is added So every Apex equally Divine and as immediately from God as any of it yea and as the voice whereby he spake in the Prophets pag. 27. But I say as written by thee so universally of the Writers and meer Writing of the Scriptures as they are they are for the most part as false as that foregoing and that I have said above concerning the Writing of much of the Scripture at first as it stands in your Bibles by Scribes that wrote either out of other Copies or from the mouths of men more immediately inspired or from what was commonly reported and generally believed and what they had heard as delivered to them by more immediate eye and ear witnesses and what they retain'd in their memories and some way or other comprehended beforehand may stand as a sufficient Answer to this parcel also wherein according to thy wonted habitual darkness ignorance and contradiction to the Truth thou deniest the Pors-men and holy Prophets in their Writings to be enabled to declare and write what they wrote by any habitual light knowledge or conviction of the Truth As if they wrote what they neither saw nor heard nor knew nor believed to be true but besides all sight and understanding discerning mental conception meditation Rational Apprehension Faith or any manner of Antecedent comprehension of the truths they told as if they were all acted and us'd in the Writing of every Tittle by the Lord just no otherwise but as a Musical Instrument in a man's hand or the Pen itself by an expert Writer which can yeeld no more then a meer passive concurrence having no principle of life within it self from whence to act any thing at all or to move a hairs breadth in any business but as it 's mov'd or as some stark dead Corps which can neither stir nor stand but as extrinsecally born up and carried forth because deest aliquid intus Whereas as I have shew'd above some of them wrote not by immediate inspiration or bringing of the things into their minds so by the spirit but mediately that is from the mouths or writings of such as received the truths more immediately as they were inspired wrote as they also spake no other things then what by some means or other they beforehand comprehended no other then what they heard and saw and believed and retained in their minds and memories whereinto the spirit of truth and the truths he guided them into which the world receives not were both received conceived and entertained yea and I here add no other then such as in the same light were more or less seen known understood and believed before any Scripture at all was though 't was by the same way then which I know no other that the Scripture speaks of of knowing God or Christ viz of internal spiritual Revelation Matth. 11.27 Ioh. 6.47 1 Cor. 2.9 10 11 12. Gal. 1.16 Did Paul believe or witness or write any other things when he wrote with his own hands what was immediately revealed in spired into him by the same holy spirit then what by the same spirit in which and no other way all the things of God are known and ever were holy men of God believed owned witnessed wrote and both in their Writings and Speakings acknowledged to be the truth see Act 24.14 26.22 23. 2 Cor. 1 13. 4.13 Did he write any other things then what they to whom he wrote might and did read elsewhere even in the light and spirit within themselves and did thereby acknowledge to be the truth And did not he himself before he wrote them in the movings of the spirit acknowledge them to be the truth himself And did he in the light in which he liv'd and saw them acknowledge them to be the truth and yet was not enabled by any habitual Light knowledge or conviction of the truth to declare them in writing as he did but wrote as one ignorant in the dark unbelieving and unconvinced of the truths he wrote and as senselesse unintelligently and passively without any active obedience to the spirit pressing him or yeelding any but a meer passive influence and concurrence of his rational faculties in the worker as a meer dead thing that is utterly devoid of all kind of life motion or principle of Action within it self and uncapable of any action at all or motion but as it is acted ab extra by some forensical force or compulsion as a Musical Woodden instrument or a pen by the hand of the writer what a weak crooked crazy piece of conception of Scripture in this of thine of which I may truly say there was not so much active concurrence of the rational faculties of the Scribes in their writing of the Scripture but there is as little in this of thine who writest as if all the Prophets of God that ever spake and wrote what of his minde they received from his own mouth by standing in his counsel and hearkning to what he said in them and waited on him to know and understand his will and word first that they might do it in the particular in their own persons and as moved or commanded in obedience to him declare it to others were absolutely and meerly as passive as Balaams Ass was whose mouth miraculously was opened and his minde indued with rational faculties supernatural to him as he was a Beast to Reason out the case with his unrighteous Master and to reprove the madness of that Prophet and as meerly passive in their work of Prophesie as Caiphas the High Priest was whose mouth was opened to speak truer than he was aware of and to prophesie of a thing out of his irrational faculties that was as high above the reach of the best rational faculties he had being a man degenerate from pure perfect reason and in the fall as fallen mans best reason is above the brute beasts of the field for as Herod and Pontius Pilate did with wicked hands the things that God before determined should come to pass fulfilling the Prophets words in slaying Christ little thinking they served the truth as they did in it as the Assyrian in the like case they meant not so nor did their heart think otherwise than to destroy Isa. 10.5 6 7. Act. 4.27 28. Act. 3.17 18. Act. 13.27 28 29. So that Priest with a wicked heart intentionally to counsel them to murther Christ had his mouth prepared to Prophesie a precious truth which as so he spake not of himself so as one that had the light knowledge or conviction of the truth but besides himself as the Ass in the other case Numb 22.28 29 30. Joh. 11.29 50 51 52 53. Joh. 10.14 Whereas most evident it is that the holy men of God who wrote any part of the Scripture by immediate inspiration with their own hands to let pass that which some wrote for and from them as dictated to by their mouthes were in the light sight knowledge prae-conviction comprehension
the law is light Isa. 9.2 The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light they that dwell in the land and shadow of death upon them hath the light shined Hos. 6.5 I have slain them with the words of my mouth thy judgements are the light that goeth forth Matth. 4.16 The people that sat in darkness saw great light to them which sat in the Region and shadow of death light is sprung up Matth. 5.14 Ye are the light of the world Job 3.20 21. For every one that doth evil hateth the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds be reproved but he that doth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in God 2. Pet. 2.19 a light shining in a dark place Reply Sure enough the man Catalogized all these together out of his Concordance the Series wherin he hath set them learns us no less for else he would at least have joyned Isa. 9. and Matth. 4 together one of which is but a citation of the other and it may evidently seem from his more Concordantial than Cordial consultations both here and elsewhere that howbeit he set not all of them down hoc opus esset yet well-nigh by all places in his Concordance where he findes these Terms Word and Light he incontinently concludes the Scripture and Letter to be meant and so on that account as cloudily cotes as many of them as he judges as to number may make a Iury and so Hob-Nob as they say without mattering much what they are so they Concord all in one in the bare naming of the words Word or Light and mostly citing the Chapter and verse but seldome the Truths that are told there as if he thought that most men would blindly and implicitly subscribe to his sentence from such a packet of Texts trussed together and never be at so much pains as to search them all he Impannels them presently about his business hoping they will all agree to give Verdict for him when as how sweet an harmony soever they have among themselves that way where their Verdict passes yet they Concord all in one to contradict him saving I.Os. strong confidence in them such a joynt concurrence to the contrary have every one of these twelve Texts of his own taking for though he subscribe them all to that his sophistical Assertion p. 74.75 viz. The Scripture the Word of God is light in proof that the Letter is the light against such as deny it for none deny the Word of God to be the light that I know of but I O. himself who jeers of the verbum insernum lumen internum as figmentum horrendum Ex. 1. s. 5. Resomnino ficta commentum erasse excogitatum Ex 2. s. 25. merae senebrae caecitas c. Ex. 4 s. 17. so that where ever the Reader findes him prosecuting the proof of it under that terme of the Word saying the Word is the Light Rule Foundation and such like he must be taken as intending the Scripture Letter Text witness both Title pages Proscripturis A vindication of the Scriptures against the Fanaticks to be the Word of God and of the purity and integrity of the Hebrew and Greek Texts though I say they are all subscribed in vindication of the Letter to be the Light yet there is not on them all that subscribes to I.Os. sentence or judgement on them but they all give their verdict another way even for that which is Light and the light indeed as we deny it not viz. the Word Law Commandement Iudgements of God and Christs mouth but not at all for the external Text or Letter of the Scripture which issue forth ad extra from the said Word Law Commandement Iudgements that are ad intra a great deep and known savingly to those only that wait on God in the light within But to come to some examination of his Texts and of what testimony they give for him beginning however with the first and ranking the rest as I shall see occasion The Scripture is light quoth he those that reject it are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lights Rebels men râ—sisting the Authority that they cannot but bee convinced of Reply That such as reject the Scripture are to be rejected and detâ—sted I freely grant if by rejecting thou meanest such a rejection as is in detestation of them in which wise thou rejectest the spirit and light within and all the Revelation made thereby when of those means of coming to the knowledge of God and to salvation thou sayest Ex. 3 f. 28 29. Inania sunt ista principia cognitionis Dei inutilia periculosa à Faniticir simulata ideoque rejicienda ae decestanda those are vain utterly unprofitable perillous wayes toward the knowlege of God and salvation Fanatick figments and therefore to be rejected and abhorred and in which wise thou falsely accusest the Qua. among others as rejecters of the Scriptures when thou mis-callest them Ex. 3. s. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 haters of the Scriptures as if they bore some spleen or such spite to the Letter as ye do to the Light and Spirit or more than to other writings which yet we for holy truth and doctrines sake declared in them love and prize above any books and honour one Chapter of them as more worth than twenty of your printed Preachments upon them I say he that so rejects the Letter or Scripture as is above said let him be rejected and even Anathema Maranatha for me for otherwise there is a kinde of rejecting which the light is not liable to of the meer Letter or Scripture that is not at all to be found fault with much less to be rejected and detested as that of those who make waste paper of old printed sheets or leaves of the Bibles and use them as they do other Scriptures or Writings as they please about refusely occasions But the Qua. are not to be Ranked among such Ranke rejecters of it as the first 2. That such as spitefully reject the Scriptures are though they are not so called in that of Iob Rebellious against the Light also may well bee owned howbeit upon this account only as the Letter truly Transcribed that came from the Light and the Light it came from are though two things yet so agreeing together in one as to the same testimony they both bear to the same truth that he cannot really and truly whatever hee may seem to do receive own and obey the one who is found fighting denying rejecting and rebelling against the other whereupon as obedient and reverential respectful even to superstition as I.O. would be judged to bee to the Letter which he and others receive as the Jews do with the honour and veneration due to God yet saving all these shews they are still Rebels against the very Letter whilst so rebellious against the Light as to reject it with that detestation that is due to nothing but sin
they shall be blessed that sow beside all waters and the soul of the diligent shall thrive and be fat but the soul of the vile person and niggard and of the sluggard shall desire but have nothing yea their Vintage shall faile and their gathering shall not come and their fruitful field shall be turned into a forrest they shall be stript and made bare and sit with sackcloth on their loins and lament for the tears for the pleasant fields and the fruitfull vine and their pallaces shall be forsaken their tents and towers shall be for dâ—ns and that which now is the pasture of wild asses Iob 11.12 Isa. 29.18 24. shall be no more enjoyed by them for ever Isa. 32. Wherefore then â—ayest thou I. O. with Restriction of the Spirits guidance to those first generations thus viz. While the infallible spirit continued his extraordinary guidance and thus viz. guided therein by the infallible direction of the spirit of God and by way of exclusion of after-ages and more expresly of this age thus viz. They were born acted carried out by the Holy Ghost to speake deliver and write c. and suppose a man were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1. inspired of God and should professe himself so and were so indeed as the Prophes of old Am. 7. Let me expostulate the case with thee a little about these expressions whereby thou seemest to shut all the past primitive times from any participation of the movings and actings of the Spirit as those that have neither part nor portion in that matter of his infallible guidance and direction First then not denying what Christ himself foretold Iohn â—4 28 30. Iohn 16.16 viz. That he would go away for a while and his Disciples should not see him and the Prince of this world which hath nothing in him should come and interpose himself to the great interception of that primitive Communion the Saints then had with him and his Spirit so that he would not have very much talk with them thereafter let me ask thee this much Did he say he would leave them for ever and never have any talk or words with them more then what they should find of his written in the Scriptures of such as should write some few things and a little of that much which they knew of his minde Did he say he should not speake at all not so much as by his Spirt Nay rather did he not say that so soon as his fleshly pretence was withdrawn he would send the holy Spirit himselfe the comforter to supply the room of that personall and bodily appearance wherein he then stood among them which they were so in love with and so loath to part with that they were ready well-nigh to dote so upon it as to let sorrow fill their hearts to think they should be utterly without his tuition as sheep without a shepherd if that should vanish and be removed In the departure and absence of which notwithstanding he told them it would be never the worse but much the better and more expedient for them For if I goe away saith he the Comforter cannot come but if I go I will send him unto you which Comforter was himselfe in Spirit the presence of which in the heart gives nearer acquaintance and fellowship with Christ and the Father then his abode among them their sight of him in the flesh could possibly do for the sight of him in the flesh the world may have and had which is to little effect if the other be wanting but his presence in the Spirit is that which is of Power and Efficacy though yet in two different wayes viz. of bare conviction or condemnation to the one and refreshment and consolation to the other both to the World and to the Saints though there be no sight of him as in the flesh any more by either I will send the Holy spirit the comforter to you saith he and he shall convince or reprove the world also Doth Christ therefore say he will leave them comfortlesse i.e. Orphans Iohn 14.17 18. deprived utterly of his presence because he said he i.e. in flesh would go away Nay saith he I will come to you i.e. in Spirit the Spirit of truth which dwelleth in you and shall be in you and though the world seeth me no more when I am gone because though the Spirit of Truth be sent into them and is nigh to men even striving preaching reproving in them yet they recieve him not neither see him nor know him yet ye see me and because I live ye shall live also and doth he not say that this spirit of truth should lead and guide them into all truth and bring all things to their remembrance whatever he spakâ— while he was seen in the flesh Which the letter doth not for there were many more things that Iesus spake and did that are not written there so many that if they should be written every one it might be supposed the world could not contain what should be written John 14.26 13 21 25. And howbeit he intimates a more sparing Communion in Spirit with his Dâ—sciples and Church which would be permitted to come to passe by the coming in of the Prince of this world wherein there should not be so much talk as there should be before and would be again after that gloomy day was once over wherein the manifestations of him though as infallible in that small measure wherein they should be made for gradus non variant naturam rei yet as to the measure would not be so great as at other times of which going away and withdrawing even in the spirit also he seemes to speak when he saith A little while and ye shall not see me in which Eclipse the chidren of the night must have a revelling night of rejoycing over the Word and Spirit and Saints sitting in sackcloth and an hour of laughter and merriment at the power of 〈◊〉 its prevailing Iohn 16. to 22. yet doth he say that Eclipse should be â—oâ—aâ—l Was there not some few in every age in whom the Spirit bare a testimony and by whom to the blind world also of little truth And did he not say the Spirit should be in them and abide with them i.e. in the same manner of infallibility in manifestation of whatever he makes known though not in the same measure of manifestation of the truth even for ever Iohn 14.16 And did he not say that the Spirit of truth should testifie of him when he came and so consequently his testimony must be with his Disciples and Church for ever Iohn 15.26 Which testimony is not that of the letter which men wrote at his motion as thou falsely supposest for that is mans mediate testimony and not immediately the Spirits any more then the testimony that men bear by word of mouth as they are moved of which in the very next verse i. e. Iohn 15.27 Christ calls their testimony and not the
