Uniting Protestants by Act of Parliament And many Episcopal Divines and some Bishops were for it a clear discovery that the mischiefs of our Divisions are of that sort that it were better that an abatement were made of some things made necessary to Uniformity without which the Dissenters will not unite than suffer them to hang over our heads and come upon us we plainly see that many of these reasons of the Commons were of no force we will observe what is of present use to our times which is the first and for the other it became their Wisdom and Religion to Pass a Bill taking from the Act of Uniformity his Majesty hath not been molested by the Importunities of the Dissenters who have not so much as opened their Grievances or Petitioned the King and Parliament these many years There is no new Sect appearing or increase of any by the Non-conformists to weaken the Protestant Religion who have us'd endeavours to Increase and Maintain it it is is in no danger from them they are not troublesome to the Government are not for a Toleration of intolerable Sects and Sectaries contend not for an Establishment which they would rejoyce in but as it become learned men and rational with as great a temper at least as theirs that writ against them the Peace of the Nation is not disturb'd by them and if Popery come in it is against their wills Pains and Prayers to expose and baffle it It is their trouble that they are thought troublesome to the Government which may by no extraordinary exercise of Patience and Love overcome the trouble in their own Breast which is the seat of trouble and for the only remaining which is the evil of Schism it 's clear that Connivance gives no Establishment to it c. But seeing the D. is so confident of the Authority of the Commons in that Parliament and lays so much stress upon it we hope he will not decline the Authority of the whole when the Experience of Ten Years had made them wiser for p. 22. our Author tells what England knows That that very Parliament which was observed for a great part of it to be young Gentlemen growing Elder became more cool and moderate toward Dissenting Protestants more suspicious of Popery and the more Resolute they grew in Maintaining Property and the Protestant Religion and break the leggs and arms of growing Popery the more temperate they grew toward Nonconformists c. And therefore at that meeting of the Parliament in Feb. 24. 1672. An Act passed against Papists and a Bill was presented by the same House of Commons to the Lords in favour of the Dissenting and for Uniting Protestants which as some who have as much reason to know as any that write say would have passed if they had got time to sit and from that time that Long Parliament who had made the Act against Conventicles A. 1670. how Resolute soever they were against Indulgence Feb. 15. 1662. they saw the incompatibility of the Execution of their own Law and the Preservation of the Protestant Religion and have ever since taken other Measures Now whether or not the same Parliament after ten years Experience of the weakness and some worse evils of their own Prophetical Arguments upon which they retract their former Sentence is to be more regarded than when they gave their first unexperienced thoughts we shall leave all thinking Men to judge and of the D's Candour in concealing this part of the History And if we were to manage this Argument by Authority we have an Act of Parliament consisting of as good Protestants A. 1689. to ballance the Addrese of the Commons in 1662. with the concurring Authority of all our Kings who have been experienced in these our differences asserting the conveniency of Indulging tender Consciences as we could give him undeniable Instances But one for all is the Vote of the House of Commons passed Jan. 10th 168 where they say It is the Opinion of this House that the Persecution of Protestant Dissenters upon the Penal Laws is at this time Grievous to the Subject and weakening to the Protestant Interest an Encouragement to Popery and dangerous to the Peace of the Kingdom His 7th and last Argument which he calls the most forcible of all is the judgment of the Ministers of London with those of Lancaster against Toleration Printed Anno 1648. A. Tho' we allow the Truth of all those Ministers say yet they never intended that for that end which he perverts their words to For it will be hard to persuade the world that these men judged the Toleration of Presbyterians unlawful seeing themselves were such and because his whole Argument runs upon a false supposition that we desired an universal Toleration of all Sects he may receive our judgment in this from our confession Cap. 20. Sect. 3. They who upon pretence of Christian Liberty do practice any Sin or cherish any Lust do thereby destroy the end of Christian Liberty c. And because the Power which God hath ordained and Liberty which Christ hath purchased are not intended by God to destroy but mutually to uphold one another they who upon pretence of Christian Liberty shall oppose any lawful Power whether Civil or Ecclesiastical resist the Ordinance of God and for their publishing such Opinions and maintaining such Practices as are contrary to the Light of Nature or the known Principles of Christianity whether concerning Faith Worship Conversation or the Power of Godliness Or such Erronious Opinions or Practices as