any King or Tyrant whatsoever Neither is it therefore true That Christianity is planted or watred with Christian blood for there is a large difference between forcing men by the Sword to turne Presbyterians and defending those who willingly are so from a r fiousfu inroad o bloody Bishops arm'd with the Militia of a King thir Pupill And if covetousness and ambition be an argument that Presbytery hath not much of Christ it argues more strongly against Episcopacy which from the time of her first mounting to an order above the Presbyters had no other Parents then Covetousness Ambition And those Sects Scisms and Heresies which he speaks of if they get but strength and numbers need no other pattern then Episcopacie and himself to set up their ways by the like method of violence Nor is ther any thing that hath more marks of Scism and Sectarism then English Episcopacy whether we look at Apostolic times or at reformed Churches for the universall way of Church goverment before may as soon lead us into gross error as thir universally corrupted Doctrin And Goverment by reason of ambition was likeliest to be corrupted much the sooner of the two However nothing can be to us Catholic or universal in Religion but what the Scripture teaches whatsoever without Scripture pleads to be universal in the Church in being universal is but the more Scismatical Much less can particular Laws and Constitutions impart to the Church of England any power of consistory or tribunal above other Churches to be the sole Judge of what is Sect or Scism as with much rigor and without Scripture they took upon them Yet these the King resolves heer to defend and maintain to his last pretending after all those conferences offer'd or had with him not to see more rationall and religious motives then Soldiers carry in thir Knapsacks with one thus resolv'd it was but folly to stand disputing He imagins his own judicious zeal to be most concernd in his tuition of the Church So thought Saul when he presum'd to offer Sacrifice for which he lost his Kingdom So thought Uzziah when he went into the Temple but was thrust out with a Leprosie for his opinion'd zeal which he thought judicious It is not the part of a King because he ought to defend the Church therfore to set himself supreme Head over the Church or to meddle with Ecclesial Goverment or to defend the Church otherwise then the Church would be defended for such defence is bondage nor to defend abuses and stop all Reformation under the name of New moulds fanct'd and fashion'd to privat designes The holy things of Church are in the power of other keys then were deliverd to his keeping Christian libertie purchas'd with the death of our Redeemer and establish'd by the sending of his free Spirit to inhabit in us is not now to depend upon the doubtful consent of any earthly Monarch nor to be again fetter'd with a presumptuous negative voice tyrannical to the Parlament but much more tyrannical to the Church of God which was compell'd to implore the aid of Parlament to remove his force and heavy hands frō off our consciēces who therfore complains now of that most just defensive force because onely it remov'd his violence and persecution If this be a violation to his conscience that it was hinderd by the Parlament from violating the more tender consciences of so many thousand good Christians let the usurping conscience of all Tyrants be ever so violated He wonders Fox wonder how we could so much distrust Gods assistance as to call in the Protestant aid of our Brethren in Scotland why then did he if his trust were in God and the justice of his Cause not scruple to sollicit and invite earnestly the assistance both of Papists and of Irish Rebels If the Scots were by us at length sent home they were not call'd to stay heer always neither was it for the peoples ease to feed so many Legions longer then thir help was needfull The Goverment of thir Kirk we despis'd not but thir imposing of that Goverment upon us not Presbytery but Arch-Presbytery Classical Provincial and Diocesan Prebytery claiming to it self a Lordly power and Superintendency both over Flocks and Pastors over Persons and Congregations no way thir own But these debates in his judgement would have bin ended better by the best Divines in Christ'ndom in a full and free Synod A most improbable way and such as never yet was us'd at least with good success by any Protestant Kingdom or State since the Reformation Every true Church having wherewithall from Heav'n and the assisting Spirit of Christ implor'd to be complete and perfet within it self And the whole Nation is not easily to be thought so raw and so perpetually a novice after all this light as to need the help and direction of other Nations more then what they write in public of thir opinion in a matter so familiar as Church Goverment In fine he accuses Piety with the want of Loyalty and Religion with the breach of Allegeance as if God and he were one Maister whose commands were
so oft'n contrary to the commands of God He would perswade the Scots that thir chief Interest consists in thir fidelity to the Crown But true policy will teach them to find a safer interest in the common friendship of England then in the ruins of one ejected Family XIIII Upon the Covnant VPON this Theme his Discours is long his Matter little but repetition and therfore soon answerd First after an abusive and strange apprehension of Covnants as if Men pawn'd thir souls to them with whom they Covnant he digresses to plead for Bishops first from the antiquity of thir possession heer since the first plantation of Christianity in this Iland next from a universal prescription since the Apostles till this last Centurie But what availes the most Primitive Antiquity against the plain sense of Scripture which if the last Centurie have best follow'd it ought in our esteem to be the first And yet it hath bin oft'n prov'd by Learned Men from the Writings and Epistles of most ancient Christians that Episcopacy crept not up into an order above the Presbyters till many years after that the Apostles were deceas'd He next is unsatisfied with the Covnant not onely for some passages in it