has a good degree of Charity to the Poor and as great of the Vertue of Liberality to the Learned I can inform him of your Compositions to the Theater which made your younger Years so famous and of the unanswerable Defences you have since made for the Nation 's Rights against Arbitrary Power and Tyranny I dare not I confess tell him of your Posts of Trust and Honour for he will be unreconcileably alienated when he knows that to all your other Naughtiness you are a Williamite too He takes for his Text the words of Solomon Prov. 14.6 A Scorner seeketh Wisdom and findeth it not From hence he would raise an Invective a Sermon he calls it against you and the History of Religion A Man would wonder how this Text should make for Popery and Persecution or against the Patrons of Sincerity and Liberty in Religion But what is there so remote or hid from others that a Student cannot discover it Father Atterbury is able I doubt not to prove from this Text or to disprove any Proposition in Euclid For Students do not hold themselves obliged to reason accurately and closely as other common Men must but by leaping over some intervening unsutable Propositions may skip from Tumult to King Pipin or what is as good from Historian to Scorner Yet methinks since this Gentleman had a mind to declaim before the Queen against the History of Popish Jugglers and Cheats he should have shown his Zeal in some other way rather than in a Sermon or from a Text of Holy Scripture for of all Abominations there is none so detestable as to wire-draw wind and bow the sacred Text to argue against it self that is to patronize Impostures and Deceits In the Prosecution of his Text so pat as every one sees to his purpose he falls to considering what may be the Reasons why the Scorner seeketh Wisdom and findeth it not One of the Reasons he offers is very marvellous it is this because the Scorner saith he pag. 12. is a Man of quick and lively Parts Such Men saith he further there are apt to give themselves a Loose beyond plain Reason and common Sense I know not I confess what he means nor I believe can all the Students of Christ-Church interpret it to me But be that as it will the thing he aims at in that whole Page is that quick and lively Parts are marvellous Hinderances in the Quest of Wisdom and Truth according to him the only hopeful Candidate of Wisdom is a Sancho Pancha But it will not yet go out of my Mind nor can I keep my Eye off it that a Court-Chaplain should have so little Government with him that so soon as he had read a Book against Popery and Persecution he should from the Pulpit and in the Royal Presence attack the Author in such Terms as these He has written the History of Religion and were I not withheld by Religion I would write his History What! is it such an Offence at this time of day to write a few Sheets against Popery that no Person of Honour must put Pen to Paper on that Subject on pain of being libelled by her Majesty's Chaplain for that 's the unquestionable Meaning of writing his Life But he is withheld he says from writing this Life by Religion By what Religion Sir Would you have us to think after you have defamed him in such Language as this and to such an Auditory 't is from Conscience and Love of your Brother that you do not libel him to the unsignificant Rabble It is evident then that you have hypocritically feigned a religious Tenderness to which you are an utter Stranger must we be obliged to call it your Religion your Charity and Tenderness that you are content not to write his Life to the common Herd when you have actually pointed at him in a sacred Place and Exercise in the Presence of the Prince and most illustrious Personages of the Kingdom And for whom is it that you counterfeit this pious Tenderness For an Anonymous Writer for one you do not know For as to Report and the Whispers of those sagacious Men who so certainly know all Authors they are so oft mistaken that except it be here and there a Student no body heeds them or rather every Body abhors them I am amazed that any Man especially a Man of Learning and Wit should utter so many Follies and Contradictions in a Pulpit and also oversee them all again when he prepared his Notes for the Press For Instance He asperses an honourable Person in the very highest degree in the Royal Presence and yet 't is meer Religion he says that withholds him from writing his Life to the common People That is he has swallowed the Camel and is now grievously straining at the Gnat. Again He has an Inclination to libel or as he calls it write the Life of the Author of the History of Religion and yet this Author is nameless that is utterly unknown to Father Atterbury and his whole Fraternity Again He saith this Book is directed against all Religion and every thing in Religion and yet the very design of the Book is this that ' t is a shame that so many have had no Religion but their Belly and their Profit and a Pity that others are persecuted only for Religion and Conscience towards God Once more He saith that the thing which the Scorner seeketh for is Wisdom and yet he adds he finds it not because he has quick and lively Parts That is according to this Student the Scorner seeks for what he has and he misses it because he possesses it It is well that the Student's Sermons are so short as they always I observe are for these are such flat and direct Contradictions that if there were many of them they would too much expose the Preacher to the Contempt of his very meanest Hearers I have done with Father Francis for the present only this Sir I shall promise you that when he is disposed to try his Hand in writing Lives he shall have the Satisfaction to see his own Picture drawn in such lively Colours as Time shall not easily deface Sir I think I shall not need to mind you that you ought not to be in the least disturbed at the Sawciness of an obscure Academick For being bred as they are among mean Companions and comparing themselves only with Under-graduates Servitors and Gippoes when they first appear abroad in the World the poor Wretches always make themselves ridiculous by not knowing themselves and their Rank in the World They think that all Mankind has that Reverence for them which their Sizers and College-Servants are forced to show them and from hence when they get into the wooden Box instead of the Apostolical Reprove and Exhort they fall to Porterly Reproach and Scandalize On the contrary I doubt not you will always be pleased and happy in the Recollection of the immortal Services which you have done the Royal
