Tulse Mayor. Martis, quinto die Februarii, 1683. Annoque Regni Regis Caroli Secundi Angliae, &c. tricesimo sexto. THis Court doth desire Dr. LAKE to Print his Sermon preached at Bow-Church on the Thirtieth of January last, being the Anniversary for the Martyrdom of King Charles the First. wagstaff. A SERMON PREACHED AT The Church of S. Mary le Bow, Before the Right Honourable The LORD MAYOR and Court of Aldermen, ON THE Thirtieth of january, MDCLXXXIII. Being the Anniversary Day of Humiliation FOR THE Martyrdom of K. CHARLES the First. By EDWARD LAKE, D.D. Rector of S. Mary at Hill, and of S. Andrew Hubbard, LONDON; and Chaplain to His Royal Highness. LONDON: Printed by M. C. for C. Wilkinson, at the black Boy over against S. Dunstan's Church, Fleetstreet. 1684. To the Right Honourable Sir Henry Tulse, Lord Mayor of the City of London, AND TO THE Honourable Court of Aldermen. MY LORD, THere are few Citizens who have not heard of or red the Valour of Sir William Walworth, one of your Predecessors in the Chair; that when Richard the Second was surrounded by those desperate complices in Tyler's Rebellion, and in danger of losing both his Life and Crown, he raised and animated the Citizens by crying out, Ye good Citizens, help your King that is to be murdered, and succour me your Mayor that am in the like danger; or if you will not succour me, leave not your King destitute. Whereupon the Rebels immediately dispersed, and the King was rescued. When I reminded this Story, I was in some suspense, how I should apply it, whether to the shane of our late Citizens, who could thus basely suffer their King to be murdered before their faces, nay, harboured and encouraged the very Murtherers: or to the praise of your Lordship and present Aldermen, and many brave loyal Spirits within the walls of your City, who would, I dare say, upon the like occasion, as briskly, as courageously oppose themselves to whatever Rebels who should dare again to invade the Royal Life and Interest. It is well known, my Lord, that the late Rebellion was managed and transacted by men of several Sects and Persuasions: the Presbyterians boasted themselves as the more sober and moderate Party; but I have here made it appear, that they were all influenced and acted by the same Principles; Principles destructive as to Monarchy, so to the safety and security of all Societies: I have in this following Discourse assayed to detect and expose them, as also the principal Boutefeus and Abettors of them, who did either inflame the people into those rebellious Attempts, or did afterward justify them. Some of them perhaps do yet live, and if they think themselves aggrieved with any thing I have said, they may thank themselves; my proofs are undeniable, my quotations, if my Printer do me right, exact. May the great God( with whom nothing is impossible) at length open all their eyes. May they be converted to him and his holy Church by an unfeigned Repentance; that Righteousness and Peace may dwell in our Land, and this City may be at Unity in itself; which is the earnest Prayer of MY LORD. Your Lordships most humble and obedient Servant EDWARD LAKE. A SERMON PREACHED Before the LORD MAYOR: On 2 SAM i. 18. Also he bad them teach the Children of Judah the Use of the Bow. WE red in the precedent Verse, That David lamented with this Lamentation over Saul and Jonathan; as we do this Day over a greater King, and a better Man than either. And presently follows my Text, inserted in a Parenthesis: Also he bad, &c. That I may not be censured trifling and impertinent, for recommending to you this Text upon this Solemnity; it concerns me first to clear and evince it suitable thereunto. Some of our late Commentators, Munster, Vatablus, Piscator, and others, adhering to the sense of the Targum and Jewish Rabbi's, understand this Bow literally for that Military Weapon, in the Use whereof, the philistines were, it seems, well expert; wherefore David commands his Prefects or Captains of his Army, to Exercise herewith the Children of Judah, who generally, above the other Tribes, were prosperous in Arms, and successful in the Conquest of their Enemies, according to Old Jacob's Blessing, Gen. 49.8. Judah, thou art he whom thy Brethren shall praise, thy hand shall be in the Neck of thine Enemies. The Belgic Edition has annexed this reason hereto, lest the minds of the poor Jews should despond and sink under the important losses of their King Saul, their Valiant Jonathan, aggravated to them in the following Epicedium; but rather from their Experience in the Use of the Bow, be rowz'd up and encouraged to revenge their Deaths upon the proud philistines. But the consequence will not hold; nor can it be supposed, that the Jews were now to learn the