referring to himself as he supposes with very dubious and dangerous limitations but for binding men by Oath and Covnant to the Reformation of Church Discipline First those limitations were not more dangerous to him then he to our Libertie and Religion next that which was there vow'd to cast out of the Church an Antichristian Hierarchy which God had not planted but ambition and corruption had brought in and fosterd to the Churches great dammage and oppression was no point of controversie to be argu'd without end but a thing of cleer moral necessity to be forthwith don Neither was the Covnant superfluous though former engagements both religious and legal bound us before But was the practice of all Churches heertofore intending Reformation All Israel though bound anough before by the Law of Moses to all necessary duties yet with Asa thir King enter'd into a new Covnant at the beginning of a Reformation And the Jews after Captivity without consent demanded of that King who was thir Maister took solemn Oath to walk in the Command'ments of God All Protestant Churches have don the like notwithstanding former engagements to thir several duties And although his aime were to sow variance between the Protestation and the Covnant to reconcile them is not difficult The Protestation was but one step extending onely to the Doctrin of the Church of England as it was distinct from Church Discipline the Covnant went furder as it pleas'd God to dispense his light and our encouragement by degrees and comprehended Church Goverment Former with latter steps in the progress of well doing need not reconcilement Nevertheless he breaks through to his conclusion That all honest and wise men ever thought themselves sufficently bound by former ties of Religion leaving Asa Ezra and the whole Church of God in sundry Ages to shift for honestie and wisdom from som other then his testimony And although after-contracts absolve not till the former be made void yet he first having don that our duty returns back which to him was neither moral nor eternal but conditional Willing to perswade himself that many good men took the Covnant either unwarily or out of fear he seems to have bestow'd som thoughts how these good men following his advice may keep the the Covnant and not keep it The first evasion is presuming that the chief end of Covnanting in such mens intentions was to preserve Religion in purity and the Kingdoms peace But the Covnant will more truly inform them that purity of Religion and the Kingdoms peace was not then in state to be preservd but to be restor'd and therfore binds them not to a preservation of what was but to a Reformation of what was evil what was Traditional and dangerous whether novelty or antiquity in Church or State To doe this clashes with no former Oath lawfully sworn either to God or the King and rightly understood In general he brands all such confederations by League and Covnant as the common rode us'd in all Factious perturbations of State and Church This kinde of language reflects with the same ignominy upon all the Protestant Reformations that have bin since Luther and so indeed doth his whole Book replenish'd throughout with hardly other words or arguments then Papists and especially Popish Kings have us'd heertofore against thir Protestant Subjects whom he would perswade to be every man his own Pope and to absolve himfelf of those ties by the suggestion of fals or equivocal interpretations too oft repeated to be now answer'd The Parlament he saith made thir Covnant like Manna agreeable to every mans Palat. This is another of his glosses upon the Covnant he is content to let it be Manna but his drift is that men should loath it or at least expound it by thir own relish and latitude of sense wherin least any one of the simpler sort should faile to be his crafts maister he furnishes him with two or three laxative he termes them general clauses which may serve somwhat to releeve them against the Covnant tak'n intimating as if what were lawfull and according to the Word of God were no otherwise so then as every man fansi'd to himself From such learned explications and resolutions as these upon the Covnant what marvel if no Royalist or Malignant refuse to take it as having learnt from these Princely instructions his many Salvo's cautions and reservations how to be a Covnanter and Anticovnanter how at once to be a Scot and an Irish Rebel He returns again to disallow of that Reformation which the Covnant vows as being the partiall advice of a few Divines But matters of this moment as they were not to be decided there by those Divines so neither are they to be determin'd heer by Essays curtal Aphorisms but by solid proofs of Scripture The rest of his discourse he spends highly accusing the Parlament that the main Reformation by them intended was to robb the Church and much applauding himself both for his forwardness to all due Reformation and his aversness from all such kind of Sacrilege All which with his glorious title of the Churches Defender we leave him to make good by Pharaoh's Divinity if he please for to Josephs Pietie it will be a task unsutable As for the parity and poverty of Ministers which he takes to be so sad of consequence the Scripture reck'ns them for two special Legacies left by our Saviour to his Disciples under which two Primitive Nurses for such they were indeed the Church of God more truly flourisht then ever after since the time that imparitie and Church revennue rushing in corrupted and beleper'd all the Clergie with a worse infection then Gehezi's some one of whose Tribe rather then a King I should take to be compiler of that unsalted and
