your Ornament to the Ten Commandments O rare Ornament a great Carved Gilded Image described fully in all its Demensions by my last Book a silly Tool of Superstition it had one end of a Lath tack't to its Bumfidle and the other end to the Window for its better preservation from falling least the Cats scampering over it in the heat of their Woeing Should have made it a Tumble-down Dick Instead of a Gilded and Carved St. Mick O Rara-show a most beautiful Bit for the Parson to rail in Print and Pulpit against him that saved the Parish a Score of Billets by burning it in Vestry instead of Billet and Charcole as to your last Aspersion in your Sham-Indictment brought in there as an Advertisement I do positively deny that the Printed Book called Birth and Burning of this image c. was ever read in Vestry when I was present or that ever there hath been any Vestry since the Book was Printed and Published which was but about the Twenty-sixth of May last it is true that when my Narrative was in Manuscript about Four Weeks before it was printed it was read in Vestry and some would needs cavil at it and asked if I would own it I told them I would and said it was true and asked What one Material thing was false I would justifie it to be true no Body gave Instances of any Particulars that were false pray name any Material one if you can and will the Pamphlet say I câ—â—ld make little or no Reply Is Truth a little thing I do tell thee Johnathan that the substance of that Book Birth and Burning c. is as true as any thing thou ever saidst or wrote of thy own making There might he false Spellings false Latin and some Words misplaced in the written Narrative But what does that concern the World The World knows nothing but what is published in Print and the Title is not called A Copy of a Narrative But the substance of a Narrative lately given in to the Vestry c. So that all that the World is to take notice of is First Whether this Book since in was printed was read in Vestry Secondly Whether this Book be answerable to its Title viz. The substance of the aforesaid Narrative Thirdly and Lastly whether the substance of that Book be true or false And now not to enumerate all over again I will only Repeat the most Material Heads or Substance Which take thus 1. In 1675. we set up Organs And we set this Image upon our Altar which was made in 1659. by Mr. Edwards who set it on the Steeple till about 1675. or 1676. and then it was removed to the Altar by Mr. Clements 2. That this Image was made and removed without any Order of Vestry particularly directing the making or removing his Image 3. That 1677. we beautified our Organs As it stands written thereon Made 1675. Beautified 1677. 4. That Mr. Tho. Whitebread gave us in 1677. a rich Carpet c. with such an Imbroyder'd Glory c. with a Cross and this Inscription as in the Margent 5. That this Gist stands Registred in a Table in our Vestry in the same Words as I mention in my said Book Page 8. 6. That our Linnen Cloath used to hang down to the Ground or very near it in our front till we had this Carpet 7. That since we had this Carpet we expose that to view and Fold upon the fore-part of the Table our Linnen 8. That by the Act of Uniformity it may be allowable enough for our Communion Table to stand further off yea in the middle of the Church and so it would not look so like an Altar as now it does standing close to the Commandments with Ends North and South Thus much for the Furniture of the Church and Altar Now for your Ceremonies 9. That until about 1678. we had all our Services said in the Desk and no where else 10. That until about 1678. our Sermon did conclude in the Pulpit with some Prayer or other and the Benediction was until then ever given in the Pulpit 11. That since 1677. you have begun and continued to read Second Service at the Altar and at your approach to the Altar you make a reverend low Bow towards the Altar or Image or Carpet 12. That since 1677. you conclude the Sermon without Prayer and Blessing and the Organ strikes up a Tune to divert the People till you go into Vestry to put on the Surplice and then you come out so habited mount the steps enter the Rails make a low bow towards the middle of the Altar then you turn to the North end kneel and say some Prayers there then pronounce the Blessing at the Altar which ever till about 1678. was pronounced in the Pulpit 13. That you nor no Minister before you did ever in our Church bow at the Altar before St. Michael was set there except when the Bread and Wine was there on Sacrament Dayes for I will allow that That you and Doctor Lafield did Bow on Sacrament Dayes at the Altar but that was because or when there was Bread and Wine there and this you did and Doctor Lafield too before any St. Michael was set there But it was only on Sacrament Dayes 14. That you are charged to be the first Man that bowed there after St. Michael was up when there was no Communion and the first Man that went and Offered up Prayers and Benedictions under St. Michael's Nose at the Altar where in some parts of the Church People can't hear nor see the Parson and so Prayers in Latin or an unknown Tongue may do