1646 NICHOLAS LOCKYER. Westminster Assembly Puritan Preaches on the Need for Just and Robust Government.

A superb sermon preached in the heat of the English Civil War under the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell by Nicholas Lockyer [1611-1685], who would become Cromwell's Chaplain. The Presbyterians and other Puritan Independents and Congregationalists were engaged in a heated philosophical debate regarding the right of more fundamentalist Presbyterians to utilize their new-found power to establish a Covenanted Kingdom based on establishment of something very like Scotland's Solemn League and Covenant. It would, by default, mean persecution of Anglicans, Baptists, and of course Catholics at the National level.  Some of the Presbyterians were so-inclined, which led to Rogers Williams labeling them as no better than the Priests & Popes with their persecuting and narrow spirit.  Lockyer was of the stronger-handed variety. He subscribed to the Covenant, later became Cromwell's Chaplain, and was often asked to preach the Fast Sermons before Parliament, then dominated by Presbyterians. A robus