Treasure so noble of birth so fortunate in Wars zealous in Religion who builded so many Hospitals founded so many Monasteries enacted such wholsome Laws and Statutes got so many Victories in Fâ—ance c. even to Palestine it Self all professed Roman Catholicks Secundo It deserves one observation that when Christianity became the ruling Religion of the World under the great Constantine and Emperours his immediate Successors the very Heathens themselves were exempt from all manner of severity upon the score of their Religion Because they were in possession of it by discent from Father to Son and not by usurpation or intrusion And we have the like president in our own Country For when King Ethelbert had embraced the Christian Faith by the preaching of Saint Austin he would not force his own Subjects though Pagans to receive it Bedâ— l. 1. c. 260. For this reason it was that the great Apostles treated the Synagogue whose Religion at that time was vacuated and consequently void of Truth with so much respect and condescendency and that afterwards the most primitive Fathers used so often this expression that the Synagogue ought to be buried with honour Whence one of our Protestant Divines saith even by the Law of Seniority Catholicks might exspect some favour For what priviledges or immunities have we but the old Church gave us whence had we our Bible Creed Honors Donations commendable Ceremonies charitable Foundations had not they preserved them faithfully we never had found them The first possession of a man is a good title by the Law of Nature until an elder or the Law of Reason which with mankind is to have pre-eminence dispossesses it The Roman Church had a possession unquestionable for above a thousand years and the Pope enjoyed jurisdiction a longer time than any succession of Princes can pretend to and submitted to by all our Ancestors In Catholick Religion they stand as defenders others as invaders they as possessors others as disseisors they seek to keep what de jure they had Calvin and others what they had not There is a vast difference in these two Cases to oppose by force the introducement of innovations and to attempt by force the extinguishment of an ancient Religion of which the People are universally in a quiet and immemorial possession The one drives others out of possession the other maintains himself the one invades his neighbours rights the other defends his own Apostacy and innovation with some colour of right have been oft in several ages persecuted by rigour of Laws even by Protestants and the reason is because innovation in Religion most commonly breeds disturbance in the Common-wealth Natural reason teaches that no particular man is to be condemned much less deprived of what he stands possessed till his cause be judiciously heard and sentenced Nor ought any man to be Judg in his own Cause But penal Laws and Oaths made in contempt and derogation of that Religion which through all Christendom abounds with learning civility and loyalty whose Doctrin amongst the primitive greatest and most learned societies hath been and is avouched in most Nations and Kingdoms allowed and more freely exercised and permitted established by the Laws in which our Predecessors were born and continued wherein all our Progenitors all the Peers Ecclesiast Nobles and Princes of our Realm in precedent ages thought themselves happy and honourable If they had imagined that in future times their Posterity would revile that Religion with Epithets unbeseeming humane much less Christian Ears what an opinion would they have preconceived of us It was said by King James one of the most learned Princes not in private but in open Parliament represented I acknowlege the Roman Church to be our Mother Church although defiled with infirmities and corruptions Is it not then a kind of Spiritual Parracide in the Daughter not only to revile the Mother or which is worse scratch her by the Face call her Whore Superstitious Idolatrous c. on whose Knees you have been dandled nourished by her Breasts and carried in her Womb Hear O you Heavens and give ear O earth I have nourished and brought up Children and they have rebelled against me Isa 1. 2. Let it be allowed some corruptions be of our aged Mother this should be no warrant for cruelty but rather a motive of compassion especially considering that by confession of all her adversaries those pretended failings are of no modern date but such as they are now such likewise they were when first Christianity was received by English-men under King Ethelbert The Church of England who Glory in their succession of Bishops and in this is singular from other Reformers acknowledge they immediately derive their true and lawful Ordination and mission and from whom their first Mininistry viz. Cranmer Baker c. were Consecrated and consequently that the Roman Church conveyed divine right and authority from Christ to them the very essence and being of Religion Which Church notwithstanding they call Antichristian Idolatrous c. abusing tender Consciences sâ—â—press that which themselves confess to be divine Truth condemn as Trayâ—â—rs and persecute to death with pâ—â—munire loss of fortunes c. those from whom such Apostolical Graces and Functions proceed and were continued and preserved If our succession from the Roman be the glory of the English Church it s our scorn and ignominy to persecute and revile them Tertio Penal Laws and Statutes against the Catholick Religion destroyes the ground and foundation of Justice and the form Judicature Because the Witness can have no evidence for their Testimony the Judges not any for their sentence and the Legislator as little for the Law Primo There must be evidence of lawful Witnesses In matters of Faith we go by hearing Rom. 10. The best evidence then of any Religion is the testimony of our deceased Predecessors and Ancestry whose Faith and Doctrine is fresh in the memories and testimonies of the Christian posterity of the present Church For besides the Authority of the present Church we can have no greater evidence in foro externo for the Law of God and Religion then the testimony of precedent ages confirmed with supernatural Signs v. g. the fourteenth Age delivered to the fifteenth the Roman Faith which now they profess assuring them that it was the true sense and Letter of Scripture which they had learned from the thirteenth age and so forward to the Apostles No reformers can produce one lawful Witness against Catholick Religion and their sense of Scripture yet the Greatest Crimes require at least one lawful Witness For what evidence had the first Reformers to oppose the testimony of all former Ages confirmed with so many miracles and to make Statutes against the known practiced Religion at least for nine hundred years Antiquity affords them none because though in diverse Ages some odd men did testifie sometimes an errour they were in those very times contradicted by the Church and declared impostors and innovators In this
in a fair and equal retribution Whence a late Presb. Divine confesseth none ever saw any argument yet could clearly evince why any sort of men who would profess a peaceable subjection unto the Civil Government might not in all their Civil Rights be protected by it I conceive it therefore most clear both in right reason and true Religion that Governours ought to move in that middle way between tolerating all differences and none at all in matters of Religion wherein men are variously to be considered according to the profession they own and make of Religion as none are to be tolerated in Blasphemy or any that have cast off all sense of justice order shame and humanity seeing the nature of man is more prone to imbibe noxious things then to eject them so true virtuous liberty is not to be infringed nor any who can give a sober Christian and rational account for their principles and profession to Church and State For the Power among Chrstians should not be a hard and sharp rock dashing presently all in pieces that touch and strike at it in the least kind though never so modestly Christian Religion saith a learned Divine hath moderated the extremity of Servitude as to Civil things in all places where it was received when certainly it is much more consonant to that Religion and especially that form of Religion which hath asserted its Spiritual Liberty from the impositions of others to allow a Spiritual Freedom to others Another of our Divines saith Christian Religion ought not to be made a snare harrow a rack or heavy yoak or an Egyptian bondage to mens minds and consciences this were to turn the sweetest vine into a sharp bramble and fig-tree into a thorn nor is there any thing Christians should be more tender of as the Ephesine Fathers admonish than their own and others true liberty Christ hath purchased with his pretious Blood of which Christian Magistrates should be exact keepers and conscientious defenders lest piety prove an oppression and the bracelets and ornaments of Religion become the chains of hypocrisie and manacles of superstition binding such heavy burdens on mens Consciences which God hath not imposed but exempted from their Commission The best way to convince opposers is by instructing them in meekness in the Spirit of Love by suitable acts of indulgency for our dear Lord that bought us will take nothing more kindly at this time from us saith an ingenious Author as to be pitiful to his Servants who are distressed about your acts in point of Conscience who the more distressed they are and like to our Lord the fitter subjects they are for your Compassion If you had no need of mercy from God it were tolerable then for you to be extream towards others In point of Christianity we should be merciful unto them as our heavenly Father is merciful Luke 6. 36. Mercy is to be preferred before Sacrifice No torture no rack or tyranny so great as when exercised on the conscience forcing to declare or swear where their judgments are not fully satisfied Force may make an hypocrite it is Faith grounded on knowledge and consent that makes a Christian no war so passionate as the war of Conscience in Factions Conventicles Associations and Sects such practises become not the Gospel nor are suitable to Christ's meek Precepts Sufferings and Doctrine True Christian Concord is the consequence only of a favourable benignity or toleration as before circumstantiated For a true Christian following the rules precepts and examples of our Saviour Jesus Christ loveth God above all things and his Neighbour as himself doth injury to no man pardoneth all injuries done to him esteemeth and honoureth every one according to his degree and merit represseth all concupisence unlawful desires obeyeth Magistrates Superiours and laws as the ordinance of God Non propter â—iram Sed propter justitiam Rom. 13. Not for fear but conscience Yeildeth to every one his due to Caesar that which is due to Caesar c. And finally preferreth in all things the publick wealth before his private Commodity hence it followeth that in whatsoever state he liveth he is humble meek peaceable obedient temperate just religious and consequently a good and excellent member of his Common-wealth insomuch that if the precepts of Christian Religion were followed there should need no Political Law which as the Apostle saith posita est injustis non subditis ordained for the disobedient and unjust Christian Religion in respect of the means it giveth for attaining of true perfection and virtue and for the purity and excellency of the doctrine and of rites and ceremonies is truly Political and most necessary for Government of state whence whosoever is a true and perfect Christian is and must needs be Bonus Civis a good Citizen as Aristotle termeth a good member of the Common-Wealth This was evident to the Paynims when they considered Christian Doctrine without Passion and partiality that Pliny the Second being proconsul of Asia under Trajan Emperour acknowledged the same in an Epistle to Trajan written in favour of persecuted Christians in his Jurisdiction testifying of them they were an innocent and harmless people whose custom and exercise was to assemble themselves in the night to sing Hymns and Praises to Jesus Christ and that they promised and vowed to Commit no offence or do any hurt to other men not to steal rob perjury break promise c. upon which testimony Trajan ordained no Christian should be further punished or inquired of for their Religion Euseb l. 3. Ecclesiast c. 27. and his Successor Adrian upon Like suggestion and information given by a noble man Called Serennio Gramiano gave order to Minutius Fundanus his proconsul that Christians should not be punished Euseb l. 4. c. 8. Hist Eccles Thus ordaiâ—ed they knowing only some points of Christian Religion if they had understood how it reforms mens manners how the Canons Codes institutes digests out of the Corpus Civile are congruous consonant with the good of Civil society they would not have held it only tolerable but even necessary for establishment and conservation of Goverment As nothing is more plain and sure then that the tolerating of all Sects errors and faults which conscience may pretend for or of none at all are utterly destructive of Christian and human peace society and safety nor is he well in his wits that holdeth either part universally or unlimitted who thinketh all or none to be tolerated for by the one we should have no government and by the other in time by death banishments persecutions c. we should have no Subjects to be governed nor have any Servant so no Master no Wife so no Husband So seeing an universal unity among Christians is not to be attained a toleration of things tolerable is not only lawful but necessary a Latitude of Liberty is left in such things as are not clearly and positively laid down in Scripture Or in things of private practice