as much good as Prayers which we can't hear 15. That you were the promoter of the beginning of these Ceremonies though Doctor Lafield did perswade against iâ—â— whereas a Lecturer ought to have followed rather than led in any New performances 16. That the suspicion of Superstition and the ground of all this Noise did arise from your beginning these Ceremonies but just about the time the Papists Lords were sending to the Tower 17. That you account Mr. Whitebread's glorious Carpet a better Ornament than the Linnen which the Act of Uniformity enjoyns for if it be not better you are fools for using it for if we do not use the very best of every thing other Parishes may be more serious and regularly Devout than this of All-Saints-Barking if we have nothing else to boast of but that we have a better Carpet and more Ceremonies and a more Ceremonious Lecturer than other Parishes And now Mr. Saunders not to give you too great a Task at once though there are many more observable Matters in my Book called Birth and Burning c. which are true also yet I have singled you out these seventeen Heads as part of the Matter charged to be the occasion of this Indictment it lyes on your part to name those twenty Men that dare say to my Face that these Heads are rude scurrilous and
there though you practise it at Barking yet when you are your self at Sandon you your self do not do so there it seems you have Two sorts of Service for God Almighty a City Service and a Country Service as if our God were a God of the Hills but not of the Valleys for this way of after-Sermon-Service neither you nor your Curate do practise at Sandon for at Saydon not only the Curate constantly but you your self also when you Preach there do dismiss the people with Prayer and Benediction from the Pulpit without going up to the Altar after Sermon perhaps it is because you have no Organs to Dance you up to the Altar nor Carved Image nor no such rich Carpet at Sandon and therefore in your Conscience you ought not to say all such rich Service there as you do at London But you must give the World a better Reason than your Conscience which in twenty five Miles varies as much as the Compass does in some Latitudes or as the Sun in some parts of the World is hotter than in other parts But that Learned worthy Man you Curate hath a very good Character for Life as well as Doctrine and knows his duty as well as you and I hear he never bows at the Altar at Sandon it may be he is Conscientious in not bowing nor doing the Altar Services to avoid offence because it seems there hath been great bustle and opposition to these Altar-services there the rather because they were inforc't by you at Sandon also but about 78. or about the time of the Popish Plot though you had been in that Living some Years before One would think you might easily read a few more Sermons to your own Parish since it is so easily done to read a Book in the Pulpit it is no such doughty accomplishment for seven or eight Years Study at the University to come and read a Sermon and it is strange that such Readers should get Living upon Living only because they can read a Business Though it is true many a Man saves his Life by Reading when the Ordinary reports Legit ut Clerious or if you will He Reads like a Clegy-man is it not a shame while other Arts are every Day so much improved to see Doctors Parsons and Lecturers stand still or rather dwindle back to Readers which is very unlike the practice of our Blessed Lord and his Apostles who never Read either their own or other Mens Works but their Heads and Hearts were full of the Matter Doctrine and Instruction that they had to say Indeed our Blessed Redeemer himself in one place and at one time called for a Book but as soon as he had read the Text closed the Book again and gave it to the Mininster or a kind of Deacon among the Jews and then went on Preaching But where a Preacher shall study and premeditate how to vent his Spleen handsomly against his Parishioners and then read it out of a Book wherein it was written with a Pen dipt in Gaul instead of common Ink will any Body think he that does so speaks by the Spirit of God or is this becoming the Gravity of so Sacred a Profession for Doctors Parsons and Lecturers to become Readers Readers Ecclesastical History tells us that the Emperor Julian the Apostate was once a Reader in the Church no great honour for him or the Church to have such a Reader and I read in later History that in great praise of one of the Henrys was styled Bean-Clerk because he could Write and Read It seems that in Julians dayes a Scholar was Rara avis but in these dayes when Learning is so common and so much advanced is it not a said sight to fee Doctors Parsons and Lecturers to be but Readers in the Pulpit and to have their Heads and Hearts so little affected with what they have to say that if they chance to turn over two or three Leaves too much they are at a great loss and with a world of Hums and Haes before they can get in again which looks like A B C nay take away their Books and Notes and they can say nothing at all or no better than some such plain Men as Coblers of some other Trade