A most worthy SPEECH Of the truly Honourable and worthy Member of the House of COMMONS, Sir Edward Deering Knight and Baronet.  
Spoken in Parliament.  
Concerning the liturgy of the Church of England, and for a national Synod.  
LONDON, Printed for John Frank, and are to be sold at his shop under the King's head at Chancery-lanes end in Fleetstreet, 1642.   

Sir Edward Deering's SPEECH in Parliament, concerning the Liturgy of the Church of England, and a national Synod.  
Master Speaker,  
THe Question is, whether this clause concerning some pretended erroneous passages in our liturgy shall be laid by or not.  
I am of opinion to decline them here, but not to bury them in perpetual silence.  
In this period, you give us (in general terms) a promise of a national Synod: I do still wish the presence of it; It being (to my understanding) the only proper cure and remedy for all our Church distractions.  
The promised Synod is too far off; let me have better assurance than a promise, which that I may obtain, I will be bold to give you reasons to induce that Assembly, and speed it also.  
M. Speaker, Much hath been said, and something attempted to be done, to regulate the exterior part of Religion: but Sir, we bleed inwardly; much endeavour hath been to amend the deformed forms, and to new govern the government.  
Yet Sir, this is but the leaves of good Religion; fit (I confess) notwithstanding to be taken care of, for beauty and ornament: Nay some leaves are fit and necessary to be preserved for shadows and for shelter to the blossoms and the fruit.  
The fruit of all is a good life, which you must never expect to see unless the blossoms be pure and good; that is, unless your Doctrine be sound and true.  
Sir, I speak it with full grief of heart, whilst we are thus long pruning and composing of the leaves, or rather whilst some would pluck all leaves away, our blossoms are blasted, and whilst we sit here in cure of Government and Ceremonies, we are poisoned in our Doctrinals: And on whose door will the guilt and sin of all this lie.  Qui non vetat peccare cum potest, jubet. Senec. 
It is true that this mischief grows not by our consent, and yet I know not by what unhappy fate, there is at present such an all-daring liberty, such a lewd licentiousness for venting all men's several senses (Senseless senses) in Religion, as never was in any age, in any Nation, until thi● present Parliament was met together.  
Sir, It belongs to us to take hee●, that our countenancing (the countenance of this Honourable House) be not prostituted to sinister ends by bold offenders: If it be in our power to give a remedy, a timely and a seasonable remedy to these dangerous evils, and if we (being also put in mind) shall neglect to do it, we pluck their sins on our own heads.  Alienum qui fert scelus, facit suum. Seneca. 
Shall I be bold to give you a very few instances? one for a hundred, wherewith our Pulpits and our Presses do groan.  
1 Mr. Speaker, There is a certain newborn, unseen, ignorant, dangerous, desperate way of independency: Are we Sir, for this Independency? Nay Sir, are we for the elder brother of it, the presbyterial form? I have not yet heard any one Gentleman within these walls stand up and assert his thoughts here for either of these ways: And yet Sir, we are made the Patrons, and Protectors of these so different, so repugnant innovations, witness the several dedications to us.  
Nay, both these ways, together with the episcopal, come rushing in upon us, every one pretending a forehead of Divinity.  
1 Episcopacy says it is by Divine right, and certainly Sir, it comes much nearer to its claim than any other.  
2 presbytery, that saith it is by Divine right.  
3 Nay, this illegitimate thing, this new born Independency, that dares to say it is by Divine right also.  
Thus the Church of England (not long since the glory of the reformed Religion) is miserably torn and distracted; whither shall we turn for cure?  
2 Another instance; If I would deal with a Papist, to reduce him, he answers, (I have been answered so already) To what Religion would you persuade me? what is the Religion you profess? your 39 Articles, they are contested against; your public solemn Liturgy that is detested; and, which is more than both these, the three essential, proper, and only marks of a true Church, they are protested against: what Religion would you persuade me to? where may I find and know, and see, and read the Religion you profess? I beseech you Sir, help me an answer to this Papist.  
Nay Sir, the Papist herein hath assistance even amongst ourselves, and doth get the tongues of some men, whose hearts are far from them: For at one of our Committees I heard it publicly asserted by one of that Committee, that some of our Articles do contain some things contrary to holy Scripture.  
3 Mr. Speaker, Sunday is a Sabbath: Sunday is no Sabbath: both true, both untrue in their several acceptations, and the knot (I think) too hard for our teeth. Shall I give you an easier instance.  