and dust as every one hath received a several external figure of Face and every one a diverse internal form of mind every one a Cogitation and fancy distant from whence it cometh that there is so great diversity of Opinions so strange a contrariety of inclinations so different affections and passions in mortal men that no ordinary means is forcible enough to perswade them to any thing to which their private Spirits or imaginations are not inclined Hence so many Scripture interpretations so many quarrels and divisions in Religion even to Massacres Evils unknown to the very Heathens Hence we have often seen good by false representations may pass for abominable in the sight of sober men Hence the inconsiderate multitude prejudiced by education passion interest or false Teachers representing the Roman Church to them as a Monster composed of all sort of abomination having their Ears perpetually beaten with seven Hills Antichrist Idolatry Superstition by many unchristian aspersions false pretences by private forgeries and publick impressions wounding most Christian and innocent men How can they otherwise but hate them they know no better and even suck from their first Milk such an ill Opinion or odium of them as if they were Turks or Jews and had principles destructive to common Society Peace and Concord What a Wonder and what a Lamentation is it that those men who cry out so much for forbearance to Magistrates should themselves be so rigid and can less forbear dissenters or see the same sin in themselves So justifie all their Cruelties and think persecution to be their Duty Whence is persecution but from thinking ill of others abhorring and not loving them condemning them without hearing bearing them down not with sincere and plain dealing becoming Christians with inveterate malice filling Books with trivial Stories and Fables pickt up out of Authors without discretion make it their business to seek calumnies and reproaches in the Sepulchres and Common-shores of Schismaticks with untrue reporting of Doctrins false and unjust Criminations and other indirect wayes unseemly and unworthy the Cause of Truth to the dishonour of God and disparagement of Christian Religion Reading a Treatise lately Printed against Toleration by an university Schollar Had this Dilemma if Liberty or Toleration may be granted either an universal Toleration or particular not an universal for then saith he Papists may be tolerated which is against all As if all the Monsters of Aegypt may be admitted so the Papists be excluded Yet we must know if there had been no Papists in the World no other Sect among us had ever heard of Christianity If we knew all the Evils may ensue we should then be forced to Check the People from railing and let them feel our anger who would deceive us with Lies Nor can we look on those men as either of wit or honesty who are ever promoting the harassing of a faithful party needlesly to disoblige their fellow Subjects and Sufferers Wherefore to undeceive the so long abused and deluded multitude I will endeavour in the ensuing discourse to wipe of the Paint and Fucus that so things may appear in their true complexion unadulterated with the slights and subtilties of deluders I have chosen rather to expose these lines to Censure than to forbear to speak or be silent in the Cause and Defence of the Innocent Silui a bonis saith the Prophet dolor meus renovatus est in the following lines shall be shewed that the Law of God Christian Religion nature reason and our own principles doth oblige us to more charitable censures of the Roman Religion And that they are as highly if not more entitled to the true Christian Liberty of Conscience than any other Sect or Religion whatsoever all objections to the contrary cleared and evinced to any rational or impartial Reader If it remains as a Probatum est that no Christian ought to be compelled in matters of Faith or Religion provided it broacheth forth no new Sects or Schisms or that it be not in Case of Scandal or open blasphemy And if the Fundamental Laws and Government were established as a Defence and Protection to all sober peaceable Christians that immunity and freedom of Conscience ought to be indulged to Dissenters in this sense it being their due right and not only granted in policy to some persons or to oblige a party or to be enjoyed by the strongest and subtilest only to curb and subiect the rest as is shewed before there can be no ground able to convince any rational man why Papists should be excluded this priviledge unless we infringe the Laws and Government by not distributing equal and impartial justice nay the truth of this assertion is more evident and convincing for them then any Primo It is against reason and all examples of antiquity for men to be punished for adhering to the Religion of their Fore-fathers Now the Roman-Catholick Religion was the first Christian Religion planted in our native Country from whom we had and have our very Christianity the first universally spread and preached by Government permitted and encouraged by Counsels and Parliaments confirmed and approved a thousand years there continued even by our deceased kindred and parents not long since professed by our Universities established and defended against all Adversaries From whence we derive even the Scripture â—t self our ordinations most of our material Churches Colledges Inns of Court Hospitals c. and shall Charity ever be so buried in Oblivion in England that the Posterity of those from whom we must confess to have received these and other great advantages never be remembred and used with equity and common Justice They are linked in Religion to all Catholick Princes and Countries about us who will be more loving Neighbours if they see their Brethren find favour from us To persecute this Religion is to War against our Progenitors It is this Church in which so many Martyrs have dyed so many Doctors have taught and preached so many Virgins have lived in flesh like Angels so many Saints wrought wonders and miracles so many Councils called so many Ecclesiastical Laws enacted so many Nations converted so many Kings and Emperors lived and died and hope to be saved against which so many persecutors Machiavels and Tyrants in vain have used torments and contrived all imaginable force wicked policy or cruelty could invent This Faith hath the best evidence as taught and instituted by Christ his Apostles and Successors in an uninterrupted series and delivery down to us Set before your eyes those glorious Champions of Christs Church Constantines Theodos Pepines Charles all sirnamed Great more Glorious for Victories over Heresies and Idolatries than for conquests of Countries more renowned for propagating Catholick Religion than enlarging their Dominions See the Catologue of noble Kings of England Lucius Ethelbert Egbert Oswald Oswine Alfred Edgar before the conquest William the Conqueror and so many Henries Edwards Richards after the Conquest mighty of force rich of
well of her as the Dutchess of Sommerset to Sir John Cheeke to Sir Edward Mountague Lord chief Justice who had subscribed and counselled her disinheriting to Sir Roger Cholmey to the Marqness of Northampton to the Lord Robert Dudley to Sir Henry Dudley to Sir Henry Gates c. who stood attainted and the Duke of Suffolke all obnoxious to her Justice she knew very well neither affected her Religion nor Title they being her prisoners in the Tower she released them all But for all this the Zealots of her time would not be quieted they libel against the Government of Women they pick quarrels and murmur at her Marriage they publish invectives and scurrilous Pamphlets against Religion yet forbear not to plot and conspire her deprivation Goodman writ a pernitious Book to have her put to death William Thomas a Gospeller conspires to Out of Fox his Martyrs kill the Queen and when hanged said he died for his Country Stow in Queen Mary p. 1056. On the contrary in Queen Elizabeths time although Catholicks then were the chief Ministers in Church and State and might have used indirect means against her she being of a contrary Religion and not of so clear a Title yet Catholick Bishops who set the Crown upon her head are commended by Holinshed a Prot. Hist ann Eliz. 26. pag. 1358 1360. for peaceable quiet Bishops and the Catholick temporal Lords there by him recorded to be far from opposing themselves against her interest as they are said there to offer her Majesty in her defence to impugne and resist any â—orreign force though it should come from the Pope himself Insomuch that they are commended by Holinshed for loyalty and obedience And Stow testifies how diligent Catholicks were to offer their service in that great action 88. neither were they altogether refused by her Majesty How the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellour of England Doctor Heath a Catholick Bishop instead of inveighing against her or casting forth of Libels as Cranmer did against Q. Mary her entrance and Government made a publick oration in her behalf to perswade the people to obedience and to acknowledg her power and authority Holin ib. 1170. whence the said Archbishops faithfulness was left to commendation also by Protestant Bishop Goodman in his Catalogue of Bishops How all Catholick Lords and Bishops repaired to London to proclaim her Queen who not long after turned them out of several Offices and Bishopricks Holinshed p. 1171. To use Cambdens own words and phrase the world stood Cambdens Britann p. 163. amazed and England groaned at it what would flesh and blood move him to was it not strange in the beginning to behold Abbies destroyed Bishopricks gelded Chaunteries Hospitals Colledges turned to profaneness change of Liturgies Rites c. to see people renounce their pious vows such unexpected alterations it being a pitiful thing as Stow saith to hear the Lamentations in the Country for religious Houses Stâ—w p. 964. Notwithstanding the loyalty and obedience of Catholicks towards her appeared undeniable in all things not only in their humble petitions but by their constant and general conformity unto her temporal Government in 88. and by their Protestations made at Ely 1588. as by other offers made to the Lord North the Queens Lieutenant there and by their just actions afterwards by their submission as to the Lords of the Privy Council and profession of all due acknowledgment to her Majesty notwithstanding the Sentence of Excommunication Whence the Author of Execution of English Justice acknowledges their obedience and loyalty to Elizabeth in a time when they wanted no matter of complaint Any man of candour and integrity may easily convince the vulgar error the unevenness of Queen Elizabeths nature and severity to that of Queen Marys Queen Elizabeth made new Laws against Catholicks and put them to death for not embracing a new heresie which has been condemned to the fire here and in all other Christian Countries She embrued her hands in the blood royal of Mary Stewart lawful Heir to the Crown put to death many noble persons by their blood to colour her Supremacy raised up upstarts Hereticks from nothing annihilated the antient Nobility and Gentry c. to use a Protest Historiographers words the bloody practices of Queen Eliz. if not so barbarous in appearance though more wicked in substance as being exhibited under the colour and pretext of Law in the starving and racking so many innocent worthy learned persons tearing out their hearts and bowels in publick view upon suborned witnesses base vagabond and perjured Catchpoles hired to swear Neither was there any reason then for persecution on the account of the Catholicks misdemeanours For as Cambden her own Historiographer noteth The reason of the penal Statutes in Eliz. was 1. the opinion of the Queens Illegitimation abroad 2. Jealousies had of the Queen of Scots her nearness to the Crown 3. the Bull of Pius 5. 4. the doubt of the house of Guise in behalf of their Neece 5. the offence given to the King of Spain in assisting Orange These causes induced the Queen with her Pauculi intimi saith Cambden We cannot excuse the persecution therefore under Queen Elizabeth against Catholicks for any cause given by them or just fear of their fidelity nor from the example of Christian Emperours and Kings that both for zeal of Religion and human policy to avoid danger of Rebellion made Laws and Statutes against Hereticks and innovators of the antient faith and sense of Scripture which descended to them by Tradition from the Apostles Queen Elizabeth taking a contrary way made Laws and Statutes against the ancient Religion and known sense of Gods word delivered from age tâ— age which practice destroys the order of Justice to persecute Christians for professing a Religion confirmed by the publick testimony and practice of the Christian world from the first propaâ—â—tion of Christianity to this present tâ—â—e No part of their Dectrine being â—â—er judged an heresie or novelty by antiquity otherwise they had not escaped the rigour of penal Laws made against Hereticks and Novelists in former ages But no History did or can ever mention any person that suffered as an Heretick for broaching or maintaining any one point which they now believe and profess Whereas Q. Mary her predecessors Emperours and Kings punished Novelists only that made Religons of their own heads condemneâ— as Hereticks by the Church in ancient times The disparity therefore was great Catholick Princes standing as defenders of their ancient Faith others as invaders and introducers of a new Belief They seek to keep what de jure they had Calvinists what they had not they possessors of the traditum and depositum left by Christ and his Apostles others descissors and injurious infringers of those Apostolick tyes and regulations so carefully delivered to all posterity Laws indeed have been made in Catholick Countries very severe against those the Church calleth Hereticks but they were none of the Churches
Judicature in abetting any contrivance or disturbance to common peace or civility Proceeding on the premises the title of the first Chapter will be CAP. I. Persecution on the score of Religion is utterly Condemned and unlawful IMposition Violence and Persecution for matters meerly relating to Conscience directly invades the divine prerogative for God alone is Lord over the Conscience it is his just Claim and priviledg for as Solomon saith no man hath power over Conscience Luther Eccles in the Book of Civil Magistrates saith the Law of them extends no farther then Body and Goods for over Conscience God alone ruleth in the same Book in the building of the Temple saith he there was no sound of Iron heard to signifie that Christ will have in his Church a free and willing people not compelled by human Laws and Statutes God hath exempted the soul out of your Commission c. The Cause and reason why Judicatures of men are appointed and set up are that Magistrates should be Ministers of protection and praise to them that do good and of terror and revenge of those that do Evil in matters to outward practise but to exceed these limits imposing nice and doubtful oaths not having the Conditions required in Scriptures on the Consciences of men and other pressure and penalties concerning their souls only of which Christ alone Challengeth the propriety is neither lawful nor warrantable it is Gods prerogative to punish for Conscience who hath only propriety in the Soul unto whom all must give account in spiritual things For Religion is a virtue hath God for its immediate object when according to all Divines it is not within the vierge of humane Cognizance because the Soul is not liable to our tribunal Keckerman a learned Writer saith that the Bond between the Magistrate and Subject is essentially Civil The saying of King Stephen the wise King of Poland is Observable that he was King of men not of Consciences Commander of Bodies not of Souls The practise of persecution meerly for conscience hath been disavowed and condemned by divine authority and holy writ by the Primitive Fathers by many of the most famous Princes in the world by our own principles and concessions by the wisest greatest and Best States in ancient and modern times as the Jews Romans Egyptians Germany Holland nay the Turks and Persians Polish and Bohemian Kings Marcus Aurelius a Pagan permitted tolleration to Christians Antâ—niâ—â— Pius Emperor so called for his great piety whose Empire God blessed with greater peace and felicity then any Pagan Empeperor had before or after him for the favour he shewed to Christians in taking of the many and Cruel persecutions suffered under his Predecessors Forbad no man should be accused for their Religion affirmed that the great Earthquakes and other Calamities wherewith the Empire was afflicted proceeded of the justice of God for the injuries done to the Christians as it is manifested by a Copy of the edict related by Eutrop. l. 10. Gratian Jovianus Caesar Emperors permitted various Religions the old Romans offered the Jews Liberty on condition they would be faithful Theodosius and Gratian most Christian Emperors were contented to tollerate the Arrians At Hierusalem in Christ time were two Sects living sociable the Pharisees and Sadduces in Germany these hundred years Papists and Lutherans live together in France Calvenists are permitted How oft the French King gave Edicts of pacification is set down in Laval l. 3. Solomon permitted the Hittites Hivites Perizites and Jebuzites to live quietly under his Reign as Grotius observeth on the 1 of Kings 19. 