Spirit also by himself as saying one thing and meaning another and so would set the Spirits words and the Spirits meanings at odds and together by the eares against themselves Christ enlightens only such men as are spiritually inlightned Nor secondly if he had said so would it have followed that every individual man is not enlightned for of a truth every individuall man is not only enlightned but also spiritually enlightned for he that is enlightned to discern spiritual things good or bad spiritual wickednesses or spiritual righteousness many sins and duties and divine attributes which are all spirituall objects and some of them some of those things of the Spirit which the meer natural man without the Spirits revealing cannot know because they are spiritually discerned that man must be spiritually enlightned so out of a better Bow then the Devils even that of Iosephs which abides in strength I shoot back T Ds second Arrow again thus against himself as that which hath done us no harm howbeit he meant it otherwise it being in his mind to have mischief'd the Truth viz. Christ enlightens every man that is spiritually enlightned witness T D p 36 but every individuall man is more or lesse even spiritually inlightned i. e. to discern spiritual objects which by the Spirits revealing them only and not naturally but spiritually only or by the Spirit are to be discerned witness T D again p 1 therefore Christ inlightens every individuall man 3 T D who hath mostly two hath here a third string to his Bow left the two first should not hold from which he shoots thus viz. He enlightens some of every Nation Kindred Tongue and People as the phrase is Rev. 5.9 Repl. And this however he meanes pinchingly yet is true too in terminis that Christ enlightens some every where a number in all Nations as he expresses it over again p. 36. for the termes all and every one are conclusive continually of some but that Arrow reaches not far enough to wound our universal construction so long as the termes some a number many without a but put to them whereby to bolt out othersome which is wanting here though elsewhere added and by and by to be talkt with is not exclusive of all men of every man nor of any man and so his bow and bolts shoots too short to hit the Butt still Nor is the Phrase Rev. 5 9 which T D in his fancy fellows and Identifies with this in Iohn 1 9 like it in any wise for one is enlightens every man in the world the other Redeemed us out of every Nation c. were it Redeemed every man in every Nation and made every man in every Nation and Kindred c. a King a Priest to God c. then it had been somewhat neeâ— a Kin to it indeed Thus T D by his single self with all his sharpest shafts or sorry shifts can make nothing stick to the gaining of any ground against us nor so much as to stirre us a hairs breadth from our interest in it much lesse to storm us out of the strong Hold we have in that high place of Scripture wherein the Qua. stand over the head of the Serpent to the bruising of it Let us see sith vis unita fortior what the joyned forces of him and I. O. together can do for they two who fight as under from that Text in some of their several senses against the Qua. fall in together in one of their four or five senses even that which hath the least sense and reason in it of all the rest and so of two make one most senselesse head against the Qua. and the Text and the Truth or true sense of the Spirit no lesse plainly imported and implyed to any but that darkness which comprehends not the true light when it shines in it then it is plainly end evidently exprest therein That sense I shall joyn issue in against them both at last but there lies on single sense of I O wherein T. D. joyns not with him wherewith I. O. shoots out of the same Bow as hard as he can against us though too short to hit or hurt us the which must be shot back again upon himself first in the service of the Qua. and the Truth which it serves perfectly while not at all themselves nor their own false doctrine and then I shall have the more Field-Room to fight them both in about the other The sense of I. O. which is not only his own neither though T. D. appears not to own it with him for I have seen others besides as himself seeking to shuffle off the Truth with it is this viz. Christ coming into the world inlightens every man and this sense seems to be ushered in with a deal of pâ—mp and ceremony as if I O was confident of carrying the cause by it when it first Center'd within his conciet and so intended to act his Triumph over the Qua. before his effecting of the victory I shall set down some of his triumphant matter wherein he marches on towards the Text where he meets us and make some occasionall notes on some crosse whets to himself and halts and inter-feeres he makes by the way I. O Videanâ—us porro quid contra garriunt Fanatici ut que operam dent quacum ratione aliqua insanire videantur c. Ex. 4. S. 23 24. Le ts see quoth he what the Quakers prate to the contrary and how they do their best to shew that they are not mad without some Reason but they bring no new thing they are old worn out Arminian matters they bring a thousand times confuted already they have nothing more frequently in their mouth then those words concerning Christ John I. 2 They never make a more horrid out-cry then when they come upon this place here they fain wonderfull triumphs to themselves and not a little cast ignominy on their adversaries Repl. No otherwise I say still do we reproach then as the Virgin of Sion Isai. 37.21 22. Despised laughed to scorn shook her head at the insolent filliness of the haughty Assyrian that reproached blasphemed exalted his voice and lifted up his eyes on high against the Holy One of Israel in his Truth and People o're whom he looked so superciliously as if he would pluck them out of Sion by the eareâ— when he was not so much as to shoot an Arrow that should reach to do any execution there No otherwise then as plain Ephraim the people and the honest hearted Sons of Sion are at this day in the Spirit and Power of the Lord to be raised against thy silly-seemingly-wise Sons O Greece and to be made against you Greekish Scribes and Disputers of this world as the Sword of a mighty man and a polished Shaft and his Bow and Arrows and Battel-Axe in his hand to beat down aud break in pieces the Horse and his Rider and as the Potters Clay the works of them that turn Gods things
own perverse mind and meaning why cannot that be meant of freedome from sin but that men who are not fully willing to be freed from it and are in love with it and being loath to leave it are loath to see it It s more hard not to see then it is to see that it is meant of freedome from sin What should or can it be meant of else Are not freed me from sin and not committing of sin made synominous as committing sin and not being freed from it are made by Christ himself opposites to each other Ioh. 8.32 33. 34. 35. 36. The Iews thought they had the fullest freedome that men could have in this world because they were the visible Church Abrahams Seed and such like externals as they then trusted in as ye now do though not yet freed from that thing call'd sinning to serve the Lord alone whose service the very Common-Prayer-Book it self was wont to call perfect freedome But Christ learns them another Lesson viz. that they had none of that true Gospel freedome that the saving knowledge of the truth gives and which he makes such as continue in his words and so are his Disciples indeed and not in word only as ye are free withall which is a full freedome in deed and truth and not half a one or by the halves such as that is ye talk of who upon the account of some private Patent alias particular personal Election thereto from everlasting prattle to your selves of freedome from guilt while ye remain in your filth and of a general Iustification anâ— pardon for all sins past present and to come in this world expecting your purging or Iustification as to Sanctification from sin and â—ncleâ—â—ness not in this world but that to come But verily verily I say unto you quoth he he that committeth sin is yet the servant of sin and must know for all his boasting he has not long to abide in the House and Church of God wherein Ishmael-like he scoffs at the right Heir Isaac as if himself alone who is but a Bastard born of fornication should inherit all and will prove an out-cast himself at last before the Son who is born of God and free indeed and the only true Heir of all things full freedome from sin and committing of it are oppos'd to each other by Christ therefore freedome from it and not committing it are the same To wind out of this T.D. would seem to say somewhat but of two things he can't tell which but one of the two must be it rather then the Truth Either there is quoth he an Emphasis in the word sin intending under that general term one kind of sin viz. sin unto death or if not in the Substantive on the Verb Poiei which notes to make a trade or business of sin as the Devil does who sinneth from the beginning and never ceased from sin since he began Thus indeed the Saints sin not c. Rep. As to they Emphases they are the foolish empty conceits of thy own and other mens brains there 's no such Emphasis either in the Substantive or Verb as ye all prate whereby the Spirit should be understood as speaking otherwise then he truly means or meaning otherwise then he plainly sayes whose words are plain to the honest heart though not to Idol Shepherd who by the Sword of the Lord hath his right eye utterly darkned because he hath darkned the Lords Counsel by his own words without knowledge And if the eyes of the Seers were not shut up from seeing the very Letter they prate about as well the mysteries of the Spirit which the animal man can never know by all his searchings they being revealed only by the Spirit they might see that the Text it self makes no difference between sinning and committing sin and that the one is no more Emphatical then the other And if T.D. who in the same page 9. where he mentions the words were not so busie in his mind about the meaning and did not make such a warbling noyse as shallow waters ever do more then those that are deepest with harping at this that and t' other silly sense he might in coolness have considered that in the same ninth verse as well as the eigth and others about it the Spirit makes no difference between Amartian Poiein and Amortanein to commit sin and to sin but uses them promiscuously Ouk Amartanei every one that abides in him sinneth not So ver 8. He that commits sin is of the Devil for the Devil Amartanei sinneth from the beginning And because T.D. seems to put an Emphasis upon the word sinneth as well as committeth sin making the word sinneth as here used to amount to somewhat more then an ordinary sort of sinning as here it intends some high or desperate degree of sin even that which 1 Ioh. 5.16 is call'd Kat ' Exoken a sin unto death without remedy or forgiveness for ever because never to be repented of as in opposition to all other sins that men do commit which when this alone being ever joyâ—'d with impenitency is impardonable are all upon that true repentance they are yet in possibility of who commit them pardâ—nable or possible to be forgiven for this is T. Ds. emphasis on the Substantive Sin for I shall not wrong him so much as to take him meaning as the Papists do who put such difference between peccatum veniale and mortale as if some sins only without repentance were mortal or to death and some venial or not to death though not repented of at all your Church of England opposing them in this and holding every sin yea the least unrepented of unto death though T. D. would have suspected me to be a Iesuite for a less matter This concludes him that is born of God to be even qua sic as born of God as easily liable to and excludes him no more then it does the very wicked themselves from the committing of any sin that the wickedest can commit except that ye call the sin against the Holy Ghost it self which is so gross an absurdity that he can be no spiritually wise man that does not feel him to be spiritually infatuated that so imagines For still though the Devil sinneth and he that is of the Devil doth nothing else but Nicodemus though a Master in Israel can't read this Birth of God which is Anothen from above of water and the Spirit John 1.12 John 3. which blows where it lists and the Priests hear an outward sound thereof but know not whence it comes nor whether it goes nor how he is that is born of the Spirit as plain as 't is in the Text which they read more then that truth tells of yet as he that sinneth is of the Devil and he that is of the Devil sinneth altogether so he that sinneth not but doth righteousness only is of God and he that is born of God and the Spirit which is Spirit and not flesh sinneth not at
thereunto that he is comparatively to such â— one but as the â—east of the field that perisheth yet in the Fall he hath all that is Essential to him as a man and flowing ex principirs naturae But and this may be an Addition to the other Arguments in the Book if it be not touch't upon therein already Gods Law or Light in the consciences of all men which we call them to though given of God in some not the same measure at first to All so that universally every Individual or hath or hath had somthing of it yet through mans not using it well may he yet remaining Essentially a man be totally taken from him as the Talent from the sâ—othfull and darkness come upon him and be left to walk in utter darkness and to stumble in that dismall night of which its said then and of that time he that walketh in it knows not whether he goes and to stumble not only because he hates the Light as he did before while yet he had it but because now he hath it 〈◊〉 and because now there is no light left in him Of which Light and of its universality and sufficiency to save such as seek God in it and how it 's a supernatural spirituall gift and grace of God to all men where it is and not the naturall faculty of mans understanding only as our Opponents pittifulâ—y praâ—â—e to prove it is is most plainâ—y proved in the 4th Exeâ—citation from p. 49 to p. 194. and made more apparent in the Appendix also And when we assert the Ministry of Christ to be an infallible Ministry and the Spirit of God by which his Ministers are ever guided in the work of his Ministry for they are out of his Ministry or Service and in the Devils at that time who ever are at any time guided by any other is an infallible Spirit for God hath no fallible Spirit that we know of and that all the directions leadings and guidances of that Spirit are infallible which Spirit hath no fallible guidance as J. O. little lesse then seems to intimate he has that we know of and consequently that All who are led by that Light or Spirit are so far infallibly led and that all and only they are the Sons of God that are led by that Spirit of God and that God hath Children at this day in the world and so consequently that at this day his Ministers and Children who are all â—aught of God are infallibly taught as they attend to that Anointing that 's given to be their Teacher that leads into all truth which Spirit of Christ also whoever hath not as his teacher is none of Christ's Then they bely us as saying of our selves that we as of our selves as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as J.O. flouts are infallible Whereas we say no such thing at all of our selves nor of any men but that All men as in themselves and in the Fall are no more then fallible But because men in the Fall are fallible liable of themselves to erre still as they are erred already to their own ruine Therefore God in his love hath sent his Son a Light into the Nations So to be his Salvation to the ends of the earth to lighten them that sit in darkness and to guide their feet in the way of peace out of the crooked paths they are in in which who walks can never know peace and that the Light and Spirit of him who is the Light of the world the Lord that Spirit which is Truth it self and no Lye is lent as the Letter speaks of it to every man even that True Light that enlightneth every man that comes into the world given to lead him back infallibly unto God from whom it comes who can be known out of that no more then the Sun can be seen by any other Light then what shines from it self in which Light wherein he looks after the Lost whoever look after him are not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and shall find that Salvation of which he says Look ye unto me and be ye saved All ye ends of the earth Of the Infallibility of which Light and Spirit and of its guidance of all Christ's Ministers and Children and of all men also so far only and no further then as they are led by it as of old so at this day there is much said in answer to those Ignes fatuos that fain the contrary in the 4 Exercitation from p. 1. to p. 47. And because we call on men as the Scripture does to perfect holiness in Gods fear and to cleanse themselves from all uncleannesse of Flesh and Spirit then which there is no more as a thing attainable by Christs grace and Power only improved as a thing not only Possible to be done here as God requires who calls not for Impossibilities from his People on pain of Eternall Punishment if they Perform it not but also needfull and necessary to be done here if they mean to do it at all sith as Themselves say with Vs against the Pope there 's no Purgatory in the World to come They commonly accuse Vs of saying in A Self-Vaunting Proud Disdainfull Vain-glorious Boasting Way over all other men of our selves that we are perfect and as J. O. impudently intimates that we impudently Glory in it that we are free from not only Hypocrisyes Fraud Wickedness Lyes which it seems he can't Glory yet that by the Grace of God he is yet free from but even from all other even the very least evils and so would have us have Punitiones Incarrationes Punishments Prisons c. for so saying Whereas we use not to bear Testimony to our selves but to the Truth of Carist and though by the Grace of God only We are what We are and His Grace to whom alone therefore We give the Glory and not to our selves who have nothing but what we have received and Glory not as some do in Sin and Shame nor boast as they do in evill doing of anything that 's Good As if we had not received it is not in vain so but that our walking is such that they can't accuse some of us Justly of the least Evills yet we Testify the Truth rather as a Doctrine to all Teaching not what our selves are what ere we are so much as what both We and All men should be and also may be by the Grace of God who is not wanting to us if we be not wanting to our selves and must be also viz. Deniers of all Ungodliness and worldly Lusts and Godly Righteous Sober Livers in this present world or else it had been better men had never been born seeing for them that loose their day for it here it 's too late to begin that life in the world to come where there is no Purgatory nor place for Repentance though it shall be then sought carefully with Teares Pro. 1. Math. 25. Luke 13. In this Doctrine
