Baxters Narrative of His Life and Times, Part 1 (4 of 7)

Baxters Narrative of His Life and Times · Part 1 (4 of 7)

p. 60Hereupon the King being delivered to the Parliament, they appointed Colonel Richard Greaves, Major General Richard Brown, with others to be his Attendants, and desired him to abide awhile at Homeby-House in Northamptonshire, While he was here the Army was hatching their Conspiracy: And on the sudden one Cornet Ioyce, with a party of Soldiers, fetcht away the King, notwithstanding the Parliaments Order for his Security: And this was done as if it had been against Cromwell's Will, and without any Order or Consent of theirs: But so far was he from losing his Head for such a Treason, that it proved the means of his Pre…erment. And so far was Cromwell and his Soldiers from returning the King in Safety, that they detained him among them, and kept him with them, till they came to Hampton Court, and there they lodged him under the Guard of Col. Whalley, the Army quarterring all about him. While he was here the mutable Hypocrites first pretended an extraordinary Care of the King's Honour, Liberty, Safety and Conscience. They blamed the Austerity of the Parliament, who had denied him the Attendance of his own Chaplains; and of his Friends in whom he took most pleasure: They gave Liberty for his Friends and Chaplains to come to him: They pretended that they would save him from the Incivilities of the Parliament and Presbyterians. Whether this were while they tried what Terms they could make with him for themselves, or while they acted any other part; it is certain that the King's old Adherents began to extol the Army, and to speak against the Presbyterians more distastfully than before. When the Parliament offered the King Propositions for Concord, (which Vane's Faction made as high and unreasonable as they could, that they might come to nothing) the Army forsooth offer him Proposals of their own, which the King liked better: But which of them to treat with he did not know. At last on the sudden the Judgment of the Army changed, and they began to cry for Iustice against the King, and with vile Hypocrisie, to publish their Repentance, and cry God Mercy for their Kindness to the King, and confess that they were under a Temptation: But in all this Cromwell and Ireton, and the rest of the Council of War appeared not: The Instruments of all this Work must p. 61be the Common Soldiers, Two of the most violent Sectaries in each Regiment are chosen by the Common Soldiers, by the Name of Agitators, to represent the rest in these great Affairs. All these together made a Council, of which Col. Iames Berry was the President, that they might be used, ruled and dissolved at pleasure. No man that knew them will doubt whether this was done by Cromwell's and Ireton's Direction. This Council of Agitators take not only the Parliaments Work upon themselves, but much more: They draw up a Paper called The Agreement of the People, as the Model or Form of a New Commonwealth. They have their own Printer, and publish abundance of wild Pamphlets, as changeable as the Moon: the thing contrived was an Heretical Democracy. When Cromwell had awhile permitted them thus to play themselves, partly to please them, and confirm them to him, and chiefly to use them in his demolishing Work, at last he seemeth to be so much for Order and Government, as to blame them for their Disorder, Presumption and Headiness, as if they had done it without his Consent. This emboldeneth the Parliament (not to Censure them as Rebels, but) to rebuke them and prohibit them, and claim their own Superiority: And while the Parliament and the Agitators are contending, a Letter is secretly sent to Col. Whalley, to intimate that the Agitators had a design suddenly to surprize and murder the King. Some think that this was sent from a real Friend; but most think it was contrived by Cromwell to affright the King out of the Land, or into some desperate Course which might give them Advantage against him. Collonel Whalley sheweth the Letter to the King, which put him into much fear of such ill governed Hands: so that he secretly got Horses and slipt away towards the Sea with two of his Confidents only; who coming to the Sea near Southampton, found that they were disappointed of the Vessel expected to transport them; and so were fain to pass over into the Isle of Wight, and there to commit his Majesty to the Trust of Collonel Robert Hammond who was Governor of a Castle there: A Day or two all were amazed to think what was become of the King; and then a Letter from the King to the House acquainted them that he was fain to fly thither from the Cruelty of the Agitators, who, as he was informed thought to murder him; and urging them to treat about the ending all these Troubles. But here Cromwell had the King in a Pinfold, and was more secure of him than before.

§ 90. The Parliament and the Scots, and all that were loyal and soberminded abhorred these traiterous Proceedings of Cromwell and the sectarian Army; but saw it a Matter of great difficulty to resist them: but the Conscience of their Oath of Allegiance and Covenant, told them that they were bound to hazard their Lives in the attempt.

The three Commanders for the Parliament in Pembrookshire raised an Army against them, viz. Major General Langhorn, Collonel Powel, and Collonel Poyer: The Scots raised a great Army under the Command of the Duke of Hamilton: The Kentish Men rose under the Command of the Lord Goring and others: and the Essex Men under Sir Charles Lucas: But God's time was not come, and the Spirit of Pride and Schism must be known to the World by its Effects. Duke Hamilton's Army was easily routed in Lancashire, and he taken, and the scattered Parts pursued till they came to nothing: Langhorn with the Pembrookshire Men was totally routed by Collonel Horton, and all the chief Commanders being taken Prisoners, it fell to Collonel Poyer's Lot to be shot to Death: The Kentish Men were driven out of Kent into Essex, being foiled at Maidstone: And in Colchester they endured a long and grievous Siege, and yielding at last, Sir Charles Lucas, and another or two were shot to Death, and thus all the Succors of the King were defeated.

§ 91. Never to this time, when Cromwell had taught his Agitators to govern, and could not easily unteach it them again, there arose a Party who adhered to the Principles of their [agreement of the People] which suited not with his Designs: And to make them odious he denominated them Levellers, as if they intended to level Men of all Qualities and Estates; while he discountenanced them, he discontented them; and being discontented, they endeavoured to discontent the Army; and at last appointed a Randezvouz at Burford to make Head against him. But Cromwell (whose Diligence and Dispatch was a great Cause of his Successes) had presently his Brother Desborough, and some other Regiments ready to surprise them there in their Quarters, before they could get their Numbers together: So that about 1500 being scattered and taken, and some slain, the Levellers War was crusht in the Egg, and Thompson (one of Captain Pitchford's Corporals aforementioned) who became their chief Leader, was pursued near Wielingborough in Northamptonshire, and there slain while he defended himself.

p. 62§ 92. As I have past over many Battles, Sieges, and great Actions of the Wars, as not belonging to my purpose; so I have passed over Cromwell's March into Scotland to help the Covenanters when Montross was too strong for them, and I shall pass over his Transportation into Ireland, and his speedy Conquest of the remaining Forces and Fortresses of that Kingdom, his taking the Isles of Man, of Iersey, Garnsey, and Scilly, and such other of his Successes, and speak only in brief of what he did to the change of the Government, and to the exalting of himself and of his Confidents. And I will pass over the Londoners Petitions for the King, and their Carriage towards the House, which looked like a force, and exasperated them so, that the Speakers of both Houses, the Earl of Manchester and Mr. Lenthall, did with the greater part of the present Members, go forth to Cromwell, and make some kind of Confederacy with the Army, and took them for their Protectors against the Citizens. Also their votings and unvoting in these Cases, &c.

§ 93. The King being at the Isle of Wight, the Parliament sent him some Propositions to be consented to in order to his Restoration: The King granted many of them, and some he granted not: The Scottish Commissioners thought the Conditions more dishonourable to the King, than was consistant with their Covenant and Duty, and protested against them; for which the Parliament blamed them as hinderers of the desired Peace. The chiefest thing which the King stuck at, was, the utter abolishing of Episcopacy, and alienating theirs and the Dean and Chapters Lands. Hereupon, with the Commissioners certain Divines were sent down to satisfie the King, viz. Mr. Steph. Marshall, Mr. Rich. Vines, Dr. Lazarus Seaman, &c. who were met by many of the King's Divines, Archbishop Usher, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sheldon, &c. The Debates here being in Writing were published, and each Party thought they had the better, and the Parliaments Divines came off with great Honour: But for my part, I confess these two things against them, though Persons whom I highly honoured:

1. That they seem not to me to have answered satisfactorily to the main Argument fetcht from the Apostles own Government, with which Saravia had inclined me to some Episcopacy before; though Miracles and Infallibility were Apostolical temporary Priviledges; yet Church Government is an ordinary thing to be continued: And therefore as the Apostles had Successors as they were Preachers, I see not but that they must have Successors as Church Governors: And it seemeth unlikely to me, that Christ should settle a Form of Government in his Church, which was to continue but for one Age, and then to be transformed into another Species. Could I be sure what was the Government in the Days of the Apostles themselves, I should be satisfied what should be the Government now.

2. They seem not to me to have taken the Course which should have setled these distracted Churches: Instead of disputing against all Episcopacy, they should have changed Diocesan Prelacy into such an Episcopacy as the Conscience of the King might have admitted, and as was agreeable to that which the Church had in the two or three first Ages. I confess, Mr. Vines wrote to me as their excuse in this and other Matters of the Assembly, that the Parliament tied them up from treating or disputing of any thing at all, but what they appointed or proposed to them: But I think plain dealing with such Leaders had been best, and to have told them this is our Iudgment, and in the matters of God and his Church we will serve you according to our Judgment, or not at all. (But indeed if they were not of one Mind among themselves, this could not be expected).

