for my fiery zeal that wears no mask the Apostle says Gal. 4. 18. It is good to be zealous in a good matter and as good to be zealous against a bad one And is not the spirit of God resembled to fire Which where it appears in truth it will burn off all masks of Hypocrisy and make men walk in all simplicity of Conversation before God and before men But why is my disputing open railing If I speak any thing false witness of the falâ—hood But if the corruptions of your Church be such that they cannot be named by their proper Names such as all solid Theologâ— Philosophy and ordinary humane Laws would call them in calling them so am I a Rayler or you very great and enormous sinners I speak of those two grand crimes Idolatry and Murder which are interwoven into your Religion And whetâ—er my Arguments be blustering words or solid Reason let any indifferent Reader judge by what has passed â—itherto in your pretended Confuration of this Antidote against Idolatry and in my â—o clearly proving my Reasonings therein to remain sound and unshaken for all the Battery you could lay against them And whereas you add not always too much concerned whether true or false it is such an equivocating Imputation that look one way on it it says less than is true For I confess I am never too much concerned whether I speak true or false especially considering of what moment the things are I write of But if you mean I am not always enough concerned whether what I affirm be true or false The tree is known by its fruits â—â—ow me where I have trip't or if I have any where trip't prove that it was out of carelesne's whether it was true or false which I uttered And this I think he pretends he will show in this Dehortation of mine For immediately he adds Witness the Contents of this Chapter whereof I shall give my Reader a brief Extract drawn up in the Form of an Homily yet in the Doctors own words and charitable Dialect Thus then begins the Dissuasive Repl. This is a Dissuasive of my Adversaries own making whom though I acknowledge a man of Wit and Eloquence yet I will not trust him in making speeches for me and seâ—ing his Dissuasive is pretended but an Epitome of mine and mine being already under the eye of the Reader I hold it altogether impertinent to set down his especially he putting his for mine and calling it so adding at the end of it This is Mellifluous Dr. Mores sweet harangue c. The truth is he has made as dry and lank an Homily as he could and heaped up those Titles their Church is adorned with in the Apocalypse barely and nakedly without the Occasions and circumstances I bring them in upon to make himself and his party merry and to make my serious Exhortation to deceivable People that they take heed of the frauds and danger of that Church to look ridiculously But this is one Artifice of theirs amongst the rest when the weight of Reason and Religion presses on them to any purpose to slip from under it by some ludicrous jest or profane raillery Wherefore letting this drollery pass let us observe what in good earnest he would weaken my Exhorration by or where is that place in it where he will make good that Imputation against me that I am not enough concerned whether what I say be true or false Now I would gladly know says he what there is in all this discourse which an ingenuous Son of the Church of England will not be heartily ashamed of and even blush for the Doctors sake Repl. Why did you then make such a silly Oration in my name that all the ingenuous Church-men in England should be ashamed of it as well they might if I had made such a jejune lank piece of stuff as your officiousness has made for me But for mine I dare say there is no ingenuous Son of the Church of England unless â—ou measure the Iâ—genuity and Disingenuity of men by their affection and disaâ—fection to the errors of your Chuoch as you seem to do in Dr. Taylor much less any genuine Sons of our Church but will approve of the firmness reasonableness and seasonableness of such an Exhortation Here is I confâ—ss quoth he stout railing Disingenuity more than is necessary for a Doctor c. Repl. Here the Reader may be pleased to take notice of the special sense of Disingenuity with my Antagonist namely that it is the plainly speaking such Truths as argue the gross errors and perillous Enormities â—f the Church of Rome Whenas it is ten thousand times more disingenuous according to the law of God and Nature to smother Truth to the great and real injury of both the Church of Rome and our own And then for my stout Railing which else where he calls that â—nmanly Rhetoâ—ick of Railing let us put them together The stout unmanly Rhetorick of Railing I demand If it be either ferine or womanish with a plain open Constancy to declare those Truths that are of such vast Concern and of so perspicuous a clearness to those that do not wilfully wink against them Or if the propriety of language and to declare according to the nature and true Notion of things and