IT is no safe taske in a time like this, to write truth of Men and Manners, the visible Authors, and known meanes of so unexampled distraction, and confusion: when ti's destructive, but to be in suspect to observe them: And tis an unsufferable weight to be borne by any Man, who can make title to understanding; to heare with silence, people pretending to Religion, and to nothing else; crying up against reason, a Reformation, in which them selves are (however in themselves insensibly) to the stranger standers by visibly rui­ned. Provoked therefore by my compassion to my Country, the seate of mindes as unnaturall as the warre, by which it lan­guisheth, and by pitty of my gull'd (because willing to bee gull'd) Country-men, I have endeavoured to convince the opiniators of a Reformation: by putting yesterday and to day, this and the end of the preceeding Septenarie in the Bal­lance. And therefore invite such who are in any capacitie of be­ing aduised, to a retrospection, so farre as the yeare 1639. Where they may if they looke not thorow State-spectacles, see a King selected, whose Royall, or Christian reputation Fame dared not; could not, with so much as a whisper, sulley: [Page 4]Rich in the accumulate hearts of a Numerous, and Loyall peo­ple, happy, eminently happy, in his Royall Consort; and in the pledges of their mutuall loves, and of our succeeding, (hope­fully succeeding) peace, in their assured succession: Strong in Armes, and stor'd with crowded Magazines of all Militarie provisions; Predominant at Sea above his Ancestors, by a for­midable Navie; and in an instant able to confront an Army, (to say no more) in the Field, like a King of such a King­dome: A Court in which (himselfe being president) the Men and Manners compleated an Academie.

They may see a Church full of light, Order and Discipline, having a forme beautifull, and an inside garnisht, and enricht with as much (not to swell the comparison) Learning, and Piety, as observation, or storie can attribute to any since Chri­stianity was a profession. Those then inconsiderable few the opposers, or interrupters of its peace, and Government; being persons of as obscure marke, as of clandestine and mycheing motion, skulking like young Foxes, and no sooner unkenneld, but as Vermine pursued; the Generall Odium being con­tracted upon them: They may see a Nobility, Lustrous, like mirrors by the Sunnes, their Princes, reflex, in the badges of their honour, and office, a flourishing Gentry, plentifully sha­ring dignities, and trusts in the Militarie, and civill Magistra­cy. An obedient, peacefull, and contented Cominalty; the num­ber of the factions of all conditions, scarce justifying the name of a number: Cities exemplarie to our neighbours for their Government, and envied by them for their opulencie in pre­sent havings, and assured growth in an encreasing Trade, U­niversities both of Divinity, the Arts, and Lawes Common, and Civill, beyond any forraigne example: Stoar'd with able pro­fessors, sedulous, and well-manner'd Students; taught by Lear­ned and frequent Lectures, in all Studies, and rudiments, con­ducing to the building up of men, for a succession of Ministers, and Counsellors: a Land populous, plenteous, at unity with it selfe; the gaze and envy of forraigne Nations, and in so high a degree of happinesse, as to be almost incapable of a degree of happinesse in addition, or diminution, no meanes but mi­racle, [Page 5]or warre to abate it to misery, and the meanes to beget such a warre to the best understanders, appearing to bee of no lesse extent then a miracle. It is the height of unhappi­nesse, to looke backward at so much of blessing, and to say it was. Consider the present reformed con­dition of all these; And see a King rejected, and in his good name of King, and Christian blasphemed: Poore by the losse of the deceived, seduced hearts, of an abused and misgui­ded people; Divorced from his injuriously maligned (because exemplary faithfull) Consort: distanced from the sight of his deare and Princely Issue, dispersed like a scattered Covye; that succession, of whose likelihood, each man had cause to joy in, being become disputable; a King reduced to lesse power, Ar­mature, or store, then the Master of a private family, and fright­ed from a visible storme, to an uncertaine, and now failing shelter. A Court vanish't, and no footsteps left of its former beautie, and civility; a Church shuffeld to indistinction; degrees unadmitted, Sects, and Schismes, Heresies, and Blasphemies, in this time, and Kingdome, vying with all those of past Ages, and forreigne Nations; and in number, partaken and counte­nanced by Grandees of the new State, and walking in foro un­controled; and like the wilde Boares of the Forrest, rooting up the establisht Religion, while he ancient, and true Protestant changes turns, with the last ages Seperatist; and serves God in corners, to avoid reproach.

