past That God would give him the Heathen for an Inheritance and the utmost Parts of the Earth for a Possession James Claypool AS concerning the Letter called The Spirit of the Hat This I testifie It proceeded from a Subtil Dark Insinuating Treacherous and Malicious Spirit in words seeming to magnify the Name of the Lord but its Workings ever brought reproach and dishonour thereunto of which to my great Sorrow I have been a Concerned and Experienced Witness For Reader this know That the Lord God Everlasting having visited this Nation with the Day-Spring of Eternal and Immortal Life how were our Hearts affected and our Spirits revived and our very Souls made exceeding and unexpressibly glad Ah! how did the Solitary rejoyce How were the Mourners comforted How beautiful were the Feet of them that brought us Tidings of this blessed Day We knew throw Judgment and Burnings and no otherwise the Oyle of Joy and River of Gladness for the Antient Path which is Holiness to the Lord that was and is cast up and the Joy of many Generations was and is come and the Angel of his Presence that rewarded Disobedience with Judgment was known and his Mighty Arme that wrought Wonders of old that was and is with us And Oh! that the Nations knew this their Day of Visitation For of a certain Truth the Lord God of the Hebrews hath appeared unto us and his Message is He hath seen He hath seen the Afflictions of his holy Seed by reason of Sin and Iniquity and he is come down to deliver out of spiritual Darkness and Bondage Many have been and are the Witnesses hereof and are raised and raising to testify thereunto and their Testimony shall endure and remain Yet notwithstanding as of old many that have confessed to this Testimony have turned aside and given heed unto Fables and forgotten the right Way of the Lord and many Spirits have risen up to Stop the Passage of this blessed Work and many have turned aside and some are fallen as in the Temptations and Provocations in the Wilderness in Israels journying toward the blessed Land and as record is made in the Scriptures of what befel them in their Travels that Ages to come may hear and fear and not tempt and provoke the Lord as they did The same in some measure being in this Age also manifest in which I my self was concerned and saw the Snare and through the Goodness and Mercy of the Lord am delivered from and have often had it in my Heart to leave it on Record to Ages to come Therefore let him that reads understand When we had seen the great Plunges in Egypts Land and had travelled through the Red-Sea and saw the Wonders of the Lord in the Field of Zoar and Sang the Song of his Prayses upon the Banks of Salvation and were Travelling on in the Wilderness to Canaan's Blessed Land we were Proved Tryed Tempted and Assaulted by many Enemies and as we kept unto the Angel of his Presence we were kept and preserved from all Danger That was a Pillar of Fire by Night and a Cloud to cover us from hurt by Day and Angels Food we knew and the Water out of the Rock we saw and drank of the River of his Good Pleasure and the Desert did rejoyce and the Wilderness did blossom as a Rose But after all this we tasted the Waters of Merra and through want of Watchfulness liked not the Food of Angels but desired other Meat and Quaile sell amongst us upon which Judgment came and many fell for Disobidience and some are yet Monuments of his Mercies and some yet withstand their Visitations And that none may pretend Ignorance and that all may be left without Excuse the thing was this A Spirit arose in John Perrot pretending that the putting off the Hat in prayer was a Romish Tradition and that a higher Dispensation was to be waited for This and much more was asserted under a pretence of a more excellent Way accompanied with pretences of a more strickt and mortified Life which I sought for and was grieved that some that made a profession thereof did not walk answerable unto this in which trouble I with several was amused and muddled and not Watching in that that discovers the Enemy in every Appearance did not understand the working of that Spirit nor that Power that withstood this Spirit though often warned thereof by them that kept their Habitations For in a Mystery it did wotk and still doth and lead many to the Chambers of Death and Death is its Food for into prejudice it brought many that did eat as a Canker and the Good was not discerned but they were and some yet are as the Heath in the Desert that knows not when good comes And the Spirit that introduced that Practice is manifest and him by whom it was first asserted hath merited in the Hearts of several the Appellation and Detestation as of Jeroboam the Son of Nebat that caused many