Rule and Controversie on foot were manifestly implyed especially when I made no Advantage to my self by it But every such little thing must be called by a hard Name or John Faldo would have little to write and but a few to believe his Books But to the Point avoiding many Occasions for severe Reflection Perhaps he grants us what we can desire For upon my asserting that what was and is more general then the Scriptures is most properly the General Rule he replies Rep. I never affirmed them to be a general Rule nor is it that I charge the Quakers for denying but I charge them with denying them to be any Rule at all of Faith and Life he mistakes the Question and yields my Charge to be their Principle and pleads for it p. 54. Rejoyn If that be not the Question how have I granted the Question Do I plead for his Charge because I plead against the Scriptures being the General Rule p. 54. which he sayes is no part of the Charge and what himself undertakes not to contradict But sure I am if the Scriptures be not the General Rule as he implies and thereby cuts his own Throat and grants to the Quakers the Question as largely as needs to be They are not The Rule by way of Excellency or the Rule by which God's People in all Ages have walked for that was and is General So that the Scripture upon his own Concession is but a particular Rule and therefore must be subservient to the Spirit who is the great Evangelical Rule as are many other Instruments that have been made use of upon several Occasions He might have learn'd thus much in p. 53. of my Answer where I say that we acknowledge the Scriptures to contain many Holy Rules for Godliness I would know of him how that could be and yet deny them to be a Rule in any sense But we have good Reason to deny them to be the Rule of Faith and Judge of Controversies who can neither give nor govern Faith nor Judge of Controversies as the many different Perswasions in the World fully prove for then all that have the Scriptures would be of one Perswasion as it is most certain those are who have and walk by the One Spirit VVherefore since the Scriptures themselves testifie to the Spirit as the great Judge Rule and Leader especially under the New Covenant where the Law is not written on Tables of Stone much less Paper but of Flesh to wit the Hearts of the Sons and Daughters of Men the Spirit and not the Scripture must be the Rule of Faith and Judge of Controversie In short The Scripture cannot try a present Motion or Prophecy Bad Spirits are wholely hid from it For Instance Paul reproved not the Spirit that cryed These are the Servants of the Most High God that shew unto us the VVay of Eternal Life from the Scriptures neither did Peter Deceitful Ananias but from the heavenly Instinct and Savour Relish or Discerning they received from the Spirit of God within them 'T was in a Case of such Difficulty that some in these late Times have writ That the Scripture gave no general standing Rule for all particular Cases in fleeing or standing in Times of Persecution but that it was the Frame of the Spirits of the People of God to retire at that season which whether it be true or false that the Spirit of God did so influence them two things are undeniable first That it was the Frame of their Spirits witness their Practice secondly That the Scripture was not sufficient for them to square themselves by on that Occasion And what else do Professors mean when they advise People to seek the Lord in this or the other Case why do they not go seek the Scriptures rather Doth not such a Practice manifestly detect the Scriptures of Insufficiency and evidently prove their Acknowledgment both of Revelation and their Recourse to a more Living Spiritual Immediate and Sufficient Rule VVhy else do they seek God's Mind say they by Prayers not formal but by the Spirit But this is become despised Heresie with J. Faldo For Faith in his Sense rises no higher then so many Articles laid down suppose truly according to the bare Letter of the Scriptures which the Devil can believe as well as he This Faith I call meerly Verbal and Historical of which the Scripture may be a Rule but not of Saving Faith for of that Faith only the Spirit can be the Rule and why because the Spirit of God alone reveals him to the Soul who is the Object of Faith and works Faith in the Soul upon that Object and as this only begets Faith so it increases enlivens rules governs and strengthens Faith unto Dominion This alone unfolds those Mysteries spoak of in the Scriptures Wherefore answered the Eunuch unto Philip when he queried Understandest thou what thou readest How should I unless 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I had a guide as sayes