THE CASE OF THE QUAKERS RELATING TO OATHS STATED Wherein they are Discover'd To oppose Prophetical To pervert Evangelical To falsifie Ecclesiastical and To contradict their own Doctrine LONDON Printed for Charles Brome at the Sign of the Gun at the West-End of St. Pauls 1696. SECTION I. Christians of the highest rank and greatest Prosiciency way lawfully in some cases confirm the Truth with an Oath Arg. 1. SAint Paul both knew the minde of Christ 2 Cor. 1.23 And served God in the spirit in the Gospel of his Son Rom. 1.9 yet he was so far from pleading that of the Essenns mentioned by Josephus Bell. Jud. lib. 2. c. 7. who profess'd that quicquid dixerint validius esse omni juramento supervacuum esse ipsis jurare their word was stronger then the oath of other men and therefore it was superfluous for them to swear Or that of the Scythians who told Alexander as Quintus Curtius reports that their love of veracity was so eminent as their affirming a thing was in stead of an Oath Or the custome of the Heroick Age wherein as Homer relates the shaking of their Sceptre or shaking by the hand did more oblige men to speak the truth and perform promises then the most sacred Oaths could oblige succeeding degenerate Ages So far I say was S. Paul from pleading such examples or his own exemption from his performance of this office of charity to common humane infirmity which in many cases requires the inter position of an oath in order to the procuring an indubitable perswasion of the truth as he frequently confirms what he asserts in such like forms of sacred oaths as these God is my witnesse Rom. 1.9 I say the truth in Christ I lie not my conscience also bearing me witnesse in the holy Ghost Rom. 9.1 I call God for a record upon my soul that c. 2 Cor. 1.23 The God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ knows that I ly not 2 Cor. 11.37 As God is true our word towards you was not yea and nay 2. Cor. 1.18 Before God I ly not Gal. 1.20 God is my record Phil. 1.8 Ye are witnesses and God also 1 Thes 2.10 upon which St. Austin Jura … autem ipse Apostolus in Epistolis suis sio ostendit quomodo accipiendum quod dictum est Non Jurate omnino Augustine de mend cap. 15. for the Apostle himself did swear in his Epistles and thereby demonstrate how that is to be understood where it is said swear not at all That these forms of speech are sacred oaths is manifest from Genesis 31.50.53 where Laban and Jacob are said to swear in these forms of words So God is witnesse betwixt me and thee and the God of Abram the God of Nahor the God of their fathers judge betwixt us and Jacob sware by the fear of his father Isaack that is by God whom his father worshipt And to spare the labour of making more quotations from the definition of an oath which in Philo's phrase de legibus particularibus and in the common notion of mankinde is nothing else but a calling of God to witnâ—sse to the truth of what we say From which if eminency of Holinesse would excuse any man it would have excused S. Paul who before the writing of those Epistles had given greater testimony of his sincerity veracity and love to truth then any man living can either in truth or with Christian modesty lay claim to Who can have the face to say That he hath delivered the truth with greater demonstration of the spirit and of power in words which the Holy Ghost teacheth 1 Cor. 2.4.13 That he hath by manifestation of the truth commended himself to every mans conscience in the sight of God 2 Cor. 4.2 more then this chosen vessel did which of them that tell us we may take their word and spare their oath dares vie with him in the perills pains hardships labours losses which he sustain'd for the truths sake If then S. Paul notwithstanding Christs prohibition and that he could pleade more for mens taking his bare yea and nay then any man now living can pleade did yet frequently confirm his sayings with an oath what more then Essaan then Scythiâ—â— then Luciferian pride possesseth those monsters of men who have the impudence to pleade their own eminency in grace as that which exempts them from calling God for a record against their soul when the considerableness of the thing requires it From exhibiting to the divine Majesty that part of incommunicable honour due to his sacred and dreadfull name Away with that smoakie pride out of Gods house let it not be so much as named amongst Saints whosâ— character is humility Arg. 2. Without the interposition of an oath 't is impossible iâ— many câ—sâ—â— that Justice can be administred according to the rule of the Gospell To instance in one for all Exod. 22.10 11. If a man deliver unto his neighbour an oxe or ass or sheep to keep and it die or be hurt or driven away no man seeing it then shall an oath of the Lord be between them both that he hath not put his hand to his neighbours goods and the owner of it shall accept thereof and he shall not make it good It is the righteous Gods will that Justice be administred in this and the like cases now under the Gospell as well as formerly under the law but in such like cases it cannot be determined according to the Evangelical rule who shall bear the losse without the interposition of an oath For if the mans bare word be taken for the proof of his innocency the controversy will be