Parliament put into a Remonstrance and Presented to Charles the First was Frequent Dissolution of Parliaments Raising of Ship-money Suspensions Excommunications and Degradations of divers Painful Learned Pious Ministers c. There comes in at last a Complaint of His Chaplains and other Ministers of the Church of England Preaching before the King against the Liberty and Property of the Subject and for the Prerogative of the King above the Law. What will the World say of us while they see us blow hot and cold out at the same Mouth For my part I beleive the scratch is now where it don't itch Prerogative is not the thing does so much aggreive us If it happened to be on our side as we apprehend it now against us we should like Prerogative well enough If we had liv'd in those days what should we have though of such a Prerogative-Indulgence from Queen Mary in the behalf of Her Protestant Subjects from the Penal and Sanguinary Laws then established by Parliament Would we not have dared to own it to publish it in our Churches and Chapels till we had Authority of Parliament for it Would we have deserted and opposed so gracious a Queen and stroke into a Confederacy with the concurring Opinions of the Nobility and Gentry That to take away-the Penal Laws at that time would be but one step from the introducing of Protestancy I do not find the Clergy at all aggrieved at the Dispensing Power when at any time serving for the Interest of the Protestant Religion For instance When King Edward the Sixth by his mere Prerogative disposed of the Crown for that Reason to the Lady Jane most expresly contrary to a late establish'd Law passed in Parliament whereby the Crown was entailed on the Children of Henry the Eighth of which Mary and Elizabeth were both surviving it was so far from a daring not to do it till we had Authority of Parliament for it and from scrupling the Teaching of that which alters what has been formerly Thought the whole Constitution of this Church and Kingdom That Doctor Ridley Bishop of London by Order of the Council Preached a Sermon on purpose at Pauls-Cross to set forth the Title of the Lady Jane and to justifie the proceedings of the King and Council in that Affair Doctor Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury was one of the Principal in the Council and most of the rest of the Bishops and Clergy complied with and approved of it and commended it to their People Nor were the Nobility and Gentry averse from it After Queen Elizabeth by the same Established Laws the Succession of the Crown was to pass to Mary Queen of Scots but she being a professed Catholick what intrigues were driven to exclude Her in favour of the Protestant Religion and also Her Son James the First of England yet in his Infancy and probably enough supposed to bring with him His Mothers Religion Did not the Parliament offer to the Queen I cannot tell but it passed to an Act to enable Her to nominate Her Successor to the Crown Was not this to alter what had been formerly thought the whole Constitution of this Church and Kingdom Did not Charles the First the Protestant Martyr authorise the Canons of the Convocation 1640 by His Prerogative-Royal the Bishops and Clergy rightly asserting and espousing His Authority and Power in that matter nevertheless for the Parliaments declaring at the same time the Illegality of the thing and That it was against the whole Constitution of this Church and Kingdom So that it is not so much the Parliament of 72 nor the Constitution of the Church and Kingdom but somthing else in the Wind which makes us so off the Hooks with Prerogative and Dispensing Power at this time something we fear which I am confident upon the Integrity of His Majesties promise we have no cause to Fear But since you have so rudely jogg'd Prerogative for nothing in the World that I can see but happening to stand in your way at this time I will try a little of my skill as well as I can to defend it Treating first of the King 's Dispensing Power in general And Secondly of the exercise of it in this particular Instance which is the matter of the Declaration 1. In General That such a Power of dispensing with the Laws at least in the interim of Parliaments be lodged somewhere is grounded upon the same reason as of making Laws which is for the common good Salus populi est Suprema Lex Laws abstract from the Sanctions whereby they are injoyn'd are nothing else but Provisions made as at the first so on every arising occasion of promoting the common Good and consequently of averting any prospect of evil But for Parliaments in which so great a number of Men are employed and at so great a charge as that must be to the Nation to Sit continually watching and waiting upon such contingent occasions were almost as intolerable as any other evil the Laws would prevent Somtimes Laws Salutary and fitting to the juncture wherein they were made with some unexpected Providence Vicissitude or other un-thought Emergency change their nature and become noxious Besides that many Evils even pernicious and destructive to Common-wealths are somtimes so sudden and impendent as the Remedy would come too late in that way Somtimes of that nature that as nothing but dispatch so nothing but Secresie can avert them Somtimes so fixed in a popular mistake and misunderstanding as nothing but Time and Reasoning can make the discovery and generally enough dispose the Nation to consent to a Remedy And what must the Publick suffer perhaps an intolerable Evil or an irrepairable Ruin for want of applying an extraordinary Remedy in such Emergent cases That it is not expedient only but necessary for the publique Good that a Trust be reposed somwhere to make provision for the security of the whole Poplitique Body in such grand Emergencies and to judge of the matter and of the means proper for averting the Evil I think is by no body denied Whether it be so in our written Laws it makes no matter I am sure he that runs may read it in the original Prototype of all Laws which is right Reason even in the Fundamental Laws and Constitution of this Kingdom and all other Human Societies The Parliament of 41. could see a dispensing Power thus far thô they could not or which is blinder would not see to set the Saddle on the right Horse It is resolved say they by both Houses that in this case of extreme danger and of His Majesties refusal the Ordinance agreed upon by both Houses for the Militia doth oblige the People by the Fundamental Laws of the Kingdom It being so then that by the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom written or unwritten such a Dispensing Power with the present establish'd Laws is necessary at some times to be interposed I know not nor do I believe that any one else can tell me where it
Moral Certainty be grounded upon that It seems you were before aware of this Retort and you think fit to grant it in these words which follow which are by way of Question Whether the King cannot keep his Promise to the Church of England if the Test and Penal Laws be repealed To which your self make answer You cannot say but this may be so that you grant as Moral a Certainty on this side as on the other But the Kings Moral Certainty is not to be believ'd though yours must But for Reasons wherefore you are wont to be sparing where the Matter pinches but if we will take your Word there are some very substantial ones behind the Curtain Wherefore as you say the Nation does not think fit to try it and we commend the great Men who deny it If we will take such Reasons as you think fit to make show of at present why here they are The King is an Immoral Man and therefore no Moral certainty of what otherwise might be possible enough in it self The King professes an Immoral Religion and he converses with a sort of Immoral Men called Jesuits who can presently furnish him with a Salvo for his inclination to forget his promise to the Church of England Is not this to make the matter almost as evident a Demonstration as you promis'd us Why Sir I confess this is a young Phoenix Argument sprung out of the Ashes of that old one said to be of the Earl of Shaftburies which was burnt by the hand of the Common Hangman We must have a King we can trust And the Nobility and Gentry are called to take notice of it and to be supposed they