in England might not marry Queen Mary of Scotland a Papist as all the World knew yet the Protector made it no scruple of Conscience to pursue that business to the utmost hazzard Calvinism and Lutheranism are themselves as opposite as the Antipodes yet they enter-marry frequently and their issué bear witness thereof Was it then tolerable in the Reformed Churches and is it now intolerable with Spain Or is there any particular cause of scrupulosity and fear in this overture more then in those other doth the State of the Kingdom and fear of alterations trouble them that fear is vain The Husband is head of the Wife and though the Infanta be born in Familiâ Imperatrice yet there is no Soveraignty invested in her she can make no mutation of State least of all without consent of the State and we have little cause to distrust her having had such a president before of King Philip who being king of England yet neither did nor could attempt of himself any alteration And if the English be sure to hold their Religion it were neither Justice nor Humanity if she should be denied hers There is no man of Honor would offend a Lady of her Dignity for a difference that concerns her Soul her Faith her Devotion towards God What then is the reason why this Match seems so distasteful Is the name are the qualities of a Spaniard become so odious amongst us Surely ab initio non fuit sic of old it was not so it is neither an ancient quarrel nor a natural impression in the English In the time of Edward the Third there was a firm and fixed amity between England and Portugal and from that Lancaster of England the Kings of Portugal are descended As for Castile John of Gaunt married Constance the Daughter of King Peter by right of whom the Crown of Castile appertained unto him and his Daughter Katherine was married afterward to Henry the Third King of Castile upon which Match as appears yet in the Records of the Savoy John of Gaunt resigning that Crown the controversie ended and the Kings of Spain as flourishing Branches of the Tree and Stock of Lancaster have ever since quietly possessed that Kingdom So that Prince Charls by this Match is likely to warm his Bed again with some of his own Blood I might adde further that King Henry the Seventh married his Son to King Ferdinands Daughter on purpose to continue the Successon of that amity I might remember the Treaties of 1505. between King Henry the Seventh and Philip of Austria Son in Law to King Ferdinand for the preservation and strengthning of that League And how much the amity of England was esteemed and how readily embraced by Charls the Fifth Emperor and Grand-childe of Ferdinand appeareth very well by the Treaty Arctioris Amicitiae in the year 1514. And by that renowned Treaty of Calice the greatest Honor perhaps that ever was done to the English Crown and by the Treaty 1517. between Maximilian the Emperor Charls King of Spain and King Henry the Eighth not to speak of the Treaties for entercourse in the years 1515. and 1520 nor of the Treaty at Cambray 1529. nor lastly of that famous one 1542. Let it suffice that by them all it is manifest with what mutual constant and warm affections both Crowns and both Kingdoms entertained the strictest correspondence that could be till the Schism of Henry the Eighth and disgrace done to Queen Katherine by that unhappy Divorce and the Kings confederating with France made the first breach So as in those days we see there was no such unkindness no such hatred no such Antipathy betwixt the two Nations The first spark of difference between them brake out in Queen Maries time about the matter of Religion no other pretext could be found to make that breach which Wyat desired Yet neither is this the true nor the sole motive of the grudge which is now taken There is an other impostume which will not be cured without lancing The remembrance the hatred ever since Eighty Eight Manet altâ mente repostum Sticks still in our Stomacks and it is most true Hinc illae lachrymae from hence springs all our pain Well but let us be as indifferent as we can let us consider not onely their attempts upon us but the provocations that is the wrongs which we first did unto them Strad de bell Belgic Let us remember the Money intercepted which the King was sending unto D'Alva the want whereof at that time hazarded well nigh the loss of all the Netherland Provinces so lately reduced Camd. in Elizab. the assistance given to the Prince of Orange by Gilbert Morgan and others the first voyage of Sir Francis Drake the sacking of Saint Domingo the Protection of Holland by Leicester the infinite Depredations Letters of Mart executed to the infinite damage of the Spaniards beside the Philippicks the invectives which were in every Pulpit the Ballads and Libels in every Press were provocations such as Flesh and Blood would not endure in the meanest persons I speak nothing at all of the Portugal voyage nor of the surprize of Cales nor of the Island voyage but can any wise man think That the King of Spain should not be sensible of such indignities Was it not probable nay was it not equal that he should send a fury to Kingsale to revenge these wrongs And yet notwithstanding this Hostility when His Majesty came to the Crown how friendly yea how quickly did the King of Spain alter his course and send the Constable of Castile as the Dove out of the Ark to see if the Flouds of Enmity were any whit faln and to seek Peace with an Olive branch in his hand to establish a general Amnestia or Perpetual Oblivion of all unkindness past to bury all quarrels and reconcile the two Crowns and Kingdoms into an everlasting Friendship And surely cursed will he be that seeks to violate this Peace and under colour of Religion to extirpate Charity and publike concord And I pray what would be thought of the loyalty of that man who should now set himself to trouble and exasperate mens mindes with the old feuds and quarrels which this Nation hath had with Scotland But stay here my Pen must intrude no further without warrant into the Labyrinth of this secret Councel I know not whether it be agreeable to the Kings pleasure or no or fit matter for private Subjects to discourse upon I know very well how unsearchable the secrets of Princes are in what an abyss they lie and how much too deep to be sounded by every shallow discourser I remember also what Praying and Preaching here was against the Match of Queen Elizabeth with Mounsieur a business of very like nature with this in hand and declaimed against upon the same pretended peril of Religion alteration of Government and what not Yet it is very well known That those of the Councel who did most oppose it
violence of his own exorbitant passions without any order or colour of Law and as no just Prince ought to govern how much less would they have thought it lawful and how little would they approve it to be done against such Princes as govern legally and do nothing concerning Religion or otherwise but according as the Laws and and publike Constitutions of their several Kingdoms do direct and inable them to do He that proclaymed the Prerogative of Kings in these terms Vos Estis Dii I have said Yee are Gods surely intended to teach the world rather a lesson of obedience then rebellion And there is no Prince or State in the world Let them countenance what Sect or Profession of Religion soever they please but shall finde it at one time or another a necessary Bulwark for them to retreat unto against the inundations of popular fury Who doth deny but that it is necessary that the governments of all Princes whatsoever should be regulated and moderated by Laws and that all persons in Authority do observe all rules whatsoever that are proper for them or prescribed to them by those to whom that power belongeth We pretend not to enhaunce the Authority of Princes so far as to exempt them from the rule of Law or to make them Arbitrary in their government but this we say Vos Esi is Dii in relation unto Princes and all Persons established in Supream Authority justly that is by the will of Divine Providence and consent of the people is a great exemption of them from any popular Cognizance For what does it intimate but that * Egodixi Allmighty God himself hath made them Gods unto the people that is to say persons of Knowledge Experience Foresight Care Providence and other abilities Intellectual which are the natural and genuine principles of government competent and sufficient for the government of people who are not otherwise generally speaking Et pro majori parte able to govern themselves in civil society and for their preservation in peace and quietness which is the end of Government We think it is most proper for God onely to say Transferam Regna de gente in gentem Revolutions of Governments and Translating of one Kingdom to another are the Extraordinary Dispensations of Divine Providence and for reasons onely known unto his supream and secret wisdom Which although they be acted that is brought to pass by the hands of men yea through their infirmities and many times blamable passions as experience often sheweth and as in the case of King Rehoboam the Son of Solomon 1 Reg. 12.16 may seem plain yet are not the common people licensed hereby to run upon any irregular designs of their own head and to renounce their Governors headily and hastily of themselves for every lght greivance and misgovernment that may seem to afflict them To remove Tyrants and oppression from a people is the work of Divine Mercy as it is of his justice to permit them to oppress and from him only must they expect deliverance abiding in the mean while with patience until his Divine hand shall appear leading them to such means as they may with justice and good order use to the procuring of their liberty The Second Part. JERUSALEM OR The Obedience Loyalty and Conformity OF CATHOLIKES unto Publike Order HItherto we have insisted onely upon the Doctrines and practises of those who call themselves Reformed Churches or Protestants in the charge of Rebellion and Tumult against the Civil Magistrate by which how tolerable and quiet they are in any Kingdom or State whose Religion is not framed according to their Mode the indifferent Reader will judge It remaineth now that we make good the contrary concerning our selves and shew that those vertues which we pretend to be the true and proper Characters of our Religion viz. Humility Devotion Obedience Order Patience c. are more generally and more constantly exercised by Catholikes in times of Tryal then by any other Sect or Sort of people whatsoever This we intend to do but not so much Theoretically or by way of any long and speculative discourse as Practically Historically and by way of instance shewing what the behavior and practise of Catholikes have been in this case upon occasions given Neither shall we range far abroad into the world because that would be less pertinent to our main purpose which is onely to justifie our selves in this point so far as reason and truth will give us leave and enlarge our discourse beyond its intended bounds But we shall content our selves onely with domestick examples and that experience which the Catholikes of this Nation have given of themselves from time to time in this kinde What kinde of people they were anciently in this Land in the time of King Lucius and the Brittons I shall not need to relate but refer you to the Ecclesiasticall Histories of those times the rather because the Centurists of Magdeburgh and Master Fox in his Acts and Monuments will have these Catholikes to be Protestants and of their Church which though it be very false yet I may not ingage for the cleering of that point now Nor shall I insist any longer upon those times of the Saxons after they were converted to Christianity to shew their vertues and singular devotion towards God and how happily by means thereof the Church and Common-wealth did grow up together unto that perfection of Spiritual and Temporal glory which they injoyed under that Blessed Prince and Saint King Edward the Confessor I shall not tell you how highly the good Prelates of the Church were then reverenced by the people nor how much their holy Counsels and Authority did conduce to the happy government of the State It sufficeth Lamb. Archaion Camden Spelm. Concil that many old Saxon Laws and other Monuments yet upon record Venerable Bede and the Stories of those times with other Modern Authors are witnesses of it beyond all exception From King Edward the Confessor downwards to King Henry the Eighth there is no man of judgement will affirm or thinketh that any other Religion was known in England but the Roman-Catholike that is the same that had been long before planted here by Saint Austin and those Good men his followers who were sent hither to convert the English Saxons by Saint Gregory the Great Bishop of Rome for which charity towards our Nation Doctor Whitaker giveth him thanks and professeth it was a great Benefit and for ever most gratefully to be remembred In all which time although the Clergy made Canons and managed all things pertaining to Religion by an Authority of their own that is to say given them by God and derived to them from an other origin then that of the State or Supream Magistrate Temporal yet never did the Kings of this Realm finde them generally otherwise then obedient unto their Government and ready to serve them in such capacity as the Laws and duties of their function permitted and to contribute their
Honor and Strength of the Nation Titulus Secundus HItherto Schisme and Sacriledge annexed to it chiefly reigned but the second plague was the utter ruin and extinction of Religion For by abuse of the name and authority of King Edward the very Church it self was entirely subverted Religion absolutely changed Heresie introduced and established in the full open and publike profession thereof And we might say the craft and malice of the Devil whose work it is to corrupt true Religion confound States herein most perfectly appeared For though indeed the way to Heresie and all publike disorder were sufficiently levelled and made plain by King Henry the Eighth who onely by reason of his greatness and imperious cruelty was fit to begin such a work yet Religion it self was suffered to stand a while longer at least in the general and more visible parts of it he knowing well that all could not be effected at once and that it was necessary for him to seduce States as he doth souls gradatìm by degrees opportunity and succession of time And being also confident that if those forts of Piety and true Christian-Catholike Devoâ—â—on that is the Religious Houses were once-razed the Church in England brought under a Lay head and by consequence the sheep made Governors of their Shepherds he should easily upon a second attempt there and by some other hand overthrow Religion it self King Henry at his death had appointed by will sixteen Executors who during the minority of his Son King Edward should be as it were his Guardians and Counsellors for the better governing of the Realm Among these one who made himself afterward Principal was the Lord Edward Seymour Earl of Hartford who being the Kings Uncle by the Mother-side procured himself in a short time to be made Protector and by that means gat as he thought a dispensation from his Joynt Executorship with the others and demeaned himself now in all things concerning the Affaires of the Realm as their Superior A thing which King Henry least of all intended rather he had provided with as much caution as was possible against the encroaching of any one upon the rest under any title or pretence soever But this was the way to bring about some furthâ—â— designes intended by that Party which advanced the Protector to that dignity and which the other and more honest part of the Councel did not either so providently foresee or so faithfully resist as they ought to have done One of the first things which the Protector set on foot after the Protectorship was secured to him was Innovation of Religion abolishing the Old Catholike and introducing a New under the title of Reformation Not so much out of any great preciseness that was ever observed in him or devotion that he was thought to have more one way then another but because he was thirsty and desired to drink to the bottom of the Cup which in King Harries time it seems he had but onely tasted There was yet some Game in his eye which he intend-to bring into Toyls viz. some few remains of Church-Lands Collegiate-Lands and Hospitals which he could not compass or draw into possession by any Engine better then that pretence of reforming Religion Cranmer that unworthy Arch-Bishop of Canterbury was his Right Hand and chief Assistant in the work although but a few months before he was of King Harries Religion yea a Patron and Prosecutor of the Six Articles To this end viz. the more to amuze the people and as they thought to give some strength and countenance to what they meant to set up a couple of strangers Religious men indeed by profession but such as were long since run from their Orders that is Peter Martyr and Bucer must be sent for as far as Germany and placed in the Divinity Chairs at Cambridge and Oxford That the world might see how contrary not onely the Pastors of the Church and Clergy but even all the learned men in both the Universities and of the whole Kingdom generally were to his proceedings By these two Apostate Friers together with Cranmer Ridley Latimer and some others was a new Liturgie framed and the old abolished together with that Religion which had been so many hundreds of years observed in this Nation with great happiness and honour The Protector though powerful of himself by abuse and pretence of the Kings name in all things which he did although the King were but a Child of nine years old was yet well seconded by the Duke of Northumberland and by the Admiral his onely Brother by the Marquis of Northampton c. all of them persons seemingly at least much inclined to Reformation and by them he overbore all the rest that opposed him or were any thing contrary to his designs As there were many both eminent and wise men and equally intrusted in the publike affairs with himself could things have been carried rightly In particular the Lord Privy Seal the Lord St. John of Basing Bishop Tonstall Sir Anthony Brown and that wise Secretary Sir William Paget but most especially the Noble Chancellor the Lord Wriothsley a man of singular experience knowledge prudence and who deserveth to be a Pattern to his Posterity far to be preferred before any new Guides But being made Earl of Southampton though it neither won him to the Faction nor contented nor secured him yet he stood thâ— more quiet and made no great opposition to their doings All things now grew to confusion there remained no face nor scarce the name of Catholike Church in England and though there were great multitudes of men well affected to the old Religion and discontented that the Church should be thus driven into the Wilderness and forced to lurk in Corners Yet did they shew loyalty obedience and love to the publike Peace notwithstanding They took up no Arms they raised no Rebellion not so much as against the shadow of a King or the usurper of his Royal name The Protector in the mean time goeth on with his work which is principally to enrich himself with the Remains of the Church having long before as 't is said tasted the sweetness of such Morsels in the Priory of Aumesbury He now seizeth two Bishops houses in the Strand and of them buildeth Sommerset house which as the world saw quickly reverted and slipt out of his hands After this he procureth an Act to be made whereby all Colledges remaining all Chantries Free Chappels and Fraternities were suppressed and given to the King And how greedily he entered into the Bishop of Bath and Wells his Houses and Manors that Church will never be able to forget Notwithstanding that Bishop Bourn afterward by his industry recovered something but nothing to the spoiles and wast which was made Nor was he satisfied with this For shortly after contrary to all Law to King Henries will and against his own Covenants those I mean which he entred to his Advancers when they made him Protector He committed the Lord Chancellor
of Conde and the Hugonots pretending it was not against the King but against an evil Counseller and to deliver themselves from the oppression of one who abused the Kings youth That same one was the Duke of Guise who being himself a stranger say they and hating the Nobility of France on purpose to oppress them of the Reformed Religion and to set the Crown on his own head in case the King should die armed himself into the Field c. That thereupon the Nâ—bles of France perceiving his malicious designs viz. To murder and destroy so many innocents took up Arms to defend themselves against such a Tyrant That for the Kings consent it was not to be expected nor as the case stood much to be regarded seeing he was in the hands of the Guises and had neither age to discern nor freedom to deny nor power to execute the Law Lastly say some Beza teacheth obedience to Magistrates in his Book De confess fid very largely Cap. 5. Sect. 45. and prescribeth no other remedy to private persons oppressed by a Tyrant but prayers and tears to amend their lives Touching the first point the Apologists will seem confident that this Battle of Dâ—eux was neither against Law nor the King and yet afterward confess that they understand not the Law of France nor the Circumstances of the War So they pretend certainty in a matter wherein they have not Science which is to beat themselves with their own weapon But was indeed that War neither against the King nor the Law Assuredly against them both as will appear by the Laws of Charls the Eighth 1487. of Francis the First 1532. of Francis the Second 1560. at Fountain Bleau which I shall cite hereafter in the case of Rochel and Montauban Secondly it is certain that Battle was not in King Francis his time but in the Reign of Charls the Ninth And after the death of King Francis all men not unacquainted with the proceedings of that time know full well that the House of Guise did bear no sway at Court the Duke was made as it were a stranger to the State the Queen-Mother the King of Navar and the Constable sate at the stern and ruled all Therefore it is not true that the King was in captivity under the faction of Guise nor true that the Duke armed himself into the Field for the Constable commanded in cheif he and the Marshal of Saint Andrews were the Kings Lieutenants and had the Kings Commissions to warrant what they did The Duke of Guise lead onely the Rear of the Army Mons Lanow's discourses Mons Mauvissier Comment and though it were his fortune to stand master of the Field and to win the day yet he had not any charge in the Battle but onely of his own Companies Thirdly Neither did the Princes of Bourbon take arms onely to deliver themselves from the oppre sion of Guise For if it were so why did they not lay down when they saw not the Duke of Guise but the Constable Montmorency coming against them armed no less with the Kings Authority then with his Forces to chastize them as Rebels The Constable was a man against whom they could pretend nothing he was the Honor of the Admirals House the Admirals Kinsman and his great friend especially when he was prisoner at Melun by commandment of Henry the Second He was now the Kings Vicegerent in the Field why did they not reverence him yea why did they themselves begin the fight why did they first affront and assail the Kings Army This therefore is but matter of meer pretext for Beza himself confesseth plainly This Field was fought to restore or establish their pretended Religion Vbi supra Fourthly Neither is it true that the Duke of Guise is a stranger in France Is he a stranger in France who is descended clearly from the Stock and Line of Charlemaign who is no stranger in France I wis Is he a stranger in France who is a Peer of France and Cosin-German to the Prince of Conde their Protector whose own Mother was Antonietta Princess of Bourbon whose Ancestors have enjoyed the greatest Offices and Honors in the Court of France Neither may we forget the great services they have done for the Crown of France at Rome at Metz Verdun Theonville and at Calice especially in a time when all Franâ—e was in mourning and distress too for the loss which Monsieur the Admiral had received at St. Quintins Lastly that dream viz. That the Duke should aspire to the Crown is the pitifullest of all a meer fable taken out of the Legend of Lorrain and other Libels of that time For how many Walls of Brass were betwixt him and it The King himself yong his Brothers yonger their Mother living the King of Navar their trusty and Noble Friend with the whole Nobility of France as they themselves acknowledge Was it not then a likely object for such a Strangers pretensions It being then apparently false That the King was in the hands that is under the power of Guise let us consider the last Proposition viz. That the Kings Commission which the Constable had and the Prince wanted and fought against at the Battle of Dreux was not much to be regarded because at that time the King had neither age to discern nor liberty to deny c. As for Liberty it is answered already And for age what if the King wanted age naturally in his politick capacity he did not We are to know a King hath two bodies or his person may be considered under a double capacity that of Nature and that of Policy His Body politick as it never dieth so it is never defective of Authority or Direction The acts of the Body politick be not abated by the Natural bodies access The Body politick is not disabled to govern by the non-age of the natural See 26. Lib. Assis Placit 24. where by Justice Thorps judgement the gift of a King is not defeated by his non-age In the Book of Assis tit droit placit 24. Anno 6. Ed. 3. for a Writ of Right brought by Edward the Third of a Manor as Heir to Richard the First the exception of non-age against the King was not admitted For though the Natural body dieth yet the Body politick which magnifieth and advanceth the quality of the Natural is not said to die So 4. Eliz The Leases of the Dutchy made by Edward the Sixth were resolved by all the Judges to be good though made in the Kings minority So though the Kings Body natural cannot discern or judge yet that disableth not the King that the acts of his Minority ordered by his Counsel and the Regent should be of no validity which their own Hottoman in his France-Gallia might have taught them And let them resolve us whether the Counsel and State of England would take it well if a Catholike should affirm as he might do much more truly that the change of Religion made
and Cantons This Union was made by the States in the year 1578. For seeing on the one hand the fortunate Proceedings of the Duke of Parma and on the other the course of thâ— Male-Contents they enter a perpetual League which was comprized in Twenty Articles In the first whereof Holland Zealand Frize and Gelders joyn contra omnem vim quae sub praetextu c. to maintain one another against all force whatsoever that shall be made upon them in the Kings name or for matter of Religion After this viz. in the year 1579. the Prince of Orange who was the contriver and ringleader of all with those of Antwerp and Gaunt enter the League and subscribe on the Fourteenth of February and it was again confirmed at the Hague the Twentieth of July 1581. The design in all being to expel their Leige Lord the King of Spain and to deprive him of those Dominions as presently after they did publishing an Edict in the name of the States unitâ—d with this title or prescription Que le Roy a' Espague est descheu c. That the King of Spain is fallen from the Dominion of the Low-Countries and injoyning an Oath or form of Abjuration to be taken by all the people of those Countries in these words I W. N. Comme un bon vassal du ' pais Sware anew and binde my self to the Provinces united to be Loyal and Faithful to them and to Aid them against the King of Spain as a true Man of the Country Upon this they break all the Kings Seals pull down his Arms seize and enter upon his Lands Rents Customes and all Hereditaments whatsoever taking them into their own possession and as absolute Lords they Coyn Money in their own names they place and displace Officers of State Banish the Kings Counsellors seize upon Church livings suppress Catholike Religion beseidge Amsterdam and do all other acts that might import Supream and absolute Dominion And all this with so much terror and violence that as 't is reported Raald a Counsellor for Frizeland upon onely hearing of their maner of proceeding and of the new Oath against the King died suddenly therewith as of an Apoplexy The reasons they give why the King had forfeited his title and right to these Countries were these First because he labored to suppress Religion They mean their own which they had newly taken up contrary to the old and which had it not been for the opposition made against it by the Kings Governors in the Provinces had long before this time destroyed the Kings Religion which was legally established and received by the geâ—eral consent approbation and profession of the whole Country Secondly for oppressing that is governing them not according to the Law but by Tyranny Thirdly for abrogating their priviledges and holding them in a condition of bondage and servitude Such a Prince say they we are not bound to obey as a Lawful Magistrate but to â—ject as a Tyrant But this is a Presidâ—nt of vâ—ry dangerous consequâ—nâ—e doubtless For if private Subjects as 〈◊〉 that time they were without difpute may depose their Prince meerly upon general Charges and without having done any one overt Act contrary unto the Laws or the duty of his Office and may make themselves sole Judges in the cause of what is right betwixt the Prince and the People of which they were in no capacity either formal or virtual that is representative more then a Minor part Qui stat videat ne cadat there is no Prince nor State in the world can be secure The Rochellers may plead this as much as the Hollanders and so may any discontented party under a government which they like not as well as they But it shall not be amiss to enquire a little further into this business and lay open to plain view the grounds occasions and consequences thereof so compendiously as we shall be able The original primary and true cause of these troubles was the spring and growth â— heresie which by this time was like a Gangreen spread over the greatest part of Germany and not the least in these Low-Countries where under the shadow of religion especially of abetting and promoting liberty of Conscience as they called it All factions of State and discontentments of Ambitious persons shrowded themselves The peoples natural inclination to Novelty was great and set it much forward yet there wanted not the Concurrence of some Forreigners to blow the Coals of dissention both out of England and France Charls the Fifth Emperor a wise and provident Prince remembringing what a piece of work Luther had lately cut him out in Germany and with what danger difficulty and charge he overcame it intended as well for the quietness of these Provinces as for his own Interest and Honor to prevent as much as he could the Propagation of Martinests and all other Sects whatsoever And to that end finding no other means more proper and fit to be applied unto such a Malady had established the Inquisition among them about the yeer 1550. for the Execution whereof Mary Queen of Hungary then Regent of the Low-Countries procured such Explication and Mitigation of some Circumstances as was judged necessary But after this the Emperor resigning the whole government of these Provinces to his Son King Philip retired himself by a most memorable example voluntarily from the world and consâ—crated the last act of his life entirely to God and devotion King Philip at the first entrance into his government finding how much the Sects increased daily in Flanders notwithstanding the means opposed against them and considering what danger would ensue upon it to the State followed strictly his Fathers advise and in the year 1555. renewed the Commission Instructions and Articles for the said Inquisition But this as it happened through the general contagion and distemper of mindes which Heresie had bred in the people provd onely matter of further discontent to the Inhabitants of the Nether-Lands and did no good They alledge that all Strangers would thereupon be forced to depart the Country and by consequence their Trading would decay which was the Golden Mine and maintenance of those Provinces Thus they complained but indeed their inward grief was the humor of Innovation to which they were much inclined and therefore feared themselves There was another Politick Act of the Kings yet withall of very religious concernment and design which added Fewel to this Fire namely the Erecting of those new Bishopricks at Gaunt Ipres Floren. vand Haer de tumult Belgic Antwerp c. which he intended all the Provinces over And a third viz. the authority and power of the Bishop of Arras whose Cardinals Hat lately procured him by the Kings favor made him the more odious so as the greater his Obligation was to his Holiness or the King their Sovereign so much more it seemed was the malice both of the Nobility and common people incensed against him Lastly they urge their Ancient priviledges