Archbishop Usher there took the rightest course, who offered the King his Reduction of Episcopacy to the form of Presbytery: And he told me himself, that before the King had refused it, but at the Isle of Wight he accepted it, and as he would not when others would, so others would not when he would: And when our present King Charles II. came in, we tendered it for Union to him, and then he would not: And thus the true moderate healing terms are always rejected by them that stand on the higher Ground, though accepted by them that are lower and cannot have what they will: From whence it is easy to perceive, whether Prosperity or Adversity, the Highest, or the Lowest, be ordinarily the greater Hinderer of the Churches Unity and Peace. I know that if the Divines and Parliament had agreed for a moderate Episcopacy with the King, some Presbyterians of Scotland would have been against it, and many Independants of England, and the Army would have made i… the matter of odious Accusations and Clamours: But all this had been of no great regard to remove foreseeing judicious Men from those healing Counsels which must close our Wounds whenever they are closed.

p. 63§ 94. The King sending his final Answers to the Parliament, the Parliament had a long Debate upon them, whether to acquiesce in them as a sufficient Ground for Peace; and many Members spake for resting in them, and among others Mr. Prin went over all the King's Conscessions in a Speech of divers Hours long, with marvellous Memory, and shewed the Satisfactoriness of them all, (and after printed it:) So that the House voted that the King's Concessions were a sufficient Ground for a Personal Treaty with him; and had suddenly sent a concluding Answer, and sent for him up, but at such a Crisis it was time for the Army to bes…ir them: Without any more ado Cromwell and his Confidents send Collonel Pride with a Party of Souldiers to the House, and set a Guard upon the Door; one Part of the House (who were for them) they let in; another part they turned away, and told them that they must not come there; and the third part they imprisoned (the soberest worthy Members of the House); and all to prevent them from being true to their Oaths and Covenants, and loyal to their King: To so much Rebellion, Perfideousness, Perjury and Impudence, can Error, Selfishness and Pride of great Successes, transport Men of the highest Pretences to Religion.

§ 95. For the true understanding of all this, it must be remembred, that though in the beginning of the Parliament there was scarce a noted gross Sectary known, but the Lord Brook in the House of Peers, and young sir Henry Vane in the House of Commons; yet by Degrees the Number of them increased in the Lower House; Major Sallowey and some few more Sir Henry Vane had made his own Adherents: Many more were carried part of the way, to Independency, and Liberty of Religions; and many that minded not any side in Religion, did think that it was no Policie ever to trust a conquered King, and therefore were wholly for a Parliamentary Government: Of these some would have Lords and Commons as a mixture of Aristocracie and Democracie, and others would have Commons and Democracie alone; and some thought that they ought to judge the King for all the Blood that had been shed. And thus when the two Parts of the House were ejected and imprisoned, this third part composed of the Vanists, the Independants, and other Sects, with the Democratical Party, was left by Cromwell to do his Business under the Name of the Parliament of England; but by the People in Scorn commonly called, The Rump of the Parliament. The secluded and imprisoned Members published a Writing called, their Vindication; and some of them would afterwards have thrust into the House, but the Guard of Soldiers kept them out, and the Rump were called the Honest Men. And these are the Men that henceforward we have to do with in the Progress of our History, as called, The Parliament.

§ 96. As the Lords were disaffected to these Proceedings, so were the Rump and Soldiers to the Lords: So that they passed a Vote (supposing that the Army would stand by them) to establish the Government without a King and House of Lords; and so the Lords dissolved, and these Commons sat and did all alone. And being deluded by Cromwell, and verily thinking that he would be for Democracie, which they called a Commonwealth, they gratified him in his Designs, and themselves in their disloyal Distrusts and Fears; and they caused a High Court of Justice to be erected, and sent for the King from the Isle of Wight: Collonel Hammond delivered him, and to Westminster-Hall he came, and refusing to own the Court and their Power to try him, Cook as Attorney having pleaded against him, Bradshaw as President and Judge recited the Charge and condemned him:An. 1648 And before his own Gate at Whitehall they erected a Scaffold, and before a full Assembly of People beheaded him: Wherein appeared the Severity of God, the Mutability and Uncertainty of Worldly Things, and the Fruits of a sinful Nation's Provocations, and the infamous Effects of Error, Pride and Selfishness, prepared by Satan to be charged hereafter upon Reformation and Godliness, to the unspeakable Injury of the Christian Name and Protestant Cause, the Rejoicing and Advantage of the Papists, the Hardning of Thousands against the Means of their own Salvation, and the Confusion of the Actors when their Day is come.

§ 97. The Lord General Fairfax all this while stood by, and, with high Resentment, saw his Lieutenant do all this by tumultuous Souldiers, tricked and over-powered by him; neither being sufficiently upon his Guard to defeat the Intreagues of such an Actor; nor having Resolution enough (as yet) to lay down the Glory of all his Conquests and for sake him: But at the King's Death he was in wonderful Perplexities, and when Mr. Colomy and some Ministers were sent for to resolve him, and would have farther persuaded him to rescue the King, his Troubles so confounded him, that they durst let no Man speak to him: And Cromwell kept him (as it was said) in praying and consulting till the Stroke was given, p. 64and it was too late to make Resistance. But not long after, when War was determined against Scotland, he laid down his Commission, and never had to do with the Army more, and Cromwell was General in his stead.

§ 98. If you ask what did the Ministers all this while; I answer, they Preach'd and Pray'd against Disloyalty: They drew up a Writing to the Lord General, declaring their Abhorrence of all Violence against the Person of the King, and urging him and his Army to take heed of such an unlawful Act: They present it to the General when they saw the King in Danger: But Pride prevailed against their Counsels.

§ 99. The King being thus taken out of the way,An. 1649 Cromwell takes on him to be for a Commonwealth (but all in order to the Security of the good People) till he had removed the other Impediments which were yet to be removed: so that the Rump presently drew up a Form of Engagement, to be put upon all Men, viz. [I do promise to be True and Faithful to the Commonwealth as it is now established without a King or House of Lords.] So we must take the Rump for an established Commonwealth, and promise Fidelity to them. This the Sectarian Party swallowed easily, and so did the King's old Cavaliers, so far as I was acquainted with them, or could hear of them (not heartily, no doubt, but they were very few of them sick of the Disease called tenderness of Conscience, or Scrupulosity: But the Presbyterians, and the moderate Episcopal Men refused it, (and I believe so did the Prelatical Divines of the King's Party for the most part; though the Gentlemen had greater Necessities.) Without this Engagement no Man must have the Benefit of suing another at Law (which kept Men a little from Contention, and would have marr'd the Lawyers trade); nor must they have any Masterships in the Universities, nor travel above so many Miles from their Houses, and more such Penalties, which I remember not (so short Lived a Commonwealth deserved no long Remembrance): Mr. Vines and Dr. Rainbow, and many more were hereupon put out of their Headships in the Universities, and Mr. Sidrach Sympson, and Mr. Io. Sadler, and such others put in; yea, such a Man as Mr. Dell, the Chaplain of the Army, who, I think, neither understood himself, nor was understood by others any farther than to be one, who took Reason, Sound Doctrine, Order and Concord to be the intollerable Maladies of Church and State, because they were the greatest Strangers to his Mind. But poor Dr. Edward Reignolds had the hardest Measure; for when he refused to take the Engagement, his Place was forfeited; and afterwards they drew him to take it, in hopes to keep his Place, (which was no less than the Deanarie of Christ's-Church) and then turned him out of all, and offered his Place to Mr. Ios. Caryll; but he refusing it, it was conferred on Dr. Owen, to whom it was continued from year to year.

And because the Presbyterians still urged the Covenant against killing the King,Mr. Eaton wrote a Book to prove that the Oath of Allegiance nor the Covenant bind not. and pulling down the Parliament, and setting up a Commonwealth, and taking the Engagement, some of the Independent Brethren maintained, that its Obligation ceased, because it was a League, and the Occasion of it ceased: And some of the Rump said it was like an Almanack out of date; and some of the Souldiers said they never took it; and others of them railed at it as a Scottish Snare: So that when their Interest would not suffer them to keep so solemn a Vow, their Wills would not suffer their Judgments to confess it to be Obligatory, at least, as to the part which they must violate.

§ 100. For my own part, though I kept the Town and Parish of Kiderminster from taking the Covenant (and seeing how it might become a Snare to their Consciences) yea, and most of Worcestershire besides, by keeping the Ministers from offering it in any of the Congregations to the People (except in Worcester City, where I had no great Interest, and know not what they did); yet I could not judge it seemly for him that believed there is a God, to play fast and loose with a dreadful Oath, as if the Bonds of National and Personal Vows were as easily shak'd off as Sampson's Cords.

Therefore I spake and preach'd against the Engagement, and dissuaded Men from taking it: The first hour that I heard of it, being in Company with some Gentlemen of Worcestershire, I presently wrote down above twenty Queries against it, intending as many more almost against the Obligation, as those were about the Sense and Circumstances: And one that was present got the Copy of them, and shortly after, I met with them verbatim in a Book of Mr. Henry Hall's as his own: (one that was long imprisoned for writing against Cromwell.)

p. 65Some Episcopal Divines that were not so scrupulous it seems as we, did write for it (private Manuscripts which I have seen) and plead the irresistability of the Imposers, and they found starting holes in the Terms, viz. That by the Commonwealth they will mean the present Commonwealth in genere, and by [Established] they will mean only de facto, and not de jure, and by [without a King, &c.] they mean not quatenus but Etsi; and that only de facto pro tempore; q. d. I will be true to the Government of England, though at the present the King and House of Lords are put out of the Exercise of their power]. These were the Expositions of many Episcopal Men, and others that took it: But I endeavoured to evince, that this is meer jugling and jesting with Matters too great to be jested with: And that as they might easily know that the Imposers had another sense, so as easily might they know that the words in their own obvious usual sense among men, must be taken as the Promise or Engagement of a Subject as such to a Form of Government now pretended to be established: And that the Subjects Allegiance or Fidelity to his Rulers can be acknowledged and given in no plainer words: And that by such Interpretations and Stretchings of Conscience, any Treasonable Oath or Promise may be taken, and no Bonds of Society can signifie much with such Interpreters.

§ 101. England and Ireland being thus Conquered by Cromwell, (by deluding well-meaning Men into his Service, and covering his Ambition with the Lord Fairfax's Generalship); the Parliament being imprisoned and cast out, the King cut off, and the Rump established as a new Commonwealth, (those great and solid Men, Pim, Hampden, &c. being long before dead and rid out of his way, who else had been like to have prevailed against the Plots of Vane in the Parliament) you would think there were nothing now standing in his way, to hinder him from laying hands upon the Crown. But four Impediments yet stood before him: 1. The numerous Cavaliers (or Royalists) ready for new Enterprizes against him. 2. The Scots, who resolved to stick to the Covenant and the King. 3. The Army, which must be untaught all the Principles which he is now permitting them to learn: (For those Principles which must bring him to the Crown, are the worst in the World for him when once he is there). 4. The Ministers of England and Scotland, and all the sober People who regarded them.