go on the same ground Nay the whole Nation do not think fit to try it you say And all must be thanked the Nobility and Gentry especially most tenderly treated and their Ears by no means grated with this Declaration which may discourage provoke or misguide them from their opposition to the King on this account and then we are finally ruin'd indeed Now if the Church of England can be beholding to you for furnishing her Ministers with an Argument against the Kings Declaration which smells so rank of the Hangman I am mistaken in her which I am sure I am not among those who are Israelites indeed Wherefore I think it needless to spend any more words about it But having made sure of the Nobility and Gentry as you would have us think Now but a word to the Wife and you have done and that is to the Dissenters Who say you are so wise and considering as out of our opposition to the King on this Proposal to smell in us something of a persecuting spirit Well how shall the Matter be handled then that they be not provoked for there is no Policy in that at this time of the day however we have provoked them heretofore The Dissenters you say whom we ought not to provoke will expound our not reading to be the effect of a persecuting spirit Then it seems not reading is teaching too as well as reading what you will for that But how shall we split the hair between the Nobility and Gentry on the one side and the Dissenters on the other If we can draw both to to our side nothing can resist us To disoblige the Nobility and Gentry were more fatal indeed as you say than to anger the Dissenters But they are numerous and rich there is no parting with them at this time neither some cunning and fineness must be used then to bring over the Dissenters to the Confederate Army for God's sake what is the meaning of all this Plotting and Projecting and making Leagues and Alliances and mustering our Forces Where 's the Enemy May a Man venture to peep his Head over the Wall to see this same Hanibal ad portas which comes threatning thus with Fire and Fagot to discharge our new Alliance the Dissenters From all Pains Penalties Forfeitures Imprisonments by them or any of them incurred or forfeited or which they shall or may at any time hereafter be liable to by reason of their Nonconformity or the exercise of their Religion and from all Suits Troubles or Disturbances for the same And as for our selves there is no more mercy to be looked for at his hands than for our Brethren the poor Dissenters For all our Archbishops Bishops Clergy and all other of the Church of England in the first place Alas they must be every Scul of them protected and maintained in the free exercise of their Religion as by Law establish'd and in the full and quiet enjoyment of all their Possessions without any molestation or disturbance whatsoever It is time one would think to project a way of joyning the Church of England and the Dissenters to keep one another For these Dissenters are wise and considering Men and they are sensible of themselves that all this is but Anguis in Herbâ a mere Trap a Gin a pitfall And although they desire Ease and Liberty they are not willing to have it with such apparent hazard of Church and State. Let them but stay their longing a while for when there is but the first opportunity of shewing our inclinations without danger they will find that we are not such Persecutors as we have been represented Where then and what has been the danger that no such Inclinations have appeared toward the Dissenters these twenty eight years back Have not our Protestant Princes as well as this been always oppos'd in their Inclinations to any such Indulgence King Charles the Second made them a Promise of it at Breda he made several Intimations of that Promise in future Parliaments and how his Honor lay at stake but met with no Inclination in us unless it were to lay on more lode And after when that gracious Prince was fain to breake from us by main force and upon his own Prerogative issue out his promised Indulgence he could have no peace with us again nor any compliance with him in his other Affairs of State till we almost compelled him to a Revocation And yet what manner of Men should the Dissenters see we are towards them if we had but opportunity But now you say there is danger yes now we have carried our selves so as to apprehend danger to our selves there comes an opportunity for cokesing the Dissenters to help us to turn the danger upon the King and they must be made to believe they are in the saddest danger now that ever they were who in truth were never so much out of it for above twenty years past nor in such probability of shaking off the fear of any such danger for the future if they are not seduced and infatuated to be unthankful to their gracious King and wanting to themselves Now the reason wherefore I call the Dissenters to look back upon our Inclinations towards them is not to censure the Wisdom and Honor of those Parliaments which made such Laws against Dissenters
the same in Matters of Religion as well while that of our Princes and their Subjects was Pagan as afterwards when it became Christian Let us see then the Transition from the one Religion to the other in the Reigns of Lucius the First British and Ethelbert the First Christian King of the Saxons We find that in both our Kings acted without any controul of Laws as well in the relinquishing the long-established Pagan as in the reception of the Christian Religion And as our Kings were free so they kept their Subjects free from the Coaction of Laws in that Matter Particularly Venerable Beda relates of Ethelbert That having embraced the Christian Religion he could not but cast some more benign Aspect on such as were Converts with himself Yet so Bed. Histor Eccles ex Versione Abrahami Wheelock Vt nullum cogeret ad Christianisimum That there should be no Force upon the Consciences of his Subjects Didicerat enim à doctoribus auctoribusque suae salutis servitium Christi voluntarium non coactitium debere esse For that he had been taught of those who were the Authors of his Salvation That the Service of Christ ought to be voluntary and not of compulsion The Antient Jurisdiction of this Crown you may see by this was at that time free and whatever Laws were before established in favour of the Pagan Superstition and Persecution of Christians these Princes dispensed with them of their own Supreme Power next and immediately under God and so became Instruments of introducing the Blessed Means of Salvation and transmitting them to us their Posterity Which otherwise perhaps had not been so easily effected by a National or Parliamentary Concurrence at present But this Subject has been laboured by many great and learned in the Laws of this Realm to whom it especially belongs and to whom I refer those who desire further satisfaction This Antient Jurisdiction of the Crown the Second Canon measures by that which was claimed and exercised of the godly Kings of Judah and Christian Emperors of the Primitive Church How uncontrouled of any they exercised that Power who were Kings of Judah let their History in the Holy Scriptures teach you As for the Ancient Christian Emperors that they issued out Laws Ecclesisiastical by their Imperial Edicts and made Revocation of those Edicts as they pleased I think no Body will deny I know there was all the way of the Primitive Christianity another Spiritual Jurisdiction over Souls and even over the Emperors themselves as they were Sons of the Church for their Edification but no way intrenching on the Temporal Power even in Causes Ecclesiastical proper to such a Power When ever it made any attempt that way it was always checked by Christian Princes And is it to be believed that this Canon which was made with all the singular Laws and Statutes there mentioned for the abolishing all Foreign Power repugnant to the same would not have been as sharp upon any upstart Power at Home and of His Majesties own Subjects repugnant to the same if they had been aware of any the least tendency then to such an Insolence Take an Instance in one of the most famous and first Emperor of the Christian Church Constantine the Great and let us see what kind of Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical the Canons of our Church give