PREFACE. 7
author, WTitten with the same design that this is, he sliall have one proselyte to his profession ; which is more, I suppose, than otherwise he will obtain by his learned labour. That this is no other but to persuade men that they can find no certainty or establishment for their faith in Scripture, but must for it devolve themselves solely on the authority of the pope, will afterward be made to appear ; nor will himself deny it. But, it may be, it is unreasonable that when men are eagerly engaged in the pursuit of their interest, we should think, from former precedents, or general rules of sobriety, with that reverence which is due to the things of the great and holy God, to impose upon them the way and manner of their progress. The event and end aimed at is that which we are to respect ; the management of their business in reference to this world and that which is to come is their own concernment. No man, I suppose, who hath any acquaintance with the things he treats about, can abstain from smiling, to observe how dexterously he turns and winds himself in his cloak (which is not every one's work to dance in) ; how he gilds over the more comely parts of his Amasia with brave suppositions, presump- tions, and stories of things past and present, where he has been in his days; cover- ing her deformities with a perpetual silence; ever and anon bespattering the first Reformation and reformers in his passage ;— yea, their contentment must needs proceed to a high degree of complacence, in w'hom compassion for the woful state of them whom so able a man judgeth like to be inveigled by such flourishes and pretences doth not excite to other aflPections. The truth is, if ever there blew a
wind of doctrine on unwary souls, 'Ev rTi KuSlla ruv av^pu'Tiov, Iv ^uvevpyla -rpos r«y
fii^o'Siiav TYi; -rXocvtii, (Eph. iv. 14), — we have an instance of it in this discourse. Such a disposition of cogging sleights,' various crafts in enticing words, is rarely met with. Many, I think, are not able to take this course in handling the sacred things of God, and eternal concernments of men ; and more, I hope, dare not. But our author is another man's servant ; I shall not judge him ; he " stands or falls to his own master." That which the importunity of some noble friends hath com- pelled me unto is, to offer somewhat to the judgment of impartial men that may serve to unmask him of his gilded pretences, and to lay open the emptiness of those prejudices and presumptions wherewith he makes such a tinkling noise in the ears of unlearned and unstible persons. Occasion of serious debate is very little ad- ministered by him ; that which is the task assigned me I shall as fully discharge as the few hours allotted to its performance will allow.
In my dealing with him, I shall not make it my business to defend the several parties whereinto the men of his contest are distributed by our author as such ; not all, not any of them. It is the common Protestant cause which, in and by all of them, he seeks to oppose. So far as they are interested and concerned therein, they fall all of them within the bounds of our present defensative. Wherein they differ one from another, or any or all of them do or may swerve from the prin- ciples of the Protestant religion, I have nothing to do with them in this business ; and if any be so far addicted to their parties, wherein, it may be, they are in the wrong, as to choose rather not to be vindicated and pleaded for in that wherein with others I know they are in the right than to be joined in the same plea with them from whom in part they differ, I cannot help it. I pretend not their com- mission for what I do ; and they may, when they please, disclaim my appearance for them. I suppose by this course I shall please very few, and I am sure I shall displease some, if not many. I aim at neither, but to profit all. I have sundry reasons for not owning or avowing particularly any party in this discourse, so as to judge the rest, wherewith I am not bound to acquaint the world. One of them I shall, and I hope it is such a one as may suffice ingenuous and impartial men ; and thereunto some others may be added: The gentleman whose discourse I have
1 Deceitful artifices.
8 PEEFACE,
undertaken the consideration of was pleased to front and close it with a part of a speech of my Lord Chancellor ; * and his placing of it manifests how he uses it. He salutes it in his entrance, and takes his leave also of it, never regarding its in- tendment until coming to the close of his treatise ; to his " salve " in the begin- ning he adds an " aeternum vale." That the mention of such an excellent discourse (the best part in both our books) might not be lost, I have suited my plea and de- fensative of Pi-otestantism to the spirit, and principles, and excellent ratiocinations of it. Behind that shield I lay the manner of my proceeding ; where if it be not safe, I care not what becomes of it. Besides, it is not for what the men of his title-page are differenced amongst themselves that our author blames them ; but for what he thinks they agree in too well in reference to the church of Rome : nor doth he insist on the evils of their contest to persuade them to peace amongst themselves, or to prevail over them to centre in any one persuasion about which they contend ; but to lead them all over to the pope. And if any of them with whom our author deals and sports himself in his treatise are fallen off" from the fundamental denominating principles of Protestant rehgion, as some of them seem to be, they come not within the compass of our plea, seeing as such they are not dealt with by our author. It is the Protestant religion in general, which he chai'ges with all irregularities, uncertainties, and evils, that he expatiates about ; and from the principles of it doth he endeavour to withdraw us. As to the case, then, under debate with him, it is enough if we manifest that that profession of religion is not liable or obnoxious to any of the crimes or inconveniences by him objected unto it; and that the remedy of our evils, whether real or imaginar}', which he would impose upon us, is so far from being specifical towards their cure, that it is indeed far worse than the disease pretended, — to tiie full as undesirable as the cutting of the throat for the cure of a sore finger. There is no reason, therefore, in this business, wherefore I should avow any one persuasion, about which Protestants, that consent in general in the same confession of faith, may have, or actually have, difference amongst themselves; especially if I do also evince there is no cogency in them to cause any of them to renounce the truth wherein they all agree. Much less shall I undertake to plead for, excuse, or palliate the miscarriages of any part or parties of men during our late unhappy troubles ; nor shall I make much use of what offers itself in a way of reci'imination. Certain it is, that, as to this gentleman's pretensions, sundi'y things might be insisted on that would serve to allay the fierceness of his spirit in his management of other men's crimes to his own ends and purposes. The sound of our late evils, as it is known to all the world, began in Ireland, amongst his good Roman Catholics, who were blessed from Rome into rebellion and murder, somewhat before any drop of blood was shed in England or Scotland, —