Coherence in Matter and Intelligibleness of Language to all Nations which may render them such a Rule Besides it is more then probable that much of the Writings of the New Testament are lost from Luke ' s Word 's in the beginning of his History where he tells us that he was but ONE OF THE MANY who did set forth a Declaration of those things which were most surely believed amongst them even sayes he as they delivered them unto us which from the beginning were Eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word For it must be considered when Luke writ his Narrative that John's History was not in being and some will have it that Luke wrote before Mark But whether it be so or no certain it is that Mark and Matthew could not make up those many that took that Work in hand neither can we think he should call Matthew and Mark 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifie with the Athenians a Multitude for a certain Learned Man will have it That no better Greek was spoken then that wherein Luke wrote his History That those Narratives were not Apocriphal but at least of equal Authority with his dedicated to Theophilus his own words tell us For those that writ were such as related what they received from Eye-witnesses and the first Ministers of the VVord Besides which there were in the Apostles Age and the two following Centuries several Writings reputed genuine which either dyed out of the World through that Neglect brought upon them by the Advantage some accounted Hereticks might make of them in Defence of their Opinions or stifled by the subtilty of the Romish Church being more expresly opposite to her growing Superstition and Grandeur And for such Writings as still remain among us methinks it should not be unknown to a Man of J. Faldo's Pretences to Learning how much the Authority of several of them has been questioned by some and exploded by others though never by any of us particularly the Epistle to the Hebrews the Epistle of James second and third of John second of Peter Jude the Revelations and with some Matthew's History it self has not escaped the like Censure Of which Reader thou hast an Account at large in that Notable French-Man Dallaeus De usa Patrum and a late Discourse mainly directed against the Roman Church entituled Christoph Christophori Sandy Nucleas Historiae Ecclesiasticae I would not any from hence should repute me so Impious as to endeavour to weaken the Testimony of Scripture or beget any the least Doubt of the Doctrine thereby declared only upon our Adversary's Principles which so strongly oppugn'd the Doctrine of Revelation or Inspiration I must take leave to conclude in his Name and upon his Principles that the VVord of God is imperfect and a great part of the Rule of Faith and Life and Judge of Controversie is lost and that he has no more Reason to believe the Truth of those great things related in that part of the Scriptures yet remaining then any Legend at Rome For exclude Revelation and what Ground has he for his Faith besides Tradition and what Evidence can he give us upon his Principles of the Truth of the former and Falshood of the latter These Councils and Synods who collected and canonized them he accepts for one part and rejects for the other Again he trusts their Judgment in picking and chusing and yet rejects their Interpretation as if it were not so difficult to relish Genuine from Spurious Scriptures as when rightly discerning them to be such to understand them which is an absolute Contradiction For how should they know true from False and not understand the True That Council which made the Writings of the New Testament Canonical left out the Revelations as Apocriphal yet I hope J. Faldo accepts that as heartily and unquestionably as the rest And that Council which took in the Revelations and made it first Canonical brought in with it the Books of Tobi Judith c. which J. Faldo I suppose with all his Brethren rejects as Apocriphal Thus are meer Men and the Judgments of such Councils as he otherwise rejects his Rule for believing the Scriptures that remain to be Canonical if it be proper to say the first is the Rule of his Canon which is too short and the other which is superfluous as by his Account My next Question is What was his Rule for believing those Councils I am sure he must have been without all other then a Willingness to believe so because they said so which how like this is to his Papist unto whom he would resemble us let all sober Protestants consider I cannot see how he is able to oppugn any thing they say upon Tradition who mounts no higher for his Assurance then Tradition and such too as rests mostly within their Hands But if it shall be granted us that to know Scripture to have been given forth upon Inspiration Men must have Recourse to Inspiration then not so much Councils and Synods as the Inspiration of the Almighty which gives certain Understanding is our Rule in the Case as well saith the Assembly of Divines in their Confession of Faith chap. 1. § 4. The Authority of the holy Scripture for which it ougâ—t to be believ'd and obeyed depends not on the Testimony of any man or Church but only upon God who is Truth it self the Author thereof And since J. Faldo himself confesseth the Spirit necessary to the