soberly secretly and frequently dealt withall his Condition represented his Danger shewn and a Station of Safety pointed to him It was the daily Travel of many who sought his Wel-fare and the Churche's Peace to bring him to a Sence of his own Condition But no Argument or Entreaties could prevail no Sighs or Tears could soften him but resolved he was for a Sect-Master and his Mark must be the Hat on in time of Publick Prayer That which yet whetted many simple Hearts to follow his Example was with his Sufferings his Pharisaical Pretences to a higher Dispensation but instead of shewing them a readier Way to an higher State of Holiness he diverted their Minds from the more weighty things of the Law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus to contend for that rude and unprofitable Practice of the Hat on in time of publick Prayer an Invention to no Edification but to the great Disturbance of the Church Thus began what rent he sought to make amongst us Before this we were at Peace our Sion prosperous and those Apostate Adversaries allowed us to be God's Church his chosen People I appeal now to the whole World of moderate and impartial People whether we acted herein unlike Christian sober and prudent Men And if any of our publick Enemies who pretend to own a Church-Authority some of them also being Members and Leaders would not have done the like Must we suffer for that which they justifie We rejected a Practice we had no Authority for neither without nor within We saw Who brought it in and What acted him with the bent and tendency of it And it was as much our Duty to withstand the Entrance of that wich was Wrong as to continue in the Practice of that which was Right and setled in the Power of God long before among us We might invert their Plea much more truly The Light within enjoyned us to disown them had we not then sinned to have declined Or is our Light Darkness because they call their Darkness Light In short the Church never knew it when so much admired by her present Enemies And because when it came she rejected it therefore are they become her Enemies which proves Them and not the Church to be changed But supposing we had nothing of this to our Defence What is become of the once acknowledged Blessed Church and her Powerful Ministry If we have lost both who has found them If due to any Body in case our Adversaries be in the Right it must be to them But I know of no Church nor do I hear of any Ministry they have nor the Power of God manifest among them either for the Building up of themselves or the Gathering of others What! Is the Church already returned into the Wilderness and is the Power lost which they acknowledge was once amongst us and to God's Eternal Praise we daily witness in the City and Country to attend our Travels But as they were not of God in their Dissensions so neither have they stood We suffer as we did The World loves them more then it did They are Friends but both Enemies to us Their Sect Master returned with the Dog to the Vomit to Swearing Fighting fine Cloathes Cap and Knee to Men who could sit on his B with his Hat on his Head when he prayed to the most high God Some of his Followers run into Looseness and Rantism others into Enmity and Earthly-Mindedness but far the more considerable returned to their first Love and Workes whom God hath since frequently blest with his heavenly Presence and sealed to them the Comfort of the holy Communion of the Brethren To sum up what we have been saying First The True Church of Christ by the Gift of the holy Spirit from Christ the Head is enabled to try savour and relish Wrong Spirits under never such Right Appearances as that without which she could never be preserved from the Wolves that are in Sheep's Cloathing nor the Deceivers that come with Christ's Words out of Christ's Power and Life Secondly That this Church hath as well Power to reject the false Spirit as to try it Thirdly That men may be in the Words and not the Spirit of Truth that notwithstanding it is the Duty of all Men to act by the Light and Spirit within that hinders not that such as walk not according to the Light within though they may pretend to do it should be known and judged of them that really do so Fourthly That we were this True Church of God by our Apostate Adversaries own Confession And we have proved that not we but our Adversaries have altered since the time that large Confession mentions by giving the Offence and making the first Breach of Vnity notwithstanding the many Christian Courses that were taken to restore them and preserve Concord among Brethren Therefore our Judgment of them is not that of a Dark Dead Body but a Living Spiritual Society and in the Gift Discerning and Authority of God's holy and unerring Spirit which they acknowledge we once had and cannot prove when and by what we lost it And blessed be the Lord God of Heaven and Earth his Living Power is with us be owns our Ministry and Fellowship in the Hearts of Thousands yea Ten Thousands have bowed to the Righteousness of his Scepter since the day that perverse Core first troubled our Israel No Tryals have scattered us nor Sufferings worn us out but to the Honour of the blessed Name of the Lord we have been by it kept to this day whose Goodness renews with the Morning and whose Mercies endures forever Blessed are they that fear him such will he alwayes keep in perfect Peace But the Author of the Spirit of the Hat and his Tyrannical and Hypocritical Defender in his Libel called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected cry out This is arrant Popery But I will tell such Licentious Spirits That it is plainly Scriptural What if a False Church assume the Priviledge of a True one does that make the True Church a False one for pleading that Priviledge The Papists say God ought to be worshipped must we not therefore worship him because they say so 'T is just as good as to say That because one Man cheatingly calls himself by another Man's Name therefore that other Man must renounce his own Name Prove Discerning and Judgment by the Holy Ghost in any Body or Society to be the Mark of a False Church and ye do your Business otherwise you must acknowledge it to be the Priviledge of a True Church but deny it to be ours as we do that it is the Church of Rome's But we have proved out of your own Pamphlets thâ—t you acknowledge us to have been the True Church and in our own Discourse that we have continued that which we ever were And that God's powerful convincinâ—â—nd converting Ministry remains amongst us Therefore thâ—â— Priviledge upon their own Principles does belong to us But perhaps they will both endeavour
for an Answer to the Spirit of Alexander the Copper-Smith After this rate it were far easier to Answer then Accuse I am of Opinion that D. Stillingfleet's Adversaries would look upon their Cause as little injured by any bare reference to ancient Protestant-Writers how excellently soever they acquitted themselves at that time of day Fresh Opposition requires fresh Vindication If I had been Popish the man should have shewn me in what and when he had done have soundly confuted it and not in the midst of his Exclamations against Shifters give such just occasion to say thou art the man I am willing to forgive him at this time But let him be better instructed of his Cabal against the next time and see if he can learn more Truth then to call his Libels Answers whilst they prove themselves Evasions For Truth will work through all odious Names And it is not pinning the Pope upon our Tail and crying Popery Popery that will confute our Principles However till we are better known it may disrepute our Persons But let his base Constructions be considered Our Reproving Men for going out of the decent Order and happy Unity of the Body he calls Requiring Man to set down by our Determination against their Conscience And our Disowning that Breach upon persistance Excommunication from Burying and Marrying They ejected themselves by their Novelties and we are not ashamed to repute such as Publicans and Heathens as will not head the Church of Chris t Mat. 18. Had they Faith they might have kept it to themselves and not have disturbed the Church's Peace with their new Practices indeed Institutions for what was it lâ—â—e then to require our not practising of the Hat off in 〈◊〉 who called pulling it off a Popish Tradition unless men 〈◊〉 not to leave off Popish Traditions so that they and not we were to blame as the Sequel will further prove But I could not pass by this part of the Disingenuity of this Libeller As the Libel so our Discourse will consist of matter of Argument and matter of Fact I shall begin with matter of Argument which shall consist of a further Defence of what is asserted in my Book entituled The Spirit of Alexander the Copper-Smith revived and rebuked The grand Cause of that Dissension which was begun by Jo. Perrot long since happily ended among our selves though renewed divulged and aggravated for the Strengthening of the hands of our common Enemy by certain Perverse Apostates as delivered in the Spirit of the Hat and Defence of the same they must with me grant to be this The Quakers reach that every Man is enlightened with a sufficient Light to Salvation And that all Faith in and Worship to God ought to stand upon the Convictions and in the Leadings thereof yet we are oblieged by their Body unto that which we have no Motion for but rather against and upon our Refusal of such Compliance as they expect we are disowned as not of them So that the Sufficiency Convictions and Leadings of the Light must vail to the Body and not the Body to the Light wherefore not the Light but the Body is become the Quakers Rule Thus Tho. Hiks's Con. Dial. p. 63 64 65. Spir. Hat p. 11 12 13. Defence of it p. 5 6 7. Their Common Aggravations especially of the two latter are these That they are denyed Marrying Burying Trading that they are distracted and so deprived of all both Ecclesiastical and Civil Priviledges The Aggravations we shall consider in their place And first to their Objection or Argument as I have fairly fully and faithfully laid it down 'T is a Truth and as true that we urge both the Universality and Sufficiency of the Light to Salvation and that every Man ought to follow only the Teachings of it about Faith and Worship This is granted on all hands even by the Cabal to credit their present Work and obtain their envious Ends upon us and our Principles Therefore no part of the Question to be controverted The matter in difference strictly lies here that is by resolving these four following Questions the Objection will be fully and plainly answered 1. Whether Christ has given to his Church consisting of faithful Believers and obedient Walkers by the Light or Spirit within such a Sense Tast Relish and Savour of the Nature of Spirits as upon all Occasions the great Enemy of Christ and his People may take under never so seeming innocent Appearances and Transformations to condemn any thing by his Church practised or innovate any thing by the Church never practised but condemned Yea or Nay 2. Whether such a Society Body or Church after due Admonition given to any dissenting or innovating Person may not Lawfully and Christianly deny their Communion in Testimony against that wrong Spirit such Person or Persons may be acted by 3. Whether such Person or Persons may not hold this granted fundamental Principle of the Light c. before recited in the Vnderstanding and yet be acted by a wrong Spirit to Divisions and then plead against the Church under the Pretence of acting by the Light within and consequently whether he can or ought to be judged by any for so doing because every one ought to act according to the Light that is within them And lastly 4. Whether the Body of the Quakers or their present Opposers be that Church Yea or Nay The first is so evident in the Affirmative That to reject it is nothing less then to deny Scripture it self It was the express Promise of Christ to send the Comforter the Spirit of Truth to lead into all Truth which the Apostle John assures us was made good not only to the Disciples but the then Churches of Christ to whom he writ these unanswerable Passages Ye have an Vunction from the Holy One and YE SHALL KNOW ALL THINGS Again But the Anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you and you need not that any Man teach you but as the same Anointing teacheth you of ALL THINGS and is Truth and is no Lye And even as it hath taught you ye shall abide in him By which it is evident that the Church of Christ had an Infallible Spirit by which to discern the Spirit of a Sheep from the Spirit of a Wolf though he came in Sheeps Cloathing This Doctrine Christ himself taught us when he said Beware of False Prophets which come to you in Sheeps Cloathing Again Take heed that no man deceive you For many shall come in my Name saying I am Christ and shall deceive many Whence it follows that there should be False Prophets yet in Sheeps Cloathing which is a deceitful Spirit acting under refined Appearances and to compass its Deceit the better shall palliate it with the Pretence of being led by the Spirit or Light of Christ within So that as Deceitful Spirits were foretold the Way to know them was both promised and enjoyed My Sheep hear my Voice said the great
that all Men ought to follow the Light in themsâ—lves deprive the Church of the Power of Judging that for a dark Imagination which from the Savour and Sense of God's Light and Truth she feels to be so because some Person or Persons plead that they therein follow the Light This opens a Door to all Licentiousness and furnisheth every Libertine with a Plea What might have been said in this Case against the ancient Christians Every Man ought to walk in the Spirit and to be led by the Spirit Shall therefore any Man's Pretence to be led by the Spirit that is not secure him from the Judgment of those that are really led by the Spirit Or shall the Judgment of those who are led by the Spirit against him that pretends to be so led be reputed Tyranny and a going from the Leadings and Judgment of the Spirit to the Leadings and Judgment of Men Or because of granting the Light to be obeyed in all its Leadings and its Leadings to be waited for in order to Faith and Worship that therefore there is no way left to judge which are in the Wrong of the Two that equally say they are led by the same Light For if Men would come to the Salt Grace Truth and faithful Witness in themselves which only gives to discern and savour True Spirits from False ones they would hereby arrive at certain Knowledge in the Matter but where People stand they can never distinguish because they are from under the Conduct of that Spirit which alone reveals the deep things of God In short as no Man's saying he is in the Right ought to conclude him to be in the Right so neither can that hinder that he should not be found out by such as are in the Right Spirit to be in the Wrong if in it He that sayes he is ruled by the Scripture may err as well as he that sayes he is led by the Light therefore is he not to be censured Or is there no certain Way of knowing him to be in the Wrong It is the Spirit of Truth that opens the Truth of Scripture much more can it only give to relish Spirits Which leads to the last Question Whether the People called Quakers or those few stragling Followers of John Perrot are this True Church and acted by this Divine Light and Spirit yea or nay To answer this Question I shall keep very close to the Concessions of these present Apostates For it is not so much my Business at this time to prove us a True Church to them that never had any Relation to us as against those who acknowledge themselves once to have been of us but now decline us That God sent forth a Spiritual Ministry that many were gathered by it and setled in the Way of Everlasting Peace and called by the World Quakers the Author of the Spirit of the Hat fully confesseth pag. 9. That it was then the Church of God four lines after undeniably prove And the Lord did daily add â—nto the Church and raised up many to go forth in the Power to preach the Everlasting Gospel whereby the Church multiplyed and increased to the Astonishment of the Nations By this we see it was then the Church in their