by concession: the force and Effect to discharge subjects of their Allegiance, or to depose Lawfull and Annointed Kings from their estate and Dignitie.
Why then should a Kingdome so long instructed, so well grounded in Religion, totter, & stagger, as it were affrighted, & amazed at the sound of this brutish and counterfeit thunderbolt? at the slashing of this Ignis fatuus?10 Why do they live amongst us, why say I, live? Viuunt & in Senatum veniunt.11 They live & flourish, & we lodge them in our bosomes; who hold it religion, nay merit, nay supererogation, & the speediest and the directest way to heaven, to passe through a Field and a Sea of Bloud, of Sacred and Innocent Bloud, to that Glorious, & undefiled Inheritance? What can you expect of them, but that they should be, not Prickes in your eyes, and Thornes in your Sides, as God spake and Israel experienced in the Cananites; but Swords in your sides, and Pistols in your bosomes, and Poison in your Cups, and Gunpowder in your Vaults? Parricida moritur, Parricidium vivit;12 some of the Traitours have their Reward, and are dead; but whilest there is a Devil in Hell, a Pope in Rome, Murders, Massacrings, Treasons, shall never die. I have one Comfort; I know Heaven is above Hell, God above Satan, and we live under his Protection, (I would we lived Religiously, in his feare!) whose eyes are ever open to descry their conspiracies, and his Hand ever Potent, to overthrow their Machinations. I never was, I never will be a perswader to the least Cruelty: only remember, there may be Crudelis misericordia, a mercy more cruell than cruelty itselfe. I resolve with Augustine, Savire nolomus, e dormire nolumus: I would not perswade to Cruelty, but I would gladly rowse you from Security; and with the same Father; Nec obtentu Diligentia sauiamus, nec nomine Patientiae torpescemus; I hate that Diligence that leades to Cruelty, I cannot endure that Patience, that endes in Stupidity.
But whilst I am pleading against their unjust Tyranny, I may not be altogether forgetfull of the performance of mine owne Duety. For, See! this Day, I am set up, above Nations, and above Kingdomes, &c. and a Necessity is laid upon me, & wo is unto me, if I labour not, to plucke up, to roote out, &c, that roote of bitterness, which hath beene the true cause of the plucking up & extirpation, the rooting out & extermination of all estates and Kingdomes that ever flowrished, and are come to ruine: I meane Irreligion and Impiety. It is a generall, and a true observation, Imperium & Religio pariter defecerunt;13 there never yet arose any storme, to the ruine, of any Estate and Kingdome, but it sensibly grew from those vapors, which ascended from backwardness, or coldness, from contempt or indifferencie in Religion. It is as true ubi Procella, ibi Peccatŭ; where there is a storme that endangereth the ship, surely Jonas is there, or the sinne of Jonas, or a worse than Jonas, or a more prodigious sinne than his sinne. I see many Executioners of God’s just Judgements, Fire, Sword, Pestilence, Famine. The Fire never consumed, but sinne blew the Coles, & inflamed it. The Sword, never prevailed, but Sinne set an Edge on it. Pestilence never infected, but Sinne spread the Contagion of it. God never sent cleanesse of Teeth, but sinne made the Heavens as Brasse, and the Earth as Iron, and the fields as the Heath, and the fat Pastures, as the Desert. God indeed is the Judge of all; but Sinne is the Cause of all.
And therefore, Qui vultis Deum Imperatori Propitium, estote, Religiosi in Deum; As many as beare good will to zion, and pray for the Peace and Prosperity of their Soveraigne, let them grow and encrease in Grace, in Faith, in Religion, in Piety, in Zeale, in Sanctitie, in the knowledge, and in the love of our Lord Jesus Christ; that God may be pleased, and we may be blessed. Plucke up, Roote out, Destroy, Overthrow, Irreligion, Neutrality, Superstition, Indifferencie, Sinne, Impiety. God will pluck up, & roote out your enimies, God will Build, and Plant, and Protect, & Establish, & Blesse, your Estate, your Soveraigne, your Peace, your Prosperity.
Even so Blesse us, Gracious Father, that wee may serve thee. Let thine and our enimies consume like a Snaile that melteth, and like the untimely fruit of a woman that never saw the sun. But let the King live, & Raigne, and let his Throne be established, and his Days be multiplied, his Posterity be Blessed, and let there not want one of this Royalle seede, to sit on the Throne of this Kingdome, untill the coming of Christ Jesus. And let the Heart of everyone wither in the middest of his Bowels, and let their Tongues cleave to the Roofes of their Mouthes forever, that without Aequivocation, heartily, and unfainedly, will not say, Amen.
FINIS.
Roger Maynwaring was to become notorious for the extreme divine right opinions set forth in the two sermons that composed his sole, printed work. A year after receiving his doctoral degree from Oxford, Maynwaring was appointed chaplain in ordinary to Charles I. In this capacity, in July 1627, he preached two sermons before the king, one on 4 July on religion, the other on 29 July on allegiance. The first of these is reprinted here. In it Maynwaring argues that Englishmen are bound, on pain of damnation, to pay all taxes and loans demanded by the king regardless of whether Parliament had given its consent. A month later the two sermons were published, apparently at the command of the king but the order was later attributed to the influence of Archbishop Laud.
When Parliament met in 1628 outraged members of the House of Commons drew up formal charges against Maynwaring accusing him of meaning to destroy Parliament. They sentenced him to prison during the pleasure of the house, fined him £1,000, and suspended him from his offices for three years. Contrite and frightened, Maynwaring appeared before the Commons to plead repentance. He was sent to the Fleet prison for the duration of the Parliament. At the members’ insistence, Charles also issued a proclamation “for the calling in and suppressing” of the two offending sermons.
Charles did not hide his sympathy for Maynwaring and his divine right views however. A month after Maynwaring was sentenced the king presented the offender to the living of Stanford Rivers, Essex. During the 1630s further royal preferments were showered upon Maynwaring, culminating in 1635 with his consecration to the bishopric of St. David’s.
When the Short Parliament met in March 1640, despite the press of other business, angry members of the Lords, where Maynwaring was now entitled to sit, promptly took up the issue of this last appointment and succeeded in depriving him of his vote. New charges were prepared against him, this time for popish innovations. When the Long Parliament met, members imprisoned Maynwaring, removing all his preferments. He died in 1653.
The volume in which Maynwaring’s two sermons appeared was published in two editions in 1627 and reprinted in 1667 and 1709.
The First Sermon, Preached before the Kings Majestie at Oatlands, on the fourth day of July, 1627.
ECCLESIASTES 8.2.
I counsell thee, to keepe the Kings commandement, and that in regard of the oath of God.
Unity is the foundation of all difference and Distinction; Distinction the mother of Multitude; Multitude and number inferre Relation; which is the knot and confederation of things different, by reason of some Respect they beare unto each other. These Relations and Respects challenge Duties correspondent; according as they stand in distance or deerenesse, afarre off, or neere conjoined.
Of
