ye are in and repent if that be possible after ye have so abused the Truths of Jesus and his inheritance Second Section fixing Popery upon the Quakers Having discussed your charge of Popery calumniously 〈◊〉 against us I shall present a true one against you and that very breifly First Therefore for I resolve to adhere to the order of the queries above dispatched It is a Popish rule and a great one too That ignorance is the Mother of Devotion and ye both in those queries Quakerism no Popery pag. 98. are not a jot behind with them in that where ye condemn all means of knowledge both humane and divine and consequently knowledge it self seeing we cannot reach knowledge without the use of the means of knowledge whereby through Gods blessing we may attain unto it for extraordinary Inspiration is now ceased as is proved before nor must we tempt God to work extraordinary miracles and neglect and despise the ordinary means which he had allowed Secondly the Papists deny the Scriptures to have any authority over us or in order to us untill they get it from the Church whereby they mean the Pope and his Clergy and do also deprive the whole body of the people or Laity as they call them of the use of the Scriptures And do not ye also deny the Scriptures to be our rule at least our principal rule and endeavour to cause all men reject them at least as the principal rule Witness the proceeding Queries and your Quakerism no Popery And is not this one dish indifferent dressings for both of you aim to bring the Scriptures low yea to nought without your approbation they without their Pope and Councils approbation yea without the approbation of your light and sentiments within and so both of you agree exactly in subjecting the Scripture-authority to the authority of another rule which Inevitably must be as ye apprehend I am sure in both these articles ye are as like the Pope as any bastard can be like his father Thirdly The Papists and ye agree in denying Infant Baptism an external Christian Sabbath-day and Psalms-singing to be ordinances of Divine Institution under the Gospel they alleadgingthem to be only traditional ye that they are superstitious will 〈…〉 All which things we have seen in your queries Con 〈…〉 faith and Quakerism no Popery Sixthly 〈◊〉 have put three Articles into the last The Papists deny Bread and Wine to be in the Sacrament of the Lords Supper affirming that after the priests consecration it is no more Bread and Wiâ—e but is substantially changed into the very body and blood 〈◊〉 Christ so your brethren divinely Inspired as ye are in their fixth query here mock and scoff at the eating of bread and drinking of wine in that Sacrament making way it seems for that Popish Transubstantiation whereof we are the more confirmed because at the Sixteenth Query as I cleared before they lay down an assertion that cannot stand without the very grounds of that Transubstantiation Seventhly The Papists assert the Infallibility of their Pope and Councils and make that a ground of defence for their Church-constitutions and whole religion rejecting all that want the authority of such Infallible guides So do not you assert the Infallibility of your teachers Albeit often they are rather lunatick and oppose our Confession directory c. upon the very account of the fallibility of these that formed them though to no purpose as is shewed Eightly The Jesuit Papists worse then any of the rest stifly deny original sin and assert universal redemption universal light universal grace free-will in natural unrenewed men unto good and the Apostacy of the Saints all which I have shewed to be contrary to the Scriptures and in all these the Quakers are not a jot behind them but on the contrary do exceedingly out-reach them Fourteenthly For there are six articles in my last charge the same Jesuit Papists hold perfection to be attainable in this life Wherein ye are indeed more positive then they albeit still against the Scriptures as is before proved which shew us that according to Gods way of disposition for the debate depends not on potentia absoluta who will have us here to have a continual war with our corruptions that the victories of his grace may be the more glorious we the more humble and dependant on him Wee shall never here be fully perfect or freed from all corruption And Sir methinks ye strongly savour of supererogation too while ye say Quakerism no Popery Pag. 37.38 that ye can attain a sinless perfection in this life and yet grow in more degrees of grace for Sir when ye are altogether sinless and so neither God nor his law can ask any more of you as not being defective or unconform in a jot or else ye cannot be sinless ye may spare that which ye have more than is required and due to a needful friend or throw it into