let the stone Walls and iron grates convince him for we dare not meete him in the plaine feild in a publick dispute though he be but an unlearned youth And if it be possible keepe him in darknesse and obscuritie And if you can doe it handsomely that the World can take no notice of it starve him for we command you to let nothing be brought unto him Oh! you Satyrs Vultars Owles and Scritch-Owles for so the Holy Ghost calls you Esay 13. two last verses Esay 34.14.15 Rev 18.2 The Roman spirituall State being that Cage of filthinesse that holds you who are as the Holy Ghost there speakes a Company of Dragons Devils and foule Spirits Oh! you Night-Owles and Birds of Darknesse and uncleanes that dare not come to show your crooked faces in the bright Sun-shining light and cleare Crystall glasse of Gods sacred and unspotted Truth It sheweth demonstrateth to all the World that you are a Company of deformed Creatures and Sonnes of Darknesse impiety wickednesse ungodlinesse Or else you would lay aside your Cowardly Clubb-Arguments and come into the face of the open Sunne that there you may be seene whether you be rotten or sound or whether you be true gold or nothing but durt drosse which is good for nothing but the dunghill or whether your Kingdome be the Kingdome of Christ or the Kingdome of the Divell for of necessity it must be one of these for there is no more spirituall Kingdomes in the world but these two Or whether you your selves be servants of Christ or the servants and true subjects of the Divell But your hating of the truth and blaspheaming of it calling it the Refuge of Heritickes as you did in your open Court at the Censure of that worthy Doctour Doctour Iohn Bastwicke And also your hating and bloody persecuting of them that loue it doth vndenyably declare and manifest what you are and of whom your Kingdom doth depend For Christ saith every one that doth evill hates the sight neither cometh to the light least his deedes should be reproved Iohn 3.20 Truely you plainelie shew that you are men of darknesse and workers of wickednes and iniquitie for you cannot endure the light for it is too cleare too bright for you to come nakedlie and openlie and shew your selues before it because you are men of darknesse and evill doers and therefore you hate the light but if you were men that were workers of righteousnesse and walked in the waies of truth you would not be affraide to be tried by the light of it but would desire to be brought vnto it And in the former place Christ saith he that doth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God and therefore to conclude this point I will say no more then Christ saith you may know the tree by the fruit for a bad tree doth not bring forth good fruit nor a good tree corpupt fruit Math. 7.18 Luke 6.43 But to goe backe againe to Iohn 8. In the second place Christ saith The Divell abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him when he speaketh a ly he speakth it of his owne for he is a lyar and the father of it Here Christ shewes that the Children of the Divell abide not in the truth but haue their soules filled with lyes And whether you the Prelates be not such I appeale even to your owne writings sayings doeings the most of whose writings are stuffed with many vntruths having almost as many lies in them as pages And for the vntruths delivered in your Court Sermons Worthy Doctour Bastwicke in the third part of his Letany hath painted out in there colours yea what damnable Doctrines are there taught saving some few agreeing with the Filthy Whore Strumpet of Rome as that forenamed Doctour doth proue in the second part of his Letany with which he doth most truely paralel you that you are in a manner both of one corruption yea among all the rest he there proues that you hold and maintaine that monstrous and horrable Doctrine of Transubstantiation that is to say That the Body of Christ is reallie corperallie and essentiallie in the Sacrament of his Supper And this also may be proved out of the great Prelats speech made before the honorable Lords at the Censure of the three late worthies Yea whole Vollumes may be made of those damnable Doctrins that you hold are not ashamd to publish them to the view of the whole world Cum Privilegio especialy in your late printed Bookes By all which you proue make good this portion of Scripture that you are of your father the Divell because you do not abide in the truth but speake preach write and maintaine false lies wicked and damnable Doctrines Thus haue I by the strēgth of my God a litle deciphered you in a brief way But it may be you will be like a nest of Wasps which being stirred will flie about my eares with your Scorpion stings but if you do it will manifest you to be part of those Locusts as you are indeede and in truth that came out of the bottomlesse pitt Revel 9.2.3 of whom the Hoy Ghost saith that they had tailes like Scorpions and there were stings in there tailes and they had power to hurt men verse 10. But be it known vnto you that I am not in the least affraid of you for I neither feare an Axe at Tower hill nor a Stake in Smithfield nor a-Halter at Tyburne nor Whipping at a Carts-arfe nor a Pillary in the Pallice-yard nor Gagging nor Cutting of eares and nose nor Burning in the forehead or cheeks nor yet Banishment with Iohn to Pathmos For I verilie beleeve if you should send me thither I shall there finde Christ which by his spirit will vnfold the Revelation vnto me and then J would write it and send it abroad into the world and it would vex you as ill as Sampson did the Philistims