for no History can tell us what is become of them to this day And this they got even ruin the certain Portion and lot of all Rebells whilst loyal Judah and Benjamin continu'd a Kingdom govern'd by their own Laws and Religion except in the Parenthesis of 70 years Captivity until the Blood of our Saviour which according to their wish fell heavily upon them unto this day and made them Cain's and Vagabonds upon the Face of the Earth All this shews us the Truth of the Old Religion of the Primitive Christians in spight of our new Presbyterian Church-Militant whose Weapons were only Prayers and Tears with which they defended themselves and wearyed out and at last overcame their Persecutors and Tyrants And as this is true Christian Piety so we in England find it the best Policy by Fatal Lectures of woful Experience People were so alarum'd from the Pulpits with such Texts as this and so frighted with Jealousies and Fears of Arbitrary Government and Popery that like men in a Shipwrack as I said before that leap into the Sea for fear of Drowning we gulf'd our selves into more Arbitrary Government Tyranny and Popery or Foppery and Phanaticisme the Spawn of Popery then could possibly have betided us if the worst had come that men did fear or were perswaded to fear How were our Miseries in the Late Civil Wars Prologu'd with a noise of Arbitrary Government in the Case of Ship-Money a Tax impos'd without a Parliament for Remedy whereof it came to Armes and Blood and Ruine and instead of one Arbitrary Tax as they call'd it by the King without a Parliament in a Case of urgent necessity to defend the Kingdom against Forreign Foes we underwent a Thousand Arbitrary Taxes by a Parliament without a King which is at least equally Illegal and Millions of Men and Treasure consum'd was not this Remedy worse than the Disease And was there ever any Tyrant heard of in any Age or Nation that ever Ruin'd and wasted his People at that Bloody Rate that we wasted and ruin'd one another and all this because nothing would please men but New Religions and New Preachers and New Expositions of Texts such as this is but explain'd quite contrary to Truth and the Old Christian Religion whose Weapons against Authority and Soveraign Majesty are only I say again Prayers and Tears And shall not God hear his Peoples Cryes and Groanings Yes surely read all Histories and you will find that as Rebels so Tyrants seldom come to the Grave in Peace Sine coede sanguine Nemo Nec siccâ morte Tyranni Rehoboam would play the Tyrant and lost his Subjects by it Dionysius the Tyrant of Syracusa thought he had ensur'd his Kingdom of Sicily to him with Chains of Adamant and he was glad to turn School-Master in Italy in Conclusion and get a Paultry living as a Tyrannical Paedagogue with insulting over Boyes The time would fail me to tell of the dismal ends of such Nero's and Dioclesian's and I am weary of this Tragical Discourse and will briefly come to a more pleasant Improvement of the Text concluding the Stated Question thus If the King happen to be a Child a Mad-man a Papist or an Infidel for his Personal Infirmities he shall answer to God alone but his Dominion and our Obedience are circumcised within the Limits of the Laws of the Land the only Rule of his Soveraignty and our Obedience and all other Doctrine of Obedience is Parasitical or Prophane Vse 1. If the help of our Soveraign Lord the King be the help of the Lord God and if Royal Aid be Divine Aid then who do they help that Fight against and resist their Sovereign Who are they for For the Devil sure There is no middle way no favorable Limbus no Purgatory that can Intervene but they that help not Heaven they help Hell they that help not the Lord help the Devil As do all those that are so Disloyal Lazy or Cowardly that neglect to help their Soveraign when endanger'd or distrest by Enemies much more do those help the Devil that Rebel and Tumultuously resist and Fight against their Soveraign If the Spirit of Loyalty be the Spirit of God as the Holy Ghost calls it as aforesaid then what Spirit is that which Resisteth God by Resisting the Soveraign Magistrate who is called God but the Spirit of Antichrist and the Spirit of the Devil Not the Spirit of the Devil in his own Black Hellish likeness and Apparition that would affright rather than invite men to be his Followers But a Devil in the likeness of Samuel in the likeness of a Prophet a Rebel with his Cloak on the Old Cloak of Religion and the Cause the Cause The Devil was great in Absalom to make him a Rebel against his King and Father but he was a Crafty Politick Devil withall 2 Sam. 15. to make him pretend Justice and Courtesie and Humility to gain the Populace and