and truly partaking of the Divine nature and begotten by the light and living Word of Truth from death and darkness into a real union with it self by receiving with meekness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the innate ingrafted word â—am 1.21 by which they become incorporated and as it were transubstantiated into one seed with it self having the Image and glory of God seen upon them and shining in and through them before the world men before whom let your light shine faith Christ Mat. 5.16 Is. 60.1 2 3 c. 2 Cor. 2. ult I say if such men may be stiled the Light of the world as Iohn Baptist was stiled by Christ a burning and shining light Joh. 35 36 then whom yet Christ had a greater witnesâ— Wil I.O. therefore prefer the deaâ— copies of the writings of those living men who wrote from the life light and Spirit of God moving before or at least into an equality with the holy men who under God were the Authors of those writings as they were at first which now are but the fallible â—andyworks of by his own confession but meer fallible Transcribers or if he will will any wise men of God become so foolish with him I trow not in as much as the work-man is more glorious than the work that issues either originally from or but subordinately through his own hands the Writer more honourable than his meer writing as Heb. 3.3 4. Hee who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house for as every outward Writing or Letter yee now have the use of was written by some man as every such house is built by some man but he of whom are all things and he that originally built all things is God indeed Yet me thinks I sent not only I.O. but T.D. also who is so a kâ—n to him that in most matters here hee prosecues the same point unless where he contradicts him and hobbles upon the same notions enthroning the Scriptures or outward Letter very high above the Church whose children it immediately was pend by the hands of and whose meer outward Engine the outward letter is insomuch that I.O. makes it not only dearer to God then the whole world besides p. 171. but also p. 76. the very Darling of God so that his Church whose servant the Letter is and for whose sake written is made by him but some subservant to hold out the honour of the Letter that it may bee the more conspicuous rather then to let her own light image grace glory which is that of God Isa. 10.1 2. shine out before man the duty t is quoth he almost the whole of the Church to hold up that some time and when wee say the Church is a Pillar and Ground of truth from 1 Tim. 3.15 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which words Pillar and Ground should not bee taken for the supporter or foundation nor inholder of truth in sensu Architectonico which T.D. denies â—e not dispute See p. 356. See p. 355. but grant him his sensum forensem or foreign sense of it in which I.O. also who sayes absurdly however that these words Pillar and Ground may in good coherence of speech refer to the words following viz. the mystery of godliness as well as to the Church will take it in and let them have it yet what follows that the Church is but the Ground and Pillar to set the Letter upon which I.O. calls the light and truth there and to hold forth only the outward literal publication as T.D. pleads p. 18 19. of his 2. Pamph. or the seat or place of residence for the Scripture as upon the Exchange in London are pillars and places upon which hang Tables and Proclamations in no wise surely for though the Pillars of the Exchange are for support as well as shew and so T.Ds. Simile doth not quadrare nor run on all four to bee sure yet to give them the sense of a pillar to hold up or hold out only yet that which the Church is the Pillar to hold up that is hold forth is the Truth whether by or without the Scripture of it between which Truth and the book they both sometimes do distinguish which truth or light is the Foundation or Pillar in sensu Architectonico on which the Church is built and not it on the Church as the letter is which under God the Church that gives no being to the truth or light nor kindles one beam thereof as I.O. sayes but only bears witness to it gives being to and so is in sensu Architonico the Pillar or Foundation of though in sensu forensi of the light and truth only for the Church is more honourable then the letter as the Builder or that which supports the house is more honourable then the house that receives being under God and preservation from it and its Prophets but its less honourable then the light and truth it lives by and hath its being from as a Church in respect of which light and truth t is confest it is not a pillar and ground in sensu Architectonico as it is of the letter but in sensu forensi only that is the seat place or pillar from whence it is held out and shines or as the Church is called Reâ— 1.20 Zach. 4.2 a golden Candlestick that serves to hold out in life and doctrine voice and writing the eternal Word of grace light truth and word of life conveyed in measure to her from the two Olive trees or anointed ones or sons of Oyl the living Word and Spirit that empty themselves into the golden Candlesticks feeding them therewith and from thence shining as God witnesses to the world which two witnesses shining and prophesying to the Church or Candlesticks and through them to the world in power and much patience and sufferings stand before the God of the whole earth Zach. 3. Rev. 11. And if the Saints born of the incorruptible seed the Word of God which liveth and abideth ever may bee stiled the Seed of God Will I.O. thence conclude that a corruptible Letter copied out by corrupt mens hands as the Scripture is at this day may be so stiled also The Word of God took upon him the nature and seed of Abraham but never took upon him however he is written of in it the proper nature of a dead Letter that was written with ink and pen by mens hands There was no time wherein the Word and Light by which all was made was made or born into the true nature of such a Letter but there is a time of its being made flesh and dwelling as their food in the Saints Joh. 1.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 natus est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word was born flesh and dwelt in us Ioh. 6.51 to 64. the bread I give is my flesh c. howbeit all flesh is not the same flesh there is a flesh of Christ that if eaten with a carnal mouth would as so have profited nothing vers 63.
his liberty to make his choice ex dieabus malis of those two evils seems to chuse the latter saying pag. 7. that as far as their personal concernments as Saints and beleevers lay in the Scriptures and in order to their saving knowledge of the truth they studied the Writings and Prophesies of one another I conclude then against I.O. that by that clause the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles is not intended their Writings as if they laid their own Scriptures for the Foundation of the Church and her faith hope obedience but that which the Apostles themselves were built upon together with the whole Church or houshold of God which could not be nor was their own Writings but Christ the Light The Letter indeed is the foundation laid by I.O. and men of his mould of old for his Wheel in a Wheel as he speaks or his false Church whose works like his own run round on and are found to have in them Wheel within Wheel but as for the true Church of the living God which is the Wheel that will turn the worlds Wheels upside down it never did doth nor ever will acknowledge any fallible letter or meer transcribed Text or any other thing to be the true great and blessed foundation of Truth Faith Hope or Obedience then Christ Iesus the same yesterday and to day and for ever who was before it now is and ever will be when the letter shall be no more at all 2. Argument whatsoever the Scripture it self layes down and testifies to be the only true Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets and of the whole Church of God and of her Faith Hope and Obedience and of all Truth that is the only true foundation of all these things But the Scripture it self layes down and testifies Christ alone the Light the living Word and not it self to be the only true Foundation of the things aforesaid therefore Christ alone the Light Spirit and inward living Word that is nigh in the heart and not the Scripture it self is the only true Foundation of them The first and affirmative part of the minor is not denied by thee as the major cannot be and if thou deny the second part of the minor which is negative and denies the Scripture to testifie of it self in any place that its the Foundation then assign where the Scripture calls it self the Foundation or else own that it doth not and so that it is not the Foundation at all much less the truest or the only one as thou often intimatest either expresly or in terms equivalent it is Ep. p. 25 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not any means of standing out of utter uncertainty about all sacred truth if the Heb punctation be invention also p. 64 65. not a truer Foundation for for faith to repose it self upon 3. Argument if the Scripture be the foundation for the Church and all her Faith and Repentance to be founded and grounded upon then either there was no Foundation for it before the Scripture or else they who lived before the Scripture had one Foundation for their faith and we another and so consequently there hath been two Foundations for the one faith or the one Church or body of Christ but there was a Foundation before the Scripture and there are not two Foundations of faith one to that part of the body of Christ and of Gods building that was before the Scripture and another for that part that is built since the Scripture therefore the Scripture is not the Foundation Argument 4. The Foundation of the faith must be something that is infallible firm fixt certain stable sure and inalterable as the light Spirit and Word within onely is and Gods Foundation 2 Tim. 2 19. the Foundation of God sure to a Tittle for Error minimus in principio for major in medio maximus in fine the least fault or errour and deviation in the principle or Foundation of any building grows greater toward the middle and is greatest at the top as it is seen in a very Tower if the bottome or basis stands never so little awry as is discernable it is discerned more in the middle and much more still as it ascends higher But the Scripture letter Hebrew and Greek Texts how ever I.O. pleads their integrity in every Apex point tittle and iota yet are as I have shewed above more at large in answer to his long Tattle about the Tittles and points and indentity of Lections of the letter by his own confession mistaken and mistranscribed in small things yea and in some matters of more moment and importance in the best transcribed Copies of the Original Text therefore the Text or letter of the Scripture cannot be a fit Foundation for the Churches faith but the spirit and Word within is onely so Psal. 75.3 The earth and all the inhabitants thereof are dissolved faith Christ the Word of God I bear up the Pillars of it and that is the reason why the earth is so shaken as it is and reels to and fro that it is removed as a cottage and all helpers and healers avail nothing because they reject the corner stone Christ the Word for if the Foundations be destroyed what can the righteous do Psal. 11.3 Isa. 24. 18 19. Each of which Arguments hold good against the letters being the Rule the light the witness of God the Gospel the power of God to salvation the only means or way of coming to the saving knowledge of God Word of God and what ever other high Titles I. O. intitles it by as appears in their order That the Light or Word within and not the Scriptures are the Rule or Canon Another thing thou assertest of the Scripture is that it is the only Rule of the faith and obedience of Gods Church p. 173. that it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that more sure word of Prophesie to be attended to 2 Pet. 1.18 19 20. not in its self for so it was as sure as sure could be but in its giving out its evidence to us then that great miracle of miracles greater than which the Apostles of Christ never did behold or hear viz. That voice which came from the most excellent glory This is my beloved Son which we have greater security from and by according to Peter then they had in and by that miraculous voice That Moses and the Prophets which who so will not hear will not be perswaded to repent though one arise to them from the dead Luke 16.31 That Word Law and Testimony mentioned Isa. 8.20 according to which who speaks not are said to be in the dark so that there is no light in them by which what every one sayes be it what or whom it will Church or person if it be in and about the things of God concerning his will or worship or our obedience to him is to be tried That which we are sent to that which is and is asserted to be the
other your absurdities put together for I â—row whence or from what Church Principle Ground Foundation comes that Faith according to the Analogy of which ye are to conform in your interpretations of the Scripture it must be either the Infallible Chair and bottomless pit of mens dunghilly Traditions which is the Foundation of the Church of Rome and her Faith which Foundation Church and Faith that 's built on it ye would seem in words at least to deny or else the Infallible Light and Spirit of God in the heart which the Letter came from and the Qua. according to the Letter and together with it call men to and are themselves as to their Faith founded on whom together with their Faith which stands not in mens words writings nor thoughts but in that Light which is the Power of God and that Foundation of it also with no less but a little more detestation ye deny or else the Scripture it self which as much as ye live by yea by Popish Tradition in many things as the Papists do yet in words ye own Now the two first being denyed this last is the Rule of your Faith according to the Tenor and Analogy of which the Churches Faith which ye must interpret Scripture by is to be framed and conformed See then your most abominable confusions and rounds ye run in 1. You have the Scripture before which the true Faith was delivered to the Saints a 1000 years which Scripture is the Foundation of your Church Faith whereby ye might see were ye not blind that your Church and Faith has not the same Foundation as the true had Next you have a Faith which must be squared by the best interpretations ye can make of that Scripture alias a common stock of Divinity that stinks as the blood of a dead man that hath no life in it Then again this Scripture by the Analogy of which as the Church interprets it your Churches Faith is to be framed must be bent to and interpreted by the Analogy of that Faith which was thereby framed So Riddle me Riddle me what 's this Round of our reasonless Rabbies 1. The Scripture is the Rule of our Faith say they according to our Churches interpretations of which her common Faith must as to the Articles of it be framed and conformed 2. The common Faith is the Rule according to the Analogy of which the Scripture must be interpreted and all our Expositions of it framed and conformed Oh the bruitish brainy notions of our of our Brittish Nation A false Faith about personal Election and Reprobation about All 's signifying some men only and every man only a few being framed in Iohn Calvins fancy upon his miserable mistakes and misinterpretations of the Scripture Scilicet ever since All Scripture must be interpreted according to the Analogy of that false Faith â—â—a ferunt circum-feruntur T. D. J. O. R. B. J. T. Ignoramus Smâ—ctimnuus and others The Blood of Christ cleanseth us in presenti from all sin that 's the guilt say they not filth of it though the very phraâ—e imports otherwise cleanse your selves from all uncleanness of flesh and spirit that 's not as the Letter imports All indeed but All gross iniquities we must have our infirmities while we live here and and if he meant them he commanded impossibilities which the Apostle did not He that sinneth is of the Devil he that 's of God sins not that 's not as the word Amartanei nemine câ—ntradicente imports but it must be expounded by the other phrase Amartian Poiein operam dare peccato c. which Amartian Poiein but that they stretch it out upon the Tenters is no more then Amartanein for he that sins does sin and he that commits sin does no more and does so much as that while he does sin he is as Christ said Iohn 8. a servant of it and not of Christ in that they do no iniquity that is not as the Letter impâ—rts but they do none as the wicked do it that is with all their might but more moderately Perfection that 's only such an uprightness and sincerity as respects all Gods Commandments whether they be kept or broken saved from sin is from the dominion not being of it while we have a being here it hath not potestatem dominandi nor damnandi but operandi bellandi captivandi only led Paul captive while he liv'd to the Law of it so that with his flesh he served it but it domineers not damns not because the mind approves it not while the flesh commits it if it chance to be murder and adultery as that of David whose heart was upright say they though the Scripture excepts him from uprightness in that case and therefore iustified quoth T. D. alias held guiltless O Criss-Cross while under the guilt of it being weak and temptation strong and an hundred more such fetches do our formally holy Fathers find wherewith to feed up themâ—elves and their failing Flocks from fainting under their â—â—â—lest faults minifiâ—d into the name of Saints infirmities Thus they swim up and down in their non-sensical senses and notions so that nothing must be taken as the words import but when a meaning serves their licenticus turns and then they urge the words import it so one while it must be as the phrase imports other whiles it cannot be so but otherwise then the Letner imports it for then the Scripture so it seems indeed to the Owls and Batts whose eyes dazle at the Light it came from so that they see more by night then by day would contradict it self and be at variance and disagree within it self and cannot approve it self to their own understandings without the mediation of their own meanings and interpretations and therefore they must reconcile it to it self though they are at never so much odds among themselves and each man within himself about this matter of setting it to rights even one saying this is the meaning the other that a third in my opinion it is so a fourth I think it must be either so or so but which he determines no more then T. D till they have reconciled it into nothing but an irreconcileable enmity with it self and an occasion of irreconcilable enmity about it between themselves And this I know not only as one of those that now see in the Lords light their dotage herein and the wrong and crooked wayes wherein they are at work to set that to rights and strait which is so already in itself if they could let it alone without wresting it into constructions as crooked as they are in their conversations but as one that was once as busie as the best of them in the same blind fruitless frothy work of beating the brains about the meaning of this and that which the Spirit only reveals to the poor in Spirit and not to the proud haughty Scorner that dealeth in proud wâ—ath against the righteous having been my self when I was where they yet
how it should be otherwise in the latter dayes of this formal Christian Church called Christendom then he sayes it was in the latter daves of that Iewish Church both which National Churches say they are Iewes Christians and are not but lye and are the Synagogue of Satan he cannot see that will not purposely look besides the Scripture which intimates to us a necessity of the innumerable multitude of false Prophets by which People must be perplexed from submitting to the Testimony of Gods true Ones that now go forth from him to witnesse against the other since it sayes so long since as it was written that many Antichrists and false Prophets were even then already gone forth into the world which as according to Christs praediction Matth. 24. they then and not now as our Seers say who can't see themselves for their selves began to breed so have ever since spawn'd themselves by a successive generation of the same seed of blind Seers that suppose Gain to be Godliness in such Myriads over the face of the whole Earth that he must even go out of the Christian World at least that will find any clean Corner where these croaking Frogs and unclean Creatures and costly Caterpillars are not crawling So then by reason of the many subtilties and serpentine insinuations of the many false Prophets in these last dayes of the Gentile Christian Church in name not nature 't is now as 't was ever of old that the true Prophets of the Lord whom he reproves the other by are look'd on as Fanaticks fools and mad bare brain'd fellows 2 King 9.11 Acts 26.24 that do but pretend and seem to themselves to see that they do not and make themselves Prophets and are often punish'd as a sort of giddy guides with stocks stones prisons and such kind of rough Reproofs as the false Prophets the Shemaiahs or Dreamers which speak lying words in the Lords Name which he commanded them not suggest as most surable for the true Seers to the Officers whether Vice Chancellors Chief Priests or Earthly Powers that are as the Beast that bears her is the Subordinate willing Executioners of the Clergy or Whores wicked will as in the letter from the false Prophet to the Chief Priest against Ieremiah of old Ierem. 29.26 27. The Lord hath made thee Priest in the stead of Jehojadah the Priest that ye should be Officers in the House of the Lord for every one that is mad and maketh himself a Prophet that thou shouldest put him in Prison and in the Stocks Now therefore why hast thou not reproved Jeremiah of Anathoth which maketh himself a Prophet unto you c. As for thee I.O. I know not but that thou art the first that fastned that wonted foul Name of Fanaticks upon the People of God called Quakers in these dayes by thy fighting against them and falsly accusing them as fit for their Frauds to be punished with Prisons c. under that Name so over-frequently used by thee for which it hath since justly enough as from God befallen Thee and thy fellow mongril Presbyter-Independents Haman-like who hang'd high upon the Gallowes of his own preparing to be whipt smartingly by that more smoakie sort of Locusts who are in the dark behind thee with this Rod of thy own gathering for now by that Papal Prelatical-Priesthood that hope but their hopes are as-thine and those of all Hypocrites are as the giving up of the Ghost to over-top you all even ye and all Sectaries that side not or ride not with them back to Rome are branded by that same Name Fanaticks of thy own faining which is become the common Charesteristical of all but either Romish or Canterburian Catholicks and thou thy self perhaps under that Notion of a Sectary and account of a Fanatick as well as on some others art justly Iudas-like who betrayed the Truth detruded down from that place of Preheminence from whence thou prated'st out that Preheminent piece of Latine lack-Light against the Quakers and according to Psal. 96.25 26 27 28. Psal. 109. 7. to 21. Acts 1.20 deprived of thy dainty Deanery and that thy Bishoprick or Episcopal Office hath another taken and like as he did Doeg the Edomite Psal. 52.1 to ult for the same Dog-like doings viz. devising Mischiefs being as a sharp Razor to the Saints deceitful workings loving evil lying devouring words more then good and rather then to speak righteously hath God pluck'd thee away from thy Prerogatives in that falsly called Christs-Church thou was 't lately Head of and if yet thou shalt as perhaps thou mayest happen ever to recover to any such outward Lordlinesse again over Christs true Church and Gods own Heritage who come Summer heat or Winter storms will still stand Green as an Olive in the House of God yet for all thy now flouting at them as Fanaticks and their way as Madnesse that day cometh on a pace spoken of Wisd. 4. 15. 5.1 ad sinem wherein those righteous Ones thou wrongest shall stand out in great boldnesse before the faces of all such as thee who hast afflicted them and made no account of their labours and ye shall be amazed at the strangenesse of their Salvation so far beyond all ye looked for then repenting and groaning for anguish of Spirit shall ye say within your selves This is he whom we had in derision and as a Proverb of reproach We fools couâ— his life madnesse and his end without honour How is he numbred among the Children of God and his Lot is among the Saints Therefore have we erred from the way of Truth and the Light of Righteousnesse hath not shinned to us and the Sun of Righteousnesse rose upon us We wearied our selves in the way of wickednesse and destruction gone throw Desarts where there lay no way but as for the way of the Lord we have not known it What hath Pride profited us and what hath Riches with all our vaunting brought us c. Thus far as to those Two Archi-Pseudo-Prophetical Titles by thee I.O. tauntingly imposed upon the People who at this day hear the Word of the Lord and Tremble at his Word viz. That of Quaking Fanaticks or in thy Sensu Composito Fanatical Quakers Now I come to those thy many other misprisions and mis-representations of us under the Terms of poor deluded foolish Knaves Crowes Vagrant Rogues or Vagabonds Enthusiasts Locusts and such like J.O. The clamour of every Fanatical Knave Ex. 3. S. 26. Epist. pag. 28. poor deluded Fanatical souls amongst us called Quakers for the instruction of the younger sort against whose abominations I have subjoyned the Theses in the close of the other Treatises To the Instruction of the younger Schollers who intending the accutenesse of their Wit to the study of the holy Letters or Scriptures have neither list nor leasure to follow these Crows the Quakers up and down pelting at them with Tiles and Dirt this shew of new Fanaticism refuted which swarms even every where
of the Scriptures but say only in words of truth and sobernesse that they are not to be so exceedingly Adored and Idolized by men as theyâ—â—re by you who make them little lesse then All in all things to the Church the Papists speak much in disparagement of the Scriptures in which we say they do but blasphemously babble against them viz. That they are inferrior to the Humane Traditions of their Church or at least to the unerring breast of their Ghostly holy Father without whom opening and authorizing them they are of no more use nor authority then Aesops Fables and such like Reply 3. Whereas thou art ashamed to Relate the horrid foolish Titles of the Quakers Books in proof of their blasphemies against the Scriptures I believe that 's true indeed though all the rest are palpable Lyes for if thou shouldest Relate the Titles of the Quakers Books in proof of the Truth of this thy Charge of them which is utterly false then thy Lye which is plain enough already would be seen more plainly then it is for in all the Titles of the Quakers Books that ever I read who have read Ten times more of them I believe then thou hast done as I have seen Christ only exalted on the Throne and the Scripture owned in its place so I never saw and am perswaded also thou never hast seen any thing Written by the Quakers that borders on the foresaid Iewes and Papists blasphemings of the Holy Scriptures and therefore as I cannot much marvel at it that thou art ashamed to do it so I do not much blame thee that it doth so much shame thee as thou sayest to Relate the most foolish of them If it were true there was malice enough in thee I.O. to provoke thee to have instanced some Particulars in proof of this parcel of Scandal to the fuller shame of the Quakers whom to scandalize what thou canst is thy chief design and to have named those blasphemers and their Books but pudet referre sayest thou I am ashamed to Relate c. Thou art loath to be too punctual in thy Proof lest it proving too short of thy Charge the stain thou wouldest have stuck upon the Truths Friends should be stricken back upon thy self and the Lye come to lye at thy own door for if sounded out too loudly and distinctly it might Eccho and rebound home again to thee the Author and so redound to thy dishonour so thou fold'st thy self like the Serpent whose seed thou art in indefinite complexes or at least lapest thy self up in Universals and darest not lay thy self out at length nor grow too far into Particulars for dolus later in universalibus quae nunquam bene sentiuntur nisi ex particularibus suis as Deceit lyes most securely and keeps best hid in Universals which are not clearly perceived but by the Particulars in which they exist so by being beheld in the said Particulars both they and the Lyes that lye often in them undiscerned come more unavoidably to be discryed Reply 4. Whereas thou saiest thou thinkest meet to set down our Opinion as Collected out of our own Books and Speeches and accordingly dost declare what we hold as concerning the Scriptures thou most plainly Confutest thy self as to the Lyes thou tellest of us for thy self acknowledgest of us that we own that the Scriptures do contain a true Declaration of the Will and Mind of God proceeding from the spirit of Christ inspiring the Writers that thus far we are right and that we stand to this Confession without any renouncing it only that we would have wholly rejected the Scriptures without doubt but that things have not fell out according as we could wish do deny them to be the ordinary inalterable perfect and standing Rule of Gods Worship and our Obedience without the Revelations of the spirit and such like And this sayest thou is the summe of these mens Iudgements c. Which if it be where 's the wicked Blasphemy all this while wherewith thou Chargest us For there 's none as shall appear in the worst of this which yet thou settest down as gathered out of the Quakers Books and Speeches which thou sayest bear blasphemous Titles against the Scriptures but pudet referre I blush to set them down must answer all These things I O. do convict thee of telling many notorious Lyes against the Quakers even too many for a man to tell that calls himself a Minister of Christ and D. D. though not all by very many which thou tellest in thy Book some of which lyes yet left they should not be loud enough ' to come under every ordinary Readers Observation if told but once are either expresly or implicitly two or three times over related J. O. The Jewes Papists and Quakers differ among themselves it so falls out that they who in all other matters are most different in Opinion conspire altogether in this blasphemy viz. against the Scriptures The Papists and Enthusiastical Fanaticks do perpetually War against each other they mutually devote each other to destruction They are not acted by the same Reasons but those for their Traditions these for their Enthusiasms and Revelations Contending tooth and nail and so like Sampsons Foxes with their Tayles turned to each other bringing fire-brands on the Churches Bread-Corn they all attempt together very friendly to thrust down the holy Scripture from its Place The Papists do earnestly endeavour to detrude the Scripture out of its proper Place in the Church our Fanaticks tread in the same foot-steps with them into which wickednesse those among the Papists that are called the Spiritually have led them the way And elsewhere thou Reckon'st us up among the rest as Enemies of Gods Word and haters of the Scriptures Reply 1. Howbeit I. O. thou who in thy Epistle pretendest it to be thy aim and intention in thy Discourse to discover the Reproach that is cast by many upon the Scripture to its disparagement and to vindicate it therefrom dost as in most things else wherein thou bend'st at us discharge thy Bow at a venture so as at Random to rank us as joynt Abettors with them in grosse in that one grosse and common Cause of Caluminating Vilifying Decrying Denying the Scriptures among Atheists Pagans New Testament Contemning Iewes Papists and the whole Rabble of Rude Reproachers thereof whether in Whole or Part as if we were if not the Ring leaders yet at least the Rere-ward of the Ragged-Regiment of Anti-scripturists of what ever sort yet in this thou hast most grosly abused us and thy self also by thy false Accusing and Belying of us to the world in that Particular and must most assuredly come into Condemnation in â—he Judgement for Condemning the Generation of the Just for however thou mis-reportest of us to the causing of many to mistake us yet of a truth we are no such manner of People as thou wouldest make men believe we are but such as shall manifest our selves