Use of the Bow, it having been their common Weapon, I had almost said, the only one made use of in their Expeditions. And it is observable, That the Ancient Manuscripts of the Septuagint and Vulgar Editions, have rendered it Planctum in stead of Arcum, and the Hebrew Text hath Grammatically construed Written, the following participle, in the feminine gender, with Resheth, the Bow, rendering the words thus: He bad them teach the Children of Judah the Use of the Bow, written in the Book of Jasher. Upon these intimations, Mariana, I think was the first, but presently followed by many Learned Men, particularly Sanctius, Serarius, and our excellent Gregory, who did reject this sense of the words, exposed the folly and inconsistency of it, and refer the Bow to the ensuing Elegy, which David made over Saul and Jonathan, calling it a Bow,( as he did afterwards entitle some of his Psalms, Shoshannim, Heginoth, Albashith, the Morning-Hart, the lily, &c.) either because their Deaths were occasioned by the Philistin Archers, or because of the Bow of Jonathan, out of which he shot beyond the Lad, when a mutual Covenant was entred into, and an entire Affection sworn between them, 1 Sam. 20.35. an Affection" greater than the Love of Women. This Bow is written in the Book of Jasher, a Book, which probably comprehended some solemn metrical memorials of the Actions of just and upright Men, as the word imports. It is now lost, nor have we any remains, not the least Account of it, but in the Tenth of Joshuah, and in this place, that this throne or Lamentation was laid up and Recorded in it. Before we proceed to unravel it, and view it well, rendering it applicable to our present Solemnity, I shall preface these two Observations deducible from it, and the Context. First, That neither the Law of Moses, nor any other Divine Injunction hath restrained Kings from adding or altering in the Worship of God. Nay, we have many instances hereof scattered throughout the Old Testament, as David's numbering the Levites from the Age of Twenty Years, 1 Chron. 23.27. whereas the Law required Thirty to qualify them for the Service of the Congregation. Num. 4.3. Solomon's change of the Ambulatory Tabernacle, into a Standing Temple. Hezekiah's dispensing with the Law which forbids the Unclean Person to partake of the Passover. Lev. 7.10. And under the Gospel, as soon as Emperours became Christian, 2 Chron. 30.17. their first Care was to manage and appoint the Service answerable to the apostles Rule," Let all things be done decently and in order; 1 Cor. 14.40. " The Jews had a saying, and there was sense and signification in it: That the Keys of the Temple were laid under Solomon's Pillow: intimating, That a main part of the King's Office and Charge, is the care of Religion, to see, that God and his Service suffer nodetriment; hence is the Commandment which refers to them placed in 〈◇〉 in the confines of both Tables of the Law, to denote them keepers of both, and that, being thus conveniently seated, they may look to Religion with the one Eye, as well as to Civil Justice with the other. Optatus accounts it a piece of Donatus his wonted Fury, and it is no better, no other, to cry out quid Imperatori cum Ecclesia! What hath the Emperor to do with the Church! for he hath much to do, in ordering though not in administering, in disposing though not in dispensing the Affairs of it. No sooner was David set upon Gods holy hill of Sion, but he presently fetches the Ark thither, and sets it by him, appointed the Priests and Levites, and all the rest that attended upon Sacred Ministrations, their several Dignities, Courses, and Offices; he gives order for the whole Service of the Tabernacle; particularly, among other Psalms, he recommends this Bow, to one of his chief Musicians, suppose Asaph Jeduthun, or some other, to teach the Children of Judah, that they might sing it in the public Service of God. 2. I observe, That public and eminent Losses may, nay, ought to be solemnly lamented, as the deaths of Saul and Jonathan were here by David, correspondently to whose practise, our Church solemnizes as the Twenty Ninth of May, so a Thirtieth of January, and hath adjoined to Her Service hereon, this Chapter to be the First Lesson; a day, which though to our Royal Martyr was an happy day, for He had herein his Apotheosis, his Translation into an Heaven of Blessedness, and changed His corruptible Crown for an incorruptible one, yet to us 'twas Dies Maledictionis, a Cursed Day, the saddest read lettered one that ever had place in our English calendar. Oh! why did not the shadow of death slain it, and the blackness of darkness envelop it! for then was the blood of the Mighty vilely cast away: the blood of our Sovereign, as if He