Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
religion_n	church_n	protestant_n	roman_a	3,280	5	7.8264	4	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85989	The prelatical Cavalier catechized, and the Protestant souldier incouraged. By a missive sent to King Charles in the name of the Protestants beyond seas. Wherein these three questions are resolved. Viz. First, how inconsistent a prelaticall government is with the true Protestant religion, and with the peace and welfare of this kingdome. Secondly, how absolutely necessary it is for King Charles and his associats, to entertain peace with the Parliament at any hand, if ever he hopeth to recover or enjoy any glory or splendour of his royalty. Thirdly, which are the best means King Charles, &c. can use for obtayning an honourable peace for the present, and improving and continuing the same in time to come. Much conducing to encourage and confirme all true Protestants in the truth of the Protestant cause, especially all souldiers that are for King and Parliament. ... Presented to the Honorable Councels of Great Britain, now sitting in Parliament; and the rest of the Kings Majesties subjects. / By Eleazer Gilbert, a minister of Gods Word. Printed, and published according to order.	Gilbert, Eleazer.	1645 (1645)	Wing G706; Thomason E296_28; ESTC R200215	22,248	25

all contenteth himself with a part even with such a part as he may quietly and honourably possesse with the suffrages of his people for if the greedy appetite be not satiated a poore shepherd shall finde more hearts case in a beggars cottage then a great Emperour if ambitious in a Princely Palace Let Kings therefore consider that the more they abound with worldly wealth the more doe abound their cares for when goods increase they are increased that eat them and the best way for a King to be rich is to know when he hath enough and not to improve his revenues through pilling and polling his Subjects by sordid and unnecessary Taxations and Monopolies for hereby hee doth not strengthen his Crowne but bewray his tyranny nor increase his honour but call in question that love which he oweth to his people O what great grief it is to loyall and loving Subjects to see their Sovereigne undoe himself for the enriching a company of unworthy temporizing and self-seeking Parasites Who perhaps if his back should be at the wall would turn their backs upon him and like a shadow follow him no longer then the Sun shineth or if he should stand in need of their counsell could give him none better then that of Achitophel That any Prince should thus mistarry is grievous and lamentable but for such a King as your Highnesse should be who have so often smarted through the Machiavillick impostures of the Roman Antichrist and his Abettors for such kind of men expose yourself your posterity and Crowns to such extream exigencies Quis talia fando temp●ret à lachermis Be wise therefore ye Kings and be learned yee Judges of the earth be carefull as to have the wicked removed so also to have your desires moderated seek no more then is enough either for your selves or others for then certainly you shall finde in your Thro●e more cares then comforts and in your Crowns more thorns then Diamonds for he that loveth silver shall never be satisfied with silver nor he that loveth abundance with increase as wealth cannot fill mans heart so cannot grace his purse naturall desires are finite but the desires of the soul are infinite which when they are not watched but let goe loose roving up and down and not composed and limited according to the rules of godlinesse have brought men even Kings and Princes into infinite labyrinths and anxieties witnesse that insatiable conquerour whose unlimited ambition the Poet thus bemoneth Unus Pellaeo Juveni non sufficit orbis Aestuat infoelix angusto limite mundi And many also of the Roman Caesars whose time wee may read in their insatiable affections and whose covetousnesse hath brought their Titles and Diadems unto their uttermost period of whom we may almost say etiam perire animae that little of them that is left is perished in a word therefore happy is the man be he King or Subject that delighteth more in piety then in pelfe in heavenly goodnesse then in worldly goods Cui paternum Splendet in mensa tenui salinum Nec leves somnos timor aut cupido Sordidus aufort Secondly for the obtaining an honourable and lasting peace and performing this work of righteousnesse your Highnesse must look well to the rightnesse of Religion viz. that the Religion which you establish be made choice of not according as to the eye it seemeth gayest but as it is most free from and most contrary to all corruption of mans life and manners such as is grounded not upon mens invention but divine direction That your Highnesse give way to such a kinde of divine worship as is not according to the nature and will of man but according to the will of God who being a Spirit loveth best to be worshiped in spirit and truth and not in or by any painted or graven images outward pomps gaudie cloaths or superstitious representations