a high degree who serve not their enemies with that measure as they have been and would again be serv'd by them had they power but though Papists are as Antichristian Idolators to them for a Christian Brother may be an Idolator according to St. Paul 1 Cor. 5.11 and they but as stubborn Hereticks at worst to Papists yet they have been never brought to the stake for their unsound opinions and practice by the writs of their own Invention nor to Tyburn ever but for their Treasons against the State They look upon Protestants but as Dogs though far better Christians than themselves But Protestants take them for what they are but have no malice to their persons though they abhor their errours and the severity of our Laws against them is only to secure our selves from their cruelties and unquietness For where Christ and the heart are excluded as in the Romish Church too much naught but burning and destroying all dissenters as Hereticks serves the turn when it is within their power and is never out of their Study and Inclination when it is not And O the malice they shew towards those that revolt from them to the Truth And this wisdom and temper descends not from above but is Earthly Sensual and Devilish as before Jac. 3.15 And what can be the cause of this Hellish Inhumanity towards Christian Brethren but the want and absence of the heart and Conscience or which equally destroys it the giving of it to the Pope instead of Christ whereby a Papist is of a piece with the Pope in all things which yet adds not one Cubit to his Stature nor to his virtue or Graces or humanity or Eternal Protection but he is still on Earth as he was before as a Christian is one with Christ in Heaven and partaker on Earth of his meek and gratious and Heavenly dispositions It 's another-guess perfection to be United to Christ than to the Pope which is the true difference between a Protestant and a Papist the one puts on Christ the other puts on the Pope by their several resignations of their private Wills and Judgements It 's more Heavenly and Divine to be of Christs mind and disposition than of the holy inquisitions ' A mans heart or his Will or his end aâ—e much allyed and ever go together and it ever chuses and adheres either to God or to an Idol And such is the man as his choice of his Lord is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He whose heart and end is joyn'd to Christ and Heaven is Holy and Heavenly as Christ is if to any Creature such as is the Will of the Master will be the Will of his Man also To be a Roman-Catholick therefore makes not a Disciple of Christ but a Mute or a resign'd Vassal of the Pope whose Will and height and carnal Interest must therefore be the Law of Heresie and distance and hatred and damnation with such a one And what crosses the Pope's gain or Authority is laesa Majestas or Ecclesiastical Atheism or high Treason against the Roman Heaven to be vindicated and destroyed by the Angels of that Heaven with utmost zeal and fury And BABYLON is observ'd more zealous and severe for its Idol than SION for its God the reason is for where Christ is out of the heart Offenders find no Mediator or mercy And herein the Popish far out-does the Turkish zeal in cruelty Truth can better breath in Turkie than at Rome and the horns of the Mahometan Antichrist are less curst in this respect than those of the Roman Satan was not a Lyar but a Murderer also from the beginning from whom the Romanists prove their descent as well by their stakes and fire-piles as by their Legends and dispensations And it is remarkable to use conjectures with submission on mystical Scriptures Of the Beast with two horns like a Lamb and speech like a Dragon that its special mark and Character was to make fire come down from Heaven Revel 13.12 13. as of the other Beasts with 7 heads and ten horns to overcome Gods Servants with the Sword v. 1.7 And which of these Beasts is Antichrist and who meant by either is the question 1. It s out of question that with the Ancients the Empire that should succeed the Roman should be Antichrist whether it be the Popish which takes place and precedence of the German or Turkish or both for both de facto have in great part succeeded it 2. That the number 666 pointed at 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is as clear from Jreneus who lived near a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epiphan the Apostolical times to know their key and secret tradition about this mystery Now there are three parts to be considered in the old Roman Empire The Magistracy Militia and the Mitre or its civil Authority its Military Conquests its Heathenish Idolatry It s civil Authority wherein several Kings succeeded it or rather were restored to their own by its fall cannot be Antichristian because Ordain'd and approved by God To be a terrour to evil workers and encouragement to the good Rom. 13.3 But the other two parts of Imperator and Pontifex Maximus might well descend to Antichristian successors by Gods just Judgement to be both a scourge and an intoxicating Cup for degenerate and divided Christians The first probably falling to the share of the Turk who hath made such Conquests over the Saints by his Sword such havock in the Churches of Christ by his Victories v. 7. being the same Beast with the Roman Heathen Empire in effect which Conquered all in like manner with the Sword but was wounded by Constantine and other Christian Emperours but afterwards is heal'd again of that deadly wound v. 3. to whose recovery the â—ope did contribute v. 12. The residence of both being Rome new and old And the special confidence and Character of the Turk being his Sword where with he does all And their Priests never read nor expound their Alcharon in their Mosch's but with a naked b Ricold contra sect Mahomet c. 10. Sword in their hands or hanging by for Terrour And Mahomet Prophesied his Sect should last as long as it could keep the Sword and no longer But the Popes bid as fair to the succession and reviâ—ing of the Heathenish Pontificat of Rome as well as of the Apostate Jewish as both were Enemies tâ— Christianity in the garb of Religion anâ— Ecclesiastical Authority For they wave the name of Bishop used amongst Christians and chuse that of Pontifex in 〈◊〉 with Heathen's only and never met in any Canonical Scripture neither are they deficient in Heathenish Polytheism having errected a Pantheon of as many tutelar Saints and Patrons to be call'd on as there were Gods at Rome withal as the Turk is the Heathen-Roman Power recovered so the Pope is the Image of both v. 15. as well in Empire and Dominion far and wide as in cruelty and shedding the bloud of Christians And yet this Infernal