the Roman-Churches grand treasury of merit and be Canonized next day for a Saint for exceeding your duty and giving that overplus to the Church Fifteenthly Ye hold justification by your inherent righteousness and salvation by the merit of works as much as any Papist nay as the Pope himself does as is shewed Sevententhly for there are two in the last your brethren have endeavoured what they can in your Confession of Faith as we saw before And ye in your Quakerism no Popery Pag. 94 do sweetly also combine to clear the Pope from that reproachful name of Antichrist they alleadging that the Antichrist is our will and the Whore our wisdom that sits upon the same ye affirming that Antichrist more strictly taken is a spirit sitting in mans heart Properly which the Pope certainly is not and so according to you Sir we cannot at least Properly call the Pope Antichrist Ye are understood Sir Eighteenthly Ye hold the Apocryphal books at least many of them to be of divine Inspiration and consequently of equal authority with the Scriptures for every doctrine divinely Inspired is of Infallible divine authority and Scripture assurance or authority can rise no higher And herein Sir ye also joyn with the Papists And when ye ask which is your only argument by what rule of faith we know that these Apocryphal books are not of divine authority or equal to the Scriptures seeing the Scriptures says not whether they are or not I Answer that though by express Scripture sentence or plain positive saying this cannot be cleared yet seeing these books do all of them want Scripture-stile which by the rest of the undoubted Scriptures compared we easily see and they were not found in the original language of the Old Testament and they are never cited in the New Testament and in many of them there are things frivolous written yea quite unsutable and in some of them the writer excuses his failings and they were never accounted any part of Canonical Scripture in the Old Testament-times and this passes without
outward things Doth he not bring them off things that are seen to things that are not seen And whether or not ye ever intend ye your selves called Ministers or your hearers shall come any nearer to Christs Death and Die and be Buried with him but only to take Bread and Wine in remembrance of Christs Death lest ye and they should come to forget Christs Death Answer us plainly these things Yea or Nay Twelfth QUERY What is Original sin Whether it be not the Devil yea or nay For doth not the Original signifie the beginning And what did Christ come to Destroy Was it not the Devil and his works Thirteenth QUERY Whether or not did Christ die for all the ungodly in the world and Sinners that they should live and die in their ungodliness and sins or live unto him and whether or not did Christ shed his blood for all men and was a Propitiation for the sins of all men and whether or not these that do not hold this are these that make Sects and are out of the same Spirit and Doctrine of the Apostles Fourteenth QUERY What makes a Believer Whether or not is it by believing in the Light according to Christs Doctrine who says He is the Light of the World and doth enlighten every one that comes into the world that all men through him might Believe and who follows him shall not walk in darkness for he is the Light and says That he that believes is saved Then is not the Light saving which he believes and he that does not believe in the Light is damned already Then is not the Light or his disobedience to it his Condemnation Yea or Nay Fifteenth QUERY Can any man be saved by his own works Self-righteousness Will-worship and are not all men in the Self-righteousness that are not in the Righteousness of Christ Jesus and are not all of their own works that be out of the Light and the Faith that is the Gift of God and are not all in their Will-worships that are not in the worship that Jesus Christ the heavenly man set up above Sixteen hundred years since that is in the Spirit and the Truth So must not every man come to the Truth and to the Spirit in their own hearts if they come to the worship Jesus Christ set up and are not your Catechisms Confessions of Faith and Directories your own works and your own worship which ye have set down for people to fall down and do worship to and be saved by and have ye not set up this since the Apostles days and since Christ set up his worship Sixteenth QUERY Whether or not your Directory and Catechism and Confession of Faith be Gospel yea or nay And if so whether it be not another Gospel then that which the Apostles Preached who said the Gospel was the power of God Rom. 1.16 Seventeenth QUERY Whether or not the Scriptures do not say that he that believes hath ceased from his own works as God did from his