THe many Civilities which you are still pleased to continue to me, and my very great desire to answer them in the worthi­est testimonies of my zeal for your service, must make my best Apology for this manner of Addresse; if out of an ex­tream affection for your noblest Interest, I seem transported a little upon your first reflections, and am made to despise the consequence of entertaining you with such Truths, as are of the greatest danger to my Self; but of no lesse import to your happiness, and, which carry with them the most indelible Characters of my Friendship. For if as the Apostle affirms, For a good man, some would even dare to dy, why should my Charity be prejudged, if hoping to convert you from the errour of your way, I despair not of rendring you the Person for whose preservati­on there will be nothing too dear for me to expose?

I might with reason beleive that the first election of the Party wherein you stood engaged, proceeded from inexperience and the mistake of your zeal; not to say from your compliances to the passions of others; be­cause I both knew your education, and how obsequious you have alwayes shewed your self to those who had then the direction of you: But, when after the example of their conversion, upon discovery of the Impostures which perverted them; and the signall indignation of God, upon the se­verall Periods which your eyes have lately beheld, of the bloudiest Tyra­nies, and most prodigious oppressors that ever any age of the world pro­duc'd, I see you still persist in your course, and that you have turn'd about with every revolution which has hapned: when I consider, what con­tradictions you have swallowed, how deeply you have ingaged, how ser­vilely you have flatter'd, and the base, and mean submissions by which [Page 2] you have dishonour'd your self, and stained your noble Family; not to mention the least refinement of your religion or morality (besides that you have still preserved a civility for me, who am ready to acknowledge it, and never merited other from you) I say, when I seriously reflect upon all this; I cannot but suspect the integrity of your procedure, deplore the sadness of your condition, and resolve to attempt the discovery of it to you, by all the instances, which an affection perfectly touch't with a zeal for your eternall interest can produce. And who can tell, but it may please Almighty God, to affect you yet by a weak instrument, who have resisted so many powerfull indications of his displeasure at your proceed­ings, by the event of things?

For, since you are apt to recriminate, and after you have boasted of the prosperity of your cause, and the thriving of your Wickedness (an Ar­gument farr better becoming a Mahumetan then a Christian) let us state the matter a little, and compare particulars together; let us go back to the source, and search the very principles; and then see, if ever any cause had like successe indeed; and whether it be a just reproach to your Enemies, that the judgments of God have begun with them, whilst you know not yet, where they may determine.

First then, be pleased to look North-wards upon your Bretheren the Scots, Richlieu who (being first instigated by that crafty Cardinal to disturb the groth of the incomparable Church of England, and so consequently the tran­quility of a Nation, whose expedition at the Isle of Re, gave terrour to the French) made Reformation their pretence, to gratifie their owne avarice, introduce themselves, and a more then Babylonish Tyranie, imposing upon the Church and state, beyond all impudence or example. I say, look up­on what they have gotten, by deceiving their Brethren, selling their King, betraying his son, and by all their perfidie; but a slavery more then E­gyptian, and an infamy as unparalled, as their treason and ingratitude.

