Answer in Writing the thing Queried G. F. They are the properest for his Spirit to undertake Clem. Recognit p. 5. The trifling question put to Barnabas was more witty Why a Gnat being so small a Creature hath six feet and wings besides whereas an Elephant so bulky an Animal hath onely four feet 4. In the late unhappy Times when Hell was broke loose our own Countrey affords Instances too many being as anciently credulous in believing pretended Inspirations so also then in their production too fertile and the Quaker is Junior to the most of them and they are all able to produce as good Evidences and Deeds so that it seems strange the Quaker should ingross both the birth-right and the blessing too from all the rest 1. The Seekers or Religious Scepticks laid Claim to Inspirations I call them so because those various differing Sectaries may be best comprized under such a general name Edward Gangre second Part p. 2. They affirm and hold they have not onely had Revelations but they have seen Visions also The means of Gods revealing himself and his mind and will to his Servants in reference to their Salvation is immediately by himself without Scripture without Ordinances without Ministers or any other means but especially many in the Army about 1645. took themselves to be intimate with God Idem p. 5. Some Officers and Souldiers affirmed That they had had Revelations and seen Visions and took upon them to Prophesie A Lieutenant a great Devoto denyed the Trinity of Persons affirming them to be three Offices he denyed that Christs presence in Heaven could be proved by Scripture p. 7. and made a great question whether there was a Resurrection or no. Mrs. Attaway the Woman-Preacher then begun to exercise Boggis wish'd he had not known so much of the Bible which he said p. 163. was but only Paper And Clarkson the Seeker vilifies the Scripture Ordinances p. 165. c. would not have People to live upon black and white and said That they of themselves were not able to Reveal God T. E. is the Successor of such Blades as these 2. The Antinomians maintained their undutiful Notions by recourse to this Armour and the Quakers have borrowed much from them as Perfection Discerning who were Elected the Notions about Christs Person and Christ within humane Learning and the like but I shall onely consider their Inspirations a large account of which we find in one who diligently traversed their Writings Rutherford's Survey of Spiritual Anti-Christ p. 173 174 175. The Witness of the Spirit is meerly Immediate without respect to Sanctification or Acts thereof all Doctrines Revelations and Spirits must be tryed by Christ rather than by the Word A Christian is not to Pray nor to do any Spiritual Acts but when the Spirit moveth him thereunto That all other askings or seekings of God which are not thus in Spirit are but the askings of Creatures as Creatures p. 222. The Scriptures are not to be understood according to Grammatical construction p. 229. but as the Spirit of God reveals them The meer Commandments of Scripture are not a Law to Christians p. 305. but the Law written in our Hearts The Holy-Ghost comes in place of the Natural Faculties of the Soul and acteth us immediately to all internal and external acts Part 2d p. 195. c. And that Amcrican Jezebel Mrs. Hutchinson said That her particular Revelations about events to fall out p. 211. are as Infallible as any parts of Scripture and that she is bound as much to believe them as the Scripture for the same Holy Ghost is the Author of both 3. The Levellers do make out their Free-born Community with Arrows fetched from this Quiver Winstanley the great Master of the Craft is exact herein New Law of Righte p. 46. This Phrase Mine and Thine shall be swallowed up there shall be no need of Lawyers Prisons or Engines of Punishment no Beggar nor cause of complaining there shall be no Buying nor Selling no Fairs nor Markets but the whole Earth shall be a common Treasury for every man The Poor upon their Commons p. 47. saying This is Ours the Earth and Fruits are common Now this Platonick fancyful Model he raiseth upon Revelation As I was in a Trance divers matters were presented to my sight p. 57. which here must not be related likewise I heard these words Work together eat Bread together declare it all abroad Likewise I heard these words Whosoever it is that Labours in the Earth for any Person or Persons that lift up themselves as Lords or Rulers over others and that do not look upon themselves equal to others in the Creation The hand of the Lord shall be upon that Labourer I the Lord have spoken it and I will do it Declare this all abroad And this very Trumpet he saith is still sounding in his Ears p. 67. Work together c. Surely the Lord hath not revealed this in vain This Heavenly Voice was so delightful p. 58. that he was filled with abundance of quiet Peace and secret Joy and he obeyed the Command of the Spirit which bid him Declare it all abroad by word of mouth and Pen and he waited till God shewed him the place and manner how to work upon the Common Lands p. 64. I will then go forth and declare it in my Action to eat my Bread with the sweat of my brows looking upon the Land as freely mine as anothers I have now Peace in my Spirit c. Fire in the Bush the Preface And elsewhere up-the same Subject he opens freely This Declaration of the Word of Life was a free gift to me from the Father himself When I had writ it I delayed the sending it almost a fortnight then the Voice was ready go send it to the Churches which he did well I have obeyed the voice and have sent this to you but what was the substance of the voice That he relates the voice is gone out Freedom Freedom Freedom he that hath ears to hear let him hear And what was this Freedom Even a setting the Earth free a breaking down all Pin-folds and laying all open to the Common Now have not I an equal if not greater Reason to believe his so particular and exact Revelations concerning Equality rather than your general and withal mixed ones concerning other matters Nay have not you as much ground to believe his pretence in this as to take the very lineaments of your Profession from him and yet herein desert him when as he Challengeth Inspiration for this as fully as for any other Doctrine But that you dare pick and chuse mangle and alter your own Revelations as well as his may in its due place appear 4. A Sober Answer p. 56. The Ranters deluded themselves and others with this blind and Fox acknowledged the affinity of his and their Principles that black Divinity challenged
with Humane Learning thus unsuccessfully and worse But his talk of Inspiration confutes it self and his own Example is the best proof that as yet it hath not advanced beyond a Dream But if that be pleaded which he suggests That in the Country for want of Books In the Preface he was forced to take some few Quotations upon Trust but yet using much Caution in his Choice It is Replyed that these are so gross and palpable that an easie Learning might detect them and in a matter of such moment which the poor Quakers do implicitely believe and hug he was obliged to the severest Caution nor to impose upon their tame and easie Credulity And as to us who know our selves fallible and in Gods extream account very imperfect it must be allowed for an excuse But as for him who defends perfection pleads for Immediate Revelation which his Master extends to many things which are not in Scripture so much as by Consequence Keith Im. Rev. p. 6. 2d Quib. p. 11. Others of them challenging Infallibility in all things and cases and he as a Believer pretending the Unction whereby they know all things p. 229. and yet in many discovering and in some confessing his Ignorance I know not p. 227. to him this Plea can be no Advantage it pulling down that very thing which he is building up For if there be such a standing perpetual Ordinance as Immediate Revelation Gods Veracity and Goodness is concern'd at that time to let them be Infallible when they are pleading and become the Advocates for it But it is a good Confutation when a Champion proves an Instance against himself 2. T. E'lwood's Courage As to his Courage and Confidence they are high enough shewing great dis-esteem to the Sacred Scriptures as will appear in a proper place by a Catalogue of his Rules of Exposition such certainly as the Sun never saw especially by such a pretended intimate of Heaven We shall onely now consider his Carriage to most Orders of Men in the Kingdom for he presumes to Tax our World like Augustus Caesar The King must be plainly Tâ—ou'd and the Head covered before him The Turkish Fashion they esteem most proper and the tuissare or thou'ing which in Erasmus's time was opprobious among the English is dubb'd into both Religion and Manners My Lord the King is no pleasing Dialect to these new Saints it is Old Testament Divinity Dread Sovereign and Sacred Majesty must not now be used p. 46. Who must have the Majesty then Not the King I 'le warrant you it is taken from Him to be appropriated to their own dear selves take a few of their Expressions having spoken against Magistracy and for the Destruction thereof he proceeds * Fire in the Bush p. 39. If you would find true Majesty indeed go among the poor distressed ones of the Earth †Parnel's shield of the Tr. p. 25. 