OUR Lord made a private entry into the World, without pomp, or force, neither attended with a numerous and splendid train, nor at the head of a great Army: And although the design of his coming was to erect a Kingdom, and to bring men of all ranks and conditions into subjection to it, yet he used neither worldly polity, nor arms to accomplish it. For as his Kingdom was of a different nature, from all those which had been before it, so he took a quite contrary method to form and support it. He was so far from enslaving the persons of men, and spilling their bloud to encrease his own glory, and from putting the Countries about him under a contribution to carry on his Wars, and up­hold the majesty of his Court, that he did condescend to make his first appearance in a Stable, and to take upon himself the form of a Servant.

The dominion he intended, was to be over the mind, upon which outward force can take no place: and to transplant the desires and affections of the Soul from this lower world, to the glories and pleasures of Heaven: for the effecting whereof, grandeur, riches and power are so far from being necessary means, that they often prove most fatal impediments. And accordingly Christ, without a fund of treasure, without Soldiers, or the [Page 2] help of any earthly interest, gave Laws to the World; and disposed men to be subject to them, by the authori­ty of his Divine Miracles, and the convincing efficacy of his Sermons and holy life: and his Disciples preacht his Doctrines, made them spread, and be received by the power onely of plain persuasion, by setting an example according to the rules they had taught, and bearing te­stimony to the truth of their Doctrine by patiently suffe­ring persecution for it.

To tax the World, and draw the Sword, were things so foreign to his purpose, so utterly repugnant to the great end of his coming, the redemption of Mankind from the power and guilt of sin, that on the contrary he has declared it is a matter, in it self, easier for a Camel to pass through the eye of a needle, Mat. 19.24. than for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God, Mat. 26.52. and that they that take the sword, shall perish with the sword.

Whereupon most remarkable was the patience of the first Christians under their sufferings, and their peace of mind and joy, and ready submission to the divine Will in the bitterest trials, was so beyond example, that as no­thing did more abate the rage of their per­secutours, [...]. Greg. Naz. T. 1. Orat. 23. p. 410. than their chearfulness under persecution, so they added more to the Church by dying for the Cause of Christ, than they had done before by preaching it up.

Indeed our Saviour was the first that did effectually recommend this passive virtue to the World, and furnisht men with such true arguments to bear the Cross, as made the most afflicted state not onely supportable, but to be preferr'd before all the happiness of this life. It is true, the Philosophers had deeply consider'd the causes of humane misery, and apply'd themselves with all study [Page 3] and diligence to find remedies for it. But they wan­ted sound principles to build their discourses upon, made to compose the disorders of the mind, and so their rules for the government of the calamitous be­came liable to infinite and unanswerable exceptions; and all their receipts, though adorned with eloquence and the countenance of Philosophy prov'd dry and comfortless to men in pain and trouble: Marcus Tullius mul­ta quidem praeclarè, & egregiè de pa­tientia, & contemtu ad­versae fortunae disputare noverat; exilium tamen suum ubique diutissimè deplorat, & sui temporis calami­tate lamentanda mollis, & propemodum effaeminatus apparet. J. Pieri. de infelic. Literat. lib. 2. p. 99. none sinking more under their burthen, or making more effeminate complaints of the weight of it, than some of these Philosophers who had writ the wisest maxims about patience and the contempt of adverse fortune.

And that which chiefly render'd them unfit for so great an undertaking was their false notions of God, and their ignorance of another life, which sometimes they seem'd to believe, and sometimes they deny'd, and when they were on the affirming side, if we ob­serve with what weak and unsatistactory arguments they endeavour to prove and maintain the point, there will be reason to conclude, that their doubts and dark­ness as to these things would have continued to this day, had not our Lord brought life and immortality to light by the Gospel.

For as it is not to be conceiv'd that a man should bring himself to be quiet and easie under an evil that presses hard upon him, unless it be in hopes by his pa­tience to get rid of it, or to mend his condition: So it is manifest that they, who believe little or nothing themselves of a future state, cannot be stored with true arguments to prevail upon a man to be patient under a sequestration from the happiness and pleasures [Page 4] of this life. For where will they find just motives to reduce him to a composed mind, who by a fire or a storm has his Estate swept away, or by a malitious story his reputation blasted, or by the acute pains of a Disease his Body weakned beyond hopes of recovery, if neither they nor he are possest with a persuasion, that, being gone off this stage, they shall live again, and receive the recompence of their vertue? and with what conscience could the Philosophers upbraid and reproach men in distress for their grief and complaints, passions most natural to their condition, when all they could offer to comfort them, fell short of an equivalent to their present losses and misfortunes?

He then onely can be allow'd to be the true Phy­sician for the mind, who is able to assure his Patients, that even the malice of those, who torment their Bo­dies, shall never have power to reach and harm their Souls; and that for their sufferings in this world, they shall receive an hundred fold in the next. And as Christ alone is the Authour of those means which will up­hold the Spirit in the most sorrowfull condition, so he did likewise foresee, there should be no men exposed to severer trials than the Professours of his Religion, which is the reason he exhorts his Disciples to possess their souls in patience, and that the Apostles do ad­monish their new Converts of the need they have of patience, that after they have done the will of God, they might receive the reward.

In managing of this argument, I shall use the fol­lowing method.

• I. Explain the nature of Patience, and set down the chief instances wherein it is to be exercised.
• II. Propose the means by which it is to be ob­tained.
• [Page 5]III. Represent the necessity of it, and shew that it is a fundamental vertue to the Christian Life.
• IV. Prove that no Religion or Philosophy furnishes men with such true and powerfull motives to pa­tience as Christianity does.

I. I am to explain the nature of Patience. By Pa­tience, in the most comprehensive sense of it, we are to understand that Christian vertue, whereby with a calm and even mind, we do not onely bear pains, in­juries, losses and reproaches, but perform all those duties, that are difficult, tedious and irksome to flesh and bloud, which our Religion does require, and when it is for the sake of our Lord.

Or Patience is that vertue which disposeth us not onely to submit to the wrong and misery, which by the cruelty and injustice of others may happen unto us, but obstinately to deny the importunity of our sensual appetites, in order to promote the interests of piety, and the glory of God. In a word, Patience is that blest temper of mind which enables us with all cheerfulness both to doe and suffer the will of God.

Patience then is not so properly any particular ver­tue, as that happy disposition in our Souls, which has a general influence upon all vertue. It is the kee­ping the Passions within their due bounds, free from commotion and disorder, without which, a man is not capable of real happiness, or to be the master of any one vertue.

For as we are obliged by our Religion to be meek, so what pretence can he make to that vertue, who is uneasie to himself and others, let things go as they will, and clamours still in what condition soever God puts him? it is our duty to be mercifull, but who so [Page 6] cruel as he, who will exercise no patience towards his offending brother? blessed are we, if we be Peace­makers, but can there be peace, if mens passions will not suffer them to yield to one another, and to bear with each others infirmities? we are bound to be not onely content, but to rejoice, when men revile us, and we suffer all manner of evil for righteousness sake; which we can never hope to do before we have laid up in our souls a great stock of patience. We are commanded to watch and pray without ceasing, and we may as well presume to see without light, as to continue the performance of these duties without Christian patience. The many benefits of patience are elegantly heap'd together by Tertul­lian. Omnia enim ejus pla­cita tuetur; omnibus mandatis ejus intervenit: fidem munit, pacem gubernat, dilectionem adjuvat, humilitatem instruit, poenitentiam expectat, exomolo­gesin adsigrat, carnem regit, spiritum servat, linguam fre­nat, manum continet, tentatio­nes inculcat, scandala pellit, martyria consummat: pauperem consolatur, divitem temperat, infirmum non extendit, valen­tem non consumit, fidelem de­lectat, gentilem invitat, ser­vum domino, dominum Deo commendat, feminam exornat, virum approbat: amatur in puero, laudatur in juvene, sus­picitur in sene: in omni sexu, in omni aetate formosa. Ter­tul. de Patient. p. 148. It justifies all God's Decrees, has place in every command; strengthens faith, governs peace, promotes charity, teaches humility, waits for the repentance of men, and the confession of their fault, governs the flesh, preserves the spirit, bridles the tongue, holds the hands, tramples upon temptations, repells scan­dals, perfects martyrdom; comforts the poor, moderates the rich, does not bur­then the weak, nor consume the strong, de­lights the Christian, invites the Hea­then, recommends the Servant to his Master, and the Master to God, adorns the Woman, approves the Man; is lovely in a Child, commendable in the young, admirable in the old; beautifull in every sex and age.

But for the more full understanding of the nature of Patience, and to render it beneficial to us in our conversations, I will present you with some of the [Page 7] considerable instances in which the Christian Man does exercise his patience.

1. The first instance shall be this, that as none of the difficulties he does find in the duties of Religion do make him lay those duties aside, so neither the number of temptations, nor the frequency with which they assault him, do cause him to give over his watch­ing, and making resistance against them; or to fling away the spiritual weapons with which God has ar­med him for a defence. His patience has given him leave to consider the whole matter, and he is convin­ced, that the greatest difficulties in Religion, as in all Arts and Sciences, do happen at the first, and that when the hardships of the beginning are once past over, the service of God will prove not onely eassie, but very pleasant: and that with the same, or less labour, than a man can raise an estate, get a name, or become powerfull, he may fill his Soul with the solid and sincere pleasures of Religion. A Possession incomparably more to be esteem'd than riches, fame, or power. For though a man can never so clip the wings of his riches, as that they may not, in a mo­ment, all fly away; never so secure his fame, as that all on a sudden it may not quite perish by the same fickle breath, which gave it being; never so discipline and govern his arm'd powers, as that they may not all turn upon him, and destroy him, yet neither the envy, nor the strength of the whole world can rifle his mind of that tranquillity and joy, which springs up from the conscience of things well done, and the faithfull discharge of his duty to God.

Moreover why should we grudge at the pains to be taken in a godly life, when the reward of them will be so great and inexpressible? it is also fit and reasonable that there should be some hard parts in the business of [Page 8] Religion, to the end that the pleasures which it does create, might make the more deep and lasting impres­sions upon us, and teach us to set the higher rate upon them, and to be very solicitous and fearfull, lest by any false step we lose those blessings, which cost us so much care and toil.

Besides, there will be still less cause to complain of the labour that goes to the making of a good man, when we shall consider that the uneasinesses in God's service do proceed from our own fault: for what can be more agreeable to the native sentiments of our mind than the Laws of our God, before we contract sinfull habits and customs, and thereby alter the com­plexion and very constitution of our nature, and suf­fer our selves to be enslaved to the lusts of the world and the flesh? And it is but just we should taste of the fruit of our own planting. And though the paths that lead to Heaven prove strait and sometimes rugged, yet Christian patience will so cheer up our drooping hearts, that we shall not return back out of them, nor go astray from them, nor sit down in de­spair of ever arriving at the end of our race. We shall not fail to work out our salvation with fear and trembling, while it frequently refresheth our memo­ry, and animates our courage with the pleasing assu­rance, that it is God who works in us both to will, and to doe of his good pleasure. And the more work lies on our hands, the greater diligence we shall give to make our calling and election sure.

2. If the Petitions the patient man puts up to Heaven be not presently granted, he does not grow weary of his devotions, and give them over, as if God neither heard him, nor had any regard to what he desired. For there be many good reasons which convince him, that God's time to answer his Prayers [Page 9] is the best, and that he ought submissively to wait for it. Perhaps the thing he prays for, is not proper for his condition, and might doe him harm if he had it. Or perhaps he does not address himself to his Prayers, with that just preparation which may testify his sense of the Divine Presence, and that awfull regard he ought to have of the great God, with whom now he has more immediately to doe. Or it may be he does not pray with that warmth and intention of mind, which the vast importance of the mercy, he begs for, does deserve.

Therefore he ceaseth not to pray, although a spee­dy return be not made to his Prayers; as well know­ing God's Ears are always open, and his Mercies ever free, but that the fault must lie on his own side. Which obligeth him narrowly to look into the de­fects of his own performance, and to mend them.

