saith Again saith this Popish Book asking this Question Is the Church visible He answers She is and must be visible at all times as consisting of a Hierarchy of Pastors Governing Teaching and Administring Sacraments to the Worlds end and of other People governed taught and receiving Sacraments at their Hands all publickly professing the same Faith all which things are visible And for this brings Ephes 4.11 12. Mat. 5.14 15. Answer Now to this I say that the true Church the Spouse of Christ and not the Adulterer the Popedom are visible and known to God and its own Members but invisible to the World as such as the Apostle saith 1 John 3.1 Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed on us that we should be called the Sons of God therefore the World knows us not because it knew not him to wit Christ Jesus their Head though he did appear in Flesh and so the Flesh was the Vail by which he was hid from the World then as the Flesh is the Vail by which the true Saints are hid from the World now And this makes manifest that that Scripture Ephes 4.11 12. makes nothing for his Purpose at all And as for that other Scripture Mat. 5.14 15. where it is said Ye are the Light of the World a City set on a Hill which speaks of them that were truly so and kept their savour and not at all for the Pope or his great Army of Apostates nor of any other who have the Name only of Christians but have lost the good savour and so want the true Christian Life and so having put the Candle under a Bushel though they may have a shew in outward Observances of their own devising of a Church yet still wanting the true heavenly savoury Life I say they are to be trodden under Foot of Men as unsavoury Salt and so this Scripture makes nothing for them neither But some may say Though this makes not for the Pope or any false Church yet doth it not make something for the visibility of the true Church I answer No not in the Popish or Worldly Sense at all for though the good Life of the true Church be very savoury to that of God in every Man and the same Holy Life shining before Men is of great Service to Men and Glory to God and so because they separate from the World not only in the inward but outwardly also therefore they cannot be hid if they do any thing contrary to their Holy Profession and Separation yet still the Apostle 1 John 3.1 stands firm in his Testimony to which my Spirit agrees Therefore the World knows us not because they knew not Christ For how can the World who are in the False Life and Religion and yet think it is true know or believe them to be the True Church of Christ who separate from them and bear witness against them And this farther appears if we consider how the True Church as Christ himself was ever hated and persecuted of the World Rev. 12.6 c. and many other Scriptures And wherefore is all this Enmity but even because the World knew them not as they were but even accounted them through their great Ignorance as the Off-scouring of all things As it is reported also concerning the Christians in the Heathenish Persecutions after Christ Sejanus vir bonus sed est Christianus Such a one is a good Man but he is a Christian So amongst and by you called Papists Such a one is a good Man but he is a Protestant And amongst the common Protestants Such a one is a good Man but he is a Quaker Thus hath the true living Seed been vailed from the World under some Reproach or other through Ages and Generations as at this day And so to conclude I say That which is here said of the Invisibility of the True Church is not as this Popish Book would wickedly Insinuate Because there were none called Protestants before Luther's Time or because others since Luther's Time have had other Names but because the Truth according to the Scripture of Truth so judges as is here in a few words set down But to return the Wickedness of these Popish Pleaders upon their own Heads it may be truly said That the End of their Pleading so much for the Visibility of the Church is Because they have little in their Religion if any thing at all but what the blind and evil World can both see and exercise themselves in and yet continue still in their sinful Nature So that the Pope's Daughter the Popish Synagogue is most unlike the Heavenly King's Daughter the True Church which is all Glorious within but the Pope and his Daughter the False Church is all Foul within and only Glorious on the out fiâ—e and that not with a true out-side Comliness or Glory neither but even with the rotten filthy Rays and menstruous Clouts of Humane Traditions and Carnal Ordinances and Observations of their own Devising beautiful only to the Adulterous Eye but not with the Ornament of a truly Godly Life and Holy Conversation which is the True Churches Golden Ornament or Rayment which is truly Beautiful in the Eye of God and his Saints It is so as