in outward Israel to Sin And now as to the Insinuations by the Author of this Letter concerning the Meeting at Devonshire house in which my name is mentioned and my Case stated as a grand Proof of the Lordlyness and Corruptness of the Second Days Meeting there I have this to say I have as often been refreshed and comforted in the Good Presence of the Lord that there I have found and felt as in any Meeting I ever was in And the Opposition I had there related not to my Marriage as a Marriage or to hinder my proceed therein for that J. B. and all said at that time he had nothing against but that the Meeting could not passe it as their Approvement I being not in Unity with the Meeting as to that matter aforesaid So that the Letter doth not present the Matter truly as it was but in a prejudiced Spirit states things to render the Meeting and its proceeds odious both in that and several other particulars which I expect others may reply unto John Osgood I Having seen a Printed Paper to which the words above relate wherein my Name is made use of by way of Instance I find my self concerned to testifie on this wise That as the Blessed Eternal Truth was received by me in the Love of it through the Testimony of that Blessed People called Quakers I being soon after I was Convinced shut up in a Close Prison and continuing a Prisoner for divers years though the Bent of my Heart was after the Lord in a measure of Singleness yet the Enemy of Truth and my Soul being permitted to bring forth his work in a Mystery and therein to assault and gain Ground upon several of that People some whereof I had an Affectionate Esteem for hoping and believing well concerning them And I being at a Distance and much alone that spirit had an Influence upon me to the betraying of the Simplicity in me to the writing of that Paper therein mentioned and thereby to be an Occasion
of Stumbling to others and to Weaken the Hands of them I should have been a Strength to and to Strengthen the Hands of them I should not have been a Strength to And when I came to see it I came forth in absolute Judgment against that Paper and the spirit in which it was writ and what I did in it I did it absolutely to the Lord and to answer his Pure Manifestation and Appearance in my Heart and durst not do otherwise in the Pure Fear of the Lord who in a signal Manner Appeared in me and by a strong Hand and lifted up Arm opened my Heart and raised a pure Zeal and Indignation in it against that Treacherous Lying Spirit and my care was to clear Truth and its Testimony and Faithful Friends whom I found the Enemy had struck at through me and the Judgment I gave forth against that Paper was not given forth in an Hour of Weakness and Temptations but in the Strength and Dominion and Evidence and Clearness of Truth and stands and will stand forever And I do further testifie that the Spirit that hath wrought in a Mystery against Friends and to break their Unity under swelling Pretences of further Discoveries and a Singular Larger Zeal whether of that Spirit which leads unto the Practice of wearing the Hat in Publick Prayer or such like to Catch the Mind of the Young and Simple they not being aware of his Devices is the same though under diversity of Appearance that works in the Children of Deceit Disobedience to incline and intice them to all manner of Cruelty Lust and Vanity and is the Ranting Spirit is Corah's Spirit that resisted murmured against the Servant of the Lord in former days and therefore we find that Apostates from among us and Professors of all sorts and Prophane can and do center here in one Spirit of Enmity and Opposition against the Truth and its Followers and Witnesses and of this the Lord hath made me deeply sensible and through the Mercy and Power of the Lord God a Zeal and Indignation lives in my Heart against that Cursed Twining Spirit and a Care and Travel in measure for all that have been Entangled by it that they may see and be sensible of it and may be raised up to come forth in a clear and full Testimony against it without Reserve John Swinton ANd whereas it is said by the Author of that Scandalous Pamphlet call'd The Spirit of the Hat that he remembers a Paper to have been sent down to Hartford subscrib'd by a Dozen of the Great Ones as this Malecontent scoffingly terms them that it had this Passage in it That if any Person had as he thought a Command from God to do any thing or put forth any thing in print he must come and lay it before the Body and AS THEY JUDGE THEY MUST SUBMIT p. 18. querying If this was not an Arbitrary Government bound by no Law but what G. F. and a few more please and affirming That it was much disliked there This we under-written say and that in God's