he was to expect from any who had been Elder If the Gospel be true and Christian this Doctrine of blind obedience which is one of the chiefest pins or props that supports the Fabrick of that Church is false and Antichristian If God be in the World this pernicious Hellish Model that is so contrary thereunto ought to be hiss'd and exploded out of it with zeal and indignation by all Generous and Religious Princes and by every honest man that loves God or his Saviour or mankind But when the Inferiour obeys his Superiour from the heart as unto Christ the one commanding the other observing not what his own heart doth prompt or lead him to but what a conscientious heart directed by Christ gives leave to either and expects not from any other either observance or obedience further than usque ad Aras as far as Christs Law permits then all are right and happy in this Regular obedience in the Lord As I have already and may further shew And indeed without this Rule in my Text to regulate and enliven Quod tibi fieri non vis it self which is the Rule of Rules and the sum of the Scriptures all Societies and enjoyments all converse and friendship would be false irregular and degenerate Friendship it self would be Hollow-hearted Counsels treacherous Promises wind mens tongues full of nought but lyes their hearts of uncleanness and their hands of bloud and unrighteousness Their Justice would be Cruelty their Wealth an Idol their Power Tyranny their fears wild and causeless their Joys and pleasures mean and sordid their desires Feavers their mirth madness their Sorrows Apoplexies their Reasons Vagabond their best works but outward shew their Vertues Scene and Hypocrisie For when the Soul is out of Christ every Action is out of Tune and order and account for as our outward Acts without the heart are frigid and dead and null so the Actions of the Soul it self without an aim after Christ are all impure and illigitimate and null But Christ and the heart super-added to every Action shall give it Truth and Rectitude and life and permanency every thing becomes true and lovely by agreeing and answering to its proper Rule and measure When the heart agrees with Christ its rule and Judge all Hypocrisie and impurity departs when our thoughts agree with such a heart they are cur'd of their vanity when our lips agree with such thoughts and such a heart such a rule and Judge there will be no deceit in them when every Action of our whole man copies out our heart as our heart copies out Christ we recover our Original perfection which consists in agreement to that Idea and Image of God in Holiness and true Righteousness according to which we were created by him and were restored to it by Christ as we fell from it in the fall This is Truth throughout the whole man and Christian and that Truth perhaps which Pilate desired but did not deserve to know from our Saviour For in such Acts and converse which have life in them as from the heart and Sincerity and Holiness as unto Christ the Souls of all men upon trial and experience find Truth and satisfaction and peace of conscience in them and but disappointment and vexation and lies ever in the contrary And Praise and Honour and shame and Infamy from men and Life and Death Eternal from God following close upon the heels of the one and the other are suffrages for this Truth beyond exception And what makes good men makes good Subjects and Rulers by easie consequence Out of Christ all would be uppermost and Supreme and none a Servant or Subject to another from his heart and with his good will whence arise Wars and Rebellion and poysons and steelettoes at opportunities whereof Histories especially Heathenish are so full and some Christian to their greater shame But in Christ our subjection being transferr'd over from men to the Lord our slavery is extinguish'd and our service enobled and made agreeable to our Souls which know no Lord over them but God and Christ and all pride and stubborness and secret murmuring is now turn'd into good will from the heart towards our Superiours whether mild or hard As is expresly taken notice of by the Apostle and with care recommended to Inferiours in a parallel place Ephes 6.7 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with good will doing service to the Lord and not to men The Church makes no alteration in properties Luk. 12.14 or mens vocation 1 Cor. 7.20 much less in Constitutions of Governments or Civil Rights either of Kings or people but leaves all to the Reiglement of Municipal Laws and publick Contracts and local Customes which are secular things to which the Church is dead saving any thing of Conscience or duty to Christ or justice and mercy that may arise in and from them the Alteration therefore the Church makes is in the hearts and Souls of men and not in the outward things themselves It binds all rights and Duties established by Law upon any manner of persons with the bond of Conscience additional to that precedent bond of Law and Civil fear And humane Laws be they never so provident will have their oversights and holes for trangressors to