saith God's Good Spirit in his Servant A Warning to the Papists at Stafford Thomas Taylor a Servant of the True and Everliving God in the Everlasting Gospel and Kingdom of his Son sendeth Greeting and a Warning unto you from him in whose Hand is your Breath and the Breath of all the Living I say unto you who call your selves Catholicks or Roman Catholicks here about Stafford Awake Awake look into your selves Trim your Lamps and see whether the true Oyl be in you which the first Christians witnessed in them which they had of God whereby they knew all things for if you would be found true Catholicks Members of the Universal Church the Heavenly Body this you must have for the Cry is gone forth Behold the Bridegroom cometh and it 's none but the Wise in Heart the pure Virgin Souls can enter God's Kingdom it 's not enough for you to say We are Catholicks or Roman Catholicks and our Religion is old or so for it is not how Old but how Good for how much old an Error or Way of Evil is by so much the worse it is and to imagine that God will receive you because of your many Outside Observations and Carnal Ordinances you are very much mistaken so long as the inside is unwashed for it 's a pure Heart and a right Spiritual Worship from the same that God Requires And did not the Apostle to the Galatians say He was afraid of them because they thought to Please God in observing Days and Months and Times and Years after Christ was come in the Flesh and Offered up to end all such Shadows and all of like Nature that can be brought in since then as a part of God's Worship and to bring in Everlasting Righteousness even the
Christianity for saith Christ to his Followers when they were telling of who should be greatest of them he Convinced them of their Error by setting before them a little Child and saying who will be greatest of all must be Servant of all and least of all and that not in Words only but in Deed and Truth say I. But what is any thing that is said of Peter in the Scripture to the Pope O yes saith he he is his Successor To which I say it is as false as any thing is true for Peter was a Holy Man of God of Christ's sending but the Pope an unholy Man of the wicked World's sending chusing and setting up witness the Men chusing him and the manner of their chusing and setting him up the very relation of which in all the Foolish and Antichristian Circumstances of it would even make a truly Honest Spiritual Man's Heartake to hear or read it Again Peter was a Humble Man clothed with Humility as he exhorted others not a Lord over God's Heritage but an Example to it of Faith and Goodness as he exhorted others but the Pope is a Proud Man set up at Rome like a Worldly Prince Ruling and Lording it over God's Heritage not only with his wicked Curses and Excommunications of all that will not bow to his Superstitions and Abominable Idolatries but even Persecuting to Death with worldly Power and Force where he can do it either by his own or others whom he can stir up and perswade to act his wicked Will all such as deny him and against him bear withess though otherwise they be never so dear and near to the Lord God and so instead of being an Example of Goodness to any he is become an Abhorring to Nations and therefore is the Wo come and coming upon him and his Seat and Upholders and Lovers from him who is a Consuming Fire and this Babylon with all its Strength and Glory shall be burnt in his Fire and Zion shall not take one of her polluted Stones to put in her Holy Building It is so Thomas Taylor There is more by me of this kind as in Answer to more Passages of that Bad Book herein mentioned which in due time may come forth and it is this Again as concerning the Pope's succceding Peter and all Successions relating to the Church of God truly so called I say it is meerly Spiritual as the Lord said concerning his Prophet The Spirit that I have put upon thee and the Word which I have put into thy Mouth shall not depart from thee nor out of the Mouth of thy Seed nor out of the Mouth of thy Seeds Seed from henceforth and for ever And so we finding both the Spirit and Word of the Pope to be quite of another Nature than that which was in Peter and the other Apostles we deny him and his Succession together with all other Pretenders to the like Succession who want that Heavenly Spirit Life and Doctrine that they were in In the Ninth Article this Bad Book saith But why may not a well-meaning Man be saved in any Religion He answers First from Ephes 4.5 and Heb. 11.6 where mention is made of one Faith and that without Faith it is impossible to please God Then I say well meaning in the Popish Way without true Faith will not save no more than in any other But then saith he Secondly because as in a natural Body that part which hath not a due Connexion to the Heart or Root presently dies for want of Continuity So