of any thing that is in heaven above or in earth beneath such as all false Religions abound withall and whereby hereticall and Idolatrous Priests delude and dazle the eyes of simple people who are naturally inclined to affect that soonest which to the eye seemeth gayest making them believe that these dumb shews and pictures are lay mens books in the mean time hiding from them the power of Christ in the work of the ministry And seeing there is no difference between your Highnesse and us in points of doctrine the word of God being preached by us both in as great purity and orthodoxnesse as can be consistent with a militant Church our request unto your Highnesse is as you tender either your own or our peace to admit with us the same reformation and purity in matters of discipline as is implyed in the premises for certainly Sir solong as the discipline of your Church remaineth unpurged the members and professors thereof can never properly be said to be of the true Protestant Religion well they may be called Protestants and said to be of a Protestant Religion viz. comparatively as they have relation to Eutherans or Nicholuitans or some other sect of Protestanisme but to be Protestants indeed that is true Protestants of the true reformed Protestant Religion they cannot because their Religion is reformed onely in part viz. in matter of doctrine the discipline remaining and being retained in the same corruption and superstition as they received it from the Roman Church whereas the true Protestant Religion exercised in the Presbyteriall government is equally reformed as well in discipline as in doctrine depencing absolutely upon the word of God without any excessive or scandalous mixture other then accords with Christian simplicity decencie and charity of humane inventions or superstitious innovations But if you Highnesse will needs maintain some disparity amongst Ministers preferring some before others who in respect of their eminent parts may seem to deserve better we will not discommend it providing that your Highnesse remember well your Fathers Councell in his Basilicon Doron pag 44. viz. so to charge and change them with such bonds as may preserve them from creeping into corruption A third mean to procure an honourable and lasting peace is to unite the people as well as the Countreys of England and Scotland which can never be effected by your Highnesse so long as you stand in opposition to the Parliament But and if you can be so happy as to come in then we conceive it may easily be wrought in this manner viz. First by making an universall act of oblivion in both Parliaments for all Nationall quarrels and deadly feuds which have been a prohibition from all which in time to come may acrew betwixt the natives of either Kingdome by reason of any occurrence or passage of preceding or future times Secondly by abolishing the respective names of English or Scotish men which in respect of the great controversies and differences which have been between the two Kingdoms doe still continue names of prejudice to the great exasperating of the affections of both sides and possessing them with rigid and implacable mindes one against another upon the least and most slender occasionall distastes and that all the inhabitants of this one Island may be called by one name of East West South or North Britains with some aditionall title of the Shire or County prefixed for disinction sake Thirdly by engaging an equall number of both Kingdoms in their fellowship at armes in some publick and fortunate lawfull war beyond the Seas where their honour and danger may be equally divided and no jealousies nor contention arise amongst them but of wel doing certainly one victory obtained by the sound valour of the Scots and English wheresoever it be so it be not at home let it be in Bohemia France Spain or where your great Councell will think fiting will make a stronger and more indissoluble knot of union both between them and your Highnesse and amongst themselves then ever your Highnesse could make by choosing your Minions alternatively out of each Nation or by making Scotch men Lords of England English men Lords of Scotland or yet by mixture of marriage for although marriage may make two persons one yet can it not make two people to be one certainly all these are too weak ingrediences to compound a love-potion for them that were wont to thirst after one anothers blood it must be something more energeticall and vertuous that must qualifie and chain the different humors of these two Nations and make them forget whose fortune it was to be envied and whose to be contemned in times past and to speak ingenuously never had King a fairer oportunity to effect this as your Highnesse hath now all the Kingdoms in Christendome almost being now by the ears together especially if in this your day your Highnesse would resipiscere and come to your self and so much tender your own health and welfare as to apply unto your almost gangreen and incurable wounds a salving playster of Parliamentary Union FINIS Transilvania France Ireland Aristot Ethic. lib. 5.