The first of these he most easily (though not without strugling) overcame, making his advantage by all their Enterprizes. The second put him harder to it, but he overcame them at last. The third proved yet a greater difficulty, but he seemed absolutely to overcome it, yet leaving still some Life in the root. The fourth strove against him more calmly and prudently, with invincible Weapons, and though they were quiet, were never overcome; but at last revived the spark of Life which was left in the third, and thereby gave a Resurrection to the first and second, and so recovered all at last; not to the state of their own Interest, or to that Condition of Church Affairs which they desired, but to that Civil State of Royal Government to which they were engaged, and from which the Nation seemed to have fallen.

These are the true Contents of the following parts that were acted in these Lands: The Rump I might mention as another of his Impediments, but as they now were doing his work, so I conjoyn the Relicts of them which then disturbed him, with the Army who were the strength by which they did it.

§ 102. The King being dead, his Son was by right immediately King, (and from that time he dateth his Reign.) The Scots send Messengers to him to come over to them and take the Crown: But they treat with him first for his taking of the Covenant; and renouncing the Wars, and the Blood that was shed in them by his Fathers Party. By which I perceive that the Scots understood the Clause in the Covenant of [Defending the King's Person and Authority in the Defence of the true Religion and the Liberties of the Kingdom] otherwise than we did: For as they extended the word [true Religion] further than we did (including the Form of Church Government in Scotland) so they seem to understand it Conjunctione inseparabili; and to prefer the Defence of Religion before the Defence of the King: whereas we understood it Conjunctione seperabili; and though in meer estimation we preferred Religion before King or Kingdom, yet in regard of the Duty of Defence, we thought the King must be restored and defended, though (legally) he would have brought in worse than Prelacy: Though we did not think that he might do it illegally; and therefore that he could not govern Arbitrarily, nor take away the Peoples fore-prized Propriety or Liberty, nor change the Form of the Government of the Commonwealth.

p. 66But those that thought otherwise, said, That there is no power but from God, and therefore none against him or above him; and therefore none against or above his Laws]: which how true soever, seemeth not at all to decide our Case: For though it follow never so much that such Acts against God are not Acts of Authority, yet the same Person that hath not Authority to do this, may have Authority in other matters, and may be our rightful Governour, and therefore must be obeyed in all things lawful, (though not in this;) and his Person defended. And therefore how they could refuse to receive the King, till he consented to take the Covenant, I know not: unless the taking of the Covenant had been a Condition on which he was to receive his Crown by the Laws or Fundamental Constitution of the Kingdom (which none pretendeth). Nor know I by what power they can add any thing to the Coronation Oath or Covenant, which by his Ancestors was to be taken, without his own Consent. But in their Zeal for the Church, the Scots did cause the King, when he was come over to them, not only (mutat is mutandis) to take the Covenant, but also to publish a Declaration to the World, that he did it voluntarily and heartily, and that he lamented the Sins of his Father's House, acknowledging the Guilt of the Blood of the late Wars, &c.] In all which it seemed to me and many others that they miscarried divers ways: 1. In imposing Laws upon their King, for which they had no Authority. 2. In forcing him to dishonour the Memory of his Father, by such Consessions. 3. In tempting him to speak and publish that which they might easily know was contrary to his heart, and so to take God's Name in vain. 4. And in giving Cromwell occasion to charge them all with dissimulation.

§ 103. What Transactions there were between the King and the Scots for the Expediting of his Coronation, and what Preparations were made for an Army to defend him, and what Differences among the Parties hereabouts, I shall not describe, there being enow of them that were upon the place who can do it better: But to return to England, as soon as they understood what the Scots had done, the Sectaries in England reproached them as Fools and Hypocrites, that by such a Pageantry mockt themselves, and would make the People believe that the King was turned Presbyterian, and was a Cordial Covenanter, when they had forced him to say and do that which they might well know he did abhor. And they presently resolve to invade the Scots, to keep them from invading England, and not to stay till they came in upon this Land, as heretofore. So that Cromwell is in Scotland with his Army before they were well setled in their Affairs. This much increased the alienation of the Peoples hearts from the Cromwellians: for though they might suppose that the Scots intended to bring the King into England, yet few believed that he might begin with them by an Invasion, it being too much to have resisted them at home.

§ 104. When the Soldiers were going against the King and Scots, I wrote Letters to some of them to tell them of their Sin, and desired them at last to begin to know themselves: it being those same men that have so much boasted of Love to all the Godly, and pleaded for tender dealing with them, and condemned those that persecuted them or restrained their Liberty, who are now ready to imbrue their Swords in the Blood of such as they acknowledge to be Godly, and all because they dare not be perjured or disloyal as they are. Some of them were startled at these Letters, and (O blindness!) thought me an uncharitable Censurer that would say that they could kill the Godly, even when they were on their march to do it: For how bad soever they spake of the Cavaliers, (and not without too much desert as to their Morals) they confessed that abundance of the Scots were godly Men. And afterward those that I wrote to better understood me.

§ 105. At the same time the Rump (or Commonwealth) who so much abhorred Persecution, and were for Liberty of Conscience, made an Order that all Ministers should keep their days of Humiliation, to fast and pray for their Success in Scotland: and that we should keep their Days of Thanksgiving for their Victories; and this upon pain of Sequestration: so that we all expected to be turned out: but they did not execute it upon any save one in our parts.

For my part, instead of praying and preaching for them, when any of the Committee or Soldiers were my hearers, I laboured to help them to understand, what a Crime it was to force men to pray for the Success of those that were violating their Covenant and Loyalty, and going in such a Cause to kill their Brethren: And what it was to force Men to give God thanks for all their Bloodshed, and to make God's Ministers and Ordinances vile, and serviceable to such Crimes, by forcing Men to run to God on such Errands of Blood and Ruine: And what it is to be p. 67such Hypocrites as to persecute and cast out those that preach the Gospel, while they pretend the advancement of the Gospel, and the liberty of tender Consciences: And what a means it was to debauch all Consciences, and leave neither tenderness nor honesty in the World, when the Guides of the Flocks, and Preachers of the Gospel shall be noted to swallow down such heinous Sins.

My own Hearers were all satisfied with my Doctrine, but the Committee Men look sowre, but let me alone. And the Soldiers said I was so like to Love, that I would not be right till I was shorter by the Head. Yet none of them ever medled with me farther than by the Tongue, nor was I ever by any of them in those times, forbidden or hindered to preach one Sermon, except only one Assize-Sermon which the High Sheriff had desired me to preach, and afterward sent me word to …orbear, as from the Committee, saying, That by Mr. Moor's means (the Independent Preacher at the Colledge) the Committee told him that they desired me to forbear, and not to preach before the Judges, because I preached against the State: But afterward they excused it, as done meerly in kindness to me, to keep me from running my self into danger and trouble.

§ 106. Not far from this time the London Ministers were called Traitors by the Rump and Soldiers for plotting for the King (a strange kind of Treason),An. 1651 because they had some Meetings to contrive how to raise some small Sum of Money for Massey's relief, who was then in Scotland: And some false**Capt. Adams. Brother discovered them, and eight of them were sent to the Tower, Mr. Arthur Iackson, Dr. Drake, Mr. Watson, Mr. Love, Mr. Ienkins, &c. and Mr. Nalson and Mr. Caughton fled into Holland, where one died, but the other returned and lived to suffer more by them he suffered for.

Mr. Love was tried at a Court of Justice, where Edm. Prideaux a Member and Sollicitor for the Commonwealth, did think his Place allowed him to plead against the Life and Blood of the Innocent. Mr. Love was condemned and beheaded, dying neither timerously nor proudly in any desperate Bravado, but with as great alacrity and fearless quietness and freedom of Speech, as if he had but gone to Bed, and had been as little concerned as the standers by. An††Mr. Gibbons. honest Gentleman was beheaded with him for the same Cause. And at the time of their Execution, or very near it on that day, there was the dreadfullest Thunder and Lightning and Tempest, that was heard or seen of a long time before.

This Blow sunk deeper towards the Root of the New Commonwealth, than will easily be believed; and made them grow odious to almost the Religious Party in the Land, except the Sectaries: (Though some malicious Cavaliers said it was good enough for him, and laught at it as good News): for now the People would not believe that they sought the promoting of the Gospel, who killed the Ministers for the Interest of their Faction. And there is, as Sir Walter Rawleigh noteth of Learned Men, such as Demosthenes, Cicero, &c. so much more in Divines of famous Learning and Piety, enough to put an everlasting odium upon those whom they suffer by, though the Cause of the Sufferers were not justifiable. Men count him a vile and detestable Creature, who in his passion, or for his interest, or any such low account, shall deprive the World of such Lights and Ornaments, and cut off so much excellency at a blow, and be the Persecutors of such worthy and renowned Men. Though the rest of the Ministers were released, upon Mr. Ienkins's Recantation, and Confession that God had now convinced him, that he ought to submit to the present Government. Yet after this, the most of the Ministers and good People of the Land, did look upon the New Commonwealth as Tyranny, and were more alienated from them than before.

§ 107. The Lord Fairfax now laid down his Commission, and would have no more of the Honour of being Cromwell's Instrument or Mask, when he saw that he must buy it at so dear a rate. And so Cromwell with applause received a Commission, and entered upon his place.

