Synodicon in Gallia reformata, or, The acts, decisions, decrees, and canons of those famous national councils of the reformed churches in France being I. a most faithful and impartial history of the rise, growth, perfection and decay of the reformation in that kingdom, with its fatal catastrophe upon the revocation of the Edict of Nants in the year 1685 : II. the confession of faith and discipline of those churches : III. a collection of speeches, letters, sacred politicks, cases of conscience, and controversies in divinity, determined and resolved by those grave assemblies : IV. many excellent expedients for preventing and healing schisms in the churches and for re-uniting the dismembred body of divided Protestants : V. the laws, government, and maintenance of their colleges, universities and ministers, together with their exercise of discipline upon delinquent ministers and church-members : VI. a record of very many illustrious events of divine providence relating to those churches : the whole collected and composed out of original manuscript acts of those renowned synods : a work never be extant in any language.

TO THE Right Honourable WILLIAM EARL of BEDFORD, BARON of THORNHAƲGH, Lord Lieutenant of the Counties of Middlesex, Cam∣bridge, and Bedford, Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, and one of the Lords of Their Majesties most Honourable Privy-Council.

May it please your Lordship,

SEals as Coats of Arms an a kind of Hieroglyphicks. Those Mother-Churches in the Valleys of Piedmont (where our holy Religion hath been conserved in its Power and Purity, during that long black night of Popish Superstition and Idolatry,) had this for their Common Seal, A Taper burning in a golden Candlestick, scattering its glorious Beams in a Sable Field of thick darkness. It is a truth incontestable, that most of the European Nations do stand indebted to them for that comfortable Knowledge of the blessed Gospel of our Lord Jesus, which is now shining forth in its Meridian-Glory, in the midst of them. The Famous Waldo of Lions was their near Neighbour, and received his most Excellent Instru∣ctions, together with that Book of Life the Holy Bible, from them. And Lollard, that famous Preacher in England (from whom God's Saints

and Martyrs with us four hundred years ago were denominated) was one of their Barbes.

I have met, my most Noble Lord, with another Seal, as Illustrious an Hieroglyphick as the former, appertaining unto the National Synods of those Renowned, and once Flourishing, though now Desolate, Reformed Churches of France, which was Moses's Miraculous Vision when he fed his Flock under the Mount of God, viz. A Bramble-Bush in a flaming Fire, having that Essential incommunicable name of God, Jehovah, engraven in its Center, and this Motto, Comburo non consumor, in its Circumference, I burn but am not Consumed. With this those venerable Councils Sealed all their Letters and Dispatches. A sacred Em∣blem of their past and present Condition.

Whilst Mystical Babylon, Spiritual Sodom and Egypt, (where our Lord hath been in his most pretious Truths and Ordinances, and in his dear∣est Saints and Members for many Ages successively Crucified) did swim in the calm Ocean of Worldly Riches and Grandeurs, in the pacifick Seas of secular Felicities and Pleasures, Poor Zion in that bloody Kingdom of France, hath been in the storms and flames, hath passed from one fiery Tryal unto another, from Cauldrons of boyling Oyl into burning Furnaces, heated with fire seven times hotter than before, she hath been driven from populous Cities, and the pleasant Habitations of Men, unto the cold snowy Le∣banon, to the high craggy tops of Amana and Shenir, to the frightful Dens of Lions, and to the horrid Mountains of Dragons and Leopards.

Why their Heavenly Father should afflict and exercise so frequently, and so severely, these his Children and Churches, he himself informeth them by that weeping Prophet. All thy Lovers have forgotten thee, They seek thee not, for I have wounded thee with the Wound of an Enemy, with the chastisement of a cruel one for the multitude of thine Iniquities, because thy Sins were increased. Why criest thou for thy Afflictions? Thy sorrow is incurable, for the multitude of thine iniquity: because thy Sins were increased, I have done these things unto thee. And in truth the mournful Relicks of these Ca∣lamitous Churches do justify God in all the evil that is befallen them, do con∣demn themselves, and kiss his Rod, accepting patiently the punishment of their Iniquity. But this Bramble-Bush, though always burning, is not con∣sumed. This is a Miracle of divine Mercy entailed upon them for many Ge∣nerations. I will mention the loving kindnesses of Jehovah, and the prai∣ses of Jehovah, according to all that Jehovah hath bestowed on them, and his great goodness towards the House of Israel, which he hath bestowed on them, according to his Mercies, and according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses. In all their affliction he was afflicted with them, and the An∣gel of his presence saved them, in his love and in his pity he redeemed them, and he bare them, and carried them all the days of old. When they passed through the Waters he hath been with them, and through the Rivers