guess at But had his Majesty been as bountiful as the Libeller supposed Why might not our Friend have taken those Favours either as part of the Reward due to his Services or as His Majesty's Royal Munificence to Wit and distinguishing Abilities Why was he obliged to understand them as Bribes and Corruptions as the Libeller would have them interpreted This Ungrateful Man says our Popish Accuser forgot all the King's Bounties to him and was with the most forward in turning him out Let us grant to a Fool both his Lies yet where however is the Ungratitude when never any thing was given to our Friend by the Royal Family which he might not most justly put to the account either of his Services or his Abilities But King James Father Petre and the Nuncio knew better things than to fling away their Money on a Person whom his Vertue more than his Fortunes had set so much above the reach of Bribes they were for a contrary method to Brow-beat and Mortify him by Oppositions But neither would this do he remained the same to his Religion and Country as he was to the Crown and Royal Family when they were attacked by the Republican Faction that is he was Heroically firm to both while they were the weaker side without seeking afterwards from either the Rewards of his Merit to them You and I Sir have nothing so much valued by us as the Friendship and Esteem of a Fortitude Constancy and Vertue so extraordinary nor any thing that we desire so much as the long Life and Prosperity of a Friend whom with so much reason we value and love This is all that I need now to say saving that I am with the greatest Respect Your most Obliged and Assured Friend N. S. The First LETTER Being Reflections on a Sermon preach'd before her late most Excellent Majesty on these words of Solomon The Scorner seeketh Wisdom and findeth it not By Francis Atterbury Student in Christ-Church Oxford To the Honourable and Learned Author of The History of Religion SIR AS I had the Honour to see The History of Religion before you gave way that it should go to the Press So I cannot but wonder that any should be so rouzed and even affrighted and scared by a Book which seemed to me not only true and useful happily thought and as well exprest but also altogether inoffensive to every true Lover of a sincere undisguised Piety and Morality I deny not that when I began to read the Book the Term Priest-Craft there often used and the Instances you give of it made me a while doubtful what might be the Author's Aim whether he might not at length stretch his Notion of Priest-Craft not only to the impious Frauds of Pagan Priests and the pious Frauds as you civilly call them of some Christian Priests but even to all Revealed Religion as if it were an Imposture that has depraved rather than explained and inforced Natural Religion that new Mistress of many of our Modern Wits But when I had gone over the whole with such an Attention as I thought was due to the Subject treated of and of the Conceptions and Observations of an Author whose Pen had always hitherto been successful I perceived to my great Satisfaction that the Thoughts in the Book had been conceived in the last Reign and by occasion of the danger we were in from Popery You draw a Parallel between the Pagan and the Romish-Priests you are so impious as to think nay to say and publish it to the World that a Popish Priest is as errant a Knave as Cato thought the old Roman Augurs you even dare to add that their Sin and Guilt is greater because the latter had not a Rule to direct them but the other act against a most plain Rule a directing Gospel as you speak meerly for Profit You give so many and so pertinent Instances of this that had you published your Book in the last Reigns when it was thought and written you had been inrolled among our Confessors but now that the Danger is past and the Church's turn is served by you and the few such as you are Mr. Atterbury is for putting you into the Seat of Scorners After you had finished the Scenes in which you expose first Rome-Pagan then Rome-Antichristan you are so unlucky as to drop some words against Persecution and also to advise the contending Parties of Christians that Setting aside their Wranglings about obscure and undecidable Questions and Mysteries they would consider the Gospel as a Doctrine chiefly of Love Mercy and Charity and behave themselves accordingly towards one another Haec tetigit Gradive tous urtica Nepotes this invenom'd Sting in the Tail of your Book has so wounded Mr. Atterbury that he could not forbear running up immediately into his Pulpit to tell no less Persons than the Queen of England and her whole Court what kind of Man you are See here what Characters he has given you He is so possessed with the Notion of pious Frauds and Priest-Craft as to apply it indifferently to all Religions and to every thing in Religion Bless me and deliver me from the Malevolence of a Student as he writes himself But cholerick and revengeful Men commonly wound themselves most when they are endeavouring to wound others here is a Book written against Popery and Persecution