Which brings to mind the Answer of a Reading Preacher if it be not Contradictio in adjectio an honest and unfurnisht Head one that haunted Taverns more than Study who having read a Sermon of excellent Composure and being askt how he got so good a Sermon with so little Study replyed it was all his own for he bought it for Six Pence in Pauls Churchyard and it was Six Pence the best laid out of any thing he ever did in his life and he was a Lecturer too for he had Twenty Shillings for every Lecture Sermon and at a several Church it was as good as at first fresh and new and he read it every time better than other these are your brave Pulpit reading DONS of the BOOK Is it not somewhat strange that in the Pulpit the same Man would be called a Preacher because he reads out of a Book and in the Desk the same Man is said to be a Reader because he reads out of a Book I would not have toucht so much in the Press upon Reading Ministers if they did not some of them aim at me meerly upon an occasion of my Burning an Image in touching so much in the Pulpit and Press upon Sacriledge a word you must not use this Six Months in our Pulpit lest People think the Burning of this Image broyl's in the Parsons Stomach still and the more Reflections Men make either from Press or Pulpit on a defacer of Images will but render such Men suspectedly Superstitious Lovers of Images therefore leave off your Scribling in defence of an Image and come to the grand Matter and write Learndedly in Answer to my seventeen Heads and four Queries I don't see Jonathan how thou canst Answer my Queries and assert the Direction of the Rubrick so as clearly to make it out that there is any Law that absolutely and positively enjoyns every part of thy practice at Altar-Services Nay thou canst not tamper and endeavour to do it to any purpose but thou must seem to Act the part of him that is called an Accuser of the Brethren thou must reflect if not directly accuse about Eight Thousand of thy Brethren yea and thy R. R. F. also which will stick in their Stomachs and they will all Print against you and it will be such a scandal for ever upon thee as a thing that even Father Whitebread Cum mult is aliis of that Crucian black Crew chose rather to Truss than to accuse their unholy Father or any of their Brethen and if you rightly consider their couragious Example thou wert better do just so too Truss rather than beray thy own Nest consider the unseasonableness of urging Doctrines of Ceremonies upon so Laudable occasion as an Image and at such a juncture
in the same Mass-Books if we new print them and so plead these are not the same that were then standing and being for this Image was made Anno 59. without order of Vestry but by the mear Fancy of Mr. Ben. Edwards when he was Church-Warden So then you would make the Fancy of Edwards the Church-Warden to have outwitted the Law of Edward the King Ben. is a true Church-man and I am sure a great Enemy to Papists therefore they will never Saint him for the Contrivance because Ben's Fancy reacht only to put him on the Steeple it was not he no I warrant you that Removed him and placed him as an Ornament to the Commandements by standing on the top of them as ready to kick the Second Commandement out of doors as soon as ever Popery should enter But then pag. 3. you seem very skilful in the knowledge of Images and their Names for you tell the World in print that the top of the Church of Barkin is set about with Guilded figures called Seraphims and in the first Pamphlet pag. 2. you tell us the Names of others in our Church viz. Saturn Mars and other Pagan Idols A man would think you had been at the Christning if not as Lecturer yet as Clark to say Amen out of spite to the poor Clark to hinder him of Fees and Gloves Or else perhaps you stood Godfather else how shouldst thou come so intimate with these lofty things As for these things you call Seraphims on the very Roof of our Church they are nothing but meer Faces with Wings on each side of their Chops and yet canst presently tell us who they are by their very Grinning or Gritting nay you tell us their very qualities for thou faiest they are the highest Order of Angels O the Depth of this Wisdom it is learnedly said because they stand on the top of the Church Ergo they are highest This is most Lectorical Logick ever Boy of Sandon knows as much that he that is on the top of the Steeple is the highest Lad in the Parish But why dost thou take things thus by Tradition Thou art a man of great Faith for no Man will believe thou ever saw'st Angel or Seraphim but in Apparition but I won't grapple with you in this dispute nor where they commenced when they took such high Degrees whether at Oxford or at St. Andrews I have no skill in any Saint till they be grown as big as our Lubber St. Michael nor do I think I should know St. Michael if I meet him in Apparition now his Carving and Guilding is all singed off And as for those Superior things that have only Faces and no Bodies I call them only by your General Title of Pamphlets Apparitions or Shams or Lecturers Brats and leave you to Christen them with what Name you please And they being nothing