had not been Anointed with oil. This day therefore we separate as diem luctus, a day of mourning, when both Moses and Aaron dyed, Kingly and Church-Government; so that we may apply to it the words of the Prophet, alas for that day was great, Jer. 30.7. so that none was like it, it was the time of Jacob's trouble; or as the Trojan Chorus said in the Tragedy, when lamenting Hector, Solitum flendi morem vincit, Carolum flemus; let this days lamentation exceed all other, for now we bedew the hearse of a martyred Prince; the Beauty of Israel is slain upon the High Places, how are the Mighty fallen! But how shall we advance this Sorrow to an Emphasis proportionable to His mighty worth, and our loss? How insignificant to this purpose will be that little rhetoric, if any, I can pretend to? this is a subject becoming an angels Tongue, worthy of David, who made this Bow, or our David whom we lament with it. Had I but the Eloquence of either, I should be able to manage the most obdurate unconcerned Person, and even in this sense, from the Fall of the Mighty, V. 22. from the blood of the Slain, this Bow of Jonathan should not return empty. You have the whole of it in the Verses following my Text, and imbellisht with these three Affections or Passions, of Grief, shane, and Detestation, and with these three shall we exercise this Bow, and withal your Patience at this time. His Grief appears in the Front, but flows down through every Part or Verse of the throne, V. 19. The Glory of Israel is slain upon the High-Places: Oh, how are the Mighty fallen! ye Daughters of Israel, V. 24. weep over Saul, who clothed you in Scarlet, with other delights; who put on Ornaments of Gold upon your Apparel: Weep over Saul! who yet was none of the best Kings, had debauched his Subjects into several sins, and so hurried as many Judgements upon them. I believe no blessing can be bestowed upon a Nation, more advantageous, more creditable to it, than a good and indulgent King, under whose example and providence, Religion flourishes, and Virtue triumphs: But when God shall be pleased to remand to himself this great Instrument of National Happiness; when this God upon Earth, and Child of the Most High, shall die like other Men, and fall like one of the Princes; with what a sincere and resolute Passion is such a judgement bemoaned! how much, how long lamented! Osiris among the egyptians, who taught them Husbandry, and especially the culture of Vineyards,( whom a Learned Historian apprehends to have been Mitzraim eldest Son of Cham) was worshipped, yea annually commemorated by them with very solemn Lamentations. Yea, the Jews, God's own People, did on all occasions very grievously resent such a Loss, and were therefore jealous lest God was about to remove His Presence and Affection from them. Moses, whom once Corah and his Complices had invidiously represented as a Tyrant and Arbitrary, was yet by God's own Testimony, the meekest man upon Earth; ready to indulge them in any thing but what might be a Dishonour and an Offence to God, Deut. 34.8. was therefore bewailed by them with very lamentable remembrances for thirty days together, insomuch that they neglected their own Interest, and deferred the seizure of the Promised Land. When Josiah was unluckily slain at Megiddo, not only Jeremiah, Chron. 35.25. but all the singing men and women were obliged to aggravate, and even to continue to Posterity their resentments of his death. 'Tis true, presently after they were forced away as Captives into Babylon, by the waters whereof they sate down and wept, when they remembered Zion: but when they returned they took down their Harps from the willows; and yet their Sorrow for the good Josiah was reiterated, nay, to such an height advanced, that when the Prophet would express some great mourning, he resembles it to that of Hadadrimmon in the Valley of Megiddo. Zech. 11.12. But we need not ramble from the Text, I am sure, not from the Day, to demonstrate this. He who laments not upon the Thoughts of this Days Tragedy, must be a Stock or a traitor: It will be hard here to restrain our griefs from overflowing and betraying us to undecencies. O Daughters of Israel, weep over Saul; we may more reasonably urge it, Weep over Charles, who clothed us with Scarlet and other delights, continued Peace and Plenty, Wealth and Propriety, Honour and Security to the Nation, every man safely and quietly sitting under his own Vine, and Fig-Tree. He was good in both respects, his Political as well as Personal one. He was a King, a Word quod cum ictu quodam audimus, we hear it with a kind of smart, it strikes Terror into us; and no mushroom King, sprung up in a Night, but the Son of Nobles, the blood of many Royal Veins run in his; One owned