Mr. Atterbury is so angry at it that he cries out Men of Israel help here is a damnable Book written against all Religion and every thing in Religion That is he owns no Religion nor any thing as part of Religion but only Popery and Persecution Truly he has been a Student at Christ-Church so long to good purpose but was it necessary he should vomit up such a secret before the Queen and the Court of England might it not have been better whisper'd among his Jacobite Friends But her Majesty was pester'd with too many such Chaplains Men that cannot abide to hear I do not say our holy Father the Pope or the sacred College but not a Romish Priest spoken disrespectfully of At Pag. 16. he suggests the writing the History of your Life in revenge for your History of Religion He is surely a pleasant Man he would write the History of an Anonymous or nameless Author that is of one he does not know But as before he told us his Religion Persecution and Popery so here he lets us know his Wit and Honesty he would write he says of he knows not whom and he cares not what provided it be black enough For that 's the only possible meaning of writing a Life in Revenge But if his blind Rage will permit a third Person to interpose between him and the Author of the History of Religion I intreat him that when he writes I may furnish him with some Memorials better I assure him than Malice and Ignorance of his Adversary will ever minister to him I can tell him that the sad Man the Author of the History of Religion
Family the Monarchy the Liberties of the Nation the Common-wealth of Learning particularly Learned Men and that nothing may escape your Influences to the calamitous and poor I promise my self that you will not lay Father Atterbury's want of Honesty good Sense and Government against such Advantages as these but rather you will be mindful to give Thanks to God who has lifted you by favourable Providences so much above the unheeded Reproaches of an unfinish'd Pulpiteer Sir I am your most obliged most assured and most humble Servant N. S. April 3. 95. The Second LETTER In Answer to The Charge of Socinianism against Dr. Tillotson considered and to the Appendix concerning the History of Religion SIR SInce my last here is another weak Brother that has taken Offence at The History of Religion I confess I wish the History had gone to the Press with that Title which your self in the Manuscript Copy gave it The History of Religion as it has been abused by Priest-Craft The words as it has been abused by Priest-Craft might have prevented some Peoples Mistakes who now seeing in the Title Page The History of Religion and meeting with little in the Book it self but an Account of the various Perversions of Religion by Pagan and Popish Priest-Craft they infer that by Religion the Author means even all Religion The Publishers of your Book feared it should seem that if Priest-Craft were not left out of the Title of your Book it would raise such a Jealousy in those for whose Use and Good the Book is design'd that they would never suffer themselves to be undeceived that is they would never read it and thereby be informed of the Abuses put on them by Impostors pretending to Religion Either way the Book was like to be mistaken but the Publishers who put it forth I may add that also against your Inclination because you thought it now not so necessary or seasonable judged it not advisable to give occasion of Offence in the very Title But as I said it appears by the Event that it had been better to keep the Title given to his Book by the Author himself for all your Maligners that have hitherto appeared seem to be misled by the present Title Because the Title is The History of Religion and the Book is only an Exemplification of the Corruptions and Abuses thereof by some wicked Priests therefore they cry out 't is written against Religion and the Sacerdotal Function But jacta est alea 't is now too late to recal the oversight of the Title we must be content to examine what your Opposers have to object to the Book Enough I think has been said to Mr. Atterbury you are now attacked by one who does not put his Name to his Book but the Title of it is this The Charge of Socinianism against Dr. Tillotson considered with a Supplement by occasion of an History of Religion In the former Part that against Dr. Tillotson late Arch-bishop of Canterbury our Author pretends at p. 10. that the Arch-bishop's Design in publishing his four Sermons against the Socinians was only that he might be soundly answered by them and further that they and the Arch-bishop play booty into one anothers hands Pag. 9. He adds The Arch-bishop printed his Sermons and procured the Recommendation of them by the Court that he might serve the Socinians and more reconcile Men to their Principles But lest the Confederacy between him and the Socinians should be discovered they agree saith our Author like Counsel at the Bar to fall foul sometimes on one another and even to scold and call hard Names which to wise Observers says he again serves only to discover so much the more their Hypocrisy and Deceit But it is the least part of his Charge against the Arch-bishop that he is a Socinian and wrote only to oblige them and to betray the Cause into their hands for he says pag. 13. Dr. Tillotson is owned by all the Atheistical Wits of England as their true Primate and Apostle in him they glory and rejoice and make their Boasts of him He leads them not only the whole length of Socinianism they are slender Beaux who have got no further but to call in question all Revelation He sums up almost his whole Charge against the Arch-bishop at pag. 32 and 33. in these words He exceeds the Theistical Juncto in the Barbarous Accounts he gives of the Rise of Christian Religion for they make it to be only the Invention of wicked Men and of