escape if Conscience be not kept up in men which makes that which was a trespass in the outside against the Law to be treason in a Christian in the heart against Christ his Lord and he suffers for his offence not only as a Malefactor before men but as a Reprobate and Rebel in his Conscience to his Saviour Thus St. Paul states the matter of Christian obedience Wherefore ye must needs be subject not only for wrath but also for Conscience sake For whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the Ordinance of God and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation Rom. 13.2 5. If therefore Inferiours would obey their Superiours from the heart as unto Christ according to my Text would there be such fraud in Servants or any sedition or Rebellion or Non-conformity in Christian Subjects towards their Christian Masters and Governours Could they have the heart or Conscience thus to fight against Christ out of a tender Conscience What else is it to be Antichrist and visible Terrene Atheists against visible and Terrene Gods Nothing gives a greater blow to the order of the Universe and more provokes God to try his title of Soveraignty against men to the certain misery of the weaker side than Disobedience and Rebellion to Parents and Princes that on Earth do represent him next to Tyranny and ill example in Princes and Parents themselves It being more stupendiously monstrous and irregular to find Kings that stand for Christ to be Merciless or unholy than Subjects that represent the Creature to be frail and froward More contrary to the course of nature and experience for Parents to be unnatural than Children to be undutiful or Masters to be unjust and cruel than Servants to be false or
Apostolical Rule in my Text in your own hands to measure and Judge as Solomon once did between two Mothers the true and the pretended For a Private Person with God to guide him may judge Infallibly which Church most agrees with God for a wavering eye and a trembling hand having a streight and a stable rule and line to guide it partakes of the stability and streightness that directs it the guide and guided being one and the same person by fiction and agreement And the Roman Catholick themselves as they love to be called cannot be denied to be every Mothers Son as Infallible as the Judge himself or their Church is to whom they give themselves entirely over to be guided by them take therefore in Gods name Gods clear mind and measure and judge impartially with the heart and soul and in the strength of him that guides you Your Holy Mother the Church of England hath nourished you up in a Sound and Orthodox Religion and Worship which you and your Prosterity can understand and therefore say Amen to it from your hearts because you understand it The great pretender of Rome starves her Children at Nurse and all their life time in their own Territories by Politick Ignorance and binds and enslaves their stoutest Champions in chains of darkness and of implicit faith and blind obedience the better to keep them under in Captivity and slavery to serve her unworthy and unnatural designs and to fight against the Truth as the Turk breeds up deluded Janizaries to War and subdue their own Fathers and Mothers and people which absolute and blind subjection of the heart to any man on Earth is Idolatry in the giver and the taker Is it not lamentable to consider how prophane and perfidious the guides of the Church of Rome are towards God and their people committed to their charge and in deceiving the one and mocking the other with a worship in an unknown tongue without the heart and understanding which is therefore a meer nullity by the Divine Doctrine of my Text and by common sense and therefore no worship at all but Idleness and â—â—â—â—ccation approaching to Idolatry Religion without the mind is not Religion or Worship but a shew or Stage-Play or a Counterfeit of Religion as the Scene is of Truth and History where an Actor or a Mimick stands for a Prince as here the shadow for the substance or crossing of the body for the contrition of the soul and all are able to know and understand very well the whole management in both to be a meer divertisement of the fancy only more sufferable on the Stage than in the Church in Gods presence where more sobriety and seriousness of mind is required and nothing else in point of Truth and reality because the Original Persons and parties are absent and wanting there the true Hero and here the Truth of the heart A sincere Protestant is grieved and troubled at every straggling thought and the least deviation of his heart at Prayer in Gods presence as a great and griveous affront and contempt of the Divine Majesty like turning our backs to a Prince while we are speaking to him But our confident Bigots of Rome by their Publick and common pactice maintain and defend that God is best worshipped when he is so affronted and despised and that the total absence of the heart and understanding so there be an outward Opus operatum with lip and breath is no sin at all but right Catholick Devotion most agreeing with the Deity If mumbling Pater Nosters and Ave Maries whether at Church or Closet or at Cards or Plays as Witches do Charms without knowledge or Attention or meaning make good and current Roman-Catholick Devotion then Parrots and Magpyes and Apes may commence Catholick Disciples of the Roman-Catholick Salvation And upon this score perhaps it was that one of the great and Sainted Patriarchs of an order amongst them began to bestow his pains and zeal in Preaching to Birds When men in contrariety to the Apostle in my Text judge it fanatical Innovation to Worship God as Protestants do with the heart and understanding They that so exclude the heart in the first place as needless will they not exclude the Lord likewise in the second place for these two are Correlates take away the one and take away the