in the inheritance of Christ Jesus every one to his Tents ô Israel so that while as both of you seem to strive about one Religion there is in effect betwixt you both as much as no Religion Religion it self is almost lost through the quarrels and questions for Religion it faring with her as it did with the woman in Plutarch who having many Suitors when every one could not have her to himself they cut her in pieces that so none might have her For certainly if our information fail not there be almost as many false brethren and professors of the one side as there be abettors of the Prelacy and Papacy on the other yea and as obstructive and obnoxious to the Protestant Cause though both of them be eq●ally enemies to peace being not onely contentious but lovers of content on However we conceive the separating Schismaticks to be the most dangerous they being so wedded to their own phantasies and onthusiasmes that whatsoever opinion they once lay hold on let it be never so contrary to the analogie of faith or the rules of charity in the communion of Saints these men we say are so zealously confident in their way that they had rather there should be no Protestant Religion at all in the world then that opinion or phantasie which they have conceived of it should not prevail atque hinc illae lachrymae From hence your Kingdoms have received a double blow one from your professed Friends another from your professing enemies whom because nec verit ati nec paci cedere norunt they neither can nor know how to give way to a true Protestant peac● we will leave to themselves and proceed unto the second motive which should incline your Highnesse and your confederates to peace And this is the respect you should have to the Procestant Religion where by a Protestant Religion we understand not a profession of Christianity which is reformed onely an part such as is that of the Lutherans and your late Hierarchie in England which though as is aforesaid it was purged by the care of godly and orthodox Princes from the heresies of the Romane Church in matters and points of doctrine yet did it in matters of discipline retain diverse exorbitant scandalous and corrupt customs and superstitious ceremonies which made the English Church although not the same yet to resemble and be too too like that which is mayntained by the Roman Antichrist but by the Protestant Religion we understand such a profession of christianity as is reformed in both these so far as the excellencie perfection and purity of a militant Church may subsist withall without any excessive or corrupt mixture of humane inventions or superstitious customes and ceremonies either in doctrine or discipline such as we believe your self will confesse if you know any thing of a presbyterian government to be this day amongst all Europian Christians most candidly and incorruptible mayntained and practised by the Presbyterian Protestants This is that Religion which is in every godly and decent respect most consistent with the truth and purity of the Gospell and which ought to be mayntained preserved and cherished by Protesiant Princes and States with as much eagernesse and industry as the Jesuiticall Pentificians have to mayntain their Romish Idoll which an all probability can never be done by war especially by such a war as that is which is abetted by your Highnesse and Confederates for hereby if we be not much deceived you doe what you can to encourage and hearten the Papists against the Protestants and proclaim as it were with open mouth to the wide world that you are turned Apostates from the Protestant Religion For what greate cause or occasion can your Highnes and your associates give unto the Papist to work the finall overthrow and ruine of the Protestant Churches and States then to entertain and harbour prejudicate and inreconcilable affections against your Protestant Subjects and brethren this is all they seek for ●●fer if your Italie Gallico Haspamol●sed Austrian Papists can have but such a strong foundation to build upon as the distance and estrangement of Protestant Spirits either opposed or alienated one from another in points of Religion then are they perswaded and so in all humane reason they may well be that neither their Counsels nor intentions can neither fundamentally nor essentially concur and conscquently no confederation nor conjenction in real endeavours will ever be brought to any setled purpose or period either in Great Britain or elswhere And to this purpose wee cannot admire enough of your Highnesse and your Great Councell that you should take so shall notice of the Spanish King and the German Emperour who are so fast vying stakes with the French King which of them should soonest by this means engrosse unto themselves the European States and erect a Catholike Christian Monarchie to which purpose they omit no way or means to make the Protestant Princes and States fall by the eares together and keep their Houses and Territoires in perpetuall division To omit Germany and other places where we have not been so well accuainted wee appeal to the verdict of your own Countrymen Merchants that travell into Denmarke Sweden Poland Russia amongst almost an innumerable multitude of Lutheran Protestants who if they understand or have taken notice of the practice or preaching of these Luther Priests and Ministers cannot but acknowledge and testifie how carefully and industriously the Jesuits especially in Poland and Prussia doe foment and hire