puld down and spoiled the Religious expeld and driven out by force of Arms and all Magistrates whatsoever that endeavored either to pacifie or oppose them are contemn'd abused resisted yea their fury and violence was such as they forced the Governess her self to consult of retiring out of Brussels which she had done if the Counsel of some of the Nobles had not prevailed with her to the contrary Yet did not the causes of her dislike and distrust cease but rather grow and encrease daily viz. the private Conventicles preachings and insolency of the people openly now Lutheranizing and even in the Face of the Court yea the frequent and private meetings of many of the Nobility were matter of much jealousie to her whereof she often complained in Counsel but without redress She knew very well the people could work no great effects without a head and that the Nobles wanted power to execute any of their dâ—signs without the people but that both of them conspiring to countenance and aâ—â—st each other much mischief might follow Orange who was the chief Captain and contriver of all yet playd least in sight and would very seldom seem outwardly to favor any change of Religion all that he did was as he pretended for the interest of the Common-wealth and for the publick good He was assisted chiefly by the Marquis of Berghen Montagny and Florence Montmorency alias Count Horn who by this time was grown a perfect Malecontent yet not for Religion but upon some private respects viz. of his own debt and for being denied the government of Zutphen but especially for the execution of his Brother Montigny in Spain The meetings in which they agitated Counsels and brought their designs onward to perfection were first at Breda whither the Count Egmond was also invited as a man of the greaest Military power and interest in that Country and presently after as an effect or resolution taken at that assembly Brederode and his complices delivered their Petition to the Governess as hath been said for Liberty of Religion They had meetings also at Hoochstrat Osterweal and Saint Trudon at which that Noble Count Egmond was undone For at his Arraignment it was one of the principal things chargd against him that he had been privie to the Confederations and agreements made at those Assemblies Secondly that upon the same day the Petition was delivered by Brederode he came with the Prince of Orange and Count Horn to the great Banquet at the Earl of Culemberghs house where there were no less then Three hundred Confederates and dined with them at which time the name of Geuses was publikely assumed by the Confederates Thirdly that afterward he sent his Secretary Backerseal to the Crew offering them his aid And lastly which himself acknowledged at the Bar That he had offered his assistance to hinder the Duke D' Alvas coming into the Low-Countries and that he had neither disliked nor disswaded the proceedings of the Confederates Horn was endicted upon the same Articles with this further charge against him That he threatned to levy Fifty thousand men to rescue his Brother and bring him home upon force out of Spain Upon proof of which accusations they were both of them condemned and lost their heads as it semed not onely just for matter of Law but also necessary for reason of State for the example of others for the Regents safety and for vindication of the Kings honor and authority which partly by their practises and partly by their connivances contrary to duty had been insufferably vilified and abused by the rude multitude Sir Roger Williams History Yet is it commonly thought that Count Egmond was rather drawn in by the Craft and Policy of Orange then that he engaged muâ—h of himself being otherwise a person of a plain yet Noble and Magnanimous disposition and therefore generally lamented For what Prince is there in the World that having endured so many indignities and of such fowl nature as those we lately mentioned would not seek to vindicate his honor upon the offenders and to prevent the like for the future Was it not time for the King to Arm when the people were in Arms and had beside their contempt of Religion committed so many great and scandalous disorders the Nobility whose office and duty it was by their places to have suppressed and punished them conniving at their proceedings When the Cities were all in uproars and the whole frame of the Common-wealth seeming to be shaken Had not the King all the reason in the World to send D' Alva and forces of his own when the Provincial Governors would not be commanded to apply theirs effectually to the business It was certainly high time to do that which he did not onely to repress and keep in order those rebellious Spirits which were dispersed and acting in all parts of the Country but also to encounter and oppose Orange who by this time what by his open backwardness and oppositions to such Counsels as tended to a speedy redress of those evils and what by his secret practises and abetting of the Delinquent party had no less undermined the government it self then he had discouraged and wearied the Governess And for the Companies which D' Alva brought out of Spain at which the people were taught so much to murmur could it be lawful for the Prince of Orange to bring in the Reisters out of Germany and for his Brother the Count Lodowick with an Army of French to invade Henault and was it not lawful for the King to send in forces to maintain his own Was it lawful for them to surprize Montz and was it not more lawful for the King to expel them Let no man dream that if the Dukes forces had not come the Country would have been quiet for that was incredible to any body that knew the State of affairs The fire was not quenched but covered and would have broken out again in a greater flame The Confederating of so many and great Persons countenanced by the chief Governors themselves did Prognosticate a storm to be yet coming and all men of understanding saw they were not likely to be governed long by the Bridle in a Womans hand Therefore was the King forced upon the matter to send D' Alva And the rather because he could not but know that Monsieur Chastillon Jean Petit l' Histor the Admiral of France had sent to Baron Brederode both to incense him further against the King and to perswade him not to agree with the Dutchess of Parma for saith he that would but deceive him and offering moreover in case of necessity to aâ—â— st him with Four thousand Gentlemen That Count Lodowick after his defâ—at at Montâ— did lie at Rochel among the Calvinists and that the Prince himself was gone into France on purpose to prepare for a future invasion He knew that the same Admiral afterwards did sollicit Charls the Ninth King of France to turn all his Wars upon
at first was it not the Prince ex mero motu gratiâ speciali out of his meer grace and favor and to gratifie and endear the affections of good Subjects to him Do not all their Charters run in this still Speak they not all this language What ungrateful presumption is it then for people to be so ready and industrious to molest their Sovereign Princes upon the advantage of their own favors What if they be forced to break an Article or some clause of an Article upon urgent cause must it be judged a crime unpardonable what would they have said to Philip Duke of Burgundy and of the Netherlands who upon occasion resumed into his own hand Henric. Berland Histor and by his own Authority all the Priviledges and Immunities of Gaunt yea detained them all his life-time teaching them thereby to acknowledge from whose grace they held them And though the people compelled his Son Charls to restore them upon his coming to Gaunt yet it proved to their cost for they were forced to seek pardon and to cast themselves and their Charters once again at his feet and to stand to mercy The like he did at Machlin but not without great suit made to him and upon such conditions as himself thought good And it is not a little strange to be considered why this Prince of Orange who urgeth so much the Kings Oath and that it ought to be kept yet makes so little conscience to perform his own For he may remember when he was made Governor of Brabant Mich. Baius de Vnion Stat. he took his Oath to maintain Catholike Religion in that Province Hath he performed it When he retired into Holland he professed and protested publikely he would alter nothing nor dispossess the Catholike Clergie of their livings The like he did at Amsterdam and further bound himself there with a Solemn Oath yet he performed none of these but the clean contrary most perfidiously and wickedly as soon as ever he had power in his hands and could attend to do it so that to serve his own turn and for his treacherous end we see how much he could urge another man though his own sovereign to his duty but for his own Religion and bonum publicum gives him a dispensation And it is just according to Calvins Institutions Lib. 4. c. 13. Sect. 21. A man saith he once perfectly illuminated by the light of the Gospel simul omnibus vinculis obediendi legibus Ecclesâ—ae solutus est is ipso facto and at an instant discharged from all bands of obedience either to the Church or the State A blessed Lesson doubtless and wherein he could not but have many Scholars But all this while no particular charge comes in against the King no instance no example is given wherein he did break his Oath when it was poâ—â— ble for him to keep it which through their distempers and undutifulness was become not a little difficult Was it in his exactions that is answered already Was it for bringing in Spaniards upon them Time and necessity forced him to be at that great charge and trouble much against his will to defend the Church to defend the Religion of his Ancestors and of the Country against the insolencies of rude ignorant impious people connived at and countenanced by them lastly to defend the Laws and laudable Customs of the Country and to make them know he was their Prince Was it in the matter of Religion Indeed it is true there is a clause in the Vnion contra omnem vim c. That it should be against all violence whatsoever that should be offered them under pretence of the Kings Authority for matter of Religion It is to be observed at the beginning Orange Horn and Montigny joyned with the people upon pretense onely of opposing the Inquisition upon this ground onely they would seem to countenance Brederode and his complices and for this end only they seem to urge the Religions Vried yea they publish books and make liberal promises to be content if they may but enjoy their own Religion and that they will not prejudice or oppose the Catholikes and with such dissembling as this they drew a great part even of the Catholikes themselves to joyn with them yea Prelates and persons no way suspected for the matter of Religion yet deceived not a little with their pretenses of liberty and of the publike good for which reason the Arch-Duke Matthias was called in and they engaged to assist and defend him with their lives and estates Well! the Religions Vried was granted and thereby as it were a Supersedeas to the Inquisition all violence and severity for matter of Religion ceased What could they desire more All the Provinces and Holland and Zealand among the rest enjoyed what they would have Liberty Religion Et quid non But it is an observation of infallible verity Faction and Heresie are always humble till they get the Sword in their hands when they have it they change their tune as it manifestly appeared by their proceedings For in a short time they of Holland were so far from keeping the Peace of Religion which they had promised that they expel the Catholike Clergy out of all places under their power They seize upon their Lands Sequester their Benefices Imprison their Persons yea molest and prosecute all without exception whose consciences suffer them not to conform to their pretended Synods at Dort in the year 1574. at Middleborough in the year 1581. yea they drown and use many other kindes of cruelty towards men meerly for Religion not enduring so much as to heare of Toleration but onely for their own and some few Anabaptists and Semi-Arrians among them The Religions Vried so impetuously desired or rather demanded when time was for themselves is now quite forgotten and Merchants of Amsterdam Bâ—ewers of Delfâ— Staplers of Dort Seamen of Horn with some few illiterate Ministers joyned with them do now Direct Rule Govern and Judge in all things Comme bon leur semble as it is in one of the Articles touching the Vnion according as to themselves seemeth good No man must gainsay them Truly if the King had proceeded thus with them if he had taken Arms and levyed forces to introduce a new Religion upon them as they did upon the Country I should confess he had much incroached upon their liberties had broken his Oath and incurred their hatred justly The States of Holland Zealand c. have done all this and much more mischief and injurie to the people of those Provinces where they command what therefore do they desire doth not their own example and practises justifie beyond all exception the Kings proceedings Shall they presume to introduce and set up by force of Arms a Religion which before themselves no man ever owned Shall the Consistory at Genevah be so precise as not to permit any kinde of Toleration Shall the pretended Churches of France and Bearn more especially insult
the Kings of Spain France Poland the Princes of Italy Germany c. And yet this is but the first peale which he rang as a Toxsan or Alarum-bell to Bohemia For he addeth another Article which if they look not well to it may touch Reformers Freehold as well as other Princes It is Quando sub praeâ—extu Religionis c When under colour of Religion they look after their own advantages or profit This had not been a Lecture to be read to Henry the Eighth and the Courtiers of his time And surely if a man should ask Murray and Morton those two pillars of Reformation in Scotland Orange and Horn in the Netherlands Conde and the Admiral in France the Dukes of Somerset and Northumberland in England Saxony Sweden Denmark and the rest of the Lutheran Princes in Germany whether they had not some by-ends of Avarice Ambition and other sinister and worldly nature when they seemed to be most hot and zealously transported it might trouble them all perhaps what to answer Last of all he assigneth another cause of deposition viz. When they oppress their Subjects in matter of Conscience Which indeed is the strangest of all for who ever knew a Calvinist permit Liberty of Conscience to another man whom he could compel to his own and yet in this point he is so earnest that unless the people do this viz. Resist the Superior Magistrate in the defence of themselves and true Religion he tells them in conscientiis incolumes esse nequeunt They cannot have true peace of Conscience They should offend God by not doing it And in his Commentary upon Judges he speaketh yet more absurdly and dangerously Magistratus Minor potest occidere majorem The Inferior Magistrate in this case may kill the Superior Baylâ—ffs Sheriffs Constables their King and Sovereign or if they think fit one another upon the quarrel of Religion because saith he Domestick Tyrants are more to be suppressed or opposed then Forreigners or such as are without us Neither was Paraeus the onely Master of Paradoxes in that Country although it must be confessed his Doctrine so corrupted the Palatinate that in England to prevent the like evill his Books were purged by fire Gracerus his Pew-fellow teacheth that the Malice of Antichrist that is in his sense the actings or zeal of any Catholike Prince for the true Religion established coercenda est gladio must be resisted saith he or restrained by the Sword And Aretius himself sufficiently shews his affections to the Emperor Christian Empire when he teacheth that the Dragon in the Apocalyps that is the Devil Dedisse Imperio potestatem suam c. gave to the Empire its power and greatness and that plenitudinem Diabolismi the Fulness of Diabolical malice and hatred against Christ dwelleth in the Empire Nor are we to think that this Doctrine was onely Speculative among them it was the practise also of that pretended Church ab origine Yea their own Neighbors and Elder Brethren have felt the effects of it in much inhumane and uncivil usage from them Ask Gieskenius who was a man of Learning and no small account among the Lutherans and he will tell you one pretty exploit of theirs Emdenses Illustrem Dominum suum motâ seditione c. They of Emden saith he had by this time almost driven their Leige Lord out of all his dominions by their seditious proceedings And that they rested not till they had obtained these Articles of him who was himself a Lutheran Ne Illustrissimus Comes c. That his Excellency should not have power to grant unto his Subjects of Emden the exercise of any Religon but Calvinism 2. That himself onely at Court may have a Preacher of the Auspurgh-Confession So it was matter of favor to him that Subjects should tolerate their Princes Religion but for themselves it must be framed entirely according to their own Mode They must direct and their Prince obey If you object that this was but a private tumult and that the Church of the Palatinate did not approve of such proceedings against their Brethren it is cleerly answered by this That in the year 1602. there were twenty points established in that Church The first whereof was this Schulting Hierarch Anaâ—res Totus Lutheranismus omnes libri eorum c. That the whole Doctrine of Luther opposite to Calvinism and all the Lutherans Books be for ever taken away and prohibited Neither are they permitted in any part of the Palatinate the Marquisate of Brandenburgh or the Territory of Emden 'T is true The Lutherans where they command do as wisely provide against them They have as little footing in all the Duke of Saxonies Countries Hamborough or the Hans Towns That great Synod of Torgaw convented by the means and procurement of those Protestant Princes do testifie that the Calvinists had troubled and brought to ruin omnes Christianas Ecclesias All Christian Churches Vniversities Kingdoms and States where ever they were admitted And hence it is that they are not included under the peace and protection of the Empire the Religions Vried is no way permitted unto them as appeareth by the Edict of Charls the Fifth De composit pacis c. Anno 1532. Nor are they comprehended in his Sentence De confess Suevicâ 1530. Nor in the Interim 1548. Nor in the Constitution De pace publicâ And for the Acts made at Passau 1552. by the Emperor Ferdinand the very words exclude them from all benefit So also in his Declaration at Auspurgh 1555. And in the conclusion or agreement of the Princes of the Augustan Confession with the three Electors and other Princes and Cities in the year 1557. it was declared that the Sacramentaries Anabaptists Osiandrians c. were all excluded from the Articles of peace and that there should be Edicts published against them by common consent and for their utter extirpation This was enacted in the year 1557. and in the year 1566. Caesar and the Princes of the Dyet decreto publico scripserunt c. published a general decree concerning Frederick the Elector Palatine of the Rhine that he should desert the opinions of Calvin and not suffer them to be taught in any of the Churches or Schools of his Country And this Decree of the Dyet was intimated to him in the presence of the Bishops of Mentz Triers and Colen of the Elector of Saxony and of the Embassadors also of the Marquis of Brandenburgh and after his death by his Son Lewis it was obeyed In the same year the Princes declare in their reply to the Emperor permittere se nolle that they will not permit that any Sects whatsoever shall be harbored in their Dominions and that they count the Zuinglians and Calvinists for such which was also long before declared viz. in the Recess of the Empire in the year 1555. Calvinism then being so long before not counted tolerable in Germany the Bohemians of late have made it much more odious and intolerable by
treasonable design should Confederate themselves with one who is a declared Enemy of the Emperor and the Turks Vassal a Reprobate a Monster called Bethlehem Gabor and calling himself Prince of Transylvania King of Hungary and what not one who to hold himself firm in the Turks grace had already delivered up to him the Town and Fort of Lip the Towns of Solimos Tornadg Margat and Arad all well fortified places in Hungary â—nd labored hourly how to do him further service to the prejudice of Christendom One who had â—worn Allegiance to his Soveveign Lord Gabriel Batthori Prince of Transylvania yet afterward Trayâ—erously murthered him and usurped his State One who made a League with the Emperor Matthias in the year 1615. to be quiet and to attempt nothing contrary unto the Liberties and Peace of Hungary yet presently after invaded the Country in person with a great Army took upon him the Crown carried the Emperors Lievtenant Andrew Dockzy whom he had taught by Treachery prisoner into Transylvania banished all the Clergy and maintained his Soldiers with the spoils of the Church profaned the Cathedral Church at Poson with his own Heretical or Mahometan Chaplains and from thence certified the Turk boastingly under his own hand how successfully he had now begun the wotk which he promised that most of the Nobles of Hungary were under his command and that since the Popes Clergy gloried to weare their Crowns shaven he would make bold to shave some of them heads and all Upon which good news and in expectation to turn all his Warres now upon Christendom the Turk instanstly makes Peace with the Tartar and offereth Gabor to assist him upon any occasion of need with Forty thousand men Yet I say upon this mans head did the Union resolve to set the Crown of Hungary to which end his neerest Kinsmen lay all this time at Heydlebergh as an Intelligencer Treating with them yet disguised under the habit of a Scholar Let now the impartial Reader cast his eye upon Germany and see as an effect of this wicked Combination the picture of Troy on fire that is to say the lively image and horror of War And when he hath done so let him reflect how well it would please him to see the face of L ndon and Middlesex so disfigured â—â—th wounds and desolation Tâ—â—â—â—rious Zealot who is now mâ—â—tâ—â—rward to blow the Coals of dâ—ssentionâ— and to inflâ—â—me a State that is at quiet would quake and tremble when he should consider in what devastation all that once flourishing Country of the Empire now lieth mourning and groaning by reason of this War Those fertil Provinces about the Rhine all wasted and impoverished by Soldiers on both sides especially about Worms Tillage forborne Traffick decayed Trades ceased Taxes imposed Fortifications raised at the charge of the Country and for what onely for defense and security of those who oppress or impoverish them No man master of his own all at the will of Soldiers and Strangers and above an Hundred thousand persons reckoned to be slain These are the effects and issues of this War the fruits of Calvinism which though directly prohibited by the Laws of the Empire and onely tolerated by connivance and the mercy of the State yet was now come to such a point that it sought to suppress the Emperor himself and hazarded the subversion of the whole State both Ecclesiastical and Temporal An unchristian return doubtless and without any stamp of Religion Their sole justifying Faith will scarce justifie this because it was with breach of Faith and of so many civil bonds and contrary to charity The true marks of Charity are Humility Patience and Zeal perfectly conjoyned and qualified with the other two Your little Patience and less Humility do convince your Zeal to be no less counterfeit then your Faith is fruitless Charity would never have suffered you to invade the Duke of Bavieres Country notwithstanding he was willing to have stood Newter and onely because he would not joyn with you Charity never counselled Anhalt to design for pillage and as it were to devour before-hand the spoil of a City valued at Two and thirty Millions as he did in his Letters to Donau 1619. Charity never directed Christians to seek assistance from the Turk Christs greatest enemy nor to frame so many treacherous and malicious plots as they did Pag. 32 42 66 80. of their Cancâ—llaria against such as were either Neighbors or Friends to them or their lawful Superiors What the Laws of the Empire are concerning such proceedings hath been seen above in the daie of Luther where they are sufficiently condemned I shall therefore add here one onely passage of Leopold King of the Romans in his Supplication unto his Father Otho the first Emperor who because he had broken the Peace of Germany and called in Forreigners Membrum Imperii appellari non debeo I ought not saith he to be accounted any longer a Member of the Empire having brought in Forreign and Barbarous Nations into the heart of Germany â—ut these Minions of Genevah stand not upon the Law it is Gospel that they plead let the Gospel therefore condemn them The Word of God saith Per me Reges c. Kings reign by me It is by Gods appointment that they bear rule over men Therefore forbear ye people shew reverence to the Ordinance of God observe your dâ—stance Touch not mine Anointed The Gospel saith Let every soul be subject to the higher pâ—wers c. And he that resists resisteth Gods Ordinance and shall receive damnation Yea the Gospel saith Be subject unto every ordinance of man viz. That is established and by which the Will of Divine Providence may be seen For the Lords sake whither to a â—ing as Supream or more Excellent or unto Governors c. How much do the Doctrine of the Cospel and the Doctrine of Calvin differ The Gospel teacheth us to honor the King to obey Governors c. Calvin directs us rather to degrade and depose them But this is a matter needs no disputation Grace and Honesty would decide it best Titulus Sextus STATISM OR The Changes in ENGLAND About Religion AFter a tedious Voyage abroad we are at last to look homeward and to stâ—er our course for England where it must be confessed no such Paradoxâ—s are now current or practiâ—es on foot either among the Prelates or any part of the inferior Clergy I hope as abroad we have both heard and seen And it is no marvel for now they have the wind with them they live in a calm There is no great tryal of their patience and temperature of Spirit save onely what Martin Mar-Prelate and his Fellows do now and then give them Bâ—ing therefore in so great Peace themselves through the favor of the State they were mad men and should forget their own Interest if they did not Preach now very zealously against Tumults and Disloyalty in others But if we look back unto times past and observe
to flie and lurk in corners Till the Earl of Huntingdon apprehending him brought him up again to his old lodging in the Tower where he made an unfortunate end I shall not urge the practises of Sir Nicholas Throgmorton a man of great wit and policy notwithstanding he was Indicted of high Treason and arraigned at Westminster with Arnold Warner and others because though the case were plain yet the Jury acquitted him but to their own cost and trouble And it was well for him the Advocates of those times desired not so much to triumph in the calamities of poor men nor that the prisoner should loose his head rather then they their oration and the glory of the day But say some there were no Ministers had any hand in those tumults none of them were Trumpeters to Sedition at that time What was Goodman and Gilby Were not they Ministers Was not Jewel a Ministâ—â— â—ho preacht at Gl ceâ—â—er against the Queens proceedâ—ngs Was not Doctor Sands a Ministâ—r though Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge when he walkt abâ—ut with the Ragged Staff and assisted the proclaimers of Lady Jane Were not Hooper Rogers Crowly Ministers all enrolled as friends and favorers of these actions And were there not divers other Ministers both of Kent and other Counties who upon Wyats fall forsook the Realm or was there any thing more likely to drive them out then a guilty Conscience what shall we say of those two Apostles falsly so called of the time Cranmer and Ridley W re not they Ministers yet great instruments of the Queens troubles And that not in King Edwards time onely upon which account some would excuse them but after his death and under the Reign of Queen Mary For Ridleys Sermon of Pauls Cross wherein like another infamous Shaw he so highly magnified and defended the Title of Lady â—anâ— and perswaded the people to accept and obey her as Queen iâ—pugning against all honesty and conscience the right of King Henries two Daughters was the Sunday after King Edward was dead And 't is well known the Reign of a Prince commenceth not from the time of his Coronation but instantly upon the death of his predecessor And therefore was he justly attainted and convicted of Treason Cranmer was both Counsellor and Oracle in the business and was therefore arraigned and condemned with the Lady Jane and Guildford Dudly as contriver and principal assistant in that Treason as appeareth by the Records in the Kings Bench. This man was a very Proteus in all his actions and of a disposition most servil and vitiously plyable to any humor of the King and ready always to follow the prevailing party He was first a principal instrument of the Kings divorce from â—â—â—en Kâ—â—bâ—â— ne whereby the 〈◊〉 Gatâ—â— were let opon to the Lady Anne Bolen yet afterward to serve the Kings Appetite he was used again as a chief instrument in her condemnation as appears by the Statute where Cranmâ—rs Sentence is recorded judicially 28. Hen. 8. c. 7. as of his own knowledge convincing her of some fowl act Nor can any wise or indifferent man but condemn him of inexcusable iniquity that being a Counsellor of State Primate and M tropolitan of the Realm pretending also to be a Reformer of Religion would so much betray his Master whose creature he was as to frustrate and make void his will whereof himself was made chief Executor subscribe to extinguish his issue as much as possibly he could by disinheriting his two Daughters and transferring the Crown to another Line and Family and all this most basely and contrary to his conscience onely to please a Subject and to avoid â—omâ—â—inde of affliction which he feared upon the Succession of Qâ—een Mary and against which 't is manifest by the frequent changings lapses relapses and perjuries which he made he was never well armed It is manifest therefore that in all places at home as well as abroad this Spirit of Reformation hath ever been and is seditiously pragmatical and dangerous unto Princes and States wheresoever it getteth footing and is not countenanced and advanced so far as to bear all the sway it self It is in this onely respect not in any other like the Motto of her who meerly for temporal and worldly ends made her self the great Patroness of it that is it is Semper Eadem always the same and never changeth This was it which induced them of Genevah to expel their Bishop and Leige-Lord This was it which induceth them of Sâ—ethland to renounce their lawful King Them of Holland to depose their Sovereign Prince This was it which Sollicited the Bohemians to depose the Emperor their Elected Crowned and Acknowledged King That imprisoned the most Vertuous and Religious Queen and Martyr Mary Queen of Scotland and cast her undeservedly into those calamities which pursued her to death This was it which held out Rochel and Montauban in defiance against their King and lastly that which begat so many conspiracies commotions and causes of jealousie unto Queen Mary of England So as within the space of Sixty years it hath been observed More Princes have been deposed and persecuted by Protestants their Subjects upon the quarrel and difference of Religion then had bin by the Popes excommunications or by the attempts and practises of any Subjects Catholikes in Six hundred before Of the troubles which have arisen to other Princes upon this occasion we have spoken somewhat already The business of Sweden is defended by one Master T. M. upon these grounds First That it was done by the demand of the whole State But this is a manifest falshood For if you take the whole State formally that is for all the people of the Nation it is certain that Sigismund their lawful King had not onely a great but the far greater and better part of the people well affected to him If you take it Virtually that is for some general Assembly representing the people legally met and resolving upon that business there never was any such called The meetings that were were onely of Duke Charls his faction who in comparison of the Kings party both of Nobility and Commons were but few yet as it often happens the better case was more negligently managed and those for the Duke who were also inclined to Innovation in Religion being more active industrious and unanimous in their design made shift to secure the Military provisions and to invest themselves of the chief Strengths of the Kingdom before the others and so prevailed as Chytraeus himself a Protestant Author is sufficient witness Chytra Continuat Crantzii Secondly he saith it was for the defence of their Priviledges and Liberties None of which were violated as by the same Chytraeus appeareth Thirdly that it was for the fruitoin of Religion That 's true indeed and confessed That they might introduce and establish a new Religion they renounced their old King which is the thing we charge them with and wherein whatsoever they did