to our Kings in parallel to what was exercised by the Christian Emperors of the Primitive Church Thrice I think according to some Historians twice I am sure according to Valesius in the Appendix to his Latin Version of Eusebius his Ecclesiastical History Constantine did dispense with the Imperial Laws by Indulgence and Toleration of the Donatists in Africa And for that purpose caused his Declaration of Indulgence to be published directed Vniversis Episcopis per Africam to all the Bishops throughout Africa as it is found extant among the Writings of Optatus and almost in the like words and for the like Reasons on which His Majesty issued out this His present Declaration of Liberty Some part of it I will therefore repeat Quod fides debuit quantum prudentia valuit prout puritas potuit tentasse me per omnia optimè scitis ut juxta Magisteria Legis nostrae Pax stabilita per omnem concordiam teneretâ— Sed quia vim illam scelâ—ris infusi intentionis nostrae ratio non potuit edoâ—nare expectandum nobis est dum totum hoc Omnipotentis Dei misericordia witigetur Verum dum Coelestis Medicina procedat hactenus sunt cencilia nostra Moderanda ut patientiam percolamus quidquid insolentia ilierum pro consuetudine intemperantiae tentat aut facit id omne tranquillitatis virtute toleremus nihil ex reciproco reponatur injuriae This Declaration of Indulgence had likewise the ill fortune of His present Majesties to be regrated by some of the Churchmen and the severity of the established Laws against the Donatists som what unwillingly restrained and Constantine by some of them particularly by Caecilianus Bishop of Carthage solicited to revoke his Letters of Indulgence whereupon says the Historian in the year 321. The Bishops on the part of Donatus put up their Petition also to the Emperor Poscentes ut libere ipsos agere sineret nec invitos adCommunionem Caeciliani cogere vellet Adding further that they never should either by Promises or Threats be induced to it and that they would rather dye a thousand deaths than to hold Communion with that Knave as they rudely styled the Bishop against their Consciences And here as the Historian goes on did most of all appear the Clemency of the Emperor that when he ought to have punished this impudence and insolence of the Donatists in calling their Archbishop Knave whose Innocency was well known and approved by Constantine himself Nihilominus ipsis quaecunque poscebant solita benignitate indulsit Nevertheless of his wonted Benignity he Granted what Indulgence they desired issuing out to Verinus his Vicarius Vicar-General in Africa a Rescript signifying his pleasure that the Donatists should be recalled from Banishment Monensque ut proprio eos dâ—mittat arbitrio ac furorem eorum Deo vindici reservet c. All this Constantine did by the Virtue of that Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical which the Godly Kings had among the Jews and the Christian Emperors of the Primitive Church and which says the Canon further is the Regal Supremacy of this Crown and by the Laws of this Realm therein established Now if the Church of England be the same it was then you see by what measures we are to Govern ourselves in the present Affair Dr. Taylor late Bishop of Downe and Connor I think was a Man who understood how far a Church of England Loyalty ought to extend as any Man this day of it He says plainly in his Ductor Dubitantium Vol. 2. lib. 3. p. 148. That the Supreme Power is above the Laws that he can dispense with Laws he can interpret them and he can
thing and to make choice of such Members of Parliament by whose Concurrence the Provision for His Majesties Safety might be made It is true the Church of England is hereby disobliged but who can help it or is to be blamed for it it was offered to them first and rejected by them Will they be neither persuaded to afford His Majesty together with theirs the Service and Assistance of His Roman Catholique Subjects of whose Loyalty there can at this time be no doubt for His sufficient defence against His numerous and inveterate Enemies nor yet allow him by His Indulgence of Liberty to their Consciences to win them to a Dutiful and Peaceable Subjection Just such an unsociable rigor as this now in the Church of England towards the Roman Catholioks was that of the Presbyterians towards us whom they then called Malignants and which was the occasion of bringing His Majesty CHARLES I. of Sacred Memory to the Scaffold and all upon piques and dislikes one against another on point of Religion The Presbyterians had a mind to Save the King and deliver him out of the hands of the Army which they then called Sectaries but this was morally impossible to be done by them upon the strength of their own single Interest without uniting to their assistance the Malignant also as they termed all those who stood well-affected to the King and Church but by no means would they be persuaded to any conjunction with the Royalists when His Majesties Life at that time depended upon it and might have been secur'd by it and even to the last point when the Army came up in their march towards the City with the poor Captive KING in their power they obstinately refused to take in any of the King's Party to joyn with them notwithstanding all their frequent offers and importunities and notwithstanding their own ruine along with theirs choosing rather to deliver up the Common Cause than to joyn with the King's Friends in one common Defence Nay to bring the parallel still nearer when it pleased the Divine Providence to make some aspect towards the Restauration of His late Majesty CHARLES II. to the Succession of His Royal Fathers Crown so imperious and ill natur'd were they still towards the poor Cavaliers and so resolved against admitting them to any share in the Honour and Interest of the Enterprize however their former Fidelity to His Majesty might commend them and His Affair need them that after the Secluded Members were re-admitted a Resolution taken of Convening a Free Parliament in order to the King's Restauration before their Rising they passed these two Votes One That all and every Person who have Advised Abetted or Assisted in any War against the Parliament since January the First 1641. his or their Sons should be uncapable to be elected to Serve as Members of the next Parliament And another That no Man should act as a Commission-Officer without First Acknowledging and Declaring That the War undertaken by both Houses of Parliament in their Defence against the Forces raised in the name of the late KING was Just and Lawful What can more nearly resemble those Oaths and Tests which have been of late years laid upon so many of His present Majesties Friends and no doubt with the same Design and in a then probable prospect of His Succession to the Crown That if they should fail of Excluding himself yet at least they might exclude a considerable number of His Friends from joyning their Force and Assistance to the rest when He should most need them and so one time or other he might fall into their Power thus unarmed and deprived of His just and sufficient Defence The subtle Projectors and Contrivers of this Intrigue it is likely are now off the Stage but since many of those who I believe have not the least Malice against His Majesties Person are yet nevertheless so intoxicate with the fears and jealousies they then imbib'd that they are yet hardly sober and must have time to recover their debauched Reasons It is necessary in the mean time that His Majesty look to the preservation of himself and of them also whose Loyalty is yet half asleep and who perhaps when they are better awake will find reason to thank him for interposing His Prerogative against their obstinate Defence of a Law so unreasonable and unsafe and thank God too for that Courage and Wisdom with which he has inspired him to preserve both them and Himself and the whole Nation from their precipitate Folly. These things considered may I think satisfie any reasonable unprejudic'd Man of the justice and necessity of His Majesties exerting His Royal Prerogative at this time and in the manner he has expressed in His Declaration for the preservation of Himself the Head of this great National Body which cannot be touched with danger in that principal part without a fatal