three Attributes We cannot say the Son of God to be a Property or Attribute we cannot say an Attribute of Divine Nature was made Flesh we cannot say three Properties appeared in our Saviours Baptism or that we are baptised in the Name of three Properties Therefore ye may see we are not so far agreed as you said if you will have us to be agreed you must come to us for we declare we cannot go to you that 's the easiest and surest way of the two for we are tyed by a Revelation and may go no farther than it doth allow us but your Human Reason is a Latitudinarian which can stretch a great way we may not we cannot go beyond the bounds which God in his Word hath prescribed us but ye are Free-willers and at liberty to day your Reason may teach you one thing to morrow another for as you say your selves a Doctrine which at one time may be convenient may be otherwise when Circumstances of Times shall alter but with us no Circumstances can alter our Heavenly Doctrine Out of this you may see how all this while I have not been fighting against the Man in the Moon or as you very civilly express it making a Rod for a foolish Back of my own or to speak home a Fagot to roast my own Ribs But upon a surer ground I may say he hath been in a Dream or in a hot violent Fit for he hath been striking on all sides and spared none that lay in his way as for me I am the Man and therefore in the Fit having forgotten the Cause he hath at me almost in every Page and in one place he admires at my extravagant Zeal who would have the Socinians burnt for their complyance with the Church of England If so then indeed there were cause to admire but there is true ground of admiration that he thinks it so but really nothing is to be admired at either in or from him for he calls me a Papist a Calvinist and a Zealous one a Socinian nay a Real one He saith he is no Socinian but I am when he writes for and I against them this is a Hocus Pocus 't is and 't is not surely there is cause to suspect something is out of order within that brains of his or an extraordinary brazen-fac'dness however let him as he can secure all this from Contradiction Et erit mihi magnus Apollo When I think upon such Men as pretend to alter the Nature of things I am put in mind of what a famous Popish Author saith That the Pope can make that to be Sin which is no Sin and that not to be Sin which is Sin so do these Men who would seem to be much against Popery yet follow several of their Maxims and would make that to be a Nonsense which is good Sense and that to be no Contradiction which is and so on the contrary If these Men themselves be not Mysteries as one calls me their dark Sentences are all this while the Cause is safe enough But Calvin not so how roughly doth he handle him on all occasions if he were alive he would not be good to give to Dogs tho' neither he nor a dosen more such one 's would be worthy to carry his Books I confess 't is to me and ought to be a wonder to others to find how mad some Men in the World are against that faithful Servant of God once in his Life and Conversation and now in his Works and Labours an Eminent Instrument in his Hand as for Instruction so at first in the Work of Reformation This is a Fit of Rage which several Years since out of Envy some in Parts much inferiour to him began to be possessed of and by Men of the same Kidney hath been propagated to this very day whereof the Authors of the Two Letters are real Instances for to speak in Paul's words they are exceeding mad against him and as they are against his Memory and Person now far out of their reach so they are broken loose and so hot and fiery against the Doctrines he taught that all the Water of the Leman Lake could hardly cool them what they call Calvinism they adorn with these Epithets Proud sowr and fiery Qualifications Calvinistical Impatience and many such more whereof this Orthodox is one The Heresie of the Tritheists is not worse than uncharitable and ill natur'd Calvinism Therein I shall conclude with this In truth I think Heylin was over modest to esteem a Presbyterian that is a Calvinist worse than a Papist Here is your Protestants and as if this had not been enough his own venom he throws out in the same place for my part I esteem a Christian from whatsoever Sect denominated not excepting the Socinians more honourable than a Persecuting Calvinist Tho' the word Persecuting had been left out it had been all one to that Christian Righteous Soul of his But as for Socinus he was a most excellent Man very sound in the Faith and who if we will believe this Man hath by his Works laid a great Obligation upon the World and he subscribes to what one of the Gang said of him That none since the Apostles hath deserved better of the Christian Religion so that a Man may more avail himself by reading his Works than by perusing all the Fathers together with the Writings of more modern Authors This People either never read or care not for what Paul saith Let your Moderation be known unto all men for they observe it neither for Socinus nor against Calvin but having elsewhere had an occasion in few few words to do this faithful Servant of Christ some Justice I shall leave off speaking of his Person to take some brief notice of his Works That which most nettles his Enemies are the Doctrines about Grace and Providence mentioned in the Two Letters which they call Calvinism But if they would not so proudly despise all Antiquity but peruse some of Augustin's Works who lived 1200 Years before Calvin they might find he was a Calvinist so were Hilarius Prosper Fulgentius and others who so long before he was born could as well as he did afterwards find those same Doctrines in the Word of God and accordingly the beginning progress and end of our Salvation and from first to last we attribute to God's free Grace which in that matter we can never yield too much nor too little to any thing of our own we do not like the Pharisee boast in our Prayers that we Fast twice a Week give Tithes and are not Extortioners Unjust and make no Comparison with our Neighbours as being better Men than they but we say God be merciful to us miserable Sinners for we are commanded to trust in the Lord with all our hearts and forbidden to lean unto our own understanding which is as good as to say depend not upon your own Reason therefore in any
