PREFACE, are as thorns in their sides, never suffering them to take rest Ch. viii. 13. till they have brought their speculations into practice.

The

lets and impediments of which practice their restless desire and study to remove leadeth them every day forth by the hand into other more dangerous opinions, sometimes quite and clean contrary to their first pretended meanings: so as what will grow out of such errors as go masked under the cloak of divine authority, impossible it is that ever the wit of man should imagine, till time have brought forth the fruits of them for which cause it behoveth wisdom to fear the sequels thereof, even beyond all apparent cause of fear. These men,

in whose mouths at the first sounded nothing but only mortification of the flesh, were come at the length to think they might lawfully have their six or seven wives apiece; they which at the first thought judgment and justice itself to be merciless cruelty, accounted at the length their own hands sanctified with being embrued in Christian blood; they who at the first were wont to beat down all dominion, and to urge against poor constables, "Kings of nations;" had at the length both consuls and kings of their own erection amongst themselves finally, they which could not brook at the first that any man should seek, no not by law, the recovery of goods injuriously taken or withheld from him, were grown at the last to think they could not offer unto God more acceptable sacrifice, than by turning their adversaries clean out of house and home, and by enriching themselves with all kind of spoil and pillage; which thing being laid to their charge, they had in a readiness their answer 62, that now the time was come, when according to our Saviour's promise, "the meek 66 ones must inherit the earth 63;" and that their title hereunto was the same which the righteous Israelites had unto the goods of the wicked Egyptians 64.

[13.] Wherefore sith the world hath had in these men so fresh experience, how dangerous such active errors are, it must not offend you though touching the sequel of your present mispersuasions much more be doubted, than your own intents and purposes do haply aim at. And yet your

Ch. viii. 13.

words already are somewhat, when ye affirm, that your PREFACE, Pastors, Doctors, Elders, and Deacons, ought to be in this Church of England, "whether her Majesty and our state "will or no 65;" when for the animating of your confederates ye publish the musters which ye have made of your own bands, and proclaim them to amount I know not to how many thousands 66; when ye threaten, that sith neither your suits to the parliament, nor supplications to our convocation-house, neither your defences by writing, nor challenges of disputation

65 Mart. in his third Libel.

66 [Second Adm. p. 59, (misprint for 65,) ed. 1617. "We beseech "you to pity this case, and to pro"vide for it; it is the case already " of many a thousand in this land; "yea, it is the case of as many as "seek the Lord aright, and desire "to have his own orders restored. "Great troubles will come of it, if "it be not provided for; even the "same God that hath stirred me, a "man unknown, to speak, though "those poor men which are locked "up in Newgate, neither do, nor "can be suffered to speak, will daily "stir up more."

Str. Whitg. II. 18. (from a MS.) "One of our late libellers" [marg. Martyn] braggeth of 100,000 "hands: and wisheth the parlia"ment to bring in this reformation "though it be by withstanding the "Queen's Majesty.”

Ibid. 191. In 1592, the Barrowists" were reckoned to amount to 20,000 by Sir W. Raleigh, in a speech of his in the last parlia"ment."

66

And in the Epitome, against Dr. Bridges, having quoted a passage from Bp. Aylmer's Harborough "for faithful Subjects," in which the Bishop had commended "those "that in King Henry VIII. days "would not grant him that his pro"clamations should have the force " of a statute," Penry proceeds, “I

66

66

assure you, brother John, you "have spoken many things worthy "the noting, and I would our par"liament men would mark this ac"tion done in K. Hen. VIII. days, "and follow it in bringing in re"formation, and putting down Lord Bishops, with all other points of superstition. They may in your judgment not only do any thing against their King's or Queen's "mind (that is behovefull to the "honour of God and the good of "the commonwealth) but even "withstand the proceedings of their "sovereign."]

66

66

Ch. viii. 13.

192 Symptoms of Turbulence among the Puritans.

PREFACE, in behalf of that cause are able to prevail, we must blame ourselves, if to bring in discipline some such means hereafter be used as shall cause all our hearts to ache 67. "That things doubtful are to be construed in the better part," is a principle not safe to be followed in matters concerning the public state of a commonweal. But howsoever these and the like speeches be accounted as arrows idly shot at random, without either eye had to any mark, or regard to their lighting-place; hath not your longing desire for the practice of your discipline brought the matter already unto this demurrer amongst you, whether the people and their godly pastors that way affected ought not to make separation from the rest, and to begin the exercise of discipline without the license of civil powers, which license they have sought for, and are not heard? Upon which question as ye have now divided yourselves, the warier sort of you taking the one part, and the forwarder in zeal the other; so in case these earnest ones should prevail, what other sequel can any wise man imagine but this, that having first resolved that attempts for discipline without superiors are lawful, it will follow in the next place to be disputed what may be attempted against supcriors which will not have the sceptre of that discipline to rule over them? Yea even by you which have stayed yourselves from running headlong with the other sort, somewhat notwithstanding there hath been done without the leave or liking of your lawful superiors, for the exercise of a part of your discipline amongst the clergy thereunto addicted 68. And lest examination of

66

tingle, and make us be a by word "to all that pass by us."]