Devils he makes it to be a mean Compliance with those Inventions of Devils and wicked Men. He contends that all Revealed Religion is good for nothing but only to preserve outward Peace in this World 'T is a Maxim with him that a Mother's suckling her own Children is of more necessary and indispensible Obligation than to believe in Christ. He disputes openly and professedly against the Satisfaction by Christ and according to him not only the Eternity but the Being of Hell is a precarious Supposition To add now no more he he says at p. 16. that a plain and downright Hobbism appears in the Arch-bishop's Sermons and that the same Thread runs thorow all his Works Besides these as every one knows most false Imputations on the Arch-bishop's Books and Doctrine our Author speaks of his Person with like Malevolence and Contempt he never calls him Arch-bishop but Dr. Till or Jo. Cant or such like And he concludes his whole Performance with an Address to the Clergy and People to separate from this and some other Heretical and Impious Bishops He assures them that by the Canons of the Catholick Church they not may but ought to separate and that it is not Schism to depart from those Guides who corrupt Religion by their Heresies After these Compliments to the Arch-bishop our famous Author for his Book will certainly make him so proceeds to sprinkle his Flowers upon you At first he is much in doubt whether the Arch-bishop was not Author of The History of Religion but that Doubt he soon dismisses and he resolves that it is written by Sir R. H d. I suppose for no other reason but that he thought fit to divide the nauseous Load of his Stomach between two it would have seemed too malevolent and implacable to discharge it all upon one Man Besides as 't is one of the Delights as well as Undecencies of excessive Anger and Malice to repeat the same Charges and Reproaches over and over if our Author had wrote but against one he had missed the Satisfaction of easing his Mind by re-iterating his Scandals and saying again and again the same lewd and mad things When the most learned Writer had fixed in his Mind upon an Author for the History of Religion tho he is content it should not be the Arch-bishop himself yet of necessity it must be one of his Grace's Disciples and Proselytes And for this most dangerous Charge I confess Sir your self gave occasion enough
with a Religion that has not something in it Sublime Mysterious and above Human Capacity What says Momus to this Why his Answer is not more morose and malevolent than 't is impious and profane P. 6. Blessed God this Man makes no more of the Mysteries of our Religion than only to satisfy Mens foolish Curiosities He that will have a May-pole shall have a May-pole since you will have Mysteries here 's one for you God manifested in the Flesh. This is to satisfy your foolish longing after Mysteries and to give you your full of Mysteries Was there ever so impious a Burlesque upon God and the Religion of Christ as if He was incarnate and crucified only to out-do Raw-head and Bloody-bones What are Mysteries without any farther Consideration than as Mysteries but the height of Folly perfect Rary-shows The Arch-bishop said not that Mysteries are of no other consideration or use in Religion but only to satisfy the Curiosity and Inclination of Men but that this is one Reason among many others by him assigned why there are some Mysteries in the Christian Religion he giveth divers other Reasons of the Incarnation and the Satisfaction and some Illustrations of the Mystery of the Trinity besides this which so much displeases our Professor Was it becoming of a Man pretending to Probity and Learning to run out into such wild Expressions as these by occasion of the Arch-bishop's inoffensive saying that the Christian Mysteries might be in part intended to satisfy the general Inclination of Mankind for Mysteries and sublime things Would any but our mad Author have fallen hereupon to comparing the Trinity to a May-pole the Crucifixion of our Saviour to Raw-head and Bloody-bones and all Mysteries to Rary-shows and the height of Folly Is this the Sobriety of a Bishop Elect or a Reflection to be prefaced with a Blessed God He that manifestly perverts the words of another to an impious sense or puts innocent Words and Sentences into profane Terms and Expressions is guilty of Blasphemy against God and the highest Injury and Uncharitableness to his Neighbour And if the Arch-bishop's words had in the Consequences of them ministred real occasion for such kind of Comparisons as the May-pole Rary-show Raw-head and the rest of this Author's Extravagance and Wickedness yet seeing those Consequences were never intended by the Arch-bishop but are most contrary to his Mind and Sentiments concerning the Mysteries he defended this Author out of Reverence to those Mysteries themselves should have forbore such horrid Terms which would have been very foul and black even in the Mouth of a Socinian I know not what Excuse can be made for our Author unless we should say that poor Man with his Preferments he also lost his Wits Not quite to tire you Sir with the Specimen I promised of our Author's Honesty Wit and Learning I will give you but one Example more of it 'T is the principal design of his Book to prove the Arch-bishop the Bishop of Salisbury and the Author of the History of Religion are Socinians the other Charges of Irreligion and Hobbism come in only by the by and only sometimes when his inflamed Choler wholly disorders his Brain Therefore now doth he himself understand what that Socinianism is which he charges upon others for 't is not uncommon with malicious Men to charge others with Socinianism Popery Hobbism and such like which they have heard from divers are very bad things without knowing scarce at all what is implied in