above all Arts Religion let me go and pay my Vows which I have Vowed to the Lord in Hebron saith he the Place of Conventicle and the Place of Randevouz and Parade also Finge Deum Belial quoties vis fallere plebem And such Devils in the likeness of a Prophet I say in the likeness of Religion is the fiercest the Bloodyest the most Antichristian and Devillish of all Devils Did ever man read of more Bloody Massacres than under the Conduct of the Papists Covenanted together in France by the Name of the Holy League Did ever any thing Parallel it except those Hellish contrivances and Bloody Butcheries in this Island under the favor and Influence of the solemn League and Covenant We read in the Holy Go pel of a kind of Devils that cannot be Cast out but by Prayer and Fasting but this kind of Devil or Spirit of Antichrist that I am Treating of gets Life and strength by Prayer and Fasting Variety of opinions there are the Man of Sin Spoken of 2. Thef 2. the Son of Perdition Be this Spirit of Perdition or Man of Sin who it will I am sure 1st It is a religious a pretendedly Religious Spirit because it sits in the Temple of God vers 4. Secondly It is a Rebellious Spirit against the Sovereign Magistrate opposing and exalting himself above all that is called God that is the Magistrate So that those that under color of Religion and upon pretence of Religion Fight and Kill and Slay and break the peace As in our Age have the Papists especially the Jesuits and the Fanaticks especially the rigid Presbyterian and Fifth-Monarchy-Men we are sure they are Men of Sin and Sons of Perdition opposing the Magistrate for God's sake or in pretence of Religion Religion certainly true Religion is the greatest happiness that God gives to Mortal Men thereby we converse with Heaven upon Earth thereby Men live on Earth like the Glorified Saints and Angels in Heaven thereby comes Glory to God on High on Earth Peace good Will towards
decree and pronounce it altogether necessary for all Mankind to be subject to the Pope of Rome in pain of Damnation Observe by the way the difference betwixt the Popes old and new style For till a Thousand years after Christ no Pope was ever so audacious as to claim or usurp Supremacy over Kings and Emperors So that the Pope in ordine ad spiritualia and the presbyterian ribus Christi hookes in all Dominion Kings will have a good share left between them but Pride and Covetousness taught these Sons of Perdition these Innovations and Usurpations For Priests and Bishops themselves however they pretend the derivation of their Office from Christ yet have the liberty of the open Administration thereof from the Civil Authority alone and Laws of the Land Object But suppose the Civil Authority will not be so civil to us to grant us this liberty is not this Persecution what shall we do in this case Ans In such a Case obey our Saviour's Command and take his advice Mat. 10.23 When they Persecute you in one City Fly to another and in one Country Fly to another Country Every good Christian every tender conscience will do it but the Papists and Fanaticks and Non-conformists scorn the motion flye say they what fly from our dear proselytes fly from our Dayly-bread fly from our flocks and our herds they scorn it they 'le sooner fly in the Magistrates Face they are good Christians the while St. Paul thought himself happy that he could fly though he ventur'd a Limb by Flying being let down in a Basket over the City Wall and so escaped their Hands Obj. But we live not under Pagan but Christian Magistrates and therefore should expect better things of them Ans I grant it and so we do Blessed be God any man may in England be as good a Christian as he will and instead of Persecution for the same have encouragement from the King and his Laws But woful experience has taught not to trust with too much Power Canters and Hypocrites Juglers and Dissenters no Nation in the World but endeavors to maintain its own being it s own Laws and Constitutions from the Plots and Conspiracies of such as always Watch to defame disparage contemn circumvent and undermine it especially to such as have bid defyance to a good Conscience for a good and conscientious Christian dares not disobey our Saviors Command but if he be persecuted in one Country he will he must he ought to fly to another and in the Interim if he cannot Fly willingly to suffer for Christ and joy and glory therein as the Apostles did and not whine mutiny and complain as Fanaticks do Alas the Men do not believe what they would make others believe that woe be to them if they do not Preach the Gospel if they did they would Preach it in India in Turky in Persia the World is wide and the Converting of a Turk