Slaughter and Eternal Slavery for you not to Try their Talk First Who tell it you for Truth that there is now no Guidance of Christs Own Ministers by Christs Own Infallible Spirit They that Teach that their own Teaching is but Falible may easily draw all their Implicit Followers together with themselves into the Ditch Secondly Talk for Liberty of Conscience while they are under the Lash of others and for Persecution as soon as they can Climb to be Lords over all Thirdly That Affirm Christ's Righteousness Wrought in his Saints Persons by his Power and Spirit Serving to Sanctifie them too to fit them for Heaven to be of no other worth and worth no better Name and worse they cannot give it then that of unclean Dung Losse and Filthy Rags which Doctrine is Necessarily Deducible from T. D's Writing against the Quakers who yet sayes David even while Guilty of Adultery and Murder was not in a Condemned but in a Justified Estate Fourthly That where and while God Tenders Salvation Openly and Universally to All Men He Secretly Intends it but Particularly only to a Few Fifthly That that Light the Quakers Testify to which in Truth is no other then the True Light which the Life is which their own Rule of Scripture sayes John 1.9 Enlightens every man that cometh into the World Enlightens not every one but very few And is an Horrible Figment of the Quakers an Imaginary Christ as to Salvation in all Divine Matters Darkness Blindness it self and many more sayings of that sort under which they Scorn it as J. O. does and other Divines viz. R. B. and J. T. little lesse Sixthly 1. That the Letter of the Scripture is the only Sure Foundation and Rule of all Faith 2. That the said Letter is Variable and Varied and yet 3. That A thing that is Variable can be no Rule neither which is one of the many Rounds the Rabbies Run in Seventhly That Preaching of Perfect Purging and full Freedom from Sin in this world is a Doctrine of Devills so T. D. and Punishable With Prisons and other Paines so I. O. that there 's no Purgatory for purging away the Remnants of it as the Pope Falsly sayes there is in the world to come neither which Perfection of Holiness so far as to deny of all Unholiness and Salvation of Souls from Sinning is the meer End of Christs coming Matth. 1.21 the end of all Ministry that 's of his giving Eph. 4.11 12 13. the end of all the Apostles Writing willings of men to walk in the Light 2 Cor. 7 1. 1 Iohn 1.6 7 8. 1 Iohn 2.1 and of all true Faith or Beleiving 1 Pet. 1.5 And as it 's no Treachery in us to you nor others nor yet in you and us and all men to our selves to Try what 's Truth before we Trust Take and Talk for it much more Obtrude it as that Truth which must Subpaena as so be believed by Ali So it 's no lesse then time for us to Ask and put it to the Question among you Sith both cannot be so who are so Contradictory and if they be Right wee l own our selves to be wrong when once they prove it whether those who in Christs Name Minister the abovesaid Messes for Truth or the Qua. who in their Ministry Minister the very contrary and no less then the Infallible Truth it self be Christs Ministers So having in my time Born my Testimony as a Friend to the Truth against such as Tread and Trample it under Feet and Aâ—k'â— an Answer from that of God in All Consciences to which I Appeal to Judg between the Clergy and the Quakers who are in Truth I Sit down Satisfied in my Own Conscience in the Sight of God holding Love to All Mens Persons and Warr with nothing but Mens Wicked Works not knowing whether this may be the Last Time of Asking After which as to this way of Appearing in Print against the Pervertures of the Parish Priesthood I may for ought I know for Ever possibly hold my Peace Sam. Fisher. A Lamentation over Lost-Souls With a Word of Warning to All Kings Princes Parliaments Powers And People to Beware of Such Priests aâ— Uphold the Devils Kingdome by Pleading Contrary to the Scriptures of Truth A Continuance of Iniquity for Term of this Life A Necessity of Mens Transgressing of Gods Law while they Liâ—e in the World Or have any Abode in the Body IN th' Snare You Are Dear Souls I truly Know it And Wot I't Not yet there is That doth Shew it For First that 's Worst You are Beset with Sin Next Those are Foes without for That 's With in Who Preach yea Teach Yee cannot Live with out it Who Hint Live In 't yet shall Yee Live ne'r Doubt it Such Watchmen Catch men in Sins Snares not Out By Such how Much to take Sin lies at Scout Yâ—u In its Gin You 'l know when th' Light is Heeded Know'â— Now and How Christ Iesus is not Needed To Win from Sin if in it Souls can Thrive To Save from th' Grave if there Souls are Alive I Trow You 'l Know You Cannot Live in Sin When All Dy Shall who Live and Dy there in Wherefore before you Live You ought t' Eschew it Then Must I Trust even whilst you Live or Rue it Read This for 't is a Riddâ—e else in th' Light Heart Read for th' Head herein obtains no Sight It s Wis-dom Is too Dim this Depth to Enter Vn lesse you Guesse by th' Spirit which Dives to th' Center Give Ore no More your selves with Vain Hopes Cherish For Lie and Die in Sin who doth doth Perish But Lay Away all Weights Sins which be set you Abandon And shake off such Priests as Let you And Shun that Run you may with Saints that Race Which Brings with Wings from Sin to th' Holy Place To th' Place where Grace is Perfect Holy Sion The Mount where Count upon 't there comes no Lyon Nor Man that Can work Evil where the Pure In Heart leave Part Alone and their Right 's Sure For While You Stile those Saints who plead for Evil And Them Christ's Members who still Serve the Devil Nor Leave but Cleave to Them the Light ye Flee And Sure ye Pure as Christ is cannot Be. For Hire They Tire You out with Talk â—ut Know Their Words are Swords which will Souls Over throw Their Eyes toward Lyes are set Truth They Be spatter Time Serving Swerving still from God They Scatter They Sooth speak Smooth Charm Dawb Sow Pillowes Flatter Cry Peace where Peace is Not So ends this Matter Sam Fisher. A List of some of the Typographicall Mistakes THough in I. O's blind judgement it seems to Border on Atheism to say the same Fate as to Mistakes hath attended the Hebrew and Greek Text of Scripture in it's Transcribing as hath done other Books yet it seems to me upon that but Running Review I have yet taken thereof that the
Orthodox Brother Tombs as two Twins that tumbled both out of one Belly even one and the same Womb of that Babylonish Bawd are both to be tumbled into one and the same Tomb or Grave that as your two I. O. T. D. so their pair of pratings may go together into the earth whence they came as like to like earth to earth ashes to ashes for dust which is the Serpents meat all your Divinity doings are and unto dust must they all return Now as little method as thy Book I. O. hath in it yet is it as capable to be divided into parts as it is in each part in one thing or another most palpably divided against it self 1 As to the subject matter thereof it is in general twofold viz. The Outward Letter and the Inward Light that External writing or legible form of words commonly called the Scripture the Holy Scriptures which are ad extra but ab intra only and meerly without though from within together with that Internal Law Spirit Power or Word which is ad intra by all that know the Truth as it is in Iesus both seen felt heard understood and witnessed to be within not more cryed up by the men call'd Quakers who live both according to it and the Scripture then decryed by the men that are but supposed to be Christs Ministers who are utterly erring besides them both knowing truly neither the one nor yet the other Sundâ—y touches there are given by thee as thou goest along at other things viz. Vniversal Grace Perfection Persecution Modern Inspiration by the Spirit of God Revelation and such like about which thine and the Quakers Doctrine differs by which as ex pede Herculem thy Pulse is felt and it 's spied out how thy Spirit blows against Christs thy truthless talk of which may the Lord leading to it not unlikely be talked with by the way before I have done But those two abovesaid being well nigh the Totum in Toto the Totum in qualibet parte the matters thou mainly medlest with and most miserably mudlest thy self about thoroughout the whole Body of thy Book and every part thereof making little less then a very God of the one i. e. Of the Letter which is the last and the least and the lowest of the two and little better then a very Devil of the other i. e. the Light which is the first and the highest and the greatest so that all others are but toucht upon as in subserviency either to the Deifying or defying respectively of one of these to clear away that fog and smoak which thou raisest about them both to the thickning and darkning of the Sun and Ayr so that none can see either of them clearly through thy cloudy collation thereupon is the chief intent and likely to be the chief and utmost extent of this present Answer 2 As to the Tongue wherein it treats excepting here and there a little Hebrew and for shew sometimes more then service a penful or two of Greek interlin'd in both parts and now and then two or three licks of Latine among the English thy Book stands divided into two parts viz. Latine and English a Cloven Tongue of another nature then those that sate upon the Apostles and these are as the two Horns of that second double-fac'd Beast that is as the Lamb and yet speaks like the Dragon wherewith thou pushest at thy Opposers on the right hand as well as on the left even not only at thy own Brethren the Protestant Divines when they please thee not by Divining the contrary to thy peremptory peculiar Positions and preheminent pratings together with that blind Brood of the first ten-horn'd Beast of Rome to whom both thou and all thy Brethren though in many things ye justly band against them are Brothers in nature still and of neerer Kin then ye well ken or wot of but also against the true People of God These two general parts each of which is prefaced with an Epistle also in language like it self stand divided and subdivided more particularly within themselves viz. the English into two Treatises which subdivide themselves the one into six Chapters the other though falsly figured into eight the Latine into four Apologetical Exercitations as thou call'st them for the Holy Scriptures against as thou call'st the Quakers the Fanatical Ones of these Times Which fore-named divisions and subdivisions that are scarcely more divided from then against each other do all split themselves yet fuâ—ther into a new needless number of smaller Sections and Thâ—ses The two English Treatises which arise mostly from one and the same Spring or Head together with the other not God nor his Spirit nor yet the Scriptures but the Head of the Serpent which is to be bruised thy own brain vain invention and imagination run along treating to and fro in two distinct streams or Torrents awhile and at last having as thou sayst Arctissimum materiae doctrine consortium a neer coincidence of their matter with it and affinity in their subject by which the whole Trinity of them is drawn into that Unity to compleat thy double Doctrine far from the Scriptures for the Scriptures fall into one with the Latine Sourse or Lake of Lyes that burns more hotly then the rest in wrath against the Quakers And having there lodg'd and center'd thy two English Discourses and drawn them into one with this verifying herein that old true saying Vis unita fortior thou ventest that venome in stronger streams and spittest out that spite more fluently and in fuller floods against the Qua. which was in some few places only sprinkled out upon them before and filling up what was behind of thy flattering false Applauses of the naked Letter which with some of the same that were used before and some new super-eminent undue Titles thouâ— here also magnifiest beyond the bounds and measure of all modesty and truth hoping belike to appear approved of Christ as one of note in his service what disservice soever thou do him otherwise so long as thou art found saying something though Hoc aliquid nihil est as good thou hadst said just nothing as no more to the purpose and raking and skimming and scraping out of thy own thoughts some ample Apologies for the Scriptures thou fillest up thy measure of mad mirth against that true inward Light of God and its Children that testifie unto it as that which is to be preferred before the Letter and was before it as that which the Letter was given forth from despising these as in thy English Epistle p. 28. p. 30. under the as false as foul terms of poor deluded Fanatical Qua. pretending to be guided by an Infallible Spirit that oppose the whole truth about the Word of God so there under the abusive clamours against and charges of them even by whole-sale as Fanatical ones that are notoriously known by their errours and foolishness who are driven by the power of an Evil Spirit
these Lyaâ—s had not been blind to be diâ—cerned from L. Hs. White one and that in the afternoon too neither was the discourse between or appointed between L. H. and W. R. but E. B. and W. R. nor did E.B. send for me but a letter to me only not knowing of my comming but desiring my answer only neither did I know at all that any discourâ—e at all was to be till I came into the Town nor was there such a word spoken by L. H. in my heaâ—ing that he would now leave the discourse to me nor did L. H. so much as by desire engage me in that diâ—course though some few things I said in it any more then he engaged me to come to those disputes at Sandwich which saving thy lyes in that particular ore and ore againe repeated was just no way at all though hearing of a dispute to be there I was there with other friends By all which Remarkable Passages whether thou hast not marked out thy self and thy Talâ—-bearers more then the Qua. to be men that have not somuch morall honesty or to speak truth in matters of fact let all true men Iudge nor is all that in thy last half sheet of any Validity to disprove this which I say and averr to be the truth as in the sight of God who will Judge between you Lyaâ—â— and us who as little Conâ—cience as thou sayst we make of Lying have herein said the very Truth and shall be beleived against thy Tattle notwithstanding the sleeveless Testimonyes of Wâ—lliam Russell and Thâ—mas Morris whose Certificate which thou â—ettest to put an end to the contest conclude nothing to the contradicting of what 's here said by me And thus into the pit of thy own digging for us art thou fallen thy self and in the same Labo iâ—uh of lyes wherein he lay turking for the Innocent hath the Lyar lost and left him elf not a little in the Lurch T. D. Thou tellest a Tale that a dying Qua. at Dover said He expâ—cted Salvation onely by his good works and not from Christ in witness of which thou bringest Io. Davis Minister of Dover Rep. Thou hadst abused Io. Davis as grosly as thou dost thy self but that I see by his Vnderhand Testimony inserted in thy half sheet and his non-complaining of thee he is willing enough to be so abused by thee and so I am the less willing to vindicate him sith volenti non fiâ— iâ—iâ—â—ia by offering in thy Narrative to Summon him in Print as a witness of that which he himself had no otherwise than by hear-say from another for hereby thou expoâ—est I. Da. together with thy self to the iust censure of Ignoramus whilst it s well known to all save such as either are or else in enmity to the Truth are free to be counted Idiots that as in fâ—o Dei verae Ecclesiae he is no true Minister or Witness of the Word of God who stealing his Testimony and the words he speaks out of the writings of the true Prophets declares what himself never saw felt nor handled of the word of life so vel in foro hominum even before men in their earthly Courts of Iudicature that man would be deservedly cast forth with shame as no lawfull Witness against a living man there pâ—esent much less against a dead man not capable to speak for himself who should testifie it as an undoubted truth that he spake Treason and from thence accuse all that mans Kindred also to be Traytors and yet confess he was no Eaâ—ewitness of his words but only heard a Third man say somewhat to such a purpose And how Iohn Davis can be such a competent witness to the world of the words spoken by the dying Quaker as thou set'st him down for or any more then a presumptuous Intruder into or Talker of what he hath not heard but only heard of my eyes which are not so dim but that I can Divine the Divines to be in the dark to Divine lyes to each other do not fee howbeit let every one see not with my eyes but with his own as to the case in hand But I. D when he was backbiting the Qua. to thee in that Tale and tickling and scratching thy Itching ears which as false tongues do love lying words and feed on meer Fables more then truth thought perhaps as little as thou did'st of the likeliness of the Quakers Printing to be brought so openly on the Stage about it as now he is and that with so much the more shame by how much he seemes to have play'd Bâ—-peep between both partyes and by that his second hand Testimony to have â—erved two contrary turns at once viz. L. Hs. and thine too or else its like he would have kept his heaâ— say to himself but now he is justly left of the Lord to manifest himself to be one that would fain seem to hold with the Hare though he runs with the Hâ—und open mouth at her to devoure her having since he seemed to side with L. H. against thee in his last testimony obtained by thee and obtruded upon the world made himself obvious to the view of all to be a Sidesman with thee in thy viperous spirit against us and one who would Balaam-like Divine us into the denomination of Papists if he could tell how but as such Concurrâ—rs as shew their teeth much Seldome bite very deep so 't is now the curst Cow's have short Hornes and your uncertain Certificate can stand but for a Cypher at most that signifies nothing but that ye would â—ay something in disparagement of the Qua. if ye could tell what Something it seems was affirmed by some body yea by the Qua. Brother who as their own-Brethren usually do Isa. 66. for Christs name sake hated thoâ—e that hear Gods word and tremble at it and are therefore in scorn called Qua. to such an effect as if the dying Qua. had said he look'd for Saâ—vation by his own works and not by Christ wherein if he doth not as many in Dâ—veâ— and Sandwich have done as bad puâ—posely bely his Decreased Brother for the sake of his own malice to the Qua. yet I know he did at best as much mistake him as T. D. mistakes either blindly or maliciously mis eprâ—sents me to the world as a looker for Iustification without Christ by my own works which I have long since denyed as dung for those that Christ works in me for howbeit I shall not here meddle point blank to prove a Negative yet thus much I can say in disproof of your hasty Affirmaâ—ve I my self who know his principles to have been no other then to expect Salvation by Christs works in him only and not his own was with that said dying Qua. in the time of that sickness whereof he died and in as deep dâ—scourse with him I believe as that his meer fleshly Brother was who hath so abused him yet I heard him utter as nothing at all