Look nerer home on those whom they had ingaged amongst us here, and tell me if there be a Person of them left, that can shew me his prize, unlesse it be that of his Sacriledg, which he, or his Nephews must certainly vomite up again: What is become of this ignorant and furious zeal, this pretence of an universall perfection in the Religious and the Secular, after all that blood and Treasure, Rapine and Injustice, which has been exhausted, and perpetrated by these sons of Thunder? Where is the King, whom they swear to make so glorious, but meant it in his Martyrdome? Where is the Classis, and the Assembly, the Lay-elder; all that geare of Scotish disci­pline, and the fine new Trinkets of Reformation? Were not all these ta­ken out of their hand, while now they were in the height of their pride and triumph? And their dull Generall made to serve the execution of their Soveraign, and then to be turnd of himself as a property no more of use to their designes? Their riches, and their strength in which they trusted, and the Parliament which they even idoliz'd, in sum, the prey they had [Page 3] contended for at the expence of so much sin and damnation, seizd upon by those very instruments, which they had rais'd to serve their insatiable avarice, and prodigious disloyalty. For so it pleased God to chastise their implacable persecution of an excellent Prince, with a slavery under such a Tyrant, as not being contented to butcher even some upon the Scaffold, sold divers of them for slaves, and others he exild into cruell banishment, without pretence of Law, or the least commiseration; that those who be­fore had no mercy on others, might find none themselves; till upon some hope of their repentance, and future moderation, it pleased God to put his hook into the nostrills of that proud Leviathan, and send him to his place, after he had thus mortified the fury of the Presbyterians. For un­lesse God himself should utter his voice from Heaven, yea, and that a mighty voice, can there any thing in the world be more evident, then his indignation at those wretches and bare fact Impostors, who, one after ano­ther, usurped upon us, taking them off at the very point of aspiring, and praecipitating the glory and ambition of these men, before those that where, but now, their adoarers, and that had prostituted their conscien­ces to serve their lusts? To call him the Moses, the Man of God, the Joshua, the Saviour of Israel; and after all this, to treat the Thing his son with addresses no lesse then blasphemous, whose Father (as themselves confess to be the most infamous Hypocrite and proflegate Atheist of all the Usur­pers that ever any age produc'd) had made them his Vassalls, and would have intaild them so to his posterity for ever?

But behold the scean is again changed, not by the Royall party, the Common Enemy, or a forreign power; but by the despicable Rumpe of a Parliament, which that Mountebanke had formerly serv'd himself of, and had rais'd him to that pitch, and investiture: But see withall, how soon these triflers and puppets of policy are blown away, with all their pack of modells and childish Chimaeras, nothing remaining of them but their Coffine, guarded by the Souldiers at Westminster; but which is yet lesse empty then the heads of those Polititians, which so lately seemed to fill it.

For the rest, I despise to blot paper with a recitall of those wretched In­terludes, Farces and Fantasms, which appear'd in the severall intervalls; because they were nothing but the effects of an extream gyddiness, and unparallel'd levity. Yet these are those various despensations and pro­videncens in your journey to that holy land of purchases and profits, to which you have from time to time appeal'd for the justification of your proceedings, whilst they were, indeed, no other then the manifest judg­ments of God upon your rebellion and your ambition: I say nothing of your hypocriticall fasts, and pretended humiliations, previous to the succeeding plots, and suppositions Revelations, that the godly might fall into the hands of your Captains, because they were bugbears, and became ridiculous even to the common people.

And now Sr. if you please, let us begin to set down the product and sur­vey [Page 4] the successe of your party; and after all these faces and vertigo [...], tell me ingenuously, if the single chastisment with is fallen up one afflicted man, and his loyall subjects, distressed by the common event of wa [...] want of treasure, the seizure of his Fleet, forcing him from his City, an [...] all the disadvantages that a perfidious people could imagine; but in fin [...] the crowning him with a glorious Martyrdome for the Church of God, and the liberty of his people (for which his blood doth yet cry aloud for vengeance) be comparable to the confusion which you (that have been the conquerours) have suffered, and the slavery which you are like to leave to the posterities which will be born but to curse you, and to groan under the pressures which you bequeath to your own flesh and blood? For to what a condition you have already reduced this once flourishing kingdom, since all has been your own, let the intollerable▪ oppressions, taxes, Ex­cises, sequestrations, confiscations, plunders, customes, decimations, not to mention the plate, even to very thimbles and the bodkins (for even to these did your avarice descend) and other booties, speak: All this dissipated and squandred away, to gratifie a few covetous and ambitious wretches, whose appetites are as deep as hell, and as insatiable as the grave; as if (as the Wise-man speaks) our time here were but a market for gain.

Look then into the Churches, and the manners of the people, even a­mongst your own Saints, and tell me, if since Simon Magus was upon the earth, there were ever heard of so many Schismes, and Heresies, of Jewes and Socinians, Quakers, Fifth-monarchy-men, Arians, Anabaptists, Inde­pendents, and a thousand severall sorts of Blasphemies and professed Atheists, all of them spawned under your goverment; and then tell me what a Reformation of Religion you have effected?

