they have all had the effect of it, except such who, upon examination and inquiry, appeared not worthy of it; and such who, though they are pardoned, cannot yet think themselves worthy to be preferred. His majesty well knows that, by this Act, he hath gratified and obliged many worthy and pious men, who have contributed much to his Restoration, and who shall always receive fresh evidence of his majesty's favour and kindness; but he is not sure that he may not likewise have gratified some, who did neither contribute to his coming in, nor are yet glad that he is in: how comes it else to pass, that he reSermons in the city and in the country, in which all industry is used to alienate the affections of the people, and to infuse jealousies into them of the king and his government, They talk of introducing Popery, of evil coun

pardon, the poor man was so elated with the triumph he was going unto, with the Glory of Martyrdom, that he refused to be reconciled unto him; upon which he was disappointed of his end, and for this uncharitableness the spirit of God immediately forsook him, and he apostatized from the faith.-Let all those who are too proud of having been, as they think, less faulty than other men, and so are unwilling to be reconciled to those who have offended them, take heed of the apostacy of Nicephorus, and that those fumes of envy and uncharitableness, and murmuring, do not so far transport and intoxicate them, that they fall into those very crimes they value them-ceives such frequent information of seditious selves for having hitherto declined.--But, my lords and gentlemen, whilst we conspire together to execute faithfully this part of the Bill, to put all old names and terms of distinction into utter Oblivion, let us not find new names and terms to keep up the same, or a worse dis-sellors, and such other old calumnies as are tinction. If the old reproaches of Cavalier, and pardoned by this Act of Indemnity.-His maRound-Head, and Malignant, be committed jesty told you when he was last here, what to the grave, let us not find more significant rigour and severity he will hereafter use, how and better words, to signify worse things; let contrary soever it is to his nature, in these not piety and godliness grow into terms of re- cases, and conjured you, my lords and gentleproach, and distinguish between the court, and men, to concur with him in this just and necesthe city, and the country; and let not piety sary severity: which I am sure you will do with and godliness be measured by a morosity in your utmost vigilance, and that you will bemanners, an affectation of gesture, a new modelieve that too much ill cannot befall those who and tone of speaking; at least, let not our do the best they can to corrupt his majesty's constitutions and complexions make us be nature, and to extinguish his mercy.-My thought of a contrary party; and because we Lords and Gentlemen; I told you I was to achave not an affected austerity in our looks, quaint you with some things his majesty intends that we have not piety in our hearts. Very to do during this recess, that you may see he merry men have been very godly men; and if will give no intermission to his own thoughts a good conscience be a continual feast, there is for the public good, though for a time he disno reason but men may be very merry at it. penses with your assistance. He doth conYou, Mr. Speaker, have this day made a noble sider the infinite importance the improvement present to the king. Do you think that if you of Trade must be to this kingdom, and thereand your worthy companions had brought it fore his majesty intends, forthwith, to establish up with folded arms, down-cast looks, with a Council for Trade, consisting of some princisighs and other instances of desperation, it pal merchants of the several Companies, to would not have been a very melancholic pre- which he will add some gentlemen of quality sent? Have not your frank and dutiful expres- and experience; and, for their greater honour sions, that chearfulness and vivacity in your and encouragement, some of my lords of his looks, rendered it much more acceptable, own privy council.-In the next place, his much more valuable? No prince in christen- majesty hopes that, by a well-settled Peace, dom loves a chearful giver so well as God Al- and God's great blessing upon him and you, mighty does; and he, of all gifts, a chearful this nation will in a short time flourish to that heart. And therefore. I pray, let not a cloudy degree, that the land of Canaan did, when Esau and disconsolate face be the only or the best found it necessary to part from his brother. sign of piety and devotion in the heart. must ask your pardon for misplacing much of this discourse, which I should have mentioned when I came to speak of the Ministers Bill; they, I hope, will endeavour to remove these new marks of distinction and reproaches, and keep their auditories from being imposed upon by such characters and descriptions. The king hath passed this Act very willingly, and hath done much to the end of this act before; yet hath willingly admitted you to be sharers and partners with him in the obligation. I may say, confidently, his majesty hath never denied his confirmation to any man in possession who hath asked it; and

For their riches were more than that they might dwell together, and the land wherein they were could not bear them, because of their cattle. We have been ourselves very near this pinnacle of happiness, and the hope and contemplation that we may be so again, disposes the king to be very solicitous for the improvement and prosperity of his Plantations abroad, where there is such large room for the industry and reception of such who shall desire to go thither. And therefore his majesty likewise intends to erect and establish a Council for those Plantations, in which persons, well qualified, shall be wholly intent upon the good and advancement of those plantations.-There

