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cause_n	great_a	speak_v	word_n	2,711	5	3.7885	3	true

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A39296	The account from Wickham (lately published by John Raunce and Charles Harris) examin'd and found false and warning thereof given to all such well-meaning persons among the people called Quakers, as through personal affection, want of consideration, or weakness of judgment have been betrayed, or may be in danger to be betrayed by them, or any other in the same dividing spirit with them, and led aside from the way of truth into a separation from the people of God, for whose recovery and preservation this is written / by Thomas Ellwood.	Ellwood, Thomas, 1639-1713.	1689 (1689)	Wing E611; ESTC R3890	22,353	20

thither Judge you then of their Sincerity in making this Cavil And as to their other Cavil about Youths and Girls filling up our Meetings if thereby they mean that the Meetings consist of such ' its false If they mean not so but only that some young ones are sometimes there present 't is idle The Meetings it is well known consist of the most antient grave weighty Friends of either Sex in the Country And if any young people or old either that have been little amongst us at our other Meetings and whose deportment and behaviour hath not ansuered their Profession have stept in such have been taken out and desired to withdraw But if they except against all that are young in Years meerly because they are young their exception is to be excepted against as not according to Truth And I question whether they obseve their own methods in the separate Meetings they have set up But if they do not it is then without question that they urge these things not from a conscientious tenderness and with a sincere mind but as a ground of Contention and occasion of Quarrel So also they say they desired that our Meetings might consist of qualified chosen Friends from each particular Meeting But I pray now do their separate Meetings consist of such qualified chosen persons Ye that have been amongst them deal faithfully with your selves and if ye find them false in these particulars urging those things in pretence which they do not practice in reality suffer not your selves to be deceived by them As for our Meetings they do consist of qualified Friends from each particular Meeting such as are chosen by him who best knows their Qualifications God who qualifies them for the service he engages them in and enagages their Spirits in an holy Concern to undertake the work he qualifies them for But is it not strange that these men who seem ready to startle at the very Name of Form and cry out so fearfully against Imposition should on a sudden so far forget themselves as thus to contend for Form in choosing the Members of their Meeting and impose upon all others that should not be chosen and qualified as they think fit to absent themselves from those Meetings What Confusion do these Men run into Now having told us what they desired they go on to tell us what they have disliked as that when Persons have declared that they could not go to the Womens Meeting with their Marriage for Conscience sake several have declared to this effect That the authority of Iudgment concerning such Consciences belong'd to them and that they had power to judge Spirits and Consciences and that they had not only power to desire but to require Marriages before the Womens Meeting and that they could have no Vnity with neither stand Witness to any Marriage but what went first to a distinct Womans Meeting and that such ought not to proceed in Marriage but wait till the Cloud was over telling them it was not Conscience but Stubbornness and Wilfulness and would say They knew it by an inward Sence without any outward Demonstration Thus they fill your Ears with noise and endeavour to prejudice your minds with Reports of what they say others have said whose Sayings perhaps they may have mis-reported or perverted their meanings in giving their own Sence of others words for if ye observe it they do not say several have declared these very words which they have there set down but this in Effect which depends upon their Construction of the words spoken the true Sence of which too cannot be so clearly understood without knowing the Occasions and Circumstances of the Discourse Yet even as these Men have related them they will not sind upon a due Examination any great advantage accrue unto their Cause not will you I hope find cause of Offence from any of these fore-going Expressions As for the authority of judging concerning Conscience which I take to be the main thing here they carp at before it can be rightly understood with relation to be the present Case the occasion and intention of the Words must be considered A Couple that profess Truth lay their Intention of Marriage before a Meeting of Friends The intent of their doing this is not barely and only that their Intention may be made known but that the Friends of that Meeting if no just cause of Obstruction appear may own them joyn with them Act for them and stand by them in the carrying on and consummating of their Marriage Now if this Couple shall refuse to proceed