and entred into his rest and whether or not your Directory and Church-maid Faith and Catechisms and Confessions be not your own works and ye follow them and worship them and not cease from them And whether or not in so doing ye keep people and your selves in your own works and from the Rest or we desire you shew us what difference their is betwixt Spiritual Babylon and Sodom and Egypts works of their hands and Temporal Babylon and Sodom and Egypts works of their hands and their worship Of each distinguish I desire you Distinguish the mystery from a plain outward Idol These Queries were Subscribed I. S. and I could fill up his Name at length but I forbear for some reasons that I think more pertinent to Conceal than Divulge unto the world This is the true Transcript of their Queries which were directed unto me as is said which I can Attest by many others that saw and read them before they came to my hand and some after that knows they owned them and they are also the true Pourtraiture of their known Principles and beside I have in this Controversie carried along two of their most famous Books yet extant the Positions whereof which I always Cite do exactly agree with the Scope and Import of these Queries viz. their Confession of Faith Subscribed by Eight or Nine of their most famous Ring-leaders in England by them called The Principles of Truth or a Declaration of their Faith and their Quakerism no Popery written by Mr. George Keith and Subscribed both by him and Mr. Robert Barclay two of their chiefest Luminaries and greatest Apostles forsooth in Scotland This Book Mr. Keith writes against Reverend Mr. Menzies Professor of Theology at Aberdeen a man of so great Veneration and Learning that it may be justly thought a daring boldness for him to have meddled against him So that no man knowing the Quakers Principles or searching these grounds will in the least doubt the faithfulness of my Transcription beside what Credit may be allowed unto my own Ingenuity who never loved the straining of any mans Principle too sore in Consequences unclear and remote much less the fixing of Principles falsly upon such as disclaimed them But of this I need say no more for the Quakers Principles are known and these Queries they will own An Alphaâ—â—â—ical TABLE A GRacious Acts necessarily require gracious Principles proved pag. 157. Adam a common Representative head of Mankind pag. 134. The Analogy of Faith what it is pag. 78. Apocryphal Books not Canonical or of immediate Inspiration pag. 209. Apostacy of the Saints confuted pag. 162. Christian assurance needs not immediate Dictates p. 32. Authority of the Scripture-rule over all other Rules proved ibid. The Pope before the Reformation had Church-Authority and how pag. 199. B THe Baptism of John and the Apostles the same in substance p. 69. Baptism with Water of Divine Institution under the Gospel p. 68. Baptism with Water only properly called Baptism p. 78. Baptism with Water meant in the Text of Matthew Matthew 28.19 proved p. 76. Baptism with Water necessary to Salvation and how p. 74. Baptism with Water not an Old-Testament Ceremony p. 68. Baptism succeeded in the room of Circumcision p. 86. Baptism of Believers Infants a Divine Institution under the Gospel ibid. Baptism the Initiating Seal proved ibid. Probable Evidences enough for admission to Baptism p. 88. The great Beast mentioned in the Revel not our will pag. 195. Bilocation pregnant with Contradictions p. 191. Blasphemies reported in Scripture not Scripture-sentence p. 20. C EXtraordinary calls attended with extraordinary Furniture pag. 7. An inward call not necessary to the validity of Ministerial Acts. pag. 202. A Catechism requisite in a Church and why pag. 123. Our Westminster Catechism aimed at materially Scripture-sentence pag. 129. How the Command is said to be nigh unto us Deut. 30.14 p. 37. Christs coming again mentioned 1 Cor. 11.26 not meaned of his coming at the Pentecost but at the
of the Spirit of Truth to imbrace a Doctrine that is not the Rule this is liker to be an evidence of the contrary Or How shall it be an evidence of the Spirit of Error to reject such Doctrine this also is rather an evidence of the contrary providing the Rule be retained Lastly God denounces all the plagues mentioned in the Scriptures quake that dreads then against every Man that shall presume to add in matters of Faith and Duty for of these its meant to the Doctrine and Rules written in the Scriptures Therefore the Scriptures do certainly contain the Rule and whole Rule of Faith and Manners The antecedent is laid down Rev. 22.18 where it is peremptorily said That if any Man shall add unto these things that are written in the Scriptures for there is the like reason and no other or more reason against adding