at all in Vindication of the Popish Clergy in any of their Devilish doings nor scornful or spiteful speakings against the Scripture but of another Interest even that of the true Clergy or Heritage of God as remote from Theirs and Thine too 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am an Opposer of thee as to that same Book wherein thou so vehemently Opposest the Papists hence many may as some already do suppose I am in far firmer friendship and fellowship with that Fry of fighters against the Scripture then with thee and thy fellows who wouldest fain seem at least to fight against them for it but if any man will be ignorant of me and my honest meanings let him be ignorant for my part as I am a well-wisher to all Souls and am in friendship with all men having and holding as truly Pacem cum Personis as cum Peccatis Bellum so I am in no fellowship with that in all men whether of the Romish Religion or that which informe is more Reformed that is not in fellowship with the Scriptures for that which is not in union therewith is not in fellowship with God fighting against neither smal nor great save only against the sinful seed of the Serpent in them which from the spirits of the spiritually throughout all Christendom spawnes it self forth in spite and spiritual wickednesse against the seed of the Woman who must bruise his head at last though he obtains for a while to bruise her heel between whose seed which is one and his seed of every sort whose name is Legion for they are many the most endlesse enmity is so that though I appear against those Paper-works of thine wherein thou appearest upon the Stage in part against that Synagogue of Satan but more palpably against the Synagogue of the Saints yet this is not all to gratifie the Romanists in their scurrilities against the Scriptures more then thee and thine Abettors in your scarce Schollar-like much lesse Scripture-like scoldings for them but as occasion is Pro Scripturis for the Scriptures which notwithstanding thy empty Apologetica's for them ye and the Papists also are both utterly against I shall not spare to grate hard against you both as such who while you are scribling of the Scriptures whether Pro or Con are yet our of that precious Truth the Scripture tells of and against that living Word that eternal and internal Light it calls to which leads to that Life of God that the Scripture calls for 3. In regard that I am and shall unavoidably be found in this present Controversie with thee saying some things against thee and thy untrue Assertions for Truths sake yet with a due Respect thereunto which the very Papists say though truly enough yet too disrespectfully about the Scriptures In this respect though I would not have them so yet I believe some are and some will be if peradventure these Premises prevent it not so blind as to believe I own the Pope and his Apostolical Church because I cannot own all that as true and Apostolical which some Prime Protestants tell for Truth but rather tell the Truth with him when he tells it about the Scripture or any other thing then Errour and Lyes with those who pretendedly for the Truth and Pro Scripturis Protest against him For I must give the Devil his due so as to acknowledge his Words to be true when he speaks the Truth though to a false end rather then sooth up thee I.O. or any other men so as to say the Crow is white and that ye utter Truth when ye tell utter untruth though against the Devil himself to please either thee or them Howbeit many men in these dayes and not a few of those who are called Christs Ministers and counted well studied Schollars or at least would not be well contented to be not so accounted are yet so dim as without any more ado to deem them to be Romish Priests under Pay from the Pope who own some Truths which his Priesthood owns as if because at Rome they own Christ to be the Son of God they must needs be of that Church who deny him not so to be but more especially any Truths which by these Divine Deemers are not Deemed to be Truths and thereupon disowned by their non-discerning selves upon whose crazy Concerts and cloudy Accounts and crooked Conjectures some that do more service to the Truth against Popish Fictions in a year then themselves do in an Age are thorow their shallow surmises by their implicit Faith't People as sinisterly supposed to be Supporters of the Papal Hierarchy because themselves whose Idol the Letter is are not digested in all their Extravagant Exaltings of it though the Popes extream of Exalting his leaden Legends and Holy Chaire above it be more professedly distasted and detested Thus such as believe according to the Scripture the general Grace and Love of God in giving Christ to die for all men for as much as that also is believed at Rome seem to these senslesse ones to favour too much of Popery because the empty understandings narrow Nodels and heedlesse Head-pieces of many Protestant Parish Priests are not as yet enlarged enough to comprehend it who notwithstanding being blear-eyed at home whilest Eagle eyed abroad Nunquam vident id manticae quod in tergo est never come to see or sent that plain Popery of their Parish Posture and Parish pay by way of Tythes which the Night is now too far spent for any but Owles Bats and Night-birds not to see that its of the Pope sith though its a piece of stark rank and Popery not held without the guilt of Perjury yet as it s their own suus cuique crepitus bene olet so it s that which serves their turn better at this time then the Extirpation of it Root and Branch according to their Oathes which would savour lesse of Popery and more of pure Pietv will ever do Of this sort of Evil Surmisers is T. D. who not only as thou I. O. dost Accuses us me in particular as one big with and spitting out venome against the Scriptures for not owning those outward Writings as the only Rule of Faith and holy Life but also accounts of us as no other then broachers of Popish Doctrines and bringers in of the Popes Baggage for dissenting as in other points so from his blind Tenets about the Scriptures Yea so earnestly doth T. D. drive on his Design of Insinuating it into mens minds concerning me that I am Popishly affected that he finds occasion of Accusation against me as so as well where I more fully own the Scripture then himself does as where I may more easily seem to one that 's blind to deny it Witnesse his words Page 27. 1. Pamph where for owning the Epistle of Paul to LAODICEA which he sputns at as Spurious he flyes thus foolishly in my face T.D. We know quoth he your Brethren of the Popish Party have laid many such Brats at
any Critick pleases and as no Authority to us at all as they in their basenesse and hatred of it which I condemne do say it is of as 't is my continual exercise in works to do it so do I here in plain words exalt the Scripture which they so debase and state it over all that their Trash and aforesaid Trumpery even on the very top of all their long Train of Traditions and over the archest Tittle of the Tripple Crown the proudest pinacle of Peters now un Peter-like painted Temple the highest point of that pompous pious piteous Pillar and ground of Truth the choicest Chapiter of that holy Church and infallibly erring infallible Chair Thus doing I shall be own'd at last if not by I. O. and such as have his dimme Doings as tâ—ey have his person in admiration because of advantage yet by all unbyassed beholders of both our undertakings for the Scripture to be no more a pander for the Papists as I am more belyed then believed to be the lying Tribe of Levi then for himself but a just plain and impartial Pleader for the Scripture against them both and a doer of Right to those holy Writings which are egregiously wronged by both Papists and Protestants as between Two parties of partial Praters Pro and Con about them by one of which they are scarcely more sottishly and Satanically for Superstitions sake Abhorred then unduly and Superstitiously Adored by the other For howbeit thou deemest thy self and those thy self Reverencing fellow Students of it to whom thou Dedicatest thy Endeavours to Vindicate it to be such as value the Scripture as much as any thou knowest yet there are many whom thou knowest not but supposest to be sleighters and disowners of it who if to own value and exalt it be to ascribe all that to it which it assumes to it self to Preach and practise that holy Life which is the end of it and to give it its due and no more as indeed it is do own value honour and exalt the Holy Scripture much more and much more truly then any of your self-exalting selves who saving your fair Speeches for it and your fawnings on it Ore tenus your common aiëry and meer verbal Commendations thereof and of your selves as valuers thereof do yet in truth no more value or honour it then the Iewes whose grand Idol that is as the whole is yours at this day do their own owned part thereof of whose dotage in that kind I have in sundry Nations been an Eye-witnesse in not a few of their Synagogues who Adorn and carry it about as ye do your Bibles more beautified without then your selves are within and lift it up with loud noises especially when these words are read viz. He shall magnifie the Law and make it honourable when yet the Truth it makes mention of hath no Mansion in their minds to the renewing of them yea I may truly say you do more undervalue the Scripture by your advancing it above it self and over-valuing and worshipping it so much as ye do in your words whilst alienated from the Light it came from and calls to in your Works and Lives then some of the Synagogue of very Rome it self who in lips and lives too do undervalue it by how much Deceit and Hypocrisie is far greater Iniquity then 't is for men openly to disown what Cordially they do not own and to pretend to be no better Friends to it then indeed they are and by how much as all is not Gold that glisters so all that which by its glistring would fain seem to be Gold when it is but Drosse is worse then that which both is Drosse and seems to be so Yea those that undervalue the Scripture so as to set Traditions above it and they that overvalue it so as to set the Light below it both these must come under Condemnation from me as being both Abomination to the Lord before whom witness the Brazen Serpent and Christs Apostles Acts 14.11 to 19. whom the people did worse in Worshipping as Gods then if they had not heeded but hated them as of the Devil it may be worse to overvalue then to undervalue many things which may be of his own Appointment So that ye have little need to decry against Papists as Decryers of the Scriptures and lesse to link us the Quakers and Papists together as Adversaries in Common to the Scriptures as if your selves were the only Patrones thereof for as Anti-Papistical as ye seem to be about the Scriptures yet ye will be found Acting not more against them then though in a different way from the Papists against the Scriptures And howbeit thou taylest us and the Papists together figuring us out by thy fine Tale of the aforesaid Foxes as falling from and fighting against each other and yet both fellow-friends against the Scripture That is false as urged and uttered with that referrence to the Papists and Quakers as joynt Injurers of the Scriptures wherewith thou ridiculously Relatest it but true enough yea too too true If Related in that right Referrence which it bears toward the Papists and your Selves yea Quid Rides be not so merry I. O. about the Mouth for De te mutato nomine Quakers Fabula narratur thou thinkest thou hast shrewdly hurt thy meer fancied Fanatick Foes with a flap of a Fox-Tayle but in that Tale thou hast but made a Rod for thy own Tayle for verily he that hath but half an Eye and by thy mentioning thereof is minded to search where and to whom thy Simile best suits will find how causelesly and incongrously thou crowdest the Papists and Quakers so closely together as Companions in thy abusive Comparison and how aptly it may rather be Applyed to that Romish Synagogue and your Selves to whom it comes as nigh as four feet if any Simile can truly be said to run on all four can well carry it and who as much as ye dissent not only in diverse other matters but also about the Scripture it self the one for and the other against the perfection purity integrity authority and excellency of the meer Text and bare Letter of it do yet concur as closely and come as nigh to one another in denyal of the Truth and Doctrine thereof as four pence comes to a Groat Yea the Truth is your selves and they are far more fitly figured by those fiery-Tayld Foxes which tended two several wayes yet ended in one and the self same work of Destroying the Philistims Corn whil'st turning tayl to tayl and drawing into your two different Extreames one sort crying up Unwritten Traditions to be the most perfect Rule above the Scripture the other crying up the Outward Letter as the most perfect Rule above the Internal Light Word and Spirit which gave it forth ye not only fill the World as with so many Fire brands with your fiery Contentions so that like that Corn which failed when it felt the fire it fell together by the
your opposite Expositions and that in such very places which to any save such light haters as standing in their own light cannot see Wood for Trees are as plain as the Nose on a mans face If to claw it and call it Lydium lapidem a true undeceivable fixt sure and inalterable standing Touchstone and disown those as dishonourers of it who in words compare it to a Nose of Wax a Lesbyan Rule and yet in your own Works so to make it by bending and bowing it every one to his own blind Invention so as to cause it to stand Nine wayes at once and to propound not only how possibly but also how facile it is to wrest it into as many various Lections by the advantage of the Hebrew Character as can be in the most flexible Writing in the World or any Critick can invent as thou I.O. teachest in thy Epistle If to play Legerdemaine with it so as in a presence of valuing It to say great matters of it and then to depresse it so as to unsay them again and then to run the Rounds and say them again as thou I.O. often dost If to boyse it up into that honourable Title of the Living Word of God and again to hurle it down into that more temperate Term which yet ye will not endure others to Term it by of a Dead Letter and yet to go round again Horrendo percussis scotomate after that to say its Living and no where said to be Dead If to deal so worthily with it as to affirm it to be perfect as to its own end and fall out with such as deny it so to be as no Quakers do that I know of and then from the same Hand-writing that before affirmed it to deal so unworthily with it as to deny it so to be as if I.O. doth not my Eyes are out but if he do he will surely say his own were not well open when he did so If to say its profitable to its end and that its end is to make men perfect and yet to say no man is made perfect in this World in which only the Scripture is confessed to be of use nor till the world to come where it s granted to be of no use cannot profit at all If thus to tosse it to and again like a Tennis Ball in a confused self-contradictory kind of talk sometimes telling the Truth about it sometimes belying it sometimes giving both it and the Lyar himself the Lye who so belyed it sometimes yea often lying against and alwayes living beside the holy Truth and Doctrine itself declared by it If to exceed in setting forth its self evidencing Excellency in avouching its Divine Authority and Power to Command men in the Name of God as his Word and yet never to come under the Power of its Commands so as yield Obedience thereunto If to call it your Rule and yet never submit to be ruled by it If both to overvalue and to undervalue to lift up and cast down to honour and dishonour it be truly indeed to value exalt and honour the Scriptures If all the particulars above enumerated and many more of the same sort that might be instanced in by Induction be in heart word and deed so to do then I shall yield the Scripture to be as much so valued honoured and exalted in this ever-Reforming never-Reforming Nation of England as among Papists or any other Nation whatsoever and by our self separating sensual literal Antiscriptural Anti-spiritual high Notional Professors as well as by the best National Protestants that are therein and by I.O. himself and his Reverend Fellow Students if they study and value it at the same rates with himself as much as any I know Finally If this be very highly to value it to be alwayes charging challenging and calling out for the Allowance of large and liberal Maintenance Augmentation of Means by all means possible out of all mens possibilities for the Ministers not of the Spirit but of the Letter only as those of mens making are who steal words enough from thence cut of which together with what of their own they patch them up with into one or two hours piece of work in a week to pick out a Living by And if that be to value it or esteem it or prize it or rate it high or set much by it or make much of it to sell every Sermon so stole and made but on some one verse of it and yet some make so much of one verse as to make many Sermons on it stretching it out for ease-sake to hold out the running of many Glasses for 20 shillings a Sermon and more Money and to have and to hold some Hundreds at least one Hundred of pounds for at most one hundred of Sermons I say if this be to make much of the Scripture there is more made of it in one year by our Divines and Doctors of Divinity amongst whom I.O. was once none of the last nor least as to valuing and making much of it then ever was by all the Quakers in the World since that Nick-Name began who yet if to make much of it be to live in the Light as the Letter itself exhorts to do do make more of it that way in a year then all those Priests and Prophets that preach it for Hire and Divine out of it for Money or ever have done since the World began or ever will do while it hath a being So that howbeit thou I.O. in thy hostile mind representest the Quakers as hostes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 enemies and haters of the Scriptures there 's no such matter for if they be haters of it that hate to be reproved by it and cannot endure the sound Doctrine delivered in it which is according to Godlinesse the Letter hath no such haters of it as the very Ministers of the Letter are who are ever enmity against the Life Light and Spirit it calls to walk in And if they may be said to love it who are livers according to it the very Letter itself hath no such true lovers of it as the Quakers who are in thy blind zeal hated by thee as haters of it for living that Life it calls for As to thy Tale of our striving to thrust the Scripture from its own place in the Church of God it s as true a Tale as its fellow false ones for though we set Christ and his inward Light living Word and Life-giving Spirit only on the Throne in the Church yet we own and establish the Scripture which is but the meer Letter in its proper place wherein it is to stand since it had its being as so from the other as subservient and subordinate to the other which are its betters and its elders and not as such a Dominus fac Iotum as thou makest it as if those that gave being to it must now come under it so as to stand barely at the Bar before it to be tryed
by it while it sits in supream Authourity on the Bench as the most perfect infallible Touch stone Lydius lapis and standing Rule for no lesse but much more thou wouldest have it even Light Rule of Trial Iudge Witnesse and all to which all Spirits even Gods own that gave it out as well as all false ones must stand or rather stoop and submit to be judged by and the foundation which the Church or World in the World or Wheel in a Wheel must stand or else fall and fail for ever for as there was a time wherein the Church which is but one from Abel till now can have but one and the same Rule bottom and foundation for ever and one Rock on which its built which is neither Peter nor Paul nor any of their Writings nor of any Prophets that wrote afore them but Christ the Light to the Nations and the Rock of Ages and Generations was without it and not placed upon it so there was a time of thousands of years together wherein it had no place nor use at all in the Church nor so much as any being in the World and as for such high place as thou in thy own will now alowest it as it s own as wise and quick-sighted as thou art to know and see non Entities and things that never were at all I know no such Place that God ever set it in nor time when he so super-eminently exalted it and though I acknowledge and am not ignorant as thou art that meer men and blind builders as seeing as thyself have Canonized it into the Head of the Corner laying him aside whom God hath made so yet I am to learn and so art thou for all thy hasty teaching it as Truth to others where ever the bare Letter or Scripture which is all one was created into such a Lord as thou lookest on it to be over his inward Light Spirit in the heart and authorized so infinitely as thou imaginest over all things by the Lord God of Heaven and Earth the only Author and Creator of all things J.O. Not only to detrade the Scripture from its place but also that by that one only device of denying to the Scripture that glorious Title of the Word of God the Quakers aim and endeavour to divest Christ himself of his Personality and divine Being Reply Was ever man left of God to shew his own Folly by more palpable apparent absurdities then thou here utterest who by that very thing whereby we seek to invest Christ with the proper and peculiar Right both in Name and Nature whereof your selves rob him belyest us so as to say we thereby seek to divest him of it Is not the Word of God not only the proper Name Ioh. 1. Rev. 19. but also the proper Nature and divine Being of Christ which he had before he was made flesh from the very beginning before the Scripture was that declares of him before World it self was which was made by him and all things in it so that without him nothing was made that was made And because that we will not take this glorious Title of his to whom only of Right it belongeth viz. the Word of God who hath no corruptible Word that I know but only one that 's incorruptible and liveth and abideth for ever and is both essentialiter and effective and enunciative too the Word of God and invest such a corruptible thing herewith as the mouldring Letter a Writing with mens hands which Worms may eat and mens Hands blot out deface and destroy and because we will not attribute that everlasting Name of his to that which in Nature is not everlasting as ye do but decaying dost thou say we divest him of his divine Being Dost thou not beget this bastardly businesse of divesting Christ himself of his divine Name and Nature Excellency and Existence in thy own brain by ascribing these to the Scriptures and giving the glory thereof to another under that high Prerogative Title of the Word of God due only and alone to him and not to any Letter that man as moved by him writes of him and then lay it at the door of the Quakers Art not thou the man that appropriatest that Name and Nature which is proper to Christ alone to the Scripture by disputing as to Name and Thing in esse reasi cognoscibili that it is the Word of God that glorious Title is its proper Name and is not this what in you lyes to dethrone Christ who only is so and place another ever him as the only most perfect Light Foundation Touchstone by which his Spirit must be tryed and yet accusest thou the Quakers of displacing him Doth not the Scripture say that Christ is the Light which the Church Ministerially is to hold out bear witness to Ioh. 1 in all her Preachings Administrations and Walkings and the Scripture is written out for the sake and Instruction and profit or use and service of the Church 2 Tim 3.15 16. 1 Cor. 10. yet settest not thou the Letter above the Church and Christ too saying Page 76. The Scripture is Light it is the duty of every Church to hold it up almost the whole of its duty and this Duty it performs Ministerially not Authoritatively A Church may bear up that Light it is not the Light it bears Witnesse to it but kindles not one divine beam to further its discovery All the Preaching that is in any Church its Administration of Ordinances all its walking in the Truth hold up this Light Thus magnifying the Letter above all and making it the main businesse of the Church to magnifie and hold it up much what as the Iewes do whose Work in their Synagogues is to lift up the Letter while they loath the Law and the Light it came from and is but the meer Letter or Writing of J. O. The whole Truth of the Words of God is as to Name and Thing opposed by the poor Fanatical Quakers Satan in these dayes assaults the sacred Truth of the Word of God in the poor deluded Fanatical Souls among us commonly called Quakers Reply It was none but Satan himself that is a Lyar the Father of it who told thee so and in thee tells it out for Truth to the whole World For 1. The whole Word of God which is but of one not of many kinds that I know of as thou wouldest make it as if God had one Living one Dead one Fallible another Infallible one Corruptible another Incorruptible one Eternal one Temporal Word one that 's only Letter another that 's Spirit and Life one Written and another Unwritten one within men and another that 's not the same in Nature without men that one and the same Individual Word of God I say which is the same whether within or without Written or Unwritten neither of which the bare Writing is as to both Name and Thing we own and honour as that which from
the Scripture is so far from hindering any from coming to but only that the blind Porers in it with their natural Eyes cannot see Wood for Trees that it sides with us in helping to call People to the Light in the Heart which thing is as well the end of its being written as it was the end of Paul and Iohn's and all the Prophets Ministry by word of mouth Act 26.17 18. 1 Ioh. 1.1 5 6 7. And is the end of all our Ministring now as we are moved of the Lord by Voice or Writing the Letter bids look to the Light as that which leads on to the Life but both Letter and Light are a cloud to the Egyptians that pursued them which to Israel that obeyed it was a help And as it serves with us to call to the Light so before it passe away it must be used against them to send them packing first that have Abused it as thou hast done and to accuse as a Witnesse against them such as have owned it as their Rule and Foundation yet lived and built so much as ye have done beside it And as Christ said to the old Scripture searchingScribes Joh. 5. that would never come to him the Life whom they Testified of so say I to you of the same Seed Do not think that Christ by his Light within you only whereby ye are made as all men are who have not the Law in a Letter a Law before God to your selves will accuse you to the Father ye have another that accuses you for your Vanities and Deceits even Moses and the Apostles and Prophets Writings in whom ye trust to get Life for if you had believed them you would not have belyed but beleeved in and obeyed the Light and Word in the Heart which they call you to for the Scriptures testifie of that but fith you believe not their Testimony to the Light how can we look that by our Words ye should come to believe in the Light it self So that ye stand Condemned and must be Judged by the Law or Light within as well as such as are without the Law in a Letter without and fining under and against the Law in the Letter by the very Letter of the Law throw boasting and yet breaking of which ye dishonour God much more then the Heathen do Rom. 2. Ye must be condemned also So that the Scripture is of much use yet and we are free it should stand and not be blotted out that by the Testimony of it which is one and the same with ours to the Light ye might be if yet it may be brought to look to the Law of Christ which and not the Letter is the Light and Life but if you will not come to Christ and his Light in you that ye may have the Life it s all of a price to you whether the Scripture stand or be blotted out for your Names are not while ye are Enemies to the Light written there for Life but as yet blotted out even by the Scripture while it abides unblotted out from under Heaven I.O. Ex. 2. S. 26. Thou sayest The Quakers little regard the understanding of the Scripture and this is one of their Eminent Deceits so long as they have the Words they are well enough without the sense as nothing appertaining to them Reply Saving I. O's fine figment in this matter which may be more manifested in its proper place howbeit we are well satisfied without so many several silly Senses and mis-meanings of it as are ministred cut by the unlearned Ministers that know not the Mind of the Lord nor ever shall while they lean to their own meer Natural empty Understandings and lye-poring in the Letter as they do without the Spirit which only Receives and Reveals the deep things of God and opposing the Light that only opens it yet we are not against the true sense and meaning of the Spirit which expounds the Mysteries and shews the Secrets thereof to those few Babes that fear the Lord which are hidden from the worldly wise and prudent but whether the Renowned Rabbies Preach for prize or hold their peace we neverthelesse still have true meanings and mind of Christ. I.O. Ex. 2. S. 21 22. That they affirm it is not lawful for any to Interpret the Scriptures or give the sense thereof And S. 22. That altogether with the Interpretation it self they reject damne curse all Mediums of Opening Scriptures the weighing the Words and Phrases and daily Prayer and comparing of divers places together that the Opening of hard Places the clearing and proving of the Truth the Conviction and Confutation of Heresies Errours false Doctors and Doctrines the Edifying any by Instructions and Exhortations and all the other ends of lawful Interpretation of the Scriptures are odious and abomination to them they not only prosecute with Enmity all Expositions of the Scripture by word of mouth in private Families Meetings Churches Schools of Believers to the Opening of the Sense of the Word and the giving of Knowledge by the Scripture it self but also as little esteem and most Childishly defame both Commentaries and all other Books wherein part of the Scripture is Interpreted or any Truth cleared or confirmed out of it or the Faithful perswaded by Exhortations to Holinesse and Gospel Obedience or men are Instructed in any other manner whatsoever in the Knowledge of God Reply Whether all these stories of I.O. which I have here put together do more savour of the French Galimafrey or wild-Irish bonni-clabber I 'le not determine but I am sure they are an unsavoury Mess of Omnigatherums made up of many sorts of lying Reproaches that have no Consistency with the Truth which would far better have become a Doctor of Divinity to have told of the Devil himself had he been accusing of him who is the false Accuser of the true Brethren rather then such a legend of Lyes as lye here legenda legible to all that know them of the Quakers I cannot say of this indeed as of T.D. his doings in his way of sharp shooting out his false Tales against us that it will sound much to our shame in a Countrey Church because it s well nigh all laid out not to say lyed out in the Latine Tongue though only Englished here but it will ring such a Peal in the University Colledges among the Iunior sort of Haters of whom God loves and among all save the lack-Latine-Country-Clergy men against the Quakers as will make them prick up their Ears and listen that they may learn how to lye against them also more then ever they did to the Quakers themselves that of them they might learn the Truth but the best on 't is though here 's a Nest of them together if that would do any good to I.O. or hurt to the Quakers yet by Lyes and Deceits none ever did or ever must prevail against the Truth Yet to all this thou addest That we turn the Church of God into a
Hogsty And that we are great Reproachers of that Divine Goodnesse that gave it in setting so slight by Interpretations of the Scripture in order to the understanding of it To all which yet I shall answer no otherwise then thus briefly and soberly as followes Viz. We acknowledge Gods goodnesse in giving it and deny not all exposition of the matters in it provided it be by them as they are so moved that live in the light and spirit of God that gave it forth by holy men which onely opens it aright and knows its own and searcheth the deep things of God that are laid down in it in the writings and meetings and Churches and Schools of the Saints and Believers which wot you well are not your christ-Christ-Church Colledges nor Academical Covents but the Quakers Publick Congregations where I have sometimes had and heard more Scripture truly opened in an hour than in some Steeple houses in a year any more than we do any true Translations of it out of our Tongue into another of which matter about Translation sith thou sayest we covertly conceal our counsel thou mayest have it more fully perhaps anon when I have first wiped away all thy lyes of us out of the way But because we do indeed though owning the spirit and spiritual mens expositions yet deny the naturally wise mens cloudy conceptions mysty meanings shallow-brain'd senses and excentrick Expositions of the things of the spirit which he knows not as they lye in the letter which he knows as little as useful or profitable much more as so necessary as thou wouldest make this natural mans mighty doings about the Scripture who is he indeed and not the Quakers that for want of such spiritual learning as naturally unlearned Peter had wrests it into strange senses to his own ruine and because we do not childishly as thou sayest we do but soberly and justly complain of those vast confused Bombasting Bumbles of blindnesse of the cloudy Clergies composing viz. Comentaries and other Books thrust out upon pretence of clearing the Scripture which is clearer then they are but in truth to the thickening of the Ayr that the Sun shines not clearly thorow it thereupon to say that we reject damn and curse all manner of opening Scripture and that of daily prayers to God this is a businesse of thy own bruiting about whereby to render us odious among thy Oxonian fellow students that they may reject and damn and curse them thence whom God hath not cursed and against whom none of Baalams inchantments can prevail for we own the daily prayers of such as God owns who pray in the spirit though we know God hears not sinners nor the prayers of the wicked nor of such as turn their ear from hearing his Law which is Light in their own hearts their prayers are abomination to him and we own the openings of the Scripture by the spirit that gave it forth when he opens the mouth or guides the pens of any that have the minde of Christ to utter any of it as it lies in the letter hid from the natural mind unto others and to say this is to turn the Church into a hogsty as if there could possibly by no Religion nor good manners nor sheep like innocent demeanour nor any thing but meer bruitishnesse beastlinesse and swinishnesse any where in the World but where men sit under the Ministry of the Preachings Logical Expoundings Writings Ecclesiastical Rhetorick and other Reacks of those fleshly and earthly minded spiritual men Doctors and Commentators c. that have long ago got the parent and ingrossed all that work of expounding Scripture for money to themselves this I utterly dény and I also affirm that if that Crew and their Creatures be the Christians and the Church of God as they call themselves as if the Quakers were all Hereticks that do not own them then the more ado men make to be Christians in name the further off from the nature of Christ and as the old Proverb is the nearer the Church the further from God there being nor such fordid stinking sinks for wickednesse filth pride lust persecution scoffing hating God and good ungodlinesse and all manner of uncleannesse to be seen in all the Christian World again as are easie to be seen in Cathedrals Colledges Academies c. where men sit at the Fountains and Well-heads of Divinity and Nurseries of Learning and Religion as they call them and directly under the daily dispensations of their Doctors Oral and Scriptural Divinity Disputations and Expositions And whereas I O. makes a challenge to have it tryed between them and the Quakers saying in the next Section after that wherein he saves the Quakers sleighting their Interpretations do no lesse than turn the Church into a Hogsty thus J. O. For if the Experience of all Ages of all Christians that ever were if those things which themselves see behold or hear daily were of any weight or moment they the Quakers would blush to deny the use necessity and fruit of the solemne Preaching of the Word Interpretation of the Scripture made whether by word of Mouth or Writing Let us take a view of each Flock both that which although they enjoy the Word yet is destitute of its Interpretation and also that which together with the Word of God enjoyes also the other means of Gods worship which consists very much in the Interpretation of the Word if now the Tree be so be known only by its fruits then that will appear the good one which hath brought forth those fruits which the legal Interpretation of the Scripture hath every where produced or brought forth Reply Let it be well heeded First That by the Word of God here I O. intends the Scripture And Secondly That by Legal Interpretation he intends not such as is as I said before used and own'd by the Quakers viz. That which is only in the Light and in the Spirits movings that moved to write the Scripture but such as is made among the Naturalists and Schollars in their Academical Imaginations and by the Priests in their Parishes and then I am here ready to answer his Challenge and I say a Match let it be so First Let both Flocks be viewed the Quakers and the Parish People I will not say but that among them that are called Quakers that frequent the Places of their Publick Speaking there are many not only by reason of whom but also by whom the way of Truth that the Quakers walk in is evil Spoken of but I O. either hath or should have more wit and sense and reason then to account the Routs that are made by a rabble of rude ones that frequent the Quakers Meetings to render them odious with their odious Carriages to the Quakers themselves that he ought Non Trepidantibus sed Tripudiantibus vitio vertere qui vertunt seria ludo ludunt cum sacris c. to impute not to the Quakers but to Schollars and