they have not drowned them; and though they have walked through the fires, yet they have not been burnt up; those Flames have purified and refined, but not devoured them. And though these last storms, like the Fluctus de∣cumani, have been the worst and forest, yet they have not been without Illustrious tokens of God's gracious presence with them, and most merciful providence over them. He hath made the Earth to help the Woman, he hath spread a Table for their sustenance in the Wilderness, and provided for them in their flights, dispersions and banishments, a most quiet habitation; and in this last and greatest persecution that ever did befal them, they have found in this Land, as well as in other Protestant Countries, an inviolable San∣ctuary: and which cannot but be observed, it was in that very juncture when those two smoaking Firebrands, Rezin with Syria, and the Son of Remaliah, were in a joint Confederacy, totally to extirpate the blessed Gospel, as out of France, so out of these Fortunate Islands, they met with a safe Harbour in Great Brittain. The pernicious Plot was carried on as vigorously here at home, against the Reformation, as it was cruelly Execu∣ted in Kibroth Hattaavah, that Land of Graves from whence they fled, and where thousands of God's Saints were buried alive. When the Bartho∣lomaean Massacre was projected in the last Age, there was a design to have tricked over some of our most Noble Patriots unto that unfortunate Mar∣riage (in which more Blood was drunk than Wine) who should have been Sacrificed together with that Valiant Lord Admiral de Colligni, and the other Protestant Lords. And the same design was revived, and put again here in practice an hundred and thirteen years after. For Popery and An∣tichristian Tyranny could not be re-established in England but by those old methods, which Tarquin the Proud suggested to his Son Sextus for his Restoration, viz. The lopping off the Heads of our Chiefest Noblemen. Then that Noble Lord, the Honour of his Age, the singular Hope and Darling of his Country, and sincere Professor of our holy Reli∣gion, your Eldest Son, fell a Victim to their Malice, and was by their mischievous Cabal, as a Stag Royal, hunted down unto destruction. Our God will sometimes be honoured with the Sufferings of great Personages. But then the Nation loseth its best Blood and vital Spirits. So that all that feared God in the Land, and were true Lovers of their Native Coun∣try, did deeply sympathize with your Lordship in your sore Affliction, for it was not only a meer Personal one to your Lordship, but common and general to the whole Church and Nation.

The good Lord preserve us from seeing any more of those black days, and put a period to the Calamities of his poor Churches, and turn back their Cap∣tivity, and gather his dispersed, and build up Jerusalem's Walls, and make her a praise once more in the Kingdom of France, and may the glory of the second House of Reformation there be greater than the first.

Time was when the Reformed Churches of France had many sparkling Stars in their Firmament, many burning and shining Lights in their Congre∣gations,

many wise and eminently learned Master-Builders in their Temples and Synodical Assemblies; some account of whom, and of their worthy At∣chievements, for the edifying of their numerous Auditories in that Faith once delivered unto the Saints, in Christian Love and Unity, in their Sacred Or∣der and Discipline, I do now from Authentick Pieces, and Original Papers, in this my poor Labour, present unto your Lordship. Had those Reverend and accomplisht Divines, those Noble and Prudent Gentlemen, who compo∣sed their Holy Councils, been this day alive, and your Lordships great and generous Bounty, extended to their poor Exiles, refugeed amongst us, been notified to them, they would have deposited these their Acts into your Lord∣ships hands, as into the securest Archives. But what they could not do, I presume to do for them, most humbly tendring this Synodicon unto your Lord∣ship's Patronage. May your Lordship graciously pardon the tediousness of this Epistle, and vouchsafe me the Honour, May it please your Lordship, to be reputed,

London, March 12. 1691/••.

Your Lordship's Most humbly devoted, and obedient Servant, JOHN QƲICK.