in the Church the Mystical Body of Christ faith he that Part or Member that hath not a due Subordination and Connexion unto the Head and Commen Councils thereof that is the Pope and General Councils thou shouldst have said Christ as in Ephes 4.15 16. from whence under Christ we have our Spiritual Life and Motion as we are Christians must needs be dead nor indeed can be accounted a Member of that Mystical Body O Profound Antichristian Doctrine indeed For here thou hast pulled off thy Vizard with thy own Hand and any one of a very mean Understandstanding may see that by this Popish Doctrine Christ the Living Fountain is thrust out of Doors for it must not by this be known what saith Christ and his Spirit to my Soul but what faith the Pope and his Councils to mine Ear. And afterwards this Pleader for Baal to wit the Pope and his Councils accounts them Novelists Hereticks and Idle Brains that will not submit to this Tribunal of Christ he should have said Antichrist on Earth to wit the Pope and his General Councils and makes this alone to be the Cause of all Heresies and Sects as he calls them whether Protestants or other For saith he they will not be tried by this Tribunal but by their own idle Brain and the dead Letter of the Scripture To which I say God will judge this Man and all such for their Wickedness in coupling an idle Brain and the Letter of the Scripture together for though the Scripture be but as a dead thing to them that will neither understand nor believe it yet to an Inlightened Understanding Believing Soul it is of such Service that the Apostle is not afraid to say That the Scripture is given for our Learning upon whom the Ends of the World are come And the Scripture is of such force in the Hand of such Inlightned and truly Understanding Ones that Christ made use of it against the great Wrester of Scripture to wit the Devil and by the right use of it in the hands of the Faithful through the Spirit which gave them forth all the Mud-walls of Popery and Paper Bullwarks of the whole Antichristian Kingdom of False Professors both have and daily are beat down and therefore doth the wicked Popedom keep the Holy Scripture from the poor Slaves under them But the great King Christ Jesus upon his Heavenly Tribunal is bringing his great Work to pass in these latter days against the Beast Whore and False Prophet under what Name or Notion soever and by his Spirit according to Scripture to pour Judgments and Plagues upon all their Tribunals Glory to his Name for evermore Again this Popish Book asks Is not this to wit the want of a Popish Tribunal the reason why the Protestants and other Sects are so divided c. He answers Yea a principal reason For how can different Fancies says he upon different Principles be united I answer No The want of this Tribunal is not the cause And ask What was the Reason of Differences amongst the Jews that had their Tribunal of the Law outward and High Priests and Sanhedrims or great Councils for ordering Matters of Religion Yea and what was the reason that there was Divisions and Dissentions amongst the first Christians when even Peter and other Apostles were living Yea saith the Apostle There must be Heresies among you even you that all profess Christ and he gives a Reason that these that
to any of their proved Corruptions Then I say If we may not have Fellowship with them in their Corruptions no not so much as by consent then we must not have Fellowship with them at all for they and their Corruptions are one for saith Christ Ye are of your Father the Devil for his Works ye will do But saith Bryan Christ was a Member of this Church as he calls it of those wicked Jews because he was Circumcised and frequented the Temple and eat the Passover than which Saying of this Bryan nothing can be more False for what though Christ was Circumcised and went sometimes into the Temple and eat the Passover which had been Ordinances of God for their time and were Shadows of good Things to come What is that to prove Christ a Member of that Body whose House was left unto them desolate and who were headed by the Devil which at length put them on to murder him O fad that ever People in their love of the World should be so blind But what is Christ's conforming to the Shadows of the Law which God gave for that time and by him to be fulfilled and so ended to your requiring us to conform to you in that or those Things which God never ordained as Sprinkling of Infants and not only so but teaching for Doctrine That you make them thereby the Children of God Members of Christ and Heirs of his Kingdom and also your giving David's Psalms in Rhime and Meeter to the wicked World to sing to God's dishonour And to hear a proud Man and covetous Man who is an Idolater Preach and Pray whom God never sent yea and to maintain him in his Sins contrary to all Reason and Religion also