The King's Declaration concerning Ecclesi- | astical Affairs.] During the recess of parliament, the king issued the following Declaration:

"His Majesty's DECLARATION to all his loving Subjects of his Kingdom of England and Dominion of Wales, concerning Ecclesiastical Affairs.

pose somewhat for the propagation of it, that will satisfy the world, that we have always made it both our care and our study, and have enough observed what is most like to bring disadvantage to it. And, the truth is, we do think ourself the more competent to propose, and, with God's assistance, to determine, many things now in difference, from the time we have spent, and the experience we have had, in most of the Reformed Churches abroad, in France, in the Low Countries, and in Germany; where we have had frequent conferences with the most learned men, who have unanimously lamented the great reproach the Protestant Religion undergoes from the distempers and too notorious schisms in matters of Religion in England: and as the most learned amongst them have always, with great submission and reverence, acknowledged and magni

"C. R. How much the peace of the State is concerned in the peace of the Church, and how difficult a thing it is to preserve order and government in Civil, whilst there is no order or government in Ecclesiastical affairs, is evident to the world; and this little part of the world, our own dominions, hath had so late experience of it, that we may very well acquiesce in the conclusion, without enlarging ourself in discourse upon it, it being a subject we have had frequent occasion to contemplate upon, and to lament abroad, as well as at home.—fied the established government of the Church In our Letter to the Speaker of the house of commons from Breda (p. 17), we declared how much we desired the advancement and propagation of the Protestant Religion: that neither the unkindness of those of the same faith towards us, nor the civilities and obligations from those of a contrary profession (of both which we have had abundant evidence) could, in the least degree, startle us, or make us swerve from it; and that nothing can be proposed to manifest our zeal and affection for it, to which we will not readily consent and we said then, That we did hope, in due time, ourself to pro

of England, and the great countenance and shelter the Protestant Religion received from it, before these unhappy times; so many of them have, with great ingenuity and sorrow, confessed, that they were too easily misled by misinformation and prejudice, into some disesteem of it, as if it had too much complied with the church of Rome; whereas, they now acknowledge it to be the best fence God bath yet raised against Popery in the world and we are persuaded they do, with great zeal, wish it restored to its old dignity aud veneration. When we were in Holland, we were

:

appeared the sovereign power of heaven. That He supported the same spirit upon his trial.he himself, agitated by doubts, had often, with Carew, a Millenarian, submitted to his trial, passionate tears, offered up his addresses to saving to our Lord Jesus Christ his right to the divine majesty, and earnestly sought for the government of these kingdoms. Some light and conviction: he had still received as- scrupled to say, according to form, that they surance of a heavenly sanction, and returned would be tried by God and their country; befrom these devout supplications with more se- cause God was not visibly present to judge rene tranquillity and satisfaction. That all the them. Others said, that they would be tried nations of the earth were, in the eyes of their by the word of God.-No more than six of the Creator, less than a drop of water in the late king's judges, IIarrison, Scot, Carew, Clebucket; nor were their erroneous judgments ment, Jones, and Scrope, were executed : aught but darkness, compared with divine il- Scrope alone, of all those who came in upon luminations. That these frequent illapses of the king's proclamation. He was a gentleman the divine spirit he could not suspect to be in- of good family and of a decent character: but terested illusions; since he was conscious, that it was proved, that he had a little before, in for no temporal advantage, would be offer in-conversation, expressed himself as if he were jury to the poorest man or woman that trod upon the earth. That all the allurements of ambition, all the terrors of imprisonment, had not been able, during the usurpation of Cromwell, to shake his steady resolution, or bend him to a compliance with that deceitful tyrant. And that when invited by him to sit on the right hand of the throne, when offered riches and splendour and dousinion, he had disdainedly rejected all temptations; and neglecting the tears of his friends and family, had still, through every danger, held fast his principles and his integrity.Scot, who was more a republican than a fanatic, had said a little before the Restoration, that he desired no other epitaph to be inscribed on his tomb-stone than this; Here lies Tho. Scot, who adjudged the king to death.'

no-wise convinced of any guilt in condemning the king. Axtel, who had guarded the high court of justice, Hacker, who commanded on the day of the king's execution, Coke, the solicitor for the people of England, and Hugh Peters, the fanatical preacher, who inflamed the army and impelled them to regicide: all these were tried, and condemned, and suffered with the king's judges. No saint or confessor ever went to martyrdom with more assured confidence of heaven than was expressed hy those criminals, even when the terrors of immediate death, joined to many indignities, were set before them. The rest of the king's judges, by an unexampled lenity, were reprieved; and they were dispersed into several prisons." Hume.

