Answer to a Book, Part 24
XXIV. VponUpon the denying him the attendance of his Chaplains
A CHAPLAIN is a thing so diminutive, and inconsiderable, that how he should come heer among matters of so great concernment, to take such room up in the Discourses of a Prince, if it be not wonderd, is to be fmil'd at. Certainly by me, so mean an argument shall not be writt'n; but I shall huddle him as he does Prayers. The Scripture ownes no such order, no such function in the Church; and the Church not owning them, they are left, for ought I know, to such a furder examining as the Sons of Sceva the Jew met with; Bishops or Presbyters we know, and Deacons we know, but what are Chaplains? In State perhaps they may be listed among the upper Servingmen of som great houshold, and be admitted to som such place, as may stile them the Sewers, or the Yeomen-Ushers of Devotion, where the Maister is too restie, or too rich to say his own prayers, or to bless his own Table. Wherfore should the Parlament then take such implements of the Court Cupbord into thir consideration? They knew them to have bin the main corrupters at the kings elbow: they knew the king to have bin always thir most attentive Scholar, & Imitator, & of a child to have suckt from them & thir closet work all his impotent principles of tyranny & superstition. While therfore they had any hope left of his reclaiming, these sowers of Malignant Tares they kept asunder from him: and sent to him such of the Ministers and other zealous persons, as they thought were best able to instruct him, and to convert him. What could religion her self have don more to the saving of a soule? But when they found him past cure, & that he to himself was grown the most evil Counseler of all, they deny'd him not his Chaplains, as many as were fitting, and som of them attended him, or els were at his call to the very last. Yet heer he makes more Lamentationfor the want of his Chaplains, then superstitious Micah did to the Danites, who had tak'n away his houshold Priest. Yee have tak'n away my Gods which I made, and the Priest, and what have I more? And perhaps the whole Story of Micah might square not unfitly to this Argument: Now know I, saith he, that the Lord will doe me good, seeing I have a Levite to my Priest. Micah had as great a care that his Priest should be Mosaical, as the King had that his should be Apostolical; yet both in an error touching thir Priests. Houshold and privat Orisons were not to be officiated by Priests; for neither did public Prayer appertain onelyonly to their Office. Kings heertofore, David, Salomon, and Jehosaphat, who might not touch the Priesthood, yet might pray in public, yea in the Temple, while the Priests themselves stood and heard. VVhat aild this King then that he could not chew his own Mattins without the Priests Oretenus? Yet is it like he could not pray at home, who can heer publish a whole Prayer-book of his own, and signifies in some part of this Chapter, almost as good a mind to be a Priest himself, as Micah had to let his Son be. There was doubtless therfore some other matter in it, which made him so desirous to have his Chaplaines. about him, who were not onelyonly the contrivers, but very oft the instruments also of his designes.
The Ministers which were sent him no marvel he indur'd not; for they Preacht repentance to him: the others gave him easie confession, easie absolution, nay strength'nd his hands and hard'nd his heart by applauding him in his wilfull wayes. To them he was an Ahab, to these a Constantine; it must follow then that they to him were as unwelcome as Eliah was to Ahab, these as deer, and pleasing as Amaziah the Priest of Bethel was to Jeroboam. These had learnt well the lesson that would please; Prophesie not against Bethel, for it is the Kings Chappel, the Kings Court; and had taught the King to say of those Ministers which the Parlament had sent, Amos hath conspir'd against me; the Land is not able to beare all his words.
Returning to our first Parallel, this King lookt upon his Prelats as Orphans under the sacrilegious eyes of many rapacious Reformers: and there was as great feare of Sacrilege between Micah and his Mother, till with thir holy treasure, about the loss whereof there was such cursing, they made a grav'n and a molt'n Image, and got a Priest of thir own. To let go his Criticizing about the sound of Prayers, imperious, rude, or passionat, modes of his own divising, we are in danger to fall again upon the flats and shallows of Liturgie. Which if I should repeat again, would turn my answers into Responsories, and begett another Liturgie, having too much of one already.
This onelyonly I shall add, that if the heart, as he alleges, cannot safely joyn with another mans extemporal sufficiency, because we know not so exactly what they mean to say, then those public Prayers made in the Temple by those forenamed Kings, and by the Apostles in the Congregation, and by the ancient Christians for above three hundred yeares before Liturgies came in, were with the People made in vain.
After he hath acknowledg'd that kings heertofore prayd without Chaplains, eev'n publicly in the Temple it self, and that every privat Beleever is invested with a royall Priesthood, yet like one that relisht not what he tasted of the heav'nly gift, and the good word of God whose name he so confidently takes into his mouth, he frames to himself impertinent and vain reasons, why he should rather pray by the officiating mouth of a Closet Chaplain. Their prayers, saith he, are more prevalent, they flow from minds more enlightn'd, from affections less distracted. Admitt this true, which is not; this might be somthing said as to thir prayers for him, but what availes it to thir praying with him? If his own minde be incumbred with secular affaires, what helps it his particular prayer, though the mind of his Chaplain be not wandring, either after new preferment, or his Dinner? The fervencie of one man in prayer, cannot supererogate for the coldness of another; neither can his spiritual defects in that duty be made out, in the acceptance of God, by another mans abilities. Let him endeavour to have more light in himself: And not to walk by another mans Lamp, but to get Oyle into his own. Let him cast from him, as in a Christian warrfare, that secular incumbrance which either distracts, or overloads him; his load els will never be the less heavie, because another mans is light. Thus these pious flourishes and colours examin'd throughly, are like the Apples of Asphaltis, appearing goodly to the sudden eye, but look well upon them, or at least but touch them, and they turne into Cinders.
In his Prayer he remembers what voices of joy and gladness there were in his Chappell, Gods house, in his opinion, between the Singing men and the Organs; and this was unity of spirit in the bond of peace; the vanity, superstition, and misdevotion of which place was a scandall farr and neer: Wherin so many things were sung, and pray'd in those Songs, which were not understood: and yet he who makes a difficulty how the people can joyne thir hearts to extemporal prayers, though distinctly heard and understood, makes no question how they should joyn thir hearts in unitie to songs not understood.
I beleeve that God is no more mov'd with a prayer elaboratly pend, then men truely charitable are mov'd with the pen'd speech of a Begger.
Finally O yee Ministers, ye pluralists, whose lips preserve not knowledge, but the way ever op'n to your bellies, read heer what work he makes among your wares, your Gally pots, your Balmes and Cordials in print, & not onelyonly your sweet Sippets in widows houses, but the huge gobbets wherewith he charges you to have devourd houses and all; the houses of your Brethren, your King, and your God. Crie him up for a Saint in your Pulpits, while he cries you down for Atheists into Hell.