Wriothsley to the Tower deposed Bishop Tonstal both from the Counsel from his Bishoprick viz. of Durham as thinking it a seignory too Stately for a man of Religion And therefore he dissolved it and brought it within the Survey of the Exchequer that is into his own power but as it was observed he never prospered after However the Act it self was most inexcusably unjust and tyrannical being so directly contrary to Law as appeared beside what hath been alledged before by 1. Ed. 3. chap. 2. where the King dâ—clareth That the Lands of Bishops ought not to be seized into the Kings hands and that what had been done in that kinde in his Fathers days was by advise of evil Counsel and hereafter should not be so But his sins now grew towards ripeness Therfore having also deprived and committed Doctor Gardiner the Bishop of Winchester dissolved the Colledge of Stoke fleeced all the Cathedral Churches in England and added unto the guilt of Sacriledge many other outrages oppressions and crimes under the Nonage of a Pupil King without any check or opposition save onely in the business of the Earldom of Oxford which he was not able to devour as he desired at last in the midst of his carriere and after he had sentenced and put to death his own and onely Brother the Lord Admiral chiefly as 't is supposed upon the instigations of an ambitious or malicious Wife he was himself arraigned for High Treason and ill governing of the Realm as may be seen by the Articles of his Attainder in Stow and thereupon condemned and executed on the twenty second day of January in the year of our Lord 1552. When the Brothers were gone viz. the Protector and Admiral Dudley Duke of Northumberland comes upon the Stage a man whose ambition and policy though unperceived had ruined both of them but especially the Protector whose chief Adversary he was and the principal contriver of the Charge against him which in brief referred unto these Heads 1. That he had subverted all Laws 2. That he had broke the orders appointed by King Henry the Eighth for his Sons good 3. That he held a Cabinet-Councel and by it transacted the publike and chief Affairs of State without the advice of his Fellow-Counsellors 4. Lastly That he observed not the Conditions upon which he was made Protector which were to do nothing in the Kings Affairs without consent of the rest of the Executors Upon these Rocks the Protector perished not without the manifest judgement of God for much injustice which he had committed in the time of his Government especially in the business of Religion and of the Church and Northumberland for a while prevailed This man though he were all otherwise in his heart yet thought fitting to seem a little more precisely religious then the Protector intending thereby to assure himself of the affections of such people as were more Zealously affected to new Religion The Protector looking onely at present proffit caâ—â—d to humor them in that point no further â—â—en might serve his own turn But Northumberland had other designs in his head which were no less then to advance his own Family to the Crown and to ruin the right Heirs And therefore to ingratiate himself more with the Common people in the year 1552. he causeth the Liturgy or book of Common prayer to be the second time Reformed and Purged of certain ceremonies and orders offensive to that sort of people which he desired to please and so to be published This project stood him in much stead among others of the Nobility it gained him the Duke of Suffolk who from henceforward seemed wholly to be at Northumberlands Devotion and to steer his course after the others compass Being a Potent man and the greatest Precisian of those times unless perhaps they dissembled both of them upon the same account But because the Lord Treasurer Paulet Marquis of Winchester was more like to cross theâ—â—â—mply with them therefore it is resolved to remove him out of the way And to that end Northumberland observing that it was the Treasurers custom sitting at the Counsel Table if at any timâ— he were suddenly called up to the King to make such hast thâ—t he commonly left his Spectacles behindâ— him he procured them once to be so sweetly anointâ—d and perfumed before his return that at his next putting them on they cost him his Nose and scaped very narrowly with his Life which yet with much adoe was saved and the Treasurer lived to make the Duke his good friend some part of requital as the event shewed Not long after this King Edward falleth sick whereupon designes growing now to maturity the Duke procures his Son Guildford Dudly to be married to the Lady Jane Grey Daughter to the Dutchess of Suffolk one who had a remote title to the Crown But they meant to advance it by their power The Lady her self being also studiously affected to the Protestant Religion and for that respect they doubted not to finde favors and assistants enough But therein their count failed them At the same time thâ— Earl of Pembrokes Son was married to the Lady Katharine another Daughter of the Duke of Suffolk And the Earl of Huntingdons Son to one of Northumberlands own Daughters All which marriages were solemnized upon one day at Durham House in the Strand And after them King Edward lived not long It is said that the Apothecary who poisoned him for the horror of the offence and disquietness of his Conscience drowned himself and that he Laundress which washed his Shirt lost the Skin of her Fingers But this is certain thâ—re are some yet living in Court who can tell how many weeping Eyes they have seen for the untimely and Treacherous loss of such a Prince See Heyward Hist Edw. 6. But the pretence and zeale of Religion which these men shewed did so overshadow all things for a time that not many could discern their impiety The Oration which Nortâ—umberland made to the Lords in the Tower when he was upon his departure for Cambridge to proclaim his Daughter in Law Lady Jane Queen doth shew what a Fox he was and how far he could both descend and dissemble to compass his ends Goodw. Annals Howbeit in his way the Justice of God met him For the people the Suffolk men especially sticking faithfully to the right Heir and their lawful Sovereign Queen Mary he was quickly deserted by all men apprehended and received at Tower-hil the due reward of his Treason and other sins with the loss of his head And so we see those two Lords of Misrule or Reformation if it must be called so that is to say the Protector Duke of Sommerset and this man Duke of Northumberland Born both of them for the Scourge and ruin of the Catholike Church in England by a just vengance of Heaven proved at last as it were Butchers and Executioners of one another undid their several Families and endangered the whole Realm
The ones Ambition The others Avarice destroying him Yet of the two the calamity of the Protector must in all humane judgement seem most disastrous For 't is certain through his own weakness and the importune instigations of his Wife he was compelled to serve the designs of his greatest Adversary in the world by putting his own brother to death And after that living to see Bologne lost and the Crown through his Misgovernment engaged in many debts wants and trouble he last of all ended his days fatally and without any shew of repentance for those sins which brought him to that end Whereas in this respect Northumberland was far more happy For having in all humble and penitent maner acknowledged his offences to the Bishop of Worcester Doctor Heath his Ghostly Father and thereby reconciled himself to God and to the Communion of his Church at the place of Execution not out of design or hopes of life as some would malitiously asperse the action but willingly freely of his own accord and out of conscience as himself protesteth at his death he made another most Christian and publike acknowledgment of his Faults especially those which concerned Heresie Sacriledge and Treason in all which he confessed himself to be most guilty And thereupon used much and vehement exhortation to the people to beware of those Preachers of New Doctrine who had fâ— ed the Kingdom with so many false Opinions and much trouble Assuring them plainly and openly concerning himself that whatsoever he had professed or done in that kinde proceeded wholly from Covetousness Ambition and other evil Motives not worthy to be named and not from any perswasion of Judgment or Conscience which he ever had that way And therefore adminished them that they should willingly return to the Communion of Gods Church and keep themselves constant in the Catholike Faith and true Religion Which for Conscience sake saith he I onely tell you and that I may thereby in some sort acquit me of my duty and save my soul and not for any humane or temporal motive expectation or hope whatsoever And so died The Oration it self out of which this is extracted may be seen at large in Schardus Sim. Schard Memor Histor in Maximil 2. a Protestant chronicler of note in his historical collections and elsewhere I suppose without much difficulty Thus lived and thus died as we have said the two grand adversaries of Gods Church and subverters of Catholike Religion in England after so many disorders committed as God was pleased to suffer by their power and procurement and that they had sufficiently scourged and afflicted those whose sins well deserved such punishment they were both of them taken away by the hand of Justice and met with their deserts Temporally and things were restored to some better pass But what did the Catholikes all this while How did they behave themselves What Rebellions did they raise what commotions or tumults of the people did they procure I mean the more civil religious and ingenuous amongst them 'T is true some Risings there were in Devonshire and the Western parts of the rude multitude exasperated especially upon some temporal grievances oppressions and wants which followed the misgovernment of those times Religion was either not at all or least of all pretended by them They were vexed indeed to see the encroachments which the Protector and others made dayly upon the Kings and Peoples Interest They were sensible of the Scarcity and Dearth of all kinde of necessary commodities for life which came suddenly upon them and was far greater then it used to be They could not endure well to be abridged by Inclosures of some other Liberties which they pretended to In brief They were sensible of all such inconveniences in the Government of the State as concerned the Outward Man but for Religion further then it served to ease their Spleen that is to clamor to asperse and rail upon those whom they conceived the Authors of their other and more resented grievances I conceive they minded it not and that there is scarce any good ground why a man should think them in that respect more Catholikes then Protestants And if a Priest or some Ecclesiastical person were found amongst them as it were strange if there should be none considering how many there were then in the kingdom absolutely destitute and discontented yet certainly they were not many nor in any other quality considerable Whereas 't is certain that Kets camp in Norfolk a business of far greater consequence and difficulty were all of them such as were fallen with the State from the profession of Catholike Religion and become Protestants And this I would generally premise desiring the Reader to observe it that where I affirm of Catholikes that they did not conspire against their Princes nor raise any tumults in the kingdom for matter of Religion I mean such only as were Catholikes indeed and stood firm in their Holy Recusancy not complying in any sortwith those alterations which Henry the 8th Edward the 6th or Queen Elizabeth in their several times procured to be made contrary to the integrity of Christian Religion For such as complied were not to be counted Catholikes any longer but Heretikes Schismaticks Hypocrites c. And for such people having corrupted their faith to God I would not be taken to apologize in any other point of duty For 't is very possible they might still retain some notions of Catholike Religion in their minds which afterward and upon other occasions running into terms of disloyalty they might pretend as matter of complaint against their Prince though themselves were neither Catholike nor That nor any other matter purely Spiritual the true original cause of their Disorder but onely those Temporal Grievances by which they smarted as is abovesaid and which they saw well enough to procceed either wholly or in part from the several alterations made There were the like in Lincolnshire which our English Chronicles pass not over in silence But it sufficeth that for the generality of Catholikes I mean still those of more ingenuous civil and better quality notwithstanding so great and violent provocations as were used towards them their patience and submissive demeanor towards the State and civil Government was most exemplary to the World Neither Prelates nor Priests nor Lay-people making any resistance against those unworthy men who so much oppressed them under the Kings usurped Authority and Name making such havock in the Church and spoil of all things consecrate to the Service of God and exercise of their True Ancient Christian-Catholike Religion as this Nation never saw the like since it had â—he happiness to be called Christian It seemed they had been bred in a better School of Vertue then that which Calvin opened at Genevah and had learnt to bear the cross of their Saviour that is to say these temporal afflictions calamities and injuries with more Patience and that the glory of Martyrdom in sufferance was accounted far
Posse Tyrannum a quoquam c. That a Prince though Tyrant can be put to death by any private Authority And at a Councel held at Oxford under Steven Langton Arch-Bishop of Canterbury about the year 1228. Excommunication is decreed against all such as violate the Kings Peace or disturb the State of the Kingdom Yea the Councel of Constance Sess 15. declares it to be an error in Faith to hold otherwise Nuper accepit sancta synodus c. This Holy Synod saie the Fathers of it hath been lately informed that certain erronious opinions are holden contrary to Peace and good Estate of the Common-wealth viz. That a Tyrant may be lawfully and meritoriously taken away and killed by any Subject or Vassal of his c. Non obsâ—ante quocunque juramento c. Notwithstanding whatsoever Oath of Fidelity or Allegiance that he hath made to him Such Doctrine saith the Councel is contrary both to Faith and Manners and whosoever shall hold it pertinaciously are Hereticks and as such to be proceeded against according to the Canons What can be said or desired more upon the Parricide of Henry the Fourth King of France the Parliament of Paris a Court ever most studious of their Princes safety and extreamly vigilant against the encroaching of any forreign power contrary to his just Authority in Temporal causes yet thought it sufficient to publish this decree of the Church against the Assassinates of Princes both to shew the heinousness of the crime as also how much the Catholike Doctrine doth condemn such practises So that hereby as in a Glass the world might see the integrity of Catholike Loyalty if men would judge of them not by the private and perhaps misinterpretâ—table assertions of some particular Doctors but by these publike and avowed principles of their beleef This is the Basis on which they build the rule by which they walk and govern themselves in point of obedience towards their Sovereign Princes Or if they would judge of them by their proceedings and addresses to their Superiors their frequent petitions professions protestations of all just obedience will sufficiently cleer them If by their practice and manner of life their quiet deportment their peaceable manner of living and conversing with all men yea their prayers which they daily make unto Allmighty God in the behalf of their Prince and for the happiness of their Country do shew how innocent they are and how little they deserve those black aspersions and calumnies of Treason Rebellion Disloyalty Et quid non which some men are so diligent to cast upon them Yea to speak with no greater confidence then we justly may they shew how much more secure Princes may be and how much better Tye and assurance they have of Catholikes Loyalty then either of Lutherans or Calvinists For although Protestants do seem sometimes to teach obedience to the Civil Magistrate very freely and that it is sin for private Subjects to resist them as for Example Melancthon in his Epitome of Moral Philosophy makes it Peccatum Mortale No less matter then Mortal Sin I use his own words To violate the Tempâ—ral Laws of the Magistrates Yet is their Doctrine so clogged with exceptions so many limitations and Proviso's as it were are commonly added to it that Princes especially such as differ from them in Religion cannot finde I say not full and plenary but not so much as probable or competent security from them Melancthon in the place before mentioned limiteth himself thus Debet autem haec sententia c. But this which I have delivered saith he concerning obedience to the Civil Magistrates must be rightly understood viz. of such Magistrates as command nothing contrary to the Law of God as all Catholike Princes do in his opinion What security therefore have they from his Doctrine Lib. de Consens Evang. Beside we have shewen before according to his doctrine the people or inferior Magistrates may reform Religion and overthrow Idolatry as they call it without any publike Authority or Commission So that if the Justices of the Peace in some County or but the Petty Constables in Towns do beleeve the Religion professed by the Prince or State to be Idolatrous and not according to Gods word they are discharged of obedience by Melancthon and may fall to reforming solely of themselves And what his Master Luthers opinions were concerning this matter hath been sufficiently shewen already there need be no repetition of them here Danaeus teacheth the same or worse Lib. 6. Polit. c. 3. So doth Peter Martyr on Judges Cap. 11. and in his Common places And Althusius Politic. Cap. 35. P. 37. where among other causes of a Just War maintained by Subjects against their Sovereigns Purae Religionis defensio defence of True Religion hath the Second place Yea it is wel known that Sureau a Protestant Minister in France otherwise called Rosâ—eres wrote a Book expresly on this subject That it was lawful to kill Charls the Ninth Belfor lib. 6. cap. 103. his natural Sovereign and the Queen-Mother if they would not obey the Gospel But to conclude with one instance for all The Hugonots of France having in the Nine and thirtieth Article of their Confession professed That men ought to be obedient to the Laws to pay Tributes and to bear the Yoke of subjection quietly even under unbeleeving Magistrates They adde a limitation which corrupts and nullifies all that they had said viz. Dummodo Dei summum imperium integrum maneat So long onely as Gods Supream Authority is entirely acknowledged which under the Government of an Infidel Magistrate cannot be easily conceived Therefore upon the matter they profess nothing but abuse their Prince and the world with bare words as it is usuall with them to do Which is yet more evident by the Declaration which their Synod at Bearn in the year 1572. purposely made of this Article and of the Limitation of it Dei imperium dicitur manere illibatum Poplon nier lib. 34. cum Rex exterminatâ Catholicâ Religione c. Gods Sovereign Authority say they is then understood to be entirely acknowledged when the King abolishing or rooting out Catholike Religion shall set himself to advance onely the true and pure worship of God that is to say that which is so in their sense and opinion But to do this is it a thing to be supposed of an Infidel Prince to whom they pretend to profess subjection or is it to be expected of a Catholike Therefore I say they contradict themselves apparenly in their profession and do indeed profess nothing really but that they are Impostors and deserve to be branded with Characters of jealousie and distrust by all the Princes States of Christendom The book called Comment de Statu Relig. â—c a Protestant piece is ful of such stuff but especially Pâ— 2. Lib. 12. Cap. 1. where he affirmeth expressly That in all Oaths of Allegiance and Duty there is this condition always implyed at
were men which of all others were thought to care least for Religion Sir Philip Sidney indeed like a Noble and worthy Courtier as he was endeavored by a short Treatise to present unto Her Majesty the unfitness disproportion and inconveniencies of that Match both in relation to Her Person and the whole Realm but he did it privately and with discreet circumspection Stubs like an indiscreet and fiery Zelot taking the question in hand and prosecuting it in a way more likely to incense and corrupt the people then to advise or inform the Queen Cund in Elizab. his hand paid for his presumption And though some of the greatest and wisest of the Councel appeared very earnestly for it as a thing which was likely to unite the whole Kingdom of France unto England and would surely bring along with it the offer of the Netherlands by the Prince of Orange and the States whereby England was like to become a petent Monarchy yet was the whole Body of the Kingdom cast into much distemper and jealousies thereby Some upon partiality and faction others upon distrust of the practises of France some for their own some for their friends sinister ends and ambitions as in this very case I am perswaded men are not a little possessed with the same diseases and humors And if I did not well know the nature of the multitude which is a Beast with many heads and as mad brains I should wonder how they durst oppose the designs of their Sovereign a Prince of so great Experience and Judgement and who hath managed this business from the beginning with such wariness caution and prudence as this great Conjunction cannot portend any other effects then honor comfort and prosperity to the whole Nation Is he not the fittest to judge in his own case And his case being the case of the Commonwealth in general if any private man shall arrogate to himself either more wisdom to amend what is already done or pretend more affection to the State or more providence to foresee and prevent inconveniences certainly he must needs fall into the custody of the Court of Wards till he recover himself But having said this I shall leave the whole matter as a deliberative still and tell you in few words what the occasion was of this Discourse which followeth The occasion of the following Discourse THere met at a Merchants House in London where Merchants for their Table and Hospitality do worthily bear the Bell from all the Merchants in Europe divers persons of quality where being together in a Garden before Dinner T. Aldreds Letter the Pamphlet aforesaid and some strange reports of seditious practises from Amsterdam were read and discoursed upon In the midst of all comes in a fine Chaplain belonging to a great person in England and one that was of the Merchants acquaintance who hearing but a little of the discourse which at that time was the common Table-talk of City and Country with much vehemency he affirmed the Match was likely to breed great troubles and mischief to the Kingdom and that forsooth in regard as well of the increase of Catholikes within the Realm which it would occasion as also in regard of Spain which he ignorantly called an ancient Enemy Hereupon also he took occasion to rail bitterly against the Church of Rome as the Seminary of all the commotions in Europe and the contriver and plotter of all Treasons in England And being resolved to shew his Rhetorick in the Ruff and to omit nothing which might exasperate the company against Catholikes he alledged for examples in thundering language Heywards Reign of Edw. 6. the death of King Edward the Sixth sillily enough that you will say the many conspiracies against Queen Elizabeth buâ— especially that horrible project of the Gun-powder Treason which being undertaken onely by a few desperate Male-contents in justice might rather be buried with the offendors then objected perpetually to innocent men who do generally with great sorrow abhor the very memory of the fact and were publikely acquitted thereof by the King himself in the next Parliament following See the Kings Speech in Parliament Besides this he urged That Princes be disquieted yea endangered many times by Excommunications Bulls and other censures from the Pope by the Catechisms and Doctrines of Jesuites and that the Subjects of England are withdrawn by them from their obedience to their lawful Princes Lastly That they are a people so full of treacheries and disloyalty as no Nation can shew the like He forgat nor you must think to arm himself with the authority of Doctor Morton whose Maxim it was That we may now as well expect a white Aethiopian as a good Subject of that Religion He produced a Book entituled A discovery of Romish Doctrine in the case of Conspiracy and Treason wherein the Author playeth his master-prize against poor Catholikes with equal malice and indiscretion charging them with an infinity of scandalous accusations able to drive men into despair of the Kings Grace towards them and to breed in His Majesties Royal Heart an everlasting distrust of them He urged Parson Whites rash and uncharitable judgement against them That all their Religion was full of such Doctrines as afforded Monsters of conspiracy against the State that they teach men to murther Kings to blow up Parliaments and that since Bells time never was there such a ravenous Idol found as are the Priests of the Seminaries Ormerode also that famous Picture-maker was alledged in this heat who by a great mistake took upon him to condemn the singular and renowned Doctor Allen as affirming That Princes may be slain by their Subjects from the Text Numb 25. At length he concluded all with that Rhetorical flourish of Monsicur Lewis Baily in his Book of The Practice of Piety pag. 783. which he produced with much oftentation as if it alone had been enough to cast the whole Society of the Fathers into a fit of a Quartane Jesuites and Priests saith he are sent to withdraw Subjects from their Allegiance to move Invasion and to kill Kings If they be Saints who be Scythians Who are Cannibals if they Catholikes This conclusion for the art and wit of it could not but deserve a plaudite so the company went to Dinner and after Dinner this fine Chaplain was gone in haste Thereupon some of the company not so much taken with his Rhetorick as were the rest desired a Gentleman then present who well understood the World and was a freeman not obliged to any particular order furthen then as a Son of the Church to deliver his opinion of the Ministers invective which at last upon their much importunity he was perswaded to do in such maner as is here with his leave and particular information represented to you After some pause Claudius accusat Maechos quoth he Catilina Cethegum This is most ridiculous who can endure to hear a Gracchus inveigh against Sedition A man may perceive by the Prologue That
the Boors who made such havock for a while in Germany by their conspiracies and especially against the Clergy did not onely pretend the Gospel and the Liberty of the Gospel for their doings but did even appeal therein to Luther himself Ad Lutheri judicium prâ—vocaverant They appealed saith he to Luthers judgement Not to urge what Erasmus hath to this effect Hyperaspist advers Lutherum nor what Menno Simonius an Anabaptist acknowledgeth in his Book De cruce Christi Quà m sanguinolentas seditiones Lutherani c. What bloody Riots and Murthers the Lutherans have committed for some years past to maintain theâ—r Doctrine And as to that part of the Objection that Luther did reprove yea write against the Boors it is the poorest fallacy of all He did it but how With such calumniating and taxing of the Princes themselves as they could be little secured by his writing and the Boors as little discouraged He did it but when When it was too late when he could forbear no longer when he found himself generally censured and murmured at by the Nobility and better sort of people as an occasion at least if not an Instrument and Fautor of those mischeifs Lastly He did it but when When he saw the Boors go down that they were not likely to maintain their quarrel nor to go through with their work then indeed he left them in the Bryers wisely enough though they appealed to him though they used yea alledged his own Homilies and Sermons for what they did though they were all for Reformation all for Liberty all against the Church of Rome and against Bishops yea and that their very word in the Field was Vivat Evangelium Let the Gospel flourish Hitherto we have discoursed cheifly of Luthers doctrinal extravagancies and touched upon the evil practises or fruits thereof onely in such men as either for the privateness and meanness of their condition being all of them Boors Peasants and rude Country people or for the unsuccessfulness of their designs are generally disclaimed Such as neither Luther nor any of his followers will readily own I come now to give a further instance of the mischief which the doctrine and doings of this man brought upon Germany in a business which was publikely owned not by Luther onely but by many of the Princes themselves who for the defence of his new Doctrine and protection of his wretched person bandied themselves against the Emperor their Sovereign Lord and against the general body of the Empire of which they were both Members and Subjects and by the Publike Laws whereof themselves in that relation ought to have been governed The beginning proceedings and issue of which confederacy was briefly thus Old John Frederick Elector and Duke of Saxony the Landsgrave of Hessen with some others already caught with the Liberty and other advantages which they made of Luthers new doctrine besides an old and inveterate emulation in most of them against the House of Austria which then was and still is Imperial first enter a League at Smalcald which is a Town of Hessia upon the Frontiers of Saxony onely as they pretended for their own defence and to maintain their Religion and Liberties against such men as would invade or persecute them We must observe here first That the Religion spoken of was a Religion but then newly and privately taken up of themselves contrary to that which was publikely received and acknowledged in the Empire and by vertue or rather pretext whereof they were obliged to do and suffer to be done many things which were expresly contrary to the Constitutions of the Empire which Constitutions the Emperor together with themselves were by oath solemnly bound to observe and see observed In this League were also comprehended the Duke of Wittemberg and some of the Imperial Towns They renewed it again at Franckfort and after that again at Auspurgh confirming it with a general and solemn Protestation of what their opinions were in matter of Religion which Protestation being then exhibited unto the Emperor in their names the Title or Sirname of Protestants became thenceforward appropriate to that party After this viz. Anno 1536. Suspecting some opposition would be made against them by the Emperor and other States of Germany for such proceedings and not willing to be taken at unawares by him they bring viz. themselves first of all an huge Army into the Field commanded by the yong Duke of Saxony John Frederick his Father being dead and the Landsgrave of Hessen with resolution by force of Arms to finde or make themselves right as they called it The Duke of Wittemberg the Imperial Towns Auspurgh Vlm Strasburgh and Franckfort sent them aid The Count Palaâ—ine of the Rhine had levyed Two hundred horse for them but upon better thoughts revoked them when they were upon their march The Duke of Brunswick and his sons the Duke of Luneburgh the yong Marquess of Baden the Prince of Anhalt the Counts of Furstenburgh and Mansfield joyned with them either in person or power Surius in Chron. Their Army consisted of about Seventy thousand fighting men and among them Seven thousand and seven hundred at least were Horse they had an hundred and twelve Cannon and Field pieces with such an infinite quantity of all sorts of Provisions as gave them an assured hope and confidence of Victory The eyes of all Princes were upon this action and Germany it self trembled in expectation of the event and success of such an Army prepared as they saw to swallow up the Emperor if they could and to subvert the whole Government and Religion of the Empire I mean that Religion and Government which was then established and had stood so established many hundred years before the Fathers or Grand-fathers of any of those Princes now in Arms to destroy it were born The Emperor had onely God and a just cause on his side for his friends those I mean who openly and avowedly appeared for him were few viz. The King of the Romans his Brother the Duke of Bavaria and the Duke of Cleve For though Duke Maurice of Saxony followed him yet in regard of his affinity with the Landsgrave whose Son in law he was as also for his Religion being a Lutheran he could not but be suspected However it pleased God notwithstanding this huge Army of the Princes that the Emperor became Master of the Field with a most compleat and signal Victory yea which was an accident more rare the two Generals Saxony and Hessen both of them became prisoners and their whole Army was defeated The yong Duke of Saxony a person much honored and pittied had his life given him with some connivence for his Religion yet his impregnable Fort at Gotha was demolished and the Electorate with all the Lands thereunto belonging were bestowed by the Emperor upon Duke Maurice The like mercy for life was shewed the Landsgrave who after some time obtained his liberty also The Duke of Wittemberg for Two hundred