how can we conform to you in your Corruptions of respecting Persons and of having Mens Persons in Admiration because of Advantage Contrary to the express Doctrine of the Apostle which saith James 2.1 c. Have not the Faith of our Lord Jesus Christ the Lord of Glory with respect of Persons Yea and plead for their Transgressions How can we Conform to such as under the Name of Christians do live manifestly in the Sins of the Heathen as Fornication Covetousness Idolatry Drunkenness and are Railers and Extertioners and lovers of Pleasures more than lovers of God from whom the Apostle bids us turn away 2 Tim. 3. and 1 Cor. 5 11 c. with whom he forbids us to eat and yet with such both R. B. and Bryan for all their former seeming hypocritical Zeal would now have us to Communicate yet not so much as consent to their Corruptions neither as their daubing contradicting Doctrine seems willing to have Then I say We must neither have Fellowship with them in their Worship-actions as R. B. calls them nor in their ordinary Conversation for all is Corrupt For what greater Assent or Consent can we give than by joyning with them or practising such things openly But it 's better to obey God than Man both in this and all things and as the Lord said to Jeremiah so in this case hath he said to us Let them return to thee but return not thou to them for what Fellowship hath Light with Darkness or the Temple of God with Idols And now I come a little to set before you poor People who have been deceived by such Men as this R. B. and Bryan are something of the Answer they give to the Arguments of the zealous People of old called Brownists who could not for Conscience-sake conform to their Common-Brayer c. Their Objection saith Bryan in Page 297 of his Book was this to wit That the People of England were never rightly called for in the beginning of the Queen's to wit Elizabeth 's Reign they were by her Command and Proclamation compelled to embrace the Protestant Religion and to conform to God's Worship whereas in the New Testament we have no Example of People compelled to the Service of God Christ commanding Fisher men to convert Souls by Preaching not Princes to make Disciples by Compulsion therefore the Church of Christ England he should have said for who ever denied the Church of Christ had no right Constitution But now see the wretched Answer of this Bryan to the said Objection of the old Non-conformists If we speak saith he of a Church first planted the People of such a Nation are first called by the Word before they come to be a Church But it is not so saith he of a Country where for a long time true Religion hath been professed which is our case And as to that part of the Objection That there is no such Example in the New Testament First The Magistrates were then Enemies to the Christian Religion Secondly saith he It sufficeth that we have Examples in the Old Testament 2 Kings 23.21 2 Chron. 15.13 and 33.16 and 34.33 nor have saith he Christian Princes less Power in their Dominion to abolish Idolatry and by Laws and Penalties to compel their Subjects where there is a Parity of Reason And after this Bryan having wearied himself with setting down several words to and against both what the Conformists said for and the Non-conformists said against these Things he takes breath and says he returns to satiâ—fie the Objection to wit The Objection before mentioned about Separation with such words as these It is not necessary and generally true saith he of all the Members of the Visible Church that they be called by the Word Answ To which I answer on behalf of Truth That it is the great Love and tender Mercy of God to our Souls that he hath delivered us from under such Men as this Bryan and R. B. are who know nothing as they ought to know but professing themselves to be wise are become most foolish and brutish in their Minds and Words by such false and Soul-destroying Doctrines as these affirming That People may be called into the visible Church without the Word and if one ask him If not by the Word by what then His answer is by Sprinkling when Infants or for fear of Man But what are these Calls into the Visible Church A strange Church must that needs be for certain where People are called into it without God's Word for certain it 's none of God's Church into which People are called without his Word It 's the visible Company of such as know not God thou shouldst have said For God's Church are the Faithful and their Faith cometh by Hearing and Hearing by the Word of God and not without it But oh the Desolation that such Doctrine as this of Bryan and R. B. hath made amongst the poor People whose Eyes are not fully opened to see their Deceits Also this Antichristian Doctrine being laid as a Foundation in their House it is no Wonder to hear this Bryan say Page 301. That Ignorant and Prophane Persons have always been in the Church and ever will be at lest till Christ comes the second Time But by all these
