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A66428
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A true representation of the absurd and mischievous principles of the sect, commonly known by the name of Muggletonians
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Williams, John, 1636?-1709.
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1694
(1694)
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Wing W2735; ESTC R38943
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21,260
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36
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A TRUE REPRESENTATIOâ— OF THE Absurd and Mischievous PRINCIPLES OF THE SECT Commonly known by the Name of MUGGLETONIANS LONDON Printed for Ric. Chiswell at the Rose and Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard M DC XCIV THE PREFACE AFter that I had for the use and satisfaction of a private Friend made some enquiry into the Principles of the contemptible Sect known of late times by the name of Muggletonians I threw the Papers aside as thinking the time not at all well spent that I had employ'd in reading their Books and in the Examination of what is made up of Impiety Nonsence and Absurdities But however I was at last prevailed with to permit them to be made publick which I did submit to not so much for the sake of those poor deluded Souls that are won over to that pernicious Sect that having no shadow of Reason for its support will not submit to the tryal of it and so are uncapable of Argument but for the sake of others And to give the World an instance of the power of Enthusiasm and how far it exposes Persons to be led away by the confidence or craft of any Pretender how ignorant or selfish soever he be And of this sort were the first Ring-leaders of this Sect John Reeve and Lodowick Muggleton in the year 1651. a time of Universal Liberty and which gave an opportunity for the worst of Men to vent the absurdest and most infamous Errors The former of these J. Reeve by Profession a Baker pretended that the Lord Jesus spoke to him by Voice of Words three days together and with such a Godlike Majesty that he saith of himself I did not know whether I was a Mortal Man or an Immortal God That the Voice told him that he had given him Understanding in the Scripture more than all the World besides And that he had given L. Muggleton to be his Mouth and that they two were the last Commissioners to the World and the two Witnesses spoken of Revelation 11th who exercis'd a Commission of an higher nature than those of the Prophets and Apostles and that they knew more and had a greater power than any of them as they could bless or curse save or damn to all Eternity irrevocably And therefore whosoever should oppose or vilifie this their Commission and Doctrine would be guilty of the unpardonable sin against the Holy Ghost Accordingly when these two were tried 1653. at the Old Baily before the Ld. Mayor Fowke and ordered to lie in Bridewell six Months they gave Sentence against the said Ld. Mayor the Recorder Steel and the Jury after this manner In obedience to our Commission received from the Holy Spirit c. we pronounce you cursed and damned Soul and Body to all Eternity Now if we come to enquire into their Doctrine there is nothing more absurd false and precarious As they tell us God has a Body like that of a Man of very flesh and bone and that the Trinity or Father Son and Holy Ghost are only variety of Names That God the Father left Heaven for a time and became an absolute mortal Man and died and was buried and that during his absence from Heaven Elias did there represent him and was the Protector of God during his Minority in the Earth and that God was raised from the dead by a compact with Elias who surrendred up all again to him They say farther that there was but one Angel that fell and that he entred into the Womb of Eve by her consent and there died and that Cain was the very Seed of that Serpent Angel and so was Brother to Abel only on the Mother's side And that from him sprung all the Carnal Seed of Reprobates who were not of the Seed of Adam such as Cain and Judas c. They hold farther that there is no Devil at all without the Body of Man and that he is no other than Man's Spirit of unclean Reason and cursed Imagination Nay sometimes they will determine as positively in matters of History and Philosophy and tell us from the Lord that the Epistles of the Apostles were wrote in Hebrew Greek and Latin That the Sun and Stars are but little bigger than they appear to be That the Sun's Eclipse proceeds from its nearness to the Moon and that no one can foretell Eclipses but by Inspiration Marvellous Discourses And which our Astronomers and Almanack-makers are much beholding to them for For whilst Men of Learning in that way thought they went by a certain rule of Nature and constant Observation they think too meanly of themselves These new Commissioned Men instruct them better and tell them they write their Ephemerides and Almanacks by Revelation if they therein infallibly foretell Eclipses as what Astronomer doth not By this we have a taste of these new Prophets pretences and may see that their History Philosophy and Divinity are much alike and the apparent Fruits of Ignorance Confidence and Imagination But I shall leave these to be handled in the following Treatise THE PRINCIPLES OF THE MUGGLETONIANS CONSIDER'D IN the treating upon this Subject there are two Questions to be taken into Consideration viz. 1. Whether John Reeve and Lodowick Muggleton are sent from God And 2. Whether they are the Two Witnesses in the 11 th of the Revelation CHAP. I. Whether they are sent from God I Here premise That a man may pretend to be sent and to have a Commission from God when he is not sent and has no such Commission So did John Robins of whom J. Reeve and L. Muggleton say that he is the last and great Antichrist spoken of in the Thessalonians Such also were John Tanee Bull Varnum Evans as they confess So they say the Ranters and Quakers were false Christs and false Apostles Therefore they plead That there was a necessity of the witness of the Spirit because of late and at present so many several Antichristian Spirits are come forth From hence I infer That unless J Reeve and L. Muggleton can prove that they are sent and commissioned from God more than those were whom they grant to be Impostors and Deceivers we have no more reason to believe they came from God and were sent by him than they themselves had reason to believe that the forementioned Deceivers came from God For do they say they were sent from God So did the others also declare 2. Therefore we must enquire into the Evidences and Proofs they bring of their Commission This they grant a proper way So in the Book call'd a Looking-glass If divers Men appear as Witnesses or Prophets immediately sent forth by a Powerful Commission from the Everlasting God are there not certain Divine Seals to distinguish between those Embassadors which are infallible and them that are but fallible In treating upon this I shall enquire Q. 1. What are the Evidences they bring and whether they are not such as other Deceivers have alike pretended to and even exceeded
