AN Earnest CALL To the PEOPLE of ENGLAND, TO Beware of the TEMPTATIONS OF THE Regicide. LUDLOW,  
To Contract the Gild of the MURDER of KING CHARLES' the First, by a Conceit that the Shedding of that Royal Blood was no MURDER, but an Act of Justice.  
My Enemies (being more solemnly cruel) will, it may be seek to add (as those did who Crucified Christ) the Mockery of Justice to the cruelty of Malice. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the First Edition p. 256.  
Printed in the Year, 1692.   

An Earnest Call to the People of ENGLAND, etc.  
My Dear Countrymen,  
BE not Deceived, GOD is not Mocked: for whatsoever a man Soweth that shall he also Reap. Consider these words of the Apostle, and be Assured that all those, who had an Hand in Shedding the Blood of our Gracious Sovereign, and all those, who being then Unborn, do Now involve themselves in the Gild of that Innocent Blood, by concurring with the REGICIDES in the Approbation of their Diobolical Fact, Be Assured, I say, that one day they shall all Feel (if they do not truly Repent) what it is to Fall into the hands of the Living GOD. This Impenitent REGICIDE Pretending a great Love for Old England (as he speaks; My Love, says he, to Old England is such as can never be shaken!) endeavours with all his might to Seduce the People of England to their Eternal Destruction, by making them to Partake of His Gild in the most Horrid Murder that was ever Committed since the Crucifixion of the LORD of Glory. He would fain impose upon the minds of his Readers, the Belief of a thing so Incredible, that the bare mention of it is sufficient to Inflame any one of common Ingenuity with an Everlasting Indignation against so Impudent an Attempt, viz. to Persuade us to believe that King CHARLES the First was Guilty of the Death of his Father, and that by Poisoning; That King CHARLES the Second, says he, Letter p. 5. went off by poisoned Chocolate to make way for his Brother, when matters were well prepared to set up the Romish Idolatry, is a thing generally believed, and so it was that King JAMES the First was so dispatched.— Well, right, or wrong, King CHARLES ascended the Throne upon the Twenty-seventh of Mar. 1625, and at the first gave the World a Prospect what was to be expected from him; for he instantly took the Duke of Buckingham, and Laud (the Bishop of Bath and Wells) into admired Intimacy, and Dearness, and made them the chief Conductors of all Affairs in State, and Church: and that aspiring Prelate had the Guidance of his Conscience.  
Answ. Since that Admirable Learned Prelate had the Guidance of His Conscience, 'tis manifest the Duke had no Influence upon Him, so as to Pervert Him to any course of Irreligion. This Man (says he) after the Death of the Duke of B. was the Sole Favourite, and was preferred to the Bishopric of London in his way to Canterbury.  
What blessed Effects there were of the same Inclinations, which Moved this Incomparable Knowing and Virtuous Prince, to Admit this most Learned Prelate to such an Intimacy, and Participation of his deepest Counsels, will be seen by the Learned and Pious, throughout All Generations, in the Writings of this Admirable Exemplar of Royal Fortitude, and Christian Patience, who so Gloriously laid down his Life for the Preservation of a Pure Conscience from the Pollution of Perjury, in Violating his Oath to maintain the Laws of this Kingdom, particularly those, that Concern the Church, the Matter of those Laws being most Agreeable to His Judgement, so that He Knew it would have been His Duty to have Desired that such Laws should have been Made in his Time, if they had not been Made before He came to the Throne: So Unreasonable, so Unconscionable, so Traitorous, so Diabolical was it for LUDLOW, and his Companions to Urge Him to the Abrogation of those Laws, and at length to Murder Him for Adhering to the Dictates of so Pure a Conscience. Oh, My Dear Brethren, harken I beseech you, to these words of Our Persecuted, Our MURDERED SOVEREIGN, whose Blood will most certainly Cry for Vengeance against this whole Nation, if the Approbation of the Shedding of it (which God Forbid) should ever become a National Sin, through the Instigation of the DEVIL, By such Instruments as LUDLOW. Thus speaks this Mirroir of Royal Virtue in his Discourse concerning The Differences between the King, and the Two Houses in point of Church-Government. As to My particular engagement above other men, by an Oath agreeable to My Judgement, I am solemnly obliged to preserve that Government, and the Rights of the Church.  