other also where the heart and the Lord are shut out in the first and second place will not the fear of the Lord be excluded likewise though the beginning of wisdom in the third place And where the fear of the Lord is once banisht from Religion is there any sin or Villany in Soul or Body that such Religious Atheists will boggle at to act and prepetrate at opportunity or temptation when it may with safety be committed and with impunity from the Laws of man It s well that Church exceeds all others in Pardons and Absolutions if such seives hold water for their Principles cut out work enough for Pardons and if their own allowed and best Historians are to be believed the practices of their chiefest Popes come not short of their Principles How deplorable and sad is the condition of such a Church to which no further degree of disorder and misery can be added or imagin'd Nor the Devil drive this nail further to the head than that they should strongly believe themselves to be the sole and only Catholicks salvable and infallible in such gross and damnable Errours And yet upon such holy guides such infallible Rocks the Roman-Catholick Church is built For all with them are bound to believe as the Church that is the Pope believes whom they believe to be infallible For though their lives are often frail and vicious yet their Doctrines or Testimonies for God say they are ever firm and true As if a Vicious life were not an effectual quenching and renouncing of the whole Faith of such a person during such impenitence or as if a Debauch'd person or Atheist were a fit witness for the Christian Faith much less the Judge thereof He that will be Infallible for another ought first to be Infallible for himself and his own Salvation And every man is bound upon his everlasting Peril to be as Infallible as he can for himself and his Brethren But as a Creature no man is or can be Infallible nec vox hominem Sonat but more or less he may be Infallible by help from without according as he is guided wholly or in part by God who is alone Infallible And the issue and whole state of the cause and difference between Protestants and Papists lyes in the right choice and election of their Infallible guide and judge Who this is being the great Question There is no judge under God and Christ the sole judge of quick and dead but the invict Supream Powers himself hath appointed in all Kingdoms and Churches and private breasts Invict Conscience in every private man in all Private and all Eternal concerns Invict
Eve in hearkning to the Serpent against Gods word were the first Types of credulous Papists Christ the reformed Adam in siding with plain Scripture against the glosses of the Serpent was the first example of wary Protestants All Religion and Irreligion consists either in turning from the Creature to God to the exaltation and righting of the Soul or from God to the Creatures to its overturning to be in dishonourable subjection to the body its slave to its great wrong and misery This Novel Supremacy therefore being so manifestly unjust for its matter and trespass upon the rights of Soveraigns and Churches and so ungodly and scandalous for the motive and manner of its prevalence being founded in the like Pride that tumbled the Angels into Hell as Pope Gregory affirms it of his Competitor in the like impatience and despair that keeps them in it And carried on with the like love of lyes and murder and seduction as makes them intrude and wander out into our Air and prevailing upon many by the like Arts either as a Catholick Angel of light to seduce the unwary and superstitious or as a bountiful Prince with glorious offers of Palls and Caps and Dignities to win the proud and servile to comply and worship and terminating in the like everlasting damnation both to them and their followers 2 Thess 2.12 Phil. 3.19 hath enough in it hereby to dis-ingage all sober and considering English-men from any necessary zeal or tye of Conscience to subjugate themselves or betray their Church and Countrey into such dangerous and unworthy slavery Yea it were to be hop'd at first sight to dispose Italian zeal and ambition concern'd if it would but lay hand upon heart either to let us alone to enjoy our Ancient rights without wrong or trouble as all would wish to themselves and therefore ought to permit the same to others or at least to let God and Christ and Catholick Religion alone as not to bring his holy name and glory which is to be honour'd above all we have to countenance their sin and wrong to their just rebuke But that from the character of such an Apostatical Church in Prophecy which is praescient History any regard to the heart and Conscience or fear of Blasphemy is the least to be expected yea the exclusion of the one and admission of the other to be rather alwayes met as the sum and total of such Religion as the practice sufficiently confirms and fulfills the Prophecy For what Herogliphick or Emblem could more lively describe such a Church where at once the Heart and Soul is excluded and yet sanctity and zeal profess'd than that of the beast with two horns like a Lamb and speech like a Dragon Rev. 13.12 For what is any Society of men devoid of Conscience and private judgment and common Justice whose part is suum euique tribuere neminem laedere but a meer rout of Ravenous beasts or as they are describ'd elsewhere men of corrupted minds 1 Tim. 5.6 For where the mind is corrupted and dead and the body alone alive what there remains but a beast in humane shape Of the same Herd are those who are deliver'd over to a reprobate mind or a mind void of judgement like Salt that hath lost its savour or those in the Prophet whose eyes are blinded and their hearts hearden'd that they neither see with their eyes nor understand with their heart Joh. 12.40 For an useless eye is equivalent to no eye and an unconscionable Soul to no Soul at all as a depos'd