27. Here is the ground of all true Nobility Gentility Majesty Honour No more after the Flesh but after the Spirit Quakers are sprung of the Noble Gentile Seed ‡ In his Noble Salutation to thee Charles Stewart from the Council and Nobility of the Royal Seed the Lion of the Tribe of Judah the Everlasting King of Righteousness who reigneth in George Fox the Younger In the Testimony from the Brethren The Quakers Ministers are the Dignities and Government and Dominion The King must not write in the Plural Number We p. 27. though he be a Publick Person and Act by Advice of his Council all that is sprung from Pride and Flattery Besides this he saucily and pragmatically medleth with the Kings Revenues the Office for first Fruits Tenths offends him p. 355. No Flower can be fair in an English Crown which was taken out of a Popes Mitre if nothing else could be said against it but that it once stuck in the tripple Crown that alone were enough to make it unworthy to be worn in an English Diadem It seems he hath more than this to Object against it such like things are frequent in their Books which stealing out into the World are apt to leaven mens Spirits with bad Principles One of them acquaints us * Parnel's shield of the Truth p. 19 25. What Magistrates they do not own but deny and testifie against and to make their Negative Power better Armed he saith The Kings and Nobles of the Earth shall be bound in Chains and Fetters of Iron This was Printed 1655. but lest it should be onely Serviceable in those times †Some Principles of the Elect People of God called Quakers p. 89. Isaac Pennington a Name deep enough certainly in Royal Blood to make it currant Quaker Doctrine now re-prints that Book in 1671. leaving out the beginning and end of it but he hath the Conscience and Confidence to re-print those very words out of what design let our Superiours Judge But lest since then so beloved a Doctrine of binding Kings should be forgot they keep up the Memory of it ‡ The true Christians Faith and Experience by William Shewen p. 136. Another Book Printed 1675 speaks home Christ Reigning in the heart gives Power to bind Kings in Chains and Nobles in Fetters of Iron This Honour have all the Saints To the like contempt of Authority write several of them Howgils glory p. 107. Kings and Magistrates as Christians have no Priority but as they stand in the growth of Truth that is in Quakerism I charge you all by the Lord Parnel's shield p. 41. Will. Smith passim Fire in the bush p. 21 22 23. to take heed of medling about Religion meddle with such Affairs as you are set about Meddle not with Religion keep within your bounds And Winstanley the Instituter of their Order speaks roundly to all Four Idolized Powers must down The Imaginary Teaching Hear-say Book-studying Power or the Ministry The Imaginary Kingly Power must be shaken to pieces in all Nations The Imaginary Law of Justice which is but the declarative Will of Conquerours and buying and selling the Earth and being enslaved one to another must all be destroyed at the Resurrection of Christ and that he saith was then beginning and therefore the pretence to Revelation looks a-squint upon the safety of Kingdoms had not the Magistrates the Sword they might meet with as Reproachful words as the Ministers and had some Persons strength their Principles might carry them to repeat the Munster Tragedy If this Measure be dealt unto the Prince what will not be unto the Subjects The Peers and Lords must expect the like treatment from these Levellers Ploughmen James Parnel's shield p. 24 25. Fisher-men Herds-men Shepherds are Noble-men sprung of the Noble Seed here the true Honour is no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit He that boggles at using Sirs p. 46. will stumble at higher Titles and if this new Critick may be credited Titles are to cease and Epithets and Adjuncts are
in After-ages need as fresh Revelations to convey and expound them and in the mean time have no Miracles to attest the Truth of those Expositions especially when different pretenders to Revelations bring as different Expositions these do more and more ensnare but we may extricate our selves by allowing as the old Miracles to be the Seals so the old Revelations thereby attested to be the Objects of our Faith But when I find high Claims of renewed Revelations and therewith as studious an undervaluing and depressing the Honour of Miracles and withal the rejecting the Scripture from being the Rule to try the Spirits by as Quakers do and withal when I find such Caution used by Moses to satisfie himself and others that God spoke by him None especially if their Claims be really Divine can quarrel to have them examined by such means of Discovery as a wise Religion and sober Reason afford unto us Keith's Im. Rev. Title page But though T. E. was in the right that there is such a standing Ordinance in the Church of Christ of indispensable Necessity as perpetual Inspiration yet he hath but done half his work he must go write another Book to prove that among all the Societies of Christians disowning it and the various Sects of single Persons claiming it his Party having the onely inclosure thereof their Fleece to be wet when all others are dry about them till this be done his Arguments are as equally Calculated for me if I will as for himself and do conclude as forcibly for Jacob Israel or Muggleton as for George Fox It would have been an ease if his Discourse had been true meer waiting is a more facile thing than reading meditating or studying and to a weak Constitution a Supine expecting would have been far more favourable than that which wise and inspired Solomon called a weariness of the Flesh Eccles 12.12 Of the Infallibility of the Church of Rome Sect. 36 37. What the Excellent Lord Falkland spoke concerning the Romish may with no alteration be applyed to the Quakers Infallibility and Inspiration also I take no pleasure in tumbling hard and unpleasant Books and making my self giddy with Disputing obscure Questions if I could believe there should always be whom I might always know a Society of Men whose Opinions must be certainly true so as I might be excusably at ease and have no part left for me but that of Obedience which must needs be less difficult than the harsh Greek of Evagrius and the as hard Latin of Irenaeus and he would deserve not the lowest place in Bedlam that would prefer those Studies before so many so much more pleasant that would rather employ his understanding than submit it The ease then would lye in having Inspirations or sitting at the feet of such as have them rather than in employing time and strength in laborious searches only the way of Labour is the way of Gods Blessing But the whole Scene as laid by the Quakers is so distant from Gods way of Dispensation who was pleased to become God with us to live on Earth to teach us which having performed there cannot be much to be new taught now and also Immediate Revelation when in use yet being but rare conferred on some whom God used as his Mouth to communicato it to others and Religion being Published in an External sensible way and in like manner settled to prevent such delusions as might insinuate themselves under the cover of inward Suggestions we have no encouragement to sit down satisfied with these Internal and indemonstrable transactions being full of nothing but difficulties and dangers but we must take the more laborious way of searching the Scriptures praying conferring and comparing Spiritual things with Spiritual Sect. 9 10. The afore-said Lord further urged That the Romish pretence to Infallibility was but an accidental Argument because if any other Company had likewife claimed to be Infallible it had over-thrown all so proved nay it is but an Arbitrary Argument and depends upon the pleasure of the Adversary for if any Society of Christians would pretend to it the Church of Rome could make use of it no longer Now though the Disciples of Hetherington the Box-maker even before that Lord wrote to wit about 1625 had maintained Dr. Dennison's white Wolf p. 72. That they could not erre in giving deliberate Sentence in points of Divinity as H. Nicholas had done before them yet if that Noble Viscount had lived till now what would he have thought of the force of his former Argument when not onely within this Island John Reeve and Lodowick Muggleton who would be taken for the two Witnesses in the Apocalyps pretended and were owned by their few Disciples to be Infallible but the more numerous company of the Quakers do Challenge the same to their Party and out-do the Romanists in the variety of their Claims of Inspiration Immediate Revelation Apostolical Commission of Christ the light within of Infallibility and discerning of Spirits So that now on this side Dover we have Popes of both Sexes Joan belongs to England not to Mentz and we have many