our old English Translation which implies That the things declared of by the Scriptures are not to be understood from the Scriptures but a more Living Spiritual and Certain Guide Wherefore we affirm That Repentance Faith Sanctification Justification Redemption Regeneration c. are all a Mystery never to be disclosed but by the Revelation and Operation of the Spirit of God in Man the Scripture can only testfie to such things that they are but it is the Spirit alone that works them and illuminates guides governs and rules the Soul in and about such things 'T is true all the Spirit leads to is according to the Scriptures it overturns them not for they declare of most of these Operations yet because we believe know and witness them from the Conviction and Operation of the Spirit before we can possibly understand them in Scripture therefore the Scripture is but a Declaration and not the Rule of Faith c. And the only best way to determine any Controversie on foot about Repentance Faith Sanctification Justification c. is the Judgment of that Spirit which works them For how can the Scripture that has so many Meanings put upon it determine which of those meanings is the true Let them shew me that Scripture that plainly and uninterpretatedly tells me such a Proposition is True and such a one is False that consists only of their additional Meanings such a new Nick-named People right and such wrong and they do their Business if they cannot as it is impossible they should they must have recourse to something else to rule determine and what can that be besides that Eternal Spirit which worked the true Faith and ruled the holy Life of those Ancients who gave forth this Declaration of Faith and Life Can any Man tâ—ll another's Mind better then himself or resolve any Doubt or clear up any Mis-understanding concerning what is delivered better then he that spoak it To understand those holy Men's Mind and disprove them that mistake it
as said of the Scriptures out of W. Smith's Book which was one part of my Stress he was willing to shake off but it will not so easily acquit him Observe his Reply Rep. And whereas W. P. saith No such Words can be produced he intends no other but that Smith doth not accuse himself in so many words of Blaspheming the Spirit of God in the Scriptures and the Doctrines from thence received Rejoyn His first Words belye me nor can any Man be so sottish as to believe I intended any such thing as he would have his Reader believe for that were no Answer to the Objection but an arrant yet fond Cheat and Illusion My Meaning went with my Words and my Words meant as I just now explain'd them the substance of which was in my Answer though evaded by his Reply and perhaps my Rejoynder will meet with no better Usage For his Phrase of Blaspheming the Spirit of God in the Scriptures I will tell him and that upon very good Authority that he now playes the Canter with us and that shamefully The Spirit of God IN the Scriptures a Scripture for that I intreat him You may see what a Doctor he is you that believe in him that thinks he can clasp up the Spirit with his Bible It seems thus far John Faldo and Simon Magus agree for the one thought he could buy it of Peter and the other implies he may have it of his Book-seller Indeed if I thought J. Faldo could believe what he sayes I should be the tenderer of him for Ignorance is to be pittied But when he shall shut the Spirit of God out of Men and shut him up in the Scripture though it call Men the Temples or Tabernacles of God and his Spirit whilst it never calls it self so but Holy Writings or a Declaration of things certainly believed he is to be censur'd for his improper and ambiguous Terms and the rather because his Charity is so small to others in Cases more excusable and that no Man acts the Doctor of the Sentences to others more snappishly and imperiously then himself however I shall be so favourable as to take his Words in this Sense else I know not which way he will turn himself viz. The Spirit of God speaking when it pleaseth by the Scriptures which brings him and his Cause unavoidably over to us But let us see if J. F. can honestly fasten any of those fore-cited Epithetes upon W. Smith's Book If he can we will condemn the Book as heartily as J. F. traduceth us in his But if he shall be found to have wrong'd W. S. God that lives forever will avenge our Innocency upon him which we desire may extend no further then to work him into true Repentance and effectually to vindicate us in the Understandings of the Mis-informed His words are these Rep. But that all that Inventory of execrable Names W. Smith doth intend of the Scriptures and the Holy Doctrines grounded on the Authority of the written Word take these Testimonies John 1. 