4 Some say it is lawful to kneel at receiving the elements of our holy Communion: others plead it as expedient: some do press it as necessary: and there wants not others who abhor it as idolatrous. And Sir, I am confident you cannot so state this easy Question to pass amongst us, but that there will be many Contradicentes.  
5 The second Epistle of St Peter is now newly denied to be the Apostles; our Creed, the holy Apostles Creed, is now disputed, denied, inverted, and exploded by some who would be thought the best Christians amongst us: I startled with wonder and with anger, to hear a bold mechanic tell me that my Creed is not my Creed: he wondered at my wonder, and said, I hope your Worship is too wise to believe that which you call your Creed.  O Deus bone, in quae tempora reservati nos! Policarp. 
Thus {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman}. Arist. One absurdity leads in a thousand. And when you are down the hill of error, there is no bottom but in hell, and that is bottomless too.  
6 Sir, shall I be bold to give one (and but one) instance more? Much clamour now there is against our public liturgy, though hallowed with the blood of some of the first composers of it. And surely Sir, some parts of it may be very well corrected; but the clamours now go very high, Impudence or ignorance is now grown so frontless, that it is loudly expected by many, that you should utterly abrogate all forms of public worship: extirpation of Episcopacy, that hope is already swallowed; and now some men are as greedy for the abolishing of the Liturgy; that so the Church of England in her public prayers, nay her offerture, may be as a babbler at all adventures: A brainless, stupid, and an ignorant conceit of some.  
Mr Speaker, The wisdom of this House will (I am confident) never sink so low, never fall into such a delinquency of judgement an● piety: when you do, I shall humbly submit myself unto the stake and faggot, (I mean) for certainly Sir, I shall then be a Parliament heretic.  
Thus much for a taste of that whereof there is too much abroad: For the divisions of Reuben, there are great things of that abroad.  
Sir, Thus are we engaged, enclosed in points of Divinity, and with the favour of that Gentleman who did last time discuss it, I must again propound my doubtful Quere to be resolved by the wisdom of this House; Whether we be Idonei & competentes Judices, in doctrinal resolutions? In my opinion we are not: Let us maintain the Doctrine established in the Church of England; it will be neither safety nor wisdom for us to determine new.  
Sir, I do again repeat and avow my former words, and do confidently affirm, that it was never seen not known in any Age, in any Nation throughout the world, that a set of laymen, Gentlemen, soldiers, Lawyers of both gowns, physicians, Merchants, Citizens, all Professions admitted, or at least admittable, but the Professors of Religion alone excluded, than we should determine upon Doctrine Divinity.  
Shall the Clergy hold different Doctrine from us or shall our determination bind them also? They are a considerable body in the kingdom. They are herein surely as much concerned as we, and ought not to be bound up unheard and unpartied.  
Further Sir, if clergymen amongst us be thought fit for no other than for spiritual employment, how shall we answer it to God and a good conscience, if we shut them out of that which we ourselves pretend to be their only and their proper work.  
Mr. Speaker, We cannot brag of an unerring Spirit: Infallibility is no more tied to your chair, than to the Popes. And if I may speak truth, as I love truth with clearness, and with plainness, I do here ingenuously profess unto you, that I shall not acquiesce, and sit down upon the doctrinal resolutions of this House, unless it be where my own genius doth lead and prompt me to the same conclusions.  
Mr. Speaker, We are here convened by his majesty's writ to treat Super arduis negotiis Regni & Ecclesiae, I beseech you let us not turn Negotia Ecclesiae into Dogmata fidei: There is a great difference in objecto between the Agends and the Credends of a Christian: let us so take care to settle the Government, that we do not unsettle the doctrines.  
The short close of all with a motion, is but this: We are poisoned in many points of Doctrine, and I know no Antidote, no Recipe for cure but one: A well chosen and a well tempered national Synod, and God's blessing thereon: This may cure us, and without this (in my poor opinion) England is like to turn itself into a great Amsterdam, and unless this council be very speedy, the Disease will be above the Cure.  
Therefore that we may have a full fruition of what is here but promised, I do humbly move that you will command forth the Bill for a national Synod, to be read the next morning. I saw the Bill above five months since in the hand of a worthy Member of this House; if that Bill be not to be had, than my humble motion is (as formerly) that you would name a Committee to draw up another.  
This being once resolved, I would then desire that all motions of Religion (this about the Liturgy especially) may be transferred thither; and you will find it to be the way of peace and unity amongst us here.  
FINIS.