abuses of Popery were to be reformed not onely the wel-minded laid to their hands but persons also worldly godless and enemies to Religion joyned with the rest in the destructive part but intended to promote Atheisme when they set themselves against Superstition Hereticks also whose opinions lay on that side were zealous in their manner but their zeal was more like Wild-fire which they threw in to have marred all if it might have been For after that Antiquity came to be a badge ot Popery then 1 whatsoever was found to have been practised by the Papists in Church-orders was for that reason rejected Not a stone must be taken from Babylon for a foundation or a corner If the least matter of all were yielded it was as a pepper-corn in acknowledgement of the Antichristian Government And 2 even the most sacred Articles of our Christian Faith have been denyed as having come from Rome and thither were to be returned So the name of Antichrist the Beast and the Dragon served the turne for many heresies for all profaneness A Discourse came forth entituled The storming of Antichrist a right proper and well chosen word of which they know the meaning who had experience of the Wars and laying siege to Towns and strong places and assaulting them storms of winde tempests of hail and of Lightning do spare nothing that is in their way having no regard shewing no mercy making no difference for being meer naturall Agents they always act according to their utmost power and might So describes the Poet his hardy Souldiers 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not likening them to Wolves and Lions which have been known to relent and their mouths have been as it were stopped but they fought as it were a flame fell on like a tempest noting saith the great Scholiast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they were irrationally impetuous violent without sense or reason without mean or measure And much like these stormers were some of those that went among our Reformers both first and last You seem to extend Beast-worship very far even to those matters in question betwixt us But you give no instance nor shall I insist upon any I know you can if you will distinguish betwixt Poperie and the Christian Religion and if you do not consider apart what belongs to one and what belongs to the other what to Errour and what to Truth you may soon do that which tendeth to the weakening and undermining of the whole building Divers of the Papists have twitted us with the Jews laying to our charge Judaisme for refusing some Apocryphal books and for condemning Image worship as the Jews do now and for saying that a man cannot forgive sins as they also said and for insisting upon the Law of Moses and the precedents of the old Testament to prove that unto Christian Kings belongeth the supremacy in ordering matters of Religion in a Nation he that argueth thus say they is more like a Jew than a Christian The Anabaptists had learned this Lesson too for when they were bent upon such a confusion as should take away the difference betwixt Clergie and Laitie they were wont upon occasion to revile the Priests and Levites as blinde and ignorant 〈◊〉 demanding of John the Baptist by what authority he did what he did as if observation of order in the Church and pretence of Authoritie in Gods worship and service were points of Judaical blindness and infidelity Against all these and such like let us remember that the Jews were once the onely true Church of God and our Christianity came to us from them and through their hands we are all but proselytes to their Church So that as they had once all the Substantials of the true Religion both for belief and practice we cannot suppose but that they do retain many of them still In like manner the Christian Religion came to us through the Church of Rome not from the Church of Rome and our profession is but to remove the additions and superstructures of the Papists by which the right belief and worship have been corrupted and to throw out the earth with which the Philistims had filled the well and stopped the springs Antichrists are many there is false worship on both hands Anarchie is beastly doing as well as Tyrannie and Confusion as much as Usurpation I cannot but think some prejudice a-against my person I know not wherefore being so meer a stranger to him hath clouded his reason By this Clause he that will may judge of all your book as of the sack by a handfull for it is like the rest full of confidence but void of reason as if your Doctrine were so blameless that nothing could be spoken against it Perhaps against your person some may harbour prejudice but against what you teach and write no man unless his reason be overclouded can justly except You should have been well assured first that there was any such prejudice born against you before you took such thought and put your self to a loss in seeking what might be the cause of it For my part I am as much to seek what should be any the very least ground of such a vain surmise Some little while after the comming forth of this your Piece a friend of mine and of yours too who doth nor much give his mind to read Controversies nor was at that time much inclined out of his good nature to pitie my condition did ask me thus Who bade you begin And because this question is very consonant to your sense I will now give you the Answer to it And first if my charge which is that I began be in reference to those multitudes of right-believing Christians who have a long time been offended at your Doctrine My Defence is this that if any other whosoever had before endeavoured to hinder the spreading of your errours then as I could not have begun so I would not have followed There arose indeed some contest between the Reverend Doctor and your self about Vniversity-learning but for other Heterodoxies of yours no man so far as I know gave notice or publick warning I began therefore because none other would though very many much better might But I suppose the meaning of the question was not why I rather than another but why I would begin with you when as you gave me no provocation But I pray consider well they are the Schismaticks who though they abide give just occasion unto others for to depart He that denies the debt begins the sute and he that invades my right sends for the process Will you not give others leave to defend their own against you and and to continue in the things that they have learned and contend for the Faith once delivered to them which you with your Innovations and inventions have corrupted you began when you taught and promoted so many opinions contrary to what we have received when you wrought upon the people to draw them after you when at
