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book_n	according_a	judge_v	see_v	1,816	5	3.3060	3	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A85393	A fresh discovery of the high-Presbyterian spirit. Or The quenching of the second beacon fired. Declaring I. The un-Christian dealings of the authors of a pamphlet, entituled, A second beacon fired, &c. In presenting unto the Lord Protector and Parlament, a falsified passage out of one of Mr John Goodwins books, as containing, either blasphemie, or error, or both. II. The evil of their petition for subjecting the libertie of the press to the arbitrariness and will of a few men. III. The Christian equity, that satisfaction be given to the person so notoriously and publickly wronged. Together with the responsatory epistle of the said beacon firers, to the said Mr Goodwin, fraught with further revilings, falsifications, scurrilous language, &c. insteed of a Christian acknowledgment of their errour. Upon which epistle some animadversions are made, / by John Goodwin, a servant of God in the Gospel of his dear Son. Also two letters written some years since, the one by the said John Goodwin to Mr. J. Caryl; the other, by Mr Caryl in answer hereunto; both relating to the passage above hinted.	Goodwin, John, 1594?-1665.; Caryl, Joseph, 1602-1673.	1655 (1655)	Wing G1167; Thomason E821_18; ESTC R202307	68,987	94

you have published in your own name or Licensed for others but I could quarrel with somewhat therein at as good a rate of ingenuity if I judged the ingagement worthy of me as you have done at that passage of mine Yea and wring every whit as bad blood out of the nose of it as you have forced out of mine But for oversights hard expressions or doubtful passages in other mens writings otherwise then for the necessary defence of those Truths which God hath stir'd up my Spirit to plead and protect I have neither time nor mind to take any such cognisance of them Concerning my own writings so far as I find them justifiable for matter of truth and defensible I shall God willing pro virili stand up to maintain them against all Opposition and Detraction as fast as I shall come to understand what exceptions are taken against them What shall reasonably and in a Christian manner be excepted against any thing I shall make no Apology for but with a spirit of meekness own the oversight and onely endeavor the rectifying In case unjust Opposers shall rise up too fast or prove too many in number for me I must then be content to edecimate and turne my self onely to those that are counted Pillars and leave Punies-either to share with them in such answers and satisfactions which shall be given unto them or otherwise to take their pleasure in flying upon the wings of their own wind Sir I cannot suspect a want of so much civility in you as to deny water unto those for the washing of their faces who are bemired though casually and by their friends or that the publishing of these few harmless lines in order to my purgation will be matter of offence in the least unto you Thus desiring that the Father of Lights will give both to you and me and all others that desire to serve him faithfully in the Gospel of his dear Son light and not darkness for our vision I take my leave and rest Yours with a perfect Heart to serve you in our Great Redeemer J. G. Mr. Joseph Caryl's Answer to Mr. John Goodwins Letter SIR I Suppose you Printed and Published your Book with a willingnesse that it should be read and considered by all men and knew also that your opinion therein asserted concerning Universal Redemption and falling from Grace hath been as still it is opposed by very many For my own part I plainly professe to you that I have according to my measure held forth and maintained the contrary Doctrines not onely before I saw your Book but before ever I saw your face and so I judge my self bound to do as I have oppertunity till I see ground to change my opinion which as yet I do not no not by what I have found in your book As for that particular Passage of it which you say I have stigmatiz'd with a Brand of Ignominy as also caution'd my friends about it what you mean by stigmatizing I apprehend not All that I have said of it hath been but a manifestation of my dislike of it or that it is an argument of your highest confidence that the truth in that point to which it relates is on your side Now truly Sir if you call this stigmatizing it with a Brand of Ignominy I know not how to take it off notwithstanding all that you have written in vindication of it in the Letter you were