Opinion without dispute I would fain know it comes now to be no Church Has Her Refusing to conform to John Perrot's Innovation of the Hat on in time of publick Prayer unchurched Her I have hitherto thought that a Society's going from or adding to what it was when truly called a Church was that which only did Unchurch it and not its continuing as it was And if this be good Arguing The People called Quakers remain still the same Chruch but their Adversaries not the same Members In short where the first Occasion of Offence was given there was the first Breach of Unity Had the Church imposed upon them there would be some reason for varying of her Character and condemning her as Fallen But the Innovation being their own she is not accountable unto them but they to her for such unwarrantable Novelties so that the Question is not Whether the Quakers impose but Whether they did not innovate All was well till this Imagination was hatched The Spirit of Judgment and Burning had its course Their Vessells were filled with Refreshment Springs of Life broke out in their Bellies and Bread of Life dwelt within them They wanted no good thing as that Letter of the Hat relates If this may be credited How comes so sudden a Revolution that in a Years time the Mighty should be fallen the Stars ceased to give their Light the Poor distressed the Young Ones bruised and Conscience imposed upon by a Law Which wretched Deciet me-thinks should be obvious to every impartial Reader There is no Wisdom to believe Men so inconstant to their own Apprehensions and who of all times in which to prove this great Alteration should make Choice of that in which was so great a Persecution and so Noble a Testimony born for the Truth viz. 1662. But the Truth of the matter is this John Perrot who if he had been as faithful as his Companion might with him have been hanged at Rome as we have been informed to his own Comfort the Truth 's Honour and the Churches Peace came home as filled with Conceit as he pretended his Body had been oppressed with Sufferings which kindling so great a Love in the Hearts of some Tender Friends as they unwarily became Incouragers of his Ambition in their too high exilting and lamenting his Sufferings Which having rendered him Master of their Affections they most of them easily became Embracers of his Invention We had reason to believe it had almost been impossible for him ever to have made one Proselyte had not the noise of his Forreign Tryals disposed the Hearts of some affectionate People to receive his Impression He that will please to consider the improbable Account he vainly gave of his own Sufferings saying that since Adam's Day none had ever undergone the like his singular Style Proverbial Chapters in imitation of Solomon his Toyish conceited Rhymes his Title page of the Wren in the burning Bush waving her Wings of Contraction c. his peculiar Subscription which was generally JOHN and could not be so because there was no more of that Name amongst us but because he would be the JOHN of JOHNS and which is yet more ridiculous in a Letter to several grave Women your dear SISTER JOHN with his absurd new fangled bodily Greetings his most Papal Salutations to G. Fox E. Burroughs others by them rejected himself reproved as if he had spent his time in Learning all the Superlative Complements of Rome I say he that pleases to consider these things must needs think that the Man had lost his Guide and was dangerously elevated above the holy Fear of God and heavenly Life of the Truth and his Standing being soon discerned by several Weighty Friends he was
World even as I am not of the World Do you call this Blasphemy Then why do you thus seek after my Life and publish Books to set the Magistrates and Ignorant upon me but I will stand to my Tesitmony of my Lord and Saviours Words though you call his Words Blasphemy it is which I desire all People to read and see whether the Spirit of Christ be the Guide of these Men's Actions or the Spirit of Envy for they that have not the Spirit of Christ are none of his but the Spirit of Christ Jesus and of the Lamb which is in G. F. and the Holy Brethren the Heirs of Eternal Life will fall heavy upon these Men yea this Stone which they reject and set at naught will grind them to Powder Mat. 21.44 And farther Christ faith in the same Chapter I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the World but that thou wouldst keep them from the Evil Jo. 17. and mark J. P. and Baptists and the Spirit of the Hat Hyproscrise Tyranny detect who would tyranize over Christ's Testimony concerning his Saints and Followers then and now as your Fore-Fathers did In the 16th Verse Christ saith They are not of the World even as I am not of the World c. which I keep the Testimony of Jesus and know the Truth that he speaks and do not give Titles to none of his Saints to G. F. nor none beyond what Christ hath spoken and therefore be ashamed who profess your selves Christians call Christ's Words Blasphemy And farther Christ sayes That they all may be one as thou Father art in me I in thee that they may be all one in us And the Glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one as thou Father and I am one I in them and thou in me that they may be perfect in One. And moreover John saith in his 1. Epistle Chap. 4. Ye are of God little Children and have overcome because Greater is he that is in you then he that is in the World They are of the World therefore the World heareth them We are of God he that knoweth and heareth God heareth us he that is not of God heareth not us hereby know we the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Error Beloved let us love one another for Love is of God and every one that loveth is born of God and knoweth God and he that loveth not knoweth not God for God is Love And it is very like John the Divine had such Spirits as L. Muggleton J. Pennyman and the Baptists and other to deal withal as I have now And Christ my Lord saith to his Saints and Apostles If the World hate you you know it hated me before it hated you If you were of the World the World would love its own but because ye are not of the World but I have chosen you out of the World therefore the World hates you Jo. 15. Remember the Words that I said unto you The Servant is not greater then his Lord Mat. 40.24 but Christ saith Every one that is Perfect shall be as his Master Luke 6.40 If they persecute me they will also persecute you if they kept not my sayings they will not keep yours Here you may see how that you are not the Keepers of Christ's Sayings but the Persecutors of them that do Ye are my Friends saith Christ if you do what I command c. and saith Christ henceforth I call you not Servants but my Friends for the Servant knoweth not what the Lord doth but I have called you Friends c. Jo. 15.14 You have chosen me but I have chosen you and have ordained you c. And again you say in your Tyranny and Hypocrisie detected that I should say Blessed be the Man that came out of the North Blessed be the Womb that bare him the Paps that gave him suck As to the Former Words I might speak them but the Latter Words once applyed to Christ I do not remember I spake them But herein ye shew your Malice for had a Cursing Man like Muggleton come out of the North such a one would have fitted you J. Pennyman Baptists but Blessed be God I can say He is Blest for God hath Blest him And I can say He is Blest though you do speak Evil with Muggleton against him and others Curse them whom God hath blest and Christ doth bless his People Mat. 5. Glory to the Lord and you cannot curse that which God hath blest and Christ and the Apostles say Bless Curse not and you are offended for my Obeying Christ's and the Apostles Command manifesting What Spirit you are of And was it not Christ which Saul persecuted and thou you Saul like persecute him now yea that true Christ by whom the World was made in his Saints and Holy Ones under a Pretence of following the Lord faithfully but it is manifest that it is the Worlds God you have followed out of whose Mouth comes forth such Envy and Malice But it had been better for thee John Pennyman and thy Confederates that a Milstone had been hanged about thine and their Neks Luk. 17.2 then to have lifted up Tongue or Pen against God's Truth People who art in Muggleton's Spirit speaking against the Truth who art like an old Apostate twice dead pluct up by the Roots if so then how canst thou grow but art gone out amongst the Dogs Vomiting Biting and Devouring And J. Pennyman thou boasts in some of thy Papers of speaking the Word of the Lord suppose it were so Balaam had the Word of the Lord and after was cut off And was not Judas and Apostle Partaker of the Ministry And art not thou turned a Judas and now seekst to betray the Innocent yea to Death if thou couldst according to the Sayings of our Lord Jesus Christ A Brother shall betray a Brother to Death Mat. 10.21 as thou hast done as much as in thee lies like a False Brother in sending thy Papers to Barbodoes where the Baptists and Professors running up and down with them to the Justices of Peace who would have tryed me for my Life Blood-thirsty Men And one Justice of the Peace said that if S Eccles were not hanged he would be hanged for him their Rage was so high against me by Reason of thy Pamphlets but I stayed at the Bridg Town where the Court sat waiting looking every day to be called to my Tryal but the Court broke up and I was not called nor medled withall in the least so the Blood-thirsty Baptists and others their Consederates J. Pennyman's Correspondents mist their Ends. Though the Baptists themselves did confess to the same things here which thou and the Baptists call Blasphemy now yet it is no marvel for Christ our Lord was called a Blasphemer who said that which I testified to in Jo. 17. And as for all J. Pennyman's unsavory Speeches in his Abusive Pamphlets and
not very many which we that have kept the Power of God and our Habitations in the Truth of Christ did judge it the Ranters that would have imposed the same thing upon us so we have been kept as we were all along from the first and because we could not own such and J. P. carrying his Books to burn them at the Exchange because we coâ—ld not be conformable to them therefore come these Out-rages Nick Names Jeers and Mockeries against us who have kept in the same Power of God that we were first convinced by which they malitiously call Tyrannical so they are gone out from us and it is manifest they were not of us for if they had been of us they would have continued with us But as it was it is Deceitful Workers and False Apostles there are and the true Prophecy is come upon some of them The Dog is turned to his Vomit and the Sow to the Wallowing in the Mire that they thus bite and cast their Vomit out against us and who cannot tell how to worry us themselves but have others that consent and Confederates with them and these are their Abilities and Endowments they boast of but to all the Godly and sober People it savoureth that their Books are but as a Raging Wave of the Sea wherein they foam out their own Shame And as for the People of God called Quakers Conformity It is to be made conformable to the Son of God and as for the Vniformity it is in the Gospel the Power of God And whereas you say in pag. 12. the Papists say They believe as the Church believes so likewise sayes G. F. but the Spirit of the Hat sayes Nay This is known to all the People of God called Quakers to be a Lye against G. F. for G. F. his Words are and have been to believe in the Light as Christ commands who is the Head of the Church and as for the Hat-Man's Nay we dare not believe him who puts Darkness for Light and Light for Darkness But these Hat-Men are now turned into the Spirit of Wars and Fightings against the Believers in the Light and our Vncovering our Heads when we pray to God c. is by the same Spirit and Power as the Apostles did who commanded Men to pray Vncovered And whereas the Spirit of the Hat enviously saith The Spirit of Anti-Christ in G. F. would wrest from me what I am not willing to part withal to wit my Conscience What is not that concerning Wearing thy Hat in time of Praâ—er which I said before is contrary to the Apostles Order And yet this is the Hat-Man's Conscience who going from the Apostles Order and Excommunicates thy felf and casts out thy felf and your selves for Our Fellowship is in the Power of God the Gospel and we cast out none for they cast out themselves when they go from the Power of God and our Work was and is to seek to bring in again from under the Power of Antichrist by the Power Spirit of Christ as is sufficiently made manifest and not to wrest the Spirit of the Hats Conscience from him but that his Conscience and all others might have Liberty in the Gospel the Power of God and I leave it to the Lord to Reward thee according to thy Words which will be thy Burden for terming G. F. as a Pope and as the Spirit of Antichrist with such like Malitious Words for we nor he own no Head but Christ Jesus over our Church who exerciseth his Office amongst us and the Law that G. F. and others the People of God called Quakers own and are bounded with in which they have Liberty in the Order of the Gospel is the Law of the Spirit of Life which is in Christ Jesus in which we have been kept from the beginning though you have a Liberty to speak and write what you please and complain and murmur against such that cannot bow and have Fellowship with you who will have a Liberty for your Conscience but not in the Power of God And the Hat Spirit sayes He is informed of a Meeting appointed by G. F. and other Elders to Judge and Condemn several Men and Women of Good Report and to Shelter and Cover the Wanton Practices of others and to Discourage Persons from Discovering the Wanton and Vnclean Ministers Answ This is another Forgery of the Hat-Spirit for Uncleanness and Wantonness blessed be the Lord they are strange things among us but if any Unseemly thing hath at any time been done such were dealt with according to the Order of the Gospel without Respect to Persons And this we have further to say That none have been more Notorious then some of the Hat-Spirit but we shall not run into such Trash nor have we any such Ministers And whereas the Spirit of the Hat speaks of giving Nick-Names and they put themselves We were called Quakers But do these of the hat-Hat-Spirit now Tremble at the Word Nay if they did they durst not utter forth or speak forth such Nick-Names against the People of God called Quakers nor father such Envious Malitious Language against the Power of Christ and his Spirit in the Quakers as they do And another Filthy Lying Scandal the Spirit of the Hat and his Company casts upon G. F. and sayes He was in such a Rage that W. G. thought he would have struck S. N. Which thing is false there was no Appearance of any such thing as the Meeting can testifie and I am a Witness who was at that Meeting And thus with your Lyes and Slanders you think to feed the Airy Minds and make them a Feast And as for W. G. he hath been heartily Sorry for Unadvisedly Speaking such words And G. F's Books to the Lawyers and Judges did not contradict what was then acted or spoken in the Meeting and therefore the 46th page of the Spirit of the Hat 's Tyranny and Hypocrisie is full of Lyes And also the same Slander and Lye is mentioned in page 42. of the Spirit of the Hat That some there present thought that G. F. would have struck S. N. and thus you add Lye unto Lye to stuff up your Paper which as is said before there was no such thing but the Man that did report it is heartily Sorry for it But it seems you Hat-Spirits torment your selves and are vext about G. F's Marriage but why did not the Hat-Spirit reprove J. P. for his Voluptuous Marriage with his Venison Pasties which were pulled about to the spoiling of the Creature and making a Scramble for the Multitude Oh Shameful Doings In pag. 19 20. of the Spirit of the Hat 's Tyranny and Hypecrisie and in page 32. in all those pages is mentioned John Whitehead's Paper and G. F. is charged with opening J. Whitehead's Letter which was writ by him which is a Lye and a Forgery for G. F. did not open the Letter but it was sent Open only Enclosed to another and left to G.
