The wrongs of them which are possessed of the government of the church towards the other, may hardly be dissembled or excused. They have charged them as though they denied tribute to Cæsar, and withdrew from the civil magistrate their obedience which they have ever performed and taught. They have ever sorted and coupled them with the Family of love, whose heresies they have laboured to descry and confute. They have been swift of credit to receive accusations against them from those that have quarrelled with them but for speaking against sin and vice. Their examinations and inquisitions have been strait. Swearing men to blanks and generalities (not included within a compass of matter certain, which the party that is to take the oath may comprehend) is a thing captious and strainable. Their urging of subscription to their own articles is but lacessere et irritare morbos ecclesiæ, which otherwise would spend and exercise1 themselves. Non consensum quærit sed dissidium, qui quod factis præstatur in verbis exigit: he seeketh not unity, but division, which exacteth in words that which men are content to yield in action. And it is true, there are some which (as I am persuaded) will not easily offend by inconformity, who notwithstanding make some conscience to subscribe. For they know this note of inconstancy and defection from that which they have long held shall disable them to do that good which otherwise they wonld do for such is the weakness of many that their ministry should be thereby discredited. As for their easy silencing of them, in such great scarcity of preachers, it is to punish the people, and not them. Ought they not (I mean the bishops) to keep one eye open to look upon the good that these men do, but to fix them both upon the hurt that they suppose cometh by them? Indeed, such as are intemperate and incorrigible, God forbid they should be permitted to teach. But shall every inconsiderate word, sometimes captiously watched, and for the most part hardly enforced, be a forfeiture of their voice and gift of teaching? As for sundry particular molestations, I take no pleasure to recite them. If a minister shall be troubled for saying in baptism, do you believe? for, dost thou believe? If another shall be called in question for praying for her Majesty without the addition of her style; whereas the very form of prayer in the book of common prayer hath Thy servant Elizabeth, and no more: If a

So Resusc. The Bodleian and the Ad. MS. have crise: the Harleian, waste.

third shall be accused, upon these words uttered touching the controversies, tollatur lex et fiat certamen, (whereby was meant that the prejudice of the law removed, either's reasons should be equally compared) of calling the people to sedition and mutiny, as if he had said, Away with the law, and try it out by force: If these and sundry other like particulars be true, which I have but by rumour, and cannot affirm; it is to be lamented that they should labour amongst us with so little comfort. I know restrained governments are better than remiss; and I am of his mind that said, Better is it to live where nothing is lawful, than where all things are lawful. I dislike that laws be contemned, or disturbers be unpunished. But laws are likened to the grape, that being too much pressed yield an hard and unwholesome wine. Of these things I must say: Ira viri non operatur justitiam Dei; the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.

As for the injuries of the other part, they be ictus inermium; as it were headless arrows; they are fiery and eager invectives, and in some fond men uncivil and unreverent behaviour towards their persons. This last invention also, which exposeth them to derision and obloquy by libels, chargeth not (as I am persuaded) the whole side: neither doth that other, which is yet more odious, practised by the worst sort of them, which is, to call in as it were to their aids certain mercenary bands, which impugn bishops and other ecclesiastical dignities, to have the spoil of their endowments and livings. Of this I cannot speak too hardly. It is an intelligence between incendiaries and robbers, the one to fire the house, the other to rifle it. And thus much touching the third point.

4. The fourth point wholly pertaineth to them which impugn the present ecclesiastical government; who, although they have not cut themselves off from the body and communion of the church, yet do they affect certain cognizances and differences, wherein they seek to correspond amongst themselves, and to be separated from others. And it is truly said, tam sunt mores quidam schismatici, quam dogmata schismatica; there be as well schismatical fashions as opinions. First, they have impropered' to themselves the names of zealous, sincere, and reformed; as if all others were

1 So the Bodleian MS. Ad. MS. 4263 has impropried: the Resuscitatio, impropriated.

cold, minglers of holy things and profane, and friends of abuses. Yea, be a man endued with great virtues and fruitful in good works, yet if he concur not with them, they term him (in derogation) a civil and moral man, and compare him to Socrates or some heathen philosopher: whereas the wisdom of the Scriptures teacheth us contrariwise to judge and denominate men religious according to their works of the second table; because they of the first are often counterfeited and practised in hypocrisy. So St. John saith, that a man doth vainly boast of loving God whom he hath not seen, if he love not his brother whom he hath seen. And St. James saith, This is true religion, to visit the fatherless and the widow, etc. So as that which is with them but philosophical and moral, is, in the phrase of the Apostle, true religion and Christianity. As in affection they challenge the said virtues of zeal and the rest, so in knowledge they attribute unto themselves light and perfection. They say, the Church of England in King Edward's time, and in the beginning of her Majesty's reign, was but in the cradle; and the bishops in those times did somewhat for daybreak, but that maturity and fullness of light proceeded from themselves. So Sabinus, bishop of Heraclea, a Macedonian, said that the fathers in the Council of Nice were but infants and ignorant men; and that the church was not so to persist in their decrees as to refuse that further ripeness of knowledge which the time had revealed. And as they censure virtuous men by the names of civil and moral, so do they censure men truly and godly wise (who see into the vanity of their assertions) by the name of politiques; saying that their wisdom is but carnal and savouring of man's brain. So likewise if a preacher preach with care and meditation (I speak not of the vain scholastical manner of preaching, but soundly indeed, ordering the matter he handleth distinctly for memory, deducing and drawing it down for direction, and authorizing it with strong proofs and warrants), they censure it as a form of speaking not becoming the simplicity of the Gospel, and refer it to the reprehension of St. Paul, speaking of the enticing speech of man's wisdom.