those words I assure you this is very much our Author's case he has charged you and others with Socinianism not as 't is an Heresy understood and detested by him but only as 't is a word of Scandal and Reproach You will believe me when you know that he says P. 32. None were more violent Persecutors than the Arians that is the Socinians when they had Power When he says here the Arians that is the Socinians you know Sir he might as well have said the Jews that is the Roman Catholicks P. 2. There was no Shibboleth which all these our Adversaries the Anti-Trinitarians did refuse but that of Consubstantiality or that the Father Son and Spirit are Consubstantial which also this Author the Arch-bishop does refuse and while he does so he must be reckoned among those Adversaries First the Arch-bishop never refused the word Consubstantial Then you Sir who have been so conversant with the antient History of the Church remember very well that neither did all Anti-Trinitarians reject Consubstantial nor all Catholicks admit of it It was first advanced by Paul of Samosata Patriarch of Antioch who held as the Socinians now do and was rejected by a Council of 72 Catholick Bishops assembled at Antioch against the said Paul Afterwards it was approved by the first Nicen Council but refused by the Bishops of Britain Gaul and Germany not because they disliked the thing signified thereby but because they would not admit of an unscriptural Term in declaring Points of Faith As for the Arians they were only the Anomaean Arians who disliked the word Consubstantial the rest admitted of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Consubstantial as well as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of like Substance Socrat. H. E. l. 3. c. 25. P. 2. They the Socinians puzzle Peoples Understandings tho by very foolish and contradictory Arguments how God by his Infinite Power may bestow true and real Divinity upon another and that from all Eternity because what he can do to day he might have done yesterday and so backwards for ever All this Sir is a Chimera of his own and was never held or said by any Socinian they hold on the direct contrary that it implies a Contradiction that Divinity or so much as simple Existence can be bestowed by one Person on another Person from all Eternity they suppose that bestowing and receiving imply an actual Priority of the Person who bestows Being or Divinity and that in this case the Giver and Receiver cannot be Co-eternal In a word our Anti-Socinian Professor imputes the very Doctrine of the Catholick Church to the Socinians 't is the Church not the Socinians that holds that God can bestow true and real Divinity on another and that from all Eternity and 't is the Churches not the Socinians Argument because what he might have done to day or yesterday he might also do from forever When he calls this a foolish and contradictory Argument all Men but himself know that he declares himself a Socinian as often as he says it P. 30. Of the English Socinians some say the Trinity is three who are one Person others of 'em say the Trinity is three Persons whereof two are Creatures But if there be any such as he pretends neither Party of 'em are Socinians English they may be but Socinians they are not 'T is with like Truth and Knowledg of our English Vnitaries that he says in the same Page They excommunicate and depose from their Ministry those of their
own Party who deny that Divine Worship is to be paid to the Lord Christ. I am certainly informed that the Vnitarians in England have no Ministry at all they do not separate from the Church on the account of their different Opinion from the Church they never separated in England from the common Assemblies to worship which in my Opinion is pious charitable and prudent for it is the Separation not the difference of Opinion that begets the Heats among contending Parties But the occasion of these Mistakes of our worthy Author is that tho it should seem he hath read the Brief History of the Vnitarians his Northern frozen Head perceives not the Subtleties of this Mercurial Tribe he knows neither their Discipline nor Doctrine and is of their mind without being aware of it I know Sir you are weary of these Follies I will therefore draw our Author in little and having so presented him to you leave him to your Pity and Prayers He was a Bishop Elect in that Juncture when only such were chosen by the King and the Nuntio to the Episcopal Chairs of England and Scotland as would not fail to make those Churches contemptible and ridiculous by their notorious Unsufficiency and Incompetency He is a Jacobite but made so by nothing but his too certain Fears that the Presbytery would never indure a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Theological Chair With him the Arch-bishop the Bishop of Sarum and the Author of the History of Religion are most blasphemous Socinians because our Professor mistakes the Doctrine of the Church and the Arguments she useth for the Socinian Doctrine and Reasons He is an Anti-Socinian who believes that God the Father could not bestow true and real Divinity on another Person from all Eternity and that 't is foolish and contradictory to say that what God might do to day he'might do yesterday and backwards for ever An Antiquarian he is who has discovered in antient History such an only Shibboleth of Orthodoxy in the Trinitarian Questions as was first advanced by one of the Socinians Patriarchs and rejected by a Council of 72 Catholick Bishops He is a Christian who is not content to think it but publishes it in Print to all the World that Jesus Christ is an accursed and devoted Head This is your Man Sir the Critick Wit Historian Divine who resolves to make an Example of all Latitudinarian Archbishops and Bishops and all their Disciples and Seconds of which