indeed who thought they told news when they did but carry herbs to Ephrata as the Jewish Proverb hath it And although it be very little that I know in comparison to what I ought yet I have scarce had patience enough sometimes in hearing such punies documentizing me in obvious things which because new to them they thought had been so to me although I had known them from my childehood as familiarly as mine own name But because we erre not so much by ignorance as incogitancy I will suppose that you have given us this instruction for the help of our memory rather then of our understanding but on this condition that you will from hence take occasion of considering what necessary use we have of a constant Ministry for although men know as much or more then the Preacher can tell them yet have they still great need of hearing He that is of God as well in facto as in fieri heareth Gods Word which is the means of growing as well as of begetting 1 Pet. 2.2 And as the body hath still need of nourishment although it be come to its full 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which it will have supplied by a slovenly Cook rather then perish with famine So the soul even of a strong-grown Christian is not kept by the power of God unto salvation otherwise then by his Ordinances where they are exhibited of Sacraments and Preaching We know in generall Publicorum cura est minor and if there be not men enough appointed for that sacred imploiment it is like to be but badly performed Many an unregenerate Master hath a gratious servant many an irreligious parent a pious childe by Gods blessing on the publique Ordinances who had had small means of enlightning otherwise And since the rains of Government have lien but loosely on the peoples neck how many Churches stand like deserted Abbies appointed to demolition We thought much in time of Bishops to have had no other afternoons exercise in some places but Praier and Catechising but many Parishes have now nor one nor other They who can procure means will not they who would cannot and so in conclusion Et succus pecori lac subducitur agnis Besides it is to be considered that although things absolutely necessary to be beleeved are but few yet there are many things to be done the greater part by far of the word of God contains direction for a godly conversation For although Love be the fulfilling of the Law yet this Charity hath so many objects and by reason of corruption from within and temptation from without so many impediments that it requires many rules of direction and of them because of our many infirmities a frequent inculcation But what need other reasons we are sure it's Gods command and therefore must needs be our duty 'T was not the inestimableness of the fruit but the Infiniteness of the Prohibitant that gave hainousness to the sin of Adam nor are the Ordinances of God necessary for the efficacie of the outward Action but in regard to the authority of Divine institution It pleaseth God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe 1 Cor. 1.21 while to others it is said Behold ye despisers wonder and perish In p. 20. you tell us that for solution of questions in Religion you have somewhat more to say then ever you heard or read from these men Now if you have a better key to open the Scriptures with then other men how dare you be so injurious to the Church of God as to conceal it seeing Qui novit neque id quod sentit exprineit perinde est ac si nesciret And if it be one of the things which people cannot yet bear for such things you speak of p. 5 6. how unjustly do you blame the Clergy for not laying such an unsupportable burden on them What you know more then others is to others unknown but I am sure knowledge unsanctified is but like a sword in a mad mans hand and many a mans learning may be to himself but a candle to light him to hell Multos nasci omni scientia egere satius fuisset quam sic in propriam perniciem insanire In p. 24. you tell us of our nearess to the Papists in expressions I suppose you mean which are most expanse for otherwise the world knows we are at sufficient distance But concerning this my opinion is that we have gone farther from the Papists then we need in some things although not so far as they have gone from the truth in other For resolution to your instance p. 25. They say that a man hath power to do good works but we say he hath not I answer that Although it be God that worketh in us to will and to do of his own good pleasure and every Christian may truly say of his graces and all operations from them proceeding as Jacob of his children They are they which God hath graciously given to his servant yet THE REGENERATED MAN IS IN ABLED BY THE GRACE OF GOD ASSISTING HIM TO DO GOD MORE AND BETTER SERVICE THEN THAT WHICH HE DOTH Which Proposition well considered may much extricate a minde infetterd with seeming oppositions of this nature And the same refutes that gross speech of your When we are humbled for our sins we do tell God Almighty news that he would have had us walk more holily then we have done but we had not power so to walk And what you there speak of faiths being a work we must understand