of the Septuagint from that high Conceit some have of them and eminent Account some have them in pag. 339. If the Ability of the men be granted yet what security have we of their Principles and Honesty Oh much every way thinks I.O. for though when he is pleased to speak diminitively of men the Care and Fidelity and Pains of whom in Translating we have as good ground to believe was as great to the full as any of that of those he Commends in Transcribing he disparages it into Oscitancy Inadvertency Negligence Ignorance the Wisest not seeing all and such like pag 319. yet when he speaks of the Care Pains and Fidelity of men in Transcribing which is a Work as lyable to mistakes as the other that he may keep up the honour however of his infallible Transcripts to this day then he utters himself more Hyperbolically and as for Ezra and his conjectured Companions he makes their labour to Reform the Church and all the Corruptions crept into the Word as he speaks though if the Letter were the Word it were not lyable to Corruption little lesse then Monstrous and their care in restoring the Scripture to its purity mark extraordinary pag. 171 308. Yea of the Points which yet he is to prove Coaevous with the Consonants and as old as any Scripture I doubt not quoth he but of that we shall yet manifest that they were compleated it should seem then that every Tittle is not now a◠at first giving out of the Letter if the Vowels were incompleate till Esdros dayes by the men of the great Synagogue Ezra and his Companions guided by the infallible direction of the Spirit of God I might as I. O. does often beg or take it crave leave to Answer this Conjecture with another pag. 146. and fling back I. O's as well as T. D's Fortè ita with so much at least as Fortè non but ipse dixit J.O. sayes he doubts not their infallibility so I who had rather be silent then disparage Ezra will add no more to I. Os Rex sum then nil ultrae quaeio Plebeius And now I am upon a Consideration of the Canon of the Scripture let me here make an end with thee I.O. as concerning this Cogitation of thine about the Consignation of the Canon of both the Old and that thou callest the New Testament of which New thou sayest pag. 27. That what thou hadst spoken of the Scripture of the Old Testament viz. as to its immediate emanation from God and its being canonized together with it into a standard the same must be also affirmed of the New with this addition of advantage and preheminence above the Old That it began to be spoken by the L O R D himself And as for thy Canon of the outward Scriptures of both sorts one of which thou callest the Old the other the New Testament after the Bounding Compleating and Consignation of which in their Respective Junctures and Seasons and the delivery of it so Canonized to the Church or Churches Respectively as their Eternal Infallible Touchstone Rule Foundation Testimony Standard no more must be owned on such a high Account as it s Authorized into as of divine Original nor be added by either God or man while the world stands I would sain find from thee if yet thou art able thy self to fathom to the bottom of thy own Faith or rather Fancy in this point where thou findest and whence thou foundest all thy confused Communications and crude Conceptions about this Canonization of such and such outward parcels of holy mens Writings into a Rule or Standard and disfranchizing such and such of others as holy as those from a standing within the Bounds of this Magna Charta that certain Synods and supposed Sanydrims of thou knowest not whom have given and do as thou deemest give and grant thereunto together with them Where learnest thou all these Lessons but from the Lectures and lying Legends and voluminous Lexicons of the illiterate Literatists of the world that are alwayes laying on and loading one another with their endlesse boundlesse and bottomlesse Scribles about the outward Original Text and Transcriptions and Translations of the Scripture in their tedious Tomes Talmuds and Talmudical Traditions till they are lost from the very Letter much more the Life it calls to so that they have no leasure to live or learn others to live thereafter in the inextricable laborynth of their own Labours about it Who leads thee into the vain Imaginations of these things but thy own and other mens well nigh innumerable and invincible inventions What Tangles thee and others in such trifling Talkings and Treatings one to another of things that none of ye all can have any infallible Evidence or yield to any infallible Assurance of but a croud of Conceits and Catholick Traditions with which the world and ye in it are so overcharged that ye cannot contain them now without infinite frothy and fruitlesse contendings about them and obtruding your own Observances imposing your own Supposings and thrusting each upon other your own bare thred-bare Thoughts of things that ne flocci facit it amounts not to the value of a lock of Wooll as to Salvation whether they be known or not till being throng'd and thrust into the thorny Thicket of your own Thoughts you there tear one another to pieces about the Scripture insomuch that I truly may and plainly shall be so bold as flatly to Contradict what thou sayest falsly of thy Canon and Standard since the closing and compleating of it that t is a means to end all strife it is rather throw the folly of its Ministers the means of all strife and Confusion in the Christian World Thou sayest indeed of the Writings of the Old Testament that the Canon thereof had its Consignation Bounding and Delivery to the Church as its Rule so that from thenceforth nothing Written either from Moses upward or to Christs time downward must be admitted to be owned as Canonical or inspired Scripture And thou sayest pag. 27.28 That God who himself began the Writings of the Word with his own finger after he had spoken it appointing and approving the Writing of the rest that followed i.e. from Genesis to the Revelation as they are ordinarily numerated in our Bibles except the Books called Apocrypha for I reckon all those are reckoned by thee as the Books thou speakest of Epist. Ded. pag. 3. Never indited by the Holy Spirit as remote from being 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doth lastly command the close of the immediate Revelation of his Will to be written in a Book Rev. 1.11 and so gives out the whole of his Mind and Counsel unto us in Writing as a merciful and stedfast relief against all Confusion darknesse and uncertainty but what a Relief it is against Confusion I shall shew more hereafter And as to thy Scriptures Canonization or the Consignation compleating Bounding of the Canon of it a few words here
my businesse with I.O. lyes into that Name of his Word and into the Authority of the Foundation of Faith the infallible Rule of Interpretation of itself of Tryal and Examination of Spirits Doctrines c. of the Supream Iudge also by which all Controversies of Religion are to be determined the only pure Authentical Standard unto which the Church is finally to Appeal in whose Sentence it is to Rest into which all Faith is finally to be Resolved so if such Synods of men either Antient or Modern as have shouldred out all those at once from sharing with the other Writings in what they can lay just claim to had been as Spiritually discerning as they were Spiritually blind shallow and undiscerning they would have seen cause to have joyned some at least of those Apocryhal Scriptures to an Equal Participation of that Plea of divine Original and inspiration with the rest as without Cause they justled them all out from it by their joynt Consent And though it be the declared Faith of that Assembly of Divines that both Houses of Parliament advised with 1648. and of the Congregational Churches in England whose Confession is put out this instant 1659. as to that Article about the Scriptures word for word in the same words with the other That the Books commonly called Apocrypha not being of divine Inspiration are no part of the Canon of the Scriptures and therefore are of no Authority in the Church of God nor to be any otherwise approved or made use of then other humane Writings yet this I declare to the whole World as my Faith concerning them that though I own neither them nor the best bare Wriing or outward Text or Letter of the other Scripture at so high a Rate as I.O. does who makes the naked Letter in all things equivolent to the holy matter yet whatever is truly to be praedicated of the one or can solidly be pleaded on the behalf of the one which ye call your Canon as to the divinity of their Original the same may be pleaded on the behalf of not a few of the other And as they all that in general are stilled Apocryphal can plead their Authority from long before the Apostles dayes and also the special Care and Providence of God which is an Argument of such weight with I.O. and T.D. pag. 27. as swayes them not a little into their frivolous Faith about the rest in the preservation of them to this very day So that all of them have been kept by the Church that kept the rest bound up and Translated into various Languages and as publickly allowed to be publickly Read as the rest and highly esteemed by Austin and other Fathers ye Divines cannot easily be ignorant And as for sundry of them ye are ignorant with a witnesse if ye see them to be as ye say they are not of divine Inspiration or see them not to be of as divine an Original as some or even any of the other which ye own so to be As for that Fourth Book of Esdras which is but the Second as it stands in the Apocrypha besides that it s acknowledged by Clem Alexandrinus Faber and many more men of Renown among you and by many Holy men in these latter times as well learned as your selves at least in the Wisdom of Gods Spirit to be written by his immediate Inspiration so is it such a plain Prophecy consistent of many Particular Praedictions of things to be fulfilled in these last Ages as the like to it or a least clearer is hardly to be found in all the Scripture besides it insomuch that he who reads it in the 11 12 13 16 Chapters of it and some other places and sees not the beams of a divine Majesty in it and sees not the Matters now managing upon the Stage in the World that are there foretold in it reads not in the Light of that Holy Spirit that moved in the Writing both of that and all other Holy Scripture and may come before he is well aware to feel ere long the dint of that divine displeasure that is denounced against the Sinners of the latter Ages and thereby come to be convinced of the Divinity and Truth of that Scripture which our Divines that usually see altogether by the lump and are loath to see any Truth Sigillatim till they are all made to see it whether they will or no will hardly yield to if they be their Old-wonted-selves till very Necessity forces and frights them into the Faith of it And the same may be said as to the divine Original of Ieremiahs Epistle which was written and sent to them that were to go Captive into Babylon and of Ecclesiasticus and the Wisdom of Solomon which favours so much of the Wisdom of the Spirit that he is yet in that Wisdom only which is from beneath which is Earthly Animal Deceitful who doth not acknowledge the finger of God writing those deep and precious Truths and Praedictions in the heart of him whose hand was the Committer of them to outward Writing which whether it were not Solomon after whom it was so Entituled Nil ultra quaero he uttered 3000 Proverbs whereof scarce 300 are extant in that Book of his Proverbs some of which as standing inserted there in the Hebrew Text are not the Original Copy but a Transcript only at best out of that or some Second hand Copies taken and Copied cut long after Solomons dayes by the men of Hezekiah 8 or 9 Generations from him Prov. 25 1. The 30 Chapter of which Book also are the Words of one Aguâ— the son of Iaketh but sure I am that Book of Wisdom was inspired or breathed into the Penman that expired or breathed it out from no lesse then that Wisdom which is from above The main Argument that ever I have seen against the divine Original of these Books are First Their being not written in the Hebrew Tongue which what a poor pedling piece of Disproof it is he is no wiser then he should be that does not see for what warrant is there that all that was not Pen'd in the Hebrew Tongue is no Scripture of divine Inspiration Or if there be is it not as conclusive against much of the Scripture which I.O. counts Canonical the whole of wch he reckons at random was wrote in the Hebrew Tongue since its evident that much of that Book of Hester 9 Chapters and 3 Verses of which are set among the Canonical Scripture and oh the Wisdom the other 6 Chapters and 10 Verses of the 10 Chapter by you self-will'd Choppers and Changers because written in Greek are reckoned and rank'd with the Apocryphal was written not in the Hebrew but in the Caldee as much of Ezra Nehemiah and Daniel also were And besides if being written Originally in the Hebrew will avail toward the evincing of them to be Canonical this will help some of your Apocrypha into your Canon since that of Tobit or Tobias is not
very Antient Writer since those that wrote Ioshua who ere they were for himself it was not that wrote it all at least as Moses not all Deuteronomie unlesse he wrote of his own Death and Burial before he died See Iosh. 24.29 do quote him Iosh. 3.10 Where 's that part of Ieremiah the Prophet wherein he spake that which Matthew cites Matth. 27.9 10. about the giving the 30 pieces of Silver the price that Christ was sold at for the Potters field for howbeit Zachary the Prophet Zach. 11.12 speaks of the same thing who was in his work an Exalier of God in his time which the Name Ieremiah seems to signifie and so may be called Ieremiah which is not likely to be Matthews meaning yet in all the Prophesies of Ieremie extant in your Bibles there 's no such thing spoken And for you to say either that Matthew was mistaken quoting throw forgetfulness one Prophet for another or that the Transcribers of the Copies of their Original out of Matthews Original Copy failed so fowlly in their Transcribings for all your Copies that ever I saw so read as to write Ieremie for Zachary will be for I.O. upon his Principles who stands to plead every Letter Tittle and Iota that was in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be now in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as sorry a shift and miserable remedy as he makes for himself and finds who leaps out of the frying pan into the fire Where 's the Prophecy of Enoch spoken of Iude 14. out of whose Prophesie the Iewes can tell you more then ye wot of from that of Iude And as for Ezra or Esdras and his true Companions of whom thou sayest truly enough if not truer then thou art aware of that their care in restoring the Scripture to its Purity when it had met with the greatest Tryal that it ever underwent in this world considering the Paucity of the Copies then extant was great and that the Consignation and Bounding of the Canon delivered to the Judaical Church was in their dayes and that they did labour to reform all the Corruptions crept into the Word of God And that they compleated the Punctation the compleatnesse of which then was not Coaevous with the Text as at first Written in Hebrew as thou contendest to the Consuring of thy self here and that they were guided herein by the infallible direction of the Spirit of God Pag. 177. 211. 302. 303. Did not they in the Spirit and Power of God Write many more Books even 204. most of which are not in your Bibles Read 2 Esdras 14. throughout the Chapter Where are all these and sundry more Scriptures some as and some more Antient then Moses of which I will not now speak particularly And as to the New Where is that First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians mentioned in the first of those Two that we have 1 Cor. 5.9 And that First Epistle of his to the Ephesians for its evident he wrote One to them before That mentioned in that One which ye have Ephes. 33 And that Epistle of his to the Laodiceans mentioned Col. 4.16 Besides several to Seneca Neros Tutor and other of Pauls Writings who was doubtlesse far more Voluminous in his Writings then that poor pittance of Epistles to Churches and Ministers and the Letters to Philemona Tradesman about a Domestick businesse of Receiving his Servant Onesimus that had ben unserviceable to him amounts to of whole Spiritual Scriptures and Speeches that fell from him at his Martyrdom that were taken by such as were present at it some in these dayes have seen more then that which was Written of him by Luke in the Acts and Written by him in the Epistles ye count a part of your Canon And whether that which Iohn wrote to the Church mentioned by him in the 9th vers of his Letter to Gaius were no other then the first of those Three Recorded And whether that of Iude whereof Iude 3. he sayes in the Praeterimperfect Tense When I gave all diligence to write unto you of the Common Salvation it was needful for me to write unto you c. were not One he wrote before This which was now but under his hands is more then all you Sayers of what ye think only are able groundedly to gain-say And whether Clements Epistle whose name was in the Book of Life and that Church of Rome to Corinth wrote 30 years after Pauls may not Challenge to be ranck'd among the rest is worth your enquiry And what think ye of that sweet shorr pretious Reply of Christ Iesus himself in his Letter to Agbarus King of Edessa who wrote so loving'y and beleevingly to him about the Malady that lay upon him as it stood Recorded in the Roles of that City and may do still for ought ye know which is to be read and many other pretious passages about that businesse in the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius Pamphilius Is it not as Christian as Divinum Spiritum non hominem sapiens and worthy as particular as it is to stand in your Standard and claim a room in your Canon as that particular Letter of Paul to Philemon What is become I say of all these and more then may now be mentioned none of which is within the Confines of your Congregationally Constituted Synodically Composed Ecclesiastically Authorized Clerically Conceived Canon 1. Were they not divinely Inspired That were to Render doubtful your undoubted Divine Original of what you have Since some of them are quoted in these you have 2. Are they all utterly lost That were to loose himself much more in his Cause who is lost too much already for I.O. to say so sith more then 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one jot or one Tittle is then passed away and perished from the Law if the Letter be it not one jot or one Tittle of which Letter quoth I.O. wofully mis-interpreting that of Matth. 5.18 for the lotaes and Tittles of the meer Text and Letter which Christ utters only of the Doctrine Truth and Holy Matter of the Law is to passe away till Heaven and Earth which are yet standing are past away 3. Or did not God Himselfe intend to Dignifie these with the same honour and Crown them with so high an Account as those though as well descended and as immediately derived from him as the rest or did he not design them to the same Spiritual Ends and Renowned Uses with their fellows 4. Or were these Books out of the way and not present at the time and place of the first setting up of your Standard by such Synods and Sanydrims as took on them to stablish Sign Seal and Authorize what Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles should and what should not stand under that honourable Title of the stedfast Standard and so were Censured and Sentenced for ever for not appearing at that sacred Session and high Court of Iudicature which was to Iudge what Books should be from thence-forth
of God in which he lived and walk'd and out of whose movings he wrote no Epistles to the Churches was fit to stand in no other Account then the Sermons and private Religious Discourses of our Clergy-men and their Common Christians which must stand or fall as they square or not square with the Standard of Scripture And as if the Seniour Epistles of Paul to Corinth and Ephesus must like Prisoners at the Bar receive their Sentence of Guilty or not Guilty worthy or not worthy to be owned as a part of the Rule or Canon by their Iuniours or such as were sent after them to sit as Iudges of them at the Bench And so hereby his Reply is as it were an Affirmative Answer to the First of my Four Queries viz. That Pauls Writings were not all alike of Divine Original and Inspiration but some Epistles to the Churches of his were uttered as he was moved by the Holy Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and others 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of private Interpretation or as private Mens Writings Credat Apella And when 't was urged by me that there was no more evidence or Character of these Epistles being a Rule which are then of those which are not in your Books Then T.D. seeing what he had Replyed that way would not hold Replyes by way of Answer to the Second of my Four last Queries affirming that Pauls first Writings to Corinth and Ephesus were lost when those we have are saved and so makes this distinction of the ones being perished the other preserved by Gods Providence watching over them when he did not over the other a signal Evidence that God intended the one for a standing Rule to us and not the other and herein he and I.O. Jump together and border pretty near one another sith I.O. insists exceedingly as an Argument of their being a Rule in the Church on this businesse of Gods preservation of every Tittle and Iota of divinely Inspired Scripture to this day whereby he implicitly denies all the afore-named that are not in your Bibles to be any of them of Divine Inspiration But with this Difference from T.D. that I.O. sayes not a Tittle of the Inspired Scripture is lost T.D. to the confuting of I.O. Confesses being I believe informed of some Holy Scripture at the Dispute which he knew not of before that not only Tittles and Iotaes but some whole Books of which he dares not say expresly though intimate it he doth in the Head next above spoken to that they were not Divinely Inspired are lost and perished out of the World So that the Preservation of what is Preserved is made a Signal Token that it s to be our Rule and the losse of what 's lost that that was not written for such an end To which Signal Token of Gods intending the One and not the O. her for A Rule when I Replyed as 't is transiently done above to I O. touching the Books called Apocrypha that there is more Antient Holy Writ remaining extant to this day preserved for our use by Gods Providence then ye own or honour with a standing in your Standard instancing in the Epistle of Paul to Laodicea then by and by T.D. who rides the Rounds not much lesse then I.O. and is never positive nor steady to any thing he Asserts so as to stand long to it without shifting Proteus like into another shape when he is ashamed to be seen longer in his old one comes out in a clear contrary Gelour and flatly contradicts himself and unsayes what he said but just before And whereas he had made the preserving of what was written and is preserved an Argument of its being designed of God for a Rule affirms That all that was written by Holy Men meaning Paul among the rest or else he speaks not at all to the purpose and preserved also for our use is not therefore our standing Rule Thus one while 't is so and one while no then neither yet both no and so Pauls Three Epistles viz. the Two to Corinth One to Ephesus that we have appear therefore to be our standing Rule because they are preserved to our use to this day but his first of all to Corinth and Ephesus therefore not so because not preserved there 's his first saying His very next of all is this Pauls Epistle to Laodicea though preserved for our use yet is not therefore to be our standing Rule to this day So what ever Pauls Epistles are yet I am sure Pauls Life and Example is no Rule that T. D's walks by nor I.O. neither for his yea was yea and his nay nay he did not use such lightnesse as they both very often do who say nay to that they said yea to just before neither did he speak so according to the Flesh as they with whom now there 's yea yea and anon to the same thing nay nay but as God is true and Christ is not yea and nay in his words and enjoynes us to be steady in our yea and nay so was Pauls word in what he spake And yet the Reason T.D. renders of his saying No to what he said not No but so just before is as Reasonlesse as his self Confutation is for mark then quoth he If what ere was written by Holy men alluding to Paul be therefore our standing Rule because preserved the Discourses of Holy Ministers in former and latter times should be our Rule which they are not but are to be brought to the written Word as our Rule and Test. In which if by Holy Ministers in former times he means Paul among the rest as he must else he misses the matter then some of Pauls Epistles are the Rule and Test which his other Epistles must stand bare before to be tryed by which is absurd If by latter Ministers he intend such as himself who Confesses his Ministry to be fallible I would have him to know and that he shall find more of anon that Pauls Ministry and every true Ministry that Ministers by word of Mouth or Writing as moved by the Holy Spirit which moves and leads none fallibly but all infallibly whom it leads was no such fallible Ministry as his false one is that it need be tryed by his other own holy Writings But now as to the Epistle of Laodicea instanced in T.D. was so hard of belief and difficult to he perswaded that there was any such at all that if one of Sandwich had not stood up and said he had the Book wherein we Asserted it to be Printed we should hardly have gained so much Credit among the Clergy then present such pro and con they made about it as to have been believed that there was such a thing in Being so ignorant are they of some present parts of that Scripture they call their Rule yet at last 't was yielded such a one was extant But for all that T.D. who has ever more wayes then one into the Wood where he loves to
wander when he is bedged out of it one way will find or make himself a Gap into it by another and as to this matter of PAVL to LAODICEA he hath Three or Four shifts for fear one fail affirming after he had found it Translated into English not to but from Laodicea First That for ought we know it might be that First of Paul to Timothy the Post-script of which sayes it was Written from Laodicea of which Post-script which its notorious enough to every Novice that neither it nor the other Post-scripts were Pen'd by such as wrote the Epistles themselves when I Asked T.D. Whether he owned it and the Rest as Canonical or no As Canonical quoth he for ought appears yet to me as your Epistle to the Laodiceans of which Epistle yet he had said but just before It might be that of Pauls to Timothy which yet that it was is so unlikely that t is little lesse then to be like a Child to Assert it A likely matter indeed that its Pauls to Timothy meant Col. 4.16 That which Paul wrote to Timothy was to Timothy a particular Person about particular Matters concerning him as in that Capacity of a Church-Officer I Tim. 3.14 15. What should he Charge the Colosians so much to look after that for Or if he had Would he not have said See that ye read the Epistle to Timothy Had not that been plainer Secondly But seeing that Snap T.D. fits another string to his Instrument and then Fidles on in this fashion denying it to be Pauls Epistle at all either to Laodicea or Timothy or any one else branding it with the Name of one of the Brats laid by the Popish party at the Apostles doors which they will not Father and me as a Brother of the Popish party and an Abbettor of them in their wickednesse for Fathering it on Paul at all And then Thirdly That he might seem to say something though no better then nothing to every thing rather then own any thing for Truth before the World be it never so plain that the Quakers tell him he bethinks himself and upon Second or rather Third Thoughts adds having perused the Judgement of some Learned men about it that 't was neither Pauls to Timothy any more then to Laodicea nor yet altogether such a Brat or Bastard brood as a metr Chimaera hatcht and bred and sained in the Fancies only of the Popish party but at least a Real Epistle yet one that was so far from being Pauls to Laodicea that it was rather one Written by the Laodiceans to Paul himself a more incredible pigment then the first for all t is his Reverend Dr. Davenports Opinion on the place Thus Oh the twistings and turnings and chopâ—ings and changings and piecirgs and patchings and shiftings and shufflings of T.D. to wind himself away from the Truth which is to him so Intollerable that with I.O. heeâ—l bear the shame and run the hazard of giving his incongruous self-overturning Thoughts thick and threefold against it rather then truly turn to it when it s truly and uncontroulably told and laid before him As it is in this Case about the Epistle to Laodicea about which he traces to and fro two or three false wayes and yer can scarce tell well which of the Three to fix upon or steadily to stand to or stand still in Neverthelesse notwithstanding T.Ds. advance in Three Motions against the Truth of Pau's Writing to Laodicea yet they help him not but for all his two strides and a Iump yet he leaps too short to reach the matter of Truth he would resel by it for Quid verbis opus est quum facta loquuntur there need no more words in proof on 't the Epistle of Paul to Laodica is extant and speaks out it self and its Author whose it is as well by the stale and majesty of it as by the Superscription being both Translated and Printed in English as it was found though not in your Testaments yet in the Oldest Bible that was Printed at Worms And also in a certain Antient Manuscript of the New Testament Text which I have seen and can produce written in Old English 340 years since or above before the Art of Printing came up here by which its evident that it was owned as Canonical in the Church of England in those dayes and was however it came to be since left out bound upamong its fellowes And howbeit it be filled in our English Translations of Col. 4.16 the Epistle from Laodicea besides the genuine sence of the Greek which as is shewed above will much rather bear it to then from Laodicea yet let it be read from that nothing lessens the likelihood of its being Pauls for though he wrote it to Laodicea yet if the Colossians would read it as Paul bids them do as that the Laodiceans likewise should read what he wrote to the Colossians they must read it in a Copy from Laodicea whether it was sent or else not at all as the Laodiceans it they read that he wrote to the Colossians must have it first from Colosse or at least a Copy of it For as for the Scriptures of the New Testament quoth I.O. who helps us in this though he hinder himself another way by it as to his Canons Constitution out of the first Original Copies pag. 166. it doth not appear that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the several Writers of it were ever gathered into one Volumne there being now no one Church to keep them for the rest the Epistles though immediately Transcribed for the use of other Churches Col. 4.16 Mark how he Quotes the very Place too we are upon as if he owned Pauls to Laodicea which if he do he wounds himself to death in his Arch-Assertion that not a Tittle or Iota of the inspired Scripture as given out at first is lost but remaining every Apex of it in the Copies w now enjoy fith here 's a whole Epistle of Pauls lacking as well as his first to Corinth and Ephesus in which were many Tittles and lotaes were doubtless kept in the several Churches to which they were directed From those 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 there were quickly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 given out to faithful men whilst the infallible Spirit continued his guidance in an extraordinary manner Here T.D. said no more but was ad Altum srlentium and at his Non ultra as to opposing the being of such an Epistle of Paul to Laodicea legitimate but rather fell under the weight of what Evidence was brought to prove it so yet when after long striving against this Antecedent which was urged in proof of this Conclusion viz. That there 's more Holy Scriptures extant to this day which are as much a Rule as those ye have in your Bibles and call your Rule exclusively of all others to shew himself to be one of those I.O. speaks of who are as like I.O. too as ever they can look that are to