has a better Reward than the perverting of one that is a Christian already Cicero indeed holds it to be Heresie to differ or dissent from the Religion of a Man's Country and the King of Morocco answered the Ambassadors of King John of England requesting to know how His Majesty liked St. Paul's Epistles which he had lately read with a Protestation that were he to chuse a Religion he would be a Christian But he held it abominable not to live and dye in the Religion received from his Fore-fathers and his Country But these were Infidels and to be condemned by us Christians who are taught to call no Man Master nor no Man Father or Rabbi upon Earth that is not jurare in verba Magistri but to give a reason of the Faith and hope that is in us though the said Cicero and the Infidel King spoke like as they were very Wise-men and great States-men But when through Gods great Mercy we are happy in being born in a Country Beautified with the best Religion and the best Laws nothing but the said Spirit of Popery or Foppery can make any Man a Non-conformist Our Blessed Saviour though he was Lord of Heaven and Earth and also poor and penny less yet when tribute was demanded of him rather than he would offend the Law of the Land he liv'd in did a Miracle to get Money to pay his Assessment St. Paul upon his Tryal when he was Indicted before Festus by the Jews who laid many grievance complaints against him he clears himself by Pleading not Guilty not by demurring to the Jurisdiction of the Court and Laws of the Land Acts 25.28 and yet they were Heathen Laws but Pleads not Guilty and Justifies that neither against the Law of the Jews nor against the Temple which yet was Superstitious nor yet against Caesar though their Conqueror and Invader had he offended any thing all And Acts 28.17 In these words clears himself namely I have committed nothing against the People or customes of our Fathers I wonder by what Rule by what Pattern a Non-Conformist walks whilst he will neither coppy after Christ nor St. Paul Surely no opinion is so wild and extravagant but will find some Fools so wicked as to follow it though it ruin them I read of a Sect called Caynites because they praised Cain in Murdering his Brother others that have commended Corah Dathan and Abiram as stout Independents and Libertines that would not be controul'd with never a Moses or Aaron of them all nay I read of one Bruno that writ an Oration in Commendation of the Devil and his Luciferian Pride Oh liberty liberty is a sweet thing say some the very Birds when caged had rather live at all adventure and perhaps starve then be coup't up with never so much Plenty oh say they liberty of Conscience to believe what we list and say what we list and do what we lift is a very precious enjoyment Happy are the People that are in such case like the Guiana-Indians sine Lege sine Rege I can tell you of a time and a Country in Holy Scripture where there was just such a time of Liberty And yet they had a King the good King Asa but of little benefit to the People because they had a great mind to this same liberty and to live as they list and lawless Now for a long season Israel hath been without the true God no matter for that saith the Atheist and without a teaching Priest all the better saith the Papist and Fanatick and without Law all the better saith the Libertine Here was a time to some Men's wish and was it not a happy time Read that in the 5. verse And in those times there was no peace to him that went out or to him that came in but great vexations were upon all the Inhabitants of the Countries and Nation was destroyed of Nation and City of City for God did vex them with all adversity And 't is Impossible it should be otherwise for there was no Law no Yoak every
should believe Moses and the Prophets handed to them by Tradition and Humane Authority Ay but the Pharisees the Puritan Party of the Jews they must have a surer Card for their Religion then other Jews and therefore they were not content with Faith though the Prophet Habakkuk had told them that the just should live by it Hab. 2.4 no they must have more Religion and a better ground for Religion then the other Jews or then God required or did expect which was Faith only And would make the World believe that as if they had been as old as the first Mutineers and Ambitious Puritans Corah Dathan and Abiram and had seen Moses Face to shine like the Face of an Angel when he came from speaking with God in the mount they do not only by Tradition of their Fathers believe no but they knew that God spake by Moses Mr. Calvin I confess for him and his followers that he was forc't to give a Definition of Faith contrary to that in Heb. 11.1 for fear