to this Book of the Revelation and the rest of the holy Scriptures after the Canon is compleated and this Sanction is added here in the close of this Book as the close of the whole Scriptures God shall add to him all the plagues written in the Book The consequence is also evident For if not the Scriptures but some other Doctrine were the Rule then we not only might add to the Scriptures in matters of Faith and Duty but we ought of necessity to set up that other Doctrine as the Rule and Directory of both which is much worse methinks than any partial adding and so we could not be liable to such a doom for a partial adding And hence by a few arguments of many that may be produced we see that the Scriptures are the infallible Rule of our Faith and Manners that sure Word of Prophecy whereunto we ought to take heed and if an Angel from Heaven shall preach another Gospel to us than that which Christ and the Apostles did let him be accursed Every new Dispensation of the Covenant by the Ministery of Men though it were but only new in the manner was confirmed by Miracles and Wonders Exod. 4.28.30 Deut. 34.11 12. 2 Cor. 12.12 Heb. 2.4 much more need hath the Quakers Doctrine of such confirmations being new not only in the manner but also in the matter contrary to the Doctrine formerly dictated by the Holy Ghost and left upon Record unto us nor heard we ever of so great a company of Inspired Teachers as all the Doctors of the Quakers pretend to be and never one Miracle or Wonder to be had amongst them all excepting only their extream Infatuation and Brain-sickness or that they still retain the proportion and features of Human bodies having quite enervated their rational essence SECT II. Proving the Scriptures to be the principal Rule and overthrowing the Light within George Keith an Arch Quaker and a Man too learned as he imploys it doth here distinguish our Arguments yielding us That the Scriptures are the most compleat external Rule of Faith that is in the World but That they are not for all that the Principal Rule of Faith but only a Secundary Rule thereof and that the Spirit or his Dictat within is the Principal Rule in his Quakerism no Popery pages 9.13 25 59 108 109 110 111. and like Proteus turning himself into all shaces 〈…〉 â—mes designs Christ himself oftner the Spirit 〈…〉 he 〈…〉 of the Spirit within to be 〈…〉 oftnest the dictat◠〈…〉 But I am sure if George Keith be in earnest while he would have Christ himself or the Spirit himself to be our Rule he is beside himself For a Person cannot be a Rule of Faith for that must be some complex Proposition Direction or Precept and the like but Christ and the Spirit are Persons and so they cannot be a Rule of Faith The Major is already proved nor will the Quakers deny it But George Keith as many of his Brethren to my hearing doth flatly refuse the Minor as an uncertain unscriptural notion and a barbarous heathenish term to speak of a Person in the Godhead in his Quakerism no Popery page 97.104 and so according to him there are no Persons at all in the Godhead ah Blasphemy for if there be I am sure we may say there are and if Men believe that there are Three Persons in the Godhead they will not refuse to say the same The Quakers then do reject both the thing and notion and believe not there are Three Persons in the Godhead And therefore that there are I shall shortly prove First The Father Son and Holy Ghost are each of them an Intelligent Being subsisting incommunicably or distinctly from another Ergo each of them is a Person The consequence being from the Definition to the thing defined cannot be denied without a broad contradiction for if they grant the Antecedent that is the thing which all the World understands by a Person The Antecedent I prove for that each of them is an Intelligent Being Subsisting the Quakers dare not deny and their great Works declare it and that they subsist Incommunicably or distinctly from one another though in the same Godhead I prove because one and the same Subsistence cannot beget it Self or be begotten by it Self nor proceed from it Self as is palpable but the Father begets the Son the Son is begotten by him and the Holy Ghost proceeds from both and so they must be distinct Subsistences or subsist distinctly Secondly There are Three that bear Record in Heaven the Father Son and the Holy Ghost 1 John 5.7 Ergo they must either be Three Persons or Three Gods which is the beight of impossibility or let the Quakers shew how they will call them Three for though they also be one viz. one God yet the same Text cited says they are Three too I could never get any other answer to this from a Quaker but That they are three Manifestations viz. of Moses of Christ and of the Spicit But if these were the Father Son and Holy Ghost