King is a living man but a dead Prince so a reduc'd Conscience dethron'd by lusts or the Tyranny of any Church or Gods desertion is no Conscience A Soul subject to man more than God is no Soul as are all such who by force or choice are to obey man against the Truth Wherein as was proved at first the master-errour of Popery did consist Men of depos'd Souls or silenc'd Consciences in Scripture account are beasts But the other part of the character or a profession of Holiness and zeal included as well as good Conscience excluded is set forth by the other notes Hornes like a Lamb and Speech like a Dragon That is this beast is as Christ for arrogated Holiness and authority and yet as Satan or the Dragon or Serpent in Paradice for destructive seduction Good God! what a monstrous profession of Christians is here painted which in vulgar blazonry would signifie a Church hearted Beast armed Christ and langued Satan And the two horns and not seven as had the other may note that the Roman Empire had more of Gods blessing and approbation though counted Beast for its violence for God blessed the 7th day but so he did not the second Gen. 1.8 And the Roman Empire enlightned and civil'd the Countries it subdued but far otherwise it was with the Empire of Popery The Roman Religion upon this Prophetical supposition being all Christ without for Satan or the Dragon mostly tips his temptations with Religion and nothing of heart or Soul within is a Sphynx or a riddle itâ—s a Religion and no Religion The last because where there is no heart there can be no Lord no God no Bible no Religion no Salvation The first because the Pope alone serves for all for heart and judgement and God and Christ and Church and Bible and Salvation He declares all Faith allows all Scriptures decides all Controversies and where private Conscience is not to be consulted or regarded nor Scripture without his sense what makes good or evil amongst such but his pleasure only Lyes and Perjuries and Murders and Treasons and Blasphemy in favour of that Church and approv'd by them can be no sins but rather meritorious works by this Hypothesis For how can it be otherwise where there is no place or vote for Conscience to except and all power is in him alone acknowledg'd to approve and judge Beasts or un-soul'd men being not capable of faults or misdemeanours Now how can those be true Christians who are not men and how men who want Souls for where is the Soul if it be given away from Christ to any mortal whatsoever For the hearts and judgements that is the Souls of Papists are absolutely subject to the Pope but of Protestants only to Christ and truth the one are holy from the heart to Christ as Christs servants the other without a heart to their Pope or guide as the Servants of men And this Diminutio Capitis or Moral or Legal Annihilation of the Eternal soul by such a sinful profession of absolute Subjection to a mortal Creature hath the like effect and influence upon mens Acts of Worship and Religion as if it were its Physical and real extinction for not to appear is not to be and not to be valued or regarded is not to appear Not that the soul ceases to act as a soul in this its degradation or to cut out means for ends by its work of reason But that
of the Spirit Charity Meekness Patience Temperance Sobriety long suffering the Heavenly joy and Peace of a good conscience void of offence towards God and man guided by that wisdom from above which is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality without Hypocrisie Gal. 5.22 James 3.27 But in an unlawful Contract and Whoredom of the soul with another Husband stooping below its Divine rank and kind to the Impuâ—e lust of an Earthly Creature whence proceeds a Monâ—trous equivocal bastard-brood of Spiritual-Carnal Mulats which must pass for right Christians without as to sense being hardly men within to reason but liker to a prophane show of Puâ—peâ—s consisting of bare sound and mimick imitation without life or truth or understanding or a vile Communion of Baptiz'd Apes and Consecrated Foxes and Wild Beasts sign'd with many signs of the Cross without any souls or true Christian Inclinations but wholly dead to the Heaâ—enly life and as exactly alive to the Earthly and Sensual and Devilish and its fruits and works lyes legends dissimulations Cruelty Murders Treasons which must pass for Catholick zeal and Orthodox Religion by the Laws and pleasures of their guides There being no heart or Conscience left within nor any pulses thereof without in modesty and sense of honour to direct and prompt to better things that being miserably lost and ruin'd according to the supposition by being ill bestow'd upon a man instead of Christ The original cause of this woful degeneracy being the changing of their Soveraign and taking the Pope instead of the Son of God for their Lord and absolute guide surrendring their hearts and Judgements and Consciences to him without reserve which is a Divine honour and homage due to none but God wherein as was said at first lies the Characteristical note of distinction inter Cordatos Protestantes between sober Protestants that make a difference between the Creator and the Creature and inconsiderate Catholicks that make none The least soyle of the soul by surprize from any Intemperance or unmortified lusts clogs and disorders it in its devotions and addresses towards its God the suffocation thereof by the habit of vice wholly alienates it from his life leaving it dead and senseless under the Power of Satan in trespasses and sins The reduction and moral extinction thereof by its slavish profession to a lawless Counter-Christ makes it as dead and senceless under another mixt Dominion of Christ and Satan that is to say of Antichâ—ist or a mock-Christ or of a meer man assuming Gods Infallible nature upon him through his pride or evil as Christ the true God did frayle human nature