Was there ever in the whole Earth (not to mention Christendom alone) a perjury so prodigious, and yet so avowed as that by which you have ta­ken away the estate of my L. Craven, at which the very Infidels would blush, a Turke or Sythian stand amaz'd?

Under the Sun was it never heard, that a man should be condemned for transgressing no law, but that which was made after the fact, and abrogated after execution; that the Posterities to come might not be witnesses of your horrid injustice: Yet thus you proceeded against my L. Stafford. How many are those gallant persons whom after articles of war, you have butchered in cold-blood, violating your promises against the Lawes of all Nations civill, or barbarous; and yet thus you dealt in the case of my L. Capel, Sr. J. Stawell and others.

Is not the whole nation become sullen and proud, ignorant and suspici­ous, incharitable, curst, and in fine, the most depraved and perfidious under heaven? and whence does all this proceed, but from the effects of your own examples, and the impunity of evill doers?

I need not tell you how long Justice has been sold by the Comittes, and the Chair-men, the Sequestrators, and Simoniacall Tryers, not to men­tion [Page 5] the late Courtiers, and a swarm of Publicans who have eaten up the people as if they would eat bread.

Will you come now to the particular misfortunes, and the evident hand of God upon you for these actions (for he has not altogether left us with­out some express witnesses of his displeasure at your doings.) Behold then your Essex and your Warwick, your Manchester, Browne, Ferfaix, and your Waler, (whom once your Books stilled the Lord of Hosts) Cas­heered, Imprisoned, suspected and disgraced after all their services. Hotham, and his Son came to the block: Stapleton had the buriall of an Asse; and was thrown into a towne Ditch. Brooks and Hamden signally slain in the very act of rebellion and Sacriledge; your atheistical Dorislaw, Ascam, and the Sodomiticall Ariba, whom though they escaped the hand of Justice, yet Vengeance would not suffer to live: What become of Rains­burrow? Ireton perished of the Plague, and Hoyle hanged himself; Staplie died mad, and Cromewell in a fit of rageing; and if there were any others worthy the taking notice of, I should give you a list of their names and of their destinies, but it was not known whence they came which succeeded them; nor had they left any memory behind them, but for their signall wickednesses, as he that set on fire the Ephesian Temple to be recorded a Villain to posterity. Whereas those noble souls whom your inhumanity, (not your vertue) betraied, gave proof of their extraction, Innocency, Religion and Constancy under all their Tryalls and Tormen­tors; and those that died by the sword, fell in the bed of honour, and did worthily for their Countrey; their Loyalty and their Religion, will be renowned in the History of Ages, and precious to their memory, when your names will rot with your Carcasses, and your remembrance be as dung upon the face of the earth. For there is already no place of Europe where your infamy is not spread, whilst your persecuted Brethren rejoyce in their sufferings, can abound, and can want, blush not at their actions, nor are ashamed at their addresses, because they have suffered for that which their Faith and their Birth, their Lawes, and their liberties have celebra­ted with the most glorious Inscriptious, and everlasting Elogies,

