abled to make a Schifm within it; or, if they are at length brought to be perfwaded to part with any of their Principles, will they be fo Honest as to declare that they have been so far mistaken, and defire their Followers to get out of those Snares which they in former Dayes did lay for them; and particularly will they renounce the Covenant? It was very good Advice which the Right Reverend Father in God the Lord Bishop of Winchester. gave His Majefty, in his Epistle before the Coronation Sermon, when he reminded Him of that wife Refolution of His Royal Grandfather, Henry the Fourth, That he was ready at any time to make a Peace with any of the Leaguers. but he would never make any Peace with the League.

Now if they look upon it as any hard measure that they should be called upon to renounce the Covenant : Let them not at all wonder, if the Regular Sons of the Church have not forgot thofe rigours with which it was impofed the many mif chiefs which have been wrought, and

are

are fomething apprehensive of those mifchiefs which may at this day be wrought by it; if fo be that the Renunciation of it should be laid afide; which will certainly be interpre ted as at least a tacit Confeffion, that that Injunction was unreasonable, and fuch a one as a man of a tender Confcience could not submit to; and that is a fair preparation for the Opinion that the Covenant is really a thing which doth oblige us. But because that Moderation is at this time a word much in fashion; let us compare the Severities used in behalf of the Covenant with this which is fo much complained of as being against it: It is indeed, by reafon of the Clamours by themselves raised about its obligation, eftablished by a Law, that none shall be admitted to Publick Trufts in Univerfities, Schools, or the Church, who will not renounce its Obligation; but the Covenanters did not think this a fufficient fecurity in their Cafe; Mr. Calamy tells us in his fore-mentioned Speech, in the name of himself and the Reverend Minifters with him, with great

great Joy and Triumph; That there was not one Perfon in the Kingdom of Scotland who is not a Covenanter, and there shall not one abide among them who will not take this Covenant. Now this Mr. Calamy,from the beginning of the Long Parliament till the Day of his Death, was a Ringleader of that Party of men who do now plead for Comprehenfion, & do earnestly at this time defire that they may be dispensed with, for renouncing the Covenant. And if the Counsel of these Divines had been of as great Authority in the Army, as it was with the Two Houses, that which Mr. Calamy doth magnifie in Scotland would have been a pattern for the fame courfe to be taken in England.

But seeing that the Covenant is more facred with them than the Oaths of Alleagiance and Supremacy, will they, if they should be thus far con difcended to,be so grateful to His Majesty as to declare their Opinions a gainst the War raised against His Fa ther? will they in lieu of renouncing the Covenant take an Oath wherein

they

they will affert, that the War raised by fome Lords and Gentlemen fitting at Westminster, under the Name of the Lords and Commons Affembled in Parliament, by a Commiffion granted to Robert Earl of Effex, was unlawful, as being against the known Laws both of God and of the Nation? If they refuse this, seeing that we know that many of these very men for whom Comprehenfion is defired did preach up the War, if they will not declare against it, it is fhrewdly to be fufpected that their mind is the fame as formerly, and the only change which is, is in the posture of Affairs.

But because it is now faid in behalf of these men, that they allow Epifcopacy, and approve of a Liturgy, nay of ours: That we may not be impofed upon by any ambiguous generality of Words; it is but requifite that in this they would declare particularly in what fence it is that they allow and approve both these Things; for if by things paft we may guefs at things prefent;by Episcopacy they may mean but Presbytery; by the Bishop may

be

be understood a kind of a Prolocutor. Every affuming Presbyter may at any time fay as one of them lately did, that he is as good a Scripture Bishop, as he who fate upon the Bench; or perhaps look upon a Bishop only as a Civil Officer in order to fome legal purpofes:and by a Liturgy they may mean only fuch a Form of Prayers which may be either ufed or let alone, or rather a thing which is (if ever to be) permitted only to those who are Persons of such small fufficiency as not to be able to pray without it, and so instead of being a Duty is intended meerly as a disparagement: Or it may be the Common Prayer may be allowed as a way of spending the time till the Company is got together, and then comes the Prayer which the Spirit is the immediate Author of, and which alone hath the promise of any bleffing made. unto it.

Unless, I fay, that these Perfons be required to express theirMinds very particularly in these and all other Matters of Debate between us, we fhall be always at a lofs, how much of the L

good