of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 credere for otherwise it is not true But who of our Preachers ever said that faith was a meritorious cause of salvation and did not rather acknowledge the very 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be from Christ and if so they affirm no more of faith then they do of obedience as to this particular But p. 26. The Papists say good works are meritorious but we say No and yet I have heard it said if we believe repent c. it is Gods duty to give us heaven The word Duty seems somewhat too harsh but sith we cannot understand Gods acting toward us but according to the slender model of our apprehension we may with due reverence to his glorious Majesty affirm That although our works do not by any merit in them oblige God to reward them yet we having his promise for our assurance are as truly ascertained of the accomplishment thereof as if God were Debtor and we Creditors The summe whereof is That the true Beleever hath the Justice as well as the Mercy of God for his Asylum and may pray with the Psalmist Deliver me in thy righteousnesse For Christ having satisfied the Justice of God for him and imputed his own Righteousness to him he may expect from God that fruition of himself which Christ hath purchased for him of which the present grace of God inabling him to beleeve and endeavour to obey gives testimony For they do
he never work with them It was well foreseen of you therefore while you made an exception in your instance saying some of the Prophets and many Apostles but why you should put our Saviour Christ into your illiterate catalogue I know not unless that when it shall be proved impertinent to the main question in this particular you may limit it to your immediatly-foregoing assertion to which you have it may be for that cause sophistically annexed it And as for all those you speak of recorded by Mr Fox in his Acts and Monuments although they were children in Learning yet they stood on mens shoulders and might therefore see further then a Popish Polyphemus For I hope you cannot deny God made use of many famous lights of Learning for illumination of the unlearned people of that time some of which went to heaven in fiery Charets with them Christ called indeed unlearned men but he taught them what was necessary to their Apostleship while they preached only to the Jews and that within the limits of their own Country where the Hebrew tongue was well enough understood as appears Acts 21.40 although they used the Syrian Dialect But after our Saviour his Ascention when they were to teach all Nations the gift of Tongues as thereto requisite was conferred upon them And as Manna ceased when the children of Israel came into the Land of Canaan so extraordinary gifts ceased when God had by ordinary provided for the propagation of Religion So that to inhibit the use of learning in our Preachers of the Gospel were as irrational as to have forbidden the Israelites eating the fruits of Canaan because they had Manna in the Wilderness Presently after you make an odious parallel with Romish Wolves and Presbyterian Pastors affirming that as they so these hold it dangerous for such people to breath by whom their pomp and gallantry is like to fall Now Sir I require you to prove this bloudy accusation and to make it appear that the Grandees of the Presbyterian faction as you call them bare such mortall hatred against any people in England for Religions sake as the Popish Priests in Q. Maries daies had against all people of reformed Religion or else I shall hold you guilty of a malicious untruth for so speaking And yet as if this were a small matter to make them homicides you would make them murderers of souls too by affirming that As the Popish Clergie debard the common people from reading the Scriptures so these had rather people spent their time in reading of tales or following their worldly affairs but when they are hearing them speaking contradictions c. Now I am sure that I am compassed about with clouds of witnesses who will testifie with me that we never found cause of such suspition but the Ministers of the Gospel do alwaies exhort to reading and meditation of the Word of God or if any such had been we have not wanted time and means enough to displace them since the beginning of this Parliament Yet still your charge runs generally against the Clergy as if quatenus Clergy they were the greatest enemies to the Church of God And yet if you were not over-biassed with prejudice you would confess with me that the same men you inveigh against have been the instruments of what good God hath wrought in your soul either by their word or writings Good Sir do but examine when did you first come out of nature and by what means and do not with Themistocles his Hart crop that bush in a calm that sheltred you in a storm Or if it be not true by your self yet sure it is that multitudes of gracious souls will acknowledge men of that calling for their ghostly Fathers And what greater seal of an Apostleship can be desired then what the Apostle speaks of 1 Cor. 9.2 in these words If I am not an Apostle to others doubtless I am one to you for the seal of my Apostleship are ye