This was the true evangelical spirit, which taught them to obey their magistrates' commands in what was lawful; and in what was otherwise, either prudently to avoid their rage by flight, or patiently to endure it by dying. They had not learned that Lirry, that the Saints are the only Lords of the world: that all the Ungodly (and all must be such, whom they pleased): were but Usurpers and Intruders upon their Rights: that they must "Overturn, overturn, overturn," to make way for the kingdom of Christ; intending, no doubt, to set themselves, one at his right hand, and another at his left, in that his kingdom. The doctrine of the Gospel taught them not these violent and rebellious principles: but it is as full of peace as it is of purity; and instructed them to acknowledge their magistrates' authority, to pray for their prosperity, to obey their commands cheerfully, or quietly to suffer punishment and this, though they had abundant provocation to resist, and probability of being successful. Much more damnable therefore is it, when there is no such provocation given; when religion, and piety, and justice are only pretended; when godly princes discharge their conscience and their Christian duty, in the government committed unto, them: much more damnable is it, I say, yea damnable to the utmost degree of damnation, for subjects, upon every whimsical discontent, to resist, imprison, depose, and murder them; while they cheat and cozen the world with the pretences of saints, but do the works of devils.

II. And, now, had this doctrine been more pressed and more pondered of late years, WE HAD NOT THIS DAY HAD THIS SAD OCCASION TO BE HUMBLED FOR THE UNPARALLELED WICKEDNESS OF YESTERDAY.

A day it was, that, were it not that it afforded us an opportunity to testify our abhorrency and detestation of that bloody villainy which it once saw, we might well wish that the year would skip it over; and imprecate it, as Job doth the day of his birth, Job iii. 3, 4, 5. Let that day perish....let it be darkness: let not God regard it....neither let the light shine upon it: Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it; and a perpetual cloud dwell upon it. A day, that hath brought an indelible blot and infamy upon these nations, and made us a reproach and scorn to the whole world; and, what is worse, hath exposed religion itself to contempt and hatred, and made it a reproach to scorners, who, whilst

they saw those very men, that so highly pretended reformation and the power of godliness, embrue their hands in royal and sacred blood, have been ready to conclude, that to profess religion is nothing else but to seek a varnish and colour for some black and horrid wickedness. This hath rendered the reverend name of godliness, despicable and odious to profane spirits; who, whilst they saw none privileged to act their rapines, revenge, injustice, and most wrongful usurpation and tyranny, but those whose mouths were as full of a glorious profession as their hands were of wicked deeds, have charged all those im pieties upon the score of religion, and made it bear the burden of those crimes with which it is not consistent.

It was once the glory of the Protestant Religion, that it taught subjects to account the persons of their princes sacred and inviolable; supreme to all under God, and accountable to none but him and, possibly, this one doctrine hath been no small advantage to make it gain so much ground in so short a space. But, now, our adversaries triumph in the shame of our profession, when the most notorious regicides, who not only avow the doctrine, but publicly perpetrate the fact of deposing and killing a king, are found among those, who pretended to be at the greatest distance from Romish principles and practices.

There is, indeed, a great difference between the doctrine of a Schism, and the doctrine of a Church; between the practice of a Nation, and the practice of a prevalent Faction in the nation. And, blessed be God, we have this still left to silence the recriminations of all antichristian adversaries, that, to depose and assassinate kings, is not the doctrine of the Protestant Church, but of the Romish Synagogue. And, as it was not the doctrine of the Church, but of a Schism: so neither was it the fact of the Nation, but of a rebellious and prevailing Faction in it; nor could their armed violence reach the head, till they had first destroyed the body both of Church and State.

But it is not the work of this day to excuse any; but to stir up all to bemoan this bloody and horrid crime: a crime, the most horrid and accursed, that ever was acted under the sun, but only when a miracle eclipsed it from looking on. Though the histories of all nations abound with the sad tragedies of their lawful princes assassinated by their subjects: yet we may still remark, that their wickedness was either so timorous or so

modest, as to endeavour to hide the blood they shed; and durst not be otherwise guilty, but with those advantages of night and secrecy, which might make them appear innocent.

But, here, royal and sacred blood is theatrically spilt; and the fact avowed by the impudent pomp and solemnity of villainy. Villainy so profligate, that it scorned to proceed in a clandestine manner: but, as it was resolved to out-do all the examples of former regicides; so to outface all, that should dare to oppose or condemn it. And, therefore, to add ceremony and scorn to murder, they erect a pageantry of justice: summon the Throne to appear before the Bar; arraign Majesty, before which awe and reverence should have made them tremble; condemn him for their own crimes; and execute that wicked sentence, with all the ostentation that triumphant spite and malice could

invent.