Fear who are Men well known in that Place that we know of no such Paper so sign'd or sent Consequently there could not be any such passage Neither was it possible that we should dislike it unless we should dislike what was not So that five great and manifest Lyes meet in these few Lines 1. That there was such a Letter 2. That it had that Passage in it 3. That Twelve of the Great-ones as he reproachfully calls them sign'd it 4. That it was disliked And Lastly that he remembers all this He that can remember things that never were may be reasonably supposed to make those things It shows his Malice to invent and great Wickedness to affirm such Invention for very Truth God will plead with this Traducer of the Innocent in a Day when he shall not escape his Indignation This is our true Testimony for the Clearing God's Truth and People Henry Stout Nicholas Lucas Richard Martin I Perceiving the Wicked Design of this obscure Author of the Spirit of the HAT is not only to bring a Reproach upon Christ's Government and good Order among us his People as Tyrannical and Oppressive to tender Consciences which is an abominable Slander but also to sow Discord among us I must signifie this to the World that his Work is neither of Credit nor Effect with me or us For 1 he hath manifested himself to be a Belialite or a Son of Belial without a Yoke and without the Bounds of Truth and Good Order so that for him the Spirit of Ranterism is more proper and significant then the Spirit of the Hat however he makes that his Cover 2 He is deeply a Partaker not of the least of those seven Abominations Prov. 6. 17 18. 19. Being guilty of a Lying Tongue an Heart that deviseth wicked Imaginations and is a false Witness that speaketh Lyes and one that soweth or rather would sow Discord among Brethren And wherein he attempts it between me and that upright Man of God G. F. I tell him and the World That his Bait and Wicked Device shall not take with me since the Lord in Mercy hath opened my Understanding to see beyond Prejudice and Darkness upon which the Adversary of Mankind seeks occasion to Divide and Scatter where God hath Gathered and United And the occasion that this Son of Belial and Spirit of Ranterism takes wickedly to represent me and G. F. to the World as divided was a Mistake that I was under and an unadvised Expression privately spoken which did reflect upon the holy Zeal of that Man of God which when I came to see it was my Burthen and the Lord's Reproof I own'd on that and to his Testimony and Judgment I stand against that Spirit of Prejudice which did in dayes past weaken and vail my Understanding while I stood not in the Unity of his Ministers and People in which State the Life and Refreshments in the Body were not partaken of as now felt thorow the Lord's Love which hath reached my Soul and engaged my Heart to himself and People not in any thing to offend but to watch against the Dis-uniting Spirit and to live in Union with the Church of Christ whose Light is sprung up and arisen out of Obscurity Praises to our God for ever for whom I stand a Witness in my Measure against all loose disobedient Spirits Backsliders Ranters and against that disorderly irreverent Carriage of keeping on the Hat in publick Prayer and the dis-uniting Spirit that sought to set it up impose it among us which when it could not carry one its Design but was opposed by the Power of God â—mong us it cryed out Oh! Imposition upon Conscience Pope Arbitrary Government Rule without to lead us from the Movings of God's Spirit Rule and Government of Christ within as this Apostate who one while pleads Conscience another while the Spirit 's Requirings another while
think our selves nor Principles much put to it to vindicate these Assertions 1. That we are a Religious Body 2. That we have as such a Power within our selves 3. That by the Power and Spirit of the Eternal God we have condemned as well as justified many Practices 4. That being in Holy Peace and Unity and that Singular Spirit of the Hat getting place with some and secret Rents Divisions and Animosities being like to ensue among us as among the first Christians we did with such other Carriages as were reputed unbecoming the Blessed Gospel condemn that of keeping the Hat on in time of publick Prayer to Almighty God to whom alone from a sensible Mind we perform that Holy and Due Reverence as introduced by a singular Conceited and Deceitful Spirit 5. That the Author of the Spirit of the Hat c. hath resisted many Loving Treaties Serious Invitations and abundance of Good and Wholesom Advice for his own Good and the Church's Peace and because he is not owned in that Practice which should we God's Spirit would disown us in so doing