Hiera dakrya, Ecclesiae anglicanae suspiria, The tears, sighs, complaints, and prayers of the Church of England setting forth her former constitution, compared with her present condition : also the visible causes and probable cures of her distempers : in IV books / by John Gauden ...

CHAP. XXVII.

IT was a speech in old times of better significancy than sound, Luxus Clericorum Laus est Laicorum,* 1.1 The Splendour or Pomp of the Clergy was the Praise and Honour of the Laity: not that Church-men should at any time be rio∣tous and luxurious in their greatest abundance; but it is the com∣mendation of Christian people (as indeed of all men) so to entertain the Ministers of their God, and Dispensers of their Religion (special∣ly in times of peace and a Land of plenty) as may set them and their Profession furthest off from Poverty, and its inseparable companion, vulgar contempt; that Church-men might have, not onely wherewith to keep up the outward Decency & Majesty of Religion, but to maintain themselves and their families, at such a proportion as may extend to charity, liberality and hospitality. The habits and exercises of which vertues become no mens Hearts, Hands and Houses, better than Christian Ministers and Rulers of the Church: nothing more confir∣ming the Doctrine they teach of Gods munificence to mankind, than their living so, as to be ever giving; Religion is never so acceptable to common people, as when they not onely hear the Word and see the Ceremony, but taste the sweetnesse and substance of it in the reall fruits of its bounty.

Which pious Policy and charitable Craft in former dayes kept up the credit of Religion, both while it was Roman and when it was Re∣formed, to as high a pitch in England, as in any Nation under Hea∣ven; while the Clergy enjoyed those blessings of Gods and mans Donation, which enabled many an one of them to build and endow many such noble foundations of Churches, Colledges, Hospitals, and Almes-houses, that any one of them now goes beyond all that ever sacrilegious spirits did or designed, either for Gods honour or mans benefit, if all their good works and thoughts were summed up and put together, (though indeed those men are uncapable of doing any good work, as to Charity, who are guilty of sacred Robbery; stoln Sacrifices were not to be consecrated to God,* 1.2 no more than dead car∣kases.) Every History of England shews at large what good and great works Bishops and other Church-men in England did, not onely in their Papal Celebacy, but in their Primitive and later Conjugacy; fruits indeed of pious and Princely Magnificence; such as now nei∣ther the joint abilities of the indigent and peeled Clergy, nor the gripple charity of whole Counties can or will so much as keep up or repair; no not so much as to the very fabrick of those fair Churches, which were the honour of Cities, Counties, and the whole Na∣tion.

Whose vast Revenues being taken away both from Churches and Church-men, no wonder if the sordid vastations of them and their deplorable decayes, as that of S. Pauls in London, and of Ely-Min∣ster

in that Isle, every where appear as shamefull, scandalous, and pro∣digious Spectacles to all ingenuous persons, to Papists both at home and abroad; also to all Forraigners, Christian, Mahometan, or Hea∣then, who come into this Island, who may easily see such sights, as rather proclaim Saracenism, Barbarism, and Atheisme, than such a sense of Christianisme as possessed our noble Progenitors, who were ashamed to seem base and niggardly toward a bountifull God and Saviour. Every City in England, besides other Towns, had such stately and durable monuments of pristine Piety and Charity in them, as were hardly to be destroyed by the malice of Time, in many Centuries, if the sacrilegious petulancy and malice of Man had not so assaulted them in these last few years, that the care of learned and ingenuous men is now how to preserve their Memories and goodly Fabricks, in the Pictures, and printed Types or Effigies of them; whose beautifull Structures are daily threated with everlasting and ir∣reparable ruines.

I am the more sensibly sorry and ashamed, to see these deplorable and execrable ruines, because I know they are great reproches to my Countrey, as well as to the Reformed Religion professed in this Church. The better sort of English people were ever esteemed as Valiant, as Generous, as Munificent, as Charitable, as Hospitable, as Pious, and as Devout, as any civill people under Heaven: I know not by what evil fate or genius we are now so changed, that many men do not onely repine and envy at all plenty and splendor, bestow∣ed on Churches and Church-men, nor do they onely suffer, through lazinesse and neglect, those goodly Temples to lapse and de∣cay; but they do with covetous hearts, and cruell hands, industri∣ously seek to strip and pull them both down: which, I am perswa∣ded, no Christian under Heaven, either Greeks or Latines, Russians or Abissines, Georgians or Armenians, Reformed or Roman, would e∣ver either act or permit, if they had the honour to enjoy such state∣ly Houses of God among them; they would infinitely disdain to ap∣pear so degenerous from the patterns of paternall piety.