in the Lord. As therefore that Potentate said of his government Call it what you will but by it I keep the people in good order So may I say of the calling of the Ministers amongst us Call it you what you please I am sure the word in their mouth is by the grace of God accompanying it made the power of God unto salvation This is it that excited me otherwise studious of obscurity to make my self I know not yet how publique spectacle and Aegles-like to force nature upon the sight of injurious dealing for I am neither Parson Vicar nor Curate and might notwithstanding any private interest have been silent but the Cause is Gods on whom I depend and may therefore say with the Lepers 2 King 7.9 I do not well to hold my peace And indeed should the redeemed of the Lord that have had the knowledge and love of God wrought in them by our publique Ministry be silent when such indignities are cast upon it it were enough to make as our Saviour saith in the Gospel the stones to cry that I may not say to cry out against them and to condemn their ingratitude In page 4. you carp at the distinction of Clergie and Laity but for what reason we may go look though things in themselves be distinct by nature yet they cannot in discourse be distinguished without several names whereof your own practice gives experience in the title of your Book viz. The Clergie in their Colours which if you say was done for distinctions sake that we might know of whom you speak as p. 45. grant us the same liberty and we ask no more It 's a question whether you know how the first of your family came by his name and yet you will think it cannot with justice be taken from you But the Clergy have besides Antiquity Etymologie for their name being so called from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Lot because they are instead of the Levites the Lot of Gods and God of their Inheritance in especial manner for in a larger sense it is applied to all the faithfull 1 Pet. 5.3 and so are the Saints called Priests too although not by their particular but general calling of Christianity and so all the Lords people might without offence be called holy but yet when these same words were usurped by Korah in opposition to the holiness of the Priests Office God punished that schism of his with a stranger schism of the earth that swallowed him up Nor is the word therefore less pertinent because Clergy-men are not now chosen by a sortilegium as was Matthias for Apostles were a distinct degree of Ministers and to be chosen by God himself But however we are not so much in usuall words to regard a quo as ad quid and in every Art we must keep the same terms it hath been exprest in aforetime or else we can neither understand nor be understood My lot is faln to me in a fair ground saith David Psal 16. alluding to the manner
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is Exercisers of jurisdiction in other mens Dioceses 1 Pet. 4.15 What if other men be as good Scholars is it nothing but scholarship that makes a Minister I cannot think but that other Jews might be as handsome Butchers and Cooks as the Levites who yet might not be allowed to kill and dresse their own sacrifices 'T is true Christ though he called Levi call'd no Levite that he might abolish the former manner of worship yet he chose some to wait on this Ministry as they did on that and of them distinct orders as twelve Apostles and seventy two Disciples and after his Ascension others by mediation of the Apostles who are also said to be ordained by the holy Ghost Act. 20.28 either because the Apostles were by the holy Ghost directed to that Ordination of Ministers where they had planted Churches or because the gifts of the Spirit inabling for that Office were in their laying on of hands conferred or it may be for both But that Christ appointed these orders in his Church we may see Ephes 4.11 c. And he would not have directed his Epistles by St John in the second and third Chapters of the Revelation to the Angels that is the Ministers of the seven Churches if he had not approved of that Office And that it is with diligence to be proceeded in the word is plain He that hath an office let him wait on his office he that teacheth on teaching he that exhorteth on exhortation Do but make the cause your own by supposing if it could be proved that another man can husband your estate better then your self must he deprive you of your propriety If another man be found more worthy to serve the state then your self must he take from you that place to which you say you were chosen In p. 42. you have yet another fling at them and that is for waving questions when they cannot resolve them And this also if it be true is but a personall infirmity and no whit impugneth the Office of the Ministry Tishbi solvet nodos had not been a Proverb among the Jews if they had not in some questions of Religion been still unresolved But if because one Lawyer could not resolve me in one Law-case I should call the Law an imposture and the Lawyers Juglers would you not think me more fit for Bedlam then for any civil society and yet this were orthodox in your divinity Concerning the opposition you would make between