Vnderstanding of the Scripture which implies the Insufficiency of the Scripture to give that Understanding of it self the Spirit must be the Rule of our Vnderstanding the Scripture as it was before the Rule of our Faith concerning the Divine Authority of Scripture For the Light of the Interpreter and not the Thing interpreted is the Rule both of Faith and Practice which is undeniably evident from the reconciling of seeming Contradictions If the meer Letter of the Scripture were to be followed no Man could ever make them meet in the same Truth The many Different Perswasions at this Day about Religion prove this whose respective Authors and Abettors think it no mean Advantage to their Cause that they hold the Scriptures to be their Rule But such as come unto the Spirit of God know and believe the Truth as it is in Jesus David ' s Key that opens and none shuts is given unto them and the Secrets of their God remain with them This reconciles those seeming Contradictions and leads through the Greatest and Deepest Truths mentioned in Scripture without the least Doubt or Stumble This is the Super-excellent Benefit of the New-Covenant Administration the Promise of the Father the Instructer Leader and Comforter of all God's Children And for a further Account of which I refer the Reader to my Book entituled The Spirit of Truth Vindicated from pag. 16. to pag. 47. and Reason against Railing from pag. 24. to pag. 46. To prove his former Charge he produces this Passage out of James Naylor
more I that live but Christ in me that is The Apostle had no Life in him in any sense Would this be good Doctrine But more openly do the Words of Christ lay to the Exception of such Cavillers 'T is not I that speak but the Father in me Again It is not you that speak but the Holy Gost in you For after J. Faldo's Parapharase we must either deny that Christ or his Apostles spoak those words or confess that they contradicted themselves in saying they did not speak when they did or lastly He must acknowledge to us That such Teachings and Speakings are not the Teachings and Speakings of Men but of God by and through Men. Let him first see if he can reconcile himself to these Scripture-Passages so pertinent to our Purpose and leave off his silly Shifts as easily confuted as discovered Upon my saying That we do believe that there is One and but One Universal Church the Ground and Pillar of Truth and that is in God and that the Members of it are washed in the Blood of the Lamb and grafted into the True Vine bringing forth Fruit unto Holiness p. 113. he thus replyes and I beseech my Reader to consider it Reply p. 59. If he own no other Church but this which is the Character of the invisible Church he owns not a Gospel-Church whose Order and Frame is according to the Doctrine of the Apostles and Practice of the Saints in the New-Testament Rejoynder VVe are beholden to him for this May we ever meet with such kind Adversaries It seems then my Definition hath nothing to do with the Gospel-Church VVhat is it but to say that the Gospel-Chruch is not the Pillar of Truth The Gospel-Chruch is not washed in the Blood of the Lamb The Gospel-Chruch is not grafted into the true Vine that Men may be in the Truth washed in the Blood of the Lamb grafted into the true Vine bring forth Fruit unto Holiness and yet no wayes concered in the Gospel-Church in short the Gospel-Church is not the Vniversal Church nor the invisible Church a Gospel-Church and what is his Reason if any there can be for all this pernicious and Anti-christian Doctrine Because a Gospel-Church is one whose Order and Frame is according to the Doctrine of the Apostle and Practice of the Saints Worse and worse it seems then in J. F's Sence that the Order and Frame the Doctrine of the Apostles brought the Church of Christ to and the Practice of the Saints in the New Testament had nothing to do with the Pillar of Truth dwelling in God being washed in the Blood of the Lamb grafted in the true Vine and bringing forth Fruit unto Holiness What Sort of impious Gibberish is this For according to his Notion of the Gospel-Church the most Satanical Crew may as well be of that Church as the best of Christians since the External Order at most but the Form of Godliness was and is imitable and imitated by arrant Hypocrites By this Argument Elias and the Seven Hundred who had not bowed their Knees to Baal so invisible as Elias himself knew not of them were Schâ—s maticks or Infidels to the then Jewish Church being without all Visible Church Policy or Order and the Jews that had it though Apostatized must have been God's Legal Church It will also follow that for above 1200 Years together since Christ's time there hath been no Gospel-Church yet Gospellers as their Enemies have called them which were to grant to the Roman-Catholicks all they Desire What was that Church that fled into the Wilderness It must either be the Gospel-Church or not the Gospel-Church If not the Gospel-Church then not the Christian and consequently the Antichristian-Church But that could not be because she fled from Antichrist If the Gospel-Church then may a Church be Gospel without punctuallity in visible Order for it is notorious by all Story the Remnant of the Woman's Seed who have born a faithful Testimony against the