the Papists had run him a ground For if he believed Christ and the Gospel upon humane Authority or the Authority of the Popish Church which he renounc't he knew not well how to answer the renouncing the Tradition of that Church without also renouncing Jesus Christ and his Gospel therefore which he should not need he was glad to define Faith to be a stedfast and an assured knowledge of Gods kindness c. and this by a certain witness of the Spirit within a Man By which secret perswasion if he means Gods Grace to make a Man believe Humane Authority Christian and Humane Tradition and Laws whereby we believe the truth of the Holy Scripture he is in the right but he is evidently out of his Story in calling this Faith an assured Knowledge For alas the best of us except we Lye and Cheat and Vapor as those Puritan Pharisees did we must say with the Apostle we see but in part as in a glass Darkly and not with stedfast and assured knowledge as the Saints Triumphant do and as did the Apostles who saw and knew our Blessed Jesus and Saviour in the Flesh But hence comes all the mischief from this Vapor and Lye in making our Faith just like St. Thomas his whose seeing was believing and the rest of the Apostles what ever was true of the Apostles must be true of us which is an abominable Cheat and Imposture They were Witnesses of Christs Resurrection we only tell what they said or did Witness at the second or third hand said I no at the Thousand'th hand and at long run by the Tradition of the Christian Church and Laws of the Land he that pretends other ground for his Faith either believes he knows not wherefore and is a Fool or Enthusiast or Fanatick which is all one and a Cheat and Impostor or else is a Papist and has an Implicite Faith in the Church of Rome or else by doing Miracles as the Apostles did can and must give a Demonstration of the Spirit and of Power In the Name of God what would these Disturbers of Man-kind be at Here 's ado with their Religion their Religion and there 's not one of them knows where he got it except from the Church of England or the Church of Rome And yet they disclaim both these and consequently can demonstrate nothing nor rationally convince any Man of the Truth of their Faith except by their own secret perswasion which though it may be of God yet they cannot shew and prove but that it may be a Lye a Cheat and from the Father of Lyes Are they Ordain'd to Preach the Gospel Let us see their Commission and Ordination They answer they are Ordain'd by them that were Ordain'd by them that were Ordain'd by those that were Ordain'd by the Papists c. I knew whether they would come at long Run Nor can they justifie to the World that that English Minister of Gods word that is not the Kings Minister Ordain'd according to the Sacred and Christian Laws of England is any other then a Minister of the Pope or the Devil either a Papist or an Enthusiast and possest with the Spirit of Popery or the Spirit of Foppery Religion true Religion our Saviour says like a Tree is known by the Fruits consult all Histories antient and modern view the present posture of Affairs if ever this Hundred Years there ever was any Rebellion Massacre Tumults or Treasons Blood Rapine and Murder but either Papist or Fanatick or both had the great hand in it To look no further back then the Reign of King James who dethron'd his Mother and made a Slave and property of him in his Infancy but that Bloody Knox Buchanan and the rest of that Puritan Presbyterian brood by woful experience he tells his Son our late Martyr'd Sovereign in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That under pretence of Religion he should find Alas alas He did find it by sad experience no such Barbarous and Bloody Villains in the World When King James came into England they still made him weary of his Life and the Papists on the other hand endeavor'd to take away his Life by the Gunpowder-Treason But Blessed be God unsuccessfully all his Reign but what the Plots the Popish Plots could not accomplish against his Son the Presbyterian Plots did perfect Crowning their Villany with the Blood and ruin of the Kingdom bringing the Blessed King to the Bloody Scaffold and our Gracious Sovereign to the more Ignominious Stool of Repentance And is this your Religion where did they learn it not from God from Holy Scripture nor from this Text but from the Devil who was a Murderer from the beginning and a Lyar like these his Children and the Father of Lyes These things are plain and palpable and had not now been remembred but that Men tread the same steps follow the same methods may we not Fast and Pray say they sad oh sad may we not Preach wo be to us if we do not Preach the