Native Language the right use of the aforesaid Pronoune so as to wrest it besides its own due true speciall prime and genuine signification into a sense that is in truth no less then false silly non sensicall For in Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Attah 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if it be the Faeminine not only signifies Thou or Thee as likewise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Attem and Atten in the Plurall You and Yee but also the Iewish Nation in their writings and talkings one to another as they ever did so do at this day usually keep thereunto saying continually when they speak to a single per on only though never so great as well as when to the meanest Attah or At if to a woman that is being Englished Thou or Thee but never Attem or Atten that is being Englished You or Yee but when they speak to more then one the truth whereof as some of them call'd Qua. have been Eare Witnesses who have been in discourse with many of those thousands of the Iews they have been amongst so all that know ought of the Hebrew Tongue may be eye Witness thereof if they will but peruse the Scriptures or any other writings in that Language Also in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 su sou soi se which are the same pronoune of the 2d Person Singular varied only as to the Case signifying Thou or Thee are universally used among the Gracians both in Orall discourses and Writings when a single person only is spoken to and the words in the Plurall 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 humeu humon humin humas which in English are you or yee us'd only when more then one are spoken to Also in Latine every one that is learn'd no farther then the Accidence hath learnt so much that Tu tui tibi te which are Thou or Thee in the singular number only aâ—e us'd and never vos vestrium vobis which in sence and signification are You and Yee when a single person only is written or spoken to and it would be counted false Latine and Ridiculous and such a thing as deserves hissing at among very School-Boyes to use the Terms vos or vobis to express one single person by And yet such is the Folly and Apishness of our English Nation that when they speak to one person only specially if it be a Superiour for when they speak to Inferiours they often times keep to Thee and Thou and Thy or Thine which is the pronoune possessive derived from its primitive Thou E. G. Thou shalt have this or that I will give this or that to Thee get Thee hence go Thy why this book is Thine and such like but when a Superiour I say is spoken to as a Matter a Father a Land-Lord a Knight a Gentleman as they call them a Magistrate a Governour or some great â—ne then out of that Reverentiall respect they have to mens Persons which cannot stand with the true faith of God and without transgression of the Law Iam. 2. they use the words You Yee and Your and Yours c which in the propriety of the English speech are only for the Plurall number and to be used only when more persons then one are spoken to which gross digression and degeneration from the truth of their own mother Tongue in saying You Sir may it please you your Worship your Excellency or the like is as abominably absurd as it would be if in any of the three Languages abovesaid men should use words of the Plurall number to a particular person and the absolute absurdity of that every A B C-darian only in any of those Tongues is able to discover and would Abandon yea to say in English you Sir to one man be he never so Eminent is as false English as its false Latine to say to one in Latine vos domine that 's as false as to expreâ—s these words Thou lovest by the Latine words vos amas which is no better then nos amâ— or ego amanâ—â—us or tu amaâ—is or â—ille amant and all this the very Accidence doth cry shame on Finally as the Hebrew Greek and Latine Testaments as well as all other writings in those several Languages do so clearly witness it besides what evidence comes into this matter from other Tongues viz Italian Dutch Spanish c that as we may safely summon all men to shew us so much as one instance where any of the words of the Plurall number are ever used to a verbe of the second person singular or us'd to express one single individuall person so as to say in Hebrew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Abavia Attem or in Greek 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or in Latine vos amas which are all being Englished Thou Levest so excepting the writings of modern men only or their modern Translations of other Ancient Humane writings which all makes nothing against us in this case so rightly properly and truly both have and still daily do our very Adversaries fall in with us and favour us whether they will or no in this point in the Translation of all our English Bible which for shame they will not say but they have Translated into the most proper and not improper English that we can challenge all English men in the world to shew us any one Translation or any place in any one Translation of the Bible out of Hebrew Greek or Latine into the English Tongue wherein the word You which is now so used in their Common discourses one to another but especially when proud personages are bespoken or any other terme then that of Thou or Thee is used to speak to a single person by as well when God himself or the greatest King or proudest Prince as when the poorest Peasant or simplest Servant is spoken to and we will yeeld further to them that stomack it to be Thee'd and Thou'd by us then yet we can or if they will help themselves by such a helpless shift as to say the Bibles are not Translated so properly and truly as they should be as to those words of Thou or Thee let such as snuff at Thou and Thee from us put out the words Thou and Thee and instead thereof put in the words you or yee when God and great men are spoken to so as where it s said to God Thou O Lord madest the Heavens and they are the work of Thine Hands all Thy workes praise Thee and Thy Saints bless Thee to read thus viz You O God made the Heavens they are the works of Your Hands all Your works praise You and Your Saints bless You c and in that place where Paul saith to Agrippa dost Thou beleive O King Agrippa yea I know Thou beleivest to Read dost Ye beleive O King Agrippa yea I know You beleivest and they will see what a palpable piece of nonsence it would amount to like to which yet they utter and sound forth in their ordinary locution but feel it not
this doth all or any of this Minister to you Ministers who make so much of it that way any Just matter of crime whereupon to accuse me at all or any matter of probable proof of so high a crime as ye and your self-like people are ever charging me with of complying with and of being in orders and pay from the Pope Among many hundreds of Iews the Truth hath been Testified to openly in their Synagogues and streets of their Cities in Rome and elâ—ewhere and yet being in safety from them hath been witnessed the Truth hath been Testified in Turkie yea by the Power of God to some great Bashaws and to the very Grand Segâ—ior himself and his Councell by some of the Servants and Hand-maids of the Lord on whom in these dayes he pours out of his Spirit who by the same Power of God have with such reâ—pectful usage as will shame England Old and New especially if it look not to it in time been dismissed peaceably from their presence doth this prove the Qua. complyance in their several Superstitions with either the Iews or Turks Respectively I trow not yet Heu quam facile est invenire baculum ad caedendum canem when men have once an ill name as the Proverb is they are half hang'd so that evil shall be ever charged upon them for doing good when for being Christ friends they become enemies to the world who hates him and for his sake are hated as a dog how easie is it for the worlds own children not only to find a quarrel against them but a cudgel also to beat them at their pleasure For mark how matter of Accusation it self is made by our Priests of our having been at Rome and declaring there against Popery and under that Protection we went out in returning safe again into England which is now laid to me as a Crime witness thy words viz. T.D. As to the matter of which S.F. was accused part of it he denied not namely tha he had been at Rome Rep. Had I been executed there as I might have been if the Lord had not kept me it had satisfied some Parish Preachers and others here very well who though they seemed to congratulate my well coming home yet were more merry when they heard I was hang'd or hew'd to pieces but now I am as well as some smooth tongues seem to wish me t is hardly well with them while it s well with me so that if they had advantage would not be slack to make use thereof to have execution against me here so that I may safely say Lord where should the Witnesses of thy Truth be safe or have a quiet Being if not in thee who when they go into other Nations are in danger to lose their lives as Hereticks and Church-wasters and when they return if the malice of their own Counmen might be permitted to prevail are in perils of being hang'd nearer home as Iâ—suits or such as are in pay and orders from the Pope while 't was both heard and hoped I were never likely to come safe back again from out of the paw of that Romish Roâ—râ—ng Lyon 't was counted no crime by the Clergy even at Rome it self to bear Testimony against it but sith it s seen I had no harm there it must be thence granted that I did some and that a mans being there only is Crime enough to be accusâ—d on and not only so but some eminent evidence of such another high crime as by the Law as it yet stands were it made good against me cals for no less then handling with an English halter so in Summe say some of our English Seminaries whose voice is smooth as Iacobs but their hands ever rough as the hands of Esau. 2. But be it as high a Crime as it will for such as here protest against the Pope to visit Rome I can do so much good at least against their Evil as to excuse my cheif accusers and as candidly to clear our Clergy of it as several of them continually are charging me therewith yea I am perswaded that our English Clergy are as Clear in their consciences from the guilt of that Crime and as fearful of that fault and as free from the thoughts of Committing such a thing as travelling to Rome to tell the Truth as they are far from it in their Persons while they are preaching against it in their Parishes and as they are far from consenting to it and calling for it that the Iews may come into England in order to their coming to the Truth for whose coming to it they are always calling upon God There is little posting to preach abroad by these fixed Stars the stand stiff like Posts in their own places let those wandring Stars say they not considering that the Vagabonds and wandring Stars to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever are such as wander with Cain from the light of God and not to and fro to preach the Gospel let the Qua. gad about and gang to Rome or where they will wee 'l be none of their gang and as for money there 's little need for them to Run so far as Rome for pay to receive his pensions from the Pope himself having it nearer home It is enough for our Parochial Priesthood to Receive the Romish pay of Parsonages Vicaradges Curateships Glebe-lands Tithes add other of Romes Bonifaces Benefices and Benedictus's Blessings in their native Nation and have the Popes Pensions and their part of Peters Patrimony for preaching against the Pope and Peter too in the Popes old mouldy Mass-houses to his own Parochially moulded Churches It s enough for them to abide here praying down Antichrist and praying home the Iews and preaching against the Qua. while they go out against him as siders with and upholders of him as much as against Antichrist himself and cry out against those that go out as the Lord moves to cry in the Iews as one with the Iâ—ws for so I. O. saith the Qua. are in enmity to the Scripture and as worâ—e then the very Iews themselves O Lord God forgive cease this I bessech thee by whom shall Iacob arise for he is yet small by whom shall the Romane Antichrist fall for he is yet great when such as call themselves thy Messengers will neither go on thy errand or message themselves nor quietly suffer thoâ—e Messengers of thine that are made willing to it by thy power but are still-crying out to thee to bring down Antichrist and bring in the Iews and yet crying out against those that go out as from thee to bring in the one and bring down the other But by this time I suppose that as the true Israel and Clergy that is of God do little less then abhorre to see it so some of their own folds do smile more then they 'l seem to do to hear their Clergy calling and sounding out to God in their sundry Synagogues Lord discover the Skirts of that
men but if they were asleep as they say they were is the Testimony of those men fit to be entertaind for Truth or of force among any but such infatuated fancies as every ignis fatuus befooles into a following of it self wheresoever it goes before them that stand up to beare witness of what was done while they were asleep yet how strongly and strangely did this filly shift work upon the misbeleiving faculty of that foolish Nation to the finall falsifying of their Faith in so high an Article of it insomuch that as that Saying is commonly Reported so that Article of Christs Resurrection is thereupon not beleived to this day said the Evangelists 16 hundred years ago and say I who have been an Eare Witness of the same to this very day wherein we live The like effectual operation upon the prejudicate opinions and Imaginations of such people to whom there is deceptio visus and in whose visible faculty there 's a deep defect through their living in the Night and not loving the Light hath T. D's mis-reports and mis-representations of the Qua. going to Rome which as little or no truth as they are of yet if less then none can be are of less consequence to prove that he intends by them to be Truth sith of force to prove the very contrary S. F. Quoth he hath no visible Estate hath Bills of Exchange to take up 400 l. if he will had to and from Constantinople to Rome Bills of Exchange to take up money there Therefore 't is probably as true that he there receiv'd a Pension from the Pope His Tripartite Antecedent is as false as the Popes Tripple Crown is foolish but suppose it were all as True as 't is false I know no hurt in it if it were for such as Travail whether to Rome or elsewhere to have Bills to take up money if they need it and what I had or where or from whence or from whom let him that lyes go look yet â—ile tell the truth to him so farr at least as will tell his Tale to be a Lye I had none to Constantinople nor from thence to Rome neither Received I any money by any Bill at Rome much less any Pension from the Pope which is that he makes the consequent of the other so that T. D.'s Consequence is utterly inconsequent and a most non-sensicall non sequitur Some wise man that had been willing to know the Truth would have argued thus ad Contrarium viz. He went with coals from New-Castle to London therefore 't is very probable he went not to London to fetch or to get any there He carried great Bills with him to Rome to take up mony there therefore 't is utterly unlikely that he had any Pension of his own to Receive there from the Pope for then he might have sav'd his labour in the other For verily it had been as silly and superfluous for me to have Merchants Bills to take up mony by at Rome had I had a Pension to Receive there from the Pope as 't is as the Proverb is to carry coals to New-Castle which what fool doth may carry them home again when he hath done So then this Text of T. D's Triviall Talk as threefold a Cord as it may seem to him that is not quickly broken is indeed though strong enough to conclude the clean contrary way yet as to his purpose but a threefold thread of Toe so ill spun that it fails like flax when it feels the fire Nevertheless Note one Point of Doctrine more before I quit it that arises from it more against then for T. D. and his fellow forgers and foul falsifiers of the truth i.e. that whereas the National Ministry dare trust to the benevolence of their own people for outward means and maintenance no further then they have the Magistrates Mittimusses to take it from their people and raise it for them for we may have little enough and do full ill cry they if we stand to the good will and affections of our Parishes being it seems for all the shallow shews and Love-tokens and fair words that pass between them which buy no lands as little affected by their people as their people are trusted by them for each of them love money much more then they love each other yet such love credit and confidence in each others faithfulness there is among the Ministers of Truth and the children of it that they that for the Gospels sake chuse to have little of their own in their Ministry to it need not lack but serving it for its own sake and not for hire nor by constraint but willingly not for filthy lucre but of a ready mind may not by force of Arms but freely not by the greedy distraint of Tythe-mongers and Bumbayliffs but willingly have what is needed which is not so many 100's by the year as the Priests that stirring not far from their own fires need it not are ever needing in the service of the truth and rather then it shall want promoting for lack of so much no less then 400 li at once if they please T. D. Another of T. D's Antick Autecedents from whence he endeavours as by the rest he doth tooth and nail to evidence me to be of the Popish faction is that I affirmed my self to be above Ordinances saying there 's no more use of them in this life to some then of a Candle when the Sun shines instancing in Baptism and the Lords Supper Rep. In which Antecedent this is utterly false at least though affirmed by T. D. and his Sides-men viz. that I said of my self that I am above Ordinances I use not to bear Testimony to my self but to the Truth unless where the Truth is so much concern'd as it is in my clearing of my self from the clouds that not only I but that also comes under through your Lyes that are told and attend me in the service of it in the case in hand neither in the point of perfection which if I be but moved to speak the Truth in presently cry the blind leaders and the blind whom they lead he faith he is perfect did I ever say of my self that I am perfect but of myself and almeâ— that so we should be even in this life and may be too if we be not wanting to our selves and must be also or else shall never be as our heavenly Father is perfect and as for my self by the grace of God I am what I am and what ere I am where I am you are not though what and where you are both as to this woâ—ld and that to come I have been now long ago Neither as to Ordinances did I ever say I was above them I should not a little bely my self in so â—aying and that I have little need at all to do being belyâ—d moâ—e then enough already both by your selves and others for to meet and wait with his Saints on the Lord to stand in his
Councel and receive his word from his mouth to learn of Christ in silence with all subjection to hear his voice which his sheep only hear though swinish Scribes may search the Scriptures to enter by him who is the Door to bear hiâ— Cuâ—â—â— and follow him to pray preach write dispute and do all that I am cal'd to in the lâ—ght in the movings of his Spirit theâ—e all and an hundâ—ed more that might be nam'd are Ordinances of God which I am under and yourselves above who are clambering up another way in your own thoughts councâ—ls wisdâ—m and understanding above his light in the conscience that is the Door which till Ye lofty over-lookers of it the flying fowls of the air the hâ—gh-flown Climbers above vouchsafe to stoop and come down to ye shall never enter into the Sheepfold finally a holy life and that pare Religion that is undefiled before God while all the Religion of imture unbridled Lyaâ—s Wantons Wordlings c stinks before him and is defiled which is to keep a mans self unspotted of the world also to do Good works to be zealous of Good Works to be rich in good works to be wâ—ll reported of for good works to shew our selves Paterns of good works to learn to maintain be careful to maintain good works as necessary which â—ome because O V R works none of which are good the best of which are all evil further then wrought in Christ the light and by Christ in us are of none would make of none effect as to our acceptance with God and to walk in the good works which in Christ Iesus whoâ—e workmaâ—shâ—p we are we are created unto which God hath before Ordained that we should walk in them Eph. 2. 10. theâ—e are Ordinance of God which 't were well for you all if you were as much under the observance of as ye are under the obliuiâ—n of which I neither did nor do nor dare say I am above though as I desire I never may so by the grace and power of Christ to me ward I do not live so far below them as Thousands do who are both above and below them also too proud of their fine forms to be brought down to the plain power and too much sunk down over head and ears in earth lust luxury love of money pleasure wordly-mindedness and buried in blindness brutishness and sensuality to be brought up and rais'd into any heavenliness of conversation yet all crying out of them as denyers of Gods Ordinances that live in the very life and substance of those lifeless Images and shadowy parts thereof which they only call so I affirm therefore here before God and all men that I never affirmd of my self in these Terms in which its here Testifiâ—d viz. that I was above Ordinances and for thy self T.D. and thy two witnesses to it T.F. and T.B. who are three Thomas'es very faâ—thlâ—â—â— and hard to believe the truth and for your faithlesness as hardly to be believed whether you will believe me yea or nay as its false that you here witneâ—s so the witness of all three of you against me in this will be of no more force to fright any friends of Truth into the faith or belief of what you say then so many leaps of a louse since ye are found deceiving or at best deceived in your other so credible information And as for the things viz. Baptism and the Supper which yourselves call Ordinances and keep such a quarter for as if they were the main matters which God hath Oâ—dained which only can lay true claim to the foresaid Title I might possibly say then as I shall plainly now not in any way of 〈◊〉 whateâ—er is of God though but as a Type and shadow in its time and season that to such as are grown throw those Elementary institutions into the Life of God which is the end and substances they Relate to they may be useleâ—s as to their own particulars as the light of a Candle is where the Sun shines yet I deny not the use of them to such as are not satisfied as to the Lord unless they use them But most people either I abuâ—e them and themselves in the use of them who neither knowing their right end nor use nor manner of administration do either chanâ—e and alter them into Images of their own making both in their Subject and their form and thus all Rantizers of Infants do and all feeders of Dogs and Swine with that bread and wine which they call the Supper for these things are not that outwaâ—d washing and supping which were used of old as meer figures and Images of the true but sigments and fooleries and Images of their own Imagining not â—o much as the Bodily Baptism which Iâ—hn baptizeth with but a trashy Tâ—adition of man which who so teach for a Doctrine or Ordinance of God do worship God but in vain not the true outside or shadow of the Supper for that is not a coming together into one place which is to decrease and vanish before the internal and â—ternal which increaâ—eth and is to stand nor the external sign of the True Cup and Table of the Lord but in Truth the very Cup and Table of Devils where drunkards and Swerers Lustfulness and all sorts of sinners and walkers beside the light who say they have fellowship with God but lye and have none sit in fellowship with their Father the Devil Or else secondly dote upon and Idolize those graven Images of their own which if they were as truly the things in use of old as 't is true they are but new inventions of their own yet as the brazen Serpent they must be but Nehushâ—an when once mens hearts go a whoring after them from that which is the end of them all and come not to Christ Iesus the Image and rigteousness of God and to witnesse that wrought and even him who is that Image brought forth and formed in them but continue poring upon those Rudiments or like one that falls in love with his own Image in the water and for love thereof goes down under it and drownes himselfe therein run down so deep into them as to lose themselves from the other and draw such a thick vaile over their hearts as the Iewes so as not to look much lesse enter into the end of the law of which is to be abolished that is of carnall Commandments contained in Ordinances which are not of the new but of the old Covenant which is long since ready to vanish which stood in earings and drinkings and divers Baptismes carnall Ordinances bodily exercises outward Observations in which the Kingdome of God stands not which is in righteousnesse peace and joy in the holy Spirit so that he who in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God and approved of men For those meer Rites and Rudiments of washing eating drinking had their first being beginning rise and institution as Circumcision Passeover sacrifices and such