Judas and the Jews Combined against Christ and his Followers BEING A Re-joynder to the late Nameless Reply called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected made against a Book entituled The Spirit of Alexander the Copper-Smith Rebuked c. which was an Answer to a Pamphlet called The Spirit of the Hat In which Truth is cleared from Scandals and the Church of Christ in her Faith Doctrine and just Power and Authority in Discipline is clearly and fully vindicated against the malicious Endeavours of a Confederacy of some Envious Professors and Vagabond Apostate Quakers By a Member and Servant of the Church of Christ William Penn. To which are added several Testimonies of Persons concern'd He that Dippeth his Hand with me in the Dish the same shall betray me Mat. 26.23 They went out from us but were not of us 1 Joh. 2.19 In Perils among false Brethren 2 Cor. 11.26 Nevertheless the Foundation of God stands sure 2 Tim. 2.19 Printed in the Year 1673. Judas and the Jews Combined against Christ and his Followers The Introduction THe Just Defence of our so much Reviled Principles and Persons is so ill resented by our Enemies that instead of publickly Recanting their Injustice They repute us more Criminal for so doing then themselves in first Traducing us It is become a sort of Petty Treason to Reprove them they are grown almost incorrigible and to Controle them though in a Lye is hateful so much more do they prefer our Destruction then the Truth it self or their own Reputation Strange That it should be reputed Innocency to Accuse the Guiltless and Guilt to Defend them Are we of God then shall we stand maugre your Assaults if not we shall fall without them What need this Clubbing for Mischief and Caballing to our Ruin The Jews I believe never studied the Crucifying of Christ more vehemently then you vigorously combine and plot the Massacring of our Names Credit and Principles out of the World yea and we have Cause to suspect our Persons too or else this Socinian-Defender of the Hat-Spirit would never have told the World in almost so many words that Blasphemers were to dye by the Law of God and the Quakers are Blasphemers every Man can make the Conclusion that understands what a Conclusion is see pag. 23. It s a Work becomes Darkness for such I call your Nameless Pamphlet in which you have abused Vertuous and Good People by Name not daring to stand the Test of putting your Names to your Abuses against which can be no Fence but Innocency and that remains Unshaken by all your Blustering Epithetes That rests with God who will quell your swelling Rage and speedily Rebuke that great Herricane your Envy has raised to over-set us in our Voyage to Eternal Rest But he that said to Moses in an Hour of Straight Stand still and thou shalt see my Salvation has once and again Comforted us under all these Discouragements Neither are your Combinations Terrible No though Evil Spyes have been your Informers Our greatest Trouble is your own Hardening and we are sorry to see you make so much haste to old Jerusalem's Portion For us we know in whom we have believed And as he that feedeth the Fowls of the Air and clotheth the Lillies of the Field preserves us so that your Buffettings may prove our Tryals but in the End your own Judgments For however you buoy your selves up by the Acceptance you find with some Airy or Prejudiced Spirits God will certainly enter into Judgment with you for your Envious Proceeding who not being able to carry on your own Controversies now list your selves Combatants for a few stragling Apostates not out of Love to true Quakers but Hatred to such as are so What Sense is there in believing you only intend a False Quaker who have writ and abetted those Writings that are against us as Quakers at all But what shall I say It is an Age grown to that Degree of Impiety that there is no Friendship so Strait no Relation so Near no Truth so Evident nor Life so Innocent that some Men are not hardy and wicked enough to Break Violate and Slander to Avenge some supposed Wrong or gratifie an Emulous Spirit Controversie End upon Socinian Principles c. is risen now in one about the Hat on in Prayer What Variety of Shapes do our Adversaries put on to compass their Ends It has been their Practice first to Abuse our Principles and then Rail at our Defences and for Vindicating our Religion to fall foul upon our Persons and those chiefly who are most active in that Service There needs no other Demonstration of this then the Scurrilous Libel now to be considered which with me carries so Mischievous an Aspect that the Parties concerned in these Undertakings do by it proclaim they only want as much Power as Will to send us and our Principles to New-England for a Venture God deliver us from those Magistrates that are as Angry in Government as these Men are in Religion But this is our Joy That these Enemies speak all manner of Evil against us falsly for our Lord and Saviour's sake We maintain our Principles that angers them Miscarriages joy them whatever they pretend And if they can bring some Writers and Preachers out of Request they think they do their Business But we cannot believe that Sober and Judicious Persons will think the worse of us or our Cause for these Malicious Endeavours against it We have only to do with some old Adversaries new Vampt with the Slanderous Stories of some modern Apostates Had not Judas helpt the Jews had been to seek A few Vagabond Quakers are their Intelligencers it s all but a piece of Treachery and Envy And truly 't is fit we should be tryed as well by False Friends as Professed Enemies that in all things we may approve our selves compleat Conquerors through the Invincibe Power and to the alone Honour of that Eternal Truth professed by us And so we enter upon the Libel it self VVE are told in the Title Page of the Libel That it was writ in Defence of a Letter entituled The Spirit of the Hat and against the Deceitful Defective and Railing Answer called The Spirit of Alexander c. Indeed it is wonderful strange that to Reprove an Apostate should be reputed Railing and that this Secretary to this New-founded Cabal should Practiâ—e it in censuring it He cannot forbear it in his Title Page He begins with â—YRANNY AND HYPOCRISIE DETECâ—ED which Four Words he explains to us thus Or a furtheâ— Discovery of the Tyrannical Government Popish Principles and Vile Practices of the now Leading Quakers In all which if there be no Reviling there is no such thing in the World for these Words reach to the End of all Villany Meek Man that he would be thought who seems to engross Railing into a Company and seems not so Angry at it in us as that we use it Unlicenced of his Cabal for he exerciseth it at such a rate in
Checking it as if he might do it cum Privilegio But it right-well agrees with the Advocate of an Apostate Cause I complain of nothing in this kind more then that we must not Rebuke Ill-Language without being guilty of it Nay such is the Peevishness of our Adversaries that to mention theirs is Criminal But we shall run the hazard of their Frowns rather then be false to the Truth or wanting to our selves in its proper place Let it suffice that the Title manifestly speaks what the Libel vainly condemns This Secretary I suppose in the Name of the Cabal begins his Libel thus How dangerous a thing it is for a Man to engage himself publickly for any singular Party upon the Account of Religion is greatly manifest in the Leading Quakers and especially in W. Penn from whose Parts and Education one would expect more then ordinary Candor and Ingennity By which I perceive he is from a Rageing Socinian become an Vniversalian But why then so bitter against us Sure he is a Party in that and how Dangerous a thing it is Time will more fully shew However he declares himself of no Party by which I suppose he excludes the Christian for the Prophane of that Time reputed him a Sectary and all must acknowledge him to be of a Party How I came to be of this Way is best known to God But thus much I must say that nothing short of the Divine Word of Life and Power has worked that Alteration upon me from what I once was to what I now am The Tryals Travels Tribulations and Exercises that from Fourteen Years of Age have attended me but more especially since I was brought to own and abet this Holy Way I now profess are too many to be related And from the Hour I was first convinced of this Eternal Truth to this of Writing this Discourse I can with Boldness declare to all the World I have had no other Aim nor End then God's Honour the Good of others and my own Salvation in the Day of the Lord. In short I have learned to turn my Back to the Smiter and my Cheek to the Plucker off of the Hair And it is not for any Adversary at this time a day under any Pretence of Parts and Education to Dis-ingage my Affection from this Right Way o◠the Lord Remembring my Lord made himself of no Reputation and that the Prophet was accounted Mad and the Apostles Drunk But he sayes I having imbarked my self amongst those People and having obtained a high Repute among them I betook my self to such pittiful Shifts Scurrilities and Bravings he is pincht to uphold their Detected Cause and Tottering Kingdom 't will stand forever as one would think could not proceed from any Man professing Christianity witness my late Controversal Writings especially my Winding-Sheet and Spirit of Alexander c. ibid. But I cannot expect to be Well-spoken of by mine Enemies especially when they declare themselves to be such because of that Way I so earnestly defend But this Man is not so Ignorant surely as to imagine I imbarkt my self among this People to obtain Repute or Grandeur who lost all with Men when first I came amongst them I would have my Implacable Enemies know that had no more Durable and Eternal Things been in my Eye I might have had my Share where more was to be got then amongst this Despised People but Envy is Blind and Rage Foolish For my Controversal Writings they stand Unanswered among the rest my Winding-Sheet and Spirit of Alexander c. the former being Unmedled with and the Strength of the latter fouly over-looked as we shall anon have occasion to shew perhaps it might have concerned him to clear himself of the Former before he had so weakly engaged himself in the Latter still Controversie is not Ended though Changed He tells the World That notwithstanding we call the Spirit of the Hat Lyes Forgery Defamation with abundance of Terms of the like Foxonian Leaven a scornful Nick Namer yet when we come to Particulars we either first confess what we deny with an idle Distinction except some few things or secondly acknowledge them by Silence or thirdly use some Deceitful Terms of Denyal which the Reader cannot discover or fourthly take an Occasion from some Circumstances perhaps not rightly set down to deny the whole Matter which doubtless are very bad things if true He has hereby rendred us not only no Christians but the worst of Men. All I can say at present is this It has never been my Practice to palliate that which cannot be justified or to treat any Adversary so deceitfully But 't is expected he should prove what he sayes or else we must invert the Character upon himself He tells us I suppose in order to prove what he hath said That W. P. doth in the Name of the Quakers acknowledge That the Complaint made in the Spirit of the Hat is true namely That we required him to yield to our Determination against his Conscience because the Body would have it so saying that was yielding to the Power And that I undertake in Opposition to the Author That his not so yielding but persisting is Dissension but our Disowning Excommunicating and Depriving of a Liberty of Marrying Burying c. any Person for that Cause is no Breach of the great Gospel-Charter This he sayes I Labour to do with the same Arguments Papists use against Protestants who pretend to no such Power and that they may be found every-where answered in Protestant Writings A mean Answer bu◠a notable Go-by in case I had so exprest my self but most forgedly does he deliver my words and tendency of them Was this Man chosen for your prime Tool of Controversie who can only tell one big Lye and then run away My Arguments forsooth are Popish there 's Confutation enough but with whom Ignorance and Prejudice An easie way to brand Reason and render the clearest Truth suspected in a Nation as abhorrent of Popery as this we live in a shameful Injustice that Sectaries should traduce us with that which was once their own suffering from others But what if I had us 〈◊〉 any Argument for the True Church which is employed by the Papist in Defence of a False one must Truth not be Truth in it self because Misappled And suppose the Protestant has answered the Papist Is that any Answer to me How great an Untruth has he told in his Title Page when he calls his Pamphlet A Defence of the Spirit of the Hat against the Spirit of Alexander who in four Pages after tells us he intends not to medle with the Arguments of it But Perhaps he will fault me for these People are very full of finding Fault though they mend none in themselves in that he has referred us to Protestant Writers A Defence boldly begged but never to be accepted of by me Does he think I must turn over Melanchton Chemnitius Oecolampadius Jewell Whitaker Reinolds and others
Shepherd and a Stranger will they not hear Who is this Stranger Not alwayes False Doctrine but a False Spirit covered with True Doctrine They shall come in my Name that is pretending Authority from me and speaking my Words not having my Spirit Christ's Spirit within is his Voice within and 't is that alone gives to discern the Strange Voice let it come with never such True Words Had Christ left his Churches destitute of this Touch-Stone they had been imposed upon by every False Spirit and his Flock devoured by every Wolf in Sheeps Cloathing Sheep know Sheep not only by Sight but Instinct and Wolves too For if Shepherds be of Authority they tell us that if a Wolf be near though out of Sight the Sheep will bleat their Antipathy So do the Sheep of Christ know each other by the Instinct of that Divine Nature they are mutually Partakers of and by it do they discern the Wolf within notwithstanding the Sheep's Cloathing without It was for this end they were to have Salt in themselves the Anointing and Spirit in themselves that they might see relish and discern thereby who were so Salted Anointed and Spirited which in the ground could never be visibly discerned 2ly The second Question I also take in the Affirmative and for which there is both express Scripture and Unanswerable Reason This is seen in the very case of Alexander the Copper-Smith who was denyed and rejected notwithstanding that he made Profession of Christianity And there is cause to believe that the Difference began from his emulous Spirit 's taking Occasion against the Apostles Authority and the Power of the Elders in the Church It was doubtless for something not unlike to this that Paul complained of him to Timothy Alexander the Copper-Smith did me much wrong of whom be thou ware also for he hath greatly withstood our Words Which is the very State and Character of the present Apostates Who pretend with Alexander not to withstand Truth or Christianity but a Lordly Paul Timothy or such like eminent Labourers They pretend to own the Churches but deny some of their Leading Ministers That this was Alexander's Disease the next Verse proves At my first Answer no Man stood with me but all Men forsooke me I pray God it may not be laid to their Charge Who was this People but the Church for of the Heathen it could not be said And what was Alexander's aim besides Ambition I mean to discredit the Apostle that he might gain the Repute and being him down from that Authority God had given him in the Church that he might usurp it to himself What did the Apostle do in the like case shrink No Hear him For though I should boast somewhat more of our Authority which the Lord hath given us for Edification and not for your Destruction I should not be ashamed 2 Cor. 10 8. But no more of this at present That Christ as well gave his Church Power to reject as to try Spirits is not hard to prove That notable Passage Go tell the Church does it to our hand For if in case of private Offence betwixt Brethren the Church is made absolute Judge from whom there is no Appeal in this World how much more in any the least Case that concerns the Nature Being Faith and Worship of the Church her self The Judgment Christ passeth in the matter is sufficient to the Resolution of our Question But if he neglect to hear the Church let him be unto thee as a Heathen and a Publican This I say on the Account of those Apostates who pretend to be the Men they ever were For this Man that works with their Tooles is upon his own Principle as much an Heathen and a Publican as any thing else and tells us to boot that it is dangerous to be of any one Party Therefore not of the true Churche's Party I omit any particular recital of the Apostle Paul's frequent earnest Dehortations from so much as keeping company with perverse Disputers about needless Questions or any that infested the Church and disturbed her Peace and that Practice in which she was at first setled with unprofitable Novelties under what Pretence soever They that can read may find in his Epistles enough to this purpose 'T is true They used no corporal Violence or any civil Power to punish such obstinate Dissenters nor is that Unchristian Practice so much as any part of the Question But first to reprove and admonish and in case of Persistance then to disown and reject which is a part of the Question and a part of the Scripture too And indeed it is most reasonable that as a Civil so a Christian Society should have this Power to preserve it self from the Taints Infections of hurtful Spirits for such tend not to further Knowledge Increase in Holiness or Peace but Strifes and Divisions Animosities and Rents Backbitings and Revenge to the laying waste of God's holy Heritage 3ly The third Question we also accept in the affirmative That men may believe confess and subscribe to the Truth of the Doctrine of the Vniversality Sufficiency and immediate Teachings of the Light as to Faith and Worship and yet be declined from the living Sense Power and Ordering of it so as to be acted by a wrong Spirit to Divisions and notwithstanding plead his Following of the Light within against the Judgment of the Church who reproves him for so doing In short that a man may follow a Wrong Spirit when he thinks he follows the Right and though he ought to follow the Light and Spirit yet is to be judged when he does not act thereby though he may think he doth by such as walk thereby In this the Scriptures of Truth are very positive The Jews owned the Law at what time they rebelled against it and thought they acted according to Scripture when by their Traditions they made it of none Effect There was a certain Generation that were pure in their own Eyes That is believed themselves to be of a Right Spirit whom the holy Ghost reproved for being guided by a Wrong one It was no other State then this that Christ spoke of when he said If therefore the Light that is in thee be Darkness how great is that Darkness Some doubtless acted by Virtue of this Darkness not as Darkness but as Light Was it therefore Light because they thought so When it is manifest that they were against Christ the true Light as you are now Or would the Plea of such an one be so valid against the Body of a Church walking in the true Light as to disengage any from her judgment Or must we therefore conclude that the Light is not a Rule for Men to walk by because some mistake or swarve from it Or that he who calls his dark Imagination a Motion of Light is therefore not to be condemned because it is every Man's Duty to follow the True Light Shall this Position I say