are doing all we can to wipe out the memory of all that hath been done amiss by other men, and, we thank God, have wiped it out of our own remembrance, have been ourself assaulted with those reproaches, which we will likewise forget. Since the printing this Declaration, several seditious Pamphlets and Queries have been published and scattered abroad, to infuse dislike and jealousies into the hearts of the people, and of the army; and some, who ought rather to have repented the former mischief they have wrought, than to have endea

attended by many grave and learned ministers from hence, who were looked upon as the most able and principal asserters of the Presbyterian opinions, with whom we had as much conference, as the multitude of affairs, which were then upon us, would permit us to have; and, to our great satisfaction and comfort, found them persons full of affection to us, of zeal for the peace of the Church and State, and neither enemies (as they have been given out to be) to Episcopacy or Liturgy; but modestly to desire such alterations in either, as, without shaking foundations, might best allay the pre-voured to improve it, have had the hardiness sent distempers, which the indisposition of the time, and the tenderness of some men's consciences, had contracted for the better doing whereof, we did intend, upon our first arrival in this kingdom, to call a Synod of Divines, as. the most proper expedient to provide a proper remedy for all those differences and dissatisfactions which had, or should arise in matters of Religion; and, in the mean time, we published, in our Declaration from Breda, a liberty to tender consciences; and that no man should be disquieted or called in question for differences of opinion in matter of religion, which do not disturb the peace of the kingdom; and that we shall be ready to consent to such an act of parliament as, upon mature deliberation, shall be offered to us for the full granting of that indulgence.-Whilst we continued in this temper of mind and resolution, and have so far complied with the persuasion of particular persons, and the distemper of the times, as to be contented with the exercise of our religion in our own chapel, according to the constant practice and laws established, without enjoining that practice, and the observation of those laws, in the churches of the kingdom, in which we have undergone the censure of many, as if we were without that zeal for the church which we ought to have, and which by God's grace, we shall always retain, we have found ourself not so candidly dealt with as we have deserved; and that there are unquiet and restless spirits, who, without abating any of their own distemper, in recompence of the moderation they find in us, continue their bitterness against the church, and endeavour to raise jealousies of us, and to lessen our reputation by their reproaches, as if we were not true to the professions we have made. And, in order thereunto, they have very unseasonably caused to be printed, published, and dispersed throughout the kingdom, a Declaration heretofore printed in our name, during the time of our being in Scotland, of which we shall say no more than that the circumstances, by which we were enforced to sign that Declaration, are enough known to the world; and that the worthiest and greatest part of that nation did even then detest and abhor the ill usage of us in that particular, when the same tyranny was exercised there by the power of a few ill men, which, at that time, had spread itself over this kingdom; and therefore we had no reason to expect that we should, at this season, when we

to publish, That the doctrine of the Church, against which no man with whom we have conferred hath excepted, ought to be reformed as well as the discipline.-This over-passionate and turbulent way of proceeding, and the impatience we find in many for some speedy determination in these matters, whereby the minds of men may be composed, and the peace of the Church established, hath prevailed with us to invert the method we had proposed to ourself, and even, in order to the better calling and composing of a Synod (which the present jealousies will hardly agree upon) by the assistance of God's blessed spirit, which we daily invoke and supplicate, to give some determination ourself to the matters in difference, until such a Synod may be called as may, without passion or prejudice, give us such farther assistance towards a perfect union of affections, as well as submission to authority, as is necessary: and we are the rather induced to take this upon us, by finding, upon the full conference we have had with the learned men of several persuasions, that the mischiefs, under which both the Church and State do at present suffer, do not result from any formed doctrine or conclusion which either party maintains or avows; but from the passion, appetite, and interest of particular persons, who contract greater prejudice to each other from those affections, than would naturally rise from their opinions; and those distempers must be in some degree allayed, before the meeting in a Synod can be attended with better success than their meeting in other places, and their discourses in pulpits have hitherto been; and till all thoughts of victory are laid aside, the humble and necessary thoughts for the vindication of truth cannot be enough entertained.We must, for the honour of all those of either persuasion with whom we have conferred, declare, That the professions and desires of all, for the advancement of piety and true godliness, are the same; their professions of zeal for the peace of the church, the same; of affection and duty to us, the same: they all approve Episcopacy; they all approve a set Form of Liturgy; and they all disapprove and dislike the sin of sacrilege, and the alienation of the revenue of the Church. And if upon these excellent foundations, in submission to which there is such a harmony of affections, any superstructures should be raised, to the shaking those foundations, and to the contract