that without all ill will be any form of Rayling Unless Adam in the state of Innocency railed when he gave names according to the natures of the Creatures And this great Clamour against me of Railing is because I call Idolatry Idolatry and the killing of men because they will not commit Idolatry with the Church of Rome barbarous murder But if he mean because I call the Church of Rome by those Titles the Spirit of God calls her in the Apocalypse my Apology is already made in the twenty fourth Paragraph of this 10th Chapter Which I desire my Antagonist and every one it may concern in the fear of God toâ— peruse and to consider the latter part of it touching those eight last Chapters of the first book of my Synopsis Prophetica and my Exposition of the seven Epistles to the seven Churches of Asia In both which Expositions I challenge any diligent searcher to show any considerable flaw that will lessen the certitude of them for the main or if they think there is the least faultering in this proposal let them show any flaw at all if they can For as for my self though I have been an anxious searcher after Truth I was never yet satisfied concerning any more palpably than of these I speak of Which God knows I do not speak in the way of Boasting but merely to excite the ingenuous to try the strength and evidence I find them that they may thereby after a manner whether they will or no feel it also themselves and find it Nor do I use those Names of Infamy wherewith the Spirit of God has branded the Pontifician Clergy nakedly and without occasion as my Antagonist has
Incurvations being to the symbolical Presences of the Angels they bowed to my sixteenth Conclusion is unconcerned in it nor does it therefore at all enervate my ninth as is plain at first sight For it does not at all imply that either Abraham or St. John were Idolaters in their bowing to Angels or Men. His Answer to the sixteenth Conclusion The sixteenth seventeenth nineteenth and twentieth talk much says he of a symbolical Presence and Incurvation towards it whereof the sixteenth refers to the ninth and hath its Answer there The Reply How infirm my Adversaries Answer is to the ninth and unsatisfactory you have already seen and therefore I having already replied to it it is evident that his Answer to this sixteenth wants no further Reply His Answer to the seventeenth Conclusion To this saith he I have already answered shweing that the Pagans gave the Worship and Title of Deities to their Daemons and therefore became ipso facto Idolaters The Reply To that pretended Answer I have made a full and perspicuous Reply above which if the Reader be pleased to turn back and peruse the more he looks on it I do not question but the more he will be satisfied with it His Answer to the nineteenth Conclusion Here saith he I would know of the Doctor whether the Name of a person be not a symbolical Presence in its kind as well as an Image For as much as both of them are signs or tokens representing the same thing with this onely difference that the Image represents it to the eye the Name to the ear And why then may we not bow to the Image of Iesus as well as to the name of Jesus or how can the one be condemned of Idolatry but the other must incur the like brand The Reply The Doctor Answers that the Name may be a symbol as Aristotle has defined 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aword or Name may be a symbol of that conception I have in my mind says Aristotle but he says nothing of its being a symbol of the external Object But let that go Though it be a symbol yet it is very unnatural to conceive it a symbolical Presence not is any where called so nor accounted so by any one Besides a symbolical Presence must be a standing permanent representation of that which it is the symbolical Presence of consecrated and intended for that purpose How unnaâ—ural therefore is it to conceit a name that is no sooner sounded but vanishes from the senses to be a symbolical Presence but onely a meer note or symbol to help our memories and to be part of speech and discourse So plain is it there is not the same reason of the Image of Jesus and the Name of Jesus Noâ— is the second Commandment against bowing to sounds but Images Nor do we which is best of all bow to the Name of Jesus but at the Name of Jesus as I answered above And if it could be proved that the Name of Jesus were a symbolical Presence of one kind as my Adversary phrases it so long as it is not of that kind my nineteenth Conclusion speaks of and founded on the second Commandment what is it to the purpose Or if it were included unless that of the second to the Philippians commanded to bow to it in such a sense which my Adversary will be never able to prove what will it avail But I have even over-answered this Objection And it is already too too manifest that though bowing at the Name of Jesus be no Idolatry bowing to the Image of Jesus may be palpable Idolaâ—â—y His Answer to the twentieth