therefore as a Man enraged beyond all Bounds of not only Christianity but Manhood with Folly Madness and desperate Revenge has he endeavour'd our Ruin among Men. Now that here in he has not shown himself the Primitive Quaker and great Lamenter of our Apostacy as he pretendeth may be clearly seen in that he doth endeavour to render the Good as well as Bad among us suspected by those whom he confesseth cannot have that Discerning he hath and consequently their Lives and Ministry ineffectual Next to do it at this time of the Day What greater Demonstration of Implacableness can there be when so many are against us and that as Quakers in any sense yea for owning those Principles he himself asserts their hands are strengthned thereby Lamentation Murder Mercy Revenge our Recovery our utter Destruction and nothing below it must have been sought by that Discourse but it all retorts from our Impenetrable Armour upon himself and he will prove at last only to have discovered his own Nakedness by this Impious Attempt Whence if any thing appears it is this that because he is indeed gone back from what he was and we remain what we were the World that once persecuted him and still doth us count him now a very White Boy and I am perswaded let him but continue to write against us though a pretended Quaker I dare warrant they will reckon him a very Good Christian It is this Sort of Unruly Beast that the Professors who themselves would have cast him out an Hundred times maintain for an Ingenious Quaker though their bare Entertainment of him against us were Ground enough to suppose him either an Imposture or Renegade as indeed he is little better since first he pretends to be that in Religion which he is not And secondly that he is slipt from what he once was or at least pretended to be I will briefly observe the most weighty things of his Libel and which indeed comprehend the Whole and so close this Animad version First That G. Fox should say No Liberty out of the Power which he compares with the Papists thus No Liberty out of the Church What! Liberty to the Sectary No. What! Liberty to the Heretick No. And G. Fox says he thus What! Liberty to the Presbyter No. What! Liberty to the Independents and Baptists No Liberty is in the Truth Upon which he Comments at large But had this Man but one Grain of that great Stock of Righteousness he unjustly pretends to and seems to lament the Absence of among us he would never have dared to suffer this to be so Printed to the World The Truth of the Matter is this G. Fox having an Occasion to speak of Liberty of Conscience said He never liked the Word as commonly us'd for Conscience being an Inward and Spiritual Thing no mortal Man could bind or inthrale it He meddled not at all with the Outward Exercise of Conscience as to the Performance of Worship commonly called Liberty of Conscience wherefore he proceeded No Liberty out of the Power that is The Power of God Nor in reallity is there For all Consciences that are defiled or enslaved by Wicked Works they are not truly free the Power of God has not delivered such into the Glorious Liberty of the Sons of God And since those Perswasions Deny Liberty from Sin on this side the Grave at least the immediate Light Power and Spirit of God to work it in the Soul he therefore said What! Liberty to the Presbyterians Independents Baptists c. No. That is What Spiritual Liberty and Freedom of Conscience No for then in vain are we become Quakers as the world calls us And why should they deny a State of Freedom In short He spoke and meant it of an Inward Liberty of Conscience from Sin which is call'd in Scripture Purging the Conscience from Dead Works and If the Truth make you Free c. and this Alexander the Copper-Smith that Vile and Peevish Apostate turns to an outward Exercise of Religious Worship as if G. F. would have had those Professors persecuted by the Civil Magistrate O Base and Wicked Perversion of an Innocent Man's true Words But for all this shall the Eternal Just God bring him to Judgment His next great Cavil is about his pulling off the HAT at Publick Prayer either upon Conviction or the Judgment of the Body wherein he tells us That not only some of us counsell'd or requir'd him to yield because the Body would have it saying That was yielding to the Power But his not so yielding but persisting is no Dissention but our Disowning any Person for that Cause is a Breach of the Great Gospel-Charter of Liberty Let him deny this to be the Strength of his Book if he can or dare and which is as soon blown away as the Chaff before the Wind. There is either such a Thing as a Christian Society sometimes call'd a Visible Body or Church or there is not If there be not all is at an