And if fresher instances of all these particulars be required, cast but your eye a little upon the Armies pretended plea, which came lately a birding to beat the away before them, charm the ears of the vulgar, and captivate the people; That after all its Pseudo-politicks and irreligious Principles, is at last constrained to acknowledg your open and prodigious violations, strang and illegall actions, (as in termes it confesses) of taking up armes, raising and forming Armies against the King, fighting against his person, imprisoning, impeaching, arraigning, trying, and execu­ting him: banishing his Children, abolishing Bishops, Deans and Chap­ters; taking away Kingly Government, and the House of Lords, break­ing the crowns, selling the Jewells, Plate, Goods, Houses and Lands belonging unto the Kings of this Nation, erecting extraordinary High-Courts [Page 6] of Justice and therein impeaching, araigning, condemning, and executing many pretended notorious Enemies to the publique peace; when the lawes in being, and the ordinary Courts of Justice could not reach them: by strange and unknown practises in this Nation, and not at all justifiable by any known lawes and statutes, but by certain diabo­licall principles of late distilled into some persons of the Army, and which he would intitle to the whole, who (abating some of their Commanders, that have sucked the sweet of this doctrine) had them never so much as entred into their thoughts, nor could they be so depraved, though they were Masters only of the Light of nature to direct them. For Common sense will tell them, that whoever are our lawfull superiours, and invested with the supream Authority, either by their own vertue, or the peoples due election, have then a just right to challeng submission to their precepts, and that we acquiesce in their determinations; since there is in nature no other expedient to preserve us from everlasting confusion: But it is the height of all impertinency to conceive, that those which are a part of themselves, and can in so great a body, have no other interests, should fall into such exorbitabitant contradiction to their own good, as a child of four years old would not be guilty of; and as this Phamphleter wildly suggests in pp. 6. 11. 27. &c. did they steer their course by the known lawes of the Land, and as obedient Subjects should do, who without the King and his Peers, are but the Carcass of a Parliament, as destitute of the Soul which should informe and give it being. But if so small a handfull of men as appeared in the Palace-Yard without consent of a quarter of the English Army, much lesse of the tenthousandth part of the free people that are not clad in red, shall disturb and alter a Government when it thinkes fit to set aside a few imperious officers, who plainly seek themselves, and derive their Commissions from a superiour to whom they swear obedience, (I mean not here the Rumpe) who shall ever hope, or live to see any go­vernment established in these miserably abused Nations? For I dare report my self to the ingenuity of the very Souldiers themselves, if they, who have effected all these changes by your wretched instigations, and blind pre­tences, imagine themselves the people of this Nation, but as a very small portion of them, compared to the whole, and who are maintained by them, to recover and protect the Civill Government, according to the good old lawes of the Land; not such as they themselves shall invente from day to day, or as the interests of some few persons may engage them.

But if the essential end of Rulers be the common peace, and their Laws obliging as they become relative: restore us then to those under which we lived with so much sweetnesse and tranquility, as no age in the world, no government under Heaven could ever pretend the like. And if the people (as you declare) are to be the Judges of it, summon them together in a Free Parliament, according to its legal Constitution; or make a universal Balott, and then let it appear, if Collonel Lambert and half a dozen Officers, [Page 7] with all their seduced Partizans, make so much as a single Cypher to the Summe Total. And this shall be enough to answer those devious Principles set down in the Porch of that specious Edifice; which being erected upon the Sand, will (like the rest that has been daubed with untempered mortar) sink also at the next high winde that blowes upon it. But I am glad it is at last avowed, upon what pretexts that late pretended Parliament have pleaded on the behalf of themselves and party, their discharge from all the former Protestations, Engagements, solemn Vows, Covenants, with hands (as you say) lift up to the most high God, as also their Oaths and Al­legiance, &c. because I shall not in this discourse be charged with slan­dering of them, and that the whole World may detest the Actions of such perfidious Infidels, with whom nothing sacred has remained inviolable.

But there is yet a piece of Artifice behinde, of no less consequence then the former, and that is, a seeking to perswade the present Armie, that They were the men, who first engaged thus solemnly to destroy the Government under which they were born, and reduce it to this miserable condition: whereas it is well known by such as converse daily with them, that there is hardly one of ten amongst them, who was then in Arms, and that it was the Zelots under Essex, Manchester, Waller, and the succeeding Gene­rals, who were the persons of whose perfidiousness he makes so much use of, and that the present Army consist of a far more ingenuous spirit, and might in one moment vindicate this aspersion, make their conditions with all advantage, and these nations the most happy people upon the Earth, as it cannot be despaired but they will one day do, when by the goodness of Almighty God, they shall perfectly discern through the mist which you have cast upon their eyes, lest they should discover the Imposture of these Egyptian Sorcerers.

But now he comes next to glorifie the late Northern Expedition, and because it should look more dreadful, he reckons up a horrible Plot of the poor Cavaliers conspiring with Sir Geo. Booth; whereas (God knows) 'twas a thing wholly mannaged by some of their own party, whom the Rump had disobliged, and that could have no other effect, then to shew the judgements of God, upon so many as it involved under a Calamity, which their former Actions had deserved; though, under the pretence of it, and because there was want of prey, many innocent persons were seiz­ed upon, and imprisoned with them.