faith and reason because you both use and require your Respondent to use all possible brevity I refer you for satisfaction to a little Book lately set forth and intituled The reasonablenesse of Christian Religion And what you say of the man of Macedonia meaning a better living and of the abuse of Funeral Sermons p. 44. is also to be reckoned among personall offences which no man doth as a Minister but as a sinner it being common to all men in some kinde or other to transgress In p. 44. you have While they are under such dispensations they are in a Labyrinth of trouble one while having rest in their spirits another while distraction judging of the love and anger of God toward them according to their actings as if God were as inconstant as they You would not be thought an Antiscripturist p. 51. You would not be thought to take men off from duty p. 56. and yet you condemn that dispensation men are under who are inconstant in their feelings Now whether are you in state of Grace or Glory this I hope you will not say and the other will confute your opinion I know Grace to be Glory inchoate and Glory to be Grace consummate But by state of Grace we understand that condition to Godward a man is in after his conversion so long as corruption is inmate with grace and like the Canaanites to the Israelites will dwell with him for sin doth remain though it do not reign in the Regenerate and grace is given to sustain the soul against corruption and temptation the filth continueth though the guilt be removed and the guilt though wholly in foro divino yet not so in foro conscientiae if wheresoever there be faith there is also infidelity Faith is therefore call'd a shield because it defendeth against despair Now no man can say his charity is perfect or his patience undisturbed and yet must we beleeve any mans faith to be insuperable in evidence as well as adherence in reflect as well as direct action God give me faith so long as I have doubt and when I shall have no longer doubt I shall have no need of faith But They judge of Gods love or anger c. There is not any knowing Christian that thinks love or anger to be in God quoad affectum because it would argue mutability which Scripture and reason teach us cannot be in him But quoad effectum we ought to judge for the most faithfull servants of God upon their uneven walking I mean their not sticking so close to the rules of obedience as sometimes they do and even when they do not are inabled to do observe not only outward calamities but inward desertions ingruing And whether God be displeased or no surely every true childe of God will finde cause to be displeased with himself for his own disobedience And if any man that hat Gods Word for his guide live under any higher dispensation I acknowledge my self to be experimentally ignorant of that condition And what is your conceit of this You write only negatively and so keep your self in a cloud still But when you have sublimed your conceptions of God and extracted from them the purest quintessence yet still you have of him no adequate but an analogical conception only God dwelleth in light inaccessible we can but per transennas videre while we dwell in houses of clay and cannot see him as he is while we have about us the body of sin Nor afterward neither can God be apprehended more then ad modum apprehendentis As therefore our Saviour said in the Gospel Why trouble you the woman for shee hath wrought a good work upon me so Why disturb you the Church of God putting people out of their good way and obscuring the light by which they walk sith you cannot hold them out a better it is a greater light must overcome the lesse and when the Sun of Righteousnesse shall arise the Moon and Starres may fail but neither the Glow-worms of earthly preferment nor the ignis lambens of flattering speeches nor the ignis fatuus of fantastick opinions ought to seduce us no nor the blazing comets of pretended revelations attract our confidence An approver of which dotages you seem to be p. 47. where you have these words I am much satisfied in my spirit having done that which I was convinced was my duty by the stirrings within me to this thing for at least a year past But how came you to be convinced
that you ought to revile them whom God commands you to honour You say by the stirrings within you But what if the spirit within you lusteth to envy we are commanded to try the spirits whether they be of God or no 1 Joh. 4.1 Now if your word be consonant to the voice of Gods spirit in the holy Scriptures God forbid but that I should lay my hand upon my mouth but your drift is to undo the Clergy which consequently must deprive us of the means of salvation which God by the men of that calling holds forth to us and that upon no other ground then some of your own carps and crotchets and contradictions which you would have fastned to their discourses but were fain to let them fall rather then have them no where upon the sacred Scriptures Set all the faults you have reckoned upon the tenters to make them odious and stretch them n longer then they will hold to be theirs and they will be found but a few personall infirmities such as we cannot have men