The patience with which his Soul is sustained, even when God refuseth to grant the things he has pray'd for, preserves him from running into any sinfull extreme. From either being so prophane, as to believe his condition may be prosperous though he prays not at all, or so vainly fancifull, as to hope by any super­stitious practice to render his Prayers the more effec­tual. He is as far on the one hand, from being puft up with the haughty confidence of the Stoic, who bids his wise man fac te ipse felicem make himself happy, as he is from degenerating into the supersti­tion of the Papists, who, lest their Prayers should miscarry, address them to hundreds of Mediatours, more than God has either appointed, or allow'd, and without one example in the Primitive Church to ju­stify it.

Insomuch as some honest and learned men of that Church could not forbear laying open the absurdness [Page 10] and impiety of this modern practice of these Semi­christians, who pray hardly oftner to God than to the Virgin Mary, Quo magis demiror fri­gus istud inusitatum Semichri­stianorum, in quibus non solúm refrixit dilectio Dei sed prope­modum extincta est cognitio Dei: aversi videlicet existen­tes à Christo ad Mariam, at­que filii cultu degenerantes ad cultum Matris, adeo ut Putent summum esse scelus, dicere ora­tionem Dominicam, nisi statim addant salutationem Angelicam, perinde ac si citra hanc non va­leat cassam nucem. G. Wicel. Elenc. abus. p. 124. thinking it the highest crime to say the Lord's Prayer, if presently they do not add to it an Ave Maria, as if that, without this, would not be of the least value. By which course they seem to imply, that God's hand is grown shorter than it was in the beginning, and the power and merit of Christ's intercession, so weakned by length of time, that they find it necessa­ry to join a multitude of Saints to him, to be his Coadjutors. And to this pur­pose Henno, interprets Gen. 2.18. Scriptum est, inquit, non est bonum hominem esse so­lum, faciamiss ei Adjutorium, id est, non sufficit unus Advo­catus vel Mediator humano ge­neri in coelo, c;ùm tot ac tam pe­riculosas causas habeat coram Deo: faciamus ei Adjutorium, hoc est, Beatam Virginem. Vid. Wicel. Elenc. abus. p. 125. It is not good that the man should be alone, let us make a meet help for him. That is, says he, one Advocate or Mediatour in Heaven is not sufficient for Mankind, which has so many causes of the highest and most dangerous consequence depending before God: Let us make him a meet help, i. e. The Blessed Virgin.

Neither are opinions so ridiculous, and usages so repugnant to Primitive Christianity, to be charged onely on the weak and ignorant Members of that Church, since these things have taken up a place in their Public Offices, and we find Pope Pius II. direc­ting his Prayers immediately to the Virgin Mary, to cure his Fever, and in that Prayer Pia Dei Genetrix, quamvis tua potestas nullis co­arctetur finibus, ac totum im­pleat orbem Miraculis, &c. H. Tursellin. Lauret. hist. l. 1. c. 26. p. 81. Matrem quippe suam Praepo­tens ille Deus Divinae Majesta­tis, potestatisque sociam, quate­nus licuit, ascivit. Huic olim coelestium, mortaliúmque princi­patum detulit: ad bujus arbi­trium, quoad hominum tutela postulat, terros, maria, coelum, naturámque moderatur: — ut omnes intelligant, quic­quid aó aeterno illo, augustóque bonorum fonte in terras profluat, fluere per Mariam. H. Tur­sel. Ep. P. Aldobrand. Cardin. acknowledging her power to be infi­nite, and the whole world to be filled with its Miracles. And Leo X. Sed procedant: ne tum nos, tum etiam Deam ipsam inani lignorum inutilium donatione lusisse videamini. P. Bembi Ep. lib. 8. ep. 17. p. 181. gives her the title of Goddess, and Diligam te Domina coeli & terrae, & in gentibus nomen tuum invocabo. Psal. 17.1. Adorent te familiae gentium, & glorificent te omnes ordines angelorum, Psal. 21.5. In te Do­minae Speravi non consundar in aeternum, Psal. 70.1. Bonavent. Op. Tom. 6. p. 478. Bona­ventura a Cardinal and a Saint has bur­lesqu'd [Page 11] the Book of Psalms, applying and translating the incommunicable At­tributes of God and Jesus Christ unto the Virgin Mother.

But the humble patient Christian we are descri­bing, he both abhors the impious Doctrine of Epicu­rus, that holds God is too high and too busie to mind our Prayers, and the false Worship of the Romanists, who go about to reconcile the offended Deity Quamo­brem exigua haec data est mihi Poenitentia. 1. Ʋt omnibus patribus & fratribus pedes exosculer. 2. Humilitatis offi­cium, quod est cloacaes expurgare, per octiduum subeam. 3. Ollas & vasa culinae eluam. 4. Per spatium unius horae coram venerabili sacramento culpam deprecer. 5. Per mensis cursum quotidie ter conscientiae examen faciam. 6. Jam meipsum flagellem, donec tertium fuerit appositum ferculum, vel Dominus Rector sufficientiae signum dederit. E. Hasenmull. hist. Jesuit. p. 73. with trifling and childish Penances.

He does not hope to move God to hear him the sooner by scourging his back, or by a Pilgrimage per­form'd barefoot. He does not cross his Body, but he crucifies his Lusts; he does not put off his shoes, but he layeth aside every weight which may clog and in­cumber him, so that he cannot run with patience the race set before him. But he has a great care that the fear of being drawn into the senseless superstitions of Rome betray him not into a neglect of natural reve­rence in his devotions, and the omitting of decency and order in the Worship of God. Neither does he believe that the length of his Prayers will the more recommend them to Heaven, or that he shall have a [Page 12] speedier grant of them, when they are utter'd in un­premeditated, and sometimes unseemly expressions, than when offer'd up in a grave form of proper and well chosen words.

He is not so much concern'd for the circumstances of his Prayers, as the sincerity of them. He is even afraid of being so loud in private, as to make the Streets the witnesses of his Devotion, lest he should onely receive the Pharisee's reward; but he retires in­to the secresies of his Closet, and there poureth forth his soul before God, with a profound reverence, an unfeigned humility, and deep sense of his own wants; and though his Prayers be not always long, yet he suffers few hours of any day to pass without sending up to Heaven hearty and earnest supplications, with thanksgivings.

3. He does not unreasonably terrify himself with distant dangers, and anticipate calamities before they come. For the remote evils we so much dread, may both prove very tolerable when they come, and make but a short stay with us. Nay, though to us they may seem insufferable, and by no humane means to be avoided, yet the alwise Providence of God, whose ways are as unsearchable as the great deeps, may pre­vent their coming at all, and scatter our proud enemies before the wind, who boasted of their powers as invin­cible; contriving for us a wonderfull deliverance, when we suppose our selves on the brink of destruction.

And surely the Israelites, when they beheld Pha­raoh and his Hosts floating upon the Red-sea, could not but with shame reflect upon their own distrust of God's wisedom and goodness, and those unjust reproa­ches they had cast upon Moses, as if they had been deliver'd on purpose from their bondage in Aegypt to perish in the Wilderness

[Page 13]But such fears never more, deserve censure, than when we are so confounded by them as to neglect our Callings, desert the stations wherein God has placed us, and take ill courses to preserve our selves against them. When we are so terrify'd about the events of things, as to seek to cunning men for a resolution: and perhaps embarke our selves in some down-right sinfull methods for our own security. We ought al­ways to keep our eye upon our Lord's rule; Matth. 6.30. Take therefore no thought for the morrow, sufficient unto the day, is the evil thereof. It being a reproof to those impatient Christians, who are not content with ha­ving made an honest provision for their present neces­sities, but are also so anxiously and unmeasurably soli­citous about the future, as to evidence unto the World their independency upon Divine Providence.

4. The humble and patient Christian, when crosses and afflictions overtake him, neither grows froward under them, nor stupid. He neither suffers himself to be cast into despair by immoderate grief, nor his vertue to be stained by getting loose from his troubles. He neither dishonours God, nor injures his Neigh­bour, nor lays violent hands upon himself. He does not murmur and fill all peoples ears with complaints for such calamities, as are as natural to his condition, as it is for the sparks to fly upward, and of which all men taste more or less.

He sets the good he receives, against the evil he suffers, and by a just comparison finds his happiness far to overbalance his misfortunes. He discovers an exact wisedom in God's Providence under the great variety of its dispensations: and ever mildly composes himself into an entire submission to all that is harsh and grievous in his Christian warfare: so far is he in bad times, and when he is ill used from falling into [Page 14] violent fits of sorrow, and languishing away in a me­lancholy retirement.

And indeed the more a man indulges his grief, the greater head it will make against him, and in tract of time so dispirit his mind, that he shall not be fit ei­ther to graple with his present distress, or to guard himself against any other. For Jo. Stearne de obstinatione, p. 121. though all other things in the world by use and custome become easie to us, yet grief is ever to be excepted; because it is impossible to make grief become gratefull and plea­sant to us, by accustoming our selves to grieve: but on the contrary, grief by continuance, is so far from being asswaged and deposing its sour and churlish nature, that it grows more fierce and outrageous, and by our tame yielding to it, will bring both body and mind so low, as in the conclusion to overwhelm and stupify all our faculties and powers.

Farthermore, although he does not allow his pains to throw him into the excesses of sorrow, yet he is not so stupid and void of all sense, as to pretend, or endeavour to persuade others, that he does not feel them; nor arrived to that pitch of vanity with the Stoics, as to boast of the indifference between the rest on a Bed, and the tortures on a Rack, just as if the one was as agreeable to his constitution as the o­ther. He does not therefore think it his privilege to be without passions, whereof he knows so good an use may be made, but he strives to govern them by his reason. He sees no cause to judge that the several hardships and miseries which fill the world with sighs, and groans, and lamentations, have nothing of reality in them, but are all to be resolved into mere opinion or fancy; or that torments can be the more easily en­dured, when they are call'd by fine names.

[Page 15]No, he is sensible of his pain, and it is his great bu­siness, that the sense of it may not breed in him any unworthy apprehensions of God, or transport him in­to any evil or indecent speech or carriage, such as may reflect dishonour upon his most holy Religion. And he ever upholds in his soul a just abhorrence of that false and wicked tenet, asserted by the same Sect of Philosophers, that it is a piece of heroical gal­lantry for a man in sharp pain or great troubles to starve himself, or cut his own throat. For so to doe is a violation of the Laws of Nature, and an usurpa­tion upon God's Prerogative, who has a right to that service, which by self-murther we are render'd unca­pable to perform: it is an injury to humane Society, who have a claim to some share of our labour: it is making our selves the judges in God's stead, whether it be fit for us to live any longer or no? it is the highest affront we can put upon the Divine good­ness, since by evident construction, we declare, that it is better for us to die, than to sub-sist any longer in that uncomfortable condition Providence has chosen for us; and that we are so little be­holden to God for all the mercies of this life, that irreverently and unmannerly we turn them all back upon him.

In a word, the Christian fortified by patience, as he doth not think death is to be feared, when it comes upon him by Divine appointment, so neither believes he that life is to be despised, so long as God shall please to continue it. Seeing it will ever be in his power by God's grace, whether in sickness, or in troubles, to enjoy a contented and serene mind.

And to make his patience the more steddy, he en­quires into the causes of his calamity: and if he hap­neth to have been involv'd in it by his own crime, [Page 16] neglect, or mismanagement, he neither bursts out in­to complaints, nor sits down slothfully under it, nor yet does any other violence to himself than what is in order to the cure, and may be the most effectual means to remove the cause.

But if the evil comes by another man's fault, he employs his clemency and patience in forgiving it; and is so far from returning the injury, that he prays God also to pardon it, and stands prepared to receive another.

And lastly, if it do not come directly, either by his own folly, or another man's malice, he submits, and is thankfull for it, as an act of Providence, de­signed either to reform his manners, or to try his ver­tue, and the sincerity of his love of God.

And it was the sense of the great good that afflic­tions may bring, and of the joy holy men perceive in their sufferings for the cause of Christ, that did tran­sport St. Chrysostome into such an hyper­bolical rapture, as to profess, [...]. S. Chrys. de Patien. Tom. 6. p. 868. That if any one would give him the whole Heaven, or the Chain with which Saint Paul's hands were bound, he would prefer this before that. If any one would place him among the Angels above, or with St. Paul in bonds, he would chuse the Prison. If any one would make him to be among the Powers about the Throne, or such a Prisoner, he would rather chuse to be such a Prisoner. For nothing is bet­ter than to suffer evil for Christ's sake.