but complain'd of Thus these two heads wherein the utmost of his allowance heer will give our Liberties leave to consist the one of them shall be so farr onely made good to us as may support his own interest and Crown from ruin or debilitation and so farr Turkish Vassals enjoy as much liberty under Mahomet and the Grand Signor the other we neither yet have enjoyd under him nor were ever like to doe under the Tyranny of a negative voice which he claimes above the unanimous consent and power of a whole Nation virtually in the Parlament In which negative voice to have bin cast by the doom of Warr and put to death by those who vanquisht him in thir own defence he reck'ns to himself more then a negative Martyrdom But Martyrs bear witness to the truth not to themselves If I beare witness of my self saith Christ my witness is not true He who writes himself Martyr by his own inscription is like an ill Painter who by writing on the shapeless Picture which he hath drawn is fain to tell passengers what shape it is which els no man could imagin no more then how a Martyrdom can belong to him who therfore dyes for his Religion because it is establisht Certainly if Agrippa had turn'd Christian as he was once turning and had put to death Scribes and Pharisees for observing the Law of Moses and refusing Christianitie they had di'd a truer Martyrdom For those Laws were establisht by God and Moses these by no warrantable authors of Religion whose Laws in all other best reformed Churches are rejected And if to die for an establshment of Religion be Martyrdom then Romish Priests executed for that which had so many hundred yeares bin establisht in this Land are no wors Martyrs then he Lastly if to die for the testimony of his own conscience be anough to make him Martyr what Heretic dying for direct blasphemie as som have don constantly may not boast a Martyrdom As for the constitution or repeale of civil Laws that power lying onely in the Parlament which he by the verry law of his coronation was to grant them not to debarr them nor to preserve a lesser Law with the contempt and violation of a greater it will conclude him not so much as in a civil and metaphoricall sense to have di'd a Martyr of our Laws but a plaine transgressor of them And should the Parlament endu'd with Legislative power make our Laws and be after to dispute them peece meale with the reson conscience humour passion fansie folly obstinacy or other ends of one man whose sole word and will shall baffle and unmake what all the wisdom of a Parlament hath bin deliberatly framing what a ridiculous and contemptible thing a Parlament would soon be and what a base unworthy Nation we who boast our freedom and send them with the manifest peril of thir lives to preserve it they who are not mark'd by destiny for Slaves may apprehend In this servil condition to have kept us still under hatches he both resolves heer to the last and so instructs his Son As to those offerd condescensions of Charitable connivence or toleration if we consider what went before and what follows they moulder into nothing For what with not suffering ever so little to seem a despicable scism without effectual suppression as he warn'd him before and what with no opposition of Law Goverment or establisht Religion to be permitted which is his following proviso and wholly within his own construction what a miserable and suspected toleration under Spies and haunting Promooters we should enjoy is apparent Besides that it is so farr beneath the honour of a Parlament and free Nation to begg and supplicat the Godship of one fraile Man for the bare and simple toleration of what they all consent to be both just pious and best pleasing to God while that which is erroneous unjust and mischeivous in the church or State shall by him alone against them all be kept up and establisht and they censur'd the while for a covetous ambitious sacrilegious faction Another bait to allure the people is the charge he laies upon his Son to be tender of them Which if we should beleeve in part because they are his Heard his Cattell the Stock upon his ground as he accounts them whom to wast and destroy would undoe himself yet the inducement which he brings to move him renders the motion it self somthing suspicious For if Princes need no Palliations as he tells his Son wherfore is it that he himself hath so oft'n us'd them Princes of all other men have not more change of Rayment in thir Wardrobes then variety of Shifts and palliations in thir solemn actingsand pretences to the People To try next if he can insnare the prime Men of those who have oppos'd him whom more truly then his meaning was he calls the Patrons and Vindicators of the People he gives out Indemnity and offers Acts of Oblivion But they who with a good conscience and upright heart did thir civil duties in the sight of God and in thir several places to resist Tyranny and the violence of Superstition banded both against them he may be sure will never seek to be forgiv'n that which may be justly attributed to thir immortal praise nor will assent ever to the guilty blotting out of those actions before men by which thir Faith assures them they chiefly stand approv'd and are had in remembrance before the throne of God He exhorts his son not tostudy revenge But how far he or at least they about him intend to follow that exhortation was seen lately at the Hague now lateliest at Madrid where to execute in the basest manner though but the smallest part of that savage barbarous revenge which they doe no thing elsbut study contemplate they car'd not to let the world know them for profess'd Traitors assassinatersof all Law both Divine and human eev'n of that last and most extensive Law kept inviolable to public persons among all fair enemies in the midst of uttermost defiance and hostility How implacable therefore they would be after any termes of closure or admittance for the future or any like opportunity giv'n them heerafter it will be wisdom our safety to beleeve rather and prevent then to make triall And it will concerne the multitude though courted heer to take heed how they seek to hide or colour thir own fickleness and instability with a bad repentance of thir well-doing and thir fidelity to the better cause to which at first so cherfully and conscientiously they joyn'd themselves He returnes againe to extoll the Church of England and againe requires his Son by the joynt autority of a Father and a King not to let his heart receive the least check or disaffection against it And not without cause for by that meanes having sole influence upon the Clergy and they upon the people after long search and many disputes he could not