without and such as any but a Malignant Ham would rather cover then blazon abroad You complain indeed of formality in religion p. 44. and abuse of Ordinances p. 46. but how you knit these into the net you make to catch Clarks in I see not Irregularity in singing Psalms hath the greatest cause of complaint that I finde in your Book and that 's farre from being a property of the Clergy for it agrees neither omni soli nor semper as is shewn before The Word of God in St Pauls time was preached by some out of envy by some out of vain-glory by some out of covetousnesse yet herein the Apostle rejoyced that it was at all preached Phil. 1.18 and if you had the same Spirit with Saint Paul you would not shew your self of a contrary mide Sir as you love your soul take heed of trusting to your inward stirrings You may be sure the subtle Tempter will not ordinarily suggest to a religious man a temptation to open prophanenesse because it is not like to finde acceptance but he will put into such a mans head good thoughts sometimes to keep out better he will strive to encrease his hatred of meritorious conceits thereby to insinuate into him neglect of duty and possesse him with grand detestation of formality in Religion in hope thereby to beget in him a disesteem of Ordinances Be not rashly confident of such motions knowing that the devill in form of an Angel of light may easily through the treachery of our deceitfull hearts insnare us I desire to presse this consideration the more earnestly because the main of your discourse consists in accusation a practice from which the very devil takes his denomination as if it were the worst quality he hath or his very profession for so 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dicitur 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as we have the word used Luk. 16.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he was accused I say again be not deceived the devill brought a colourable accusation against Job and there is little more in all that satyrical invective of your as you apply it to the Clergy In p. 48. You would not have people hearken to them in matters of State If you had said no more I should have had nothing to say against you why did you not take that for your theam and yet seeing you speak so much of the Clergies interest I may take notice of yours in this particular for had not Ministers medled in matters of State when time was you had scarce had any State-matters to meddle with now But how shall cases of conscience depending on matters of State be resolved suppose which no doubt hath been somewhere done a Minister be enquired of concerning the lawfullnesse of taking the late Engagement if he do his office he fals under your censure for medling in a State matter if he refuse he is condemned for a Malignant so that a Clergy-man considing or diffiding cannot be innocent 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But they stir up people against the Parliament you say which if they do I hope the Parliament hath better arms then your pen to defend it But what makes you so hot in the businesse you who if you be out deserve not to come in and if you be in deserve to be outed doubtlesse the worst spoak in the wheel cracks first Though you worship no Images you may be a Worshipper of imaginations and adore the spurious brats of your own brain begotten in spirituall fornication and then the two-edged sword in the mouth of the Clergy must needs terrifie you being to divide between you and your errors It may be there would be no cause of complaining of their being against the Parliament if you were out of it Hatred against powerfull Preachers of the Word hath ever been a symptome of an unsound heart and if your inside were turned outward I doubt we might there reade somewhat like the words of angry Agamemnon 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or that of Ahab concerning Micaiah I hate him because he never prophesieth good to me but evill Ministers being for no other cause your enemies but because they tell you the truth Such were the complaints that the rebellious Jews made against Jeremy he fell away to the Chaldeans he weakened the hands of the men of warre he sought not the prosperity but the hurt of the people no lesse then High Treason in every Article So they by the Apostles in the Acts These are the men that have turned all the world upside down The very foundations are out of frame but what hath the righteous done they stir up people against the Parliament What the Clergy the whole Clergy and quatenus Clergy so that their very calling is opposite to the power and priviledge of Parliament then lay all their faults upon me if that can be proved and Vnum pro multis dabitur caput Then to prove what I know not who denies you produce a place of Scripture viz. Rom. 13.1 2. Let every soul be subject c. Which because it is positively and directly whereas the rest of your discourse as your self confesse is negative and your texts of Scripture but obliquely introduced I will see how these words as a proof will stand with your prohibition of humane learning Suppose any conspiring servant make this plea for himself I am under command and must obey that power to which I am subject for all power is of God And by like proportion may every underling thus defend his guilt in any rebellion unlesse you tell him that by power is meant lawfull authority and not every force But while 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be translated power as well as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 how can you be able without Greek to confute the Defendant So if it