to avoid the Dint of these convincing Arguments thus We deny not the Body of the People called Quakers nor as they act in the Light that they have true Judgment But we complain against your Foxonian Vnity which consists of certain Ministers and Elders which lift up G. Fox for a Bishop a Pope and a King making his Papers Edicts then entitle them the Judgment of the Body whereas indeed 't is but the Mind of a Cabal of Foxonians the Leaders are the Men we strike at See Spirit of the Hat pag. 11 12 13 14 15 16. Tyran Defend But should we allow this to be True as we reject it for a Slander 't is granted to us that the Body of the People called Quakers is not their Aim but some few particulars that make not up the hundreth part of the Church and who will in the things objected sufficiently clear themselves so that the Judgment of the Body is not denyed because of the Judgment of some few Elders that displease them the Question then will be whether the Body in all Places concerned has given its Judgment against that innovating Spirit of John Perrot yea or nay The Determination of which Question gives a great In-sight into the present Controversie In order to which I offer two things to be considered First That in all Places where Jo. Perrot's Spirit and Practice made any Appearance through the Churches in this or other Nations there has been a two-fold Judgment given 1. That of the Church in the Fear and Presence of the Eternal God she worships according to his free Spirit and that Discerning which was given her of him concerning which if there be any Scruple in the publick canvas of this Matter we can readily produce a multitude of Certificates to verifie it 2. The Judgment of many considerable Persons against themselves and their own Practice whose Simplicity was betrayed by that dissentious Spirit But it so happens that some of them of how good Report soever are now not to be credited because it crosseth the Humor of these Envious Authors and their prejudiced Adherents What Name shall we call this Partiallity by who praised their Honesty when they espoused the Hat and now question their Conscience in declaring their Mistake And such is the Fool-Hardiness and Vanity of this Socinian Apologizer in the Defence of the Hat on in Prayer That in a great Marginal Note he cryes out What 's become of John Osgood ' s Integrity that he should put his Name among such Men as these As if we had committed all the Infamies prohibited in the first and second Table of God's Law rather then seasonably given check to the boundless Novelties of an Imaginary Innovatour This is your Vniversalian that tells us how dangerous it is to be of a Party who has bestowed a whole Pamphlet in Defence of one built upon no better Foundation then the irreverent Practice of the Hat on in time of publick Prayer But his own Revilings and injustifiable Officiousness have proved it dangerous to be of such a Party indeed But why must not the rest be credited Are they deceived in Returning Shew it Was it imposed upon them as they suggest Prove it John Pennyman if he has not lost all Conscience and Memory can tell them another Story For as became the People of God for the Decision of this Controversie a very great Meeting was desired and appointed unto which both sorts willingly resorted So that it was not Imposition but Choice In which great and earnest were the Desires and Travels of those who had opposed the Spirit of John Perrot that the Lord himself would please in some signal manner to break forth amongst them that the Judgment which should pass among them in order to a Reconciliation might not be accounted the Judgment of Man but the Judgment of God These faithful Cryes entered the Ears of the God of Peace whose Compassions fail not That with an high Hand and an out-stretched Arm he rent through the Meeting that both Sorts were greatly broken and humbled before the Lord. In which deep and tender Sense J. P. J. C. though never in the Practice of the Hat J. O. J. C. W. P. W. G. G. W. and John Pennyman himself with very many more not now to be mentioned in Fear and Trembling great Brokenness of Spirit to the Astonishment of all Beholders plainly and fully testified against the Spirit and Practice of J. Perrot to be out of the Life of the Truth Vnity of the Body And who wâ—â— more Express Earnest Frequent in the Judging that Spirit 〈◊〉 Envious Apostatized J. Pennyman Did he not say of those 〈◊〉 â—â—â—posed J. Perrot's Spirit You are more Righteous then we And if you had not stood we had perisht And did not he call that Spirit of J. Perrot that led to keep on the Hat in Publick Prayer THE SPIRIT OF WITCHCRAFT AND OF THE DEVIL and to that Purpose And is he not now in Defence of that Spirit What shall we say then upon his present Distance and Enmity Hath he not pronounced his own Character and Sentence hereby What heed is to be given to such a Changeable Self-Contradicting Person Now that the Government of our Christian Body should be called Tyranny and the Confessions of these Men Hypocrisy tell me thou that art my impartial Reader what sort of Conscience our present Enemies have thus to treat both the one and the other How evident is it that these great Enemies of Imposition would have been the Task-Masters themselves who are Insolent and Uncharitable enough to censure these Men in pulling off their Hats again to be guilty of Hypocrisie who in Fear to God and the Sense of his Spirit condemned the keeping of it on Deceit Oh how unworthily have they dealt with us and how ill an Use have they made of all wholsom Counsel to reclaim them That little Yielding that our Friends at first shewed to re-gain them they made use of to confirm them and their Obstinacy leading us to more Severity like Bastard Children they run away with open mouth bauling into the very Ears of some Envious and Busie-body Professors Imposition Popery Tyranny Arbitrary Government and these are become Theames for such prejudiced Persons as this Adversary to declaim against the poor Quakers upon Where it may not be unseasonably observed That if we should as ill bestow our time in gathering up all the Villanous and Impious Miscarriages of many professed Members of the several Religious Ways within this Kingdom I doubt not but we might cut them out more Work then they would be willing to have Had we thus begun with them how Condemnable would they have thought it But it having been their Practice towards us we must not chide them for Injustice lest we be reputed Railers For so big is the Beam in their own Eyes that the Vilest buses against us pass for Innocent and Justifiable things 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The second thing
describe good and bad Fruits and from such Actions Men may by a Writing describe the Right from the Wrong But what gives to relish tast or savour a Wrong Spirit in Sheeps Cloathing beside the Heavenly Instinct of the Divine Nature As People are turned to that they can discern as saith the Apostle The Spiritual Man judgeth all things that is of right he may and is judged of no Man that is not discerningly of the meer Natural Men And as the Spiritual Man's Discerning is from the Spirit that searcheth out the deep things of God so is God the Judge and Law giver to his People under this Dispensation If the Gospel-Fellowship be in Spirit True Christians must have an Inward Tast and Sense of one anothers Spirits and what gives to savour aright at the same time gives to relish a Wrong Spirit The same Objection he makes against the Light may be made against the Spirit which is but another Name for the same Principle and I hope he will not dare to say that any Confusion can follow upon holding that Men under the Gospel ought to be led by it Yet this granted suppose Men pretending to be led by the Spirit to be gone from the Spirit or that two equally pretending to be guided by it differ as Paul and Barnabas and Peter what should determine No Writings of the Old Testament could at least without Meanings and the same Difficulty lyes about the Meanings of Scripture as about being led by the Spirit In this Case what shall be done Surely the Spirit must not be upbraided nor branded Neither will it follow That there is no Judge for Christ is the great Judge appointed of God the Spiritual great Prophet that speaks from Heaven and in his own time will give Judgment to the View of all Men. In the mean while he satisfies the Minds of those who are truly led by his Spirit and Withering Decay Murmuring Complaining and finally Apostasy will follow upon the Pretenders as is fulfilled in the present Judasses This hath been largely argued elsewhere yet I was not willing to let this Passage of our Enemies pass unconsidered which indeed is the Strength of his Book and what the ablest of our Adversaries can say against us an this account I have proceeded thus far more particularly in Defence of the Church against the Apostate Adversaries and their Apologist about the Argument by them made about the Hat and those Discords that issued In which I hope I have not exceeded the Bounds of Truth and Moderation For the latter Objection which is directed not so much against the Body of our Friends as a select Number of Ministers and Elders devoted as he falsly and scoffingly suggests to the Promotion of G. F's Authority and Interest I can with all Clearness and Sincerity and that in the Name of many Brethren give this following Testimony G. F. I would have all to know seeks not Himself but Christ and as becomes a true Apostle and Servant of his Lord and Master Jesus Christ Early and Late in Season and out of Season with incessant Pains and Care not being Burthensom unto any endeavours to promote the Work of God in the Earth and is so far from Lording it over any that he daily serves all for the Truth 's sake thinking no Labour too great nor Condescension too mean whereby he may be Serviceable to any in what concerns their Eternal Well-fare and this some of these Apostates must needs know He has approved himself and still doth among us to be a Man of God and a True Prophet of the Lord and as such we do Value him and the Rage of Men shall not Dis-settle us from our Sense and Regard of him who seeks not himself nor his own things but the Things of God that Christ and his Power alone may be exalted in the Hearts of all People and all Flesh humbled and for this alone are all publick Labourers of Value with our Friends and no otherwise Respected or Regarded then in the Lord which is not Tyranny but Duty Wherefore those Terms of Foxonian King George Fox Foxonian Leaven G. Fox and his Party or Adherents are with many more Words of Scorn and Abuse he has no such intended Lordship nor are we of his Party buâ— God's Free-Men and True Christians being with him Baptized by One Spirit into One Body the Unity of which these smiting Apostates and their abusive Libeller can never break I shall touch upon their Aggravations about not Marrying Burying c. before I come to those other Reflections made against G.F. our Ministry and My self and all before I end my Share in this Re-joynder First He is pleased to say That we deny them Trading Marrying Burying and all Ecclesiastical Civil Priviledges to those that dissent from us p. 7. These were the Aggravations I before promised to observe But alas What shall we say to a Man thus Hardy and resolved to be Wicked that he may render us so Did we even forbid Men Trading or endeavour to take People off from Trading with them J. Pennyman can say no such thing without Lying for several have lovingly frequented his Shop since he Enviously visited and disturbed our Meetings And how many do we daily trade with that are not of us in Love and full Assurance of their Honesty For Marrying I referred the Author of the Spirit of the Hat to the Apostle's Dehortation Be ye not Vnequally Yoaked together It seems if we cannot own Persons to be of us that are not of us we must be abused This made the present Apologizer if I am not out of my Guess Angry and Enraged with us at first 'T is not meer Talking of Christ and hammering out a few Notions in the meer Strength of Man's Will and Wisdom that makes a True Christian therefore we could not receive him for our Sect-Master that angers him And for Marriage we cannot have Unity with any in that solemn Performance of Marrying who are acted by a Wrong Spirit and so gone out of the Union of the Body of Friends We do not deny them that are so Married to be Married at all as this Enemy would conclude though to be Married in the Unity we can never own them As to our denying of Burial unto such Apostates my words in the Book called The Spirit of Alexander the Copper-Smith Rebuked carry no such unnatural Sense Two things I denyed 1. That we therefore denyed them a Burial because we should alwayes refuse it as of us whilst they continued in that Dissenting Spirit from us 2. That we Vsurped their Property To the first sayes our Adversary The Quakers would not suffer such to stink above Ground but he should be buried not among the Catholicks but as Hereticks in Spaine or Italy p. 19. Behold the Candor of this Interpreter What a strange Improvement has he made of my Saying much more resembling the Carriage of that sort of Catholicks he likens us to against
against those as Persecutors that obtained their Peace by Thrusting and Carrying us out But I will tell him first that our Paper against John Pennyman was as necessary to clear us from that Instigation of the Devil that led him to give up to burn the Scriptures of Truth and the Writings of Friends which were some of those Papers this Apologizer fitted for all turns of Deceitful Evasion calleth Wast pag. 37. under the Pretence of the Motion of God's Spirit as for an Innocent Man in Sight of a Murder to clear himself from being guilty of so heinous a Fact We delighted not at his Imprisonment for we were wounded by the Cause of it and had great Reason to deny that Action which brought a Reproach upon our Principle and Practice that never belonged to either God's Spirit hath hitherto lead us to Read Believe Obey and Witness the Scriptures and not to tare them as did our Adversaryes Orthodox Elizabeth Bâ—rens p. 52. in the height of Rage before mine Eyes and offer to burn them as did his so much Commended and Defended John Pennynman I perceive this Socinian Author denyes our Testimony by his Dislike of it and consequently owns that Wicked Position that the Spirit of God may lead a Man to burn the Scriptures of God against which our Testimony was mainly directed For his ancient grave Gentle-Woman as he calls her she hath been so Unhappy as through her Excess of Affection to J. Pennyman to be a Sharer with him in his perverse Out-Cryes against us yet I can scarcely think that she will attest any such thing But if it were true as I believe it to be false it can be no Valid Argument against the Faith Worship or Actions of the Body of the Quakers But why MOVED me-thinks here and in J. P's Case he hath learned to pronounce Moved as if he believed the Spirit in these Dayes used any such thing Is he angry with us for resisting Ann Mud's MOTION who himself p. 32 33 71. denyes the Certainty of any such thing but Envy blinds Men. We shall also grant that we are the Men whom the Eternal God from time to time raised to testifie against the Hireling Teachers that took Money for that which was not Bread but were like Wolves in Sheeps Cloathing devoured the Flock and made a Prey of the People and God hath blessed us in that Service for before a Gathering there was to be a Scattering And God made us Instrumental to turn People from Darkness to Light from the Power of Satan unto God by directing their Minds to the Gift of his Holy Light and Spirit which discovers the Deeds of Darkness convinceth the World of Sin revealeth the Mind and Will of God and gives Power to the Creature that believes in it to obey and do it For this Testimony in the â—irelings Synagogues did the False Jew or Christian Hale Tere Beat Bruise Knock down Stock Whip Imprison with many such like Horrid and Inhuman Actions which became not our Adversaries Interest though an Impartial Historian to mention But have we been no otherwise disturbed or have we so used our Disturbers Our Faithful Chronicles of the Bloody Tragedies of that Professing Generation will tell future Ages other things O the Partiality of this Socinian Apologizer for our Disturbers But to close this Either our Adversary condemns our former Testimonies against the Priests in their Steeple-Houses or he does not if he does he cannot justifie the Senseless Bawlings of Proud and Envious J. Pennyman Francis Chadwel and the like Disturbers of our Assemblies upon his own Comparison If he justifies their Disturbances of us especially those given by his Prime and Singular Witness F. Chadwel with what Face can he censure our Serious Solemn Admonitions or Reproofs in the National Synagogues Let it be as it will with him we expect an higher Judgment and to that shall we gladly yield And for those two or three Stories of the Wantonness Uncleanness of some particutar Persons among us though it is spoken to in some following Testimonies yet I have thus much to say J. W's Name is Basely and Falsly used by the Libeller though he could not have mentioned it but upon Information from some of these Defaming Apostates whom God will judge for endeavouring to Murder the Reputation of an Ancient Solid Faithful Labourer in God's Work Shall Ifs and may be 's conclude Men Guilty It is not the first Mistake W. M. if he be their Informer hath committed whose Jealous Surmising Soul can scarce do any thing else in Cases relating unto us as I have experienced His Worth is lighter to the Man his Name is brought in t to slander then the Chaff to the Wheat For the Two Young Women concerning whom M. Y's Information is cited they were examined Childish Toyish and Unseemly Carriages were with much Contrition confest but for any such gross Wickedness as was and is suggested by these Men they said it was false if there was a God in Heaven For M. Y. we shall say no more till we have a more express Account of his Concernment in that Libel or Information mentioned therein We see no Name to it and might as well suspect that with other things however our Friends behaved themselves in that Matter as became God's People to do For T. M One Story is cleared by the Woman's Testimony and W. M's Malice discovered For his common Uncleanness under Pretence of Physick c. We know not how to allow it for several Years since dealt withal by our Friends and in particular by a Physician about it and what there was any just Ground to Condemn him for he was judged his other Unwatchful Carriages denyed and his Conversation turned form by our Friends Lastly Suppose these Enemies of God and his Work and People could Say and Prove Ten Times as much shall those Miscarriages bring many Thousands of People out of Request and go for an utter Blast upon their Faith or Way Vain Men Should we tell the Stories of the Abominable Practices of both such Apostates and some Envious Professors what of Sin could we not find several that have profest their Way guilty of But we will make no Musick for the Atheist Has not every Miscarriage as Known been Reproved Yes Every Unfruitful Work of Darkness as by the Light within when known only to the Party Offending so by the Light in our Friends as a Church when known to them Is not this Gospel-Order Or must some raw Slips of Unwatchful Persons Antichrist our whole Society Reader These Things and Persons objected have been several Years since examined who were Innocent Acquitted and who were Guilty Condemned according to the Righteous Law of God And upon this old Condemned Stuff it is our Enemies feed with this they Arm themselves against us and upon this Quagmire as their best Foundation they stand In short They have been False to God Abusive to his People Hurtful to the