like had before Christ was crucified though in regard of inability to beare the sudden abolâ—tion thereof by permission more then commission practised after as circumcision and vowes and shavings and some other Rite and Ceremonies were in which case if any now will needs uâ—e them I meddle not to forbid though he that is in the spirit and substance and not the letter of them is not out of them but in them more truly then he that is in them outwardly according to the letter and not in the spirit for they are the Iewes the circumcision the Christians the baptiz'd ones the Suppers with the Lord the partakers of his Table who open when Christ knocks and let him in that he may Sup with them and they with him who rejoyce in Christ Iesus and have no confidence in the flesh and worship God in the spirit and are Jewes in heart and spirit not letter onely when they of the letter are but the Concision that say they are Iewes Christians Baptists Communicants with God children of God but lye and are not but are the Synagogue of Satan the end of which foresaid outward Commandments is love out of a pure heart a good conscience faith unfained which who serve in are the servants of God and who swerve from and turn aside into â—angling about the other and are zealous in teaching up the Law understand neither themselves nor what they say nor doe nor whereof they affirme and are but of the Gentiles that dwell in the outward Court which is given to them who tread down the holy Citty nor in the inward Temple nor of them that worship therein not to be counted thereunto but left out and not measured when the measuring line goeth out upon it to build and rear it up again in the latter dayes So then though I deny all the Ordinances Traditions and Doctrines Wayes and Worships of men innovated and impos'd at their wills as praecepts of God yet I deny not the due use of any thing that ever was in meer outside service required and appointed of God himself when performed in its proper place and season from a right Principle of inward power to the right end which they lead and tend to viz. Christ Iesus the head the body of those shadows the Image of God begotten and born not after the Law of a Carnal Commandment but after the Power of an endless life after which Image when men witness themselves to be truly created in righteousness and holiness of truth they will see how these pass away as to the use thereof as the Moon in a morning waxes pale and dies out as to its shining any more before the Sun as the lesser which must give way to the greater glory which lesser things while men busie themselves in and boast of crying the Temple of the Lord are these the Tythes Offerings New-moons the Sabbaths the solemn Assemblies the Sacrifices the Circumcision the Passeover the Baptism the Supper the Services the Ordinances of the Lord are these neglecting the weightier matters the washing and circumcising their hearts to the Lord the putting off the body of the sins of the flesh putting away the evil of their doings from before Gods eyes not minding but forgetting breaking the everlasting visible life way righteousness kingdom House Temple Gospel Glory Covenant which the Letter lays down as that which all these Ceremonies so call'd of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from their standing but for a time and all these meer Temporals do but tend to the Lord loaths all that which was even of his own requiring the more men load him with it that love not-the other and says he required it not he spake not of it he would have none of it he could not away with it his delight is not so much in it as in obeying his saul hates it he is weary to bear it 't is the offering of Swines blood 't is the cutting off a Dogs neck 't is as acceptable to him as if one slew a man 't is the blessing of an Idol 't is but a trusting in lying words when trusted in 't is an apron of fig-leaves 't is a covering of Idols 't is a righteousness that shall not profit him 't is a refuge of lyes which the hail shall sweep away 't is a hiding place which the storm shall overflow by which shall be trodden down even all you that are hidden in it 't is a Covenant and agreement with death and hell the Drunkards of Ephraim make which must be disannul'd and not stand 't is a bed shorter then that a man can stretch himself on it 't is a covering too narrow for a man to wrap himself in it 't is a House on the sand and not on the Rock of Ages the fall of which on the head of the builders will be great when the wind of the Lords Spirit comes to blow upon it 't is flesh that must wither then as the grass and the flower of it 't is Ashur and Jareb that can't cure Israels wounds 't is Pharoah the broken reed that runs into the hand of the leaners thereon 't is the Egyptians and their horses which are men and flesh not God nor Spirit 't is the many mountains in which salvation is hoped for in vain 't is not the right Rest to the soul 't is the polluted rest which who ever is in and first or last ariseth not above and departs not out of it will destroy him with a sore destruction 't is iniquity 't is dung which God will spread upon mens faces who live like Swine yet will wallow in it even the dung and iniquity of their solemn meetings How untrue then thy Testimony is of my saying I was above Ordinances who am one that am under Water-Baptism being once baptized as the Sprinklers of Infants never were if there were any ground of glorying in or any stress to be put upon that and have also used Bread and wine till Christ who now cometh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in myriads of his Saints came in me as few Parish Preachers do that prattle for that Supper though Christ be not yet come in them as he will ere long come nigh to judgement I suppose all save such Simplerous as either will see or at least seem to see nothing save what their Seers see may more easily discern then be ignorant But suppose it were all as true that 's here told by you three Thomasses would it follow at all from hence that I probably comply with the Pope and his faction or would it not rather free me among all save such as if they cannot by Hooke will needs have it so by Crooke from all suspition of such complyance more then such as cry out for Ordinances with the Pope yea more for meere mans Ordinances too then for Gods viz. that of sprinkling and Ordinances for Tribes and maintenance as his Priests do Is 't not a far clearer consequence to
and avenge all that disobedience of his Adversaries whose Ministry further then by his own permission it s born down by that extrinsecall force of the beasts putting forth and interposing for a time will make its own way and cleare the truth as the light both amongst and against all false ones without either maintenance or defence or so much as good countenance if that may not be had from the higher powers of the earth being such a Substantive as is well able if let alone and in the midst of not a little interruption to stand by it self in reason before any and not such a Noun-Adjective as the nationalâ— C Clergy is which cannot stand by itself to shew one glasse full of its own sense and meaning on the Scripture without some Constable or Officer joyning with it to take that honest man or woman to the Stocks or Cage that by two or three good words shall disturb them nor stand by it self to shew its reason or signification to such as soberly reason with it but must require another force then that of words to resist and sometimes the rude ones to run with stones and stop the mouths of its opponents Not by might nor power of this sort but by my spirit saith the Lord. That Dagon that cannot stand unless its worshippers hold it up in this manner before the Ark undoutedly will fall and let it fall if it will and never rise any more for me And if Papists Iews and Turks being obedient to the civill power in civill matters between man and man shall come in and uâ—e their blind consciences in their respective blind Religions they shall deceive not one of the Elect and none but such as are disobedient to what they know â—for which to stumbling they are appointed That Protestanism that can't stand if Popery Indaism and Turcism have liberty till it fall by the pure power of God and not meer man to stand peaceably by it in one Nation for fear it should dye out before them let it dye out with them all when the Lord will for me that truth which is to out-shine and out-live them all may stand up alone in its proper power and native lustre when they are gone as for such Protestants as would run to hell with them if Papists Turks and Iewes should come among them they are onely such as would never come neer to heaven if these should never come neer them at all 5 Our Doctrine of the true lights enlightning every man the truth of which is to be prov'd against I. O. and T. D. in its proper place and our calling every man to attend to the shining of it in his own conscience can be no fair In-let to the Popish Bag and Baggage for all that arises and springs from the cloudinesse of their consciences the blindnesse of their hearts the darknesse that is in their understandings in which darknesse or dark places which are in the heart the true light shines though the darknesse comprehends it not and the daâ—k minds of men consider it not which if they would once doe so well as to take heed to the day would dawn the day Star arise at last in their hearts the light shine forth the shadowes fly away the clouds scatter the vaile that overspreads them vanish the face of the covering be removed the daâ—knesse of this world in which the devill who is the Prince and Ruler of it dwells diggs deceives devoures destroyes udoes does all he has to doe who hath nothing in Christ the light nor ought to doe in them that dwell out of his reach under Christs Protection in the lâ—ght would be dispeld and the bâ—â—ghtnessâ— of a better Religion Worship Gospell Faith Knowledge Righteousnâ—sse Holynesse Salvation Redemption Kingdome then any power and glory they yet are aware off or your selves either would break forth upon them But such as your Tenet is who rebell against the light not knowing the paâ—hs theâ—eâ—f Job 24.6 and band yourselves together against the blowers of it up in men to blow it out what yee can denying it to be in any measure at all in any but very few quarrelling with the Quakers for calling any much more all to take heed to it that they might walk up in singlenesse to to what of God by it is made known in them doth both River England into a resolution to retain so much of Romes Bag and Baggage as is yet remaining and into their and the Priests wonted readinesse to receive more or all of it again if it shall so return as in Maâ—yes dayâ—s and be handed out to them by the threatning helping hand of those that have the highest handling of the Helm 6 Our Doctrine of the infallibility of the true Ministry of Christ which we say is that which is among them call'd Quakers in these dayes as in those of old can be no fair In-let to the Antichristian Bag and Baggage or to those Ministries or Ministrations for to teach which is not more taught by me then shall be proved against I. O. and T. D. who both deny it more at large in its proper place viz. that the infaâ—â—ible spirit continues his infallible direction guidance and diviâ—e inspirations to the true ministâ—y and Church which waits upon him now in such wise as heretofore is so far from leting in that it shuts out for ever their Mâ—nistâ—y all its A coutrements as false fictitious and yours also who as to your confessed fallibility are Biâ—ds of the same feather with them who as in that ye flock so must flee and fall and fail all together seeing saving onely that they ascribe infalibility to their Vice-God the Pope as yee doe not and Châ—ists spirits inspirations to his single sacred soul they count it Egregiâ—us blasphâ—my for any Minister or other to say they have the holy spirit so onely as to assure them of Gods love and acceptance much more to make them infallible in their ministry and though you hold men may have it to assure them of salvation yet as to it s assumed and infallible guidance of your selves in yours or any men at all in their ministrings now you count it little lesse then the same and differing so as to the matter of the Ministry no further from them then thus viz. that whereas they hold infallibility â—omewhere but falsely enough fixing it to that false subject the breast of their Arch-Bishâ—p Vicarâ— of Christ and supream Master-Minister here on earth yee deny it to be in anâ— Ministers at all now to the utter uâ—mâ—nistring of your selves and evincing it yee are none of Christs any more then they But so to teach that all Ministries that pretend to Christ are fallible in these dayes and not one Christian Ministry infallible throw-out the earth Nor any one of all them that are in England at this day no nor yet so much as that of your own is a Doctrine and a peice of news which if
it were not a little more strange then true for one here is though it be not yours is a very fair In-let to and by my conâ—ent might without much scruple usher in that old Antichristian Ministry and its pertenances here again as that which may stand welny with as much safety to peoples souls and give as good security and infallible assurance of its guiding and conducting them infallibly to salvation as your own can doe since that at the worst is little worse then fallible and your own by your own consent at the best is little better for it s much at one to me and other poor people of it what Mnistry stands here in England if in a case of such main moment and eternall concernment there stands none that by the Spirit of God are made in their ministrations infallible if there be no guides to be had save such as are fain to confesse they are but fallibly guided themselves or if in this case there be no other as the Proverb is then Hobsons Choice to be made which is chuse whether you will have this or none One blind guide being to me little better then another if others would be rul'd by me I would chuse none of that sort at all but cleave to the light and Spirit it selfe which is infallible and leads all that follow it into all truth for if the blinde lead the blind whether Papists or Protestants they must all at last into the ditch and if England must have an outward ministry and by no meanes will be made to own that ministry of the Qua. now among them which is of God seeing it is so that none of all those other she takes hold on in this day of her breaches saying thou hast cloathing be thou our Ruler in things of God Let this ruine be made up under thy hand that answer her any other then so as Isa. 2.6.7 I will not be an healer for in my house is neither bread nor cloathing I am not guided infallibly my selfe I am a deceivable erring man I dare not say my ministry is unerring make me not a Ruler of the people seeing I say there 's none to guide her assuredly among all her own Sons she haâ—h brought forth Isa. 15.18 Neither any that taketh her by the hand infallibly to direct her among all the Sons she hath brought up with great care cost and charge at her own Universities here at home but they are all at a losse within themselves mâ—ping up and down in a mist their Divinest Doctors confessing and declaring that to be justly come upon them which God aid should Isa. 29.9 to 15. viz. that its night to them they can't infallibly divine the vision of all is become as a book sealed to them they can't read c. Though I advise her not to give way to any of those guides yet she could have neither more nor lesse said to her if she should send for some of her own native Sons to come home and guide her that are brought up in the English Colledge at the Popes own charge at Rome it selfe But if she be resolved no more to be foold with a fallible ministry but will have one that is infallible as I would or none at all then if she mean never to bear the Popes Bag and Baggage in truth as she talks she will not let her take the infallible Spirit within for her guide and no man without but such as are guided infallibly by it which guides none fallibly that unfainedly follow it as thousands of Quakers do and if any seem to do it and do not they in so doing undo themselves but I know no other men call'd Ministers in all the world beside the Qua. that so much as pretend to infallibility but he that sâ—ts in the infallible chaire 7 Neither is our Doctrine of the light and spirits being the rule of the true faith and good life and not the externall Text or letter of the Scripture onely any fair In-let for the Pâ—pish Bag and Baggage for howbeit they take not the Text thereof to be their onely truest Touchstone most certain Standard and measure of Truth and Doctrines as we doe not yet that they take for their sure and certain Rule which we say with you is a manifold more fallible matter yea by an hundred degrees more fallible then the most falsified Coppy of the Scripture that ever yet came forth is something that stands more at Staves end and at a far wider distance from that aforesaid Rule of ours then from yours who for your Rule and Standaâ—d doe own no other then the Scripture by how much two things whereof the one is fallible the other infallible are further off each other by far then two things are both which are at most no more then fallible for the Light and Spirit of Christ which we onely do and all Christians ought to own for their standing Rule and trusty Teacher are iâ—fallible and will hereafter in the proper place for that be proud to be to But your professed Standard which is no other then that outward Text and the Papists which is no other then Tradition taken from that dark and worse then dubious Oracle viz. the erring miâ—d and mouth of their great Grand Ghostly Father excepting ever that this is far more fallible then the former i.e. then the letter are both but fallible Your Doctrine then who teach the meer Text which is but fallible as must anon be shew'd to be the most true Touchstone comes neerer to the Papists Doctrine who teach another thing to be the most true Touchstone which what ere you say of the infallibility of yours and they of the infallibility of theirs is at best but fallible and at worst but more fallible then yours is then ours possibly can do which is on all hands own'd to be infallible And howbeit the Scripture which lyes in the midway between us and Papists so that till they March so far towards us as to own it better then they do they and we are never likely to meet in one unlesse they can come ab extremâ— ad extremum from their ill extream to our true extream and misse the mâ—dium as they cannot howbeit I â—aâ— the Scripture and its honest owners are really neerer and dearer to us then they and their most trusty traditions are which they take from their sore aid Oâ—â—cle yet is there not so vast a disproportion and diâ—agreement betwen â—uch owners as ye are of the Scripture for the only Rule and such as own that Treasury of Traditions that lyes lockt up in the Pope Breast as the only Rule as is between these Tradition-Trusterâ— and us who own as our only Rule the true light of Christ and the holy Spirit the inconsistency being not so much between your meer fallible lâ—tter and their more fallible chaire as it is between the most assuredly infallâ—ble holy spirit and their most assuredly fallible though supposed