And that, which makes all this the more odious and execrable; all this was transacted under forms of justice, and specious pretexts of the glory of God and the interests of religion. Here, the Faith bleeds, together with the Defender of it: religion itself suffers, by the vile hypocrisy of those, who pretended to a higher strain of godliness in practice and reformation in discipline, than yet the world had ever known. And it is likely to suffer an eternal reproach, so long as there are any Popish Blasphemers, to cast it into the teeth of Protestants, that they never thought their religion pure enough, till it was washed in the blood of a Christian King, of the same profession with themselves. O prodigy of wickedness! that ever justice should be pretended to the committing of a crime so full of dread and horror, that it might well puzzle and nonplus justice how to punish it, and mercy how to forgive it! that ever the increase of true piety and the advancement of the honour of religion, should be made a colour to the shedding the blood of a king; a fact, that gave religion the most mortal wound that ever it received, since it was first planted in the world by the blood of our Saviour! And yet those sacred names, the Purity of Worship, the Reformation of Abuses, the Honour and Glory of God, Law and Justice, and the due Liberty of the Subject, must be made a stale by those men (who could not else have successfully acted such a devilish part, unless they appeared like angels of light) to promote an impiety, whose direct design and natural consequence was to overthrow and root them all out: and, when they had cast out and slaughtered, not only their

brethren, but their common father, set up their cry with those hypocrites in Isaiah, Now the Lord be glorified: Is. lxvi. 5.

And as this fact was in itself most impious, so it was most fatal in all its train of consequents. Nothing, but ruins and mischiefs; extortion, distraction, sacrilege, injustice, the blood of many and the tears of all; personal, domestic, and public evils; rents and divisions at home, scorn and contempt abroad; have almost ever since followed, one upon the neck of another: and, would to God they were so little felt and known, as to need recounting! Nor, indeed, was it fit, that so horrid a crime. should have any better attendants. And, truly, how could it be otherwise, where oppression and violence were the only legis lative power? where anarchy and tyranny, the two extremes of government, were always striving for the upper hand? where our lives, liberties, and estates depended only upon the rude vote of the sword! Our laws, the common fence and security of the nation, and every man's best and richest patrimony, were themselves outlawed by the private interests of a few ambitious malecontents: our Church rent in pieces by schisms, errors, heresies, damnable doctrines of devils; not only publicly broached, but publicly patronized too.

And, yet, some easy minds are ready to think those times happy, because of the liberty, or rather indeed the licentiousness, of religion. But, was religion indeed in so good a plight, when, in a junto, the necessity and usefulness of the ministry was put to the question? when learning, religion, and the holy and precious ordinances of God depended upon the rotten breath of a company of men of rotten and corrupt minds, whose gain was their godliness, and who had nothing holy belonging to them but what they got by sacrilege? Was religion in so good a plight, when we daily feared an interdict upon our public assemblies? when the solemn worship of God was interrupted and affronted, by every one, that had but impudence and enthusiasm enough to do it? Nay, indeed religion was vanished into canting phrases, into an empty and notional profession; and that very profession, dwindled away into innumerable sects and schisms, errors, and heresies; that, certainly, none can think it was in a prosperous condition, but those, who think religion then prospers, when it is not much, but manifold. Those, who tolerated every sect, every opinion and religion, seemed so to carry themselves, as if within a while they would have expelled the true; for, certainly, when once men in power

can allow of false doctrines, the next step is to embrace them; the next, to impose them.

away

Yea, the fickleness and instability of our usurped governments, which might give us hope of relief, proved only the frequent renewing of our misery: one power still succeeding another, in the same design; all seeking to advance themselves, upon the ruins of the public *. I remember an Apologue of an ulcerated man: when his friends would have driven swarm of flies that had been long sucking his sores, "Let them alone," saith he: " these are pretty well sated; but if you drive them away, fresh ones will come, with fresh appetites, and more torment me." So, truly, it fared with us, in our tosses and change of governments: when one swarm of our governors had their greediness and avarice somewhat glutted, then were we consigned over unto another; who ate the very flesh of these nations, and drank their tears and blood. Yea, and what was both the reproach and aggravation of our misery, those flies were but the offspring of dirt and dunghills: our plague was like that of Egypt, the very dust of the earth crawled upon us: the meanest of the people were our rulers: and, out of those brambles, proceeded fire, that consumed the cedars of Lebanon. And, according to the pedigree of our princes, such were our priests and teachers: if any could but prate nonsense, and prove it by blasphemy, this was a sufficient consecration into the office: this was enough to make him a most admired light, who indeed was but an ignis fatuus; leading the silly and deluded rout, through the bogs and precipices of error and heresy, into perdition.

This was the posture both of Church and State, in those blessed times of Religion and Liberty, which they so much boast of! and which were so highly advanced by those men's zealous endeavours, that they were grown quite out of reach, and almost out of sight: and, had not God, by a miracle of divine mercy, interposed, within a while we should neither have had the face nor the name of Religion or Liberty left amongst us. But he infatuated their counsels, and defeated their designs; and, when there was no visible power to break them, he dashed them in pieces one against the other, till they mutually brake themselves. So let all thine enemies perish, O Lord. But

* Haud parcit populis regnum breve. Stat.