else but Face you have a fair Mark to Sprinkle at and they will cry no more at your Christning than St. Michael did when I burnt him if you shall say I prophane the Order or Service of the holy Sacrament of Baptism so did you when you called St. Michael my God-son Lectoris ad Exemplum O let not the Devil rebuke sin and let who will vouch for you that those are Seraphims as you call them for I will never be God-father again seeing you have so vainly and prophanely defiled the name by applying it to an Image for though its true I have heard that Papists do Christen their Images yet I never heard they had God-fathers before Mr. Saunders printed it Thus I only lay open the substance of the Matter let other Men enlarge upon your Texts and your Brats and your Images and your defence at Sessions and in print and your Bowings and your way of performing Ceremonies and the timing of them not beginning them till the Plot was Discovering and untill you had got up St. Michael Organs and Whitebread's Carpet c. exposed to view in the Front instead of our white Linnen which the Act of Uniformity Injoyns For sure it will be necessary for some of our Reverend Clergy in this juncture to oppose that Doctrine of Images which you so strenuously advance for your whole quarrel is because I pulled down an Image Let not Papists on one hand be encouraged and hardned in their Idolatries and Phanaticks on the other hand pretend some ground for their Clamours that the Church of England or at least some of her Seraphim or Topp-heavy Sons are warping towards Popery though it is in truth only a Lecturer and a few more scarce one of nine thousand of the Churches in England use such Ceremonies as we do Cathedral c. excepteds But towards the end of your Anonimous Pamphlet I met this dreadful Charge fol. 3. That there is one of these Faces set up at the East end of the Church plum over the Communion Table towards which the late upper Church-warden as many of the Parish will testifie hath frequently Bowed without any scruple of Conscience while the figure called St. Michael stood thereupon Truly all this I can deny as stiff as ever any Priest of St. Michael or any Jesuit did at Tyburn that I had no hand in this Plot I am as clear of it as the Child unborn Pray Name your Witnesses and Time when and where to prove that ever I Bowed to any thing set up at the East end of the Church but your Pamphlet having no Bodies Name to it I cannot tell who to go to but to you our Apparition Lecturer and if you can't bring Real Corporeal Witnesses then bring some Apparition to prove it for I believe thou hast more Apparitions in thy Budget Jonathan And now to conclude all this Tragedy I find at the Rump of this nameless Authors Pamphlet there comes out a flash like the blaze at the tail of a Comet with a thundering Sentence or Bull of Condemnation of the Book called The Birth and Burning c. Intending I suppose to blast the Credit thereof by the scribble of one that dares not put his Name to what he prints But People do the rather run on and buy that Book the more so that it requires a second Impression because they see the Lecturer inclines to Stifle it but none to Answer it For instead of Answering any one particular of the Ceremonies charged upon him to have never except on Communion dayes been performed by him till St. Michael was set upon the Commandments this Lecturer does as that Ignorant Author did who thought the World would believe he had fully Confuted the Learned Roman Cardinal by only saying Bellarmine thou Lyest So our sine Nomine Pamphleteer alias Lecturer or Will in the wisp or dark Lanthorn man or I know not who to call him because he is ashamed to print his Name acts much at the same rate and says it was some bodies Opinion that it was a rude scurrilous insolent Paper many falsities therein but is this all the
insolent or dare Assert there are many Falsities and Prevarications in them and that these highly tend to the dishonour of the established Protestant Religion and that it is a Libel upon the whole Parish Except you don't mean on my part but your own part Nay have you confidence enough your self In verbo sacerdotis to say the substance of these Matters are false If you dare not print that all these seventeen Heads in verbo sacerdotis are false then let the World believe them all to be true Nay Mr. Saunders since you have printed such a scandalous Report of my Book called Birth and Burning c. you must give me a Reply My Book called Birth and Burning c. hath my own Name to it Folio 14. and I own it all even to the End and I put my Name to this and own it also therefore I will not take any Answer from any Body but you and signed with your hand that you will own and if you Answer short I will call upon you for positive not evasive Answer The World will judge by my Print and your Answer who Writes clearest to the Matter I will not accept of any Answer of Nath. Thomson that is his Answer to the other Mercury let them squabble one with the other till they can agree one in staring the Questions right the other in Answering I respect Mr. Thomson because he Prints the Loyal Intelligence and the good Loyal