thousand Duckats and the Imperial Towns partly with Money and partly upon their humble Petitions and Submission made their peace at last with the Emperor And thus by the good Providence of God and happy conduct of Caesar was the Empire preserved in Statu quo prius the Electors Ecclesiastical and other Prelates continued and their Dignities maintained whereas in all probability had the Princes prevailed as they had already by the instigation of Luther and such Preachers swallowed the Revenues extinguished yea wholly buried the Title State and Authority of Bishops in their own Provinces so would they have done all the Empire over Now as Greatness and Innovation seldom want Patrons nor wit to colour their faults so it must be confessed there are some who endeavor to excuse Luther and Lutheranism of the odiousness of this Action yea and the Action it self from the imputation of Rebellion First of all Doctor Bilson affirmeth Differences of Christian Subjects c. That the Lawyers of Germany do in some cases permit resistance to be made against Caesar but he names not one Then he saith The States of Germany are not absolutely subject to the Emperor but onely upon some conditions Secondly Centur. 16. the Divines of Magdeburgh plead That if the Magistrate pass the bounds of his Authority and command things wicked and unlawful he may well be resisted and must not be obeyed Thirdly Sleydan saith Lib. 19. fol. 263. We may resist Caesar with good Conscience when he intends the destruction of Religion and Liberty Lastly Consil Evangel Part. 1. p. 314 Philip Melancthon with great confidence gives Authority to the Inferior Magistrate to alter Religion and overthrow Idolatry So they all conclude the War lawful both by Gods Law and Mans And this indeed is the substance of the Reasons alledged by the Duke and the Landsgrave both when the League was first made at Smalcald and when they first proclaimed War against the Emperor But as it is easie to perceive these Doctors Assertions do all of them suppose certain things which ought first to be proved as for example 1. That Caesar passed the bounds of his Authority for if he did not it is clear they passed theirs 2. That he commanded things wicked and unlawful 3. That he went about to destroy true Religion and their Liberty All these must be proved before it be lawful to take Arms and resist him by their own confession I demand therefore of them this Question When Caesar or the Supream Magistrate commandeth any thing to be done which is not apparently contrary to the Laws of the Empire then in force who shall be Censor who shall Judge whether Caesar passeth the bounds of his Authority and whether the things which he commandeth be impious or no They answer he absolutely sought to destroy their Religion and Liberties But I reply it hath been an old and usual stratagem of Satan to oppose Religion against Religion thereby to bring in Atheism and leave us no Religion Beside making Lutheranism to be the onely true Religion and their Liberties to consist in the free profession of that they take that for granted which Caesar both at Worms and Auspurgh made the greatest Question So they argue not well because they do not proceed ex concessis yea it is manifest that when they did presume to set up a new Religion they passed themselves the bounds of their Authority and the World might judge Caesar a very simple Prince if he should either change his own Religion or tolerate theirs upon the bare credit of Luthers private opinion and spirit or upon the bare Protestation of the Confederates For were they competent Judges against the whole World or can Religion be lawfully and orderly changed by Civil Magistrates onely and when neither a General Councel nor National Councel hath decreed it nor any Imperial Dyet established it may every Elector or Prince frame a new Religion for his own Province by Law without consent of the Emperor and States Give me an Instance shew me a President when any such Innovation was ever made in the Empire without an Imperial Dyet Shew me a Law or some colour of Law by which it might be done or else confess That the Princes taking up Arms against the Emperor was without Justice and their quarrel without lawful ground Beside was it lawful for the Confederates to coyn a new Religion and maintain it by Arms and was it not more lawful for the Emperor to defend the old which was already received and to reform them The Boors took Arms upon the self-same pretences viz. For Religion and Liberty yet the Princes with their own forces and with no less Justice and Honor subdued them Why might not therefore Caesar compel the Confederates unto the same terms as they did the Boors viz. To exercise that Religion which was established at least with à quousque until a legal Reformation could be had and to obey the Laws in force and to keep the Peace of the Commonwealth Doth the degree or dignity of the persons make the cause so different I trow not And for any designs of Caesar upon them under colour of Religion it cannot be made good They were first in the Field the Emperor had not any forces ready a long time after yea they pursued him with their Army and compelled him to fortifie himself P. Avila de bello Germanico So that if mens Councels may be guessed at by their actings it is clear they had rather designs upon him And his favorable dealings with all of them after the Victory do more then refute such a calumny But saith Dr. Bilson The Emperor is not absolutely to be obeyed by the States It is no matter He is to be obeyed in seeing the Laws and Constitutions of the Empire observed and that is enough to justifie his proceedings in the case How far he is absolute and how far the Princes do ow fealty and homage to him and obedience to the Publike Constitutions of the Empire their several Oaths taken at the Coronation of the one and Investitures or Instalments of the other do best shew But I will leave skirmishing and come to the main point It is most certain That Caesar did observe the Law and that the Confederate Princes did violate both the Laws and Liberties of Germany For what Prince soever stands Rectus in Curiâ having the ancient and known Laws of the Kingdom on his side must always be judged to hold a better plea then Subjects who arm themselves against him illegally disorderly and by authority of their own private opinions onely At that time Caesar was bound by Law to extirpate Lutheranism and to maintain the Popes authority in Germany as it was acknowledged in the other parts of Christendom he was bound to maintain Catholike Religion and the Immunities or Rights of the Church so manifestly that even their own Goldastus doth acknowledge it to be the Emperors Oath so to do
points and Doctrines which I leave to the more learned to discuss That which I shall insist upon here shall be according to my principal purpose to deliver their seditious Paradoxes and shew unto the World how much their new refined doctrine doth derogate from Royalty and that sovereign Authority which belongeth unto aâ—l Kings Princes and States rightly constituted and how much it favoreth the worst of Governments that is Pure Democraty or Popularity And I shall begin with Calvin who goeth more slily and cunningly to work nothing so rudely and bluntly as Luther First therefore for the reputation of his Consistory or Sanhedrim at Genevah he labors to dâ—base Monarchy and to prefer Aristocracy before it Non id quidem per se Instit lib. 4. c. 20. sect 10. Not in it self forsooth as if he had been very tender of the Rights of Kings but by reason of mens natural corruption Quia rarissime contingit Because it is seldom seen saith he that Princes can govern their Passions so well or are so wise and prudent as thâ—y ought to be to uphold good Government So he makes it a rare thing to finde a wise and moderate King and so concludes from a general defect which he supposeth in Kings that it is best fâ—r many joyntly and not one alone absolutely to command For saith he where many govern one supplyâ—th the dâ—fects of another both in point of Counsel and Justice This was his way politick and plausible enough to prepare the hearts of his people at Genevah to the Discipline which he intended for thâ—m For you must know the Genevians had now ejected their Bishop who was also their Sovereign Prince and had been so ever since the time of Frederick the First Bodin de Rep. So that their Monarchy was newly changed into a popular State yet governed Aristocratically which Calvin therefore smooths unto the people by such Reasons as it concerned him to do this change being as the First-fruits of his new Gospel in that City So having given this first blow to Monarchy though therein he seems to forget that himself was born at Noyon and finding himself safe at Genevah he proceeds and to prevent your objection in behalf of Monarchy That Kings have always grave and wise Counsellors to advise them and to supply their defects in case themselves be weak he gives his resolution elsewhere Kings saith he Comment in Dan. 11.26 make choice of such men for their Counsellors as can best fit their humors and accommodate themselves to their appetites in the ways of cruelty and deceit So he makes them little better by having Counsellors and stains the reputation of Counsellors themselves with a scandal intolerable Daniel But Chap. 2. v. 39. he is yet more passionate They are saith he out of their wits quite void of sense and understanding who desire to live under Sovereign Monarchies for it cannot be but order and policy must decay where one man holds such an extent of Government Yea Chap. 5. v. 25. Kings saith he oftentimes forget they are men aâ—d of the same mould with others They are stiled Dei Gratia but to what sense or purpose save onely to shew they acknowledge no Superior oâ— Earth yet under colour of this they will trample upon God with their feet so that it is but an abuse and fallacy when they are so stiled Which is a pretty descant is it not upon Dei Gratiâ and therefore Voila saith he See what the rage and madness of all Kings is with whom it is an ordinary and common thing to exclude God from the Government of the Wâ—rld And this he writ not in quality of a Statesman but of a Divine in that master-peice of his his Institutions and in his Commentaries upon Scripture he delivereth these dangerous Positions as matters of Doctrine and of Discipline to be generally received by all and makes a Nebuchadnezzar of all Kings But rather out of his own spleen then out of his Text by his good leave For to what purpose can such expressions tend but to disgrace Scepters and to scandalize all Governments that are not framed according to his own mould And therefore Chap. 6. v. 25. in Daniel hâ— chargeth them directly Darius saith he will condemn by his example all those that profess themselves at this day Catholike Kings Christian Kings and Defenders of the Faith and yet do not onely deface and bury all true Piety and Religion but corrupt and deprave the whole worship of God This indeed is work for the Cooper not by a Mar-Prelate but a Mar-Prince The most Christian King must be new Catechised he that is Catholike must be taught a new by an Uncatholike that is a private spirit and the Defender of the Faith must have a new Faith given him to defend by this great Prophet Calvin And so by a new Model all the old Religion of the Church and all the Laws of State concerning it must be abolished Thus doth Calvin presume to reform Kings and Government and pretends to build an Ark but it is of his own head to save the World having dreamt that otherwise it must perish by a deluge of Ignorance Impiety and Superstition of whom it may be truly said Plusquam regnare videtur He must be much more then a Prince himself who thus presumes to play the Aristarchus and censurer of Princes And that he may not seem to come short of Luther his Predecessor in any degree of immodesty Les Rois Chap. 6. v. 3 4. sont presque tous These Kings saith he are in a maner all of them a company of Block-heads and brutish persons as wilde and ungoverned as their Horses preferring their Bawds and their Vices above all things whatsoever Yet did he write this in an age when to say but truth the Princes of Christendom were not so extreamly debauched Lewis the Twelfth Francis the First and Henry the Second of France have left a better fame of themselves to Posterities then this So have Maximilian the First and Charls the Fifth Emperors in Germany Henry â—he Eighth of England degenerated onely in his latter times and not till he was corrupted by some principles of this Reforming Liberty In his children Edward the Sixth there was much hope at least and in Queen Mary much vertue In Scotland reigned James the Fifth and two Maries that might be canonized for their merits And for Castile and Portugal their Kings never flourished more for Government Greatness encrease of State Plenty Peace then in those times What could his meaning then be to censure them all so much for stupidity and vice but to breed a contempt of Kings and to induce people that live under Free States to despise and hate them and their own people to cast of their Government and procure their Liberties at all adventures especially under the cloak of Religion for at this he driveth altogether as knowing well That in popular and tumultuary States he
should prevail more then where men of wisdom and discerning judgements sit at the Helm And as Zuinglius before him had found That he could not induce Francis the First to favor him so Calvin well perceived that Kings and Dei gratâ—á would be always blocks in his way Therefore he is willing to remove them so far as he can out of the way that they may not impeach the current of his Prâ—achings and to that end tells them in plain terms Dan. 6.22 Abdicant se potestate Princes deprive themselves of aâ—â— power when they oppose God and it is better in such case to spit â—n theâ—r faces then to obey them Which irreverence yet he never learned from the example of any Apostle or Prophet There is a respect due to the persons of Princes even when they forget their office if we be not much mistaken Doctor Bilson labors much to save Calvins credit in this business with Princes and to expound the words in some tolerable sense Christians subject to Antichrists Rebellion He says Calvin speaketh not a word of depriving Princes or resisting him with Arms. That by Abdicant se he means not they loose their Crowns but their power to command unlawful things a fine gloss they loose a power which they never had but in lawful things they retain their power still The phrase Conspuere he confesseth to be harsh and that the comparison was urged by him in vehemâ—nt words yet is willing to excuse them But as to the first plea it is wholly impertinent For what though he use not the words of deprivation and resâ—stance are therefore the words he useth excusable to speak too plainly had been to erre too palpably which stood not with Calvins craftiness Beside what was Daniels defence which he urgeth it was onely in Humility Patience and Prayer It was not after the violent fashion of Genevah he did not spit in Nebuchadonozors face nor tell him he was unworthy to live And for the second Abdicant se what means he that Kings do loose not their Crowns but onely their Power to Command Speak plain English and be clear You confess the King looseth his Power to Command but you adde obscurely in these things meaning in matters of Religion for so it must be understood though you cast a cloak over the words and cover the matter But I dâ—sire to know what is a Kings Crown without power to command He that teacheth they loose their Royal Power doth he not say as much as that they forfeit it and if they forfeit it who may challenge and take the forfeiture of such a Crown But by such Lectures and Doctrines as these doth not Calvin plainly enough arm the Subjects against the Prince when they revolt for Religion And is not this the very ground of all the Combustion and Civil Wars in France Yea but in other things lawful Princes retain their power First these are not Calvins words but Doctor Bilsons who writes and lives under a Monarchy Calvins words are indifinite Abdicant se potestate They deprive themselves of the power they have without exception or limitation absolutely not after a sort in all things not in some particular for altogether not for some time onely and then to be restored For Princes once dispossessed seldom recover their hold again Secondly what Court or Magistrates shall take cognizance and determine wherein Kings loose their power and wherein not who shall judge and decide the difference between the matters lawful and unlawful that you speak of Though as I say Calvins own words import no such restriction at all which doth plainly appear by his harsh phrase as you call it of spitting in his face that is to defie them openly and to contemn them and their acts according to your own interpretation But this you say is far from Rebellion true but not from Treason And therefore though he teach not the one yet he may teach the other Extenuate the words as much as you can yet they will be really heinous and seditious For he that holdeth a King is not worthy to be or to live among men doth he not sufficiently excommunicate him from his Government As for your Insurgunt contra Deum it is a stale and Arbitrary pretext and serves onely to make them odious under a feigned charge of impiety it convinceth nothing but much impudence and malice in the objectors who should first learn to be vertuous themselves before they charge vice so freely upon others especially Princes A thing which they never yet were in any kinde that the World knoweth To conclude this you grant in effect That if the King of Babylon threatens Daniel with punishment in case he will not worship his Idol or the King of France commands his Subjects to obey the Laws and communicate at the Altar of the Church in both cases alike abdicant se potestate the Kings loose their power and Subjects ought not to obey them but rather to spit in their faces And this was the reason why Doctor Alâ—â— objeâ—ted it to Calvin as seditious Doctrine and Doctor Bilson well knoweth that seditious Doctrines are not so dainty at Genevah For there it was that in hatred of thâ—ee Queen Maries of England and Scotland that Calvin first set a broach that more then seditious Paradox against Gynocraty or the Government of Women and by instruction and example from him Knox and Goodman afterward published their several Books of that subject Look but upon the History of Scotland Printed by Wautroller Page 213. and you will finde that Knox Apologized for all his practises from the authority and judgement of Calvin viz. That it was lawful for Subjects to reform Religion when Princes will not And that Calvins opinion in the point may be yet more manifested the practises of his darling and Scholar Master Theodore Beza must be considered who perfectly understood his Doctrine and did no less bravely put it in execution In the Preface to his Translation of the New Testament which he maketh to Queen Elizabeth he writeth thus Quo die Scil. 19. Decemb. Vpon which day Anno 1564. saith he two years sâ—nce the Nobility and Gentlemen of France under the command of his Excellency the Prince of Conde being assisted with Your Majesties Auxiliaries and some others from the Princes of Germany laid the first foundation of the true Reformed Religiâ—n in France with their own blood This I hope Master Bilson himself will confess to be Rebellion yet Beza justifieth it openly yea glorieth that himself was not an accessory but a principal in the business For after he had commended some other good services of this nature which the Reforming Parties had done at Meaulx Orleans c. He concludes Id quod eò libentiùs testor Which I speak saith he the more freely because I my self as it pleased God was present at most of those Counsels and Actions It is true there be some that would excuse even this Action
by Edward the Sixth was not warrantable being done in his Minority and when he had neither age to discern what he did nor liberty to discern any thing to the Protector and Northumberland in whose hands he was If you approve not this Argument why do you disallow the same plea for the Authority of the King of France was the age of the one a Bar in Law and not in the other or was the one an absolute King and not the other was King Edwards consent sufficient to authorize his Uncles doings and was King Charls his consent insufficient and nothing worth to authorize the Constable with his Army to pursue and punish their Army of Rebels Beza's opinion therefore In câ—nfess fid is much contrary to what he alloweth and commendeth here For if there be no other remedy but preces and lachrymae for private persons against the oppressions of a Tyrant he betrayed the Admiral and the Prince very foully to bring them into the fields of Dreux to fight against the King for Religion Doctor Bilson hath taken up somewhere one notable singularity to excuse the Prince of Conde viz. That he was not an absolute Subject of France ought not simple subjection to the Crown Ergo might lawfully do something more then others But it argueth such a gross ignorance in the Laws of France and in the state of that Prince that it deserveth more to be pitied then answered Neither could it help the Admiral who had no other Protection then that of his Sword nor Priviledge but from his new Religion But because that smooth profession of Beza above mentioned is so much insisted on and cunningly used as it were to cast a mist before the eyes of an unwary Reader it will be necessary to clear that business a little further by letting you see the man himself in more proper colours as in relation to this point First therefore read his Positions and Catechism of Seditions viz. That Book of his called Vindiciae contra Tyrannos There acting the part of Junius Brutus a Noble Roman indeed but great enemy of Kings he propounds in the first place this Question Whether Subjects be bound to obey their Kings when they command contrary unto Gods Law and resolveth presently Pag. 22. We must obey Kings for Gods sake when they obey God But otherwise Pag. 24. we are absolved For as the Vassal saith he looseth his Fief or Lordship if he commit Felony so doth the King loose his Right and his Realm also viz. By commanding contrary unto Gods Law Which considering that Gods Law is onely as they themselves shall think good to interpret it is dangâ—rous enough But Pag. 65. he is more notable Conspiracy saith he is goâ—d or ill according as the end is at which it aimeth Which is a most pernicious Maxim and a Doctrine fit for nothing but to encourage Ruvillac Poltrot or some such villanous assassinate to his desperate work or to be a buckler to the Conspirators at Ambois So Pag. 66. The Magistrates saith he or any one part of the Realm may resist the King being an Idolater as Lobna revolted from Joram when he forsook God And Pag. 132. The Government of the Kingdom is not given to the King alone but also to the Officers of the Realm And again Pag. 103. The Kings of France saith he Spain and England are crowned and put as it were into pâ—ssession of their charge by the States Peers and Lords which represent the people And Pag. 199. There is a stipulation in all Kingdoms Hereditary As in France when the King is crowned the Bishops of Beauvois and Loan ask the people if they desire and command This man shall be King What if they do it is no argument that the people do therefore chuse him to be King for his Kingdom is confessed already to be Hereditary and so the Succession determined by Law much less that they make him such It is an acceptation onely not an election a declaration of their willing Subjection Obedience and Fidelity towards him and nothing else as you may be well informed out of Francis Rosselets Ceremonies at the Consecration or Inauguration of the Kings of France Was there ever an Assembly of Estates held to consecrate or elect a King of France or do the Kings of France count the time of their Reign from their Inauguration onely and not from their entrance was not Charls the Seventh full Eight years King of France before he was crowned as the French Historians themselves report Gaguin Giles or think you that the Peers are Ephori No they are Pares inter se but not Companions to the King They are not States as in Holland to rule and direct all Affairs For in France and England all the Authority depends upon the Kings and what is the State but the Authority of the Prince Who onely by his Letters Patents createth Peers disposeth all Offices giveth all Honors receiveth all Homages in cheif as being the sole Fountain from whence springeth both Nobility and Authority And he that would either restrain this Sovereignty within any narrower bounds or communicate it to others makes no difference between the Crown of a King and the Berrette of a Duke of Venice Many other Maxims and Rules he hath of this nature fit for nothing but to introduce Anarchy and confusion in the World most of them false all of them dangerous Vails onely to cover the ugly faces of Sedition and Treason because in their proper shapes no man living can abide to see them I might here travel and weary you further with as much good stuff out of his Book De Jure Magistratus for his it is as most men think or else Hottomans who was his Comrade But I shall leave them both for indeed they touch the string of Sovereignty with too rough a hand yea rather they strain to break it if they could by such gross and misinterpretable Paradoxes as when they say The States are above the King that is the Body above the Head As if any man could seriously make it a question whether people should be commanded by the Master or by some of their fellow-servants by the Subject or by the Sovereign by the Prince of Conde and the Admiral or by their Lawful King and Sovereign King Charls And therefore had King Philip good reason to cut off the head of that Justice of Arragon upon a just occasion and to teach the people by example what the true meaning was of Nos qui podemos tanto come vos All which Paradoxes it were easie to refel but that I have undertaken onely to discover and not to combate And because they are both learnedly and piously confuted already by Barclay Baurican and Blackwood Onely by the way I shall desire you to observe how politickly they go to work They profess not openly and absolutely any desire to change the State or to depose Kings But this they do They labor by insinuation first
to breed some dislike of Monarchs in the mindes of people and to shew how inconvenient it is for such an infinite multitude and variety of people to depend upon the Edicts of one man This being done they know it is then easie and they may much better advance the authority of inferior Magistrates and by them emboldned by such degrees to contest at last and jar with their Superiors under a pretence of Reforming abuses and pulling down Idolatry they become able to pull down Kings themselves and to level the Creators that is to say the cheif Authors and origin of all lawful Power exercised in their respective Kingdoms with the most inferior Creatures themselves upon whom it should be exercised And after this they are sure their Consistories and Elders must rule all be Judges both of Clergy and Law Councel and King They must be henceforward the onely Rabbies and from their onely Sanbedrim or Genevian Consistory must the Oracles of all Government be fetcht both for Church and Kingdom Neither can I forget how irreverently Eusebius Philadelphus viz. Master Theodore Beza disguised used his Sovereign King Charls in his other Book of Reveille Matin where usually he calls the King Tyrant and of his name Charls Valois makes this Anagram Chasseur Desloyal that is neither more nor less Perfidious Hunter or Persecutor chuse you whether Read his rimes and scandalous reproaches of the Queen-Mother himself being a fugitive for more crimes then one deservedly most infamous Peruse the Forty Articles recorded in that Book for the better advancing of seditious Government For example Art 25. All Generals and Commanders in cheif must observe the Ecclesiastical Discipline ordained by their Synods Art 40. They are bound never to disarm so long as their Religion is persecuted as they call it by the King This is the patience of those Saints But what is become of their Preces lachrymae in the mean time That pretending to reform the World are so little masters of their own Passions But in Article fourteen and fifteen their spirits and designs appear in their bravery aiming at no less then the utter overthrow of the King and extirpation of the whole family of Valois as any man may perceive that reads them These were those Holy Articles of Bearn Anno 1574. so much talked of over all France coyned with Beza's own stamp and at Melion dispersed and communicated to their inferior Moschees all the Kingdom over to the intent as they expresly avowed That they might make war more strongly against their Enemies who were no other but the King and whole State of France and â—ill it should please God say they to turn the heart of the Tyrant that is of the French King their Natural and Lawful Sovereign About the same time also was framed and published by their Emissaries that libellous life of Catharine de Medices Queen-Mother Franco-Gallia the Tocsan of Massacreurs together with that fine-piece mentioned bâ—fore called the Legend of Lorrain For this is very observable and it is an honor which the House of Guise hath had a long time that no man ever professed himself an Enemy to the Church of God in France but he was likewise at deadly feud with them All which proceedings were so notorious and unexcusable in those times that even their fellow Protestants here in England those I mean of better note and more moderated judgement do acknowledge them with dislike The Protestants of the French Church saith Doctor Sutcliff Answ to a Lib. suppl for thirty years together taught violent Reformation by the Nobility people and private persons And again Beza saith he in his Book De jure Magistratus doth arm the Subject against the Prince and in effect overthroweth the Authority of Christian Kings and Magistrates And the Book Vindiciae contra Tyrannos gives power saith he not onely to resist but to kill the King if he impugn Gods true Religion The same also is affirmed by the late Archbishop of Canterbury Doctor Bancroft in the Survey of Discipline but most copiously and at large in the Book of Dangerous Positions especially about Pag. 192. seq To these I may adde Francis Baldwin a famous Lawyer of France who lived a long time with Calvin at Genevah and knew all their proceedings very well Mirabar saith he Respons ultim ad Jo. Calvin I wondred a long while whether your fiery Apostle viz. Theodore Beza would tend who in his Sermons here so much extolled that fact of the Levites running up and down the Tents of Israel Exod. 32. and slaying every man his Brother that had committed Idolatry But I hear now that your self are not much satisfied with such Ministers And again Pag. 128. Leviora sunt isia All this is nothing saith he in comparison of that which follows For now men make war even upon the dead The Statues the Sepulchres the very bones and bodies of Martyrs Princes c. scape not their barbarous hands Cities are sacked Churches robbed and spoiled c. Which Beza is so far from excusing that he justifieth them rather and professeth to his Friend Christopher Thretâ—â—s Epist 40. That for his part he hath no thoughts of peace that is that if such outrages and villanies should cease Nisi de ellatis hostâ—bus until the â—nemies so he calls the Kings Army and all the Catholikes of France with them be totally subdued But we ought not to wonder at it It is Morbus innatus to all Sacramentaries a disease bred in their bones that is in the very vitals and entrails of their cause to be seditious and dangerous to their Princes Zuinglius their Patriarch first taught them the Lesson who Tom. 1. of his works Art 2. delivers this for an Oracle viz. That Reges quandò perfidè extra regulam Christi egerint c. When Kings break Faith with their people and do otherwise then the rule of Christ directs them which rule themselves will onely interpret Possunt cum Deo deponi They may be deposed with right good Conscience Doctor Bilson is here again entangled and troubles himself and his Reader not a little to finde som Apology for this Paradox I undertake not saith he first To defend each mans several opinion Wisely spoken Secondly They may be deposed saith he when they advance ungodliness as Saul was May they so where is the Samuel the Prophet extraordinarily and on purpose sent from God that shall do it may the people do it No saith he blushing or afraid to affirm that and therefore seems to leave it as a priviledge or a matter reserved to the judgement of the Elders But Zuinglius himself deals more plainly and tells you Art 42. and 43. who shall do it Cum suffragiis consensu totius aut majoris c. When saith he such a Tyrant is deposed by consent of all or the major part of the people it is well done and as God would have it Therefore in his