end and why Contend we at all If there be then this Church either has Power or not If no Power then no Church If a Body Church or Society for the Word Church signifies no more borrowed from the Assemblies of the Aâ—â—enians then there must be a Power within it self to determine an Anointing to lead into all Truth Deny this and all falls of it self Well but this I suppose will be confessed to The Question then is this But how far may this Church in joyn the Consciences of Individuals any Performance supposing their Dis-like I answer It would be first enquired into Whether those things have been once generally own'd by such a Church or not secondly Or if it be about some super added Ceremony something over and above what each Member at first sate down contented with Now it is manifest that this very Perverse and Quarrelsom Man when he at
first came among us and walkt with us that he was not in any such Practice As keeping on his Hat in time of Publick Prayer but believ'd and in some measure walked in the Way we profess conformable as we are and we hope for Conscience sake He dare not also say That he enjoy'd nor some Comfort from those Prayers that came through an Uncovered Head but acknowledgeth the contrary and at that time of Day all was well It was the Gospel the Truth the Way of God said he and others since of his Stamp they were Zealous also to promote it This now will be the Question Whether If any Person that had given those Signal Testimonies for a Way and People and so incorporated himself with them finding afterwards Fault with a Practice so Innocent so Reverent as keeping off the Hat in time of Publick Prayer to Almighty God should step out of that â—omely Order set up a New Mark and Standard whereby some should have their Heads covered others uncovered a most divided confused and unseemly Sight the Church in this Case may not Admonish andafter her due Admonition and the Parties tenacious resolute and captions Disputes for that unsutable Practice may not justly disown him as a Disputer about needless Questions and one that is gone out of the compleat Union of the Body and exercised by another Spirit Deny this and Farewel to all Christian Church Order and Discipline yea and Truth it self For it is an absolute Inlet to Ranterism and so to Atheism near whose Borders this Author dwells I say If the Scripture is to be credited this is sound Doctrine If the several Societies or Churches then gathered were not to pass Judgment till the Hereticks or Schismaticks were convinc'd of and acknowledg'd their Mistake they had never done it since upon such Conviction Acknowledgment they ceased to be such unless we should believe that notwithstanding they were convinced in their Consciences of their Errors or Dissentions they still persisted in the Belief of them which I will not affirm If then a Society or Church so anointed as aforesaid have that Power We do by Authority thereof as a Christian Society judge all Persons concern'd with the Spirit of this Author to be thus far led by a Delusive Turbulent Unchristian Spirit which if once given way to there is no Imagination so Sordid and Scandalous as it would not lead to and by this will we stand in the Day of the Lord when it will be proved no Popery but Gospel to do so with him and this Novice appear a Wretched Slanderer His Objection Were I among you could I Marry if an whole Nation since you deny it to Dissenters from you is Childish in every thing but the Malice of it If all the World but he were Believers he might ask the Apostle Paul that Question who said Be ye not unequally yoak'd together It is not the Fault of the Body that he dissents but his own Imaginations and Whimsies His Suggestion that we would then deny him a Burial because we should deny it him alwayes as one of us but especially our now Usurping his Property in a Burial Place is a down-right Forgery That our Friends require any Man to practise what they are not convinc'd of I utterly renounce in their Name and that as an Infamous Slander But that we will be well satisfied with any Member's Dispractice of an orderly Performance once cheerefully own'd is also true and most reasonable and orderly That we Exalt our selves is a Calumny of his making but we know our Places in the Body And for his saying Every Member is Equal it is false For though it belongs to the same Body yet not to the same Service some are in that sense more Honourable then others This shows an Aspiring Discontented Mind in him that where he can't be Superiour he would be Equal He saith that with sorrow hath he seen pulling down haling out and thrusting forth of our Meetings and that we went as far as our Power and wanted only more to punish But could