Man thinking the Church is concern'd takes her part he means well in that He tells you the Indictment was Quasht for Insufficiency of the Indictment he don't say it was Quasht for insufficiency of the Law of Edward the Sixth Are not many Men Non-Suited though they have the Law on their side yea sometimes upon a very Bond meerly for the insufficiency of a Declaration and don 't the very Words he quotes signifie as much quassitur per curam pro insufficientia inde c. And he that Loyal Man quotes Mr. Westcoat and Mr. Clements for Proofs of what I don't deny nor Object He saith it was the Common practice of Doctor Lafield and Mr. Saunders also to bow towards the Communion-Table when they had occasion to go up unto it yea but they never had or did take any occasion to go up to read Service on Sundayes but on Communion-dayes and so I say now again in this Book also that they never did Bow there before St. Michael was set there but on Communion-dayes and so my usual Charge runs throughout my Book except on Communion-dayes and if the exception be any where omitted I hereby declare it ought so to be understood But this Loyal Man does not offer a Word of Proof that this Carved Image was any Ornament to the Commandments or that the Commandments especially the Second Commandment is a Farthing the worse or the Parish a Farthing the poorer for my burning it nor doth any Body take occasion of bawling for loss of it so much as a Lecturer but it is true that the Parish is two or three Pounds the worse by Mr. Ben. Edwards expending so much Money out of the Poors Stock for making this useless Image for the Parish hath no Stock but what is intended by the Benefactors for the Poor or some useful things for the Church I hope future Church-Wardens will imploy Peoples Benevolence to Feed and Cloath the Poor and not to buy Carved Images which will not be useful in Churches till Popery come in which God prevent I do my part to prevent it by Writing against Images I have drawn my Pen and I will throw away the Scabbord But I won't say any more to Mr. Thomson my business is with you and it will lessen the esteem of your own Learning to set a Hackney though never so Loyal to Answer me you must take a little more pains than a sheet of Paper to Answer the great Labour and pains I have taken in my First and Second Part of my Book called The Birth and Burning of St. Michael I have given you a great deal of time already since you first knew the Substance charged on you and I hear you are going to consult your Oracle that right Loyal Gentleman Mr. Aâ—â—â—â— c. I am content you should consult many more lay your Heads close and le ts see the product of that Cabal come out in your Name bravely fixed to it as you did to your beloved Book called Fiery Apparition and then if it be good and fully satisfactory to the World it shall satisfie me and every other part of both my Books as well as any of these Articles which you leave unanswered ought to be understood by the World as true if you do not Answer them For a bare saying the Rubrick directs won't do except you name the Act of Uniformity and except you do name the place therein where it directs it so and that it does as much direct in Manner Time and Place every part of your practice as absolutely and as well in all parochial Churches as in Cathedrals and Chappels not only on Communion-dayes or Holy-dayes but every Sunday though there be no Communion and this you are to Answer under my first Quaere which you will find tender'd to you by and by If you do not Answer particularly to each Head whether those seventeen particulars be true every ones Tongue will be calling on you and I crave the World to credit me till you Answer fairly and sully with your own hand If these seventeen Heads be false then my Book Birth and Burning c. is false But if these seventeen Heads being the considerable and most material part of my said Book are true in substance then now false is that Nameless Author of that Libel called The Sham-Indictment Quasht and who will believe him in Print or Pulpit that would by a Pamphlet with a Sham Title and no Authors Name call that false which in it self is true in substance Mr. Saunders I expect Answer under your own hand not generally except you own them all but particular which you confess and which you deny and shew me the Error if you can find it And then you must Answer these four Queries 1. Whether the Act of Uniformity does as much and as positively command the use of all those Ceremonies in the same manner and place and times as you practise as it doth all other Services therein injoyned and prove it by quoting of places else if it be indifferent why did you Press it especially at such a juncture of time as 78. when the Popish Plot was discovering O the Time the Time the critical minite And have a care your Answer do not reflect upon above a hundred Parishes in and about London yea upon our own Lord Bishop of London's Parish of Aldersgate and upon about eight thousand other Parishes in England where it is not so used For if you be in the right then Aldersgate as well as the rest are all in the