Rank Papists nor Rankers of our â—elves with them against the Truth in our maintaining of thoâ—e Doctrines I must therefore since the Lord hath laid it upon me if all the world would take me off it take leave here to enlarge so far as to enter the lists in one short single duel with T.D. alone about these matters desiring I. O. to have patience and stand by a while longer till I can have while to handle him and T.D. both at once in those points wherein they two joyne and issue out together making as it were but one head as to the doctrines wherein they oppose against the Qua and the rather because I find not I. O. in his book which elsewise is Brotherly enough with T.D. in bitternesse against the Truth and Qua. intermedling much there what ere he thinks in this so momentary a matter As for T. D. I have sundry things to reckon and reason with him in aboutit 1 I am to have a talking with thee T.D. in a few words for a certain abuse or injury done by thee in that passage of thine p. 14. wherein thou relatest that the 3d. Question debated on by us was stated in these Termes viz. whether OUR good works are the meritorious cause of our justification that I not onely held it in the affirmative but also disputed it in those termes of OUR good works in such wise as the Papists do so as to shew my selfe a rank Papist which injury in regard of the extent of it to the severall persons wronged is not more manifest then manifold yea verily seven-fold more then ordinary for as much as no lesse then seven persons are thereby most grossely abused and belyed that is to say not only my selfe whom onely thou intendedst should suffer by it but also thy selfe and five of thy chiefe friends too for want of thy forecast viz. 2 of them thou calâ—t Gentlemen and three of thy Master Ministers whose witnesse thou appealest to who are all more moderate and gentle Men then thy selfe it seemes as to their Testimony in this matter for they all and thy selfe too who bring'st them to bear witnesse with thee of the truth in this case do with one accord together with thee testifie another thing which is the very truth and no more then the truth viz. see p. 58. Of thine own narrative that the termes of the 3 d. Question were whether good works be the meritorious cause of our justification which as 't is there said truly was expressely affirmed by us without that figmentitious particle OVR in the sence thou usest it in which is of thine own forging and foisting in and adding to that term good works the adding of which in the eye of any save such as are not either Arrand fooles or else as the Proverb is more Knaves then Fools which yet is in plain terms the plain case of all that wink against the truth and will not seem to see it when they do doth alter the State of the Question so as to make it utterly another for who but such as either cannot see or which is worse may see and will not can chuse but understand that whether OVR good works at least in that sottish and sordid sense wherein the Papists hold it do justifie Is one Question And whether Good works do justifie Is another In which 1 st sense of the Papist when they say OVR good works whose Good Works as they call them are no better than other mens own are whose own meerly are all stark naught I neither do nor ever did affirm our Iustification to come but in the latter viz. that Good works meaning only those of Christs own working in and for us by the same power and spirit by which he did good works in that person in which he liv'd and dyed at Ierusalem then whom I know no other that can without his power work any Good I confesse I both then did affirm and own and as I then did in the power of Christ so I ever shall both affirm evince and maintain And whether it was in this latter sense only or in the former Popish sâ—nse in which thou T.D. art impudent enough to assert I held it he that will in no wise beleive me if I speak in my own case nor any that side with me in the truth but had rather give credit to T.D. let him beleive T.D. with all my heart provided he do but take his Testiomy to be truâ—st where its strongest for then he cannot but beleive me to be belyed for that T.D. who in p. 58. Sayes the Question was stated in these Termes Good Works which was the same T.D. undoutedly that sayes the other doth flatly gainsay and clearly contradict that T.D. And prove him a lyar that saves p. 14. It was stated in these Termes OVR good works and if any doubt which of these two selfe-overturning Testimonies of T.D. may most securely be taken for truth seeing they are 2. contrary Testimonies of one and the same man viz. that in p. 14. wherein he wrongs me or that of his own in p. 58. which I appeale to for right and am willing to be tryed by as touching his false charge of me as saying OUR good works justifie I say unlesse the Reader mean to wrong more then himselfe or me either by his misbeleife namely not only such of my friends as witness truth with me but also â— of T. D's own most eminent and credible witnesses so as to Judge them also to be all Lyars he must beleive what T.D. sayes p. 58. Namely that I affirm'd Good works justifie and beleive that to be a lye which T.D. sayes p. 14. Namely that I affirm'd OUR good works justifie for T.D. alone on his own head only sayes this last but T.D. together with his 5. Witnesses assert the other Thus then stands this case between me and thy selfe T.D. thou arraignest me openly at the Bar before the world p. 14. as a raâ—k Papist as saying in these Termes that OUR good works are the meritorious cause of our justification to which Inditement I pleading not guilty of saying OVR good works but good works are the cause c. How wilt thou be tryed quoth the impartiall Iudge the honest hearted Reader that would â—ain find out the truth in the Court of his own conscience whether thou be guilty of affirming and disputing the said position expressely in those Termes or not guilty I reply by God and the Country What evidence bringst thou in quoth the righteous Reader to T.D. against S.F. whom thou so accusest What were the Termes in which he and the Qua. expressely affirm'd it The Termes of the Question were these quoth T.D. p. 58. whether Good Workes he the meritoricus cause of our justification which was expressely affirmed by them Thus am I cleared in the sight of God and all men from T. D's Accusation by the true evidence of T.D. himselfe my accuser for we have
the many frivoulous flouting phrases and new fangled nick-Names wherewith thou who bearest Christs Name more then his Nature like the old Heathen Enemies to the Truth dost cover its true Christian Friends as it were with wild Beasts-skins that looking on them under that likenesse Name and Notion of Deceivers Destroyers Lyars Hypocrites horrid cursed Diabolical Blasphemers the Dogs of your Flocks may be hereby encouraged and set on to run the more greedily on to tear and worry them These will all Reflect upon thy self the envious Exerter of them and lye with no little load like a Talent of Lead upon thy Conscience and sink thee down among the rest of the uncircumcised in lips into sore Condemnation when thou awakest to behold him who now cometh in Myriads of his Saints to Convince and Iudge all ungodly Sinners for all the hard speeches they have ungodly spoken against him in his Saints and Servants whose Righteousness is of the Lord and whose Heritage it is to condemne every false Blasphemous and unruly Tongue that as thine doth riseth up in Judgement against them And as for us the Reproach of Christ is greater Riches to us then the Treasures of England which ye are glorying in and gaping after Nevertheless I shall here have a few words with thee about some few of them as well as about the Lyes that under them thou rellest of us Thou ventest thy venome against us under those Two now vulgar Names of Quakers and Fanaticks on this wise J. O. The second part of the Question concerning the proper Name of the Scripture relates to our Fanaticks who from that Trembling wherewith they fain themselves to be shaken in their holy Services or rather the power of that evil spirit by which in very deed they are shaken are commonly called Quakers Reply As for that holy duty it self of Quaking and Trembling at the Word of God which as blind a guide and bruit a Beast as thou art in speaking evil of what thou knowest as also of what thou knowest not thou both ownest and acknowledgest the holy men of God were taken with of old when moved to utter his Word as it came to them witness thy own words pag. 8. viz. the coming of the Word to them filled them with dread and reverence of God Hab. 3.16 and also greatly affected even their outward man though we dare not be so desperate as to damne it all for Diabolical as thou dost in these dayes in which God hath his Prophets and his People as well as then yet we own it as thou in word dost and indeed as they did Isa. 66.5 and are as they by their Brethren hated and cast out by you our Brother Christians in Name for so doing which meer fleshly Brotherhood who hate us and cast out our Name as evil for his Names sake shall be ashamed for it before him that appears to our joy and when Ierusalem hath first drunk her part as she is now a doing ye shall drink the dregs of the Cup of Trembling with the Devils whose Portion Trembling is for all ye believe the History as they also do and wring them out together with all the wicked of the Earth And as we own the thing so saving all your Ironical Tauntings of us therewith which we deny as that which ye even of God must be denied for we own the Name when used in his fear as that which is both Arbitrio Iure Divine imposed by God himself as their proper right on his own People whom himself from that holy Qualification of Trembling at his Word even thereby as by a peculiar Character denominates Isa. 66.5 and distinguishes from all other people that are found Quaking and Trembling mostly at the Word of man whom his Saints have ceased from whose breath is in his nostrils so that if the Word of man earthly powers Princes Parliaments go forth for such or such a kind of Christianity Religion Worship Order or Form of Ecclesiastical Doctrine or Discipline they all Priests and People and the Nations that fear not God by whole-sale strait stand stupified Quaking and Trembling and fall down Worshipping for fear of the Furnace the Quakers at Gods Word only excepted whatever Golden Image the King of Babilon pleases to set up and impose on them to how down to As to Name and Thing then we own that of Quaking and Trembling but dare not like thy self who ownest and yet defamest it corrupt our selves in what we know Nec tutum est ludere cum sacris neither is it a safe matter for such a high Professor as thou I.O. goest for to jeast and fleere so as thou dost about such holy matters as Quaking and Trembling at the Word of God which thou must come to know nearer home then ever yet when that Word nigh in the heart thou so sowlely fallest on comes once to be felt in thee as an Hammer breaking thy Rocky heart to pieces and to flame forth in thee as a fire and a spirit of burning under the Pot whose filthy scum boyls in it against the Truth and is not yet purged away When thou comest to know Moses of whom thou pratest so much a little better then yet thou dost thou shalt say I exceedingly Fear and Quake assâ—re they self as well as he with whom thou must Tremble on Mount Sinai Heb. 12.18 21 22 23 24 25 c. at that voice of the Trumpet and that Terrour of the Lord and that Blacknesse and Darknesse and Tempest which attends it before thou come near Mount Sion and to rest in the Hill thereof as much as in an empty sound of Words thou art mounting up thither afore thy time I.O. But this Dread and Terrour which Satan strove to imitate in his filthy Tripodes and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 was peculiar to the Old Testament and belonged to the Paedogogy thereof the Spirit in the Declaration of the New Testament gave out his mind and will in a way of more liberty and glory the manner of it related more to that glorious liberty in fellowship and Communion with the Father whereunto Believers had then an accesse provided them by Jesus Christ. Rep. That the Devil may and doth strive to imitate the things of God I deny not yea there 's scarse any outward Appearance or Form that the power of God puts it self forth in but the power of the evil One in man strives Apishly to imitate and make the meer likenesse and Image of it but these Images and Imitations are made among the Magicians and Wisemen of Egypt who are gone out from Gods Counsel the Light and Power of God in the Conscience into the meer Imaginations of their own vain minds and foolish hearts leaning to their own benighted understandings but not among these who leaving their own Wisdom learn only at the lips of Christ who leads even fools that love him into the Substance it self and that wisdom which makes wise to Salvation 'T is
it self while they fit under the shadow of your Ministry whilest thousands in this Nation that have been turned to the light and the Truth within by means of the Quakers Ministry which a taking heed to within is the end of are come to witnesse the Word of Christ which your letter is but a witnesse of dweling Richly in themselves and with the Spouse Cant. 3.2 3 4. that sought her Beloved in your broad wayes once wherein she never found him being passed away from you Watchmen who beat and smite and wound them for so doing Cant. 5.7 have in the narrow way which ye have no mind to walk in found him whom their souls loved Ye often tell such as Relinquish your Ministeries that ye have been a means of opening their eyes and think strange that they cannot abide under your Teachings as well as heretofore but were it as true as ye do but deem it so to be that your pains had prov'd so profitable as to open the eyes that now see ye could not but see of your selves that while they abode in blindnesse they abode quietly under you blind guides but when once they came to see they saw they were to abide there no longer Ye call your Universities the eyes and the Wel springs heads fountains mothers and nurseries of Learning and True Religion but the Lord is judging those filthy Fountains and the Rivers that run out of them and turning their waters into blood and giving them blood to drink of which also they are worthy yea and righteous is the Lord in judging for they have ever shed the blood of Saints and Prophets and strove to root out the True Religion that is Pure and undefiled from off the earth and have nourisht up Illiteracy it self if that onely be learning as in Scripture sence it is 2 Pet. 3.1 Cor. 2.1 2. to know Christ and the Scripture by the Spirit and have headed all men in their hatred of the Truth and been mothers of most of that mischief that is now befalling all Nations where they are and the Wells from whence those Legions of learned unlearned ones to whom the vision of all is as a Book sealed have sprang and to whom all people have leaned as their Leaders till they have utterly lost the way to life and the Right eyes of those Idol-shepherds which the sword of the Lord now comes upon till it be night unto them that they shall not divine and till they sha'l be utterly darkned And this I declare not as one that am utterly against that outward Inferiour furniture or lower sort of literature whereon ye live and feed till ye surfet and for having but a little of which for some that pretend to very much have not overmuch of that and as much abuse that little they have more in defiance then in defence of Truth ye Reckon on your selves as exceedingly inriched nay if most of you had more of it then you have it were not much the worse would you use it better then you do and were ye as Rich and learned as ye are in that in the best kind of learning which the light within leads to and ye fight against and the measure of Gods gift of grace in your own hearts that brings Salvation with it to all that submit to be taught by it teaches viz. to deny ungodlinesse and worldly lusts and to liue godly righteously and soberly in this present world as little of which learning and life is to be found among young Academical self Admirers as among any people upon earth among whom there is whether magna or parva cura linguarum major or minor Artium I will not say nor is it much material so long as what is of the Lord most expected lies most neglected but I may safely say not maxima but minima pietatis But I speak it as one not a little lamenting over our Nurseries of learning and Religion and not a little grieved to see how little of God and godlinesse in the power of it is either seen or sought after by those Seers and formal Seekers but those of outward letters and writings whereof some are as bad rotten poysonsome false and foolish as othersome are good wholsome true sound and solid in the best of which yet without the Light which universally they hate and look askew at the life of God can never be found and to see how little yet our Nations supposedly learned leaders have learn'd of that Mistery Christ Iesus within themselves whereby to become any other then Ignes fatui or false Leaders to the whole Land which hath been wholly caused to erre by them and hath been led of them to its own destruction Yea this lamentable and shall be for a lamentation of lamentations with which I must make a little out here to lament against you O ye nursing Mothers so called to the Church of God both in this Nation and throughout Christendom that there is none among all the sons which to the vast expending and exhausting of her earthly treasure and the very Quintessence of all her carnal things upon them both in her Vniversities and in all her Parishes when remov'd from thence she hath nourished and that is found able by the Spirit which onely does it to minister spiritual things truly to her or in requital of her who hath so inriched them for it the other way to enrich her with any true lasting heavenly treasure or to measure and tale back again to her even as well in her Protestant and more reformed as in her Popish and more deformed States any other then such Trash Wood Hay and Stubble as is now falling before the fire And that by all the most Learned labours of her most Learned Rabbies Doctors and Students in Theology and Clergy of what sort soever the rest of her children call'd Christians have not learn'd so much as to know Christ and themselves much lesse Christ in themselves so far as make them honest true holy just sober meek pure loving gentle merciful pitiful peaceable patient temperate and after his own Image which is the end of all Learning Ministries Ministrations and doings that pertain ad intra and ad extra too to Christian Religion which Christ or Image of God ad intra and ad extra also who are not come to witnesse in and on themselves know not yet Christ the Mystery the hope of Glory and cannot prove themselves upon due examination to be in the faith or any other in the sight of God then Reprobates And that by and from her Priests and her Prophets whose own eyes are not yet annointed with eye-salve that they may see that have took upon them to be her Supream Guides into goodnesse and took many millions of money for many Ages and generations upwards to make other men learned in the Truth to direct them into Righteousnesse and Holinesse the hands of evil dâ—ers have been strengthened so that none hath returned perfectly from