Yea I should injure the very Jewes, Turks, Persians, Tartars, Indi∣ans, and Chineses, if I should believe they would suffer such stately Edifices, being dedicated to the service and honour of their Gods, to run to ruine; if they were masters of them, doubtlesse they would both preserve and imploy them to such uses as they thought holy. Yet these are the beames that afflict some mens eyes in Eng∣land, these the Camels they long to swallow down, under the preten∣ded hunger and thirst of special Reformations; whose impudent appe∣tites have dared of late years publickly to petition the demolishing of all Church-edifices whatsoever, pretending they have been guilty of superstitious abuses: which (if so) is yet the fault of the Persons, not the Places, which are (without doubt) as capable to be consecrated by pious uses and holy duties, as desecrated by any past superstitious abuses: besides, no publick Edifices of Churches should, upon this ac∣count, ever be preserved in the changes incident to the various opi∣nions

and perswasions, the outward modes and fashions of Religion; every form seeming to such as differ from it to have in it something either impious, superfluous, or superstitious, by its Antiquity or its Novelty, by its omissions or admissions.

If these sad and sordid spectacles, which have so foul an aspect of sacrilegious profanenesse in respect of our materiall Churches (which are the most visible tokens and publick badges of religious Honour and Reverence in any Nation) if these cannot but scandalize and scare any sober & ingenuous Papist, from any thought or inclination to approve or adhere to any such immoderate & immodest Reformations; how much more will any honest-hearted Romanist loath and abhorre the very name of such Reformers, as he sees daily spitting upon, and casting dirt in the faces of their own Fathers, the Bishops and Ministers of their Christian and Reformed Religion, so much heretofore authori∣sed & reverenced by the voice of the whole Nation in its Parlaments? whom yet some men have not only sought to lop & crop to the very stub (as to former endowments of Estate and Honour) but they aim (still in order to farther Reformations) to grub up the very roots of all Religion and Learning, of Civility and Sanctity: they would depo∣pulate and desolate the very Nurseries and Schools of able Scholars, excellent Preachers, sage Counsellours and prudent Governours, both in Church and State: all Universities, Colledges and Free-schools, must be robbed of their Lands and Revenues; there want not those who long to see them confiscated, and to make private pur∣chases of them; who would fain have leave to treat the Colledges and Scholars in them, as Beares are wont to do the poore Bees, when with their rude and mercilesse pawes they teare in pieces and over∣throw their hives, that they may plunder them of their honey. Which abomination of utter desolation had ere this befaln all Scholars, as well Lay-men as Clergy-men, in England, if Gods good providence had not set some bounds to the endlesse projects of sacrilegious Reformers, by the Moderation, Learning, Justice, Generosity and Prudence of those, whose great power, and greater minds, were (onely) capable to curb that plebeian petulancy and mechanick importunity, which not content to have taken away the liberall mangers and large provender of faire Estates and Honours from the Clergy of England (with which all were dignified, though but few enjoyed them) have further sought to muzzle the mouths of the most laborious Oxen, grudging the meanest and painfullest Ministers (who are generally so lean, that they are reduced to skin and bone) the tenuity yet left them of Hay, Straw and Stubble; any thing of setled and secure Maintenance, in their little, and many times litigious, livings. Which cruelty, however at present it would infinitely gratifie and fatten the Popish party, to see all Ministers and Scholars (which are the light and life, the rationall part and intellect, the very soul and spirit of any Nation) in such a Reformed Church as England was, thus treat∣ed and abased; yet they cannot but stomack and scorn all Reforma∣tion, that hath such scratches of sacrilegious Cruelties and rapacious

Practises, which are as the Mothes of Religion, the very Mice and Rats of Reformation, the effects not of piety and purity, but of en∣vy and fury, great rocks of offence to all sober men, to all good Christians, to all ingenuous Papists, setting them (no doubt) at ever∣lasting distances and defiances from all Reformations of Religion, which have such brands of Covetousnesse, Contempt, Sacriledge, injustice and confusion upon them.

When these two precipicious Rocks, and high Cliffs of distance, can be closed, between which lyeth that deep Gulph of mutuall anti∣pathie, hatred and abhorrence, which keeps sober Protestants and moderate Papists from passing over or conversing, as Christians, one with another; When (on the one side) the Romanists will not be ashamed, ingenuously to own, and consciensciously to reforme, such things as are evidently and grosly amisse, yea confessedly such, if Scripture, Antiquity, Catholick and Primitive Testimony, yea and many of their own best Authors may be Judges, (such as are (for example) The taking away the cup from Christian people, The pe∣remptory defining the manner of Christs presence in the Sacrament, and imposing an explicite belief of it contrary to all senses, common reason, and Scripture Analogy, The worshipping of any creature, or God under the form of it, as in Bread, Images, Angels, Saints, Reliques, The fallacious pedling with Indulgences and Purgatory, The adding to the Scripture-Canon, The imposing new articles of faith, besides other intolerable practises of Papall arrogancy and Tyranny, carried on by Jesuitick Policies, Principles and Practises, against all rules of Morality and Piety, Honor and Humanity;) when these, and some of the like rank leaven, are recanted and remo∣ved from the Roman party;