Johns above 24 but whilst three different if not contradictory Parties pretend to Infallibility we have Reason to suspect they are all alike Infallible The Quakers have a pretty Craft but it may easily be seen thorow The Apostles were endued with extraordinary Powers both inward and outward now they Challenge to themselves the inward as Authority Inspiration Infallibility Commission Discerning of Spirits the inward Baptism with the Holy-Ghost c. which being Internal and indiscernable may be Challenged and are not so readily confuted but then the outward as the Miraculous descent of the Holy-Ghost the gift of Tongues the visible Baptism with fire the ability of working Miracles of all sorts the Spirit of Prophecy or fore-telling future things c. these being discernable to the sense capable of an easie detection they do both deny them and speak slightly of their necessity or use Though God conferred these outward ones as undeniable proofs and convictions of the inward and without which sensible Testimonials the internal would not have had that Operation but have been like Candles under Bushels and this very Art lays no little prejudice upon their Plea T. Ellwood's Notion of Divine Revelation is put into variety of Expressions which lie dispersed in several pages his stating of things is different and the claims he makes are of several Natures I shall put them into the best Method I can more orderly to examine them We may conceive some of them to be as the ground-work whereon he builds the other as the Fabrick thereon raised His grounds are two 1. That the Apostles had an inward manifestation and Immediate Revelation of the Will and Mind of God to them by the Spirit of Truth which dwelt in them p. 227 228 233. 2. That the Apostles Successors or all Believers in an extensive Relation receive the knowledge of the
Gospel in the same manner as the Apostles received it p. 228 230 233. Other things he Erecteth upon or claimeth in pursuance of these 1. They have renewed and repeated Revelations p. 238 240 243. The good Old Gospel is again revealed by the same Spirit p. 254. 256. 2. They have Immediate Revelations from the Spirit as the Apostles had p. 228. 3. They have expository Revelations the Spirit giveth the true sence and meaning of Scripture immediately p. 238 239 251 253 255. 4. The Gospel is now Preached in the demonstration of the Spirit and Power p. 244. and they are the Persons without question who Preach it 5. They know the Word of God by Experience p. 249. 6. The Primitive Christians had the knowledge of the Gospel by the immediate Revelation of the Spirit as the Apostles had p. 233 245. and the Quakers now receive it in the same manner 7. They receive it by the gift of God p. 245. 8. They have heard the voice of God speaking in them p. 249. 9. Divine Revelation consists in opening and discovering p. 249. 253 255. that is in expounding And all this is done without any help of Humane Learning which is not so much as to appear between the first of Genesis and the last of the Revelations but hath its Circle assigned beyond which it must not step reduced to its proper station and service which is to be conversant in Natural Civil or Humane Affairs p. 218. Humane Learning is to do the Drudgery of Translating to put an English Bible into a Quakers hand and must presently with draw the pretended Spirit then supervening and opening each Text of Scripture truly to them These are different Notions and are too great favours for any Party on this side Heaven but it s subtilly done to chuse so many to leave room for escaping that if some prove deceitful the rest may support their Partners We must attend his Motions and examine them one by one giving his own words under each head onely some few things must be premised in passage 1. I think he seldom or never names our Lord Jesus Christ who dyed at Jerusalem as concerned in the revealing of Gods will His Prophetick Office is destroyed or weakned by this Sect and the Spirit is substituted in his place Thus p. 245. when he saith the Author of our Faith is the same the Finisher of it is the same alluding to Heb. 12.2 Where Jesus to wit the Son of the B. Virgin is named yet he takes no notice of him but turns it another way They received their Faith namely by the gift of God they received their Faith he saith there in the same manner that the Primitive Christians received it of old Now how that was he tells us p. 233 From the Immediate teachings of the Holy Spirit which dwelt in them So that he either lays aside our dearest Saviour or Confounds Jesus Christ and the Holy-Ghost as one and the same which he doth to purpose p. 233. Paul received the knowledge of the Gospel from Christ revealed in him thence he presently infers thus The Apostles did receive the knowledge of the Gospel from the immediate teachings of the Holy Spirit making Christ revealed in Paul and the Holy Spirit to be the same 2. He seems to make some concessions to inform within what bounds they keep denying new Revelations and yet he either hath new ones or none as from his Principles will be proved p. 237. they expect not a Revelation of any other Gospel of any other way of Salvation of any other Essentials in the Christian Religion they have but renewed Revelations p. 238. Truths formerly revealed p. 254. The same good old Truths p. 243 The good old Gospel again revealed a concession that destroys his design for having no new ones the old do neither need nor are capable of Repetition 3. The true Christians Faith and Experience He appropriates these receits to himself and Party We p. 237 245 249. Vs 254 256. to all Believers 228. that is to himself and Friends for they are the onely true the others but Titular and Nominal Christians saith Will. Shewen frequently The Testimony from the Brethren they are the Church of God returned out of the Wilderness And this is large enough Moses wish fulfilled Numb 11.29 All the People of the Lord are Prophets Are all Apostles Are all Prophets 1 Cor. 12.29 Yes among the Quakers Had he Challenged some few Inspirations in pursuance of the former or some rare single notices from good Angels they had been more Modest or an Immediate Revelation to ascertain him which Books were Divinely inspired and which not it should have been confessed that some have gone that way before him Vindication of the Protestants grounds of Faith second Discourse p. 308 Sect. 4. not onely the Enthusiasts and some Calvinists but the Popish Guide in Controversies in Dr. Stillingfleet saith That the ultimate Resolution of a Christians Divine Faith is into that particular Revelation first made known to him But supposing there was such a Supernatural and infused assurance given yet it is not rational and discursive saith Mr. Chillingworth it may be an assurance to a mans self but it is no Argument to another But one single immediate Revelation is too scant for T. E. during his whole life time He must put God upon Miracles and unnecessaries have what hath been before Revealed though translated into the vulgar Tongue renewed repeated re-revealed in the same manner and he must have Expository Revelations given him of the Sacred Books besides So that his own words contain the best his own Character p. 101. he treadeth an unbeaten path p. 246. he seems not rightly to understand Revelation but rather to have taken in some strange Notion concerning it CHAP. II. How the Apostles came to the Knowledge of the Gospel HIS first rise is That the Apostles had an inward manifestation and Immediate Revelation of the Mind and Will of God to them by the Spirit of Truth which dwelt in them p. 227. this he would have and so craftily brings in as if the Friendly Conference had so meant If by all those ways he intends no more than an inward manifestation But supposing this was true as he states it yet it is not Large nor Comprehensive enough For the Apostles had another Teacher even an outward one both before and besides the Holy Spirit and what Christian did ever yet lay aside or overlook the Personal Oral Teaching of their Lord Jesus Irenae ad Heres L. 1. C. 1. If Quakers delight to be called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Spiritual and perfect from their supposed Teacher the Spirit as the Scholars of Valentinus did we must adhere to our elder name 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from that Author and Finisher of our Faith If Quakers first make no distinction between the Father the Word and the Holy Ghost and then would lay aside the God-Man Jesus by