proue as fatall to your decaying tottering spirituall Babilonian Antichristian Kingdome as his Foxes with fire-brands at their tailes were to the Philistims Corne. And therefore as you loue your almost ruinated Kingdome looke to it and knowe that the faster you kicke the harder I will spurre you the more you fling the closer will I sticke cleave fast vnto you for you are plants which I groundedly know the Lord never planted therfore vndoubtedly he will plucke you up Mat. 15.13 And therefore by the might power and strength of my God Psal 118.14 Esa 12.2 who is the worker of all my works in mee and for mee Esa 26.12 For I am resolved come life come death seeing you by force crueltie haue called me to it to shewe my selfe valiant for the truth of God Ier. 9.3 I alreadie made three Challenges to dispute with you but you are so Cowardlie that you dare not to come into the plaine and open field but you fight with tyrant-like weapons namelie with crueltie And therefore to see whether you haue any manhoode in you or noe J make send forth this fourth Challenge to you Bishops Prelates which is this That I will if you please dispute with you all face to face before the King and State for life and libertie vpon these ensueing Propositions First To proue that the Popes Power is from the Divell Secondly That your Calling Power Authoritie Iurisdiction is from the Pope Thirdly That all Gods people are bound vnder paine of eternall damnation to withdraw their spirituall obedience and subjection from your spirituall law and Kingdome Now vnpon these propositions will I dispute with you all and venter life for life before the King and State vpon these tearmes First That you shall lay aside Club-Arguments which is take him Iaylour and lay him in Irons and locke him up close Prisoner and keep him in safe custodie Secondly That the Booke of God which is an infallible truth shall be the sole Iudge of the Controversie Thirdly That J may haue libertie without being Gagged to speake my minde freelie and boldlie Fourthly That J may haue the vse of some books which I shall chuse And if you dare grāt me these 4 things if I be not able to proue all the fore said Positions by demonstrable and vndeniable arguments that you shall not be able in the words of truth to gainsay or deny thē I wil be willing to lose my head and life therefore take notice of what J haue now the fourth time said and challenged you to your faces for I intend to send you this that in the presence of the King and Nobles you will make it good and therefore if you be not Cowards fitt yourselues to come into the open pitched field face to face Also be it knowne vnto you that I will at Pauls Crosse dispute with all your Priests and Deacons vpon these Propositions First That they are all of them Servants Ministers of Antichrist Secondly That in the place and standing they are now in at this present they haue no authority from God to preach his word nor administer any of his sacred ordinances to the peole nor the people any ground or warrant out of the word of God to heare the word from or pertake with them Thirdly That the Church of England as at this day it stands is Antichristian both in Power in Matter in Ministrie in Forme and in Woshirppe Fourrhly That all Gods people are bound in duty conscience to separate away from it to haue no communion with it All which things if J be not able to proue against them all laying aside as I said before all Club law and letting the word of God be the sole Judge of the controversie I will be bound to preach a Recanting Sermon in every Citty in the Kingdome JOHN LILBURNE FINIS
are no better then scandalous factious and seditious when as indeed they were the words of nothing but the naked Truths of God and did not in the least meddle with the persons of any or with any temporall state matters with which I have nothing to doe and say unto And therefore they could neither factious nor seditious unlesse the Booke of God be faction and sedition which were blasphemy once to thinke But indeed with the Prelates every thing that is said or written against their spirituall Babilonian wicked Kingdome is counted faction and sedition for indeed they have no other arguments to maintaine their tottering and languishing Kingdome but Clubb Law that is to say tyranny blood-thirstinesse and cruelty But take that Argument and Weapon away and then a Child will disarme them and beare them and take away their Weapons from them And then to ruine and destruction will their decaying Kingdome come and also the Weapons that J exhorted and perswaded the people of God to draw out against the Prelates those Spirituall Adversaries of the Kingdome of the Lord Iesus Christ was not any temporall sword or Weapon but only the two edged sword of Gods Word spoken off Hebrews 4 12. And they are more described in the sixth of the Ephes Also the next day after my sufferings by Mr. Ingram the Warden of the Fleete I sent this Challeng in particular to the Bishop of Canterbury and earnestly intreated him to deliver is to himselfe that I would dispute with him before all the Nobles and Peeres of this Kingdome And if I were not able to prove that his calling and power is from the Devill I would be willing to lose my head But I pray you take notice of his great learned Arguments which he used to confute me and defend himselfe which were these Let him be lockt up close prisoner in the basest place in the Wards of the Fleete for so runne the words of the Order and let none come at him least he should infect any of the people with his errours and so be