we do so as he wickedly falsly suggests we should have been perhaps more formidable to our Insolent Envious Perverse Opposers who come not for Conscience sake or to seek Satisfaction which we shall never refuse but to Disturb introduce a Rabble beget Laughter or any thing that might disquiet our Assemblies and as much as in them lies render them Unprofitable to the People If we ever so us'd any Conscientious Inquirer or Opposer let us know them It is Baseness it self to suggest our Ill-using of People in general and none named perhaps we have refused and condemn'd the bawling Opposition of such Apostate Slanderers as our Adversary but we appeal to God's holy Witness in all Consciences if that has been or is our Practice which is insmuated against us much less that his Uncharitable Expression If he had Power equal to our Will we would punish should have any place the Suggestion of the common Adversary For his saying that the Ministers are Ravening Wolves that prey upon the Flockâ— and that if they commit a Fault they are not to be judged by the Laity but their Peers or Equals It is easie with him to Slander but hard to prove What one Minister ever made a Prey upon this Authors Person or Estate let him give us his Name If Preaching the Everlasting Gospel in season and out of Season Rising early and laying down late Suffering Travelling and Spending and being spent in Body and Estate Sacrificing the Joy Strength and Pleasure of their Youth to the Service of the Living Eternal God and the Salvation of Peoples Souls if all this makes them Ravenous Wolves of Pray then hath he rightly denominated them but if this be Love unfeign'd to God and Men then will that Righteous Judge certainly reckon with this Apostate for all his Slanders and Calumnies against his Faithful and Painful Messengers For not being judg'd by the Laity but their Peers as he wickedly distinguishes be it known to all That if any such Person have committed an Injury against any of those who are not exercised in the Ministry then as well those as the Ministry are proper Judges but in Cases that may more strictly concern the Exercise of his Gift it is most equal reasonable that such other faithful publick Labourers as may be gotten together with some of the more approved among us whom we can call Elders should be Judges in the Case But how Only as they are upon serious Waiting to receive Counsel and Wisdom from God directed of his Holy Spirit to speak act or determine Now what great Matter of Evil Apostacy Popery Tyranny Lordlings c. can there be in so orderly a Practice O this Libertine Ranting Spirit that therefore hateth us because we would have it Ruled Guided and Govern'd with the Curb of Truth and not under a Pretence of Gospel-Liberty run out into
all Excess in which we have some Cause to fear this pretended Lamenter hath too deeply involv'd himself True Liberty is not to Commit Sin Innocently as some fancy but to be freed from Sin which is ever Nocent and will prove destructive of all who are seduc'd by it Nor is he less untrue and unrighteous to us when he sayes That as others Err'd in setting up the Scriptures as the Standard Tryal and Touch-stone of Doctrines and Spirits so we do greatly Err in setting up the Body above the Spirit There is no such Doctrine as the Latter maintained among us It is well known that the Former is by the many Professors yea those who boast in his Treachery and Lyes But this alwayes hath been and still is and we hope ever will be our Belief that no meer Body of People without the Guidance of God's Spirit are capable of Determining in Matters of Religious Concernment For it is not an Hundred Persons singly void of the Holy Spirit coming together that makes them any whit more certain in their Judgment The only and indispensable Qualification to that great Work being Discoveries and Assistance of the Holy Spirit A Body then without the Holy Spirit can be no Touch-stone but a Body attended with the Holy Spirit certainly is The Question then is not If we prefer the Body above the Spirit for that is the False Insinuation of this Apostate who is inraged that we should so severely censure him and such Contentious Persons as he is But Whether we as a Believing Body have the Holy Spirit or no Of which much hath been said by way of Vindication already in other Tracts and we shall leave it to God's Witness in the Consciences of those we are concern'd with in Matters of that Import whether we are acted by that holy Wisdom and Direction which gives true and sound Judgment We know we are of God and the World whether Apostates or others that thus withstand our Testimony are in the Gaul of Bitterness and Bond of Iniquity His Objection That the Hat