number he saith you are the first and most considerable and as such 't is but just and fit that you should be treated accordingly What he objects is partly against your self and partly against your History of Religion As to your self he saith You are a Disciple of that late execrable Jo. Cant or as he otherwise call him John Till You have copied he saith after him very exactly insomuch that this Critick himself is sometimes in doubt whether The History of Religion were written by you or by the Archbishop Elsewhere he saith your History doth square most exactly with the Archbishop's Notions and Scheme of Religion Yet he owns that you are not altogether so profligate or have more of Art and Address than that Archbishop of Theists and Hobbists you are more modest or more cunning those are his words than the other you do not attack Religion in such broad words as he But 't is the endeavour of both of you of him more openly of you more secretly to ridicule all Religion and to resolve it wholly into Priest-Craft And I must confess Sir that your History and the Archbishop's Sermons have a like Thread He in most of his Sermons combats the seven-headed Beast as a Divine by Argument you as a Gentleman in the Historical Way he shows how defenceless and weak Popery is you how ridiculous and foppish it is And the learned Professor by exclaiming thereupon against both of you as designing to ridicule all Religion abundantly intimates that to him there is no other Religion but Popery He has an obscure Period at p. 31. that you assisted in turning a certain Neighbour out of House and Home who had not only never injur'd you but had done more for you than all your Relations and other Friends ever did The meaning is you had a share in effecting the late Revolution or as our Author elsewhere speaks concerning some others in deserting betraying and excluding King James who as this Man says did more for you than all your Friends or Relations ever have done I am wholly a Stranger to the Particulars of this Charge therefore I can only say either 't is true or 't is false If 't is false his Lordship Elect is a great Rascal saving the Reverence belonging to his Coat and Profession to devise and publish to the World a Tale that in his opinion implies the very foulest and blackest of Crimes and Scandals But if it is true that when King James had done a great deal for you after all you concurred with nay you highly promoted the Revolution the Charge here brought against you will amount to thus much That whereas 't is too well known that his late Majesty's Favours to any of his Protestant Subjects were designed only to gain them to the Popish and Arbitrary Interest you could not be bought no not by more than all your Friends and Relations ever did for you to side against the Interests of your Religion and Country No Money no Preferments no Favours it should seem could bribe you to give up the Protestant Religion or the Freedom and Properties of the Nation A most terrible Accusation and on your part a Treachery not to be purged with Sacrifice or Offering for ever But then after all this to write a History too against the holy Cheats of your King's and Friend's Religion this is such an Aggravation of your former Fault that our Author will not say the Lord have Mercy on you but in the Highland Phrase It makes his Flesh to creep I am of opinion that an Highlander's Flesh naturally creeps for our Beggars say that set a on a Board or Table with the Head West or East or South the will not fail to turn it self and creep Northward As to your Book his general Charge against it is that 't is designed against all Religion and especially all Positive or revealed Religion from whence he takes occasion to Nick-name you Sir Positive or as he writes according to the High-land Orthography Sir Possitive If you say but what Instances can he give out of your History from whence any sober Man would infer that you meant to expose Religion in general and not only the pious Frauds of Modern Rome and the Tricks of Rome Pagan I can only answer that what Collections out of the History he may have by him I know not but the Particulars which he mentions are these P. 27. You set up he saith unreconcileable War against all Mystery How so have you dropt the least
Vertue as that excellent Prelate of whose Sermons he makes honourable mention in his Preface and but with the last necessity was consenting to retire from that impatient Tyranny which for a while bore down all our Rights Religious and Civil before it But see the Craft of some Men they flatter Kings not for any love they bear to a Crown more than to the Rods and Axes of a Republick but that Kings rais'd to Heaven by them may draw them up after they make all to be Law which comes from the Mouth of Kings that Kings may make all that to be Gospel which comes from the Mouth of Priests Let the Name of Kings in God's Name be for ever honour'd but let Priests that is if they would deserve Esteem know their Distance and their Duty there 's designing Sawciness in them when they join their Honour so nearly to that of Kings from writing Kings and Priests they 'll rise to the vain Stile of the Butcher's Son Ego Rex meus Crafty Priests like Ivy twist their clinging Arms around the Royal Oak tenaciously adhere rob the Root of its nutritive Moisture and if not timely torn away o're-top the tallest Branches nay tear it all to pieces every adhering part still lives and every creeping Fibre plots to steal into the decays of the poor dying Trunk and there a new Root infix for it is all one to the Ivy so it have but a Supporter whether 't is a vigorous living or a dull dead one Reflecting on Sir R. H. and others the Libeller says They make Religion to be State-craft or Priest-craft as it serves their Purpose I answer for Sir R. H. that he has