by Inspiration is preserved without Corruption i.e. variety from the first Original Manuscripts in the Copies we have Pag. 137. The whole Scriptâ—re entire as given out from God without any losse is preserved in the Copies of the Originals in â—hâ—m all we say is every Letter and Tittle Pag. 10. Tâ—e Word i.e. Scripture with thee still for thou denyest the words coming any other-way to your selves or any now is come forth unto us from God without the least mixture or intervenience of any medium obnoxious to fallibility as is the Wisdom Truth Integrity Knowledge and Memory of the best of all men Pag. 13. We have not the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of Mo es and the Prophets the Apostles and Evangelists but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have or Coâ—iâ—s contain every Iota that was in them Hebraeâ— Volumina nec in unica dictione corrupta intenies S. Pag. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matth. 5. 18. To which Answers that Pag. 316 317. Doth not our Saviour affirm of the Word that was among the Jewes i.e. Scripture Secundum te still That not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of it should passe away or perish where let the Consonants themselves with their Apices be intended or alluded to in that expression c. And Epist pag. 27. None are able to shew out of any Copies yet extant in the World and that they can make appear ever to have been extant that ever there were any such various Lections in the Old Testament And pag. 319. Neither the Care oâ— God over his Truth nor the Fidelity of the Judaical Church will permit us to entertain the least suspition that there was ever in the world any Copy of the Bible differing in tâ—e least from that we enjoy or that those we have are corrupted And pag. 317. Let the Authors of this Insinuation prove that there ever was in the World any Copy of the Bible Differing in any one word from those that we now enjoy let them produce one Testimony ne Author of C edâ— Jâ—w or Christian that can or doth or ever did speak one word to this purpâ—se let them direct us to any Relick any Monument any kind of Remembrance of them and it shall b of weâ—ght to us c. Many more exceeding and extraordinary high strict streins thou deliverest thyself in in other places about the non-corruption non alteration of the Text of Scripture in one Letter Tittle Iota or Syllable since the first giving it out so but that in the Copies extant to this day there 's an exact Unity and entire Identity with the first Originals a kind of Summary Collection and Câ—pitulation of which thou makest pag. 153. speaking to this purpose thus viz. I O. The Sum of what I am Pleading for as to the particular Head to be vindicated is That as the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament were immediately and entirely given out by God himself his Mind being in them represented unto us without the least interveniency of such mediums and wayes as were capable of giving Change or Alteration to the least Iota or Syllable So by his good and merciful Providential Dispensation in his love to his Word and Church his whole Word alias the Scripture with thee as at first given out by him is preserved unto us entire in the Original Languages where shining in its own beauty and lustre as also in all Translations as far as they faithfully represent the Originals it manifests and evidences unto the Consciences of men without other forreign help or Assistance its divine Original and Authority Reply This is the Capital Cardinal General Assertion or Position which branches it selâ— into several Particulars or petty Propositions viz. The immediate coming forth of the Scripture from God to us its self evidencing power to evince it self by it self alone to be of God and his Word it s descending to us at this day entire to a Tittle without corruption by alteration in the least Letter Iota Vowel Point or Syllable its uncapablenesse of such Change and Alteration in its coming to us so are thy words here and pag. 10. to the least Iota or Syllable Unto which General Head and its branches the Ramuâ—culi lesser twigs or little Sentences scattered here and there throwout thy Book are Reducible and each to its own suitable Branch respectively That which I am here under Consideration of thy piâ—tiful Plea for is both its non-Alteration de facto as it s handed down by Transcribers from the fiâ—st Scribes of it to us in these dayes and its Unalterablenesse or Uncapablenesse of Alteration which if thou mean as thou sayest thou here Assertest to the least Iota or Syllable These are to thee as thou sayest such important Truths that thou shalt not be blamed in the least by thy own Spirit nor thou hopest by any others in contending for them judging them Fundamental parts of the Faith once but say I thou knowest not when delivered to the Saints Reply Though I who cannot hold thee because I cannot find thee guiltlesse in either thy hasty holding or thy heedlesse unhandy handling thy weak vindicatory piece of Probation of them at so high a rate do advise thee to praise a fair day at night assuring thee that if ever thou come to learn the Truth in the plainnesse and power of it as it is in Iesus the Light of whom the Letter testifies thou wilt find these no Fundamental parts of that One Faith which Paul and Iude speak of Eph. 4. Iude 3 which was One even of old from Abraham Enoch Noah and downwards from the beginning before the Letter was delivered to and earnestly to be contended for by the Saints and wilt find thy own Spirit also however it now seems not to blame thee in the least blaming thee nor a little for thy ignorance in due time and howbeit being bolstered up for a while above it by the Aery Academical Applauses Gratulatory Euge's J O's Hic est's and such like blessings of thy blind Brother literatists that are as the rich mans wealth to him Prov. 10.15 thy strong City thy Murus Abaeneus a high Brazen Wall to thee in thy own conceit thou feel'st no Check and seemest Nil Conscire tibi nullâ Pallescere Cultâ Yet let others and thy own heart also Clear Chear and Cheat thee as it will thou wilt once know that as to every work there is a time to do it in and a Judgment after it so thy whole lame Anti-Scriptural work about the Scriptures as well as thy other part of it against the Quakers though fenced in the Frontispice with the fair formal pretence of A Vindication of the Purity and Integrity of the Hebrew and Greek Texts and Pro Scripturis and such like must come to another account then that I am here taking of it before the world even to a Judgment from God within thy own now blinded Bosome and closed Conscience as the Book thereof comes to be
did to the Thessalonians 2. Thes 2. by word or Epistle and if I. O. will have it so that t was by a former Epistle then he serves me against T. D. and himself more than himself against me acknowledging the first Epistle of Paul to Corinth which he wrote before the first of the two we have and mentions 1. Cor. 5. to be Authentick and Canonical and so that a whole Canonical Epistle of that holy Apostle and that 's more than a Tittle or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is utterly lost The Fifth viz. Math. 28.20 Teaching them to observe whatever I command you and so I am with you alway even to the end of the world which way I. O. can from thence conclude a promise for every Tittle of inspired Scripture to be preserved for ever entire without losse or alteration I see not but I see one thing that if I. O. hobble but upon a Text of Scripture he thinks at a venture it must serve his Turn about the entirenesse and integrity of the Text and its Tittles though there be no mention of Scripture made at all in it for here 's none in this in which Christ bids them Teach the Nations to observe what he commanded them and that they did he promised then to be with them alway to the end of the world as he was and is ever with his people by his light word they being turned to it themselves but what 's all this to the Tittles of Hebrew and Greek Texts unlesse I. O. say they are the Christ that he meant when he laid I will be with you never did I see men in two Books so miserably wrest and mis-interpret Scripture on pretence of vindicating Scripture as T. D. and I. O. do Yea I. O. there is scarce any or but very few of all the Scriptures thou quotest in all thy Books but thou pervertest them more or lesse as T. D. does the most if not all he meddles with whether about the Scripture or the word or foundation or Rule or what ever else And as for these five last examined if thou hadst not sent me to them to that end I should as soon of my self have gone to seek a Dolphin in the woods as lookt into any one of them to find God promising in his love to his Church and Word and in order to the preserving of them both to be carefull to set his providence so on work as to lay the Transcribers of the Scriptures in the Hebrew and Greek Tongues but not the Translaâ—ors of them into other tongues in which yet his care and Love to his Church though not to the Clergy that trade out of their Original Texts would as much appear and his Truth and most mens souls are as much concerned and more too then in Hebrew and Greek Texts if the Scripture were the onely way to life under his loving aspect so as to see they should not misse nor falsifie in a Tittle though he would leave Translators out of the lists of that loving aspect to erre and corrupt as much as they would for howbeit I ken not the mystery of I. O's mind in this nor any Reason why if God love his Church and Word he should not in his care to preserve both oversee with a loving Aspect that Translators should not mis-translate as well as Transcribers not mis-transcribe yet I. O. allowes the loving Aspect of God to Transcribers but whether God himself do so or no I dare not say denying that great favour as in which his Church is much concerned as in the other to Translators for p. 334. speaking of the Chaldee Paraphrase he sayes thus viz. Seeing it hath not lain under any peculiar care and mercifull providence of God whether innumerable other faults be not get into it and errours not to be discovered by any varieties of Copies as it is happened with the Sepmagint who can tell No promise nor providence nor mercy nor loving aspect to the poor peoples Scripture still which is that of Translation onely for they cannot read Hebrew and Greek their part may go whither it will God looks not after it but such darlings do our Doctors and Clergy men deem themselves to be with God that his love care oversight promise providence and all is towards every Tittle of their Transcripts that they may trade with their Text and mete out what they will to men for money from it should any Qua. make such mad conclusions their Books would be good enough to be burned and thou I. O wouldst Iudge them no better Egregiam vero laudem spolia ampla refertis Tuque liberque tuus magnum memorabile nomen Having foild the Front-Guard of that Ragged Rout the Rest that have far lesse Reason in them if lesse can be are soon Routed Arg. the Second is the Religious care of the Church not of the Romish Synagogue sayst thou to whom these Oracles of God were committed Rep. What Church then if not the Remish Synagogue hath had that Commission of the Scriptures to her and that Religious care thou here talkst on to keep every Tittle of the Text entire without losse or change I do not say that the now Romane Harlot hath now or ever had in her Apostatical slate such a Commission of the Scripture to her as she pretends to as if they were the onely Trustees to whose care and custody the Text was committed of God for as to their proud prate and peculiar claim to such a preheminent power to be keepers and preservers of the Scripture I deny it nay with thy self in the 2.3.4.5 pages of thy Epistle I disown and damn their deceitfull pretence to such a trust reposed in them and if they had enjoy'd any such they have as thou sayest truly manifested a treacherous mind and falsified their Trust egregiously and so cannot stand in Judgement if called to account upon their own principles having indeed so far as they have had to do with the Scriptures altered added detracted depraved vitiated interpolated and done what not to corrupt them during the long time of their Dominus fac-totum-ship in whole Christendom about Scripture and every thing else ad extra that had any pretence toward the Truth and while the Scripture of the Old but the New Testament more specially seeing the Iewes reject it lay lockt up from all the Laity within the lines of her conclavical clerical Conemunication for though de jure they ought not so to have impropriated it but were Arrogant usurpers in so doing yet that de facto they had the grand Custody of that ye call your Canon and changed it as they pleased I should judge thee more silly then I am willing to do if thou shouldst deny it there being no visibly constituted Christian Church as to outward Order in all Europe that was other then a member of that blind Babylonish Body for at least a thousand years together But if that Church had not as I say
they had not canst thou tell me what Church had the exact Tale of so many Books of the Scripture as ye talk on and call your Canon committed to her of God any more then they or if thou say the whole True Apostolical Church of Christ under the Gospel had that Scripture we count the Canon and no more committed to it where was there ever such a thing done by whom or when canst thou tell us any of this thou talkst on or give us any Testimony of Scripture for this or trusty Tradition or any ground whereupon to act divine faith in this with thee so fundamental a matter save â—he fiction of thy own fancy and thy own meer untrusty thoughts and blindly confident Conjectures thou thinkst that in 2. Tim. 2.2 will serve thy turn in this case but I have overturned that already and if ever there were such a divine Commission of so many writings as a Canon by Christ or his Apostles to the gospel-Gospel-Church though I abhor that paultry novelly pretended Primacy of Rome over other particulars yet while it remained in its Primitive Apostolical Purity it had as deep a share as any other in that Commission of the Canon to her and so thy two Questions Ep. p. 3. what Scripture was this they say was committed to them and when was this deed of Trust made unto them have full as much in them but that plane nibilest to answer thee withall as thou hast to answer me who of the Church to whose care and custody thou sayest the Scripture was committed since Christ and by him or his Apostles do here ask thee what Church is that for thou amazest thy own and seek'st as Priests do to stun other mens minds with the name of the Church the Church but what Church is that whose care is said by thee to be so great whilst Rome's was so little to keep every Tittle of the Text entire and to whose care and custody it was to that end committed and intrusted and in thy own words to Rome so I to thee propound what Scripture was this or where was this deed of Trust made unto them And since it was not the Church of Rome as I freely agree with thee it was not what Church was it or where liv'd it or by what name or Title beside that generall blind people-confounding name of Church dost thou call it was it some one universal Catholick visibly constituted true Christian Church that had such a constant clearly visible continuance and successive outward orderly being in a Body as that Romane Harlot hath ever seemed to have from Christ downward to this day was it your what should I call it mingle-mangled Episcopall-Presbyter-Independant Church that 's run out from the Womb of that Babylonish Bawd through the loines of your late Fathers the Prelates and Scottish Presbyters into that Ragged Patcht Posture wherein it now stands like a Participle that 's neither this nor that nor Noun Substantive that can stand by it self without the Magistrates help nor Verb that betokens either doing or suffering any great matters for the Truth but most like an Adjective that leans upon Parliaments and earthly Powers to uphold it partaking with all sides as occasion is and of all formes something yet is just nothing but some Participle or PapalPrelatical-Presbyterian 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i.e. vere nihil but a mongrel Was it this Church that is one not individually but specifically the same with what yours is at this present derived downward and carefully receiving the Scripture downward entirely in all its Hebrew and Greek Letters Accents Points Tittles and Iota's without change or losse in the least is so shew us but some few footsteps of such a thing through the time of the Catholike Apostacy as a visible constituted Church which might have been known by the distinction of Elders Bishops Deacons c. in the dark dayes of Romes dominion except that of Rome it self that had the Canon constituted of no more nor lâ—sse but just so many Scriptures Letters Stories Tittles Iota's as thou trislingly tatlest by the Apostles and so committed to their care and as carefully handed down to you Linguists in every Letter of the Original Languages without alteration addition or diminution But I more than suppose thou shalt as soon find and follow to a hairs breadth the very way of a bird flying or an Arrow shot through the air as decypher such a matter and if the Papists should put the Question de novo to thee as they did long since to the Protestants where was your Church before Luther if thou couldst prove the Pedegree of thine so high as Luther though witnesses to the Truth more or lesse in all times suffering in sackcloth in the most dismall dayes I own yet thou wouldst be as much puzled to prove any other constituted Church that kept so entire as thou talkst thy constituted Canon in all Christendom beside that of the Romish Synagogue that corrupted it as that namelesse Author was who wrote an answer to it 1624 entituled Luthers Predecessors who though he quits himself well in proving downward from Iohn Wicklisse who was well nigh 200. years afore Luther but 1370. after Christ a company of particular successive sufferers for some truth that began to shine out again from under the Romish smother yet can instance no higher then Io. Wicklisse for at least a 1000. years upward any thing at all but an universal dominion of the Church of Rome confessing that if the Papists will tye him to prove any visible constituted Church beside theirs before Luther the Task is unequall because the records are wanting and also because the Church was not in the long time of Apostacy nor yet was to be alwaies in such a manner visible which is the very Truth for the true Church was to be and was according to the word of Prophesie Rev. 12. in a waste suffering afflicted desolate forlorn widernesse condition trodden under feet by the Gentiles coming into the out Court the outward name and profession of Christianity Rev. 11. And as when in her primitive glory she was cloathed with the Sun and a crown of twelve stars on her head i.e. the doctrine truth word of faith the 12 Apostles Preached and not simply those few of their naked writings and Letters and Texts and their Tittles and thou simply contendest on her head and the Moon i.e. all changeable things such as all Texts and Transcripts and Tittles and Iota's are under her feet so when she came into her forlorn solitary state in the time which was while the Whore or Clergy began to Ride the Beast and fit upon the Waters Tongues Nations Kings and Kindreds of the Earth and to cry Ecce duo gladii hic to claim both swords and to become supreamly as she made her sub-sub or Magistratical Power that bore her up subordinately to her not onely Custos utriusque Tabulae Vice-preserver of both Tables but pretendedly
high unjust Adorations of it and as for the holy Truth that 's declared in it I have bought and paid so dear for that that no lesse then All that I had in the world of what sort soever lust pleasure honour riches or righteousnesse of mine is gone for the sake of it and to have all that ever I lost for it I would not sell it again yet All the Tittles and Letters Accents Iota's and Points which I. O. counts his such a rich possession p. 252. that are in All the Hebrew Bibles and Greek Testaments I have and I have more than one of each sort any one shall have of me for five pound and lesse money and the Books themselves to boot and that is lesse then the whole world and yet I shall hope to enjoy not a Tittle the lesse of the word of Truth that is therein told if I sincerely attend to the light the Letter calls to though I should never neither buy nor so much as look into any outward Copy of the Original Text more while I live And whereas I. O. sayes p. 163. somewhat sutably to what he sayes here that the Church of God doth now and hath for many ages enjoyed the Copies of the Original Languages as her chiefest Treasure I say that is one of the chiefest untruths that have been told yet among those many that he hath Treated out of that whole Treasury of Tales and vaÌ„in thoughts that are in his heart out of the abundance of which evil Treasury his mouth speaketh and pen bringeth forth evil things for though the Churches of mans constituting of which I. O. is yet a member and the Ministers of mens making at the Vniversities do now rejoyce in Transcripts Copies of the Hebrew and Greek Texts and Iota's and Points and Tittles and such like Toyes and Trappings and fruitlesse furniture as their chiefest Treasure rich possession and inheritance which they glory and blesse themselves in for the whole world will not he deprived of knowing that they must be deprived of all their worldly excellencies if they come once to part with them and do cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that all Truth tumbles to the ground if any jot and Tittle of their Original Texts and Hebrew punctation fail and they see no way to be delivered from utter uncertainty in and about all sacred Truth Ep. p. 25. in such wise as the Antichristian Churches did in darker times behind us and do still in the dark places of their several habitations count old mouldy Latine masse books and new moulded Engâ—ish Liturgies Letanies and Scottish Directories meliori â—ute of a little better mould yet then the other two a thousand fold before the best of which yet I prefer the Scripture Directory whether in its Original Transcripts or but Translations their chief spiritual treasure crying out that all true faith worship Church Word of God Religion and all is like to be utterly lost if these be taken away till the Remove of which Religion was never rightly found Yet the Church of God which is now the some that it was in substance before any Scripture at all was in rerum natura both ever did and doth still count Christ the Light and Life of whom the Letter onely Testifies her chiefest Ioy and Treasure Luk. 1.57 Joh. 8 56 and not the outward Text that doth but talk of him much lesse the meer Accidental Adventitious parts thereof quae possunt vel adesse vel abesse sine Scripturae interitu which as the whole Scripture it self may be either present or absent from without the corruption of the substantial Truth or word But whose Treasure the Scripture is or is not it 's little yea nothing to I. O's purpose to prove a non-mis transcription of the Scripture we see I. O. and many millions more make much of and more ado about every Tittle and lota of the Text then they need do at this day and yet with a non obstante to all that the variety of Lections are a thousand times twice told in Transcripts and Translations and if we will believe I. O. p. 16. frequent insinuations of an infinite number more are yet to be collected Arg. the Eighth as to the old Testament in particular is the care of Ezra and his companions in restoring the Scripture to its purity when it had met with the greatest tryal that ever it underwent in this world considering the paucity of Copies then extant Rep. Ezra and his companions care was as great no doubt as mans could well be in that case but ultra posse non est esse they could do no more then they could do as to the restoring the purity of the Scripture when corrupted and that 's Questionable whether they restored it so perfectly as not to leave out some Tittles or Iota's yea and whole Books too because they could not find them witnesse all those forenamed whole Prophecies that are wanting but what if their endeavours had succeeded so as to set all to rights as perfectly and exactly to a Tittle as 't was at first giving our might it not as likely and much more be corrupted vitiated altered in points Tittles and Iota's between Ezraes dayes and now through the many Tumbles Catastrophes Revolutions and greater changes of times and things then that of the Babylonish Captivity that have happened then in the dayes of its so long steady standing while it was reserved within the bounds and confines of the Iewish Church onely and yet here thou intimatest it to have been then exceedingly charged depraved and defective or else how could Ezra and his fellows be said to restore it to its purity thou art very hard put to it for a proof of the present integrity and purity of the Hebrew Text to a Tittle that goest two thousand years backward asserting that it was restored to its purity then and thence concluding that it stands as entire to a Tittle now as then it did thou mightst as well have gone a little higher and argued thus from before Ezra viz. the Hebrew Text was at first written by the Holy Penmen Moses David Isaiah and the other Prophets truly and according to the mind of the Spirit therefore it stands so entihe 〈◊〉 this day but thou seeing for all the Iewes great care to keep it thou makest such an Argument of it was much corrupted before Ezra therefore beginnest thy account of its integrity to a Tittle no higher then him in whose dayes thou deemest it was de novo most perfectly rectified ad amussim reckoning rashly as thou mostly dost and in no wise considering that thou hast no more but much lesse security against its alteration from Ezra downward to this day not knowing what heedlesse hands of carelesse Scribes it hath since come under then there was from Ezra â—â—â—ards from the time of its most pure giying out in which juncture yet it so fell out that as that which they found of it
not to be believed when she talks the Truth p. 225. So I may say of thee though I believe thee when thou speakest truth yet thou utterest so many untruths that thou scarcely deservest to be believed when thou tellest the Truth but yet if thou be of any credit with thy self and thou wilt but take thy own word then we are well enough and have wherewith to answer thy challenge having thy self in the self same Book we have here to do with speaking more then one word at least and that 's enough ad bominem to this purpose viz. that there was in the world a Copy of the Bible different from what we now enjoy in one word at least and that 's in more then Tittles which thou who art Callidus more then Callidus in thy Re frigida contendest for sith the Keri and Ketib those 840. words which are confest by thee to vary in their Consonants from what they should be written with if what is in the margin were in the line are confest by thee not to have been so from the beginning which if not then there was once a Copy different from what we now enjoy but of this thou wilt hear more from us by and by Secondly p. 300. thou sayest the difference in the sense taken in the whole context is upon the matter very little or none at all at least each word both that in the margin that in the line yield a sense agreeable to the Analogy of faith Rep. Here thou mendest thy bad cause as well as one can well do that makes it two-fold worse then 't was before for if there be welnigh a thousand words not onely different in Consonants which is greater then that of Tittles but also such as makes the least difference in the sense of the Spirit which how many so e're the Text may bear is acknowledged by all but your selves that make many to be but one alone ever to one word or place then thou thy self overturnest that certainty and Identity of not onely the Text it self thou so loudly contendest for but also in some measure of the Truth it self contained therein which we say is eternally entire let the Text run which way it will but thou here art forced to confesse that in the Keri and Ketib there 's not onely a variation in words but also thereby in the very sense it self And though thou wouldst fain mend it when thou hast done by mincing the matter making as if the Context considered the difference in the sense is upon the matter very little and agreeable either way to the Analogy of faith as ye often speak whereby if not blinded ye might see how for all ye call the Scripture your Rule of Faith yet ye more serne the Scripture into the sense of a suitablenesse to your modern devised model of faith still then suit and model your faith according to the true sense of the Spirit and mind of Christ in the Scripture yet that 's a meer false seeth and â—â—gment of thy own for in some places there arises from the Keri and Ketib a very vast variety not to say clear contrariety in the sense such as if the Context be consulted with is consistent with the faith but one way onely and not the other and sith thou puttest it to the tryall by the variety of those two words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are the same in sound yet most distinct in their significations and so of all the varieties that are of this kind seeming to thee of the greatest importance of which it is observable that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose signification is not is fourteen or fifteen times put in the Text or line instead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose signification is to him or it which is set in the margin I am willing to be tryed by that very variety that is of thy own naming the better to satisfie thee And whereas thou sayest that though these seem contrary one to the other yet wherever this falls out a sense agreeable to the Analogy of faith ariseth fairly from either word instancing in some places picke out by thee for thy own purpose I say if it do hold it s not worth a pin or point to the proof of what thou sayest if in any one of those fourteen or fifteen places it appear to the contrary and that it does let me be so bold fith thou instancest in two that are fittest for thee to instance but one that makes against thee and then I shall trouble my self no more with thy Keri and Ketib which would make one if not sick yet at least sorry for thee to see how sorrily thou shifts by it Isa. 9.3 thou hast multiplyed the Nation not encreased the joy say the Ketib or word in the Text but the Keri or word in the Margin is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to it which marginal Reading though Translators following the mistake of the mis-transcribers keep to the Ketib is undoubtedly the true and onely sense of the Spirit for the reading in the line as it is in both Transcripts and Translation is considered with the Context a piece of meer non-sensicall contradiction thou hast encreased the Nation not encreased the Ioy they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest as men rejoyce when they divide the spoil what a jarre does the word not encreased the Ioy make in the sense of that verse yea it makes it meet confusion and contradiction to say the joy is not enlarged and yet it is enlarged like to that of men that rejoyce in harvest and at the dividing of the spoil but read it by the Keri 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to it thus viz thou hast multiplyed the Nation thou hast encreased joy to it or its joy they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest as men rejoyce when they divide the spoil and then there 's no discord in the sound but it s all sweetly sutable and harmonious and agreeable to the Analogy of the true faith also Arg. thy Eleventh is The security we have that no mistakes were voluntarily or negligently brought into the Text before the coming of our Saviour who was to declare all things in that he not once reproves the Iewes â—n that Account when yet for their false glosses on the word be spares them not And this Argument is urged o're again p. 316 interrogatively thus viz. can it be once imagined that there should be at that time such notorious varieties in the Copies of the Scripture through the negligence of that Church and yet afterword neither our Saviour nor his Apostles take the least notice of it yea doth not our Saviour himself affirm of the word that was then among them Scripture with thee that not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should passe away or perish Rep. 1. Leave calling Christ thy Saviour as thou often dost till thou witnesse thy self saved by his grace from
Apostles and Prophets it self which was not their writings for these were not their foundation nor were given to be ours for if they were then they had been built upon themselves and we are to be upon them which is absurd to say for neither their own preachings nor writings were their own foundation which they were built on nor are we to build onely upon them but both they and we upon that which all holy men were built on from the beginning before any writing was at all viz. Christ Iesus the light the corner stone which the blind builders refuse on whom whoever builds and believes if he never come to read one Tittle of any outward writing shall assuredly never be ashamed In this one grant then thou hast given both the Qua. and all others thou contendest with no lesse then the very cause thou contendest for viz. that the Scripture or Letter is infallibly the infallible word of God and every Letter Tittle and Iota of it also one Iot or Tittle of which can no sooner fail then Heaven and Earth can passe away and that every Iota and Tittle that was in the outward Letter as at first given forth from God by inspiration is preserved to this very day without corruption and remains in the Copies preserved till now for the use of his Church that the whole Scripture entire as given out from God without any losse is preserved in the Original Copies yet remaining yea in them all is every Letter and Tittle For this is the cause thou hast taken in hand in which thou wilt find when once thou awakest that thou hast hold on the wrong end of the staffe and these and much more of the like sort are thy own words and absolute assertions about it up and down in thy Book T. 1. c. 1. S. 14. T. 12. e. 2. S. 7. 9. which if they cannot be made good so high thou runnest but that there be any corruption to be supposed in your present Original Copies and various Lections though it be granted by Capellus and others that the saving Doctrine remaines sound as to matters of moment yet this shall not satisfie nor afford thee relief enough but thou wilt needs give up all thy cause as lost even further then thy own opponents would have thee confessing and professing that all your Doctrine is corrupt not continuing entire no means of its discovery nor of its recovery from a lost condition no means of rectifying it or determining any thing about it see T. 1. c. 1. S. 16.17 yea so as to yeild your selves to be at such a losse as not to know what ground ye stand on yea in thy Dedicatory Epistle pag. 25. lay but these two together first that the Points are the invention of the Tiberian Massorites which by all thy proofs to the contrary thou leavest as uncertain as thou foundst it and little lesse then yeild'st that it 's but uncertain 2 That its lawful to gather various Lections c. and then sayest thou for my part I must needs cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tell me where I must stand as not seeing any means of being delivered from utter uncertainty in and about all sacred Truth and so thou goest on desuing to be instructed by such as see through the deâ—adiations that are likely to ensue on these principles as one that tremblest to think what will be the desperate consequences of imagining alterations in the Points Tittles and Iotaes of your Originals Ep. ded p. 19. now what the issue will be we leave to God though some know it yet thou are too weak to bear the sense of it without amazement being bottomed no better then upon a quavering bogge if it should be told thee yet know it thou wilt when it comes to passe or if thou canst bear it take it now Fiat justuis aut pereat mundus the issue as dreadfull as it seems to thee who aâ—t in fearlesse dangers of greater mischiefs and but dangerless fears of this present object thou so startlest at will assuredly be no worse then this as I said above viz. that while Theeves will fall out True men will come by their good again if all the Divines in the world be in such digladiations as to draw their daggers against each other about it yet the light from which your whole Letter came will be turned to when the Letter is found to be but a fallible uncertain Rule as falsified by mens mis-transcriptions and mis-translations which light is certo certius vera verius if ought can be so even no lesse then infallibility and certainty it self and that very Equity and Truth it self which the Letter teaches and doth but tend to and for my part sink thou and thy fearful fellows boreling Priests and wrangling Lawyers that live altogether on mens lusts trespasses and sins of which when the world comes to the light and by it to be led into love honesty and peace as there will be no need so it will be wiser then to be fooled into a feeding of you for feeding them in their fightings I say sink ye whether ye will and your Quick sandy foundadations together with you till both your selves and them be swallowed up by that greater glory of the light it self now arising again upon the world though they will nor see it I know some that stand so fast in this juncture wherein the old heaven and earth shakes in order to its removing as to see thousands fall besides them and thousands at their right hand yet be out of fear of the fearful fall of the Hypocrites coming nigh them And as it hath never repented me hitherto to see that people that were Priestbewildred and hampered in Latine Letanies English Liturgies divine Scottish Directoryes falling off from their Priests and Scribes to the search of Scriptures so it will never repent either my self or many thousands more that are turned to a true attendance to the light of Christ having witnessed that weaknesse of the Letter it self to save the soules of men which the Letter it self also bears witnesse to Rom. 8 2. to see men fall according to the councel of the Scripture in that behalf Gal. 5.16 such a tall is in truth not from but to the Scriptures from the Scripture it self to the holy Spirit Neverthelesse were I one that did close never so cordially with thee in thy cause about the Scripture yet could I not commend but most condemne the Course in which thou commend'st it to us for as if it were not forward enough te fall of it self thou hastenest to handle it down with thy own hand writing while thou grantest the very first Transcribers of the Scripture to be fallible and also to have erred and failed though it were but in Points Tittles and Iotaes and in no lesse they could fail if they fail'd at all for is they were fallible and what they wrote were falsified in the least then at least thy