as such even by them that Crucified him, in their Inscription of Regum Ultimus; a Good, a Pious King, too good for a People so ungrateful; Let the proudest of his surviving Enemies say it, if they can, Was he a Pharaoh to us, and changed a Kingdom of Free-men into an House of Bondage? did he ever enslave us in our Persons, Labours, Possessions, and Understandings? did he ever invade your Rights, and abridge you the Liberty of Subjects? when did he without any trial of Law, make his Pleasure pass for Right? can you say, you had then such Times as Tacitus describes, when no man durst be Virtuous, lest he should upbraid his Prince! Or were his Subjects like Naboth, stoned for their Vineyard! No, no, he acted like a Steward for his People, rather than a Lord over them, that we might well call him the Tutelar Angel of his Three Kingdoms, whom when God called to himself, he quickly sent a destroying Angel among us! You may red him protesting in his Royal Portraiture, That he was ever more Afraid to take away any Man's Life unjustly, 15 Decem. 1641. than to lose his own. Some of the Rebels, when they first Remonstrated against him, could not but aclowledge, Ex. Coll. p. 529. That he had passed more good Bills to the Advantage of his Subjects, than had been done in many Ages. He gave them indeed what they asked, but a liberty to destroy themselves; and to procure their Good and Peace, partend with many Jewels from his Crown, as Queen Elizabeth used to call her Prerogatives: yet would not all this please them, being like the Sea, insatiable. Sander. Hist. K. Ch. p. 505. Hambden. " He must part with his Power" too, and trust it to them; as one of their worthy Patriots once with some earnestness He might truly say in the words of our Saviour, Many Good Works have I done, for which of these do you kill me? Joh. 10 32. From his politic let us pass to his Personal Capacity, for it was the least of his Titles that he was a King, whose virtuous endowments were unparalleled, and raised him higher above the People than his Throne. He was Sober, Just, Temperate, Prudent, Gentle, Merciful, Charitable; his Patience was invincible, no Affronts could conquer, no Injuries overcome him: His Charity in forgiving his Enemies was admirable; It is all( saith he) that I have now left me, ( viz.) a Power to forgive them who have deprived me of all, and I thank God, I have an heart to do it, and joy as much in this Grace which God hath given me, than in all my former enjoyments, as being a greater Argument of God's Love to me, than any Prosperity possibly can be; You may red it in that exquisite and incomparable Piece, his Eikon Basilike, a Book which at once evidences his Parts and Piety, his Reason and Religion, to be above any but his own expression; a Book which so confounded his Adversaries, that when they, could neither contradict nor confute it, they were fain to deny it to be his. His Piety and Religious Observance of the Duties of it was very conspicuous and exemplary; no Occasion did ever interfere with his Devotion, nor Business of State outdate his Attendance on the Offices of the Church; so Virtuous and free from 'vice, that even Malice itself could fasten nothing on him; these ungrateful Islands, yea the World was not worthy of him: and therefore by a new kind of Ostracism, worse than that of Athens, he must be banished from it, because he was too good and excellent. Grot de satisfact. cap. 10. Grotius tell us of a strange Custom among a People of Scythia, who would offer that man in Sacrifice to the Gods, whom they knew most eminent for Holiness of Life. Thus stood the Case between the King and his Rebels: whatever they could offer to palliate so horrid a wickedness, their Conscience told them, There was no fault in him, as Pilate said of our Saviour: of whose Life and Death he was the most exact Picture, and pointed out so by the casual Lesson red the very Morning of his Sufferings. And now, Behold the Man, look upon him as a King, and look upon him as a Man; he was a mirror of both, the best of Kings, and the best of Men: The more I praise him, the more miserable you will think yourselves in the loss of him, and lament as David did over Jonathan, we are distressed for Thee, most Dear Sovereign, thy Love to us was wonderful, passing the Love of Women, let us recover ourselves a little, if we can; but yet proceed to complain with that Holy Man, How, O How are the Mighty fallen! Had he fallen like one of the Princes, ( i.e.) dyed the common death of Men, or, Had he fallen like Saul and Jonathan, by the Philistin Bow-Men, we might ease ourselves a little of this burdenous Grief: but he fell as the vilest of Malefactors, lead as a Sheep to the Slaughter, as a Sacrifice lead in procession