by it while it sits in supream Authourity on the Bench as the most perfect infallible Touch stone Lydius lapis and standing Rule for no lesse but much more thou wouldest have it even Light Rule of Trial Iudge Witnesse and all to which all Spirits even Gods own that gave it out as well as all false ones must stand or rather stoop and submit to be judged by and the foundation which the Church or World in the World or Wheel in a Wheel must stand or else fall and fail for ever for as there was a time wherein the Church which is but one from Abel till now can have but one and the same Rule bottom and foundation for ever and one Rock on which its built which is neither Peter nor Paul nor any of their Writings nor of any Prophets that wrote afore them but Christ the Light to the Nations and the Rock of Ages and Generations was without it and not placed upon it so there was a time of thousands of years together wherein it had no place nor use at all in the Church nor so much as any being in the World and as for such high place as thou in thy own will now alowest it as it s own as wise and quick-sighted as thou art to know and see non Entities and things that never were at all I know no such Place that God ever set it in nor time when he so super-eminently exalted it and though I acknowledge and am not ignorant as thou art that meer men and blind builders as seeing as thyself have Canonized it into the Head of the Corner laying him aside whom God hath made so yet I am to learn and so art thou for all thy hasty teaching it as Truth to others where ever the bare Letter or Scripture which is all one was created into such a Lord as thou lookest on it to be over his inward Light Spirit in the heart and authorized so infinitely as thou imaginest over all things by the Lord God of Heaven and Earth the only Author and Creator of all things J.O. Not only to detrade the Scripture from its place but also that by that one only device of denying to the Scripture that glorious Title of the Word of God the Quakers aim and endeavour to divest Christ himself of his Personality and divine Being Reply Was ever man left of God to shew his own Folly by more palpable apparent absurdities then thou here utterest who by that very thing whereby we seek to invest Christ with the proper and peculiar Right both in Name and Nature whereof your selves rob him belyest us so as to say we thereby seek to divest him of it Is not the Word of God not only the proper Name Ioh. 1. Rev. 19. but also the proper Nature and divine Being of Christ which he had before he was made flesh from the very beginning before the Scripture was that declares of him before World it self was which was made by him and all things in it so that without him nothing was made that was made And because that we will not take this glorious Title of his to whom only of Right it belongeth viz. the Word of God who hath no corruptible Word that I know but only one that 's incorruptible and liveth and abideth for ever and is both essentialiter and effective and enunciative too the Word of God and invest such a corruptible thing herewith as the mouldring Letter a Writing with mens hands which Worms may eat and mens Hands blot out deface and destroy and because we will not attribute that everlasting Name of his to that which in Nature is not everlasting as ye do but decaying dost thou say we divest him of his divine Being Dost thou not beget this bastardly businesse of divesting Christ himself of his divine Name and Nature Excellency and Existence in thy own brain by ascribing these to the Scriptures and giving the glory thereof to another under that high Prerogative Title of the Word of God due only and alone to him and not to any Letter that man as moved by him writes of him and then lay it at the door of the Quakers Art not thou the man that appropriatest that Name and Nature which is proper to Christ alone to the Scripture by disputing as to Name and Thing in esse reasi cognoscibili that it is the Word of God that glorious Title is its proper Name and is not this what in you lyes to dethrone Christ who only is so and place another ever him as the only most perfect Light Foundation Touchstone by which his Spirit must be tryed and yet accusest thou the Quakers of displacing him Doth not the Scripture say that Christ is the Light which the Church Ministerially is to hold out bear witness to Ioh. 1 in all her Preachings Administrations and Walkings and the Scripture is written out for the sake and Instruction and profit or use and service of the Church 2 Tim 3.15 16. 1 Cor. 10. yet settest not thou the Letter above the Church and Christ too saying Page 76. The Scripture is Light it is the duty of every Church to hold it up almost the whole of its duty and this Duty it performs Ministerially not Authoritatively A Church may bear up that Light it is not the Light it bears Witnesse to it but kindles not one divine beam to further its discovery All the Preaching that is in any Church its Administration of Ordinances all its walking in the Truth hold up this Light Thus magnifying the Letter above all and making it the main businesse of the Church to magnifie and hold it up much what as the Iewes do whose Work in their Synagogues is to lift up the Letter while they loath the Law and the Light it came from and is but the meer Letter or Writing of J. O. The whole Truth of the Words of God is as to Name and Thing opposed by the poor Fanatical Quakers Satan in these dayes assaults the sacred Truth of the Word of God in the poor deluded Fanatical Souls among us commonly called Quakers Reply It was none but Satan himself that is a Lyar the Father of it who told thee so and in thee tells it out for Truth to the whole World For 1. The whole Word of God which is but of one not of many kinds that I know of as thou wouldest make it as if God had one Living one Dead one Fallible another Infallible one Corruptible another Incorruptible one Eternal one Temporal Word one that 's only Letter another that 's Spirit and Life one Written and another Unwritten one within men and another that 's not the same in Nature without men that one and the same Individual Word of God I say which is the same whether within or without Written or Unwritten neither of which the bare Writing is as to both Name and Thing we own and honour as that which from
self-condemned and that we will not easily yield to a Renouncing of this Confession Is all this then that thy self Confessest of us the Quakers whom thou Condemnest for utter rejecting the Scripture consistent with such an utter rejecting it as thou Chargest them with Dost not here clear the Quakers out of thy own mouth out of which thou Condemnest them for the same thou clearest them in to the Condemning of thy self to be one out of whose one and the same mouth comes to the same men Blessing and Cursing Excusing and Accusing for the same thing Doth any good Fountain send forth sweet Water and bitter at the same time Is not thy Tongue an unruly Member which thy self can'st tame no better then therewith to blesse God and men too that are made after Gods Image as owners of the Scriptures and yet to Curse them with thy Lyes as denyers thereof when thou hast done Art thou not herein right Baalam like who for the Preferments-sake from which God kept him would sain have Cursed Israel with his Divinations as thou dost with thy Divinity Disputations and yet was against his will forced to forbear and to his own shame to blesse them altogether Object Oh but quoth I.O. no matter what the Quakers confesse of the Scripture now no doubt had things fallen out accordinn to their desire and if People could have born the denyal of it who bore such respect to the Scripture that they would have flown with fury on the Quakers Pates if they should have seemed to deny it the Quakers from whom the fear of that more then the force of Truth forces that Confession Proculdubiò Jamdudum rejecissent had doubtlesly Rejected them utterly long ago Ex. 3. S. 19. Reply This is not so true not well-grunded a Surmise as this viz. No matter how the Priests fawn own the Kings Protectors Parliaments or Powers still that are in present Being to save their Standings in their present Places and Preferments No heed's to be given to their Crouchings Cringing and Humble Representations No doubt but as things fall out and succeed to the serving of their Interest they will turn still to what best serves their turns and have Exceptis excipiendis been generally known to have done so now long ago even from Henry the Eighths time to this very day As for the Quakers could they have dissembled so as ye do for fear of mans Fury they might have escaped many if not all those furious Fallings of your bloudy mad-brain'd Parish-Professors upon their Pares and have saved Oxford and Cambridge that labour pains they more like Fiends then Friends of Truth have been at to persecute them long since also Again I.O. Dost not thou say 't is evident enough that some of us Read the Holy Scripture in Private or at least Remember what we have Read or Heard out of it and for the most part carry the Holy Bible about with us and that in our Digladiations or Disputes we very often rehearse and urge the words of the Scriptures and that the reason why we own Translations is because being not learn'd farther then our Mother Tongue we shall then deprive our selves of all use of the Scriptures which we are loath to do Which of these two I O's must we believe Or if it be but one I.O. as no doubt it is divided against himself and telling two contrary Tales whereof but one can be true which of his two Testimonies must men give credit to That wherein he sayes we strive to bereave men of All Vse of the Scripture and count it odious and abominable to have Heresies Errour false Doctors and Doctrines Convicted and Confuted out of it Or that clean Contrary one wherein he tells all men that we use it so as to Read it in Private Remember what we Read or Hear of it Carry it about with us use it and urge out of it in our Disputes and are shy of denying it to be Translated into English for our use least we should be deprived of All that Vse of it our selves which we are willing to make For my part let others do what they will I have found I.O. telling so many Lyes when in his malice he talkes against the Quakers that I shall rather take that for Truth now which against his envious lying self he here talks for them for some Vse and that not a little himself here affirms we make of the Scriptures and in other places quotes many Scriptures out of which we argue against our Opposers and if it be never so little use it s enough to stop his mouth out of his own mouth who sayes we utterly reject the Scriptures as to All its Vse for he that rejects it as to its Whole use or All its use must be one that makes no use of it at all And if I. O's Testimony had been only that we deny many ill uses of it that himself and other Scribes make that spend and take up more time in scraping and scribling for it then take care to live the life of it and that wrest it to their own ruine he had said the Truth Or had he said we deny many of those good lifes that many make of it he had much lessened his Lye and his Folly in it but because we own it not as useful to all those extraordinary weighty and mighty lifes which he sayes falsly are to be made of it which indeed are to be made only of the Eternal Internal Spirit Word and Light it came from to say we deny all Vses of it as if it were good and profitable and useful and fit for nothing this renders his Lye the more lyable to all mens view and himself to be as blind as one that can see no difference between staring and stark mad What I. O. is that which is not said to be good for all things thereupon said to be good for nothing If I should say soft Wax is not useful to stop hot Ovens with must it straitway be thrown away and must it be taken for Granted that I say it s not good to Seal with or that its useful for nothing That may be good to Cut and Kill as a Knife that when it hath so done can't quicken nor heal nor save nor cure The Letter kills as an Executing Instrument but the Spirit only gives the Life And whereas thou sayest we wish it blotted out that men may come to the Light within in which is the life Nay stay I. O. no hast to hang true men we would have all come to the Light and Life within indeed no such hast yet of the Scriptures going hence though old it will wax once and wear away there 's many pretious Uses though not all the Eminent ones thou talkest of to be made of it before it go hence One whereof is that very thing upon the account of which thou falsly sayest we wish it blotted out viz. That men may come to the Light within which
O. what Text of Scripture God ever made such a Promise in concerning the Text or the Scripture that he would in his Care and Providence preserve every Titt'e of that outward Writing for his Church and his Words sake which was written at the motion of his Spirit so that it never should be so mis-transcribed in any Tittle of it but that in the Greek and Hebrew Copies not English mark that nor any Translated but only Transcribed Copies he would keep it from being so adulterated vitiated altered depraved and interpolated as not to be every jot the same verbatim as at first I say I. O. where is that Promise so made to this purpose which his Providence is so engaged to answer Is it in Isa. 59.22 the place thou quorest together with a whole nest of others to the same end p. 155. viz. Matth 5.18 1 Pet 1.25 1 Cor. 11. Matth. 28.20 not one of which make one jot of mention of the Letter Text or any Tittle thereof at all That in Isaiah there cited is hinted at and harp upon to the same Tune in 7 or 8 pages in thy 2d Treatise viz. 155 167 168 169 273 317 319. In all which more or less in whole or part thou talkest much of the Transcribers lying under a loving and careful aspect from the Promise and Providence of God in beir transcribing alluding all along to Iâ— 59.12 as if God had there engaged himself by Promise as it were to guide their hands that they should not erre in a Tittle for his Word and Churches sake but is there the least Tittle of such a Promise there made and look it â—ore again and see if there be such a thing touche upon in the least either expressly or implicity 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as thou speakst or by consequence either immediate or far fetcht the words are these to the Church under the new Covenant or Gospel My words which I have put into thy mouth shall not depart out of the Mouth of thy seed nor out of the mouth of thy seeds seed from henceforth for ever Here I confesse is a promise to keep his words in the mouths of his Servants under the Gospel in the latter dayes especially so that they shall by word of mouth and writing bear Testimony against the world to his Truth and Name even the whole seed of the Righteous successively for ever without fail as now they begin to do even â—abes and Sucklings out of whose mouths and stammering lips the Lord is speaking to reprove the world and the proud Doctors Pharisaical self-seeking Teachers and to convince all ungodly ones of their ungodly deeds and hard Speeches they speak against him in his Saints in whom he comes to Judgement but what 's this to the preservation of I. O's Greek and Hebrew Texts to a Tittle without alteration This is not spoken of the continuance of any outward Scripture but of that word of Faith in the heart and mouth which the Apostles Rom. 10. preacht to turn men to telling them 't was nigh and they need not look without for it was ever man so bemoped as to draw such a Conclusion as thou dost from that Scripture viz. that every Tittle of the Text of Scripture given out of old should be secured without one jot of losse to the worlds end and if that were the promise there made it was never made good since as is shewed above the Scriptures of sundry whole prophecies and Epistles written by inspiration are lost since then nay rather and indeed that Text produces a Truth which thou deniest that in the last dayes his word and Spirit shall be de novo so poured out shed abroad and planted in the heares of his handmaids and servants Sons and Daughters that they shall Prophesie and reach as of old by word of Mouth his word as put into them by God himself Yet I. O. I know not how often betakes himself to that Text to make good his talk of the eternal Entirenesse to a Tittle of his outward Text in the Greek and Hebrew Transcripts thereof without which the word is as true entire and secure as it is when the Text is entire when the Text is torn to pieces and every Tittle of it mouldred away Beside if that were a promise of preserving the Text it must evince the Text is to endure for ever world without end as the word it self doth for its never to depart for ever from the seed that it 's there promised to but I. O. confesses the Scripture is not to abide for ever in its use which is onely faith he Ex. 3. S. 39. presenti statui c. suited to our present state and say I as it shall cease as to it's use so once to its esse or very being Obj. And if I. O. urge as he does in effect that it 's true the Word and Doctrine and Truth is the thing promised to be continued for ever primarily but consequentially the Letter and it's Tittles for as much as without it be preserved in that and that be preserved entire to a Tittle the word it self cannot be preserved from corruption Rep. He had as good have told me as soon I should have believed him in it that because Moses by Gods appointment made an Ark to lay the Book Tables and Letter in the two Tables and Letter written on it could not last any longer then the Ark or be kept from being lost any where be not kept so entire that not one bit or scrap of it be broken or lost there is no hopes that ever the light should shine out or be kept alive or be beheld yea if one inch of horn or a nail or the least Pin about the Ark had happened to be shattered or got any knock or any odd corner of it be broken off with being carried jumbled or tossed to and sro between Israel and the Philistines there had been no means of preserving the Letter from being lost or as if one should say the glasse window is set up that the Sun may shine through it therefore suppose that to be crackt or to have any flawes in it or to suffer the losse of but one little piece of a pane there 's no likelihood of enjoying the clear bright Beams of the Sun more distinctly or at any certainty nor can I be satisfied unquestionably that the Sun it self remains inviolate unlesse ye can assure me that there is every barley-corns bredth of the glasse-window without any losse as it was at first setting up though yet we see now the Sun both is the same and is better seen when beheld without a glasse then thorough it and is most clear when the glasse window is taken down and it beheld more immediately in the light that shines from it self he were fit to be Canonized for a fool that would count him a very wife man at least as to that affair that should so affirm so let who will esteem of I.