On the other side, when the Protestants and all that pretend to any name of Reformation shall be ashamed, under any cloak of Piety or Christian Liberty, either to rob from God and his Church, from his service, and speciall servants the Ministers of the Gospell, or not to restore to them what is theirs by all Lawes, Divine and Humane, by right of Testamentary Donation, by religious consecration, by civill sanction and confirmation, by long use and peaceable fruition, no way forfeitable by Man, or alienable from God, whose the fee, right and property is, as a gratitude and homage payed to the Honour, Worship and service of his great Name; When Papists forbear their Superstitious Sacriledge, and Protestants their Covetous Sacri∣ledge; when the first restore the Truth, Purity, and Integrity of Christian Religion, which they have long detained in unrighteous∣nesse; when the other restores that Order, Honour, and Estate, which belongs to the support and government, the decency and Ma∣jesty of Christ, his Church, and true Religion:

Then, and not before, may we expect some happy close among these so divided Western Churches, whom first Papall policy and pride, now Plebian loosenesse and insolency, on all sides factious and schismaticall, covetous and cruell practises, have now no lesse

divided than former different Doctrines, opinions and ceremonies did, the reconciliation of which many learned and peaceable men have se∣riously studied, soberly proposed, and charitably endeavoured. The want, & almost despaire now (without multiplied Miracles) of which most desirable atonement, & the sad consequences which must needs attend the continuance and increase of desperate defiances, im∣placable violences, and cruell immoderations on all sides, these, these (I say) are calamities more deplorable than any that a Chri∣stians eyes can behold in all the world, since they are at once the sin, shame, and misery of Christendom; besides the scandall and scorn of all the world. It being a farre sadder sight, to see Christians thus rob and spoile, thus worry and wound one another, than to see them persecuted by Heathens and Infidels, Jewes and Mahometans: as it is farre more horrid to see men fighting with one another, than beasts; or brethren, than strangers. Without any doubt, the mutuall animosities and barbarities exercised by Christians on all sides, as they will in time open a doore for Turkish power to prevaile against them, so (meane while) it makes Christians turn Turkes one against another. Besides that these unchristian Practises on all sides do leave not onely the looser sort of men and women to an Atheisticall indif∣ferency as to any Religion; but the more sober and just Christians on every side (Protestants and Papists) are so scandalized and perplex∣ed, that they do not wel know what course of Religion to hold, nor how to steere between the grosse errors on the one side, and the base rapines on the other: It being an hard choice for a serious and honest Christian, whether he should keep Communion with superstitious and Idolatrous Papists, or with schismaticall and sacrilegious Prote∣stants; the one refusing to be justly reformed, the other deform∣ing even Reformation it self.

Amidst which miserable distances and disadvantages of Christian Religion, this sad event and burden of the Lord may be too easily foretold by one of the smallest Prophets, That as Atheisme, Profane∣nesse and Irreligion is like to get ground on all sides, through the de∣formities, immoderations, varieties, & inconsistencies of Religion, so (to be sure) the Papall party, repute & interest will daily prevaile every where, (as of later yeares it hath) against those of the Protestant and Reformed profession: since they see even the most famous, setled and flourishing Church of England, (which was the Mirror of Reformation, the noblest standard of Religion, the ablest Antagonist against Ro∣mish pride and superstition in all the world,) this, even this, sought now to be so reduced, so battered and divided, so peeled and spoiled, distressed, deformed, dissipated and despised; and this even by those that pretend high to Reformation, which must, they say, be attained and perfected by utter devesting, even this so famous a Church, and its deserving Clergy, of their former Honour and Estate, Order and Government, Authority and Dignity, Revenues and Reputa∣tion, Uniformity and Unity; all which heretofore they enjoyed by the mercy of God, and good will of such Princes and Peers, Par∣laments

and People, as were the best Christians and best reformed, who justly abhorred those sacrilegious and sharking arts, which make either Religion or Reformation▪ Preachers or true Professors, ei∣ther avaritious, or beggerly and necessitous; which their Wisdome and Piety knew would be the way to undermine and obstruct all true Religion and progresse of Reformation; all experience teaching us, that mankind is naturally prone rather to follow liberall Errours than niggardly Truths: few men will adhere to hungry Holinesse and fami∣shing Reformations, such as some men have designed and vehement∣ly agitated of late years in England, little (God knows) to the credit or advance of any true Reformation.