sufficiently declar'd how true a sense he has of Religion in that just and noble Character which he has given of the Arch-bishop's Sermons But if this Libeller would fain know distinctly what is State-craft and what Priest-craft neither confounding the Terms nor uniting the Sense I will tell him When Kings make use of the learned Sophistry of obsequious Priests to support their illegal Arbitrary Power that Design in Kings is properly call'd State-craft or King-craft bur when Priests preach up Passive Obedience and Non-resistance their so doing is Priest-craft for such crafty Priests as those would not lavish a poor Prayer for ever a King of 'em all if it was not in prospect of a mighty Protection to bear them out in all their unwarrantable Clerocatacurieuontisms if this cramp word be too hard for the Reader he may pick the sense of it out of 1 Pet. 5.3 The next Charge against Sir R. H. is this He makes use of the Errors of the Church of Rome to undermine Christianity But sure a Man may reprove the Errors of the Church of Rome without undermining Christianity unless those Errors belong to the Foundation which God forbid it should be said this I am sure Sir R. H. has not utter'd nor does the Libeller charge him to have utter'd the least word against Faith in Christ Repentance and good Works It is usual with Men to be fond of their own Conceptions and confident that every beloved Error of theirs belongs to the Foundation of Faith but for one that calls himself a true Son of the Church to be so much concern'd at the Reproof of Romish Errors argues that there 's false fire in his Zeal or but a cold Indifference in his Protestant Profession and that for his particular tho Priest-craft be the thing he chiefly studies yet he is not his Craft's-Master But further says the Libeller Sir R. H. spits his Venom against the Mosaical Institution and to prove this Charge he cites Hist. of Relig. p. 58. where Sir R. H. has these words Christ came to redeem us from the darkness of that Condition we were in by strange and puzzling Methods of Religious Ceremonies and Mysteries various Rites of sacrificing good for nothing but to confound and distract the Minds of Men. Now if this be to spit Venom at the Mosaical Institution then the Pen-men of the New Testament spit Venom at it most outragiously for they frequently speak of it in their Epistles after the same manner as Sir R. H. in his History Nay St. Paul in one place says all our Fathers were under a Cloud under a Vail and if I be not much mistaken he calls their mysterious Rites and Ceremonies beggarly Elements But setting aside the Authority of the sacred Pen-men have not all the Doctors which have labour'd in expounding the Mosaical Ceremonies acknowledg'd them to be very puzzling The Calvinists are generally perswaded that God instituted the Ceremonial Digest purely because he would do it for no other reason but to prove his People whether they would obey his Laws which had no other Goodness in them but what his Arbitrary Sanction gave them but the learned Spencer hath satisfied me that God design'd in all those Laws to distinguish his People from the Heathen and wean them from Idolatry but yet as Dr. Spencer confesses it is not so very plain of every Ceremony what was the natural Tendency thereof to such good End But as for Mens learning the Duties of Morality from the Ceremonial Law it was certainly dark as for inclining them to Vertue it was without Contradiction weak and it were a wonder if the Minds of Men should not be confounded and distracted by such Methods But now for a dismal Charge This Sir R. H. like a meer Infidel not having the Fear of God before his Eyes borrows the Socinian Arms against Christianity To this I answer 1. It is a silly Cavil Such a one borrows Arms or Arguments against this or that whereas the only thing worth noting is whether the Borrower understands and uses them with Skill 2. Let it be examin'd whether the Libeller does not borrow his Reproaches indeed they are so gross and impudent they should be his own yet were it worth the while I could show how he runs in debt for them to some of his craftier Brethren who have rais'd Slander to such a height that it is not safe no not for a Man of the greatest Integrity to reprove any the most odious Instances of Priest-craft 3. But has Socinus wrote against Christianity The Downfal in Black-fryars upon Father Drury and his Popish Conventicle was impudently publish'd beyond Sea by a bold turn of lying Priest-craft as a sad Judgment upon an Assembly of Hereticks this is the very Picture of the Libeller's Charge For not to recount the Books which Socinus has wrote in Confirmation of the Christian Religion not to mention the honourable Testimony which the Polonian Knight has bore to his Memory even the Adversaries of that famous Man will vindicate him from the Libeller's base Reproach Mr. How as firm a Trinitarian as any Non-jurant Jacobite of 'em all and much an honester Man fairly confesses concerning Socinus's Book de Deo that it is wrote not without Nerves i. e. in plain English it was wrote strongly