the World is much elder than they and then Who made it Thirdly While Christ proves Himself the Light of the World against the Jews who denied it He says John 8.17 18. It is also written in your Law That the Testimony of two Men is true I am one that bears Witness of my Self and the Father that sent Me beareth Witness of Me. Now Christ and the Father could not have been two Witnesses according to their Law except they be two distinct Persons for their Law admitted the Testimony of two Men proof enough because it was the Testimony of two Persons and otherwise the Testimony had not been admitted as proof enough Christ then clearly teaches Himself and the Father to be two Persons while he asserts that their Witnessing was proof enough according to their Laws demand Lastly Christ is said to be the express Image in the Original Language Character of the Fathers Person Heb. 1.3 Therefore the Father is a Person and Christ also and distinct Persons for the Father is plainly called so and
Sloath It may be they do for they will not so much as pray to God Except when they Incline to it by a free motion and Instigation within The Quakers in the Close of their query require us to distinguish betwixt Temporal Babylon and Egypt and Spiritual Babylon and Egypt Ans I have hitherto abundantly vindicated our Church from the Aspersion of being a Spiritual Babylon wherewith the Quakers do ordinarily and wickedly traduce her and it is the scope of this Epilogue of their Queries they must end as they began slandering and accusing the Brethren and it may be also seen in their Confession of Faith pag. 122 124. Upon the other hand I have charged home the Quakers with their Errors Blasphemies Contradictions and shall do in a Post-script with their Papism and with Irresistible Evidence have made good every Article of my charge against them Only in the general to this part of the Query I Answer that Temporal Babylon and Egypt are understood properly of the places so called by the Inhabitants and were a tipe of the Spiritual but Spiritual Babylon and Egypt are mystically and improperly understood and are the Anti-tipe of the other And hitherto the Quakers possibly will consent But we will surely discord in the Application for the Quakers make that great Babylon Spiritually and mystically so called so much spoken of in the Book of Revelation to be only inward in the hearts of people See their Confession pag. 114 115 121 122 138 140. Where they alleadge that great Spiritual Babylon to be within in the hearts of people and affirm the great Whore and mystery Babylon to be our wisdom and the Beast be our will whereupon our wisdom sits I Confess the Pope is deeply obliged to the Quakers and belike some of them are asmuch obliged to him he is not so unreasonable as to make them work for nothing The whole Protestant Church hath hitherto proclaimed the Pope to be the great Antichrist and Beast and the Church of Rome to be that mystery Babylon great Whore and Mother of Harlots The Quakers are so tender of his and her credit as to Contribute their best endeavors by a new Invention because all other devices have long since failed for Enervating our Churches libel and for wiping the reproach from off them both But go to is mystery-Babylon our wisdom and the Beast and Antichrist our will Let the Quakers then Answer these few following Arguments First albeit all Hereticks are Commonly called Antichrists 1 Joh. 2 18. yet the great Antichrist singularly and Eminently so called was not revealed in the time of the Apostles but to be afterwards revealed 2 Thes 2 3 5 6 7 8. But it cannot be said that the Corrupt wills of men were not then revealed Secondly it cannot be understood how the Kings who give their power for a season to the Beast Revel 17 12 13 and afterwards destroy the Whore ver 16. there shall destroy the carnal wisdom of all men so that it shall be found no more at all as it is said of that great Whore Babylon after these Kings have destroyed her Revel 18 21. Thirdly seeing they will have our wisdom to be Babylon the great Whore what then are these Seven mountains whereupon that Whore sits and what are these Seven Kings Five whereof were fallen before the Book of Revelation was written one then was and another was not then come which are the Seven heads of that whores Beast and what again are these Ten Kings which are the horns of that Beast Revel 17.3 5 9 10 12. how shall these things be applyed to the Seat Heads and Horns of our wisdom and will Such an application will be an excellent Romance I le warrand Fourthly the great whore Babylon hath in her Harpers Pipers Trumpeters Craftmen Milstones Bridegrooms Brides c. Revel 18 22 23. But are all these things in peoples hearts in their wisdom The Quakers would make