the Children of Men there will neither be Peace nor Establishment of any good thing but as a Wheel will the whole Earth be from Generation to Generation saith the Spirit who is the sweet Orderer in all things for the Holy Seed's sake Glory to his Name for ever And so in the Love and Kindness of the Lord God have I been thus enabled for the Truth and the poor Peoples sake to lay open something of the Deceits and gross Hypocrisie of these two Men called R. B. and Bryan who have long under a Cover or Vizard of Holiness deceived the unstable Souls of many But now the Covering being rent off their Wolfish Nature is fully manifest Glory to the Lord the good Work-man over all for ever So be it Thomas Taylor Some Gentle Remarks on a Book Entituled A Discourse concerning the Idolatry Practised in the Church of Rome A Book coming to my Hands called A Discourse concerning the Idolatry Practised in the Church of Rome Written by E. S. Stiled D. D. And finding the Man Zealous against that Romish Idolatry which is Commendable in him E. S. in his Book Orig. Sacra Page 4. hath these words God Created the Souls of Men not only Capable of finding out the Truth of things but furnished him with a Sufficient Teacher to discover Truth from Falshood by a LIGHT set up in his Vnderstanding which if he had attended to he might have secured himself from all Impostors and Deceit And also finding in his Principles towards the latter end of his Book such a saying as this to wit his fifth Priciple There can be no other means Imagined whereby we are to judge of the Truth of Divine Revelation but a faculty in us discerning Truth and Falshood in Matters Proposed to our Vnderstandings which if we do not Exercise in Judging the Truth of Divine Revelation we must be imposed upon by every thing that pretends to be so And in Article 13. The Holy Scriptures may be understood Infallibly by all Persons who sincerely endeavour to know the meaning of them in all such things as are necessary for their Salvation This is the Scope of the latter part of that Article And in Article 13. And there can be no sufficient Reason given why that may not serve in matters of Faith which God himself hath made use of as the means to keep Men from Sin in their Lives unless any imagine that Errors in Opinion are far more Dangerous to Mens Souls than a vicious Life is and therefore that God is bound to take more Care to prevent the one than the other And in his Fourth and Fifth Conclusion upon his Articles saith The more absurd any Opinions are and Repugnant to the first Principles of Sense and Reason which any Church Obtrudes upon the Faith of Men The greater Reason Men still have to reject the pretence of Infallibility in that Church as a grand Imposture And so to disown what is so Taught by such a Church is not to question the Veracity of God but so firmly to adhere to it as to what he hath Revealed in Scriptures that Men dare not out of Love to their Souls reject what is so taught Yet finding this E. S. making several Reflections upon us whom the World Scorn under the Nick name of Quakers I say us whom the Lord hath drawn out of the many Waters of Mystery Babylon into the Light of his Son that most inward Principle Faculty and alone Ability in Man to try all Doctrines and Works by I could not but thus write something to him that he might see his Mistake of us and not lose his Reward of standing against Romish Delusions by withstanding or Speaking against the Truth of God made manifest to us in our Hearts and Shining forth in our Lives to the Praise of his Glory and the Good of all who do rightly understand us and receive our Testimony I say that if possible he may understand a little and feel of that inward Principle or Faculty as he calls it which he is aiming at and which he saith must be antecedently supposed viz. necessarily to all Divine Revelation are these things writ Now that part of his Book where he some-what smites at us is that where he Treats of the Fanaticism of the Roman Church As one may see Page 249. where he says Who will not take pains to see how Faithfully I have Translated these Words out of Eymericus would imagine I have borrowed some of the canting Language of the Modern Quakers Look * where he goes on Now What is this some of this canting Language That part of Petrus Johannis's Relation of St. Francis as he calls him runs thus That those who Opposed this Order to wit of that Francis were the Carnal Persecuting Clergy in whom the Seat of the Beast is much more than in the People that in the time of the Mystical Antichrist the Carnal Church shall oppose the Doctrine Life and Zeal of the Saints and burn as it were with Fire against them but it shall be dried up from all Spiritual Wisdom and Grace and the