And now, Sir, if after all this injustice, and impiety on your parts, you have prosecuted that with the extreamest madness, which you esteemed criminal in your enemies, viz. To arrogate the supream power to a single per­son, condemn men without Law, execute, and proscribe them with as little: Im­prest for your Service, violate your Parliaments, dispense with your solemn Oaths; in summe, to mingle Earth and Heaven by your unarbitrary proceedings: All which, not only your printed books, this pretended plea; but your Actions have abundantly declared; have you not justified the Royal party, and [Page 8] pronounced them the only honest men which have appeared upon the stage, in Characters as plain, that he which runs may read, whilst yet you persecute them to the death? Therefore, thou art inexcusable, O man, that perpetratest these things; For wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thy self; seeing thou that judgest doest the same things. But thinkest thou this, O man, that thus judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the vengeance of God? I tell ye nay, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.

Truly, Sir, when I compare these things together, and compare them I do very often, consider the purchases which you have made, and the dam­nation you have certainly adventured; the despite you have done to the name of Christ, the Laws of Common humanity which you have violated, the malice and the folly of your proceedings; in fine, the confusion which you have brought upon the Church, the State, and your selves; I adore the just and righteous judgment of God; and (howsoever you may possi­bly emerge, and recover the present rout) had rather be a sufferer a­mongst those whom you have thus afflicted, and thus censure, then to en­joy the pleasures of your sins for that season you are likely to possess them: For if an Angel from heaven should tell me you had done your duties, I would no more believe him, then if he should preach another Gospel, then that which has been delivered to us; because you have blasphemed that holy Profession, and done violence to that Gracious Spirit, by whose sacred dictates you are taught to live in obedience to your Superiours, and in Charity to one another; covering yet all this Hydra of Impostures with a mask of Piety and Reformation, whilst you breath nothing but oppres­sion, and lie in wait to deceive. But O God! how long shall the Adversary do this dishonour, how long shall the Enemy blaspheme thy name, for ever? They gather them together against the soul of the Righteous, and condemn the inno­cent blood. Lo these are the ungodly, these prosper in the world, and these have riches in possession: And I said, then have I cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency. Yea, and I had almost said as they; but lo, then I should have condemned the generation of thy Children. Then thought I to un­derstand this, but it was too hard for me, until I went into the Sanctuary of God; then understood I the end of these men. Namely, how thou dost set them in slip­pery places, castest them down and destroyest them.

O how suddenly do they consume, perish, and come to a fearful end!

We have seen it, indeed Sir, we have seen it, and we cannot but acknow­ledge it the very finger of God, mirabile in oculis nostris; and is that, truly, which even constrains me out of Charity to your Soul, as well as out of a deep sense of your Honour, and the Friendship which I otherwise bear you, to beseech you to re-enter into your self, to abandon those false Principles, to withdraw your self from these Seducers, to repent of what you have done, and save your self from this untoward generation: There is yet a door of Repentance open, do not provoke the Majestie of the great [Page 9] God any longer, which yet tenders a Reconciliation to you. Remem­ber what was once said over the perishing Jerusalem. How often would have gathered you together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wing [...] and ye would not? Behold, your House is left unto you desolate. — For [...] not think it impossible, that we should become the most abandon'd, a [...] barbarous of all the nations under heaven. You know who has said i [...], He turneth a fruitfull land into a Wildernesse, for the iniquity of them that i [...] habit therein. And truly, he that shall seriously consider the sad Carast [...]phe of the Eastern Empire, so flourishing in piety, policy, knowledg, liter [...] ture, and all the excellencies of a happy and blessed people; would almo [...] think it impossible, that in so few years, and a midst so glorious a light learning and Religion, so suddain, and palpable a darknesse, so stran [...] and horrid a barbarity should over-spread them, as now we behold in [...] that goodly tract of the Turkish dominions: And what was the cause of a this, but the giddinesse of a wanton people, the Schisms and the Heresi [...] in the church, and the prosperous successes of a rebellious Imposto [...] whose steps we have pursued in so many pregnant instances, giving cour­tenance to those unheard of impieties, and delusions, as if God be not infinitely merciful, must needs involve us under the same disasters? For, whi [...]t there is no order in the Church, no body of Religion agreed upon, no go­vernment established, and that every man is abandon'd to his own decei [...] ­full heart: whilst learning is decried, and honesty discountenanc'd, rapit [...] defended, and vertue finds no advocate; what can we in reason expect [...] but the most direfull expressions of the wrath of God, a universall desola­tion, when by the industry of Sathan and his crafty Emisaries, some despe­rate enthusiasme, compounded (like that of Mohomet,) of Arian, Socinian, Jew Anabaptist, and the impurer Gnostick, something I say made up of all these heresies, shall diffuse it self over the Nation, in a universall conta­gion, and nothing lesse appear then the Christian which we have ingrate­fully renounced?

