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

46 THE REGISTER OF CONSULTATIONS
be fundamentable to our common right, liberty, and
safety, and so all that are subjects in those Nations, should
be obliged to maintaine and defend the same. These
transactions as to things religious are for the substance
much the same that were holdin forth in the yeir 1649 in
that paper formerly mentioned, and, so farr as concemes
this Nation and Church, in the Declarations from Dalkeith
in the yeir 1652. Concerning the first, so farr as relates
to tolleration, this Church did publish their sense fully a
little after it came abroad; and concerning the last, wee
have once and againe before this time testified our dis¬
satisfaction and the grounds and reasons thereof, first in
a letter, and afterwards in a larger testimony directed to
the Lord Generali Cromwell, to which as to this day we
have receaved no answer. So wee conceave our selves
bund still to professe our adherence thereunto, wishing
grace from God that we may doe no thing that may staine
any pretious truth contained therein and mereie to others
whom it concerns, that they may consider of the justice
and equity of the cause which we plead for, and do as they
are commanded of God, who, tlo’ He doth chastise His
people, yet doth He not cast them of, neither forsake His
inheritance, but causeth judgement returne unto victorie.
We shall at this tyme onlie add a little unto (or rather
repeat from) these former testimonies, because of this
new and strange establishment of religion which is not
only contrary to the Word of God, and to the vow and
protestation of England 1641, and to the Nationall
Covenant of Scotland 1638, and the Solemne League and
Covenant betwixt the Nations 1643. But so farr as we
kpew without any precedent or example in the Christean
world, that we oppen it a litle, wee sail give the meaning
of those propositions in simplicity of heart and without
straining or wresting of any thing so farre as we can
attaine it. 2. Wee shall hold forth some of the grounds
of our dissatisfaction from the Lord’s Word. 3. Wee shall
shew how grat and unrighteous encroachments and how
sadd consequences these things import upon the Church
and work of God in this land.