either in their own nature or in the manner of publishing and maintaining them are destructive to the external Order which Christ has Established in the Church they may be lawfully call'd to account and proceeded against by the Censures of the Church and by the Power of the Civil Magistrate Thus far our Confession of Faith By this 't is apparent that we justify no unlimited Toleration and when he hath made it appear that we maintain Opinions and Practices inconsistent with the light of Nature and known Principles of Christianity either in Faith Worship or Conversation or destructive of the external Order by Christ Established in his Church then let us be look't upon as deserving no Toleration and till then we judge our title to it as good as theirs who enjoy their legal Establishment and tho we are not for encouraging any Evils yet we believe if no Sinner were tolerable the D. himself would be intolerable for the Apostle teacheth G. 6. 1. that even Brethren may be overtaken in faults but then they are to be restored with the spirit of meekness not rigor Every Sin is not the object of Church Censure or the Magistrate's Wrath but they may and ought to bear one anothers burthens and not to bind more heavy burthens on the backs of our Brethren and then lash them for their inability to bear them For his Remark about that which he calls the fortune of Toleration which is as
Illustrious and unparallel'd Line is the greatest glory of this your Ancient Kingdom we pay our most humble gratitude to Your Majesty for the repeated assurances of your Royal Protection to our National Church and Religion as the Laws have Established them which are very suitable to the gracious countenance incouragement and Protection your Majesty was pleased to afford to our Church whilst we were happy in your presence amongst us We Magnifie the Divine Majesty for blessing you with a Son and us with a Prince whom we pray Heaven may bless and preserve to sway Your Royal Scepter after you and that he may inherit with Your Royal Dominions the Illustrious and Heroick virtues of his August and most Serene Parents We are amaz'd to hear of the danger of an Invasion from Holland which excites our prayers for an universal Repentance to all orders of men that God may yet spare his people preserve Your Royal Person prevent the Effusion of Christian blood and give such Success to your Majesty's Arms that all who invade your Majesty's just and undoubted Right and Disturb or Interrupt the Peace of your Realms may be disappointed and cloathed with shame so that on your Royal Head the Crown may still flourish As by the grace of God we shall preserve in our selves an unshaken and firm Loyalty so we shall be careful and zealous to promote in all your Subjects an intrepid and stedfast Allegiance to your Majesty as an essential part of their Religion and the glory of our holy Profession Not doubting but that God in his great mercy who hath so often preserved and delivered your Majesty will still preserve and deliver you by giving you the hearts of your Subjects and the necks of your Enemies so Pray we who in all humility are May it please your most Sacred Majesty Your Majesty's most Humble most Faithful and most Obedient Subjects and Servants Edinburgh Nov. 3 1688. Signed by the Lords Bishops B. St. Andrews B. Glasgow B. Galloway B. Aberdeen B. Dunkell B. Buchan B. Orkney B. Murray B. Ross B. Dumblaine B. Isles Here is a Specimen of those Gentlemens Genius whose heads the D. would preserve while he boldâ—y opposeth truth and necessitates us to lay open to the world this Tryal of Skill of his Episcopal Brethren who all yet except the Bishop of Rapho whom an Irish Bishoprick hath converted glory in their being counted worthy to suffer for K. James and continue to deny Allegiance to K. William with many of their fellow Brethren That the Scoth Bishops unanimously deserted the convention of States we suppose none of themselves will deny which if any do we shall In Answer to his reasons proving these Reflections untrue because that the conversion would have pass'd some publick and severe mark upon them had that been true we say that by this he sees the mildness and tenderness of that convention who without laying open to the world their grossest Iniquities only voted the Bishops and their Clergy the great and unsupportable grievance of the Nation and thereupon voted the total abolishing of Prelacy and if these be not publick and severe marks indeed upon them why doth he make such a horrid Noise about their Persecution further 't is not to be attributed to want of matter that in the Act they are excluded by there is no particular mention of the misbecoming actions of their Lives c. for Parliaments are not Historians but yet if he long for a Legend of their Lives he may possibly obtain his desires e're long little to their Credit or his Comfort for there are many recorded Instances of their misbecoming actions noticed by those who smarted under them which if he necessitates us to lay open to the world possibly his Brethren may thank him For do's he think that so long as it remains in the Records of Counsel that they imposed and took a contradictory Test that it will not be alledged that they are perjured themselves and the cause of it in others or that they abjured what they had formerly sworn with great Solemnity and betrayed the truth