foregoing things are serious and of moment and the better to set out that Buffoon's Trick of his he goes backward to the Dissenters of the last Age who saith he baited the Word unmercifully I see as to Time we must help his Mâ—mory for that which was about between 40 and 50 years ago within this same Century he calls the last age then he omits the chief ground of Exception against it which was an Oath in the case Men were made to swear to an c. but here his righteous Conscience as he calls my Soul is not put to the Rack but seeing he presses me to declare what I meant by c. after Atheism Deism Profaneness Immorality Idolatry whereby I also pointed at Popery I now fill it up with Davidism whereunto I might add Ebionism Cerinthism Arianism Photinianism Sabellianism Samosatenianism Macedonianism Pelagianism Donatism ye see how big-bellied was my c. to contain so many things and more too for Socinianism I look upon as a Sink into which fall all virulent Humours against the Person and Grace of our blessed Lord and Saviour as in the Body a diseased and infected Place draws most if not all corrupted Humours to it self and as your Religion is a kind of Confusion and ye are great Latitudinarians so to strengthen your selves you reject none but receive all Comers into your Communion which you would set up for the only School of Wit Parts and Learning and this in part was my Meaning when I said how to promote your Cause you would be ready to admit among you not only all Excrements of Christian Religion but even Jews and Mahometans for you think the way to Heaven broad and easie there being as ye say but very few things necessary to Salvation to be done and believed contrary to what our Saviour said Strait is the gate and narrow is the way which leads unto Life and his Apostle saith the Righteous is scarcely saved By what I said it may appear whether my Charge was disagreeing false and incredible or whether the Attendance I gave Socinianism doth not belong to it Now I come to the two ways whereby you think Socinianism may get clear of the Charge of Idolatry the first you say is by the help of her own Logick the second by virtue of the Authority of the Church its Logick is refined enough according to this World as far as Mode and Figure can stretch you will if Barbara cannot do may be Celarent Cesare Festino or some Bocardo will all these are at the command of your Logicians then Sophism as Sorites or the like will come in apace and in course and when an Argument in its own Mode and Figure cannot do then you will be mincing for out of your own Letters I find ye are excellent in that Art now your Logick is this if nothing else can serve you will say ye are no Socinians ye take it an Injury to be so called for ye say ye are very injuriously termed Socinians yea twice in the same Page so ye positively deny your selves to be Socinians do ye say so out of shame or out of fear one would think there is cause for both Men who call themselves and pretend to be Christians should indeed be ashamed to go about robbing Christ of his due and afraid of Punishment if not from Men yet at last from God the Avenger of his Honour not only if we may believe him he is no Socinian but saith he if there be any in England 't is more than I know sometimes some Men in the World know not themselves however they will not confirm their Denyal with an Oath They will not be Socinians yet when they are charged with a Denyal of Revealed Religion they appeal to the Racovian Catechism which is the Summary of Socinianism this playing fast and loose in matters of Religion is not to be endured however they are brought to deny themselves and so they may be allowed to deny their Master Socinus but why do ye engage in a Cause if you are ashamed to own it hereupon to them we may put the Question which upon the account of the most holy Trinity they put to us a thing is or is not ye are Socinians or ye are not if ye be why are ye such Hypocrites as to deny it if not why do you concern your selves for them let them maintain their own Quarrel and defend their own Cause and why do ye take up the Cudgels for them why in their Defence contrary to good Nature Breeding and Moderation do ye write so passionatly and angrily that one would think your Letters to be dated from Billingsgate if ye be Davidians ye are Socinians still and the worst of them too Sirs 't is not the Change of Name that can alter the thing if ye hold Socinus his damnable Opinions ye are Socinians call your selves never so much by the Name of Vnitarians or what other ye please so this Sophistical Logick of denying your selves to be Socinians cannot do the Work Let us see whether the other which you brag of the Authority of the Church will do 't these Men make use of a great Name with a Design to shelter themselves under it one of them falsly chargeth me with making as he calls it an impudent Reflection but here upon good grounds in his own coin I might turn it upon him and say 't is a piece of transcendent Impudence for such Cattel to call themselves Members of the Church which this doth in as plain Words as can be For I am no Socinian but a Member of the Church of England by Law established So formerly some called themselves the Church which were the Synagogue of Satan and as our glorified Saviour knew them so he knows these I know saith he the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews and are not but do lye and are the Synagogue of Satan he knows them to be Blasphemers Socinians Members of the Church of England then Satan is an Angel of Light for sometimes transforming himself into one those who are a scandal to the Christian Name and would prove a shame to any Church but their own to be Members of our Church then such Members as are rotten and gangreened ought to be cut off and spued out of the Church in case they be in as they pretend they are Members of the Church are her Sons but these can be no natural lawfully begotten but Bastards who are in only to watch an opportunity and time to bring in Thieves and Enemies unnatural Sons who rend their Mother and care not if she were torn in pieces such Sons to the Mother as the Harlot was Mother to the Child whom she pretended to be Mother to tho she was not content she was that the Child should be divided and cut to pieces I hear indeed how some of them are in Orders and actually in the Service of the Church and this I meant when