20. The Novatians saith Baxter were tollerated and loved by the sober Catholick Emperors because they had tollerable principles when many others were otherwise dealt withal and S. Martin and Sulpitius Severus refused to be of their Councel for inciting the Emperor to the way of blood corporal violence The Turk permitteth Christians Persians and Aethiopians in his Dominions Venetians suffereth Jews amongst them as the King of Spain did the Moors till necessity forced him to expel them by the Inquisition It s a false proposition proceeding from Gall and Spleen only to breed an exulceration in the hearts of the people that Catholicks Protestants c. may not be tollerated in a well governed wealth the wiser sort will not endure so gross a paradox dayly proved false before their eyes It was a notable observation of a wise Father that those that perswaded pressure of Conscience were commonly therein interressed themselves for their own end And most that now plead against tolleration would plead as much for it if they were once under the hatches and their Religion discountenanced By Power and we that once thought the imposition of a directory unreasonable a restraint from our way of worship Vnchristian do not the same reasons remain in vindication of indulgence to others if you will have liberty to maintain your own opinions why should not reason tell you others will exspect the like for themselves Protestants Calvinist Presbiterians c. living in popish Countries will plead for tolleration Our first reformers were great Champions for liberty of Conscience as Wicliffe in his remonstration to the Parliament the Albigensis to Lewis the eleventh and twelfth of France Calvin to Francis the First Luther to the several Dyets under Frederick and Charls the Fifth our ancient Protestant Divines Musculus Osiander Sâ—ermius The Protestants in Swetia desired tolleration as Chytraeus sheweth in his Chronicle 1595. and Belloy in Apol. saith that Melanchton consented Erasmus laboured to prove the necessity of it While Popery was prevalent in England the Pope being then reputed Vicar of Christ in spiritual things yet notwithstanding so much liberty was given that no man suffered death for opposing his dictates in Religion and then in the 2. of Henry the fourth a Statute being made against the Lollards the Commons petitioned the King it might be repealed and by complaint of the Commons it was then in part repealed in Stat. Hen. 8. A wise Emperor told Henry the third King of France there was no greater sin then to force mens consciences for such as think to Command them supposing to win heaven do often loose what they possess on earth King James in his speech to the Parliment saith that it is a sure Rule in Divinity that God never planted the Church by violence or Bloodshed Much less saith the wise Sir Francis Bacon ought the Sword to be put in the peoples hands to persecute nourish sedition authorize conspiracies c. for that is but to dash the first table against the second and to Consider men as Christians as we forget they are men The wise Romans in Case of Religion were very tender and Cautious for when Cato was Consul and it seemed necessary to the Senate to suppress with violence the disordered Ceremonies of the Bacchinals brought in by a strange Priest into the City he withstood that sentence alleging there was nothing
hath caused the slaughter of 200000 in Germany hath caused at least occasioned most of the wars devastations and bloodshed the great alterations tumults troubles in most places of Christiandom our late Bishop of Exeter saith impositions on mens Consciences and Judgments in matters of Religion to tye them by penal and coercive Statutes which like Persian sheep carry tails of incurious mulcts after them that are heavier then their bodies To come with swords to put Religion into our heads with main force is like the watering of Plants with salt streams or the lighting of a Candle with gun-powder Never was Christian Religion planted or propagated by wars by the civil and martial Sword for God is not pleased with hypocrital and unwilling worshippers forced thereto by outward violence nor are Christian Societies bettered by such force but oft-times the contrary Too much severity maketh men desperate sheweth a will to oppress the offendor rather then cure the offence and nothing sheweth more evidently that authority inclineth to tyranny then the multitude of Promoters continual informations and the name of treason made as a Livery to put upon all offences Unchristian persecution like a violent Chrysis more frequently taketh away the Patient then Contributes to his recovery nourisheth a wrathful devouring spirit one against another makes us transgressors of that Royal law which forbids us to do that one to another we would not have them do to us were we in their condition and by this rule whosoever is not against the cruelty of persecution hath nothing to say against justice of his being a slave for what measure he would mete unto others he deserves himself If to hate our brother is murder as he is man 1 John 3. 16. sure not only to hate but even for Religion sake to kill our brother a Christian and to be destroyers of Christians are rather deicides then homicides and if nothing can have more of Christian then Charity nothing can have more of Antichristian then such uncharitableness which many nourishing for zeal mistake a Cockatrice for a Dove and fiery Serpent for a Phenix Outward violence in Cause of Religion is also condemned by holy Write and dâ—vine authority Christ commanded both the tares and the wheat should remaine togâ—ther in the world Mat. 13. 30. he repâ—oved his Disciples who would have had fiâ—e come down from heaven ro destroy the Sâ—maritans that would not entertain him in these word you know what spirit you are of the son of man came not to destroy Luke 9. 54. the servant of God must not strive but be gentle to all men 2 Rom. 2. 24. as God hath called every one so let him walk 1 Cor. 7. 17. they who now are tares may become wheat who are blind may see some there be that come not till the eleventh hour Mat. 20. 6. let your moderation be known unto all men Phil. 4. 5. who art thou that judgest anothers servant c. Rom. 4. now I shall beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ 2 Corin. 10. Wo unto them that make a man an offender for a word or lay a snare for him Esay The Fathers of the primitive times pleaded against all force in Religion The Christian Church saith Saint Hillary against Auxentius doth not persecute but is persecuted No man is forced against his will by the Christians saith Lactantius S. Hierom in paenit cap. 4. saith that heresie must be cut off by the Sword of the Spirit And Tertullian saith seeing he that wants faith and devotion is unserviceable to God for God being not contentious would not be worshipped by the unwilling The Arrians were the first introducers of persecution Let all the Canons of the Church be examined and searched if one be found that justifies the shedding of blood meerly on the score of Religion S. Augustine complaineth how the Donatists filled with blood and desolation all Africa persecuting the Orthodox under Julian the Apostate Docendo magis quam jubendo monendo quam minando veritatem agnoscant Aug. Epist 63. Fides siquidem suadenda est non imperanda ait S. Bernard The Churches of the East grievously complained of the Arrians persecution Athan. Epist ad Solicar speaketh much of their inhumane cruelty Nil tam voluntarium quam Religio cogi non potestdiversa sunt carnifex charitas non potest veritas cum vi aut justitia cum credulitate conjungi in primitiva Ecclesia saith learned Becanus haeretici non puniebantur morte corporali alius est spiritus legalis saith he qui consistebat in severitate alius est spiritus Evangelicus qui consistit in mansuetudine hunc debetis imitari Et Apost ad Titum 3. haereticum hominem devita post unam secundam correptionem Sciens quia subversus est ubi notantur dixit devita non occide Esay 11. 9. non occiderit in universo monte sancto meo id est in Ecclesia ubi Propheta praedixit doctrinam Evangelii propogandam in Ecclesia sine sanguine caede See Becanus Dominicus a Soto in his 4. Sent. dist 5. saith every man hath a natural right to instruct others in things that are good but cannot compell Strifes about Religion saith Grotius are pernicious and destructive where provision is not made for dissenters Persecution overturns the practice of Religion from Abel to Moses and the Prophets even to the meek example of Jesus Christ The Apostles and their Successors for 300 years confirmed their Religion with their own blood and not with the blood of their opposers External force in matter of Faith and Worship is repugnant to the nature of Christian Religion which is meekness To the practice which is suffering To the promotion of it go teach all Nations Christian Religion intreats all compels none Force never yet made a good Christian or a good Subject It subverts all Religion because men believe not because it is true or false but because they are Commanded for to do their interest and security oblige them rather to obey then dispute It is very unreasonable to force men to declare or swear where their judgments are not fully satisfied to require Faith where they cannot choose but doubt to punish them for disobedience if they go not against their consciences and to be punished hereafter if they do For an erroneous Conscience bindeth a man to follow it according to the learned of all Religions Persecution destroyeth the noble principle of reason for no man can believe before he understands and no man can understand before he is taught for Faith in all acts of Religion is necessary Now to believe we must first will to will we must judge to judge any thing we must understand which cannot be forced How can the leprous disease of the mind be cured with corporal catoplasts or mens judgments be convinced of the truth by tormenting their Bodies the inflictions then of external punishments for meer mental errors not wilful is
unreasonable and inadaequate for as corporal penalties cannot convince the understanding so neither can they be proportionable mulct for faults purely intellectual Before we can with justice inflict penalties upon any different profession we ought to use all means possible to recover them to truth Arguments to rational creatures as Christians are to instruct admonish warn and finally to reject to come to them full of compassion of their misery full of affection of their Salvation by reasonable and persuasive motives suitable to their own nature by somethng can resolve its doubts answer its objections tenets and Propositions Whence our first work should be to collect a Body of positive articles evidently contained in Scripture and absolutely necessary to salvation for its improper to pen the form of Faith in the negative because my believing Christian truths makes me a Christian and not my disbelieving the errors that oppose it else he that believes nothing at all would be the best Christian We must fight against Antichrist by lawful ways prescribed by the Word of God by the spirit of his mouth in preaching instructing in Charity Patience humility according to the example of Christ and his Apostles The weapons of Christian warfare are not Carnal but Spiritual 2 Cor. 10. For as they were not the warlike engines of Joshua but the trumpets of the Sanctuary that made the walls of Jericho to fall down So it is not the Canon but the trumpet of the Gospel which is required to pull down the walls of Babylon True Religion was never advanced by these ways but propagated by patient sufferings the Example of Jesus Christ is so far from persecuting that he would not revile his persecutors prayed for them saith go teach all nations c. The Text directs Christs procedure in teaching not in devouring Wherefore all wise humble and charitable Christians should so Order their judgments and Censures if at any time they are forced to declare them they must above all things take heed they nourish not nor discover any uncharitable fewds antipathies distances against others after the rule of those passions which were the common source of Schism and Heresies The free meek and solid piety feeds it self on the substance of Religion without picking quarrels at the shell free from the superstition and hypochondriacal Zeal of some who pretend to advance the Kingdom of Christ by cutting the throats of his Disciples and cementing his temples with blood instead of the Cement of charity CAP. II. Persecution is against Policy and Piety THe grand fomenters of persecution can be no friends to the English State for what but imposition immoderation and restraint in the cause of Religion as a learned divine Noteth hath turned Episcopacy into Presbytery Presbytery into Independancy Independancy into Quakerism Religion into Policy Reformation into Innovation Profession into Pretence Ministery into Souldiers Souldiers into Preachers Churches into Stables Pulpits into Tubs Degrees into Parity Pastors into Hirelings Apostolical Hierarchy into Anarchy with abusive fumes and flames to build Babels of their own I am not able to express saith another great Doctor of our English Church how high an impiety it is that at this time when Gods hand is out against us justly for our sins to be disposed and fixed upon a resolution that to redeem external peace we will persecute c. I admire to see too too many in Parliament here amongst us where is great plenty of able Gentlemen of excellent learning worth wit and other perfections and endowments as any nation besides to be inclinable if not actually resolved in all meetings to feud about the Rom. Religion especially now after this tryal of their honesty more is to be admired the preposterous machinations and motions even of Churchmen who by the Canons are forbid to have any hand in blood when they forsake the ancient refuges of Christians which were preaching and tears and betake themselves to swords and helmets plots conspiracies and pursuivants Wisemen have seen those obscurities and disgraces which as black shadows have attended even Churchmen Persecution is fitter for the hands of Cyclops who forged Jupiters Thunderbolts then the Priests of the Gods Bishops should always be tender of good consciences and of the honour of Christian Religion which was not wont to see Ministers rough and targetted as the Rhinoceroes bâ—â— soft and gentle cloathed as the Sheep and Sheepheards of Christ There is not a more portentous sight then to see galeatos Clericos Christ long ago in the person of Saint Peter commanded them to put up their Swords nor was he ever heard to repeal that word or Bid them draw their Swords no not in Christs Cause that is meerly for Religion who hath legions of Angels armies of Truth gifts of Graces of the Spirit to defend himself and his true interest in Religion withal and a little after Indeed our Ecclesiastical Rulers have reason to steer us cautiously since they sit at the Helm in such a Ship as hath thrown very many Pilots over board it becomes those Bishops now got up newly to be most calm quiet and sedate Spirits The great alteration of the Body of the People since these last twenty years require that our old ends of promoting the welfare of the Church of England should be attained by the conduct of new means Bishops should compose the affections of the People by Liberty of Conscience and not Acts of Vniformity for the greatest assertors of Episcopacy and Ceremonies of the Church are lodged in their Graves and the present major part of this Land consists in those to whom the introducing of the old Church Prelatical Government will seem an Innovation It s the interest of the Clergy here to temper the Government of the Church for its irrational to think that any Church Government in a Protestant Country of Sectaries can be accommodated to the content and satisfaction of all which restraineth a large and almost absolute power to the heads of a few Protestant Bishops It s the concern of none but Souldiers of Fortune to oppose due Liberty of Conscience Whence the wise King James had wholly repealed the penal Statutes engaged so to do and Papistry then was declared tolerable had he not been diverted from it by Cecil and other Upstarts and Politicians whose interest was begun and grounded upon Heresie and destruction of the ancient Nobility and Gentry of the Kingdome For in his Speech Sess 1. Printed 161â— My mind saith he was ever free from persecuting and thralling my Subjects in matters of Conscience and in his next words I was so far from increasing their burdens with Roboam as I have so much as either time occasion or law would permit me to have lightened them And in his Censure against Conradus Vorstius the Dutch Heretick recounting the difference between Protestants and Catholicks he findeth not any for which Papists may be persecuted but rather the contrary You may object persecution is necessary in Policy of