Gospel and wo be to you good People if we do not Preach as if the Gospel were confin'd and Monopoliz'd to a Crew that can show no Authority no Commission no Call no Warrant for what they do except from the Pope and Jesuits who I fear have a great Influence among them The King and his Laws Ordain and constitutes in England the only true Christian Bishops Priests and Deacons as he does the only true Judges and Justices of the Peace and he may deprive all of them equally And therefore if they cannot justifie there Ordination and Commission their Warrant and their Call in an Ordinary and orderly way nor yet by Miracles in an extraordinary way let them no more so idly so impudently and so vainly apply the Apostle's sayings to themselves but contrarily wo be to them if they Preach the Gospel without sufficient Call Warrant Ordination and Lawful Authority Pilate rationally and honestly subjoyn'd to the
Curse ye Meroz OR THE FATAL DOOM IN A SERMON Preached in Guild-hall-Chappel LONDON BEFORE The Right Honorable the Lord Mayor and Court of Aldermen May the 9th 1680. By EDMOND HICKERINGILL late Fellow of Gonvil and Cajus Colledge in Cambridge and Rector of the Rectory of All-Saints in Colchester LONDON Printed by J. R. for J. Williams at the Sign of the Crown in St. Pauls-Church-yard 1680. To the Most Illustrious PRINCESS ELIZABETH DUTCHESS of ALBEMARLE c. May it please your Grace TO take this occasion to Blazon and Publish your Virtues would be an employ as needless as his that Lighted a Candle to the Sun And if I should here declare how much I am Obliged to your Grace and how good an Opinion you have had of my Endeavours in this kind Envy perhaps would Construe it in me Ambition rather than Gratitude And if by the Formality of a Dedication I should thus engage you to Countenance or perhaps blush for my escapes it would not only be a Presumption but a Trappan None of these were Motives to perswade to this address but the Truth is Religion in this Age is so much out of Fashion amongst the Men some of them at least looking upon all Religion but as the needless Parenthesis of Life that if I take all occasions to give your Grace opportunities to encourage any Loyal and Religious attempts 't is the greatest honour I can do you or can be done to you For which cause no doubt St. John Dedicated one of his Epistles to the Elect Lady And with the same or the like methods the Apostles did so Court the great Ladies in the Court of Rome that they Proselyted to Virtue and Christianity of Honourable Women not a few Nor can I better evidence my Devotion to your Grace or more approve my own Judgment to the World than by this Dedication in making Choice of such a Protectoress to favour that Loyalty and Religion that is Retrieved in this Sermon from a Text by the perverse Interpretations of some Men almost lost and forlorn Religion I say and Loyalty I put them together for they are Twins that in our Christian Kingdom are born and Live and Dye together 〈…〉 Man in England at this day can be 〈…〉 Religious that is not truly Loyal nor any Man truly Loyal that is not truly Religious Not only I mean in the Sence of that great and good German Emperour that turned away his Prophane Servants with these words How can he be faithful to me that is not faithful to his God But chiefly because true Loyalty as well as true Religion are nothing else but an Obedience to God and the King in the Observance of the Christian Laws of the Land Any other account of Religion is Superstititious and any other account of Loyalty is Factious or Parasitical In our Age no Rebells ever disturbed the Government and England's Peace 〈…〉 such as marcht in a Religious Dress and â—…y Masquerade and therefore the most dangerous And though I cannot but have great Compassion for misguided Zeal yet I have sometimes in this following Sermon followed St. Paul's advice against my natural tenderness and inclination in reproving them sharply and giving the Devil his due None was so mild and compassionate to Publicans and Sinners as our Blessed Saviour yet when he had to do with Scribes Pharisees and Hypocrites he denounc't as many Woo's as Verses against them and called Judas the Traitour plain Devil But to enlarge this Epistle would but aggravate the trouble of this interruption I shall therefore now as I daily do Conclude with my earnest Prayers for the Temporal and Eternal Prosperity of you and yours as the bounden Duty of Illustrious Madam Your Grace's most Humble and obliged Servant and Chaplain Edm. Hickeringill Colchester May 14.1680 Judges 5.23 Curse ye Meroz said the Angel of the Lord Curse ye bitterly the Inhabitants thereof because they came not to the help of the Lord to the