committed to them Yea sure so long as it continues in the Records of these Counsels whereof they were Members that they ordered men to be killed without any Tryal or Colour of Law or so much as with an exception whether they resisted or no it will be hard to purge them from the guilt of Murther for it is very evident that these Prelates had a hot hand in all the Innocent Blood shed in Scotland in K. Charles II. and K. James I. times which we leave to those who may write their History Possibly the D. believes not this because he heard it not and therefore we urge him to inform himself better from Authentick Proofs and Records of that Nation that the Stains of his Brethren there may be a warning to him and all Clergy-men to fright them from merciless cruelty to which from a small tryal of his skill already given we fear he may be too much given His second exception against those two Gentlemens Letter is That it confidently asserts that there is not so much as one single man who was in the Possession of their Churches and publick Livings whâ—n K. James abdicated and forfeited who hath since K. William ' s accession to the Crown been thrust out for any other Crimes than either 1. for not reading the Proclamation whereby K. William and Q. Mary were Declared King and Queen or 2. for their not Praying for His Majesty or 3. for not Swearing the Oath of Allegiance and Assurance or 4 for such Immoralities as the Church of England as truly disallows as Prebyterians To contradict which he produceth an Instance of one Mr. Samuel Mowat a Clergy-man of Scotland in the Diocess of Glasgow and at the time in Dublin c. who was in possession of his Church in Scotland after K. William and Q Mary's accession to the Throne and read the Proclamation c. published by the Council of Scotland April 13. 1689. by the appointment of the General Assembly 2. Prayed for Their Majesties 3. took the Oath of Allegiance and Assurance 4. was free of Immoralities c. and declared himself willing to submit to the Presbyterian Government according to his Majesty's Formula and yet he was rejected by them because he would not renounce the Episcopal Government and declare his sorrow for submitting to it A. We might satisfy our selves with this that Mr. Samuel Mowat point blank denies what the D. hath written to be his Testimony and that it is grosly falsifyed but tho' he had said all this his single Testimony does not prove it's Truth for while he says that the Assembly appointed the reading the Proclamation whereby K. William and Q. Mary were Declared King and Queen which Proclamation was published April 13. 1690. This must be false seeing there was no Assembly till October 16. 1690. when they first sat after the Revolution It 's
conditions to an Enemy which if he were left to the freedom of his own will neither his fatherly kindness would incline him nor his prudence permit him to allow even to some of his own Children this were no reflection on his justice or kindness A. Supposito quolibet sequitur quodlibet But let us suppose as well as he what is real matter of fact that the Civil Parent is under no such pressure but delivered from it by the assistance of his dutiful Children It wou'd reflect on his justice not only to treat equally dutiful Children unequally but to deal worse with the dutiful Children than with rebellious heart-Enemies And it is but to Preach up Rebellion to tell us that our Civil Parents may reward Rebellion with priviledges not to be granted to Loyal Subjects For if Rebellion be the way to obtain priviledges men will easily be induc'd to Rebel To the D's reflection on Dissenters as men of uncertain measures and unsteady tempers and therefore not to be trusted for it 's unknown what changes some sudden turns of publick Affairs might make in the passions and interests of such men We Answer that tho we pretend not to immutability yet most Dissenters dare assert the certainty of their measures and steadiness of their tempers to have exceeded their Accusers for neither can he charge us with breach of our Oath to any King after Swearing never to take up Arms against him nor any in Authority by him upon any pretence whatsoever nor did we violate our Faith by endeavoring alteration of the Government in the State Having never taken such an Oath Some of his own Brethren can tell him that the Pillars of his Party who in former Reigns were fixed Stars are now become Planets And that of the seven Golden Candlesticks put in the Tower by King Ja. five of them prov'd Princes Metal The Speech made by the Bishop of M. in the name of the Clergy to King Ja. at the Castle of Dublin March 1688. And that made to K. William at his Camp nigh Dublin 7 July 1690. by the same Persons convince us that sudden turns of publick Affairs will change mens passions yea and prayers to witness that set framed 1688. against the Invasion intended by the Pr. of O. and the new Edition framed since for K. William where God is thanked for not hearing the former prayers so that Turpe est doctori cum culpa redaâ—guit ipsum If they be afraid of our unsteady tempers let us be Established by Law and that prevents the evil in us as well as them The D'â— consequence from the uncertain measures c. of Dissenters viz. that all prudent and unbyass'd persons will agree in judging that a limited Indulgence will be more proper for the Non-Conformists