Series 3 > Register of the consultations of the ministers of Edinburgh and some other brethren of the ministry > Volume 1

DECLARATION OR TESTIMONIE OF THE
PROTESTERS IN REFERENCE TO THE
ENGLISH ACTINGS AMONGST US, 17
March 1653
A brotherly and Christian exhortation and warning
from many Ministers, Elders, and Professours of
the Gospell in Scotland, unto those of the English
Nation who have been authors of, or had accesse
unto, the late or present actings and transactions
that concerne this land.
If the Lord did not speake to us with a strong hand, we
should thinke it our wisdome to be found amongst those
who keepe silence in an evill tyme ; but when the word
of the testimony is in our hearts as a fire shut up in our
bones, we are wearie with forbearing, and cannot stay,
but must make mention of the things which He hath
engraven upon our spirits. It is our purpose to speak of
those of the English Nation, whither members of their
Parliament, generall officers of their army, Judges higher
and lower, and all persons of whatsoever quality and con¬
dition, who have been and are engaged in the late and
present actings and transactions against this poore Church
and land, especially to those who do more solemnly, and
in a speciall way professe to have the glorie of the Lord
and the true and common interest of all the godlie in all
these thrie Nations before their eyes before and above all
things else, and who have been and are upon the search
and tryall of their wayes in order to sinne and duetie ;
ffrom whom we are informed some hints have issued to
all the godly in these lands (amongst whom we, though
the meanest, desire, not presumptuously, but through the
free grace of God, to reckon ourselves) inveiting them to
speak the impressions of their hearts, and giveing ground