And into Scotland he hasteneth, and there he maketh his way near Edinburgh, where the Scots Army lay: But after long skirmishing and expectations, when he could neither draw the Scots out of their Trenches to a fight, nor yet pass forward, his Soldiers contracted Sicknesses, and were impatient of the Poverty of the Country, and so with a weakned ragged Army he drew off to return to England, and had the Scots but let him go, or cautelously followed him, they had kept their Peace and broken his Honour: But they drew out and followed him, and overtaking him near Dunbarr, did force him to a Fight, by engaging his Rere; in which Fight being not of equal Fortitude they were totally rowted, their Foot taken, and their Horse pursued to Edinburgh.

p. 68§ 108. Ten thousand Prisoners of the Foot were brought to Newcastle, where the greatness of the Number, and the baseness of the Country (with their Poverty) and the cruel Negligence of the Army, caused them to be almost all famished: For being shut up in a Cabbage-Garden, and having no Food, they cast themselves into a Flux and other Diseases with eating the raw Cabbages; so that few of them survived, and those few were little better used. The Colours that were taken were hanged up as Trophies in Westminster-Hall, and never taken down till the King's Restoration.

§ 109. Cromwell being thus called back to Edinburgh, driveth the Scots to Sterling beyond the River, where they fortifie themselves: He besiegeth the impregnable Castle of Edinburgh and winneth it; the Governor, Coll. William Dunglasse, laying the blame on his Souldiers that else would have delivered It and him; but his Superiors condemned him for the Cowardly Surrender.

After this, Cromwell passeth some of his Men over the River, and after them most of the rest: The King with the Scots Army being unable to give him Battle after such Discouragements, takes the Opportunity to haste away with what Force they had towards England, thinking that Cromwell being cast now some Days March behind them, by Reason of his passing the River, they might be before him in England, and there be abundantly increased, by the coming in both of the Cavaliers and the rest of the People to him. And doubtless all the Land would Suddenly have flockt in to him but for these two Causes:

1. The Success of Cromwell at Dumbarre and afterwards, had put a Fear upon all Men, and the manner of the Scots coming away, persuaded all Men that Necessity forced them, and they were look'd upon rather as flying than as marching into England; and few Men will put themselves into a flying Army which is pursued by the conquering Enemy.

2. The implacable Cavaliers had made no Preparation of the Peoples Mind, by any Significations of Reconciliation, or of probable future Peace: And the Prelatical Divines, instead of drawing nearer those they differed from for Peace, had gone farther from them by Dr. Hammond's new way, than their Predecessors were before them; and the very Cause which they contended for, being not Concord and Neighbourhood, but Domination, they had given the dissenting Clergy and People no hopes of finding favourable Lords, or any Abatement of their former Burdens, so little did their Task-Masters relent: But contrariwise, they saw Reason enough to expect that their little Fingers would be heavier than their Predecessors Loyns. And it is hard to bring Men readily to venture their Lives to bring themselves into a Prison, or Beggary, or Banishment.

These were the true Causes that no more came in to the King: The first kept off the Royalists and the rest, the second kept off the rest alone. Yet the Earl of Darby, the Lord Talbott and many Gentlemen did come in to him; and some that had been Souldiers for the Parliament, (as Capt. Benbow from Shrewsbury, with Cornet Kinnersly and a Party of Horse, and some few more.)

The King's Army of Scots was excellently well governed (in comparison of what his Father's was wont to be): Not a Souldier durst wrong any Man of the worth of a Penny; which much drew the Affections of the People towards them.

The Presence of Collonel Rich. Graves, and Collonel Massy with them, was the great Inducement to the Parliamentarians to come in: But another great Impediment kept them off, which was, Cromwell's exceeding speedy Pursuit of them; so that People had not time to resolve themselves considerately; and most were willing to see what Cromwell's Assault would do, before they cast themselves into the Danger; Soldiers may most easily be had when there is least need of them.

The King came by the way of Lancoshire, and summoned Shrewsbury in vain as he passed by through Shropshire: And when all the Country thought that he was hastening to London (where all Men supposed he would have attained his Ends, increased his Strength, and had no Resistance,) he turned to Worcester, and there stayed to refresh his Army, Cromwell's Forces being within a few days March of him.

§ 110. The Army passed most by Kiderminster (a Fields Breadth off) and the rest through it: Collonel Graves sent two or three Messages to me, as from the King, to come to him; and after, when he was at Worcester, some others were sent: But I was at that time under so great an Affliction of sore Eyes, that I was not scarce able to see the Light, nor fit to stir out of Doors: And being not p. 69much doubtful of the Issue which followed, I thought if I had been able, it would have been no Service at all to the King; it being so little on such a sudden, that I could add to his Assistance.

When the King had stayed a few Days at Worcester, Cromwell came with his Army to the East side of the City, and after that, made a Bridge of Boats over Severn, to hinder them from Forage on the other side; but because so great an Army could not long endure to be pent up, the King resolved to charge Cromwell's Men; and a while the Scots Foot did charge very gallantly, and some chief Persons among the Horse, The Marquis Hamilton (late Earl of Lanerick) being slain: But at last the hope of Security so near their Backs, encouraged the King's Army to retreat into the City, and Cromwell's Souldiers followed them so close at the Heels, that Major Swallow of Whalley's Regiment first, and others after him entered Sidbury-Gate with them; and so the whole Army fled through the City quite away, many being trodden down and slain in the Streets; so that the King was faign to fly with them Northward, the Lord Will…ot, the Earl of Lauderdaile, and many others of his Lords and Commanders with him: Kiderminster being but eleven Miles from Worcester, the flying Army past some of them through the Town, and some by it: I was newly gone to Bed when the Noise of the flying Horse acquainted us of the Overthrow: and a piece of one of Cromwell's Troops that Guarded Bewdley-Bridge having tidings of it, came into our Streets, and stood in the open Marketplace before my Door, to surprise those that past by: And so when many hundreds of the flying Army came together, when the 30 Troopers cryed stand, and fired at them, they either hasted away, or cryed Quarter, not knowing in the Dark what Number it was that charged them: And so as many were taken there, as so few Men could lay hold on: And till Midnight the Bullets flying towards my Door and Windows, and the sorrowful Fugitives hasting by for their Lives, did tell me the Calamitousness of War.

The King parted at last from most of his Lords, and went to Boscobell by the white Ladies, where he was hid in an Oak, in manner sufficiently declared to the World; and thence to Mosely, and so with Mrs. Lane away as a Traveller, and escaped all the Searchers Hands, till he came safe beyond Sea, as is published at large by divers.

The City of Worcester was much plundered by Cromwell's Souldiers, and a Party only sent out after the King's Fugitives (for an Army I will call them no more): the Earl of Derby was taken, and Capt. Benbow of Shrewsbury, and were both put to Death; the Sentence of Coll. Mackworth dispatched Benbow, because he had been a Souldier under him. The Earl of Lauderdaile, and the Earl of Craford were sent Prisoners to Windsor-Castle, where they were detained till the Restoration of the King: Coll. Graves at last being released by Cromwell, lived quietly at his House, which made him ill thought of, and kept from Preferment afterwards when the King came in.

And thus Cromwell's next Impediment was over.

§ 111. The Scots Army being utterly dispatched in England (and many of the Prisoners of Foot sent to the Barbado's, &c.) part of Cromwell's Army was sent to prosecute the Victory in Scotland, where (briefly) all their Garrisons at last were taken, and the Earl of Glencarne, and that learned, religious, excellent Person, the Earl of Balcarres, who kept up the last Forces there for the King, were fain to fly to the King beyond Sea: And Major General Monk was there left with some Forces to keep the Country in Subjection.

§ 112. Cromwell having thus far seemed to be a Servant to the Parliament, and work for his Masters the Rump or Commonwealth, doth next begin to shew whom he served, and take that Impediment also out of the way: To which End he first doth by them as he did by the Presbyterians, make them odious by hard Speeches of them throughout his Army; as if they intended to perpetuate themselves, and would not be accountable for the Money of the Commonwealth, &c. and he treateth privately with many of them, to appoint a time when they would dissolve themselves, that another free Parliament might be chosen: But they perceived the Danger, and were rather for the filling up of their Number by New Elections, which he was utterly against.

His greatest Advantage to strengthen himself against them by the Sectaries, was their owning the publick Ministry and their Maintenance; for though Vane and his party set themselves to make the Ministers odious by reproachful Titles, and to take them down, yet still the greater part of the House did carry it for a sober Ministry, and competent Maintenance. And when the Quakers and others did openly p. 70reproach the Ministry, and the Souldiers favour them, I drew up a Petition for the Ministry, and got many thousand Hands to it in Worcestershire, and Mr. Tho. F… ley, and Coll. Iohn Bridgis presented it; and the House gave a kind and promising Answer to it, which increased the Sectaries Dipleasure against them: And when a certain Quaker wrote a reviling Censure of this Petition, I wrote a Defence of it, and caused one of them to be given each parliament Man at the Door; and within one day after they were dissolved: For Cromwell impatient of any more delay, suddenly took Harrison and some Souldiers with him (as if God had impelled him) and as in a Rapture went into the House, and reproveth the Members for their Faults, and pointing to Vane, calls him a Juglar, and to Henry Martin, and calls him Whoremaster, and having two such to instance in, taketh it for granted that they were all unfit to continue in the Government of the Commonwealth; and out he turneth them: And so ended the Government of the Rump, and no sort of People expressed any great Offence that they were cast out, though all, save the Sectaries and the Army almost, did take him to be a Traitor that did it.

§ 113. The young Commonwealth being already Headless, you might think that nothing was left to stand between Cromwell and the Crown: For a Governor there must be, and who should be thought fitter? But yet there was another Pageant to be played, which had a double end: 1. To make the Necessity of his Governing undeniable. And 2. To make his own Souldiers at last out of love with Democracie; or at least to make them hateful that adhered to it. A Parliament must be called, but the ungodly People are not to be trusted with the choice; therefore the Souldiers, as more religious, must be the Choosers: And two out of a County are chosen by the Officers upon the Advice of their Sectarian Friends in the Country. This was called in Contempt, The Little Parliament.