Epistle to Conradus Sonnius Lib. 4. p. 868. he professeth That obedience or respect is due unto Caesar onely upon condition viz. That he permits them entire Liberty of Religion which yet is more then the Lutherans themselves their pretended Brethren will do Otherwise saith he it should be sin in them and make them guilty before God to obey him Thus boldly doth a Minister of Sedition take upon him to determine whether and upon what terms a Sovereign Prince yea the supream and cheif of all Christian Princes shall either hold his Dignity or be dethroned If Caesar will be wise and advised by them they will obey otherwise they not onely may with Justice but are obliged to take a course with him To which end and that they might be ready when time and opportunity should serve their turn to put such Doctrine in execution in his Epistle to them of Vlm Lib. 4. p. 196. one of the Imperial or free Cities of Germany as they are called he adviseth the fraternity of Ministers there very properly viz. That they remember by little and little warily and by degrees Detrahere personam Imperio Romano c. To pull of this vizor of the Roman Empire from their Auditory and make them see what a folly it is for them to acknowledge a Roman Empire in the midst of Germany which is not regarded at Rome it self Could there be a project devised more wretchedly dangerous and disloyal then this against the Emperor O the depths of Heretical malice and treachery They must do it not suddenly not openly not all at once for that were to spoil all but sensim paulatim prudentèr now a little and then a little as the people shall appear capable of such Counsels and the poyson of Rebellious suggestions shall be most likely to be received and to work upon them Certainly a most plain and full discovery of the Reforming Design and by it the Princes and all States of Europe may see what they are to expect from that sort of people when they have once given them power enough to pull their Superiors down Having thus declared the Principles and Apliorisms of this great Triumvirate of the French Church viz. Zuinglius Calvin and Beza those Ecclesiastical Tribunes of the people and Ring-leaders of Rebellion I am now to make it appear also ex effectis or by the evident practise of such principles That Genevah is and hath been a School of Rebellion to all these parts of Christendom and a Seminary in particular of all the Civil Wars in France Neither shall I blot their names with any false aspersions For as their practise is the best Commentary of their Positions and Writings so it is the best tryal of their Loyalty and can give in best evidence whether they be as they will yet pretend and seem to be good Patriots and faithful Subjects I shall shew both their first beginnings progress and continuance at this present time and this so much as may be in a method ordering their disorderly crimes under these general heads viz. First Their Conspiracies against the King Secondly Their Battles fought against the Kings Armies and Officers And thirdly Their horrible Outrages and Villanies committed incomparable for cruelty and incredible for disloyalty The first of their Conspiracies taken notice of was that of Ambois there they began the Scene of their Tragedy on this maner At an Assembly they had at Nantes in the year 1560. certain of the Calvinists conspired among themselves to seize the Kings person and surprize the Court to apprehend the two principal of the Guises upon an accusation That they sought to invade and possess themselves of the Crown and thereby to ruine the Princes of the Blood and to suppress Religion This being secretly yet upon great deliberation concluded by them in the Moneth of January was to be executed the Tenth of March following at Blois The cheif of the Conspiracy was Godfrey de Barry sirnamed de Renaudy By this man it was imparted to the Prince of Conde who disliked it not but onely wished it could be executed in some form of Law While they stood thus at Demurrer the business hapned to be strangely and beside all their expectation discovered first by a Secretary of the Cardinal of Lorrains afterward by more perfect Intelligence and Information from Cardinal Granvellan out of the Low Countries Whereupon the King suddenly removing to Ambois the Conspirators were disappointed both of time and place so as the forces which they had levied and appointed for that exploit wandered up and down for some while without any Commander in Cheif appearing and were in a short space after most of them apprehended and gathered up by the Duke of Nemours his Troops among others there were taken the Baron of Castelnau and Monsieur Pardillan Mons Castelnau Comment Renaudy the General was slain and some others executed The Duke of Guise in the mean time providently took order for the safety of the King and the Court and so assured himself of the person of the Prince of Conde that he had not power to attempt any thing to their prejudice He was afterwards committed upon this business yea condemned to loose his head Yet nevertheless Charls the Ninth upon some politick Reasons of State and because he was so neer a Kinsman and a Prince of the Blood not onely gave him enlargement but for his honor and to assure his fidelity the more if that had been possible he acquitted him also and declared him innocent of the Conspiracy This was the first attempt of the Calvinists for Religion and Bonum Publicum Their second should have been executed at Meaulx upon the person of Charls the Ninth in the year 1567. But by the noble service of the Duke of Nemours and of the Switzers the King though with some difficulty escaped Their purpose was here as before to have possessed themselves of the Kings person and of the Duke of Anjou his Brother to have put the Queen-Mother with some others marked out to death but as I said by the valor and fidelity of the Duke of Nemours with the aid of the Switzers they recovered Paris by a sudden flight in the night and so were all saved Onely the Cardinal of Lorrain a person whom they principally desired to entrap was forced to take another way yet he made shift to get privately to Rhemes and there died A third was at St. Germans in lay against both King and Queen-Mother for which although onely Mole and Coconas lost their heads through the ill management of the business yet were there so many heads and hands both engaged in it That it was matter of great trouble disquiet and danger unto France for a long time after And this onely of their Conspiracies or of such Treacherous designs as never went further then Intention To inform you of their open and actual Rebellions in the Field where they sought by force of Arms and with
the Sword in their hands to compel the King to grant them what Liberty and Terms of Pacification they liked we are first to call again to minde that so famous and indeed furious Battle upon the Plains of Dreux of which Beza formerly boasted That the foundations of Reformed Religion in France were first laid and as it were consecrated therein Let us remember also the Battle of Saint Dennis the Battle of Jarnac the Battle of Coutras the Battle of Moncontour together with the besiedging of Roan and how much and Noble Blood was spilt in all these Actions At Roan the King of Navar lost his life at Saint Dennis the Constable was slain at Jarnaec the Prince of Conde and at Contras the Noble Duke of Joyeuse ended his days Tho Fields are yet stained France was let-blood too prodigally and strangers brought in as Surgeons to launce her wounds who have left behinde them greater cause of Lamentation then Remembrance At Moncentour where the Admiral stood alone as the sole Champion of the Reformed Churches The Missa-pulta testified what their quarrel was which by Beza's devise was advanced as a Basilisk to beat down the Royal Standard of France and the Labarum or Cross of Constantine Now as concerning the outrages assassinations and other mischeifs done and committed by these spirits of Reformation yet pretending nevertheless to be altogether innocent of Blood and Murther Polâ—rot in this Kalender must have the first place for killing the Duke of Guise who was the Kings Lieutenant General at that time so basely and treacherously as he did confessing it afterward before the Queen-Mother and avouching that Beza had both counselled and encouraged him to the Action After him we may remember how the Protestants in Valentia used Signeut de la Motte Gondrin the Kings Lieutenant in Daulphin who had assured them in case they would live peaceably and quietly with the Catholikes he would bring none of the Kings Soldiers upon them yet notwithstanding this they assembled forces of their own privately surprized La Motte and hung him up instantly in cold blood without any provocation save onely of their own malice to shew their contempt of the King and scorn of his Officers among them Which was a villany not sufferable in any Commonwealth especially where such favor and connivence had been offered but immediately before We may remember the Conspiracy of Simon May a man induced by the same spirit and instructed out of the same School to kill the Queen-Mother and Henry the Third But his purpose being discovered he was apprehended and had his desert Neither can the business be excused or shifted off with any colors himself confessed it and accused Seigneur de la Tour and Monsieur d' Avantigny two Gentlemen of good parentage yet birds of a Feather to have been hiâ— Counsellors and Abettors in the Plot Whereupon they were both of them apprehended but afterward released by His Majesty for private reasons not being willing as some thought at that time to search too deep into the wound either for the men engaged in it or the matter it self yet this was not all They proceed much further and seize upon the Kings own Rents and Râ—venues they coyn money and surprize either by fraud or force of Arms the cheif Cities of the Realm Orleans Troyes Poictiers Tours c. putting in Garrisons and Governors of their own party and for their own ends They deliver one of the Keys of France into the custody and command of Forreigners All which were attempts of the Highest Treason that could be and usurpations of the Prerogative Royal being done without colour of Commission or Warrant from the King and contrary to his express Will and the Law Lib. des Financ de France Nicholas Froumenteau a Minister of the new Edition confesseth That in Daulphin onely the Army of the Hugâ—nots killed Two hundred fifty and six Priests and One hundred and twelve Monks and Friers burnt Nine hundred Towns and Villages And yet what a pitiful tale do the Calvinists and others tell of a Massacre at Vassy by the Duke of Guise as if no cruelty had been comparable to that Which yet indeed was nothing at all in comparison of these and was done without the Dukes consent as not onely Monsieur Chasteauneuf in his Commentaries but also Thuanus Thuan. Historian lib. 29. who was a man never suspected to be of the Guisian Faction do expresly avouch Yea the blood that was drawn from the Duke himself laboring to have appeased the fray at the beginning was the cause that some quantity more was drawn from those Hugonots by the Dukes servants then otherwise there needed to have been No it was a toy and a trifle in respect of those outragious excessive carnages of Montbrison of Mornas and many other places acted by the Hugonots But such was the calamity of those times They which most justly deserved and unjustly complained against persecution did persecute their Neighbors most unjustly and tyrannically Let the world and all indifferent men judge by this In these Civil Wars there were no less then Twenty thousand Churches destroyed by Protestants and yet these men were born as they say to edifie the Church Is it not likely Could Mahomet himself edifie better or was his Alchoran and Turkish Superstition set up any other way then by the power of a Tyrants Sword and pulling down of Christian Churches I shall not commend any Act of Cruelty in whomsoever yet let men that are impartial consider how they can justly blame Charls the Ninth King of France for his proceedings against this sort of people at Paris and some other places in the year 1572. The Admiral being the principal Instrument and mover of all those Seditions and Troubles which for a long time had disquieted France and indangered so much the very life and person of the King the Queen Mother and other of the Princes who can wonder if his Majestie at last were compelled to use a mean extraordinary and somewhat rough for the cutting off such a Pestilent Member with his Complices who did nothing but Gangren-like perpetually corrupt and indanger the whole body of his State yea and often threatned the Head it self 'T is well known he was come to such height at this time that he Reigned in France as it were some Petty King in a Common-wealth meerly through the assistance of such people as had by his Means and Sollicitation chiefly revolted from their Lawful and Natural Sovereign he maintained in France an open War against the King and Crown of France he Sollicited and called in strangers to his aid levied Contributions exacted Tributes coyned Mony seized the Kings Revenues invaded his Towns contemned all his Laws yea what actions of Sovereignity did he not usurp exercise in contempt of his Sovereign For which having been first proclaimed Traytor in the year 1569. he afterward met with the punishment which both he and his had most justly deserved
though the way of Execution was very extraordinary indeed and hath no excuse but necessity But perhaps you are ready to say This age hath reformed those errors such violencies as were formerly used are now ceased and that at present more charitable mild and civil proceedings are held by the Hugonots It is not so They have the same principles and the same spirits still which upon occasion they are not slow to manifest And to make this more plain I shall give you a relation of the true state and condition of those reformed Churches as they call themselves in France at this very time viz. Anno 1621. wherein not to trouble you with any thing concerning the infinite troubles great charges which they forced their Sovereign Lewis 13. to be at and endure all the last Summer and Winter nor concerning their Garboils at Tours nor the practises of the Rochellers to have put a Garrison of Six thousand men into Saumur on purpose to have given work to the Kings Army thereabouts and to hinder their March to Montauban nor concerning their revolt and disloyal practises at Gergeau standing out against the Count St. Paul Governour of the Province of Orleance and at Sancer against the Prince of Conde not to exaggerate the Treacheries and Conspiracies of Vattevile in Normandy which yet were so plainly proved by his own Papers and Instructions intercepted that the Duke of Longueville was compelled thereupon to disarm those of Deep Roan and Caen to prevent danger and fearing least they should joyn with Vattevile I say omitting all these which yet were actions and passages wherein much malignity and undutifulness to their Sovereign was apparent I shall begin onely with the business of St. Jean d' Angely which held out a long time and refused submission Notwithstanding the King in person demanded it of them and that Monsieur Soubize Commander of the place for the Hugonots were Summoned to render the Town or to stand to the Peril and Attaynt of Treason yet they contemned all and held it out to the very last point that they had any hopes of help left them At Montauban how was his Majestie defied and despited as it were to His Face continuing in person at the Siedge thereof for a long time together with an Army of Noble and most Expert Soldiers many of whom men of Eminent Desert and Dignity were lost in that service especially the two Brothers the Duke of Mayenne and the Marquis of Villars who were generally lamented And to draw the Kings eyes the more upon them it is said by some They had set upon their Gates this insolent Motto viz. Roy sans foy Ville sans peur importing that the King had no Faith nor the Towns no fear Yea so obstinate were they in their resolution of disobedience that for the present they forced His Majestie upon advice to defer their merited punishment and to raise the Siedge Whereupon the Insolent Burgers after the Kings Army was departed lead the whole Clergy of the Town as it were in Triumph using them with many scornful indignities for which they smarted not undeservedly the year following In Montpellier and Languedoc the Hugonots deprived Monsieur Chastillon of all his Governments by a pretended Sentence of their Consistory which is very observable and razed at the least Six and thirty Parish Churches and Chappels there Nor do they usurp onely upon the Royalties of the King though that be too much they are as bold where they prevail with the Inheritances and Estates of Private persons At Privas they would not suffer the Viscount l' Estrainge to enjoy his Lordship of that place onely because he was a Catholike They put him out of his own Castle at Lake whereof the Marshal Momorency had but lately given him possession and give it to Brison one of their own fraternity upon a pretence that it belonged to him yet was it none of the Towns of assurance nor comprized in the list at Brewet in the year 1598. neither would they permit the Kings Justices delegated thither to compound controversies so much as to hear Mass though private or to have any exercise of their Religion What Society or Common-wealth can stand if upon pretence of Religion such petulant usurpers as these may disseize Right-owners of their Estate at pleasure and hold whatsoever they get upon a pretence that it is for the use and security of some Confederate Gospellers But what cause have they to ryot thus upon their Neighbors and Fellow-subjects The King is content they should quietly enjoy what is theirs yea and securly use the liberty of their Religion Will not this content them Should not Catholikes in all reason and equity enjoy the same Yet will they not live peaceably themselves Notwithstanding such royal Favor nor Converse peaceably with Catholikes They obey not the Kings Laws for all this not I mean in Temporal Affairs wherein he onely pretends to command them At Saint Jean d' Angely the King assured them he would protect all those of the reformed Religion in France that would obey him and obseâ—ve his Edicts He promised and performed nâ— less to Mallâ—ret who was sent to him as Deputy from the Assembly of Lower Guienne He did the like to the Duke of â—removille Son in Law to Monsieur Bâ—vâ—llâ—n who came to that seidge tendring his service and protesting obedience to His Majestie was not the Government of Saumur that so famous and considerable a place given by His Majestie to the Count de Sault Grandchilde of the Duke Desdiguieres though he were known to be of the Reformed Religion Did he not long before viz. in the year 1615. answer the Petition of the Hugonots That he meant not by his Oath at Consecration which was for the Repressing of Heresies to comprehend therein Those His Subjects of the Reformed Religion who would live obediently under his Laws and Authority And how graciously the King dealt with Rochel all the world knoweth how willing was he rather to regain and reduce it then to destroy it How much and often did His Majestie employ Monsieur the Duke Desdiguieres to perswade them to conformity and obedience How much and often did he the said Duke solicite them accordingly by Letters to return to their duty proposing them Articles which all the world but themselves would have thought reasonable Yet the Deputies Chalas and Favas obstinately refused them till it was too late What can a King do more then seek the winning of his Subjects so far as 't is possible by fair and gracious means Yet see the recompence which His Majestie found from such Spirits It was no other then a long and frivolous Declaration published against his proceedings wherein instead of acknowledging their own Crimes they tax His Majestie of much injustice persecution and I know not what other designs which they charge him to prosecute by the counsel and inducement of certain persons that were Fnemies of the State as they said and
of their Religion the Cankerworm of it To discover and disprove the vanity of which pretences I shal search ab origine and deliver you the true causes of the Kings proceedings against these Male-contents and how great reason or necessity rather he had by Arms to maintain his Royal Authority which they by Arms sought either to contemn or usurp that is wherefore he was constrained at Myort to proclaim Rochel and all their Adherents Rebels against him and guilty of treason First it appears by the Edict of Nantes Art 77. That King Henry the Fourth had discharged the Protestants from holding any Assemblies General or Provincial likewise from all Unions and Leagues and from holding of any Counsel or Decreeing and Establishing any Acts by them Likewise Art 82. from holding any Correspondencies or Intelligences without the Realm Yea Art 32. They might not hold any Synods Provincial without the Kings License All which Articles they also promised to observe but as all France and the world knoweth have broken them every one And not onely so but they have intruded upon the State it self taking and fortifying places of assurance without any Warrant from the King and contrary to an express order set down in August in the year 1612. whereby it evidently appeareth to be of the Kings Royal favor and goodness to assign them places of surety and not for them to chuse or usurp where they please Adde to this their notable presumption and disobedience shewen in laboring so much to introduce the reformed Churches of Bearne and to annex them to those of France by an Act of Vnion as they call'd it both Spiritual and Temporal passed at Rochel in the year 1617. In which business they were so confident That they did not onely justifie their pretended act by Apology but promised all possible assistance to Bearn yea and bound themselves by Oath First To observe and execute whatsoevâ—r was determined in that Assembly Secondly To venture their Lives and Estates in maintenance thereof and thirdly Not to reveal or make known any Propositions Advices or Resolutions taken or made in that Assembly unto any person whatsoever no not to the King himself All which was done by them not onely irregularly and without Law but most contemptuously also in as much as they well know that the King of France had sent to all the Provinces and expresly forbad that Vnion yea and had made a Decree of his Councel to the contrary Besides how they used Regnard whom the King had sent into Bearn as his Commissioner about the Church Goods and what disorders they committed at Paw against him is scarce credible Not to speak any thing of their Assembly holden at Loudun with most obstinate disobedience to the Kings command At Grenoble the King was content and gave them leave to hold an Assembly but that all the World might see what a factious and froward spirit governed them they refuse the place and by their own authority assemble at Nâ—smes At Chastelrault and Saumur the King suffered them to Assemble onely to chuse two Deputies who were to remain at Court and receive the Kings Orders concerning them and to exhibite from time to time their own Plaints and Grievances as occasion should be Contrary to this they make an Act of Vnion there also and take the same Oath which the Confederate Catholikes then in Arms had not long before taken yet with this difference That whereas the Catholikes protest their service to His Majesty so long as he continued Catholike which was to oblige him to no more then his Oath and the Interest of His Royal Office required of him so long as he lived These Hugonots protest theirs onely on this condition viz. Le Sovereign Empire de Dieu demeurant tousiours en son entier that is to say in effâ—ct So far as may stand with their duty to God Which whosoever knows what a Hugonot thinks is his duty to God will confess to be a restriction of an equivocal and perillous signification to a King of France And so they did plainly shew sending presently after to the Camp at Sansay and offering to joyn with those Frenchmen who had taken arms to oppose the Kings marriage And not onely this but they established in each Province of France a Councel of their own to hear Affairs and to take notice what the Order and Government of the Country was yea and importunately urged to have Counsellors in the Parliament at Paris Lastly to shew in one Act as in a Mirror the height of their Presumption and Treason in the year 1621. at Rochel out of their own onely authority and arrogance they divide the Provinces of France into Seven Synods which they call Circles adding Bearn for the Eighth And having formerly resolved to have War with the King and to make good their actings by force of Arms in this Assembly now they make Orders for the Government of their Army they chuse a General and Officers for every Circle which what other thing was it but to Cantonize France Art 35. They Decree That no Treaty nor Truce should be made without this Assembly They Order That this pretended General Assembly of theirs in respect of the great charge which they must necessarily undergo should arrest all the Kings Rents and Money due for Tails Ayds Gabels c. They appoint Officers for collecting the same Art 36. They order the seizing and letting to Farm of all Goods Ecclesiastical and profits of Churches Revenues of Parsonages c. Art 41. They take the same order for all the profits of the Admiralty And when all was done the Articles are every one of them signed by their President Combart very solemnly yea as foul as their fault was and beyond all colour of excuse yet there is nothing pretended in the business but Justice and Loyalty and His Majesties service All is covered with that false mantle of Religion and Publike good But wisely and truly was it long since observed by the Orator Tully Totius injustitiae nulla capitalior c. Of all injustice saith he none is more odious and abominable then where men act their villanies under a vizard and pretence of good I for my part shall not insist much here upon the opinion of the Civilians what a Sect is what meetings of people are justly called Conventicles and declared to be against the Prince and the ancient Laws nor how Faction and Conspiracy are defined by the Lawyers and when they fall within the compass of Treason as conceiving it matter though not altogether impertinent to my subject yet something more then I have undertaken For this therefore I refer you to Farinaâ—ius Part. 4. to Decius Lib. 7. c. 7 20. to Bossius to Gigas and others who can with greater authority resolve you I shall onely alledge the Municipal and Common Laws of France in such cases which heretofore have used to be a rule and bridle of Justice and to be able to