one Day be told this was the likeness of something in Heaven c. Thus you bring down upon your own Head the Thunder of the Holy Pen-Man in these Words Her Prophets are light and treacherous Persons her Priests have polluted the Sanctuary THEY HAVE DONE VIOLENCE TO THE LAW Zeph. 3.4 This might strike you Dead and Dumb but that you have quoted a Text for your shelter in the end of the next Verse THE UNJUST KNOWETH NO SHAME But I wonder the less at you seeing you are grown so dairingly Impudent as to add one Chapter more to God's Book than ever God made which is my second Astonishment viz. in your Sham Indictment quasht you end with a Text which you say is in Zeph. 4.5 whereas there is but Three Chapters in Zeph. that ever any Protestant Minister could find however the words you may treasure up to your own self which are these The unjust knoweth no shame being suitably proper to you that of meer Malice and without any Provocation by me given you or without ever before or since speaking one word friendly to me about it or inquiring whether things were so or no yet you have premeditatedly and falsly represented the Matter of first Sessions as I have laid open in my first Book which the Reader must peruse as well as this Second Part else the whole Matter will not be understood thus when Lecturers venture to Print things they hear in a Tavern or Alchouse or Coffe-house how do they sham themselves and how great a Fire does a little spark kindle when a Lecturer hath the kindling O these Seditious Lecturers made the Fire blaze devilishly when they had the blowing of it in 41. Now I have waded through a Two Years troublesom Office it must stir up heat in a Stone to see an unserious Lecturer concern himself to reflect upon me in Print but what I have said might make this READINGDON OF THE BOOK blush if he had any shame But what new fangled Company doest thou keep that hath taught thee to stretch and hale and pull Gods Book out a whole Chapter longer than it was made a â—an may perceive thou art one won't shrink but rather run out in the wetting for no Body will think thou kept's such a drie Gizzard long as to believe thou wert drie at Heart when you wrote it But it may prove at last of good use and serve for the best Answer you can think of for though you can't plead Non est factum at least a privity to all Three Pamphlets yet you may plead Non compos Mantis or some such other Plea as may bring you within benefit of the Clergy and for you 〈…〉 so much as remember what Room or what Company no nor so much as what Tavern you were in when any of those Three Pamphlets were wrote and so drop the Cudgels and let the Liquor run through the Stage one way and the Lecturer off another way and so for this time end all our grumbling with this merry Jig while You and I sing the Tune thus UNTIL YOU ANSWER IN PRINT This Dance it will no farther go Pray good Sir why say you so Because the Parson won't come too He must come too and he shall come too whether he will or no. Else all all the World will point at you and sing Farewel John Sanderson farewel farwel And you will be hiss'd at by every Porter of London and pist at by every Boy of Sandon they wil say there goes the silence Minister not silenced by his Bishop but by his Quoudam Church-warden You must excuse me from running so much upon Ridicule for if I did not do so upon occasion of an Image all that know me would not think it my own But let the Reader Observe I did not begin with the Lecturer but he with me I do but defend my self from being Pope Gregorv's Ass and which is worse from being Priest-ridden nor I don't condemn Pope Gregory's Opinion that by Oxen were meant the Clergy so let it be with his Popish Clergy I only Comment upon his Unholiness's Opinion and say that Oxen are Creatures not of Gods making for God made only Male and Female Cowes and Bulls but Oxen are only the Manufacture of some cunning Sow-Gelder But Lecturers sure must have been some busie Factious Canundrum invention ab Origine because they were thought so Seditious in 41.41 And may not we say of them Parsons we know and Vicars we know but who are ye Perhaps you will answer as in Matth. 23.23 We are those that tythe Mint Annise and Cummin which give me leave to call uninjoin'd Ceremonies and have omitted the weightier matters of the Law I pray the Reader further to observe that I intend not to Ridicule any thing that the Law directs for I really press Comformity to the Law but when I find Pulpits as well as Prints vent Vanity and Froth I can't forbear giving you a Trantrum or two Preach no more against them that scoff at thy Ministers for I scoff at none but those that Print false Pamphlets and rail in the Pulpit only upon occasion of a silly Image And it cannot be thought a suitable Answer to you if I do not blow off your Froth with a little blustring and seeming vanity of my own and so I add this one pania Brochia more Why talk now no more of Ludere cum Sanctis Nor Bow to no Saint but the goodly St. Francis Then Disciples you 'l have to dance to your Lure But I Bulkin at Barking who can indure Now according to our Lectorian new up-start way of writing Pamphlets to begin with one Text and end with another which I am afraid is an Old trick Reviv'd from 41.41 but to shew I am an apt Scholar I 'le give you two for one YE WORSHIP YE KNOW NOT WHAT John 4. 