This Conventicle made an Act (as I remember) that Magistrates should marry People instead of Ministers, (yet not prohibiting the Ministers to do their part): And then they came to the Business of Tythes and Ministers; and before this, Harrison, being authorized thereto, had at once put down all the Parish-Ministers of Wales, because that most of them were ignorant and scandalous, and had set up a few i…nerant Preachers in their stead, who were for Number incompetent for so great a Charge, there being but one to many of those wide Parishes; so that the People having but a Sermon once in many Weeks, and nothing else in the mean time, were ready to turn Papists or any thing: And this Plight would the Anabaptists, and other Sectaries have brought England to: And all was, 1. That the People might not be tempted to think the Parish-Churches to be true Churches: 2. Nor Insant Baptism to be true Baptism, and so themselves to be true Christians; but must be made Christians and Churches in the Anabaptists and Separatists way. Hereupon Harrison became the Head of the Sectaries, and Cromwell now began to design the heading of a soberer Party, that were for Learning and Ministry; but yet to be the equal Protector of all: Hereupon in the Little Sectarian Parliament, it was put to the Vote, whether all the Parish Ministers of England should at once be put down or no? And it was but accidentally carried in the negative by two Voices: And it was taken for granted, that the Tythes and Universities would at the next Opportunity be voted down; and now Cromwell must be their Saviour, or they must perish; when he had purposely cast them into the Pit, that they might be beholden to him to pull them out. (But his Game was so grosly play'd, as made him the more loath'd by Men of Understanding and Sincerity) So Sir C. W. and some others of them take their time, and put it to the vote whether the House as uncapable of serving the Commonwealth, should go and deliver up their Power to Cromwell from whom they had received it; and they carried it in the Affirmative, and away they go, and solemnly resign their Power to him; and now who but Cromwell and his Army.

§ 114. The intelligent Sort by this time did fully see that Cromwell's design was, by causing and permitting destruction to hang over us, to necessitate the Nation whether they would or not, to take him for their Governour, that he might be their Protector: Being resolved that we should be saved by him, or perish: He made more use of the wild headed Sectaries than barely to fight for him: They now serve him as much by their Heresies, their Enmity to Learning and Ministry, their pernicious Demands which tended to Confusion, as they had done before by their Valour in the Field. He can now conjure up at pleasure some terrible apparition, of Agitators, Levellers, or such like, who as they affrighted the King from Hampton-Court, shall affright the People to fly to him for refuge; that the hand that wounded them may heal them. For now he exclaimeth against the giddiness of p. 71these unruly Men, and earnestly pleadeth for Order and Government, and will needs become the Patron of the Ministry, yet so as to secure all others of their Liberty.

Some that saw his Design, said, We will rather all perish, and see both Tythes and Universities overthrown, than we will any way submit to such deceitful Usurpations.

Others said, It is the Providence of God, whoever be the Instruments, which hath brought us into this Necessity, which we were unable to prevent; and being in it, we are not bound to choose our own destruction: Therefore Necessity requireth us to accept of any One to rule us that is like to deliver us.

But the generality of the Ministers went the middle way; and our Consciences thus apprehended the state of our present Duty: [We acknowledge that God Almighty hath over-ruled in all these great Mutations, and hath permitted the perfidiousness of Men, and their Success. And the Common Good being the end of all just Government, we may not do any thing against the Common Good, much less to the Destruction of it, under pretence of resisting an Usurper, or of Restoring him who is our rightful Governour. If the Universities be overthrown, the Fabricks demolished, the Lands alienated, the Ministry put down, the Tithes sold, or given to the People, to engage them all to be against any means which tend to a Recovery, whatever we contribute to this, we do against the King and Kingdom, and do but cut his Throat in kindness: For we pull down the House that he may be Master of it, and destroy the Commonwealth that he may be the Head of it: We strengthen his Enemies by our imprudent Passions: But yet we must neither do nor approve of Evil, for any Good End, nor forbear in our Places seasonably to reprehend it: Therefore it is unlawful for us to Consent to any Governour but the King; or take any Engagement or Oath of Allegiance to any: But it is not unlawful for us to submit to them, by living quietly in our Places, and to make use of the Courts of Justice established by Law, yea, and to demand protection from the Usurper. For his stepping into the Ruler's place, and Usurping the Government, obligeth him to do all the parts of a Governour's Office, while he is there; and warranteth us to demand it, and accept it of him; but it doth not at all oblige us to obey him or consent to his Usurpation: Even as we may demand Justice of a General of Rebels, or a Captain of Thieves; or of Pyrates that shall surprize the Ship which we are in: but we are not bound to consent to his Government, or formally obey him; but contrarily to disown his Villany, and to do all that we can against his Tyranny, which tendeth not to the hurt of the Society: So here, it is our Duty to keep the state of things as entire as we can, till God be pleased to restore the King, that he may find it a whole and not a ruin'd irrepairable State.]

And thus for my part was my Practice: I did seasonably and moderately by Preaching and Printing condemn the Usurpation, and the Deceit which was the means to bring it to pass.Very like to Maximus in the days of Gratian and Theodosius. I did in open Conference declare Cromwell and his Adherents to be Guilty of Treason and Rebellion, aggravated with Perfidiousness and Hypocrisie; to be abhorred of all good and sober Men: But yet I did not think it my Duty to rave against him in the Pulpit, nor to do this so unseasonably and imprudently as might irritate him to mischief. And the rather because, as he kept up his approbation of a godly Life in the general, and of all that was good, except that which the Interest of his Sinful Cause engaged him to be against; so I perceived that it was his design to do good in the main, and to promote the Gospel and the Interest of Godliness, more than any had done before him; except in those particulars which his own interest was against: And it was the principal means that hence-forward he trusted to for his own Establishment, even by doing good: That the People might love him, or at least be willing to have his Government for that Good, who were against it, as it was Usurpation. And I made no question at all, but that when the Rightful Governour was restored, the People that had adhered to him (being so extreamly irritated) would cast out multitudes of the Ministers, and undo the Good which the Usurper had done, because he did it; and would bring abundance of Calamity upon the Land. And some Men thought it a very hard Question, Whether they should rather wish the continuance of an Usurper that will do good, or the restitution of a Rightful Governour whose Followers will do hurt. But for my part I thought my Duty was clear, to disown the Usurper's Sin, what Good soever he would do; and to perform all my Engagements to a Rightful Governour, leaving the Issue of all to God: but yet to commend the Good which a Usurper doth, and to do any lawful thing p. 72which may provoke him to do more; and to approve of no Evil which is done by any, either Usurper or a lawful Governour.

And thus stood the Affections of the Intelligent sort to Cromwell: but the Simpler sort believed that he designed nothing of all that came to pass; but that God's Providence brought about all, without his Contrivance or Expectation.

§ 115. The little Parliament having resigned their Commission to Cromwell, An. 1653that we might not be ungoverned, a Iuncto of Officers, and I know not who (nor ever could learn, but that Lambert and Berry were two Chief Men in it) did draw up a Writing, called, The Instrument of the Government of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland]. This Instrument made Oliver Cromwell Lord Protector of the Commonwealth: The Lord Mayor and Aldermen, the Judges, and the Officers of the Army, were suddenly drawn together to Westminster-Hall, and upon the reading of this Instrument, installed Cromwell in the Office of Protector, and swore him accordingly; and thus the Commonwealth seemed once more to have a Head.

§ 116. I shall for brevity over-pass the particular mention of the Parliaments summoned by Cromwell; of their displeasing him by ravelling his Instrument, and other means, and of his rough and resolute dissolving them.

One of the chief Works which he did was the purging of the Ministry; of which I shall say somewhat more. And here I suppose the Reader to understand that the Synod of Westminster was dissolved with the Parliament; and therefore a Society of Ministers with some others, were chosen by Cromwell to sit at Whitehall, under the Name of Triers, who were mostly Independants, but some sober Presbyterians with them, and had power to try all that came for Institution or Induction, and without their Approbation none were admitted: This assembly of Triers examined themselves all that were able to come up to London: but if any were unable, or were of doubtful Qualifications between Worthy and Unworthy, they used to refer them to some Ministers in the County where they lived, and to approve them if they approved them.

And because this Assembly of Triers is most heavily accused and reproached by some Men, I shall speak the truth of them, and suppose my word will be the rather taken, because most of them took me for one of their boldest Adversaries, as to their Opinions, and because I was known to disown their Power, insomuch that I refused to try any under them upon their reference, except a very few, whose Importunity and necessity moved me (they being such as for their Episcopal Judgment, or some such Cause, the Triers were like to have rejected.) The truth is, that though their Authority was null, and though some few over-busie and over-rigid Independants among them, were too severe against all that were Arminians, and too particular in enquiring after Evidences of Sanctification in those whom they Examined, and somewhat too lax in their Admission of Unlearned and Erroneous Men, that favoured Antinomianism or Anabaptism; yet to give them their due, they did abundance of good to the Church: They saved many a Congregation from ignorant, ungodly, drunken Teachers: that sort of Men that intended no more in the Ministry, than to say a Sermon, as Readers say their Common Prayers, and so patch up a few good words together to talk the People asleep with on Sunday; and all the rest of the Week go with them to the Ale-house, and harden them in their Sin: And that sort of Ministers that either preacht against a holy Life, or preacht as Men that never were acquinted with it; all those that used the Ministry but as a Common Trade to live by, and were never likely to convert a Soul; all these they usually rejected; and in their stead admitted of any that were able serious Preachers, and lived a godly Life, of what tollerable Opinion soever they were. So that though they were many of them somewhat partial for the Independents, Separatists, Fifth-Monarchy-men and Anabaptists, and against the Prelatists and Arminians, yet so great was the benefit above the hurt, which they brought to the Church, that many thousands of Souls blest God for the faithful Ministers whom they let in, and grieved when the Prelatists afterward cast them out again.

§ 117. And because I am fall'n upon this Subject, I will look back to the Alterations that were made upon the Ministry by the Long Parliament before, both by the Country Committees and the Synod at Westminster: I know that there are Men in the World that defame both the Actors and the Work, and would make the World believe that almost none but worthy Learned Men were turned out, and that for their Fidelity to the King and Bishops, and that almost none but Unlearned p. 73and Factious Fellows were introduced. But this Age hath taught the World how little the Report of such Men is to be believed of any others, who speak what their Interest and Malice do command them; and by these are made strangers to the Men they speak of, though they dwell among them: For they Converse not with them at all, unless in some wrangling Dispute, when Malice and Passion seek a Whetstone; but they talk only with those that talk against them, and easily believe any false Reports, when once they are so like the Common Enemy that they desire them to be true. But I shall in this Case also speak impartially, neither justifying what they did amiss, nor condemning them without cause.

