chester House. I can compare him to nothing but a great fish that we catch and let go again, but still he will come to the bait; at last, therefore, we put him into some great pond for store.

INCENDIARIES.

FANCY to yourself a man sets the city on fire at Cripplegate, and that fire continues by means of others, till it come to Whitefriars, and then he that began it would fain quench it; does not he deserve to be punished most that first set the city on fire? So it is with the incendiaries of the state. They that first set it on fire (by monopolizing, forest business, imprisoning parliament men, tertio Caroli, &c.), are now become regenerate, and would fain quench the fire; certainly they deserved most to be punished, for being the first cause of our distractions.

INDEPENDENCY.

1. INDEPENDENCY is in use at Amsterdam, where forty churches or congregations have nothing to do one with another. And it is no question agreeable to the primitive times,

before the Emperor became Christian. For either we must say every church governed itself, or else we must fall upon that old foolish rock, that St. Peter and his successors governed all; but when the civil state became Christian, they appointed who should govern them, before they governed by agreement and consent. If you will not do this, you shall come no more amongst us; but both the Independent man, and the Presbyterian man, do equally exclude the civil power, though after a different manner.

2. The Independent may as well plead, they should not be subject to temporal things, not come before a constable, or a justice of peace, as they plead they should not be subject in spiritual things; because St. Paul says, Is it so, that there is not a wise man amongst you?

3. The pope challenges all churches to be under him; the king and the two archbishops challenge all the church of England to be under them. The Presbyterian man divides the kingdom into as many churches as there be presbyteries, and your Independent would have every congregation a church by itself.

THINGS INDIFFERENT.

IN time of a parliament, when things are under debate, they are indifferent, but in a church or state settled, there is nothing left indifferent.

PUBLIC INTEREST.

ALL might go well in the commonwealth, if every one in the parliament would lay down his own interest, and aim at the general good. If a man were sick, and the whole college of physicians should come to him, and administer severally, haply so long as they observed the rules of art he might recover; but if one of them had a great deal of scammony by him, he must put off that, therefore he prescribes. scammony. Another had a great deal of rhubarb, and he must put off that, and therefore he prescribes rhubarb, &c.; they would certainly kill the man. We destroy the commonwealth, while we preserve our own private interests, and neglect the public.

HUMAN INVENTION.

there must be no human invention nothing but the pure word.

Answ. If I give any exposition, but what is expressed in the text, that is my invention: if you give another exposition, that is your invention, and both are human. For example, suppose the word egg were in the text, I say, it is meant an hen-egg; you say, a goose-egg. Neither of these are expressed, therefore they are human invention; and I am sure the newer the invention the worse, old inventions are best.

2. If we must admit nothing but what we read in the Bible, what will become of the parliament? For we do not read of that there.

JUDGMENTS.

WE cannot tell what is a judgment of God, it is presumption to take upon us to know. In time of plague we know we want health, and therefore we pray to God to give us health; in time of war we know we want peace, and therefore we pray to God to give us peace. Commonly we say a judgment falls upon a man for something in him we cannot abide. An example we have in king James, concerning the death of Henry the Fourth of France; one said he was killed for his wenching, another said he was killed for turning his

religion. No, says king James (who could not abide fighting), he was killed for permitting duels in his kingdom.

JUDGE.

1. WE see the pageants in Cheapside, the lions, and the elephants, but we do not see the men that carry them; we see the judges look big, look like lions, but we do not see who moves them.

2. Little things do great works, when great things will not. If I should take a pin from the ground, a little pair of tongs will do it, when a great pair will not. Go to a judge to do a business for you, by no means he will not hear of it; but go to some small servant about him, and he will dispatch it according to your heart's desire.

3. There could be no mischief done in the commonwealth without a judge. Though there be false dice brought in at the groom-porters, and cheating offered, yet unless he allow the cheating, and judge the dice to be good, there may be hopes of fair play.

JUGGLING.

It is not juggling that is to be blamed, but much juggling, for the world cannot be go