9. He that is John beheld him and his Glory and felt his Power and what his Power took away then he declared him as he knew him and not from any Tradition or Writing before him why then do teach for Doctrines Men's Traditions running into the Lines of what others have written Morn Watch pag. 6. Rejoyn The Passages from whence the particular Epithetes are taken shall be consider'd anon This is one of those Testimonies he brings to prove he rightly cited and apply'd his former Testimonies out of the same Author which had he intended in reallity he should as well have inserted the one as the other to help such as had not seen his other Book into a true Judgment of this but then may he say I should not make the best of my Case which to do him no Wrong he studies more then the Truth or any thing else next to his making the worst of ours And now Reader that this Proof is as lame as his former and wholely as silent to his Wicked purposes consider I entreat thee the Drift of this Man as his Discourse at large manifests Two things he had in his Eye First to beat People off from the Doctrines and Traditions of Men in the Sense Christ once spoke those words to wit not the Scriptures but Men's humane Interpretations of them with such Forms and Worships as they had invented in the Apostacy from the true Spirit of Christianity as these words by J. F. purposely omitted notwithstanding they lay between the two first Sentences which therefore make an absolute Break though he makes none do undeniably evince to wit VVeigh this Truth all ye Priests and Professors and ponder it in your Hearts have you beheld Christ and seen his Glory Have you felt his Power to take away your sin If yea then why do ye teach for Doctrine Men's Traditions Again pag. 16. For they being from the Life that gave forth Scriptures their Vnderstandings are darkened and they err and know not the Scriptures nor the Power of God Lastly in the 14th page he hath these words All the vain Worships and Customs which People at this day are in who yet abide in Forms and Traditions are all come up since the dayes of the Apostles and are after Men's Traditions and not after Christ And the Conception of all hath been in Man's Imagination and hath been brought forth in his own Will and Wisdom By all which Reader it appears that he distinguisheth between Men's Traditions and God's Tradition For first how can he mean the Scriptures in the first Passage the middle of which our Adversary so wilfully dropt when he implies that from feeling the Power of Christ to take away Sin Men would leave off Teaching for Doctrine the Traditions of Men making them thereby sinful and a Sin to teach them when J. Faldo confesses that upon the Spirit 's moving and giving us the understanding of Scripture we do allow the Doctrines therein deliver'd to be rightly preach'd In the second Passage he undeniably distinguishes between the Scriptures rightly understood and their Mistake of them to whom he wrote Not knowing says he the Scriptures nor the Power of God being darkned which imports that truly to know and teach according to the sense of Holy Scripture is a quite differing thing from Teaching for Doctrine the Traditions of Men. Nor is his third Passage less clear in the Point pag. 14. sinâ—â— he explains what he means by those offensive Words to J. Faldo's Ear by such Customs Worships and Traditions as were not of Christ and that took their rise since the time of the Apostles and proceeded from the Imagination Will and Wisdom of Man therefore not the Writings of either Prophets or Apostles that were before such Apostacy and which were given forth as they were mov'd of the Holy Ghost The second thing greatly in the Author's Eye and with which his Spirit seems to be prest through the
chosen by Man though he be thereto disposed by the Will of God revealed in the Scripture W. P. This is False Many things may be and are daily chosen by Man that is not in the Will of the Flesh nor by his own Will much less when any should be disposed thereto by the Will of God revealed in the Scripture An Abominable Untruth and so Notorious that I need say no more only Challenge him to produce any of us that is any of our Sayings or VVritings in Proof of his Exposition if he can otherwise be hath Slandered Us and Our Principles For the Wâ—ll of the Flesh is that which is quite Contrary to God and inconsistent with the Good of the Creature How well he hath acquitted himself in point of Honesty as well as Ability first in so maiming my Answer and next in saying nothing to it is still referred to my Reader 's Judgment and so we proceed Reply pag. 92. The second is pag. 