ing and lessening the blessed gift of charity, | piness of the kingdom: and therefore we have which is a vital part of Christian religion, we not the least doubt but that the present shall think ourself very unfortunate, and even Bishops will think the present concessions, suspect that we are defective in that adminis- now made by us to allay the present distempers, tration of government with which God hath very just and reasonable, and will very chearentrusted us. We need not profess the high fully conform themselves thereunto.-1. We affection and esteem we have for the Church do in the first place declare our purpose and of England, as it is established by law, the resolution is, and shall be, to promote the reverence to which hath supported us, with power of godliness, to encourage the exercises God's blessing, against many temptations; of Religion both public and private, and to nor do we think that reverence in the least take care that the Lord's Day be applied to degree diminished by our condescensions, not holy exercises, without unnecessary divertiseperemptorily to insist on some particulars of ments; and that insufficient, negligent, and ceremony; which, however introduced by the scandalous ministers, be not permitted in the piety, devotion, and order of former times, Church. And that as the present Bishops are may not be so agreeable to the present; but known to be men of great and exemplary piety may even lessen that piety and devotion, for in their lives, which they have manifested in the improvement whereof they might haply be their notorious and unexampled sufferings first introduced, and consequently may well be during these late distempers, and of great and dispensed with and we hope this charitable known sufficiency of learning; so we shall compliance of ours will dispose the minds of take special care, by the assistance of God, all men to a chearful submission to that authoto prefer no men to that office and charge, rity, the preservation whereof is so necessary but men of learning, virtue, and piety, who for the unity and peace of the Church, and may be themselves the best examples to those that they will acknowledge the support of the who are to be governed by them; and we Episcopal authority to be the best support of shall expect, and provide the best we can, that Religion, by being the best means to contain the Bishops be frequent preachers, and that the minds of men within the rules of govern- they do very often preach themselves in some ment. And they who would restrain the church of their diocese, except they be hinexercise of that holy function within the rules dered by sickness or other bodily infirmities, or which were observed in the primitive times, some other justifiable occasion; which shall not must remember and consider, that the eccle- be thought justifiable if it be frequent.-2. Besiastical power, being in those blessed times cause the Dioceses, especially some of them, are always subordinate and subject to the civil, it thought to be of too large extent, we will was likewise proportioned to such an extent of appoint such a number of Suffragan Bishops in jurisdiction as was most agreeable to that. every diocese, as shall be sufficient for the due And as the sanctity, simplicity, and resignation performance of their work.-3. No Bishop of that age, did then refer many things to the shall ordain, or exercise any part of jurisdicBishops, which the policy of succeeding ages tion, which appertains to the censures of the would not admit, at least did otherwise pro- Church, without the advice and assistance of vide for; so it can be no reproach to primitive the presbyters; and no chancellor, commisEpiscopacy, if, where there have been great sary, or official, as such, shall exercise any act alterations in the civil government from what of spiritual jurisdiction in these cases, viz. exwas then, there have been likewise some diffe- communication, absolution, or wherein any of rence and alteration in the ecclesiastical, the the ministry are concerned, with reference to essence and foundation being still preserved. their pastoral charge. However, our intent And upon this ground, without taking upon us and meaning is, to uphold and maintain the to censure the government of the church in profession of the civil law, so far, and in such other countries, where the government of the matters, as it hath been of use and practice state is different from what it is here, or en- within our kingdoms and dominions: albeit, as larging ourself upon the reasons why, whilst to excommunication, our will and pleasure is, there was an imagination of erecting a demo- That no chancellor, commissary, or official, cratical government here in the state, they shall decree any sentence of excommunication should be willing to continue an aristocratical or absolution, or be judges in those things government in the church; it shall suffice to wherein any of the ministry are concerned, as say, that since, by the wonderful blessing of is aforesaid. Nor shall the archdeacon exerGod, the hearts of this whole nation are re- cise any jurisdiction without the advice and turned to an obedience to monarchial govern- assistance of six ministers of his archdeaconry, ment in the state, it must be very reasonable whereof 3 to be nominated by the bishop, and to support that government in the church 3 by the election of the major part of the preswhich is established by law, and with which byters within the archdeaconry.-4. To the the monarchy hath flourished through so many end that the Deans and Chapters may be the ages, and which is in truth as antient in this better fitted to afford counsel and assistance to island as the Christian monarchy thereof; and the bishops, both in ordination and the other which hath always, in some respects or degrees, offices mentioned before, we will take care been enlarged or restrained, as hath been that those preferments be given to the most thought most conducing to the peace and hap- learned and pious presbyters of the diocese ;