5. When he is persecuted for his Religion, he nei­ther deserts it, nor by any unlawfull means defends it. He will not renounce his Faith to escape persecution, and yet he dreads by resisting of Authority to pro­mote [Page 17] the cause of Religion; he will sooner part with his life, than give up his Bible, as those impatient Christians once did, who, by the title of Traditores, will be infamous to all posterity. And rather than quit the hopes he has of enjoying endless happiness by his firm profession of Christianity, he will yield up his Body a Sacrifice to the malice of his Persecutours, and endure the utmost misery that can come by their tor­turing of it. And avow to them with the Primitive Martyr, [...]. S. Greg. Nyss. de Theod. Mart. [...]. 1014. That his Body does owe patience in every member of it to his Creatour.

And as above all Earthly Treasure he values the Word of God, so has he such a just esteem for all the parts of it, as not to dare to corrupt and mangle them, though it be for never so good an end. And therefore he cannot but detest the impiety of the course taken by the Fathers of the Society of Jesus Myst. Je­suit. Let. 5. p. 51. to propagate the Christian Religion in China and the Indies, where the belief of the sufferings and put­ting to death of our ever blessed Lord Jesus Christ, be­ing accounted an extravagance that might give great offence, as it had heretofore proved a stumbling block to the Jew, and seem'd foolishness to the Gentile, they smother'd the doctrine and scandal of the Cross, and preached up a glorify'd Jesus, but not a crucified Sa­viour. And permitted the Christians publickly to adore the Idol Cachim choan, onely fetching them off by a very subtile invention, which was mentally to direct those adorations to the image of Jesus Christ, which they had hid under their Cloathes.

Whereas had these men possest their Souls with true Christian Patience, such as would have enabled them to suffer for the Cross of Christ, they would have had the courage also to preach it up, and as then [Page 18] their practice would have carry'd a conformity to that of the first planters of Christianity, so we might have hoped their endeavours would have been blest with a good measure of the same success.

These good Fathers indeed have gone on journies, as far as the rising, and setting Sun, to make Con­verts, but had their love for mens souls born a propor­tion to their fierce desires of encreasing the riches and splendour of their Church and Society, they would not have confined their charity to the places which abound with costly spices, and where the bowels of the Earth are replenisht with veins of Gold: but their zeal would have cast some warmth upon the poor fro­zen People that dwell near the North-pole, as well as upon the rich Countries of the East and the West. And the starv'd Laplander, who hardly ever heard of a Popish Apostle, should have had a share in their Christian kindness, no less than the Inhabitants of wealthy Peru.

Moreover, as the patient Christian stands prepared for the heaviest afflictions, rather than he will be in­duced to corrupt the purity of his Faith, or add to, or diminish the number of the Articles of his Creed, so is he highly concern'd about the honour of his Reli­gion, that the reputation of it may not be lessened, by any faulty proceeding of his in the defence thereof, or his doing any thing in it self wicked under the pretence and colour of it. He does not think Christia­nity can be spread or promoted by any other means than it was at first set up in the world: or that the least service can be done to Religion by acting contra­ry to the express Precepts thereof. And therefore he cannot but condemn those, Sacrum Evangelium ante omnia annuncian­dum, cura­rent, mox etiam admo­nerent ut foe­dissimis mori­bus relictis, cum honestis viris composi­tè & pacatè vivere vel­lent, & Hispanorum amicitiam sincerè colere. Quas si conditiones acciperent, &c. sin minus, jubere eos capi & trahi in servitutem: denique in eorum corpora, fortunas, & vitam ferre, flamma, & omni Belli clade saeviri. Hier. Benzo. Hist. Nov. Orbis, p. 74, 75. who by force of arms go about to enlarge the borders of Christ's Kingdom, and compell men, upon pain of death, to become his [Page 19] Subjects, and in order to rectify their errours in the Faith, sentence their Bodies to the flames. A method so contrary to that taken by our Lord, his Apostles, and their next Successours, that Richerius the Lear­ned Sorbon Doctour confesses, Hoc obiter notandum Christianam rempublicam mille atque amplius annorum decursu nunquam poenas capitales Religionis ergo inflixisse. E. Richer. Hist. Gen. Conc. Tom. 1. p. 588. That the Christian Church, for above a thousand years, never inflicted ca­pital punishment in the mere cause of Religion.

Neither can he pass a more favourable judgment on those, who take upon them to absolve whole Nations from their sworn duty to their Prince, on the score of Religion: or upon those, who under the pretence of defending their Rights or Religion, Omnibus Christianis diligentissimè advertendum, quòd Deus us­que adeò hanc impietatem in Regibus detestatur, & usque adeò fidelibus populis imponit officium hoc Reges sic deliquentes castigandi, & ab omni regali altitudine funditùs dejiciendi, ut si hoc loco populus Regi suo vel exile quid indulgeat; Deus eo facto populum peccare, & divinam suam maje­statem non leviter offendere. G. Rossaeus aliàs Giffordus de just. Reip. Christ. Author. in Reg. imp. p. 611. resist lawfull Authority. It being a blasphemy against the Divine wisedom and power, to suppose God can ever stand in need of our sins to bring to pass his most glorious designs.

He then in whom this vertue of Patience dwells keeps a due regard to the commands laid upon him to submit himself to the supreme Powers, and he dares not lift up his hand against the Lord's Anointed, or levy war upon the most plausible account whatsoever: nay to him it cannot but seem a wonder that the doc­trine of Resistence should have gone down so glibly with any, who have read the New Testament, and are baptized into the Christian Faith.

[Page 20]Now since disobedience to lawfull Governours has been a frequent sin in these times, wherein men have studied and strain'd to find out such numbers of cases, in which they believe they may lawfully resist those whom God has set over them, as that they hardly have left a place for Christian Patience to bear its part in. I intreat leave somewhat the more largely to in­sist upon these two things. 1. To prove that all re­sistence to the Supreme Authority is unlawfull. 2. To shew with what care, impartiality and patience the good Christian searches into the grounds and causes of his persuasion, that the commands of Authority are sinfull, before he refuses to pay obedience to them.

First, To prove, that all resistence to Supreme Au­thority is unlawfull; in order to which we may ob­serve these three things.

1. That there is an universal command in holy Scripture laid upon all Christians to be subject to the Supreme Powers.

2. That this command is enforced with strong and clear reasons.

3. That the Popes of Rome were the first Preten­ders from Scripture to a right to resist the Civil Power.

1. That there is an universal and absolute com­mand in holy Scripture laid upon all Christians to be subject to the Supreme Powers in all cases. Now no­thing is plainer than that, if we be required to be sub­ject in all cases, Rom. 13.1. resistence in any will be sinfull. Let every soul be subject to the higher power, to which Christian Precept there's no exception to be found for any person in any instance, from one end of the Christian Institution to the other. The duty of Sub­jection is grounded both upon the Precepts of Christ and his Apostles, and confirmed by their constant prac­tice. [Page 21] He and they not onely paid tribute to Caesar, but gave proof of their submission even to the bitter­ness of death it self. And his and their examples have been faithfully copied out by the Apostolic Church, in the lives of its pious Confessours and glorious Mar­tyrs. Subjection is a duty than which, there hardly is any oftner repeated in the Christian Law, so as we cannot plead ignorance of it; it is pressed with such evidence of reason, that cuts off all pretences of eva­ding it; it is set down in such plain, easie, and full expressions, as that there can be no colour to doubt about the right understanding of it. The holy Scrip­ture gives permission no more to the People collected into one body to rebell, than it does to each of them, by himself singly considered. Every Christian, in all circumstances, is required to conform to the Laws of the Supreme Authority, if they have no repugnancy to God's Laws; and to suffer patiently where obedi­ence would be a sin. Now there being in our Reli­gion a general Precept to be subject to our Gover­nours, without one exception to it, what will the Sons of disobedience urge in excuse of themselves? will they say that the Evangelical Precepts were not to bind perpetually, and that our obligation to observe them is already ceased? If it be, then we have done with our Religion and our Bibles, and may lay them both aside.

It is most certain, that by the same argument they would take off their obligation to this plain Christian Duty, they may excuse themselves from their obliga­tion to all the rest. Will they plead, that the Gospel is not a perfect rule of duty, and that the inspired Writers did not foresee and provide for all cases; and that therefore it is but reasonable there should be a sup­plement of new Doctrines and Rules, where the [Page 22] Gospel has been defective? But is not this rank Po­pery do we not justly condemn the Church of Rome for taking upon her to make new Articles of Faith? is not this to incur the guilt of St. Paul's Ana­thema, which shall pass upon whosoever preaches ano­ther Doctrine?

Or will they say that the general Laws of the Go­spel bind but sometimes, and the universal Rules hold onely in particular cases? That is, notwithstanding St. Paul does lay a strict injunction upon every Soul to be subject to the Higher Powers, yet that some ought to be excepted. But is not this the way to de­stroy all the Laws of the Christian Religion? since upon the same ground they dispense with one Law of Christ, they may dispense with as many as they please. Is not this to open a gap to all impiety and looseness? yet to these miserable shifts must the Ad­vocates of Rebellion be driven.

So it was the fate of our unhappy Nation to run it self into a most unnatural and bloudy Rebellion, by a set of distinctions that had not the least footstep in the Christian Religion. England's distract. p. 11. By distinctions between a power radically limited, and not onely in the use and exercise of it; between a moral power to resist, and an authoritative and civil power; between resistence of the King himself, and of his Agents and Officers; between resistence positive, and active; negative and passive; between jus regiminis & usurpationis, according to God's Law and Man's Law; between resistence of the King's Power, and of his Will; between fighting against the Magistrate, and against the Man.

And the same ill cause, which put men upon in­venting distinctions, that would in no wise agree with the Faith of Christ, and to which the Primitive Christians were strangers, did lay a necessity on them [Page 23] to doe violence to the holy Scriptures, and to extort senses out of them different from their plain mea­ning.

Thus to evade this Text of St. Peter, 1 Pet. 2.13. Submit your selves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be to the King as supreme, or to Gover­nours, &c. Jo. Goodwin, in his defence of the horri­ble Sentence against the late King of glorious memo­ry, tells us, Good­win's De­fence, p. 15. That the supremacy here asserted un­to the King, is not over the whole body of his People, but onely over inferiour Officers.

Now that the King should be supreme as St. Peter declares, and yet subject, as our Authour asserts, to the whole body of the People, is a matter as hard to make out, as it is to reconcile contradictions. And it is manifest, that St. Peter requiring submission expres­ly, first to the King as supreme, then to Governours as under him, does extend this Precept to others, besides the inferiour Officers, that is to the People.

It must be granted, that, as it is absurd speech to say, he who is the supreme Ruler, can have any per­son not subject to him in his own Dominions, so also that in this Apostolical injunction to submit to the King, there is no more a reservation made, for the whole body of the People to resist, than for under Of­ficers; no more for under Officers, than for private Men.

However The true name of which Authour Learned Men do conjecture, with great probability, to be Hubert Languet. Voetius in disquisi­tione de auctore vindiciarum contra Tyrannos, quae sub nomi­ne Junii Bruti Celtae typis edi­tae sunt, Huberti Langueti opusculum hoc esse, verosimilius facit, quàm ut amplius ea de re dubitare sustineam. Vinc. Placc. Pseudon. Catal. p. 369. Mihi videtur auctorem fuisse Hub. Languetum: Losannae fuit vir doctus, qui Pagellas habuit Scriptas manu ipsius Langueti, & quidem ita scriptas, quasi composuerit, deinde stylus cum ipsius stylo congruit. Boeclerus ad Grotium de Jur. Bel. & Pa. lib. 1. vid. Placcium, p. 370. And no Authour in print before Milton has affirm'd that Beza was the Writer of this ill Book. Junius Brutus to escape the force of the same Text, puts a gloss upon it contradictory to that of our o­ther Authour, he attributing the right to resist to inferiour Officers, which was given before to the body of the People. For he declares that these exhortations of St. Peter and St. Paul to submission [Page 24] Sed praterquam quòd ad privatas personas adhortationes illa diriguntur, quibus nul­lum aliud remedium, quàm preces & patientiam reliquum esse semper diximus, meminisse hic quoque oportet, cùm dicimus, Magistratus inferiores, aut Regni alicujus ordines posse, imo & debere Tyrannidi obsistere. Junii Bruti de jur. Magist. p. 317. are directed to private persons, who by his confessions have no other remedy than prayers and patience, but that the inferi­our Magistrates not onely may, but are in duty bound to resist a Tyrant.