Rom. 14. 22. hast thou faith have it to thy Self But then it may be objected seeing toleration must have its bounds and limits and those are almost indiscoverable viz. what points are necessary and what not what Sects and Opinions tolerable and what not and who must be the Judge or else we must deal partially and unjustly condemn one Sect and tolerate others I answer we must not cast away reason because there is a difficulty in using it aright What if be a hard thing to enumerate how many bits a man may eat and not be a glutton or how much drink and not a drunkard or what meats or drinks must be used to avoid excess in quality or what cloth silks fashion may be used without excess in apparel will you thence infer that men may eat and drink any think in quantity or quality or else nothing or wear any thing or else go naked as long as it is certain such a difference there is that some opinons are tolerable and some not you must distinguish and then you will find a necessity of discerning as you can according to right reason and grounds of Christianity the Tolerable from the intolerable The profession of the Creed and those who give some solid succinct and apodictical account directly grounded on Scripture rightly understood or in right regulated reason which is able to bear a superstructure of Christian Doctrin and practice as enumerated afore agreeing upon the summary of Belief in positive evident and fundamental points suitable to the Apostolical Symbol are conditions which require necessarily indulgency and toleration In these regards then there can be no prevalent objections urged why a wise State may not tolerate at least in private different Religions when otherwise the publick may be intangled or endangered or rather because the conscience cannot be compelled or Faith forced And more especially if they be such Religions as do not overthrow the fundamentals of Truth Nor such as disturbe or impugn the Government established Or if the professors thereof be such as are not factious or pertinacious but honest simple tractable obedient to Superiours having no other end in holding their Opinions in Religion than Gods glory or satisfaction of their own consciences and withall are willing to submit to better judgments when they are convinced to be Erroneous In this respect the late gratious Declaration for Liberty doth sufficiently appear to all impartial men to be prudent pious and politick For this purpose the Turks and Muscovites inhibited all disputations in matter of Religion upon pain of Death the like inhibition was made by the Emperour and Princes in Germany after their Civil Wars that there should be no Contention between Catholicks and Protestants to this end that there may be no breach of Peace and disturbance in the Government of the State Hence Leo Emperour made an Edict of union Called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all the different Religions within his Dominions might live quietly and friendly together For the same Cause Anastasius made a Law of Amnesty and accounted those the best Preachers that were moderate Since there must be Heresies and our judgments are as different as our Faces since breeding and education doth so much sway and hath so great influence on many Religions and that Sectaries are grown numerous we ought to have a Latitude of Charity for those that dissent if they be not Impostors or turbulent Incendiaries Dissenters in Controversies are obliged to a mutual toleration We cannot be ignorant of other States and Kingdomes and now very lately in the Empire and Denmark those that Dissent from the Religion publikely authorized are permitted and secured so long as they do not affront Civil or Ecclesiastick Laws For true Christianity addeth such force and vigour to Civil Power by planting in Mens hearts the awe of Religion which is the main pillar of obedience by weeding out such Errors as humane authority would have much adoe to pluck up CAP. IV. Toleration or Liberty improperly taken and unlimited is neither reasonable nor justifiable I Dare not positively affirm that the Civil Magistrate is not to intermeddle at all in matters of Religion but how far he is to proceed and not exceed his Commission is disputable seeing learned Divines generally hold that the bond between the Magistrate and the Subject is essentially Civil Querulous persons have shown a Childishness in their complaints without telling what the very thing is that troubles them and how far they would have it removed and so complain for want of Liberty because they have not their Wills cry out before they know their own minds fully or take care the Magistrate shall know them otherwise then by inspiration It s the opinion of injudicious furious Spirits that no truth is to be silenced for Peace or forborn for spiritual advantage or true necessity For every one to hold what he pleaseth and publish and Preach what he holds confined to no rule of Order but contemning law will rule as Transcendents For as Plato saith it s a temerarious Liberty to pronounce of what is known and unknown with like confidence Tell us of obeying the Laws of God as long as you please I dare not believe you as long as you break the Laws of those appointed to rule over you it is a distinction without difference to separate and divide the Laws of Men from the Laws of God for unless we observe both we obey neither saith Hooker l. 3. c. 107. Here I confess Christian Governours are not to regard such pleas for private Liberty as overthrow the Publick Order and Peace nor to regard those Clamours against them and the Laws as persecuting when they do but oppose and restrain such perillous exorbitancies as have no savour of reason or Religion which strikes at the foundation of Christianity and openeth a gap to Atheism Profaneness and Blasphemy Here the Magistrate must interpose his Coâ—rcive Power for remedy Nor are they in this infringers of the Peoples Liberty but preservers of Freedome not oppressors of others Consciences but dischargers of their own It s a false Liberty to imagine our Liberty consists in speaking or doing what we List without regard to God or man It s no freedom for a man to think what he lists in vain erroneous Blasphemous thoughts or to bolt out and vent his raw indigested and rotten fancies or irreligious opinions to others its far from Christian Liberty for any Christian to start up loose Principles destructive to Government subverting Order violating Laws breaking Oaths and Covenants contemning Authority for every one to hold what he pleaseth and publish and Preach what he holds upon light popular and untried grounds and publickly to act according to his private perswasions passions lusts or interests wherein neither right reason nor common Order nor publick peace nor Conscience of Duty nor fear of God have any such serious tyes upon men as necessary to the common good No Christian I say can
religiously plead for a Liberty seditiously and factiously to broach to others any new opinions he pleaseth Nor may any part of men though never so godly carry on any design though it may be better than what at present may be by any violent irregular and disorderly ways For every Christian duty hath its Bounds beyond which it is not true and virtuous Liberty but inordinateness and excess Some mens pedantick incivilities to the Consciences of others may be instructive to us as to convince the necessity of setting out true bounds of Liberty which should not be granted on other terms then as far as it conduceth to Gods honour and the Peoples good For if publick power should suffer arrogant ignorance excess of passion perversness of will to come to its full rudeness and extent tumultuary numbers and brutish Power will soon make good private presumptions and cover over the most impotent Lusts passions and ambitions of men with the pleas and outcryes of Christian Liberty For that is no other freedome then that as water enjoys when it overbears and overflows her Banks and Bounds and such as the envious and malitious Devils affects and are most impatient not to enjoy nor may they be touched or curbed by any authority in Church or State be their extravagancies never so blasphemous but presently they make great clamours of persecution as if all were persecutors who helped to bind a Mad-man or put a roaring drunkard into the Cage The vitious are not to be counted into the sort of meer Dissenters Socinians who are enemies to the Blessed Trinity Atheists who hold Principles destructive to Christianity and those Parties whose Religion forbids subjection and carries an opposition to civil Government and Commands by Fire and Sword to erect their new Spiritual Kingdom And those who hold forth notions and conceptions reforming or wholly changing the state of Religion and Government and in order to that shake even the frame of Civil things to which they think themselves no longer bound in subjection then they want a party strong enough for opposition nor will they easily be perswaded that it is the sin of Rebellion carries the face of reformation easily dispensing with obedience to men where they pretend amendment before God putting on Sheeps Cloathing to no other purpose but the renting of Christs seemless Coat Sow to themselves leaves of frivolous pretences dispute Preach Plead Clamour about moderation and Liberty when all the immoderation is in themselves contend to have priviledges prerogatives freedome regulated so and so yet would they examine themselves nothing needs more regulation then their own judgments opinions and humours There be others of hotter tempers more Cholerick Constitutions and feaverish complexions have such ferocious Spirits like pampered Horses whom no ground will hold dayly neighing after novelties who love to be moving in the troubled waters of secular affairs who seem most impatient of any order or publick rule in which they have not some stroak or influence ready to undo whatever is done without them their Brest is full of turbulent and seditious Spirits as the Cave of Aeolus of Winds Forgetting what Spirit becomes followers of the Gospel whose heads are prone to move their hearts with Specious novelties quick excitations and zealous resolutions which soon after like salt-streams descend and fall upon their Lungs provoking them violently to the spreading their opinions to others till they see the Children of their brains prove meer abortions To the misguided activity of such even Ministers the Commonalty may owe much of its troubles These only and the like most truly forfeit their Christian private Liberty to the publick discretion and power who will not or cannot use it but to the publick detriment Beware then of Compliances with and indulgence to all sorts Sects and Schisms pleaded for as if it were a part of Christs Legacy and Peoples Liberty to be tolerated in any Actions or Opinions never so pernicious Saint Paul beseecheth the Romans to mark those that Cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine received Rom. 4. 6 17. As an absolute unity in judgment is not to be attained in this Life so an universal or absolute Liberty is not to be permitted or indulged in things injurious to God Toleration of all things is a destructive principle to State and Church a Cloak to Licentiousness ushereth in Atheism and Libertinism Transports Men oft-times to such excesses beyond those bounds of duty which as Subjects we ought to observe Hath many Latitudes evasions and distinctions to unravel the Cords of any Oaths and untwist the Bonds of any Covenant or Protestations Those who are most pregnant and impatient of holding in their Opinions on the pretence of Truth do but proudly esteem their own understandings pretious to vend some raw and indigested notions The Devil usually pretends Truth to Cover his Lyes Clamour must not prevail but reason Is it to follow the direction of Christ to Preach on the House-top If there were a Nero or Dioclesian at the Helm who should threaten to mingle our Blood with our Sacrifices if you had your Antelencana and should flock into Caves of the Earth to worship Christ your zeal would be more tolerable True Christian toleration extends not to matters of an extern nature wherefore Magistrates may use a Coercive hinderance from publick Meetings without impeaching it When Subjects have expressed a due Regulation in it then is a King in Capacity to shew a God-like benignity and Power in granting the things they ask as conducing to God's honour and the Peoples Good nor is it rational to be granted on other terms For Religion cannot be defended by transgression of God's Commands which are the rule of it The true Liberty of conscience of any man consists in a Constant tendency or intention to the Supream end and those holy regulations which God hath prescribed as it stands in referrence to God its Creator and its Neighbour Wherein a Christian is free to declare and utter them to know consider meditate of and believe whatever Truth God hath revealed When he is free to declare and utter them in such a holy way which Charity Sobriety Modesty Order and Gravity allow or conferring so with others as may have some savour of Reason and Religion in an humble and holy desire to learn or teach in a regular not in a rude insolent and imperious way A wise humble Christian is never far from his refuge and when pursued and urged beyond what he thinks agreeablt to good Conscience he is not to seek for or take Foxes shifts subtil windings or sinful coverts Is more willing to hear then earnest to object and labours to acquiesce in others satisfaction as well as his own becomes all things to all men in regard of things Civil and extern CAP. V. Whether the Romanists have not a just and equal title to Toleration SUch is the multiplying of that breath giving Life which God hath cast upon slime