evil to the whole But with His Majesties Person I intimated also a Salvo for His Conscience and that by His Prerogative if he cannot have it otherwise Conscience is the common answer on the account of which the Nobility and Gentry do not consent to His Majesties Proposals for taking off the Test and Penal Laws Is there not some regard to be had to the King's Conscience as well as other Mens The King no doubt so sincere and devout as he is in the profession of His Religion accounts it a very high offence against God and danger of Eternal Damnation to His Soul to persecute what He accounts the Truth and to drive away or terrifie any by Penal Laws from embracing it Who does not I believe also the inflicting of such Penalties on any other for mere matter of Conscience is not without a great regret to His own That Conscience ought not to be constrained nor People forced in matters of mere Religion are the express words of His Declaration Now all prosecution of Law against Recusants or what other Dissenters from the establish'd Doctrine and Discipline of the Church of England must be made in the King's Name and all Warrants for the execution of Sanguinary Pecuniary or what other kind of Mulcts issue from His immediate Authority So that no Man's Conscience of the whole Nation is so nearly concern'd nor so accountable to God for what relates to these Laws as the King's Conscience I think no Man will say that the King ought in the execution of such Laws to sin against His Conscience or that we have ever the less obligation upon us to Own Him and Obey Him as our King and to comply with Him tenderly for the finding such a temper if there be any better than what He already offers for the satisfaction of both His Conscience and ours Subjects may suffer for Conscience sake and lose some part of the priviledge of Subjects rather than break the publick measures which have been established But Kings may not be constrained by Law to suffer nor to diminish any part of their Royal Sovereignty
Parliament will find some Temper that no restraint or oppression shall for the future be laid upon the Consciences of our Kings by our Laws their Consciences as I said being much more concerned and aggreived in the Execution of such Penal Laws and Tests by their Authority then ours can be who pretend that for the cause wherefore we cannot comply with His Majesties Proposals for the taking them off This I have said to justifie His Majesty in the present use of his Prerogative as the necessary Salvo for His Conscience in this Conjuncture With His Conscience I further intimated a care to be taken for the preserving his Honour and that by his Prerogative dispensing with such Laws as by any new emergency contrary to their Primary intention do interpose and cast a cloud upon it Honour in Noble much more in Royal Personages is by our Laws ratable at the value of Conscience what therefore they declare upon their Honour is Equivalent to what Persons of a less Honourable degree declare upon their Oath But above all the Honour of our Kings is a most inestimable Jewel of their Crowns and Standard of their Government it is upon the account of that that their Subjects are disposed to revere and obey them to love them to confide in them to repose in them the trust of all they are and have and with their Lives and Fortunes to serve them Upon which account it is having so great an interest in the Government and well being of Mankind in their respective Societies and so great an Influence upon Subjects to ingage them to a quiet and tractable compliance with the wise consults of their Subjects hence I say it is that God himself is concerned for their Honour commanding in His Holy Scriptures that as we Fear God so we should Honour the King. Let me note to you further that our Laws are for these great Reasons so tender of the Honour of Kings as they will endure no attainder upon them but so soon as from Subjects they become Kings whatever attainder was before upon them from the Laws it falls of it self because otherwise the Laws lose their main end laying a blot upon his Honour and lessening his esteem with his People from which does naturally arise many intolerable Evils to the Government And for the same reason whatever Person is Convict of an attempt to Alienate from our Kings the Affections of their Liege People are looked on as Traitors and reputed such as do therein subvert the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom and if we follow the reason of the thing for doubtless upon that the Law is Grounded as any Person so any matter or thing which tends to Alienate from the King the Affections of his Liege People is by parity of Reason to be removed In short that which we call the Test however agreeable it might be to the present Circumstances in which it was made yet now as Circumstances are by the Divine Providence changed the continuing of it does reflect such Dishonour upon His Majesty as does evidently tend to alienate from Him the Affections of His Liege People and that two ways 1. As insinuating Him to be a Conspirator against the Life and Crown of His late Majesty in that which was called the Damnable Hellish and Popish Plot. And 2. As implying Him an Idolater against God the Supreme Majesty of Heaven and Earth First That the Test was made against the Roman Catholicks on presumption that they were generally ingaged in or one way or other Abettors of that then reputed Horrid Plot I think is too plain to be fairly denied If you object That His Sacred Majesty then Duke of York was Himself exempted from that Test and so it could not reflect upon him I answer Never the less for that Nothing more served their Purposes of that Conjuncture than that subtle-seeming Tenderness of the Duke For they knew His Majesties Love and Confidence in His Royal Brother was not yet shaken enough and that to have but named Him among the other Roman Catholicks at that time had certainly obviated the Kings Royal Assent to that Act. The Game was then but to extort from the King by force or gain by surprize what they might easily convert to the Dukes Disadvantage afterward For the Test being put upon all bearing Office throughout the Kingdom for the discovery of the Professors of that Religion on suspicion and suggestion to the People that they were all in that Conspiracy and the Duke being known to be of that Religion every one knew how to draw the Conclusion though the Duke were excepted to please the good King but especially when Matters were afterward intrigued to that pass that they dared openly to bring against Him a Bill of Exclusion in the High Court of Parliament and infaming Him at the same time all over the Kingdom with Libels of the most black and horrid import that Craft and Malice together could suggest Whatever was in the Design it is manifest enough in the Event that the first imposing of this Test and diffusing it through the whole Kingdom did universally ferment a disgust and prejudice against Him and cast a Dishonour upon Him and was a Method and Disposition to the Exclusion-Bill which followed while He was yet Duke But now He is by the Grace of God King of England c. the continuing of the same and the frequent occasion of using and renewing it must necessarily continue renew and fasten in His Subjects Minds the same preconceived prejudice which cannot be without Alienation of the Affections of His Liege-People from Him and consequently not only incumber and make His Government unwieldable in His Hand but also shrewdly hazard a Dissolution of it and be a continual Spring of many Evils against all which the keeping up of this Test still and putting that alone into the Ballance I think must appear to any thinking Man lighter than Vanity And yet much more when this malicious Suggestion against the King and others of His Religion is by the same Votaries to this Test for the most part acknowledged to be nothing but Sham and Illusion Cheat and Villany It were to be supposed in generous Equity that all those who had on that account suffered in their Fortunes and their Honour their Innocency being cleared should be also now cleared of the Laws respecting them on that account and that some other expedient might be excogitated so to secure us and our Religion as might not expose innocent Persons to Dishonor and Ruine How should we expect God should bless it to us and make us safe by such an unjust security Unjust I say and especially to so Great and Sacred a Person as our Prince Why do we suffer any thing to remain which may intimate and insinuate to His Liege People such a false Suggestion and dishonourable Imputation and still further impress upon their Minds so odious a Character as in this Test if not by design yet by