in his humility for good This is that Roman Idol which is the glory and fear of devout Romanists being a God devoid of all Divine Attributes without either much holiness for imitation or all-sufficient bounty for the relief or constancy and truth which endures for ever for the stay and trust of his Worshippers being but titular in the one but a Broker in the other starving and over-reaching these corrupting others as Satan whom he relieves with favours And in the third so shamefully mash'd with contradictions and non-obstante's ever and anon at every appearance of Lucre and advantage that a Weather-Cock in the English or the retentives of a Suckling in the Brittish Proverb cannot be more uncertain and unsteddy The truth is it is not he himself that is God and Governour but his Lust or Mammon which Governs him at whose beck he must change his Laws and Bulls and Canons and Decrees which seldom yielded to God or his Scriptures as good men their vain thoughts and lives at God's rebukes or wicked men their good thoughts and Intervals of sobriety at the Rules of their Whores And there is no other hold to have him fast and sure by but this alone which makes the Rich to be the Elect and the poor to be as Reprobates in that Church nor any lasting hold by this without exceeding all Competitors in the more zealous worship of out-bidding as several Princes and Prelates have known it to their smart and which ever carried the cause at Rome beteewn York and Canterbury as it also did between Canterbury and St. Davids and in most Controversies before or since where the heaviest purse seldom sailed to be the best cause Is he fit to be a Witness between party and party that will swear any thing against Truth or Conscience for a guift or boon Or to be a judge in Tribunals who is professedly for a bribe above Justice And is he only fit then to be sole Judge of Controversie in Gods Church for Peace and Union who is notoriously mortally sick of the same disease and Inclination and makes his Disciples stupidly believe it to be perfect health and holiness whereon they may venter their Salvation Or is it not in this as in other Idols that they that make them are like unto them or as in other offences against Magistrates where the receiver is as bad as the thief or against God himself where as Satan is highly Blasphemous in taking Divine honour to himself so Witches are no less damnably unreasonable and impious in giving it by their Covenants and recognitions Men are as responsible in their Reputations in their Worldly Affairs for heedless and gross trusts as for heady and gross mistakes for chusing a manifest wrong way having sums about them under their trust as taking some known Robber for their guide in the right The Antichristianism is not so much to be wonder'd at on the one hand that some proud Spirits at the Instigation of the Serpent should affect to be as God as on the other that any should be so Spiritually besotted as contrary to the indelible Allegiance of their Souls to God and the Truth Traiterously to own and Recognize them A Perversion that humane nature which is essentially tyed to the Election of good in the general is not capable of it self to fall into without some omnipotent curse from God upon it condemning it to believe strong lyes for it s too much neglect in loving sound Truths as the Apostle shews 2 Thess 2.11 12. Therefore these kind of Fishermen catch most in troubled Waters find most Proselytes amongst the grosly ignorant and vitious amongst silly women loaden with sin and shame and weak children led by sence and shows and Customs or disorder'd sinners shackled with guilt or drown'd in Debauchery or sunk in Despair or stupified with sorrow and discontent or blinded with ambition and vain glory and an high esteem for implicit faith in order to absolute and tyrannical government over mens Souls and Bodies who are entertain'd with false joyes and lull'd with false pardons and releas'd with false Absolutions and heal'd with false Cures and supported with false Comforts and canoniz'd with â—alse Glory And all these Impostures and deceits father'd upon God and Christ and his Catholick Church and his
Preach Gods word without a License sued out from their See Nor the Scriptures themselves to be Gods word without their stamp or Allowance nor any hope of Salvation to any Soul out of the Pale of their Church The Corinthians Ephesians Thessalonians Phillipians Galatians had their Gospel not from St. Peter but from St. Paul for he had it not of man nor by men Gal. 1.1 And therefore not from St. Peter if St. Peter were a man but from Jesus Christ who is therefore God as likewise the Brittains had theirs from Christs Apostles and Companions before St. Peter ever had a Chair at Rome yet all these must be no Churches with the Church of Rome which is an absolute Haeretical affront to the Article in the Creed touching the Church which they deny to be Catholick and universal by limiting it to their Roman Communion Did the Haeresie of the Donatists heretofore speak higher or plainer Or of a Epiphanius in Simonianis the Pepusians who affirmed their own City Pepusa to be Jerusalem above if the Church of Rome in St. Augustine's dayes had been so Heretical as our Modern had it escap'd the impartial zeal and censure of that Learned Father and wherein was Basilides the Ancient Gnostick worse than these Modern Who maintain'd that God reveal'd his Truth to His party only a Epiphanius in Simonianis 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they alone were men all others as Swine and Dogs as Protestants are esteem'd in the Romish Territories Or wherein exceeded by Simon Magus the Father of the Gnosticks who b Idem 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 said he was Christ as the Pope doth in effect who a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 first Worshipped Images who made