249. CHRIST THE OFFERING i. e. the Light within W. P. calls this no Quakers Expression that it is take this Proof We believe that Christ in us doth offer himself up a Living Sacrifice to God for us Smith Cat. pag. 64. Rejoynder I still say it is no Quaker's Expression Though the Light that shineth in our Hearts be Christ the true Light But that which I most insisted on he hath as he useth to do quite left out viz. for he would by this insinuate that we deny Christ to be an Offering as in the Flesh and that Body then offered up to be concerned in our Belief of the Offering but I do declare it to have been an Holy Offering and such an one too as was to be once for all therefore let none receive his Abuse of us for our Faith He that hath half an Eye may see how poorly and meanly he hath shifted off the Weight of my Answer Again Reply p. 92. The third MEN-PLEASERS Sense They who comply with Men though in things not only Lawful but also to Edification This W. P. calls an arrant Lye but the ground is provided J. F. meaneth by Lawful unto Edification what we do I am not so silly to put such Bonds on the Truth Rejoynder Indeed I never took him to be so Silly as Mischievous in the Matter not to use his own Phrase more then Ignoramus for instead of putting Bonds on the Truth he hath broken all Bonds of Truth he pretends to give our Sense of Men-Pleasers and substitutes his own in the room of it and when we tell him that if he means by Lawful and to Edification what we do he belies us he confidently replies I am not so silly to put such Bonds on the Truth as if in rendring our Sense of words he were not bound to keep to our Sense of them how is it our Sense if it be his and not ours and how truly ours if it be putting Bonds on the Truth to render ours truly But the Man's present Hardiness is beyond wondring at To the next Reply p. 92. TRADITIONS OF MEN i. e. The Scripture or written Word p. 250. To this W. P. adds But to say they are the Traditions of Men in the sense Christ forbid the Pharisaical Religion God forbid I had rather my Tongue were cut out of my Head Oh base Man to abuse an Innocent People thus grosly I have already proved the Phrase to be the Quakers viz. Smith ' s and Nailor ' s. Rejoynder This answers it self if he had taken off the Force of my Words I might have bestowed a Rejoynder upon him in the mean time I have disproved his pretended Proof where I met with it and what I find here is but a meer begging of the Question The fifth and last Particular he thus endeavours to vindicate is this Reply p. 93. THE VAIL IS OVER THEM p. 251. Their Sense I give of this he presents the greater half of which explains the other by an c. to blind the Reader and make the Quakers believe I deserve the Imputations of Malice and wicked Man which it seems he is resolved afore hand to bestow on me Rejoynder The Man is weary of his Work as we may see by the great haste he makes over every particular No Man living that hath not read both our Books can make any Sense of this Hodge-Podge Section that ever any Man should touch with Religious Controversie that is so visibly defective in it My Answer shall be my Rejoynder for sure I am he hath overlookt it and therefore yet to be replyed to J. F. p. 89. THE VAIL IS OVER THEM that is sayes J. Faldo the Belief of the Man Christ Jesus which was of our Nature to be p. 251 252. the Christ c. W. P. Let this be the last though several more might be observed which at this time shall be considered in which we shall see that J. Faldo has done like himself and the Man we have all along taken him to be The Vail is over them it is a Scripture-Phrase 2 Cor. 3. 15. used by the Apostle to express the Darkness and Ignorance that to that time remained over the Understanding of the Jews in reading the Law and this Vail he makes us to interpret after this gross and absurd manner namely that the Vail is the Man Christ Wicked Man Did ever Quaker so irreverently express himself Give us his Name or tell us in what Book we may find it What greater Malice couldst thou have shown then thus injustly to pervert the Scripture in our Name abusing both As if because Christ's Flesh is called a Vail and the Ignorance of the Jews a Vail that therefore the Quakers must of Necessity mean by Vail in the first Sense Vail in the second Sense as if the Way to have the Vail rent were to deny the Man Christ Jesus All this my Adversary thought fit to conceal left his transcribing it into his Reply would have made that Discovery of his Baseness which he should never have been able by all his Shifts to palliate I think I did not nick-name this Chapter when I called it a Representation of his whole Reply He ends as he begun with