For this plague is already beginning amongst us, and there is none to take the Censer, and to stand between the living and the dead, that we be not con­sumed as in a moment; for there is wrath gone out from the Lord. Let us then depart from the tents of these wicked men (who have brought all this upon us) and touch nothing of theirs, least we be consumed in all their sins.

But you will say, the King is not to be trusted: judg not of others by your selves; did ever any man observe the least inclination of revenge in his breast? has he not besides the innate propensity of his own nature to gentlenesse, the strict injunctions of a dying Father and a Martyr, to for­give even greater offenders then you are? Yes, I dare pronounce it with confidence, and avouch it whith all assurance, that there is not an individu­all all amongst you, whose crimes are the most crimson, whom he will not be most ready to pardon, and graciously receive upon their repentance; nor any thing that can be desired of him, to which he would not cheerfully [Page 10] accommode, for the stopping of that torrent of blood, and extream confusi­on, which has hitherto run, and is yet imminent over us. Do but reason a little with your self, and consider sadly, whether a young Prince, mortifi­ed by so many afflictions, disciplin'd by much experience, and instructed by the miscarriages of others, be not the most excellently qualified to govern and reduce a people, who have so successesly tried so many governments, of old, impious and crafty Foxes, that have exercised upon us the most intol­lerable Tyranies that were ever heard of?

But you object further, that he has lived amongst Papists, is vitiously inclin'd, and has wicked men about him: What can be said more unjust­ly, what more malitious? And can you have the foreheads to tell us he has lived amongst Papists to his prejudice, who have proscrib'd him from Pro­testants, persecuted him from place to place, as a Patridg on the Mountains? You may remember who once went to Achich the King of Gath, and chang­ed his behaviour before them, and fain'd himself mad in their hands; had many great infirmities, and was yet a man after Gods own heart; Whilst the Catholick King was your Allie, you had nothing to do with Papists, it was then no crime: God is not mocked, away with this respect of persons: But where is it you would have him to be? The Hollander dares not afford him harbour, lest you refuse them yours: The French may not give him bread for fear of offending you; and unlesse he should go to the Indies, or the Turk (where yet your malice would undoubtedly reach him) where can he be safe from your revenge? But suppose him in a Papist Countrey, constrained thereto by your incharity to his Soul as well as body; would he have condescended to half so much, as you have offered for a tolerati­on of Papists, he needed not now have made use of this Apology, or want­ed the assistance of the most puissant Princes of Christendome to restore him, of whom he has refused such conditions as in prudence he might have yielded to, and the people would have gladly received; whilst those who know with what persons you have transacted, what truck you have made with the Jesuites, what secret Papists there are amongst you, may easily divine why they have been no forwarder to assist him, and how far distant he is from the least wavering in his Faith. But since you have now declared that you will tollerate all Religions, without exception; do not think it a sin in him, to gratifie those that shall most oblige him.

For his vertues and Morality, I provoak the most refined Family in this Nation to produce me a Relation of more piety and moderation; shew me a Fraternity more spotlesse in their honour, and freer from the exorbi­tances of youth, then these three Brothers, so conspicuous to all the world for their Temperance, Magnanimity, Constancy, and Understanding; a friendship and humility unparallel'd and rarely to be found amongst the severest p rsons, scarcely in a private family. It is the malice of a very black Soul, and a virulent [...]egado (of whom to be commended were the utmost infamy) that has interpreted some compliances, to which per­sons [Page 11] in distress are sometimes engaged, with those whom they converse with­all, to his Majesties disadvantage: whilst these filthy dreamers defile the flesh them­selves, and thinking it no sin to despise dominion, speak evill of dignities, and of the things which they know not. But woe unto them, for they have gone in the way of Kain, and run greedily after the errour of Balaam, for reward, having mens persons in admiration because of advantage.