unconscionable Divines to mayntain pretences of a fundamentall difference in Religion betwixt us and them which in truth and substance is but all one giving unto the Lutherans many promises and priviledges which they will not so much as profer unto the Evangelick Protestants that separation being made between the Lutheran Protestant and the Reformed Evangelick Protestant the occasion of Disputes envy strife rayling and evill ●●mising might never be wanting amongst them and that as well for temporall and worldly as for heavenly and spirituall respects The third motive to induce your Highnesse unto peace is the Obligation which God and Nature hath laid upon you to mayntain the Rights of your Sister and Nephews whose parents if they had been either Papists or Neuterals might have this day been sitting in their Castle or Wittenbergh For although ambition was the cause pretended yet who knoweth not that knoweth any thing that their Religion was the cause intended For had they complyed so much as some other Princes do that beare the name of Protestants with the Spanish King and the Germane Emperour neither had their Confederates so miserably flinched from them us they did nor they liad been so rigidly and cruelly ejected out of their own inheritante us they were But because Gods judgments are unsearchable and his ways past finding out for who knoweth Gods mind or who hath been his Counsellor and also because no man can discerne Gods love and hatred in this respect by this

Bishop of that grand question who was Melchisedecks father to permit such men them we say so shamefully to ingrosse to themselves all the fattest Benefices in your Kingdoms and that a few perhaps forty or fifty prelaticall Priests or Ministers by their codpiece or Court Symonie should have every one for his yearly stipend 1000 or 2000 livre. a year at the least when it may be 5000 more godly learned and every way more worthy pastors who have also a greater charge to mayntain shall not have so much amongst them all but are enforced notwithstanding their assiduous labours and conscionable conversation to eat the bread of car fulnesse and to drink the waters of affliction by measure That such barbarous or rather Antichristian inequality should not onely be tolerated but also with tooth and nail so eagerly be mayntained without reformation and that by a Protestant Prince who styleth himself Defender of the Faith and by his associates who pretend and professe so much of the Protestant Religion is a thing we must needs confess beyond our admiration What should wespeak of your admitting Popish Priests and sacrificatures unto your parochiall charges yea and sometimes to steer the helme of Christs ship amongst you without any imposition of hands admission or vocation other then they received from the Roman Bishops by whom they were ordinated sacrificers to offer in their blasphemous Masses a Sacrifice both for quick and dead which how far it doth derogate from the all-sufficiency of Christs passion and how far such Sacrifices and Sacrificers are different from those in the Gospel Rom. 12. 1. which consists principally in killing and mortifying our sinfull lusts and affections we hope may appear easily to any true Protestant whom God hath not given over to believe strong delusions and to hold the truth in unrighteousnesse nor is there any lesse difference betwixt the calling of a Priest by a Popish Bishop we speake as they are devoted to the errours and blasphemies of the See of Rome as now it is unto the dispensation and ministry of the Gospell and the calling of a Protestant Minister by a lawfull Presbyter for ought we know then there was betwixt the calling of Annas and Caiphas and that of Paul and Barnabas Act. 13. 1. And so also we could tell your Prelates of their permitting women to baptise children in case of weaknesle and if they cannot conveniently be brought to Church as if the salvation of infants did depend upon the act of Baptisme and not upon the free grace of God who according to the good pleasure of his will and in relation to the covenant he hath made with our fathers hath elected them to salvation in Christ their Saviour for by the ministery of the Sacraments Gods promises unto us are not accomplished and finished but only established and confirmed here therefore is one grosse errour more to permit women to baptise whom the Apostle 1 Tim. 2. 12. will not permit to teach or speak in the congregation nor to have any publike charge in the Church certainly if they may lawfully be permitted to minister the one Sacrament we know no reason why they may not as lawfully minister the other which we hope no sound protestant will deny to be flat contrary to the ordinance of Christ and a meer profanation of those holy mysteries The like also we might alleage of the Anabaptists Brownists and divers other Schismatikes that are permitted by you on both sides to the great disparagement of our Protestant Religion who although they were never brought up at the feet of Gamaliel nor bred in the schools of the Prophets but meer husbandmen or tradesmen whose credit wealth and wit lieth in their hands and fingers yet forsooth will brag of the Spirit and without any warrant or commission from Christ or his Church will presume to take upon them this sacred function and both preach and baptise without any warrant or calling other then their own private phantasie or some brainsick enthusiasme What need we say more seeing that which we