great deal of poison I shall therefore for the sake of the Ignorant and such as lie most obnoxious to their snares discover the Cheat. To omit that this Expression Several Ministrations before and after the Law by Moses and after by John Baptist and Christ and his Apostles can scarce be made tolerable sense a fault pardonable enough in Mechanics and the Brethren of the Family but a notorious instance of their Hypocrisie in pretending immediate Inspiration from the Spirit when they write nonsense In the Discourse such as it is we learn these three things 1. That the Ministration of Christ was but a temporary Ministration to continue only till the Dispensation of the Spirit came and therefore was disliked and rejected of God as wanting that full Measure Rule and Power of the Spirit which should afterwards come into the world Whereas the Ministration of Christ was indeed the Ministration of the Spirit and therefore to set up a Dispensation of the Spirit above and in opposition to that of the Lord Jesus in the Gospel is a blasphemous derogation from the honour of our blessed Saviour who said to his Apostles Joh. 16. 14. He shall receive of mine and shall shew it unto you 2. It follows from the forementioned passage that the Spirit of God equally moves and acts in them as it did in the Apostles therefore say they As the Apostles were commanded to wait at Jerusalem for the gracious illapse and descent of the Holy Spirit so they and this signifies to them both what and when to speak But will any sober person believe that a Quaking Speaker is divinely inspired when he commits endless Tautologies and vain repetitions and makes inconsequent illations and especially when the greatest part of his Harangue shall be downright railing Shall the eternal Spirit of Wisedom and Reason be guilty of nonsense and absurdities 3. It will follow that what they speak or write must be as good Canonical Scripture as the Bible and we are as much bound to believe George Fox and James Nailor as S. Paul and S. Peter I shall instance but in one Quaker more to prove this first part of their Doctrin all one with Familism and that shall be out of Humphrey Smith's Discourse of the three Ministrations of Moses Christ and the Spirit If Moses says he with all his Priests Tythes and long Prayers were now upon earth and Christ in his own body with his Miracles Baptism and Supper then whether those obey not Moses who leave the Priests and come to Christ And whether such when they are come to Christ should always be looking and following after his Body Miracles Baptism or Supper without them or tarry and wait to receive the Spirit within them And then which of these now should all people that profess Christ be led by in these days either Moses or the Person of Christ or the Spirit of Truth There is no sober Christian that can read this passage without anger and disdain to see such wicked wretches scoff and flearingly insult upon the sacred Person of our Lord Jesus the whole History of whose blessed Life and Death in the Letter of it they esteem no better than one of Esop's Fables Again the same Person hath this Whether they be not compassed about with a cloud of error who are upholding that Ministry of the Law which Christ is the end of and likewise such as are upholding and keeping up that which Christ said he had finished And being that Moses nor indeed his true Ministers of the Law are upon Earth neither the body of Christ which by the Professors was murdered at Jerusalem visibly to be seen upon earth then what was it these have to follow who have not received the Spirit to be led by Here again the Personal Offices of the blessed Jesus are laid aside SECT II. The second thing wherein the Familists and Quakers are all one is the Pretence of immediate Revelation David George and H. N. both pretended to receive their Doctrin from the Angel Gabriel And Wil. Gibson the Quaker says that the Gospel which they preach they have not received it from men nor from books nor from writings but by the Revelation of Jesus Christ in them and then he goes on and denies the Scriptures of the old and new Testament to be the revealed Will of God There are two things especially by which our Saviour Jesus Christ and his Apostles demonstrated the Truth of their Doctrin 1. The Miracles which they did And these were so many infallible Seals and Marks of the Divinity of the Doctrin they communicated to the World that God was the Author of it For there can be no surer evidence of any thing being delivered from heaven than when a man in favour of it is enabled to work Miracles And this was the sign which Moses gave the children of Israel when they asked how they should know the word which God has not spoken Deut. 18. 22. When a Prophet speaks in the name of the Lord if the thing follow not nor come to pass that is if he do no Miracle that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken 2. The Reasonableness of the Doctrin which they delivered To this S. Peter seems to appeal 2 Pet. 3. 