decided by one onely witnesse directly against Christs precept Mat. 18.16 That in tho much of two or three witnesses every word may be establisht And therefore the guiltlesse party in such cases as this where no man but himself is privy to his innocency must in vindication thereof take iâ— God to witness with him that so the matter may be decided by two witnesses at least to wit by him that makes oath and by God whom he calls to witnesse with him Breifly we must either make Christ by this prohibition swear not to patronize such injustice under the Gospell as God would not patronize under the law or proceed to the determination of controversies contrary to Christs rule or else put an end to such like strife by the interposure of an oath And therefore swearing in such cases is so far from being a sin as it is a necessary duty not to be neglected without manifest injustice to the preventing whereof and the doing of right betwixt man and man nothing is more contributary then Evangelicall grace so far is sanctity from exempting its possessors from the discharge of those offices of charity which they owe to themselves and their neighbour in such cases Arg. 3. That which the spirit of Christ in the old Testament-Prophets 1 Peter 1.11 did commend as that which should be
them that drop from their lipps 3. Sincerely with a purpose to lay as great an Obligation upon thyself to keep thy promise and swear truly as thy making oath imports to thy neighbour when thy minde and words are both of a colour and the impressions of thy soul correspond with the expressions of thy mouth when thy conscience can tell thee that thou speakest before God in thy heart what thou utterest to thy neighbour a words All these conditions concur'd in our Saviours and S. Pauls asseverations and therefore though they were more then these yet they proceeded not of evill but from a good and honest heart and were all wanting in those Pharisaicall oaths which our Saviour condemns wherein they had neither reverentiall thoughts of God for they conceited they did by those forms swear by God nor weighed the matter and ponderated circumstances but upon every slieght upon no occasion bolted out fruitless oaths nor did they intend to binde themselves to a performance of their word for they accounted themselves as sree after such oaths as if thoy had never made them Such kinde of additions to our yea and day are of themselves evil and therefore forbidden But the ground and reason of Christs prohibition does not reach the other sort of additions 9. That I may make the two Testaments kisse one another at partting and bring the ends of my discourse together Let it be considered from the prophesies before-quoted That to interpret those Evangelical texts as prohibitions to Christians to swear in any case draws after it these blasphemous consequences 1. That Christ who came to accomplish and seal prophesies to fullfill what was spoken by the mouth of the prophets which have been since the world began did contradict by his precepts and prohibit the accomplishment of those prophesies that foretold that under the Gospel when Gods name should be great in all the earth his elect and chosen servants should swear by the God of truth as an evidence of their conversion to him from idols 2. That S. James was by the Holy Ghost which Christ promised should leade his Apostles into all truth to forbid that viz. to learn to swear after the way of Gods people the Lord liveth under pain of falling into condemnation or at least into hypocrisy which the Spirit of Christ in the holy Prophets perswades Christians to do under pain of utter destruction in case of neglect and by the promise of being built up in the midsts of Gods people in case they would dilligently learn to swear by his name which the same spirit commends to Christians as a signe of their sincere and cordiall acceptance of the true God for their God 3. That if the Christian Church does not perform homage to the God of truth by swearing as well as blessing in his name If their tongue does not as well swear as their knees bow to him then the Christian people are not the people of the Messias the Messias is not yet come but still to be expected then the blessed Jesus is not that Christ of whom the prophets speak but as the Jews at his arraignment and their posterity blasphemously stile him a deceiver and a counterfeit For by the prophets it was foretold that at his exhibition and vocation of the gentiles to the knowledge of the true God the gentiles called by his name should swear by the God of truth throughout the carth c. Yield but this much to a Jew or Pagan that the Christian law forbids worshipping of God by swearing by his name forbids any other confirmation of what we affirm but yea yea nay nay and you do not only deprive the Christian Cause and Church of one of her strongest bulwarks of one of those demonstrations of the spirit the spirit of prophesy in the holy men of old whereby the Champions of the Christian faith have inrefragably proved against all assailants that Jesus is the prophets Christ viz. because since his calling of us gentiles by his gospell we have worshipt the true God by swearing by his name but also administer to Infidells an unanswerable argument for them to prove that that