I have oft wondered how men pretending to tenderness of Conscience, and Reformation, can at once tell Me that My Coronation Oath binds Me to Consent to whatsoever they shall propound to Me (which they urge with such violence) though contrary to all that Rational, and Religious freedom which every man ought to preserve; and of which they seem so tender in their own Votes; yet at the same time these men will needs persuade Me, That I must and aught to dispense with, and roundly break that part of My Oath, which binds Me (agreeable to the best light of Reason and Religion I have) to maintain the Government, and Legal Rights of the Church. Yet upon this Rack chiefly have I been held so long, by some men's ambitious Covetousness, and Sacrilegious Cruelty; torturing (with Me) both Church and State, in Civil dissensions; till I shall be forced to consent, and declare that I do approve, what (God knows) I utterly dislike, and in My Soul abhor, as many ways highly against Reason, Justice, and Religion.  
I shall not undertake to meddle with History in this Paper farther than what concerns A. B. LAUD, and B. MONTAGUE. By the Notoriety of the Falsehood of LUDLOW'S Reflections upon Them, any man may Judge what Credit is to be given to him in other Matters. How Prodigiously False his Charge against Montague is, I have shown in My Paper Entitled, A Vindication of the Honour of King Charles the First. It is certainly to the Praise and not to the Dishonour of A. B. Laud what this Regicide Truly Reports of Him p. 9 Laud solicited the King to shelter Montague from the Prosecution of the Commons, and upon the occasion of that Prosecution said, I seem to see a Cloud arising, and threatening the Church of England, God for his Mercy dissipate it. The words following, though He designed by them to Reproach the King, do most certainly tend to his Eternal Praise in that He saw the Resplendent Merit of that wonderful Learned Man, though Overcast with the Mists of so much Obloquy and and Public Reproach. The King appeared incensed at the Prosecution, and sent a Message to the Commons, that Montague was his Chaplain, and he had taken the business into his own hands: he afterwards granted him a Pardon of all Offences, and made him Bishop of Chichester. Well, Sr and what then? Most certainly for foe doing this Blessed Prince, throughout all Generations, shall have the Praise of all Learned Men that read the Latin Writings of this excellent Prelate, and are themselves as he was, steadfast, and Judicious Adversaries of the grossest Errors of the Church of Rome. I do not undertake to Vindicate all his opinions, but I can prove that the Errors of his most Confident Adversaries were far worse than the worst of His. p. 15. This State-Sophister falls again upon A. B. Laud, Bishop Laud, says he, took Sibthorp into his Bosom, and that he might undermine Good Old Abbot, whose Bishopric he Coveted, he put it into the King's head to require the Archbishop to Licence Sibthorp's Sermon— The good Old Man persisted in his Refusal.  
Whose Bishopric He Coveted! This he can never prove to be True, unless he can Prove himself to have a Faculty of searching the hearts of Men. I can hardly think that LUDLOW himself could believe that so Wise a Man as B. Laud could be so Silly in any thing, as to conceit that A. B. Abbot should have been put to Death or deprived of his Archbishopric (that it might be conferred on him) for refusing to Licence a Sermon. I never read or heard that Archbishop Abbot was ever Formally Suspended: if he were, most certainly it was not for refusing to Licence Sibthorp's Sermon, but for that casual Homicide, which he was guilty of, concerning which, in the late History of Oxford Writers we find these words. At length he being found guilty of casual homicide, Retired for a time to Guildford in Surrey, the place of his Nativity, where he had erected an Hospital for Men and Women. Here you see the Occasion that the Archiepiscopal Jurisdiction was committed to Five Bishops as Ludlow reports p. 16. The King instantly suspended the Archbishop, and also Confined him, and committed the Archiepiscopal Jurisdiction to Five Bishops, all of the New Church of England, and Sibthorp's Patrons, viz. London, Durham, Rochester, Oxford, and honest Laud of Bath and Wells.  
Let any man judge, whether honest Laud were for Novelties or a New Church, that reads his Book: And whether it be not the height of Impudence for Ludlow to endeavour thus to Impose upon the World a conceit that King Charles the First, and his Bishops (of which Bishop ANDREWS, BELLARMINE'S Victorious Antagonist, was one) Designed to bring in Popery p. 26. He Charges the King [Horresia referens] as an Accessary to the Horrid MURDERS of those many Thousands of Miserable Protestants who fell in Ireland. Oh, my Dear Countrymen, can you believe that such words could proceed from any other Principle than the Instigation of the Father of Lies! Harken, I beseech you, to these words of Our Gracious Sovereign speaking in his own Defence against this Hellish Calumny. Indeed that Sea of Blood, which hath there been cruelly and barbarously shed, is enough to drown any man in eternal both infamy and misery, whom God shall find the malicious Author, or Instigator of its effusion.  