22. AND IF THE BLIND LEAD THE BLIND BOTH SHALL FALL INTO THE DITCH Matth. 15.14 And so once more you are bid farewel farewel by him whom you have Thrice Pamphleted EDMVND SHERMAN POSTSCRIPT I Have Penned my Matter as it occurr'd to my Memory I hope the honest Reader will excuse some Tautologies and not having made every Paragraph hang so suitably together as I might have done Confider I am but a Lay-Man I declare again that none of the Drolling part is intended against any thing injoyned by Law but only to Droll at the Singularity of a Lecturers new Practices of Ceremonies not used by himself for about Sixteen Years after the Act of Uniformly was made and now enlightned by a pretended Conscience at London and yet contradicted by his own practice at Sandon therefore let my Drolling part shift for it self and it will be Commendably done if the Lecturer can without Drolling or Rayling answer more Learnedly and fully Satisfactory to the World which he can never do except he 1. First gathers up the Stress of every thing I have urged and charged upon him as well in my first Book as in this Second Part also relating to the Altar Services both before and after Sermon and his Bowing just at the Altar and no place else in the Church And he must prove our Communion-Table stands as it ought by Law to do and whether we can hear or not yet he is bound to say those Services just there where it is 2. He must give a Reason why he never said these Second Services and after Sermon-Services at the Altar before St. Michael was set there and prove this Image an Ornament to the Commandments and my Burning it Sacriledge else why is all this Noise 3. He can't answer any thing to the purpose until he hath reconciled the Practice of the Lecturer of Barking to the practice of the Parson of Sandon that the World may know which of them is the Schismatick or Non-conformist At him Johnathan of London too him Saunders of Barking and when you two have agreed then too him all ye Eight Thousand at them stoutly single Mr. Saunders 4. Though Prayers may be better heard from the Desk or Body of the Church yet you must affirm that they cannot be legally performed except at the Altar but have a care your Assertions don't contradict the Act of Uniformity and your Practice thwart both The Reader may Observe that I do positively limit the Begining of these Altar Services to about An. 78. though not so exactly to the very Day the Lords went to the Tower I would have no Reflections cast on the Parish of Barking nor on Clergy-men in general but particularly such as come to our Pulpit and Reflect about this Image Mr. Saunders hath singled me out and now I single out Mr. Saunders I will justifie my Burning this Image let him justifie his Printing against me for Burning it and his Altar-Services and Bowings which occasioned the Indictment and Noise I desire the World to leave us a free Stage and that no Body would intermeddle but let us Two Print out the Matter with our own Names Subscribed Now seeing Mr. Saunders does Bow and so differs from Eight Thousand Clergy-men in England by his Bowings c. it will be well for him if he gets himself to be one of the Number of the Seven Thousand that had not Bowed to the Image of Baal which I read of in Rom. 11.4 But then he must tell the World in Print who he Bows unto and why he Bows at all and in that Place only â—else Men will turn upon him the Texts before quoted Ye worship ye know not what I perceive that in all things you are too Superstitions FINIS London Printed the 10. of June 1681. for Mr. Sherman the Author And Published by Richard Janeway in Queens-Head-Alley in Pater-noster row
Answer you can give this is still but Bellarmine thou lyest I tell thee Johnathan it is as true as any thing thou ever saidst or wrote in thy Life of thy own making But who is this Reporter this Illustrious unkown upon whose veracity all this story depends In Nomine omnium sanctorum what art thou that thus Invisibly and sine Nomine prints Pamphlets against a late Church-warden of All-saints-Barking Sure thou art some ubiquitarian some Supernumerary Reformado or some hanger on Sir By your Priesthood tell me who you are Apparition I am a thing they call Lecturer and have got my self in among you though the Law knows me not and in former time I have heard the very Name of Lecturer was Branded by some high-flying Church men as a tool of Sedition I mean in 41. But I hope to bring the Name and use of Lecturer into Church again with great Benefit by my great Zeal for Images and Ceremonies shewed in my learned Pamphlets against Mr. Sherman for pulling down St. Michael though the times will not yet bare putting my Name to my prints Pray let me stay with this Parish till the times may favour Images and Ceremonies more and give me what you please I 'le be content Hark! Hark! Hark! A Voyce I hear but nothing can I see Speak speak thou grisly Ghost what e're thou be Aparition I am a shade and though no Name I tell Yet you shall know I lov'd St. Michael