wherewith thou standest out Pushing and Warring on in vindication of thy Assertion which looses ground more and more at the tayl of which thou again usherest in thy Conclusion viz. The Iewes silly superstitious sayings and doings which thou minglest with thy own shall we thinks as if thou didst not only justifie and side with them in their Absurdities but also build much as to the Evincing of thy Position thereupon there lacks little to be Replyed as to the Routing of them every one that hath any little solidity in him being easily capable to see and feel the foppicalnesse thereof yet at least I shall do thee so much Right who perhaps placest more in them then many a wise man would do as to nominate them The Iewes sayest thou pag. 169 170 171 173. have a Common saying That to alter one Letter of the Law is no lesse sin then to set the whole World on fire The truth is they are prodigious things that are Related of the Exact Diligence and Reverential Care of the Antient Jewes in this Work Ben Asher spent many years in the Careful Exact Writing out of the Bible Let any consider the things which they affirm to Prophane a Book or Copy One is if but one Letter be wanting and Another if but one Letter be Redundant and shall we think that is Writing it they took no more Care then a man would do in Writing out Aristotle or Plato Considering that the Word to be Transcribed was every Tittle and Iota of it The Word of the great God c. that if any failings were made innumerable Eyes of men owning their Eternal Concernment to lye in that Word were open upon it to discover it c. It is no hard work to prove their Care and Diligence to have out-gone that of Common Scribes of Heathen Authors Even among the Heathen we will scarce think that the Roman Pontifices going solemnly to Transcribe Sybills Verses would do it either negligently or Treacherously or alter one Tittle from what they found written And shall we entertain such Thoughts of them that knew they had to do with the living God in and about that which is dearer to him then all the World besides Let men then Clamour as they please and cry out of all as ignorant and stupid which will not grant the Corruptions of the Old Testament they plead let them propose their Conjectures of Mistakes crept into the Original Copies with their Remedies as Capellus We shall acknowledge nothing of this nature but what they can prove by undeniable and irrefragable instances which as to any thing done by them appears upon the matter to be nothing at all It can then with no colour of Probability be Asserted which yet I find some Learned men too free in granting namely that there hath the same Face attended the Scripture in its Transcription as hath done other Books Let me say without offence this Imagination seems to the to border on Atheism Surely the Promise of God for the Preservation of his Word with his Love and Care of his Church of whose Faith and Obedience the Word is the only Rule require other Thoughts at our hands We adde that the whole Scripture entire as given out from God without any losse is preserved in the Copies of the Originals yet remaining What varieties there are among the Copies themselves shall be afterwards declared in them all we say is every Letter and Tittle of the Word Reply Because the Children of the Letter of the Old Testament nor of the Gospel the Spirit and the New are so sortish and senslesse as to surmise that the bare Copies of the Letters and Points and Tittles and loâ—aes are dearer to God then all the World besides so that its a greater sin to mis-transcribe one Letter by either Alteration Ablation or Addition which change by Deficiency or Redundancy may befal the most Critical Curious Careful Scribe that ever was does prophan a Copy so that it s not the Holy Scripture for Prophane and Holy are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and is as great a sin and a matter of as much moment as the fiâ—ing the whole World and upon such uncircumcised Conceits are men Excrementiâ—ously exact and diligent to very doâ—age and careful of Pins Points Vowels Accents Tittles Iotaes Apices and Letters of the Text ad Extra not Tantamount to the least of the Truths therein contained no not to so â—uch as Tyth while the Law for it stood of Mint Anâ—is and Commin to utter Carelesnesse of the grand Truths and reverentially respectful to their Book as they were of old to their Brazen Serpent of as divine Original and to as divine an end as the Letter is to very idolatry and spending their time in tedious transcribings of every Apex to the very total loss of many years from the more weighty matters of Judgement Mercy Righteousnesse Faith and Truth which the Text doth but testifie of and prodigious to very Superstition I say because that blinded Generation of men viz. the Iewes whom sometimes thou seemest to tax for their undue Veneration of the Letter and over-weenings of it pag. 236. and to set them at nought as men feeding themselves all their dayes with vain Fables addicted to figments profoundly Ignorant Idolatrous full of foolish Contradictious Triflings bewitched with their Dunghilly Traditions doing how seriously of nothing how Childishly in serious things fools sots froth smoke nothing whose sayings and doings are no more to be heeded then that of wick'd blind mad-men c. pag. 236 239 242 243 246 247. do so adore the letter and dote on the Tittles of it must thou needs be foolish and doting and sottish and superstitious and Idolatrous and so Childishly serious in taking up thy Time and Thoughts so totally and piningly after Toyes and Trifles and Iots and Tittles together with them Vin tu Curtis Judaeis oppedere c. Wilt thou sometimes flert at the Iewes Fancies and Fopperies and odde Conceits and over-curious Carriages of themselves in Boyes Toyes and at that which is the fruit of their fidling minds as not fit to be any other then forgotten and yet forget thy self so other whiles as to entertain their vain Thoughts so as to own them as thine own and own them as thy grounds and foundations to frame thy Arguments upon so as both â—o think the same with them and from thence to impose upon the thoughts and faith of others for if thou judg them ridiculous why dost thou alledge them in so serious a Case as thou dost and if thou justifie them art thou not one with them and because thou think'st as they so superstitiously think and from thence thrusts out thy confident Conclusions in that thy wonted Interrogative way of shall we think this and that shall we entertain such Thoughts can it be imagined c. or if positively then thus it is not unprobable it can with no colour of probability be Asserted this or that
differences that are in later Transcripts as various Lections p. 192. whatever varying word quoth he Syllable or Tittle could by any be obseâ—ved wherein any Book though of yesterday varieth from the common received Copy though manifestly a mistake superfluous or deficient inconsistent with the sense of the place yea barbarous is presently imposed on us as various Lection so p. 194. How peevishly complains he that all differences that could be found in any Copies printed or written are equally given out as various Lections many differences that have been formerly rejected by learned men for open corruptions are here tendred us again quoth he adding it is not every variety or difference in a Copy that should presently be cryed up for a various Reading A man might with as good colour take all the printed Copies he could get of various Editions and gathering out the Errata Typographica print them for various Lections I answer why not do not all Errata whether Apographica or Typographica make various Lections from the first 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in some degree at least whether they be fewer and lesser or more and grosser â— whence come those few errours that thou thy self ownest for various Lections but from the failings and mistakes of the Scribes in Transcribing or the Compositors at the Presse from whence all the rest come which by no means thou wilt admit to be called by that name yet those that others call corruptions and various Lections on the self same account as thou callest those few which thy ownest as such thou turnest them off with To what end should mens minds be troubled with them being evident mistakes of the Scribes dost thou grant then that in many places of your Original Apographical Copies there be evident mistakes of the Scribes in so doing dost not thou grant all that is contended for against thee which is that in your Transcriptions of the Original Text thou so much talkest for the entirenesse and integrity of to every Letter Point Syllable Tittle and Iota the Scribes were evidently mistaken so as to mis-transcribe and the Printers through whose hands the Bible comes mostly or altogether now were evidently mistaken so as to mis-print many words Syllables Letters Tittles Points Iotaes to the manifest corrupting of the Scripture in the Greek and Hebrew Text thereof as well as of the Text in other Tongues whereby it is undeniably evident to any but obstinate I.O. that the same fate both hath ever and still doth and therefore may sith quod fieri potuit potest attend the Scripture in its Editions by Transcribing as hath done doth or may do any other Books and may well be asserted so to do without thy sottish senselesse unreasonable Atheistical supposition and censure of its bordering on Atheism so to imagine and for all thy foolish and false affirmation p. 173 that the promise of God for the preservation of the Scripture to a Tittle require other thoughts at our hands I say why should not one various Lection by a mistake in the Transcribers or Printers be counted and called a various Lection corruption mis-transcription alteration of the Text as well as another a lesser as well as a greater a later as well as one more ancient 2. I wonder whose Reason but Reasonlesse I. Os. it is against the corruptions in Copies of so great Antiquity as two or three hundred years should not be numbred among others that are much elder And sith many mistakes and corruptions are confest to have crept into Copies of later times by the Oscitancy Negligence Ignorance Wilfulnesse or something of the Scribes who knew as much of late as they did of old what they were about and with whom they had to do therein and were under as much promise aspect and care of God whose providence and love to his Church and Word is as great for the preservation of both in these last ages as ever if his un-erring guidance of Scribes and Printers that Transcribe and Print the Scripture be such a non such expression thereof as I.O. would make it I wonder what warrant and security I.O. who denyes inspiration and infallible direction to all Transcribers from the first to the last can give us of the honesty fidelity integrity ability and against the erroneousnesse carelesnesse unskilfulnesse and aptnesse to mis-transcribe of the more ancient more then I can of and against that of the later Transcribers whether Jewes or Christians since they who know not the Spirit are all as zealous now of the letter as ever and more Tender and Talkative and Tâ—tling for every Tittle of their Text then ever they were since the world stood witnesse I.O. himself yea when was there more care and curiosity and critical consideration about the exact writings printings and reprintings of the Bible then is now adayes yet no Editions ever come out so carefully corrected and copied out but that a man may fill a page with its Errataes in more then either Tittles or Iotaes and if now and two or three hundred years ago why not in dayes of old I know not nor any one else I believe but that I.O. sayes otherwise and is more ready to beleeve his own Sayâ—soes and suppositions then the naked Truth and to be believed by such as dote on his Doctorship then to be disproved or proved a Lyar. But finally that I may at once remove this sleevelesse pretence of I. O. out of the way at his command and our own leasure let those obscure private novel Copies as he counts them and their corruptions be separated and removed out of his way since they trouble him so much we can abate him them and afford and spare him the setting apart of them and more too and yet carry the cause against him too out of his own mouth nor will his plea and pretence of the privacy obscurity and novelty of these if we allow it him prosper to the proving that there is no various Lections in his Original Texts since we have it professed publikely passed and consequently proved against himself under his own hand which ever and anon pulls down what it builds up and soon after builds again what it once destroyed thus viz. p. 190. I.O. That there are in some Copies of the New Testament and those some of them of some good Antiquity divers Readings in things or words of lesse importance is acknowledged the proof of it lyes within the reach of most in the Copies that we have and I shall not sollicite the reputation of those who have afforded us others out of their own private furniture Rep. These being I.Os. own words whereby he hath overturned his t'other Talk I need talk no more on it for I cannot set his Babel more perpendicularly with its Bottom upwards then it stands already as himself hath set it Yet for all this I. O. may think he hath qualified and salved this saying of his from the censure of a contradiction to the other
maintaining of is this viz. that though the first and immediate Manuscripts and individual writings of Moses and the Prophets the Apostles and Evangelists are all utterly lost and perished out of the world p. 13. 163. 164. yet the Hebrew and Greek Copies of them that remain exâ—ant at this day do contain every Letter Apex Syllable Accent Iota Tittle Point that was in them without any addition of the Points ablation alteration variation change or corruption by mistake or mis-transcription in the least notwithstanding the hands of so many Transcribers as they have passed thorow and that the Text in the Original Languages hath been both promised to be and accordingly hath bin providentially preserved in Gods Love and care to his Word and Church so that the same fate hath not attended the Scripture as to mis-transcription or alteration any way in the Original Copies of it through any miscarriages mistakes oscitancy negligence ignorance sloth carelesnesse unfaithfulnesse much lesse treacherousnesse in Transcribing thereof as hath attended other Books in their Editions and Transcribings p. 13. 14. 153. 155. 156. 164. 168. 170. 171. 173. 177. 203. 206. 213. 317. 319. in all these pages and many more where the particularities of it are sprinkled up and down this general grand Position is to be apprehended as affirmed by him and undertaken to be vindicated to a Tittle 2. That this position is not onely thus punctually propounded by I.O. for Truth but also avouched with that extremity rigidity and strictnesse that it s made the very Basis of all true Belief and of all that whole businesse that he calls divine saving sacred Truth Religion Worship Knowledge Service of God duty of man towards him c. so that in case these his Thoughts Apprehensions Position and Assertion as he often calls it p. 146. 149. 163. 181. 193. 202. 203. proves not true firm sound but false faulty and faultring and if it ever appear that there are corruptions crept into the Text of Scripture by either the addition of the Hebrew points Accents or punctation since the beginning of the first writing thereof immediately from God as a late novell invention of some Iudaical Rabbins viz. the Tiberian Massorites by whom they are judged to have been added or else by the oscitancy carelesnesse negligence ignorance treachery weaknesse or wilfulnesse of the Transcribers mistaking mis-transcribing and thereby occasioning variations in the Copies of the Original so that the Text of Scripture is not wholly pure and entire or that we may if we please reject the Points and read otherwise Actum est Imus Imus praecipites what pernitious what devious wayes must men run scarce a Chapter a Verse a word left free from perplexing contradicting conjectures nothing but Fruitlesse Contests nothing but humane fallible perswasion to be fixed on for the sense A firebrand is brought into the Churches bread-corn the consequences are so desperate that he dares not mention them he cannot but tremble to think what is the issue of this imagination of such a supposition that the Points Vowels Accents are no better guides then so it renders questionable the foundation of all ejects as uselesse the whole Scripture it 's a pestilent poysonsome undervaluing the Originals crept in now among Protestants themselves though this comfort is left yet that the generality of learned Protestants are not yet infected with this Leven but if it should by a change of Iudgement break in so on the Protestant world as to be avowed in publike works the end will be a frightning poor unstable souls into the hands of the pretended infallible guide a return to Rome under the pretence of the Scriptures corruption in the Original Text as there was a passing from thence under the purity thereof yea 't is not known whether this inconvenience will grow yea once suppose corruptions crept into the Original Text and the pretended novelty of the Hebrew punctuation and then the wells and fountains from whence ye should draw all your soules refreshment are utterly stopt Ep p. 19. 20. so p. 196. 206. 207. 208. 209. 212. 213. 214. 215. 216. 218. 219. 220. 221. better all the works like to the Biblia Polyglotta were out of the world then this opinion of the â—Texs non-integrity to a Tittle or the novelty in Points should be embraced with its consequences that unavoidably attend it that if those seeming difficulties of Scripture to reconcile wch some look on as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or irreconcileable though some learned Iewes and Christians have been well exercised to reconcile and give fair account of them may by a liberty given be looked on as corruptions how ye shall be able to stay till ye come to the bottom of questioning the whole Scripture he knows not p. 347. 3. Let it be considered how eminently he stands concerned upon the confession that his foundation is not firm in case a Tittle of the Text be wanting or the Points added to it since its first giving out to make it out not probably onely but unquestionably clear and certain that the Text hath every Tittle and Iota and that the Points are no novelty but of equall Antiquity with the Text it self or else begin again with the Qua. at his A.B.C. in the things of God and lay a surer bottom for his building and foundation for his Faith then ever he hath laid to this day 4. Whether I. Os proof be infallible or but fallible of Divine certainty or meer humane conjecture self-conceit thought apprehension and imagination onely and whether the Text be so firm and entire to a Tittle as he affirms it to be yea rather that it is not let it be considered by all who read my examination of it in this now welnigh ended exercitation wherein the contrary is both apparently and abundantly evidenced his whole Regiment of Reasons by him rendred in proof thereof disproved and all that defensive stragling straw that hangs about them dispelled as chaffe as not onely falling short of infallible scientifical demonstration but also as not amounting to so much as a probable evidence that either the Points are coaevous wâ—â—h the Consonants which is sometimes no lesse then asserted or so high as Ezra which is undertaken to be manifested and are not rather a novelty no elder then the Massorites which with such affrightments at the consequences of such a Clergy-confounding conclusion is denyed and yet as to that reviving thereof whereby we now enjoy them acknowledged also by I O. or that the Text is in its most Original Copies wherein we now have it is the same as at first it was without any various Lections or unchanged Thus I have traced after I.O. in his Treatings and twinings too and fro in vindication of the integrity of his Greek and Hebrew Text and have evidently proved that there are not onely many whole Books of that Scripture which holy men were moved to write both before and since Christ wanting to his compleated Canon as
gives out his goodly colour in the Glass or that the picture of a Prince or eminent person is in esse reali cognoscibili and in all propriety of speech so to be called the very Prince or person him self it is but the Image of or the Map of the City London Rome Jerusalem is the very City it represents so that he bereaves it of its proper name that will not allow it to to be any otherwise but figuratively so called Now as to the Scriptures being the Word of God and evidently known to be so or evidencing themselves to be so and that of right and properly they are to be so called all which thou J. O very absolutely averrest I do here as absolutely deny confessing that if they be so or can be evidenced so to be they ought accordingly so to be called or else not for tum demum propriè dicuntur resfieri quoad nos cum incipiunt patefieri what is not so is not known to be so much less can challenge that as its proper name so that if in essereali they can be made appear to be the Word of God then I give the rest for granted or if I make it appear that they are not so then all wise men that not for want of ignorance of it yet do not will once grant that they are not so infallibly known as J.O. avouches they are to be the Word of God and that the Word of God is not the proper name of the Scriptures so distinctly and abstractively understood as is above said And seeing that thou J.O. art first out in the field appearing for them it s but meet that I should first examine what thou urgest in way of evidence for their being the Word of God and so subjoyn what I have to say truly of them against what falsely thou hast said And seeing that which thou thy self layest as the very basis and foundation of thy whole brittle building and of all that divine Authority ascribed by thee to the Scripture of its being owned sub paena to be submitted to as the Word of God on peril of eternal damnation is its Divine original and is best also to be first medled with that the bottome being shaken and shewed to be unsound the body of sticks and straws thou buildest thereon which is torn and shattered not a little within it self as it stands untouched in the eye of any intelligent and observant Reader may yet with the more ease and less labour be shaken to the ground I shall enter first at the front of thy Formidable forces and begin to undo where thou beginnest to do thy Do which yet will not be so much in one sense to undo as truly to do Right to the Truth about the letter which thou wrongest in uttering so many utter untruths concerning it as thou doest J. O. The whole Authority of the Scripture in it self depends solely on its Divine original pag. 2. This Original is the basis and foundation of all its Authority pag. 28. Rep. As to the Divine original of the Scripture which is the first and fundamental matter that in the very original or first Chapter of thy first Treatise thou pleadest on its behalf as in proof of its Divine Authority or Right to be owned as the Word of God I deny not but that it is of Divine original and so one way or other is every thing else that hath a truly good and honest being yea the very Devil himself as a creature of God though neither any of his deeds which are sin which is deceit and defect nor himself quà 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he is a Deceiver and as immediate an original from God as any meer writing or Scripture in the world hath this Scripture hath and some little of it such an immediate emanation from God as neither the most of it self hath or ever had nor yet the best that ever any holy man of God was the Pen-man of now hath or ever had I acknowledge that Scripture which is the present subject had at its first giving out to men for a few words of that outward writing the mee◠writing or letter of which yet though the matter still remains and ever will when all writing fails is lost and perished out of the world as well as the original manuscripts of the holy men who wrote the rest was written more miraculously at first then with the hands of holy men namely some with such Fingers as came out from the wall by God◠appointment in Belshazzars carousing Room Dan. 5.24 25 26 27 28. and some with no less than the Finger of God himself Exod. 32.18 16.32 15 16. 34.1.28 Deuter. 9 10. 10.12 But what of all this that the meer Transcripts of that Text which was so immediately though little or none of it so immediately from God as J.O. contends neither or at least none at all of it immediate unto us that our modern Transcripts I say thereof which is all that is immediate to us and which J.O. who confesses all the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or first writings to be lost busies himself to prove to be so are at all immediately come forth from God to us or that that letter which was most immediately penned from Gods own hand is thereupon evinced to be truly and in proper location the Word of God or any more then externa mera licet vera Imag◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a meer though true outward copy expression or express Image as vox omnis is and Scripture too ad intra of the Word of God which is that only that is written of and not the writing of it This I both dare and do deny again J.O. or any other that asserts it yet what a deal of stress doth J.O. put upon his strict and strong Asseveration of this throughout his first Chapter insomuch that he layes the whole load of his cause and makes all his labours to lean upon this weak Reed and broken Basis the falseness shallowness and sandiness of which as he manages this matter viz. the manner of the Scriptures coming out from God by then I shall have a little examined it will shew it self unable to bear up the weighty Fabrick of the Scriptures being the Word of God which is the Babel that he builds upon it against a storm I shall here take notice of some at least of J. O.'s foolish false fictitious and self-contradicting talk about that prime Prop and Pillar on which his grand Proposition that the Scripture is assuredly and infallibly known to be the Word of God and all his proofs thereof are grounded viz. The Divine Original of the Scripture CHAP. II. I Shall consider this matter of the Scriptures Original both Absolutely taking notice of a few of thy false and foolish fancies about it and also Relatively as it 's laid by thee as the Basis of the Scriptures Divine Authority or being th◠Word of God J. O. The Laws
God by the writers of the Scripture to the Pedagogie of the Old Testament and times before Christ such as greatly affected the outward man with trembling and astonishment for which thou citest both Habakkuk and Daniel as it the times since Christ knew no such matter as true Trembling or any such Quaking as may affect the outward man but what is fained and from Satan and the force and power of the evil Spirit imitating in his filthy Tripodes and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that Dread and Terrour which is by the Power of God upon his people of which said fictitious sort thou falsely and foolishly fainest all that outward Trembling that is found among the Qua. to be at this day pag. 8. Ex. 1. S. 1. I say hadst thou been as well read and skilled in Scripture as by thy scribling pro Scripturis thou wouldest fain seem to be surely thou wouldest have found that Paul and John both were found in as great Tremblings and Astonishments Dread and Terrour to the great affecting of the outward man under the Appearances of the Lord to them in Visions and Revelations of his minde and will to them which they wrote as either Daniel Habakkuk or the rest of the Prophets before Christ that wrote them insomuch that they scarce knew sometimes where they were whether in or out of the body but were as dead with fear Act. 9 6.26.14 1 Cor. 2.3 2 Cor. 12.2 3. Rev. 1.17 But alas J.O. is so taken up and hurried in his thoughts in a hideous talking for the Scriptures that he hath little time to give any very great good heed to the Scriptures themselves he so talks for J.O. Thou addest pag. 6 7. That as far as their own personal concernments as Saints and beleevers did lye in the things they wrote they studied the writings and Prophesies of one another Dan. 9.2 and made a diligent enquiry thereby in order to the investigation of the things which the Spirit that spake in themselves did signifie 1 Pet. 1.10.10 without which though their Visions were express yet they understood them not and that they attained a saving useful habitual knowledge of the truths delivered by themselves and others by the illumination of the Holy Ghost through the study of the Word i.e. Scripture with thee still even as ye do Psal. 119 104. but as to the receiving of the Word from God as God Spoke in them they obtained nothing by study or meditation by enquiry or reading Am. 7.15 Rep. Here is such a parcel of uncouth prate about the Prophets and their Prophesie of Scriptures and the Scriptures of their Prophesies as favours of nothing but that illiterateness and ignorance of the true wayes of coming to the saving knowledge and understanding of the minde and will of God that abounds in Vniversities the supposed Nurseries as well of spiritual learning as any other well nigh as much as in any places of the so called Christian world besides What dreaming what darkness and confusion is here As if the Writers of the Scriptures because they were moved by the holy Spirit to write what they did therefore wrote they did not know what themselves nor in any wise sawingly understood every one his own piece of writing or Scripture pag. 5. whether of Histories or Prophesies or Proverbs or Psalms or Instructions or Doctrines or Laws or Promises or what ever tru he recorded delivered made known given out revealed by themselves revealed to them first from God as to their own concernment therein as Saints or beleevers by the Revelation thereof to them from God which as I said above is the only way of coming to the saving knowledge of any truth and not that of reading it as truth in anothers writings without running out to study and read the writings of some other men in order to their attaining any habitual saving useful intelligence of their own as if Isaiah that Evangelical Prophet did not savingly understand the Gospel Doctrines and Promises and Instructions and his own Recorded History of Senacherib and Hezekiah and other saving truths delivered and written by himself as they were revealed to him by the Lord nor by the voice Spirit and light of God himself manifesting them within him nor as he received the word so revealed and manifested in order to which receiving the word thou assertest also they obtained nothing by study or meditation enquiry or reading but onely as he made diligent enquiry study and search after the things the Spirit signified by him in the writings and Scriptures of some other Prophets I wonder what other parts of Scripture of the other Prophets he studied so to get that saving knowledge by since unless it were the Psalmes the last book of which is judged to have been compiled together by the Maccabees long after his dayes excepting also the three i.e. Hos a Amos and Micah that were co aetaneous with him all other Prophets that are ranked after him in your Bibles though not in the same order of time wherein they wrote wrote long after him and as if Ezekiel Jeremiah Daniel or the rest knew not savingly what they wrote themselves no more then we do as to themselves or any personal interest they had in the truths of their own writings but as they got an useful saving knowledges thereof out of each others writings in proof of which if a man would wrest them as thou doest to thine by the head and shoulders to such a purpose he might almost as easily evince the Pope to be head of Christs Church as draw any such matter as this thou concludest from Scripture That of 1 Pet. 1.10 11. Ministers no more matter of evidence to thy imagination in this particular that the Prophets searched other Prophets writings to finde out each the meaning of his own then Peters being at Rome if ever he were there doth to his being the Popes Predecessor there in the holy Chair 'T is true the Prophets are there said to enquire and search diligently after the salvation and the grace that comes unto the Saints at the revelation of Christ but is there no searching and enquiring after the salvation and the fulness of the grace of God but iâ— the letter is not the most succesful searching after these matters made in the light it self that teaches and shews it and brings the salvation nigh to all that wait for it therein which light or grace hath appeared to all men Tit. 2.11 12. and is tâ—eâ—e any way whereby God gives the knowledge of his own glory but the light from himself which the letter speaks of wherewith God who commands the light to shine out of darkness shines into the hearts of the Saints in order thereunto 2 Cor. 4.5 6. And are not all things that are manifested manifested in the light and is there any thing that doth make manifest but the said light and Spirit which the letter speaks of and which was before the letter was Eph. 5.13