word Church when applied to them by a Metonymie as the Latines on the other side apply the word Ecclesia to the house which properly signifies the people to avoid as I suppose the Roman Templum as Heathenish and the Greek Synagogue as Jewish Whence it appears that the houses only are in proper speech called Churches to which every man else of the Congregation belongeth but according to his generall calling of Christianity but the Minister also by his particular calling from which men take their denomination so we say Wool-men Silk-men Heard-men and why not but that your envy can allow them nothing that is good Church-men In p. 54. You express your confidence in God for being carried to the Land of Rest and that on this ground as it seems to me which is contained in the very next words I having no misgotten goods to stare in the face of my conscience nor errors nor blasphemies to affright me and presently after you confess your dependance on the love of God through his Son Which words I no whit dislike in themselves for I acknowledge works to justifie not only before men but in the Court of conscience as they testifie the truth of our faith from which office the infirmities that accompany them do no more derogate then the imperfection of our faith from the truth of our beleeving But seeing you are so curiously criticall against our Preachers for want of all possible perspicuity in every expression you may consider how unkindely you would take it on so slight occasion to be accused as guilty of a contradiction For in these words you do not only allow in your self what you condemn in others p. 44. concerning inconstancy of assurance according to instability of action in the duties of obedience but you jumble Faith and Works together Sanctification though but privative and Justification by the merits of Christ and if so strong a member as you would seem to be have such tender ears as to complain of contradictions or confuse expressions where other men apprehend no such matter it 's possible some other upon this occasion may make bold to taunt you in the words of the Satyrist Loripedem rectus derideat Aethiopem albus And now may I say of our Shepheards what David of his Metaphoricall sheep What have they done Many good works have I done among you said our Saviour to the Jews for which of them do you stone me so many good things have we received from the Clergy for which of them do you thus to use C. Agrippa's phrase lapides loqui Is it nothing to be excluded the Parliament as an inconsiderable part of the Nation nothing for them to abridge themselves in lawfull recreations for fear of other mens excesse in imitation nothing to be worried with uncessant clamours of Schismaticks and which is worst of all that the precious balms of Gods own people by ill applying should break their heads and cause them to pray also against their wickednesse Is it for this they spend and are spent Hunc fertilitatis honorem Officijque refers Is this the reward of their Labour Is it for this they strain their wits macerate their bodies neglect provision for themselvrs and posterities and contract remedilesse diseases Hoc est cur pallet cur quis non prandeat hoc est Such discouragements to learning if but for politique reasons would be unsufferable Well may Colledges be empty of Students when mens mouths are full of reproaches and their hands of injuries against that which is the chiefest end of all their studies Invitatus ad haec aliquis de ponte negabit If other men were of your minde how contemptible would this sacred Function be Praestaret dentiscalpia radere quam literarijs monumentis insudare Respect and maintenance you would deprive them of and what then will they have left that men can take from them It is well their mental endowments are without the reach of your sacrilegious clutches or else they had been devoured too unlesse you would forbear as Tiberius refused to take the life of one whom he was minded to torment that by them they may be the more apprehensive of their misery Expositors on those words of Job 19.20 I have escaped with the skin of my teeth do observe that the devil left Job his mouth whole that with it he might blaspheme God and bewail his calamity so have the Clergy their Learning left them I will not say with Menippus Literas habent queis sibi fortunae suae maledicant but to lament their own and the Churches misery They are indeed but your words that we hear and yet they though levitèr volant gravitèr vulnerant but if you had power over the Clergy answerable to your will you would quickly give them cause to complain in the words of that exiled Poet Vix habet in nobis jam nova plaga locum The sum of all I have to say concerning your