than a legal and restrictive Liberty c. A. We are of opinion that neither We nor the Establish't Church have right to unlimited Liberty for as Rex habet in Regno suo superiores Deum legem Parliamentum as a great Lawyer saith so we are satisfied that both C N. C be limited by these only we desire that our Liberty granted be not clogg'd with Tests destructive of that Liberty by which only the best and most capable of serving their King and Country amongst the Dissenters are Disenabled thereto And tho' as he saith that none blame the Chineses for building a Wall to defend their Frontiers from the Incursions of the Tartars yet we are told by as good an Author as himself that that great Wall doth not keep the Cham of Tartary from invading that rich and plentiful Country insomuch that his successors have been quiet possessors of it ever since 1650. But tho' Walls be good for defence yet the Chinesies were never such fools as to make partition Walls to divide their Kingdom The D. vain gloriously boasting that he had beaten the V. out of his several Arguments pursues him with open mouth to matter of fact And is as followeth The V. had hinted a memorial of the State of the Church of Scotland since the Revolution to vindicate the State and Church from the unjust Calumnys of the Answerer to the Case which Memorial he had from two Scotch Gentlemen particularly acquainted with the affairs of that Nation which the D. will have to be a forgery pretended to be wrought by a friend when it was the V ' s own Act and Deed and his reasons for this forgery are 1. The Title discovers it to be his 2. The Genius of the Person who is not like other Men for setting things in a false light A. The D pretends indeed to an Extraordinary Sagacity in discerning Stiles And yet what the V. asserted in that is firm truth for the Gentleman if needful can be produced and will own that Letter to be theirs and prove every tittle in it to be true so that if there be any Genius's more remarkable for raising and false accusing of the Brethren than others the D. is unhappily match'd with one of those But let 's come to the Merits of the Cause The first thing in the Letter he is offended at is a general reflection cast upon the whole Body of the Scotch Bishops for their declaring their utmost abhorrence of his presens Majesty's descent into England their Unanimous deserting of the convention of States both which he denies to be true for this reason That if they had been guilty of these things it would have occasioned some publick and severe remark to be passed upon them and would have been insisted on as the most plausible if not the greatest reason for extirpating of Episcopacy whereas in the Act for Abolishing Prelacy there is not the least censure pass'd on any of the Bishops c. A. That the Bishops of Scotland did both declare their abhorrence of the Prince of Orange's descent and Unanimously desert the convention of States are such evident truths that nothing but wilfull Ignorance or gross Impudence would make a man deny them because they were not done in a corner but in the face of the Nation now their Address to King James will sufficiently prove the first which take as followeth The Address of the Arch Bishops and Bishops of Scotland to K. James upon the news of the Prince of Orange ' s Undertaking Nov. 10. 1688. Vide Gazette Numb 2398. May it please your Most Sacred Majesty VVE prostrate our selves to pay our most devout thanks and adoration to the Soveraign Majesty of Heaven and Earth for preserving your sacred Life and Person so frequently exposed to the greatest hazards and as often delivered and you miraculously preserved with Glory and Victory in defence of the Rights and honour of Your Majesty's August Brother and these Kingdoms and that by his merciful goodness the ragings of the Sea and madness of unreasonable men have been stilled and oalmed and Your Majesty as the darling of Heaven peaceably seated on the I hrones of your Royal Ancestors whose long
true he Petition'd the Assembly who referr'd his Case to the Presbyteries of Lanerk and Hamilton where he had formerly been officiated but was by them rejected for his Immoralities which himself knows and all have cause to believe seeing Bishop Foley late Bishop of Down and Connor did for gross Immoralities fully proven against him deprive him of his Curacy he had got in the Parish of Dunean in the County of Antrim So that if he was barbarorsly robbed by Presbiterians in Scotland he has met with as little mercy from his Brethren in Ireland as the Records of the Diocess of Connor can testify His third Exception to these Gentlemens Letter is to these words in it viz. So far are they in Scotland from exercising severities against men for being Episcopal in their Judgment that a great part of the Ministers of that Kingdom who injoyed not only the Protection of the Government but the free and Publick Exercise of their Ministry together with the legal Established maintenance before the first of September last were or professed to be of the Episcopal Perswasion and had not at that time so much as taken the Oath of Allegiance to his Majesty and yet of these no more is required for their continuance in their Parishes than that they take the said Oath of Allegiance and Assurance and that they behave themselves worthily in Doctrine Life and Conversation as appears by the Act of Parliament past July 16. 