present Age no Sectaries can be lawful Witnesses for their own lately modelled Religion or against the ancient Catholick because their testimonies cannot be valid against so constant an universal Tradition and practice Secundo It s ridiculous and unjust in a Judge to pronounce sentence against Roman Catholick upon the evidence and testimony of Calvin Luther c. as in open Court to condemn men to forfeit their Estates and ancient inheritances upon the word of a mad fellow that produceth no other evidence to confirm his claim but interior motions of the Spirit or some obscure Text of Law appliable to all Cases and Subjects for all the Protestant evidence is reduced to the private Spirit and the pretended clearness of Scripture Tertio The Legislative power ought to be subordinate to Christian Religion but Statutes against Catholicks are evidently against the Law of God and Christian Religion if we may credit Antiquity and stick to the Faith and practice of the Church and Princes that went before us not only in England but all other Christian Kingdomes This way therefore of proceeding is different from all other Nations and altereth the Stile of natural reason humane nature and the practice of all Antiquity and consequently destroyes the foundation of justice and form of Judicature Quarto The common temporal Municipal Laws which Science above all others next to Divinity doth confirm and evince unto the understanding of an Englishman the Truth of Catholick Religion Forasmuch as from our first Christian Kings and Queens which must needs be the origin and beginning of all Christian Common Laws in England unto the reign of Henry the eight all our Princes and People being of one and the same Catholick Religion their Laws must needs be presumed to have been conformed to their sense and judgment in that behalf and our Lawyers to our Laws So as now to see an English temporal Lawyer to impugn the said Catholick Religion by the antiquity of the common Laws throughout the times and reigns of the said Kings and Queens to favour and countenance Luther Calvin c. or any new Opinions not known before is as great an absurdity novelty and wonder as to see a Philosopher brought up in Aristotles School to impugn Aristotle by Aristotles learning in favour of Petrus Ramus Descartes or some other new Adversary Catholick Religion never prejudiced any Nation or State where it had free passage in the least degree but hath ever been their safety happiness and honour No People or Church in the World so great a friend to loyalty and obedience they have the repute of honest men patient and charitable carry themselves civilly and religiously nothing is heard from their mouths of Blasphemy or Atheism or that may have ground of not believing or adoring God alone or of not hoping to be saved by the merits of Jesus Christ They have lived without just complaint sociable and amicable If they meet you not at Church they meet you at Market Do they not buy and sell with you Are ready to perform all Offices of good neighbourhood and civility Do they refuse any kind of temporal duties or payments Do ye not find them at home and abroad as strict to their promises as any others you converse withall They cannot be persecuted by any Government that understands its own interest unless first abused by false Teachers nor can we deny them what ancient and good Laws have ever allowed theâ— being no innovators but Professors of the same Religion which made this Nation Christian If there were no other Apology for peaceable men but only those Pleas of Conscience tendered to publick view those ought not to be unconsidered by such as profess Christianity Never any Acts of Vniformity could expel Papists out of heretical Countries Do ye know what you ask when you are still urging the execution of pressures against Catholicks even their blood life and fortunes can any Christian zeal be so irregular Can this come from the Spirit of the Gospel Is this wisdome from above Whence comes all this anger What evil have they done What maximes have they so rough and unreasonable that they must be taken away by the Sword Why should we be so bloody in our Tenets How can our passions be so intemperate Our mercies so cruel To them whose Faith was established by our Fundamental Laws and maintenance of it sworn to at least by twenty of our Monarchs even by Queen Elizabeth her self Why must the Papists be thus singled out from all the rest and forced to forfeit all advantages or forsake his Conscience They only exposed to publick hatred and rigour though they only least deserve it Shall we extinguish all considerations of equity and charity towards them of whose honesty we are assured by their Long and Patient Sufferings rather than they would renounce their Conscience towards God who are ready to abjure what is or may be objected as only dangerous in their Religion who have given evidences already they will perform those Oaths and that they cannot be absolved from them If we apprehend their principles and doctrines are inconsistent with the Gospel or Civil Government grant them a free Conference about the points in question which are those Tenets carry an opposition to either and if upon impartial enquiry they are found so Heterodox as represented then inflict penalties If their Ecclesiasticks are not able to justisie both their Religion and Principles let them renounce all mercy This offer is very fair and equal a Vindication of Justice and a legal proceeding against the Criminal And the contrary how plausible soever represented pretending thereby to do God good service is most injurious to the Peace Christian meekness Reason Religion or Charity and destructive to that prudential Ballance the wisest and best States have ever carefully observ'd Who always after questions of Religion freely discussed relieved the distresses of tender and innocent Consciences We must not judge of them or any other by the private and perhaps misinterpretable assertions of some particular Doctors but by the avowed principles of their belief This is the basis on which they build the rule by which they walk in point of obedience to God and man or if you would judg of them by their proceedings and addresses their frequent petitions professions protestations of all just obedience will sufficiently clear them If by their practice and manner of lives their quiet deportment and manner of living and conversing with all men yea even their prayers and wishes which they dayly make unto Almighty God in behalf of their Prince and Country do shew how innocent they are and how little they deserve those black aspersions and calumnies some rash Satyrists are so diligent to cast upon them In charity we are bound to believe the best of others and also to think they speak true when we cannot prove the contrary Some destine them to destruction and extirpation as Agapete did the Jews Are so eager declaimers
visible executioners This premised I argue thus Where there is a liberty of examining and judging there must be a freedome of election upon such judgment but the Church of England v. g. in her Doctrine alloweth men to search the Scriptures and examine whether her Doctrine be agreeable to Scripture or no Therefore the Church of England and other Reformed cannot in reason and equity persecute such men as in foro conscientiae shall upon such due examination of judgment dissent from their Doctrine If this principle pass current amongst us that every one may read judg and interpret Scripture which is by us the judg of Controversies the only rule to guide us to Faith we are bound to give Liberty of Conscience to others Whence one of our own Doctors saith Our Bishops who have declared the Doctrine of giving freedome of Conscience what every one in their private judgments do of discretion hold to be most conformable to Gods Word yet they very inconsequently and disingenuously excite our Governours to force their Conscience to an exterior Conformity Secondly We confess the Church of England and all Churches may erre and for ought we know do erre and lead into error and such an uncertain and fallible guide or ground to rely on is not proportionable to the nature and quality of Faith which must be certain and infallible with an internal consent of the Will and subjection of our understandings to revealed Truths Our Senses may be deluded but Faith not for it must be more firm and certain than any thing we see or feel Supposing then the Reformed Churches fallible will it not be a most unreasonable thing to be still exacting of Recusants by rigorous Sequestratious Oaths and what other penalties they think fit to leave and forsake the Church and Faith which they so groundedly hold to be the infallible guide appointed by God himself as the only means to direct them securely to eternal Salvation And to yield exterior conformity to our own new moulded Church we all profess to be fallible Or to be forced to embrace a Doctrine deduced by fallible interpretations out of Scripture which interpretations the far greater and learneder part of this very age reject as Heretical and which as such were rejected by almost all visible Christianity for these thousand years And which perhaps may shortly be rejected by us We having oft-times rejected that which we cryed up before for verity and the Religion now in vogue not many years ago was cryed down If our Church be not then infallible in what we teach against them but may embrace a lye for a divine Truth they need not to vindicate and justifie their most just recusancy in refusing to submit when we provide them no better security but force them to refuse due submission to that infallible direction appointed by divine Writ to bring them securely to their end To which the most religious the most learned and the major part of Christians ever yet thought and submitted too If I should disobey the sentence of the Church upon what other authority can I more prudently rely What Labyrinths and Abysmes should I fall into How can we force and draw others to our Churches if we cannot agree where and how to lay our Foundation How can we impose upon and restrain others whom we are so far from assuring of Truth as we pretend to be but uncertain of it and are not able to do so much for our selves being liable to change and no ways certain of our own belief to be the most infallible as our multiplied Concessions are pregnant instances What is this but to put certain penalties upon an uncertain Faith And if our Teachers agree not in all points of Religion the Dissenters in controversie are obliged to allow a mâ—tual toleration If we say the Roman Church erred for 900. years till our Reformation we exclude our selves from all possible assurance of true Faith or Salvation And to arrogate to our Selves or to attribute to private persons or Pastors the all-defining Spirit which we deny to the whole Church represented in a general Council is absurd His presumption must needs be vast that builds more on his own tenet then the mature judgment of all successive Fathers While he cryes down others for infallible he lifts himself up to be so as if God revealed more to him than all the Doctors and Propagators of his Church Now let us hear what our own Divines acknowledge Doctor Taylor saith but alas notwithstanding our Religion thus framed by our Divines yet it seems not sufficiently marked or the cognizance of Schism taken away for yet we have no particular positive points among us setled for undoubted Truths those being rather a medley of all Religions and new Sects professed among us or a negation of those tenets of the Church we went out of and which stood a thousand years before us as Histories and Monuments witness which is but a negative Faith in effect for what is positive or of Order and Government is wholly derived and taken from that Religion which not long since we pulled down abominated and so violently persecuted Doctor Gauden saith I see not why Papists may not in reason of State have and enjoy that liberty without perturbing the Publick Peace which Presbyterians and Independents do enjoy in their new ways For nothing will savour more of an imperious or impotent Spirit whose Faith and Charity are Slaves to Secular Interests than for those who have obtained liberty to their Novelties to deny the like freedome to other mens Antiquity which hath Ecclesiastical practise and precedency of a thousand years besides the preponderancy of much reason Scripture and holy examples All which to force godly grave and learned men to renounce or comply with other ways against their judgments must be a crying Self-condemning sin in those men who lately approved the ancient Church way and after dissenting at first desired but a modest toleration And in another place saith To Fleece and depress Popish Recusants by pecuniary mulcts exactions c. is to set Religion to sale and make Merchandize of Conscience and mens errors rather than fairly to perswade and win them by proper and perswasive engines of true Religion Thorndike a learned Divine saith also Cerâ—ainly it may be justiâ—â—able for the secular power to grant Papists exercise of their Religion in private places under such moderate penalties as disobeying the Laws of a mans Country requires For Persecution to Death in that case the whole Reformation condemns the Church of Rome And I conceive there is no reason for that which will not condemn Persecution to Banishment The State may easier be secured of Papists against all such power in the Pope then of our Sectaries against that Dispensation to their allegiance which the pretence of Gods Spirit may import when they please Whereas it is manifest that many Papists hold against those equivocations and reservations which destroy all confidence in the