Squibs Puns Evasions and Ill Language for unless the Goodness of a Book be to be measured by the Paint of a Title-Page or bare Writing reputed Replying he might with more Sense and Reason have called it Froth Folly and Fiction then a Religious Vindication c. No Man I ever read of hath exceeded the Bounds of Truth by obtruding Falshoods and wandred from the Dâ—corum of a fair Adversary by unfair Citations and obvious Wrestings betaken himself for Sanctuary to such silly Shifts School-boy Jeers at the rate this Adversary hath done And I have no Reason to Doubt of others being of the same Mind since the World is not so destitute of Understanding as to be cheated with his hocus-pocus Tricks to take Tin for Silver or Copper for Gold or Froth for
far beneath those noble Gentiles who not having an outward Law were a Law unto themselves having the Effect of it written in their Hearts their Conscience bearing witness c. And this we may boldly say That such as ever acted from that inward Sense never thought they did God Good Service in Killing his Servants whilst great Admirers of the Letter of the Scriptures and who as concerning this Commandment Thou shalt not Murder thought themselves most unblamable believed They did God Good Service in killing his Servants Nor can I think it so great a Disgrace to our Cause that we ingenuously profess the Reason why we desire to fear God and keep his Commandments doing unto others as we would have them do unto us not so much to be from the Letter of the Scripture as the Convictions of the Eternal Light and Spirit of God in our Consciences As it ought to be unto John Faldo and his Adherents who ground their Obedience upon the Letter of the Scripture and not upon such internal Convictions What is it but to say They could Lye Swear Steal Kill c. without any Remorse did they not find such Injunctions and Prohibitions upon record A Consequence so detestable yet so natural to their Principles that if this render them not able Guides to the very Confines of Rantism and Atheism I shall gladly ask an Excuse for my Ignorance But that I may leave nothing undone that may compleat the Satisfaction of every moderate Inquirer I shall further weigh and rejoyn to these words of his They who thought they did God good Service in Killing his Servants did not sin in the least because they were not convinced of a Command to the contrary nor the Idolaters in the Case of Baal because they thought Baal to be a God indeed Now Reader observe the Evasion This Passage relates not to Men's practising what God Commands or our Tenderness in imitating other Saints without Commission for fear we should offer strange Fire which is our Question but their doing that which God never commanded yea which Mankind in all Ages hath adjudged impious and which to be sure his Holy Spirit that E. B. said All Men should wait to be convinced assisted and led by in fulfilling God's Commandments never moved any to He unworthily draws a general Conclusion against us from meer particular Premises It seems Men are to act without if not against Conviction upon his Principle and that it is the same thing with him to commit moral Enormities from an Hardned Heart and to be tender of taking up any external Practice or performing some Religious Duty without the Convictions and Leadings of the Holy Spirit The Apostle said to such as had not as yet so full clearness as others That if any were otherwise-minded God would reveal it He did not injoyn them during that Scruple to believe or practice the thing doubted but therefore did Persecutors act inexcusably in their fiery Zeal because their blind Consciences checkt them not Again If Blindness came from Education it is though Blindness still and therefore it was basely done of J. Faldo to say in our Name that it is not Sin in the least c. more excusable for in the dayes of such Ignorance God winks But if it be a Blindness proceeding from long Disobedience and Rebellion against the Convictions and Strivings of the Good Spirit of God as his Word Hardned implies then I say it is not only very hainous in God's Sight but those Persons can never be excused neither from great Guilt nor the Sense of it in themselves let them or J. F. talk never so much of Conscience Besides the most Essential and Universally Necessary Commands of God were through all Ages confest to both before there was any of those Writings we rightly call the Scriptures of Truth from the Law of Nature as many stile it or rather the Law God placed in Man's Nature and since where they have never been Therefore whatever particular hardned and seared Consciences may say we have the Consent of Mankind and their own Rebellion and Lewdness against