through pretended Courts, through infinite Indignities, to a solemn and ceremonious Death. His Betrayers and Murtherers were not open Enemies, for then we could have born it; but his Treacherous Friends, who had publicly professed and declared for his Safety and Honour; even by them was he most Barbarously butchered before that part of his Palace, where he was wont to appear in State, and give Audience to Ambassadors; and in order hereto, they erect themselves into an High Court of Justice, a Court, which was no ways High, but in Guilt and Impudence; nor had any thing to do with Justice, but as they were fit to be the Objects of it; no ways capable of the Title of it, but by an Antiphrasis, because it was so eminently unjust, as well in its illegal Constitution, as in their direful proceedings against their Lawful Sovereign. And now what Name shall we find for such a Wickedness! a Crime piacular, black as that Hell from whence it came, and which nothing can equal but the Defence of it. Pass over to the Isles of Kittim and see, Jer. 2.10. go unto Kedar, and consider diligently and see, whether there be any such thing: and we may Answer in the Words of Joel, There never was any such thing, nor ever shall be. We red in the Roman Histories, of the bloody and unnatural Emperour CARACALLA, that he slay his own Brother GETA, his Brother by Nature, and should have been so in the Empire: and which aggravated his Cruelty, he forced the poor Innocent from his Mothers Arms, where he had refug'd himself, and after all translated him into the number of the Gods, with this bloody Sarcasm, sit divus modo non sit vivus, let him be Registr'd among the Gods in Heaven, so he be not numbered among the Emperours on Earth. It is in some sort, an Emblem of this days villainy, but only this was more foul, more horrid; there 'twas but a Brother, here 'tis a Father,( and which renders it more highly criminal) the Father of our Country, the head of our body, the light of our eyes, the breath of our Nostrils, whom the bloody CARACALLA's of our Age, ravished out of the Arms of his beseeching Mother the Church, and inhumanly murdered him in the face of Heaven, and before the Sun; and though the most malicious and bloodthirsty of his enemies,( might their consciences have had a free Voice in Court) would have been his compurgators, yet they were as Religious as bloody CARACALLA; Sit divus, let him be a Saint in Heaven, so he be no longer a King on Earth. To conclude this first point, with applying to him Davids lamentation over Abner, Died Abner as a fool dieth? 2 Sam. 3.33. thy hands were not bound, nor thy feet put into Fetters; as a Man falleth before wicked Men, so fellest thou. I proceed to consider a second passion, viz. of shane, which the Prophet emphatically expresses in this his throne, Tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the Streets of Ashkelon, v. 20. lest the Daughters of the philistines rejoice, lest the Daughters of the Uncircumcised Triumph. People are generally tender of the credit of their Country, cannot endure to have it blemished with any ignominious defeat; yea, some have sacrificed their lives to the honour of it. Moses did therefore deprecate Gods judgments from the Jews, lest their egyptian enemies should Triumph and say, Exod. 32, 12. For mischief did he bring them forth. In this manner, the Priests in Joel are appointed to pray for the people, Joel. 2, 17. Spare thy People, O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach; wherefore should they say among the Heathen, Where is their God? and well might they among the Heathen have said of late of us of this Nation, Where is your God? where your Religion? His Majesty indeed by the institution of this anniversary Fast, would wipe away the dishonour, where with this horrid perpetration of a few Miscreants, has stained the whole Nation; yet there are still those who will not cease to blacken, to brand it with infamy, due only to our Enemies. How did their villainy render us a reproach to all neighbouring Nations? the name of an English Man did stink in their Nostrils, was a scorn, a derision, to those who are round about us; that, when our Natives walked in the streets of foreign Cities,( from which before we had the privilege of a kind acceptance, above all people in the world) the finger of scorn was lifted up against us, our name was Schellam, and our entertainment an exprobration of such shameful practices, as by the example of which the Turk might pled innocence, and the savages justify their Barbarities: What kill your King! as if this had been an unheard of wickedness, so that our Merchants and traveling Gentry, choose sometimes rather to deny their Country, than to abide this ignominy. Wherefore