Soveraign in Allegiance Though not secured in those that pretend Gods Spirit Besides Recusants being for the most part of the good Families of the Nation will take it for a part of their Nobility freely to profess themselves in Religion whereas the Sectaries are People of mean quality cannot be presumed to stand so much on their reputation And in another place he saith to proceed to divide the Church more and more with Persecutions is more destructive to the substance of Christianity than all that corruption Reformation pretendeth to cure Osborne a Protestant Hist mem Q. E. p. 17. 〈◊〉 that against the poor Catholicks nothing in relation to the generality remaineth upon due proof sufficient to justifie the severity of Laws dayly enacted and put in execution against them All other Sects saith he oppose the Roman with more spleen and animosity then ordinary yet they defend themselves and prevail against all still continue and have been the most grand and principal Body of all Christian Societies and the greatest force and Forâ—ress of Christianity against Turks and Heathenish impieties and chiefest Propagators of the Gospel in all Nations c. I see no reason saith another Doctor of our English Church why Papists in England should not as well deserve hope and enjoy as any other order or rank of men freedome to their Consciences Nor can I think but those men who are so hardned in their Malice and persecution against them do often hear a voice secretly call within them O ye Souls why do ye persecute me in my Servants It s a kind of injustice and an uncharitable course as I conceive saith he when we spare them that have no Religion at all and censure those that can give an account of somewhat tending to that purpose Shall Atheists and Socinians Enemies of the blessed Trinity be not looked after And shall others following the Heresie of Aerius directly opposing the order of Bishops and their Jurisdiction that is the whole frame of the Church of God assembled in the first four general Councils asserted and affirmed to be of divine right by Scripture and the Church of England be winked at And must we only incite our Governours against Papists Force them upon Banishments Prisons Persecutions Pressures and Calamities and use such severity against that Religion we our selves hold Salvation to be acquired in who hold all the positive Articles with us I may loudly proclaim saith Bishop Gauden with Samuel 12. 3. this Protestation in their behalf Behold the Servants of the Lord and his Church O Christians causless Enemies witness against them and before the Lord and before the People Whose Oxe or Ass have they taken Whom have they defrauded or oppressed Whose hurt or damage have they procured Whose evil of sin or misery have they not pitied What is the injury for which so desolating a vengeance must pass upon them and their whole Profession What is the Blasphemy against God or man for which these Naboths must loose their lives liberties and liveâ—â—hoods Wherein have they deserved so ill of former and later Ages that they should be so used as Ahab commanded of Miâ—heas and the Jews did to Hieremias to be cast into Prisons to â—ordid and â—bsâ—ure restraints or to be exposed to Mendicant liberty to be fed only with Bread and water of Affliction What necessary Truths of God or righteousness have they detained What error have they broached revived or maintained What true Christian liberty have they impeached A little after They have not light conjectures not partial Customes not bare Profession not uncertain Tradition not blind Antiquity but evident grounds Scripture Succession Conversion of Nations planting of Churches all over the known World crowning their Doctrine with Martyrdome Authors of best credit undeniable famous in Church through all the first Ages shewing us Catholick Religion And uncontradicted consent constant and uninterrupted Succession their great abilities Add those Credential letters the testimonies and seals which God hath given of his holy Spirit Lastly the Civil rights and priviledges the piety of the Nation and the Laws of this Land have always given to them by the fullest and freest consent of all Estates in Parliament these ought to be regarded much of men of Justice honour and conscience as not to break all these Sanctions and Laws asunder by which their forefathers have bound to God c. Whence Doctor Taylor in his Book concerning the unreasonableness of prescribing to other mens Faith in liberty of prophecying § 2. 249. that Considerations to a charitable Toleration concerning the Roman Church which saith he may easily perswade persons of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their forefathers which had actual possession and seizure of men's understanding before the opposite Profession had a name Another learned Protestant Doctor saith the humble peaceable and discreet carriage of them may justly plead for favour and protection against this calumny of proneness to Sedition Faction or illegal disturbance in civil affairs Even in all the unhappy troubles of the late years have generally behaved themselves and shewed they had no other design than to live a quiet life in all godliness and honesty If they could not help in fair ways to steer the Ship as they desired they did not seem to set it on fire and overwhelm it If at any time relating to publick variations and tossings they could not act with satisfied and good Consciences they humbly bear with silence and suffer with patience Intentive chiefly and fearful to offend God tender of Conscience and their own Religion Whence The late Bishop of Exeter saith in these christian bounds of peaceable subjection humility and holiness if the Papists in England may but obtain so much declared favour and publick countenance which all other fraternities and Professions have as to be sure to enjoy their callings liberties and properties which seem to be so many times in great uncertainties under the protection and obedience of the Laws it would encourage them and redeem them from those menaces insolencies and oppressions of unreasonable men who look upon them like publick Enemies and perdue because they have little of publick favour and encouragement Christian usage will no doubt win more upon them than those rough storms and winds wherewith they are dayly threatened and are still distressed Which makes them wrap themselves up as Elias in his hairy Mantle when they think their lives liberties and livelyhoods are sought after and no such protection like to continue over them they thought in a Christian State and Church they might have obtained and deserved through their quiet conversation As a just protection infers our due subjection so no men pay more willingly then they who besides the Iron-rod of fear have softer cords of love and favour upon them How can we with justice honour or humanity inflict severe penalties upon Papists as refusing to conform to our Church
and Religion when they protest with so much truth to our faces they cannot see any Church any Religion among us as uniform publick authentick Constant We might consider that the enacting of laws penalties and impositions against Papists is but a knotting Whipcord to lash our own posterity Seeing now there be so many Opinions in the World God knows upon whose children it may fall next For the Church of England is not a Manna that relisheth in every mans palate Secondly To use severity against Papists overturns the very ground of our retreat from Rome It is against Protestant sincerity for how can they exclaim against them for persecutors and are now the men themselves Was it an instance of weakness in their Religion and is it become a demonstration in ours Is it Antichristian in them and Christian in us For if men must be restrained upon prudential pretended considerations for their Religious exercise why not the same in France Germany Holland Constantinople c. where matters of State may equally be pleaded And if Protestants who maintain that no Councils or Church without tyranny may require belief or internal consent from their subjects to their definitions or Articles of Religion a practice much exclaimed against in the Church of Rome why then do they of the Church of England so inconsequently exact in practice such consent blamed in the Roman CAP. VII That by our own Concessions true Salvation is acquired in the Roman Church and therefore not to be persecuted THe most eminent Divines of the English Church allow the Church of Rome to be a true Church whence they acknowledge and derive their Orders Ordination Calling Mission Jurisdiction Authority to Preach c. wherein they agree Salvation may be had and all Fundamentals of Faith are profest v. g. Papists hold all positive Articles of Faith setled among Protestants as divine and undoubted Truths Protestants and Catholicks both are Christians Both Baptized in that holy name both lay hold on the promises of the Gospel have the Lords Prayer Belief the same three Creeds Apostolical Nicene Athanasian The first four General Councils They believe with the Roman Church Articles of Doctrine that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son terms of Trinity substantiality virginity of our Blessed Lady Scripture all Laws Canons Ordinances forms of Liturgy Prayer Service Discipline c. And though the Roman Church doth declare many doctrinal points as necessary to be believed being deduced from holy Writ and practice of the primitive times whch the Reformists deny Yet seeing they acknowledge all the necessary articles fundamentally required to Salvation as is by their Adversaries granted What reason or justice is it to condem them to so great cruelties for matters of their Belief I could produce innumerable testimonies from the best Authors and Writings of the English Church who teach the Roman notwithstanding her supposed errors to be the Church of Christ and therein perfect Christianity and hope of Salvation to be found To avoid prolixity I will mention a few Doctor Morton in his Treatise of King of Israel and the Church p. 24 Papists saith he are to be accounted of the Church of God because they hold the Foundation of the Gospel Hooker 5. Book of Eccles Policy saith The Church of Rome is reputed a part of the House of God and of the Family of Jesus Christ Doctor Couel in defence of Hooker p. 17. saith We affirm them of the Church of Rome to be part of the Church of Christ and those that live and dye in that Church may be saved Master White in defence c. 41. in the name of his Brethren saith We profess the Church of Rome it self in all Ages to have been the visible Church of God Field lib. 3. c. 8. saith We most firmly believe all the Churches of the World wherein our Fathers lived and died to have been the true Churches of God in which undoubted Salvation was to be had And after in the same Book We never doubted but that in the Churches wherein those holy men St. Bernard and St. Dominick lived were the true Churches of God Osiander witnesseth Bede had all Popish errors yet Dr. Humphrey in his Jesuitism acknowledges him to be in the number of the godly so doth Fulk of St. Bernard Luther the Centurists Tindal and Pantaleon title St. Francis and St. Dominick holy men though they bleieved all Papistical errors therefore Papists may be saved if Protestants may be believed Dove persuas saith in fundamental points of Doctrine the greatest Papists in the world agree with us Prot. rel affirmeth the Roman Church hath still inviolably the foundation of Religion l. 48. Downam l. 2. Antichr granteth it was a note of a good Christian to cleave to the Romish and Apostolical Church and p. 103. l. Antichr he yieldeth to Bellarmine that S. Augustine and Victor Oticensis were of opinion to adhere to the Church of Rome was a mark of a true Catholick in those times Our Stars of the first magnitude as Luther in Epist against Anabap. saith we confess that all Christian good is in the Papacy and from them it came down to us and ibid. I say in the Papacy is the true Christianity yea the true Kernel of Christianity and on the 28 of Genes we confess the Church to be among the Papists for they have Baptism Absolution the Text of the Gospel c. and there are many godly men among them Calvin Instit l. 4. confesseth in the Roman Church in the deepest of her supposed errors there ever remained inviolabile foedus Dei the Covenant of God inviolable Doth not Bunny Whitaker Junius Zanrchius Seravia and almost all Protestants generally hold as much at least that we agree in fundamentals that the Roman Church is a true Church the Mother C-hurch A thousand of learned Reformists confess in general Antiquity and the Fathers are for the Roman Church Whence a learned Writer noteth in some things or other yea in every particular Controversy Protestants grant their Assertions and there is no assertion by the Papists defended but some of the reformed yield too and confess as of great reason and authority Magdeburgenses 4. Cent. dedicated to Queen Elizabeth ad Jacobum Regem that the first purest times of the Church taught Sacramental Confession Tradition Invocation of Saints Purgatory Mass a propitiatory Sacrifice Miracles obtained at the reliques of Saints Images in Churches for the first 200 and 300 years Concerning the Primacy that one must be Cheif in the Church is taught by Melancton Luther in loc com Couel in examen Jacobus Andreas related by Hospiuian Mr. Perkins Prob. p. 237. saith Appeals were often made out of Africa to Popes of Rome in primitive days Middleton Papist p. 39. that the first general Council of Nice taught the Dignity of Rome over the West Provinces and hold p. 200. Papias living in the time of the Apostles taught Peters Supremacy Field lib. Church saith the
Bohemia and Poland That imprisoned Mary Queen of Scots That authorized Mountebank and Rochel to stand in defiauce against their King That begot so many conspiracies against Queen Mary of England as appears in our Chronicles That ravished from their lawful Governours the Low Countries and Transylvania and many Towns now called free Was it from any of their Books you have drawn these vile Maximes viz. that the authority of the Soveraign Magistrate is of humane right That the People are above the King That the People can give Power to the Prince and take it away That Kings are not anointed of the Lord That if a King fail in performing his Oath at Coronation the Subjects are absolved from their allegiance That if Princes fall from the grace of God the people are loosed from their subjection Do not these doctrines proceed from Wickliffe Waldenses and other Sectaries Doth not Belforrest sufficiently prove the like maximes from Luther Calvin Melancton Peter Martir c. What Buchanan and Knox did against Queen Mary their lawful Soveraign is evident in History and Beza in Epist 78. ad Buchanan approves their actions Calvin l. 4. c. 3. Instit from his high Consistorian gives this absolution to all Oaths of that nature Quibuscunque hujus evangelii lux effulgeat ab omnibus laqueis juramentisque absolvitur And the famous Minister Surean called Rosiers writ a Book expresly that it was lawful to kill Charls the ninth and the Queen Mother if they would not obey the Gospel Belforrest is sufficient witness See more in Althusius Politicks c. 35. Dausus l. 6. Polit. c. 3. In all the Councils Synods writings of any Roman Divines no such matters are found and allowed but only such as teach Subjects loyalty humility obedience More Princes have been deposed by Sectaries in sixty years than by Papists in six hundred years and that deposing of Kings is no doctrine nor practice of Catholicks shall be proved hereafter and that others have been more faulty in each of their respective Sects in all kind of disorders at home or abroad History and experience testifie In no Country or City in Christendome but Catholick Religion ever entred by meekness and suffering in no Country of Christendome but other Sects entred by sedition rebellion disobedience or murdering of great Princes or Persons by vast destruction of Cities Countries Kingdomes As in France Holland several States in Germany Scotland twenty years in England c. Consider what was done against France Holland several States in Germany Mary Queen of Scots or the late unparallel'd Rebellion In Catholick Religion I find they learn their duty towards God cannot be complied with without an exact performance of their duty towards their Soveraign to obey him not for advantages or temporal concerns but out of Conscience For no Roman Catholick can be true to his Religion who is not true to his Prince Whom they obey for Conscience sake whose Person they love and honour and whose prosperity they always pray for Though stript of their Estates or loaden with stripes It is in the power of great ones to make them suffer but not to make them guilty Their Religion tells them that Caesar's due ought not to be kept