a meanes to bring ruine and destruction upon his spirituall Kingdome Oh! Scholasticall Arguments indeed Alas poore man are your eyes so sore that they cannot endure to looke upon the Sunne or your back so gawled that you cannot endure to be touched it seemes they are or else you would never have been affrayde to have met a younge man in the open feild to have tryed out the goodnesse of your cause who desires no other Weapons against you but the Bible the Word of Life and infallible judge of all Controversies and the Liberty of my Tongue to speake freely without any gagging And yet you are affrayde and dare not meere me in a publicke dispute As poore weake and feeble men let me speake in the words of the spirit of God unto you Ier 12. if you have runne with Foote-men and they wearied you then how can you contend with Horses And if in the Land of peace wherein you trust they have wearied you how will you then doe in the swellings of Jordan That is to say if you be affrayde of me a younge beginner in the wayes of God Or if you dare not venture in the Land of peace where you have the Temporall power and sword at command to incounter with me a stripling that never studied Philosophy Logick Rhetorick nor euer was at any Vniversity to learne any Lattin Greeke or Hebrew How will you doe in the swelling of Iordan when your temporall power shall be taken away from you and strange men of great parts fall upon you and make open spirituall warre against you Surely you will never be able to stand for already your Pillars that hold up your Kingdome are growne so rotten that they cannot endure to be roughly handled or touched And therefore without doubt ere long your building must needs fall and therefore looke to your heads and take notice that I have given you warning of it least you repent when it is to late Againe upon Thursday the 17. or 18 of May last I was had before Sir Iohn Bancks and Mr. Littleton the Kings Attourney and Soliciter Generall to be examined what J said at the Pillory before whom I expressed my minde so freely that they were willing and desirous that J should hold my peace and laboured with me by fleshly Arguments as Peter did with Christ to save my selfe But before them I made this challenge and desired them to tell it to the Bishops that I would dispute with them all before my Dread Soveraigne whose faithfull loyall and humble subject I am to prove their calling so farre from being of God as they affirme it is that is is from the Devill And if I were not able to prove it or if I delivered any thing in the proofe of it that deserved death I would not refuse to dye or if J held any errours if they could by the Authority of the Scripture confute me I would publickly recant them But their Argumēts replicatiō to this my challeng was Lay him fast in Irō chains Armes and Leggs coupled together And let him lye in them night and day And let neither gold nor money nor bookes nor writings nor any other thing be brought unto him from his freinds And let none come to him to speake with him And if any come to aske for him take notice of their name and place of habitation that so we may overcome him with crueltie and Tyrannie and make him submit for if we doe it not by these meanes he will hardly be brought unto it And therefore Warden of the Fleete looke to it have a speciall care of him that none come to have any talke with him or give him any thing that so we may by Tyrannie Crueltie and Torments overcome him for he leads away a multitude of people and causes them to follow him And he is of such a lofty high spirit that if he goe on in the way he will spoyle our tottering Kingdome And therefore put to your best assistance to see if by any meanes you can overcome him to get him to submit This was the effect of their speech Oh! Brave Episcopall Arguments indeed But J pray you did ever Christ or his Apostles or any of his Servants use any such Arguments to overcome or convince those that were opposite to them in judgement No verily in the whole New Testament we doe not read that any of Christs servants for spirituall things used any such Weapons or Clubb Arguments as these for they used nothing but spirituall Weapons to overcome ther enemies And with the sharpe two edged sword of Gods Word Heb. 4.12 Rev 19.15 they fought against their Adversaries by this and by this alone they did overcome them And Peter with this one Weapon did strike downe three thousand of them at a blow and made them yeeld subjection to the Kingdome of Christ Acts 2. And we never reade of any temporall Weapon that they made
I would know where any of his people hath any warrant to seeke his presence and blessing any where but where he hath promised it But he never promised it in the visible Assemblies of Antichrists Kingdome Therefore we have no ground or warrant to seeke it there or come there at all Much more concerning this I have and am able to say but I am above measure straightned for want of a fitting opportunitie And therefore for your further satisfaction repaire to the perusall of a little thing called a declaration where the people of God are to seeke his presence and blessing only in Mount Sion the Citty and Church of God Psal 46 4. and 48.1.2.8 Esay 60.14 and 62.11.12 and not in the Assemblies of Antichrist being Cages of uncleane Birds Rev. 18 2. Esay 13.21.22 Againe I see no ground or warrant that any of Gods people have to have any spiritual communion with them in regard God hath commanded his people at all times very strictly that they shall have no communion with Idolaters nor their Idols as the