on in Prayer is a Trifle or of no such moment as justly to occasion such a Busle makes for us since he can't be other then a Trifler at best for all his high Pretences who hazards the Church's Peace gives this Disturbance bears this Ill-will and shows that Revenge for a Trifle 'T were well if his Conscience were so nice in Cases of more Weight I fear he is as well a Demas as an Alexander and that his Cries against our Ministers decent and clean Apparel is but a better sort of Coyer for his own Rusty Pharisaical kind of Garb the Effect perhaps of his fordid Avarice It seems by his Letter that the Quakers mean Clothes made up much of his Convincement at first Truly that Faith which came in by the Outside will go out by it too But it is a Wonder to me that the Costly Clothes and Prodigal Feast to Excess and Derision of that Exalted J. Penniman and his Beloved Mary Boreman who in Token of her Self-Denial and Attainment to a more excellent Administration exchanged her Cloth Waste-Coat for a Silk Farendine Gown her Blew Apron for one of Fine Holland and her Ordinary Bodice for Rich Sattin it self to say little of her Riding in Fine Coaches and several other things once accounted by her Self-Righteousness Abominable Things did never offend this Author's Nice and Squeamish Stomach But we are they only who must be condemned and I perceive that must be reputed a Sin in us which is accounted a Vertue in them Away with such Deceit for Shame He says That we desert the Light for the Judgment of the Body A wretched Begging of the Question We do deny that to be Light in him which opposeth it He at other times grants the Body has Light though not some Elders But the Body judgeth him How will he do then For him to say he believes the Body to be in the Right and yet subject them to his own Conceits is what deserves to be disdain'd of all understanding Men. He should have gone to those Elders and cleared himself if he had ought against them and not place their Miscarriages as he thinks to the Account of the whole Body Were he any thing of a True Quaker and that he pretends to he would have abhorred to add thus to their Indeavours that strike at True as well as False And if by True is understood something more refined then we are he may be said to add to our Sufferings so much the more What but a Dark Envious Inveterate Man would have done such a thing at any time but especially at this Juncture and Season Behold the Hat now and what a notable Spirit it affords us one drop of which by Antipathy were enough one would think to cure any one not too far gone in Prejudice and Schism O that all who profess the Truth of the Living God may be kept out of such Temptation that they may never sacrifice the Peace of the Church and Quiet of their own Souls to the Introduction or Promotion of any thing so Unserviceable Senseless and Unprofitable both to Soul and Body but Eyeing the Blessed Truth in their Inward Parts may by it be Exercised in Body Soul and Spirit to all Godly Conversation among Men so will God be glorified and they preserved For his other Stories Some things are true hurt us not but show our Care to preserve Unity Order though they will the JUDAS that both reveal'd augmented them Other Passages are greatly abused and down-right Lyes told as before three of which I cannot forbear to mark out with a Challenge to prove them notwithstanding the following Testimonies First That our Ministry is Vitious and Wanton guilty of Whoredoms and that Strumpets are among them This we do in the Name of the Holy God deny and defie any Man on Earth to prove any part of this Ungodly general Charge against our Ministry to so much as belong to any one Person by us accounted of it If any such thing be let the Accuser his Witnesses and the Accused be brought forth and an Hearing shall never be refused But let me ask this Apostate If ever he knew such a one If he admonish'd him If upon Continuance in such Ungodly Living he told it to the Church before this Publication of his Ungodly Slanders to the World If he says he did he adds to his Lyes be it then True or False in it self he has done but like a Treacherous Renegade I fasten an Action of Defamation upon his Head and that in the High and Holy Court of Heaven before God the Righteous Judge who will avenge the Cause of the Innocent upon their false Accusers Next That we with the Papists prefer a Loose Person before a Non-Conformist or such like is an horrid Lye We own and cannot but cherish Sobriety and a Conscientiousness to God in all which we never could