pleased to send me And whereas you intimate your purpose to Print that Letter it shall I hope be no trouble to me unlesse for your sake if you do so Onely give me leave to caution you as a friend to consider well both with your self and with your friends Whether it be so comely or you to discover such an eagernesse in this cause that you cannot contain your self from publishing in Print what is spoken in private discourse among Friends concerning this or other Passages of your Book The Lord lead us into all truth and teach us how to walk in Love Yours in the truth to serve you in all Offices of Gospel Love Joseph Caryl Post-Script 1. To be read in Page 42. line 23. after these words Mr. Horn And why do you not demand of your Committee-man George otherwise called Doctor Kendal another of your three worthies why he hath not as yet answered Mr. Baxter who in your phrase hath charged him home to the life or rather indeed to the death of those foppish opinions and conceits of his which he encounters with as much ease and with like success as the fire doth the dryed stubble Yea why doe not you ask your third Committee-man and Champion Joseph why he hath not answered the same Mr. Baxters Epistle wherein he very gravely and Christianly yet roundly and smartly enough expostulates with him for helping into the world and this with approbation and applause such a book which well deserves to be hissed out of the world with indignation Post-Script 2. To be read in Page 47. line 10. after these words So still Yea there are such things found and have been discovered by others as well as by my self especially by Mr. Baxter and Mr. Hora in the writings of the three additional members of your Committee which according to the terms of your own regulation mentioned 12. of your Letter render them signally unmeet for a superintendency over the Press Mr. Baxter well nigh all along his Reply to Mr. Kendals Digression page after page evinceth him to be a man destitute of the truth void of judgement c. in very many things delivered by him in the said Digression And for Doctor Owen Mr. Horn hath in a just volume discovered his incompetency in the same kind FINIS Faults escaped in some Copies Epist. p. 3. l. 3. r. oculos p. 4. l. 15. r. failings l. ult. r. over-easie p. 7. l. 26. r. generality Book p. 1. l. 5. r. Nathanael p. 3. l. 21. r. creature p. 5. l. 15. r. Beacon-Firers p. 8. l. 11. r. be p. 10. l. 14. r. the p. 10. l. 20. r. work p. 14. l. 2. r. into p. 20. l. 6. r. black-friar p. 20. l. 8 r. Presbiterian p. 27. in the marg. r. errorum immaculatumque p. 28. l. ult. r. Pauls p. 34. l. 3. dele p. 35. l. 14. after below r. l. 15. after strong supply p. 36. l. ult. r. warie p. 40. l. 1. r. to l. ult. for with r. of p. 41. l. 24. r. if I did it not p. 43. l. 3. r. Co-adjutor p. 44. l. 7. r. spend p. 51. l. 33. r. ingenuously p. 54. l. 5. dele the p. 70. l. 12. after less r. a Nobis fratres suff cit conscientia nostra sed propter vos etiam fama pollere debet b In snspicione Hereseos nolo quenquam esse patientem Judg. 12. 6. a Promissiones itaque illae 〈◊〉 pro statis praesenti rer●●● sunt 〈◊〉 gende a Nunc autē quia juxta sententiam Salvatoris volo operari cibum qui non perit antiquam divinorum voluminum viam sentibus virgultisque purgare Error mihi geminus infligitur corrector vitiorum falsarius dicor et errores non auferre sed serere b Ac Beatus Job qui adhuc apud Latinos jacebat in stercore et vermibus scatebat erroram integrum immacultumque gaudete a Pauca sunt enim quae proprie loquimur sc. de Deo plura non propri● sed cognoscitur quid velimus Aug. Confes. 11. c. 2. a See the 26. and last Chapter of my Redemption Redeemed a Cum et ed numero et de conditione ac differentiâ eorum qui manu-mitterentur curiose cavisset hoc queque adjecit me vinctus unquam tortusve quis ullo libertatis genere urbem adipis ceretur Sueton. Octav. §. 40. a I call your request Anti-Christian because a restraint of the Press is generally practised where Anti-Christ hath his Throne The same Engine was made use of by the late Prelacy to support their Kingdom of unrighteousness Is it me●t to bring in the methods and arrifices invented and practised by Satan for the support of his tottering State and Kingdom in the world into the Kingdom of Jesus Christ for the establishment of this as if it were not able to stand but upon Satans legs a Part. 2. p. 50. 54 a {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} Eph. 4. 8. See Master Baxter Preface Apologetical pag. 6. And again in his Prologue to Mr. Kendal p. 4. a 2 Tim. 2. a Mal. 2. 17.