from that sure Rock on which through mercy I stand into that deep pit of doubtful disputations into which such as are fell from God are fallen so as irreconcilably to fall out about things so little worth knowing that they are fit for nothing but to be forgotten left passing by and intermedling in a strife that directly concerns me not I not onely take a dog by the ears but raise also a Nest of Wasps or whole Hive of Hornets about my own who are striving to sting one another with what strength they can about stuff which on which side foe're the truth lyes is no more worth such a stirre and strife as they make for it then a very straw And since I see all the Builders that reject the Corner-stone are found in broiles and brabbles not onely about their several Superstructions and Fabricks built thereon but also their several Foundations and even the very Protestant Divines whose is the better of the two so long as the Papists have but Traditions at oddes within themse'ves about their own which being but the bare Letter is but brittle some with I.O. stickling to little purpose to prove it firm and uncorrupted whilst others with far more evidence to evince it to be decrepid I am minded to stand off from that Battel about the Points as to any earnest Interposition and deeper engagement therein then is above and become a looker on and leave the Clergy that are loud and clamorous and full of noiles to claw one another with their wonted Clubs and bang one another with their Branglings and vain janglings about Boy-Toy the Antiquity or Novelty of Hebrew Points And seeing they are hard at work in the Night and wrestling in Chaines of Darknesse like the foolish woman to pull down their own house with their own hands and to find out and fling about that all may see it the sandiness and crack's falsities and fallibilittes and flaws that are in their own crazie Corner-stone and faultring Foundation and to crush down their own Chaos they have rear'd thereupon with the curiosity of their own Criticisms and burn up their Babels with the confus'd fire of their angry quarrellings and contentions I rejoice more to see the Truth go on then sorrow to see their Trash come down thereby hoping that when they have laboured long enough in the fire of their own fury and find they have wearyed themselves for very vanity and see the Earth fill'd from the Lord 's own teachings without theirs with the knowledge of his glory from one end to another as the Waters cover the Sea and that when they begin to feele their old Heavens wax hot and be on fire o're their heads and their worldly Elements and Earthly Rudiments to melt away with fervent heat and the ragged Rocks they have carved out to themselves in their own conceits to rest upon to râ—ad in pieces and their Root to shew it self to themselves as it 's seen by others to be rottenness and their Blossom to go up as the dust and their boggy Foundation to shake and the ground they go upon to open crack cleave a sunder under their feet and themselves to cry out as I. O begins to do already 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Shâ—w me where I shall stand And that when they feel themseves sinking and going down alive with the uncircumcised into the pit they will then learn that from themselves which being wiser in their own eyes then the men that can render a reason they would never learn from others ' viz. That were they as truly built on the Letter of Scripture as they deem themselves to be and it 's most sure to some and infallibly true they are all beside it yet being not on the Light they are no better bottom'd then on the Sand trusting also as I said above that when the holy Thieves that steal the word they speake from one another to make a trade on and the Scribes have done Scolding and Scuffling together about the Scriptures then there wil be a restitution to every thing that hath been robb'd thereof of its own proper Name viz. Of the Rule to the Rule of the Foundation to the Foundation of the Light to the Light of the Witnesse of God to the Witnesse of God of the living Word to the living Word of God and of the bare Writing Text or Letter to the Letter and no more which in truth is no more then plainly so So then as positive as thou art in it I.O. that the outward Writing the close of the Canon of which as to any more immediate Revelation of his Will was immediately given out from God to us as a continent of the whole of his mind and will as a merciful and stedfast relief against all confusion darkness uncertainty loosenesse of mens minds c. ut supra and as it were a certain Standard to hush all Controversies Yet I who affirm the inward Light VVord and Spirit of God in the heart so to be do deny that the whole Scripture how immediately soever it had its being and beginning of God and however some little of it was Act. 15. was ever designed by him to such an end as the ending of strifes and contention or determining of all doubts and questions and disputings about his mind and will among men or that it ever prov'd succesful or effectual to such an end or else ut frustrâ est ista potentia quae ne unquaem reducitur in actum sic frustra istud medium quod nunquam obtinere potest suum finem As that 's a vain Power which never produces its effect so that 's a vain Means and therefore not so intended of God who appoints no means utterly in vain which never can obtaine its own end Nay verily though miserable man for his own ends cryes it up into that supremacy sets it up as the Ensign to the Nations in which he would have them put their trust that it will end and amend all matters that are out of tune in the world about truth and is a stedfast relief against all that fighting Andabatarum mors in their dark mindes that is among the Clergy of all kinds and colours Papists Prelates Presbyters who all three like Ammon Moab and Mount Seir making one head against the people of God do yet destroy each other and non secus as Sampsonis vulpeculae c. like Sampson's Fire-brand-tayl'd Foxes burn up the Churches true Bread-Corn as if such were the plenitudo Scripturarum the sufficiency power and perfect efficacy of the Scripture that if men will come all to a tryal of Doctrines Faiths Spirits and all by that tanquam ad Lydium lapidem Then all differences and dissentions in Religion of whatsoever sorts must cease and all the most detestable errors which flying the Scripture men are divided into must extempore vanish upon their looking there yet till men come to turn to the Light and Word within
which is the Power of God the Scriptures tells of which who erres from and are ignorant of as the Schollars and Scribes are more then any do erre not knowing the Scripture they scribble on any more then it the Letter is too weak an Engine to set to rights what 's what 's out of order and a Standard which men that lean to it as to that intent find to be but a broken staff that not onely fails their expectation of support from it but also wounds them more and runs into their hands Witnesse the wosul work that the Worlds Ministers make in it for all their Scripture who for and about the Scripture and their sundry silly senses about it self and meanings made of the holy matter that 's plainly made out in it make more havock of whole Nations by stirring them up to war about the Scripture in their wild wisdom wicked wils then ever could have been in Christendom if the Scripture had never been among them at all What wasting devastations and calamity hath been in Germany not onely betwixt Protestants and Papists but also by Protestants i.e. Lutherans and Calvinists within themselves and wherefore but for their divided thoughts upon some few Texts of Scripture And what Errors Heresies straglings from the Truth which is but one and from the true Light the Scripture calls to Did ever any sorts of erring men among whom the Clergy that commonly cryed Whore first have been the chief run out into error in the Christian world who have not pretended at least to own and to be willing to be tryed also by the Scripture Yea the Papists for all their infallible Chair will and do ever when they plead it against Protestants professe pretensively to prove it by the Scripture having a sense for every place to serve their own turns as the Protestant Clergy to serve their turns have another And howbeit it hath been thought in the Protestant part of Europe that all would be unity it self among them and so 't is as to make one against the Pope since men fell from that infinity of imagination and invention which was and was capable to be eternally fed with the endless fuel which the unerring Breast and boundless treasure of tradition could easily finde for it and betook themselves more singly to the Scriptures marching from Rome under the conduct of the purity of the Originals as thou speakest p. 207 of the Scritures yet what multiplication of divisions for want of coming to the light which is but one in all and in which alone all true unity is had and held with God and one another 1 Ioh. 1.5 6 7 8. rather then any diminution thereof hath fell out in your Reformed Churches as ye call them 〈◊〉 all the Scriptures being so all in all among them so that like the Serpent Hydraus hundred Heads whereof when Hercules cut off one two grew up after it in the place as soon as one controversie among the Reform'd Clergy was hoped to be ended though I know none was ever truly ended yet by all the Synodical designs that ever were on foot in this Nation or any other so that we may truly say of every Synod of Divines that hath yet fate Quis Synodus Nodus Patrum Chorus Integer Aeger Conventus Ventus Sessio Stramen Amen Many new ones began that like new fresh Hares starting upon tired Hounds that have been hot in the old sent have run them all out of breath or if any evil of division in one thing hath been put to an end it hath been but a preparative to a greater breach among the Protestant Clergy and all their creatures and still Finis alterius Mali gradus est Futuri Yea I may say of thy Scriptures as thou pleads for them J.O. to end all strife withall as I may say of our English Oaths impos'd upon poor persons to the impeaching themselves when they come before our crooked Courts in Case of Tythes viz. that the Oaths given on pretence of ending all strife are in truth given by the Judges to begin all strife with For if an honest man will not swear how many Eggs and Pigs and Pears and Plumbs c. he hath had for so many years past they will not permit him to plead at all or strive in his own defence against his Persecutor In like manner it is with that which thou exhibit'st to men in order to the ending all Divisions and Disputes viz. the meer looking beside the Light within into the Letter of the Scriptures which is so far from finishing any strife that it feeds vain foolish loose mindes such as thine that hates the light none else with fuel and furnishes their fancies with matter for many more strifes then they would find cause for if they kept to the Light within alone for their learning or at least so as in that alone to look into the Letter where such as learn at the Light may read their own Yea dark minds diving into the Scripture divine lyes enough out of it to set whole Countreys on fire as the Divines have ever done And as to the purity of the Originals under the Conduct of which thou saist ye went from Rome wishing none may return thither under pretence of their corruption I say the purity of them which thou pleadest in that height thou dost is but pretended and that more or less corrupted they are to the contradicting thy self thy self art forced to confess p. 167. as is shewed above but be they as they are or how they will be pure or not pure to a tittle as thou assertest them they are so far from relieving you in your wearisom wrathful strifes that cum nemini obtrudi potest itur ad me may your Original Text say when the Divines can have leisure to cease a little from their strife about the holy matter and Doctrine of it then rather then sit still and be quiet or be idle from their common Calling which is contention they 'l role Sysiphus his stone and be at wars and tear one another about the very Letter and their Original Transcripts of it and try that out tooth and nail whether they be true or no in every Letter Tittle Point and Iota as they were written as the first Yea O curas hominum though for truth and wisdom and the Scriptures sake which I own and honour as holy just and good and of precious use to such as know and obey the truth I am become such a fool with them by answering them according to their folly as to make this one Skiâ—mish among them about the Scripture that I may bring some of them to the truth and light of God in them in which only the union is that they may cease henceforth from their stirs strifes which light til they turn to I testifie to them that their way is as slippery places in the dark in which they will be driven on till they fall therein that
their feet are swift to shed blood that wasting and misery are in their wayes and the way to true peace they know not yet this one thing I must say too and of our Vniversity Scriblers pro Scripturis that as there are no men in the world more up to the ears in strife about the Scripture and their own Fancies on it as to matter and letter than the Scribes are so there is no one thing that the Scribes are striving scuffling and scolding at each other more about than about their Scriptures That light or word within and not the letter is the Foundation First I shall take account of what thou falsely assertest concerning the Scriptures being a Foundation Thou affirmest the Scriptures to be the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles spoken of Eph. 2.20 pag 33. saying of them that men may quietly repose their souls upon them in beleeving and obedience and of your selves thus are we built 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. on the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets and calling them Page 48. The Foundation of that world which he hath set up in this world as a Wheel within a Wheel his Church And page 154. The Foundation of faith hope and obedience And page 155. The Foundation of all that faith and obedience which he requires at our hands And page 316. The great and blessed Foundation of Truth All this I own to be very true of the Word of God of which the Scripture speaks but it is utterly false as uttered by thee of the Scriptures The falsehood of which appears plainly by this Argument 1. Argument That which is the great and blessed Foundation of all that truth faith hope and obedience that God requires at mens hands and of the Church and of the Apostles and Prophets must be something which was in being before any of these things were for the Foundation on which these are built must have a being before they can be built thereupon every Foundation being before the building can stand upon it But though the Word of God be so yet the Scripture is not before but long after that truth faith hope and obedience which God requires at mens hands and long after the Church and long after the Apostles and Prophets were yea after those Apostles and Prophets were Respectively who were the Respective pen-men thereof Therefore the Scripture the Writing the Letter the Greek and Hebrew Text is not the Foundation of any of these things The first Proposition is so true that it were no less then disparagement to I. O's wisdom to suppose him to be mentis inops to go about to prove it to him sith as he builds Castles in the air as easily thrown down as erected upon no better Foundation then his own fancy thoughts conjectures and imaginations yet he cannot be so senceless as to think that that Foundation be it what it will firm or brittle on which any thing is built must be before the building can stand thereon And as for the minor in every part thereof it 's as undeniably true to any save such as having once turn'd their backs upon the Truth are resolved to render themselves devoid of eithet Sense or Reason in their Reasonings against it then to own it For none else can deny but the Church and the Truth Faith Hope and Obedience of it and the Messengers Apostles Prophets Preachers of Righteousnesse such as were Enoch Noah Abraham Lot and others were in the Truth Faith Hope Obedience of the Gospel and also built upon Christ the Light the Word of God the Rock of Ages before Moses dayes who is unversally supposed at our Vniversities to have been the first Pen-man of the Scriptures The grand Master-place of Scripture that is us'd in proof hereof that the Scriptures are the Foundation is Ephes. 2.20 where it 's said by Paul to the Ephesians Ye are built on the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets Iesus Christ himself being the chief Corner-Stone Hence it is strenuously stickled for and as confidently as cloudily concluded by our doting Doctors and dreaming Divines that the Church of God as to all her Faith Hope Obedience Knowledge of the Truth is built upon the Apostles and Prophets Writings as that which is there called the Foundaeion whereas were they but at leisure from that lesser and lower literature wherein they are lost from the Lord and the Light and Life of God and the Letter also which issued forth from thence to look into the Light and by it into the Letter it self they more blindly labour for then truly learn by they would soon see that the Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets there spoken of is not the Apostles and Prophets themselves much less uncertain transcribed Copies of those few Fragments of their Letters and some other honest mens true stories of what was done in their times good instructions memorandums and litteral recommendations of wholsome Laws and Statutes most of which as laid down in the Letter saving that they remain in the truth and substance whereof they were the types figures and shadows are above 1600-years since cancelled and abolished Promises Prophesies Psalms Proverbs Parables occasional Letters Epistles and other Writings which such as fell into a foolish following and falling down before outward Images and from the infallible Spirit it self that their Scriptures were written to keepe men to found and fardelled together and fram'd in their own fancies into a Foundation of the Faith and of all the whole Fabrick of Religion to be for ever framed and founded upon But Christ Iesus himself who is there also called the chief Corner-stone and 1 Pet. 2.4 that living Stone disallowed indeed of men but chosen of God and precious on whom the Saints even all together with the Apostles and Prophets and the whole Houshold of God as Fellow-Citizens and lively Stones are built up a spiritual House to offer spiritual sacrifices yea all into one holy Temple or Habitation of God through the spirit This is the true and sole Foundation of all the matters before mentioned Christ Iesus the Rock of Ages on whom whoever believes shall not be ashamed Christ the living Word of God that also quickneth whose words are spirit and life to the hearers of his voice whose words uttered in the heart do good to those that walk uprightly this is the Stone that you Babel-builders refuse which God hath made the very head stone in the Corner Psal. 118.22 Matt 21.42 This verbum lumen internum Christ the eternal internal Word in the heart and Light of the World given a Light to the Nations and as such Gods salvation to the ends of the earth and the precious sanctuary to such as believe in his light is that stone of stumbling and Rock of offence to such as thee I.O. that stumble at the Word in their wrestlings for the Letter being disobedient unto both whereunto also they are appointed and a Gin and a Snare to the
Inhabitants of that earthly Jerusalem which is from beneath the fleshly Church of Jews and Christians according to the meer Letter which is in bondage with her children Isa. 8.14 28.16 1 Pet. 2. And that it is Christ Iesus alone and not the Scriptures that is there call'd the Foundation is most evident not onely from the Text it self wherein Jesus Christ himself is instanced in as such for the same that is call'd the Foundation is there also call'd the Corner-stone but also from other Scriptures whereby the truth hereof is yet more illustrated viz. Isa. 28.18 where speaking both in the foregoing and following Verses of the false Foundations short beds narrow coverings and lying refuges that the Drunkards of Ephraim that erred from the simple plain truth thorow the Wine of their own Wisdom and were out of the way and stumbled in Wisdom and Iudgement thorow the strong Drink of their own devised Doctrines so that they could not discern nor learn the Lords Doctrine that was divined to them thorow the stammering lips of such as ministred Precept upon Precept Line upon Line here a little and there a little among them he summons all to fix their Faith on the one onely true and firm Foundation saying Behold I lay in Sion for a Foundation a Stone a tryed Stone a precious Corner-stone a sure Foundation he that believeth shall not make haste Where it 's very observable as it is in Eph. 2.20 That the self-same that is called the Corner-stone is also ca'led the sure Foundation Likewise 1 Cor 11. where it's expresly said That other Foundation can no man lay then that is laid which is JESUS CHRIST Now if no man can lay any other Foundation of the Church which is God's Building then Christ whom the Apostle sayes ver 10. He himself laid as a wise Master-Builder according to the Grace of God given unto him Then all things else besides Christ the Word of God the Light of the World and that measure of Light that shines from him which is not divided from him any more then that of the Sun from it but one with him whatsoever men go about to lay as the Foundation of the Church and her Faith Hope and Obedience are not truly really and properly so but imaginarily supposively fictitiously so and but falsly so called meerly seigned found out and founded onely in the Fancies of foolish blind Babel-builders which Founders and their fictitious Foundations must be confounded For the layers of a false Foundation and such are all they that with I.O. lay the Letter or Traditions with the Papists and Iesuits he justles with or any other then Christ the Light must come to confusion as wel as the meer Formalists their Wood Hey Stubble Trash Imitations empty forms and such like Superstitions and all sorts of Superstructions of the Babilonish Builders upon the true Whereupon as much as J.O. blesses himself in his holding the Foundation and feeds himself with hopes of salvation so long as he is found holding that though he build Hay and Stubble upon it and his Works come to be consumed saying p. 160. It will be well for us if we be found holding the Foundation if we build hay and stubble upon it though our Work perish we shall be saved Yet alas poor deluded man J.O. thou mistakest thy self exceedingly it would be well for thee indeed if thou held'st the Foundation Christ the Head the Light of men thy person might then be saved though thy Work of wood hay stubble will assuredly perish in the fire But thou art far from being found holding that Foundation then which there is no other and found laying another even thy uncertain Transcripts of the Greek and Hebrew Texts and an outward fallible Letter and its Points and Syllables and Tittles and Iota's one jot or tittle of which if it fail thou confessest all thy Faith and Fabrick of Religion falls to the ground confessing also that 't was not impossible for the chiefest Transcribers thereof to mistake in any thing yea that they did fail in their Work so rasing thy false feigned and fallible Foundation to the ground and pulling down thy House with thy own hands like the foolish woman And as for the true Foundation Christ the Light and Spirit which are infallible stable firm fixt sure and certain as every true laid Foundation ought to be and is though thy flexible Letter is not so which is of it self an Argument of its not being the Churches Foundation of Faith and Obedience This true one I say is by thee trampled on and flouted at under the Names of Nescio quod Lumen quem Deum seu 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Deo quopiam melius merae Tenebrae aecitas fines salutares quod attines non sufficiens ad salutem Christus Fanaticorum imaginarius fictitius qualitas nescio quae divina seu anima Mundi omnibus misia quae 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sit i.e. vere nihil Ex. 4. S. 15.17.21 Doctorem infallibilem nihil habens commune cum Scripturis Ex. 3. S. 22. I know not what Light what God or cornucopia better then any God infallible Doctor inconsonant utterly with the Scripture imaginary Christ of the Qua. I know not what Divine Quality or Soul of the World made up of all things that is all things and truly nothing Moreover if none can lay other Foundation then Christ then Paul himself by these words Ephes. 2.20 Ye are built on the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets cannot rationally be concluded as he is both senselesly and reasonlesly conceived by I.O. to intend any other Foundation then Christ himself neither can he be understood by any that have common understanding to intend himself and other Prophets and Apostles or his own and their meer outward Writings for then there are two whereof they must have one Foundation of Faith and Obedience and we another they Christ the Light and we them and their Letter which is an absurdity utterly unbecoming men call'd Christs Ministers to imagine seeing the Foundation quicquid id est of the Church and her faith hope and obedience from the beginning of the world to this day is but one and not many yea as the Faith is one and the Baptism one and the Temple and building one and the Body one and the Spirit one and the Lord and God and Father of all saints is one so the Foundation is but one what ever it is Eph. 4 5 6. Or else secondly if there be but one foundation for us and them to stand upon and that be the Apostles and Prophets themselves or thei Writings then Incidit in Scyllam c. the Apostles and Prophets must be supposed to be built not upon Christ but upon themselves their own Writings as to their faith and saving knowledge of the truth or at least on the Writings one of another which is an Imagination as if not more absolutely absurd than the former yet of the two I.O. having
Rule and standard the touchstone of all speakings whatsoever that that must speak alone for its self which must try the speaking of all but its self yea it s own also See Tr. 1. c. 3 pertotum That which is the ordinary unmoveable perfect and siable infallible Rule of Gods worship and our obedience so that ther 's no further need we should be instructed with any other new daily Revelations in the knowledge of God and our duties Yea the most perfect Rule that is given us of God whereby to attain to eternal salvation so that after the compleating of that which is called the Canon of the Scripure ye beleeve and profess no new Revelations about the common faith of the Saints or the worship of God are either to be expected or admitted as well such as are made by the Spirit or light within or inward speculation or heavenly inspiration or speech of Angèls to our instruction in the knowledge of God and our duty in order to our obtaining eternal salvation which all are a vain unprofitable false uncertain hazardous and utterly unnecessary means which the Fanaticks fain toward the knowledge of God and his will Yea that by which we are commanded to try and examine and prove all Revelations Visiâ—ns Spirits God's no more excepted then the Devil's Dreams inward appearances or speaking or prophesyings within or from within whether true or false without difference or distinction 1 Cor. 14.21 1 Thes. 5.21 1 Joh. 4.1 Ex. 3. S 33. The onely Rule of the faith and obedience of Gods Church Page 173. so Ex. 4. sect 22. Rep. In the handling of this head concerning the Scriptures being in the nature of the Canon Rule or Standard to the Church of God I say in the nature use and office of a Canon for as to the measure or bounds of your Canon I have elsewhere spoken to it I shall have to do with thee I. O. and thee T. D. also who both are as like one another in your ignorant invectives against the Qua. as enemies to the Scripture for not owning it to be what your fore-fathers and your selves have also ignorantly Canonized it into the name of viz. The standing Rule of faith and life as if one of you had been spit out of the others mouth As for thy self I.O. having Ex. 3 sect 25 26. professed thy faith or rather fancy and opinion that the Scripture is the only most perfect Rule of the faith and worship of God thou stilest thy Teeological subsequent foolish defence thereof a proving of it against 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the haters of the Scriptures as if all they that side not with thy false weak supportless suppositions about the Scriptures were presently to be condemned as enemies to them without any more ado And as for thee T.D. thou stilest it a spitting out of vemome and bringing in of another Gospel to deny the Scripture to be the Rule Thou engagest me in a publick discourse about this Question Whether the Scriptures are the Word of God or no and then when I owning the Word of God to be the Word of God publickly denied the Scripture that is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Writing not mentioning the paper or inke that is the foolish phrase of thy own inserting to be the Word of God in a shameful way of Tergiversation thou ran'st away from the Termes of thy Question and never camest near them any more but leftest quite another Question in its room viz. Whether the matter contained in the Writings be the Rule of faith and life as the Reader may see in the 25 and 26. pages of thy first Pamphlet Sir You cannot beleeve us so simple surely as to affirm the Scriptures in that sense the Word of God but we mean the matter contained in the Writing whether that be the Rule of faith and life Which matter written of and the Writing or Scripture are two different matters say I still as the Lanthorn and the Candle or the light contained therein so that thy doings T.D. that day was altogether as silly a peece of business as if one that had challenged another to dispute it openly with him that the Lanthorn is the Candle or the Light being come as T.D. did 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with much pompous shew or fancy upon the publick place of hearing before hundreds to that purpose should say to his Antagonist on this wise Sir You cannot beleeve me to be so simple surely as to affirm the Lanthorn to be the candle or light but I mean the candle or light contained in the Lanthorn whether that be a Rule for men to walk by in a dark night or no a Question which was never denied by his Antagonist at all for neither I nor any Qua. that I know deny the Word of God to be the Word of God which is contained in the Scripture or that the Scripture or Writing declares thereof any more then we deny the Candle and Light to be a Candle and a Light which is contained in the Lanthorn but that the Writing it self is that Word of God written of in it or that the Lanthorn is the ' candle or the light ' that is in the Lanthorn at least that the Word of God is the proper name of the Scripture as to his shame I. O. hath undertaken to prove in Latine against the Qua. of whom he saith they understand him not in that tongue this I and the Qua. do deny against him and thee and all men for our denial of which dream of our benighted Doctors and Divinet we have been yet damned down through the false suggestions and silly insinuations of their busie ear-wigs the Priests by all Parliaments and Powers that have yet appeared at the Helm in this Nation and deemed unmeet to be let into the lists of that liberty of conscience allowed to other men and doomed out as deniers of the fundamentals of Religion Thus T.D. As the King of Spain and forty thousand men Went up a hill and then came down agen Gathered his Forces and Fellow-souldiers together pitching his own day of battel betokening to obtain some eminent victory over the Qua. and as soon as he came into the field laid down his Arms and confessed he had no quarrel against the Qua. as to the Question he was to dispute about as stated and held by them so like some Bettle he flyes aloft with a humming noise into the ayr and at last flaps suddenly down into a peece of Cow-dung Nevertheless T.D. that thou mightest for very shame seem to do something for the Scripture even for the Book it self and Letter of it as well as for the good matter therein contained sith thou wast come upon the stage on that account after some parley that was held a while between my self and thee about the Latitude and Limits of your supposed Rule in which thy pitiful poor put offs of