enervates the written Word as will in its place appear and withal over-looks the Essential Word taking no notice of him whom God the Father sent into the World and sealed endeavouring to annihilate that Jesus as to his Prophetick Office however in whom the whole Covenant of Grace is founded and in and by and through whom all Blessings whatever are conveyed to us And this is a sad stumbling upon the very threshold a fit Pillar for nothing but a Monstrous Fabrick But to use his own words Had he not been a Quaker he could not have given such an Answer CHAP. III. Whether Quakers be the Apostles Successors and receive the Gospel in the same manner as the Apostles did II. THE other Pillar is as rotten that the Apostles Successors or all Believers do receive the knowledge of the Gospel in the same manner as they did In which three things are couched 1. That all Believers or the Quakers are the Apostles Successors 2. That these Successors receive in the same manner as the Apostles 3. The proofs produced to make out this claim 1. That all Believers or Quakers are the Apostles Successors if the first then he argues for all Parties as well as for himself and their Revelations will out-weigh his a Turk is a Musulman or Believer in the light within him withall he makes Christ to have a Monstrous Body if all Believers be the Apostles Successors But his Charity without question designed the latter by using the first Person We and Us The Apostles Successors p. 228. truly the Apostles Successors in Faith and Doctrine p. 230 233 but he should first have proved it and not have begged the question The Lamb's Officer p. 11. The Apostles Successors a great Humility Lately they were higher even true Prophets and Apostles now they are dwindled into Successors not Apostoli but Apostolici They succeed them in Inspiration Infallibility Divine Commission Discerning of Spirits he does well to add in Faith and Doctrine Pray proceed you succeed in their Chairs in their Bishopricks in their Power of binding and loosing and prove it all by succeeding in their Miraculous Powers But how do you succeed the Apostles You differ vastly among your selves what time the Apostacy entred into the Church but stating it as some do to commence at the entry of the first Century Smith's Spiritual glass opened p. 36 Keith's Universal Free Grace 92. then for 1548 years the Gospel Dispensation was lost and is now revealed Christs Spiritual Dispensation is now again revealed in this day after the Apostacy And so many years make an hiatus large enough to disturb Succession 'T is not the Apostles but Winstanley whom you succeed In the year 1648 God did cause a branch to spring forth out of the root of David which was filled with Vertue J. Whitehead in Mr. Faldo's Q. no Christ p. 16. for the Covenant of Life and Peace was with him he spread forth many Branches which did partake of the fatness of the Root the weary came to rest under his branches with him was the Word of Reconciliation And to that purpose the Blasphemous Harangue proceedeth so that you do but succeed that Leveller as Whitehead did in 1655. Ibid. Being a branch of this Tree viz. the branch afore said the life of its Root caused me to blossom and bring forth fruit c. It is the Spirit of Winstanley whereby you are Acted and whether that be the Spirit of God deserves your diligent enquiry But supposing with the Socinians that Doctrinal Succession is sufficient without Personal we can discern no likeness between their and your Doctrine You Allegorize that Baptism and the Lords Supper which they practised you set up that Christ within whom they saw ascending into Heaven there to abide till the day of Judgment You make but small esteem of those Scriptures which they wrote or commended as able to make the Man of God wise unto Salvation They did eat and drink with Christ you have scarce allowed him to be a distinct Person from you They make Christ the Redeemer of Men you must have him to Redeem himself even a lost God and a lost Christ They expected Justification by the suffering Jesus that you make a Doctrine of Devils and will be saved by your own Works or by a Christ within you They believed Christ to be made a Sin-offering for them you entertain him but as your Pattern They believed their dead Bodies should rise again you do style it a Carnal Resurrection with several such irreconcileable differences between their Doctrines and yours There are other Fathers whom you succeed even many of the old Hereticks as might easily be shewed but especially Henry Nicholas is your Grand-father the Life and Spirit of Familism runs through your writings you have taken many things from the Libertines Swenckfeldians and Anabaptists the Antinomians also as Saltmarsh in his Sparkles of Glory and others of them contributed towards your Original for those and other Sects agree much in one bottom that of Immediate teaching these prepared the Materials out of which your Father Winstanley formed the most part of your Opinions which being thrown together in a confused manner you fancy the result to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 an Image fallen down from Jupiter and prettily style your selves the Successors of the Apostles in Faith and Doctrine by Immediate Revelation But supposing out of an excess of Charity that you are the Apostles Successors The next is more Prodigious 2. That these Successors receive in the same manner as the Apostles in the same manner he prints in a different Character p. 228 230 233. to shew the stress lyeth there and he affirms it to be no presumption ungodliness or absurdity in those who are the Apostles Successors in Faith and Doctrine to expect to receive the knowledge of the Gespel in the same manner as they received it p. 228 230 233. Expect and think what he please Sober men can judge the thought to be no less than madness and the thing a meer impossibility for unless Christ be now on Earth or T. E. was alive when Christ was on Earth and did personally attend him he cannot have received as the Apostles did no not though it was possible daily to repair to Jacob Behmen's Theosophick School of Pentecost But T. E. hath out-gone that Father who being 1300 years nearer Christs time might have been sooner qualified for it he hath seen Christ on Earth heard Paul in the Pulpit and by this token then he saw Rome in its Glory Did S. Mark know the Gospel in the same manner as S. Matthew Or came S. Luke to it by the same means as S. John The one saith 1 John 1.1 That which we have seen looked upon and handled The other Luke 1.2 They that were eye-witnesses have delivered them unto us And if the difference in coming to the knowledge of the Gospel was so early then Quakers can receive like
new Revelation of the good old things which are the Essentials of Religion The first of those two we do not plead for but the latter And elsewhere p. 33. The same Eternal Life which first breathed them forth doth either again breath or speak them forth in us or sendeth forth of his Living powerful Influences into them as they have a place in our Minds and Memories this latter as more modest is below Ellwoods purpose But though he taketh the Words and Notions of Keith the Revelation is still Immediate for their Institutor hath prettily determined Truth lifting up its head p. 38. If you would hear then acquaint your seives with such as can speak from a Testimony within for as they Received what they have from the pure teachings of the Father so this second hand teaching will be a pure Teaching unto you but be sure you do not prefer this second Teaching before the first for now the Everlasting Word and Gospel must reveal himself to you or else you cannot be satisfyed Their own or others is first and second hand teaching but instructing from the Scriptures is not so much as third hand Teaching and the Scriptures are now out of date The Writings of the Apostles are to cease Truth lifting c. p. 30. when the Lord himself who is the Everlasting Gospel doth manifest himself to Rule in the Flesh of Sons and Daughters They have no New Essentials of Religion this I thought spoke in our Acception about Fundamentals till further Converse in their Works discovered the Deceit Keith Im. Rev. p. 5. for though one tell us that less than one half of the Scriptures is a full and perfect Testimony of all the Essentials yet he spoyls all in saying That the knowledge and beliefe of the History of Christ his outward Coming Pag. 229. Birth Life Death Burial Resurrection c. are such parts of our Religion and Faith as serve to make up the Intiredness or Fulness of it yet so as true Religion may be without the express Knowledge and Beliefe of them So that a man may be a Quaker Christian without the express knowledge of Christ in the outward either of his Name Nature Laws or Offices The great Mogul hath true Religion as much as George Fox This lays aside all that Jesus Was Did Taught and Suffered and contains all Heresies in its Bowels even to the denying the Lord who bought them And another hath writ a Folio to shew that men should not be concern'd about Faith or Creeds Bishops looking glass for the times but leave all to the Conduct of the Light But what then are their Essentials of Religion nothing of Jesus our Lord and Saviour nothing that is a part of the four Gospels True Christianity and Religion may subsist without the History of Christ in the Letter to wit Im. Rev. p. 243. In the Mistery of the Life of Christ in the Spirit So that a Turk is a true Christian though he never owned but hated Christ rarely allegorized till our whole Christianity is shrunk up into those four insignificant