But what maketh you think I commend all the Answers in your Catechisme that I passed by and did not mention I pray do not abuse your self and me so far as to imagine it But that I should commend this Answer that contains the same Errour and falshood that the other did because I took it not in among them is the most idle fancie that could come into your head Sect. 4. The humblest souls are usually best at seeing Even as there be many poor despised illiterate men that see more into Christ and heaven than many proud ministers scholars and Universitie men that swell with conceits of their science and despise them He that will beleeve readily what you say take it upon your word though it be weak and unsound shall have the commendation of an humble Christian Papists are brought to think that when they renounce their own understanding and blindfold follow their guides it is a high act of humilitie and you would have it thought that all they who question what you deliver do swell with pride and self conceit and a high opinion of their own knowledge But as worldly want doth not always make men humble nor penury starve pride according to what Solomon saith in the twelfth of the Proverbs There is that honoureth himself and lacketh bread and as Gregory in his Pastoral enlargeth the observation Plerumque personarum ordinem permutat qualitas morum ut dives humilis sit pauper elatus that is Mens qualities and demeanours for the most part run quite a cross their estates and degrees the richer sort being in their carriage low and gentle while the poor are stiff and loftie So there be many ignorant and illiterate people that are intolerably proud undervaluing disdainfully all knowledge and knowing men and on the other side there are many men as eminent and as much above others in humilitie as they are in learning and parts and promotion You tell us somewhere who bred the Quakers but who is most like to do it who talketh most like them their name is new but their manner S. Jerom thus taxeth to Marcella Crassam rusticitatem pro sanctitate habent quasâ—â—dcirco sancti sint si nihil scierint Down-right rudeness they count is holiness as if because they knew nothing they must be therefore more holy than others are There be some lay-men whom perhaps you may think to gain upon and to gain to you while you complie with them and joyn with them in reproaching the Clergie But as love that is caused by undue means doth not long continue but is unstable and fastidious like fishes saith Plutarch that being taken with medicated baits are unwholsome and nothing worth So when you have pleased some ill-disposed people in reviling their Ministers your example hath taught them to do the like by your self as well as others and of this you have had experience But after that conference came abroad wherein G. W. produced your self against your self reading out of your book the testimonie you gave against the Ministers although you reasonably well shifted off one of the particulars from your self at that time yet I thought you might have been more warie of your words afterwards but I finde it otherwise One of the badges you there bestow upon your brethren is That they are more mindfull of the fleece than the flock Whether it be true or false that you said it was verie rashly spoken of you because it is a hard matter for you to know what others minde and what they minde most But do you well know what you meant by the fleece If you meant not the fleece of the flock it is scarce tolerable sense and if you did it is a manifest falshood and injurie For in England the maintenance of the Clergy is theirs by the same law by which any man holdeth what he hath and enjoyeth And is your understanding so extremely superficial as to think it is theirs who pay it and not theirs who take it or that the Laws of the Land should enforce any man to give away that which is his own to another though never so much against his will Another may come and out-go you but in your own way and bewail the iniquitie of the times that creditours should fleece their debters so as daily they do when they take what is due to them and complain of the Nobility and Gentrie of the land for fleecing their Tenants twice a year It may be you are troubled with an noise you have heard of some Minister that is compelled to sue at Law some of his neighbours for taking away some of the fleece from his back hazarding the loss of all the rest for being so litigious But whether he be more troubled and more grieved at his own loss and charge or at the dishonestie of the people that put him to it That you know not and till you do know you are bound in civilitie and charitie to think the best But you proceed further in this vein I remember my reverend Tutour M. Henry Hall of Trinitie Colledge once said to us his pupils We sit here speaking of the Universitie-fellows poring on our books and filling our selves with notions or to that purpose when the poor countrey-men or Ministers run away with the true and heavenly understanding With your good leave I should think that he did not speak of persons absent which had been to little purpose but as he spake to his pupils so he spake of them too who might be so disposed as to need such caution and advice or howsoever it was good that they should know that sanctifying grace is not attained always nor onely by learning and studie and it is good likewise for all men whatsoever to know that it is sooner and more probably attained by knowledge and reading than by lasiness and ignorance But why do you not speak against other vocations and employments as well as against that of scholars and learned men It is their profession to pore on books if you will needs call it so and fill their heads with notions it is their particular calling and it sets them never the further off from Religion nor out of the way to the general calling of Christianitie Why will you not let every one abide in his calling according to the Apostles appointment Why do you not speak aginst manufactures and merchandizing against navigation against building and rigging of ships against rearing fair houses and providing costly furniture Why not against keeping Courts and surveying lands for a poor countrey-man that never busied himself about any of these matters may run away with the true understanding But howsoever the world goes you must have your years minde of flinging at Universities and Philosophy and humane learning without any colour of good reason but not without a great suspicion of an ill intent For suppose that these things were merely secular and worldly nevertheless to the pure all things are pure and we may use