should be abolished and that whosoever defended the Popes Authority in Scotland should be banished and that all former Acts to the contrary should be repealed This was pretended to be done by the three Estates but the Queens Commission could not be shewn nor any consent of hers to confirm such Acts beside the opposition which the Clergy or State Ecclesiastical generally made against such proceedings See Jo. Leslaeus hist of Scotland not onely in the Parliament or Convention of States where they happened to be overborn but all the Kingdom over Therefore to make that seem good by a colour of Law which was at first begun by meer Faction and Violence some years after viz. Anno 1567. and after the deposition or rather unjust and forced Resignation of their lawful Sovereign the Queen they procure an other Parliament to be called the Earl Murray being then Regent and the King scarce out of his Cradle which confirms the Acts of the Parliament 1560. Cap. 9. and prescribes an oath to be taken by all succeeding Kings to maintain the Religion then received to which as yet no King had ever consented and establisheth the Confession of that Church The Queen provoked with their many and insufferable indignities had before this time sent for some French Forces into Scotland to oppose them But this they take so ill and the Preachers of new Doctrine in all parts of the Kingdom improve the occasion so much to her disadvantage and to the further incensing of the people that at last they not onely make shift to exclude her from all Government putting her in condition of a private person but dishonor her beside with most capital and criminous Accusations yea and cast her into prison not without great danger of her life Beza that Tibullus of Genevah instigating and encouraging them much thereunto who is pleased in his Reformed Zeal and Eloquence to call her Medea Athaliah and what not Nullum ejus sceleribus nomen c. The Good Man it seems could not finde words bad enough to express her guiltiness and yet how well is it known he had store of them always at command and how maliciously he pleaded against her while she was prisoner in England onely out of hatred to the House of Lorrain appears abundantly in his Book called Reveille-Matin I confess generally t is better to bury old quarrels then to renew their memory yet to justifie the Innocent and to detect perfectly the evil practises of these men I cannot forbear to insist a while on this Subject and to declare more particularly what inducements they pretended for such exorbitant courses They accused the Queen of procuring the death of her Husband the Lord Henry Darley out of a desire and intention to marry Bothwel who was principal in the murther Therefore say they for zeal to Justice for the Honor of the Realm and satisfaction to Forreign Nations it is necessary that she be under restraint til she cleer her self from the imputation of such heinous crimes These were their Accusations and pretenses But touching the Murther it was very unlike to be true and certainly required manifest proofs if ever any cause did Her Sex was not fit for such a Butchery and her nature known to be too Royal to harbor such dishonorable Treachery though she had some just cause of offence against him If she had desired to put him to death he was her Subject and she might have done it openly legally and by course of Justice He had been of the Confederacy for the killing of David Riza her Secretary his own Dagger was found in his Body The Earl Morton beeing fled into England upon that offence he presumed to revoke him and call him home without thâ— Queens knowledge or allowance Neither was he Loyal to the Queen in respect of Conjugal affection and duty his offâ—nsiveness in that kinde was very notorious and scandalous to all the Court and occasion of much disquiet and difference betwixt the Queen and him and from whence their common Adversaries took advantage in a short time to ruin them both What then is the proof of such a crime what evidence bring they to convince her guilty of the Fact First they object that Douglas Earl Bothwels man was executed for it True And that it was he that brought a Box of Letters of the Queens to Bothwel which he had received of Sir James Balfoor at Edenburgh to carry to his Master by which Letters intercepted their juglings and practises viz. of the Queen and Bothwel were discovered It is answered Lyes have commonly one Leg short and so 't is here For is it probable that either the Queen or the Earl should repose such confidence and so great secrets in a man that was known to be at the devotion of a contrary Faction as Sir James Balfoor was Is it likely she would at all send such a Packet which she knew contained matter of great Peril but of no consequence at all to her self For she directs them to be burnt and might have done that her self well enough without the labor of sending them to him Beside the Queen ever denied those Letters to be hers though her hand had been counterfeited to them neither was there Superscription Indorsement Seal Date or any thing else that might possibly discover more cleerly whose they were or from whom coming Her hand was onely Subscribed the Letters themselves of another Character and truly it is not probable that in a business of so great privacy she should require the State of a Secretary and that of some Stranger too for had it been the hand of any of her ordinary Amanuenses the case had been cleer and a discovery would have been easily made Neither could he who delivered them ever be found out to discover the Pack and Douglass who was the man accused to carry them protested at his death that he never knew of any such Letters Lastly supposing that she had indeed sent them yet was there no express proof of any unlawful act attempt or practise to charge her with Suppose she had desired to have her husband murthered doubtless it had been a great offence against God and odious to all men but was it a sufficient cause for her own Subjects to take Arms against her and to depose her Was not David in a like case in the business of Vriah and Bathshebah Yet he forfeited not his Crown Saint John Baptist reproved Herod for his Adultery yet did neither exhort nor counsel the people to deprive him of his Dignity though he were both a stranger of Idumaea and an usurper Edward the fourth of England was not deposed for keeping another mans Wife though he committed a great sin Nor Henry eighth for cutting off the Heads of so many of his own Wives and committing as great sins Spectante populo in the view of his Kingdom and of all the world Surely these Bouâ—efeux while they presume to punish their Kings for sin without
and liberties which they pretend were violated by the King They would have no Strangers rule or bear Office among them The Spaniards must be dismissed the Country and some new liberties granted viz. Liberty of Conscience and Toleration for Religion Thus were the names of Liberty and Religion made the Standard-bearers as it were to their future Commotions But let us concerning their several grievances As concerning the first that of the Inquisition the name is of greater Terror then the thing It was first devised upon a neceâ—sity against the Moors in Spain and upon experience of the use and benefit thereof continued And though I shall not commend any sign or proceedings that savor of cruelty yet I cannot condemn this because it addeth nothing to the punishment of Heresie which the Law did not inflict before but requires onely a more strict Execution of the Law and a more diligent course of examination to be used by the Inquisitors And certainly under God it hath been the chief Antidote which hath preserved Spain so well and so long free from the infection of heresies and from such dangerous and lasting tumults as do commonly follow them and wherewith the other Kingdoms of Europe have been generally embroyled The Spaniards themselves when they were most discontented never complained of it nor is it in it self a more bloody Law or Execution of Justice then the Consistory it self at Genevah doth maintain and hath executed more then once though unjustly and Tyrannically considering what principles they pretend and what outcries and obtestations they once made for Liberty of Conscience Liberty of Prophesying Liberty of the Spirit which is their onely Judge of Controversies according to the written word alone and not any Consistory or company of men whatsoever Besides as it was at first propounded by the King out of his zeal for the good and quiet of the Country so was it by his wisdom suspended afterwards finding they were not capable of such a remedy For the second viz. the Erecting of the new Bishopricks it was a prudent and necessary resolution to bridle Sectaries and as a Sythe to cut down those Weeds which grew so fast in Gods Church For by appointing in each Province grave and learned men to stand as Watchmen and Sentinels against the Enemies of the Church and State it would be more easie by concurrence of their Authority and by their vigilancy over their Flocks to preserve the people from danger of seducement Neither was it a new design For Philip Duke of Burgundy had long before desired it as a thing very needful because in his time all the Seventeen Provinces except onely the Diocess of Arras were under such Bishops as were strangers to the Country and Subjects of Forreign Princes which could not be convenient for the State And what good their Erection hath wrought experience daily sheweth in those places where they still continue For now every Diocess is carefully visited by a Bishop of the same Country and Language who as he hath more natural compassion so hath he also more knowledge and care to instruct his Countrymen in the way that is right and to weed out disorders And therefore was the Erection allowed and ratified by Bull of Pius Quartus in the year 1559. Concerning the third viz. the Cardinal of Arras Although his wisdom and experience in affairs of government as well Ecclesiastical as Civil was sufficiently known to the King yet because the Prince of Orange with the Counts Egmond and Horn did joyntly write to the King against him His Majestie though to his great disservice was content to remove him for their satisfaction But when this was done neither was the Country any whit the quieter for his calling away nor did they themselves cease from further practising As for their liberties and franchises had not the King confirm'd them all at the joyful entry When did he violat them afterward was it for preferring Spaniards There were very few of them left in the Country and of these fewer cum imperio Was it for the Offices of State See how the governments were distributed among themselves Count Egmond was Governor of Flaunders and Artois The Prince of Orange Governor of Holland Zealand Vtreckt and Burgundy Count Aremberge was Governor of West-Frezeland and Over-Issel Count Barlamont of Namur Count Mansfeld of Luxemberge and Clinay The Marquis of Berghen of Lisle and Doway So as 't is not easie to see how the Nobility could complain justly they were neglected or not honorably imployed And yet for addition and their further assurance of the Kings good affection to them and the Provinces he left his Sister the Dutchess of Parma Governor General with them a Woman of a very peaceable and mild Spirit and one that was like to hold the bridle of Government with a Gentle hand and to be advised by their Counsels In this maner were all things wisely and moderately constituted by the King and might have so continued had the Nobles complied with their duty and not favored so much those spirits of Innovation and Tumult which lurked up and down the Country and had infected no small part of the Common people Howbeit all things remained outwardly quiet for a long while The fire that was lay covered in Ashes The first breaking out was not til Baron Brederode and his Associates presented their Petition to the Dutchess which containing many things neither fit for them to aske nor safe for her to grant was not without reason look't upon as a Prologue to some future Troubles Henceforward the Heads of the Faction plot the advancing of their party and begin to strengthen themselves both at home and abroad These were the Earl of Culembergh who had lately married a Germane Lady of the Lutheran way Horn who was matched with the Sister of Count Harman The Prince of Orange was already by his Mother allied to the Count of Solms and his Wife was Sister to Maurice Duke of Saxony And Grave Scheremberg had married his Sister There was also Count Lodowick the Princes Brother a Soldier and a man of great Spirit Lutheran all over and as fit an instrument as could be desired both to make a party and to back it Besides these Flacius Illiricus a most turbulent Preacher of new Doctrines had been sent for privately out of Germany with some other Ministers and were dispersed in all corners of the Country incensing and corrupting the people with as much industry as was possible These were Lutherans and did mischief enough But when Calvins Quicksilver came to be cast in among them the fire then could be kept in no longer but the flames break out in all places The people in spight of Laws mutiny every where down go the Kings Arms down go Images and all the Ornaments in the Churches The Churches themselves as if they had been the Castles and Forts of some Enemy are Sackd and Pillaged Strad de bell Belgie Monasteries rifled Religious houses robd
Fifteen years after the beginning of the troubles Adde hereunto that when the Emperor procured the Treaty at Colen in the yeer 1579 and made choise of most Honorable and eminent persons for that purpose viz. Two of the Princes Electors the Bishop of Wurtzburgh the Count Wartzemburgh and Doctor Lawenman the King of Spain was as forward and sent thither the Duke de Terra Nova And the Duke Areschot with some others were Commissioners from the States with Commission Signed by the Arch-Duke Mutthias The States had by their Letter to the Emperor bearing date June the Eighth 1578. promised that they were and so would continue constantly resolved Vt in Belgio colatur religio Catholica sua Regi constet Authoritas that both Catholike Religion and the Kings Authority should be maintained in the Netherlands Before this at Worms in the year 1577. the Agents of the States submitted and referred themselves to the Emperor as likewise the King of Spain did Therefore both parties being so inclinable and consenting in Eodem Tertio in the same Umpire who could expect but that a general peace should follow But Davus perturbat omnia When the Emperors Commissioners were come to Colen at the time appointed viz. by the beginning of April the States Commissioners appeared not till the Fourth of May and then with a Commission insufficient and their Treating restrained to a Term of Six weeks and no longer when as themselves had been twice the time in but framing their instructions which the Commissioners of the Emperor took for a great error as justly they might do All which delays had been craftily procured by the Prince of Orange and his party on purpose to obstruct the peace And in the Articles themselves the States Commissioners propounded many things contrary to promise In the Articles proposed by the Duke de Terrâ Novâ in the behalf of his Master All kinde of severity relating to Religion was mitigated as the Emperors Commissioners had assured them to the intent ut nemo justè queri possit c. that no man might complain of the King as if he desired either to Tyrannize over their bodies or to Seize their Estates or to Oppress their Consciences for matter of Religion But nothing could prevail so the Imperial Commissioners finding such dallying and delays in the States That in Sixteen weeks they could get no answer and that in their Letters they did onely renew old grievances and quarrels they broke up the Treaty and departed Nevertheless Bâ—lduc and Valenciennes received the Articles So did Over-Issle and Tournay Artois and Henault guided by the Bonus Genius of the Country and Em. Lâ—lain that valiant and religious Marquis of Renty together with Monsieurs de Capre Heze Barze and the rest contemned the course of Orange offered their obedience to the King and made peace with the Duke of Parma But as for the Hollanders they were now further off then ever they publish discourses against the Treaty and labor by all means possible how to make good their usurpation and perfect their Union which they were all this time a framing not forgetting to scatter seeds of dissention and further discord among the Provinces in which business their Ministers helped them not a little And lastly at this time also by the advise of Orange and England they admitted Monsieur the Duke of Alenson in the year 1578. to a kinde of Protectorship of the Provinces creating him Duke of Brabant and absolute Prince of the Netherlands And all to shew how irreconcileable they were to their natural Sovereign Thus much hath been said to shew the Kings good inclination to Peace Now for his Tyranny and Exaction which they pretended and objected in the second place as the cause of making that Union and also his breaking of their Priviledges and the too severe Government of his Ministers contrary as they say to his Oath at Coronation surely so long after D' Alva's times and under the moderate Government of the Duke of Parma and after so many significations of the Kings gracious disposition and offers to ease their burthens if they would themselves this may rather be judged a Cavil to shift Peace then any desire to be rid of War But as for the business of the Tenth Penny an exaction which they so much complain of we must draw the Curtain a little and tell you it was necessity and not his own will which forced him to require that and that otherwise neither would he have done it nor the King have suffered it But as it happened being driven to an extremity for the satisfying of the Soldiers who always grow wilde if they want Pay he was constrained to incur an inconvenience that he might avoid a mischief England and Orange were the cause of it For about this time some of the Counsel here by the instigation of the Prince had made stop of no less sum then Six hundred thousand Duckets which were sent out of Spain to the Army but driven by hard weather and ill fortune upon the coast of Hampshire notwithstanding as some say the Queen had given a safe Conduct for the passage thereof But the Polititians of those times and Enemies of Spain knew well into what Streights the want of this money would drive D' Alva and that of necessity he must commit some error or other which would encrease the hatred of his Government and perhaps arm the peoples fury once more to sedition Besides this the King had sent another sum of Two hundred thousand Duckets by the Duke de Medina but that also was intercepted at Sea by the Zealanders and converted to other uses This man was of a milder nature and sent on purpose to qualifie the severity of D' Alva who by his natural Sterneness and some errors in Government which the general malice of the people and disfavor of some Forreign Princes did much aggravate had made himself it must be confessed not a little odious but having as was said lost his money and Ships he had small heart to stay among them so he quickly returned home again and with a resolution it seemed never to have further dealing with such sharking Cormorants and left D' Alva in a Labyrinth of difficulties how to get money and govern his Soldiers But however it appears by this that it was never the Kings pleasure nor purpose but meerly the necessity of his present wants which compelled the Duke to demand that Tribute and that the quarrel upon it was rather made and contrived by themselves then given And these great pretenders for the Commons that seemed then so extreamly careful of the peoples ease and sollicitous to keep them free from Taxes Impositions c. Let me ask them one question Why do they now Tax them so much Why do they lay such heavy burthens upon them they themselves now they have them in their power Excises Subsidies Taxes of all sorts which they have augmented and do daily augment and raise
in such sort that never any Common-wealth in Christendome groaned under the like burthens T is certain The Gentle Father of the people as they once called that Fox the Prince of Orange did propound and endeavor to wrest from them not the Tenth but the Sixth Penny towards his charge and maintenance in the year 1584 Mich. ab Isselt de bell Belgic after he had made them a Free State This you will say was a Note above Ela. And though the people denied it and murmured grievously at the motion yet is he still in Holland Pater Patriae so well and cunningly doth he both shuffle his Cards and play his Game Barnevelt in his Apologie confesseth that in the year 1586. he found the order of Government out of all good frame many Protestant Preachers would not acknowledge the States because they had not that command and discipline after the French fashion which they desired The Common people all contrary-minded one to another and the Towns wishing for Peace The Expences of the State exceeded all incomes by Twenty six Millions and that which I cannot but wish the Reader to observe West-Frizeland which in the beginning of the troubles did contribute onely Eighteen hundred thousand Florens was now charged to pay Quadragies centena millia librarum duos Milliones I have put it down in the Authors own words because I would not have the Reader poâ—â— bly mistaken Who is now the Tyrant and Exactor It seems though the people have changed their Lord they have not laid down their burthen D'Alva may be said to have beat them with Whips but the States with Scorpions Do but consider their Excises and Impositions upon all sorts of Commodities even the most necessary for humane life and subsistance viz. Meat Drink Fewel yea men-servants Wages and what not Besides Loans and Benevolences which are both commonly required and heavy Cnickius directly chargeth them that they exact one way or other the Fourth part of the peoples Revenues that are Hollanders and live out of the Country But saith he Si in Provinciis nostris c. if they live in any of our Provinces by leave Semissem jubent solvere c. they require them to pay the one half and in case they refuse or neglect They take all As for the cruelty of D' Alva which was objected so much to little purpose in the Treaty at Colen and hath been since Rhetorically aggravated by their Doctor Baudius let us call to minde See Baudii orat what provocations were at first given him by the oppositions and malice of the Nassovians by the War at Montz by the practises used to impead his entrance into Brabant and by so often contriving his death yet were these venial sins But when he found the Nobility so far engaged with the Geuses as they were that the Kings Authority was slighted Catholike Religion generally deserted and profaned the chief solemnities thereof in some places most impiously and contumeliously abused in the face of Heaven and of the Catholike Army when he saw the Towns in Holland and Zealand revolt Harlem Alcmar and others refusing the Kings Authority what indifferent man can wonder if severity were used at first to such of them as fell under his power Who would not think that Cauterizing was necessary when there appeared so much proud flesh in the wound and that purgations must be somewhat violent when the body is so much and so generally distempered Nor could the peaceable nature of the Commendador Ludovicus Requesens who succeeded D'Alva do any good upon such rough and irreconcileable spirits How often was he heard to cry out Dios nos libera de estos estados God deliver me from these States once Insomuch that Sir Roger Williams a Gentleman of our own Country and Soldier of good note who had served on both sides and knew the nature of the people very well condemns the revocation of D'Alva as an error of State Because saith he See his History nothing but rigor could reduce such violent Spirits unto order and nothing but a Sword in hand keep them in obedience As for the Kings Oath which they say he hath broken in the matter of priviledges if they would decide the matter by justice they must make it plain and evident by what Fact in what case instance example he hath broke it and ought not to presume so much as they do viz. to be Themselves both Plaintiffs Accusers and Judges Again supposing that the King had broken his Oath may not many things happen after his Oath-taking to excuse him from perjury By Law every Oath or promise how absolute soever yet hath always this necessary condition tacitly implyed in it viz rebus sic stantibus that things remain so as they were when the Oath was taken But if such difficulties or alterations happen as render the promise either impossible or unlawful to be performed a man doth not then commit perjury nor any other kinde of injustice by not performing his promise What if that which the King at his Inauguration promised for the good of the Province cannot be observed now but with the great dammage of the Province and of all Europe and this occasioned by the distemper and change of the people themselves of the Province of necessity if the case that is to say the condition and state of affairs be so far changed resolutions and proceedings upon them must also change Again supposing he had broken his Oath suâ culpâ and blameably yet were not the States thereby inabled or authorized to depose him and chuse a new Prince For in the Articles of the Joyful Entry this is a Clause Vt si in omnibus aut in vno quopiam Articulo pacta ista Dux Brabantiae violasset c. That if it shall happen that the said Dake of Brabant doth violate or break either all or any one of these Articles it shall be lawful for his Subjects to deny him the accustomed services until the thing in Controversie be either revoked or amended So long they might but after the grievances complained of should be redressed they were to return again to their duty and to rest in statu quo prius of obedient Subjects And the world knows how oft the King offered unto the Emperor to other Forreign Princes and to the States themselves to revoke and amend whatsoever could be proved amiss Beside the States and Courts of Brabant are more proper to decide this question then the States of Holland who have no such priviledges Originally but onely by Participation and Vnion And they that is Brabant Flanders Artois Henault and the rest have conformed themselves and are returned to their due Allegiance being obedient to the King his Laws and Government And if Holland would but follow their example the business were at an end To draw therefore to some conclusion in this matter of Priviledges and of the Kings Oath it would be demanded who granted these Priviledges
Ottoman Greatness and the whole Nation of Turks and that in a short time Ferdinand would surely be expelled out of all Germany and forced to seek his fortunes in Spain But O Monstrous O Incredible that such desperate malice and impiety should enter the hearts of any that profess themselves Christians were it not that the Records themselves be extant fide publicâ which do assure us thereof even beyond contradiction who could beleeve it O Malice implacable O Envy most perfectly diabolical And O happy house Family Name of Austria which for the interest of true Religion and Constancy to Justice deservest to be made the object of such execrable Spleen and to Combat perpetually with such odious and Antichristian Conspiracies Guicciard Lib. 20. It is no new thing But Macte istâ virtute Be faithful to God and to those principles of piety and justice descended from so many so Religious and so Renouned Ancestors and reign in spite of Hell so long as the Sun and Moon endureth The Truth is Ambition was so hungry with them that they consulted about dividing the Bears Skin before the Bear was taken They consulted how they should share among them the spoils of the German Clergy and of the house of Austria before either of them was in their power For as by their Chancery-rolls it is evident Their intent was to advance the Palatine to Bohemia Cancel Anhaltina Alsatia and some part of Austria enlarging his Dominion also with the Bishoprick of Spiers and a part of Mentz Bethlehem Gabor should be assisted to keep Hungary which afterwaâ—d this Gabor having no issue might also probably fall to the Palâ—tines lot Too many Crowns herâ—â— you will say to expect any in Heaven Onaltzbach gaped for Two fat Benefices the Bishopricks of Wâ—râ—â—burgh and Bambergh his Neighbors and therefore was it agreed that their Armies should Rendevouz in those parts The Marquis of Baden thirsted after Brisack and was willing by this occasion to continue his possession of the upper Marquisate against the more just claim of the Count Eberstein Brandenburgh expected the least of all being content onely with a part of the Bishoprick of Wirtzburgh which lay fit for him But Anhalt intended to recruit both his purse and broken fortunes with the spoils of Mentz Banbergh and other Catholike places as also with some Lands and Lordships which were like to Escheat in Bohemia If the Venetians would joyn with them they might make themselves Masters of Istria and Friuli and so Oceanum cum Adriatico as their Cancellaria speaks they might joyn Sea to Sea and Land to Land and carry all before them without controule Such were the vast but vain designs of their Ambition and Avarice But before we proceed any further it may not be amiss to examine their Plea It is manifest their design in it self was most pernicious and such as if it had taken effect which God would not suffer had been of general prejudice to the State of Christendom and not onely to the Peace of the Empire which yet every one of the Princes Confederate were bound in some relation or other to maintain beside the subversion of all Laws which apparently it carryed along with it Who doth not remember how all the Pulpits in England when time was and generally of all the Reformed Churches abroad sounded the Alarme against the League and Leaguers in France Which yet was not half so mischeivous as this but was at first set on foot quietly without any sedition or insurrection onely for defense of the Ancient Religion always received and established in France yea confirmed with the Kings personal Oath and approbation And though it were afterward continueed and more strictly prosecuted upon occasion of some horrid Actions of murther and tyranny yet Monsieur Villeroy himself who was a wise man and a great Royallist professeth that their aim was not the Extirpation of the King of Navarre but his Reformation and that if they might be assured of his Religion which he had promised he should be instantly assured of their obedience as in the conclusion it clearly appeared every person in France according as the King condiscended to give them satisfaction in that point entirely acknowledging their Allegiance to him And the mishap which befel him afterwards was not in pursuance of the League but upon a private account not to say upon some new provocation given and which no man living justified But as for this Union it runs in a far wilder strain and is for the advancement of a new Religion entirely disavowed by all the States of the Empire in all their publike Acts. How then can it be otherwise then extreamly disloyal and criminous The Duke of Saxony himself though a Protestant Prince disswaded it and advised the Palatine very prudently and like a friend to quit Bohemia and to seek for reconciliation and pardon where as yet he might possibly finde it Beside it opened the Gates of the Empire to the Turk which mischief alone had there been no other going along with it had been sufficient to condemn it But Plessen confesseth in his Letter to Anhalt That it was an Action of the same nature with Holland and what that was we have seen already In brief they took arms against a King Lawfully Elected solemnly Crowned and established in possession by consent of the States It is true when they first went about the work they nominated the Duke of Saxony as Competitor with the Palsgrave for Bohemia but that was meerly craft and a trick of maliciousness to render the Duke suspected with the Emperor They knew he had rejected their offer and Confederacy long before when their Agent the Count Slick sollicited him in their names By this means they put Austria it self the Emperors Patrimonial Country into sedition The people there through correspondence with the Turk and Gabor were so bold as to tell Ferdinand that unless he would grant them Toleration and such Liberty of Conscience as they desired they would joyn with his Enemies And they were in this point as good as their words For in the year 1620. all the upper Austria did really quit their old Lord and submitted unto a new Protector in his stead If the Catholikes of England should attempt the like how would it be censured for sedition and punished severely as it might and yet surely the cases are much Parallel and if there be any advantage it is on our side who desire the exercise of nothing but what was once publike owned for many ages together by all the people of the Nation and legally established before us But nothing makes the Action more offensive and scandalous then that Anhalt and Onoltzbach two such private and inconsiderable persons in relation to the business they dealt in should take upon them insciis Electoribus without the knowledge and consent of the Princes Electors themselves to dispose of the succession of the Empire and in order to effect this more then