Maximilian the Emperour was, you see, little less than a Prophet, when he styled the King of England, a Prince of Devils, because of their frequent Insurrections and Rebellions against their Kings. We have had the best Kings, and been the worst Subjects, God forgive us, and to our shane be it spoken. But the credit of the Nation is not so much our concern, as of the Religion of it. This suffers, this is dishonoured, and 'twill be difficult to assoil it from that dirt which mahometans, Heathens, and even Romanists have therefore thrown upon it. The Heathen World would have censured, Eustat. in Ho●…. p. 199. Rom. ed. abominated, this sin as piacular, and ever paid a mighty deference to their Kings. Homer calls them, born from and nurtured by Jove, implying, that from God they derive their regal power. Syn. orat. de Regno. Plato stiles the Kingly Office, a Divine Good among Men: Menander, as he is expressed by Henry Stephens, elegantly delivers it, that the King is the lively Image of the living God: Monostich. ab Hen. Steph. edita An. 1569. And from this notion of them, the noble inhabitants of Nicaragua in n =" *" Tho. gauge, Survey of the West Indics. cap. 12, p. 74, 75. America, had no Law to punish the murder of a King, because they conceived no Man so unnatural as to commit such a Crime. The opinion of the Jews is soon evinced from those titles in the Old Testament, wherewith they dignify their Kings, styling them the lights of Israel, the breath of their Nostrils, the Angels of God, and the Heads of the people, all which denote them supreme and inviolable. It was an usual saying among the Rabbi's, that no one can judge the King, but he who is over all, God blessed for ever; and Solomon confirms it, where the word of a King is, Eccl. 8, 4. there is power, and who shall say unto him, what dost thou? David speaks home to the Amalekite, 2 Sam. 1 14. How wast thou not afraid to stretch forth thy hand to destroy the Lords Anointed? and so does Pilat to the Jews, Joh 19, 15. shall I Crucify your King? he cannot be crucified, but your Honour is crucified with him. This was a sin too great for the delicate Consciences of the Scribes and Pharisees; Jews themselves could not away with such a dishonour, who then, and ever since, were the most profligate and despicable sort of humane-kind. How then shall we hid this shane? how shall we rescue our Christian Religion from those disgraces poured thereon by reason of the Professors of it! Yes we can: let the Church of Rome, and other Churches, look to, and speak for themselves; the Reformed Religion of our Church, gives no Rules, prefers no Examples, but what are obedient and loyal ones. If any will convince our Church as accessary to any others, let them impeach her authentic Constitutions, her Doctrine, Worship or Discipline. Her Doctrine is contained in the 39 Articles, Arti●…. 37. and Book of Homilies, which are of Age, and can speak for themselves, That the Queens Majesty,[ now the Kings,] hath the chief power in these Realms, and is not, nor ought to be, subject to any other jurisdiction. What our Articles do more concisely speak, the Homilies do more fully teach; I refer you to the six Sermons against Rebellion, which evince the greatness of that sin from Scripture, and the remarkable instances of Gods vengeance on persons guilty of it. With an exact agreement to this Doctrine, is her Liturgy composed, where are none of her Services, whether of daily or weekly use, wherein the King is not particularly remembered, and with an acknowledgement of his sovereign Authority, and subjection to none but God, whom therefore we style the only Ruler of Princes; a piece of duty, which with some, instead of a just applause, hath met with severe censures, and been cavilled at, like Mary's Box of ointment, to what purpose was this wast? Our blessed Martyr took special notice hereof, as a reason, why so many zealots of those times bandied against the public Service: 〈◇〉 One of the greatest faults, some Men found with the Common Prayer Book, I believe, was this, that it taught them to Pray too oft for me, to which Petitions they had not Loyalty enough to say Amen. Her Ecclesiastical Constitutions, agreed on in a full Convocation, 1603. accord hereunto, ordering, That all having cure of Souls, shall four times a year declare in their Sermons, that the Kings power within his Realms, is the highest power under God, to whom by Gods Law do all owe Loyalty and obedience. Nor has the practise of the Children of this Church, ever run counter to those excellent Rules, nor can any object to us the least connivance at this late Rebellion and bloody Regicide. Our Martyr himself hath vindicated us, in his Letter to the then Prince of Wales, his present