A treatise of miscellany questions wherein many useful questions and cases of conscience are…A treatise of miscellany questions wherein many usefull questions and cases of conscience are…

Now the grounds and reasons for such an Ordinance may be these.

1. It were a great unthankfulness to God, if after sacred and solemn vows made in time of our greatest dangers, and when after our vows, God hath begun to deliver us, and hath dissipated our Enemies, we should now grow weary of paying, and performing those vows. We may say of the Covenant, as the Prophet said of the laying of the foundation of the second Temple. Consider whether from that very day God did not sensibly bless us, and give a testimony from Heaven, to his own Cause and Covenant. And now shall the Covenant which was our glory and ornament before God and men, be laid aside as a worn or moth-eaten garment? God forbid.

1. It were a great unthankfulnsse to God, if after sacred and solemne vowes made in time of our greatest dangers, and when after our vowes, God hath begun to deliver us, and hath dissipated our Enemies, we should now grow wearie of paying, and performing those vowes. We may say of the Covenant, as the Prophet said of the laying of the foundation of the second Temple. Consider whether from that very day God did not sensibly blesse us, and give a testimony from Heaven, to his own Cause and Covenant. And now shall the Covenant which was our glory and ornament before God and men, be laid aside as a worne or moth-eaten garment? God forbid.

2. If the taking of the solemn League and Covenant, be not enjoined by authority of Parliaments, under a penalty, but left arbitrary, this were an opening in stead of shutting of the door unto as many as are apt and inclinable •o refuse and ⟨p. 204⟩oppose the Covenant, yea, to as many as write or speak against it, and maintain opinions or practises contrary to it. The impiety and obstinacy of such persons, if not punished, but connived at, or tacitly permitted by the Parliaments, involveth them and the Nation as partakers of the sin, and so consequently of the judgement.