Heraclitus turn a plain Democritus nay almost a dead man to laugh himself alive by their jocund and facetious humor Lastly the place where Babylon stood becomes an Habitation of Devils the hold of every foul Spirit and a Cage of every unclean and hateful Bird after her destruction by the ten Kings Revel 18 2. But I would think that after the destruction of our carnal and corrupt wisdom that the Devil and all his foul Spirits should get the less access unto and worse lodging into our hearts where our carnal wisdom before remained Hence we see what a wild Romance the Quakers gloss upon the Beast and great whore amounts unto and upon how Ridiculous a fiction their apology for the Pope and Church of Rome is founded and yet I think the great Doctors of the Quakers deserves rewards at their hands for they have done what they could and who can do more Albeit the success and event which who can help does not answer their desires And now I hope that boisterous wind of Arrogance and storm of pride wherewith that supercilious Inscription of the Quakers the haughty Harbinger of these Queries did Insolently swell is a little calm'd and I trust I have by the evidence of Irrestible truth so overturned their Bulwarks and dashed the force of their Heretical Armado of falshoods that they shall not so confidently hereafter Summon the Armies of Israel with a defiance But if their courage be so undaunted that no routing of their Forces can abate it nor Impose silence upon them but they will still be smattering and will yet rally upon us with the new supply of a Reply then I must require them at the Instance of all rational Creatures to speak Reason and sense for in earnest not in jest I say it they are often so obscure in their Aenigmatical Riddles and abstruse Expressions of mysterious and Cloudy non-sense that they transcend and over-reach the most Metaphysical capacity of all mortals This demand is so exceedingly reasonable that I presume if any Quaker shall as yet have the boldness to Compear in the defence of their heretical Interest it will without further pressing be accepted and granted Another thing I must desire of the Quakers viz. That they trouble us not with new controversies as their manner is when they are overpower'd and non-plus'd in any one purpose to skip away to another and from that again to a third without either yeilding or satisfying untill they have First methodically in form and order answered and satisfied this Survey of their present Queries and this I expect to see at the Greek calends let the Quakers then who I have often heard are Threatening a reply perform these Conditions therein which most justly I demand or else I assure them for ought I yet know I will trouble my self no more with their Confuse Rapsodies of nauseous non-sense A Postscript for George Keith which I divide into two Sections The first shall wipe off his calumnies of Popery cast upon us The Second shall fix Popery upon
any reproof from Christ or his Apostles though most material when they are reproving all the other vices of that Old-Testament-Church We may clearly see that these Apocryphal books are no part of Scripture-Canon or rule place them in what degree ye will next for that I care not but a part or all of these things misses none of these books As for what ye object Sir of many books wanting that might be useful as ye say in the Scripture-Canon I must tell you to cut short that I am not here concerned what books are wanting that is none of the present controversie but it is concerning some books viz. these called Apocryphal which ye will have added to the Canon with the rest that are known to be Canonical and which we deny to be Canonical and requires you the affirmers to prove that they are such and though not obliged as being the denyers yet we have proved they are not such And hereby I cut off your tedious rapsody of confused arguments whereby ye have wasted more paper in your Quakerism no Popery pag. 60.61.62.63 then all your work was worth But the Quakers have one grand principle of following the Dictate within as the principal rule at least which it would seem and George Keith also insinuates Quakerism no Popery pag. 49.59 103. will never reconcile with that other grand principle of Popery to believe as the Church of Rome believes But unto this I Answer that a great number we see of the direct principles of the Quakers are but meer Popish doctrines disguised nay all of their principles almost except some that are much worse being more Blasphemous then ever a Papist held and that of following the dictate within is but a reflex principle obliging them the more to follow their direct principles which we see are generally Popish And so when their great doctors teach their disciples to follow their Dictate