whole Booke of God doth declare and I desire you to read the seventh of Deut and there you shall see Gods strict command to that end But the Ministers all of them are Idolaters yea Idols themselves Therefore we must have no communion with them Now that they are Jdolaters is as cleare as the Sun that shines at noone-day And that they are Idols I am able to prove it to their faces For an Idoll is nothing else according to the Scripture but a Creature or Creatures set a part or instituted to worship God with or by which he himselfe never ordained for that end and purpose But such are all the Prelates Ministers for they were never of his ordaining or instituting but of his greatest enemies the Pillars of Antichrists Kingdome by vertue of whose power they officiate Therefore they are Idols whom all Gods people that are faithfull Souldiers and leige Subjects ought to be a meanes and a helpe to roote up and pull downe Now this definition of an Idoll is not only according to the Scripture but is given by the foundest Nonconformists themselves as you may read in their Bookes where they have strongly proved the Surplice and the Crosse in Baptisme and kneeling in the Act oâ— receiving the Communion And the rest of the Prelates instituted sacred Ceremonies as they call them saying in their Reasons before the Common-prayer for the retaining of some Ceremonies and the abolishing of others that they are apt to stirr up the dull minde of man to the remembrance of some duty to God by some speciall signification whereby he might be ediâ—yed Now if you reade the Scots Dispute which was printed at Leyden in Holland the last Summer you shall there find strong reasons to prove the Ceremonies Idols and his maine Argument is because they are not of Gods institution but of sinfull mans ordaining Also that Noâ—le and worthy Doctor whom I so much honour and respect Doctor Bastwicke in his Booke called The Vanity and Impiety of the old Lettany doth prove it to be an Idoll yea and calls it a damnable soule-murthering Jdoll And that upon the same ground because it is not of Gods us of mans institution without any ground or warâ—ant from God and thereâ—ore is an Idoll and is to be detested as an abominable Idoll Now what they say of the Ceremonies and of the Service the same I say oâ— the Prelates and all the Ministers that are made by them and have their calling from the Bishops they are Creatures set a part to worship God with or by but were never of his instituting or by vertue oâ— his power but by mans institution and by vertue of the power of the greatest enemy that ever Iesus Christ had or his Kingdome ever had on Earth namely Antichrist or the Kingdome of the Beast Rev. 9 3.7.10.11 and 13.6.7.16.17 and 12 6.7.15.17 And therefore they are Idols whom so long as they stand in their places and callings under the spirituall Antichristian authority which they all submit to and subject themselves to I shall not dare to have any spirituall communion with them either in publicke or private for what fellowship hath righteousnesse with unrighteousnesse Or what communion hath light with darknesse And what Concord hath Christ with Beliall Or what part hath he that beleeveth with an Infidell Or what agreement hath the Temple of God with Idols Surely none at all Wherefore come you out from among them and be you seperate saith the Lord and touch no uncleane thing and I will receive you and will be a Father unto you and you shall be my Sonnes and Daughters saith the Lord Almighty 2 Cor. 6.14 to the end Esay 62.11 Ier. 51.6 7 Rev. 18.4 5. Besides this though J am and doe respect them as men being the Creatures of God and doe reverence them as they are privy Counsellours and Head-members of the State though it be not sutable in the least to their false pretended spirituall calling But as they are Bishops and Officers in the Kingdome of the Beast my knee and submission and reverence shall by the strength of my God be as litle to them as Mordecay was to proud Haman who was King Abashueros Cheife Favorite being above all the Princes that were with him Hest 3.1 Yâ— Mordecay would not so much as bow to him or doe him any reverence verse the 3. though it doe procure me as much wrath from theÌ„ as it did Mordecay from Haman of whom the Holy Gost saith he was full of wrath seeing Mordecay would not reverence him Vers 5.6 Neither will I ever give baile to them or part with any money either to them or any of their Creatures for any thing whatsoever unlesse it be meerely for Temporall and Earthly things in regard I doe beleeve it is the duty of all Gods people who desire to glorify him in their lives and conversations and to shine as so many burning Lamps in the midst of a peruerse and crooked generation as they ought and should doe Neither to bow finger knee or hatt unto any of them or to doe them any reverence as they are Bishops and Cheife Pillars in the Kingdome of Antichrist for by vertue of their calling and Office they are the deadly and implacable enemies of God and are so many pernicious and damnable Idols by which God is exceedingly dishonoured set up by the Devill in the Kingdome of the Beast Rev. 9 3 and 13.2.4 and 16.13.14 And I can prove it that it was as Lawfull for the 3 Children to worship or bow to Nebuchadnezars Idoll as for Gods people to bow and doe homage to them And for my owne part if they require of me any such my answer shall be to them as the 3 Children was to the King Dan 3.16.17.18 Be it knowne to you Bishops and Doctors I feare you not or the God whom I serve and feare is able to deliver me out of your