Spirit of Antichrist in their Sack-Cloth and Wilderness Estate have been destitute of that Visible Order Indeed I hitherto thought that a Gospel-Church constituted necessary external Order and not that meer external Order constitutes the Church Gospel or Evangelical But John Faldo sayes No who seems not to scruple at the Word Church but to play upon the Word Gospel as if external Order and Gospel were synonimous or of equal force whereas the Gospel is called in Scripture The Power of God to Salvation from that Spiritual Redemption it efficatiously worketh in them that receive it from the Bondage of Corruption under which they have fruitlesly laboured which is the Reason and a good one too why it signifieth Glad-Tidings since nothing can be more Joyous to a weary and heavy-loaden Sinner then to be eased of his former Iniquities by Remission and purged from the Nature and Habits of it out of the Soul by the Operation of this Heavenly and Everlasting Gospel which worthy Christopher Goad Right Spirit of Christ pag. 17. calls the forming or bringing forth of Christ in us What is all our Adversary hath said but to make Remedies against or Condescension to the Weakness of the Church's Infancy as sayes honest W. Tindal in his Works p. 9. 436 438. the only great Constitutes of a Gospel-Church By which he denyes a Gospel-Church to have been antecedent to that External Order and consequently that the Believers were not a Gospel-Church when met together on the Day of Penticost not long after since the Gospel had been many years preached Multitudes converted and many baptized by the One Spirit into the One Body of true Gospel-Fellowship before ever those Epistles were written by the Apostle Paul either to the Church at Corinth or to Timothy in which only External Order is mentioned Nay at this rate he hath Unchurched every Party in England but one if yet one may be excepted for if External Order only constitutes a Gospel-Church every Party in England differing greatly in their External Order it must follow that none but one if any one can have any just Pretence to a Compleat Gospel-Church consequently Mungrils He still forgets what he promised that None of them were further concerned against the Quakers then Vindicated Howbeit herein they may hold him excused that he hath equally unchurched Himself and these he preacheth to in Company with all other Parties in England being out of that Order But I intreat the Reader to consider what a Monster he hath made of Christ who describeth him with two such Bodies to one Head one Invisible the other Visible one washed in the Blood of the Lamb grafted into the true Vine bringing forth Fruit unto Holiness Qualifications hid from the Eye of the World as worthy John Bradford told T. Weston as in B. Martyr p. 104 312. That the Church of Christ is Invisible to him that hath not a Spiritual Eye The other constituted of People no matter how Vnregenerated if submitted to
more Spiritual Nature and Dignity then the Flesh Christ took of the Seed of Abraham for he was made the high Priest of the second Covenant was without beginning of Dayes or End of Life Fourthly Because Christ himself magnifieth the Spirit above the Flesh They look not farther then his Body or Flesh as it was visible to the World and he appointed them to look farther yea to his Flesh and Blood spiritually which is Meat indeed and Drink indeed being that Living Bread which came down from Heaven that who eats thereof shall live forever Joh. 6. 48 to 58 63. And those that see not through and beyond that visible Body of Flesh which was the Vail which the eternal Word took to trasact and represent as in a common Person that which every Child of God ought measurably to witness in his own particular unto the beholding and partaking of the divine Widom Power and Righteousness that dwelt therein which are Meat indeed and Drink indeed unto every hungry and thirsty Soul they are not yet come to the chief Corner-Stone that is Elect and Pretious but are carnal not knowing the Scriptures nor the Power of God Mat. 22. 29. Fifthly Christ Jesus lay'd far more Weight upon the Coming of the Comforter or himself in his second and spiritual Appearance in them among whom he bodily conversed then upon the Continuance of his bodily Presence Joh. 16. 7. intimating that he intended a more spiritual Communion with them they in him and he in them even as he was in his Father his Father in him chap. 17 21 23. a Fellowship beyond what they had already known how could it otherwise have been expedient as the Text expresseth it if the Change from his visible to invisible Presence had not been both more glorious and advantageous His Disciples believed him for the Words he spoak Chap. 16. 30. But ver 31. 32. Jesus answerd them Do you now believe Behold the Hour cometh yea is now come that ye shall be scattered every Man to his OWN as much as if he had said You shall then know me and believe in me upon a more clear and certain Ground when you shall have received thus of my Fulness and Grace for Grace Joh. 1. 16. and be scattered to it which is hard to be done while I stay in this Capacity among you therefore it is expedient that I go away as to my bodily Presence Joh. 16. 