in your Book by the respectful mention you make of his Grace and by your quoting and most wickedly applauding some Passages of his Sermons which recommend a pacifick Temper and Carriage as the greatest and surest Argument of a right Christian. But here before we go farther it will be proper and useful seeing our immortal Author has been so careful to discover the Heretical and Blasphemous Writer of the History of Pagan and Popish Cheats in Religion for you meddle with no other to inquire and if we can to ascertain our Conjecture who it is that is thus greatly concerned and angry at their Detection and whether I rightly guess at the Man or no yet I shall not fail I think to give his true Character both as to his Honesty Principles and Abilities The Vogue of the Town lays this Libel to a certain Jacobite Club others again to a late Dean who has quitted his Deanry because he would not take the Oaths that are required since his present Majesty was declar'd King I do not believe it was written by a Club for this in my Opinion incontestable Reason that whereas it consists of three Parts and were it not printed in an extream small Character would be a bulky Book yet the whole is very uniform the Language Thoughts Theology are throughout the same every where of a piece As to the Dean having read his former Works to which his Name is affixed I dare to discharge him wholly from having the least hand in or liking of this equally silly and wicked Trifle The Dean writes after another manner Elegantly Judiciously Learnedly I doubt not he is a much better Man than so much as to approve the shameless Falsifications and Scandals that appear here in every Paragraph No no the Author came from beyond Tweed if not beyond the Tay the many Northern Improprieties and Barbarisms both in the Phrase and the writing particular Words never used by any English-man and the Calvinism or rather the Knoxism in the whole are manifest Indications that our Author is a Scot. Nor has Dr. M roe been able to keep his own Secret 't is got abroad among a great many that this late Professor in one of the Scotch Universities and a Bishop Elect is the Man that has thought himself qualified to censure the Doctrine of an Arch-bishop of Canterbury and to incounter with the Great Author of the History of Religion That he is a Scot I prove I say first by the Northern Improprieties and Solecisms as well in the writing of particular Words as in the Phrase which abound in every Page of this Pamphlet I believe Sir you will be of my Mind if you cast your Eye but on a few of them For Positive he always writes Possitive For Estimation our Highland Aristarchus says Esteemation and never other ways When you say Innoscence the most Learned Professor takes it to be Innocence and hereupon commits I know not how many Blunders and vents his Follies as fast as elsewhere his Malice Then for his Phrase or improper Application of Words and Proverbial Expressions his Elegances are such as these The Man above-told The Reasons above-told Barbarous Notion of the Christian Religion Barbarous Account of the Rise of the Christian Religion It makes all my Flesh to creep No English-man ever writes so or uses these words in that sense or that order His Theology too as I observed before is Knox all over For tho the Scotch Divines of the Episcopal Party forsook Mr. Calvin and Mr. Knox in the Question about Church-Government yet in Points of Doctrine they have varied nothing at all from Mr. Knox Author of the Reformation in Scotland and Mr. Knox took Mr. Calvin for his Copy Hence it is that our present Libeller so often Cants and Calvinizes you would think the Bishop Elect were some Speaker in a Quakers or Anabaptists Meeting-place of which I suppose the Reason is because he would pass for an Elect Bishop as well as a Bishop Elect. For Example Pag. 15. I compare our Natural Light or Knowledg to the Creation of the first Day And it is the Light of the first Day that we enjoy still but not as it was that day created It was regulated and modelled the fourth Day into the Sun Moon and Stars and now we have no Participation at all of the Light of the first Day but what we have from its Regulation on the fourth Day and convey'd to us from the Sun which I compare to Revealed that is to the Christian Religion God is Light 1 John 1.5 and Christ is called Mal. 4.2 the Sun of Righteousness and tho there is a precedent natural Knowledg of God like the Light of the first Day yet now that Christ is revealed the true Knowledg of God must be had in the Face of Christ. Pag. 8. As we explain the matter he means the Satisfaction by Christ all the Attributes of God stand full and infinite they rejoice and exalt together But this I cite not for the Divinity but for the monstrous Impropriety and Cant of the Language the words full and exalt being altogether senseless here P. 21. God is not only Just but is Justice in the Abstract Justice is the Nature of God All the Justice we have is but a Ray sent down from the Essential Restitude he aimed to say Rectitude in God At p. 7. He affirms that the Law and Gospel are the same and he thinks that St. Paul has so taught us Heb. 4.2 At p. 9. he contends that it was indispensably necessary that a full and adequate Satisfaction should be made for Sin to the Justice of God At p. 21. he will have it that Justice will exact the uttermost Farthing Justice MUST do it and otherways it were not Justice and from hence he concludes that because God is Justice and Justice cannot forgive the Debt of Sin therefore God cannot forgive it All this is Calvinism or rather Knoxism But what Name shall we give to his Impiety when speaking of our Saviour he fears not to call him p. 22. that accursed and devoted Head He did not learn this of Mr. Calvin or of Mr. Knox Mr. Calvin makes this judicious Note on Gal. 3.13 Christus peccati maledictionis reus erat non in se sed in nobis sive quatenus nostram Personam susceperat As who should say the Lord Christ is not to be called accursed in his own Person but only as representing or sustaining our Persons the Persons of Sinners Therefore Accursed Head when spoken of our Saviour is not only harsh improper and overbold but heretical and impious But of our Author's Divinity more hereafter let us now see what are his Principles and how he stands affected toward the Government it may be we shall find that all this Cry about Socinianism Hobbism and Irreligion is nothing but this that they are Charges very fit for a Jacobite to lay to a Williamite because they are black enough He