Majesty. Whereas, they who fomented or were active in carrying it on, departed from our principles, and sucked in others, most pernicious ones, from Rome or Geneva. They went out from us, and would not be of us, because our Religion was too Loyal and passive for Men of such a fiery temper: Not unto us, therefore, not unto us, but to them be the shane of it, if as yet they are capable of any. I beg your Patience, whilst I speak a little upon the third strain of this Bow, his Detestation or Curse of it: Ye Mountains of Gilboa, vers. 21. let there be no due, neither let there be Rain upon you, nor Fields of Offerings: For there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul, as though he had not been Anointed with oil. But how shall we manage this Passion? Shall we curse, shall we detest the Men who acted or encouraged this murder? No, our present King has graced them with a Pardon, and our martyred one with his Prayer, that Repentance may be their only Punishment: But we will execrate those damnable Positions which gave occasion to it; those Positions which fix the Government in the people, and transfer to them a power to kerb, to correct, to depose their Prnces. You Bloody, you Anti-Christian, you Hellish Doctrines, let there be no more due nor Rain upon you! let them not be diffused, nor propagate any farther, but whither and die. And that I may not be thought to fight without an Adversary, I can call forth many who have broached those accursed opinions, which did but too much abet and justify this days Calamity. And in order hereto, give me leave to preface a story, to the truth of which my own experience does attest. When attending in Scotland, Skeen. Sprewle. Steward, 1680. in Decemb. upon his ROYAL HIGHNESS, that great and good Prince, I was curious to discourse some Rebels then in Jail; who did openly avow their Rebellion, and did refuse even to pray for the King; I told them they were variously represented to the world, by some to be Jesuits, or Jesuitically affencted; by others to be Fifth Monarchy-Men, wild arrant Fanaticks. They told me they were neither one nor other, but true Presbyterians according to the Covenant. I replied, we had Presbyterians in our own Kingdom, who yet did not thus obstinately maintain such King-deposing and murdering Doctrines; they told me, I did not understand them, for they believed the same Doctrines, but only wanted power and courage to act them: And I believe, 'twas from a resentment of this discourse I had then with them, that two of them, when upon the Ladder, ready to be Executed, bad the people take notice, they died true Presbyterians according to the Covenant, and I am apt to think they did so, when the Books they had with them in Prison, were no other than Presbyterian ones, viz. The Assembly's Catechism, with the Covenant annexed to it, Baxter of Conversion, a Sermon of Jenkins's, &c. nor were they without Presidents for what they said and did, as I shall now make appear. John Calvin, the Founder of this Sect, Calv. in Amos. cap 7. v. 13. pag. 281. started up at the very same time with Ignatius Loyola, and his inconsiderate zeal hurried him on into a fury even against crowned Heads, particularly against Queen Mary, when he called her proserpina, and said, she outstrip'd all the Devils in Hell; withall referring to the Parliament, a Power to restrain the enormities of Kings, Instit. lib. 4. c. 20. sect 3.1. and telling them, if they do not, they are perfidious and betrayers of their trust; and as he, so his Disciples too, have made it their business ever since, not only to derogate from, but also to extirpate all civil Authority, not conducible to their Interests: I shall only mention some of them, Cartwright, Trevers, Knox, Beza who went abroad under the mask of Junius Brutus, a fit name for such a murderous mind; as also in one Goodman, who, in a Book written by him, Euller. l. 9. p. 77. publicly vindicated Wiat's Rebellion, affirming, that all who took not his part were Traytors to God, his people, and their Country; nor will these intimations seem strange to any who shall peruse their Geneva Notes upon our Bibles, 2. Chron. 