Scribes that keep scribling and preaching and disputing all their dayes as if they did delight to know Gods wayes enquiring after the Ordinances of Iustice in order as they pretend to the knowledge of what is to be done and yet in what they know naturally as brute beasts by a habit of reading Chapter and Verse as as a Horse that is versed in a way to the Pasture he is used to run in in those very things they corrupt themselves saying to God when he tells them any troublesome truth Depart from us we desire not the knowledge of thy wayes â—â—taining the truth in unrighteousness that is told them within by the Light of God himself in their own hearts not receiving the love of it that they may be saved having pleasure in unrighteousness and no pleasure in the Truth such shall have at last that they have taken away from them and in the just Iudgement of God be blasted and blinded and given over to strong delusion to believe lyes that they may be damned Nevertheless not as a Principle onely but as a Rule of obedience to such as truly love her the Light within the Spirit of God the Word nigh in the heart and Wisdom not onely with but without the Letter ever was is and will be profitable to direct Eccl. 10 10. And no less then this that the Spirit is the standing Rule of Faith and Life to the Church as well as the Principle thereof doth that Gal. 6.8.16 evince where the Apostle having spoken so much before in ch 5. and the â— verse of this 6. of the lustings of the spirit against the flesh or evil spirit in us that lusteth to envy of walking according to the Spirit living according to the Spirit being led by the Spirit of sowing to the Spirit the crop of which is the fruit of the Spirit the everlasting life the new Creature while the Crop reaped from the fulfilling the lustings of the flesh is more and more Works of the flesh and corruption to death and condemnation at least adds by way of encouragement that the walkers by the Spirit might not not be weary of well doing thus much viz. that so many as walk according to this Rule which Rule is not the Scripture as the Divines and Doctors citing that place as J. O. does twice over at least viz. Ex. 3. S. 26. Ex. 4 S. 22. to that purpose do ignorantly divine but the Spirit the walking in and after which is so often hinted at above and the Light within which and not the Letter without makes manifest both the Works of the flesh and darknesse and the Fruits of the Spirit and the light For the Letter indeed doth declare that the works of the Flesh and the fruits of the Spirit are manifest but it declares also that that which doth manifest them both is the Light by which also they were manifested before the Letter was Which Letter likewise doth de jure declare what is to be done and not done but onely the Light de facto what is done and what is not done of the Mind and Will of God thereby inwardly nigh more immediately revealed and declared as 't is ad extra onely and more mediately and afar off by the Letter For all things that are reproved or approved are as so made manifest by the Light the Letter came from And whatsoever doth primarily and principally make manifest good and evil right and wrong crooked and straight truth and falshood simplicity and deceit it self and darkness it self and all false spirits sound Doctrine and seducing is that Light and Spirit which comes from God and shines more or lesse in all mens hearts This as it is the Principle as J.O. foolishly affirms the Letter only is p. 18. or means of discovery so it and not the Writing only as he there blindly writes is also the Rule or measure of judging and determining about the saving Doctrine of the Gospel this is as the Light of the outward world is in it the discovery of it self and of all things else in their proper appearances This is certum Rectum Regula quae est mensura sui obliqui Hitherto are we sent this and not the Letter as I.O. childishly asserts p. 57. is asserted to be the Rule and Standard the Touchstone of all speaking whatsoever that must speak alone for it selfe and try the speaking of all but it selfe yea it s own also By all which it is evident how the Light and Spirit is designed by God to be the unchangeable standing-Rule of Faith and Life and the Churches Directory in all Divine Doctrines to be believed and practised and not the Letter of the Scripture at least not the Letter onely which is the matter very stifly affirmed and stickled for by J.O. and T.D. the latter of which stands up to vindicate it in these terms see T. D ' second Pamphlet p. 16. that the Scriptures are the Word of God and the Rule of Faith and Life and that there is no other standing-Rule but the Scriptures The former in these If every man's private Light so he floutingly calls that particular measure of that publike Light of Christ which is one and the same in all be the Rule of yeilding obedience unto God then so many men so many Rules but the Divine Canon is but onely one and that the holy Scripture is that only Rule is abundantly shewn quoth J.O. before In proof of which saying the Rule is but one J.O. quotes that Gal. 6.16 which speakes not of the Scripture at all And Eph. 3.16 which speaks expresly of the Spirit of God as the next verse does of Christ the Word which we confess is the Rule but neither the one nor the other of the Scripture Isa. S. 20. which speaks of the Law and Testimony which are the Light and Spirit as I shall shew anon For this place is three times at least alluded to by J.O. to the like little purpose and not the Letter of the Scripture Obj. And if any say But is not the Sripture profitable to direct yea for Doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousnesse able to make wise to salvacion to make a man of God perfect thorowly furnished or as the word is perfected into all good works according to 2 Tim. 3.15 16 17. and so to be the onely Rule Canon Standard Touch-stone in all cases Rep. This place is insisted upon or quoted three or four times by I. O. To whom I say howbeit there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 holy Scriptures as I have said elsewhere that are not written with Ink and Pen nor ingraven in stones but with the Finger and Spirit of the living God upon the fleshly Tables of mens hearts which make such as Timothy was who knew that spirit in himself spoke of Iob 32.8 and that inward Writing and inspiration of the Almighty that onely giveth the understanding which are most profitable for Doctrine Correction
which we deny which matter notwithstanding when it comes to the point of proof before people they dare denominate only to be the only Rule and Word denying those high Titles to the naked Letter as well as we crying out with a dreadful ditty against the Qua. in their Pulpits as deniers of the Scriptures the Bible to be the Word of God the Rule c. and when we enter the lifts with them then finding themselves unable to carry it against us falling down before us in confessions to us that it is the Divine truth and matter only contained in the Scripture which is the Rule to all men so far as it that is that Truth and matter is revealed to them as it is here confessed also by T.D. to be to the very Heathen in their hearts that have no Scripture and was so before it was put into writing that is before the Scripture was which seeing it is so confest in the same way as I argued above about the Foundation against I.O. so may I here against T.D. and him both about the Rule viz. Arg. 1. The Rule must be something that is in being before the faith and life that is to be Regulated by it 2. Must be that the Scripture testifies to be the Rule 3. Something that is firm fixt sure stable inflexible infallible inalterable else all the work wrought by a Lesbian Rule a soft waxen measure may be ad infinitum crooked scanty erroneous disorderly in all Dimensions at mens pleasure who may as our Priests mostly do transcribe translate expound rectifie the Scripture according to their crooked conceits and their Antichristian Analogy of faith as they use to speak and not their crooked conceits and false faith according to the true Theology that is plain to godly honest hearted men in the Sâ—ripture wrest their Rule to their own wills self-ends interests and where it likes not their unruly selves to be Ruled by it Run from it or rather Rule over ir as they list But the Light and Spirit and Truth and living Word and holy Doctrine was in being before the faith and life of any man 2. Is testified by the Scripture at is above shewed to be the Rule 3 Is inalserable firm c. and the Scripture it self is already proved and is yet more to be proved not to be so therefore the Light Truth c. not the Scripture Text c. is the Rule Be sides what Ioh. Tombs and Rich. â—axter who must here be wrapt with their own weapon argue falsely against the Lights being the Rule I may truly argue against the Letters being it For page 51. of their Book entituled The true old Light Thus they dispute viz. That which is variable and alterable cannot be a persons Rule for its the property of a Rule to be invariable and the same at all times The Rules Measures and Weights and Dialls and Squares and what other things are made if they be varied they cease to be Rules for Rules should be fixed and certain But there is nothing more variable then mens light in them say they falsely but say I truly then a Letter or Writing without That which is to day say they taken for light is to morrow judged to be darkness and that light which is this day in a person may be lessened to morrow a person may become Fanatick and dote who yesterday was heard with applause therefore each persons light cannot be his Rule so us that at all times he should be bid to look to it as a safe guide as the Qua. do And say I that which is to day Transcribed Translated Interpreted so and in such a sense by some may be through Mis-transcription Mis-translation Mis-interpretation be wrested as a Nose of wax to morrow by others into a clear contrary sense by Transposition of Hebrew letters which in shape and sound are alike either in way of mistake among the most careful Scribes in the world or at the mâ—er will and pleasure of Criticks who ad libitum may turn the Text into twenty senses one after another as seems good to them witness I.O. himself who as is elswhere shewed in many pages together of his Epistle Dedicatory tells how easie it is so to do yea to turn that one word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the different pointing of it into 8 sundry senses some whereof are clear contrary to each other yea it is but doing so or so saith he and as many various lections arise in the very original Text as a man pleases to make It being so then with the Letter that it is so variable and flexible and contrariwise the Light being fixt firm stable without variation as it is for all their lying of it it 's eternally and unchangeably the same even yesterday to day and for ever as Christ is from whom it comes one and the same in all the Foundation and witness of God which stands sure and keeps its place in the consciences of men let them go whether they will testifying the same truth as Gods witness in all men that it doth in any mâ—n both de jure defacto also never consenting to any evil but condemning it all in all men more or less Therefore say I in consutation of I O. T. D. I.To. and Rich. Baxter out of their own Books the Light Word and Spirit of God within every one may and ought to be every mans Rule so as that at all times he should be bid to look to it and follow it as a guide as the Qua. do But the Text or Letter without however owned as it is by me above to be useful and profitable for men of God that know how to use it cannot be the most perfect stable Standard much less the only infallible Rule and guide of mens faith and life as the blind guides say in words it is though in works they themseves live and walk besides it as much as any Again if the Scriptures be the Rule and not the Light and Spirit then either there was no Rule before the Scripture or else they who lived before the Scripture had one Rule we another and so consequently there are two Rules for the one faith of the one holy Church But all these whimsies are most absurd for then the one Church hath tot regulus quot novas explicationes ejusdem veritaetis as many Rules as particular wayes of Revelation of the truth And T.D. said the Truth was one and that the matter was the Rule before the writing was and I.O. sayes Ex. 4. s. 22. Vnicus est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 divinus the Divine Rule is but one and so say I of the one general Catholick Church or Assembly of the first born from Abel to this day therefore the Light Spirit and not the Scripture is the Rule As for I. Os shallow shuffling off the Lights being the Rule and sleight slinging at it Testaque lutoque with his muddy pellet in that Section
Paul said no other things then what Moses and the Prophets said should come John Baptist came for a witness to bear witness of the light that all through him might beleeve God sayes If the Israelites observe not all the words of the Law written in that Book of Deuteronomy he would make their Plagues wonderful Christ expounds to his Disciples all the Scriptures in Moses and the Prophets concerning himself bids Search the Scriptures as testifying of him Paul sayes Whatsoever was written afore time was for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope He says To write the same things to the Church is safe John sayes he writes his Epistles to the Saints that their joy might be full Therefore the outward Letter of the Scripture is the onely Rule of all faith and Divine worship and not the Light and Spirit of Christ ye only call to nor any internal Revelation whatsoever ficta vel facta In which of all these Scriptures the Title and Authority of the only most perfect standing Rule of Faith Life and Worship is either expresly or by any true mediate much more any immediate consequence ascribed to the Scriptures who can finde but he 's that not blinde There is but one of all the places viz. Gal. 6.16 where that term Rule is at all expressed by which as I have said and shewed above is not at all intended the Scriptures but Christ the Light and his Spirit and some of them mention expresly neither the term Scripture nor Rule 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and such as have in them terms equivalent to that of the Rule neither express nor imply at all the Letter of the Scripture as that of Psal. 19.7 8. and that of Isa. 8.19 20. and that of Rom. 10 17. and that of Eph. 2.19 20. where by the Law and Commandment and Testimony and Statutes of the Lord rejoicing the heart converting the soul enlightening the eyes making wise the simple is expressed the Lamp and the Light Prov. 6.23 and by the Word in the hearing of which Faith comes the Word hid in the heart nigh in the heart and mouth to hear and do Psal. 119.105 Deut. 30.12.14 Rom. 10.8 The Law in the heart Isa. 5 1.7 Psal. 37.31 The Law in the mind which the Law of sin and death in the members wars against Rom. 7.23 The Law of the spirit of life which is in Christ the life and light whose life is the light of men that made Paul free from the other Rom. 8.2 Which light shines in the darknesse that is in our very Doctors hearts but the darkness comprehends it not The Statutes of God and Judgements to be put into the minds of men according to the tenour of the New Covenant typified by the Old where the Statutes were with Pen and Ink written and engraven on Tables of stone and by the Foundation of the Prophets and Apostles Eph. 2. Christ the Light as is above declared and not the Writing and Letter and Text in which the internal truth is but ad extra declared and by that sure Word of Prophesie ' 2 Pet. 1. not the Scripture but somewhat within as I shall shew more abundantly by and by and by Moses and the Prophets Luke 16. Writings within as I shall shew anon All which were and were the onely perfect pure right inalterable standing Rule long before any external Text or Letter was and have not ceased so to be by the coming in of the outward writing with which they are since clothed upon nor yet have surrendered their ancient Authority of being the onely Rule by which all speakings and writings and doctrines are to be tryed nor resigned up that their Right to the Writing that testifies to their suprrmacy veracity and dignity above it self to this very day Nor have they submitted themselves that were once the chief Judge and Rule for the tryal of Truth to be now tryed ruled over judged sentenced and ultimately determined authoritatively to be received or rejected as true or false of God or the Devil Divine or diabolical Delusion Enthusiasme Figment Fanaticism and what nick-name men lift to stile them by in their learned lusts by the fallible Transcriptions Translations and Expositions of miserably mistaking men in which ways only and meerly some of that Scripture that was of old written by holy men as the spirit moved them is transmitted downward to these modern ages And as for those Texts that do make express mention of the Scriptures and outward Writings of the Apostles and of Moses and the Prophets and the Old Testament as Iohn 20. ult Luke 1.3 4. 16.29 Acts 1.1 2 Cor. 3.24 2 Tim. 3.14 15 16. do there is not the least considerable much less any cogent necessary or immediate consequence in any of them to conclude the outward Letter of the Scriptures to be the onely most perfect standing Rule Touchstone for all Truth to be tryed by so exclusively as I.O. states them Spiritus verbi Luminis cujuscunque tandem generis interni Revelatienis c. Of all inward Spirit Light Word or Revelation of what sort soever For what 's the vail's being over the Iews hearts in the reading of the Old Testament which Vail is done away in turning to Christ the Light to evince any such matter Doth it not rather evidence the very contrary For if the Old Testament which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Letter written with Ink or Pen or engraven on stones is as a Vail over the hearts of such as read it as the Iews do of whom I.O. sayes pag. 236. They read it without the administration of the Spirit so that its a dead Letter of no efficacy for the good of souls Which Vail is to be and is done away no otherwise then in Christ the Light and by turning to the Lord that Spirit as Paul sayes it is then doth it not rather appear that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Letter written and engraven outwardly is not the onely most proper standing Rule but Christ's Light the Spirit and the measure and manifestation thereof within given to every man to profit withal And what though Paul to Timothy doth commend the inspired Scripture if yet we shall take that for the outward Writing as profitable to make the man of God who onely knows how to use it wisely more and more wise and to furnish him perfectly to exhort c. and every good work against the gainsayers as I have shewed above that I deny not the outward Scripture so to be to such a one And what though Christ saies in order to escaping the place of torment Let men hear Moses and the Prophets if yet we shall take Moses and the Prophets for their outward Writings And what though John sayes Christ did more then he wrote of him as well he might For Matthew Mark and Luke wrote many things that he did not and others wrote other matters that were written by none of
written for the ends above specified in the Scriptures mentioned yet will it not follow that it was intended for the Rule to the Church much less the only perfect Rule or Standard of Faith and Life because God did not give order for â—s so to be but assured her before the Scripture was at all as much as God thought sufficient to create and preserve faith in the Gospel she had before she had it written in an outward Letter viz. the inward Light Word and Spirit that was in the beginning from which the Letter came And p. 43. to make a Rule much more then the only sâ—anding Rule exclusively of all other of all internal Light Word Spirit Revelation as JO. and T.D. both hold the Scripture to be is necessary Gods appointment of a Writing to that end to which he did and even in the Scripture it appears appoint the Spirit and inward Light and Word as I shew'd above but never at all appointed the Scripture it self And p. 17 18. of T. D's 2 d. Pam. the difference lyes in God's Arbitrary dispensation who from of old disposed the Light Word and Spirit alone to be the Rule without and before the Letter as being far more excellent and fully sufficient without it as to the nature and being of a Rule but never ordered intended designed appointed or established the Writing alone as the Rule as my two Vniversity Antagonists dispute without and câ—â—lusively of the other And as for the third and fourth Classis of J. O's Scriptures which seeing they are so near a kin to these of the first therefore I shall consider them here before those of the second they are of the same kind so that the same general Answer might satisfie sapienti cui verbum sat but seeing such stress is put on them by J.O. to the stablishing of a wrong Standard which iâ— of so great concernment to be stated right or else all the Building faulters I am free to insist a little more particularly on them then else I need to do They contain as thou sayest J.O. commendations of the Scriptures as to all uses of Religion both by the practises and precepts of Christ and the Apostles searching and expounding proving and trying all things by them themselves and also commending and commanding the searching of them and the trying of all things by them in and among all others Rep. That all the places enumerated by thee do contain any such matter at all I utterly deny for some of those thou citest as well as sundry of those afore spoken to neither expresly nor intentionally relate to the Writing or Scripture but onely to the Word of God and the Things and Truth and Commands of God written of onely in the Letter which things in what Text soever thou find'st them talkt of thou present'y run'st blundering on in thy wonted blindness which discerns no difference between the Writing and things written interpreting them without more ado of the Scripture as namely Deut. 28.58 whereby the words written in that Book is not meant the Writings but the Commandmenâ— therein rehearsed the Ceremonials and Morals of which they were to observe before that Booke of Deuteronomy was penn'd which is a story of Moses his repetition by word of mouth a little before his death of such things as he had from the Lord enjoined them to observe and some of them God also from his own mouth well-nigh forty years at least before that was penned Also that in Acts. 26.22 where Paul sayes he witnessâ—d no other things or truths as to the substance and matter of them though the manner was different the one testifying de Christo exhibendo the other exhibito one saying they should come t'other they were come then what the Prophets and Moses said should come Which things Paul could now witness were come if he had not seen their witness that they should And what mention is there of the Scripture at all in that Scripture Also John 1.7 where it s said of John Baptist he was not that Light but came to bear witness of that light which John Baptist wrote no Scripture at all that I know of which Light he testified to was not the Letter or Scripture but the same the Qua. bear witness to even that measure of its light within wherewith he inlightneth every man that comes into the world so that there is no Scripture mentioned or so much as meant in that Scripture Wherever thou seest in thy Concordance the word Scripture written of in the Scripture thou art ready to think straightway it Concuâ—r'â— and hath no â—mâ—l Concordance with thy cause and where thou findest the Words Rule Foundation Law and Prophets of God Light Word Commands Statutes Testimony Prophesie and such like thou as rashly and rawly imaginest the Scripture or meer outward Writing meant and mentioned by them in what ever is predicated of them and that it makes something for thy bâ—inde business of the Scriptures being the only standing Rule and Foundation But alas hoc aliquid verè nihil est this something is plainly nothing at all to that purpose for as it makes not a mice toward the proof thereof as appears above because the Scriptures were written for good ends and are prefiâ—â—blâ— to such and such good uses unless God had Canonized them as a Rule so neither doth it that Christ expounded the Scriptures and that some did search them and were mightily read in them as some are at this day who are supposed to deny them to the confounding the Scribes that searched them daily and therein lookt for life as their only Rule but never came to him that they might have life who was the Life and Light they came from but never heard him whom they testified of that his voice was now to be heard in whom God who under the Law before his coming spake in his servants the Prophets speaks under the Gospel as by his only Son 'T is true Abraham who lived long after Moses and those Prophets whose Writings ye have were born in that Parable which illustrates a precious truth that as to the mystery of it lyes yet hid from thee is brought in by Christ as saying of the Rich mans brethren by way of prevention of their coming into torment They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them if not they 'l not be perswaded by a miraculous message of one to them from the dead but what iâ— this to prove what thou here alledgest it for and more largely inferrest from it p. 63 64 65 66 67. where thou preachest on that Text a Sermon as long as little to thy purpose improving it and that of 2 Pet. 1.19 to the utmost to prove Moses and the Prophets Writings to be the best and most effectual means of bringing men to repentance on which that and all faith is immediately to be grounded and to prove the Scriptures to be that alone which we are sent to to be more effectual
the light of God the wisdome saving truth immediate witness clearest way of Revelation soul-cleansing Law sure foundation most perfect Rule immoveable stedfast Standard of Gods setting up but it self is nos all nor any of this nor doth it at all any where avouch it self to be any of it at all The Scripture points to that which is the Power of God by the being of which in and upon his people who only own and joyn to it they are made a willing people in the day thereof when such as turn from and against the light which is the power and labour in the weak naked Letter labour in vain and are left unwilling to leave their lusts and lives for Christ as his Maryrs or outward witnesses did in all Ages But the Letter it self is not Power of God that sustained them in the suffering and inabled them to forgo what was dear to them and to undergo what was dreadful and destructive to nature in its dearest concernments The Letter tells us that the Saints did so and tells us and all Saints that we should do for Christ but the Power by which this is done is another matter then a Letter ad extra even the inward light Word and Spirit that thou doest despite to even that in the conscience that made them indure as seeing him who is invisible and discovered the darkâ—â—ss upon the discovery of which they rather chose death then to own it as Light and Truth not only in ages as high as Moses who by faith in the Light chose affliction rather then sin and feared not the wrath of Pharaoh but also from him downward as low as Maries dayes in which some died for denying the darknâ—ss of the Popes Dâ—ctrines of Transubstantiation c. which the Light in their consciences told them were too gross to be of God who yet by their confession could not dispute against it with Vniversity Sottish Sophisters Doctor Dunces out of Letter nor so much as read a letter therein and also as low as these dayes wherein by the Power of God many are born up to bear the Trials of the cruel Academical mockings scoffings scourgings inâ—lictings stonings bonds imprisonments abuses to death witness one of the first of the Lords two Hand-maids that were sent to warn the Vniversity of their universal abomiâ—ations at Oxford in the time of I.Os. Vice chancellorship there who perhaps may not be so learned literally though mystically and spiritually more in the Letter as obtuse aÌ„cuti â—omunâ—ioneâ— many of those dull-beaded nimble disputers out of it are in their bald fashion of Syllogistical form Neither did the Letter either of the Old Testament which is the Letter without of what things soever written or the outward Letter of the New ever conquer the world in which thou sayest it brought forth so much fruit further then into a meer empty fruitless form of Godliness without the power thereof insomuch that though as to the Primitive Christian Churches while they kept in the Light which the Apostles Ministry whether by word of mouth or Writing Letter Scripture was to turn them to walk by and beleeve in and in the Spirit in which they began till fooâ—ishly being bewitched from obeying the truth it self they turned aside to the outward Text that tells it and so thought to be made perfect by the flesh and the fleshly bodily exercises they found in the Letter which once used were as low weak beggeâ—ly elements for a time the power of God and godliness was much â—elt among them and abode with and upon them to the prevailing against the Powers of the earth and the overcomming the world it self and Satan the Prince of it by the blood of the Lamb and the Word of his Testimony not loving their lives to the death and much fruit of the Spirit and of righteousness was brought forth to the glory and praise of God But when Synods and Councels doting Doctors infatuated Ghostly-Fathers and such as admired their persons as they the persons of the Apostles and primitive Disciples began to bundle together what they could get of the Wâ—itings of such as were coaetaneous with Christ and the Apostles and without any such order from either Christ or the Apostles to canonize what in their conceits might be useful to others as they had found them t is like to be to themselves into a Rule or Canon and stated them into a common Standard for all to have their sole recourse to in soul-cases and matters of Christian faith and holy life and so to adore the dead letters of those holy living men and to run a whoring after some remnants of Writings that dropt from them then in the whole world now called Christendome instead of an Apostolical Spouse of Christ as Christians were at first presented a chaste Virgin to himself by them there stands up an Apostatical Strumpet that had the Letter and good words written there but neither the life of God nor the Word of life therein testified to that according to the nature of Error which is ever multiplying degenerated more and more into the dark till at last being gone from the Word Spirit Light and Life within to the outward Letter that relates of it they ran into the Wildernes of their own numberless senses upon it so that they lost the Letter also and fell from it into Tradition and a thousand Old Wives Fables and though it is good and acknowledged so to be so far as it is that the Protestants have marched from Rome under the conduct of the Leâ—ter yet for all they are come back from the blinde screel scrawls of the Popish Scribes for their smoaky imaginations to a pretensive profession of and prate prâ— Scripturis for the Scriptures unless they march on according to the conduct of the Scriptures till they come into the Light and Spirit which they point to and by a dotage upon the Scriptures ye would run from they are not so much as come yet to the Scriptures nor to conform to that counsel of the Prophets and Apostles given in it but are yet erring from the Scriptures even in and by their very eager Scriblings for it as the only most perfect Rule and from the only Rule of faith and way to Life the Letter is as loud for but that they are dull of hearing as they in their naked Writings are loud for the naked Letter it self And so it comes to pass that as Israel was of old who was as laborious in the Letter busie about the Bible and strict for his Scripture-standard as our Israel for the self-same which yet they confess too is abolished as to the Litteral observation of it with the Appendix of a few of Stories and Letters and Revelations of those holy men next to Christs time who by the Spirit wrote much more then is there own'd as their Standard I say as the old Israel proved as to God an empty vine Hos. 10.1 bringing forth
and an inexpressible exaltation of it above them the light of one day of this Sun meaning the Scripture which hee expresses by the terme the Word of God being unspeakably more then that of seven others as to the manifesting the glory of God nor doth it impaire this self-evidencing efficacy of the Scripture that it is a moral spiritual not a natural Light This and much more utters I.O. concerning these Termes of the Word the Light as the proper names of the Right belonging to the Letter Neither is I.O. alone in this but some others I have met with that have stifly stood up to defend the Scripture or Letter to be the Light the Word of God yea verbum oris the word of his mouth and the Voice of God and Christ properly and properly to be so called Rep. Which sayings O the contrariety that is in them to common sense and reason they may as well say they hear that mans voice properly some of whose sayings they read in the letters of such as write what they heard him say they may as properly say they are to own the voice of the Scribes and Pharisees for their Rule as they are written down by the Apostles and Evangelists sith Christ saith They sit in Moses chair all that they say do and that they do now properly hear their voyces sith what they said was recorded as say that they now properly hear Christs Voice in reading some things he spake as they are written by them that heard him speak them and stablish and canonize them and other mens sentences as the only standing Rule on this account because God said Hear him and they now hear properly Moses voice and must own his Law that vanisht as to the shadow of it still to the Church a standing Rule because Christ said They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them 2 O the contrarity of this to the Scriptures themselves for if they be properly the Voice of God and Christ then absit blaspemiae they make Christ charge the Scribes improperly and falsely that they never at any time heard Gods voice Joh. 5. for they heard the Scriptures read every Sabbath neither could he say truly what he doth exclusively of such as are not his sheep My sheep hear my voice if the Scriptures were his voice properly for the Dogs and Swine hear and hear the outward Scriptures read as well as his sheep but his sheep hear another secret still voice of his in all things that hee saith unto them in their own consciences which the loud Brawlers for the bare Bible drown within themselves with their non-sensical notes and noyses about their Diana's and siâ—ver shrines and Temple worship and Church work which voice and words of his are heard in secret with more profit among the wise Luke 10.17 then the cry of the Truth selling Spirit stinting-stinting-Scripture stealers among fools which still voice of Christs yeâ— whoever hears not and heeds not more then our heady high-minded Hypocrites of these dayes do may preach themselves out a while longer yet as the Ministers and Church of Christ but shall ere long be cut off from among his people in the mean time however this is the improper tone they tune it out in when we bid them fear God hearken to his voice own that as your only guide his Word his Voice his Spirit his Light as the only infallible sure standard the witness of God himself the Scripture witnesses of and sends men to which hee that heeds follows beleeves in obeyes needs not be so restless by wrangling as the wrestless for and wresters of the Scripture are about the Witness of man though witnessing from and for God as moved by him for the Witness of God himself and the Witness of Christ himself in the conscience is greater needs not be so loud for a Letter for the voyces and words of men and the Writings and Revelations of holy men for the inward immediate Voyce the Word the Spirit the Light Revelation of Christ himself in the heart is greater True say they we must hear Christs voice in all things he sayes abide in his Doctrine or Teaching receive his Witness and Testimony walk by his Word live by his Light alone bee guided and ordered in all things by his Spirit which alone reveals the minde of God and Christ without whose Revelation none knows the things of God and Christ but the Letter of the Scripture the outward Writings of such as heard him as we do not the Hebrew and Greek Text at least and Translationâ— as they keep touch with them these are that Word that living life-giving powerful heart-searching soul-saving Word those Words of his that are Spirit and Life by which alone men must come to beleeve that Light to the feet that Lamp to the path that verbum oris that very word of his mouth that works and accomplishes all things to his glory our salvation that verbum oris that goeth forth of his own mouth that hee put according to his promise Isa. 59. ult as if that were the Scripture oh gross and shameful yet over and over and over and over again I.O. cites that Text to prove Gods promise to continue the Hebrew and Greek Texts entire without loss or change of iota or title of it to the worlds end into the mouth of the Churches Seed and the mouth of her Seeds seed for ever that must go out of the mouth of babes and sucklings as the only strength against the persecutor to still the enemy and avenger that sharp sword of his mouth with which he will smite the wicked Nations Rev. 19. That Rod of his mouth or breath of his lips with which he slayes the wicked Isa. 11. That Rod of his strength and power sent out of Sion by which he will rule fâ—reuer in the midst of his enemies Psal. 110. That word that he hath spoken which God hath magnified ovâ—r all that is called his name and so over the light it self it sprang from which is his name Joh. 1. and the sâ—fe strong Tower of the Righteous That vis virtus Dei power of God and word of the Crosâ— That Doctrine or Teaching of Christ which continued in saves the Preacher and hearers ipsa doctrina quam a Deo docemur That witness of God which who so hath needs not the witness of men for the witness of God is greater That voice of God that 's more sure and certain as to its giving out its evidence to us then the very immediate voice which the Apostles heard God himself speak to them with from heaven 2 Pet. 1. And all this and much more exclusively and abstractively from that within yea and properly too so that the Word of God Foundation the Rule Light Lamp and so consequently all the rest of the Tiâ—les are the very proper names of the Scriptures no other then what are properly answerable to its nature For in this wife I.O. drives on the