have already affirmed is abundantly sufficient to discover to the world that your late English Episcopall Prelaticall Government which your Highnesse and your associats do so stifly maintain hath been no other we mean especially in point of discipline then a pattern of Popery a map of Machiavilisme a rapsodie of Superstition and a bundle of corruption in regard whereof for ought we know we may as lawfully say that of your Church and your Church government as Buchanan your Highnesse Fathers Schoolmaster spake of old Rome Totam denique quantacunque Roma est Nascentom vegetem excute florentem Nihil invenies nisi Lupercall Lupercale Lupos Lupas Lupanar To conclude therefore this first question and apply it to the use of your Highnesse and your Associates seeing that your late Prelacy as it was exercised in England and as it is now so stifly maintained by you hath not nor ever had any just ground from the Word of God nor from Christ institution nor the practice of Gods true Church for divers hundred of yeers after Christ untill Antichrist began to shoot out his horns And for as much also as the true and solid peace and prosperity of a people and their welfare also in respect of politicall government depends much if not altogether upon the right and orthodex government of the Church consisting in soundnesse of doctrine and integrity of discipline It is high time for your Highnesse seeing that yoy Hierarchy can hold no water is not like to hold water although with the Papist you should plead never so much antiquity for it for as your own Hierarchicall Civilians will confesse Quod non valet ab initio tractu temporis non convalescit To bethink your self of some more sound lawfull and warrantable way of governing your people in matters of Religion which is grounded not to much upon mens inventions and Pontificiall Canons as upon the Institution and written Word of God and of his Son Christ whose Gospel and Ordinance doth not onely blesse and sanctifie but authorize and qualifie all humane actions and that as well under the Gospel as under the Law for why should we think that Almighty God should be lesse carefull of the Government of his Church under the New Testament then he was in the time of Moses or that he should then leave or now under the Gospel allow all things in his Church nay any thing to be managed by the will and determination of subordinate Officers and Magistrates without any ground explicit or implyed from himself whereas we know that not onely Moses under the old Testament was so shie to do any thing in the government of Gods people of his own head and without a speciall direction and commandement from God that he would not admit unto the Passeover one that at a Funerall had touched the corps of a dead man before he had asked counsell of God as you may see Numb.

9. 6 7 8 verses and in Exod. 25. 40. hee is expresly charged by God not to make the Tabernacle after any other fashion then was shewed him in the mountain but also Christ himself who was Moses prototype whom God in the 18 of Deuteronomy 15. did promise to raise up as a Prophet like unto Moses although much more excellent for Moses as a servant but Christ as a sonne Heb. 3. 5 6. Did dispose and regulate his little flock according to the will of his Father not according to the will of man nor according to his owne will as he was man but according to the will of his Father for as himself witnesseth John 5. 30. He came not to seeke his own will but the will of his heavenly Father and this kinde of government revealed in his Gospel without all question he will continue and have amongst all his chosen people to be continued untill his second comming whose voice all Christians but especially all Protestants or reformed Christians must obey unlesse they will deny Christ to be their Prophet or derogate from the worthinesle of his propheticall office one principall part whereof was not only to reveal unto his people his Fathers will concerning their redemption but also to govern and rule them in the performance and execution of that will unto the end of the world wherefore to draw the frame and authenticalnesse of a Church government from any other pattern then from Christ and his Apostles is no other then to deny both the Propheticall and Regall office of the Sonne of God who if he be a King over his people why should he not be able both to prescribe laws unto them and also guide and rule them according to these Laws so far as may conduce to his owngory and their happinesse Surely they that draw the frame and government of an Evangelicall Church under the Gospel from any other authority or build the same too much upon the placets and inventions of men who are not onely vain but vanity it selfe nor subject to deceive but also to be deceived doe but take their marks by the moon build their house upon the sand preferring Eleazer the servant to Isaac the sonne and Moses the messenger unto Christ the master and Judge of all the earth In a word to say that Christ is not as carefull of his Christian Church under the Gospel as Moses was of the Church of the Jews and that he hath not in his Gospel prescribed what kind of Magistrates Ministers and Officers hee would have and by what Laws he would have them to be governed were to make him more negligent of his people then was Numa of the Romans Solon of the Lydians or Lycurgus of the Lacedemonians all which although Heathens did prescribe wholsome Laws unto their Common-wealth which