15. when he bids us be ready 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 always to give an answer to every man that asks us a reason of the hope that is in us Now let us examin a little the Doctrin of these Modern Familists or Quakers by these two foregoing Rules they pretend Divine Revelation and would fain have the World believe that they are divinely inspired but is any man so simple as to believe they are so merely because they say it so a man may believe all the Cheats and Impostors in the World What sign do they shew or what evidence do they bring that they have received their Doctrin immediately from God If they can work any Miracles to confirm it we will believe them otherwise we have no more faith to believe them than we have to believe that Mahomet discoursed with the Angel Gabriel and received his Alchoran from him As for the Reasonableness of their Doctrin a very easie and mean capacity can find none in it for how should there be any Reason in what they teach when they themselves deny the use of Reason and tell the world they are guided by a Light within them that is neither Reason nor Conscience which yet is but like a dark Lanthorn that gives light to none but themselves And besides by this Principle it is impossible they should ever convince any man that is not merely besotted As for Example the Quakers Light says that the Sacrament of the Lords Supper is needless but the Light within me tells me it is not And is not my Light as good as his nay much better for I have the warrant of Christ and his Apostles but he has only his own bare blind Fansie And the man
Sugar-Plumbs lay under their Tongues when a deadly poison lodges in their Hearts which being nothing but a canting in Scripture-phrase and expression and fitted to feminine fancies yet has a very great influence upon the people especially when their minds are prepared and prejudicated with an opinion of their being inspired In these respects now it appears that Quakery hath a very great advantage above all other Heresies and hath strong and powerful temptations to allure unstable and wavering minds from the knowledge of the truth But their Impostures and Cheats being so plainly detected and discovered in this foregoing Treatise if any man knowing and warned of them yet wilfully and presumptuously shall fall into them his destruction is of himself and his ruine inexcusable he hath now no cloak for his sin The Conclusion I have now run through the chiefest of the Quakers Opinions and plainly and evidently proved them in every thing to be exactly Familistical I shall now for a Conclusion of this Treatise only add this serious Admonition to those who approve of and are hankering after Quakery And to this end I would have them consider that the Quakers do deny the Books of the Old and New Testament to be the Word of God and say that they are no Rule of our Faith and Manners which must needs be of the most dangerous consequence to the souls of men for men being reasonable Creatures and in that Princely Prerogative Superiour to the Beasts of the Field must of necessity guide and determine their Actions by some Rule and Measure and if neither Reason nor Scripture be that Rule they are liable to be imposed upon by every Cheat and led into any errour whatever and so at last eternally destroyed for by this means having cast away Reason and Scripture from having any thing to do with their Actions good and evil Truth and Falshood will be all alike and there will be no difference between Virtue and Vice and to kill a mans Neighbour and seize upon his Estate may be no sin if the voice of Reason and Scripture be not to judge of it These things will be of a very sad consequence to every one that expects and looks for another life when this is ended But it may further be considered that the rejecting of the Scriptures and denying them to be the Word of God is likewise a piece of Familism and was a part of the Doctrine of Caspar Swenckfield a Silesian and that upon this ground which the Quakers likewise urge because Christ is called the Word But so are the Scriptures too called the Word of God 1 Thes 2. 13. For this cause also thank we God without ceasing because when ye received the Word of God which ye heard of us ye received it not as the word of men but as it is indeed the Word of God So Heb. 13. 7. Remember them which have the rule over you and have spoken to you the Word of God Moreover they would do well to reflect and consider how they hope to be saved If they profess Quakery it cannot be by the Death and Satisfaction of Jesus Christ the Son of God because the Quakers own no such Person living without them nor do they believe the History of his Death and Passion at Jerusalem in the letter of it so that every man who turns to be a Quaker puts himself out of a capacity of being saved for there being no Name by which any man shall be saved but by the Name of JESVS and he being denied by them as a Person living in Heaven they are by the Tenour of the Gospel excluded from having any Salvation by him By which it appears that every man professing and embracing Quakery hazards and sets at stake the everlasting Happiness of his Immortal Soul But it is no wonder they take so little notice of their Souls when they believe they have none and he that follows their ways and opinions must cast away all care for another life nor think of any thing but for the present for Heaven Hell and the Day of Judgment are as they say in this Life And though the Quaker will impudently deny all this and boldly affirm that he holds no such things yet I have produced nothing as their Judgment but what I find published by some of them in their printed Papers or has been delivered by them at their own Conventicles and Meetings and therefore is sufficiently known to be their own opinion But it need not startle any man to hear a Quaker out-face his own Errours when challenged with them for he that takes away all distinction between good and evil will not stick to lye when it is for his advantage Wherefore these Hereticks being so dangerous and their Doctrine so destructive of the Salvation of mens Souls they ought carefully to be avoided and their society detested and abhorred for he that associates himself with them cannot be free from Sin but as he is guilty of Sin in the sight of God by joyning himself to them so unless he speedily return and repent he will partake of their Punishments For so said the Spirit of God Numb 16. 