Riches of Christ and be Exposed to Errors and Delusion and as it was with the Jews and Greeks Thus far there To which I Answer What is this kind of Language Canting where it is truly applied in any Age dost not thou Edward Stillingfleet believe that there both was and is a Carnal Church that did and doth oppose the Doctrine Life and Zeal of the Saints c. as is there sâ—t down To let Francis and his Applauders alone we know both the Holy Prophets and Apostles of Jesus Christ mentioned in Scripture as also Christ himself did vehemently Cry against a Carnal Church or Fleshly Company of Professors in those days for he that was born after the Flesh did always Persecute him that was born after the Spirit both before and in the Apostles Days And so it hath been since no question all along downwards and as we for certain find it so in these our days not only by the Papists but even amongst them called Protestants also And was those many Sharp Reproofs and large Discoveries of the False Teachers in the Prophets and Apostles time Canting O Man take heed thou knows not what thou dost when thou judges our Witness against the False Teachers and Carnal Professors of this Age no better than Canting But certainly though some of you may put it off at present as a light thing and look at it Scornfully as no better than Canting as they did who said He is Mad and hath a Devil why hear ye him but the time will come when it will be otherwise even then when the Books are opened and every one receives a Reward according to their Deeds It is strange this Doctor who seems to be so much Read should Read our Principles no better and pretending to so much Wisdom if he have Read our Books that he should no better understand us than to compare us
lose their whole Faith if they believe it not as before In the Ninth Article speaking of the Church he saith The Church is the Congregation of all the Faithful under Christ their Invisible Head and his Vicar upon Earth the Pope But how proves he this Neither by Scripture nor Apostolical Tradition for which he brings neither for there is none for certain for the Church hath not two Heads the Church is not a Monster with two Heads one Visible to wit The Pope or such-like and another invisible to wit Christ Neither is the Church an Adulteress with two Husbands one visible and another invisible For saith the Apostle I have espoused you to one Husband even Christ So all others are Antichrist And then this wicked Book farther asks What are the Essential parts of the Church And to that it answers A Pope or Supreme Head Bishops Pastors and the Laity To this I say It is rank Popish Poison And what Scripture have they for this Surely none nor Apostolical Tradition-neither for the Apostles could not contradict their own Writings the Scriptures of Truth as is said before And the Scripture doth no where make the Church of Christ consist of such Essentials for God's Church are his Cleroi that is his choice ones his Lot his Heritage his Flock all of them 1 Pet. 5.3 God's Flock are every one of them sound Sheep and Lambs and they are Men God's Cleroi that is Clergy and not Laity and the word Laity is Popish and Antichristian as well as the Pope And for the true Overseers and Pastors Feeders in and of the true Church What have you to do with them unless it be to Persecute them as your Custom hath been all along ever since Night and Darkness came upon you for your great Apostasie Then this blind Guide goes on asking How prove you St. Peter and the Pope his Successor to be the visible Head of the Church He answers First out of John 21.16 17 18. Where Christ saith he for a Reward of his special Faith and Love gave Peter absolute Power to feed and govern his whole Flock yea even the Apostles themselves to be his Sheep and he their Head and Pastor I answer This is a most shameless Lie For Christ was so far in those words from giving Peter charge of Feeding and Governing his whole Church in general much less the Apostles in particular who were his Equals that the same Charge that is given here is also given to the rest of the Apostles though not in the same express words as here yet in words of the same import fully as not only when he first called them to be Fellow Apostles but also and that most plainly when he departed from them as in Matt. 28.18 19 20. where it is said And Jesus came and spake unto them that is to say to the Eleven for Judas was gone to his place saying All power in Heaven and Earth is given to me Go ye therefore not Peter only but all the rest as well as he and teach all Nations Baptizing them in or rather into as the Greek there truly signifies the Name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you And lo I am with you to wit all of you not Peter only alway even to the end of the World Amen And whereas this Liar says It was for Peter 's special