And because I have past it by before, I shall say something of the Westminster Assembly here. This Synod was not a Convocation according to the Diocesan way of Government, nor was it called by the Votes of the Ministers according to the Presbyterian way: But the Parliament not intending to call an Assembly which should pretend a Divine Right to make obliging Laws or Canons to bind their Brethren, but an Ecclesiastical Council to be Advisers to themselves, did think that they best knew who were the fittest to give them Advice, and therefore chose them all themselves. Two were to be chosen out of each County; but some few Counties (I know not upon what reason) had but one: I suppose it was long of the Parliament Men of those Counties. And because they would seem Impartial, and have each Party to have liberty to speak, they over and above the number chose many Episcopal Divines, even the Learnedest of them in the Land, as Archbishop Usher Primate of Ireland, Dr. Holdsworth, Dr. Hammond, Dr. Wincop, Bishop Westford, Bishop Prideaux, and many more. But they would not come, because it was not a Legal Convocation, and because the King declared himself against it: Dr. Dan. Featley and very few more of that Party came: (But at last he was charged with sending Intelligence to the King's Quarters at Oxford, of what was done in the Synod and Parliament, and was imprisoned; which much reflected on the Parliament, because whatever his Fact were, he was so Learned a Man, as was sufficient to dishonour those he suffered by). The Prolocutor or Moderator was Dr. William Twisse (a Man very famous for his Scholastical Wit and Writings in a very smooth triumphant Stile): The Divines there Congregate were Men of Eminent Learning and Godliness, and Ministerial Abilities and Fidelity: And being not worthy to be one of them my self, I may the more freely speak that Truth which I know even in the Face of Malice and Envy, that, as far as I am able to judge by the Information of all History of that kind, and by any other Evidences left us, the Christian World, since the days of the Apostles, had never a Synod of more Excellent Divines (taking one thing with another) than this Synod and the Synod of Dort were.

This Assembly was confined by the Parliament to debate only such things as they proposed to them: And many Lords and Commons were joyned in Commission with them, to see that they did not go beyond their Commission: Six or seven Independants were joyned with them, that all sides may be heard; of whom five were called the Dissenting Brethren, (Philip Nye, Thomas Goodwyn, Ieremiah Burroughs, Sydrach Sympson, and William Bridge) who joyned with the rest till they had drawn up a Confession of Faith, a larger and a shorter Catechism. But when they came to Church Government, they engaged them in many long Debates, and kept that Business as long as possibly they could undetermined; and after that kept it so long unexecuted in almost all parts of the Land, saving London and Lancashire, that their Party had time to strengthen themselves in the Army and the Parliament, and hinder the Execution after all, and keep the Government determined of, a Stranger to most of the People of this Land, who knew it but by hearsay, as it was represented by Reporters. For my own part, as highly as I honour the Men, I am not of their Mind, in every Point of the Government which they would have set up; and some words in their Catechism I could wish had been more clear; and above all, I could wish that the Parliament and their more skilful Hand, had done more than was done to heal our Breaches, and had hit upon the right way either to unite with the Episcopal and Independants (which was possible, as distant as they are) or at least had pitched on the Terms that are fit for Universal Concord, and left all to come in upon those Terms that would. But for all this dissent I must testifie my Love and Honour to the Persons of such great Sincerity, and Eminent Ministerial Sufficiency, as were Gataker, Vines, Burgess, White, and the greater part of that Assembly.

p. 74Among other parts of their Trust, one was to approve of all that should be admitted into any Church Livings. They had no Power to put out any, but only to judge of the fitness of such as were taken in. The Power of Casting out unworthy Men, was partly in a Committee of Parliament Men at London, and partly in the Committees of each several County, according to an Ordinance of Parliament expressing the Crimes: Herein it was laudable that Drunkards, Swearers, Cursers, Blasphemers, Hereticks, Fornicators, and such scandalous Persons were to be ejected: but it was not well done to put in those among them that had been against the Parliament in the War: For the Work of God should not give place to the Matters of their Secular Interest and Policy, as long as the Being of the Commonwealth is secured: And all the Learned Ministers in the Land, on one side and the other, are few enow to do the Work of Christ: And I believe that those that were against them, would have done them less hurt in the Pulpits where there were so many Witnesses, than they did in Private. But yet I must needs say, that in all the Countreys where I was acquainted, six to one at least (if not many more) that were Sequestred by the Committee, were by the Oaths of Witnesses proved insufficent, or scandalous, or both; especially guilty of Drunkenness or Swearing: and those that being able, godly Preachers, were cast out for the War alone, as for their Opinions sake, were comparatively very few. This I know will displease that Party; but this is true. And though now and then an unworthy Person by sinister means crept into their Places, yet commonly those whom they put in, were such as set themselves laboriously to seek the Saving of Souls: Indeed the one half of them were very young; but that could not be helpt, because there were no other to be had. The Parliament could not make Men Learned nor Godly, but only put in the learnedest and ablest that they could have. And though it had been to be wisht that they might have had leisure to ripen in the Universities, yet many of them did as Ambrose, teach and learn at once so successfully, as that they much increased in Learning themselves, whilst they prosited others; and proportionably more than many in the Universities do.

§ 118. To return from this Digression to the Proceedings of Cromwell, when he was made Lord Protector, he had the Policy not to detect and exasperate the Ministers and others that consented not to his Government, (having seen what a stir the Engagement had before made): but he let Men live quietly, without putting any Oaths of Fidelity upon them; except his Parliaments; for those must not enter the House till they had sworn Fidelity to him. The Sectarian Party in his Army and elsewhere, he chiefly trusted to and pleased, till by the Peoples submission and quietness he thought himself well settled: And then he began to undermine them, and by degrees to work them out: And though he had so often spoken for the Anabaptists, now he findeth them so heady, and so much against any settled Government, and so set upon the promoting of their Way and Party, that he doth not only begin to blame their unruliness, but also designeth to settle himself in the Peoples Favour by suppressing them. In Ireland they were grown so high, that the Soldiers were many of them re-baptized as the way to Preferment: and those that opposed them they crusht with much uncharitable Fierceness. To suppress these, he sent thither his Son Henry Cromwell, who so discountenanced the Anabaptists, as yet to deal civilly by them, repressing their Insolencies, but not abusing them, or dealing hardly with them; promoting the Work of the Gospel, and setting up good and sober Ministers; and dealing civilly with the Royallists, and obliging all; so that he was generally beloved, and well spoken of. And Major General Ludlow, who headed the Anabaptists in Ireland, was fain to draw in his head.

In England Cromwell connived at his old Friend Harrison, while he made himself the Head of the Anabaptists and Fanaticks here, till he saw it would be an applauded acceptable thing to the Nation to suppress him, and then he doth it easily in a trice, and maketh him contemptible who but yesterday thought himself not much below him: The same he doth also as easily by Lambert and layeth him by.

§ 119. In these times (especially since the Rump reigned) sprang up five Sects at least, whose Doctrines were almost the same, but they sell into several Shapes and Names: 1. The Vanists: 2. The Seekers: 3. The Ranters: 4. The Quakers: 5. The Behmenists.

1. The Vanists, (for I know not by what other Name to make them known) who were Sir Henry Vane's Disciples, first sprang up under him in new England when he was Governor there: But their Notions were then raw and undigested, and their Party quickly confounded by God's Providence; as you may see in a p. 75little Book of Mr. Tho. Welds of the Rise and Fall of Antinomianism, and Familism in New-England; where their Opinions and these Providences are recorded by him that was a reverend Minister there: One Mrs. Dyer, a chief Person of the Sect, did first bring forth a Monster, which had the Parts of almost all sorts of living Creatures, some Parts like Man, but most ugly and misplaced, and some like Beasts, Birds and Fishes, having Horns, Fins and Claws; and at the Birth of it the Bed shook, and the Women present fell a Vomiting and were fain to go forth of the Room: Mr. Cotton was too favourable to them, till this helpt to recover him: Mrs. Hutchinson, the chief Woman among them and their Teacher, (to whose Exercises a Congregation of them used to assemble) brought forth about 30 mishapen Births or Lumps at once; and being banished into another Plantation was killed there by the Indians. Sir Henry Vane being Governor, and found to be the secret Fautor and Life of their Cause, was fain to steal away by Night, and take Shipping for England, before his Year of Government was at an end.

But when he came over into England he proved an Instrument of greater Calamity to a People more sinful and more prepared for God's Judgments: Being chosen a Parliament man, he was very active at first for the bringing of Delinquents to Punishment: He was the Principal Man that drove on the Parliament to go too high, and act too vehemently against the King: Being of very ready Parts, and very great Subtilty, and unwearied Industry, he laboured, and not without Success, to win others in Parliament, City and Country to his Way. When the Earl of Strafford was accused, he got a Paper out of his Father's Cabinet (who was Secretary of State) which was the chief Means of his Condemnation: To most of our Changes he was that Within the House, which Cromwell was without. His great Zeal to drive all into War, and to the highest, and to cherish the Sectaries, and especially in the Army, made him above all Men to be valued by that Party.

His Unhappiness lay in this, that his Doctrines were so clowdily formed and expressed, that few could understand them, and therefore he had but few true Disciples: The Lord Brook was slain before he had brought him to Maturity: Mr. Sterry is thought to be of his Mind, as he was his Intimate; but he hath not opened himself in writingA post humous Book of Mr. Sterry's is since Published., and was so famous for Obscurity in Preaching (being, said Sir Benj. Rudiard, too high for this World, and too low for the other) that he thereby proved almost Barren also, and Vanity and Sterility were never more happily conjoined: Mr. Sprig is the chief of his more open Disciples (too well known by a Book of his Sermons.)