well Bring back St. Michael to the Altar then I and you 'l drink and once be Friends agaen Else with Apparitions you shall ever Frighted be And in your very sleep St. Michaels Ghost shall see I must Conjure down this Spectrum and though I am not so much a Candidate of Clergyship as to be an Exorcist or Devil driver yet I 'le try what can be done By the vertue of a late upper Church-Warden of Omnium Sanctorum and in the Name of Sancta Clara Sancta Winifred Sanctus Antonius Vanish but more particularly by the all powerfull Name of our great Champion St. Michael I command you down to your shades This said away the frightful Mormo flew And Lecturer alone was left in view O! was it you Mr. Apparition Lecturer that thus frighted me well don't print no more Apparitions and I will serve you do but try me once more if you can but get me to accept of the Office again then to please you I 'le pull that Fa-La-Soll-Clark out of the Desk by the ears that is such an eye-sore to thee I will make him a Desk just before you where he shall say Amen as it were under your feet that so you may Crow over him and so pull down his Pride as I did St. Michael but you must not Burn him least you be Prosecuted for Burning Church Ornaments For to give the Clark his due that stands at your right hand he is as good an Ornament as the Lecturer or St. Michael for he keeps us all in tune except the Lecturer The man sings well and does nick a Psalm as suitably to the Sermon as the Lecturer does his Sermon to the occasion And pray good Mr. Apparition Lecturer be pacified and pray present my Service to that Divine that Preacht at our Church on Sunday the 〈◊〉 June in the Afternoon who I won't name because I pay him respect Tell him I took notice that he made occasion to inveigh against such as Lampoon Ministers and their Ceremonies c. And tell him I went home and applyed it to my own self as he meant it and it might have done some good upon me but looking into the Clergy mens three printed multiplying-Glasses particularly that called a fiery Apparition c. I saw there a Clergy-man doing the same thing Lampooning not only me but also the very Expressions used in the Service and Ceremonies of the holy Sacrament of Baptism which the Church hath so solemnly injoyn'd and with vil'e impudence put it in print vainly and prophanely giving the Appellation of God-Father to a wooden Image and Printing as speaking of the Image St. Michael calls it Mr. Shermans God-son And remembring your Suspectedly Superstitious bowing at the other Sacrament also Nay then quoth I to my self these are but vain and suspectedly superstitious Ridiculing Lampooning Parsons and they would have a Bull or Grant to Lampoon and Ridicule others in Print and in the Pulpits too and meerly upon occasion of a rotten Image but they would not be Lampoon'd or Ridicul'd themselves which made me early the next Monday morning take my pen in hand and draw all this in as much Ridicule and Lampoon fashion as the Guts of a Superannuated Church-Warden could Invent and therefore you were as good spare the Press and spare the Pulpits for better uses than to Lampoon or Ridicule the Laity especially me else I 'le Lampoon you again and again Say you are glad I don't Bamboo you for truly truly if Divines do these rascally tricks we Lay-men cannot stand still and let you spit in our Faces your venomous Malice from the Pulpit and not wipe it off with a printed Paper and let the World know that whatever you print or Preach against me it is all but only upon occasion because I did not defend an Image and so you do but publish your selves to the world to be Advocates for Images Let me alone and mind your own business of teaching Folks the way to Heaven without those side-winds of Reflection out of the Pulpit which makes the people remember to repeat nothing of the Sermom to one another but this I think the Parson paid off Mr. Sherman to day for Lampooning of Ministers and their Ceremonies But truly another replyes they give Mr. Sherman just Cause and he will certainly do it the more because Ministers print Apparitions and I 'le warrant you he 'l pay them all off in print again for he is taught by the Parson to say Where there is no Law there is no Transgression Thus you give the people heavenly matter to talk on Lampooning of Ministers and their Ceremonies and so you vent private Spleen in that Holy place where you should deliver the Oracles of God Don't tell me any more of Ludere cum Sanctis for I will answer the Devil rebukes sin I 'le believe Benefit by the Church-prayers bur none by Sermons of such Preachers till they leave of their Railing If my Book called The Birth and Burning c. be False and Libellous on the Parish as you would have the World believe why doth not some Body prosecute me for it as you have hinted in your first Pamphlet that it should not preclude the Vestry from further proceeding against me and your last sayes it should be taken into further consideration Threatned Folks live long I only here add to what I said in my last about this Head of prosecuting me I laugh at all those that talk of prosecuting for a vile abominable Image which you call