I said the Enemy and Plague of Socinianism was gotten into the Bowels of the Church the more the Pity and therefore seeing they will not hide themselves for shame here I do humbly desire the Heads and Governours of it to take notice of Socinians boasting to be Members of the Church and care to weed them out Good Lord Men who overthrow the first Article of our Religion of one God in three Persons and the second of two Natures in one Person besides others the Athanasian Creed the the first part of the Litany with several others of the Service Book yet they have the face to call themselves Members of the Church However 't is worth the inquiring into what they ground upon their calling themselves Members of the Church we already have taken notice of one place wherein speaking of themselves in the third Person they say For Peace sake they submit to the Phrase of the Church and own three Persons so they seem not to be much concerned for the Truth to know whether what they or we say be true but they take care of their Safety being as they pretend alarm'd with fear of Fire and Faggot and to save their Bacon therefore I am apt to believe that what they say in relation to this is more out of fear of Punishment than of love for Truth however for Peace sake they are Members of the Church but to dive into the bottom of this Title of theirs of being Members of the Church two Places I am to look into the first is this As for those late English Writers sometimes called Unitarians and very injuriosly termed Socinians they seem desirous to wash their hand of it and their disputing some of the Articles of our Church hath proceeded chiefly from their Apprehension that it would be Idolatry to admit them Thus still under disguise and of a third Person they are those late English Writers who call themselves Vnitarians who seem desirous to wash their hand of Socinianism so 't is only seemingly and in appearance for else what could make them tooth and nail concern themselves so much for Socinians let it be taken notice of how these pretended Members of the Church confess that they disputed some of the Articles of it and these are none of the less fundamental which they suspected as leading into Idolatry and therefore they would not admit them See what Members of the Church these are who publickly and in Print own that some of the Articles of the Church do tend to Idolatry doth not this very thing deserve Punishment according to Law and to justifie their disputing of some of the Articles they would infinuate as if the Church or some part of it had owned they were in the right Therefore upon the prudent Explication which hath been given he doth not name by whom of some obnoxious Terms they wave the Dispute and come in as Brethren This is as good as to say that in our Articles those that are the most Fundamental are in terms justly obnoxious that is to their Cavils And to shew they had cause to take Exceptions an Interpretation hath according to their Sense been given those Articles and so upon their own Terms they are come in as Brethren if they are come in then they were out before and so no Members Thus it seems they had Correspondency in the Church with some who as they term it prudently made way for them to come in Now doth not this Confession justifie what in my Epistle I said Socinianism is gotten into the Church and consequently shew a necessity to turn it out Thus having as he thinks twisted Socinians with the Church he most judiciously draws this Inference and Ironically bids me defiance I hope Mr. Gailhard will not in anger against them impute Idolatry to our Church as by Law established Can any thing in relation to the Church be spoken more insolently in the face of the whole Nation A strange thing indeed tho' nothing may seem strange from Men whose Principles allow them to say and make themselves any thing Like the grievous Wolves which in Sheeps Clothing enter in among the Flock not to feed but to tare it to deceive the blind they come in with Esau's Hands but the Voice is Jacob's yet being known should bring a Curse upon themselves But 't will be strange indeed if such ones be once found out having under the cloak of taking Care of Souls Poisoned them be not cast out by Suspension or Deprivation according to the severity of the Penal or at least of the Ecclesiastical Laws Upon this occasion the Eyes of the whole Nation are fixed upon my Lords the Bishops The other Place which I must take into consideration is this He tells us speaking of me that to deny the Trinity and our Saviours Divinity is as much as in a Man lieth to pull our Religion up by the very roots and quite to overthrow it which saith he that the Socinians do he takes it for granted That they deny the Trinity and Christ's Deity 't is done in the face of the Sun and that these Points are the Foundation of Christian Religion no true Christian will deny and my Inference is good that pulling down the Foundation the Building doth necessarily fall Yet according to the usual way he would mince the matter thus Yet those who are injuriously called Socinians declare that they only dispute some unscriptural Terms with us but are well satisfied with the Sense put upon those Terms and Explications which a considerable majority seem to be agreed in They cannot leave off the ridiculous juggling in their change of Persons for they are those called Socinians who dispute with us that is with themselves so they act both parts put the Question and answer it be the Socinian and Church-men too but the worst is they want Sincerity that whilst they indeed are the Socinian yet would pass for the Church-men Besides they would have the Dispute to be only about Words and so of no Importance thus whether there be Three Persons in the most adorable Trinity and whether the Lord Jesus and the Holy Ghost be truly God they make it to be a Dispute only about a Word and a Trifle What a Confidence is it for such Men so publickly to vent their Impieties Thereupon they declare to be satisfied upon this ground that a considerable Majority of the Church seem to be agreed with them in their Sense so according to this a considerable Majority of the Church is become Socinian Let him that can believe this for my own part I am not so Credulous however I humbly desire of the Church especially of that lesser part which this Man owneth not to be Socinian to mind what he saith so openly and to take it into their serious Consideration I bring it to their Door and there leave it They are highly concerned to take in hand their own Cause as 't is now become I have done