so much as to thinke of the Lord Jesus in whom were hiden all treasures of wisdome and knowledge were most damnable and blasphemous So much of the first Question viz. How inconsistent your late Church government was with the Gospel and how far it hath been of late years in your Kingdoms abused The second Question HOw inconsistent this kind of Church government is unto your Highness safety and prosperity of the Republick and consequently what a preposterous thing it is to continue the same in these Kingdoms This Question is easily resolved if you will suffer your judgment without partiality but to reflect upon these three Objects viz. First the disposition and affections of your own Subjects Secondly the reputation and expectation of Protestant Princes and Professors amongst us beyond the Seas Thirdly the condition and nature of the true Protestant Religion and Protestant Professors established and regulated by a Presbytery which without all peradventure of all Christian professions this day in the World is that which is most sound and orthodox in it self as being most free from corruption and most safe for a true Protestant Prince which undertaketh to mayntain not a Protestant Religion for so do the Kings of Poland Sweden and Denmark although corrupted with the Roman and Lutheran Superstitions but the Protestant Religion which onely is most consonant with the doctrine and practice of Christ and his Apostles and most agreeable to that pattern of wholsome doctrine expressed in the Gospel the patronage whereof no Prince can deny that is a true Protestant unlesse it be such a Prince that affecteth tyranny and would make under the cloak of Relgion not the Word of God and welfare of his people but worldly policy and private respects to be rule of his government First then May it please your Highnesse and Confederates to cast your eyes upon the people we mean not such people whom malice corruption or covetousnes without any respect to the Word of God or a good conscience have drawne to your side but the mayn body of the two of your best Kingdoms of England and Scotland for the most and best part how exasperatly and uncontrolable are they set against this way mayntayning it for a maxime as your Associates doe No Bishop no King so they No Bishops no Popery where by the word Bishop they do not understand any of Pauls Bishops mentioned in the Epistle to Timothy and Titus for such Bishops as these they seek for and their Petition unto your Highnesse is Da nobis tales Timothaeos nos eos cib abimus auro potabimus balsamo Such Bishops as these may be well consistent with the Presbyteriall Government and by the prayers and suffrages of such Bishops before ever hee medled with a Hierarchy your Royall Father King James did enjoy many peaceable and happy days which if it had pleased our Great Land-lord might have been continued unto your Highnesse and your posterity and which wee beseech the Almighty mangre the unhappinesse of your present distempers may be continued unto you and yours as long as the Sun and Moon endureth But by a Bishop your people for the most part understand a domineering temporizing and self-seeking prelate where by the word Bishop or prelate they doe not so much conceive one particular office or individuall person of one Clergy man but collectively all his subordinate Officers Assistants and Attendants such as Deans Archdeacons Prebends Surrogates Chancelours Commissaries Registers Proctors Apparitors Chaunters Choristers Canons Pety-Canons Vergers and all their Ecclesiasticall Courts Laws Canons Orders Innovations and Ceremonies which although they were in themselves never so indifferent decent or commendable yet the Commons for the most part of both these Kingdomes are perswaded and hold it for Maxim irrefragible that dictates such a Bishop we say not such a Prines mayntaining or approving such persons or things is no other then a relike of popery a limbe of Antichrist a Wenne upon the face or a Boyle upon the blest of a true Protestant Reformed Church Nay there be many thousands of Husbandmen Artificers and Tradesmen besides people of greater quality if we be not much misinformed

within your Island whom if wee should goe about to perswade of the lawfulnesse of such a Bishop but in jest they would be ready to cut our throats in earnest so rigidly are they set against this kinde of Prelacie the Hierarchy that the very name of a Bishop is to an ordinary English or Scotish countrey man as the King of Spain is to a Hollander for as the one taketh it for an argument somuch honesty to rail against the Spanish King so doth the other hold this to be a speciall marke of a good Protestant to condemne and cry down Episcopacy the very name of a Bishop they hate worse then a young Court Lady doth old age or a Jew Images Seeing therefore your people for the most part are thus disposed it is the duty of a wise Prince being Pater patriae to comply to their desires your greatest strength consisting in their affections and their affections being so brittle as a Crystall glasse which being once broken can hardly be souldred together again yea although that which they desire should be unreasonable yet if the common stream be very strong a discreet Prince can have no better policy then to row with the tyde although he should be forced through the violence of the weather to land at the wrong stairs it is but a little going on foot if he cannot have a Coach or Sedan that will bring him to his