A Censure of Simony, Corollary – Petition to Parliament
The Corollary: directed especially to all Lay-Patrons, and Lay-Purchasers of the Sacred Portion.
NOw before I shut vp my little Treatise, I intreate all Lay-persons, especially Patrons of Benefices, and also all such Fathers, as make no difference betweene the purchase of a Benefice, and of a Farme, to leaue as a portion for their children: that they would patiently peruse, and wisely weigh these few lines; which, as they proceed from a heart inflamed with the zeale of Gods glory, of the propagation of his Church, and of the Soule-saluation of all those whom it especially concerneth: So I desire they may be affectuously imbraced, and effectually followed of all. For, sith I speake vntounto wise men, let me speake the more freely in few words; but they are the words of our Lord Iesus Christ: What shall it profit a man, Mar. ….36.if he win the whole world, and lose his owne soule? Hereby the Lord implies, that a mans soule is infinitely of more value, then the whole world. Now if it be so in the whole, what is it in eueryevery little part? What shall it profit a man, if he winne a little piece of the world, and lose his owne soule? What gained Esau, for selling his birthright, and typically his soule, for a messe of broth? or Achan, for a wedge of gold? or Iudas, for selling both his soule and his Sauiour for thirtie pence? or Gihezi, for selling his Masters gift for two talents? or Ananias and Saphira, for detaining what was vowed and consecrate? Now God is the same iealous God still, that hee was from the beginning. And the Apostle saith concerning sacrilegious persons; *Gal. 6.7.Be not deceiued, God is not mocked; for whatsoeuer a man soweth, the same shall hee also reape. But wherefore all this? First, this concerneth all Patrons to looke vntounto it; such as account it no lesse lawfull to sell a Benefice, or to vsurpe by strong hand, or cunning, either the whole, or a part, to his owne proper improper vse, then to sell his horse, or house.
Now to all Patrons is my speech chiefly addressed. The Benefices in your Patronage, are but a gage committed to you of trust. And it is no small trust. The soules of Gods people are ingaged in it. Your first and chiefe care should be to make choice of a worthy Minister; next, to collate it on him freely, without either exacting, or expecting of him lesse or more. Much lesse should you set a rate vponupon it, or make portsale of it to him that will giuegive most; or to reserue your owne Tithes, or the glebe, or such a portion to m…intaine your house with bread-corne, or drinke-corne, or some other commodities. The Eagle snatching the sacrifice from the Altar, carried withall a coale that claue vntounto it, which proued enough to set her nest, and selfe on fire. O looke vntounto it, if euer you looke for Gods blessing vponupon you, and your posteritie. Gihezies curse was fearefull, it claue also to his posteritie. How many such Merchants hauehave beene outed of all, if wee did but obserue the examples? Nor is it sufficient that you shake your owne hands from Simonie, but see that your family, your wife, your sonne, or daughter, or seruant, bee free from it. In vaine did Pilate w…sh his hands, from the guilt of that innocent bloud of the Lambe of God, while he suffered himselfe to be ouercome with the malicious importunities of those murtherous Iewes, himselfe passing the sentence, though it were perhaps as much against his will, as against his conscience. When you bestow a Benefice at the earnest suit of any of yours, when you cannot bee ignorant of some base corruption, you giuegive your consent to the betraying of the lambes of Christ into the wolfes power. And where doth Simonie begin, but at this source? At this gate is let in some Alphabeticall homebred Pedant, the verie fry of Simonie. Such a one will bee content to change his Ferula, for a broken shortned Sheep-hook, and to accept, not what the Church may challenge, but what the Patron will leaue, and perhaps will cite authoritie out of the Grammer Schoole for it, if he hauehave so much Greeke, foreign. Dimidium plus toto. Halfe a loafe is better then no bread, nay then a whole loafe which hee cannot come by. For it cannot bee, that an ingenuous Schollar, of liberall education, will euer seeke to enter into Christs fold, vponupon any base and vnworthy termes. If there bee any Simoniacall Ministers in the Church (as I charitably hope there may be none) that goe about to pur…hase dignities, it is most probable they learned first to chafer in this market. O shut your gates against such pedling Merchants. The way to keepe the coasts cleere, is for you to be no lesse carefull in prouiding a worthy Incumbent before-hand, then the illiterate Pedant is watchfull to catch the preferment before it fall. But your giuing way to such, opens a wide gate to euerie Farmer, teaching him by this meanes to prouide a sufficient maintenance, perhaps for the most vntowardly, and most deformed of all his sonnes, by laying out his money for the next vacancie, which lay in your power to preuent. Haply you will say, You bought the perpetuall Presentation or Patronage at a great rate; or, if not your selfe, your father or predecessors. If your predecessors bought, & left it freely to you, you may the more freely bestow it. If you bought it for your mony, and not with a purpose to bestow it freely for the glory of God, & good of his Church; but to make a ga…ne of it, your sin is so much the greater, & not to be pardoned, without speedie and heartie repentance, nor that repentance euer true, or pleasing to God, vnlesse you bestow euen that you deerly bought, both freely, and worthily. You sinned in the buying of it, with respect to gaine: but your sinne is doubled, and sealed vp in a bag, if you sell it againe. Therefore in the feare of God take heed to your selues. The Liuing is Gods, not yours. You keepe it but in trust. Discharge your trust faithfully. So, God will reward it. Otherwise, he will require it.
And you Fathers, let mee vse a word of aduice to you. You desire to leaue your children portions for this life. I commend i…. For hee that doth not prouide for his family, hath denied the faith, and is worse then an Infidel. But let your prouision (as I say) be honest. Prouide honest things aforehand, saith the Apostle, and that honestly. First, let your monies bee lawfully gotten. Next, if you will disburse a piece of money for the setling of your sonnes Patrimonie, bestow it, where you may lawfully. Take heed of purchasing that, which is Gods owne Patrimonie, Gods Tithes, or a Benefice. Much lesse, for one of your most vnlikely sonnes, for him, that you know not, or rather may suspect whether hee will proue Schollar, or no; or if Schollar sufficient, whether an honest man: or if both, whether he may bee fit for that holy calling, apt to teach, wise and faithfull to goe in and out before Gods people, family, and flocke. *Matt. 24 45.Who is a faithfull steward and wise, whom his Master may set ouer his family, to giuegive them their portion in due season? For, who is sufficient for these things, saith the Apostle? Take heed, least while you seeke to purchase your sonne a fathers blessing, you procure vntounto him an ineuitable, an inheritable curse. Besides, though you are the principall Simonist in the purchase, yet hee is the accessarie, in one degree, or other; either hee knowes, or suspects at least, and that strongly, that he comes in by purchase, and so by an implicite faith hee becomes a periured Simonist. But if you will needs make your sonne a Minister, let him bee one of the best and towardliest; and if you will needs purchase for him, let it be of such things as are common merchandise, not Gods inheritance. Tithes are Sacred, not to bee bought and sold, no more then the Cure of Soules, or the Calling of the Ministrie, vponupon which Tithes attend, as their ordinarie maintenance. Meddle not you with that, for feare of Christs whip. Hee cannot indure bu…ers and sellers in his Temple. And doth it not stand with good reason, why Lai-men should not meddle with purchasing of B…nefices, sith you hauehave by a strict Law prouided, that Minis…ers shall not meddle in purchasing your Farmes? And shall not Gods Law be as powerfull to restraine you from laying profane hands vponupon that which is sanctified: as mans Lawes are to inhibit… Ministers to purchase a poore Lease of a Farme or Tenement? Nay, rather let Gods Law stand for euer inuiolable, and consider with your selues, how reasonable your owne Law is, that vponupon any termes, without any expresse limitation, prohibits to a Minister the laying out of a little money (if perhaps hee hauehave it) vponupon a poore Lease, that may be at least some staie for his poore wife and children, when hee is gone. H…ply the first hint of this Law, was some abuse. If so, as Saint Hierome said vponupon the like purpose, I am not so sory for the Law, as for the occasion of it. Yet if some men abuse wine, you doe not presently make a law to forbid all men to drinke any wine at all. But the way is to make a law against drunkennesse: If wee could as readily define what drunkennesse is, as wee are sharpe sighted to condemne a Minister for base couetousnesse, in case hee had a Farme in possession. Indeed, if a Minister should turne Farmer, and Negotiator, relinquishing, or neglecting his calling, let the Law forbid that in any case. For as Saint Hierome saith, Negotiatorem Clericum, ex inopi diuitem, ex ignobili gloriosum, quasi quandam pestem fuge. This were for Ministers to turne Impropriators (the worst of all other) to impropriate their Sacred Calling, by bemudding t…eir hands, but more, their mindes, by leauing to bee the Lord…s husband-men, to become the worlds drudges. But howsoeuer, remoue the abuse by law, and that euen of the Medes and Persians, that altereth not. In the meane while bee pleased to take into your consideration, what equalitie there is (and consequently, what equitie) between your restraining Ministers from the lawfull purchase of your Farmes, and your vnlimitted purchasing of our proper Free-holds, the purchase whereof howsoeuer Humane Law makes it currant, yet Diuine Law hath proclaimed the contrarie. Besides, if Gods Law were silent, or of no force, yet herein humane and carnall reason might sway you. For consider, I pray you, & consult but with flesh and bloud; in restraining Ministers from that libertie, what doe you, but bring an old house vponupon your owne heads? For doe not Ministers come out of your loines? Doe you not make interchangeable & reciprocal marriages with them? (except where any of the Lay-tribe (as too many there be) doe disdaine to match with a Priest, as they terme vsus) Are not their children your grand-children, doe not their sons match with your daughters, and their daughters with your sonnes? We are not, as once the Leuites, a Tribe so select, and so separate from the rest of our brethren, but that in all naturall respects we communicate with you. We that are now Ministers, were once (if you remember) your sonnes. And your sonnes may be (if you consider) Ministers as we. To whom then doe you denie this libertie? Is it not to your owne sonnes and daughters, and grand children? Euen to your owne flesh and bloud? Say, a Minister, your sonne-in-law dieth poore, leauing a poore widow, and so many small helplesse orphanes behind him; is she not now your daughter still, and are not her babes your grand-children, flesh of your flesh, and bone of your bone? Well; you that cannot bee content to giuegive Ministers libertie so much as to purchase a Farme, if they bee able in their life time (& haply they were able; had money; but for want of such occasion to lay it out, spent it, now it is gone; and no signe of …t, but perhaps a few bookes, which now at the Booke-binders rate will not purchase the fourth part of a Farme) yet no doubt (such are the bowells of naturall louelove, yea and compassion in you, that you will not denie your daughter and grand-children, harbor and maintenance, in this their distressed calamitie. But now if you find a yearning in your bowels, vponupon better reason to repeale this law, then haply whereon it was first grounded: yet for all that, you must not thinke to claime the like libertie in purchasing Gods owne patrimonie, which is holy. Your doing Gods Ministers right and reason, giues you no warrant or priuiledge to wrong God. Doe God right, and deny his Ministers, your owne bowells, no reason. But this by the way, to show that in no case sacred Tithes are to be bought and sold.
No? In no case? Yes, in some case. There is a way of purchasing the sacred Tithes, which would be both acceptable to God, profitable to his Church, and comfortable to the soule and conscience of the purchaser himselfe. How is that? But alas! where shall wee find one Purchaser? Yet wee are not altogether hopelesse. There be verie many charitable and well disposed Christian men and women in this our Church, whom God hath inabled as well with a large hand, as a gracious heart, to leaue goodly Legacies to charitable vses, as Hospitalls, and the like: and no doubt more would bee, if they could find Executors or Feffees in trust, who could but liue to see the will of the bequeather duly executed. Now to all such well disposed Christians, that desire to make them friends of the vnrighteous mammon, and to lay vp in store for themselues a good foundation for the time to come, that they may inherit eternall life: to such let me addresse my speech. How many hauehave money to lay out vponupon land, or so, and cannot light of a fit purchase? I wil be your intelligencer to discouer vntounto you a faire purchase; so faire, as I cannot but maruell, that neuer yet any hath traded in it. Shall I tell you? The purchase of Tithes. Why, that is no newes. They are bought and sold euerie where. But I meane here the purchase of Tithes impropriate. These also are commonly bought and sold. But I meane, the purchasing of them, and redeeming of them, to restore them to God againe, for the maintenance of his Ministrie. O noble purchase! so rare as vnheard of. A worthy obiect, indeed, for euerie rich good man to pitch the eye of his charitie vponupon, a worthy subiect to deale in. Would yee erect a new Hospitall? Sa… your labour. You hauehave all re…die at your hand in an impropriate Parsonage; both house, and d…maines. Plant your hospitall there. A hospitall not onelyonly for poore bodies, but for poore soules too; poore st…rued soules. For a Parsonage being rightily vsed, is a verie hospitall for the poore, in both these kindes, O, lay out your money heere. Christ made one vnualuable and incomparable purchase, redeeming our soules with his most precious blood. That is indeed without parallell. All the merits of Saint Francis, or Saint Dominicke, wherewith the golden Legend is stuffed, or the vertue of our Lad…s Milke, as they call it, are not to bee compared vntounto That. But if any purchase may bee named after That, in any relation, surely this purchase, of all other is neerest a kin vntounto it; not by way of merit, in no sort that; for it cost more to redeeme their soules, but by way of meanes to saue mens soules. To purchase an Impropriation, and to restore it to the Church, whose it is, and where it ought to bee, is to purchase the meanes of sauing so many soules, which for lacke of that meanes doe perish. For where the maintenance faileth, the Ministrie faileth (for Ministers are men, and cannot liue by the aire) and consequently the people perisheth, for whom Christ dyed. O then, you Christian hearted ones, whom the Lord hath blessed with abundance, make your purchase heere. O, how happie you, that thus may bee the Instruments of sauing so many poore soules, by pulling them out of the fire, as Inde speaketh! But you will say, How shall this bee done? I will tell you, doe but entertaine such a purpose in your heart, and God tha… put it in your heart to will, will also direct and enable you to doe it, of his good pleasure. The readie way is, as one saith, Sapere aude, Incipe, &c. Resolue to bee wise betime; begin. Hee that dela…es the time of doing good, is as hee that obserues the Riuer, while