A Nobility clouded by their Suns Eclipse, and the Foggs arising from their inferiors, and their owne degenerate spirits; their very honours being made arbitrary, and no longer theirs, then the common throng shall continue them in vogue, which is alwaies dated with their subservience to the better felt, then discovered faction: A Gentry discountenanced by an intro­duced partie, aw'd by Tenants, and Servants, impoverished by long Sequestrations, and second purchases of their lawfull, and not to any subjects single, or aggregate, by any act forfeit­able inheritance. A giddie Comminaltie, and tumultuous, fond of new words, who would have something, and otherwaies then it was; but what, how much, and how done they are not [Page 6]bound to discover, till they know themselves; Their freedome lost, nay rather given away, liberty of person, propertie of e­state, reputation, and good name, being become meer Notions, and by law not preservable, nor vindicable. Cities dispeopled, untraded by the obstruction, and impoverisht by the charge of a continued warre, and as much confounded in Government, as opinion; Universities, and Inns of Courts motlied by a mi­scellanie of families, a mixture of beardlesse, and brainlesse Pro­fessors, and Governors: a Junior batchelor, and a Senior fel­low, being tearmes convertible, lectures of law neglected, and of Divinity, and Arts performed by such, who are therefore unfit to reade, because not used to heare. The refusall of a not un­derstood, or to well understood Covenant; being enough to break lawes of pious founders of Colledges, and establishment of a suc­cession of learned, and religious Princes to the disseizing, and eje­ction of many, and the most able Masters, Fellows, and Schollers, from their lawfull and rightfull freeholds; by the supply of whose roomes, a man would guesse that there were a designe to increase, and propagate Devotion by an Introduction of Ignorance. And all this justified by sonnes of the same sister-mothers. Lawyers pleading, and Ministers preaching Ordinances, against the knowne Lawes of God, and he Nation: A Land more then skim'd of its Inhabitants, and generally harassed, and worne out by payes, and quarterings, growne almost wilde in want of husbandry, and so much at emnity with it selfe, that there is hardly found a single, and that a faithfull freindship, or good neighbourhood: And all this by a warre, raised by our selves for Reformation sake; acted, and prosecuted by, and upon our selves, as if we had in he darke, lost the spirit of sober Christians, and grop't out the furie of inflamed Bacchinalls, and could finde no place to skowre our long rusted swords, o­ther then our owne bowels. It is a hightened and superlative af­fliction to a diseased person, so onely to be made to understand his defects, as to know them to be irreparable.

Hold now an even hand, and poize these two conditions im­partially, and tell me, tell thy selfe, where lyes the improvement? Where the Reformation? If yet to be expected, where the foun­dation [Page 7]is layd for such a hoped superstructure? Sure Common­wealths, and Churches have not a Philosophicall Generation, the new out of the perversion, the corruption of the ancient Government; the new out of the extirpation, the annihila­ting the establisht old religion; And if so great tempests, and earthquakes of Drums and Artillery, subversions and immersi­ons, of persons and estates: Such unreckonable expence of a Kingdome coin'd (to effect) forsupplyes, and such inundations, and overwhelmings of blood, beget but a bare promise of such an issue, what remaines for the Nation to undergoe before its production? Doubtlesse this birth can at these rates be atten­ded with no lesse then a desolation, when there shall be too few left, and those too much enfeeble to fall out about the en­joyment of so great a happinesse.

Reason was given to man for a direction, as well as a distin­ction, and generally we believe our eyes above any assertions: Poore self-deceiving English-man, who canst not bee sensible how fantastick thy opinionate Reformation is, how reall the devastation of thy substance, and canst finde a hope that the one will improve, and not a feare that the other may inmpaire; As thou art onely miserable in a proportion at present from thy selfe; so the remaining degrees which thou art to take in mi­sery, are not to be proceeded in without thy consent to a con­tinued vassilage.

It is just with God, and abates of the condemnation of im­posing Man to lay burdens, and use goades on those who will be beasts by disavowing their reason, or pinning it upon opinion of anothers infallibilitie; and as just to strike him blind, who will not see an object of his marke, in other colours, or dimensions, then what are rendred by anothers spectacles.