a further Dispensation another while the Rule and Light within another while the great Charter of Liberty And what for What 's the great Matter and Drift of the Business but for keeping on his Hat in Publick Prayer But in pag. 24. he confesseth They keep it neither off nor on upon a Religious account which is a manifest Contradiction to the former which being read together amount to this sense or as if he should say I keep on my Hat in publick Prayer on the Account of Conscience at the Requirings of the Spirit Light and Rule within c. but not upon a Religious Account Oh monstrous Work Irreligious and void of both Conscience and Spirit and yet pretend both as the Main Stress of his Work By this the Ingenuous Reader may see his gross Hypocrisie in pretending Conscience and the Spirit of God for that which he hath no Religion in And while he pretends to be a Deep Mourner in Israel pag. 44. he is Reviling and bringing forth evil Reports against the Lord's People as one that will both Bite and Whine who falsly accused the Body with the same Spirit of Reproach being entered that is in the Papists because of the Phrase Spirit of the Hat or Hat men though it be confirm'd in the Title of his Pamphlet and yet his tender Conscience will serve him Scornfully and Reproachfully to call our Unity which is the Unity of the Spirit profest by us The Foxoman Unity Oh fordid Hypocrisie and Scorn This is he that is against the Spirit of Reproach and Names of that tendence and yet can thus Reproachfully Nick-name our Unity And whereas this pretended deep Mourner in Israel would appear very Zealous for the People called Quakers as in the beginning but now in the current of his Work charge them or the Body with a great Apostacy Tyranny Persecution Violence c. and therein would be lookt upon both as a Master Controller and Judge over them as also to be a Quaker standing in his first Purity both as to his Life and Principles viz. For Christ's Government Guidance of his Spirit Light Within as the only Rule c. Let it be considered how the Quakers were at first treated and his Pamphlet now received and embraced by their open Enemies and Persecutors the Quakers were Persecuted and Reviled by the World by whom his Pamphlet is own'd and cry'd up as an Ingenious Piâ—â—e and he as an Ingenious Quaker even by the Envious Dippers and others who are of a Persecuting spirit who are of the World by whose Slanderous Tongues and Pens the Quakers are Persecuted and Reviled â—o that this pretended Mourrer is no real Quaker but appears plainly to be one of those Antichrists who are of the World and whom the World heareth and applaudeth for his Envious Work against the Quakers And seeing that some Anabaptists and Socinians own his Pamphlet in the Publication and Spreading of it and cry it up as such an Ingenious siece We charge manifest Contradiction upon them in their opposing the Spirit or Light of Christ Within as the Rule which this Mourner owns in words unless they Recant of their opposing this Inward Rule and acknowledge themselves to be real Primitive Quakers only opposing the Body of us as Apostates and hereupon we challenge them to be ingenuous and not to shuffle but be plain and tell us Whether this shall be the Matter in Controversie or whether they really own what they publish of this kind against us if they do not then what they do will the more appear to be of meer Malice and Revenge And as for this Author We challenge him to signifie his Name if he dare stand by his Work in this Spirit of the Hat otherwise let the World judge how Infamously he has notified several Persons by Name and yet dare not appear nor discover his own We can manifest him guilty of many gross Lyes and Forgeries in his Pamphlet more then we have mentioned both against particular Persons and the Body in general who being a Vagabond from Christ's Light Government and Order he is one of them that despise Government while he asperseth those Helps and Governments that Christ hath set up in his Church which hath Power to mark abstain from and reject all such Contentious and Disorderly Walkers of which number the Author of the Spirit of the Hat is and so do warn him to Repentance as also exhort him to the Calling-in that Envious Letter or Book called The Spirit of the HAT and commit it â—o the Fire and send forth into the World from an Honest 〈…〉 Denyal of the same in a due Acknowledgment of the Evil of his so doing that so if possible he may find Mercy from the Lord whose Name Truth and People he hath dishonour'd and so appears not one though he pretends to it of the Principle and Practice of the People of God called Quakers whose Work Travel and Service is for the Prosperity of the Truth and not against it as his hath been William Gosnell THE END p. 12. p. 14 15. pag. 1 2 3. pag. 13. Pag. 15. Pag. 15 16. pag. 29. pag. 29. p. 21. pag. 18. pag. 22. 23 43.