right Harbour Nor can the foregoing or quitting the Prelacy Hierarchy detract any thing if you consider rightly from the stature of your magnificence For why may not a Moderator in a government presbyteriall be as safe and honourable unto your Highnesse and as well endowed by your Highnesse bounty as any prelate under the government Hierarchicall your Highnesse especially having therewith which wee are sure you have not now the affections and consent of your people Neither can it any ways be dishonourable to admit of this change at the request of the Commons seeing you have the president of divers wise and mighty Potentates for the same who rather then they would admit of warre to come within the channell of their Dominions upon any terms did think it no disparagement to subscribe unto their peoples demands although sometimes absurd and ridiculous Witnesse Lewes the Eleventh and Henry the Seventh then which all England and France cannot point forth two of more profound judgment and better verst in the mystery of government who in cases of controversie with their subjects were the first propounders and seekers of peace and by their soft complyance did dint the bullets of their peoples fury and so by this means when the storme was over and businesse came to be debated upon the great Carpet did in a short time and by degrees become Masters of their own ends and their subjects affections Yea which is yet more Suppose that your Great Counsell would comply with your Highnesse to continue this Hierarchy which as we understand they will yet hardly do yet shall not ever your Highnesse or your posterity have any setled peace in your Dominions unlesse you abolish the same The people wil stil once in twenty or thirty yeers run into their old byas Episcopacy as it hath been there amongst you exercised being in their construction as is aforesaid no other then a wound or gangreen upon the brest of the English Church in which wound so long as there remayneth any corruption so long there will be pain and so long as there is pain the patient will complain the humour therefore must be purged and the wound before it be sewed up well clensed lest it burst out again or if it be a gangreen the part that is festered must be cut off Immedicabile vulnus Ense recidendum ne pars synceratrahatur For if it be let alone the whole body will be thereby endamaged so long as the cause remayns so long will the effect be continued so long as your Highnesse doth mayntain and patronize Episcopacie so long will your people murmur and grudge at your government As therefore you tender the health of the Common-wealth and as you desire the setled peace of this Kingdome venienti occurrite morbo purge out this old leven cleer the brest and heal the heart of your politicall body and that so seasonably and speedily that your miseries come not to a greater heighth for Sero medicina paratur Cum mala per longas invaluere moras If your disposition to jarring turn once into a setled habit of warring without the rich mercy of God there will be norhing wanting to make your calamities irrecoverable Furthermore let your Highnesse and your Confederates if you be as you professe your selves to be true Protestants duly consider what a great improvement this will be to the Protestant Religion if you will abandon this kind of government and establish throughout all your Dominions the government Presbyteriall what a great heartning and encouragement to all forreigne Protestant Princes and professors throughout Europe who do worship God in spirit and truth are resolved to maintain their Religion in the same purity it was in the Apostlestime and many yeers after untill pride ambition and corruption began to sway What joyfull news we say will this be to them that your Highnesse and Associates have resolved to put to your helping hands towards the curtaling of the Popes horns and that you have given such a blow to the Roman Antichrist as that you have not only within your Dominions cutoff the head and members that is the Prelaticall Bishops and their Court-keepers but also demolished and defaced the very Images and representations of that Babylonish Monster yea that you have not onely cashiered and discarced all open professors of popery such as were Jesuits Priests and others their Disciples and Emissaries but also all Ecclesiasticall Dignities Orders Canons Courts and Conditions of men which did any ways concern or rellish a popish Hierarchie For certainly say what you will their is no Religion in the world next to the Muscovites except the Lutherans who yet in their Prelacy and Church Discipline are not so corrupt and extravagant which doth more punctually resemble the government of the Roman Church then doth the English Hierarchie in so much that since the beginning of your late intestine broyls in Great Britain the Jesuits have not failed to stirre up and incense the King and Parliament of Poland either to banish and exterminate all your Highnesse Subjects and Countrymen out of their Kingdome or else to vex and charge them yeerly with such grievous and unaccustomed taxations as that now they can hardly gain livelihood amongst them notwithstanding their laborious endevours good desert and great services which they have done for them and why is all this forsooth but because they will not be of their own Kings religion which they take for granted to be Roman Catholick else why did the Jesuits of the City of Vilna wherein is the chief Tribunall