words as so used which are fit for nothing but a Quakers Posy And George Bishop crouds all into that Everlasting Truth viz. A looking glass for the times p. 235. the Principle of God in Man which is in every man a measure thereof to lead him and guide him which is able to lead him into all truth and to deliver him from evil and which will bring him to God These are the new made Essentials of Religion which the ancient Heroes knew not of who required from all Baptised persons the Profession of their Faith about Christ in the outward who scrupled the change of one Letter in the Creed but Quakers disowning visible Baptism have sent away the Creed therewith lest the retaining of it should upbraid them In the mean time the Devil hath ordered their Scene rarely The Light Christ within renders the Christ without much useless he who shed his Blood for them is no Essential of their Religion and their Inspirations supply the place of Scripture being preferred before it So that their two Principles Im. Rev. p. p. 43. the Light and Motions fairly lessen if not discharge the Essential and Written word of God Christ in Heaven and the Scriptures on Earth signifie little to these self-made Pagans who have enough within to carry them to all that Heaven which their Faith expects But to resume the claim of renewed and Repeated Revelations a Notion so strange that nothing but a search into their Writings can Discover the sense or design of it I must take the freedom to present their thoughts of the Holy Scriptures that by such preparatory tasts we may be drawn on to swallow this Camel of Repetition To begin with their Founder men must not walk by the Scriptures Winstanley in Truth lifting up p. 39. for this is to walk by the eyes of other men and the Spirit is not so scanty that a dozen ar twenty pair of eyes shall serve the World but every Son and Daughter have light within themselves You shall feed no longer upon the Oyl that was in other mens Lamps the Scriptures In the Title page now it is required that every one have Oyl in his own Lamp within himself Some walk by Example Mistery of God p. 35. The Saints Paradise p. 1.2 and have seen very little of the anointing in them some walk more in Spirit and Truth as the anoynting of the Father teacheth them teaching from Scripture is not but speaking from their own experience that is from God The like Notion breaths in T. E. Master Keith The old Revelations given unto the Saints cannot serve our turn the Faith of another man is not sufficient unto me but I must be saved by the Faith Knowledge and Experience given me of God of the self same things the Revelation of them given of God unto others cannot suffice me nor were these things recorded in Writ that I should sit down upon the History but to point us inward to that same Principle of life revealing and working the same things in us Pag. 34. c. We find it to hurt and deaden us to think any thoughts even from the Scriptures but as the Spirit influenceth if at any time we do it we find our selves rebuked and chastized of the Lord for it and in another place we must not obey Scripture without motions but we may obey motions without Scripture At this rate write others of them to cull out some few from among many G. W. and Fox in the gag for the Q. p. 14. what Paul wrote unto the Ephesians and Colossions doth not concern this Generation That is no Command from God to me which God hath given by way of Command to another Burroughs Works p. 47. neither did any of the Saints act by the Command which was to another every one obeyed their own Commands
visibly in their exstacyes c. that all things ought to be done by Immediate Motions and Inspirations c. The Church of Rome proves her self the Temple of the Living God from these Revelations Borius de Signis Eccles L. 6. C. 2. in Dr. Spencers Prophecyes p. 15. Keiths Im. Rev. p. 99. or the voice of his Oracles heard therein she hath she tells us the Spirit of Prophecy called the Testimony of Jesus to bear Witness to her Doctrine Worship and Discipline and to this purpose gives in a list of her Prophets and of their Wonderful Predictions And this very Argument is used by the Quakers Jâ—sus Christ revealed in man or Immediate Revelation is the Foundation of the true Church and of every member thereof in particular and therefore if the true Church remain this must remain also And the Councel of Laterane having prescribed Rules for the Preachers Session the 11. under Leo the 10. addeth an exception Caeterum si quibusdam c. But if to some the Lord shall Reveal by Inspiration certain Future things in his Church as he hath promised by Amos the Prophet and Paul saith despise not Prophecying we will not have such to be numbred amongst Fabulous or lying People or otherways to be disturbed Here is a Council defending Immediate Revelation and if I credit a Quakers pretensions that way I am in point of Justice equally bound to believe the Romish and the Doctrines thereby confirmed nay I am more bound in that the Romish Church hath used this claim much longer and pretends to more Caution in examining the things thereby brought 3. At the Reformation this pretence was industriously set up and carried on by Satan to weaken or defeat the endeavours of those Worthy Heroes Calvin in the preface saith That for twenty years Satan endeavoured to extinguish Adver Libertin stifle or defame that Evangelicall Doctrine which he saw appearing they called them Literal Reformers who had but faint and small discoveries of the Spirit c. Muncer said the first Reformers were not sent of God Bullinger Adver Anabap. L. 1. c. 1. nor preach'd the True Word of God c. Of these Conceited Devoto's there were several sorts which did split and subdivide more and more afterwards 1. The Anabaptists flew high with this claim and it was the stale to cary on each design Their Founder Nicholas Stork John Davyes Apocalypse had his visions and God Communicated Himself to Thomas Muncer John Matthiz the Baker had Secrets revealed to him which God had not Revealed to others He being Enoch the second High-Priest of God Herman the Cobler professed himself a true Prophet and the true Messiah c. Their Storyes are so known that it is superfluous to relate them John Buckhold had Revelations as plentiful as Mahomet This King of Justice Minted his Money with this Impression Verbum caro factum quod habitat in nobis that is the Word was made Flesh which dwelleth in us which is the Doctrine of Winstaenley and of his Disciples that God is manifested in the Flesh of Sons and Daughters New Law of Righte p. 33. or in many Bodyes as Christ or the Anointing was poured on that Humane Body Jesus the Son of man and dwelt Bodily there for a time So that Quakers are Christs now as much as Jesus was on Earth only he was one single Christ but this spreading power of Righteousness makes them many Christs in many Bodyes But if there was perpetual Inspiration Reason would adjudge the Anabaptists and the others being contemporary with the Reformation more likely to have a share thereof than others at a great Distance from it And so little did the first Reformers favour them that Luther Writ to the Senate of Mulhusium to beware of such Wolves and Melancton expressly declares against them De numero Sacramentorum Anabaptistae fingunt expectandas esse novas Revelationes c. The Anabaptists feign that there are new Revelations and Illuminations to be expected from God and that these are to be obtained with great Bodily severities as the Monks and Enthusiasts of old Feigned These Fanatical dotages are accursed we contrarily do think that God out of his Infinite Goodness having Revealed his Will to us in the Gospel other Revelations or Illuminations are not to be expected 2. The Libertines took themselves to be Inspired Calvin Advers Libertinos C. â— and galled the Church much totus corum sermo de Spiritu est Calvin Advers Libertinos C. 2. c. all their Discourse was of the Spirit Sometimes they used strange Words to bring their hearers into Admiration and cast a mist about them at other times they used common words Sed significationem corum deformant C. 7. altering their signification when any place of Scripture was urged C. 9. their Answer was nos Literae minimè obnoxios esse that they were not concern'd in the Letter thereof but were bound to follow the Spirit that quickneth It was their Principle that the Scripture in its natural Sence was a dead Letter and therefore was not to be regarded but to observe the quickning Spirit saying Sublimiùs speculemur let us look for higher things than what the Letter affords and let us seek new Revelations They scarce spake two Clauses but the word Spirit was in their mouths C. 10. and made no Account of the name Christian in compare to the name Spiritual perswading their hearers that they were Spiritual purely Divine Et jam cum Angelis semiraptos esse Antonius Pocquius a great man among them said Aspicite adest tempus c. Behold now the time is at hand wherein the Disciple of Elijah begged the double Portion of the Spirit and that was the time which Christ meant when he said I have many things to say unto you c. Qualis ego sum such a Teacher did Pocquius boast himself to be but he would not speak out donec tempus advenerit 3. Casper Swenckfield for thirty years together troubled the Church with his Dreams Rutherford p. 15. Ex schlus Selburgio he called for Spiritualness and the Spirit and the internal word that we must not depend on the External Word he took several things from Papists Anabaptists and Calvin making a mixture of Opinions he accused the Reformed Pastors that no man was better for their Preaching extolling the Spirit as doing all The Reformed Divines admonished and refuted him his monstrous Opinions were Condemned by a Synod at Norinburg and by the Divines of Mansfield and he still persisted in them He made the Gospel to be the Essence of God which is the Doctrine of Winstanley the Lord himself Truth lifting up its head p. 30. who is the Everlasting Gospel he made Faith and Conversion to be wrought Immediately taught that we must try the Word by the Spirit and not the Spirit by the Word that no Doctrine Sacraments or any things written in
