amounts not to much as yet; but as they have been trouble-some,
so they will be still, if a strickt eye be not kept upon
them. They are a tamer sort of beasts then those of the
stamp Royal; who look several wayes, but (like Sampsons
Foxes) carry firebrands in their tailes, and have the same
enmity against our English Interest: Nevercheless, if you
please to humor them, they will be your very good friends,
and appear like Angels of light, upon the first arrival of any
Commissioners that shall be sent hither by Parliament, and tell
them they were your very good friends, and meant nothing
but well, but that they were over-born by a commanding
Faction both of Kirk and State, or else they had been as true
as steel to England. They talk at this rate already, and we
know their meaning well enough; but if you suffer them to
keep up the formality, and face of a General Assembly, you
will soon see your English Authority bassled out of credit,
and must ever look to have the people inflamed with new
broils and insurrections. Take it for certain, you have no
greater enemies under Heaven, then those men, however they
may disguise and un-Scot themselves with new pretences;
for, you will never want a wel-affected Party here to your
vexation, and such as to serve ends, will seem to curse their
old interpretation of the Covenant, and crouch beneath the
posture of a Spaniel. But we hope, even in this particular,
God will put a spirit of wisdom into the Parliament, that
they may know how to order this Hypocritical generation,
and not suffer any jurisdiction to be exercised (either in spirituals,
nor temporals) but by their own Authority; for, you
will finde, that in the end, the Kirkmen will be so bold again,
to declare themselves as distinct and independent in power, as
any of the Popish Hierarchy can do, if you give them but the
least countenance in their way: which would be of a very
dangerous consequence, considering how they have the command
of a company of men, that are enemies above all to
your English Interest; hating none more then those that
stand for you, and being apt to improve any favour you shall
bestow, to a reviving of their old Confederacy with the Male
contents of England.