their Doctrine They answer by their Commission 3. The matter of Fact is not true for there have been others before them of the same Opinion so little reason have they to claim the first discovery to themselves as I shall presently shew 4. It 's an ill sign that this should be the first discovery and that for above 1600 years the whole Christian World should know nothing of it as they themselves acknowledge III. Character or Proof of their Commission is That throughout the Book call'd the Looking-glass there is no point contradicting it self nor one another which he calls an Infallible Proof of the Truth of this Writing If there was no other proof of a Point contradicting it self than what is here asserted that is sufficient For he saith That to have no point contradicting it self nor one another in a Book is an Infallible Proof of the Truth of that Writing By which Argument every Book consistent with it self would be necessarily true whereas nothing more evident than that a Book may be consistent with it self and yet be false As for instance They say that one Bull and Varnum and others long before them have pretended to be the two Witnesses in the 11th of the Revelation Suppose we now that those two had wrote a Book as L. Muggleton has done and call'd it a True Interpretation of the 11 th of the Revelation would that have been a sufficient proof of the Truth of that Writing that there was no point in it contradicting it self nor one another I trow not and yet no one can deny but such a Book might have been so contrived And I durst have put it to the venture whether if this be true it would not have been as much a proof of their being those Witnesses and they might have alike Subscribed their Book as he doth his viz. By Bull and Varnum the two last Commissionated Witnesses And as this is not an Infallible proof of the Truth of the Writing so much less of the Divine Inspiration of it and of their Commission For a Book may in all points agree with it self and contain nothing but Truth and yet be of Humane Invention If a Book be inconsistent with it self it 's to be sure not of Divine Inspiration but it may be consistent and yet be only of Man's Composition And yet they fail in this point for it will be a difficult matter to reconcile it to it self For they say they write from an Infallible Spirit which implies the highest certainty and yet say I am perswaded in my Spirit and I do rather believe that there was seven hundred thousand than seven thousand though the Revelation of John doth express it to be but seven thousand To be perswaded and to believe a thing to be so are inconsistent with Infallibility for that admits no less than I am sure of it So again Muggleton saith of the Angel St. Matthew speaks of that perhaps it was no more to his visible sight and speaking of St. John's Revelation he explains it so it may be said Now these words perhaps and it may be said are doubtful Expressions and not reconcileable to Infallibility IV. V. VI. Suppose these Characters to be true for the matter yet that follows not that they are of Divine Inspiration and Infallible 1. Because then it would follow that all good Books and true were infallible 2. The 5th is what others have held as well as they VII If the largeness of the Book and the not looking in any Writing were Signs of an unerring Spirit then the Writings of several Quakers as Burroughs and G. Fox c. might pretend to it if they may be believed who often begin their Books with The Word of God And so would those of Jacob Behem who saith he writ without Humane Assistance And if the Purity of the Language be a Sign of Truth and Infallibility then I am sure that the Writings of these two are far from being either true or infallible This it seems was notorious in the former Edition of the Looking-glass 1656. And therefore L. Muggleton doth wisely to lay it upon the Abuse it received in the Press But if L. Muggleton was the Corrector and was to rectifie those abuses by his own unerring Spirit it would have escaped no better than his True Interpretation of the 11 th of the Revelation which abounds with false English beyond number and of which I never read a Page that wanted it And even that very Book which this is immediately spoken of viz. The Looking-glass after his Correction of it fails in the propriety of the Words the Concord the Connexion In the Paragraph just before this bold Challenge and the Appeal he makes to the Purity of its Language n 45. we find the Word Tosticated a vulgar but a much mistaken word and is for Intoxicated Where is the Concord in the Phrase Things of such Concernment requires Epistle 1. prefixed by Reeve And Men takes upon them p. 165. n. 29. My Brethren that hath p. 207. n. 8 Secrets that hath not been reveal'd p. 208. n. 17. Where is the propriety in Neither did he know not what Power he was endued with p. 127. n. 21. and confounded of Conscience p. 96. n. 18. These are passages I casually met with but if any one will have a Specimen let him read L. Muggleton's Epistle annexed to that Book and try what Purity and Elegancy is in it It 's a sign these Persons did not understand true English nor often the Sence of what they wrote that would venture upon this and produce the Purity of the Language as a Note of an unerring Spirit in the compiling of it VIII Character or Evidence is That since the Apostles Worship ceased which continued about 300 years and which was in or at the end of the ten Persecutions not a Man hath been commissioned till they were How many things are here taken for granted which there is not a Syllable of Proof for As 1. That there was a time when the Apostles way of Worship was to cease and actually ceased 2. That this time was at the end of the ten Persecutions 3. That none was Commissioned from that time 4. That J. Reeve and L. Muggleton are now Commissioned After all that has been said where is the Evidence of these Mens Commission They did wisely to lay aside Scripture and Miracles as they do Of Scripture they say The Commission of the Spirit agreeing with and explaining of the former Commissions of the Law and the Gospel differing only in point of Worship And as for Signs they are for those that are Spiritual Invisible Fire and Burning within but as for Natural Visible Signs they leave them to the first and second Commission to Moses and Christ But yet after all we think we may as well say to them as they to others If thou shalt imagine thy self fit to Minister I would fain know of