Conclusion To me this Conclusion saith he seems big with a spirit of contradiction as being manifestly against Scripture against the practise of the Church of England and lastly against Dr. More himself First Against Scripture As is manifest besides what we have said says he in Answer to the last Conclusion of the first Chapter from the Incurvation the Scripture commands to the Name of Jesus which is as much a Religious Incurvation as any we give to t'ose symbolical Presences called Images Secondly Against the Church of England who bow the knee at the Eucharist to the bare Figurative or symbolical Presence of Christs natural flesh and blood and therefore they useing this Religious Incurvation towards a symbolical Presence are Idolaters Nor can excuse themselves by a mental reserve they intending it onely as a circumstance of their Worship because that is declared Equivocation in this very Conclusion and the foregoing one Thirdly and lastly This Conclusion is against my self Because my sixteenth Conclusion openly avoucheth That the erecting of a symbolical Presence with Incurvation thitherward was declared by the supreme God the God of Israel one of the manners of worship due to him but my twentieth runs counter and stifly presseth That Religious Incurvation towards a symbolical Presence without exception of any wittingly and conscientiously directed thither is real Idolatry These two Conclusions saith he are as perfect a contradiction as to say All Religious Incurvation toward a symbolical Presence is Idolatry Not all Religious Incurvation toward a symbolical Presence is Idolatry The Reply To all which three I Reply and First to the first That what he has said in Answer to the last Conclusion of my first Chapter I have replied to already and plainly proved there is nothing therein that clashes with the Scripture And as I said before so I again repeat that we are not commanded to bow to the name of Jesus but if it be understood of any external Ceremony onely at the name of Jesus and with all though the Incurvation be Religious that his name is no symbolical Presence as I declared before Never any one phancied a name any such thing so that it is a meer shift to amuze the ignorant To the Second that the Bread and Wine are no symbolical Presence or Figure of the very Person of Christ nor do I know that any Protetestants hold that any Blood or Flesh of Christ not actuated by his humane Spirit nor joyned with the Divinity is capable of Divine or Religious Worship sith nothing is capable thereof but God But a symbolical Presence is the representation of some Person or thing erected to represent the thing oâ— Person conceived by them that erect it adorable ' But we do not conceive the Body of Christ killed and Sacrificed and his Blood shed out of his Body adorable unless it could be proved what yet is impossible that it was even then Hypostatically united with God when it was disunited from the Soul So that the broken Bread and the Wine are but commemoration tokens of the Body of Christ killed and Crucified and his Blood shed for us this commemoration being as it were a feast upon a Sacrifice as the Apostle intimates 1 Cor. 5. 7. after the Lamb is perfectly slain Nor is any man on his knees at the Communion in order to direct their
to be also that false Prophet that is to be taken alive and cast into the lake of fire and brimstone Apoc. 19. 20 to be that great City that spiritually is called Sodom and Aegypt where our Lord was crucified Apoc. 11. 8. to be the Beast that has the horns of a Lamb but the voice of the Dragon Apoc. 13. 11. decreeing Idolatries and cruel Persecutions against God's people to be that Babylon the great Apoc. 17. Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth the Woman on the seven Hills that is drunk with the bloud of the Saints and with the bloud of the Martyrs of Iesus and lastly to be that Man of Sin 2 Thess. 2. that notorious Antichrist that opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or is worshipped whose coming is with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish because they receive not the love of the truth that they may be saved For which cause God sends them strong delusion that they believe a lie That they all might be damned that believe not the truth but have pleasure in unrighteousness As well 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as well all they that love the Romish Lies and Impostures as all they that invent them are here plainly declared in the state of Damnation With this Nosegay of Rue and Wormwood antidote thy self against the Idolatrous infection of that strange Woman's breath Prov. 5. 