with this Power That it is no where wiser and safer lodg'd than in the King. That therefore we must acquiesce in His judgment when it is seasonable to use it That nevertheless for our satisfaction the Reasons which His Majesty has given in that Declaration of His which we refuse to Read are very clear and cogent for the putting in practice His Prerogative at this time But you say further We cannot Consent nor Read. For that is to recommend to out People the choice of such Persons as shall take away the Test and Penal Laws which most of the Nobility and Gentry have Declared their Judgment against This is an Argument not from the force of Reason but Example which may be right or wrong as it happens and we have no way to assure us when it is and when it is not but by putting it to the touchstone of Reason which being done already till I see those Reasons answer'd I have no more to say but Magis amica Veritas Passing this over therefore as nothing new but only a scrape to the Nobility and Gentry you say next rather than nothing almost the same over again viz. That it is to condemn all those great and worthy Patriots of their Country who forfeited the dearest thing in the world to them next a good Conscience that is The Favour of their Prince and a great many Honourable and Profitable imployments with it rather than consent to the Proposal of taking away the Test and Penal Laws which they apprehend destructive to the Church of England and the Protestant Religion and he who can in Conscience do all this I think need scruple nothing If the same Proposal had been made to us as to the Worthy Patriots that is Whether we would give our Votes in Parliament for taking off the Test and Penal Laws then you had rightly taken an Argument a simili for our suffering like them rather than consenting which is the thing you pretend to do but very inconsiderately for our Case is not like theirs Nor will the Great and Worthy Patriots Thank you for bringing them to parallel and patronize your Disobedience to His Majesties plain Command when the Consent they were asked to give was only to a Proposal and so can imply no Disobedience if they did not consent If His Majesty had asked no more of them than he does of us which is to publish His Declaration they would never have forfeited His Majesties Favour for that nor their Honourable and profitable Imployments For how I pray came His Majesties Declaration the first time published I suppose it must be communicated to others so as to pass all over the Nation through many Hands of Officers of the Gentry and of the Nobility too for any thing you know and of such as nevertheless did stop perhaps at the Proposal of taking off the Test and Penal Laws and so are you left free to do if you please for all your Reading and as free are all those that hear you You proceed next to the evil consequences which may follow your Reading It would make our Ministry contemptible you say which must by no means be admitted right or wrong for ought I see A Minister must look to please and humour the Mobile or all his Counsels Exhortations Preachings Writings are nothing worth For St. Paul has said Tit. 2.15 Let no man despise thee That is well enough argued against Authority in a matter where we see the People as hot and as forward as ourselves But now if we were to Teach the People as you call it by Reading the Act of Vniformity the Book of Homilies or the Book of Common Prayer or any thing else not so relishing or by which we are like to get the Ill-will and Contempt of the People Why it is but putting on our Nose of Wax again with a bent on the other side then by honour and dishonour by good report and evil report as deceivers and yet true 2 Cor. 6.8 Am I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the Truth If your business were only ad captandum populum this might serve but whereas you wish us so to behave ourselves that no Man despise us It will concern us who are Clergy-men and Scholars not to appear to all Men of Sense such silly and despicable Animals as you seem to take us for by thinking to impose upon us with such pitiful Sophistry as this For Sir Is the thing evil or is it not If it be as somtimes you are in the mind contrary to the Laws both of God and Man do but prove this as soundly to us as you have said it temerariously and we are as much at a point for not recommending it to our People as you though they should despise us for it never so much But if it be not evil in itself as forgetting your Theme in another place you had almost slipped out in these words It may be it were no fault to consent to the Declaration If I say there be perhaps no fault but only a popular misprision in it to make some Men despise us by the same reason we should not read the Book of Canons as we are bound every year nor an Homily nor the Book of Common-Prayer itself Your next Reason is that it will effectually tend to the ruine of the Church of England And why Because it will provoke or misguide all the friends it has What the Reading it and nothing else A Man had as good be a keeper of Bears as of such Friends who will be so easily provoked As for the King no body cares how much he be provoked though he be most able by His Power and obliged by His Sacred Promise to Protect us from ruine And if we once disoblige Him from that I fear we shall find it beyond the Power of the Nobility and Gentry to protect and maintain us so far as he has ingag'd Himself in this so provoking Declaration supposing His Majesty false and treacherous to His Royal Word and Promise you have said somthing on this Argument and truly he who should be over solicitous in answering it would but seem to be so too Wherefore you may run for me to the end of your Rope with the rest of your harangue on this reason It is all set on a false bottom which is Answer enough Your Objection comes next of some who should say These are Consequences but conjectural and not absolutely necessary It may be the Reading of it will not so effectually tend to the Churches ruine To which you Answer They are not indeed such effects in respect of certainty as arise from natural Causes but they are as morally certain as any thing can be Good Sir then do us the Favour but to hear them made out almost as evident Demonstrations as you have promised us let us see this Moral Certainty Moral Effects must have Moral Causes Is not the Kings a Moral Promise and may not a
Consent nor Read. Nevertheless the Basis or Ground-work on which you Rear the whole Superstructure of your Letter is a supposition That no Minister of the Church of England can give his Consent to the Declaration What! Not to a thing in which if there be any Fault it is of his own making Is our thinking some one way some the other enough to turn the Scale so as what were otherwise no fault at all becomes presently contrary to the Laws of God and Laws of the Land as you say afterward Point to that matter of the Declaration which cannot be approved by a Minister of the Church of England on account of its being contrary to or prohibited by the Laws of God. This indeed would make it matter of Conscience which to render it the more odious you here and there slily suggest without offering at the least mannâ—â— of Proof for you know well enough there is none His Majesty by this 〈◊〉 Declaration requires us to signifie to His People a method which in this juncture he Judges most expedient to be taken for the securing the Crown and the Persons of our Kings from those apparent Dangers to which they have been frequently exposed by our Dissentions in matters of Religion and for the common Peace and Good of all His Subjects Some approve it and some do not according as their Humour their Interest or their Parts serve and as ordinarily Mens Censures pass on other Affairs of State. But so to Reprobate it as a Mulum in se as a Pest to