Moderate and basely Treacherous to their Ancient Friends If being Base to God and Men can render Men Christian then they deserve to be so accounted of But till Religion cometh to be read Backwards let them go for Enemies to Christianity and Murderers of Natural Affection To conclude OUr Ministry is of God it stands in the Power of the Living Spiritual Gift of God to testifie against all Ungodliness And if any Particular has ever slipt and brought Dishonour to the Truth such hath been Reproved in Righteousness and only Received upon Unfeigned Repentance which is God's Way But to Publish Proclaim and Aggravate Miscarriages of Any to the World who profess Religion committed many years ago Examin'd Judg'd and they Forgiven upon Repentance by the Lord and therefore Received again by us and all this done with Design to Blast our Credit Disgrace the Way we profess though they were no way concerned to meddle or interpose To do all this I say is not to be acted by the Spirit of God but That of an Accursed Ham and Treacherous Judas and the Lord will avenge our Cause we doubt not in due time But an Hainous Blasphemy is laid to the Memory of Josiah Coale by this Angry Agent in behalf of these Apostates and that is a Passage in a Letter writ anciently by him in his Life-time to G. Fox viz. That G. F. was the Father of many Nations But what Blasphemy is in this Is it any more then to say That by him as an Instrument in the Hand of God People of many Nations have been by him begotten to God Was not Paul a Father of many Nations who begot the Corinthians that were Greeks and the Romans that were Latins But further Whose Life hath reached through us thy Children even to the Isles afar off to the begetting of many again unto a lively Hope for which Generations to come shall call thee Blessed Very well And what Blasphemy lodges in these Words Is not that which is the Life of one Good Man the Life of another Were not the Christians of old by One Spirit baptized into One Body What Life G. F. had was from Christ Jesus and it was no other Life J. Coale writ of And I hope The Life of Christ is one in All and who can limit it And Josiah Coals with others were Children in the Sense afore-mentioned and that Life through those Children by him instrumentally begotten did reach to those Isles afar off unto which he and others went to preach the Everlasting Gospel Paul reached to the Churches though afar off 2 Cor. 13 10. He was Present in Spirit though Absent in Body for I verily as Absent in Body BUT PRESENT IN SPIRIT have judged already as though I were present In the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ when ye are gathered and MY SPIRIT in the Power of the Lord Jesus Christ cast forth and taken in too upon Repentance without going to the Lord Major and Aldermen 1 Cor. 5.3 4. His Life and Hope was through Timothy Titus and others extended unto many And why shall not Generations to come call an Apostle Blessed and bless the Name of the Lord for him respecting the Benefit any such one might be in God's Power to a People Is not the Memory of the Just Blessed Prov. 10.7 And did not the Lord by his Prophet say of Israel his People I will make thee an Eternal Excellency and the Joy of many Generations Isa 60.57 What if J. Coale had so spoak of G. F. and God's Israel now Would it have been Blasphemy But these Err not knowing the Scriptures nor the Power of God like the Jews of old But yet again whose Being and Habitation is in the Power of the Highest And so is the Being and Habitation of every Child of God or else he is in the Power of the Lowest the God of the World whose Habitation is in Darkness Are we not to turn away from such as stand not in the Power of Godliness And did not the Apostle go to turn People from the Power of Satan unto the Power of God which is the Power of the Highest And is it notwithstanding Blasphemy to stand in it or testifie of one that doth stand in it that he doth so stand Oh the Idle Opposition but great Envy of our Enemies They seek nothing less then the Blood of this Upright Man as the next Words and their Aggravation of them prove In which Thou Rulest Governest in Righteousness and thy Kingdom is establisht in Peace and the Increase thereof is without End Upon this our Adversary takes frequent Occasion scoffingly to call him King George suggesting him to be so vile an Impostor as to assume unto himself the Compleat and Peculiar Dignity Dominion and Authority due to Christ See Pag. 53 54 55. Which Blasphemy I am of the Mind our Adversary thinks deservedly Punishable after the Severest Sort of Death But he unworthily traduceth that Good Man and layes the Harmless Scripture-Expressions of a departed Servant of the Lord upon the Tenters or Rack that he may stretch them to his own Vile and Bloody Purposes Hath this Man forgot that there were ever such Passages writ as these The Good Seed are the Children of the KINGDOM Mat. 13.28 The KINGDOM of God is within Luke 17.20 The Saints shall JUDGE the World 1 Cor. 6.2 3. But ye are a ROYAL Priesthood 1 Pet. 9.2 And thou the Lamb hast made us unto our God KINGS and PRIESTS and we shall RAIGN on the Earth Rev. 5.10 And I appoint unto you a KINGDOM as my Father hath appointed unto me that ye may Eat and Drink at my Table in the Kingdom and JUDGE on Thrones the Twelve Tribes of Israel Luke 22.29 30. It is the Father's good Pleasure to give you a KINGDOM Luke 12.23 who hath translated us into the KINGDOM of his dear Son 1 Col. 13. the Untranslated therefore Rage Wherefore we have received a KINGDOM that cannot be shaken Hebr. 12.28 they then had it I beheld and the same Horn made War with the Saints and prevailed against them untill the Ancient of Dayes came and JUDGMENT was given to the SAINTS of the Most High and Time came that the SAINTS POSSESSED THE KINGDOM WHOSE KINGDOM IS AN EVERLASTING KINGDOM Dan. 7.21 22 27. By all which it is manifest that it is the Priviledge of every Saint and Child of God to be a King a Royal Priest to bave a Kingdom and to Rule Govern and Raign in Righteousness and Peace without End So that Josiah Coale and every Heir and Co heir with Christ Rom. 8.17 doth as well Raign in an Everlasting Kingdom of Righteousness as G. F. doth or shall do for we have One Faith One Baptism One Power One Lord One Kingdom Where let it be noted that by all these Titles and Priviledges we only mean and understand Dominion over Not Bodies nor Souls Not Flesh nor Blood but in the Sense of the Apostle Ephes 6.12
Principalities and Powers the Rulers of the Darkness of this World and Spiritual Wickednesses in High Places which center in the Invisible Dark Power of the God of the World that since the Beginning hath drawn and acted Man out of God's Counsel and Power in which the Kingdom stands For though we walk in the Flesh or Body we do not War after the Flesh for the Weapons of our Warfare are not Carnal but Mighty through God to the pulling down Strong Holds casting down Imaginations and every high Thing that exalts it self against the Knowledge of God 1 Cor. 10.4 5. And as our War and Weapons so our Kingdom is not Carnal but Spiritual not of this World but that which is without End and of this we are not ashamed It may not be unseasonable to take Notice of that Passage in his Book so often mentioned eagerly insisted upon and aggravated to the height of Ananias's Belying the Holy Ghost viz That G. Fox this Great Prophet as he in Abuse calls him should break open and alter the Contents of John Whitehead 's Letter which as he said was writ in the Name of the Lord and that to a quite contrary Sense making the Letter to judge those that kept the Hat on whereas J W. therein justified both those that kept it off or on Thus saith our Adversary doth G. Fox belye both John Whitehead and the Holy Spirit of God and that knowingly He proceeds Oh Prodigious Impudence He that counterfeits any Man's Name in a Matter of any Concernment deserves to be exposed on the PILLARY AND TO LOSE HIS EARS HOW MUCH GREATER PUNISHMENT DOTH HE DESERVE that Counterfeits both the Name of God and Man in a Matter of Religious Concern This sayes he is the Course that G. F. took to make his Injunctions to be observed But this is the Course more truly to make the Impiety of this Adversary more Notorious For first G. Fox never opened his Letter nor made any Alteration in it at all that I dare affirm in so many Words much less that he belyed the Holy Spirit and least of all that he did it willingly I perceive by his Conclusion he acknowledges that the Holy Ghost as really moved in J. Whitehead as in Peter contrary to his own Principle Any thing will they All grant that they may Slander or Injure us in the Minds of the People How knows he it was a True Motion Doth he not deny it may be known If so then how dare he be so positive in the Censure of G. Fox Will he make the Motion Uncertain and yet certainly judge G. F. for a Forger who was yet Innocent I leave it to the Reader what to call this part of his Tale. Secondly J. Whitehead gave Power by Letter at that time to the Brethren of London to supervise and alter it as they should see convenient and no otherwise was G. F. concerned in it then as one assenting with other of our Friends that according to Power given and their best Understanding did alter it for the better and herein did J. W. testifie his Unity and Fellowship for the Spirits of the Prophets are subject to the Prophets So that what was done was no more then what J. Whitehead left Power to do and which the Scripture justifies Wherefore Prodigious Impudence belongs not to G. F. but this hardy Adversary and Prodigious Cruelty Persecution if not Murder too is he guilty of that would have him not only Pillary'd and lose his Ears but his Life too or something very near a kin to it This is confirmed page 33. where he charges us to be Blasphemers and that such ought to Dye by the Law of God in former times The Consequence is plainer then his Power to execute it Oh the Mercies Oh the Forgiveness of these exceeding Meek Suffering Bruised Little Ones as they would have as think But Oh Deceitful and Blood thirsty Generation who have endeavoured what in you lies to betray with your Treacherous Kiss of pretended Love to our Souls our Faith Reputations and Lives too into the Hands of some Bloody-minded Jews who are not of the Circumcision in Spirit but lust against those that are that they may be stirred up against us But God will reckon with you and them too for these things This Adversary takes an Occasion to fasten a Lye upon a Paper set forth in the Name of the Quakers but he sayes writ chiefly by G. F. and G. W. in saying That we have paid our Taxes and other Dues more then any People according to our Abilities When sayes our Adversary their Neighbours know all over England there are at least some Taxes or Assessments which they have peremptorily refused But why must we be branded for Lyars because of that Saying or our Adversaries base Aggravation I do affirm That we have been oversest more then any and Paying those Extream Assessments gives good Ground for Saying what we did But indeed some Hat-Spirits perhaps could not say so but why Because some of them are so leavened into another Spirit that they almost question the Payment of any as M. Boreman now called M. Pennyman did I must not be plainer least the Cabal further represent me one that exposes Person to the Lash of Government Wherein we can pay we do what ever they come for and in some Cases wherein we cannot answer their Demands for Christ's Peaceable GOSPEL sake They commonly Take three times the Value seldom if ever Returning any again But this our Adversary calls no Paying Sure I am it is Loosing more then our Adversary dare adventure for if I mistake not he can send out all those things rather then suffer though perhaps against his Conscience also Well but if we will believe him there is such an Arrogant Imperious and Audacious Paper given forth by R. Farnsworth A. Parker G. Whitehead J. Coale J. Whitehead T. Loe S. Crisp T. Green T. Moon T. Brigs and J. Parks as he thinks was ever given forth by Mortals A Charge too great and a Reflection so sharp that it had need be one of the worst Papers that was ever writ Now let us hear what it is 1. They allow not such to have Dominion in the Church who exalt themselves above the Body of Good and Ancient Friends Now what hateful thing did they deliver in this wholesome Christian Saying It seems this Enemy of God and true Righteousness would have liked us better if Bad Friends had been suffered to exercise the Dominion over the Body of Good and Ancient Friends But he starts out thus That by the Body of Good and Ancient Friends is meant G. Fox and his Adherents which sort of Interpretation well becomes such a Caballistick Writer for after those Allowances I will misrender the best Cause Pretences or Actions in the World It is an arrant Falshood He was then far from them Neither had they him in their Eye in doing it but God's Honour and the
Churches Peace 2. That such as are not in Vnity with the Ministry and Body have no Gospel-Authority to be Judges in the Church And that it is abominable Pride when any Particular will not yield TO THE WITNESS OF GOD IN FRIENDS But what is the Matter with our Adversary Hath he lost his Wits that he makes this so Criminal Are any to be Judges in that Church they have no Unity with and amongst the Ministry they deny or are at distance from Strange Contradiction But why is it so Hainous to call such Proud or Self-willed who resist the Witness of God in Friends Certainly the Expressions are sound unless Scripture be defective He that can see any thing in them that deserveth such hard Words as this Billings-Gate Rhetorician bestoweth upon us has better Eyes then I. 3ly But they say That the Church without Dissenters has Power to Determine Controversies Very well and is it not true Are the Dissenters from the Church part of the Church they dissent from For Shame Thou Learned and talk so Idly Scripture declares That God has given the Power of Determination to his Church All the World knows That Dissenters are not of that Church they dissent from therefore the Church without Dissenters has that Power of Determination 4ly and 5ly But they add That such disapproved Ministers ought to leave off Ministring till they are Reconciled to the Church And if approved Ministers degenerate to Division the Church has Authority to deal with them in the same manner and that no such Persons Writings should be publisht with Consent c. What of all this He that can call this Imperious Audaoious c. can call any thing To allow that Dissentious Preachers and Writers are by the Church they dissent from to be approved of in the Course of that Ministry and Writing is such a Bedlam Boundless Piece of Stuff that none but one who thinks it Dangerous to be of any Party would be the Author of such a Wild Expression 6ly But they advise That such whom the Holy Ghost had made Over-seers should not admit of the Weak to that Trust nor such as seek not the Good of all which All this Disingenuous Wrester interprets The great Body of George Fox and his Party But Men of Wisdom and Moderation will not I am confident so spoil the Text with his Comment This is the seventh time in two pages that G. Fox is brought in as the Explanation of the Word Body who was then close Prisoner at Scar-brough where no Letter was suffered to come to him and who never knew of any Paper till sometime after its being out O the Implacable Envy of these Men I have hitherto waited for that Arrogant Imperious and Audacious Passage which might have raized up our Adversary's Choller and whetted him to this Degree of Scolding but find no worse then what I have transcribed and justified this last excepted and I think it justifies it self such as seek the Good of all are certainly Fittest If he dare tell us his Name and meet me by Day as he can post up his Scurrilous Title-Pages on the City Posts with Flambeux or Links and a Guard by Night I will any where and in any sober Auditory maintain the Truth of all these Particulars and their clear Consistency with Scripture and Reason on whom he has bestowed so many hard Names But 't is to be lamented of his Cabal that he should with his Passion and Hate divulge so much Ignorance as to cry out That he thinks the Pope himself hath never taken such Power as to determine in Matters of this Nature and Manner but in a general Council Poor Man Brand us he would one way or other Has he never read the Council of Trent nor considered among many others the Life of Paul the 3d Is he to be informed of that Controversie long on foot between the Jesuits and the Doctors of Sorbon and the Followers of Jansenius I thought Councils had sometimes been as meer Cyphers in Italy as Parliaments are in France But this Man is as Kind to Elizabeth Barns one of that Backsliding Spirit as he represents me else where Unjust to M. Boreman that was For though she has Torn the Bible calling it in my hearing the Pope's Idol the Professors Idol and the Quakers Idol an Incredible Thing with J. Faldo and T. Hicks and committed more then a small History of shameful Miscarriages since yet is he pleased to tell us That she seeing the Ministers exalted themselves cryed out while R. Farnsworth was preaching You have whored from the Lord. Farnsworth sayes our Adversary replyed Thou art a Whore but for fear of being too great a Forger he brings it afterwards thus in a Parenthesis or the Whore This Michael Stanclift called Unsavory For which sayes this Secretary he was cast out as calling the Spirit of Truth Vnsavory Oh the Wretched Work these People make Will our Adversary justifie her Interruption of R. F. in Preaching who condemned it in us who did it after a more seasonable and justifiable manner a little before Yes that he will But does he think R. F's Reply Unsavory and not E. Barns Out-cry who only returned her own Word to herself Yes that he will Strange But does he take E. Barns word Whore in a spiritual Sense as Degenerating and will he seem to understand R. F's word Whore only in a Common and Proper Acceptation as a Dishonest Woman Yes that he will Well but was it Vnsavory so to reply and not in E. Barns so to interrupt and speak Yes that it was implies this present Apologist both of himself and M. S. O Monstrous O Partial But perhaps M. S. apprehended that R. F. meant by Whore an Unclean or Dishonest Woman in the Sense before-mentioned and then there might have been some Ground for his Answer but if M. S. took R. F. in the sense in which he spoak it to wit that she was gone out of her Habitation that is the Truth turned Harlot in Spirit and so was become Clamorous as speaks the Wise Man and should notwithstanding call that Vnsavory it was a Sign that he had more Unity with that Vnclean Ranting and Envious Spirit in E. B. then the Friends of Truth that generally judged her And truly in that Case it was time for them to tell that Angry Old Man their Mind of him In which they did but that which I dare answer for before the great and terrible Judge of Heaven and Earth Mine Own Defence from the most Considerable Reflections made by this Libeller against Me. § 1 HE is pleased both to Jeer and Prophane upon this Passage in the Spirit of Alexander the Copper-Smith Rebuked We require not Men to practise what they are not convinc'd of but we will be well satisfied with any Member's Dispractice of an Orderly Performance once Chearfully owned For this he calls me a Deep-studied Man and the Passage a Learned Distinction Let the Learned