all Religion and the Cross of Christ subservient to their fleshly ends and pretended themselves to have Ecclesiastical Authority above any else or St. Paul himself though they were the enemies of Christ because the enemies of his Cross and Gospel and to be shunn'd therefore by all true Christians Phil. 3.18 as the Apostle there declares Whom no Oaths also can bind no more than they could the old Heretick c Epiphanus lib. 1. p. 24. Helxas in the Jewish Church who taught it was no sin to worship Idols in time of Persecution 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and although he made profession with his mouth but denyed the same with mental reservation in his heart which is a Doctrine too well known at Rome he was not guilty of any offence at all Who lastly in a word not to enumerate any more particular Heresies whom they revive are our Apsychites as before who by their Principles and pactices deny the heart and its necessary use in Religious worship and by consequence deny Christ and God and all for without the heart or soul as a body is a dead body so a Church is a dead Church in reason and but the Carcass of a Church and as the death of the body contains most of the diseases that can be nam'd Deafness Blindness Apoplexy c. so deadness in a Church through the want and absence of the heart and soul pregnantly comprizes all sorts of errours and Heresies as Arrianism Nestorianism Pelagianism Manicheism Libertinism Antichristanism Atheism c. for take away the heart and take away God and take away God you take away all Religion whatsoever as take away smelling you take away odours or take away eyes and you take away light these being correlates to one another as was shewed before For the heart being intirely for Christ as its end and correlate as was shewed at the beginning when it loses its true end it ceases to be a heart the end in such things as are ordain'd for an end being as their life and soul and being whereof when depriv'd or frustrated in fiction of reason they cease to be as an eye that cannot see or an ear that cannot hear or a foot that cannot move is in reason no eye or ear or foot though the Ball or Organ or Limb remain in visible existence to the sense In like manner where the heart is seis'd or diverted by any Idol or vanity from Christ its end and life it ceases to be a heart To honour men for Christ's sake for any likeness to him bâ— Grace or Place or Quality may be done with the heart for it is not man so much as Christ himself is so honour'd by the heart which thereby attains its end and life by conjunction with him But to honour Christ upon the score of the Pope as is the way and Principle of Romanists with whom the Pope gives Authority to Scripture and Religion and to Christ himself by consequence It is not to honour or serve Christ so much as the Pope to whom the heart is thereby Principally directed and not to Christ but rather divided from him by the interposition and presence of another And whatever it be in like manner that severs and engrosses the heart from Christ its life and proper Element whether it be lust or Interest or wordly end or any sin or man of sin destroys and choaks it It is the extinction of reason to be besides it self the extinction of the heart to be besides its Christ The corps of a Religious Action remains in all Acts of Hypocrisie and Superstition and Idolatry but the heart and soul is lost and gone And generally the form of godliness no where more abounds than where the life and Power is wanting who more for outward zeal and show of Religion than the Hypocrite who hath none who more nice and exact in all minical Ceremonies than the Superstitious who wants the substance who more complemental than the hollow-hearted Forma viros neglecta decet men of great hearts and reality are more for deeds than words Now some superficial understandings that judge all by sense and outward appearance though but skin-deep are apt to mistake busie and zealous superstition and bigottry to be sincere and sober Religion whereas these differ in specie and are no more the same than a dying man sâ—picking bed câ—oaths is Family care or hollow Complement of the lip true friendship of the heart or an fâ—bullition of worms in a putrified Corps the Restoration of its former life unto it for in like manner as the cessation of natural life brings forth an unnatural bâ—ood of maggots in dead bodies so the departure of the heart and life from any Church ends in innumerable freaks of Religious whimsies and crossings and cringings without end There are several other Characteristical marks and effects of the want and absence of the heart and conscience in the Romish Religion wherein it goes beyond common Heresies and bids fair for Antichrist And waving the Principal or Lucifer-like Pride the womb of Antichrist and Universal Supremacy according to our Pope Gregory which hath been our game and Subject all along I shall instance but in three or four genuine properties very particular to that
Church above any other 1. It s Addiction and delight in fictions and pious frauds and officious lies and equivocations and mental Reservations and Stolid Insipid Legends and Infamous unconscionable forgeries and falfifying of the Living and the dead both persons and Records and Histories Fathers Councils Saints Apostles Angels Virgin Mary and Christ himself as well when there is no need of such Arts as when there is out of meer delight in this ugly sin as it were to keep their hands in whereby few Ecclesiastical Authors saving the Bibles have escaped their forgeries and their Histories where they are worth the reading are scarce to be believed but where they speak against them and their Interest now a lye is a slight or repugnancy to the heart and to God present in it or to Ciceroe's Divine mind and by consequence never without a kind of perjury in its train But when the heart