the Publick as an Abomination and Prophanation of our Churches and not fit to be heard by Christian Ears is such a hard straining of the case as brings along with iâ— the very dregs of Passion and Party We cannot approve of the matter of it you say it may be so Men doâ—câ— always disapprove or deny their Consent to what is proposed because it is evil but because they have no mind to it and so the consequence will be applying it to the matter in Hand That the Authority of His Majesty over a Minister of the Church of England does not to extend so far as to injoyn him to Read the Declaration when he has no mind to it For I doubt there is with a great many more of Stomach in the refusal than Conscience but this not to appear above board One thing though I perceive you have a great mind to which is that we would grant you your supposition before you prove it namely That no Minister of the Church of England can give Consent to the Declaration and then let you alone to make good your Inference that he cannot Read it Now Sir I do not think you have us so much upon the Hanck as you imagine should I grant your Supposition But I see you care not whither we do or no for you presently fall hot upon the Work to prove the Conclusion Ergo He cannot Read for that is interpretative Consent Now for my part I confess to you I turn over the Leaf knowing how many soever your Arguments be to prove it they would not satisfie me nor I think any reasonable Man till he see first how well bottom'd your Hypothesis be from which you borrow your Inference I would fain see your Reasons first Why a Minister of the Church of England cannot Consent before I grant what you are so hasty to suppose Why that I shall by and by but you will prove first That Reading is Consenting Reading is Teaching which is as odd an Hysteron Proteron as Hanging and Trying afterwards Let Reading be Consenting or not Consenting without troubling your self till I hear whether I may Consent or Not. Wherefore I must beg your Favour to let me depart from your method and turn over two or three Pages further to examine your Reasons wherefore we cannot Consent 1. Your first is That it is against the Constitution of the Church of England which is established by Law and to which I have subscribed and therefore am bound to teach nothing contrary to it so long as this Obligation lasts The Constitution of the Church of England as it is now a Protestant Church distinct from what it was before consists in various Acts of Parliament made especially in the beginning of the Reformation But I know of no Subscriptions required of the Clergy to such Acts of Parliament There is a Book intituled Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical Treated upon by the Bishop of London c. Anno Domini 1603. Which Constitutions and Canons Ecclesiastical are in Number CXLI These I think you must mean by your saying to which you have subscribed But you have not pleased to tell us against which of them it is we offend by Reading the Kings Declaration So that this Argument does nothing but lead us into a Wood and there leave us to be lost Is there any Constitution or Canon Ecclesiastical which bars the King from extending Clemency even to His Dissenting Subjects where He sees a reasonable and honourable Occasion for it Much less where the Necessity of His Affairs drive Him to it His Honour His Conscience the Preservation of Himself and His Friends and the common Peace of all I dare trust King JAMES the First for that without troubling my self to look over all the Hundred and Forty One Canons He had more King-craft than to part with such a Jewel out of the Crown to adorn the Crosier of the Church of England The Constitution you mention here is to what you have subscribed you say By the 36 Canon Subscription is required not to the whole Book but only to three Articles in that Canon mentioned By the first We acknowledge the Kings Supremacy By the second The lawful use of the Common-Prayer By the third An Allowance is made of the 39 Articles Upon any of which I cannot imagine how you ground your Reason wherefore we cannot consent to the Declaration unless you had told us If you were to prove the contrary from these Constitutions there seems to be something accommodate for your purpose in the first and second Canons All Archbishops Bishops c. are obliged by the first to keep and observe all and singular the Laws made for restoring to the Crown of this Kingdom the Antient Jurisdiction over the State Ecclesiastical Which Antient Jurisdiction in the Second Canon is resembled to the same Authority in Causes Ecclesiastical which the godly Kings had among the Jews and Christian Emperors of the Primitive Church Now if the Parallel run so high as to the Antient Jurisdiction of this Crown how Antient does it mean Certainly before any pretence of the Invasion of it by the Bishop of Rome Wherefore that being a Work too big for a Letter I will give but one or two Instances and those so far back as to be out of suspicion of any such Foreign Invasion The Government or Jurisdiction of this Crown if inherent in it was and of right ought to be
their Consciences As for the other succeeding Ages of the Church after the Sixth Century the Church of England throws them aside as no Precedents for us to follow And yet it is the Christian Church in all Ages you would call in to avouch for you the Illegality of this Toleration 3. Your next Reason on which you ground your suppose that we cannot Consent you thus express It is to Teach my People that they need never come to Church more but have my free leave as they have the Kings leave to go to a Conventicle or to Mass Why Sir that they would do without the Kings leave or yours either before this Declaration came out However you are loth to have your Scepter wrested out of your Hands though it be with as vain and empty a Title as King of Jerusalem What a Grand Seignior you may be still in your Parish I cannot tell but I assure you in our Country Parish Dominions such a despotick Church-Power is extinguished long since Well Sir I perceive you are not inclin'd to be so merciful a Prince over your Subjects as His Majesty over His they shall never have leave for you But your Brother King would intreat however this favour at your Hands that when you have occasion to shake your Rod over your Subjects you would not send for him to be your Beadle And the rather because as he has no mind to it and that it is against his Conscience so you have no want of him neither the Spiritual Power having a Rod of their own more proper and agreeable to their purpose that is the Rod of Excommunication and other Church Censures which no body goes about to take out of your Hand Wherefore when you Read the Declaration you may let your People understand if you please that it is with a Non Obstante to that and so you have well enough escaped the Danger you fear should ensue to your Regalia viz. That it would be to Teach your People that they need never more come to Church but have your free leave as they have the Kings leave to go to a Conventicle or to Mass And so I pass on to your Fourth Reason 4. It is you say to Teach the dispensing Power which alters what has been formerly thought the whole Constitution of this Church and Kingdom which we dare not do till we have the Authority of Parliament for it At the Kings Command you dare not do it till you have the Authority of Parliament for it It seems then however you are bound in Conscience not to approve of such a Declaration Though it be against the Constitution of the Church of England nay though condemned by the Christian Church in all Ages though against the Laws of God and the Laws of the Land yet Authority of Parliament can discharge you of all Never was any Pope in England so high as Authority of Parliament is now set up that can dispense with the Laws both of God and Man for all this of the Kings doing is against both you say but not of the Parliaments By the way though you give a fair Hint unto the Parliament of the only Expedient as things now stand for the Common Peace Agreement and Satisfaction of all which is by their concurring with His Majesty in the setling what He has proposed by His Declaration For one part of the Nation approve of it for it self and all the rest want