15 16. where you may find them highly complaining against Asa, because he did not kill his Queen-Mother, furiously terming it lack of zeal, and a foolish pity. Nor do we wonder at their Seditious Preachments and practices in their late Conventicles, when in one of the first which they ever held in this Kingdom, in Queen Elizabeth's days, in one of our Famous Universities, they Collected a good sum of Money for their Scottish Brethren, Weavers fun. Mon. pag. 54. who fled hither for High Treason. What troubles they created to King JAMES would be tedious to recount; and when our late Martyr succeeded him, this Presbyterian humour advancing into a Parliament, never left working, till they had barbarously brought the King upon the Scaffold, and delivered him over to his Independent Executioners. Yet still the Presbyterians are Loyal Men; it's true, they professed to be so; they vowed, they protested to be so; so did the subtle Fox in Chaucer, who Swore, he came only to hear the Cock sing, but when by that craft he had once got hold on him, the case was altered then. We may allow them somewhat a Kin to the old Parthians, who acknowledged no Honesty nor Religion, but what conduced to their own private interests; their obedience is but a bargain, at best they are but conditional Subjects, and will serve the King no longer than he will serve their turns, still Seditious and opposite, never complying with Authority unless that submit first to them. You may judge of their Loyalty, by what you red in the Writings of those Boutefeus, Incendiaries of Sedition, whose Treasonable suggestions I cannot stand now to mention, much less to insist on; Hall, The Noble Cavalier characterized. p. 56. Foulis Hist. of Plet. l. 3. cap 2. p. 181. * Concerning Baxter, vide his Holy commonwealth. p. 846. 477, &c. Knox, v. Hist. Reformat. of Scotland, p. 392, 393. Jenkins his Sermon before the Parliament. 24 Septem. 1656. p. 23. 2. Croffrons J●stning of St. Peter's Fetiers. p. 67, 118. loves Englands destemper. p. 7. 26. 32. 37. Hall of Kings-Norton v. Funeb. Flor, &c. Baxter, Knox, Crofton, Jenkins, Case, who did once in a famous Church near the City, Pray for a Gentlewoman sorely afflicted because her Son was fallen from Grace, and served the King in his Wars. I will not excuse Mr. Love himself, though they boast him a mighty Martyr for the King: You may believe it, if you please, for upon the Scaffold he professed a vehement detestation of the malignant, Narrat. p. 14. i.e. e. the Royal Interest. And yet still they will proceed to object and boast their integrity, their Loyalty: These things are past, his Majesty has forgiven them, and good reason, for they restored him: They did so, but as Marcus Livius was the cause of taking Tarentum, because if he had not first lost it, it could not have been taken: So did they restore the King, for if they had not driven him from his Kingdom, he could not have been restored. They restore him! Why then were they they so angry at his undisturbed Restoration! Why have they been so Turbulent and unquiet since he was restored? Why presently upon his return, do they threaten him with Divisions, breaches, doleful effects, confusions, great Calamities, if their humours be not satisfied! For my part, Master Whalys civil rights, &c. of Episcopacy in his Speec. at Nottingham. p. 9. I cannot but agree to that of an Ingenuous Gentleman, Men possibly may repent of Presbytery, but Presbytery never yet repented of any thing. I profess; 'tis not with any delight that I have raked in these Sinks, nor should I have thus exposed these Men and Doctrines, but that we see this seditious humour abroad again; those venomous Serpents are still in the High-ways, sedulous to betray and undermine us; upon the same principles they murdered the Father, even upon the very same they contrived to seize, yea assassinate his Sons. What remains, but that we ever detest and accurse their villainous suggestions, beware of the witchcraft of Rebellion, and not suffer ourselves to be again charmed and trick't our of our Loyalty, by the pretences of those abominable Men. What Jacob upon his Death-bed bequeathed to those Brethren in Iniquity, I shall Apply to them and their Independent Brethren, and so conclude. Gen. 49. Simeon and Levi are Brethren, instruments of Cruelty are in their Habitation. O my Soul, come not thou into their secrets, unto their Assembly mine Honour be not thou united; for in their Anger they slay a Man, a Man of Gods right hand, a Man after Gods own heart; and in their self-will they digged down a Wall, a Government that was a Bulwark to our Lives, our Liberties, our Fortunes, to defend them from Violence and Invasion: Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce, and their wrath, for it was cruel. But praised be God who hath Repaired that Wall, by Restoring the Son of that Royal Martyr to Reign over us. May he long, long Reign and prosper. May the Government flourish in his hands! May all those Factions which oppose him, be as the dust before the Wind, and their designs as the Grass on the House tops, which withereth before it be plucked up! May all his Enemies be clothed with shane, but upon himself let his Crown flourish many and many years, that under him we may led quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and Honesty. AMEN. FINIS.