The Levites Scourge, Section 9
SECT. IX. Britanicus his scurrilous jests at spirituall Courts retorted, and extemporarie prayers and sermons deservedly censured.
Brit. p. 67.HE sayes, the Doctor excepted against the Scotch covenant as not agreeable to Gods Word: this is not all. For the Doctor would not like it a jot worse for that, but there are not so many reverend conveniences; you cannot have libertie of conscience, and pluralities at once, you cannot keep an orthodoxall coach and four horses, you cannot mind your businesse of State and ease ▪ for the ceremonie of constant preaching; you shall want the good companie of Chancellours and Commissaries, and the gainfull equitie of the canon law, and the goodly tyrannie of the high Commission Courts, and the comfortable use of the keyes over a pottle of Sack in the Chancellours chamber.
Ans.If thou hadst any vermilion tincture of modestie Britanicus ▪ thou wouldst blush to charge the Doctor with negligence in preaching▪ or coaching it with four horses, or gleeking it on the Lords day: for it is well known to all that know him, that he never kept coach with four horses, nor playd at gleek in his life, much lesse on the Lords day. And for his constant diligence in preaching, for 35 years and more, if I should hold my peace, the prime and chief pulpits in the Universitie and London would say enough▪ to stop thy mouth, and open all ingenuous mens, to yield a testimonie to a known truth. But thou art possessed with Martin Marprelates devill, which Urbanus will shortly conjure out of thee. The power of the keyes is a great eye-sore to thee, for those of thy sect like not to stand in white sheets, though if the world belye you not, none better deserve it: for Papists and Brownists, like Sampsons foxes, though they are severed in the heads, they are joyned in the tails. And doubtlesse, when thou wert summoned by an Apparitor for committing follie with an elect Sister, & waitedst in the Chancellors chamber, it was then that thou heldst thy nose so long over a pottle of Sack, till thy brains crowed. For what Chimera's, Tragelaphusses, and Hippocentaurs dost thou talk of? reverend conveniences, orthodoxall coaches, and businesse of State, and ease, the ceremonie of constant preaching and goodly tyrannie of the high commission Court, as if that court now stood? What thy intoxicated brain conceiveth, or thy loose tongue would have understood by reverend conveniences ▪ and orthodoxall coaches, I understand not; unlesse thou alludest to that noble mans conveniencie, who had a reverend coachman for his preacher; whose doctrine, very agreeable to his profession, was, that a stable was every way as holy a… a Church, (and for my part, I wish those of his strain may have no other Church,) or thou hadst a s…ing at the Doctors successour in Acton, who rideth every Lords day in triumph in a coach drawn with four horses to exercise there.M. Nye. What thou talkest of businesse of state and ease, thou understandest not thy self; if there be businesse in state, surely there is little …ase; bus…nesse of state and ease are a kind of asystata; non bene conveniunt nec in una s…de morantur; if there were ever such a calm… in the state, that the steer…men might take their ease, yet certainly never since your Boreas blew in the Church. If that character might truly be given of any, it may of your sect; turba gravis paci▪ placidaequ… immica quieti: you are the naturall sons of Ismael, your hands are against all men and all mens hands against you. But here thou secretly girdest at our Bishops sitting in Parliament, and our Doctors on the Bench of Justice; that is a great eye-sore to you, as if it were agreeable to reason or religion for Lay-men to meddle with all Ecclesiasticall matters as now they doe, and Ecclesiasticall persons to meddle with no secular; or the Apostles argument were of no fo…ce▪ those who a…e fit Judges of the highest cases of conscience, and shall one day judge the Angells, are much more able to judge men, and compose differences of a lower nature. Certainly, the superiour science is better able to judge of the conclusions of an inferiour, the … the inferiour of a superiour. Yea, but this is a distraction from their sacred function: none at all, if, as thou here sayest, the handling of such businesse is a matter of ease: yet admit it be some distraction and trouble to Clergie-men to keep the peace, & compose secular differences amongst those of their flock; yet that religious Bishop S. Aug…stine yields a good reason for it; why for the good of souls godly pastors must not refuse this troublesome work: otium s…nctum quaerit charitas veritatis, sed nego…ium justum suscipit necessitas charitatis, the love of truth desires the rest of contemplation, but the necessitie of charitie puts manifold businesses upon us.
But, I pray thee, tell me what thou meanest by the ceremonie of preaching. This is thy peculiar dialect, never any to my knowledge tearmed it so before thee; if some too much addicted to prayer have too much …ig…tned preaching; as on the contrarie, some too much addicted to preaching have to much vilified common-prayer: what is this to the Doctor, who was ever both for diligent preaching, and constant prayer? For neither can a man pray as he ought without direction from preaching, nor preach powerfully without prayer: and as it is an absurd kind of preaching▪ to preach against preaching; so it is a most unholy prayer to pray ex tempore against the set-forms of prayer allowed by the Church. The publique preaching of the word is a substantiall part of Gods worship, and very imp…usly called by thee a ceremonie, unlesse the word be applyed to your ex tempore Enthusiasts, whose preaching is nothing else but a meer ceremonie of lifting up the hands and eyes and moving the lips, and b…ating the cushio…, and varying phrases, and plundering an English concordance. Cicero in his book intituled Orator, speaks of negligentia quaedam diligens, a carefull avoyding of accurate penning and neglect of ornaments of speech; there is, saith he, a diligent kind of negligence consisting in the weeding out the flow…rs of rhetor…ck: but I may truly say of these mens preaching, that we may observe in it a negligent kind of diligence, an idle kind of labour; and though they exercise twice every Lords day, and lecture it most dayes of the week▪ & kill their hearers at every funerall sermon with the tedious prolixitie therof; yet unlesse they take more pains in composing their sermon, then they doe, they shall never escape the curse of the Prophet: woe be to them that doe the work of the Lord negligently.