in that Method for the accomplishing their Marriage which the Meeting uses on the like Occasions and shall pretend a Conscientious scruple for such Refusal hath not that Meeting Authority to inquire into the Grounds and Reasons of such a pretence and upon that Inquiry power also to judge of the Sincerity or Insincerity of such a Pretence or Plea of Conscience so far as concerns their own Satisfaction in order to their owning or not owning acting for or not acting for joyning with or not joyning with standing by or not standing by such Persons in their present Procceedings How else shall a Meeting be capable to act with Iudgment and Safety shall a Meeting of Friends be obliged to acquiesse and submit to every bare Plea of Conscience from others contrary to the firm Perswasion of their own Consciences and not be allowed a Liberty Ability Capacity Authority to Examine Try Judge a Plea of Conscience whether it be sincere or no especially in a Case wherein themselves are to be concerned Worse then would the Condition of a Meeting be than that of a single Person We have been told indeed by some of them when we have asked of the Parties refusing a reason of their refusing to let their Proceedings be lookt into by the Womens Meeting that we ought not to ask them such Questions but that when they have declared it to be matter of Conscience to them we ought to be satisfied with that Answer without inquiring further But this has not answered our Consciences nor our Understandings We believed that in a Case wherein they desired us to be concerned we might reasonably desire to be further satisfied th●● so Their excepting against any Friends saying if any did say they had power to judge Spirits shews how short they are of the state of the Spiritual Man who the Apostle testifies Iudges all things 1 Cor. 2. 15. Consider I intreat you wherefore was the Gift of Discerning Spirits given to the Church as we read it was 1 Cor. 12. 10. If it was not to be used in the Church And wherefore were the Saints exhorted 1 Iohn 4. 1. To try the Spirits whether they were of God or no if they have not received from God ability to Try and power upon Tryal to Iudge whether those Spirits are of God or not at least so far as relates to their own satisfaction in receiving or not receiving

The ACCOUNT From WICKHAM Lately published by Iohn Raunce and Charles Harris Examin'd and found False And Warning thereof given to all such Well-meaning Persons among the People called Quakers As through Personal Affection want of Consideration or Weakness of Judgment have been betrayed or may be in danger to be betrayed by them or any other in the same dividing Spirit with them and led aside from the Way of Truth into a Separation from the People of God For whose Recovery and Preservation this is written By Thomas Ellwood Printed in the Year 1689. The Account from WICKHAM Lately published by Iohn Raunce and Charles Harris Examined and found False And a warning thereof given to all such well-meaning Persons among the People called Quakers as through Personal Affection want of Consideration or Weakness of Judgment have been betrayed or may be in danger to be betrayed by them or any other in the same dividing Spirit with them and led aside from the Way of Truth into a Separation from the People of God for whose Recovery and Preservation this is written FOr your sakes it is O ye much pitied Ones more than for any Weight in the Account it self or Worth in the Authors of it that I have thus taken notice of it For indeed as soon as I had perused it I felt a compassionate Concern spring in my Heart on your behalfs and a direction in Spirit to open some passages therein and relating thereto to you that ye might be preserved from being taken or if in any measure taken might be rescued and delivered from the snare which the Enemy of your Souls and of all Righteousness hath made use of these men to set to intangle entrap and catch you by And to the true Witness of the holy God in every one of your Consciences who retain any honest breathing after the Lord and the way of Holiness do I recommend this my undertaking and the sincerity of my Intention herein To begin therefore with the beginning of their Account they say The Differences amongst Friends in these parts did not arise amongst our selves but were brought in by such who have largely endeavoured to cause Division amongst us Now I affirm in the presence and fear of the holy God and upon my own certain knowledge that these men themselves were the chief Instruments of bringing the Differences in amongst Friends in these parts and They with their Associates have largely endeavoured yea and laboured hard for many Years to cause Divisions amongst us The Lord knows this is true and many of his faithful Servants in these parts know this is true yea and these men themselves also cannot but know this is true which makes their Condemnation the greater They say It is a Comfort to us that we can say in the presence of God we have not been the cause thereof but then being conscious of their own guilt they add for a Salvo these words by bringing into the Church any new Doctrine or any sort of unscriptural Discipline Were I now to deal