the world and all things therein so we abuse them not but all Arts and sciences may be and they are serviceable to the true Religion and the worship of the onely true God provided that they do not over-rule but be kept in good order and subjection If you would refuse to joyn with those that will prove man hath Free-will to good out of Aristotles Ethicks or with those that conclude a Christian is justified by doing just actions out of the principles of moral Philosophy it were commendably done of you But when you take delight and a small occasion to inveigh against these peculiar and appointed places where nature and natural faculties are polished and perfected by accession of art and studie for the better service of God in the State and in the Church and when to maintain the sufficiency of Scripture-doctrine for preaching the Gospel against the incroachment of Philosophie you bring such arguments as will hold as much against lips and lungs as against Logick and Metaphysicks This is no good humour of yours and it may be a very bad one And in you especially it is the more absurd and incongruous who promote the New Light That the works of Creation preach the Doctrine of the Gospel yea who say Essay pag. 14. The works of God are true preachers of God but the force of their voice is taken off by many of these Ministers that run without Gods message You that speak so much of the open school that is in the creatures praising Gods name and declaring his glorie and goodness do but destroy what you build in girding thus at schools of learning For Arts and Sciences and the studie of them do serve for lectures or for commentaries upon the great book of the world Who can search out and contemplate the influences and motions of the heavenly bodies Who can set forth the Historie of Plants Stones Metals Meteors Fishes Birds and Beasts and the works of the six-days-Creation but such men as have their education in places dedicated to learning and studie You talk of a School that God hath opened and you do what you can to seal up the doors of it One thing I must tell you further that the greatest enemies that Christians ever had most opposed and sought to hinder Christian schools and the most pestilent hereticks that have arisen since the Reformation have most of all declaimed against Scholastical and Academical knowledge And you will never perswade indifferent persons to beleeve any otherwise but that you speak against learning and learned men to this end that your errours and abuses that you put upon the people may not be discovered for always among the blinde he that is half-sighted is king I am sure many lay-men that cannot read Latine could see the faults of M. H. arguings when both himself and if I may credit reports divers Universitiemen were not so good at seeing them overmuch light makes some men almost if not altogether blinde If want of Latine be a good help to see by it may be this was the designe of the new method to make experiment in curing by contraries and to put out our lights the better to clear up our ey-sight It is verie well that you have declared your self in your seventh chapter against Impositions of Opinions I may therefore freely dissent from you in this matter and I will give you some reason There is difference betwixt the light of the Sun and that light which enlightens the minde because the sensitive power and the organ of the bodie are but weak and narrow and if there be an undue application or proportion of outward light all will be spoiled But humane understanding after Gods image being of vast capacitie or comprehension there is no fear that the intellectual light which is so sparingly dispensed in this life whether by acquisition or infusion should oppress or any way corrupt the facultie of the minde How it fares with you I know not but as for others in all ages the more they have waded into the abyss of knowledge the more they have confessed their own ignorance This light doth discover darkness but that it should cause any or make some men blinde is a blinde and blundering conceit of your own And now we will return to the particular controversie of this chapter Sect. 6. You will not grant that the Sun did shine upon Adam after he was fallen as it did before or if it did yet it spake not the same language because it spake God kinde to sinners which it could not do before man sinned It is pitie to interrupt you in these your deep speculations Go on I pray to prove that when you turn homeward the winde blows not as it did and that the Sun doth not shine alike upon the dial but speaks a new language everie hour of the day with plentie of the like never heretofore thought reasonable or credible He brings the saying of the scoffers to confirm his assertion and justifies the truth of it when the Apostle tells us that saying proceeded out of their wilfull ignorance and minds them that since the creation of the world all things did not continue alike for God overflowed the creation with a floud Thus did the impostours argue If the world hath lasted for so many ages then it will always last But it hath lasted for so many ages Therefore it will always last Now the Apostle doth not denie the Assumption or second proposition but directs his answer to the Connexion as if he had said thus It is too great ignorance to think the world must always continue because it hath continued so long for know they not that God is the Lord of nature know they not that he made this earth as standing and emergent out of the waters and that after so many years the waters were let loose upon it and wasted it The course of nature therefore doth not abide constant and unmoved but the power of God countermands it at his own will 2 Pet. 3.7 The heavens and the earth which now are by the same word are kept in store the Apostle confuteth them not from the change or alteration that was upon the floud but from the word or power of God that caused the floud The same hand or power or word that drowned the world shall when time cometh put an end to it by fire So that when the scoffers said All things continue alike from the first creation it was true as they meant it namely of a continued course of the heavenly motions and of the seasons of the year winter and summer day and night These and the like abide as they were at the first notwithstanding the deluge according to Gods promise Gen. 8. The earth had long ere S. Peters time out-worn the floud and the Psalmist saith as much psal 119.91 They continue this day according to thine ordinances Sect. 7. Evident it is they preach God mercifull to sinners as well as just