1695. Before the D. can answer this he throws himself into a paraxism of astonishment at those who pretending to be more then ordinary strict and holy Ministers of Jesus Christ and the most faithful Servants of the God of truth that they can allow themselves the liberty of willfully misrepresenting the most notorious matters of Fact and the plainest State of publick Affairs and flatly contrary to truth and the mind of the writer of which he offers to prove the V. scandalously guilty But had he rightly pitcht on the guilty and as truly confest his own fault as he faâ—sly accuseth the V. he might have deserv'd compassion to cry out against those Sins in others which we nourish in our own Bosoms is hypocrisie But in answer to these words he first concedeth a matter of Fact viz. That the Episcopal Clergy in Scotland have enjoyed the free Exercise of their Religion and quiet possession of their Parishes c. which indeed many in the North yet do But saith he 1. These Instances are but seeming favours 2. They be produc'd as arguments of the moderation of the Presbyterian Government whereas they are nothing else but the effect of the weakness of the Party A. If the Protection of the Government in the free and publick Exercise of Religion with the Legally establisht maintenance be but seeming favours Let the Dissenters here have only such seeming favours and we shall promise in their name real thanks for the same But 2. He might have own'd them real favours had he consider'd on whom they were confer'd even the Abetters of Viscount Dundee's Rebellion For by his silence to the third Paragraph of that Letter viz. That at the Abetters of Viscount Dundee's Rebellion were or pretended to be of the Episcopal perswasion as have also all those that have made any Publick Commotion in that Kingdom since this happy Revolution he tacitly confesseth the truth thereof But thirdly that these favours were the effects only of the Presbyterian parties weakness will not be so easily believed by considering men for why should the Party be able to destroy the Root the Bishops and their prelacy and yet not be able to Lop off the Branches is improbable These sure who could extirpate prelacy in the North had Power to drive out Curacy there too But to make it evident that it was not the effect of weakness but their moderation they have now driven out all that rebellious brood who had contemn'd the King's Clemency and Churches moderation Yet farther had the Church of that Kingdom been weak the State was not but could easily extirpate them for he is mightily mistaken of Scotland if he thinks that many of that People would be Martyrs for Prelacy That the Episcopal Party in the North are a formidable Party and therefore kept it depends on the Credit of his Informers for were they such as he saith they 're neither stout nor kind in suffering their Reverend Fathers to be laid aside Why might not the Children who were able to secure themselves being so formidable been willing also to defend and continue their Fathers Yet his reason to prove them a formidable party viz. That part of Scotland on the North of Tay is known to be little less than the half of the Kingdom is not very formidable for if the Highlands and Isles of Scotland be comprehended in this his Geography may hold good but his reason 's lame for he will have little Credit of many of the Episcopal Highlanders who possess more Land than Religion And that the Episcopal Party there is eleven to one depends on the veracity of his Informers who we see are no friends to his Reputation and will at last cause him to turn Bankrupt of it if he continue to give such Left-handed News-mongers such Credit For deduce from the number Papists the most of whom are in the North he must abate of the proportion for in the Shires of Sutherland Stranaver Ross and Murray there might be and hath been a force which was a terror to it's Enemies raised to defend the Settlement of State and Church Besides all this considerable numbers are in every part of that Country and these as strict as any in Scotland by which we see he 's little acquainted with the State of that part of the Kingdom These favors then werenot the effect of weakness but the genuine supple fruit of the Clemency and Moderation of that Church which by long experience of the evil of oppression which is apt to make wise men mad are resolved upon it as the surest method to secure themselves and indeed their moderation is that which now is become most formidable to their wisest Enemies and the true cause why not the same moderation but distinct courses were taken with the Episcopal Câ—ergy in the North and in the West is because the Ministers in the North were generally men of better Learning and Lives and less concern'd in these Cruelties and Oppressions by which the West was harassed and so having done less harm were more favoured while those in the West met with Adonibezek's Reward Now from all this let the Reader judge if the D. had just cause for his so rash judging the Vindicator His 2. Reason to prove the V. scandalously guilty of Disingenuity and representing things contrary to Truth and his certain knowledge is that there are no Acts of Parliament in favour of the Episcopal Clergy save that of July 16. 1695. And therefore leaves it to the Reader to judge what sort of usage