help of the Lord against the Mighty I Have chosen a Text very seldom if at all insisted upon in these Times and never before by me at any time But yet about Forty years ago this Text I have heard was the Common Theam in Pulpits and Usher'd in as well as promoted the late Bloody Civil Wars In this Text some sagacious men could find Horse and Armes and hence Raise and Muster Battalia's against Soveraign Majesty nay here they could find Commissions too to vouch the Quarrel And why should this Text of Holy Writ now like a piece of Apocrypha be laid aside Antiquated and out of Date Shall this Portion of Holy Scripture never appear but like those ominous flames call'd Castor and Pollux by Marriners that sometimes precede but always presage a Storm Shall this Text of Curse ye Meroz c. never be handled but as a Sheet Anchor never made use of but in a Stress of Weather I am resolv'd to endeavor whatever be the Consequence to bring again into Reputation this Text Curse ye Meroz c. And because this Text will direct me necessarily to Treat of no vulgar Truths nor every days Discourse I will therefore for your sakes and mine own do what I never did before Read my Sermon upon this Text Curse ye Meroz c. The true and genuine meaning whereof will appear if we enquire 1. What is meant by Meroz 2. What is meant by the help of the Lord 3. Why Meroz was accursed 4. Why a good Angel the Angel of the Lord did Curse Is this the Language of a good Angel or rather the Language of a staring Hector to Curse and Damme The Language of a Popes Bull to Anathematize and Curse is this the Dialect of Heaven or the Dialect of Hell That the Fourth and last Quere why the Angel of the Lord did Curse Q. 1. First What is meant by Meroz Ans 1. Meroz is a Name not found in any part of Scripture except here but by the following words is imply'd that Meroz was one of the Associated Counties the Inhabitants whereof were Israelites Cursed Israelites Cowardly Israelites a pack of Neuters at least Judg 5.18 that whilst Zebulun and Naphtali were a People that being good Subjects Jeoparded their Lives unto the Death in the High Places of the Field to help their Soveraign Magistrate Deborah against the Enemy The Inhabitants of Meroz either out of Cowardize or Disloyalty or both staid at home and would not stir a Foot nor contribute Hand nor Heart nor their Purses neither to Royal Aid therefore Gods Angel does Anathematize and Curse them Q. 2. Secondly What is meant by the help of the Lord Ans 1. By the help of the Lord surely is meant the help of Rebels Aiding and Assisting them against the Soveraign at least men have been taught so and made to believe it and have ventur'd all their Estates nay more Body and Soul upon the truth on 't If this be the true meaning of the Words the Text
Men And as true Religion is the best thing so it is facile and easie to learn and practice Fear God and Honor the King Love thy Neighbor includes the whole duty of Man But the Hypocrisie of Religion the Face without the Heart of Religion it requires such a deal of dresses and paintings controversies disputes dissimulations frauds and pretences that it had been much better for the good and Peace of Mankind to have had no Religion then such a perplext tragical troublesome and fatal thing as some have made it and still endeavor to make it The first Quarrel and Bloodshed that ever was in the World was about Religion therefore Cain slew his Brother Abel and became the great Example of Murthering our Brethren upon a Religious score to all Holy and Solemn Leaguers and Covenanters both of Papists in France and Protestants in great Britain We have then here a clear Evidence who is the Man of Sin and Son of Perdition namely every Spirit that sits in the Temple of God and opposes and exalts it self above the Magistrate who is called God And that Spirit that Devillish Anti-christian Spirit divides it self like two lines drawn from the circumference to the center that seem to oppose one another yet both aime at the Center into the Spirit of Popery and the Spirit of Foppery The Former under pretence of Religion exalts the Mitre above the Crown and the Crosier above the Scepter the latter plumes himself in his Almighty Pulpit whilst the Magistrate truckles under him upon the Stool of Repentance both of them oppose and exalt themselves above all that is called God both of them will without scruple do evil that good may come thereof Equivocate Lye Plunder Sequester and Behead for Gods-sake and the causes-sake both of them agree in that Jesuitical tenent that Dominion is founded in grace both of them Plot and contrive Mischief where and when they have sway but always Mischief as much as in them lyes both