26. Come out from the Congregation of these men lest ye be consumed in their sins And the Apostle St. John Epist 2. ver 10. 11. says that If there come any to you and bring not the Doctrin of Jesus Christ which is conteined in the Books of the New Testament he is not to be received into your house nor to be bid God speed for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds Lastly if any man would keep himself from being drawn into their Errors he must be sure to observe the written Word of God as the Rule of his Belief and Actions nor must he forsake the Dictates and Notices of right Reason For by these two things he may judge of any Doctrin propounded to him and whatever any man tells him if it be contrary to Scripture and Reason he may be certain that it is false As for instance the Quaker comes and pretends that what he delivers it is divinely inspired to him by the Spirit and that he hath immediate Revelations from God In this Case now I am to try what he brings by the Word of God and right Reason St. Paul says Gal. 1. 8. 9. That if any man or an Angel from Heaven should preach any other Doctrin than what they had already preached and the believers received he should be accursed Now therefore if these Quaking Inspirations contein any other Doctrin than what is delivered in the Bible that Doctrin is false and those that broached it are accursed And if the Revelation be of something which the Word of God meddles not with as concerning the going or not going to such a Place the doing or not doing of such an Action Common Reason will help a man to judge very much in it and will afford so much light as to discover the Revelation to be foolish and ridiculous and nothing else but a Fansie arising from a deep Melancholy and mistaken for the Inspiration of the Spirit of God And by these two helps supposing a man to be faithful to God and his own soul he may easily discover and avoid such pernicious Errors For it is the cunning of these wicked People to deny the Scriptures and the use of Reason because they know they are so diametrically opposite to their Doctrins and Opinions The Contents CHAP. I. THe Cognation and Agreement between the Quakers and other Antient and Modern Heretics CHAP. II. Of the Authors of Familism and the Quakers Agreement with them in their Doctrin CHAP. III. Of the Holiness of Times Things and Persons under the Gospel CHAP. IV. That Quakery though it pretend high is mere Sadducism at the Bottom CHAP. V. That the Quakers are dangerous Enemies of the Civil Magistrate CHAP. VI. Of the Light within CHAP. VII The Quakers Pretence of Immediate Revelations CHAP. VIII Of the Quakers Perfection CHAP. IX The Ways and Arts the Quakers use in gaining Proselytes CHAP. X. The Advantage of Familism above other Sects and Heresies FINIS Lib. 1. c. 18. Concerning a form of Prayer Of Baptism Of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper Of the Time allotted for the Service of God Exod. 20. 8. Of the Place of Gods Worship 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pro 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * So 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is found to signifie in Homer So Herod in Erato 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Et apud Euripīdem Helena 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Of the Ministers Maintenance 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Object I. Of the Ministers of the Gospel The Lawfulness of taking an Oath Rom. 14. 11. * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 v. Job 34. 30. Mat. 24. 51. 2 Thess 2. 10 11.
as perfect slaves to their Pride Hatred Malice Covetousness and Lust as any people in the World One of these perfect Creatures was accused lately for getting his Maid with Child And when R. B. a Quaker advised with Lacock concerning a Marriage intended by him with a rich Woman Lacock told him it was not fit for him having begun in the Spirit to end in the Flesh and no sooner had R. B. desisted in his Suit but Lacock takes the woman and marries her Was not this a perfect Cheat The Quakers pretend very much to Inspiration and Prophesie and so did Marcus an old Heretic who abused many silly women under colour of conferring on them the gift of Prophecying The same Marcus had a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a familiar Spirit by which he brought himself into credit with his deluded Followers and I have had it confidently affirmed that about the first rise of the Quakers in the North of England several persons by Gloves and Ribbands and divers Charms and Incantations were really bewitched by them And doubtless many of their Quaking Fits wherein they fomed at the mouth trembled throughout all parts of their bodies hideously groaned their visages distorted and tumbling upon the ground were real possessions by the Devil It were easie to draw out the Parallel between them into a greater length but that I think it would be too burdensom and tedious to the Reader forasmuch as it is true of them what Irenaeus said of the Heretics of his time Per singulos dies affectant novum aliquid adinvenire That every day they affect to bring in some novelty and dangerous Opinion I shall rather chuse now to represent them under the Notion of Familists CHAP. II. Of the Authors of Familism and the Quakers Agreement with them in their Doctrin IT was not long after David George had disseminated and spread abroad his pernicious Errors but they were greedily sucked in and embraced by Henry