from him be he of what religion he pleaseth This is the will of God in Scripture preached by the Apostles and from them derived to us this doctrine is instilled in their Catechisms confirmed by their Sermons and conferences Insomuch that a Papist that is not truly loyal is not truly a Papist if to believe not what they are taught by the Church makes a man cease to be of it From the Saxons to Edward the sixth to be a Catholick was never taken as a bar to loyalty Nor doth it seem possible a Religion which governed England with glory so many hundred years can teach a doctrine destructive to Princes or infuse Maximes that will breed Commotion in the People They are ready by Oath in the face of Heaven to profess loyalty a divine command and an indispensable duty and any who pretend to know what Catholick doctrine is must know this to be a part of it In matters of fact their actions have given indubitable testimonies even by their Enemies own Concessions If Catholicks had been disloyal either the King or his Council or at least the States-men under Cromwel or the Rump must know it They appeal to the Council in all discoveries of their Treacheries against the King whether ever any constant Catholick was accessary or concurred in any design against his Majesty They appeal and challenge all the black Catalogue of Cromwells favorites and the whole Rumpists to discover if they can any Papist who concurred in any plot or action If Catholicks refuse to go to Protestant Churches in respect of Conscience They will far more refuse for Conscience sake to commit Treason a sin of a higher degree will hardly attempt or consent to any desperate act against their State and Country and commit such Crimes as hazard Body and Soul Nay what other Sectaries will boggle at If the King should be a Heathen and make Laws against them they hold it not lawful to resist but peaceably to endure During the time of the late King of France there was proposed by an Assembly of Catholick Divines and Bishops this question or Probleme If it were supposed the King of France became a Mahometan and by his Power endeavoured to force his Subjects to that infidelity whether they might lawfully according to the Principles of Christianity by arms resist him to which question the unanimous consent of the Assembly was that such a resistance would be unlawful since Christian Religion allowed no other way of maintaining Faith against lawful Soveraigns but prayers tears and sufferings When shall we find such a result from a Synod of Presbyterians Compare these primtive Doctrines with new the Evangelists and we shall find them quite contrary to the rules of Wiâ—liffians Waldenses Paraeus Knox and Buchanan c. who teach that Subjects may not only defend by Arms their Religion but offend also And lately Baxter in lib. of Rest p. 258. saith we may fight against Kings if it were for cause of Religion to purge the Church from Idolatry and Superstition The Genova Notes of the Bible 2 Chron. c. 5. allow the deposing of Queen Macha See more in Belforrest On the contrary the Doctors and Casuists of the Roman Church hold it as an Article of Faith that neither Heresie nor Turcism can be opposed by Rebellion Belloy in Apol. part 2. plainly saith Arms against Princes have no warrant Orationibus tantum pugnandum Navar Cunerus and all other Catholick Doctors agree in the same as most conformable to the doctrine and practice of the Primitive Fathers The General Council of Constance Sess 5. concludes it an error in Faith to maintain Subjects may kill their Kings being Tyants nuper accepit Synodus c. Cardinal Tolet in his Summolies l. 3. c. 6. affirms
Church of England guilty of Fanatick Principles because Taylor one of their renowned Doctors and Bishops writes for liberty of Prophecying And of Murder and Theft c. because some of them are condemned every Sessions Whence an English Divine ingenuously speaketh We cast an aspersion on a sort of people whose tried loyalty in all vicissitudes of dangerous troubles as it should have altered your judgments so their grievous sufferings for loyalty should from the Charity of our Profession have found rather pity for their afflictions than aspersion on their innonence So good deserving an opinion they know Papists deserve from these times that no security needs to tye them deeper Nor can there be any apprehension of the least danger from them to his Majesties Person or State for in point of fidelity they have given unquestionable proofs by their actions as their enemies witness Needham in his Book Interest will not lye saith ' Papists adhered generally 'to the King Oliver pressed by Cardinal Mazarine for liberty to Papists said they were his greatest enemies lib. Of Treaty at St. John de Luze They can say two things no profession else can viz. that no person of Honour or Estate among them was ever against the King and on the contrary hardly any one so qualified but did assist him Who can therefore look on those men as to have any honesty wisdom or charity who are ever grudging and repining at the least favour indulged to a faithful loyal and sociable people and can never rest satisfied with their own unlimited immunities unless they see others contemned afflicted and abused When by all the Apostolick Rules of Christianity we should help and compassionate and not make it our business to supplant one another Before I answer the vulgar objections and undeserved clamours so confidently though without any legal examination and process according to justice and judgment laid upon them and so frequently though disingenuously urged against them I will shew more largely what they teach concerning loyalty and fidelity to their King and Country 1. It is an undoubted verity generally taught in all their Councils Canons Synods Divines Civilians c. that our duty to God cannot be complied with without an exact performance of our duty towards our Soveraign to obey him not for advantage private interest or temporal concerns but of Conscience Nay what other Sectaries have bogled at if the King should be a Heathen and make Laws contrary to the Gospel we ought not to resist but patiently endure No Roman Catholick can be true to his Religion who is not true to his Prince and Country Saint Peter and Saint Paul did vehemently press obedience to the Emperours in Nero and Claudius times who were Idolaters No Divinity can be warranted from Scripture against evil Princes but Prayers and Tears Whatsoever they command which is not contrary to the great Charter of the word of God I am bound in Conscience to obey If they command any thing repugnant evidently to Gods revealed Will I must obey them still though not actively in doing what they command yet passively in submitting to those penalties they shall inflict He that proclaimed the Prerogative of Kings vos estis Dii taught the World People are to obey Xephlon in vita Mar. Anton. tells us Solus Deus est Index Principum God alone is the Judg of Kings I know no sin against the second Table set forth in more bloody colours by Catholick Authors than this of disobe dience to Governours they saying it is compounded of Homicide Parricide Christicide and Deicide They compare it to Witchcraft where the partie intends and covenants with the Devil himself God commanded the Amalekite who had a hand in Sauls death to be slain before his eyes Sheba blowing a Trumpet against David is stiled a Son of Belial What made Jeroboâ—m so infamous in Scripture but because he lifted up his hand against the King 1 King 11. 26. an irreverent or wry word against the King is in Scripture called Blasphemy Proverb 27. thou shalt not blaspheme the Gods And Naboth was accused in that he did blaspheme God and the King Curse not the King no not in thy thoughts for a bird in the air shall carry the voice is it fit to say to the King thou art wicked and to Princes ye are ungodly Job 34. 18. It hath been observed God hath signally punished those wrongs have been done to his Vicegerents What an unluckie time was it and accompanied with a deluge of miseries when Kings were taken away from Rome and Consuls set up We read in our Annals after Richard the Second was deposed followed a War wherein a hundred thousand were slain besides what of late in our memorie What more hurtful and hateful Creature than the Locusts Yâ—â— they are observed only to have no King if we obey not the King who is a visible God how shall we obey God who is an invisible King Since the lines of our peace and happiness do meet and center in him as in our common Father Who can think that any natives of a Land professing themselves followers of Christ who in the days of his humiliation was obedient to Caesar that he wrought a miracle to give him his due and expecting a protection from a lawful Prince should once demur to swear and yield Obedience Mens ears are open saith a learned Divine to receive any tragical complaints concerning their Governours Sheba's Trumpet is pleasant Musick to that great Beast the common people they hearken with both ears to Detractions and Calumnies against Governours that they are tyrannical Bishops are Antichristian Popery is coming in apace the Gospel is adulterated Justice obstructed Profaneness countenanced What Hurricanes will these men raise I even tremble any should profane the Pulpit poison the Air or which is worse the very hearts of men with such seditious and devilish Doctrines Who can chuse but renounce that way of Discipline which startles at renouncing War with the King For my part as Lactantius said to Constantine the same say I of our Soveraigns Restauration Ille dies foelicissimus illuxit c. Whose Person if we be not worse than Heathens we ought to love and honour and whose prosperity we ought to pray for His unquestionable Title and most noble and high Descent and Birthright cannot but strike a reverential aw upon us for it may lineally and successively be derived from the British Scottish Danish Saxon and Norman Princes above two thousand years which is more antient and truly noble than any Prince in the World caâ— shew A Prince whose great Judgment Gentility Educarion candid Nature Meekness Generosity Benignity and justness in Dealing all the world cannot but know and may imitate And his very enemies if he can contract any must if not injudiciously passionate or deserve in some measure to be ranged in the Categories of fools and mad men acknowledg But we our selves his Subjects are more pathetically sensible of the
ages she hath had some glorious company professing her Religion even in points their adversaries now impugne There makes for them all that may or can be of any Christian man required Literal Text of holy Scripture approved Tradition general Councils ancient Fathers Ecclesiastical Histories Christian Laws Conversion of Nations divine miracles heavenly Visions Vnity Vniversality Antiquity Succession their true Mission Ordination c. all Monuments all Substance all accidents of Christianity No wit of man can find out Arguments more convincing in themselves the truth of Religion than plain Texts and literal Sense of holy Writ the infallible Decrees of Church and general Councils the indubitable Writings and unanimous consent of ancient Fathers the credible Histories of all times and places and often the common light of Nature and Reason it self And ad hominem for prevention of all evasions no victory more certain no objection more unanswerable than the plain confession of their adversaries themselves The Volumes of Fathers and Councils in the eldest and purest times be so clear in themselves for Romish Faith that the primest and most learned Reformists studying the same are enforced through evidence of their words and deeds to acknowledg as Master Bierly in King James's time produceth clear testimonies If that Church erred or changed by little and little or that the true Church was invisible c. they require some humane reason to shew it catigorically In what time in what Articles what Pope changed what tumults rise thereupon what Councils withstood c. which in all innovations they can shew easily a total change and in what particular points as by Arrians Sabellians Donatists Pelagians Protestants c. What places what Countries changed with them what Catholicks set against them what kept the old paths To say the Church was extinct a thousand years or unknown is expresly against the Scripture Christs Promises and Providence and Reason it self If the Church were invisible whether should Gentiles address for their Conversion or the doubtful for resolution or all faithful for their direction was our Saviour who was promised to all Nations brought to that streight that he had not a visible Chappel reserved to him in the whole world Is it not good reason God would preserve his Church which he had planted and watered with his Blood Is it not a denyal of Gods Providence and to say Jesus Christ was unjust or an Impostor to oblige all men to indispensible obedience to her if erroneous or invisible if men were changed into beasts they may be thus perswaded Is not the Church compared to a City to a Light to the Sun c. can the Church which is a Sun be drawn into a chinâ—k or all her Beams into the center of a Burning-glass Can any Proposition be more reasonable than to ask of those who maintain a thing to be in former ages to produce some marks thereof to shew where they had a being or a Company successively holding the same Articles with them The Building is perpetual where God layeth the Foundation The Church is the Pillar of truth 1 Tim. 3. cannot err Irenaeus l. 3. c. 4. Mat. 28. Act. 3. Go teach all Nations and I am with you all days to the consummation John 17. Father keep them in â—hy name whom thou hast given me See his Petition to keep his Church gathered of all Nations and his continual protection I will give you another Comforâ—â—â— â—o aâ—iâ—e with you for ever John 16. When the spirit of truth cometh he shall â—â—ach you all truth This assistaâ—ce promisâ—d was ever in all ages no Heresie or Jew could ever prevail against it The guard and strength of Truth in point also of antiquity is ever such that she resteth still accompanied attended and fortified with surest friends strongest towers and best munition Priority and ancestry is so specially affected by the Wisdom of God and maligned by the enemy of man that in first planting the Church it s said Mat. 4. 13 24 25. 5. Mat. 13 17. Luk. 8. 12. that he first sowed good seed in the field and after the enemie came and oversowed Cockle not obscurely intimating true Faith and Religion that is good seed was first and ancient to Sects and Heresies Even as temporal nobility is most honourable which is derived from the aâ—cientest Blood and in earthly possessions that Title strongest which pleadeth longest prescription or ancientest evidence So it cannot be denied but truth was before falshood substance before shadows the Gospel Faith Religion c. which is first and eldest is only the true Gospel Faith Church and other Congregations afterwards arising or going out from thence are only malignant inventions of the enemy In which respect to find out truth in all occurring difficulties we are specially forewarned to recurre to antiquity to suspect novelty Moses Deut. 32. before his death leaving documents to the Children of Israel saith Remember the old days ask thy Father c. so Bildab Jobs friend 1 Job 8. advised him in greatest extremities ask the old generation and search diligently Solom Eccl. 9. 8. 11 12. let not the â—â—rration of the ancient escape thee c. and Jer. c. 16. stand upon the ways and ask the old paths which is the good way c. on the contrary God reproveth such as walk in a way not trodden and Solomons lesson is Transgress not the ancient bounds which thy Father hath put So Saint Paul to Timothy to keep the Depositum avoiding profane novelties It 's very ordinary with the Fathers to confute Hereticks by their innovation So Tertullian reproveth Novelists of his time saying to them who are you when and from whence came you what do you in my grounds by what right Marcion didst thou cut down my woods by what licence Valentine dost thou overthrow my Fountains c. It is my possession long since I possessed it I possessed it first So Saint Hierom. of the Luciferians Why do you go about after four hundred years to teach that we knew not before until this day the world was Christian without that Doctrine So Athan. confuteth the Arrians Saint Hilarie and Saint Aug. Donatists These reasons may induce us to take new measures of that ancient Church and may easily perswade persons as Doctor Taylor in his Treatise of Liberty of Prophecying of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their forefathers especially when her Soveraign Rights Titles and Prerogatives are admitted and acknowledged by her professed enemies Whence Chillingworth confesseth that Protestants cannot with coherence to their own grounds require of others the belief of any thing besides Scripture and the plain irrefragable and indubitable consequences of it without most high and schismatical presumption Dr. Bramh. Reply p. 264. We do not saith he hold our 39 Articles to be such necessary truths extra quas non est salus without which there is no salvation nor enjoin ecclesiastical