many things or many spirits of Doctrines be not suffered to come to the knowledge of men how shall they be able to try them Do not then the Beacon-firers by their counsel given to the Lord Protector and Parliament for the restraining of the Presse render that great commandement of God for the trial of all things of none effect 9. And lastly That great evill of the infectious spreading of errours and heresies in the Nation the prevention whereof the said advice given touching the Press pretendeth unto is not likely to be at all prevented but promoted rather by it should it he followed and put in execution For 1. As the saying is Quod licet ingratum est quod non licet acrius urit What Laws permit to do to do Men do not much desire But what restrained is to do They burn as hot as Fire And the Apostle Paul himself saith That Sin taking occasion by the commandement wrought in him all manner of concupiscence For without the Law Sin is dead Rom 7. 8. And little question there is but that in case the liberty of the Press shall bee by any law restreined they who otherwise would be but indifferent whether they published in Print their weak it may be their erroneous and wicked conceptions or no will be hereby admonished and provoked to do it though more secretly Stollen Waters are sweet 2. In case they shall by any such law of restraint be kept from venting their fond and uncouth notions by the Press or shall by the Masters of the Press bee prohibited the Printing of them they will by way of indignation and revenge be so much the more zealously diligent and intent to propagate them underhand and privately and probably gain many more disciples this way then by the other The prophane and vain babling of Hymeneus and Philetus fretted like a Canker although they wanted the opportunity of a Press for their propagation 3. When the generality of people shal understand that the publishing of such or such notions or Tenents hath been restrained and obstructed by those who shall exercise an arbitrary dominion over the Presse it will in reason both occasion them to think the better of them or at least to think that there is somewhat more then ordinary in them in one kind or other and consequently they will be awakened and stirred in their spirits to inquire more narrowly after them and to acquaint themselves with them So that in this respect also there is little like to be gained towards the suppression of errors and heresies by subjecting the Presse unto a Test 4. The setting of Watchmen with authority at the door of the Presse to keep errors and heresies out of the world is as weak a project and design as it would be to set a company of armed men about an house to keep darknesse out of it in the night season For as the natural darknesse cannot be prevented or dispelled but by the presence of light nor needeth there to be any thing either for the preventing or dispelling it but light onely So neither is it possible either to prevent or to remove errors and heresies which are spiritual darknesse but onely by shining spiritual light in the hea●ts and understandings of men neither needeth there any thing but this to effect either 5. Errors and Heresies the lesse they play in sight are like to defend themselves upon terms of more advantage and to lengthen out the daies of their continuance amongst men for the longer time For by this means they are kept from the clear and distinct knowledge of judicious and learned men who otherwise being both able and willing to perform so worthy a service both unto God and men would publickly detect and confute them And I verily beleeve that the printing of J. Biddles most enormous and hideous notions and conceits about the nature of God and some other very weighty points in religion will bring the judgement of bloody and deceitfull men upon them which according to Davids Award is not to live cut half their daies Psal 55. 23 For as the great Apostles reasoneth concerning such Teachers whom he calleth men of corrupt minds {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} injudicieus or without judgement about matters of Faith But saith he they shal proceed no further for their madnesse shall be manifest unto all men as theirs also was so is it very reasonable to conceive and judge that the more generally and publickly any vile wicked or blasphemous conceit shall discover and manifest it self unto men it is so much the nearer to become the loathing and abhorring of all men Nor do the Beacon-firers argue like worthy men when from the numbers of unworthy books printed they infer the number of buyers and from hence conclude the number of persons either infected with or inclined to the errors contained and pleaded for in those books For who knoweth not that many men especially Ministers Schollars and learned men buy many books not with any intent to say as they say or to side in opinion with their Authors but partly to inform themselves concerning the spirits that come abroad into the world partly to rebuke and confute them upon occasion in case they see cause for it 6. And lastly for this The Gospel and the truth never flourished prospered triumphed at an higher rate in the world then when errors and heresies were no otherwise restreined punished or opposed then by those spiritual means which God himself hath