this in the inwards of my Spirit I smote upon my Thigh and said What have I done and was willing to take Shame upon my self and to give Glory to the Lord. How hard it went with me inwardly none knows And he that knows how easie it is to let in a Snare and Temptation and to have the inward Eye blinded thereby will not wonder nor think too hardly of me but his Bowels will rather rowl in the Sense of the Misery I underwent God knows I did not mistake willingly Nay truly The Power was upon me when I wrote those Queries but I did not understand the Signification thereof which would rather have led me then as it hath since against that Spirit which brought up that new Vnprofitable and Vnseemly Practice of keeping on the Hat in time of Publick Prayer in the Assemblies of God's People Now the making use of this against the Infallible Teachings of God's Spirit and the Infallible Way in which he leads his People is not Just True and Equal What! Was I never Infallibly led because the Enemy once blinded my Eâ—e and deceived me Did not the Apostle Peter receive the Infallible Spirit and was not he led thereby And did he not walk in the infallible Way because once he did that which was justly to be blamed and doubtless erred in Judgment concerning the Practice Gal. 2.11 I do not desire that Men should judge me Infallible or hearken to me as to one Infallible but this I desire that I may alwayes understand and follow the Voice and Guidings of God's Holy Spirit and then I am sure I shall alwayes walk in the Certain Vnerring Infallible Way besides which indeed there is no safe Way And I desire also that others with Ears and Eyes opened by the Lord may hear that Living Sound and Testimony which cometh from the Spirit of the Lord in those whom he sends that the Gathering may be to him and the Walking with him in the Spirit of his Son in the Light which is Eternal which ever was and ever will be Infallible which is the Path of the Living in this Day of the Breaking forth of God's Pure Power and Love in the Heats of many Oh Glory Oh fresh living Praises to his Name forever Isaac Penington John Crook's Testimony Having seen a Pamphlet intituled Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected in which is printed a Paper of mine writ by me about Eleaven or Twelve Years since about Gestures and Postures c. it is thus in my Heart to write MY Desires and Breathings from my tender years have been after the Living God and since I have tasted of his Goodness and Mercy I have had a Love for and Longing after the Eternal Welfare of all that in any Measure sought after him in Truth and Righteousness knowing the Enemy's Devices to be many and various seeking by all Means to devour them And from a deep Sense of the same I writ the Paper about Gestures and Postures c. many years since knowing how busie the great Enemy of Man's Soul was at that juncture of time to draw out the Minds of some into the Observation and Innovation of Keeping their Hats upon their Heads in the time of Prayer in the publick Assemblies of God's People hoping that those Lines at that time might have been Successful to stop that Practice in some of them at least and also have allayed any thing in any others which might be of tendency to hinder their Information and Recovery But it was never in the least in my Heart or Intention to Encourage or Strengthen that Spirit and Practice which my own Judgment and Practice was against Neither did I intend any other Liberty then what was in the Lord and the Maintaining Love and Vnity amongst Brethren And truly in these various or contrary Practices of some keeping on their Hats and others putting off their Hats my Heart was affected desiring that the Lord would put a Stop to whatever tended to Discord which since hath appeared manifestly to arise from that Spirit which first brought in that Innovation Therefore in Good Conscience I cannot but bear my Testimony against the Author of this scurrilous Pamphlet for endeavouring not only to fasten such a Sense and Imputation upon me but also for his Attempt and Industry what in him lies to render God's People Odious and his ever-blessed Truth Contemptible to the World and thereby himself becomes a Murderer of Souls in perverting the Right Way of the Lord for which the God of Heaven will undoubtedly rebuke both him and all his Confederates in this wicked Vndertaking and in his time bring them to open Shame if they Repent not of this their Wickedness and Sin For the Epistle subscribed by Edw. Burroughs John Perrot and My Self it was writ when we were Prisoners together in New-Gate where John Perrot forbore the Wearing his Hat on purpose as we supposed to avoid Offence and also at that time be writ a Paper which was Satisfactory concerning the Matter of the Hat and had he made it publick at that time it might have prevented what afterwards befel him At this very juncture when there was such a Compliance and Hopes of his Recovery was the fore-mentioned Epistle writ Now let the Impatrtial Reader judge whether the Author of this Envious Libel hath shewed either Ingenuity or Humanity in his recital of the fore-mentioned Papers to the End for which he hath made them publick John Crook Solomon Eccle's Testimony FRIENDS I Give my Testimony for the Lord and for this blessed Truth this Day The Lord is amongst us and through the Riches of his Love towards us hath he made himself known unto us by his Eternal Light which shines in our Hearts And this Light is exceeding pretious to all that receive it in the Love of it for it is Pure and Divine and to be admired in all that do believe The Life is the Light of Men Jo. 1.4 and to know this is the excelent Knowledge And by believivg in this Light and walking in the same We have Fellowship one with an other 1 Jo. 1.7 and Peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ But some are gone out from us and gone from their own Mercies and are turned against the Truth yet pretend to follow the Lamb They would Exclude us that the World might Affect them Of this sort is John Pennyman who hath sought Occasion against me and G. F. and hath printed and caused to be printed three times against me that never did him hurt first in his own Pamphlet next the Baptists called the Spirit of the Hat 3lY the Tyranny and Hypocrisy detected But in this he hath not done any wayes like a Servant of the Lord as he stiles himself nor a Follower of the Lamb for he never came to me in a Brotherly Way according to Gospel Order Mat. 18.15 first in secret by my self to shew me wherein I had done amiss if I had done amiss Nor was he so
in a former Book and it might have been sufficient to Reasonable Men For as I then said I did not Deny what I had spoke at the former Meeting but being Mis-understood I Explained it which gave Satisfaction We pretend not to be above Mis-hearings and Mis-apprehensions though above Wilful Evils It s well they have no greater Crime to accuse me of who are so Envious as to make use of such Trifling Inconsiderable Matters as this to Discredit us Well this I have further to say concerning the siad book That Hell hath opened her Mouth and the Dragon hath cast out Floods against the Church that is coming out of the Wilderness which the Lord our God is building upon the Rock Christ Jesus and the Gates of Hell shall never prevail against it And many hath the Lord established upon this Rock who are Inhabitants thereof and can sing for Joy in the midst of all Tryals and Excersises Storms and Tempests knowing that our Foundation stands sure and as there we abide we can never be moved having Salvation for Walls and Bulworks and being kept as in the Munition of Rocks where our Bread is sure and our Waters never fall Praises to the Lord forever James Claypoole John Osgood's Testimony I Having seen a Pamphlet called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected in which my Name is inferred in pag. 17. saying That whilst I in general terms deny all I do in particular deny nothing at all I say My Answer stated the Matter truly as it was and many are the yet Witnesses that know it to be so and to J. P. at his House it was so proved to be since the said Answer was printed And as to his Query in pag. 28. What is become of the Integrity of J. O. that he should put his Name among such Men as these I answer As for these Men I believe they would not affirm a thing with Pen or Toungue that they knew to be Untrue as this Pamphlet basely insinuates nor did I so much as in the least know of their Answer till I saw it printed And as for my Integrity it is known unto the Lord and to him have I approv'd my self in faithfulness even in Reproving the Extravagancies of him that I believe was the Grand Informer to him or them that made this Pamphlet and Sorrows many the Lord knows I have and had for him and oh that he had not been above Counsel then had he not been found Running the Race of Core nor Furnishing with Spears the Goliahs of Gath that this day Defie the Host of the Living God How have they made the Haerts of the Uncircumcised Glad How doth Askalon Rejoyce and Atheism say Ah! ha thus would we have it How is this Pamphlet furnished with Scoffs as Foxonians King Fox and Ironically Oh Innocent Holy Harmless People Well the Righteous Terrible Dreadful God will Avenge for these things What thought the Apostle said There where those things amongst the Corinthians that were not so much as to be named among the Heathens what must be their Portion that unto the Heathens made known this and thereby the God of the Christians Blaspheamed and the Way of Truth Reproached as it is at this day But with this sad Difference some of them that now are Agents in this Work have Tasted of and Witnessed unto theat Immortal and heavenly Power that was and is manifest amongst us and have gone from it and given heed to Fables Being Heady and High-minded they have stumbled and caused others to stumble they have Offended and treasured up the Offences of others unto their own Hurt John Osgood William Gosnell 's Testimony This is my Faithful Testimony for God his Truth and People and the Clearing of mine own Conscience As also given forth for Information of the Sober Enquirer and for'Condemnation of J. P. and his Confederates against whose Works I am and hope shall terminate my dayes in Judgment against that Spirit they serve Warning all to take heed of them who tender the Good of their Souls knowing their Ways and Works lead unto Death by Means whereof the Way of Truth is Evil-spoken to the Dishonour of God and Strengthening of the Wicked in their Doings FOr that my Soul loves the Truth and such who are the Faithful Servants thereof I do therefore reckon my self concerned with my Brethren as also for their sakes who have any Desires in their Hearts after the Way of Truth as it is by a Remnant Despised of Men in this our Day made known and testified unto to write something in Answer to what is charged against me in a Libel called TYRANNY AND HYPOCRISIE DETECTED which to the truly Sober and Unprejudiced Reader can be accounted nothing less then impious Railing and from an Ishmaelitish Spirit and from the Enemy of all Good in his Instruments manifested against such who are Resisters of Tyrrany and in the Uprightness of their Hearts Denyers of Hypocrise and in that give my Testimony against the said Pamphlet believing that whosoever is the Author thereof or Contributory thereto shall receive of the Lord our God the Just Judge of all who hath pleaded and will plead the Cause of his Truth and People the just Recompence of Reward according as their Work hath been which unto them who walk in the Light are seen to be Evil and They the Workers thereof bound in Chains of Darkness reserved to the Judgment of the Great Day nevertheless my Soul's Desire is if possible the may find a place for Repentance In Pag. 45. called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected are these words When I first saw Gosnell ' s Name in the Spirit of Alexander I expected nothing less then a Denyal of what is related to have been said by G. F. viz. Friends Although I have not told it you I do now declare That I have Power to Bind and to Loose whom I please In that thou didst nothing less then expect a Denyal c. doth manifest what Spirit thou art of viz. That which watcheth and waiteth for Evil and expecteth nothing less Why didst thou not set thy Name to that which thou hast heaped up that so we might have known ther and made some Enquiry after thee It s written That Fear surprizeth the Hypocrite Were thy Works such as would bring Honour to thee it may be we might have had thy Name at large but thy Works are manifest to be Evil and of the Flesh as are Railings Envious and Scoffing Speeches Slanders and Evil Suggestions So though thou concealest thy Name yet by thy Fruits thou art manifested to be an Evil Tree For an Evil Tree bringeth forth Evil Fruit. And why thou shouldst Expect a Denyal whilst sayest thou it seems is true let the Sober judge And so thou goest on as one of Ishmael's Brood with a Scoff saying How can it be otherwise that so Great a King and Prophet as G. F. should not have Power to Bind and Loose That there is a Power to Bind and
Heart Henry Stout Rebecca Travese's Testimony A Testimony in the Spirit of Love against that Malitious Spirit that in certain Apostates and their Abettors exercises Tyranny and Hypocrisie every where TO you Friends is my Love who are in the Enquirings after the Lord and his Truth that you may come to be Partakers of the same Inheritance of Life and Glory that many are made Witnesses of through Believing And the Power thereof we cannot but testifie of as by the Effectual Working and Operation in our Hearts we feel not only to set us free from that which imbondaged us in times past as well as others but hath brought us to the Liberty of the Seed of God which above and before all seeks the Glory of God and this hath enriched us with Grace and enduring Mercy whereby we feel all our Iniquities taken away and Transgressions blotted out in and for the Name and Power of Christ which in us is become the sure Hope of endless Glory and this hath made us Us That hold the Faith willing to proclaim the good Will of God unto all that others with us might come to set down in the Heavenly Places with Christ our alone Head and Life and be delivered from those Runnings Strivings and Inventions Tossings Tumblings and Turmilings that all Image-Makers are in not being possible to find Rest but in and by the Light which from the Rest comes and to the Rest gathers into which many are entred and cannot be disturbed or made afraid and it is Everlasting And the Satisfaction and Peace of this true abiding Love rests upon us and constreins us to call and invite them afar off as those near to come freely to the Fountain of Living Water without Money and without Price For a Remnant are come to know that there is and shall be a daily adding of them to us that shall be saved for the Work of the Lord must prosper notwithstanding all the Force and Subtility of them that contrive against it The Building must be finished all things are prepared and preparing thereunto and the House of the Lord shall be established upon the Top of that that resisteth it and the Foundation is already laid sure and steddy and every Stone hewen and fitted thereto is pretious and the Command of our King none can reverse for he is Almighty and works according to the Counsel of his own Will 't is Counsel indeed close hid from all Sorts of Workers in the dark So they fret and are angry the Heathen rage but theirs is a Fury that consumes it self and soon goes out if not added to by new Fewil And these of all Sorts have manned their Weapons to the utmost and done what ever they can to hinder the Increase of this Work yet these are not the worst Enemies for it is the People that imagine vainly that ever withstood the Appearance of God in the World search the Scriptures Christ came unto his own them that profest a Waiting for him and they rejected him they crucified him yea he that walkt with Christ and sometimes cryed Hail Master he and these Pretenders are the Betrayers in all Generations and Hinderers of the Work of the Lord here the Power of Darkness in all Generations wrought mind Scriptures through all that desire to be kept from resisting the Just and Holy One. Though many Enemies Nations and People Withstood the Servant of the Lord Moses in his great Work whereunto God had called him yet none did like Mischief as that gain-saying Spirit in Korah Dathan and Abiram and Balaam that was for and against Israel who had been a Prophet and loving the Wages of Unrighteousness becomes a Tempter and layes the Snare that they might Sin against God and be divided from The Blessing And so mind who hindred the Building of the Temple of the Lord in the time that Deliverance drew nigh when the great and noble Travil of the Holy Servants of the Lord that were Zealous for the Restoring of the Captivated to their former Liberties and Rights in the Place that then was owned and appointed of the Lord and ever to be remembred was and is the Courage Boldness and Constant Watchfulness of those Worthies Ezra Nehemiah and Zerubabel that discerned the Falseness and Treachery of those pretending Friends that did not only seem to approve their Works and offer to build the House of the Lord but to assist them saying Let us build with you for we seek your God as you do and that they had done it for a long time but they being discerned and refused by Zerubabel and the other Worthies of Israel then they manifested themselves to be Hinderers of the Work of God and hired Counsellors against them to frustrate their Purpose whose Work a little before they pretended to be assistent to and after write against them with great Accusasations Ezra the 4th and the 14th and Nehemiah the 4th and the 1st Sambalet and Tobiah they mocked taunted and scoffed to make ridiculous and little Worth the then Endeavours and good Orders that these Noble Men put in Practice for the Restoring of the House of God And so to you Friends to whom my mind is directed that are weak in the Faith I writ that you may be warned that you may be strengthened against this Treacherous Spirit Do not these Scriptures run parallel with them that have brought forth such Accusations whether false or true Is not their End one who have joyned with and taken Counsel of such whom they know were and are contrary to the People and Truth that they formerly seemed to be of and for to make Odious and Ridiculous in the Sight of all Men with their Orders And though some of them under Pretence did act with them and would have Lorded it as much as any until discerned and dealt with for their Unorderly Practice and Unsubjectedness to them that in the Spirit serve the Lord continually So Friends This is it I would have you observe in all things and at all times that that Spirit that professeth Truth and talkes of Truth and seems for it and yet is against it is not of God though it seems so for here first sprang and is continued that monstrous Anti-Christian Brood that hath filled the Earth with Darkness Blood and Cruelty and with these shall those be judged that in this our Day have given and taken Offences to lay Stumblings in the Way of the Simple But Glorified be the Power that hath broke forth before which they must all fly yet here and there a few crawle up to use their Strength against the Increase of his Power the Word of whose Mouth shall destroy them and the Brightness of his Coming shall utterly consume them for they are such of whom the Apostle complained had done him much Wrong for they hindred as much as in them lay the Purpose of the Lord in the Earth And this hath been the Work of many in this our Day of