This Obscurity by some was imputed to his not understanding himself; but by others to design, because he could speak plainly when he listed: the two Courses, in which he had most Success, and spake most plainly were, His earnest Plea for universal Liberty of Conscience, and against the Magistrates intermedling with Religion, and his teaching his Followers to revile the Ministry, calling them ordinarily Blackcoats, Priests, and other Names which then savoured of Reproach; and those Gentlemen that adhered to the Ministry, they said, were Priest-ridden.

When Cromwell had served himself by him as his surest Friend, as long as he could; and gone as far with him as their way lay together, (Vane being for a Fanatick Democracie, and Cromwell for Monarchy) at last there was no Remedy but they must part; and when Cromwell cast out the Rump (as disdainfully as Men do Excrements) he called Vane a Jugler, and Martin a Whoremonger, to excuse his usage of the rest as is aforesaid.

When Vane was thus laid by, he wrote his Book called The retired Man's Meditations, wherein the best part of his Opinions are so expressed, as will make but few Men his Disciples: His Healing Question is more plainly written.

When Cromwell was dead, he got Sir Arthur Haselrigge to be his close Adherent on Civil Accounts, and got the Rump set up again, and a Council of State, and got the Power much into his own Hands. When he was in the height of his power he set upon the forming of a new Commonwealth, and with some of his Adherants drew up the model, which was for popular Government; but so that Men of his Confidence must be the People.

Of my own displeasing him this is the true Account: It grieved me to see a poor Kingdom thus tost up and down in Unquietness, and the Ministers made odious and ready to be cast out, and a Reformation trodden under Foot, and Parliaments and Piety made a Scorn, and scarce any doubted but he was the principal Spring of all: Therefore, being writing against the Papists, coming to vindicate our Religion against them, when they impute to us the Blood of the King, I fully proved p. 76that the Protestants, and particularly the Presbyterians adhorred it, and suffered greatly for opposing it; and that it was the Act of Cromwell's Army and the Sectaries, among which I named the Vanists as one Sort, and I shewed that the Fryers and Jesuits were their Deceivers, and under several Vizors were disperst among them; and Mr. Nye having told me that he was long in Italy, I said, it was considerable how much of his Doctrine their Leader brought from Italy; whereas it proved that he was only in France and Helvetia upon the Borders of Italy, and whereas it was printed from Italy, I had ordered the Printer to correct it [fromwards Italy] but though the Copy was corrected, the Impression was not: Hereupon Sir Henry Vane being exceedingly provoked, threatned me to many, and spake against me in the House, and one Stubbs (that had been whipt in the Convocation House at Oxford) wrote for him a bitter Book against me, who from a Vanist afterwards turned a Conformist, since that he turned Physician, and was drowned in a small Puddle or Brook as he was riding near the Bath.

I confess my Writing was a means to lessen his Reputation, and make men take him for what Cromwell (that better knew him) called him a Iugler: and I wish I had done so much in time: But the whole Land rang of his Anger and my Danger; and all expected my present Ruine by him. But to shew him that I was not about Recanting (as his Agents would have perswaded me) I wrote also against his Healing Question, in a Preface before my Holy Commonwealth. And the speedy turn of Affairs did tye his Hands from Executing his Wrath upon me.

Upon the King's Coming in, he was questioned, with others, by the Parliament, but seemed to have his Life secured: But being brought to the Barr, he spake so boldly in justifying the Parliaments Cause, and what he had done, that it exasperated the King, and made him resolve upon his Death. When he came to Towerhill to die, and would have spoken to the People, he began so resolutely as caused the Officers to sound the Trumpets and beat the Drums, and hinder him from speaking. No Man could die with greater appearance of gallant Resolution, and Fearlesness than he did, though before supposed a timorous Man: Insomuch that the manner of his Death procured him more Applause than all the Actions of his Life. And when he was dead his intended Speech was printed, and afterwards his Opinions, more plainly expressed by his Friend than by himself.

When he was Condemned some of his Friends desired me to come to him, that I might see how far he was from Popery, and in how excellent a Temper, (thinking I would have askt him Forgiveness for doing him wrong): I told them, that if he had desired it, I would have gone to him: but seeing he did not, I supposed he would take it for an injury; for my Conference was not like to be such as would not be pleasing to a dying man: For though I never called him a Papist, yet I still suppose he hath done the Papists so much Service, and this poor Nation and Religion so much wrong, that we and our Posterity are like to have cause and time enough to Lament it. And so much of Sir Henry Vane and his Adherents.

§ 121. The second Sect which then rose up was that called Seekers: These taught that our Scripture was uncertain; that present Miracles are necessary to Faith; that our Ministry is null and without authority, and our Worship and Ordinances unnecessary or vain; the true Church, Ministry, Scripture, and Ordinances being lost; for which they are now Seeking.

I quickly found, that the Papists principally hatcht and actuated this Sect, and that a considerable Number that were of this Profession were some Papists, and some Infidels: However they closed with the Vanists, and sheltered themselves under them, as if they had been the very same.

§ 122. The third Sect were the Ranters: These also made it their Business as the former, to set up the Light of Nature, under the Name of Christ in Men, and to dishonour and cry down the Church, the Scripture, the Present Ministry, and our Worship and Ordinances; and call'd men to hearken to Christ within them: But withal, they conjoyned a Cursed Doctrine of Libertinism, which brought them to all abominable filthiness of Life: They taught as the Familists, that God regardeth not the Actions of the Outward Man, but of the Heart; and that to the Pure all things are Pure, (even things forbidden): And so as allowed by God, they spake most hideous Words of Blasphemy, and many of them committed Whoredoms commonly: Insomuch that a Matron of great Note for Godliness and Sobriety, being perverted by them, turned so shameless a Whore, that she was Carted in the Streets of London.

p. 77There could never Sect arise in the World, that was a lowder Warning to Professors of Religion to be humble, fearful, cautelous, and watchful: Never could the World be told more lowdly, whither the Spiritual Pride of ungrounded Novices in Religion tendeth; and whither Professors of Strictness in Religion may be carried in the Stream of Sects and Factions.They were so very few and of short continuance that I never saw one of them I have seen my self Letters written from Abbington, where among both Soldiers and People, this Contagion did then prevail, full of horrid Oaths and Curses and Blasphemy, not fit to be repeated by the Tongue or Pen of Man; and this all uttered as the Effect of Knowledge, and a part of their Religion, in a Fanatick Strain, and fathered on the Spirit of God.

But the horrid Villanies of this Sect did not only speedily Extinguish it, but also did as much as ever any thing did, to disgrace all Sectaries, and to restore the Credit of the Ministry and the sober unanimous Christians: So that the Devil and the Jesuits quickly found that this way served not their turn, and therefore they suddenly took another.

§ 123. And that was the fourth Sect, the Quakers; who were but the Ranters turned from horrid Prophaneness and Blasphemy, to a Life of extream Austerity on the other side. Their Doctrines were mostly the same with the Ranters: They make the Light which every Man hath within him to be his sufficient Rule, and consequently the Scripture and Ministry are set light by: They speak much for the dwelling and working of the Spirit in us; but little of Justification, and the Pardon of Sin, and our Reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ: They pretend their dependance on the Spirit's Conduct, against Set-times of Prayer, and against Sacraments, and against their due esteem of Scripture and Ministry. They will not have the Scripture called the Word of God: Their principal Zeal lyeth in railing at the Ministers as Hirelings, Deceivers, False Prophets, &c. and in refusing to Swear before a Magistrate, or to put off their Hat to any, or to say [You] instead of [Thou] or [Thee] which are their words to all. At first they did use to fall into Tremblings and sometime Vomitings in their Meetings, and pretended to be violently acted by the Spirit; but now that is ceased, they only meet, and he that pretendeth to be moved by the Spirit speaketh; and sometime they say nothing, but sit an hour or more in silence, and then depart. One while divers of them went Naked through divers chief Towns and Cities of the Land, as a Prophetical act: Some of them have famished and drowned themselves in Melancholy; and others undertaken by the Power of the Spirit to raise them (as Susan Pierson did at Claines near Worcester, where they took a Man out of his Grave that had so made away himself, and commanded him to arise and live; but to their shame). Their chief Leader Iames Nayler acted the part of Christ at Bristol, according to much of the History of the Gospel, (and was long laid in Bridewell for it, and his Tongue bored as a Blasphemer by the Parliament). Many Franciscan Fryers and other Papists, have been proved to be Disguised Speakers in their Assemblies, and to be among them; and it's like are the very Soul of all these horrible Delusions. But of late one William Penn is become their Leader, and would reform the Sect, and Set up a kind of Ministry among them.

§ 124. The fifth Sect are the Bethmenists, whose Opinions go much toward the way of the former, for the Sufficiency of the Light of Nature, the Salvation of Hearthens as well as Christians, and a dependence on Revelations, &c. But they are fewer in Number, and seem to have attained to greater Meekness and conquest of Passions than any of the rest: Their Doctrine is to be seen in Iacob Behmen's Books, by him that hath nothing else to do, than to bestow a great deal of time to understand him that was not willing to be easily understood, and to know that his bombasted words do signifie nothing more than before was easily known by common familiar terms.

