The King's Commissioners Reply in two several Papers next following. 2. Feb.
[ XLI] VVE conceive there was no cause your Lordships should apprehend any loss of time occasioned by our Questions, for that your Propositions concerning Religion were not delivered to us till Friday last, and the Directory then delivered with them, so long, that the reading of it spent the residue of that day, and divers other Papers to which the Propositions referred, and without which we could not consider them, were not delivered us before yesterday, and some of them not till after the Paper which imputes a delay to us; and your Lordships having propounded only general heads of a Presbyterial Government, without any particular Model of it, which in several Reformed Churches (as we are informed) is various both in Names and Powers, it was necessary to understand the particular expressions in your Paper, the Alteration desired being so great, and being proposed to be enacted, which will require His Majesty's Consent, whom we ought to satisfie, having so great a Trust reposed in us. And we desire your Lordships to consider how impossible it hath been for us to give your Lordships, in less than two days, a full Answer (which in your last Paper you require) to what you propose, which is in effect to consent to the utter abolishing of that Government, Discipline and publick Form of the Worship of God, which hath been practised and established by Law here ever since the Refor∣mation; and which we well understand, and the Alteration of which in the manner proposed, takes away many things in the Civil Government, and provides no remedy for the Inconveniences which may happen thereby: And to consent to the Alienation of the Lands of the Church, by which (for ought appears) besides infinite other Considerations, so many Persons may be put to beg their Bread, to oblige His Majesty and all His Subjects to the taking a new Oath or Covenant, and to