God's Appearance from the beginning thereof and by such as came to see the Glory of Truth and heard gladly for a Season as they that receive the Seed in the high way where it was either lost or carried away by the Fowls of the Air and these could never fell All for the Kingdom nor take up the daily Cross so mist the Life and came to be carried about with Winds and missing of the Righteousness of God have gone about to establish their own and blindly Zealous have watched others Vineyards and neglected their own so Withering and Fruitlesness hath come upon them until they are twice dead These were and are known by their Murmurings and Complainings yet listed up in their Minds by their own Righteousness which as sure as God's Righteousness layes low and makes to grow in Love so Man's begets Envy and watcheth for Evil and feeds upon it and is filled with it So as they living in Love can think no Evil so they out of it can imagine no good of them from whom by Pride and Envy they are divided and so exercising their Minds in the Evil. Never did hungry Beasts more earnestly seek their Prey to devour it then these Back-sliders have and do watch to catch the Miscarriages of any such as do profess the Faith and if they can find a little they make it a great deal by Whisperings and Back-bitings and large Intimations more by much then the Substance and in all pretending to be in an Hatred of Evil and to cry to others Stand farther off for we are Holyer then these So after a doing some years Threatnings to make the Lord's People Odious in what they would publish and bring forth and having done what they can to the utmost that way and that not accomplishing their End now they lay their Stress on the severe Government of the Quakers which some of these Revolters once knew was set up in the Wisdom of God to hinder such Evils as they were used to speak against and to reform and gather nearer unto the Truth of God but this Order being like to smite some of them they strike hard at those that are exercised therein their End being in all to present the People of the Lord and their Way Worthless and Bad that so they themselves might not be so manifest in the Forsaking and Withstanding the Good Way of the Lord and that they might shut up that Kingdom to others into which they themselves would not enter And tha◠to all they may be manifest their Works declare them for every Lye is of the Devil and how many they have publisht in their late Books of Darkness to which they have been ashamed to joyn a Name can I tell nor am I covetous to know for who in the Faith stands wars not with Flesh and Blood but with Spiritual Wickedness in High Places and I have had and have as sensible a Feeling of that Spirit from whence it comes and whither it must go that brought forth that called the Spirit of the Hat and that called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected or an Answer to Alexander the Copper-Smith and it is the same that the Prophet Micha had a Sight of that Lying Spirit which went into the Mouthes of the Seduced Prophets and though I never read the last of these Pamphlets in that my time not being like to be long on Earth I was not willing to Mis-spend so much of it but one reading the Title to me a Renewed Strength I found against that Spirit that brought it forth and that it did with Re-doubled Strength strike at W. P. as one whose Pen had hit them and had he never writ a Word he judgeth them in Denying the Glory of this World the Vain Hope of which hath bewitched some of them to draw back And another read to me that Lye made of me in the last of these two Books which I must speak something to that little part that was read to me of my Son J. O. and I. I need not say much of my Son J. O. for he through Grace is made able to display and resist them only this I would have all the Simple take notice of their Scornful Taunts and Willingness to render him and I as Speakers Falsly or being like unto them and indeed in this they much resemble God's Enemies in former Ages as in other things and to his Judgment are they left I having not a Purpose at this time so much to answer them for whom my Hope is near worn out as to hold out my Hand with many Brethren that the Honest-hearted might be delivered from those Perdicious Wayes they walk in and are alluring to by their Subtility and False Speeches And by Question they ask How could this accute Man say The Meeting would not hinder his Marriage To this as a Witness I answer I heard with many more J. B. whom they most accused to hinder say That they had nothing against his Marriage and this some of their Confederates know And for what they say of me as being a Great Mother and Governess among these People is but to set me on high that the Dîrt they fling may the more come upon me for some of them that are so Miserable as to contribute to this Work of Darkness in Fighting against Truth know that I have Gladly and Long been a Servant to this People of the Lord and no more Government have I coveted or gained but by Love and in Love possess And for the Charge writ against me it is utterly false in Matter and Words as these Accusers have stated it for those words they say I cried out no Man nor Woman that was present in that great Congregation will witness it if they fear to Lye and there are may many Witnesses of what I said and though I was permitted to speak a few words at that time that one or more of their Informers heard me say I had condemned as not expedient to have been spoken there but they being in the Dark have altogether mist it and placed a Lye of their own making in the stead of what I spoak But I unfeignedly desire that they may find a place of Repentance for this and all other their Evils But it is followed with another Falsity for say they By her Authority and J. O 's Interest they proceeded te Marry without's License As to License from any Man or Woman to Marry I have often publickly as called to it born my Witness against and with the rest of the Lord's People declared We make no Marriages nor break no Marriages nor Marry any but every True Man and Wife should known their being joyned of the Lord and so were these Couple yet did not nor durst not go brutishly together as some pretending more Holiness then others have done but this prudent Couple according to the Example of Holy Men and Women had many Witnesses of the People of the Lord and in an Orderly Solemn Assembly took
each other and the Presence and Power of the Lord sealed to it and she was a Blessing to him to whom the Lord gave her all her days And I was so far from the Exercise of Authority in that Matter that I know not that I Invited one to the Marriage much less Commanded and J. O. used no Interest in that Matter that I know then what he gained by Love and had these Accusers come to and kept in this Love they had been kept out of that Spirit of the Accuser that now from time to time acts them to seek Occasion against the Brethren and the Truth and then whether False or True as those that Rejoyce in Iniquity they publish it that they may Murder in the Way And if any Righteous Soul grieved and burdened with their Bringings forth in Mischief Write or Answer them sharply they imagine they get Strength by it and shew it to Adversaries of Truth as if the People of the Lord did Amiss in Clearing the Truth and throwing back the Dirt on them from whence it comes but let all take notice that the Prophet Elijah was Justified in his Reproaching of Baal's Priests in their Blind Worships and Mad Fury for the True God appeared to him for his Justification as be doth unto us that abide in his Power unto this day But for the Taunts and Mockings of Samballat Tobiah they are recorded for their Infamy forever For what is the Chaff to the Wheat saith the Lord And I did not nor do not intend to Controvert or Answer the Writings of these Enemies of Truth having not so much as read them through only a few Lines which being False Truth required to come over and upon the Head of the False Worker is it set and I did not then cry out as they say in my own Concern nor do I now write to serve my selfe but the Truth and the End hath and shall declare the Ground of all Actions And as the Fighters against God have and do scatter from him and gather into the World with the Vain Customs thereof so those that have and do contend earnestly for the Truth have no other End or Aim but to preserve in and gather to the Grace of God which Teacheth to Deny all Vngodliness and Worldly Lusts and many Thousands they are that to this day are preserved thereby out of the Net that these Subtil and Deceitful Ones have laid and are laying But Sufficient is the Grace in which we have believed and thereby we receive Power over all Spirits which are gone out and hatch Mischief and bring forth Lyes But Praises be to the Power that hath brought many into the One Mind that above and before all they seek the Encrease and Enlargement of Truth and these have the Mind of God and know he is on their side and laughs to Scorn all his Enemies And our Communion and Fellowship is Holy and within the Holy Place where the Unclean and Inventers of Evil could never come for the Unfeigned Brotherly Love gives an Enterance thereunto but they out of it not seeking after this grow in Envy by lusting thereto and offering Despight to the Spirit of Grace in themselves they bring forth the same against all us that are guided thereby And I am bold in that Spirit that cannot Lye to say to all in this Gainsaying Spirit as I did many Years since to some in the same Spirit and some of these Evil-Workers did hear it and are Witnesses it is fulfilled on them of whom it was then testified J. P. and C. B. and others if they return not they are and shall assuredly be swallowed up of the Earth and link into it cast again into the Sea from whence they were taken as bad Fish indeed out of the Net But Holy is the Lord and his Name shall be Magnified of all the Upright Ones for their Redemption is sure and these are daily coming forth with Songs of Thanksgiving and the High Praises of the Lord are in their Hearts and Mouths forever and for evermore Amen Friends that are plain-hearted and love Righteousness and though but turned Sion-ward and you that for the Truth have sold All you are all very dear unto me as I know I am and must be to you for as we are all of one Begetting and are come to the one Hope and are nourished at the one Breast where the Milk of the Word causeth to grow into the Oneness of that Spirit which sets free from Sin and Death here we have Unity and bear one another's Burdens and in the Life of the Head are affected with the Suffering of every Member that hath Life therein and with his Compâ—ssions come to be filled and having Fellowship in his Suffering are grieved and oppressed with the Works of the Adversaries every where and at all times that ever since the Entrance of the Night of Apostasy to this time are as truly Persecuting Christ Jesus in his Members and Slaying him in the Streets of the great City spiritually called Sodom and Aegypt as Paul persecuted â—â—m when he got Letters from the high Priests to take Men or Women that were of that Way and bring them bound to Jerusalem And as sure as the Apostle John saw his Crucifying in the Spirit of Prophecy so certainly with all the Contenders and Gain-sayers and Resisters of the Testimony of Jesus which Testimony is the Spirit of Prophecy be found Fighters against God who mischievously have taken up all Miscarriages and Mistakes and with their Misunderstandings and own dark Imaginations adding Lyes of their own making whereby some have been weakened and others turned out of the Way and the Truth come to be questioned by the Ignorant whereby the End of these Revolters is made manifest And though I have not so much as said in my Heart I would they were cut off from the Lord yet sure I am they have gone about as much as in them lies to pervert the good Way of the Lord by making the People believe the Quakers allow Vcleanness or Vnrighteousness in that some professing it have gone out as they and practised those things that the Light testifieth against and yet when in good Order by Men loving Holiness there is a Meeting to reform or divide such far from us in the outward this offends them also So may not all see the Restlesness of this Spirit that would throw the Guilt of those that have offended on those Innocent ones that are travelling for the Removal of all Evils But there are many Thousands to the Praise of the Power of God be it spoken that are kept not only out of Uncleanness and all Unrighteousnes but are in the true Religion which keeps from the Spots of the World and their Communion stands where the Blind could never see Another Stumbling-Block that these that are making the Offences lay in the Way of the Simple is as if we honour and set up Man in the Place of God or
we were Worshippers of Angels which is indeed Idolatry To which I am called to say something as being presented with others whom I am bold to say believe all Obedience Honour and Thanks-giving belongeth unto him that sits upon the Throne and to the Lamb for evermore and are not guilty of what this malitious Spirit would present them to be But being acted by the same Spirit that they were that said this Man sayes he is the Son of God and therefore ought to dye So they not being in the Spirit that revealeth the Son of God thinks we worship Man for him but he that knew Christ revealed in him bids follow him as he followed Christ and that if I forgave any I forgave it saith he in the Person of Christ This I speak to the Simple and Upright-hearted that they may be delivered out ot the Snare of the Cunning Hunter that seeks the pretious Life and to such it will be given to know what is hid from the Serpent that is still blind and on Dust feeds and the Children's Bread I nor any in the Faith dare give unto them But that every honest Heart may see what Spirit acts in these Purposers of Evil I take notice of another Passage where this Libeller names my Name and indeed I knew not of it when I writ the former Part but an honest young Man in the Street told me of it and then I looked on that which they accuse me with some times before that and after it I read and being by the Power of the Lord whom I serve in my Spirit made as willing to remove any Offences as these by whom the Offences come and on whom the Wo must come are to lay Stumblings and I shall freely confess to that which is true in their Charge and deny the Falshood in this as the former and I shall begin with that in the 19th Line pag. 44. It 's not unusual say they with the Quakers to give as much Credit to one another as is the setting their Names to things they know not Answ Friends take notice how Ignorant the Carnal Man is of the things of God and not knowing that Nearness and Strength of Love that is among the Disciples of Christ he brings it among the rest of the Rabble of his Accusations that the Quakers credit one another in such matters as indeed no Money-Lover nor Unbeliever could never do for every Deceiver is afraid to be deceived but who out of the Deceit is brought into the Faith and Love that is unfeigned cannot fear that a Brother will deceive or hurt him and had rather bear the harm of a False Brother if it should so be suffered to be then mistrust or think Evil of him that is the Faith But the Accuser of the Brethren with all his Adherents are out of this Faith and are Strangers to this Love by which it works And though I never knew such a Practice among the Quakers not in one President ever offered to me or any to put their Hands to what they know not but this here rehearsed and is this only by what he himself and my Maid said some of which I know to be true and some false but I had Joy that all should know in this Pack of Falshoods this Truth That the Quakers have and do still credit one another But whether it was so or no that G. F. sent to our House to have J. P. and my Husband put their Hands to such a Paper as they knew not all I know of it I may speak of My Maid-Servant then living with me many Years since told me in a Morning when I came down that there was a Man with a Paper to have some Friends put their Hands to and that J. P. was a wise Man because he refused it and this I upon some Occasion told J. P. of for I do not believe he ever heard my Maid say so to him but he being affected with his own Commendations hath repeated it before me more then once that my Maid should say he was a Wise Man What was said was said to me and from me he had it and to my Knowledge I never heard my Maid to say Nor did I ever tell him or hear him speak those words That she believed her Master would have done it until now I see it in Print so I cannot but take notice of their adding that which is False to make their Matters hold together nor do I remember that Time or Day or Week that I said any thing of George Fox these words that he repeats as though I spoak them at the same time but that I did at some time speak those words to J. Pennyman and it may be to some others I deny not for in the Love of the Lord I travelled for him and some others of them that were in Danger by their Imaginations to fall into the Pit of Perdition and so as one that lived in the Love of God I according to the best of my Understanding endeavoured their Return and Safety by imparting to them what I had found to be my Profit and Safety and bowed to him and several of them in telling them that in the Light none errs yet that I was such a Child as for many years I might not know my Right-Hand from my left and if there were a Motion or Revelation did arise in me that I might think was true and we that are in Unity in the Spirit of God may and do speak our Motions one to another for the Spirit of the Prophets is subject to the Prophets and the Order of the Church was that they might Prophesie one by one and the rest might Judge yet if G. F. should deny it to be of the Lord I should be subject to his Judgment therein as one in Christ before me This or to this purpose I spoke and deny it not But that this Despiser of Dignities may attain his own End to pervert the Good Way of God by giving them to know what I was he said A Great Prophetess Now if he did believe what he saith though it was then a young time with me being nigh Ten Years ago he should have followed my Example and have brought his Motions to some in Christ before him to have tried his Motion and so by Counsel have been delivered from those Wanderings and Runnings and Mad Actions that he ran into when he brought that Truly-Valued Book called the Bible that I and many are come to the Comfort of and know that it hath been the Mighty Power of God that hath preserved it from the Hands of those that would have utterly Extinguished or Destroyed it to be burned But Praises be to the Lord that hath preserved iâ— unto this Day to give Testimony to the Light and Spirit which gave it forth though J. P. may be reckoned among the Intenders that would Destroy the Bible who brought it to the Exchange with other serviceable Books in their Places