is with Christ Christ is with that heart by consequence and he that speaks with and from his heart never lies for Christ speaks through him by fiction and he in whom Christ speaks cannot lye for Christ is Truth and Truth is only that which God saith or approves And God can neither lie himself nor approve it in any others where lyes are in common request and vogue it 's a sign God and the heart are departed and the Dialect of Satan who is a lyar becomes the Language of that Country The Innundation of Legends and Fables that over-spreads the service and Religion and Profession of that Church manifestly proves that its banks are broken that there is little or nothing of the heart or Christ or Conscience left amongst them as the sole and proper walls and fences against all untruth and falshood for regard to the heart alone will keep out lyes as in Generous Heathens and all persons of true honour and honesty much more to the heart and Christ as with all true Christians there is an Antipathy and inconsistency between every Ly and Christ and the heart and Conscience and Honour Where lying and Legending and dissimulation before God and man are easily dispensed with as no where more than at Rome there Christ and the heart are but cashier'd Soveraigns and stand for Ciphers And in what Church or Profession soever Christ goes off the stage Antichrist soon comes on the Father and Patron of Lyes who primarily and originally sure is Satan Revel 2.9 c. 13.4 or the great Dragon and old Serpent in Paradice the first Anti-god that destroyed mankind with a Lie seducing them from their Allegiance to God and substituting his own will to be observ'd instead by interpretation from Gods Authority against his mind Whereof the Science and Mystery is retain'd and profess'd in the Academy of Rome but the common practice and lying Dialect of his Kingdom is to be met in other Apostatical places and Ages co-dispers'd with the Church like Tares among Wheat to destroy and choak it And though the Jewish Turkish and Popish Apostacy use different Dialects the Hebrew the Arabick and the Latine yet they understand one another and exactly agree in their common Mother Tongue of vain lying For our Popish Legends and Alcharon Dreams and Talmudical Dotages wherein differ they but in the Garb and Masquerade of different Languages being all three a breed of the same womb and the Genuine off-spring of the Father of Lyes strongly retaining as bred in the bone the humour and special faculty of vending their own Errours for Gods Truths whose Interpreters they pretend each to be but the Pope and Mahomet more especially 2ly The Unchristian Cruelties of that Church proves it to be an unconscionable Church without a heart and nearly Allyed to Antichrist For by the Heart and Conscience we carry all other men about us in our breasts and our Souls are the Armory and Magazines of Modells and Suppositions by which ouâ— Inward Actions are first form'd and conceived whereof our Outward are but Copies and Counterparts And no man can wrong another outwardly without wronging him in himself to the wounding of his own Conscience in the first place The hurt in both is to himself in the one to the life and quick in the inward guilt in the other in the outward effigie to his own flesh By our unconfin'd Souls whereby one man is all mankind by fiction we are naturally fram'd and dispos'd to compassion and justice and doing as we would be done by As by our confin'd bodies on the other hand or the existence of no more but our bodily life and concerns in the conceptions of the Soul which is our narrowest being and measure of self-preservation we become mean and solitary Individuals and prompted thereby to the sole care and defence of our skin and property and often betrayed to insatiable deceitful appetites after Luxury which more tire and disappoint than satisfie the immense desires of the Soul aiming at the beatifical enjoyment of its God in every lust and pleasure it blindly stumbles upon The whole Creation being not a sufficient meal and the narrow brittle Vessel of the body not large and tight enough to contain and digest its vast draughts and ingestions but in a bounded love or Mortification rather of its Carnal self and unbounded Charity and preference of God and Countrey and mankind iâ— finds a Divine and honourable repast to its full â—atietie and true content yea our Souls were made to be not only receptacles and Synods of mankind but the Temples of God and Christ and all Christians And where the Heart is given Christ Christ a Eph. 3.17 1 Cor. 6.20 in MS. Alexandr in his Law and Nature resides and acts in that heart As such a heart also by its inspir'd Commands and dispositions rules its own body and members whereby every Christian carrying Christ about him by his Faith or Christian supposition is partaker of his Divine Nature and become an inspir'd Actor of his Saviours Vertues meek and merciful to enemies as Christ himself was and kind and tender hearted b Jac. 3. â—7 and peaceable and gentle and easie to be entreated as he hopes to find Christ to himself from an assurance from and in himself of his Infinite and unbounded goodness A right Catholick Christian is angry aâ— Hereticks and transgressors with the same zeal and dislike as Christ is who delights not in their death and ruine but their repentance and return yea he had rather dye for them than be the death of any of them though his enemies Mercy therefore and mildness and compassion from the heart to erroneous fellow-Christians is a great demonstration of true Catholick Christianity where ever it occurres or shines as merciless hostilities and zealous killing and burning all Dissenters of the contrary and of the Eclipse of the heart and Conscience and Christ by consequence in such a Church or Christian Whereby the Protestant Spirit is justified to the World to be right Christian and that in