Scriptures do conduce to Salvation but God is to be sought in his naked Majesty in Dreams Inspirations and Revelations of the Spirit 4. Henry Nicholas In the answer to the Families Supplication the first Illuminated Elder of the Family of Love put in as high for Visions and Revelations as any of the rest the power of the highest came upon his Godded man H N. and did instruct and speak such and such things to him as his words are at large set down H. N. by the Grace and Mercy of God through the Holy Spirit of the love of Jesus Christ raised up by the highest God from the Death anointed with the Holy Ghost Elected to be a Minister of the Gracious Word In the Evangel Regm C. 1. which is now in the last times raised up by God according to his Promises in the most Holy Scrvice of God under the Obedience of his Love and in a Manuscript Epistle written in an apish imitation of Clemens Ignatius or those times he declares his Divine Commission H. N. Jesu Christi Minister à Dco ad veritatem è Gratiae Solio Epistola H. N. ex Charitare Jesu Christi in Angl. missa c. Majestatis Dei testificandam Electus ad Bonum nuntium de Regno Dei ura Charitate retectae faciei Jesu Christi super terram annunciandum ac salutem in eadem manifest andam missus quemadmodum de adventu ejusdem charitatis per Prophetas Dei Apostolos Jesu Christi prius significatum Evangelizatum fuit Nos Dei Misericordiam sacerdotale munus nostrae Administrationis sub obedientia Charitatis Jesu Christi accepimus c. And he goeth on relating the great things that God was about to do the danger in not accepting his Ministery that God was about restoring all things the Earth to be full of his Glory applying twice that in Abac. 1. and Act. 13. Behold ye Despisers c. and the late New-England Families were high in the same pretence that the Quakers have much affinity with the Familists might easily be shewed and they seem to have the most kindness for them George Whitehead makes the Familists to have better Discoveries than other men In Cambridg debate p. 63. and Keith determines that we must examine Revelations Inspirations Visions and Openings by this of Divine Love Im. Rev. p. 241. Q◠love to mankind p. 3 A Brief Rehearsal of the Belief of the Good Willing in England which are named the Family of Love Print 1575. If it be alledged that Quakers of late do not so allegorize Jesus Christ as formerly I can produce the like outward ownings of Christ by the Familists the Apostles Creed at length owned by them Jesus acknowledged to be the Son of God c. in words much like the Nicene Creed born of a Virgin out of the Seed of David in whose name only and no other they obtain Salvation and Remission of their Sins 5. Some time after the Reformation Jacob Behmen appeared who received if we will believe him his Mystical dark terms from the Father of Lights there is but a glimpse of the Mystery Signatura rerum p. 209 in these writings for a man cannot write them if any man shall be accounted worthy of God to have the Light inkindled in his own Soul he shall see unspeakable things there is the Theosophick School of Pentecost wherein the Soul is Taught of God Joh. 6.45 Joel 2.28 he that can read his own Book aright needs no other for therein lyeth the unction from the Holy one In the Preface which teacheth him aright of all things none can understand these obscurely clear Writings but they that have tasted of the Feast of Pentecost saith Ellistone the Translator and the Author himself saith I have set before the Readers eyes p. 201. what the Lord of all Beings hath given me and in the Preface to his 177 Questions without Divine Light p. 223. none can be able to expound them it is only the Spirit of Christ that gives their understanding and he wrote from his own experimental Science His Notion of the Signature opened by the Spirit p. 1. 2. imprinting his Similitude in my Similitude entring into another mans form and awakening in the other such a form in the Signature So that both forms do mutually assimilate together in one form and then there is one comprehension is much like the Quakers Seed or Birth which is the Susceptive Principle conveying Inspiration from God into the Soul there being a Revelation required as well in the Hearer as in the Speaker Im. Rev. p. 209. Theophilus had the Spirit Witnessing to the truth of the things which gave the certainty or assurance what the Apostles declared in words from the life of Jesus Christ revealed in them the same Spirit answered and testifyed to the truth of those things in their hearers It seems it was not the Apostles certain knowledge of Christ Idem p. 58. and the Miracles they wrought which inclined men to believe their Doctrine but it was a light in them which met with a Signature or Seed or a congenial Principle in others that perswaded them to become I dare not say Christians but Illuminado's Having tasted of Jacob Behmens Style and the Subject being unpleasant a cage of unclean Birds or an Herd of lying Prophets of which but one Sect be it which it will can but possibly be true Before we descend to view the last Scene of our own Countries Abominations it may be a Diversion to present fome of Geo. Foxes Divinity and Oratory which if you have the Patience to read you shall not be Obliged to the pains of Studying or Understanding The Worlds Original Some Princi ples of the Elect People of God called Quakers p. 51. is the many Languages whose Original is Babel which make Divines as they call them sit a top of Christ And the Whore sits upon the Waters as it is spoken in the Revelation and John saith the Waters are Nations Multitudes People and Tongues which Tongues they call their Original To which Waters the Gospel must be Preached before they can be established And ye are to be redeemed from Tongues and Tongues shall cease saith the Apostle and so from this Worlds Original the beginning of which is Babel and which keeps in Babylon the Saints are Redeemed and this hath been set up as an Original among them who are alieniated from the Spirit of God in Babel where the Original of Tongues was in the days of Nimrod that Heretick who began to build Babel The same Curious Writer hath a rare gift in proposing Queries Ibidem p. 70. 12. Q. Whether ever any Man came to see so far as Balaam's Ass who saw the Angel of the Lord 13. Q. What are the Graves and the Tombs and the Sepulchres and the Fowls of the Air and the Nests they sit in which Christ spake of
in the World one while man must be thou'd because God is so Q. plainness p. 70 71. The true Christians Faith p. 187. anon the Hat must not be put off to man that must be reserved to God alone as a necessary piece of his Worship These and many such are the crooked ways and interfering paths wherein their private Spirit is bewildred Spirit of the Hat p. 25. 