68[In 1567, some of the ministers who had been silenced by the bishops for nonconformity began to set up separate assemblies, using the Geneva Prayer Book. Strype, Parker, I. 478-483. In 1577, the same party, by their "use or rather "abuse" (Bishop Cox to Burghley, in Str. Ann. II. ii. 611.) of prophesyings, caused the inhibition of those exercises, (Queen's letter to the Bishop of Lincoln, ibid. 612.) and the suspension of Archbishop Grindal. (Grind. 342.) In 1585,

Puritan Notions regarding certain Oaths.

Ch. viii. 14.

193 principal parties therein should bring those things to light, PREFACE, which might hinder and let your proceedings; behold, for a bar against that impediment, one opinion ye have newly added unto the rest even upon this occasion, an opinion to exempt you from taking oaths which may turn to the molestation of your brethren in that cause 69. The next neighbour opinion whereunto when occasion requireth may follow, for dispensation with oaths already taken, if they afterwards be found to import a necessity of detecting aught which may bring such good men into trouble or damage, whatsoever the cause be 70. O merciful God, what man's wit is there able to sound the depth of those dangerous and fearful evils, whereinto our weak and impotent nature is inclinable to sink itself, rather than to shew an acknowledgment of error in that which once we have unadvisedly taken upon us to defend, against the stream as it were of a contrary public resolution!

[14] Wherefore if we any thing respect their error, who being persuaded even as you are have gone further upon that persuasion than you allow; if we regard the present state of the highest governor placed over us, if the quality and disposition of our nobles, if the orders and laws of our famous universities, if the profession of the civil or the practice of the common law amongst us, if the mischiefs whereinto even before our eyes so many others have fallen headlong from no less plausible and fair beginnings than yours are: there is in every of these considerations most just cause to fear lest our hastiness to embrace a thing of so perilous consequence

they are charged with having established synods and classes in various counties, with reordination, unauthorized fast-days, and other schismatical acts. (Articles against Cartwright, in Fuller, C. H. IX. 200, 201, 202.) comp. in Strype's Whitg. III. 244—256, the bill exhibited against them in the Star Chamber.]

69 [This seems to have been first started, in a formal and public way, by Cartwright and others, when cited before the ecclesiastical commission in 1590. Strype, Whitg. HOOKER, VOL. I.

194

Retractation, for the Truth's Sake, no Disgrace.

Ch. ix. 1-3.

PREFACE, should cause posterity to feel those evils, which as yet are more easy for us to prevent than they would be for them to remedy.

The conclu

sion of all.

IX. The best and safest way for you therefore, my dear brethren, is, to call your deeds past to a new reckoning, to reexamine the cause ye have taken in hand, and to try it even point by point, argument by argument, with all the diligent exactness ye can; to lay aside the gall of that bitterness wherein your minds have hitherto over-abounded, and with meekness to search the truth. Think ye are men, deem it not impossible for you to err; sift unpartially your own hearts, whether it be force of reason or vehemency of affection, which hath bred and still doth feed these opinions in you. If truth do any where manifest itself, seek not to smother it with glosing delusions, acknowledge the greatness thereof, and think it your best victory when the same doth prevail over you.

[2] That ye have been earnest in speaking or writing again and again the contrary way, shall be no blemish or discredit at all unto you. Amongst so many so huge volumes as the infinite pains of St. Augustine have brought forth, what one hath gotten him greater love, commendation and honour, than the book 71 wherein he carefully collecteth his own oversights, and sincerely condemneth them? Many speeches there are of Job's whereby his wisdom and other virtues may appear; but the glory of an ingenuous mind he hath purchased by these words only, "72 Behold, I will lay "mine hand on my mouth; I have spoken once, yet will I "not therefore maintain argument; yea twice, howbeit for "that cause further I will not proceed."

[3] Far more comfort it were for us (so small is the joy we take in these strifes) to labour under the same yoke, as men that look for the same eternal reward of their labours, to be joined with you in bands of indissoluble love and amity, to live as if our persons being many our souls were but one, rather than in such dismembered sort to spend our few and wretched days in a tedious prosecuting of wearisome contentions: the end whereof, if they have not some speedy end,