burnt by a Decree in the face of the world by publick Justice did not a General Council of Constance sentence the Deposing Power as erroneous and scandalous although he were a Tyrant Have any other reformed Churches proceeded so far The Doctor doth well to cry Whore first and take no notice of the many standing objections in this and other things against his own Calvinistical party But what need I trouble Ink and Paper to examine this mans absurdities when I had taken but three hours to run them over they are encreased to so many I am come into a Labyrinth you may judg by his first ten lines wherein he committeth three first he saith His Majesty found it necessary for good of his affairs to grant freedom to all Dissentors If His Majesty found it necessary is not he presumptuous being a private man and a subject to make this invective he calls seasonable Discourse to impeach it to offer weak and lying motives to obstruct it Secondly what confidence hath he to utter so notorious an untruth as to say Now Priests openly act in all parts their functions In what City or Countrey Town hath he found them publckly preaching or praying Thirdly is it not absurd that being an ecclesiastick he should so mind us of Capital punishment who by the Canons should have no hand in blood He is much troubled at the Coâ—â—iers Crred viz. to believe as the Church believes Which gives a suspition he doth not believe or would not have his Parishoners believe one article of the Creed He calls charity and love but tempting charms as if he did not know or believe the Gospel where there be innumerable commands for it But then he comes a canting being suspitious his Book tends to Sedition and to breed feuds amongst us saith no price can be to great for peace but truth But what truth doth he mean the many imputed slanders in his Book or would he have truth separated from love peace and charity He cites Authors falsely as Thomas Aquinus Peron c. he hath false supposals viz. that Catholicks take away the Scripture give a half Communion make new Articles of Religion c. that indulgencies remit the guilt of sin and that the gifts of God are bought with money c. who ever writ more against such Simony than Catholick Authors or hold more plainly that sin is never forgiven without sorrow and repentance from God by the Merits and Passion of Jesus Christ So much for the Vnseasonable Discourse Now to overthrow from the foundation all other aspersions in this kind Let all impartial men consider first those criminations proceed originally from enemies and grand animosities of parties adverse Secondly Papists universally disown them Thirdly unrepentant traytors and implacable enemies are amongst their accusers and which most encourages them is their constant fidelity they might easily vindicate themselves from all such imputations by the putting their adversaries to the proof had they but liberty to question them and bring them to a trial For they never durst appear or shew their faces in an open and impartial audience We might admire where such deep malice could be found but much more how any prudence could believe them and that no reason or experience will restrain them How strange a wickedness is then the groundless censuring so highly and publickly so many noble and honourable personages so many eminently deserving subjects of his Majesty so many grave most venerable and most sacred personages in the world What account shall such give at the last day what is this less than persecution what mischiefs flow and are apt from such libelling by sad experience we have tasted the bitterness of the fruit The dreadful ruin of Hierusalem was brought about by such furious ones Josephus calleth the Zealots And should they still be countenanced it unavoidably bringeth incurable divisions for there is no certain rule of Justice with such persons Secondly It breeds an ill correspondence between our fellow subjects and makes them ill looked upon which violates civil unity so necessary for the peace and strength of a Kingdom Thirdly It disincourages Loyalty to see that after such testimonies it may be lawful for any at pleasure to brand them as Traytors publickly in Print Fourthly It tends to excite our Governours that they are not fit to be endured in any State Fifthly It must breed fouds between private persons all over England Scotland and Ireland 6. It is a reproach to Christian Religion when the world must see we have not so much justice and equity as Heathens have in their worldly Societies Seventhly It is a great cause of the persecution of Christians and the damnation of Persecutors being foolisher than the Devil who would build Christ's house or Kingdom by dividing it Mat. 12. And that which must sanctifie all this sin is the seeming interest of God and Religion to hinder the growth and increase of Popery If it was an untruth they spake it was for Religion if they did backbite and revile it was to preserve the hearers from errors aud infection If they used their reputation to murder love and make others odious and rejoiced in their sufferings and afflictions all this is but for defence of truth They think all this is a part of Christian zeal And this is a mark of Satans way of Reformation he doth it by dividing and teaching Christians to form odious thoughts of one another And when his meaning is to save you from heaven and truth he takes upon him he is only saving you from sin or errors or corruptions of the Church By these notes and signs saith an English Divine you may easily perceive how the dividing zeal of such differs from the true genuine Christian Catholick Zeal If your zeal be raised for some singular opinion not for the common salvation moved by some personal interest honour or dishonour for strengthning a party c. And not to promote godliness the common cause of Christianity or general cause of pedce and piety A hurting burning zeal for execution of penal Statutes When it causeth you to revile backbite despise censure and zealously to make dissenters odious that hearers may abate their love When your zeal tendeth to hurt and cruelty and is greater for the adversaries destruction than your desire and prayer for his conversion It s a false zeal more inclined to their sufferings reproach or hurt with some secret desire of fire from heaven c. when it tendeth to separations divisions distances from our ancient Brethren This is the complexion of the proud false conceited and surly sort of professors which flyeth outward against the sins of other men and can live with pride selfishness and sensuality at home a contemptuous persecuting zeal kinled by inflaming censures of rash passionate Preachers First it is an ill sign when their censures are beyond the proportion of their understandings and their experience and prudence much less then others whom they censure
understanding to examine them It 's hard for the most judicious and learned men to give a right judgment of many points and yet notwithstanding many engaged persons are ready to force Dissenters by coercive Power or blacken them with opprobrious terms The Controversies of Justification by faith or good works hath filled volumes with Arguments Definitions and Distinctions but it is hard to find whether the difference be not de nomine and of words only The Controversie of free-will since neither part doth absolutely exclude Divine Grace or concurrence of the will with it may be called verbal if understood cum grano salis and by those who carrie no partial biass on their judgments Some rigid Calvinists indeed though not all conclude an absolute fate by Predestination to Salvation or Reprobation to those I answer they need not trouble themselves but let every one go quietly to his destinie since by their own Principles all their Praying Preaching c. can neither help nor hurt Seeing it is not in their power to avoid evil or do good Worship of Images exclaimed as Idolatrous the scandal is chiefly as I conceive taken from the word Adoration which in the Grammar sense is but adorare to pray to but the generality of Rome disown that acceptation and told them chiefly as Memorials as I shewed before The Pope to be Antichrist the Etymology of the very word is repugnant to it the being by us acknowledged likewise the great Patriarch of the most Christian and Western Church and every one that hath but an ordinary reason sense or knowledge of Scripture can own but one Antichrist to come the Prophet Daniel spoke of And that he should give pardon for Sins or Sinners whatsoever without first having remission from God by Sorrow Repentance and Amendment is so great a Calumny that I pray God to pardon such malicious ignorance I tremble to hear such horrid blasphemies out of Christian mouths to derogate and scandalize their fellow Christians with more than Hâ—athenish impleties Many and other great things have been objected against them through ignorance weakness mistakes or malice which unjust men scatter too and fro as chasse to blinde the eyes of simple and credulous people The crimes of a few miserable wretches by none more detâ—sted than themselves are made their guilt but it is the fashion Papists and Popery must be brought in by head and shoulders and sit down under any affronts what ever the difference be to exasperate mens spirits and make odious and suspected those whom we can never confute It is hard they should alwaies lie under such undeserved imputations and be persecuted without liberty of a just defence The Morality of the Heathens was more equitable and less envious where the Emperor Adrian commanded unto Minutius his Proconsul of Asia as a thing of great importances ne nomen condemnaretur sed crimen A Divine of our English Church exclaiming against such proceedings saith Our affections change our thoughts and our imaginations fit the scene and what we call reason is many times but a chain of phantasms and we are guided by prejudices and overwhelmed by Authority and formed by education and suck in opinions carelesly are deeply setled before we examine them and when we examine them it is but by halfes we see but few things and judg all things by them and either seek not truth at all or are unable to manage a due and impartial search When we stumble upon it we are afraid and run away from it or stand to pelt it with dirt and vile names In the mean time we catch at shadows and grow fond of the imaginations of our own fancies Doctor Taylor one of our late and most eminent Divines in Treatise of Liberty of Propheâ—ying § 2. 10. p. 249. Collecting some considerations inducing persons saith he of much reason and more piety to retain the Religion of their forefathers Their Doctrines having had a long continuance and possession of the Church which therefore cannot easily be supposed in the present Professors to be a design for Covetousness Ambition c. since they have received it from so many ages and it is not likely that all ages should have the same purposes or that the same Doctrine should serve the several ends of diverse ages It s long prescription which is such a prejudice as cannot be retrenched as relying upon these grounds that truth is more ancient than falshood that God would not for so many ages forsake his Church and leave her in error I add not such gross errors as are imputed on them as Idolatry c. Again the beauty and splendor of that Church their pompous Service the stateliness and solemnity of the Hierarchy their name of Catholicks which they suppose and claim as their own due and to concern no other Sect of Christians The antiquity of many of their Doctrines the continual succession of their Bishops their immediate derivation from the Apostles their title to succeed Saint Peter and in this regard chiefly honoured and submitted to by antiquity the supposal and pretence of his personal prerogatives much spoken of by the Fathers the flattering expressions of minor Bishops in modester language honourable expressions which by being old records have obtained credulity The multitude and variety of people which are of their perswasion apparent consent with elder ages in many matters doctrinal the advantage which is derived by entertaining some personal opinions of the Fathers the great consent of one part with another in that which they affirm to be de fide The great differences which are commenced among their adversaries their happiness of being instruments in converting divers Nations The advantage of Monarchical Government the benefit of which they daily enjoy The piety and austerity of their religious Orders of men and women the single life of their Priests and Bishops the severity of their Fasts and their exterior observances The great Reputation of their Bishops for Faith and Sanctity The known holiness of some of those persons whose institutes the religious persons preâ—end to imitate Their Miracles false or true substantial or imaginary The causalities and accidents that have happened to their adversaries the oblique acts and indirect proceedings of some of those who departed from them To which join that of Sir Edwine Sands in his relation of the western Religion p. 29. saying Beside the Roman Church and those Churches united with her we find all other Churches to have had their end and decay as Hussits Sollards Waldenses Albigenses Berengarians c. or their beginning but of late This being founded by the Prince of the Apostles with promise to him by Christ c. much more to that purpose ibid. What Church but one can shew the fulfilling of innumerable Scriptures touching the Churches Infallibility Vniversality by time place and person Which can spread before your eyes her Line and Pedigree descendâ—ng from the Apostles to these times which can declare that in all