Nicholas who being of a crafty and subtle Temper a plausible and winning Deportment as if the Stars had pointed him out for a grand Impostor carefully concealed his Doctrin at Munster in Westphalia where he was born and in the mean time diffused it by Letters and Emissaries instructed by him in many places of Germany forty miles distant from him so that the Sect of Familists grew and increased for a good while before it was known who was the Fomenter of it At last he removes to Amsterdam sets up the Trade of a Mercer and professes his Doctrin calling his Fraternity and Society The Family of Love and in his Writings gave a Symbol or Cognizance Charitas extorsit per H. N. as may be seen at the end of every Epistle or Treatise of his For his Person he was corpulent of a good Presence and Sanguine Temper shrewdly suspected of Incontinence with some Women in his house and 't is no wonder if he should not bathe his begodded Humanity as he phrases it of himself in carnal and sensual Pleasures when the great Arcanum and Mystery of his Doctrin was mere Sadducism that is A Denial of the Immortality of the Soul and a Life to come From Amsterdam he sails over into England and here divulges and communicates his destructive Errors among a company of Artificers and silly Women who being unstable and not well principled in the Rudiments of Christian Religion became an easie Prey to this white Wolf He wrote an Epistle to two Daughters of Warwick dissuading them from Regeneration by the Word of God read or preached calling it ceremonial elementish and false and laboured to persuade the Maids to a spiritual new birth through his Doctrin His Errors were afterwards discovered and refuted by J. Knewstub in a Book dedicated to Ambrose Earl of Warwick and printed at London by Order from the Queen 1579. He pretended a Revelation from the Angel Gabriel He affirmed that Christ was neither God nor Man but the State of his Doctrin and that every one of his illuminate Elders was Christ He held a Perfection without sin and that the whole History of Jesus Christ was not to be understood in a literal but Mystical and Allegorical sense that there is no Heaven Hell nor Judgment but what is in this Life and that all outward Ordinances in Religion are foolish and trifling things But I shall trouble my self no further to collect the Heads of his Doctrin since I shall take a general view of it by comparing the Doctrin of the Quakers and that of H. N. together SECT I. H. N. says that not only the Law of Moses but the Ministration of Christ and his Apostles were only temporary things instituted to bring men to the full and perfect Reige of the Spirit and as Children when they arrive to a good competency of understanding and can read well they throw away their Horn-books and Primers so the Pedagogy of the Law and Gospel are to be cast aside when men come to the Spirit and this Dispensation of the Spirit is only in the Familists and in their doctrin And that this is the full sense of the Quakers appears from their own Books which they cunningly spread abroad to infect and poison the minds of weak and ignorant People In the Book called A Declaration of the Faith of Quakers penned by four of that Gang John Crook says thus We believe by the same gift of Grace that there are several Ministrations and several Operations according to 1 Cor. 12. and all by the same Spirit as before and after the Law by Moses and after by John the Baptist and Christ and his Apostles and in all those the Ministration had acceptance with God through the management of the Spirit and its rejection and dislike of God for the want thereof And by this Spirit were the Scriptures given forth and the Holy men of God did speak prophesie preach and pray as they were moved and for want of it the Letter did and doth kill And for the further appearance and pouring out of this Spirit answerable unto the work and service that God had for them to do they were to wait as Christ commanded his Disciples to do at Jerusalem to receive the promise of the Father for by this Spirit he that speaks speaks as the Oracles of God And therefore as it was the practice of the People of God in old time to wait for the moving and stirring of this Spirit that they might speak as it gave them utterance in the evidence and demonstration thereof so do this People called Quakers now and according to its moving in their hearts they minister according to the signification of the Spirit whereby they understand both what and when to speak and when to be silent Although this sweet sugared speech seem to be without deceit yet there is gall and wormwood mixed with it and in this new wine drawn from their own Cellar which lies deep in the lowest Region of the Body there is a
Christ and he is no where else H. N. first Exhort Sect. 13. And that this is the very Doctrine of the Quakers I prove 1. Because Tho. Forster in the above-mentioned Treatise p. 13. saith That the Light which is Christ within is not natural but it is sufficient to Salvation But we know that Reason and Conscience are natural and insufficient in themselves to Salvation by which it is plain they are excluded from having any thing to do in this Light 2. G. Fox in his Great Mystery pag. 207. 