nothing it seems for their intire Satisfaction but only their Authority along with His Majesties At the present the main thing you stick at is The Kings Dispensing Power without Authority of Parliament Which indeed is the only thing you have said which bears any semblance of excuse for not consenting and consequently not reading the Declaration And you would have done better to have maintained your Post here than to have stuffed your Letter with Enemies Evil Counsellors Popery Mass Ruine utter and avoidable Destruction to both Church and Kingdom I have been fain to follow you hitherto in this wild Ramble which is nothing to the purpose but to inflame and exasperate Nobility Gentry Clergy People and all against the King and make the Breach wider than it would be Was not his late Majesty who was a Protestant and by the Advice of Protestant Councellors the adored Earl of Shaftsbury the Duke of Lauderdale and others forced to do the same thing when necessity of Publick Affairs required it Yet no Ruine of the Church of England followed nor of the Protestant Religion no Ruine no Destruction no Introduction of Popery nor intended to follow Some stir was then about the business of the Dispensing Power but nothing to what it is now Let us but quietly attend the expectation of a Parliament and that is a thing which it is likely may close of it self It did so before For indeed the Concurrence of His Two Houses of Parliament of which His Majesty made no doubt as He says when He first issued out His Declaration before we had royld the Nation The Concurrence I say of His Parliament will bury up all in Silence and Peace which is better than blow up so great a Flame as would arise by stirring the Coals of this Contest Prerogative of the Crown and Priviledges of Parliament are Matters too August for private Men as we are to meddle in much more to pass Sentence as your Letter does and plainly say The Dispensing Power is against the Laws and Constitution of this Church and Kingdom That it is Illegal which is so high a Presumption as can have no countenance for what was done in Parliament 72 for they have the Priviledge of free speaking there But out of Parliament perhaps it is a Crime of an higher Nature than we are aware Even the Bishops themselves though Persons moving in so high a Sphere and protected by so great a Power as the Pope was then in England yet they are given to understand as I find some Lawyers note 18 Hen. 3. That for as much as they hold their Baronies of the King that if they intermeddle with the Rights and Prerogatives of the Crown they must look to forfeit their Baronies for their Presumption If I say the Bishops out of Parliament incur so high a Censure should they do any such thing what Animadversion is due to Men of a lower Order Evil Men such as have some Fish to take which will not be catch'd but in troubled Waters are wont to throw in one of these as certain Occasions of it and as Bones of Contention whenever they have a mind to have one It would have becomed us who are Men of Peace of all Men in the Kingdom to have contained our selves and whatever we think to have said nothing in this Matter Now is Out-cry against Prerogative Time was when we made as loud a Cry against pretended Priviledges of Parliament Liberty of the Subject and for Prerogative Among other Complaints and Grievances which the Black
for that their Consciences cannot comply with the execution of some Laws made by their Predecessors in matters of Religion Constantine the Great Lucius Ethelbert by the established Laws should have persecuted Christianity but then they must have done it against their Consciences Julian found Christian Laws in the Empire but he could not be bound by them against his Will and retain the Authority of Emperor What would you have His Majesty do bring in an Exclusion Bill against Himself lay down His Crown and Scepter at your Feet and turn Subject to serve you Or would you have Him do worse prostitute His Conscience to your pleasure and act against the interest of His Soul to serve yours of the World Indeed what would you have Him do wiser and safer for His own Conscience and gentler and kinder for ours than what is imported in that Declaration which we suppress notwithstanding His Majesties Command to publish it and against which your Letter endeavours to stir up the madness of the People and to alienate their Hearts and Affections from so Gracious and so Wise and so Religious a Prince You would have Him perhaps represent the Business to His Parliament and leave it with them to excogitate some expedient for this emergent difficulty Well and what must He do in the mean time Sin against His Conscience No suspend For Gods sake then what is this stir for You know Sir His Majesty has already attempted something of this Nature with His first Parliament but with no success If you answer It was not probably to be expected then The Nation had not time enough to bethink themselves to take a Right Understanding of the thing and to apprehend the reasonableness of His Majesties Proposals To all this I agree with you Magna molimina tardè moventur Matters of so great moment and springing from such a surprising Vicissitude of State could hardly be so soon digested Yet His Majesty Dissolved not that Parliament till after He had condescended to Treat further of that Affair in His Closet with most of the principal Members and till He assured Himself of an utter averseness in them to any reasonable Complyance If you say then He must leave it to the issue of the next Parliament after so long a time as they have had to think over again You say right and so His Majesty intends and so He would have us signifie for the Peoples Satisfaction by Reading this Declaration Well but in this longer protraction of the time to another Parliament what would you have Him do Put these Laws in execution not only against the Safety of His Person but of His Conscience too Persecute what He accounts the Truth Apply Force where in His Conscience He judges nothing but Persuasion to be used I know no remedy for His Majesties Conscience in the interim but a further suspending and dispensing still with such Laws Nor do I believe that you or any Man else can assign a better Why He may not then make known the Continuance of His former Purposes in his first Declaration and why may it not be published by us the Ministers of Conscience and whose Duty it is of all Men to be most tender and of all others towards His Majesties Conscience And why not in our Churches and Chapels where we have insinuated generally to our People our own Mistakes in common with others even almost the whole Nations first hastily taken up false Conception of His Majesties Purposes Rightly to inform His Majesties Conscience so far as is becoming will not be taken amiss from us But if we find Him at a Point and that He is not to be moved from His Sentiment in these Matters I am confident none of us dare I am sure ought not to advise His Majesty to sin against His Conscience no more than we would do it our selves against ours Upon which Concession we cannot fairly censure and oppose in the manner we do His withdrawing His Authority from those Laws in the practice and prosecution of which His Conscience must needs be violated These are the Straits into which our Gracious King is driven at this Juncture He chuses according to His Judgment to offend Man rather than God Can we blame Him Nay ought we not rather to applaud Him for it We of the Clergy ought of all Men to lay our Hands upon our Mouths and make no Clamors nor give Him any Molestation on this account It is our own Doctrine in His Majesties Application while there are such Diversities of Religion among us and none more infallible than other on our Principles and while Temporal Laws will be medling with them and determining their Controversies unless they could make it a Shoo to fit to every Foot and to stretch to every Conscience such Mutations and Troubles of State as we meet with now are like frequently to return and the Government will ever and anon be off the Hinges new Exclusion-Bills to be brought into Parliaments new Plots and new Subjects for almost every new Prince To prevent such Convulsions of State and probably at one time or other Dissolutions of the Government