But in finding out expedients to fence against direct Precepts of Scripture, it may be observ'd that his Ho­liness has been before this sort of men, and set them a pattern from this very Text. For Innocent III. (who sainted Thomas à Becket for Sedition and Treason) in a Letter to Henry Emperour of Constantinople, puts a pleasant interpretation upon the place, viz. that these words, Submit your selves to every ordi­nance of man, whether to the King, Locum hunc de ipso Petro intellegendum esse respon­det: Scribebat enim (ait) Apostolus subditis suis, &c. deinde ad illa verba Regi tan­quam praecellenti addendam esse hanc coarctationem, in temporalibus: Pontisicem e­nim in spiritualibus antecel­lere. Innoc. Gentillet. Apol. pro Gal. Christ, p. 163, 164. are to be understood of St. Peter himself, for that he did write to his own Subjects, and that to those words, to the King as su­preme is to be added this limitation, intemporals; because in matters spiritual the Pope is above him. Which is to say, either that St. Peter by the King did mean the Pope; or that St. Peter when he taught Christians the duty of subjection to the King, unhappily forgot to put in a clause or proviso, to secure the Supremacy of his Successours over the Civil Power.

Insomuch as the Doctrine of the lawfulness of re­sistence to the Supreme Powers must be laid aside for an unchristian opinion which can never be main­tained, [Page 25] unless we will suppose a right in the Pope, or some other party of men, to interpret the Scrip­tures contrary to the manifest sense of the words, and either to add to, or take from them such passages as may sute with their present turn. And it always holds true with respect to the Sovereign Power in any Countrey, what was said by Judge Creshald, both like a pious Christian, and an able Lawyer, concer­ning the Royal Judge Cresh. Lega­cy, p. 5. Authority in our own Nation, That the Jura Regalia of our Kings are holden of Heaven, and cannot for any cause escheat to their Sub­jects; nor they for any cause make any positive or ac­tual forcible resistence against them: but that we ought to yield to them passive obedience, by suffering the pu­nishment, albeit their commands should be against the Divine Law. And that in such case, arma nostra sunt preces nostrae, nec possumus, nec debemus aliter re­sistere; for who can lift up his hand against the Lord's Anointed and be guiltless?

2. That this command to be subject to the Higher Powers is enforced by the Holy Writers with divers strong and clear reasons. 1. Because the Powers are ordained of God, so that he who resists them, resists the Ordinance of God. Which reason will carry a perpetual obligation along with it: for if it be always our duty submit to the Ordinances of God, then it will ever be a sin to resist the Higher Powers. And so long as God has a title to our obedience, so long subjection to his chief Minister will be our duty.

Now if this Doctrine of St. Paul be true, then that Doctrine must be false, that all power being original­ly from the People, where Est quoque alia ratio quare Reges justissimè repre­hendere possumus, atque iis e­tium si vim faciant resistere. Quum enim finita sit & ter­minata eorum potestas, — si­quando extra terminos sibi cir­cundato [...] evagari vult, & in alienam messem suam falcem immittere, quia jam non ut Rex agit sed ut Tyrannus, hîc glo­riosum es;t regem coarguere, eique non verbo solùm, sed re quoque obsistere. G. Ross. p. 564. the Powers exceed the just bounds of their Authority, they may be call'd to ac­count for it, and that Kings not perfor­ming [Page 26] their duty, the Subjects are relea­sed from theirs.

For we may observe, that though the Roman Em­perours rarely came to their Crowns by right of suc­cession, but receiv'd them from the hands of the Se­nate or their Souldiers, yet the Apostle acknowledges them to rule by God's appointment, and forbids there­fore all resistence utterly. If then we will but grant what with no reason we can deny, that Christian Kings have as good titles as Heathen Emperours had, we must be bound to make the Apostle's inferences also, that they are ordained by God, and that it is our duty ever to submit to them. So that notwithstan­ding the power had first been conferr'd by the Peo­ple, yet they cannot resume it when they please, and make the Supreme Authority accountable to them.

2. We are required to submit our selves to every ordinance of Man for the Lord's sake, 1 Pet. 2.13. i. e. for the sake and honour of the Lord's Religion, upon which some Seducers had brought a great scandal, by tea­ching that it sets men at liberty from the obligation of being subject to Authority. Neither if it was askt, What men those were, who crept among the Chri­stians, and would have infected them with such per­nicious Principles? should we be much surprized and at a loss to find an answer, and to shew what necessi­ty the Apostle had to issue forth so early a prohibition against resistence of the Higher Powers; since a little before that time Joseph. Ant. Jud. l. 18. c. 2. Judas Galilaeus founded a Sect, of which probably were those Galileans, whose bloud Pi­late had mingled with their Sacrifice, who did chuse to suffer the most cruel torments that could be devised, [Page 27] rather than they would acknowledge any mortal man to be their Lord and Prince. And Rebellion and Se­dition in those days were crimes whereof the Jews were frequently guilty. So that by our submission we shall assert and maintain the just credit of the Christian Religion, which is meek and peaceable, and put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. It being it seems in the judgment of St. Peter a mark both of ignorance and folly to think the Religion of Jesus did allow its Professours in any rebellious practice against their Governours.

3. We are to be subject because the Magistrate is the Minister of God to us for good. Rom. 13.4.

The benefits and blessings of government are so ne­cessary to our well-being in the World, that as Man­kind could not subsist without them, so neither can any Government subsist without it be allow'd that the Supreme Power be uncontrollable. And albeit it must be confest, that it is a heavy judgment upon a Nation for the Rulers thereof, by lust and ambition pusht on, to exercise tyranny over it, yet it will be evident to them who have been either conversant in the Histories of times past, or registred the experi­ences of their own, that the evils which proceed from oppression by our Governours bear no proportion to the miseries and calamities which naturally spring from Rebellion and Civil Wars.

Where the bounds between right and wrong are all levell'd, and the lives, liberties and properties of Men brought under the Arbitrary Power of the longer Sword: where Beggars and Servants ride on Horse­back, and Princes and Masters go on foot: where nothing appears but rapins, ruins, outrages and deva­stations, Houses plunder'd, Towns fired, whole Coun­treys laid waste and desolate, and the Inhabitants slain, [Page 28] or sled, or confined to dark and noisome Prisons: where the Father falls by the sword of his own Son, the Son by the hand of his Brother; and they who were closely united by neighbourhood, friendship, bloud, and the profession of the same Religion, for­getting all these sacred tyes, do in a most unnatural and salvage manner rip up, and let out the Bowels of one another. So true is it, Judge Creshald's Legacy, p. 6. that the King's Pre­rogative doth in his own hand become a Sceptre to pro­tect his Subjects from ruine; but in the hands of the Sub­jects becomes many times Spears sticking in their own sides, and as Spades to dig their own graves the sooner for death.

3. We must needs be subject, not onely for wrath; but also for conscience sake. That is, not onely for fear of punishment from those in Authority, but from the sense of subjection being a duty, which God has laid on us. So that the love of God, as well as ap­prehensions of the Magistrate's displeasure, do keep the Christian Man firm to his resolutions of not lif­ting up his hand against the Sovereign Powers. And from this reason of our obligation to submit to Autho­rity, we may wipe off that notorious scandal, which has been fastn'd on the Primitive Christians by Bellar­mine and others, namely, that therefore they were subject to the Supreme Powers, because they were not strong enough to resist them: as if they had wanted the power onely, but not the will to rise up against them, and lay them aside.

Which charge, as it always was not true in matter of fact, since there be instances Si enim & hostes ex­ertos, non tan­tum vindices occultos agere vellemus, de­esset nobis vis numerorum & copiarum? —hesterni sumus & ve­stra omnia implevimus, urbes, insulas, castella, municipia, conciliabula, castra ipsa, tribus, decurias, palatium, senatum, forum. —Cui bello non idonei, non prompti fuissemus, etiam impares coptis, qui tam libenter truci­damur, si non apud istam disciplinam magìs occidi liceret, quàm occidere? Tertul. Apol. p. 30. when the Chri­stians had Forces enough to have made a dangerous resistence, if their Consciences would have granted them a licence to rebell; so it is altogether beside the grounds of their dutifull and humble deportment, [Page 29] which did proceed not from the dread of the Empe­rours, whom they were too weak to oppose, but from the certain knowledge they had that resistence would be a violation of the Laws of their holy Re­ligion.

The truth is, Bellarmine gives out, that the Quòd si Christiani olim non deposuerunt Neronem, & Diocletianum, & Julianum Apostatam, ac Valentem Aria­num & similes, id fuit quia deerant vires temporales Chri­stianis. Nam quod alioqui ju­re potuissent id facere, pa­tet, &c. Bellarm. de Rom. Pont. l. 5. c. 7. p. 891. reason why Christians did not depose Nero, Diocletian, Julian, Va­lens, and others, was not because they were destitute of a right, but of the power to doe it; that ever such a speech should come out of the mouth of a most emi­nent Cardinal! but on the contrary, both St. Paul and Peter lay strict in­junctions on their Converts to be subject to their pre­sent Governours, not because they were in no condi­tion to resist them effectually, but for Conscience sake and because they are ordained by God.

Now if the Magistrate be ordained by God, then it is no more lawfull for an hundred thousand men to resist him, than for twelve, and if we are bound to submit for Conscience sake, no encrease of our num­bers or strength can alter the rule of our duty, or take off the obligation of Conscience. So that had the first Christians had more potent Armies than Nero or Julian, yet no right ever could have accru'd to them thereby to oppose God's Ordinance, or to proceed against their Conscience. We may perceive therefore a wide difference between the Cardinal and the Apo­stles in this matter. He resolves the subjection of the Primitive Christians into a mere point of prudence [Page 30] and discretion, but they into a principle of duty and conscience. He ascribes their quiet and peaceable be­haviour under Tyrants to their defect in strength and numbers; but we find them, in what circumstances soever placed, always avowing the necessity of subjec­tion, as an indispensable Precept of their Religion: but, with more modesty certainly, we may charge the Cardinal with the guilt of grievous slander, than raise a suspicion of the least hypocrisie in the Primi­tive Martyrs.

Wherefore notwithstanding the Supreme Authority of a Nation may sometimes be reduced to such extre­mity, as that Rebels may be out of both the fears and danger of the public Sword, yet they can never get out of the reach of their own Consciences, nor free themselves of those terrible convictions, where­with it will ever sting the Children of disobedience, and testify that they shall receive to themselves dam­nation.

2. That the Popes of Rome were the first preten­ders from Scripture to a right, not onely of resisting Kings, but of deposing them, and absolving their Subjects from their duty and allegiance. Many hun­dred years after our Saviour's time the Doctrine of non-resistence to the Higher Powers was constantly taught, and universally practised in the Christian Church. There was a great degeneracy from the pri­mitive strictness in the lives of Christians, and much humane mixture in the Doctrines of Christianity, be­fore men did claim, by a title derived from Christ, a right to controll the Supreme Authority. And as the lusts of the flesh did more vigorously put forth them­selves in the conversation of those who profest the doctrine of the Cross, so the greater pains was taken to corrupt a most pure Religion, that it might warp [Page 31] into a compliance therewith, till at length men had near worn out of their minds the sense of their duty to God and the King.