Jesus whom we Christians worship for the Christ is not indeed the very Christ viz. because he hath forbid that worship to be exhibited which the prophets foretold men should learn to tender the God of truth at the coming of that Christ whom they speak of It is not possible to imagine any thing more unlike or opposite to one another then that Christ and his disciples which the prophets describe are to what this glosse of the Quakers presents Jesus Christ and his disciples to be In the reign of the Prophets Christ Gods chosen ones of the Gentiles are to do him homage to acknowledge their subjection to him dependance on him awe of him and his dreadfull attributes by swearing by his name But in the reign of the Quakers Christ the world indeed may take its own course but they whom God hath called and chosen out of the world are not to swear at all The people of the Prophets Christ at what time he should publish his royall law and men should be taught of God were to learn to swear the Lord â—â—veth and to be made to ply this lesson with a promise to be built up of they learn'd it diligently with a threat to be plucked up if they did not But the people of the Quakers Christ are taught of God that they must not learn this lesson and are terrified from their book with demouns against it as evill as leading to destruction c. For the opposition is so palpable as I need not illustrate it with more Instances It can now therefore be a matter of no great difficulty to determine whether exposition and practise grounded upon these expostions is more justifiable That of the Christian Church in all ages which so expounds Christs words as not prohibiting her to give to God the honour that 's due to him by a reverentiall invocating of his great name in sacred and solemn oaths to the end that the sayings of the prophets may be fulfill'd our Jesus demonstrated to be the Christ or that of the Quakers whose glosse defrauds God of his due homage robs the King of Saints of one of the prime Jewells of his crown presents the ever-blessed Jesus in the form of an Impostor and false Christ leads directly to the gulf of grossest infidelity and denial of Christ and sets the Old and New-Testaments the Prophets and Evangelists at greater odds then the Manichaeans did making the Gospel to contradict those holy Prophets to whose testimony our Saviour constantly appe al'd for the decision of that great question whether he was that Christ that was to come putting it to this issue that he would forego the claim and give them leave to call him deceiver if he did not exactly answer that model which the Prophets had drawn of him that was to come if they could discern
the practise of the choise servants of God in the Christian Church called from amongst the Gentiles after his rejection of the Jewes may lawfully be done by the holiest Christian But the spirit of Christ in the old Testament-Prophets did command swearing by the God of truth as that which was to be the practise of Gods elect servants in the Christian Church after his rejection of the Jewes and choosing the Gentiles Therefore the holiest Christian may lawfully swear by the God of truth The major is undeniable the Assumption I prove from Isaiah 65.15 And ye shall leave your name for a curse to my chosen that is The people that I shall choose from amongst the gentiles shall use your name the name of a Jew in execrations when they have a minde to denounce a curse they shall do it in this or the like form the Lord make thee like a Jew whom he hath cast off and mâ—de a vagabond upon earth parallel to that Jeremy 29.22 of them shall be taken up a curse that is the form of a curse by all the captivity of Judah saying the Lord make the like Ahab and Zedekiah two false prophets whom the king of Babylon rosted in the fire For the Lord God shall slay thee and call his servants by another name that is God will dissolve the Judaick Church Common-wealth so that his people shall no longer be discriminated from the rest of the world by the name Jew but by another new name that which was given at Antioch where the disciples were first called Christian by which name ever since the people of the God of Abram have been called and differenc't from all other people upon the face of the earth That he who blesseth himself in the earth shall blesse himself in the God of truth and he that sweareth in the earth shall swear by the God of truth The sum of this whole Paragraph is breifly this You Jewes boast of your priviledges of my electing you out of all Nations to be my peculiar people and you please your selves with these conceits that if I cast you off I shall have none to worship me in the whole world I shall break my promise made to Abraham But know ye that Abraham hath another seed then carnal Jews and when I cast you off I will take the spirituall seed of Abraham his children by faith to be my people who shall be known from others by the name Christian by these I will be secured not as I am now by you in a corner of the world Judaea but in the earth for the uttermost parts of the earth shall be my possession and whosoever through the wide world under the Christian name shall call upon the name of the true God shall blesse themselves in his name and swear by him as the God of truth as