they did by private Authority and Faction It shall suffice therefore to send this Master T. M. for his better instruction unto a great Doctor of his own Church Doctor Bilson above mentioned who as we have heard before holdeth it tantum non as an Article of Faith that Princes are not to be deposed which is also the judgement of the greatest Doctor of the English Church and hath been so for these Fifty years and upwards But we demand of them is it good Doctrine in the Reign and case of Queen Elizabeth onely and not so in the Reign and case of Queen Mary It is a position frequently defended in their own Schools Dominium non fundatur in gratiâ and the contrary Doctrine is as generally exploded in Wâ—cleff The difference then of Religion alters not the Authority and power of Jurisdiction And Wyat with his complices rising in Arms without and against royal Authority was a Rebel against Queen Mary as much as Westmorland and the rest with them whom the English Chronicles mention were Rebels in rising against Queen Elizabeth But you will say Queen Mary observed not the Laws of the Realm she abrogated the Statutes of the First of Edward the Sixth which all the Kingdom approved and 't is the profession of good Princes to observe the Laws and to govern by them I answer it is true Legibus se Subjectos esse c. it is a most Christian profession of all Kings to be subject to their own Laws but it would be understood cum grano salis soberly and to refer more to the directive part or power of them then to the corrective or punitive especially in criminal cases if any such should happen lest the remedy should prove worse then the disease the reparation of a private person turn to the ruin of the publike which is contrary to reason the end of government Beside in Princes we may consider their private Acts as I may so cal them of Government which consist in the Executive part of their Office viz. in administring or dealing justice betwixt man and man and in seeing so far as the Law or reason requireth of them that all men under them live well and according to their several duties in these Acts the Prince may be justly supposed to be bound up to the Law and that he ought not to do otherwise then the Law prescribes But who ever accused Queen Mary of breach of Law or misgovernment in this sense Happy had it been for some of her Successors and this whole Nation if they had affected arbitrary Government and Rule no more then she did Secondly we may consider in Princes their more publike Acts which concern all their people in general and consist in the Legislative part of their Office and in these they are Free they are absolute unlimited and bound to nothing but onely to proceed upon such advise as the Constitutions of their several Governments do require that is most commonly and as is best upon advise and the consent of their whole people represented and giving them Counsel in Full Parliament I say in this capacity the Prince is bound to no Law but the Law of Reason and a Good Conscience as to all other respects at liberty to enact or abrogate to make or repeal what Laws he shall think fit and most likely to procure publike good upon such advise given And did not Queen Mary so proceed Did she do any thing but by publike consent advise and supplication of her people in Parliament Beside if Queen Mary should be so subject to her Brothers Laws as not to alter them upon any reason in a legal and due manner why was not Queen Elizabeth so subject to Hers yea why was not King Edward the Sixth himself so subject to the Laws of his Father Why were they altered and that in his Minority too When he was a Childe and understood no more in things of that nature and consequence then a Childe you will say The Religion which Queen Mary brought in was corrupt and impure That of her Brother before and of Queen Elizabeth after her was pure and according to Gods word But this is your assertion onely we say still That you proceed upon a false supposition that presumption and self-conceit rules the greatest part of your rost That thing viz. Whether Queen Maries or Queen Elizabeths Religion were best is the grand question betwixt us And as it is certain that it was never yet by any general and orderly Counsel no not of Protestants determined on your side so we are sure and the world together with your selves know it hath been often legally solemnly determined for us by all sorts of Counsels Provincial National Oecumenical And we pray what reason can be given why the Judgement of Parliament restoring Catholike Religion under Queen Mary with the consent and advise of the chief and best of the whole Clergy of the Nation should not be as good as that which under Queen Elizabeth abolish'd it not onely contrary to the Queens Oath taken at her Coronation but without the advise or consent of so much as any one Bishop or spiritual Prelate of the whole Kingdom who yet in a business of that nature viz. concerning Religion were by all Laws both of * Malach. 2.7 Heb. 13.7.8 17. God and of the Nation principally to be consulted with But let us gratifie our Adversaries as much as may be Let us suppose the worst viz. that Queen Mary had indeed erred in the introduceing of some kinde of superstitions ought she therefore presently to be censured by Ministers or deposed and put down by a Wyat God forbid Solomon himself a wise and a great King did fall into grievous sins and particularly into the grosest of those kinds whereof they presume to censure Queen Mary He had many Hundreds of strange Wives contrary to the Law of Moses and by reason of them fell to Idolatry beyond measure The Queen never took but one Husband and he a Catholike Prince of the same Religion with her self and with the whole Christian world beside except onely some few Provinces which Heresie had lately corrupted Yet neither did the Priest or people take upon them to depose such a King as Solomon They left him to him who is the Supream and most proper Judge of Kings and who in the time appointed by his Divine Providence raised up Jeroboam to chastise him in his Son Yea when Julian himself of a Christian Emperor became Apostate and persecuted the Christians of his time with all maner of vexation and cruelty which either policy of malice could devise neither the people nor the Pastors of the Church though they sharply reproved and inveighed against his proceedings yet none of them took up Arms against him none went about to deprive him either of Dominion or Life And if they thought it not expedient or becoming Christians to do so against a Tyrant acting Tyrannically and onely by the
best assistance to the support of the Estate Royal and of the Kingdom wherein they lived It is true through the malice of the Devil and Instigation of some Enemies of the Church some of them for the asserting of their legal Immunities and to preserve the Liberty of their spiritual Jurisdiction entirely Free as it ought they were dirven now and then yet very seldom in comparison of such a long tract of time as we instance in unto some vehement and earnest contestation with their Princes and though much further then was pleasing to them yet I suppose not beyond terms of due respect and the Authority of their Function much less did they endeavor to stir up rebellion or instigate the people to sedition and commotions against their Princes nor did they ever upon their own account solely concur in any thing of that nature The first King that ever gave cause in this Kingdom effectually and in the face of the world to trie the admirable patience obedience and loyalty of Catholikcs was King Henry the Eighth Flagellum Dei that scourge of God to the Church of England and all good Catholikes therein yet outwardly professing the same Religion in most things with Catholikes This he did first by a pretended Accusation of the Clergy to be fallen in a Praemunire because Scil they did that which all their predecessors the Bishops and Clergy of England for many Hundreds of years confessedly had done without any exception taken viz. for acknowledging the power Legantine of Cardinal Wâ—lsey which yet the King himself for his own ends and in his own case had first of all procured 2. upon the Statute of supremacy And 3. by suppression of the Abbies These were his Three first breaches by which the Foundation strength and glory of the Catholike Church in England became afterwards utterly ruinated By the first his way was levelled to the Second and the Second obtained gave him power and authority to compass the Third By the First indeed onely the Clergy smarted in a fine of an Hundred thousand pound The second lay heavy upon the Clergy and Temporalty both But by the Third viz. the suppression of the Abbies and Religious houses if we consider the infinite prejudice which the poor Commonalty suffered thereby both in point of spiritual and temporal interest the whole Kingdom might be said to be worse then conquered by him that is Robbed Spoiled Enslaved to the exorbitancy of his sole Will Prodigality Lust and Tyranny And all this done to be revenged on the Pope who condescended not to humor him in the business of his marriage Therefore and to advance his own power and greatness That Authority and Jurisdiction which had alway been acknowledged as sacred by the English ever since the English were Christians must in a moment be abandoned disclaimed abjured himself by an unheard of and fatal Ambition instead thereof made Head of the Church and all persons who out of scruple of Conscience refused to conform to such grand sudden and sacrilegious Innovations and to swear they knew not what were cut shorter by the head executed at Tyborn imprisoned banished and put into such condition as he was sure they should not oppose him The ground of the Praemunire was at first onely a quarrel which he pick't against the Cardinal Wolsey but afterwards stretched it upon the Tenters and made it reach the whole Clergy who being thereupon Summoned into the Kings Bench the business was so aggravated there by the Lawyers The Kings Learned Counsel that in the Convocation house they presently concluded to submit themselves to the King and offer him no less sum then One hundred thousand pound for their pardon This was look't upon by the Christian world as a Prodigy That so many Shepherds should be afraid of one Wolfe And though it becomes us not hear to censure whether they did as they ought yet certainly this weakness of the Pastors boded no good to the Flock and it is observed that neither themselves nor the Church nor Religion ever prospered in England afterwards However the King accepts of thâ—ir offâ—r and signs their Pardon but with a fetch far worse then the first For undâ—r a prâ—â—eâ—ce of procuring this Pardon to be confirmed to them in Parliament he draws thâ—m in there how willingly or unwillingly let the world judge to acknowledge him Supream Head of the Church It was a course even at that time not thought agreeable to Justice or Honor. For as we said the Cardinal Wolsey had the Kings License for the exercise of his Legantine power both under the Kings hand and the Great Seal of England and was employed by the Kings particular Mandate and pleasure in the quality of Legat to sit with the other Legat Cardinal Campegius and examine the business of his marriage And could the Divorce have been granted according to the Kings minde it is easily conjectured the Cardinal had never been questioned for his Legat-ship Touching the Second of Supremacy All the Subjects of England ever acknowledged that the Crown and State of England quoad Temporalia in Temporal affairs and matters is independent of any other power but of that Transcendent Majestie which saith Per me reges regnant and this to the intent that Kings and all Governors considering who will one day take their Audit may be more careful to rule with Justice and common equity without partiality passion prejudice against any mans person further then his crimes against Publike Order Common Right and the Peace of the State shall make him obnoxious and by so doing may keep their accounts streight against the day of Account And on the other side that Subjects remembring their duty and who it is that layeth this jugum suave the sweet Yoke of good Government upon their Shoulders might be induced to obey with more fidelity and prompt affection But the Question which King Henry the first of all Kings Princes or States of Christendom propounded to his Clergy and People in Parliament concerned matters purely Spiritual and wherein not himself onely and his Subjects at home but all Christian Kings Princes States and people in the world were concerned And therefore required far greater deliberation I say not then was used for in truth that was little or none at all the Kings pleasure and resolution was known and that as the world went then was sufficient but I say then could possâ—bly be used in England which was then but one single Kingdom and a small Province of Christendom And for the suppression of the Abbeys and Religious houses by that Act and this other of Supremacy together the Clergy of England were brought absolutely into Captivity and stood meerly as they have done ever since at the pleasure of the King and of the State Their Possessions the greatest part of them were seized their Goods forfeited their Churches profaned and sacked and upon the spoils thereof together with the sale of the Vestments Chalices Bells and other
more honorable with them and more becomming good Christians then the Sword and Fortune of a Conqueror in comanding In which most Christian posture I leave them to proceed Titulus Tertius THe last and greatest tempest against poor English Catholikes was raised by Queen Elizabeth This not onely shook the foundations of the Church which had been so lately repaired by the most Catholike Princess Queen Mary but proceeded so far as humane policy and power could to extirpate the very name and memory of Catholike Religion in England Camd. in Elizab. And this as it were in an instant and without noise For as her own Historian Camdeu reporteth it was done Sine sanguine sudore No man unless perhaps it were Master Secretary Cecil did so much as sweat in the bringing in of New Religion nor was any mans blood I mean at the first beginning drawn about it The Christian world stood amazed at the first news of such a sudden alteration Both because Religion had been so lately and so solemnly restored by Parliament as also because the Queen her self that now was always professed her self so much Catholike during the Reign of her Sister She constantly every day heared Mass saith the same Camden and beside that ad Romanae Religionis normam soepius confiteretur went often to Confession as other Roman Catholikes did Yea saith Sir Francis Ingleseild when she was upon other matters sometimes examined by Commissioners from the Queen she would her self take occasion to complain that the Queen her Sister should see me to have any doubt of her Religion and would thereupon make Protestation and Swear that she was a Catholike The Duke of Feria's Letter to King Philip is yet extant to be seen wherein is certified that the Queen had given him such assurance of her beleefe and in particular concerning the point of Real Presence that for his part he could not beleeve she intended any great Alteration in Religion The same profession also she made to Monsieur Lansack as many Honorable Persons have testified and at her Coronation she was Consecrated in all points according to the Catholike maner and anointed at Mass by the Bishop of Carlile taking the same Oath to maintain Catholike Religion the Church and Liberties thereof as all other her Catholike Predecessors Kings and Queens of England had ever done Concerning the grounds which moved her to make this Alteration so much contrary to the expectation and judgement of Christendom we shall speak in due place This was manifest that the long sickness of Queen Mary gave her great advantage time both to deliberate and draw all platforms into debate to prepare instruments in readiness for all designs and to make choise of the fittest and surest Counsellors such as were most likely to advance her ends Neither did she seem to value her Honor overmuch in order to the bringing about of her chief design For in open Parliament after her intentions for a change began to be discovered she protested that no trouble should arise to the Roman Catholikes Horas Preface of Queen Elizab. for any difference in Religion Which did much abate the opposition which otherwise might probably have been made by the Catholike party and put the Clergy themselves in some hopes of Fair quarter under her Government She knew full well that a Prince alone how Sovereign soever could not establish a new Religions in his Kingdom but that it must be the work of a Parliament to give Authority and Countenance to a business of that nature Therefore to win the Bishops and the rest of the Catholikes in Parliament to silence at least she was content to use policy with them and promise them fair as Monsieur Mauvissieir hath well observed Les memoir de Mons. Mich. Castelnau who was a long time Embassador heer from the French King and curiously noted the passages of those times Add hereunto That when the Act for Supremacy was revived which was always the great Wheel of these Motions whereas by King Henry's Law both Bishops and Barons stood in danger thereof as the examples of Sir Thomas Moor Lord Chancellor of England and Doctor Fisher Bishop of Rochester had shewen in this Parliament the Queen was content to exempt the Lords and Barons absolutely from the Oath as they in King Edward the Sixths time had exempted themselves and to leave the Rigor of it onely upon the Clergy and Commons She also thought good to qualifie the Stile somewhat viz. from Supream Head changing it into Supream Governor which though it altered not the sence yet it abused some into a beleef that the Queen pretended not unto so much in matters Ecclesiastical as the King her Father had done Beside we are to remember that King Henry by pulling he Abbyes had much weakned the power of the Clergy in Parliament having deprived them of the Votes of no less then Five and twenty Abbots who constantly sat in Parliament in the quality of Barons And lastly it is well known The Lower House of Parliament it self as they call it was so calmly spirited in those times that they used not much to oppose what their good Lords of the upper House liked All which things considered and that too many of the Catholikes both Lords and others thinking it better wisdom to purchase their future security by present silence then to expose themselves to trouble and vexation afterward by opposing that which they feared they should not be able to hinder therefore either but faintly resist or quietly absent themselves who can wonder if the whole business were carried with ease upon such promises of the Queen and by the industry and craft of Sinon alias Secretary Cecil who had the chief Management of it in his hands By his advise it was thought fitting that the Noble Earl of Arundel should for a time be abused with some hopes of marrying the Queen who thereupon by the interest which he had in the house of Peers ingrosed into his own hands the Proxies or voices of so many of them who thought good to be absent as when time came served the Queens turn exceedingly well The duke of Norfolk Son in law to Arundel but now a Widower was already exasperated against the Pope because he might not have dispensation to marry his Kins-woman and therefore it was no hard matter to joyn him with Arundel The Queen had also against this time either made or advanced in dignity and consequently in interest certain new Lords whom she knew to be favorers of her design viz. William Lord Parr was made Marquis of Northampton a good Speaker and a Politick man Edward Seymour Son to the late Duke of Sommerset was made Viscount Beauchamp and Earl of Hartford Sir Thomas Howard was made Viscount Bindon Sir Oliver Saint John Lord St. John of Bletso Sir Henry Cary Lord Hunsdon She had also as much weakened the Catholikes party by discharging from the Counsel-Table many of the old Counsellors
proceedings she was not onely left destitute of all her Allies and Confederates and driven as it were to stand solely upon her own guard against France who was already an Enemy and against Spain who was a friend not very well satisfied But she was forced even at first and at the entrance of her Reign to run upon a Rock which might have Shipwrackt her whole State which was to assist the Rebells in Scotland against their lawful Sovereign under a pretence of expelling the French who were brought in thither by Authority of the Queen onely to maintain the Government established This might have taught her own people a bad lesson at home a man would think though it did not as it proved And being thus engaged in Scotland she was obliged in pursuance of her design to succor the Admiral and those Rebellious Hugonots of France by whose perswasion she invaded Normandy took possession of the Towns of Newhaven Diep and some other places delivered to her by the Vidame of Charteres But the disgrace in ill-defending and loosing of them especially of Newhaven was one of the greatest blemishes that ever the English before that time received upon French ground and far greater then it was Honor to have them delivered upon such occasion into the Queens possession For certainly had either the cause been just or prudently managed they might upon that advantage have easily brought home Calice again or lockt up the Gates of Roan and Paris But they did neither nor brought home any thing but a great Plague after them in most mens judgement a scourge to the Realm for that offence After this upon the like necessity of self-preservation and upon the Reason of State which Polybius prescribeth Vicini nimâ—ùm crescentiâ— potentia quâcunque ex causâ deprimenda By all meanes keep thy Neighbor from growing too great she made no scruple to impede and give obstruction to the affairs of King Philip in the Netherlands who was her Neighbor her Ally her Confederate yea upon more occasions then one and in matters of no small exigence the best friend which she had in the world Yet by reason of those pernicious Counsels concerning Religioâ— which she was fallen upon she was as it were compelled to disown his just interest and profess her self Ungrateful in the face of the world Thereupon Orange and the States are assisted against their lawful Sovereign King Philip. I must not deny but even in doing this she pretended respect unto the Kings interest professing in her Declaration concerning that business Stow. That what she did was to preserve the Ancient Amity and Leagues betwixt the Crown of England and the House of Burgundy and to prevent the loss and utter revolt of those Countries from the Kings obedience which she knew otherwise the States and Orange would deliver up to some other Prince more professedly his Enemy So true it is that which Machiavel observed I suppose much about those times viz. That wise Princes seldom or never want pretences for their Actions What a fair colour is here given to a foul Cause But where is Conscience Christianity and Truth in the mean time The world could see well enough through the Vizard and knew at what mark both the Queen and the States aimed But most Sage sure and worthy of so great a Commander and wise man as himself was is that of Thucydides Nullus Princeps a suis subditis justè puniendis arcendus est c No Prince saith he ought to be hindred from punishing his Subjects according to the Laws and whosoever goeth about to do so by his evil example parem in se legem Statuit c. he makes a Law against himself and inables his own Subjects in like case to seek forreign protection against his jusâ—ice And this the Queen with the whole Nation might have found true by sad experience if that either Henry the Second or Francis the Second Kings of France had lived or that her own Subjects I mean those whom she had not a little injured and alienated by her Misgovernment had not been more loyally respective of her dignity and more inclined to obedience and sufferance for a good cause then many other people in the world were But Divine Providence having decreed for our much unworthiness and many sins to remove the Candlestick of this Nation that is to deprive us of the Light of the true saving Faith and of all publike and free exercise of true Christian Religion and to deliver us up to the darkness and many old delusions of Heresie and to follow our own ways in those things wherein it most of all concerned us to have been ruled by good Authority which is the greatest judgement that can befall a Nation or any people in this woâ—ld all things cooperated to the accomplishment of his just displeasure against us And the Queen with heâ— party were permâ—tted to go on with their work without any interruption Even before her Coronation or that any debate or resolution had been taken in Parliament de novo concerning Religion she being her self but a Sheep of the Flock as Constantine Thedosius and many others her Christian Predecessors in Princely Dignity have not blushed to acknowledge yet presumed to put all the Shepheards of the Kingdom to silence commanding that none of the Bishops or other Prelates should preach till her pleasure was further known And after the Parliament all of them that refused the new revived Oath of Supremacy were deprived of all Honors Dignities and Employments which they had in Church or Common-wealth and committed to several Prisons Of this sort there are reckoned no less then Fourteen Bishops of England all Vertuous and Learned Prelates that were instantly deposed and Ten of Ireland Twelve Deans Fifteen Heads or Masters of Colledges Six Abbots besides inferior dignitaries of the clergy viz. Arch-Deacons and other Priests without number together with Master Shelley Prior of Saint Johns of Jerusalem All these as to their demeanor towards the Queen were blameless there was not the least exception taken against them in that respect The Bishops themselves were all sitting in Parliament at the time of Queen Maries death and acknowledged by diverse Proclamations Queen Elizabeths Right and Title to the Crown The Arch-Bishop of York Doctor Heath was then Chancellor of England and labored by all means possible to do her Majestie service and to settle the Hearts of her people in obedience and loyalty towards her as to their natural and lawful Sovereign especially in that grave Oration which he made to the Nobility and Commons of Parliament upon the first report of Queen Maries death The Bishops joyntly did their Homage and Fealty to her in all dutiful maner and though they were not without some suspicion that she intended to change Religion yet did they practise neither Scotizing nor Genevating towards her Never did they incense the people against her though they were generally Catholik and they might probably have
the Instruction and training up of yong Scholars viz. of the Catholike Nobility Gentry and others of our Nation in the studies of Learning Vertue and all kinde of honest and christian Education which as the case stood they could not possibly have in their own Country without Ship-wracking of their consciences and great peril of their souls This I say was the first and onely design of the Seminaries viz. to be a Nursery of young and tender plants as should be committed to them to be fitted for the Service of God and the leading of a true Christian Vertuous life afterward and not to be Seedplots or Forges of Treason and seditious practises against their Country as their Adversaries cease not to accuse them That 's a calumny black and palpable as shall appear more hereafter At present I shall onely take notice of what that great Protonotary of England brings in charge against them in his Book called Justitia Britannica which are three things First That they are a company of base fugitive persons Secondly that they corrupt the Land with false Doctrine and Thirdly That they practise with forreign States to disturb the Kingdom raise rebellion and withdraw Subjects from their obedience As touching the First I am very well assured that there be Gentlemen of our Nation at Doway both in the Colledge and Monasteries of as good Families as well Bred and as Eminent Scholars as any I have known of all these sorts in the Universities of England wherein I am not altogether a stranger I will not make Comparisons for that were but to make them more odious neither am I willing to detract any thing from the honor of our English Academies which I am bound to maintain It must be confessed there be many excellent wits and men of great learning bred in them yet this I may truly say That those beyond Sea are of no base quality neither is their education in those places such as should render them liable to that Character in time to come Yea rather they are so orderly governed and their times of study devotion exercise both Scholastical and Spiritual recreation yea even of their most necessary repast and rest are all so exactly measured out to them all occasions of idleness excess and ill company so prudently and carefully prevented that it is indeed no wonder they appear so civil so devout so religious temperate sober and well governed in all outward deportment as through the grace of God they do They are as I said by their Superiors strictly kept to their tasks yet rather won then forced unto good They are bridled with a hard bit but it is carried with such a gentle hand as it doth not pinch but guide them So that as their studies blessed be God are not altogether unhappy so neither is their life unpleasant but sweet agreable to vertuous mindes and full of the Noblest contents And that they should be counted Fugitives is most injurious For do they live there as Outlaws in a forreign Province have they fled for any crime doth Justice enquire after them or wait for them in their own Country what Felonies what Treasons have driven them thence but such as a very few years before were not onely in the same place where they are now so hardly censured but in all places of Christendom and by all people of sound judgement counted the greatest vertues Again they live not there out of any factiousness of spirit or ill affection towards his Majestie or the State of England but for conscience sake onely and to avoid the severity of Laws enacted here against Catholikes and the profession of Catholike Religion It is necessity that compels them to take this course In England Catholikes have no Churches wherein to serve God publickly nor liberty to serve him privately any where else The Sacraments are never or but very seldom Administred to them in comparison of what they should be They can have no priviledge or benefit of the Universities for education and study without Oaths going to Church and hearing and doing many other things contrary to a good conscience Beside all this did not Barty Knolls and Hales did not Jewel Horn Cox Pilkington Poynet and many others in Queen Maries time take the same course for conscience as they pretended They would not willingly have been called Fugitives when they were abroad Why then should those Gentlemen at Doway Saint Omars and elsewhere Exil'd as it were at present from their native Country upon the same common pretence and reason viz. reason of conscience be called Fugitives or stigmatized with any such Characters of ignominy Let those Laws be repealed first which threaten present death to them upon their return and which were all procured against them unduly and by misprizion viz. of their supposed practisings against the State which as they complain were never proved nor are true Let it be permitted to them to enjoy Liberty of Conscience and to serve God as all good Catholikes and Christians ought to do without molestation and danger to their persons prejudice to their estates further then they shall give just offence to the State and the world would quickly see where their truest affections lay Neither Doway nor St. Omars nor Rhemes nor Rome it self would hold them from returning with all thankfulness and speed to express their humblest obedience to his Majestie and fidelity to their native Country And as for their Parents Kinsfolks and Friends from whom they are now unhappily separated and from many of them perhaps against their wills they should plainly finde that natural affection was not extinguished in them neither would kindness creep where it might safely go The Second objection is They corrupt the Land with false Doctrine This objection supposeth that Calvinism and the present Religion by Law established in England is the true which England it self denied but a few years since and the whole Christian world doth at this day I do not except the Protesttants themselves For there is not any one of their pretended Churches abroad that agreeth with this present Church of England in all points of Doctrine and Discipline established But to wave that quâ—stion at present as no part of my undertaking it must be considered there are learned and vertuous men on both sides one whereof will not it seems vaile Bonnet to the other in point of understanding the Scriptures How then should the diffâ—râ—nce be decided even in reason but by some Authority distinct from them both yet indifferent and superior to both which can be no other but the judgement and tradition of the Catholike Church precedent unto both Besides this the Bishops in the first Parliament offered to defend their Religion by disputation which the Protestants would not accept but upon an unequal condition that is as Master Camden himself reporteth Nisi Baconus in studiis Theologicis parùm Versatus c. Vnless Sir Nicholas Bacon might be President and Moderator of the business