3. whose lips yet drop as an honyâ— comb and â—er mouth is more smooth then oyl And be assured that that cannot be the true Holy Church wherein Salvation is to be expected which the Spirit of God has marked with such unholy and hellish Chara â—ers let her boast of her own Holiness as much as she will 24. And if she return this Answer to thee That this is not to argue but to rail in phrases of Scripture do thou make this short Reply That whiles she accuses thee of railing against sinfull and obnoxious men she must take heed that she be not found guilty of blaspâ—eming the holy Spirit of God I confess these Propheticall Passages apply'd to such persons as to whom they do not belong were an high and rude strain of Railing indeed and quite out of the road of Christianity and common Humanity But to call them Railings when they are apply'd to that very Party to whom they are really meant by that Spirit that dictated them is indeed to pretend to a sense of Civility towards men but in the mean time to become a down-right Blasphemer against the Holy Ghost that dictated these Oracles And that they are not mis-apply'd any impartial man of but an ordinary patience and comprehension of wit may have all assurance desirable from that demonstration of the truth compriz'd in the eight last Chapters of the first Book of Synopsis Prophetica to say nothing of the present Exposition of the Seven Epistles to the Seven Churches in Asia 25. Wherefore O serious Soul whoever thou art be not complemented out of the Truth and an earnest pursuance of thine own Salvation from a vain sense of the Applauses or Reproaches of men or from any consideration what they may think of thee for attesting or standing to such Verities as are so unwelcome to many ears but of such huge importance to all to hear For no less a Game is at stake in our choice of what Church we adhere to that of Rome or the Reformed then the Possession of Heaven and eternal Life Wherefore stand stoutlâ— upon thy guard and whensoever thou art accosted by the fair words and sugar'd speeches of that cunning Woman who will make semblance of great solicitude for thy future Happiness most passionately inviting thee to return into the bosom of Holy Church be sure to remember what an Holy Church she is according to Divine description and that if thou assentest to her smooth Persuasions and crafty Importunities thou dost â—pso facto pardon the vehemence of expression adventure thy self into the jaws of Hell and cast thy self into the arms of the Devil Matth. 23. 15. God of his mercy give us all Grace to consider what has been spoken that we may evermore escape these Snares of Death Amen THE END CHAP. X. The Answers of my Antagonist to this 10th Chapter and my Replies put together without any distinction of Paragraphs HItherto I have reduced my Antagonists Answers to the Paragraphs of each Chapter But now he does so overflow with humour wit and confusedness and walks so aloâ—t in Generals that I cannot reduce this last Section of his on my last Chapter to any such particular distinctness but must make what I can of things in that order they lye First then my hearty Exhortation to men to take heed how they be drawn into the Communion of the Church of Rome he phancies may fitly be called Dr. Taylor revived or a second Disâ—asive from Popery Whereupon he takes Occasion to give the different Characters of Dr. Taylor and my self For Dr. Taylor is a Person says he of a more refined and plausible Insinuation a smooth tongue and oâ—ly Expression cloaking his many and great Disingenuities with fair glozing words in an affected strain of Scripture phrase pretending to the power of Godliness But Dr. More is a Polemical man of a quite different Temper His fiery zeal wears no mask His disputing is open rayling and his Arguments blustering words not always too much concerned whether true for alse To which I Reply Whether he call my hearty Dehortation Dr. Taylor revived or a second Dissâ—asive from Popery he may please his own pâ—ancy in that he shall find me a man of great humanity and facility in matters of that kind And let Dr. Taylor be of one temper and my self of another so there be no Immorality in these different tempers that is all one to me also But when he talks of the great Disingenuities of Dr. Taylor I suspect they are nothing else but great and hard Arguments against the errors of the Roman Church which they cannot Answer The same crime that I have been guilty of all along this book hitherto and it 's â—ell I be not charged with great disingenuities my self at last which now I think on 't I have been already under an harsher term he calling that calumny in me who seem to be a more rude Writer which in Dr. Taylor that more smooth and oylâ— Arguer he termes a disingenuity But it 's needless for me to say any thing more of Dr. Taylor his learned and eloquent writings will Answer for him and themselves too But now for my own Charge That I am â—olemical I am sure I am neither Souldier nâ—r disputacious Schoolman But if I be Polemical or warlike it is in that warâ—are whose weapons are spiritual as the Apostle speaks 2 Cor. 10. 4. for the pulling down strong holds and inveterate Imaginations raised against the truth of God and the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. And