melius c. for woe unto him that ever he was born if he repent not of it but run from him to the Letter which doth but testifie of him and call to him in the reading and searching of which if he think he hears Christs voice and Gods voice truly then the Scribes that read the Scripture as much as hee could not be truly reprov'd Ioh. 5. as not hearing it as they are by Christ And 2. I shall think hee is not only without his sense of spiritual hearing but as 't is shewed above of others in the like case not so well as he ought to be in his natural wits and understanding And as to that 2 Pet. 1.19 which I insisted so lately and so largely upon above if there were the weight of one half grain in it towards the turning of the scales to his purpose I would weigh it once again but he that shall say these words We have a more sure word of Prophesie to which yee do well if yee take heed as unto a light shining in a dark place till the day dawn and day star arise in your hearts hath ought in it if the Letter of Scripture were there meant as I have shewed it is not to prove there must bee no more Scripture written as from the Spirit after that verse was written on pain of damnation as I.O. doth for that 's his drift in quoting it doth no more condemne the Qua. by that Text of Peter then he damn Iohn himself whose Revelation was written as by the Spirit no little while after that As to that 1 Cor. 4.5 spoken to once before where I met with it Ex. 3. s. 28. yet twice here cited by I.O. to the self-same purpose as before from which because Paul there sayes hee would have none think of him and Apollos above what he wrote of himself and him as no more however Idolized by the Church then meer Ministers by whom they beleeved I.O. concludes there must be no addition of more Scripture to his Canon Rep. If any man be minded to look so long till hee finde a pin in a pack of wool which he may sooner do if lost there then finde I.Os. conclusion coming from the Text aforesaid let him look till he is weary for mee who will meddle no more with that And the same summarily and in short say I of 2 Pet. 2.18 another Text of I.Os. urging For when they speak great swelling words of vanity they allure through the lusts of the flesh through much wantonness those that were clean escaped from them who live in errour Rep. He that will spend so much time as to study on that Text till hee can duely draw either of these Doctrines from it viz that the holy Spirit downrightly damns 1. All addings whatsoever of more Scripture or writing as from the Spirit to that Scripture now in the Bible which our Clergy calls their Canon And 2. All the wayes and means of knowing God and of communion with him even that internal Spirit and light in the conscience to use I Os. phrase boasted of by the Qua. as in some measure communicated to all men shall most assuredly have his labour for his pains The same may be said of 1 Ioh. 5.1 Beloved beleeve not every spirit but try the spirits whether they he of God or no for many false Prophets are gone out into the world Rep. What damnation is thundred out here at all to the Adding of any thing or Revelation that is true to the outward Writing or Scripture where the Scripture is neither talked on nor intended he talks of Spirits there and not Letters much more what follows thence to the condemnation of the inward light and spirit the Qua. talk of call to live and walk and hold communion with God in now according to the counsel of the Scriptures as Abel Noah and all holy men of God did from the beginning before the Scripture was Is this to adde to the Scripture and to fall under condemnation from that Scripture and from that Text too as Adders to the Scripture to hold forth preach publish in the movings of the Spirit and therein also to commit to writing the holy Truths revealed in the Light and Spirit of God they obey and walk in and to call men by Voice Scripture or Writing as they are moved to live and beleeve in the Light to walk not after flesh but the holy Spirit of God in them which reproves them of sin and lusts against their flesh as they did of old who wrote in the same Light and Spirit of God that outward Scripture ye more scrible for then walk by so long as ye walk not by the Light and Spirit as it bids you doth not the Scripture call to beleeve and walk in the Light and Spirit and not in the darkness and in the flesh and where is that Spirit and Light is it not within in the heart where the flesh and darkness dwells which lust against it And for as much as thou sayest here the Spirit damns all wayes and means of knowing God and communion with him beside the Scripture O thou Elymas Wilt thou not cease to pervert the right wayes of the Lord Doth not the Scripture and Spirit of God by it rather down rightly damn all them out of al' communion with God let them jactitare joy and boast never so much of their having the Scriptures that walk not in the said Light the Qua. testifie to which thy self only contrarily both to the Scriptures and sound reason and Gods Spirit also damnest down as Diabolical to the Pit of hell who yet sometimes again confessest it to be of God and Gods voice in nature by which he reveals his minde to men and that infallibly without the least contribution of strength or assistance from without and therefore surely without a Letter ad exera p 42 43 44 45 46. yea and rejectest with abhorrency and detestation Ex. 3. s. 28 Doth not the Spirit by the Scripture condemn them for Lyars and such are all the formal Professors of the Letter that have got the good words to talk on for hire and make a trade of whose portion is the Lake while they are not under the power of the Light but hate it and the holders of it out that pretend to communion with God out of the Light and own 's it any other way or means of fellowship with God but the light saying 1 Iob. 1 4 5 6 7. God is light and in him is no darkness at all if we say we have fellowship with him and walk in darkness we lye and do not the truth but if we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship together and the blood of his Son cleanseth us from all sin dost not thou then instead of light walk in obscurity instead of brightness in darkness it self dost thou not grope for the wall yet like the blind as if thou hadst no
that beleeves not both beleeves neither But what of that what follows hence this quoth I O. for that is the very end hee infers this Text for and the very conclusion he infers from it viz. that Moses writings of Christ are more sure and of greater certainty as to the Churches use then Christs own words from his own mouth or then Christs Revelations of Gods minds to men as revealed to him from the mouth of God from the very bosome of the Father Siccine Itane is it so I O. indeed what the ouâ—â—ard remotely transcribed Copies of the writings of the Old servant that put a vail over his face too and spake so darkly in types and figures and shews and shadows that 't was hard to behold stedfastly to what end he spake more plain and stedfast and sure and certain then the immediate Voice Words Revelations of the Son himself whom Moses called to hear as coming and speaking more distinctly out of the very bosome of the Father O the dotage of our Vniversity Doctors the dimness of our Divines who profess to dive daily and deeply into the Scriptures that make the dark Writings and dead Letter and servant more clear and worthy and useful to the Church then the express Voice and Words of the Son which are Spirit and life it self I shall set but one Scripture to face this fancy of I.O. and so leave and let it stand to the shame of it self and its Father Heb. 3. vers 1. to the 8. See and read it Thus of the first The words of the second are these Be not soon shaken in minde nor troubled neither by spirit nor by word nor by letter as from us as that the day of the Lord is at hand Rep. The business I.O. cites this in proof of is for this and that next before are of those that are subscribed to that purpose that the certainty of the Scripture is preferred before the certainty of true Revelations and Miracles but which way so much can be drawn unless it be as I.O. draws iniquity with cords of vanity and sin as it were with Cart Ropes from that Text is more then I can tell Paul Silas and Timothy had told them it seems of the coming of the day of God both by Spirit Word and Letter they whose great hope lay in the comming of that day like such as look and long for what they love and are apt to thinke and hope it to be as they would have it did hope it to be nearer hand then it was and fearing left finding it further off then they thought they might bee troubled and shaken in minde and failing in their faith of it he gives them to understand the worst of it that the best might the better help it self that they should not mistake them in their Doctrine about that day as if they had said it was immediately to shine out upon them and so waver in their mindes flag in their faith and be troubled with doubts as if it would never come to them because not so soon as they wisht it might for there was a long night to interpose it self first he wills them withall to remember v. 5. that he told them no less in the Spirit by Word of his mouth as now he doth over again by Letter or Writing when was present with them howbeit as that 's never long that comes at last so that day would come at last to their salvation and destruction of the man of sin who caused the night with the brightness of it Here 's the short and the long of the business of that verse and those about it from which I who can see the Sun can see no such Doctrine follow as I.O. dreamingly draws from it nor one dram of Reason nor the least grain of Assent to his Asasâ—inated Assertion that the Scripture is of more certitude as to the Churches use then any true Revelations Other Arguments I.O. urges why the Light and Spirit cannot bee the Rule c. Therefore the Scripture must be it J.O. That to which we are never no where sent of God that we might learn the knowledge of himself and his will and take direction in our duty that cannot be the Rule Canon Principle or directory of our Faith Learning Knowledge and obedience But we are never no wheresent of God to any inward Light or internal Private spirit c. Therefore c. Les the Fanaticks produce but one place of Scripture wherein we or any are sent to their Rules or directions of faith and obedience and we will not say but they have cause to triumph in earnest but if they speak of their own they are Lyars they bear witness to themselves and their witness is not true Reply As for thy word Private Spirit we deny all leading by any Private Light and Spirit It is the Common Light and Publick Spirit of God which is one and the same in all though not in the same measure and not any thing of our own that we testifie to and profess to follow as our guide It is the gift of Gods grace in us that appears to all bringing salvation which teaches all that are led by it and learn at it to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts and live godly righteously and soberly here that we intend nor do we so much as pretend to any other inwardlight but that of God in the conscience which though thou foolishly stile it Natural yet thy self be â—rest such an ample testimony to sometimes that we need use no other then thy own words to prove it to be infallibly of God and from him an infallible guide and that we are sent of God to this inward Light Word or Spirit in answer to thy challenge to produce one Scripture I say what need wee produce one Thy own pen if thou l't beleeve it points out almost iâ—numerable places yea all in which the Word of God is said to be preacht publisht multiplied received where the Word nigh in the heart is meant and the outward Scripture that is the declaration of it considered formaliter or as written not at all intended yet for fear thou shouldest not beleeve thy own pen when such Truths drop from it as make against thee and indeed it hath let fall so many untruths pro and cons and fellaries from it that it little deserves to be beleeved by thy self but rather suspected when it writes the truth I am free here to produce some out of many more that might bee produced wherein men are sent in the Scripture if that be of God by whom thou sâ—yest they nunquam nusquam never no where are so sent to the rules and directions we call to which are not any mans own private spirit or fained light or Enthusiasms or dreams as thou dreamest and to the abusing of us to the world out of thy own narrow private light-loathing spirit divinest they are but the Word Light and Spirit of God which is
to blow where it listed Ioh. 3. without looking at any light within without walking in any way or using any other means of knowing God of having or holding fellowship or communion with him which was wont to be only in the light 1 Ioh. 1. but that of the Scriptures on pain of rejection and heavy damnation from God own Spirit in the Scripture In a word That Law and Testimony which alone is to be consulted with in all doubtful cases to which God calls from our seeking and attending Pythonibus aut Aryolis qui pipiunt qui mussitant to Wizards and familiar spirits that peep and that mutter yea that very word there spoken of Isa. 8. which whoever speaks not according to these is no light to him I say the two Texts abovesaid are not only frequently cited and recited in evidence of these various and sundry particulars but also judged by J.O. to be such sure grounds Hercules pillars firm props and principles as are not only satisfactory to mens consciences but sufficient to stand that way he draws them against all mens objections so that relying thereon men have a sure bottome and foundation for their receiving all the other Scriptures so assuredly as the Word of God and consequently all that that it abovesaid that who even from thence even from these Text own them not in that manner as such are left inexcusable in their dammâ—ble 〈◊〉 p. 56. That therefore the utter in â—onsequence of J.Os. deductions from them which are meer non sequiâ—â—â—s may the more plainly appear I shall letting fall J.Os. other trifling Arguments and sidling Replies to what the Qua. urge on behalf of the light of inartificial Arguments as himself calls them draw them into the form of artificial ones and express the manner of his illegal inferences from them which is in such wiâ—e as here under follows We are by that Text in Isa. 8.19 20. sent to the Law and to the Testimony to try what evâ—y Churches or persons speak about the things of God his will worship or our obedience to him who if they speak not according to that Word there is no light in them Therefore 't is evident that the Scriptures are the Word of God and consequently all that that is abovesaid The second viz. Christ Luke 16.31 bids men attend not looking for Miracles to Moses and the Prophets the written Word as the best and most effectual means to bring to repentance and which all faith and repentance is immediately grounded upon Therefore the Scriptures are evidently the Word of God c. Rep. In which two Arguments thou reasonest in Print well nigh as ridiculously as he works in Paint who doth Humano capiti cervicem jungere equinam For the head of the corner is strait sound and sure the body of the building upon it corrupt and crooked weak and rotten That we are sent to the Law and Testimony to that Word there talkt of and intended and to Moses and the Prophets and that that Law Testimony and Word that Moses and the Prophets spake of in those two Texts is that Word that is the true touchstone of all truth a greater ground for faith and repentance to be founded on then that of Miracles and a more sure stable firm fixt stedfast or standing Word then the voice which came from heaven all this I do not in the least deny but that the bare outward Writing which thou falsely callest the Written word and the external 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as at first written much more the present transcribed Copies of that Letter much more yet every Letter Tittle and Iota of it which thou keepest such a tatling for to be no less then the Word of the living God is that Law Testimony Moses and the Prophets or written Word as thou callest it intended in those two Texts or that by these termes in those two places is meant the said outward Scriptures and lastly most of all that it follows by any good consequence from those two places by such sound deduction as will stand against all objections gives such assurance thereof that he is a damnable unbeleever that beâ—eeves not from thence that the said Letter and Letters are infallibly known to bee the Word of God and the rest above said which are the things by thee inferred from them all this I both do and dare deny For the Law that in Isaiah is spoken of is not the literal Copy nor outward legible Letter that thou pleadest for and divinest it is but another Law which I see by thee thou art not yet very much ver'st in nor used to read even that in the heart not the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Letter of a Law of carnal Commandements not the formal Letter or literal form of a writing without but an inwardly written spiritual Law or Light within which is the power of the endless life that Law in mens mindes which is warred against by that Law of sin and death that dwells in their members The Law in the Spirit lusting against that and lusted against by that flesh or evil spirit that is also in men lusting unto envy and all evill the Law of the Spirit of life which is by Christ Iesus that is powerful to that which the Letter or Copy thereof which is figuratively called the Law is weak to cannot do viz. to deliver such as take heed thereunto from that Law of sin aforesaid that leads men captive unto death The Commandement that is a Lamp and not a dark Lanthorn p. 6.23 the Law that is the Light it self that leads to the life it self for so that of the Spirit doth and not the dead Letter that is used instrumentally as a knife to kill but in any wise cannot quicken And that Testimony or Witness is that Testimony of Iesus which they have hear that keep the Commandements of God even the Light in the conscience as aforesaid This Testimony of Iesus who is the true and faithful Witness of God of whom also God himself testifieth and beareth witness is Jesus his own Witness or testimony for God born by his own voice and writing by his own Spirit and light immediately in the heart who there testifyeth what he hath seen and heard of the Father though few such a thou art receive not his Testimony whose light voice spirit speakings and counsel from heaven in their own hearts who so turns away from and hears not in all things is none of his sheep but shall be condemned and cut off from among his people and not the testimony or witness of men in outward Writings or Letters testifying though as moved by him what they have seen and heard from him not that Scripture thou so wâ—itest for and callest the witness of God for that of God is far greater the Testimony of Iesus is a Letter indeed a Writing and an Epistle Prophesie yet not the outward Writings Letter and Copies of the Epistles and Prophesies of
believe so that we were never put into any capacity for life and salvation by all that best Grace that thou vouchsafedit to uâ— they told us not only that many Ages and Generations never had one offer of salvation from thee but also that in these very Nations where thy Gospel rich Grace and large Love as they call it at least is proclaimed and held forth in words proffers preachings and pretences to all yet there is not one of an hundred that is as they say no more then the personally elected ones which are very few also as they say in comparison of the rest that were a certain determinate but much more numberlesse number also as unchangeably reprobated from everlasting without reference to good or evil foreseen to be done by them in time that the salvation so universally offered in thy name was ever so truly intended to by thee as it was tendred and that the Saviour of the World of whom they say He came to save not the righteous but sinners and ungodly ones to seek out that which is lost and of whom they say Thou in thy love sentest him not to condemn but save the World was sent to save none but that foresaid few set number of elect ones of which number we could find little ground to hope we were sith an hundred to one were not any more then if an hundred were sentenced to die and but one of them to be saved and a Pardon should be proclaimed to them all conditionally that every man believed for himself that he were the man to whom the Pardon is intended any one man could have ground of confidence that himself was he and so we were quite discouraged by the Preachers of thy grace from believing the Salvation to be intended to us since an hundred to one it was not and they told us that the said Saviour did not die for all but for a few even the said choice ones whereupon though he was held forth to us all to be believed in as the common Salvation in thy revealed Will as they call it on pain of eternal condemnation to every one of us that should not believe in him as our Lord and our God and Saviour and with promises or eternall life to us all conditionally we would all so believe yet we could not see how this could rationally hang together or how we could all truly have believed such a thing every man of us for himself without the most of us should have believed a lie and we thought whatever they said that thou wouldst have us all believe no more then the Truth and not have any of us believe much lesse be damned for not believing a lie we could not see though they bad us every one believe in Christ as ours how the most of us had a Christ to believe in as ours sith they told us alâ—o he was not intended to all to whom he is offered but to a very few even of them since we were by themselves who bade us believe in him every of us as our Salvation bad to believe this doctrine also on pain of being held Armenians Socinians and Hereticks in the Church that he did not offer himself a ransome for all as the Scripture in plain terms sayes he did but as much as be is offered to us all yet he offered himself not for all but only for the foresaid few and that by Aâ—l and every one in the Scripture and the lost ones and sinners and ungodly and the whole world which he is said to die for we must at no hand understand Aâ—l indeed nor think that thy meaning was as thy words imported nor according to the literal sense of them for then we might mistake thee but that by All and every one the whole world thou meanest but a very few only and by sinners and ungodly thy Elect ones only neither could we see upon the account of their personal particular principles as universal as thy tenders of Christ to us all were or at least theirs in thy name that we could possibly believe the truth if we should all have believed in him as ours or that we could all have a share in him and we saw that it being so that he was not intended to be a Saviour to every man to whom he is offered some men had no Saviour to believe in as their and for ought we saw 't was an hundred to one but we might be the men and to believe it that he was ours we had no ground from their doctrine for such a Faith and so might if we had yea must most of us if we had believed it have believed a lye and tho sayest thou wilt damn men for not believing the truth and wilt thou now damn all us for believing the truth for he was not intended by thee if our Ministers did not belye thee to us to be our Saviour who are Reprobates and we did believe him not to be so according as it proves and so our Faith was of the truth and if we all had believed it that he died for every of us it had been a lye if our learned Leaders did not lye and wilt thou now damn us for not believing that which if we had believed all of us an hundred to one but the most of us must have believed a lye and that which was not so if we had believed it we had been deceived for 't was not so it their doctrine be true and now we did not believe it we are to be condemned because we believe not in thy Son and apply him not every one to our selves in particular to whose Salvation he was never appointed but in thy unalterable Decree before ever we were born though offered to us a ours upn equal terms as they say with the Elect whose only in particular beâ—is designed altogether to another purpose even to be the Salvation of some few but the unavoidable further condemnation of us Reprobates and only to leave us the more excuseless in our suffering of it And howbeit its true we did not obey the Gospel nor do thy will we must need confess in order unto life yet it was never savingly nor sufficiently manifested to us in all our lives as they said nor was any measure of that true Light in which is the Life nor one grain of that as our Divines told us which is sufficient for us to bring us to life vouchsaf'd but a Natural Light in attending to which had we ever so well heeded or improved it 't would not have helpt us imparted to us only a certain common Grace and Light as they told us which had we answered it could have avail'd us nothing as to Salvation and a Talent which had we traded with as they tell us and doubled it â—ad encreased into but more of the same kind and common sort not obtain'd any Special nor what ere the Scripture seems to say to the contrary which we poor ignorants
they have it for their further ruine yea while they keep the Scripture quoth I. O. of the Iews and I of I.O. and such literal Christians as he is we shall never ment weapons out of their own Armory for their destruction like the Philistiâ—e they carry the weapon that will serve to cut off their own heads Thus Though I. O. who sayes elsewhere the Scripture is without need of other helps or advantages or revelation by the Spirit or Light within per se sola sufficiens living absolute full of power and efficacy to save souls and yet rides the Rounds so here as to say that without the Spirit the word and that 's more then the Qua dare say howbeit he means thereby but the Scripture is a dead latter of no efficacy to the good of souls yet horrendo percussus scotomate he stayes not here but having said the letter is dead rather then the Qua he so hates shall be owned by him in saying the self-same that himself sayes hee 'l ride round back again to his first stage that he may not seem to side with them and therefore in Ex. 3. S. 40. where I.O. brings in the Qua arguing strongly against the Letters being the only most perfect rule thus Scrâ—ptura est litera mortua Spiritus vivisicat quis litera mortua nisâ— ipse sit mortuus idhaerere veâ—it The Scripture is a dead letter the Spirit quickens who but he that 's dead will adhere to a dead letter as his Rule I. O. brings in himself weakly answering thus viz To go round again to the confounding of all his own former sayings that the letter is dead Falsissima est ista assertio Scriptura est verbum Dei quod vivum est et efficax neque uspiam litera esse mortua dicitur i.e. That 's a most false assertion the Scripture is that word of God which is living and efficacious neither quoth he Trapezuntius like who forgot his own name forgetting its the name of I.Os. own imposing in the same book is the letter any where at all said to be dead I. Os. Rounds and Contradictions to himselfe about the Hebrew punctation Moreover as to Hebrew Ponts I. O. capers about quavers up and down and runs round like a blind Horse in a Mill One while asserting them coavo'us with the Consonants of such necessity that without the owning of these to be of Divine original men are left which is as much as to say all the Iewish Church were so left from Moses to Ezra if the Points were added but by Ezra and his companions and not by Moses at the first writing unto great uncertainty in all Translations and Expositions of the Scripture p. 202. That who owns them not as so and are otherwise minded then those who maintain the Antiquity of the Vowels and Accents so as that the Hebrew Language was written with them from the beginning not only make doubtfull the Authority of the Scriptures but even pluck it up by the Roots sith without the Vowels and Notes of distinction it hath nothing firm and certain p. 2.13 That he that reads it without Points as the Church did before Ezra if Ezra was the first Author of them is as one that rides a Horse without a bridle that may be carried he knows not wither whereupon relating the opinion of Radulph Cevall to be that the Hebrew Language was plainly written with them from the beginning This mans judgement quoth I. O. is also mine yea p. 205 207. He makes the foundation of all Questionable upon the supposition of the Novelty of the Hebrew Points insinuating it as a just consequence which great and wise men suppose naturally and necessarily flows from the opinion of the Novelty of the Vowels and from the state of the Hebrew Language and Bible unpointed Otherwhiles notwithstanding not knowing whether he had best assert them to be so ancient or no he to go round again at first faces halse about and leaves those who held them up as high as Moses to prove it saying only He shall not oppose them that maintain the Points Coaevous with the letters and yet after a while does no less in effect then face quite Round about and oppose them in the same sentence by this confident assertion viz. I no wayes doâ—bt but as we now enjoy them we shall manifest that they were compleated by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The men of the great Synagogue Ezra and his companions p. 210 211. and p. 226. Pleading against such as hold them to be more Novel and of no higher invention then from the Tiberian Missorites on his own and their behalf who affirm Ezra and his companions to have been the Authors of the Points he sayes their sayings whom he opposes cast a probability that Ezra laying aside the old letters because of their difficulty together with the new introduced the Points to facilitate their use which if so then he leaves all ages of the Jewish â—hurch before Ezra even the true Saints meerly for want of the Hebrew Vowels and Accents as men riding Horses without Bridles who were carried they knew not whether but so the Saints then were not and though the generality of the Iews were yet 't was not because they had no Vowels Accents and Points to attend to as their guides though I am of I. Os. mind t is like they then and till Ezra's days had none but because they refused to be led by the Light within and guided by the Holy Spirit which for all their attendance to the letter they as Stephen said Acts 7. had allwayes resisted Thus I. O. to the contradiction of his first selfe is run round down the hill from Moses as low as Esdras about his punctilio's and Hebrew Points but there he reckons to stand and keep his ground against all that come against him to bring him and his Ancient rich possession of Pins and Points any lower or at least so low as the Tiberian Missorites and here he fights like a man in a fâ—ight or frensie left all truâ—h be for ever lost if he can't make it uncontroleably manifest that the Points are better guides then may be expected from such bad men as the Tiberian Massorites And first to make that good to the begetting of an infallible and divine faith of the Points divine original and not such a humane one as they must have if from the Massorites that these Charecters the Hebrew Points mark as we have them are not to be ascribed to the Massorites as their Authors he does not more make severall silly consequences then he does himself confound them even as fast as he makes them First Not to meddle here with those many paedantick proofs and put offs which I have elsewhere viz in the 2 Exer of my Book call'd The Country correcting the University sufficiently already disproved he treats it out throw a great part of his two Treatises with no other Tool then that Toy of Tradition