210. saith That Christ is not distinct from the Saints and he that eats the flesh of Christ hath it within him And in pag. 206. he declares That if there be any Christ but he that was crucified within he is a false Christ and he that hath not this Christ that was crucified within is a Reprobate To this purpose is that of Richard Stubbs a Quaker who asking Elizabeth Whetherly How she expected to be saved she answered By that Jesus who was born of a Virgin and died at Jerusalem Stubbs told her that was the false Christ and an Antichrist Whereby it is plain that the Quakers lay aside the Person of Christ as he is God and Man without us What then can this Light within which they say is Christ be but the coming into the way or dispensation of Quakers which is such a state wherein a man leaves the written Word of God and hearkens wholly to inward Revelations And if any man shall object and say That the Quakers speak of Christ and say that he was born of the Virgin and crucified upon the Cross and therefore shall think that they acknowledge a Christ without them Let him not be gulled and cheated into a good opinion of them for this for H. N. says as much and repeats the very words of most of the Articles of the Apostles Creed as the Christian Church hath them and yet turns them all into a mystical and allegorical sense And I have above cited the Testimony of G. Fox a prime Quaker that if there be any Christ but he that was crucified within he is a false Christ and James Naylor wrote a Letter to one in Lancashire that he that expected to be saved by him that died at Jerusalem should be deceived Therefore it is undoubted that they account the Conception Birth Life Death Resurrection and Ascension of our Lord Jesus as they were in the History and Letter transacted in Judea to be a mere Fable So that this may serve as a Caution once for all to every one that reads their Writings that when they meet with any thing about our Saviour Jesus Christ or Heaven or Hell or the day of Judgment they may know the Quakers understand it in a Mystical sense There is no Rational Person but will at first sight discover the horrid and wicked Blasphemy of the Quakers in asserting their Light within and that whoever follows them must deny the Lord Jesus as a Person without them beside whom there is no name given under heaven whereby any man can be saved And is not this a very sad Light that shall lead a man down to Hell and the Devil that shall carry a man like an Ignis fatuus from his right way into Bogs and Ditches and cause him at last to fall into the pit of everlasting Destruction CHAP. VII The Quakers Pretence of Immediate Revelations BEcause the true Religion justly entitles God to be its Author who immediately inspired the Prophets and Apostles therefore the Devil who was always Gods Ape countenances the Impostures and Deceits he sets abroad by his servants with the false Pretence of Divine Inspiration And herein these Seducers have a double advantage first by amusing the common People and telling them that what they speak comes from God And then secondly they hope to secure themselves from any Disputes and Examination of their Doctrin for none are so bold as to question any thing that truly comes from God Now all such People as these are called Enthusiasts that is such as falsly conceit themselves to be inspired now to be inspired is to be moved in an extraordinary manner by the Power or Spirit of God to act speak or think what is holy just and true from whence it follows that Enthusiasm is a full but false Persuasion in a man that he is inspired And this false Persuasion in the Quakers of being immediately inspired arises from the Melancholiness of their Temper for the Dejectedness of their Countenances and the alteration of their Visages from that chearfulness that is in other men shew them to be the most Melancholic Sect that ever came into the World When therefore the Melancholic and Hypochondriacal Humor which is extraordinarily predominant in them mixing with the Blood and Spirits is somewhat refined in the Heart and being warmed there ascends copiously into the Brain it affects the mind with varieties of Imaginations and intoxicates and makes the man as it were drunk for the present till by stretching his Voice and the Earnestness and Motion of his body it becomes in some degree evaporated And all that time that his brains are turgid and full of this Humor he is wonderful eloquent and bewitchingly taking and the poor ignorant People loook upon him as a Prophet sent immediately from God and admire the Overflowings of the Lord as the Quakers phrase it in the man who is so sweet and affectionate as if he would pour his whole Soul into the good womens Mouths Whereas all this is only an effect of his Melancholic Temper the Hypochondria rising into the Region of the Brain which is ordinary in Poets and Orators according to that Est Deus in nobis agitante calescimus illo But lest these Juglers should say that they are scandalized and that they pretend to no such thing as an immediate Inspiration from God I think it not amiss to give the Reader a brief Account of some of them That it is their Judgment and Opinion I prove from their Writings William Gibson in a Pamphlet of his says expresly thus The Gospel which we preach we have not received it from Man nor from Books nor from Writings but by the Revelation of Jesus Christ in us Thomas Forster in the often above mentioned piece says That immediate Revelation is not ceased but that the Saints must now expect as glorious Manifestations as were in the Primitive times I shall add to these that famous Commission of Edward Burroughs whom the Quakers stile A worthy and true Prophet and a Martyr for the Testimony of Jesus because he died sottishly in the Goal at London for his Rebellion against and contempt of the known Laws of the Land and over whom Francis Howgil laments with the lamentation of David over Saul and Jonathan I am greatly distressed for thee my brother Edward c. then that of David over Abner Died Ed. Burroughs as a fool dieth Ah no. His Commission then is this as