2. Having taken an Essay of their different Doctrines it will be pleasant to consider their Carriages in such oppositions and the means they have of convincing one another for allowing no outward Rule whereby they should be concluded Spirit is opposed to Spirit and the boldest Face or the best Lungs or the strongest Interest doth carry it and should I say I wrote this tract by Inspiration upon their Principles they could not confute me and every one having the Light within the comparatively small number of the Quakers argues them to be in the wrong When differences arise among them they esteem the diffenters to be cheats Mr. Jenner p 86 the Woman at Dublin condemned their old Light producing a span new one of her own the rest were displeased saying she was a false Prophetess but she still maintained that her Light came immediately from God Living Stone to the Dissenters made this Rejoynder you are led by a private Spirit 3d. Quibble p. 19. though you pretend it to be Vniversal here is a deceitful whining Spirit rarely confuted for the other upon their Principles may better call Living-stones a private deceitful whining Spirit Pens answer to Faldo p. 53. I declare in the name of all the right Quakers in the World it seems he knows all their Hearts and Principles but how must we do that what is the Earmark of a right Quaker can any of them be in the wrong or is their perfection gone or is Thee and Thou the pure Language Hicks 2d Dialogue p. 12. the badge of a right one as Thomas Ruddyer would have it Tyran Hipo. detected p. 16. The former Author calls anothers dissent very prettily Imaginations and Whimsyes And I can as cheaply and Inspiredly call his and theirs all by the same phrases Keith in a publick dispute attempted to prove that Pen speaks by Immediate Inspiration Hicks 3d. Dialogue in the Preface and yet others say he is a heady rash young man we take no notice what he saith and Luddington looks upon him as not Catechized enough I would rather have compared him to Apollos Q. is Paganism p. 5 6. and wishing him a little more fully instructed in the ends of Christs Life and Death Gotherson Alarums them all to purpose saying That wicked men are crept in among them Mr. Jenner p. 177 178 179. as Judas among the Apostles calls their Spirit a blind ignis fatuus that they are led by Imaginations Lusts and Fancyes It is not as Roger Crab William Smith and John Dunck surmise the head of the Serpent is too powerful in Roger Crab and his followers With such like severity And no question but Crab could make the like reply and Smiths Works are since Printed as Living Divine Testimonies but whom must I trust when such as these can pass for Inspirations and Confutations of them 't is usual to call one another Antichrist Ranters Scotch-men Taylors or what will look illfavouredly John Swinton wrote a Paper Tyran and Hipo. detec p. 39 42. Spirit of the Hat p. 35. in the express motion of God who justifyed him in every tittle of it after this he retracted and denyed the Spirit in which it was Writ saying it was fit for the fire and was done in an hour of Temptation and Weakness the Account is large and deserves reading but what evidence had he he was in the right after retracting more than when asserting and if he for four or five years together took the Spirit of Delusion for the Spirit of God they can give no security but it is the same Errour that still enthralls them contradictory partyes dare both use the name of the Lord John Osgoods Marriage with R. T. was well approved of Spirit of the Hat p. 30.31 the Elder Rebeckah Travers and J. O. declared it to be of the Lord. John Bolton with two or three more opposed its passing in the name of the Lord Tyran and Hipo. detected p. 22. unless he would give Testimony against the Hat Spirit The like difference there was about the Marriage of M. B. one part declared positively from the Lord that it was to pass Briggs told the Opposers that they opposed the mind of the Lord when as the good man knew not so much as the persons he spake of Spirit of the Hat p. 33. the other part greatly opposed it under the same pretence setting the Lord against the Lord. John Whitehead wrote a Letter in the name of the Lord Tyran p. 20. Geo. Fox blotted out a line or more altering it to a quite contrary sense without any liberty from Whitehead so to do by which both the Spirit of God and the Writer were belyed and yet others of them justifyed that alteration Never did any in such a manner debase and prostitute sacred Inspiration as these Controulers and Correctors of the Spirit do But as the Romish infallibility is by some shrunk into an Indefectibility so that of the Quakers keeps a somewhat like pace Whiteheads Spirit offers it self willing to receive Information and in a Letter I have from a leading Quaker 3 Quib. p. 49. he thus write on behalf of Keith that if he have held any thing contrary to the Testimony of Holy Scriptures and sound Christian experience he will be willing to hear and be convinced by a sober Christian demonstration they either have no Inspiration or its impression is very weak for if it was real it would assure it self both to them and others and leave no such place for second thoughts and demurrings A just rebuke to 21 Divines p. 22. Pen saith we ascribe not Infallibility to men but to the Grace of God and to men so far as they are led by it for that it certainly teacheth what it doth teach an acute invention so he certainly writeth what he doth write and I am as good an Infallible as he is but this only covers and doth not cure for still the Quaery recurs how can I be infallibly assured p. 7. that such a person is led by Gods Grace or not he also calls it a being assured of what a Christian ought not to make a doubt of but Certainty is capable of degrees and there is a vast difference between actual certainty and absolute Infallibility But it is well we have got Company Whitehead at Cambr. p. 10. and Gag for Q. p. 4. Ann Pearsons warning to Judges p. 7. other Professions are to be guided by Inspiration all Acts of Parliament are to be made and
think Immediate Teachings needful we cannot thence Infer them But if God had so conveyed himself he would have so ordered that all his Communications should have exactly agreed and have told us with whom we should find them Whether may not Quakerism be improved another come and Super-reform the Elders as they have done the Hat-men Mr. Jenner p. 86. The Quaker Woman at Dublin cryed up her span new light which the rest had never seen nor heard of and cryed down their old light as darkness pretending to have hers Immediately And 't is hard to discover how upon their principles they can confute her Rationally sometimes they stop the Mouths of such Tyran 15. Silent meet a wounder p. 10. as offer to speak in the name of the Lord. So Ann Mud c. Was pulled away by violence they are very curious in the time when the Spirit seizeth on them the 22. day of the 7. Month the word of the Lord came unto W. B. another is more exact On the 31st day of the 10th Month 1655. about 4 a Clock in the Morning the Word of the Lord came to Burroughs c the same could have gone on to Minutes Seconds c. Revelation also is challenged for bad Desings Hicks 1 Dial. p. 26. a Quaker Debtor replyed to his Creditor 't is revealed to me I ow thee nothing p. 27. Ellis Pseudo-christus p. 27 Studelys looking glass of Schism Messages have been pretended sent from God and the person hath been proved many miles distant when the dreamer came to declare it so Holbrow and Marshal were deluded Mary Gadbury pretended a Revelation to get some Cloath from Mrs. Woodward and such a Command must be embraced Schucker beheaded his brother Leonard by Inspiration and Enoch ap Evan upon partly such a pretence killed his Mother and his Brother Kays Answ to 18. Quae. p. 5. Q. Spi. Court p. 7.21 And two Quakers near Stokely in York shire their Conscience bidding them destroy Original Sin they Apprehending that their Mother was the fountain thereof Murdered her Fox challenged Inspiration for the Earths being flat Spirit of Hat 27. and that it was twelve a Clock all the World over and he kept part of his Commission concealed a long time Although I have not yet told it you I do now declare it I have power to bind and to loose whom I please At this rate he may keep an Instrument for Reconciling us to Rome dormant by him And Revelations have put them both upon hardships and going naked Idem p. 20. But all these contentions are nothing to such Inspirado's they are yet Whole and Sound in the true Church unity stands in Diversityes as if they had taken the word of the Valentinians Tertul. adve Valcutin who take Diversity as a Charisma or gift Concerning in Faldo Q. no Christ p. 56. nec unitatem sed diversitatem and Pennington licks all right the doing the same thing the thinking the same thing the speaking the same thing this doth not unite here in this state in this nature but the doing the thinking the speaking of it in the same life yea though the doings or thoughts or words be divers yet if they Proceed from the same Principle or nature there is a true unity felt therein where the life alone is Judge And by this salvo all these Contradictions hurt their unity no more than taking an Oath doth prejudice their not Swearing CHAP. VIII Concerning their Expository Revelations III. THe third which these Privado's of Heaven enjoy is They have Expository Revelations so T. E. p. 238. the Scriptures are understood only and alone by the openings and discoveries of that Holy Spirit by which they were at first revealed those Divine Mysteries are Mysteires indeed and remain so as a sealed book until Christ the Lamb doth open them p. 239. nor can the Doctrine of the Gospel or the Mysteries of Gods Kingdom be known to man but by the Revevelation of the Holy Spirit Revelation is necessary yea of necessity even to understand the Scriptures the true sence man can never attain unto until the Holy Spirit Reveal it to him to the like purpose he writes p. 251 253. and 255. that the Spirits helping to understand the Scriptures is by its teaching the true sence and meaning of them by opening discovering and making known the Mind and Will of God therein exprest This is Revelation But there is a great Craft in this procedure for he beginneth with Immediate Revelation but after he Ommitteth the Word Immediate and slideth into Revelation in General But what makes he Requisite on our Part to receive this boon from the Spirit 't is summ'd up into a narrower room than the Essentials by Keith viz. waiting p. 220. desiring and waiting p. 240 but especially humane Learning is disbanded from the least concern except Translating T. Es. Spirit cannot Translate a Greek Chapter but it can Infallibly Expound an English one that is it can do nothing discernible but it can do all things Indiscernible This gaping way of Expounding was taught by Winstanley New Law of Right p. 111 all Expositions upon others words shall cease they shall wait with a quiet silence upon the Lord Till he break forth within their Hearts and give them words and Power to speak You must get into the Holy Silence Silent Meeting p. 8. 