It was toward the end of the Eleventh Century when Gregory VII. called Hildebrand before he was Pope, did take upon him, both to excommunicate the Emperour Henry IV. and to devest him of all Royal Power, Hildebrandus Papa om­nes adversantes Imperatori ab­solvit ab infidelitate & perju­rio, Sigeber. Gemblac. Chron. p. 603. pretending to free his Subjects from the Allegiance they had sworn. That Hildebrand was the first Pope who usur­ped such an extravagant Power over all the crown'd Heads in the World, may be made evident from the ancient Acts and Monuments of the Church, and the concurrent testimo­ny of the Historians of those and later times. The Church of Liege, in their answer to Paschal II. declare Hildebrandus Papa Au­thor est hujus novelli Schisma­tis, & primus levavit Sacer­dotalem lanceam contra diade­ma Regni, primo indiscretè Henrico saventes excommunica­vit. Leodens. ep. advers. Pas­chal. 2. p. 137. Ed. a S. Schar­dio. Hoc exemplo omnes à primo Gregorio contenti, utebantur gla­dio spirituali usque ad ultimum Gregorium, i.e. Hildebrandum, qui primus se, & suo exemplo, alios Pontifices contra Imperato­rem accinxit gladio. Leodens. p. 138. Hildebrand the Pope is the Authour of this new Schism, and has first lift up the Priests Spear against the Im­perial Crown, and excommunicated those that favour'd the interest of Henry with­out difference or distinction. All were content with the use of the spiritual Sword down from Gregory the first to Gregory the last, i.e. Hildebrand, who first did arm himself, then other Popes, against the Emperour, by his example. Lego & relego Roma­norum Regum & Imperatorum gesta, & nusquam inverrio ali­quem, ante hunc à Romano Pontifice excommunicatum, vèl Regno Privatum. Otto Fri­sing. Chron. lib. 6. c. 35. I read the Acts (says Otto Bishop of Frisingen) of the Roman Kings and Em­perours over and over, and no-where find any of them before this, by the Pope, to be excommunicated, or deprived of his King­dom. Ipse primus est; inter omnes Imperatores per Papam depositus. Scholastici certant & adhuc sub judice lis est, utrum Papa possit Imperatorem depo­nere. J. Trithem. Chron. An. 1106. Of the Emperours he's the first that was deposed by the Pope; and it is a dispute among the Schoolmen yet unde­cided, [Page 32] whether the Pope can depose the Emperour. Thus Trithemius. Nam etsi ante Romani Pontifices, tanquam Christianae Religionis capita, Christique vi­carii & Petri successores cole­rentur, non tamen eorum autho­ritas ultra protendebatur quàm in fidei dogmatibus vel asseren­dis vel tuendis— Primus omnium Romanorum Pontificum Gregorius VII. Armis Norman­norum fretus, o [...]ibus Comitissae Mathildis, mulieris per Italiam Potentissimae confisus, discordiá­que Germanorum Principum bel­lo civili laborantium inflam­matus, praeter majorum morem, contemptâ Imperatoris auctori­tate & potestate, cùm summum Pontificatum obtinuisset, Caesa­rem ipsum, à quo si non electus, saltem confirmatus suerat, non dicam excommunicare, sed e­tiam regno imperióque privare ausus est; res ante ea saecula inaudita. Onuph. Panvin. in vita Greg. VII. p. 272. For altho the Bishops of Rome were reveren­ced as the Heads of the Christian Reli­gion, the Vicars of Christ, and the Suc­cessours of St. Peter; yet their Authority extended no farther than to the asserting and defending of points of Faith. — Gre­gory VII. first of all Popes, supported with the Arms of the Normans, and the Treasury of Mawd, a Lady of pow­erfull interest thorough Italy, and en­couraged by the discord of the German Princes engaged in a Civil War, when he had got the Popedom, contrary to the practice of his Predecessours, contemning the power and authority of the Emperour, did presume, I do not say to excommuni­cate, but to deprive Caesar of his Empire, by whom he had himself been confirm'd at least, if not elected. A thing before those times never heard of.

Nimirum, ut pace om­nium bonorum dixerim, haec so­la novitas, non dicam Haeresis nec dum in mundo emerserat, ut Sacerdotes— doceant po­pulum, quòd malis regibus nul­lam debeant subjectionem, & licèt eis sacramentum fidelitatis fecerint, nullam tamen debeant fidelitatem, nec perjuri dican­tur qui contra Regem senserint, imo qui Regi paruerit, pro ex­communicato habeatur, qui contra Regem fecerit, à noxa in­justitiae & perjurii absolvatur. Sigeber. Gembl. Chron. p. 606. ex. Bib. J. Pistorii. This novelty onely, not to say He­resie had not yet put forth it self in the world, that the Priests — should teach the People, that they owe no subjection to bad Kings, and though they had sworn allegi­ance to them, that yet they ow'd them none. Nor were they to be said perjur'd who should conspire against the King. Nay, he who will obey the King, is to be repu­ted excommunicate; he who will resist him, to be absolved from the sin of in­justice and perjury.

[Page 33]It is true, a few of his Predecessours had made some attempts to incroach upon the Royal Power: but what they did can bear no comparison with the Usurpations of Hildebrand. And he to avoid the im­putation of being the Authour of such unjust Innova­tions, and to make his ambitious designs the more prosperous, did alledge, that Pope Zachary had de­prived King Childeric of the Crown of France, and set it upon Pepin's Head. But by the stream of Writers it does appear, that by a conspiracy of the Nobility and People Pipinus factus est rex ex communi suffragio Princi­pum. Apolog. Hen. IV. p. 156. ed. à M. Freher. Romanus Pontifex respondit, illum debere Regem vocari qui rempublicam gereret, detonso igi­tur Hildrico & in Monasteri­um detruso mox Franci Pipi­num sibi Regem constituunt. Annal. Franc. edit. à P. Pi­thaeo, par. 2. p. 5. Pipinus vero per Papam Zach. ex electione Francorum factus est Rex Francorum. Got. Viterb. Chron. p. 436. Pro [...]eres Regni & Populi amplexi Pipini virtutem pertae­síque regis amentiam Zachariae Romano Pontifice prius consulto — Pipinum Regem creant. Sa­bellic. en. 8. L. 8. vid. Hotto­mani Francogalliam, c. 13. p. 108. King Chil­deric was laid aside; and application onely made to the Pope to allow and confirm an ill deed. But the deposing of Princes by their own Subjects was a thing in it self so wicked, and wherein there was no precedent for Popes to in­termeddle, that Zachary was to that de­gree confounded with this Address from Burchardus in the name of the People of France, that Initio minime audebat tam magni momenti cogitatio­nem suscipere. P. Aemyl. in vit. Childer. p. 63. at first he durst not so much as take into his thoughts a work of such great moment. Bellarmine, a con­stant Advocate for the Popes in all Causes, says indeed, Quod sanè justum fuisse nemo sanae mentis negabit, prae­sertim cùm eventus docuerit mu­tationem illam felicissimam fu­isse. Bellarm. de Pontif. lib. 2. c. 17. p. 655. That no man in his wits will deny this act of the Pope to be righteous, especially since the event has taught that the change was most happy. But if we are to measure the goodness of the deed by the success of the event, then all the outrages and villanies in the World, so long as they prosper, will by this argument be justify'd, and victorious Rebels may believe they are carrying on the work of the Lord.

[Page 34]Sigon. de Reg. Ital. l. 2. p. 57. Anno 625. It may be here worth noting, how Honorius I. who was Pope above an hundred years before Za­chary, did reprove the Bishops beyond the Po, who were earnest with the Nobility to set up Arioaldus in the place of Adoevaldus King of Italy, against their oath of allegiance, and summon them to appear with their Cause before him.

The Popes, it seems yet, had not discover'd, that they had power to dispense with oaths, and cancell the obligation of that duty of submission to Kings, which St. Peter had laid upon all Christians. It was not in those days revealed that that Text Antonin. Sum. vide respons. ad Tortum. p. 177. Thou hast put all things under his feet, was meant of the Pope, and the better to accommodate it to his Holiness, that we are to understand, by the beasts of the field, Men, by the fowl of the air, Angels, by the fish of the sea, Souls in Purgatory. All put under the Pope's feet.

Now as to Hildebrand, though he was a publisher of new Doctrines, yet there will be no reason to be­lieve he brought them down from Heaven, if we may credit the account of his morals, which is given by his Contemporaries. Cardinal Benno Benno de vita Hilde­brandi, p. 43, 44, 45, &c. edit. à R. Rei­neccio. 1581. taxes him with all the deadly sins, each of which, upon the commission of it, does immediately put a man out of a state of salvation. With murthers, rapine, adulte­ry, and constant practice of the Black-art.

Hildebrand however passes always with Bellar­mine for a Saint, and Baronius recommends his ex­ample to the imitation of Paul V. as the most excel­lent person that ever sate in the Papal Chair. And they have no names bad enough to bestow upon Benno. Both of them also insinuate the probability of the Book being written by a Lutheran, which goes under Benno's name: but Baronius was very unlucky in his conjecture that Hic in­quam consar­tor imposturarum de quo alte­rum de doubus dicendum est, vel quòd eas ipse commentus sit stylo mendaci. Baron. Ann. Tom. 11. An. 1076. num. 7. p. 469. Reinerus Reineccius was [Page 35] the Father of this supposed spurious Piece, when near 50 years before the Edition of Reineccius, the Life of Hilde­brand by Benno, was publisht among the Tracts in the Book entitled Fasci­culus rerum expetendarum ac fugienda­rum. Sedis Apostolicae Baroni­us ita erat acer propugnator— ut diuturna Regum maximorum imperia non dubitaverit scriptis suis labefactare atque convel­lere. Jan. Nicii Pinac. par. 1. p. 89. It is the main business of these two Learned Men in their volumi­nous Works to ascribe uncontrollable, I may say, boundless power to the Bishops of Rome, and to maintain their right in the most unconscionable claims to a so­vereignty over Emperours and Kings, otherwise Bellar­mine would never have vented it for truth, that the Pope can change the nature of things, and that Si autem Papa erratet praecipiendo vitia, vel prohiben­do virtutes teneretur Ecclesia credere vitia esse bona & vir­tutes malas. Bellar. de Rom. Pont. p. 803. if falling into errour, he should command vice and forbid vertue, the Church would be bound to believe vertue to be vice, and vice to be vertue. It being strange, that in the same period he sup­poses the Pope can err, he should assign such a power to him as by reason of its inconsistency with the perfec­tions of the Divine Nature, we may not ascribe to the Almighty God himself. Otherwise Baronius would not have pick'd out of the whole Catalogue of the Popes Gregory VII. and Alexander the III. as Patterns for Paul V. to govern himself by. At the later of whose Feet Friderick Barbarossa Collo ipsius prostrati pe­dem imposuisse, cepisséque inte­rim Davidicum illud super As­pidem & Basiliscum ambulabis: Friderico autem ingentes adbuc spiritus alenti, dicentíque non tibi, sed Petro, irato similem, impressa fortius planta; respon­disse, & mihi, & Petro. Sa­bellic. Rer. Ven. dec. 1. l. 7. p. 200. lying prostrate, he trampled upon his Neck, and began to sing that of David, thou shalt goe upon the Asp and Basilisc: And to the Emperour, who, his Spirits boiling within him, said, [this submission is made] not to thee, but to Peter; the angry Pope, pressing harder with [Page 36] his Foot, did reply, both to me and to Peter.

And Hildebrand, the other Pope re­commended to Paul V. Henry IV. Pecunia favorem, sa­vore ferrum, ferro sedem pacis adisti, & de sede pacis pacem turbâsti. Ep. Hen. IV. p. 196. ex Bib. Ruberi. up­braids with having by money got favour, by favour got the sword, by the sword pla­ced himself in the seat of Peace, and, when in the seat of Peace, banisht Peace from it. Gregory Ortus est magnus tu­multus populi & fremitus— violentis manibus me in locum Apostolici regiminis, cui longè impar, rapuerunt. Greg. VII. Ep. l. 1. Ep. 3. Concil. Labb. Tom. 10. p. 7. could not but con­fess himself advanced by violent hands into St. Peter's Chair. In which Chair he did dictate or decree, Quòd illius solius nomen in Ecclesiis recitetur. Quòd illi liceat imperatores deponere. Quòd à nemine ipse judicari debeat. Quòd à fidelitate iniquorum sub­ditos potest absolvere. Concil. Tom. 10. p. 110. Vir dignus Pontificatu ad deprimendum Politicorum su­percilium; Monarchas terruit nominis sui & zeli claritate. Captivitatem Ecclesiae, & ser­vitutem, quam à principibus patiebatur restituit. Genebr. Chron. p. 582. That his name alone should be rehearsed in the Churches. That he has power to depose Emperours. That he ought to be judged by no man. That he can absolve Subjects from their allegiance to unjust Princes. That he should give himself the title of Christ's Vicar, and yet make his Kingdom to be of this World, and by his Decrees set aside the plain Precepts of Christ! that he should pretend to be the Successour of St. Peter, and teach Doctrines directly contrary to those of St. Peter!

In which Chair he thunder'd out Curses against the Emperours, Kings, Princes, Bishops, and demanded Tribute almost of every Kingdom in Europe. Enga­ging them in bloudy Wars, and setting their Subjects loose from their duty and obedience. He contrived an Oath in such a form, to be imposed upon Kings, as no honest man could take it.

