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. II.

AS for that new generation which is grown up of la∣ter years,* 1.1 and who have never known those Jo∣sephs, whose prudent piety established and pre∣served the Reformed Religion for many years, with great peace, plenty, prosperity and profici∣ency in the Church of England; these have, for the most part, been onely spectators or abettors of those ingratefull exorbitances, which some Christians have affected and mis-called for precious liberties, though beyond all bounds of modesty, charity and piety, as well as beyond the merits of the Church of England and its well-reformed Religion. These have hither∣to seen the face of this Church and our Religion, like that of a field, in which a fierce and cruell battel hath been fought, and still is, with dubious success, by Christians of bold, pertinacious and implacable spirits; they behold all things, as to the purity, peace, order and harmony of the Reformed Religion (which was once wisely establi∣shed and uniformly professed in the Church of Engl.) full of clamour and confusion, of hatred and horrour, of bitter complaints, unchari∣table jealousies, Satyrick invectives, sharp disputations, endless con∣tentions. Many are brought up in gross ignorance of the very funda∣mentals of true Religion, counting it a part of their liberty & Religion, not to be taught by any man, Parent or Minister, any principles of Religion: others that have some glimmering knowledge, are but meer Scepticks, and unsetled, ever dubious and vertiginous, thinking it a token of their true conversion, to be daily turning from one side and opinion to another: a third sort quarrel at all they have been taught and baptized into by the testimony of the Church and its Ministry, as a method below the sublimity of their spirits, who fancy nothing but immediate teachings of God, illuminations and inspirations, beyond

the usual dispensations of the heavenly treasure,* 1.2 which hath been hi∣therto in earthen vessels. A fourth sort of people, driven by the fu∣ries of their own lusts and passions, animated also by the extravagan∣cies of others (who seem pretenders to Religion) have sought to cast off the thought, care and conscience of any Religion, fancying such a Religion and Liberty, as may best consist with their temporal safety and worldly interests; however they profess, they practise perfect Atheism, to live without any God preceptive, but onely providen∣tial, in the world. Nor are there wanting some men of great parts and conspicuous learning, as well as estates, who set their wits on work to maintain this principle, That there is no Numen, no divine being di∣stinct from that we call Nature, no Creator, no creature, no Scrip∣ture as Gods Word, no Saviour, no Sin as against God, no re∣ward or judgement to come. Yea, that universal Tradition, that in∣bred Principle, that Catholick perswasion, which hath possessed all Na∣tions and successions of mankind, (as Tully observed) touching the immortality of rationall spirits or humane souls, as to their eternall recompenses; this point is not onely doubted and disputed, but by some denied: notwithstanding that few men in all ages, by their greatest wit and wickedness, were ever able to redeem themselves from the terrour of this truth, and the captivity of their own consci∣ences, which are hardly freed from these convictions, that there is a God above us, and an immortall soul within us: nor have ever any men endeavoured to put out this light within them,* 1.3 but onely those, whom the conscience of their wickedness made desirous rather to perish utterly, than to be perpetuated to an after-being in misery. From these main unhingings of Religion in mens consciences, which have set them above any fear of God or reverence of man, who can wonder at those disorderly motions, which have so long filled and deformed this Church with so many schisms, Heresies and Tragedies? The utter irreligion of some, the superstition of others; the pee∣vishness of some, the pertinacy of others; here Atheisme, there hypocrisie; here any Religion that civil politie lists to set up, there no Religion setled, to give any check or restraint by law; here novelties and varieties of Religion affected, there uniformity and Catholick antiquity despised; these encounterings and contra∣dictions among men, as to matters of Religion in England, what strages and vastations have they made in the minds of common people, and the younger sort especially? The face of Christian and Reformed Religion looks blasted with fire, black with powder and smoke, besmeared with dirt and blood; the prospect of it is full of death and despair; the distractions of it threaten both it and us with destruction at last; because nothing whets mens swords sharper against each other than Religion. With how much glorying, even in point of conscience, have Christians and Protestants wounded, op∣pressed, killed one another in England, in great part upon the quar∣rel of Religion, yea, and of Reformation? The scandall, eclipse, and ruine of which, as to its truth, credit and consistency, is far more

considerable, than the loss of thousands of our carkases, or vile bo∣dies, which were worthily and almost meritoriously sacrificed, if by such means the true honour and interests of Religion, as Christian and Reformed, could be preserved or advanced.

But (alas) this is so far from any advantages of life, health and vigour, by all those bitter pills and potions it hath taken, by all those sharp phlebotomies & lancings it hath endured, that it seems exhau∣sted, dispirited, languishing, drooping, decaying and dying; sinking under its own weight, or rather under the pressures of impotent passi∣ons on all sides: not onely to indifferency, negligence, and unset∣ledness as to any Religion at all, which is very rife; but to sottish ignorance, gross superstition, high Atheism, and insolent blasphe∣mies against our God, our Saviour, our Scriptures, our Sacraments, all ordinances, and all that is sacred. The epidemical rudeness and irreverence, the vulgar profaneness and immorality, their brutish stupor and barbarity, their licentious impudencies and insolencies, their publick scorns, affronts and oppositions of the lawful Ministers of England in their holy Ministrations (part of which I have seen, others I have heard of,) these and the like fedities, like a plague and leprosie, have mightily infected and daily spread over the souls of men and women, young and old, in countries and cities, both in En∣gland and in Wales, as necessary consequents and concomitants of that liberty in Religion which many men have challenged to them∣selves.

Nor is this depravedness onely befaln the beasts of the people, the meaner sort, whose souls are as precious as the best, though their condition be poor, their breeding bad, and their manners generally vile, having naturally a brutish carelesness and dulness to any Re∣ligion; but their greatest awknesse and aversness is against that Reli∣gion which is most soberly setled, and exactly professed; this giving most check to their boisterous lusts and extravagant fancies: whose Religion is generally more upon custome and constraint, than upon judgement, choice or conscience; ever waiting, as water pent up doth, for any opportunity to get such a liberty as will at last quite spill and spend it self; being never better pleased than when they finde themselves least tied to please either God, or any men but themselves. This sort of vulgar people may in part excuse the abuses they make of any liberties or indulgences they can at any time extort by their terrours, multitudes and importunities, from wiser men.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Decayes of godliness as to the new brood and later off∣spring of mea∣ner Christians.
• * 1.2

  2 Cor. 4.7.
• * 1.3

  M••lint extin∣gui quàm ad supplicia re∣parari.