sanctified and prescribed in this behalf as viz. by the effectual preaching of the Gospel the stopping of the mouths of the gain-sayers of truth by arguments of conviction and solid demonstration by casting out of their respective Churches and delivering up unto Sathan all such who after admonition and conviction shall persist in their errors and in the teaching and spreading of them But certainly amongst all the means Offices and Officers which the Lord Christ hath directed or established for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edifying of the body of Christ till we all come in the unity of the faith and acknowledgement of the son of God unto a perfect man c. neither restraint of printing nor Licensers of the Presse are to be found these are Apocryphal both Names and Things This for the second particular For the third and last He or they whether it be some other others or your selves who have represented you as the firers of the second Beacon and consequently the Authors of the advice given in the Pamphlet mentioned touching the monopolizing of the Presse do insinuate you as men who can be too well content that others of the same craft with you should suffer in their trade so you may advance in yours For it is not much to be doubted but that your desire is that such men as you count Orthodox should be recommended by you or by your motion interest to the high

them with this Majesty carries the print of a false singer in it as was lately said Nor is it any better then a putid of silly cavil not worthy the Genius of a School-Boy of ten or twelve years old to charge me with the grossest Blasphemy because I ascribe unto the University an Autocratorical majesty over Books and opinions in such a sence as I declare and explain in the period immediately following at large Nor would your Committee of Licensers should the Parliament indulge you in your Anti-Christian a request about them which I trust is found among the Absits of all considering men be able to accommodate you in your expectations or desires if they should not invest them with such an Autocratorical Majesty over Books and Opinions as I ascribe to the Doctors of Cambridge Should then the Parliament be guilty either of base flattery or of the grossest Blasphemy in case they should invest them with such a power over Books and Opinions as that which I Rhetorically term an Autocratorical Majesty Or have not I every whit as much ground of hope that there will be found none at least no wise men who will take that power and glory to themselves without which Licensers of the Presse cannot be established to do their work effectually and with authority as you have to hope that the Cambridge Doctors will not take that glory to themselves which I ascribe to them When you insinnuate indeed as good as say right-down that I my self ascribe unto God that Autocratorical Majesty which I ascribe unto men vestratim facitis you do like your selves and not like unto men honestly considerate Do I anywhere ascribe unto God an Autocratorical Majesty over Books and Opinions But he that commits sin I see is the servant of sin e Whereas you wish me a better memory then that which I have I fear you would be better satisfied if it were worse But I shall not burthen you with this jealousie Nay if you be reall and Christian in your wish I most heartily concur with you in it And by way of recompence for your good affections to me most cordially wish you a better understanding which I know will accommodate you as much as a better memory will do me f Your Prophets are they who aspire above the Order of second Causes when they claim a Lordship and Dominion over mens faith and undertake to prescribe what must be taught and beleeved by men And if your notion here be true this probably may be the cause why they are in your affectate Metaphor so Wormeaten in their intellectuals Booksellers or Beacon-firers §. XII 3. To your 3 reason concerning Qualifications the Holy Ghost doth set down such Qualifications both Negatively and Positively as would fit men to oversee a Presse though printing was not invented some hundreds of years after the Canon was perfected 1. Negatively They are not fit to oversee the Presse who are men of corrupt minds destitute of the truth a void of judgement or delivered over to areprobate sence 2. Positively they are fit who hold fast the wholesome form of sound words the mystery of faith and Godlinesse and have their sences exercised to discern both good and evill b Mr. Goodwins Animadversion XII a If men of corrupt minds or destitute of the truth be not fit men to oversee a Presse I doubt you must contract the number of your Committee of Six or else admit of men not fit according to your own rule for the service b Again if they and onely they be fit who hold fast the wholesome form of sound words certain I am that your Committee of Six are not fit for they hold fast an unwholsome form of words and teach many unsound Doctrines which are not according to Godlinesse the unsoundnesse and ill consistency of several of these Doctrines with the interest of Godlinesse I have demonstratively shewed and proved in sundry places of my writings Nor have all the Mercury water that hath been applied nor all the scrapings and scratchings and scrubbings that have been used been able