and setting some on Fire in order to burn them was prevented in this his Work of Darkness and being by me and others dealt with for this and other Mad Actions intreating him to come to Repentance and no more follow the Imaginations of his own Brain but he being too high for Counsel or Intreaty returns us Hatred for Love and goes on in Impenitency and Malitious Practices unto this time as all the High-minded and Despisers of Counsel ever did and therefore no marvel that he presents me as one doing Amiss in saying I should subject to one in Christ before me in any Case So all the Honest and Plain-hearted will come to see their End and Spirit and beware thereof And I have Justification with God in giving Honour to whom Honour is due and have no Man's Person in Admiration and know G. F. did never seek for Honour nor hath been trusted in or bowed to as a Man but who seeth him that is sent of God must hear and obey him and if any have or do exalt or worship any but the Seed Christ to whom all Honour Worship and Obedience is due they have another God and practise another Doctrine then G. F. hath been the Messenger of for unto him the only Begotten of the Father he came to gather and as he hath received hath given unto us that in the one Everlasting Covenant testified of by him and all sent of God we may know the Father and the Son whom he hath sent And many through believing can say He is ascended and lives for evermore But such as are out of the Faith Reprobate from God could never see the Descendings not the Ascendings of the Son of God who is to be Honoured as the Father And they that are without Guile may see the Heavens open and the Angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man But all out of the Spirit of Truth are Wonderers and Despisers thinking and speaking Evil of those things they know not We read of one that came to Christ in the outward and said unto him Good Master What may I do to have Eternal Life Christ answered him with a Question Why callest thou me Good None saith he is Good but God This was a Parable to me when out of the Faith but in the Faith it is given to know the Deep Things of God And I only mention this Scripture to throw back the many Accusations that these Carping Spirits do cast on us as if we Idolize Man or Men when all in the Faith know all Power all Good is of God manifest and revealed in the Son by that Eternal Light and Spirit in which we worship And none ever come unto the Father but by the Son nor none ever come unto the Son but whom the Father draweth And all those that are in the Dark prophane that Name whereby we are saved but our Peace they cannot Break nor the Purpose of our God Hinder for it must be accomplished The full Time is come and coming in which all things shall be put under his Feet in whom we believe And so I shall Conclude with minding J. Pennyman and that though I have Cause to believe He Tauntingly calleth me A Great Prophetess yet I would have him call to Mind what I writ to him when he was a Prisoner at Bishops-Gate and as it hath in part been fulfilled the full Truth thereof shall come upon him and be made manifest to many and if not the Lord hath not spoken by me Rebecca Traverse Ellis Hooks's Testimony OF late there have been two Scurrilous Books published against the People of God called Quakers one entituled The Spirit of the Hat and the other called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected or a further Discovery of the Tyrannical Government Popish Principles and the Vile Practices of the now Leading Quakers Which Books are full of Taunts Jeers Lyes Scoffs and Scorns which indeed are scarce worth answering for God and all sober Men know us to be otherwise and our Neighbours that are not prejudiced But some thing has been answered and is answered for the sake of the Moderate and Simple that they may not feed with them upon Lyes Scoffs and Jeers and their Condemned Stuff and such that have been amongst them and have seen their Errors and have Condemned and been heartily Sorry of and for those things while they were amongst them that is Meat now for the Vagabond Quakers like the Vagabond Jews which they publish to the World to help them that deny the Principle of Truth it self and have made them a Feast with Lyes and nevertheless they boast of the Parts of the Hat-Men as in page 71. and those that Consent with them of the Abilities and Endowments and then Scoff and Jeer at the People of God and call them Foxonians Will this be taking think you with People that love Peace and Quietness But truly their Endowments and your Abilities are manifest to all the Peaceable People and Sober-minded The Hat-Men have been Raking and Watching these many years for Evil and Failings and give it you to publish which manifesteth your two Parties opposite one against another for one pretends to stand for the Principle of Truth but the other clearly denies it But Pilate and Herod were agreed against Christ and so here is Pilate Herod and Judas agreed against Christ's Members and so against him the Head And these Vagabond Quakers that have been Watching for Evil Corrupt Members these many years and you that Consented with them say The People of God called Quakers are fallen in their Principles But they are the Hat-Men that are fallen for the True Quakers ever stood against the Hat-Men as they call them in the time of them and the Ranters and we say They are fallen And you that take their Part and Consent with them should publish your Names and be ashamed of your Doings in the Dark but bring forth your Names to the Light and not work in the Dark nor challenge in the Dark without Name and great Boasts for we can appear before the King and the King of Heaven concerning our Actions And as for the Hypocrisie and Tyranny of the Hat Spirit which would thrust it self in among us which never was of us from the beginning we alwayes judged it by the Power of God to be of the Ranters who would have thrust in amongst us before it was born And as for Popish Practices we deny and Tyrannical Government but own the Order of the Gospel the Power of God And there is none of all them that are mentioned in these Books that hath done any Uncivil thing but hath been dealt withal according to the Order of the Gospel and what has been Amiss they have acknowledg'd and been heartily Sorry for and have Turned from the Evil of their Doings but these Hat-Men or the Spirit of the Hat that have not Repented and Some did make Confessions like Pharaoh and in Words seem'd to Repent are now turned
F. and other Friends to dispose of as J. W's Testimony under his own Hand before going doth testifie And therefore here you may see what sort of Men these are that forge such Lyes upon G. F. And that which he left to G. F. and others to alter was the Matter concerning Wearing the Hat in Prayer for that was the Matter then in Controversie and not Other things which he wrote to you For the Spirit of the Prophets is to be subject to the Prophets And as for George Bishop's Paper mentioned in your Tyranny and Hypocrisie about the time that you would have thrust your Spirit of the Hat in amongst us he did give it a sufficient Blow in Bristol which you might have done well to have printed with his Paper but it is like that made against you who feed upon Condemned Stuff Actions which many have been sorry for running into in the time of their Ignorance wherein they beguiled the Simplicity but now returned to Christ their Shepherd and feed amongst the Flocks of his Pasture but God's Words are true The Serpent must feed on Dust who is out of Truth Dust is the Serpent's Meat Your Sting Venum and Poison is felt and savoured And as for John Bolton's Reproving the Slit in the Woman's Coat which you stuff up your Book with and G. F's Paper against Fashion and Images c. You may feed on such Stuff who live in the Vain Fashions which therein are declared against and which shall stand over you and your Images And as for all your Aggravations and Nick Names which proceed from your bitter Gaul and Envy Simon Magus like we shall leave to God to judge of for there are few sober People but see your Books are a piece of Envy Malice Hatred and Spight and to be a Spirit that seeks Blood and you would not have been so served your selves And you make a great Clamour against our Law Government or Order I say as before Our Order is the Gospel Order and our Law is the Spirit of Life which we received which is in Christ Jesus the Heavenly Man by which the Old Adam's Actions are judged And further The Spirit of the Hat saith That G. F. and some others the Elders had a Meeting to Judge and Condemn several Men and Women of Good Report Answ Why might not William Mucklow have said That he was one of them that had reported that Slander to a Lass upon a Woman that was Innocent who was judged for it And this is another Lye in your saying That G. F. and others endeavour to subvert the Royal Law of Liberty pag. 38. For had you owned it and kept in it you would not have done that unto us as you have done Neither did God or Christ ever teach you to utter forth those Scoffing Expressions against G. F. and the People of God as may be seen in the 40th Page of the Hat-Spirit and it is the Hat-Spirit indeed for it is not the Spirit of God And in pag. 3 4. of your Tyranny and Hypocrisie there it is said Our Principles are far different from what we profess openly and that we act upon the same Principles as the Court of Rome Oh Lyes and Malitious Men All these are your invented Lyes for you and the Court of Rome we deny your Spirit and Power who are of the same Spirit that would murder us as the Papists did formerly your Spirit is favoured How we invite People to Christ both in publick and private the Lord knows to whom we leave you for him to deal with you according to your Works And in the 7th page of your Hypocrisie and Tyranny it is said For if every Man upon pain of Sin walk according to the Light in his own particular then he cannot without Sin walk according to the Light in G. F. or others when that is diverse or contrary from his own As for your Light as Christ said It is Darkness your Works and Words do manifest it who are condemned with the Light which G. F. and we and others walk in which is the Light of Christ Jesus which makes you to Rage and then we know that you cannot bear our Judgment nor G. F's and therefore such as pretend the Light of Christ and are Haters and Persecutors with your Tongues of them that walk in the Light we have no Unity with you as before But you often with Aggravations and Malice quote G. F. and scoffingly say your Elders throwing Dirt at them to make them Odious amongst such as your selves putting your Bear-Skins upon them that you may set the Dogs upon them And we and G. F. do know the things of God by the Spirit of God and the Scripture doth not reveal the Scripture but the Spirit of God is it that leads into all Truth and it is the same that is revealing the Father to us And whereas you make a great Complaint in the 16th page of the Quakers not letting some of you Bury in their Burying-Ground Indeed when some of you Hat-Men have come with Railing and Abusive Terms against us with Abusive Language and called us worse then the Priests and when his Child has dyed then the Father of such a Child has come to us to have a Grave not out of any Conscience but to save his Money we have bid him then go to the Priest whom he counted better then we with whom he had Fellowship And such Loose Persons that live not in the Truth We cannot be Witnesses of their Marriages for we Marry none but are Witnesses and well might J. B. deny William Mucklow who Ranter-like kept on his Hat in Prayer we have no Unity with such Uncomely Practices And J. Osgood and others may praise God that they see your Folly and have given a Sufficient Testimony concerning your Spirit It seems you are tormented because G. F. sent for two Kings and the Emperor which came to hear him in America and were tender you wanted something to stuff up your Book withal had they been Malitious it would have pleased you And whereas you Scoff at our Order of Marriage page 21 22. and call it G. F's Order We must tell you It is the Order and Practice of the Holy Men of God mentioned in Scriptures who took one another before Witnesses And whereas you Wickedly say We Contradict one another in the Light and Spirit This is all like the rest for such as you we can savour You Hat-Men who have pretended to lean upon the Lord but have and some have had a Bitter Cup for it And G. F's words were true in time of J. P's Wearing his Hat in Prayer if all be left to the Free Spirit of God there had been no such Reasoning about the Hat in Prayer which you should have printed the rest of G. F's words how that we denyed the Wearing the Hat in Prayer in the Ranters in the time of J. N. and also in the time of J. P. and did
all unsavory Words in the Spirit of the Hat and their Tyranny and the Hypocrisie detected I can say the Lord lay them not to their Charge as knowing our Lord and Master's Words They shall speak all manner of Evil of us falsely for his Names sake And whereas you say in pag. 18. of your Tyran and Hypocr detect That G. F. did approve of those Words both before and after they were Printed by S. E. Which is utterly False and a Lye of your own forging for G. F. did not know what I writ before they came forth for I must clear the Innocent from this Forger of Lyes and they that have gotten these Lyes from him daub him and boulster him up as an Honest Man that they might get Lyes to Print and to make Money of them and feed themselves with such Lyes of which there are many in their books which they have from the Father of them who is out of the Truth and the Saying of the Apostle is come to pass The Wicked grow worse and worse and love to make a Lye and others make Lyes their Refuge and others are given up to believe Lyes And take heed that you be not all Damn'd together and the Lord doth not render Vengeance from Heaven in Flames of Fire upon you for be sure it will come if you do not Repent And do not boast your selves you Hat-Men of the Abilities and Endowments who are inventing and forging Lyes and publishing them like a Ballet-Singer to get a Penny against the Innocent yea to the taking away their Lives for all that are sober may see it is their Blood you seek after For Men that have an Esteem of Christianity and their own Reputation would not be sound in such Works and Actions and be a Companion among them nor give Ear to them but all these things shall work together for good to them that love God Rom. 8.38 and the Secrets of all Hearts will God reveal and judge by the Man Christ Jesus 1 Tim. 2.5 For did ever I or G. F. do any Hurt to J. Pennyman or ever give him an ill Word who thus hath abused us and published these things behind our Backs But I leave him to the Great God the Judge of all who Jusifies and Clears the Innocent and Condemns the Guilty For the Lord knows that I and I believe G. F. had nothing but Good-will for his Eternal Good and Prosperity inwardly and outwardlv though he has thus ill requited us who never spake a Syllable to me before he printed against me neither have I seen him nor know not where to find him since I came to England nor never spake he to G. F. as I understand although I know G. F. sent for him and he would not come But as I said before I will leave all to the Righteous Judge who will render to every Man a Reward according to his Words and Works And my Desire is That all sober People might not feed upon Lyes published by Apostates and Back-sliders nor lend their Ear to them but to Christ Jesus and feed upon him the Heavenly Bread that comes down from Heaven by which they may have Life But truly as the Scripture saith The Children of this World are Wiser in their Generation then the Children of the Kingdom Luke 16.8 For I had challenged L. Muggleton and the Papists and the Baptists to Fast with them Seven Dayes and Seven Nights not to â—at nor to Drink for a Tryal of their Faith which was a Sober thing for Fasting and Watching are Ordinances of God But L. Muggleton and the Baptists have agreed with J. Pennyman to get something against S. E. to save their Bellies and so J. Pennyman as a Captain of Cowards endeavours to strenghthen the Enemies of God against me behind my Back but he should first have answered my Challenge in Muggleton's behalf but contrary-wise he sends to Barbadoes a piece of my Paper writ to that Cursing Man when he knew I was out of his reach Ah poor Man the Lord forgive thee for truly I do with all my Hart also all the Baptists here beyond Sea And I desire also with all my Soul that if it were the Will of God Poor J Pennyman might yet find a Place of Repentance if his Day he not over The 24th of the 7th Moneth 1673 S. E. James Claypole 's Testimony HAving perused a Pamphlet called Tyranny and Hypocrisie Detected c. I find it a very Envious Reproachful Piece and that the secret Design of the common Enemy in the Authors and their Informers and Abettors is to root out Truth and Righteousness from the Earth and to bring People into Atheism by endeavouring to render some of the People of God called Quakers guilty of the foulest Evils acted by the Sons of Men and the rest of them mentioning those they account the Leaders and Chiefest amongst them to be Connivers at and Coverers of such Evils as if they did secretly allow thereof and that their preaching up a Good Life was but a Decoy to gain Proselytes and not only so but rendring the Righteous Principle of Christ Jesus which is the True Guide the Way and the Life which God has revealed in the Hearts of Thousands to be Fallible Insufficient Vncertain or but a pretended Guide because some that have professed it have walked contrary thereunto wherby it is evident that the God of this World has blinded the Eye of their Minds and that through Envy Malice and Desire of Revenge their Understandings are become darkened that they cannot discern things that differ but in Conclusion jumble all together Just and Unjust he that Loves and he that Hates a Lye the Motions of God and of the Devil being in Enmity against that in themselves which makes the Separation and gives the Discerning between the Pretious and the Vile And so these Judasses some whereof have been almost accounted as Disciples have endeavoured as much as in them lies to betray the Just into the Hands of Sinners and to cause the Truth of God to be Evil-spoken of by those that watch for Iniquity and hate to be Reformed And for our own Vindication from these Reproaches we do appeal to God who knows the Secrets of all Hearts That we do not Own or Countenance any Iniquity in our selves or others but according to our Dotrine and Principles do desire and endeavour in that Ability that God hath given us To approve our selves in all-things in Sincerity and Vprightness both to God and Man and that we had rather Dye outwardly then sin against God wherein we have been tryed these many yeares God's Witness in the Hearts of our Enemies will plead for us And farther As to the part which doth more immediately concern me wherein I am brought in as an Hypocrite and John Boulton as a Tyrant He for Reproving an Vncomely Fashion and Invention and my self for Denying that in Publick which in Private I Owned I answered it