them But the Words of J. Faldo in plain terms import as if 1 st Men were not generally convinced of the Righteousness of the Moral Commands of God but that Men keep them because they are in the Bible only which runs against the Testimony of Scripture the Consent of Ages and the Writings and Judgment of the most Honest and Learn'd Protestants 2ly As if it were a like Evil Conscientiously to forbear Running Willing and Striving in Matters of Worship without the Spirit 's Conduct and searedly to plead for the Commission of Murder and Idolatry because Men of such Consciences bogle not at it though that is more then J. F. can prove I mean that they have no Stroak or Remorse 3 ly As if we could worship preach gather Churches and administer Gospel-Ordinances aright without the Spirit 4 ly That he is not convinced by any other Testimony then the Scripture without of any Transgression against God's Law 5 ly It supposes that if Men stay'd till the Spirit mov'd they should stay long enough who vainly prate of Praying by the Spirit notwithstanding never considering that the Spirit standeth ready to Reveal it self to their Assistance and Assurance who wait for it and that all the Children of God are led by the Spirit of God which being our Position had it but been weighed by this Adversary he could not methinks be so Unjust in his Aggravations 'T is true should we believe as he doth the Spirit is not to be waited for now adayes to lead us or that it is not ready to our Information when we wait for its Discoveries and Leadings our Assertion would look very absurd and loose for it were to let fall all Worship but not upon our own Principle as I said before for first all Worship to God ought to be performed by the Assistance of his holy Spirit for of our selves we can do nothing that is Good And secondly God's Spirit is ready to assist instruct and comfort those that wait diligently and patiently for it yea God has given it to the Rebellious that it may judge them if it don't lead them It is such Protestant Doctrine that I wonder Men should not know their Admired Ancestors Faith when they met it Oh great Degeneration into Hardness and Ignorance Lastly There is the same to be said against him that pretends to ground all upon the Scripture that he objects against us who plead for the Conviction of Conscience which the Instance of the Jews Murder of our Lord Jesus Christ unanswerably proves There was a Law that Blasphemers should be put to Death By this Law they apprehended Jesus adjudged and got him to be executed These Men above any Age exalted the Scriptures as the Only Rule Where lies the Mistake Not in the Scripture but in their blind and envious Application of it Now I ask if the only Way
for them to have come to the true Sense and Knowledge of him and escaped that Wicked Murder and the Deplorable Consequences of it had not been to have waited upon God for the Convictions Discoveries and Guidance of his Holy Spirit since Flesh and Blood and the utmost VVit of Man with the Exactness of the meer Letter of the Scriptures could never give the certain Discerning Knowledge and Savour of him unto that Generation whose very VVords themselves were Spirit and Life It was by a Divine Touch Sense and Knowledge given from above that he was truly diâ—cern'd own'd and follow'd of those that believ'd in him and cleav'd to him therefore said Christ No man cometh to me but whom my Father draweth Where was that Drawing but within Again Simon Peter Flesh and Blood hath not revealed what who I am but my Father that is in Heaven So that at last Men must come to this Spiritual Sense in themselves to understand and apply the very Commands of Scripture otherwise not Justice but detestable Murder may under the Name of it be confidently perpetrated Wherefore we Exhort all To have Recourse unto God's Spirit that illuminates certainly and gives to act unblamably by which the Scriptures are only understood as they should be and People brought into the Possession of that Life of Righteousness they plentifully declare of Had it not been for this inward Discerning there had been no Ground for the Abolishment of the whole Jewish Service which follow'd some years after Christ's Ascension And it is the same Eternal Spirit that is the great Rule and Judge now which God promised more particularly to shed abroad in the latter Dayes and is the great inseparable Priviledge from the New and Everlasting Covenant But to conclude Why should it seem so Heterâ—dox in J. Faldo's Judgment since if Men believe the Scripture upon the Testimony of the Spirit they practise it by the Knowledge and Power of the same How else could Paul have decry'd Jewish Ceremonies or we know