to cleanse or clear those Doctrines from these stains and blots By the way though it be true that the Scripture doth mention such qualifications and characters of men both negative and positive as you speak of in reference to other occasions and imployments yet by what authority or warrant do you make them competent to qualifie for such an Apocryphal office as you call the over-seeing of a Presse Are not you men who abhominate to make use of your own wits reasons or judgements in matters of Religion especially to trust unto them Or can you prove from the Scriptures that your qualifications were ever intended or meant by the Holy Ghost for the designation or characterizing of persons meet to make Oversee-ers of Presses Or is your Office of Presse-over-sight an alien to Religion and irrelative to it Besides what warrant have you but onely from your selves and your own reasons when you undertake to qualifie your Presse-masters with those qualifications from the Scriptures which you expresse to lay aside and leave out others which are delivered there upon the same or like account with those insisted on by you Why do you not require in your Overseers of the Presse that they be as well blamelesse husbands of one wife given to Hospitality not given to wine not greedy of filthy lucre not covetous c. as men who hold fast the wholesome form of sound words which by the way is no Scripture qualification this no where termeth forms wholesome but words or Doctrines onely Notwithstanding this Section of your Letter hath this that it is the calmest of all the 22. Book-sellers or Beacon-firers §. XIII 4. To your 4th all things are not free in a free Common-wealth that Christian Commonwealth must expect to be ruined which allows men a liberty to blaspheme Jesus Christ or corrupt his Gospel a 5. To your 5th be pleased to read the 13th of Deuter. the 13th of Zachary and the 13th to the Romans and draw conclusions from thence for your satisfaction b 6. To your 6th The Religion owned by our State is the Christian Religion c Mr. Goodwins Animadversion XIII a What you mean by a Christian Commonwealth what by this Commonwealths allowing men a liberty to blaspheme Jesus Christ or corrupt his Gospel I professe ingeniously I understand not If by the former you mean a Nation or State wherein Christianity at large is more generally professed that which you speak here of a Christian Commonwealth you might as well have spoken of an Anti-Christian But I pray tell me did you ever know or hear of a Commonwealth which was either Christian or Anti-Christian that did allow men a liberty to blaspheme Jesus Christ or to corrupt his Gospel Or doth it follow that unlesse a Committee of Presse-Masters be established in a Commonwealth this Common-wealth must needs allow men a liberty to blaspheme or corrupt as you say Or have the

men of corrupt minds and injudicious about matters of faith at least many of them will I question not be found men of as pure and sound minds and of as discerning spirits in matters of Faith as either your selves or your best Teachers In the mean time I would gladly purchase of you at the price of the best book in all your shops so much as a tolerable answer to this double Question who are competent to appoint or to be appointed Judges between men men of corrupt minds and injudicious c. and men that are otherwise For it is not meet for any man or men to take this honour unto themselves I mean of being Judges over all other mens faith much lesse is it meet that any man or men should take so great an honor unto themselves as to constitute or appoint others to be Judges hereof If your answer shall be that the civil Magistrate is competent to appoint Judges in this kind you must give me a very pregnant and satisfactory account of his Commission from the Lord Christ in this behalf and by what rule he is directed by him to proceed in this great and important affair Book-sellers or Beacon-firers §. XVII To your 3d. and last charge which is that we smell of such a spirit as teaches men to suppose that Gain is Godlinesse and that our indeavour is to Monopolize our trade We answer 1. That we are not so vain as to desire what is utterly impossible to effect a 2. That we are willing that all of our Trade and Company should have equal liberty with our selves to Print or sell any Books which may promote the truth which is according to Godlinesse b 3d. We shake our hands from all dishonest gain it is below us to live by the Sins of the Age we look upon it as the basest drudgery in the world to be Pandors to the Errors and Lusts of men c We might gain by selling Biddles Books but we had rather see them burnt by the hand of the Hangman Your Motto will best become those who usually Print and sell Blasphemous Pamphlets For they if any look upon Gain as Godlinesse but our Motto is this Godlinesse is Gain and true Piety is the best Policy d Mr. Goodwins Animadversion XVII a Here again you make your charge from me greater then it is that by denying the sum total of it as your selves make it you may seem to deny all the particulars I no where charge you with Monopolizing your trade You would gladly I perceive be charged with that of which you can acquit your selves with credit b But what if your Licensers shall suppress such books which may promote the truth which