of them have for many years been the great Disturbers of the Peace of all Christendome as well as of the Peace of England and tell me but of any Massacre or Bloody Wars and Stratagem 's against the Magistrate any Treason 's and Rebellions but what was carried on either by Papists and Jesuits or by Presbyterians and Fanaticks in the Memory of Man and I 'le be content to abide the Bloody Inquisition of the one and undergo the Fates of the Arch-Bishops and Metropolitan's of England and Scotland Canterbury and St. Andrews Murther'd by the other Both are Bejesuited and Breath nothing but Blood and Ruin for Gods-sake and Gods-cause and yet they are severally distinguish't and disguiz'd one wears a Fryars weed the other a short synodical Jump Jam. 4.1 one wear's his Crown shaven the other only crop't So that whence comes wars and Fightings amongst us From the Church the Temple of God And such as sit in the Temple of God Comes it from the conclave the Synod or the Pulpit Yes it did God knows when Men Men of Sin and Sons of Perdition with such a Text as this did make the Sacred Pulpit a Pulpit Drum to beat a Call thereon and an Alarum to Arms and War to Rebellion and Blood But such wild expositions and Harangues to bejuggle and beguile the silly Rabble came from the Lusts that Warr'd in their Members the Lust of Ambition the Lust of Covetousness after the Kings Lands the Bishops Lands the Stately Houses and Mannors of the Loyal Lords and Gentlemen And this all this and more came from the Pulpit From this Principle and Spirit of Antichrist or Rebellion under the Cloak of Religion did Pope Boniface exalted in Pride set his insulting Toe upon the Neck of Frederick the Emperor repeating with a surly grace that of the Psalmist Psa 18.40 Thou hast given me the Necks of mine Enemies and Psal 91.13 Psa 91.13 Thou shalt tread upon the Lion and Adder the Young Lion and Dragon shalt thou trample under Feet And just so did the Fanaticks who are minor Popes of a later Edition from this Principle wrest another place of the Psalmist to justifie the Murther of our late Sovereign of Blessed Memory namely To bind their Kings with Chains Psa 149 9â—… and their Nobles with Fetters of Iron to Execute upon them the Judgment written this Honor of all the Saints Then that of Isa 2.2 has done great Service namely Isa 2.2 The Mountain of the Lords House shall be established upon the top of the Mountains and shall be exalted above the Hills c. I 'le warrant there has been old quarrelling and scolding disputing and calling names Sons of Whores Sons of the Whore of Babylon Whore of Rome old Fighting and Wrangling Parrying and Fencing Thrusting and Scrambling whose Party should get up on and be this Mountain that shall be exalted upon the top of all other Mountains Ambition and Covetousness are of all Lusts never weary never tyred especially when Pride and Coverousness wears the Vizard of Religion then the Riches of Pluto and Hell cannot glut them and nothing but the ambition of Lucifer to be equal if not above their Maker can satisfie their Insatiable Pride Thus Vid. Alph de Verg. p. 123. Pope Boniface Lesson'd and Tutor'd Phillip Sirnamed the Fair King of France volumus te scire in temporali spirituali nobis subjacere you must know Sir that in Temporals as well as Spirituals you are our Subject Yet the French Army made bold to Plunder Pope Boniface 8th of more Treasure then all the Revenue of the Kings of the whole Earth amounted to in one Year Heildfield Histor a Sum by far exceeding the Sum of Two Hundred and Fifty Tun of Gold which Pope John 22. left to his Heirs All the wealth of the Indies is theirs if the King that owes those golden Mines be Priest-Ridden But the French not only of late through the Sorbonists Doctrine but also in former ages been very dull and unapt to learn the Doctrine of the Popes Supremacy and therefore the said French King Philip the Fair in his Letter to Pope Boniface in answer to his said impudent as well as imprudent claim begins his Letter with Sciat fatuitas vestra instead of Sciat sanctitas vestra that is in English I give your Fop-ship to understand instead of I give your Popeship to understand When Hen. 2. King of England was whipt and went to Tyburn in expiation of Beckets Death Thomas of Canterbury a proud Sawcy Priest and Rebel the King took every blow in Dudgeon and grumbled somewhat to himself in a menacing way whereupon the Popes legate stop't his Mouth presently with these words Domine noli minari c. Sir never threaten us who are Retainers to a Court that Lords it justly over Kings and Emperors 'T is endless to tell Stories of this Nature See Gerson Chancelor of Paâ—…is de poestate Ecles consid â—…2 part 3.