The chiefest of these in England are Dr. Pordage and his Family, who live together in Community, and pretend to hold visible and sensible Communion with Angels, whom they sometime see, and sometime smell, &c. Mr. Fowler of Redding accused him before the Committee for divers things, (as for preaching against Imputed Righteousness, and perswading married Persons from the Carnal Knowledge of each other, &c.) but especially for Familiarity with Devils or Conjuration. The Doctor wrote a Book to vindicate himself, in which he professeth to have sensible Communion with Angels, and to know by sights and smells, &c. good Spirits from bad: But he saith, that indeed one Month his House was molested with Evil Spirits, which was occasioned by one Everard whom he taketh to be a Conjurer, who stayed so long with him, as desiring to be of their Communion. In this time p. 78he saith, that a fiery Dragon, so big as to fill a very great Room, conflicted visibly with him many hours; that one appeared to him in his Chamber in the likeness of Everard, with Boots, Spurs, &c. that an impression was made on the Brick-wall of his Chimney, of a Coach drawn with Tygers and Lions, which could not be got out till it was hewed out with Pick-Axes: and another on his Glass-window which yet remaineth, &c. Whether these things be true or false I know not; but the chief Person of the Doctor's Family-Communion (being a Gentleman and Student of All Souls in Oxford) was thus made known to me. His Mother being a sober, pious Woman, being dissatisfied with his way, could prevail with him to suffer her to open it to none but me; (of whole Conversion to them their Charity was much desirous): Upon discourse with the young man, I found a very good Disposition, aspiring after the highest Spiritual state, and thinking that visible Communion with Angels was it, he much expected it, and protest in some measure to have attained it; for some lights and odd sights he had seen; but upon strict Examination, he knew not whether it were with the Eye of the Body or of the Mind: nor I knew not whether it were any thing real. or but fantastical. He would not dispute, because he thought he knew things by a higher light than Reason, even by Intuition, by the extraordinary Irradiation of the Mind. He was much against Propriety, and against Relations of Magistrates, Subjects, Husbands, Wives, Masters, Servants, &c. But I perceived he was a young, raw Scholar of some Fryar whom he understood not, and when he should but have commended the Perfection of a Monastical Life (which is the thing that they so highly magnifie) he carried it too far, and made it seem more necessary than he should.

They then professed to wait for such a Coming down of the holy Ghost upon them, as should send them out as his Missionaries to unite, and reconcile, and heal the Churches, and do wonders in the World: But its fifteen years ago, and yet they are latent and their work undone.

§ 125. Among these fall in many other Sect-makers; as Dr. Gell of London (known partly by a printed Volume in Folio) and one Mr. Parker, who got in to the Earl of Pembroke; and was one that wrote a Book against the Assemblies Confession: In which (as the rest) he taketh up most of the Popish Doctrines, and riseth up against them with Papal Pride and Contempt, but owneth not the Pope himself, but headeth his Body of Doctrine with the Spirit, as the Papists do with the Pope: (And if they could bring men to receive the rest, it will be easie to spurn down the Idol of their Fantasie or pretended Spirit, and to set on the proper Head again). To these also must be added Dr. Gibbon, who goeth about with his Scheme to Proselyte men, whom I have more cause to know than some of the rest.

All these with subtile Diligence promote most of the Papal Cause, and get in with the Religious sort, either upon pretence of Austerity, Mortification, Angelical Communion, or Clearer Light; but none of them yet owneth the Name of a Papist, but what they are indeed, and who sendeth them, and what is their Work, though I strongly conjecture, I will not assert, because I am not fully certain: Let time discover them.

§ 126. The most among Cromwell's Soldiers that ever I could suspect for Papists, were but a few that began as Strangers among the Common Soldiers, and by degrees rose up to some Inferiour Offices, and were most conversant with the Common Soldiers; but none of the Superiour Officers seemed such, though seduced by them. There is one of them (Capt. Everard) that was a busie preaching Sectary (in appearance) and disputed for Anabaptistry, and against Original Sin (whom Mr. Stephens hath wrote against, who took him then to be a Papist; and who hath lately published a Book for the Popish Religion, as giving the Reasons of his Conversion to them, as if it were a thing that had been lately done: But they permit but now and then one thus to detect themselves, to win others by the fame of their Conversion: But the rest must still ply their work, as masked: for secret Instruments have much advantages above publick ones. Capt. Everard since the burning of London, and since many new Fires have been attempted to consume the rest, was Accused to Sir Richard Brown, as one that intended to burn the rest of the City; and upon search there was a dangerous Letter found with him, and four hundred Hand-Granado's with Earthen Shells, and fill'd up ready with Powder, were found covered under his Billets. There being two of that Name that were Sectaries in Cromwell's Army, I have not yet learned which of them this was.

p. 79§ 127. Also the Socinians made some increase by the Ministry of one Mr. Biddle, sometimes School-master in Glocester; who wrote against the Godhead of the Holy Ghost, and afterwards of Christ; whose Followers inclined much to meer Deism and Infidelity.

§ 128. Having gone on thus far with the general Hints of the History of those times, because I would not obscure them by the Interpositions of my own Affairs, I now return to these, and shall set them also together, that they may be the better understood.

I have related how after my bleeding of a Gallon of Blood by the Nose, I was left weak at Sir Thomas Rous's House at Rous-Lench, where I was taken up with daily Medicines to prevent a Dropsie: And being conscious that my time had not been improved to the Service of God as I desired it had been, I put up many an earnest Prayer to God, that he would restore me, and use me more successfully in his Work. And blessed be that Mercy which heard my Groans in the Day of my Distress, and granted my Desires, and wrought my Deliverance, when Men and Means failed, and gave me Opportunity to Celebrate his Praise.

Whilst I there continued weak and unable to Preach, the People at Kidderminster had again renewed their Articles against their old Vicar and his Curate; and upon Trial of the Cause the Committee sequestred the Place, but put no one into it, but put the Profits into the Hands of divers of the Inhabitants to pay a Preacher till it were disposed of. They sent to me, and desired me to take it, in case I were again enabled to Preach: which I flatly refused; and told them, I would take only the Lecture, which by his own Consent and Bond I held before.

Hereupon they sought to Mr. Brumskill, and others, to accept the Place, but could not meet with any one to their minds: Therefore they chose one Mr. Richard Serjeant to Officiate, reserving the Vicaridge for some one that were fitter.

When I was able (after about five Months) to go abroad, I went to Kidderminster, where I found only Mr. Sergeant in Possession; and the People again vehemently urged me to take the Vicaridge: which I denied; and got the Magistrates and Burgesses together into the Town-hall, and told them, That (though I was offered many Hundred pounds per Annum elsewhere) I was willing to continue with them in my old Lecturers place which I had before the Wars, expecting they should make the Maintenance an Hundred pounds a year, and a House; and if they would promise to submit to that Doctrine of Christ, which as his Minister I should deliver to them, proved by the Holy Scriptures, I would not leave them. And that this Maintenance should neither come out of their own Purses, nor any more of it out of the Tythes save the 60l. which the Vicar had before bound himself to pay me, I undertook to procure an Augmentation for Mitton (a Chappel in the Parish) of 40l. per Annum, which I did; and so the 60 l. and that 40l. was to be part, and the rest I was to have nothing to do with. This Covenant was drawn up between us in Articles, and Subscribed, in which I disclaimed the Vicaridge and Pastoral Charge of the Parish, and only undertook the Lecture.

And thus the Sequestration continued in the hands of the Towns-men, as aforesaid, who gathered the Tythes, and paid me (not an Hundred as they promised) but Eighty pound per Annum, or Ninety at most, and House-rent for a few Rooms in the top of another man's house, which is all I had at Kidderminster. The rest they gave to Mr. Sergeant, and about 40l. per Annum to the old Vicar, and 6l. per Annum to the King and Lord for Rents, besides other Charges.

But when they had long continued in this way, they feared lest some one else against their wills would get a grant of the Sequestration from the Committee, and therefore they went privately and got an Order from them to settle me in the Title, and never shewed it me, but kept it by them secretly, only to secure the Place from a Surprize, and themselves from repaying what they disbursed.

And thus it lay till the King's Coming out of Scotland with his Army to Worcester: and then, their Houses being full of Soldiers, they brought me the Order, and intreated me, if not to own it, yet to keep it safe, and to save them harmless by it, if they were called to account.

I recite this, because Mr. Thomas Pierce, while he was rageingly fierce to prove me a Thief, and I know not what else, doth charge me with taking this Sequestration, and so with taking another man's Bread out of his mouth, and robbing the Innocent; and so doth Bishop Morley after him; and Durel, Dr. …Boneman, and many others, from him: whereas the Place was sequestred while I was far p. 80enough off, and I disowned it, and made a contrary Covenant with the People: But I durst not till this for my own vindication, left the Towns-men should be called to an account; for the Sequestration to their undoing; though I knew them to be honest and just in the Distribution of it. And indeed though (which they knew not) the Matter of Fact was false, by which they proved me so vile a Person, yet I was the less careful so to clear my self as I might, because I take it to be a thing as justifiable as to eat Bread, if I had taken the Sequestration; because the man's own Fundamental Right (as it was a thing Consecrated to God) was null, he being so insufficient as not to be owned for a Minister: As I have great reason, by all the trial I made of him, to think that he understood not the Substance of Religion, the common Catechism or Creed, so he was unable to teach the People the very Substantials of Christianity. Once a quarter he scrapt a …ew words together, which he so said over as to move pity in his Auditors; but woe to the People that have no other Pastor then such as he: And God's Right being the first in Dedicated Things, and the Law also annexing them to the Office for the Work's sake, and for the sake of the Peoples Souls, he that cannot at all do the Work, and so is uncapable of the Office, can have no Title to the Place and Maintenance. And I cannot believe that the Peoples Souls must be all untaught and sacrificed to his pretended Legal Right. And another Pastor they were not like to have without the Maintenance, unless they could have got one that had an Estate of his own, and would go on warfare at his own Charges, or could live without Food and Raiment: for the Peoples Poverty disabled them from maintaining him: … it had been but a Physician's or Surgeon's Place in an Hospital, which a meer … had got for his life, I think to let the People perish, for fear of dispossessing him of his Place and Pay, had been to be righteous over much, and charitable over little: And the fifth part was allowed them for their Wives, though they did nothing for it. And yet this ignorant man was not dispossest by force, but by the Power then in possession; even by Parliamentary Power, when the Lords (who are the highest Judicture) sate as well as the Commons, by the King's …aw. And he was cast out on Articles sworn for Insufficiency and Scandal. And yet this was done by others, before I came near them: And must the place be void of a Teacher, because the Parliament would not give the Maintenance to a man that knew not what the Work of a Pastor was.