is according to godliness and commend to the Press those that look another way How then shall men of your trade yea or our selves have that liberty you speak of c To what end you should purge your selves so zealously from the guilt of being pandours to the lusts of men I understand not unless haply some of your consciences charge you in this kind and you speak thus to stop their mouths But for that which you call pandour-ship to the errors of men I fear you are as obnoxious as others of your trade though perhaps you understand not your guilt in it more then they d If you saw the Books that you speak of burnt by the hand of the hangman do you think that the Errors Heresies and Blasphemies contained in them would burn with them If you do I confess I am of a far differing mind from you I verily beleeve that the ashes of these Books would be much more propagative of the said Errors and Heresies then the Books themselvs Your Motto may be as you say and you shall do well if you be not like those Boxes in Apothecaries Shops of which an ancient Father said that they had Pharmacum in titulo in pixide venenum The Arch-Priest of Rome hath this Motto Servus Servorum Dei yet in his practise he is Dominus Dominantium He of your company that understands Latine may interpret Book-Sellers or Beacon-Firers §. XVIII Finally to your close we answer that you have no jurisdiction over us and therefore you have no Authority to impose any penance upon us a or to curse us with Bell Book and Candle because we have in some weak measure discovered you to the world b It is true we owed you SVCH and now we have made restitution of it c You know not what to do with it because you are not able by the help of it to return an answer to those three Reverend Divines whom we mentioned before d Mr. Goodwins Animadversion XVIII a I am sorry to hear from you that you look upon a Christian request made unto you to do that which is your duty as an imposition of a Penance I perceive that things which are just and comely are far from being the joy and rejoicing of your souls You have forgotten your Motto already b Curse you with Bell Book and Candle Surely either I was asleep when I did it or you when you said it Name the word or words of the Curse and save your selves from the shame of a new foolish slander Whereas you speak of suffering from me because you detected me to the world The truth is had you detected me I should have counted you my great Benefactors for it I shall be a gainer not a loser by detection But so far have you been from detecting me to the world that you have concealed and hid me from the world as Tertullus did Paul when he termed him a pestilent fellow Act. 24. 5. and the malicious Jews did our Saviour when they put the veil of this reproach over his face that he was a Samaritan and had a Devil Joh. 8. you have not detected me to the world but your selves and have given the world an opportunity yea a kind of invitation to see your nakednesse c Concerning the restitution of which you vainly here boast it was before proved unto you that you are debtors unto me of far greater Sums then of the word Such Besides you speak at an extream low rate of understanding when you have traduced a man openly and in print to call a broken kind of acknowledgement in hugger mugger and sealed up in a paper a restitution If you pay your debts after this manner they are wisest that trust you least d Yes you have seen that by the help of the word h I am able to return an answer as you term it to your three reverend Divines in case any of them should levy an Argument or ground of exception against the passage you wot of which yet none of them have done nor can do with any colour of reason but only clamour'd and cavill'd as you have done Book-sellers or Beacon-fyrers §. XIX If you desire us to print your Letter and this our answer we will for once make you an Apocryphal Licencer and print both if you

Notwithstanding I had in some particular distinct explications of my self immediatly before endeavoured to remove the stumbling-stone such as it was out of his way and had shewed him before this how he might with a very good conscience with more honour to himself have passed by that passage without lifting up his heel against it but that I want such particularity of information about the carriage of the discourse as I desire hope in due time to obtain As for him who Arch-Rabbi-like concluded at once without premises al those without exception that hold the Doctrines of general Attonement by Christ and of a possibility of a final declining in such who ever believed to be men Godlesse Christlesse Spiritlesse Gracelesse I shall at present onely advise him to lay his heart close to those two sayings of a wise man Prov. 26. 12. and Prov. 29. 