what to take and what to leave Or why do we omit any Command therein mention'd They Cicumcised therefore must I Circumcise They Baptized must I therefore Baptize with forty more particular Cases wherein nothing can secure any from the Imitation of them set Conviction or Spiritual Disâ—erning aside I will offer two or three Testimonies from approved Men in our Defence William Tindal that ancient faithful Protestant Martyr whom J. Fox that writ the Books of Martyrs calls the English Apostle speaks thus That it is impossible to understand in the Scripture more then a Turk for whosoever or any that hath not the Law of God writ in his Heart to fulfil it Again Without the Spirit it is impossible to understand them John Jewel Bishop of Salisbury in his excellent Book against the Papists writ above One Hundred Years ago sayes thus to our purpose The Spirit of God is bound neither to Sharpness of Wit nor to abundance of Learning Oftentimes the Unlearned see that thing that the Learned cannot see Christ saith I thank thee O Father Lord of Heaven and Earth that thou hast hid these things from the Wise and the Politick and hast revealed them unto the Little Ones Therefore Epiphanius saith Only to the Children of the Holy Ghost all the Holy Scriptures are plain and clear Again Flesh and Blood is not able to understand the Holy Will of God without SPECIAL Revelation Therefore Christ gave Thanks unto his Father and likewise opened the Hearts of his Disciples that they might understand the Scriptures Without this special Help and PROMPTING of God's Holy Spirit the Word of God is unto the Reader be he never so wise or well learned as the Vision of a Sealed Book Now unless Men are bound to do what they do not understand how to do then only are they to do them where they are Revealed or Discovered to them which being by the Spirit only according to their Doctrine the Testimony and Discoveries of the Spirit are requisite to our understanding of the Scriptures which implies and comprehends a Discriminating Knowledge or Certain Discerning of what we should practise from what is not oblieging upon us to practise and consequently that we ought not to run head-long without such knowledge T. Collier an Ancient and Eminent Man among the Western-Separatists of our Nation writeth thus For me to speak of God because another speaks of him and to be able to talk much of God as I read of him in Scripture NOT BEING MADE ONE IN THE SAME TRUTH I see and speak BUT WHAT ANOTHER HATH SPOKEN and so may speak truly sometimes of God but it is by Hear-say ANOTHER MAN's TRUTH BUT NOT MINE So I doubt many a Soul BOASTS IN ANOTHER MAN's LIGHT Again I see that external Actings according to a Rule without is nothing if not flowing from a Principle of Life and Love within Which is more then E. B. said of whom J. Faldo with unworthy Reflection and base Wrestings hath said so much Thus much of sober Rejoynder and much more then my Adversary's scurrilous Reply deserves but the ConCernment I have for the Information of others drew this from me I shall pass by his Ranting Strain against us at the top of his 36th page desiring to keep close to the Business and where I may without breaking his Matter avoid troubling the World with a Transcript of them I am very careful to do it But this next particular as many more being little else and since he suggests thereby an Untruth with great Confidence against me I should wrong both the Truth and my self in omitting it He charged us with Denying the Scriptures to be any Means to know God Christ or our selves for which he quoted W. Smith's Primmer pag. 2. because he there tells the Questioner that Christ is the Only Way to which J. Faldo answered That though Christ said No Man can come to the Father but by me yet he did not say that there is no coming to the Knowledge of God but by Christ thereby making as I observed in my Return to him a Difference between coming to the Father by the Son and to God by Christ though no other Name be given under Heaven then the Name of Jeâ—us Christ c. That we never deny'd the Scriptures to be a Means in God's Hand to convince instruct or confirm nor could this be W. Smith's Meaning since he would thereby have cut off all Benefit from accruing to People by his Books and also that Ministry he had receiv'd of God In short From our Denying that there is any other Way to the Father but Christ he concludes that we exclude the Scriptures and consequently our own Books and Ministry with them from being any way Instrumental of Good however if I err'd it was in good Company and that J. F. must acknowledge for worthy W. Tindal p. 80. of his Works and H. Bullenger a learned and famous Reformer in Switzerland