Kings are to swear, Juramentum Regis.— & quodcunque mihi ipse Papa prae­ceperit, per veram obedientiam fideliter, sicut oportet Christia­num, observabo. Concil. Max. Tom. 10. p. 279. faithfully to observe whatsoever the Pope shall com­mand them. Bellarmine's Doctrine tru­ly agrees with this Oath. For if the [Page 37] Pope should command a Prince to mur­ther an hundred of his innocent Subjects, he was bound to believe it would be a vertue so to doe. But the very rage of this fierce and haughty man dis­charged its self chiefly upon Henry IV. whom he ex­communicated four times, Fuit autem hic Henri­cus ore facundus, ingenio acu­tus, eleemosynis largus, in re mili­tari fortunatissimus. Contra hunc Imperatorem Greg. VII. commo­vit & fovit Rodulphum ducem Saxoniae, quem Electores in Phor­cheim congregati elegerunt in lo­cum Henrici quem Papa deposuit nec confessum, nec convictum. Fel. Fabr. Monach. Vlm. Suevic. Rer. Script. ed. à Goldast. p. 91. deposed him unheard and unconvicted, and gave his Kingdom to Rodulphus. And, after a terrible journey in the depth of a severe Winter, made him, without all his At­tendants, and stript of his Royal Robes, Venit ille ut jussum fu­erat, & cum castellum illud tri­plici muro septum esset, intra secundum murorum ambitum receptus, foris derelicto omni comi­tatu suo, deposito cultu regio, nihil praeferens regium, nihil ostentans Pompaticum, nudis pedi­bus, jejunus, mane usque and vesperam perstabat Romani Pontificis sententiam praestolando. Hoc secundo, hoc tertio die fecit. Lamb. Schafnab. p. 249. ed. Pistorii. to wait barefoot and fasting three whole days before he would admit him but into his presence, he all the time caressing his Mistris in the Castle at Canusium.

Insomuch as in his own Letter to the Germans up­on this occasion, he acquaints them, Omnes quidem insolitam nostrae mentis duritiem mira­rentur, nonnulli in nobis non A­postolicae severitatis gravitatem, sed quasi Tyrannicae feritatis crudelitatem esse clamarent. Greg. Ep. L. 4. Ep. 12. Con­cil. Tom. 10. p. 159. that all wonder'd at the strange hard­ness of his heart, and some cryed out of him as not proceeding with the gravity of Apostolic severity, but with the cruelty of brutish Tyranny.

The Church of Liege farther inform us they had read that Hildebrand, Solus Hildebrandus Pa­pa ultimam manum sacris Ca­nonibus imposuit, quem legimus praecepisse Mathildi Marchionis­sae, in remissionem peccatorum suorum, ut debellaret Henricum Imperatorem. —unde haec no­va Authoritas, per quam reis sine confessione & poenitentia offertur praeteritorum peccato­rum impunitas, & futurorum libertas? Leodens. Ep. p. 141. the onely Pope who hath added to the holy Canons, had commanded the Marchioness Mawd, as the condition of the forgiveness of her sins, to subdue Henry the Empe­rour. —but whence, say they, is this new Authority, by which impunity of the sins past, and licence for those which shall [Page 38] be hereafter, is offer'd to the guilty with­out confession and repentance?

These Proceedings do indeed suppose God Commissum ei munus à Deo excelso, non modòo articulos indeterminatos determinandi, sed etiam Fidei symbolum con­dendi. Bened. in Praesat. re­spons. ad Tortum. p. 179. to have committed to the Pope a power, not onely of determining disputa­ble points, but as Benedict tells Paul V. of making new Creeds.

So that is was judiciously observ'd by Aventinus, Homines non peccatis sed lege Christi, atque Sacra­mentis solvit, Pacem atque Pie­tatem Religionis nostrae labefac­tat, Bella, Seditiones concitat. Stupro, Caedi, Perjuriis, Perfi­diis, Rapinis, Incendio indulget. Non solùm ad Ambitionem su­am occulendam fabulas commi­niscitur, Annales corrumpit, res gestas invertit, sed etiam cae­lestia Oracula adulterat: Di­vinas Literas falso interpretan­do suae libidini serviri cogit. Aventin. Ann. L. 5. p. 573. that Hildebrand did ab­solve men not from their sins, but from the Law and Sacraments of Christ, under­mine the Peace and Piety of our Religion, raise War and Seditions, indulge Whore­dom, Murther, Perjuries, Perfidiousness, Rapines, Fire; and to hide his Ambition did not onely devise Fables, corrupt An­nals, pervert Records, but also adulterate the heavenly Oracles. Forcing the Di­vine Writings to serve his Lust by false glosses put upon them.

And the Councils of Mentz, Brixia and Wormes did great service to Christianity, and pursued truly the interest of the Church when they de­posed Gregory VII. Quia illum constat non à Deo electum, sed à seipso, fraude ac pecunia impudentissimè objec­tum, qui Ecclesiasticum subver­tit ordinem: qui Christiani im­perii perturbat Regnum: qui regi Catholico ac pacifico corpo­ris ac animae intentat mortem: qui perjurum defendit regem: qui inter concordes, seminavit discordiam, inter pacificos lites, inter fratres scandala, inter con­juges divortia. Concil. Tom. 10. p. 389. Edit. à Labbeo. as not elected by God, but one who impudently obtained the Popedom by fraud and money, subverted Ec­clesiastical Order, disturbed the Kingdom of the Christian Empire, menaced death to the Body and Soul of a Catholick and Pacific King, defended a perjured King, sow'd discord among Friends, strifes among the Peaceable, scandals among Brethren, di­vorces between Man and Wife, &c.

To come to the last scene of this high-spirited Pope, who put the Christian World all into commo­tion, [Page 39] if we may believe Paul Bernriedensis a Writer on his side, and publisht by Gretser the Jesuit, Ʋbi verò in extremo positus erat, ultima verba ejus haec fuerunt. Dilexi justitiam & odivi iniquitatem, propterea morior in exilio. P. Bernr. p. 240. these were his last words, I have loved righteousness, and hated ini­quity, therefore I die in banishment: but if we will give credit not onely to Mat­thew Paris, but Sigebert Gemblacensis, and others: and to what Cuspinian found in most ancient Records. Moriens Cardinalibus convocatis confessus est se valde peccâsse in cura Pastorali, ac suadente Diabolo contra huma­num genus iram Dei & odi­um concitâsse. Matth. Paris, Anno 1087. pag. 13. Sigeb. Gembl. pag. 605. He dying, to the Cardinals assembled about him, did confess, he had greatly sinned in his Pa­storal Charge, and stirr'd up the wrath and hatred of God against Mankind by the instigation of the Devil, Invenio in vetustissimis annalibus Hildebrandum Mo­nachum, qui Greg. VII. dictus est, dum moreretur plurimum, qoud Henricum Imperatorem mo­lestâsset, doluisse, & ob id, ante obitum suum absolvisse. J. Cuspinian. in vita Henr. IV. p. 357. and that on his death-bed he did extremely grieve for the trouble he had given Henry the Emperour, and so did absolve him.

And after all, why should it seem strange to any man that Gregory VII. should use crown'd Heads so coursly, when he had such a mean opinion of Royal Power as in an Epistle to Heriman Bi­shop of Mets, to declare Quis nesciat Reges & duces ab iis habuisse principi­um, qui Deum ignorantes, Su­perbia, Rapinis, Perfidia, Ho­micidiis, postremo universis pe­nè sceleribus, mundi Principe Diabolo videlicet agitante, su­per pares, scilicet homines, do­minari caeca cupiditate, & in­tolerabili praesumptione affecta­verunt. Greg. VII. Ep. L. 8. Ep. 21. Concil. Max. Labb. Tom. 10. Col. 269. that Kings owe their beginning to those men, who knew not God, and who, by the agency of the Devil, and by Pride, Rapins, Perfidious­ness, Murthers, and all kind of wickedness got the dominion over them, who by na­ture did stand on the same level with them. And in the same Epist. Quis dubitet Sacerdotes Christi Regum & Principum omniùmque fidelium Patres & Magistros censeri? ibid. Who doubts but that the Priests of Christ ought to be accounted the Fathers and Masters of all Kings and Princes? And Quod Aurum non pretio­sius sit Plumbo, quaàm Regia Potestate sit-altior Dignitas Sa­cerdotalis. Col. 270. that Gold does not more excell Lead, than the [Page 40] Sacerdotal Dignity the Royal Power. And likewise Major Potestas exorcistae conceditur, cùm Spiritualis Im­perator ad abjiciendos Daemones constituitur, quàm alicui Lai­corum causa Saecularis Dominationis tribui possit. Ibid. That there is more power granted to an Exorcist, since he is made a Spiritual Emperour [i. e. Conjurour] to cast out Devils, than can be to any Lay­man on the score of Secular Dominion.

Now was there ever a greater Patron of Republican Principles than this Pope, who most malitiously and falsly lays the foundations and original of Kingly Power in the Lusts and Sins of Men, assisted by the Devil? Could Knox, Milton, Rutherford, Goodwin, or any Commonwealth's Man of them all, have spit ranker Venom at Kings, or spoke with greater contempt of their Authority than Hildebrand, who makes them Servants to the Priest, and their Power less than that of one of the most inferiour Officers in the Church?

And having made this report of the life and beha­viour of Hildebrand, and cited the Authours upon whose Authority it does rely, I conceive I need not tell the Reader, that the Writers I have dealt with were all of the Church of Rome, and generally con­fest to be the most eminent and judicious Historians in these Matters, and that most of the notorious Crimes charged upon Hildebrand do not appear more from others, than from his own words to be found in his Books of Epistles. Neither will it be easie to free Bellarmine from much disingenuity in going about to take away the credit of Jo. Aventinus's Hi­story, for that he does not name the Authours from whence he has it, when in the period immediately above that Bellarmine quotes Bellar. de Rom. Pont. lib. 4. c. 13. Col. 837. out of Aventinus concerning the faults of Henry IV. Aventinus Extant praeterea in Bibliothecis nostris Epistolae, Diplomata, Edicta, Rescripta Hainrici, & Hildebrandi ul­tro, citroque missa, Ego horum instrumentorum Publicam se­quar Authoritatem, utriusque causam sedulo, & ex fide pero­rabo: vitiis utriusque (ut ho­mines fuerunt) notandis, ami­cis, in virtutibus praedicandis hostibus credam. Jo. Avent. Annal. Boi. lib. 5. p. 563. de­clares, that he follow'd the Public Authority of the [Page 41] Letters, Diploma's, Edicts, Rescripts, that passed between Henry and Hilde­brand, still preserved in their Libraries. And that he did not charge either of them with any vice, which was not owned by their Friends, nor praise any vertue in either, which was not before ascribed to them even by their Enemies. But how far Bellarmine was from rela­ting things thus honestly, we may rest satisfied from the Citation now mentioned. Where he has from A­ventinus transcribed the Vices of the Emperour, but concealed his Vertues which next follow.

Now had we time, it would not be hard to shew, how the Bishops of Rome, who did tread in the steps of Hildebrand, have been for the most treated with the same sharpness, and disrespect. How the Princes have asserted their Rights conferred by God against the unjust Intrusions of Popes. And with what con­tempt and neglect they have receiv'd their insolent Messages in all Countries. I produce an instance or two, ancient and modern. When Boniface VIII. writ to Philip the fair of France, Bonifacius servus servo­rum Dei Philippo Francorum Regi — scire te volumus, quòd Spiritualibus & Tempora­libus nobis subes. —aliud cre­dentes fatuos reputamus. Phi­lippus D. G. Francorum Rex, Bonifacio se gerente pro Pontifice maximo, salutem modicam sive nullam. Sciat tua maxima fa­tuitas in Temporalibus alicui nos non subesse. Les Croniq. & Annal. des France par Nicolle Gilles, p. 132. A Paris 1562. Mira hominis impudentia fu­it qui Regnum Galliae Pontificiae majestatis beneficium asserere ausus est. Verùm multò stolidiores esse puto, qui disceptant an tan­tum liceat Pontifici. J. Tillii Chron. de Reg. Franc. ad Ann. 1302. to give him to know he was subject to him in matters Spiritual and Temporal; and that they were Fools who thought otherwise. His answer was, Let your Holiness's won­derfull Wisedom know that in Temporals we are subject to no body. They that com­plain of the indecency of the King's Lan­guage must observe it is the same the Pope used first, and that his Holiness should not have provoked his Son to wrath.