It fell out, as a most unhappy advantage of some men's malice against me; that when they had impudence enough to lay any thing to my charge, this bloody opportunity, should be offended them, with which I must be aspersed. Although there was nothing which could be more abhorred to me, being so full of Sin against God, Disloyalty to myself, and destructive to my Subjects.  
God knows, as I can with Truth wash my hands in Innocency, as to any guilt in that Rebellion; so I might wash them in my Tears, as to the sad apprehensions I had, to see it spread so far, and make such waste. And this in a time when distractions and jealousies here in England, made most men rather intent to their own safety, or designs they were driving, than to the relief of those, who were every day inhumanely Butchered in Ireland: Whose tears, and blood might, if nothing else, have quenched, or at least for a time repressed, and smothered those sparks of Civil dissensions, and Jealousies which in England some men most industriously scattered. See, Reader, and Admire the Charity of this Blessed Prince Expressed in the Prayer he makes upon this Occasion. Let the scandalous, and unjust Reproaches cast upon Mc, be as a breath more to kindle my compassion; Give me grace to heap charitable coals of Fire upon their heads to melt them, whose malice, or cruel zeal hath kindled, or hindered the quenching of those flames, which have so much wasted my three Kingdoms.  
O rescue, and assist those poor Protestants in Ireland, whom thou hast hitherto preserved.  
And lead those in the ways of thy saving Truths, whose ignorance, or errors have filled them with rebellious, and destructive Principles  
I have lately seen in Print a Device to make people believe that the King was not the Author of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉. who then? why, Bishop Gauden. At this I should Laugh heartily; but that I consider that the Wickedness of the Lie is as Notorious, as the Absurdity of the Fiction, that the Author of this Malicious Invention discovers himself to be a person Near to Hell, and Far from any understanding of the Difference of the Genius and Style of Writers. Bishop Gauden's Way of Thinking and Expression was as Different from what we find in this Admirable Book, as the Glittering of Ice from the Shining of Diamonds; or any thing that is most Loose, and full of Air from that which is most Solid, and Compact. I attribute so much to the Wit, and Scholarly Education of LUDLOW, as to think He could not but Laugh in his Sleeve (as the Vulgar Phrase is) at the Absurdity of such a Fiction: neither can I conceive but that if He would most seriously peruse all that has been Written by Our Gracious Sovereign on this Subject, The Rebellion, and Troubles in Ireland, Defending his Innocency with that Strength of Reason, and Perspicuity of Expression; I say I cannot conceive but that if LUDLOW would but Read what the King has written in His own Defence, he would Condemn himself, if not for his Wickedness, yet at least for his Shameful Inadvertency in venturing upon so Notorious a piece of SATANISM, as this Hellish Calumny. Now, Reader, let us consider the words of the Challenge of this bold Champion of Malice and Falsehood, p. 27. In whatsoever I have said, I have had a Due, and Faithful Regard to Truth, and do Challenge even Pelling himself (who ought for his own Vindication to do it, if he can) to Convict me of Falsehood in any one Particular charged upon his INCOMPARABLE PRINCE.  
I am as much Concerned in the Challenge as Mr. Pelling, having in Many Sermons, Preached on the Thirtieth of January, set forth the Praise of this Incomparable Prince, (though not with so much Eloquence) with as much Zeal, and Ardency of Love to His Blessed Memory, as any Preacher in the Kingdom: And by the Help of God I shall be ever ready to Contend with Any Man, or Any Number of Men, who shall Endeavour to Slain the Honour of so Gracious a Prince, so Sincere a Christian, a Person so Wonderfuly Adorned with All the Excellencies of Wit, Learning, and Virtue. Whether I have Convicted LUDLOW of any Falsehood, I leave to the Judgement of any Impartial Reader: And in Confidence that I have done so, I shall Conclude with these words of the Psalmist: What shall be done unto thee, thou False Tongue!  
FINIS.