we see well enough it had been in other cases of this Nature Neither in King Edward the Sixths time nor against the Kings of Scotland Denmark Sweden Duke of Saxony Marquis of Brandenburgh or any other Protestant Prince was there ever any such sentence issued to this day Whereupon Father Pâ—rsons and Father Campian procured some kinde of mitigation concerning it presently after the publishing and Pope Gregory following declared That the Subjects of England ought to perform all duties to Queen Elizabeth notwithstanding the censures So little reason is there in truth that Protestants should clamour so loud as they do and cry out nothing but Treason Treason against religious and good men who as they have no other business so come they hither for no other end but to do them good and so far as lieth in their power and office to save their souls They tell the world that no less then two hundred Priests have been executed in England for Treason since the times of Reformation which is certainly a very heavy report and sufficient to make them odious to all the world if it were true or that there were any thing in it but fallacie and aequivocation of words whiles they call that Treason in England which in all parts of Christendome besides is both called and counted Religion and the highest Vertue For we beseech them to tell us of what Treason do they convict us at any time but the Treason of being a Priest the Treason to say Mass the Treason to refuse the Oath the Treason to absolve Penitents confessing their sins the Treason to restore men to the Communion of the Church the Treason to Preach and Administer Christs Sacraments the Treason to be bred up in the Seminaries that is in such places where onely as things now stand in England thâ—y can be Catholikely bred and fitted for such Christian imployment What actual and real Treason is in England according to the true sâ—nse and notion of that crime â—dious both to God and man the Statute of 25 Edw. 3. will inform us better then any other being enacted when the whole Kingdom was of one mind and of one judgement as all Christian Kingdoms and Societies ought to be not rent nor overborn by factions and parties undermining and supplanting one another by indirect and undue meanes as it was when these new Statutes of Treason were made By that Statute and by the opinions of the most learned Judges in England Ploydon Stamford c. Treason must alwayes be some Action or Intention actually discovered not an opinion onely or a profession of Religion And this is the reason why Sir John Oldcastle Stow. one of Mr. Fox his Martyrs in the Reign of Henry the Fifth mentioned before though he were both Traytor and Heretike yet for his Treason he was condemned in one Court and for his Heresie in another as also were Cranmer and Ridley in Queen Maries time Secondly it must be some Act or Intention discovered of a subject prejudicial to his Sovereign or to the State where he lives But what hurt had ever I say not Queen Mary Henry the Eighth while he stood right Henry the Seventh or any other Catholike Prince but even Queen Elizabeth her self King James or any other Protestant Prince by a Priests saying Mass absolving of Penitents preaching of sound Doctrine to them and particularly of all due and just obedience to Civil Magistrates as they have ever constantly done Therefore by the common Laws of England and in it self it is not it cannot be Treason or criminous to be a Priest to say Mass Absolve c. But onely by Statute Laws it is made so upon temporary and present occasions and for certain politick ends which men have projected of themselves and which they are resolved to follow And therefore also it is by the very Statutes themselves provided 22. and 27. Elizab. That if a Priest conforms be content to go to Church to renounce the Pope or his Orders c. he becomes ipso facto without more ado Rectus in Curia and is actually discharged of all imputation of Treason no further proceedings lie against him Yea even at the very place of Execution and when the instruments of death are upon him yet still 't is in his own power if he please in three words to pardon himself and frustrate the expectation of so many eyes as are commonly waiting to see his last Exit Let him but say I will conform or I will swear c. Ther 's no man living dares meddle with him further Which is far otherwise where the offence is judged to be Treâ—son indeed and really prejudicial to the Prince or State But the fatal resolution being taken to change Religâ—on upon a principle or pretended reason of State as false as the Counsel it self was evil viâ— That otherwise the Queen could not be secure either of her Kingdom or Life it was necessary to take a severe course with those men whose Function obliged them to maintain True Religion and to endeavour to reduce things again into the old State From this root also sprang their extream jealousie and hatred of the Queen of Scots For she being Heir Apparent to the Crown after Queen Elizabeth and a Princess zealously affected unto Catholike Religion and so strongly Allied in France Those Statesmen who had contrived and wrought all the alterations here could never think themselves secure so long as her head stood upon her shoulders Therefore was she first invited into England upon pretence of Friendship and for Safety But when she was here used with so much unkindness and kept under restraint for little less then twenty years together that at last in order to procure her Liberty she was indeed provoked to doe something which it was easie for them who loved her not to interpret to be Treason and so they cut off her head From hence also sprung those continual injuries and practises of much ingratitude against the King of Spain The intercepting of his Treasure The holding of his Towns The ayding of Orange and the States as hath been said Lastly from this onely Source and Fountain of unjust Policie sprung all those laws of severity and bloud against Recusants as we are commonly called viz. of Twenty pound a moneth of Two third parts of Estate against Hearing Mass against Harbouring a Priest against Being reconciled c. It is well known the Recusants of England against whom those Laws were made were generally persons in all degrees of the Noblest quality in this Nation Vertuous Grave Wise Charitable Just and Good men of fair and friendly Conversation towards all I shall not say Loyal to their Prince because the contrary is so commonly beleeved Stow. yet our own Chronicles will not altogether deny them right in that regard while they testifiâ— how diligent and forward they were to offer their service to the Queen and State even in that great Action of Eighty eight Neither were
own Religion as beleeving it to be right or the best neither are Catholikes to be excepted in that point They must be permitted to desire at least and wish for the restoring of Catholike Religion as it ought to be But surely as to the means whereby they procure it and the course and manner of their proceeding that seek and endeavor it This treatise hath already shewen what great odds and difference there is betwixt the proceedings of Catholikes and that of Protestants And that what the one viz. Catholikes seek â—â—ely by way of Petition Supplication Prayer and humble Remonstrating of their Sufferances The other viz. Protestants seek chiefly by fire and Sword and Cannon Bullet and by Thundring of Ordnances rather then Apologies in their Princes ears Beside to proceed a little further in this Parallel the Catholikes generally and for a long time both in Germany and France were Passive as in England they are still to this day The Protestants were Aâ—tive and the offendors Catholikes onely defend their own maintain the possession of that which they have quietly held out of all memory of Men and Ages Protestants invade and usurp by force Priests desire onely to keep that which they once de jure had Ministers seek to get that which they had not Catholikes obey ex conscientiâ out of an inflexible principle of Conscience and absolutely submit unto all lawful and established Government Protestants generally speaking but upon condition and with such limitations and restrictions of their obedience as they themselves think good to prescribe Priests are punished not for any formal wickedness or that which is a crime in its own nature but for something that is so onely by interpretation or in the judgement of the present State which perhaps a few days agoe did not judge so but the quite contrary Calvinists when they suffer suffer for real and foule crimes for Sedition Rebellion Murther Treason not imputative onely fictitious or made such of late by the prevailing of some particular faction in the State but truly and properly so and adjudged for such by all Laws Divine and Humane of their own Countries and of all Christendom beside long before they or their Grandsires were born Witness the examples of this last year in France of Lescun President of the Assemblies at Rochel Haute-Fountain Chamier P. Gomboult and some others who all suffered for real and actual Treasons and by vertue of such Laws not as the Parliament at Paris or some party there had procured to be enacted a few years or a few moneths before on purpose to entrap them but by the ancâ—â—nt known Lawâ— of â—rancâ— b wh ch they themselves knew the Kingdom was governed and had been ever governed time out of minde and therefore could not in any reason but expect the execution of them upon themselves in case they would persist to offend Witness the Treasons of their Brother Bischarcy in Poland who attempted to kill the King and did indeed wound him very dangerously as he was going to Church They object to us the positions of some private and disavowed persons and words onely We object to them the resolutions of whole general Assemblies held by them and those rebellions which have followed thereupon not in word onely but in deed and in act their real and actual Conspiracies their many Battles really and actually fought in the Field without lawful Authority or any publike Call against their Sovereign Princes with other manifold iniuries and insolencies committed Lastly Protestants reform commonly per populum and by Tumults Catholikes do nothing of this kinde but by Law Order and their proper Superiors So that the difference betwixt them is manifâ—st and the integrity of the professions of Catholike in point of obedience and loyalty towards their Prince beyond that of Calvinists or Protestants generally speaking is visible to every eye Why may they not then under the Favor of the State enjoy like Liberty of Conscience Person and Estates with other good Subjects notwithstanding that they differ in Judgement from the profession of the State Why may not a Catholike be tolerated to live and injoy without molestation that which God Nature and the Laws of the Land do give him as well as a Calvinist Why should the Laws of England be fettered with so many Shacles of Interpretative and Temporary Treason to the prejudice of many innocent persons and to the scandal of the Government Admit that for some worldly respect they were indeed nâ—cessary in State-policy for the times wherein they were enacted yet the times changing so much as thâ—y have done and those causes entirely ceasing which made them seem necessary then it may be thought now not onely safe as undoubtedly it is but honorable and just to repeal them May it not with great reason be wondered at that a Nation so Just so Honorable so Wise as this of England hath ever been acknowledged by the Nations abroad and settled by Extraordinary Dispensations of Divine Providâ—nce upon such Equitable fair and just principles of government as be constantly held forth by the Supream Authority of the Nation should permit any thing to be counted Treason by an Act of Parliament which is so generally over all Christendom at this day and hath been so anciently and even till of late times in this our own Nation so much honored maintained and reverenced by all men especially I say when there is no cause of suspicion remaining when there is no cause nor colour of jealousie from any persons that desire this liberty at least none but what may be easily removed by the wisdom of the State and plenary satisfaction given in that behalf both to themselves and to all the good people of the Nation How much Religious men and persons Ecclesiastical now called Traytors by the Law were wont to be esteemed in this Nation is not necessary now to speak our own Chronicles and the Constitutions of our very Laws themselves do abundantly declare it If a bondman entred a Cloysture he could not be commanded out by any power whatsoever The Law it self anciently holding it more reasonable that even the King should loose his interest in such a body then that he should be taken out from the Order which he had chosen The like was judged if the Kings Wards entred Religion An Alien by Law can hold no Lands in England yet if he be a Priest he may by Law be a Bishop here and enjoy his Temporalties as Lanfranck Anselme and some others did who were never Denizens It is well known The Six Clearks of the Chancery were anciently Clearks of the Church The Master of the Rolls Master of Requests Lord Privy Seal yea the Lord Chancellors and Treasurers of the Realm not onely commonly but in a manner constantly till of late times were Bishops Clergy-men How strange therefore may it seem that the Laws of England should make a Function so ancient and honorable in England to be Treason which
certainly is the same function now that it was then when it was most honored and hath suffered no more change from what it first was then Saint Pauls Church hath suffered change since the time it was first built by King Ethelbert that is it is grown old indeed and by the iniquity of the times hath lost some part of that outward Glory Magnificence and Splendor which it once had And for Papists if men goe about to make them a Sect and endeavor to suppress them under that notion truly we shall be found a very ancient Sect and I bâ—leeve it will trouble the best Doctor in Enâ—land to assign us any other Sect-Master any other Author and Founder of our profession then our Saviour Christ and Sainâ— P ter But most men know 't is to litâ—le purpose to attempt any thing against us that way All other Sects have their particular Authors and many other circumstances of their begining aâ—â—â—gnable easily cleerly notoriously I mean not onely Lutherans Calvinists Anabaptists and such others of yesterday but those more ancient Arians Eunomians Pelagians Nestorians Manichees c. only Catholikes have not nor can any man shew when their profession began or from whom it came but from our Saviour and his Apostles What therefore should hinder a reconciliation and a re-admission of this Ancient and Universal profession of Christianity into England again I mean unto such an equal and avowed liberty of private exercise as other people of the Nation doe enjoy in the profession of theirs On his Majesties part I humbly suppose there can be little dâ—ubt made who hath been ever of himself constantly inclined to shew mercy if there had been no crooked and unhappy instruments about him to hinder it My minde saith the King was ever free from persecution or thralling my Subjects in matters of Conscience And again Fateor me non libenter suspendere Presbyterum c. I confess saith he it g eth much against my minde to put a Priest to death onely for his Religion or for saying of Mass He who judged that it could no way become him though a Prince of so great Learning and Judgement to pronounce sentence lightly in so old a controversie what Priest or Religious man can appeal to a better Judge or from whom should they expect a sentence of more favourable compassion He who sent into France to mediate for the peace of Strangers what man can doubt but of his own Royal inclination he is as willing to shew favour to his Subjects at home Though we differ in Religion yet in obedience to our Prince and the State that protects us we agree neither will we be preceded in this part of our duty by any profession under Heaven Our bodies are at the Kings service and at the States to command may they be pleased to leave our souls to God Let our actions be tried and if they finde not cause let them not trust us It hath bin long since observed by wise men That too much severity doth but make men desperate and it is an ancient Aphorism of State punire rarò What an honourable addition was it to Augustus Caesar his other Titles that of the Historian Sueton. Nunquam civâ—lem sanguinem fudisse That never any subject suffered by him in cold bloud And it is as infallibly true in all generous Spirits fidelem si putaveris facies that confidence gains much security from them as counting it the greatest of disgraces to be distrusted Malus custos diuturnâ—tatis metus Fear is not always the best Guardian Seneca who lived under a Tyrant and knew what tyranny was giveth this counsel Vlâ—ima supplicia suppliciis ultimis ponat Let saith he a Prince alwayes observe this rule in the administration of justice viz. That capital punishments be the last punishments which he inflicteth and never used but where no other remedy will serve And Tacitus observes it among other marks of Tiberius his cruelty Delatorum Authoritas magna frequens accusatio in quovis crimine adjuncta de laesâ Majestate Principis That Sycophants Informers and such fellows were the onely men about him and every offence was made Treason And certainly there can be no greater Symptome that Government declines to tyranny then the multitude of such people attending the Courts and that such proceedings are used I confess the Law was once strict at Rome Deos peregrinos ne colunto Yet Marcus Aurelius a wise and gallant Emperor tolerated the Christians yea Theodosius and Grat an Emperors though most most Christian and Catholike themselves yet for some time were contented to tolerate the Arians enemies of Christ The Venetians and many other Christian States permit the Jewes to live among them as Spain did the Moores till necessity at last forced the King to expel them It is a false and uncharitable Assertion savouring too much of gall and spleen to say as some do that Catholikes are unsociable they cannot live with Protestants in one Common-wealth without jars and tumults For is there any thing more visible and in your eyes every day then that the contrary is true Doe we not live among you here in England Have we not ever done so since the first unhappy difference and change made peaceably neighbourly friendly Doe me not buy and sell with you and you with us are we not ready to perform all offices of civility and good neighbourhood where we live Doe we refuse any kinde of temporal duties or payments Even of our Tiths to the Ministers which yet are in themselves a kinde of religious Salary and if in any surely we should boggle and shew unwillingness in them Besides it is a false surmise that we hold all Protestants generally for Heretikes and Excommunicate persons as some spare not to urge both in the pulpit and press to make us odious or that thereby we should think our selves at liberty when we have opportunity to deal less faithfully justly and truly with them then becommeth honest men and Christians For that they are not Excommunicate I mean specially by name or by any such sentence of the Judge Ecclesiastical as doth relax or debar either all or any civil duty towards them is out of question And to make a man Heretike formally speaking and in the proper notion of that crime obstinacie in opinion is by all confess d to be requisite and that he persisteth deliberately therein notwithstanding that he knoweth the opinion which he holdeth to be contrary to the Doctrine of the Catholike Church and to the general unanimous or known consent of those Pastors which as Saint Paul teacheth us ought to have the oversight and government of him in our Lord Acts 20.28 Heb. 13.7.17 Tit. 3.10 which I suâ—poâ—e cannot be the case of all the Protestants in England Indeed of thâ— Doctrine of Protestancy as 't is consider'd in it self abstractâ—dly from the persons that profess it we say 't is Heresie that is to say â— false
Doctrine a condemned Doctrine a Doctrine so far as Doctrin can barely be not only of dangerous but of damnable malignity being contrary to the Doctrine and Institutions of true Christian Religion which our Saviour by his Apostles left unto the Church to be professâ—d and observed for ever and therfore in it self of such nature that it ought to be deposed by all men who desire to be saved and in profession whereof no man living may securely rest This we say of their Doctrine But as to the persons of Protestants themâ—elves viz. how far their personal errour in the profession thereof is voluntary and affectate what means of better information they do neglect against how much light that is inward knowledge and perswasion of minde that Catholike Religion is true they doe sin or what secret doubtings they have that it may be true what inward stirrings and checks of conscience they doe stifle in themselves and persist in a way which their own hearts suspect meerly for temporal ends and because it stands better with their designs of this world that is the present interests of their honouâ—s reputation ease pleasure profit c. or lastly how far their ignorance of the truth may be perhaps invinc ble which where it is so excuseth much of all this we say nothing God onely knoweth how things are with them in these respects not man no not the men themselves and therefore as concerning their persons to his judgemâ—nt onely we must leave them This business therefore viz. of Protestants being counted Heretikes by us is but a Bug-bear a Scar-crow set up on purpose by those our Adversaries who would have the difference and aversions which they have bred betwixt us to be immortal Rather it were to be wished by all honest men of what perswasion soever that a just and equitable liberty in matters of conscience were granted unto all if but for this onely respect viz. That so by a free confident and friendly conversing one with another void of suspition void of jealousie fear danger to one party or other and by amicable discourse and debating of things truth might come to be more cleerly discoverded and we might be able through Gods grace mutually to give and receive good one of another But this is a work which hath so much of God and goodness in it that we cannot but expect many adversaries should appear against it However those Doctors Boutefeux should doe well to remember if they pleas'd that even by the Law of Seniority Catholikes might expect some little favour For we beseech them to tell us upon what Patrimony doe themselves and families now live but that which the right Heirs of the Church dis-inherited indeed or disseized by the power of the State have left them What Priviledges Immunities Honours have they but what the old Church gave them What Churches have they either Cathedral Collegiate or Parochial which She built not What Colledges which She founded or endowed not Nay whence have they their Bible the Creed the Ceremonies or any thing else that is good and commendable among them but from Her If She had not preserved them faithfully to their hands they had never found them Shall Charity then be for ever so buried in England that the posterity of those from whom they must confess to have received these great advantages shall never be remembred by them never be used with equity and common justice It were too great a shame surely to lye long upon such a Nation as this and a defect of Government which all Nâ—tions about us would observe Beside let our Adversaries remember what the French commonly say Chacum á son tour and we in England A dog hath a day Religion here with us since King Henry the Eighth wore the Crown hath had many changes and exchanges as the world knoweth and the principles on which it now standeth are not thought to be so fixed and unmoveable but that it may take one turn more All things are in the hands of God and whatsoever he hath determined in the Counsel of his Divine wisdom must stand and take effect in its appointed due time say we or do we to the contrary what we can And therefore let our hot Brethren the Calvinists who can themselves so little endure the severity of Bishops let them not further promote nor hold up persecution against any body else least in an howre when they think lest of it the mischief which they wish to others fall upon their own heads and that they finde themselves not onely out of the Saddle where they would be but in the Mire under the Horse belly and so obnoxious as they may have need of favor themselves They desire nothing more then Liberty of Conscience in their own way fulness of liberty to themselves let them be perswaded also to grant the same unto others That this is but equal reason it self will tell us And that persecution for matter of Religion is not always the best means to advance religion is the judgement of as wise and learned men even of their own profession as any they can shew for the contrary What Luthers opinion was in the point I value no much because the world did not take him for a man very learned or very wise although by Gods permission he did much mischief in it for his time as a simple Conjurer though he be neither Mathematician nor Philosopher himself yet by the help of the Devil may raise a storm able to confound all the Sciences Nevertheless what he thought appears in his Assertions Art 33. de non comburendis Haereticis Vrbanus Rhegius Wolfgangus Musculus famous men and Protestants both of them in their Common places are much against persecution for Religion So is Osiander Epitom Centur. 7. Chytraeus in Chron. 1593. Castalio and others But above all Acontius in his Book de Stratagemat Satan is most earnest Dominus non permittit haereticorum supplicium imò definitè declaravit interdixit c. God saith he doth not permit nor allow that Hereticks should be thus punished yea he hath expresly declared his minde to the contrary and forbidden the Magistrate to exercise any such Authority upon them Calvin once that is till he had setled himself in power at Genevah held the same opinion and was much for Liberty of Conscience Hen. 2. when Annas Burges died for Heresie in France Of the same judgement also is Monsieur Lanou in his Discourses Sturmius in his Epistles Bâ—lloy Melancthon and many other professed and earnest Protestants Not to mention Erasmus Cassander Grotius or any other of that middle temper And as for matter of example or practise do not the Cantons in Switzerland agree well enough in Temporal things notwithstanding their difference in Religion is mutual Toleration of one another in their several judgements that way any prejudice to the publike peace Are there any people under Heaven more happy and free then they or more likely to
that should now prohibit it although I perswade it not And concludes generally that whatsoever the ancient Patriarks are reported to have done in this kinde is free in it self to be done and ought not to be prohibited at this day Thus did not Elias preach nor Saint John Baptist nor any of the Prophets But of all his Doctrine concerning grace and good life is most scandalous and detestable In Philip. Fol. 345. Tom. 1. lat Si vera Gratia est c. would you be sure saith he that the grace of God is true grace in you And that with him is only Remission or Pardon of sin See then that you be truly sinners sin lustily and with a witness onely trust as much and be confident in Christ For t is not sin that can divide you from him no nothing but unbeleeving though you should commit Murther Adultery or Fornication a Thousand times in a day As for his Pride it was so intolerable that even those complained of it who were his followers in most things and of his excessive scurrility even in matters most sacred Now to speak of Galvin who was little less then a professed Adversary and taxed him frequently not onely in point of Doctrine but of manners and good life Cont. Melanch nor of Tossanus and others of that side Bucer himself who was his Friend Disciple and Follower confesseth plainly That Luther was blamed of all men for an immoderate insolency and contumeliousness of Spirit which he manifested in all his writings Resp ad Luth. Oecolampadius tells him he begins and ends his work commonly with the Devil But Zuinglius and his Brethren of Zurick are hottest of all Nullum unquam Mortalium c. We beleeve saith they that never Mortal man handled the mysteries of Christian Religion more unworthily and filthily then Luther hath done not observing the bounds even of common modestie and good manners Another calls him Divelish Lyar Campanus and maintains that he never had any true Light or understanding of the Gospel in him No what then is become of Elias their Prophet the man sent so Extraordinarily they say by God to reform the world Doth such a Seer see nothing now but Phantasmes and the immaginations of his own vain heart This were very strange indeed and the poor Country of Germany in an unhappy condition to have followed a seducing Epicure so far But who can they blame but themselves It was too much confidence even in the judgement of their own Brethren For not onely Galvin is very angry Admon ultim ad Westphal that the world should have such opinion of him saying directly Qui volunt de Luthero intelâ—igi c. They that apply the Prophesies of Elias unto Luther do in my opinion very unadvisedly and commit as great a sin as those Egyptians did who adored the Body and Sepulcher of the Prophet Jeremy But to call him The last Elias is unpardonable Sacrilege temeritatis est c. It is a Sacrilegious rashnest saith he to do so as if the Lords hand were shortned and that he could not finde a better or his equal to send forth for the reforming of the Church which was much contrary to the opinion he had of himself I say not onely Calvin but many other more moderately affected more Allied in point of opinion unto Luther do yet finde fault with those Exotick Titles and pretentions of his to Elias and Extraordinary Mission Vrbanus Rhegius both for Quality and cleer confession may serve for all Admon Cap. 6. Scimus istos Magnis clamoribus regerere Lutherum esse Prophetam c. I know saith he very well what some men will reply with no little confidence That Luther was a Prophet immediately raised by God to reform the Church c. but Manifestum est illos pessimè de totâ Christi Ecclesiâ mereri c. They saith he who think so or say so deserve very little thanks of the Church of God neither do they well by such extravagant and undue Titles to exempt any man from the Censure and Judgement of the Churches much less to make his writings as it were a Rule of Faith and Beleeving unto all men And therefore as to the pretence of Extraordinary Mission a thing onely given out to amaze the ignorant world and to countenance irregular courses I suppose it will hardly stand in the judgement of indifferent and wise men there is so little evidence or argument for it Either extraordinary as was most requisite to have been shewen or ordinary that is of but vertuous and commendable Conversation Shall we consider a little the fruits of it and what good it wrought in the world Our Saviour Matth. 7.15 speaking generally of false Prophets and such Pretenders as Luther was telleth us By their fruits you shall know them And it is certain the experience of all Nations and Ages doth confirm it That when a Country hath the happiness to be converted from Heresie Infidelity or any other false and corrupt way of Worshipping God by Preachers lawfully and in truth sent unto them from God some extraordinary and singular Reformation of manners doth follow thereupon and their Conversion worketh in them a great and eminent degree of Holiness Vertue Piety Devotion and purity of Conversation answerable to the means which God useth towards them and to the Spirit which worketh in them But in the Reformation of Luther it was nothing so The change of the world which followed upon his preaching was notoriously seen not to be to the better but to the worse both in respect of the Publike Affairs of State and of the private manners of men Men grew upon it much more lewd much more vicious unchristian and godless in their conversation then they were before And this so evidently that it is not without much regret and shame acknowledged even by those who were a principal cause of it Let Luther himself speak in the first place The world Serm. in 1. Dom. Advent saith he groweth every day worse and worse it is apparent men are now much more covetous much more malicious and given to revenge much more unruly shameless and full of all vice then thâ—y were in time of Popery In vitâ ejus Aurifaber pronounceth as from Luthers own Mouth Post exortum Evangelium c. That since the appearance of this Gospel vertue seems to be utterly extinct and devotion as it were driven out of the world Smidelin confesseth of the Lutherans That the world may easily see they are no Papists and trust not to good works For saith he they do not any The greatest part of our people saith Bucer Bucer de Regn. Christi lib. 1. c. 4. seems to have imbraced the Gospel onely out of intent to shake of the Yoke of Discipline which lay upon them and the obligation of Fasting Pennance c. which they were forced to observe in the time of Popery and to live at