as new Religions and new Consciences now a days multiply His Majesty wisely propounds that there be henceforth no disability on account of Conscience as of Kings to Reign so of Subjects to serve their Princes In the mean time nevertheless for the satisfaction of our Consciences as well as His own His Majesty further declares That he is resolved to use His uttermost indeavours to establish Liberty of Conscience on such just and equal Foundations as will render it unalterable and secure to all People the Free Exercise of their Religion for ever And to those of the Church of England principally and especially the Protestant Religion as by them profest and as by Law Established he will protect and maintain supereminently above all others as the National Religion That as we shall give the Check to no other so neither shall we be Checked by any in the free Exercise of our Consciences nor in the quiet and full enjoyment of our Possessions You would have His Majesty continue to us and protect and maintain us in our Dominion over all the Consciences of the Nation in the putting to Death Banishing Imprisoning Confiscating and by all other means not to call it persecuting suppressing and keeping under all others of a different Persuasion His Majesty would lend us His Power and Authority to do all this for us too if in Conscience he could but I think we ought to excuse him in that and I hope all Persons of Honour and Conscience will tenderly consider His Majesties Case as their own and be satisfied that the King does no more in this Affair than what any truly Conscientious Man even on our own Principles must have done And as Himself has been on this account hitherto necessitated to suspend the execution of the Penal Laws and Test so they also when convened together in
as Matters then stood But to shew that His present Majesties Religion which has been as severe towards Dissenters as ours may nevertheless for that be as sincere as we can be in the Inclinations he hints the Dissenters may hope from us when time serves I like your Commendations of the Church of England every where well enough and believe their well meaning but not as you make use of it slily to insinuate a distrust a snare and to create a suspicion in the Dissenters of His Majesties Veracity and Honour and by this base Suggestion tempt them to desert Him in this Juncture and adhere rather to those who oppose Him I believe as much as you that they are so wise and considering as to be sensible of a snare and as likely of your setting for them as of His Majesties And that they will think it more wise and safe to confide in His Word than in yours and to take the Opportunity which now presents than to stay and starve while your Grass grows But lest your Promises should not prevail you attempt also by Threatnings to deter them from strengthning His Majesties Party and Design Should they take it in this way you tell them they will find it the dearest Liberty that ever was granted I do not deny but Gold may be bought too dear let us see what we have by the Bargain of parting with our Test and Penal Laws If all the Discourse of your Letter had been against those only who are for delivering up our Laws into the Hand of another Religion without any effectual security for our own I should have agreed with you that we cannot Consent but must Suffer in this way and it is plain His Majesty is of that mind too His whole Declaration being a Proposal of Terms and Compremise of Peace among His Subjects of whatever different Persuasions that none may hinder one another of the Free Exercise of their Religion and full and quiet enjoyment of their Property and if you are so suspicious of Sinister dealing from His Majesty he offers to make our selves by our Representatives in Parliament Umpire in the business So that your Insinuation is very Ungenteel and Rude towards His Majesty and savors more of a piquing ill-natur'd jealousie than any just fear that we should find the Liberty now offered the dearest that ever was Granted These are the Reasons on which you ground your Magisterial Supposition That no Minister of the Church of England can Consent to the Declaration and therefore cannot read it how weak and insufficient they are to establish such an Hypothesis and that therefore all you have built upon it must come down with it let the world judge so that nevertheless for your Arguments a Minister of the Church of England can Consent to the Declaration and then I think that he may Read it no body will deny Nay and that he ought in omnibus licitis honestis to pay an active Obedience To answer the Command by a Passive Obedience To suffer all that can be suffered in this World as you somewhere say to be subject only and not resist will not serve the turn here The giving our Body to be burnt in this Cause will not make us Martyrs There is an Active Obedience due to all the King 's Honest and Lawful Commands by the Fundamental Laws of this Kingdom though the matter of the Command have not yet entred by a Parliamentary Law for that is but accidental we owe him 〈◊〉 much upon the account of our natural Allegiance founded in that Relation between King and Subject If it be a Matter in which he is necessitated to use his Prerogative all that we are bound to satisfie our selves in is this Is it a Moral Command Is it not against the Laws of God over which he has no Power of Dispensing though it were to save His own and the Lives of all His Subjects If not we are bound to it by our Natural Allegiance by our Loyalty or Legality which is not to be understood so ad Legem as it is not due for Conscience-sake save only in such Instances where it is pass'd into a Parliamentary Law. For Allegiance reaches to Law in a further Extent and Latitude than so even to that Law which Nature and right Reason teach is founded in such a Relation as King and Subject and Political Father and Sons Not only confined to that Law which defends the Right the Liberty and Property of the Subject which is for the most part written because it passes by Grant and stands on Record from the King But to that Prerogative Law also which is natural and unwritten and cannot be granted away because it defends the Rights of the Crown and defends the Majesty Authority and Dignity of the Prince and the Capacity whereby he may perform all the Offices of a Father to his People Do not we swear a Canonical Obedience to our Bishops In omnibus Licitis Honestis By what Law of the Land is this required By no Parliamentary Law but as I said by the Law of Nature rooted in that Relation he bears toward us of our Spiritual Father But here is no place for a Discourse so large and copious as it should be on this Subject All I mean by it here is this That if the Matter of the Declaration be Moral Honest and Lawful so far as Lawful takes in the Law of the King's Prerogative as well as the Peoples Laws We must pay an Active Obedience to this Command of His Majesty on the account of our Natural Allegiance A Suffering for it rather and not resisting only will not justifie us to God by whom Kings Reign and whose Power is Ordained of God. This I take to have been all along the Doctrine of the Church of England But after all this it is possible some of the Ministers of the Church of England cannot consent Some will not take the pains perhaps and some have not the parts to think deep enough Some like Trâ—â—â— stand their Ground where they were first set rooted by Education and some as much by Prejudice Some have their Reason over-poured by their Fears and some by their Interests What then May they not read the Declaration Must the grand and important Affairs of State be all at a stand till such Persons can be satisfied Must their Wills be the Law in the mean time and their Judgment the Standard of the King and Council and the whole Nation Must their Declaration in this Matter be published in all their Churches and Chapels and His Majesty's never suffered to come in at the Church-door Why may not both Tales be told and both Sides heard This is not just nor civil dealing with His Majesty Again What if you cannot give an internal Consent or a Consent of Approbation Can you not read it with a Consent of Acquiescence and Submission That is all which need to be in a Subject to Matters of this kind