within they do in effect teach them to believe as the Church of Rome does yet not so as to discover their design and make every man wise of their secret but subtilly under a disguise They are no fools Albeit they can desipere in loco Sir I have vindicated our Church from the Intire frivolous charge of Popery Calumniously cast upon her by you in your Quakerism no Popery and upon the other hand I have libelled against your eighteen real Popish principles from which ye can make no evasion or tergiversation they are all so clear in the preceeding survey And therefore I must here tell you that your Quakerism no Popery should have been called Quakerism no Verity for there is hardly one true word in it all which I do'nt say to irritate or exasperate you but rather with a desire from my heart if it be possible to convince you for I know you are a Scholar but alace your gifts and parts are ill Imployed against the truths laws and ordinances of Jesus which his dear purchase of them teaches their great value Be no more a stated Enemy to these or else dreadful and terrible shall the event be unto you and all who thus tread upon his truths and Blaspheme his Person as you do and trample under foot also his whole Institutions and ordinances A Second Postscript for Doctor Everards Ghost There is one Doctor Everard I wish he had been never heard who hath published a book which he calls Gospel Treasury opened up or the Holiest of all Un-vailing and this Book he hath divided into two parts In the first part whereof Pag. 150.206.347 he asserts that after we are regenerated it is no more we that think see speak goe wish will rejoyce but that it is God that does them and that it must be Christ the Son of God in us that loves God fears God obeys God and believes in God and says he though that may seem a Paradox yet it is a truth for Indeed and in truth says he there is nothing fears God but God nothing obeys God but God nothing loves God but God And again he affirms Pag. 442.443.444 part second that the good man is so swallowed up in God that wanting sense will desire he now as the word requires covets nothing but now God in him wills knows desires reads writes preaches gives prays hears and is all things for God says he desires not our works but our Sabbath and that himself in us without hindrance may work know praise pray hear crown and reward himself in us Thus the Doctor teaches the great sum of all which is That nothing obeys God but God only The Quakers seem to joyn with the Doctor in this his wild principle while at the last of their Queries here they seem to require our resting or not working and condemn our Confessions Catechisms c. upon that very ground because they are our works and to my sure experience I do know that this book of Doctor Everard hath predisposed several persons and been their preamble unto Quaking and therefore that this treatise may be somewhat compleat I resolve here to answer this principle of the Doctor and to confute it and two or three more of his positions that have some alliance with the principles of the Quakers Therefore first against the Doctors foresaid principle it is not God that believes in Christ crucified accepts and receives his righteousness for justification that looks for salvation through his merits It is not God that loaths himself for sin sorrows for his sin confesses his sin and denies himself c. And these are all works of obedience commanded of God and exercised in the godly and therefore the Doctors principle here is most false 2ly Angels and men are either obliged to obey God or not if not then they may doe what they please they cannot sin and so also fallen Angels and reprobate men are all most unjustly damned for their disobedience wherewith they cannot be justly charged seeing as is supposed they are not obliged to obey If then they be obliged to obey God then the holy Angels that stood obeys God or not if they do then something obeys God that is not God against the Doctors principle seeing Angels are not God I am sure if not then the holy Angels that stood are disobedient to God seeing they are obliged to obey God and yet does it not and that is to say the Angels that stood are fallen Angels 3ly If nothing obeys God but God then never any of all the creatures obeyed God to this day seeing none of them is God and all the creatures are equally guilty or not guilty of disobedience to God seeing not one of them ever obeyed him But these things are absurd Romances Fourthly whatever obeys God must be commanded to obey him seeing all obedience is to some command and Law But God is not commanded to obey seeing all the commandments are directed to creatures and God is not under the Law he hath given to them nor hath he any superior soveraign and though