discourse is this You are a scourge in the hand of God with which he is pleased to chastise his Laodicean Angels under which yet they may behold his favour on their repentance Rev. 3.19 And I beseech God to give you also sight of your errour and pardon for it lest when the Lord hath done correcting his people he cast his rod into the fire of his wrath Now is their hour of temptation and now are the powers of darknesse prevalent against them now are they conformed to their Master Christ in suffering being also given into the hands of men who despitefully use and persecute them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But be of good comfort precious souls for your redemption draweth nigh the rod of the wicked shall not alwaies rest on the back of the righteous 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The righteous shall have dominion in the morning when the wicked shall be turned into hell I have answered your Book no sooner because how long soever it hath been extant it came but lately to my hand and by the date 1650. I could not think it still unanswered but being otherwise informed I took this task upon my self for fear you should think it unanswerable although men of greater abilities might perhaps disdain it as unworthy their answer I have herein used more frequent interrogations then sute to the mildenesse of my disposition but I was in part thereto constrained by your negative manner of writing In the main I desire to have been sincere as in charity I think you to have been in yours for it 's possible for a man to think he serves God in his greatest disservice For what infirmities of my own I have herein discovered I desire not concealment but condonation for humanum est errare in many things we offend all and Hanc alijs veniam cupimus dabimusque vicissim IN your Post-script you deny your self to be against duty For answer to which I desire you but to consider the words of our Saviour Christ where being about to give a cognizance of false Prophets he saith Ye shall know them by their fruits What the fruits of their lives no doubtlesse for then we must give the better to divers hereticks and to many of the present Papists but if the fruits of their doctrine be intended as necessarily they must what rotten stuff would you feed our souls with no specious Apples of Asphaltus would so deceive our taste no glistering Cantharides so poyson our bodies as this doctrine of devils in form of Angels of Light beguile our souls You are not you say against duty no more was Pelagius against free-grace if you will beleeve him but as he did Gratiae vocabulo uti ad frangendam invidiam so do you draw the vail of duty over your irreligious Category to cover the horridnesse of your intention For you clearly set your self against publique Ordinances by which we come to the knowledge of our duty by which we are reproved for omission and exhorted to performance of our duty and if sublatâ causâ tollitur effectus let any reasonable man judge if you be not against duty If the publike Ministry be the ordinary means of knowing loving fearing and obeying God as all faithfull souls will witnesse it to be then he that would deprive us of the publike Ministry would rob us of the ordinary means of knowing loving fearing and obeying God But you endeavour to deprive us of the former and Quod causa causae est causa causati as well in privatives as in positives I abhor to write and I wish you would tremble to think how deeply you are involved in the conclusion And now Sir If you be not one that doth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 reason might perswade you to acknowledge your errours and if that glimmering light of it that I can hold forth how much more those resplendant raies that proceed from greater Luminaries But if a spirit of delusion hath possessed you and your Gangrene be come to a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dolendum est a medico quod non delendum medicinâ I am in part satisfied as I have in part performed my duty And having no more to say to you I must say what remains to God hearing prayers to whose mercy I commit you and continue Though the weakest oppugner yet the strongest in desire at least detester of your errours J. D. TO THE LOVER OF THE CLERGY 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 M. JOHN DAVY OF Taunton Magdalen Perseverance Dear Vncle I Have sent you in these Papers a Salve which by Gods blessing on your cost and direction I was able to compose for that wound which an undeserved enemy hath made on the reputation of the Clergy a wound too deep for me to search too great to cure but having found one instrument that caused it where I now reside I have endeavoured to apply my medicine thereto hoping that as is believed of the Unguentum armarium it may transmit some sanative vertue to th' affected subject Howsoever I shall hereby manifest my respect unto the suffering Parties and in some measure have performed the duty of Your most observant Nephew and ever gratefull servant J.D. The Authour of The Clergy in their Colours of which this is an Answer was for publishing the same expel'd the House and his Book ordered to be burnt