20. When I shall hear that he is throughly baptized into the Spirit of these Scriptures I shall judge him a person worthy a reproof when he offends In the mean time I judge that He who told it amongst news from Heaven unto the City that Arminius his rotten posts were lately new painted together with him who not long after diurnal-wise told the same story over again to the same Audience only in a more dismal Metaphor informing them that Arminius his Ghost was lately started out of his Grave and walked neither of them medling any further with the controversies I judge I say that these are men wise in their generation and did well consider that the name of Arminius is the most forcible Engine though made of nothing but air and wind to batter the walls of those opinions which they so cordially wish in the dust and that should they have engaged any Scripture or Argument upon the designe they had run an hazard of losing all that ground or more which they had reason to hope they had won by drawing the pedigree of the said opinions though most untruely from Arminius it faring with their credulous hearers according to the Proverb The blind swallow many a fly But Sir Concerning that passage in my late Book upon the horn whereof you were pleased to tye a lock or bunch of hey by way of signal unto your friends and others to take heed of it and to keep at distance from it if my intelligence leadeth me to the right place as I suppose upon competent grounds it doth as far as I am able with the most impartial eye I have to see into it it is so far from meriting the brand of ignominy wherewith you have stigmatized it that rightly understood and considered it is as innocent and offenceless as any saying that ever fell from your own mouth in any of your Sermons The passage I presume is this page 335. of the said Book I shall recite it verbatim Yea that which is yet more I verily believe that in case any such assurance of the unchangeableness of Gods love were to be found in or could regularly be deduced from the Scriptures it were a just ground to any intelligent and considering man to question their Authority and whether they were from God or no The reason of this saying I immediately subjoyne in these words For that a God infinitely righteous and holy should irreversibly assure the immortal and undefiled inheritance of his Grace and favour unto any creature whatsoever so that though this Creature should prove never so abominable in his sight never so outragiously and desperately wicked and prophane he should not be at liberty to withhold this inheritance from him is a saying doubtless too hard for any man who rightly understands and considers the Nature of God to hear What there should be in either of these sayings so much as lyable to any suspicion of an incomportance either with reason or with truth cannot enter into my thoughts to imagine or conceive The pile of the discourse is built and I cannot but presume regularly enough upon this foundation that if any thing were found in those writings or books known by the Name of Scriptures whether in the letter of them or in any expresness of consequence from them here justified or approved of any blasphemous importance against God or any his Attributes it were a just ground at least to question whether the said writings were from God or no I suppose I shal not need to argue this principle being so full of light in it self The Holy Ghost himself teacheth us that God cannot deny himselfe a and as certain it is that he cannot blaspheme himself nor yet authorize inspire or teach any person or creature whatsoever to blaspheme him the blaspheming of himselfe being nothing else but a constructive denying of himself as is evident Therefore what book or writing soever contains any thing blasphemous against God I do not mean as simply reported but as asserted and maintained in either is not onely a just ground to question which yet is all I affirm in the point whether such a writing or book be of divine inspiration or from God or no but even positively to conclude against them that they are not So then if there be any thing dangerous or of suspicious consequence in either of the said passages it must be this that in the former of them I suppose and in the latter constructively affirm that such an unchangeablenesse of the Love of God as is mentioned in the former and described in part in the latter is of a blasphemous import and repugnant to those great Attributes of righteousness and holiness in God Though the latter of the said passages recited carrieth a sufficient light in it to satisfie any man impartially considerate concerning the truth of this assertion yet the matter being of an high and sacred importance I am willing and shall endeavour to give both unto your self and others somewhat a more full and distinct account hereof First then evident it is that that unchangeablenesse of the love of God which these passages speak of and without a supposal whereof the common Doctrine of Perseverance against which I here argue cannot be maintained in the formal and proper notion of it supposeth that if ever God once truly loveth a person it is unpossible that upon any occasions or interveniences whatsoever he should hate him afterwards Secondly Every whit as evident it is that such a supposion or notion as this supposeth that in case a person hath once or at any time truly believed suppose in his youth under which condition he must needs be beloved by God though the very next hour or day after such his believing he should fall into wayes of sin wickednesse disobedience rebellion against God and should without repentance or remorse continue in these abominations adding drunkenness to thirst from time to time for 10. 20. it may be 40. 50. years together and to his last breath yet God all this while truly loveth him and remaineth unchanged in