it runne all out. Men vse to put off their doing of good vntill their death. A dangerous aduenture. For either they may bee preuented by vntimely death vnexpected: or after death, their Will may either bee neglected by, or betweene the Executors, or made frustrate by some little flaw in the conueyance, if it bee no bigger, then haply some nimble Atturney may put in his little finger, or but looke through the narrow crany of it, be it no wider then the space of one word, or one small letter. But this commonly happeneth vntounto such Legacies, as extend no farther then to temporall ends, as to bodilie reliefe. Although I could wish men would see it done in their life time. But this, which concerneth mens soules, would bee done now while wee liue. Wee need not distrust Gods prouidence, as fearing to lacke it our selues, ere wee die: no, wee may rather expect a greater blessing of God euen in this life. For as our Sauiour saith, Hee that forsaketh house or land, for my sake, and for the Gospels, shall receiue an hundred fold now in this life. Now the money wee part wi…hall for such a purchase, is for Christs sake, and for the Gospels. But if you cannot come to see it performed in your life time; then consider vponupon what assurance you may best trust it to bee done after your death. If I were either able or worthy to giuegive aduice in this matter, I should thinke, that the Legacie, so to bee bestowed, were best to bee put into the hands of some Colledge in Cambridge, or Oxford, and they, both to lay out the money vponupon the purchase, and so to hauehave the perpetuall Patronage, for the placing of some worthy member of their house in the Pastorall charge so redeemed. But they that are so well disposed and inclined to so worthy a worke, cannot want the best aduice, for the wise and well managing of such a businesse. The Lord God strengthen the hands, and stirre vp the hearts of all true Christians, to put their helping hands to this great worke. No doubt, but many Impropriators themselues well considering and weighing the nature of such a businesse, will be content to meet the Purchaser halfe way, or at least be content to stoope and condescend to some reasonable composition.
TO THE HIGH AND HONORABLE COVRT OF PARLIAMENT. now assembled.
The humble Supplication of the Author, in behalfe of many poore Soules, that perish for want of foode.
HVmbly shewing, to the wisdome of you, the most Noble Senate of this State, that whereas in many places of this Land, where Jmpropriations be, the allowance for the Vicar and Curate is so pitifully small, and the Charge or Cure it selfe so exceeding great (as commonly Impropriate liuings be, being great Parishes) as no Minister of any parts, can easily be inuited to take it vponupon him, but is necessarily deuolued vponupon some poore ten-pound-man at the most, nay in many places lower value, and that by more then halfe in mine owne knowledge; to the ineuitable perill of so many poore soules, whose mouthes should be fed with the bread of life: yea, my selfe knowing by mine own wofull experience, that in a poore Towne in Yorkeshire, where first I tooke breath, and was bred vp, that long before I was borne, and euer since now aboue this fortie yeeres, there hath not been a Preacher, but only a poore Reader, one of the cheapest rate, yea one that dwelleth two long miles off, at another Towne, where he hath also another Cure, posting between, (albeit now a poor Emeritous Octogenarie Leuite) to serue both hired at so small a rate, as I think himselfe, as poore as he is, would blush to name it, although the Parsonage it selfe be worth two hundred and forty pounds at the least by the yeere, there being also a poore Vicaridge house, which is also made by long-custome impropriate, being let out for a Lay-mans tenement; so that there is neither Minister, nor School-master to instruct old or young: which one Precedent, without any further knowledge, may iustly breed a feare, that many other places impropriate in this Kingdome may suffer the like calamitie.
May it please your wisdomes therefore, out of a tender compassion to the many dispersed Flockes of Iesus Christ in this Kingdome, who are as Sheep without a Shepheard, suffering Egyptian darknesse, euen in the midst of Goshen, to appoint and allot by Act a certaine proportion (according to your graue iudgements) of all Impropriations within this Kingdome, to the better maintenance of a worthy Minister, especially where there are no Vicaridges at all indowed, or those that be, are very poore and incompetent to maintaine liberally the Lords labourers. So shall you bring a blessing vponupon you and yours, yea vponupon this whole Land and Church, extending euen to Posteritie, whose race shall (we trust) sing the memorable Acts of this eueryevery way (as we pray) most prosperous and happy Parliament: and your humble Suppliant shall daily pray to God so to blesse this your happy Assembly, as hereby Gods glory may be aduanced, Religion propagated, the Common-wealth established, Antichristian Heresie extirpated, and your selues blessed in your deed, Amen.