[Page 42]When Sixtus V. sent out his Bull against the King of Navar, pronouncing him a Heretic, and that he had cut off his right of Succession to the Crown of France. The King, in his Remonstrance, does affirm, Quod ad confictum cri­men Haereseos attinet, de quo falso & injustè ab illo Sixto, qui nomen Papae sibi arrogat, accusatur; ait & affirmat hunc (salvâ ejus Sanctitate) falsè, nequiter, & malitiosè, mentitum esse, húnc­que ipsum fore Haereticum omni­un maximum. Quemadmodum recipit probare in Concilio libero & secundum Leges congregato. De postr. Mot. Gall. p. 305. That as to the feigned crime of Heresie, whereof he is falsly and unjustly accused, he affirms that the Pope (saving due respect to his Holiness) does falsly, wickedly and malitiously lye. And that he is of all Heretics the greatest, as he undertakes to prove in a free Council assembled, according to the Laws.

I farther observe under this head, that the Popes did take upon them first onely to confirm the Empe­rours by putting the Crown on their Heads, and from thence afterwards they pretended to a right to depose them. And yet among all M. Rous­sel Hist. Jur. Pont. l. 7. p. 699. the Eastern Emperours none but Justinus I. and Petrus Altissiodo­rus were crowned by Popes. He by John I. and this by Honorius III. And in the Western Empire this custome commenced but in Charles the Great, upon whose Head Leo III. placed the Crown in grate­full consideration of the excellent services he had done the Church against the Lumbards.

Now should it be said, that the relation we make is of matters done at a remote distance from our times, and that we may presume the Doctrines of deposing and killing of Kings (though not yet condemned by the Church of Rome) to be disown'd by all the Mem­bers of it, since some of them have writ expresly against them, and none of them have lately given us any occasion to charge them with holding these wick­ed and unchristian Doctrines. To this it may be an­swer'd, that although the present Pope Innocent XI. has censured sixty five lewd and pernicious Proposi­tions, [Page 43] taught by Jesuits, and other Popish Casuists, if that may be call'd a censure which is so very soft and gentle, yet he has slipt over this Doctrine so fre­quently taught by the same men, That a Prince ex­communicated or depriv'd by the Pope, may and ought to be deposed or killed by his own Subjects, or any what­soever, as heretical, without taking the least notice thereof. What reason can we assign for this? could his Holiness be ignorant of a Proposition maintained by Parsons, Mariana, Rossaeus, Bellarmine, Suarez, Becanus, Hessius, Valentia, Hereau, Gretser, Sancta­rellus, and many others? Or could he think there was not so much need to condemn this King-killing Doctrine, and that the consequences of it were less dangerous than those by him condemned, when yet the teaching thereof has been the occasion of spilling of so much Christian bloud, and was the foundation upon which the Powder Plotters laid their horrible Design, and when but a few months before this De­cree of the Pope came forth, so many of the Sons of his Church in our Nation fell by the stroke of Justice for conspiring the death of the King.

What can we then say, but that this small and harmless errour of the Casuists teaching the lawful­ness and duty of killing Heretical Princes was spar'd by his Holiness, when he condemned so many others, out of prudent foresight of the good service it yet one time or other may doe the Roman Church? And there will be more ground for this conjecture, when we remember that Cardinal Perron did solemnly pro­fess, that before he and his brethren the Bishops of France would by subscription declare the deposing Doctrine to be unlawfull, they would die Martyrs at the Stake.

[Page 44]And as for those of that Church who have writ against this Power in the Pope of deposing Kings, we know some of them labour under an Excommunica­tion at Rome for their pains to this day. And whe­ther there be fresh occasion to charge any Papist with these Doctrines, let what follows determine.

One J. D. a Jesuit, after the late Plot, puts forth a Catechism, entitling it, A brief Instruction touching the Oath of Allegiance. And with his Design he ac­quaints us in his Preface, that it is to defend the Resu­sers of the Oath of Allegiance, and to confirm them in their Christian Resolution, and to reclaim such as have been misled. As, in his opinion, all those are, who have sworn Allegiance to the King. And upon them he makes this odious and prophane Reflexion. Some who took the Oath, have since, to ease their fault, slept at a Minister's Sermon, and taken the cheering Cup and Lord's Supper to help its digestion. Then as to the Oath it self he tells us, Catech. p. 15. That to hold this Oath cannot be taken without grievous sin, and without per­jury, is but what two Popes have declared with several Breves. And accordingly, after several frivolous matters debated, he brings his Scholar to acknowledge Catech. p. 47. I am ready to subscribe that you have made good the un­lawfulness of the Oath. First by reason of the Title of Parliament exacting it. 2. For want of truth in all the Clauses of the Assertory Part. 3. For want of justice in the Clause of the Promissory Part. Lastly, For want of necessity; there being a necessity under a grievous sin, as the Pope declares, for the not taking it.

And yet every one knows that the very design of the Oath so much condemn'd, is onely to bring men to acknowledge their allegiance to the King, and to abjure that damnable Doctrine, that Princes which are excommunicated, or deprived by the Pope, may [Page 45] be deposed or murther'd by their Subjects or any whatsoever.

Now since in the Triennial Assembly of the Jesuits in London, April 1678. so great a part of the late Popish Plot was sworn to have been hatch'd, since the disco­very thereof proved fatal to so many of them, since at their death they did renounce the Doctrine of the lawfulness, upon any occasion or pretence whatsoe­ver, to design and cotrive the death of the King; and since the very scope of the Oath of Allegiance was to preserve the King's Leige People from being tainted with those opinions which the Jesuits in their dying Speeches did condemn, it might reasonably have been thought, not onely that no Member of that So­ciety for the time to come would have writ against the Oath of Allegiance, but also that the whole En­glish Order, in their next Triennial Assembly, would by some publick Acts, have condemned the Doctrines of deposing and killing of Kings, and thereby have gi­ven both credit and authority to the Declarations, upon this occasion, made by their dying Friends, and like­wise evidence to the World of their own loyalty.

But so far were they from giving the King any far­ther assurance of their loyalty and allegiance, that by a Decree they condemn afresh the Oath of Allegiance, and refuse to admit to absolution, those of their Church both that have taught the Oath to be lawfull and that have taken it, without they will publickly recant, and give manifest signs of their repentance, and promise amendment for the future.

The Decree of the Fathers of the Society of Jesus of the English Province, at their Provincial Congregation made, against the Oath of Allegiance at Ghent, the fifth day of July this present year 1681.

[Page 46] That we may procéed with Uniformity amongst our selves in the manner of acting touching the Oath of Allegiance.

1. Let us all profess, that as much obedience and fidelity ought to be sincerely sworn and exhibited to our King from every one of us, as is wont to be sworn and exhibited to any Prince whatsoever from other Catholick Subjects.

2. That the Oath, as now it is, sprinkled with many heterodox clauses, cannot be taken, as being condemned by many Breves of Popes.

3. If any (against the Decrées of Popes) have taught the foresaid Oath to be lawfull, let him not be admitted to absolution, without public Recanta­tion, either made or sacredly promised.

4. Those who against their Conscience have taken the Oath, let them be deprived of absolution, with­out manifest signs of repentance, and promise of amendment for the future. But those who with a good Conscience have taken it, are to be instructed: and if they renounce it, are to be absolved.

5. Let care be taken, lest either too much facility, or morosity in absolving, bréed scandal.

Thus we see what opinion, not onely single Mem­bers, but a whole Assembly of English Jesuits have of the Oath of Allegiance, and how they think them­selves bound in Conscience to treat those of their Church, who either take the Oath, or write in de­fence of it: and what little ground any Prince can have to hope they ever should become truly loyal Subjects. For all their specious professions of swea­ring as much obedience and fidelity to the King, as other Catholic Subjects do to their Prince, will come to just nothing, so long as they refuse to abjure all [Page 47] power in the Pope or the People to depose them. Since, should the Pope proceed to a sentence of deposition, they that acknowledge such a power in the Pope, must take themselves to be absolved from all that alle­giance they had sworn, and from owning him any longer for their King. So that both the King's safety, and their allegiance will entirely depend upon the Pope's pleasure.

Neither can the King have better hold of them, by any Oath they shall please themselves to take, since that Oath also, according to the doctrine of the De­cree, would become unlawfull, and so cease to bind them, if it should happen once to be condemn'd by one of the Breves or Bulls of the Pope. Moreover, though these Jesuits do profess, yet indeed they do not exhibit as much obedience to the King, as other Popish Subjects do to their Prince: for it is well known that they of the Gallican Church do pay obe­dience to the Laws and Edicts of their King even a­gainst his Holiness's Bulls: and sixty Doctours also of the Sorbon have declared, that the English Subjects of the Roman Persuasion may lawfully and safely take the Oath of Allegiance, which this Consult of Jesuits has condemned.

But to doe the Reverend Fathers of that Order right, it must be confess'd, that notwithstanding all the affronts they have put upon Kings, they can grosly flatter them, when it will serve the interest of their Society. Of which egregious flattery the French Jesuits in their College at Paris, founded by the Bi­shop of Clermont, have given a very late instance. Where in the place of their old Inscription, Collegium Claromontanum Jesu, they have put up this, Collegium Ludovici Magni, wiping out at once the names both of their Founder and Saviour.

[Page 48]What a change will Interest make in the Opinions and Practices of Men! Pope Hildebrand (to whose dictates the Jesuits pay most religious respect) de­clares Kings to be the Priests Servants, and even infe­riour to the Exorcist: but these pious Fathers did not think they had given testimony sufficient of their loy­alty, till they had preferr'd their King before Jesus Christ.

And having thus proved that all resistence to the Supreme Authority is unlawfull, and that the Popes were the first abettours of it in the Christian Church by pretended Arguments from Scripture; I come,

2. To shew with what care, impartiality and pa­tience the good Christian searches into the grounds and causes of his Persuasion, that the commands of Authority are sinfull, before he refuses to pay obe­dience to them. No power on Earth can make him withdraw his obedience to God, nor any danger awe him into the doing of that which he believes to be a sin. Where Man's Laws stand in opposition to God's Law, if it may be done without detriment to his Re­ligion, he accepts the benefit of Christ's Licence given to his Disciples, and makes his escape by flying from one City to another, or else he patiently submits to the penalty decreed to be inflicted upon him for his conscientious refusal.

But because men have refused to conform to the Laws of the Government when there has been no­thing in them repugnant to the Will of God, and have been justly punished for their disobedience, at the same time they have thought themselves Martyrs for the Cause of Christ; and since on the one hand it is most unhappy for them to suffer for their mistakes, and on the other of ill consequence to Governours, that their Laws, when just and expedient, should not be [Page 49] duly observed; therefore the man, who has possest his Soul with patience, does not run away with the first appearances of things, as being prone to suspect the errour may lie rather in his understanding, than in the Laws of his Superiours; nor does he forbear to comply with the will of the Higher Powers, till up­on much consideration he becomes persuaded there can be no compliance without involving himself in sin. And if a Law chance to be enacted, the matter whereof may seem evil to him, he does not hasten rashly into any conclusion, but he imploys his pa­tience, his sincerity, his prudence in all the proper methods to inform his judgment truly, before he comes to a resolution how he must behave himself.

And in order to prosper in a work of such impor­tance, he begins it with hearty prayer to God to bless his undertaking, and guide him into all truth. Be­fore he enters into the merits of the Cause it self, he impartially enquires, whether he be not carried into it by prejudice, passion, profit, fame or some other se­cular end. Whether he has not taken up this opinion of the unlawfulness of conformity to the Laws, as well as many false ones, by the prejudices of a disad­vantagious education; by having heard the Argu­ments, read the Books, and conversed with the Men onely, who are of one side? There being reason to believe that many of the Dissenters from our Church are mere strangers to all the constitutions of it. They have rarely, if ever, been present all the time of Di­vine Service, they have never seriously perused any one office of our Liturgy, and fairly weighed what may be said for it.