directly with them I would not grant them that But since the end of my present writing is for your Information not to contend with them that which I shall observe to you is that were they indeed never so free from bringing into the Church any new Doctrine or as they term it unscriptural Discipline yet might they notwithstanding by other ways and means have been the Cause of the Divisions amongst Friends in these parts as indeed they were They travelled to and fro and traversed the Countries gleaning up Stories and evil Surmises from such as were in the work of Division in other parts and what they had so picked up They privately whispered and insinuated into the minds of such simple ones whose Ears were open to them filling them with fears doubts and jealousies of an Apostacy entring among Friends c. whereby they begat in some a Dis-esteem of many antient Friends and faithful Labourers in Truth 's service preparing and fitting them thereby to joyn with themselves to oppose in an ignorant Zeal the Care and Counsel which in the openings of Life the God of Life conveyed through his Servants to the Meetings for preventing that Apostacy which they said was entring And having espoused the Cause of I. S. and I. W. who had headed a Separate Meeting in the North they endeavoured to make a Party for them amongst the Friends of this Country and for that end did bandy together and having got I. S. over to Wickham brought him to our Meetings to Preach over us though he was known to be out of the Vnity of Friends and to be one of the cheif Heads of the Division to the great grief and heavy burden of many an upright tender hearted Friend They add that they have only stood for their own and others Liberty in Christ that all might walk as they had received from Him and not otherwise But the Truth of the matter is otherwise Neither their own nor others Liberty in Christ was infringed nor were any desired to walk otherwise than as they had received from Christ. But they stood for a Liberty out of Truth out of Christ who is the Truth for a fleshly liberty a self-willed liberty a corrupt liberty a liberty to mix in Marriages with such as were not of us Scandalous persons were brought to our Meeting upon account of Marriage and countenanced and abetted by these very men and such others as they could get to joyn with them against the mind and life of the Meeting One Couple especially whom I forbear to name being unwilling to mark out particular persons whereof the Man was not reputed a Quaker and the Woman charged by her Neighbours with having lain with her own Father to the great scandal of Religion Yet that Marriage these men promoted and highly contended for to the great grief and burden of Friends whose Life stood against it and to the great disquieting of the Meeting I. R. alleadging that the Man had been an Absenter from the publick Worship for more then twenty Years and that though he had not frequented the Quakers Meetings yet he had not joyned to any other People And when that gave no satisfaction to Friends he plainly told us It must be passed and that there was a necessity for it otherwise things would be worse which made it more uneasy to Friends to meddle at al with them But after long debate and many Moneths contending about it having got the Woman to sign a Paper under the notion of condemning her misbehaviour which Paper was then understood to be drawn up by C. H. for her and was so favourably worded that it rather seemed to palliate and excuse her Offence than condemn it pretending that her Father when she lay with him was sick unto Death though it was known he was able to walk abroad they carried on the Marriage with such an high Hand that the most Friends could do to clear

themselves of it was to declare they did not consent to it but only by way of condescention for Peace-sake permit it to pass and that too with this caution that they should not take each other in any publick Meeting of Friends but among their own Relations that Friends might stand clear of them afterwards To which though I. R. and themselves agreed yet were they afterwards brought to a publick Monthly-Meeting of Worship where they took each other in Marriage amongst Friends and as Friends I. R. being there to preach on that occasion And when some Friends being grieved and offended thereat arose and departed in Testimony against it I. R. in reflection upon them and to abet the Marriage publickly said Let him that is without Sin cast the first Stone And this Couple soon after they were married there went and were married again by a Priest Plenty of Instances might be given of corrupt Marriages promoted and carried on by them over the Heads of Friends But by this one it may appear what sort of Liberty they stood for and what it is they call their Liberty in Christ. And it is to be observed that the Contest between Friends and them about this Couple was before any Marriage had gone to the Womens Meetings and was indeed it self the immediate Cause that Friends desired the Womens Meetings might for the future be also concerned in Inquiring into Peoples clearness upon Proposals of Marriage By which it may also appear how false and insincere these Men are