For the rest, I suppose the same was said of Holy David, when in his extream calamity, he was constrain'd to fly from Saul. For every one that was in distresse, and every one that was in debt, and every one that was discontented, gathered themselves unto him, and he became Captain over them. And to this retinue, has your malice and persecution reduced this excellent Prince; but he that preserv'd him in the Wood, and deli­vered David out of all his troubles, shall likewise in his appointed time, de­liver him also out of these distresses.

I have now answered all your calumnies, and have but a word to add, that I may yet incline you to accept of your best interest, and prevent that dreadfull ruine which your obstinacy does threaten. Is it not as perspicu­ous as the Sun, that it lies in your power to reform his Counsell, intro­duce your selves, make what composition you can desire, have all the se­curity that mortall men can imagine, and the greatest Princes of Europe to engage in the performance? This were becoming worthy men, and ho­nourable indeed; this ingenuous self-denyall: And it is no disgrace to reforme a mistake, but to persist in it lyes the shame. The whole Nation require it of you, and the lawes of God command it, you cannot, you must not deferr it. For what can you pretend that will not then drop into your bosomes? The humble man will have repose, the aspiring and am­bitious, honours: The Merchant will be secure, Trades immediately reco­ver, Aliances will be confirm'd, the Lawes reflourish, tender Consciences consider'd, present purchasers satisfied; The Souldier payed, maintained and provided for; and what's above all this, Christianity and Charity will revive again amongst us, Mercy and Truth will meet together; righte­ousness and peace shall kiss each other.

But let us now consider on the other side, the confusion, which must of necessity light upon us if we persist in our rebellion and obstinacy; We are already impoverisht, and consum'd with war and the miseries that at­tend it; you have wasted our treasure, and destroyed the Woods, spoyled the Trade, and shaken our properties; a universall animosity is in the ve­ry bowells of the Nation; the Parent against the Children, and the Chil­dren against the Parents, betraying one another to the death; in summe, if that have any truth which our B. Saviour has himself pronounced, That a Kingdome divided cannot stand, it is impossible we should subsist in the con­dition we are reduc'd to. Consider we again, how ridiculous our late pro­ceedings have made us to our neighbours round about us. Their Ministers laugh at our extram giddinesse, and we seem to mock at their addresses: [Page 12] for no sooner do their Credentialls arrive, but behold the scean is changed, and the Government is fled, he that now acted King, left a fool in his place, and they stand amazed at our Buffoonery and madnesse.

What then may we imagine will be the product of all these disadvanta­ges, when the Nations that deride and hate us, shall be united for our de­struction; and that the harvest is ripe for the sickle of their fury? shall we not certainly be a prey to an inevitable ruine, having thus weakned our selves by a brutish civill war, and cut off those glorious Heros, the wise and the valiant, whose couragein such a calamity we shall in vain imploar, that would bravely have sacrificed themselves for our delivery? Let us remember how often we have served a forraign people, and that there is nothing so confident, but a provoaked God can overthrow.

For my part, I tremble, but to consider what may be the issue of these things, when our iniquities are full, and that God shall make inquisition for the bloud that has been spilt; unlesse we suddainly meet him by an unfained repentance, and turn from all the abominations by which we have provoaked him; And then, it is to be hoped, that he who would have compounded with the Father of the faithfull, had there been but ten Righte­ous men in Sodom; and that spared Nineveh that populous and great City; will yet have mercy on us, hearken to the prayers, and have regard to the teares, of so many Millions of people, who day and night do interceed with him: The Priests and Ministers of the Lord weeping between the porch and the Altar, and saying, Spare thy people O Lord, spare thy People, and give not thine Inheritance to reproach.