They scarce can pretend to have read more leaves of the Book of Publick Prayers than of the Alcoran. However these men separate from us, because they [Page 50] have been taught to doe so, and because their Friends do, upon whom they have such a dependence, as not to dare to displease them. And in which course while they continue, their most dangerous errours will be incurable.

He farther considers whether his present dissent does not proceed from his having had a known repu­tation in such a Party a long time, and although he could now without any violence to his Conscience, yet he is ashamed to retreat? or whether it be not because he finds his opposition to the Government to be popular, and he draws crowds after him of admi­rers; or to be very profitable, he gains a fair livelihood by it, and should be at a loss for his subsistence, did he not engage himself in the interests of the Dissenters?

Lastly, He considers whether he doth pass judg­ment in the other cases which occur in his life, with the same scrupulosity and tenderness, he does in this? for if he have with such art managed his Conscience, that notwithstanding it's tenderness in the matter of Conformity, it can allow him to live quietly in the known breach of any of the moral duties of Religion, he has just reason to suspect his want of sincerity as to the causes for which he divides from the Church. If notwithstanding his long refusal to join with us in our Common Prayers, as stinting the Spirit, and not tending to edification, he yet can submit to the forms of solemnization of Marriage to gain a person with a great fortune, and to legitimate his issue to inherit it; and if after many years absence from our Churches and separation from our Communion as antichristian and unlawfull, he yet can receive the holy Sacrament with us to qualify himself for an office or employment, it will be obvious either that his Conscience is per­versely instructed, or that he is an hypocrite.

[Page 51]Now as none of the reasons before-mentioned can justify any Man's disobedience to Authority, seeing they owe their rise to pride, interest, or passion, so were such heads of enquiry duly poised in the balance, and allow'd their just weight, they would discharge out of mens minds abundance of those scruples, where­with they have brought much charge and trouble up­on themselves, and given great disturbance to their Governours; and they would be able by these me­thods to distinguish between what was done out of pure conscience, and what under the colour of it onely.

But if having proceeded thus far, by a removal of those things, which, in this case, ought to have no influence upon Conscience, some dissatisfaction sticks still in the mind, the proper work remaining is, to try the objections of Conscience by the rule of Con­science. The rule of Conscience is the will of God; the will of God is discover'd by the light of Nature, and revealed in the holy Scripture. And by an ap­plication of the objection to the rule, the Conscience may discern whether there be any strength in it. For whatsoever we find God to have commanded, we are bound in conscience to doe it; whatever to have for­bidden, we are bound in conscience to avoid it: and in matters, by God neither commanded nor forbid­den, the thing is indifferent, and the Conscience free. A man may let it alone, without omitting his duty; he may doe it, without committing a sin. For how is it possible, that should be a duty, which God never has commanded, or that a sin, which God never has forbidden? thus the Apostle argues most truly, Rom. 4.15. where no law is, there is no transgression. Wherefore if upon a just comparison between these commands of Autho­rity, against which the meek Christian's scruples have [Page 52] lain, and the word of God, there does not appear any thing in them injoined, which by the Divine Laws is forbidden; nor any thing forbidden which God has required, it will evidently follow, that he must acquit the commands of his Governours from all imputation of evil, and dismiss those scruples from his Conscience, which hitherto have been the occasion of his disobedience, and exposed him to the lash of the Law. And this is the case of the Church of England, for few of the sober Nonconformists have been so far carry'd away with the power of prejudice, as to af­firm that there is any thing in her Constitutions ex­presly forbidden by any Law of God, and those few who have been so hardy as to pass this unjust censure upon her, neither yet have, nor ever will be able to prove their assertion. And those places of holy Writ which some men would have prest into the service of this Cause, when the reason and occasion of them has been thoroughly examined, to all unprejudiced men have appear'd, to look another way.

But if the scruple against Conformity is not taken from the words of Scripture immediately, but infer­red upon some consequence which is thought to flow from them, or bottoms upon some difficult Text, which may require learning and depth of judgment to the finding out of its meaning, or upon a metaphor or allegory, as many mistakes in Religion have done, or upon his ignorance of the state of the Church, and the Controversies and Errours on foot, when those portions of the Divine Writings were penned where­from he deduceth his argument, and so he finds it an hard matter to deliver himself from his doubt; then he repairs to some sober, grave, wise man, eminent for his piety, learning, and skill in controversies; and having stript his Soul from prejudices, and that biass, [Page 53] which either passion or profit may have clapp'd upon it, with all candour and ingenuity he opens and lays his case before him, resolving firmly to submit himself to his reasons, so far as they shall convince him; and to order his conversation accordingly.

And by taking this course, there will be great rea­son to hope he shall have his doubts cleared, his scru­ples removed, and those objections dissolved, which had he relied alone upon his own abilities, might have ensnared him in unwarrantable disobedience to those God has set over him, and pull'd down heavy calami­ties upon himself.

But if after all these honest and commendable en­deavours, again and again repeated according as the difficulty of his Cause required, and he had opportu­nity to do it, he cannot attain to an entire mastery of his Scruples, and give his Conscience full satisfaction, however he will evidence to the World the upright­ness of his heart in the pains he has taken by his quiet and humble deportment. For what Scruples soever he may have as to other things, he is well assured that meekness, peace and charity, are essential ingredients in the character of a true Christian. Neque multum spei apparere de Puritanis, ut in Anglia vo­cantur, homi­num genere turbulento & seditioso ad moderationem & mutuam tolerantiam flectendis, animi eorum elatiores sunt, quàm ut aliis praeterquam sibi solis quidquam tribuant: n [...]vitatis cupidiores, quám ut Antiquitatem, & efferatiores, quàm ut tranquillitatem respiciant. G. Calixti Judic. de Controv. Theolog. p. 138. And al­though the Learned may discover the errours of his understanding, yet it is his daily care, the good and the wise shall have no true reason to blame him for stubbornness in his will, for haughty, perverse and unruly passions, such as make him to contemn the judgment of others, and will suffer him to comply with no body but upon his own terms.

[Page 54]He does not therefore grow peevish or censorious, and forthwith condemn all that differ from him in opinion or practice: he does not set up for a Patron of a new Sect, and lay aside all due respects to Anti­quity, draw as many as ever he can into his own Party, and confine salvation to the small number of his own persuasion, as if the Divine Providence had engaged it self in securing them alone from all damnable sins in practice and mistakes in Faith. He does not whisper stories and jealousies into Mens ears to dispose them to turbulency and sedition, nor speak evil of Dignities, and libel the Rulers of his People; he does not cla­mour against, nor arreign the whole management of Publick Affairs, much less enter into wicked Plots, and with the same illegal violences go about to main­tain his own Religion, by which those of the Church of Rome have so often attempted to introduce theirs. But he is meek and patient, and easie to the Govern­ment under which he lives; he conforms to all its Constitutions as far as in conscience he can; he is af­fable and courteous to his Neighbours, and upon all occasions shews a great charity for those who have not the same sentiments with him in matters of Religion: he minds his own business, keeps his peculiar opini­ons to himself whenever they stand opposite to the establishments of Authority, and is contented private­ly to enjoy them.

And having thus presented you with several in­stances which go to the description of the good Chri­stian, who in patience has possest his Soul, I will now briefly propose the means by which he doth at­tain it.

1. He is daily lessening his desires of those things, whereof there is but small use, and he may subsist well without them. And having once contracted [Page 55] and confined his Appetite to what onely is necessary to the comfortable supports of life, or in the first rank of things convenient for it, as he is but a little con­cern'd for the purchase of whatever else the World can afford, so the loss of it never torments him.

Now the necessaries to life, are so few, and almost in all places, through the goodness of God, so easie to be procured, that he who has stript himself of all co­vetous desires of the vanities and superfluities, that most men spend their time in eagerly pursuing, may have his will at a cheap rate; and there are so few things which will come cross upon him, that he hath hardly left a blot open for even the spitefull to hit, which can ruffle and disorder his Patience.

2. He takes more care to govern his Passions, than to secure himself against adversity. For it may al­ways be in our power, by the grace of God and good management to keep our Appetites and Passions under the conduct of our Reason: but the nicest care can­not secure us from Diseases, cannot preserve the lives of our nearest Relations, Children and Friends, or be a sufficient guard against the effects of other Mens ma­lice; or exempt us from our proportion in the mise­ries, which a Floud, or a Fire, or any other public Calamity brings along with it. Moreover tempests in our Passions utterly unfit us for the service of God, and rob our Souls of all sincere pleasure. Whereas there is no instance of adverse fortune, but by a gene­rous patience will be conquer'd, and we may turn it into an instrument of vertue, that shall either hasten our repentance, or increase our trust in God, or make us fair examples for less exercised Christians to imitate.

3. It is good often to suppose, that the severe hard­ships, which we see others to labour under, may in a [Page 56] short time come to our own turn, by which course, as we shall learn to be mercifull to those in distress, and charitable in the censures we pass upon the un­fortunate, so we shall be admirably prepared to re­ceive all sorts of afflictions, which can never surprise and confound them, who live in constant expectation of them.

4. When our minds are most free from the distur­bances and rage of passion, let us form judgments of all the good and evil things, which in the course of this life may happen unto us. And then peremptori­ly resolve in our practice to adhere to, and follow these deliberate and well-advised judgments, notwith­standing afterwards, our fears, or our fury, may tu­multuously present us with new measures to order our selves by.

5. That we may not be mistaken in the judgments we frame of things, let us be carefull to love every thing in proportion to it's goodness. And the true way to rate this proportion, will be to find out how much every thing can contribute to the peace of our mind, which is the greatest good we possibly can re­ceive from things. From which rule we may certain­ly conclude that we are absolutely to love God onely, and vertue: but to esteem and covet all things else with limitations, with conditions, and ever with sub­mission to the Divine Pleasure.

For as God is the sole Authour of all true Peace and joy of mind, so Vertue is the means alone, whereby we can qualify our Souls for so great a blessing, and prevail with God to bestow it upon us. How vain then is it to set our affections upon any of the goods of this World, and to make them so necessary to our happiness, as to think our selves miserable, if we suf­fer a disappointment in our expectation?

[Page 57]6. The most powerfull means to the attaining of Patience, is to carry our eyes beyond the next and immediate causes of adversity unto the great disposer of things, by whose sufferance, if not decree, every public calamity, every private affliction comes to pass. So we shall discover a righteous Judge, never puni­shing the wicked above their demerit, a mercifull Fa­ther ever designing to reclaim the perverseness of his Children by his gentle chastisements; a wise Gover­nour, still bringing great good out of all the disor­ders, combustions, and disasters in the World.

Did we but take this prospect of affairs, we should discern the beauty of Providence in the most crooked and harsh passages of this present state. We should behold the events of the wildest jars and confusions or­derly and methodically conspiring to the glory of God, and the good of the Creation. Were we but constantly affected with a lively sense of the wisedom of the Divine management in all the issues of things, we should be so far from losing our patience by be­ing defeated in a little design, by a trifling loss, by a tedious attendance for a small debt or an act of com­mon justice, by a denial of a reasonable request, by an unkindness in a friend, by a light disgrace from a superiour, by a slight from an equal, or by a neglect in an inferiour and dependant, that we should fashion our selves into an exact compliance with the alwise disposals of Providence, even when we were ready to be deprived of the dearest of our relations, the best part of our estate, and our own lives were in evident danger.

Did we but reflect how uncertain an hold we have in the goods under the Sun, should we to that degree place our security in them, as to bid our Souls take their rest? should we so set our affections upon them, [Page 58] as to grieve and murmur, upon their loss, like men utterly undone? did we but consider our dependance upon God, not onely for food and raiment, but the very breath of our nostrils; should we thus insolently trample upon our poor and harmless neighbours, and be so lavish of their reputation, and yet forget all mo­deration and patience upon the least affront or injury from others?

Did we but remember how much God has born with the best of us, how many open abuses of his grace he has past by, and how long he is pleased to wait, expecting the return of his prodigal Sons, we could not, at this unchristian rate, lock up the bowels of our charity and compassion from the needy and di­stressed, and account so severely with each other for every little trespass.

Let then the consideration that God never puni­sheth us more than we need, that God never afflicts us but in measure, and with regard to our strength, that God never correcteth us, but with design to reform us, engage us every one, through all the parts of our lives, readily and chearfully to submit to his most holy will, and to demean our selves with all patience, cha­rity, and long-sufferance one towards another.