Now for their own manner of teaching, what is it? Surely they exhort well, and work compunction of mind, and bring men well to the question, Viri, fratres, quid agemus? But that is not enough, except they resolve that question. They

handle matters of controversy weakly and obiter, and as before a people that will accept of anything. In doctrine of manners there is little but generality and repetition. The word (the bread of life) they toss up and down, they break it not. They draw not their directions down ad casus conscientiæ; that a man may be warranted in his particular actions whether they be lawful or not. Neither indeed are many of them able to do it, what through want of grounded knowledge, what through want of study and time. It is an easy and compendious thing to call for the observation of the Sabbath-day, or to speak against unlawful gain; but what actions and works may be done upon the Sabbath, and in what cases; and what courses of gain are lawful, and what not; to set this down, and to clear the whole matter with good distinctions and decisions, is a matter of great knowledge and labour, and asketh much meditation and conversation in the Scriptures, and other helps which God hath provided and preserved for instruction. Again, they carry not an equal hand in teaching the people their lawful liberty, as well as their rcstraints and prohibitions: but they think a man cannot go too far in that that hath a show of a commandment. They forget that there are sins on the right hand, as well as on the left; and that the word is double-edged, and cutteth on both sides, as well the superstitious observances as the profane transgressions. Who doubteth but it is as unlawful to shut where God hath opened, as to open where God hath shut? to bind where God hath loosed, as to loose where God hath bound? Amongst men it is commonly as ill taken to turn back favours as to disobey commandments. In this kind of zcal (for example) they have pronounced generally, and without difference, all untruths unlawful; notwithstanding that the midwives are directly reported to have been blessed for their excuse; and Rahab is said by faith to have concealed the spies; and Salomon's selected judgment proceeded upon a simulation; and our Saviour, the more to touch the hearts of the two disciples with a holy dalliance, made as if he would have passed Emmaus. Further, I have heard some sermons of mortification, which I think (with very good meaning) they have preached out of their own experience and exercise, and things in private counsels not unmeet; but

1 The two last clauses are omitted in the Bodleian MS. and are supplied from the others and from the Resuscitatio.'

surely no sound conceits; much like to Person's Resolution, or not so good; apt to breed in men rather weak opinions and perplexed despairs, than filial and true repentance which is sought. Another point of great inconvenience and peril, is to entitle the people to hear controversies and all points of doctrine. They say no part of the counsel of God must be suppressed, nor the people defrauded: so as the difference which the Apostle maketh between milk and strong meat is confounded: and his precept that the weak be not admitted unto questions and controversies taketh no place. But most of all is to be suspected, as a seed of further inconvenience, their manner of handling the Scriptures; for whilst they seek express Scripture for everything; and that they have (in manner) deprived themselves and the church of a special help and support by embasing the authority of the fathers; they resort to naked examples, conceited inferences, and forced allusions, such as do mine into all certainty of religion. Another extremity is the excessive magnifying of that which, though it be a principal and most holy institution, yet hath it limits as all things else have. We see wheresoever (in manner) they find in the Scriptures the word spoken of, they expound it of preaching. They have made it almost of the essence of the sacrament of the supper, to have a sermon precedent. They have (in sort) annihilated the use of liturgies, and forms of divine service, although the house of God be denominated of the principal, domus orationis, a house of prayer, and not a house of preaching. As for the life of the good monks and the hermits in the primitive church, I know they will condemn a man as half a Papist, if he should maintain them as other than profane, because they heard no sermons. In the meantime, what preaching is, and who may be said to preach, they make no question. But as far as I see, every man that presumeth to speak in chair is accounted a preacher. But I am assured that not a few that call hotly for a preaching ministry deserve to be of the first themselves that should be expelled. These and some other errors and misproceedings they do fortify and entrench by being so greatly addicted to their opinions, and impatient2 to

1 In the Bodleian MS. the sentence ends here. The rest is supplied from the other MSS. and the 'Resuscitatio.'

So the Bodleian MS. The other copies have "all which errors and misproceedings they do fortify and entrench by an addicted respect to their own opinions and an impatience to hear" etc.