It cannot then but be most evident to you (O my noble Countrey∣men) and to all wise men, that as the sad condition of the Church of England at once pleaseth and hardneth the Romanists (who are glad to see her thus wasted, though they abhor the means and methods of her misery;) so the reall interest of the true Reformed Religion in England seems now much weaker than ever it was, much more exposed to the objections and obloquies, the Policies and Practices of pragmatick Jesuits and other spitefull Papists, who with infinite Industry, with all Arts and Alacrity▪ daily undermine all the re∣maining parts, yea and the very foundation as well as the reputation of all reformed Religion in the hearts of the people of England. Doubtlesse, if Popish Priests, which are men of learning and sober lives, had liberty in publick to promote their party, they would draw most men and women after them, in the Novelties, Distracti∣ons, Confusions and Deformities of Religions, yea and of Reforma∣tions here in England, in despite of all the orderly and Orthodox Clergy yet left in England: so little would they consider any stop or impediment, that either Presbytery or Independency, Scotl. or New-Engl. can give them, who have all been made active and contributive to their own shame, and to the generall ruine of this Church, and consequent∣ly to the reall advantages of Popery, which professeth great unifor∣mity and constancy in their Religion. Nor can the subtil factors for the Papacy but expect and hope by degrees, in a few years, to bring in again into England, the justly feared and abhorred Inundations of the Sea of Rome, in its superstitions and usurpations: against both which our wise and pious progenitors, both since and before the Re∣formation, did in many Parlaments make severall cautions, provisions, Premunire's, and sanctions, to preserve the liberty, honour, and purity of the Church of England.

For they well knew, that the secular interests and Ecclesiastick de∣signes of the Church and Court of Rome ever have been, and still are carried on with a mighty tide and strong current, not onely of Papal authority and popular credulity, as of old, but of Learning, Eloquence, Riches, Honor, Power, Pomp, Policy, yea & with great plausibilities of Piety, Sanctity, Unity and Charity, of later Ages. All which po∣pular and potent biasses will easily and unavoidably over-beaer, in time (as to the generality of people) all those feeble resistances or

oppositions that can be made by such an equivocall generation and du∣bious succession of poor, despised and dispirited Ministers, whatever they are, whether of Episcopall, Presbyterian, or Independent chara∣cters; who in great part naked and unarmed, unfed and unstudied, reduced to a sneaking and starveling habitude, both of Body and Mind, of Honour and Estate, will prove pitifull Champions for the true Reformed Religion, when they shall neither have just Ability nor justifiable Authority, to assert the true and just measures of Re∣ligion and true Reformation. Who is there that in after-Ages will adventure his Soul & his Religion with those men & Ministers, that can have neither Learning nor Livelihood capable to bear up with their spirits and parties, or the Authority and Honour of their cal∣ling; especially when they are to encounter with such sons of Anak, such Zanzummims and Goliahs, who will ever appear on the Papall side, to defie all Reformation that seems to reproch their defor∣mities?

Alas, will not the predicant (or rather mendicant) Patrons of so divi∣ded Religion and deformed parts of Reformation, seem in their own eyes (unlesse they be strangely swelled with the puffe and breath of Popularity) but as Zanies and Dwarfs, as Grasse-hoppers before them, with their thred-bare Coats, hungry Bellies, and servile Spirits? How will these that never had means or leisure to advance their studies of Divinity or practise of preaching beyond a modern Synopsis and an English Concordance, being raw and infants in dogmatick Truths, perfect strangers to Polemick, Historick, and Scholastick Divinity, to Councils, Fathers, and Languages, how will they be affrighted to read or hear of the great names of Baronius, Bellarmine, Possevine, Perron, Petavius, Sirmundus, and many other Grandees of the Ro∣man side, great Clerks, great Church-men, and great Statesmen too, who are able to carry with them Troops of Auxiliaries, Legions of Assistants, being as rich as learned, very wise and weighty to use and improve all the strength and advantages they have of Estate and Honour, Studies and Parts, for the advance of their side, in their Er∣rours and Superstitions? which of late years their followers have done with unhappy successe and great encrease of their faction against the Reformed Religion of the divided Church of England; whose scattered Remains (in a short time) will be like a flock of silly and helpless Sheep, that have neither safe folds, nor any skilfull and va∣liant Shepherds to defend and rescue them.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The main hinderances & unlikelihood of a conjuncti∣on between Protestants & Romanists.
• * 1.2

  Deut. 14.21.