7. on which you have such great Dependence but I Christ will not leave you comfortless I will come a Comforter unto you Chap. 14. 3 18 19 20. For lo I am with you alwayes even to the End of the World Mat. 28. 20. this is the Christ of God Sixthly Because the Apostle Paul desired not thence forth to know Christ after the Flesh but spiritually as he was the Son of God revealed in himself 2 Cor. 5. 16. Gal. 1. 15 16. and as the Apostle counted all other Knowledge Dross Dung to that of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ reveal'd in him so was he not contented that the Galatians should rest in a fleshly Knowledge of Jesus Christ but travelled in Birth with them like a faithful Witness of the inward Work of God a second time until Christ was formed in them Gal. 4. 19. who doubtless was the true Christ Seventhly Because that Flesh of Christ is called a Vail but he himself is within the Vail which is the Holy of Holyest whereinto Christ Jesus our High Priest hath entered Hebr. 10. 20 21. And as he descended into and past through a suffering State in his fleshly Appearance and returned into that State of Immortality and Eternal Life and Glory from whence he humbled himself which was and is the Holy of Holiest then obscur'd or hid by his flesh or body the Vail while in the World so must all know a Death to their Fleshly Wayes and Religions yea their Knowledge of Christ himself after the Flesh or they stick in the Vail and never enter into the Holy of Holyest nor come to know him in any Spiritual Relation as their High and Holy Priest that abides therein Eighthly Because that Christ lives and dwells in the Hearts of his Children Joh. 14. 23. chap. 15. 5. chap. 17. 21. Coloss 1. 27. which cannot be said of the Outward Body of Christ Therefore I cannot by any means believe that the meer visible Flesh and Body constitutes Christ though I shall confess that respecting the Administration and the Service of that Holy Body fitted and quallified of God as an Instrument to usher introduce and bring it forth into the World it may very well have attributed to it the Name Christ being so nearly related But rather that Divine Nature Wisdom Power Righteousness Grace and Truth of which he is the Fulness whose transcending Glory was vailed by that Body of Flesh he wore and was only let forth in that Day as any were capable of beholding and receiving it which dwelt therein And those who at this Day do seed upon the History of the Bodily Appearance yet honourable in its place know not a breaking through the Vail by witnessing a Measure of the same Divine Wisdom Power Righteousness Grace Truth revealed and born forth in themselves they are but carnal and fleshly Christians being unacquainted with the Formation of the Christ of God in themselves which is the opening of the Mystery of Christ God manifested in the Flesh and Christ abiding the Hope of Glory in the Souls of his People This distinction friendly Reader of Christ and his Body is very unpleasant to me but I am thrust into it by the loud Clamours of our Adversary against us as too short he rests our words so as to rebuke his fond Absurdities I hope sufficiently detected and which was more in my Eye and indeed lay hardest upon my Spirit to oppose and defeat his Carnal Objections against the Glorious Christ of God for by his vehement Out-cries at us as Persons denying the Christ of God because we rather chuse to call that Body that was prepared of God the Body of Christ then Christ himself to beat People off at once from hearkening after our Doctrine of the Spiritual Second Coming of Christ into the Souls of Men for if his Doctrine be true Christ doth not really dwell in his Children thereby depriving the Children of Men from the most Heavenly Enjoyment and Priviledge God hath laid up for them that fear him For I am bold to affirm and that in the Name of the only True and Wise God The True Church is become Christ's Body and he the Divine Wisdom Power and Righteousness lives reigns and puts forth himself in and by her and that all those who come not thus to experience the Christ of God to dwell in them their King Prophet and High Priest who is without Beginning of Dayes and End of Life they are ignorant of God's Christ do stick in the
IN his former Book he charged us with the Sin of Idolatry his Argument lay thus Those who own and profess that to be God which is not God are gross Idolaters But the Quakers do so in professing the Light within and the Soul of every Man to be God Therefore Idolaters The Testimonies upon which he insisted I faithfully and fully considered in above Seven Pages of Sober Answer he returns me about Three in Defence of his Charge not giving above a Dozen Lines of what I writ and those made up of Scraps rather contracting what he said before then making any substantial Reply to them But however I will be just to him Thus he begins Reply p. 84 85. To my Charge of Idolatry he answers as one that intended to confirm not confute it His very Denyals implying a large Grant of the Question p. 192 193. We do forever renounce any such Principle as that the Soul of Man simply as such is the very Essence and Being of God Then it is with him the very Essence or Being of God though not because it is the Soul of Man Rejoynder No such Matter But it is plain how much the Man is upon