who would lay the rise and ground of the differences in these parts upon Marriages going to the Womens Meeting But after that Friends having been fain to use the help of the Womens Meeting to examine that unhandsome Carriage of the fore-mention Woman towards her Father found needful to desire and advise such as afterward came to propose Marriage to lay their intentions first before the Womens Meeting it was truly lamentable to see and hardly credible by any but those that did see what shameless Marriages were obtruded upon the Meeting and by these Men and their Party vigorously animated and backt against the Meeting under pretence of Conscience in not going to the Womens Meeting The Instances whereof too many to be here inserted lie ready for a future Service as further Occasion may be given for it Ah had these Men and others whom they joyned with and who joyned with them stood only for their own and others Liberty in Christ had they walked as they had received from Christ and not otherwise they had not let up that Spirit of Loseness nor made these Rents and Divisions in the Church of Christ which they have nor lost that Savour which once in some measure some of them had to become as at this day unsavory-Salt Next they say That which hath seemed to draw People to please Men and to force them to practice things wherein they have not Faith we have no Fellowship with as knowing God owns it not See here on how slight and uncertain a Ground they have laid the Foundation of their wretched work of Separation which they have run and have drawn others more simple than themselves into That which they have taken such great Offence at and declare they have no Fellowship with they durst not say did positively draw people to please Men or did realy force them to practice thigs wherein they had not Faith but they say that which hath Seemed to draw and to force c. Had they indeed been any whit tender of the Honour of God the Prosperity of Truth the peace of the Church of Christ the Salvation of Souls could they think ye have made so great a bluster have proclaimed such open War as they have done and set up such open Ensigns of Opposition and Flags of Defiance against the Standard of the Lord of Hosts as their Separate Meetings are upon no sure Ground no better Bottom than an Apprehension that something Seemed to draw People to please Men Seemed to force them to practice things c So again in their second Page they say We clearly saw That if their Orders were proposed on such terms that all were to be rendered of a dark and bad Spirit that did not conform then c. Here ye see they cannot say that those things which they call Friends-Orders were proposed on such terms but If they were Accordingly they say they did withstand them that in effect did so propose them They know if they had said they had been proposed directly or positively on such terms they should have been immediately convicted of a direct and positive Lye. Therefore they use these shifting Expressions to hide themselves and deceive you In like manner they go on there and say We had great cause to be jealous several things proposed were not from Heaven but of Man. So here ye may see they don't pretend to have had a certain Knowledge a grounded Assurance that the things proposed were not from Heaven but a Iealousie only And consider I pray what was this Iealousie of their's grounded on a Foundation ye will see sutable to it self and to them We had great cause say they to be Iealous several things proposed were not from Heaven but of Man for in their Birth into the Church they Seemed not to bear the Heavenly Image neither shake hands with Holy Scriptures Here 's their Iealousie and the great Cause of it a Seemed not to bear the heavenly Image But sure it had beseemed them to have gone past Seeming beyond Iealousie and to have had a certain sure indubitable positive Knowledge of what they Seemed to be Jealous of before they had made a certain positive Rent Breach Division Separation from the Church of Christ as they have done Ah how hath the Lord abandoned them to blindness who have resisted his Light in the manifestations thereof that they might discover their own Nakedness The Lord make every one of you wise to improve these discoveries of their Folly and Falseness to the advantage of your own Souls that hereby ye may see and seeing shun that Seducing Spirit which hath led them into these pernicious ways and would through their means lead you in after them And for your further Information and Satisfaction in this matter I who I think may reasonably pretend to know as much what has been done in the Meetings of this Conntry as any other having seldom been absent from them do plainly and sincerely declare in God's Presence and Fear that I did never hear or know any of those things which they call Friends-Orders proposed on such terms as they suggest as that all were to be rendered of a dark and bad Spirit that did not conform But I do certainly know the things they contend against have been gently and tenderly proposed and in a Christian Spirit recommended to the Witness of God in the Consciences of those to whom they were proposed and while there has not appeared a rugged