Faith and Love I say Peter had no Faith nor Love but what was common to all the rest of the Apostles But if all things may be reckoned he had but little Faith nor Love neither when he denied his Master And though Christ said Lovest thou me more than these He was taught by his former forwardness not to say Yea I love thee more than they all but humbly in the sence of his former weakness Lord thou knowest that I love thee And great cause had he to love Christ greatly seeing he had Dishonoured Christ and Wounded his own Soul by Denying and Forswearing Christ more than they all And so no Merit in Peter for any thing can be looked at but God's great and free Mercy in not only forgiving him but also in imploying him in his Service again So let your unclean Mouths be stopt for Ever ye Idolizers of Creatures For as Paul said to the Corinthians so may I say to you and all the World who are striving about Men What is Paul Or what is Apollos So what is Peter or others that God made use then or makes use of now as Instruments in his Hand for Peoples good but even as nothing seeing Christ is all and in all And with him there conclude Neither is he that planteth nor watereth any thing but God that giveth the increase 1 Cor. 1.11 c. and Chap. 3.3 4 c. His other Proof for Peter's Supremacy is out of Mat. 16.18 Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church therefore saith he the rest of the Apostles were built on him and hence it is saith he as often as they are mentioned in Scripture he is named first To which I answer and say It is no less than Blasphemy to say That either the Apostles or the rest of the Faithful were Built upon Peter as a Man for it contradicts all Scripture which every where give the Glory of being the Rock the Foundation yea and Corner-stone of the whole Building of the Church of God to Christ alone and not to Peter at all as a Man for what is said here of Peter hath relation only and altogether to the Faith of Christ the Rock here confessed only unto by Peter but given of the Father And Peter himself says expresly that the rest of the Faithful in those Days had obtained like Precious Faith with him and the rest of the Apostles See 2 Pet. 1.1 And the Apostle blames them greatly in 1 Cor. 1. before-mentioned for saying I am of Paul and I of Apollos and I of Cephas that is Peter and I of Christ as though Christ were divided For they all should have kept the one Head Christ without mentioning any Man's Name in this Matter For as Peter also said in Acts 4.12 There is no other Name but that of Christ Jesus by which Men can be saved then say I of Necessity there can be no other Rock And whereas this Imaginer would make something for Peter's Supremacy from his being named first often in Scripture when the Apostles are mentioned I say though it were always as he says it makes nothing at all for his purpose but is a meer childish empty Conceit not worthy a Man much less one professing Religion to talk on for some of them must be mentioned first but that thus mentioning Peter in Scripture had any such Intention in it as he here Dreams of I and not only I but all Saints with me do utterly deny And as for the word Supremacy it is inconsistent with the Nature of true
true Standing and ever Continuing Worship of God which is in Spirit and Truth For saith Christ God is a Spirit and they that Worship him must do it in Spirit even in his own Spirit and Truth So then they that are in the Flesh the Carnal Mind cannot Perform this Worship and so cannot Please God but a Carnal-minded One can observe your Days whether Fasts or Feasts and say all your Prayers and do all your Devotions which you are outwardly Exercised in from the one end of the Year to the other and so get a Name yet this avails nothing to the Kingdom of God Nay Paul the Apostle speaks further If I give all my Goods to Feed the Poor and my Body to be Burnt and have not the Love of God the true Charity Understanding within to Purge thy Heart from Sinful Self in the matter it is nothing For true Christians do not do good Works noâ— suffer for well doing that they may merit Salvation thereby but being saved freely by Grace through the Redemption which is in Christ Jesus they do good Works from the Heavenly Nature of that Holy Root that bears them and brings them forth as good Trees to Glorifie God in their Bodies and Souls which are his Tit. 3.8 And the Apostle Charging Titus to Exhort Believers to good Works was not because they were Saviours but because they were Profitable to Men as well as the Prophets And as for our Religion which the World and all the outside Professors of it look so slightly at and speak so Contemptibly of we would have you as well as the rest to know that it is truly Ancient Catholick Christian and Apostolical as having its Rise and Foundation in and from the Eternal Word which is Christ in us the Hope of our Glory whom the Apostle to the Colossians Preached as a Mystery formerly hid but then Revealed to the Gentiles even Christ in the Flesh the Hope of their Glory through Faith in his Name and this is God's Foundation the Foundation of Christ's Church another Foundation can no Man lay than this which God hath laid and this is the Rock not Peter but Christ who Peter by the Revelation of the Father Confessed unto And so through Faith in this Word Christ the Foundation and Rock of all the Righteous that ever were or ever shall be do we deny all the false Faiths and Works of all who have gotten the Name but want the Nature of true Christian People and so in the true Faith which gives Victory over the World and in the Name of Christ which is above every Name do we separate from them and meet together to Worship God in Spirit and Truth as he Requires us and his Blessed Presence in the midst of us according to Promise do we abundantly feel and witness to the great Rejoycing and Establishing of our Souls in Righteousness when thus met together And therefore do we Exhort all that Name Christ whether call'd Papists or Protestants to have Fellowship with us because our Fellowship is thus truly with the Father and the Son Therefore Awake Awake stand up from your Dead Faculties and Dead Worships that Christ who is the true Everlasting Way you may walk in and Worship in where no Uncircumcised or Unclean in Heart can come and if this you do not believe and bow your Heart accordingly to obey let me tell you as one who hath received Mercy to be Faithful you can never be Established with the Establishment of the Righteous for this is the Day that burns as an Oven where in all the Proud Wicked and False Professors and Confessors must be as Stubble and neither Root nor Branch must be left them because they will not have him the true Promised Seed and Heir of all things to Reign and Sway his Righteous Scepter in them and on them O! Look up to the Lord in a Trembling Soul and True Contrite Spirit to find Favour in his sight before the Door be shut and you stand without saying Lord Lord open to us And he Answer you in his Wrath because of your Unbelief and Disobedience saying Depart from me I know you not Workers of Iniquity for all are Workers of Iniquity in their highest Performances and greatest Conceits of themselves whose Works are not wrought in God that Spirit and Holy Power that Cleanses the Heart from all Sin and so brings Life to Light for God to be Praised in for the Dead cannot Praise him So consider what I say and be not Proud lest your Bands be made strong and your Feet stumble and then Fall upon the Dark Mountains where you have been too long Wandering Neither be so Foolish as to say This is but a Quaker who hath gotten some new Upstart Religion or so for in good Earnest I tell you the Truth which will stand when all Deceit and Devices of Men of corrupt Minds will come to naught for in the true Poverty of my Spirit hath the Lord according to Promise manifest his Blessed Kingdom in me and the pure Hunger and Thirst of my Soul which was after him and his Righteousness that he Graciously satisfied And therefore am Constrained in pure Love to your Souls to invite you as well as others to come out of the Prodigal State into the Heavenly Fathers House Christ Jesus as himself said My Father is in me and I in him and as the Apostle said It pleased the Father that all fulness should dwell in him for in this House and no where else is there Bread enough true Living Bread for the Hunger of the Immortal Soul as he said of himself in John 6. before any thing was spoken concerning the Bread and Wine at his last Supper I am the Living Bread the Heavenly Bread and when the Hearers Carnally Questioned How he could give them his Flesh to Eat he told them The Flesh Profiâ—ed nothing it was the Spirit that Quickened So come away Come away from your Carnal Conceivings of a Heavenly Man the Lord from Heaven to be Comprehended in a little Earthly Bread or Wine seeing the Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens contain him not much less outward Temples and outward Elements of Bread or Wine For unto his Light that is night you which shineth in your Dark Hearts though your Darkness Comprehend it not must you come and there wait for the Day to dawn in you or these Mysteries of his Kingdom you can never truly Know but in your Darkness grope and stumble for ever as People without Eyes and though this Heavenly Seed the Word the Light appear little in you yet despise it not for in it is the Blessing and if you receive it and in it abide you will know all this and it will work in you as Leaven in Meal till your whole Lumpâ— ' Heavenly Sweet and Pure and so as Christ said If thy Eye be single to wit single in and to the Lord in his Light to Believe and Walk then thy whole