that God who by choosing gentile-beleevers to be his people keeps faith with Abraham See Calvin S. Jerom iâ— locum Oecolampadii hypomnemata c. Arg. 4. That which the spirit of Christ that was in the prophets foretold should be done in the time of the Gospel by the Lords people as an evidence of their conversion unto the Lord may lawfully be done by Christians But the spirit of Christ which was in the prophets foretold that in the time of the Gospel the Lords people should swear by his name as an evidence of their conversion unto the Lord. Therefore a Christian may lawfully swear by the Lords Name The major is beyond all possibility of doubt if it be considered how it is limited for I do not say that whatsoever the prophets foretold should come to passe may lawfully be done for I know they foretold the treason of Judas the Jewes rejecting of Christ c. but that whatsoever they foretold should be done as a signe of grace as an evidence of their conversion that do it may be done without sin For sin cannot be an evidence of grace works of darknesse cannot demonstrate him that does them to be a childe of light The truth of the minor is clear from Jsaiah 45.23 I have sworn by my self the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousnesse and shall not return shall never be repeal'd that unto me every knee shall bow every tongue shall swear From which Text that I may manifest the indubitable truth of each branch of my assumption Let it be observed 1. That this prophesie is to receive its accomplishment in gospel-times For God speaks here to the ends of the earth bids them look to him and be saved promiseth salvation to the Gentiles calleth the dispersed of the nations to come near and sweareth that every knee shall bow unto him Now the ends of the earth the nations dispersed did not look to God were not brought nigh till Gospel-times till then not the gentile world but onely the Jewish people did bow the knee and swear to the God of Israel to the Lord Jehovah Before the coming of Christ and the gentiles embracing the Gospel they were without God aliens and strangers to the common-wealth of Israel and the Covenants of promise afar off c. Ephes 2.11 c. 2. That swearing to the Lord is here prophesied of as that divine service and homage by the performing whereof gentile-converts were to declare their owning of and conversion to the true God St. Paul quotes this very Text to prove that all men Gentiles as well as Jewes owe service to Christ Rom. 14.9 10. He is Lord of all that is all nations are to do him homage for it is written As I live saith the Lord every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God It were blasphemy against the Holy Ghost to say that thâ— Apostle perverts the prophets words but he knowing the minde of the Lord in this text renders that word in the prophet every tongue shall swear which denotes an eminent act of saving confession by a word which comprehends the whole service of God thereby implying that swearing by the Lord is one part of divine worship and so eminent a part of confession to God as it virtually contains all other acts of such confession and that we confesse our beleif in and subjection to the true God as well by swearing by his name as by any other act of divine worship we perform to him Breifly the plain sense of the prophet as S. Paul expounds this text is this That as the Gentiles till Christ that light that lightens the gentiles served dumb idols confessing them to be Gods by bowing the knee by swearing to them so after Christs calling the gentiles to the Obedience of the true God man should turn from idols acknowledge the living God to be what his names and attributes import infinitely knowing just powerful c. by transferring unto him those divine honours of bowing the knee and swearing which before their conversion they confer'd upon false Gods 3. That God himself swears by himself then
applyed this text to the dayes of the Messias but when our Apologists upon that concession proved the blessed Jesus to be the Christ some of them applied it to the end of the world at what time they conceive their Messias will come upon the very same mistaken scripture-texts upon which our Millenaries ground their expectation of Christs personal reign 2 I note from thisprophesie that swearing to the Lord is here commended as a signe witnesse and argument of Egipts conversion to the Lord of hosts And it shall be for a signe and for a witnesse to the Lord in the land of Egipt that is it shall be a witnesse that the land of Egipt is become the Lords inheritance that the Egiptians have dedicated themselves to the Lord that he is their God and they his people It shall be for a signe this hath relation to the whole clause afore-going not onely to the pillar erected which is mentiond immediatly before as if the sense were this pillar shall be a signe for the altar in the midst of Egipt the Egiptian Cityes speaking the language of Canaan and their swearing to the Lord are as much signes as that Nor doth the prophet speak in the plural number they shall be signes as if he meant the two last particulars joyn'd by a conjunction copulative the altar and the pillar but in the singular It shall be a signe that is the whole series of those divine dispensations when