And now I have said what was upon my Spirit for your sake, when, for the satisfaction of such as (through its effect upon your soule) this Ad­dresse of mine may possibly come to, I have religiously declared, that the Person who writ it, had no unworthy or sinister design of his owne to gra­tifie, much lesse any other party whatever; as being neither Courtier, Souldier or Church-man, but a plain Country Gentleman, engag'd on nei­ther side, who, has had leasure, (through the goodnesse of God) can­didly, and without passion to examine the particulars which he has touch­ed, and expects no other reward in the successe of it, then what Christ has promised in the Gospell; The Benediction of the peace maker; and which he already feeles in the discharge of his Conscience; being for his own particu­lar, long since resolv'd with himself, to persist in his Religion, and his loyal­ty to the death, come what will; as being fully perswaded, that all the per­secutions, losses, and other accidents which may arrive him for it here, are not worthy to be compared to that eternall weight of glory which is to be revealed hereafter; and to the inexpressible consolation, which it will afford on his Death-bed, when all these guilded pleasures will disappear, this noise, and empty pompe; when God shall set all our sins in order before us; and when, it is certain, that the humble, and the peaceable, the charitable and the meek shall not loose their reward, nor change their hopes, for all the [Page 13] Crownes and the Scepters, the Lawrells, and the Trophies, which ambi­tious and self seeking men contend for, with so much Tyranie and in­justice.

Let them therefore no longer deceive you, dear Sr. and as the guise of these vile men is, tell you they are the Godly-party, under which for the present they would pass, and courage themselves in their wickedness, stop­ing their ears, and shutting their eyes against all that has been taught and practised by the best of Christians, & holiest of Saints these sixteen hundred years: You shall know them by their fruites, do men gather Grapes of Thornes, or Figs of Thistles? But so, being miserably gall'd with the remembrance of their impieties, and the steps by which they have ascended to those fear­full precepices, they seek to allay the secret pangs of a gnawing worme, by adopting the most prodigious of their crimes into a Religion fitted for the purpose, and versatile as their giddy interest, till at last, encourag'd by the number of thriving Proselytes and successes, they grow seared and confident; swallowing all with ease, and passing from one heresie to another; whilst yet they are still pursued, and shall never be at repose: For Consci­ence will at last awake, and then how frightful, how deplorable, yea, how inexpressably sad will that day be unto them! For these things have they done, and I held my tongue (saith God) and they thought wickedly, that I am such a one as themselves; but I will reprove them and set before them the things that they have done. O consider this ye that forget God, least he pluck you away, and there be none to deliver you!

And now Sir, you see the liberty which I have taken, and how farr I have adventured to testifie a friendship which I have ever professed for you: I have indeed been very bold; but it was greatly requisite; and you know that amongst all men, there are none which more openly use the freedom of reprehension, then those who love most: Advices are not reject­ed by any, but such as determine to pursue their evill courses; and the lan­guage which I use, is not to offend, but to beseech you to return. I con­jure you therefore to re-enter into your self, and not to suffer these mean and dishonourable respects, which are unworthy your nobler spirit, to prompt you to a course so deform'd, and altogether unworthy your edu­cation and Family. Behold your friends all deploaring your misfortunes, and your Enemies even pitie you; whilst to gratifie a few mean and despe­rate persons, you cancell your duty to your prince, and disband your Reli­gion; dishonour your name, bring ruine and infamy on your posterity.

But when all this shall fail (as God forbid a title of it should) I have yet this hope remaining; that when you have been sufficiently sated with this wicked course, wandred from place to place, government to government, sect to sect, in so universal a deluge, and find no repose for the sole of your foot, (as it is certain you never shal) you will at last with the peaceful Dove, return to the Arke from whence you fled, to your first principles, and to so­ber counsels; or with the repenting Prodigall in the Gospel, to your Father [Page 14] which is in heaven, and to the Father of your Countrey: For in so doing, you shall not only rejoyce your servant, and all good men, but the very Angels which are in heaven, and who are never said to rejoyce indeed, but at the Conversion of a sinner.

This 27. Octob. 1659.

Et tu conversus, converte Fratres.