the Ketches His Argument led me to such an Answer for he calls it The Soul or Spirit of a Man which is a constitutive Part of a Man pag. 114. I was therefore led by him to write in that Abstract Sense which thus far makes for him in case he can maintain his Charge that the Idolatry would be the grosser Besides God is the Soul or Life of the Soul therefore there was a Necessity for such a Distinction Reply p. 85. W. P. pag. 193. We never did do nor shall assert the God that made Heaven or Earth to be comprehendible within the Soul of Man so that when we say the Light is within any we do not intend the whole Being of Light All that W. P. denyes here is but God's being so in the Soul of Man as that he is no where else or nothing else yet allowing the Soul and Light within to be God essential Rejoynder It were heartily to be wished we had nothing but Ignorance to charge him with in this Passage but methinks he would not have us to take him for a Man of so little Understanding as he hath need to have that writes so much Falshood and does not know it First He hath dropt the most substantial part of my Answer in the middle Secondly These Passages relate not to the Soul but to the Light upon occasion of a place he cited out of G. Fox the younger therefore not applicable to the Soul yet by him as well applyed to the Soul as to the Light Thirdly He sayes All that I deny in those words he quoted out of my Answer is only God's being so in the Soul of Man as that he is no where or nothing else which if he had only said it of the Light it would be no Contradiction to my Principle or the Truth for the Light is as well on the Earth as in the Heavens and in my Chamber as in the Firmament without any Error in Physicks and so may God whom in my Answer I called the great Sun of Righteousness that caused his Spiritual Light to arise and shine into the Souls of Men be God as well within as without the Soul for where-ever Divine Light is God is and where God is Divine Light is Howbeit we do not call the Manifestation of Light God though the Manifestation of God Fourthly His saying That I yet allow the Soul and Light within to be God essential is a down-right Falshood as with respect to the Soul it is nigh two pages before that I considered his Charge against us about the Soul What shall I call then his thrusting of it in here which cannot be concerned in the very Nature of the Answer as thus appears If the Soul be God God is comprehended within the Soul and is no where or nothing else but Soul and where the Soul is An Absurdity yea a Blasphemy never rightly to be inferred from any thing I ever said or writ thus scandalously flung upon my Answer by J. Faldo for want of a better Reply I cannot think that ever man adventured under his Pretences of Religion so knowingly to pervert wrest and misapply Men's Words about Doctrines of the greatest Importance This shows he values Credit more then Conscience who undertakes to fasten a Blasphemous Consequence untruly on my words lest he should be thought to have charged us beyond what he could prove but his Weakness bewrayes his Malice For if the Soul may be God and yet I deny that God may be nothing else his very Words in my Name then may the Soul be God and God the Soul and yet God something else and that something else God When or where did I ever give Occasion for such Biasphemish Gibberish Yet this is the Result of what he dares tell the World is my Meaning I may say the same respecting Locallity or Place for what Man not stark Mad would say the Soul is God yet deny not but that God may be else-where which J. Faldo also makes though an express Contradiction to his wrests a piece of my Meaning for unless God may be divided from God where-ever he is the Soul is if the Soul be God and so one Man is in another and every Man â—biquitary or every where at the same time Friendly Reader none of this Blasphemy and Nonsence belongeth to me therefore I return it to the True Parent to maintain it as he is able But he would have the VVorld believe that of 23. Citations out of acknowledged Quakers I did but nibble a little at five of them I think him not worth proving a L that have already so many times done it upon unquestionable Ground in this Discourse besides I should be necessitated to transcribe my whole Answer but I beseech this Kindness of the Reader that he would not think his Time lost in perusing the 20th Chapter of my Answer where he may see himself if I have only nibled perhaps he will have a better Opinion of my Endeavours I shall have Occasion here to touch upon some of them and no more yet enough to show my Adversary's unfair Dealing Reply To Fox Junior's who calls the Light the Eternal God which created all Things In his continued Discourse personating the Light he calls it the Light in you me the Light in them which P. would evade by saying I granted that in the first part within Man was not mentioned Rejoynder Had I said no more then this it might have past for an Evasion But to pass over a page and a half of pertinent Answer to his Application of both Passages out of G. F. and then say I evaded them by urging his Grant that within Man was not mentioned in the first Passage is to act the Shifter with a Witness especially when the little Part he quotes was