9. 10 and then the Spirit will Instruct you But the Rule is Elder then the Quakers Hildegardis in that her Nonsensical Vision Related to Arnold Arch-Bishop of Colen determines qui autem Vult bene Vigilare hunc intellectum Percipiat Biblio patrum Tom. 15. p. 622. c. He that will make or wait well shall have the Vnderstanding of her Vision And the Libertines and Swenck field the Familists and all the herd not so much as Anna Trapnel but they all are against learning and for T. Es. easy way of Inspiration or Ministers to have no help but to speak all from the light within So that there is nothing of Studying Praying Reading Meditating or Confering Required on our Part but a Supine desiring and Expecting Reasoning is outdated by Yawning and brains are Superseded by Meer Attendance Quakerism Nuzzles up in sloth and Idleness they may Rest day and night and have the Law writ in their Hearts without Exercising themselves in it their terms are so easy they will have Proselytes Danger of Enthusiasm p 71. but saith one Jacobs Venison could not be right it came so soon to hand To which we may add he lyed in saying the Lord his God brought it to him when it was his Mothers Art This waiting Prostitutes and layeth the soul open to every Impression what starts up first is thought a Divine Irradition The Devil loves a house so garnished and Empty and whilest Saul was thus waiting he started up in the Room and likeness of Samuel their Inspirations are both Writing and Seal to
the Law that doth not infer it must be so under the Gospel for those Prophets brought in Light by degrees and prepared the way for Christ but then Prophecy lay Silent for about 400 years before his appearing a sign that he came to fulfil and Seal up all and when God himself took the chair and in our nature discharged his Office it fastens Imperfection on him to maintain a Series of Prophets to explain what he spoke or relate what he omitted The new Testament foretells of false Prophets but no where promiseth a succession of new ones Nor is it possible Christianity being entertained upon their Personal knowledge of Christ and the Visible Evidences of the Spirit which also inwardly inclined men to search into to approve and chose what the Apostles c. outwardly proposed and now Learning and Meditation supply to us what the Spirit Immediately vouchsafed to them In Epistle ad Paulinuim as St. Hierom saith quicquid enim aliis exercitatio quotidiana in lege meditatio tribuere solet ist is hoc Spiritus sanctus suggerebat Thomas Ellwood makes some attempts of proof about the Reformation as from Tindal p. 273 but neither renewed Immediate nor Expository Revelations are therein owned nor doth it concern Notional about which our debate is but Practical knowledge he deals very unfaithfully with Bishop Jewel who proves from the Antients That many things are easy in the Scripture p. 393. and he strikes in with Harding about the darkness of Scriptures and the understanding of them not by reading but by special Revelation and Miracle p. 394. And that which the Bishop calls Help and Prompting Thomas Ellwood transforms into Inspiration and Revelation of the Divine Spirit p. 275. Without humane Learning Study or natural abilities and the Answer of Alphonsus the Spanish Fryar to Mr. Bradford becomes Thomas Ellwood's Mouth You must be as it were a Neuter as one standing in doubt Pray Fox his Mart. Vol. 3. p. 299. and be ready to receive what God shall Inspire for in vain laboureth our tongue to speak else But none of his Proofs concern Perpetual Immediate Inspiration for the Spirit giving assurance of the Scriptures is a thing of a different nature The sence of the Reformers is discerned from the Homily in the Exhortation to the reading of the Scriptures which requires our humility and diligent search and often reading And John Olde a Famous Divine in Edward the sixths days declares how they proceeded in interpreting Scripture Touching the Interpretation of the Scriptures it must be expounded according to the Proprieties of the Tongues in which it was first written In Dr. Holdsworth praelec Theolog. p. 435. and by dilsgent Weighing of sayings that go before and that follow after withall the Circumstances and also according to other places that are more plain or like or contrary and where the Fathers the Doctors of the Holy Church have Interpreted the Scriptures after this manner and have in no wise blanched or swerved from this Rule there we do with heart and good will acknowledge and take them for faithful and diligent Interpreters of the Scriptures and honorable Instruments of the Holy Ghost whose painful labours and Industryes our Lord God hath used in the Church to the Glory of his own Name and the profit of his flock c. this was Printed 1554. CHAP. XII Of their hearing the Voice of God and some other Claims THomas Ellwood to all these Superadds other Priviledges as first their hearing Gods Voice blessed be the Lord we have heard the Voice of God and when the Lord hath spoken in us p. 249. Implying in a Distinct Articulate Voice spoken within and heard by them a most dangerous Delusion and contrary to Gods manner of Proceeding who rarely or never spoke to men without some internuntius or medium his Voice being dreadfull no man can hear it and live Exod. 20.19 Deut. 18.16 So that either Angels or God Incarnate signifyed his Pleasure The Motions and Whispers of the Spirit are not an audible Voice the manner of Gods speaking is related thus Univ. Grace p. 87 88. The Word of God speaketh forth it self at first simply in Power Vertue Light and Life rather than in words and afterwards words are given and that very Distinctly beard and apprehended So that the Quakers Inspirations come rather at first by signs and Symbols than Words and that is a darker way of Expression Im. Re. p. 171. 58. For the Plainest words cannot give the knowledge of the things and words even the best cannot give the knowledg of God c. that must be strange which words cannot express though they pretend to receive it from the Mouth of the Lord or vivâ voce from him Q. no Christ p. 121. 272. New Law 96 Parnels shield 38. Im. Rev. 14. Q. spi Court p. 7. but they may questionless hear his Voice for they can see the Invisible he sees his maker and lives in the light some of them have had appearances of God the Saints have an intuitive knowledge of God in this life so that though Fox in the Divine Light could never see Angels nor Spirits yet they can see and hear God and they succeed several herein Theod. Eccl. Hist l. 4. c. 11 Dr. Cansabons Enth. p. 103.161 163 164. The Messalians did behold the Trinity with their eyes God did talk with Ignatius Loyola and the Holy Maid saw God Heaven and Hell and the Soul of Christ in its Purity And that strange Enthusiast in Acosta talked of conversing with God and the Alumbrados or Spanish Quakers said They might see God Visibly in their Ecstacyes 2. They receive the Gospel by the Gift of God p. 245. from the Divine Power it self p. 232. not once naming in this regard that great Prophet who in the days of his flesh taught us but these are two general words technically to Imply the manner of Inspiration for every good and perfect gift comes from God and yet it is not handed down by Revelation 3. Divine Revelation consists in opening discovering or expounding Teaching the true sence and meaning of Scriptures by opening discovering and making known the Will of God therein exprest this is Revelation for whatsoever is discovered or made known is Revealed p. 255. a new Notion by which the Apocalypse must be the easiest book and the Revelation of John must be the Exposition of John but he useth the word doubly sometimes properly as p. 238. for Gods conveying such a Message unto a man at other times he takes it loosly for the understanding the Message so brought Whereas Divine Revelations do not depend upon our right understanding them but upon Gods conveying them unless he be of the Jesuits mind that the Scripture not being understood is no Scripture and if discovering be Revealing then every Artist or Inventer is a Revealer So Dr. Harvey was a Revealer of the Circulation of blood Pecquet the Revealer of