the Egiptian cityes shall speak the holy language when they shall swear to the Lord erect an altar and pillar to the lord this shall be a signe of Egipts submitting to Christs scepter Niâ—â—l alud vult quam mutatum cultum idolorum translatum in honerem Dei Oecolam in locum the meaning of all this is that divine honour and worship which they had given to their idols they should alter the propertie thereof and transfer it to the true God Is any thing more obvious then that Egypts swearing erecting altars and pillars to Idols was a signe of her owning those Idol Gods or that Egipts speaking the language of Gods people setting up an altar and pillar to the Lord her making vowes and paying them her offering sacrifice and oblations to the Lord were trophyes of Christs victory over Egipt and signes of Egypts submission to Christ with what show of reason then can we except swearing to the Lord out of the catologue of those signes seeing that is spoken with the same breath belongs to the same thing and therefore must be put in the same case and be interpreted Monumentum professio publica quam Egiptii statuent ad testandam fidem communionem suam cum Deo Ecclesiae ejus Junius in locum as well as any of the rest A monument and publick profession which the Egiptians were to erect to testify their faith and their communion with God and his Church 2. Swearing to the Lord is in this Text made a branch of speaking the language of Canaan They shall speak the language of Canaan 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 swearing by the name of the Lord as the authentick Translation of the Septuagint renders it which Christ and the Apostles perpetually used in all their quotations of â—he Old Testament as that which had been current through the world for above 200. years before Christs Incarnation without contradiction of the Jewes and not so obnoxious to adulteration afterwards as the Hebrew Copies were who were in the custody of the Jewes alone and in a language which none understood but themselves and therefore as apt to be corrupted as the Jewes out of an odium to Christian Religion were apt to corrupt them as it is manifest they have done in most of those Texts which concern the Messias though this by good providence hath escap't their lime-twigg-fingers for the Hebrew now extant retains the participle jurantes So that to swear by the Lord of hosts is to speak the language of Canaan that pure language which God promised to restore to all Nations at the coming of Christ That pure and undefiled Religion which was at first reveal'd man in Paradise for before Christ all Nations but the Jews the inhabitants of Canaan sware by other Gods and to swear by the Lord of hosts was the proper idiom of Jury where that God was well known I know Jerom hath a conceit that Nebuchadnezzar after his conquest of Egipt sent a colonie of syrians Arabians into certain Egiptian cities who introduc't the use of their tongue into those Cityes But he learnt this of the Jewish tradition-mongers of whom he was too great an admirer and through his credulitie received oftentimes false aimes who put this Exposition upon this clause on purpose to divert it from bearing witnesse to the truth of the Gospell And he must be a very great stranger to the propriety of prophetick language that knows not that the language of Canaan imports in their dialect the speaking after the mode and form of Gods people and that therefore Egipts foregoing her native gentile-tongue and using the speech of that people over whom God had a peculiar Soveraignty in swearing to him after their form was a signe of Gods conquest of the Egiptians of his translating them from his dominion of Satan into the Kingdom of his dear Son so farr is swearing by the Lord of hosts or in the name of the true God in cases of importance from being a sin as it is an evedence of the Christian worlds conversion to and recognition of that God Arg. 5. The holiest Christian may lawfully and laudably do that which the spirit of Christ that spake by the prophets hath made the doings of in Gospell-times the condition of Gods accepting men for his people But the spirit of Christ in the Prophets hath made mens learning to swear by his name such a condition as upon the fulfilling thereof he will number men amongst his disciples account them his people that do and root out and utterly destroy them that do not learn to swear by his name Therefore the holiest Christian may lawfully swear by Gods name The major is plain for it is impossible that God should tempt men to sin by making the committing thereof the condition of the grand and comprehensive promise such as this is of being his people which includes all the benefits and priviledges of that relation This were to allure us to fin by stronger motives then Satan can possibly lay before us The minor I prove from Jeremy 12.16 And it shall come to pass that if they will diligently learn the ways of my people to swear by my name in this or the like form the Lord liveth as they taught my people to swear by Baal then shall they be built in the midst of my people but if they will not obey I will utterly pluck up and destroy that nation saith the Lord. It is beyond all possibility of rational doubt that this Prophesie relates to the time of