not to be believed when she talks the Truth p. 225. So I may say of thee though I believe thee when thou speakest truth yet thou utterest so many untruths that thou scarcely deservest to be believed when thou tellest the Truth but yet if thou be of any credit with thy self and thou wilt but take thy own word then we are well enough and have wherewith to answer thy challenge having thy self in the self same Book we have here to do with speaking more then one word at least and that 's enough ad bominem to this purpose viz. that there was in the world a Copy of the Bible different from what we now enjoy in one word at least and that 's in more then Tittles which thou who art Callidus more then Callidus in thy Re frigida contendest for sith the Keri and Ketib those 840. words which are confest by thee to vary in their Consonants from what they should be written with if what is in the margin were in the line are confest by thee not to have been so from the beginning which if not then there was once a Copy different from what we now enjoy but of this thou wilt hear more from us by and by Secondly p. 300. thou sayest the difference in the sense taken in the whole context is upon the matter very little or none at all at least each word both that in the margin that in the line yield a sense agreeable to the Analogy of faith Rep. Here thou mendest thy bad cause as well as one can well do that makes it two-fold worse then 't was before for if there be welnigh a thousand words not onely different in Consonants which is greater then that of Tittles but also such as makes the least difference in the sense of the Spirit which how many so e're the Text may bear is acknowledged by all but your selves that make many to be but one alone ever to one word or place then thou thy self overturnest that certainty and Identity of not onely the Text it self thou so loudly contendest for but also in some measure of the Truth it self contained therein which we say is eternally entire let the Text run which way it will but thou here art forced to confesse that in the Keri and Ketib there 's not onely a variation in words but also thereby in the very sense it self And though thou wouldst fain mend it when thou hast done by mincing the matter making as if the Context considered the difference in the sense is upon the matter very little and agreeable either way to the Analogy of faith as ye often speak whereby if not blinded ye might see how for all ye call the Scripture your Rule of Faith yet ye more serne the Scripture into the sense of a suitablenesse to your modern devised model of faith still then suit and model your faith according to the true sense of the Spirit and mind of Christ in the Scripture yet that 's a meer false seeth and â—â—gment of thy own for in some places there arises from the Keri and Ketib a very vast variety not to say clear contrariety in the sense such as if the Context be consulted with is consistent with the faith but one way onely and not the other and sith thou puttest it to the tryall by the variety of those two words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which are the same in sound yet most distinct in their significations and so of all the varieties that are of this kind seeming to thee of the greatest importance of which it is observable that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose signification is not is fourteen or fifteen times put in the Text or line instead of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whose signification is to him or it which is set in the margin I am willing to be tryed by that very variety that is of thy own naming the better to satisfie thee And whereas thou sayest that though these seem contrary one to the other yet wherever this falls out a sense agreeable to the Analogy of faith ariseth fairly from either word instancing in some places picke out by thee for thy own purpose I say if it do hold it s not worth a pin or point to the proof of what thou sayest if in any one of those fourteen or fifteen places it appear to the contrary and that it does let me be so bold fith thou instancest in two that are fittest for thee to instance but one that makes against thee and then I shall trouble my self no more with thy Keri and Ketib which would make one if not sick yet at least sorry for thee to see how sorrily thou shifts by it Isa. 9.3 thou hast multiplyed the Nation not encreased the joy say the Ketib or word in the Text but the Keri or word in the Margin is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to it which marginal Reading though Translators following the mistake of the mis-transcribers keep to the Ketib is undoubtedly the true and onely sense of the Spirit for the reading in the line as it is in both Transcripts and Translation is considered with the Context a piece of meer non-sensicall contradiction thou hast encreased the Nation not encreased the Ioy they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest as men rejoyce when they divide the spoil what a jarre does the word not encreased the Ioy make in the sense of that verse yea it makes it meet confusion and contradiction to say the joy is not enlarged and yet it is enlarged like to that of men that rejoyce in harvest and at the dividing of the spoil but read it by the Keri 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to it thus viz thou hast multiplyed the Nation thou hast encreased joy to it or its joy they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest as men rejoyce when they divide the spoil and then there 's no discord in the sound but it s all sweetly sutable and harmonious and agreeable to the Analogy of the true faith also Arg. thy Eleventh is The security we have that no mistakes were voluntarily or negligently brought into the Text before the coming of our Saviour who was to declare all things in that he not once reproves the Iewes â—n that Account when yet for their false glosses on the word be spares them not And this Argument is urged o're again p. 316 interrogatively thus viz. can it be once imagined that there should be at that time such notorious varieties in the Copies of the Scripture through the negligence of that Church and yet afterword neither our Saviour nor his Apostles take the least notice of it yea doth not our Saviour himself affirm of the word that was then among them Scripture with thee that not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 should passe away or perish Rep. 1. Leave calling Christ thy Saviour as thou often dost till thou witnesse thy self saved by his grace from
Apostles and Prophets it self which was not their writings for these were not their foundation nor were given to be ours for if they were then they had been built upon themselves and we are to be upon them which is absurd to say for neither their own preachings nor writings were their own foundation which they were built on nor are we to build onely upon them but both they and we upon that which all holy men were built on from the beginning before any writing was at all viz. Christ Iesus the light the corner stone which the blind builders refuse on whom whoever builds and believes if he never come to read one Tittle of any outward writing shall assuredly never be ashamed In this one grant then thou hast given both the Qua. and all others thou contendest with no lesse then the very cause thou contendest for viz. that the Scripture or Letter is infallibly the infallible word of God and every Letter Tittle and Iota of it also one Iot or Tittle of which can no sooner fail then Heaven and Earth can passe away and that every Iota and Tittle that was in the outward Letter as at first given forth from God by inspiration is preserved to this very day without corruption and remains in the Copies preserved till now for the use of his Church that the whole Scripture entire as given out from God without any losse is preserved in the Original Copies yet remaining yea in them all is every Letter and Tittle For this is the cause thou hast taken in hand in which thou wilt find when once thou awakest that thou hast hold on the wrong end of the staffe and these and much more of the like sort are thy own words and absolute assertions about it up and down in thy Book T. 1. c. 1. S. 14. T. 12. e. 2. S. 7. 9. which if they cannot be made good so high thou runnest but that there be any corruption to be supposed in your present Original Copies and various Lections though it be granted by Capellus and others that the saving Doctrine remaines sound as to matters of moment yet this shall not satisfie nor afford thee relief enough but thou wilt needs give up all thy cause as lost even further then thy own opponents would have thee confessing and professing that all your Doctrine is corrupt not continuing entire no means of its discovery nor of its recovery from a lost condition no means of rectifying it or determining any thing about it see T. 1. c. 1. S. 16.17 yea so as to yeild your selves to be at such a losse as not to know what ground ye stand on yea in thy Dedicatory Epistle pag. 25. lay but these two together first that the Points are the invention of the Tiberian Massorites which by all thy proofs to the contrary thou leavest as uncertain as thou foundst it and little lesse then yeild'st that it 's but uncertain 2 That its lawful to gather various Lections c. and then sayest thou for my part I must needs cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 tell me where I must stand as not seeing any means of being delivered from utter uncertainty in and about all sacred Truth and so thou goest on desuing to be instructed by such as see through the deâ—adiations that are likely to ensue on these principles as one that tremblest to think what will be the desperate consequences of imagining alterations in the Points Tittles and Iotaes of your Originals Ep. ded p. 19. now what the issue will be we leave to God though some know it yet thou are too weak to bear the sense of it without amazement being bottomed no better then upon a quavering bogge if it should be told thee yet know it thou wilt when it comes to passe or if thou canst bear it take it now Fiat justuis aut pereat mundus the issue as dreadfull as it seems to thee who aâ—t in fearlesse dangers of greater mischiefs and but dangerless fears of this present object thou so startlest at will assuredly be no worse then this as I said above viz. that while Theeves will fall out True men will come by their good again if all the Divines in the world be in such digladiations as to draw their daggers against each other about it yet the light from which your whole Letter came will be turned to when the Letter is found to be but a fallible uncertain Rule as falsified by mens mis-transcriptions and mis-translations which light is certo certius vera verius if ought can be so even no lesse then infallibility and certainty it self and that very Equity and Truth it self which the Letter teaches and doth but tend to and for my part sink thou and thy fearful fellows boreling Priests and wrangling Lawyers that live altogether on mens lusts trespasses and sins of which when the world comes to the light and by it to be led into love honesty and peace as there will be no need so it will be wiser then to be fooled into a feeding of you for feeding them in their fightings I say sink ye whether ye will and your Quick sandy foundadations together with you till both your selves and them be swallowed up by that greater glory of the light it self now arising again upon the world though they will nor see it I know some that stand so fast in this juncture wherein the old heaven and earth shakes in order to its removing as to see thousands fall besides them and thousands at their right hand yet be out of fear of the fearful fall of the Hypocrites coming nigh them And as it hath never repented me hitherto to see that people that were Priestbewildred and hampered in Latine Letanies English Liturgies divine Scottish Directoryes falling off from their Priests and Scribes to the search of Scriptures so it will never repent either my self or many thousands more that are turned to a true attendance to the light of Christ having witnessed that weaknesse of the Letter it self to save the soules of men which the Letter it self also bears witnesse to Rom. 8 2. to see men fall according to the councel of the Scripture in that behalf Gal. 5.16 such a tall is in truth not from but to the Scriptures from the Scripture it self to the holy Spirit Neverthelesse were I one that did close never so cordially with thee in thy cause about the Scripture yet could I not commend but most condemne the Course in which thou commend'st it to us for as if it were not forward enough te fall of it self thou hastenest to handle it down with thy own hand writing while thou grantest the very first Transcribers of the Scripture to be fallible and also to have erred and failed though it were but in Points Tittles and Iotaes and in no lesse they could fail if they fail'd at all for is they were fallible and what they wrote were falsified in the least then at least thy
Cause upon and too empty an Engine to carry it by it s carryed along also under that more trusty term of the Word of God by which Name I.O. by a thing call'd Petitio Principij granting himselfe leave to call the Let ter before it 's given undertakes to prove it to be the Word of God and most uncontroulably proves it so to be so far as the Letter he calls the Word of God is really so though for all his seeming to himself to have won all not one jot farther then it s so indeed that indeed is not at all having gotten such a noun substantive as the true Word of God is which can stand by it self under its own Name of the VVord of God without objection in all propriety of speech and signification and is every way able to evidence it self to be the VVord of God and is seen felt heard of them that heed it and understood not denyed so to be by the Qua. to stand by his noun adjective assertion of the scripture so to be which cannot stand by it selfe under that Name in any propriety of speech or sound sence reason or signification then he runs an end nemine c ontradicente none opposing or withstanding him in his progress nor however reserving alwayes a liberty to themselves to dissent as they see occasion from his meaning so much as once gain-saying him in his terms with a hideous Hue and Cry for the Word of God striving to restore it by his over-often repetitions of it to that title which it never lost among the Qua. who being begotten and born again into the Image of God by it are by whom onely it stands truly justified â— the children of it and of the Truth scribling it over with all his might the Word of God the Word of God the Word of God is a Light and the Word of Life the Word of God is the powerful and living and efficacious Word of God the Word of God is the Word that dwells and dives within the heart the word of God doth evidence it self to be and therefore is without controle the Word of God yea thus with a non obstante to all that deny the word to be the word which are none at all J.O. if it may be first granted him that the Scripture is the Word will undertake to prove it beyond without all further question to be the word Thus JO. howbeit by that terme the Word of God he means the Scripture all along in his book saving in one place where he calls the Word essential and effective yet as if he had utterly forgot that his business is to prove the Scripture to be the Word of God as if he had remembred himself after he was entred that his proof would not hold out without a palpable appearance of piteous weakness if he should have prosecuted it throughout under that terme of Scripture takes his predicate and makes that his subject also and in terminis goes all along asserting and assuring us the word of God is un doubtedly the word of God yea Tr. 1. cap. 2. sect 14. he goes on to prove that the word of God doth evidence it self to be of God and is of as much or more excellency and efficacy then his works and innate light to reveal God and give the knowledge of his will not so much as once mentioning the letter or Scripture at all which is the subject he there takes on him to speak of in all the following sections to the Chapters end so be labouring him all along to prove another question then that he affirmed viz. that the word is so and so when his business was to have proved the Scripture to be the known word of God for who denies that the word of God is assuredly his word but that the letter is that word is that which is denied and by him undertaken to be proved yet on he goes in his wonted blundring manner upon that term the word of God the word is undoubtedly evident to be the word making that both Suject and Predicate whereas he should have said all along if the light and Gods outward works do so much more doth the Scripture or the letter evidence it self to be the Word of God so giving his Reader no more to understand what his meaning is but that we know it some way else nor which is which by any distinction in his found or shewing when he speaks of the Scripture which is the Copy of it or the word it self which is that in the heart declared of in Scripture which he was to prove the Scripture to be then the Welch-man that being to give evidence before a Court between two that were fighting who began and was most in fault answered no otherwise then in this confused manner viz. If Him had struck Him as Him did Him either Him had killed Him or Him Him without any indignation of which of the two he meant either this or that by any or by all of his many Hims In this confused indistinct manner doest thou J.O. dispute for the Scriptures being and appearing to be the word of God so that none but folk knows what thou pleadest for viz. whether the Scripture it self singly and formally considered about which the controversie is whether it be the word of God or no or the Word of God it self about which no controversie iâ— at all with the Qu. â— who own Gods Word to be his Word yea draw up all thy Rambling matter into a closer form and thy Arguments which though thou call but some of them Inarteficial and the rest Arteficial yet are in truth the most inarteficial ones that ever I saw fall from the hands of an Artist or ever heard called truely by the name of Arguments into a nearer compass and set them in a true fair syllogistical form and order and they will appear either most false or foul or disorderly or sophistical or deformed Reader for a taste take one or two of J. O.'s mediums letting alone the examination of the strength and force of his Arguments whether such as he calls Arteficial or Inartificial and of their true consequence or inconsequence as to the Scriptures appearing to be the word to its due placeâ— and see what a mamockâ— kinde of matter they make or amount to as J.O. orders or rather disorders his matters by his impostural intruding of one subject in place of another and thrusting in of that terme the Word of God which is the main thing predicated of the Scriptures to stand instead of that terme the Scriptures of which it is by him predicated and to be proved both in esse reali cognoscibili Ex. 1. sect 1. that they are and are assuredly known to be the VVord of God and so properly to be called Having first in T. 1. cap. 1. sect 25. laid the divine original of the Scripture as the Basis of all his Babylonish building and as he saith T.
saying by which he had once gain-sayed the former returning to his former again Ex. 1. S. 29. where his Latine words Englisht are in this foolish wise viz. to express the sence they conceived of the mind and will of God the words in those tongues in which by the command and ordination of God the Scripture is written were both conceived and disposed by the holy Spirit and not permitted or left to the wisdom and will or arbitrement of the Writers themselves So of this sound piece of round Doctrine of I.O. this is the sum They that wrote the Scripture did not invent chuse or seeke words nor was it left to their minds understandings will wisdoms c. to express the truth yet to go round again they did use words of will or choice their mind and understanding were used in the choice of words yet to go round again to express the will and mind of God the words were not left to the will and wisdom of the writers Let the Reader chuse which of the two contradictory conclusions of I.O. he will take as true yet as one of them is and both cannot be true so true it is that I.O. runs the rounds and contradicts himself here as he doth in twenty places more of his self-consuting Fardel I. O. Thou addest p. 9 10. That in their writing they were not onely on a general account to utter the truth they were made acquainted with all and to speak the things they had heard and seen which was their common Preaching-work but also the very individual words they had received were to be declared And p. 9. quoting Mat. 10.10 That the Apostles were not the Speakers of what they delivered as other men are the Figment and Imagination of whose hearts are the Fountain of all that they speak but the spirit of the Father in them Rep. How hangs this true passage viz. They were to utter the truth they were acquainted withall and write the things they had heard and seen together by the ears with that false passage p. 5 6. Where thou sayest The Stories Laws Doctrines Instructions Promises Prophesies they gave out were not retained in their memories from what they had heard nor by any means before-hand comprehended by them c. What clouds of witnesses be here to the clearing of the Spirit by which thou writest to be a Spirit of self-contradiction 2. Was not their common Preaching-work and their common Writing-work all one as to the choice of Words wherein they declared Were they at liberty when they preached to ramble into words of their own meere will choice and invention and limited when they wrote so that they might not express themselves in such words as in the will and wisdome of God in which they dwelt and liv'd they saw meet for the matter in hand but just tyed to the individual words brought to them as immediately by inspiration as the matter or Word of God it self they wrote of Who acquainted thee with this whimsical non-sensical notion that they in their work of Preaching disposed and ordered their words as in wisdom they saw them acceptable or serviceable but in their work of Writing they might dispose order chuse and in wisdom seek to find out acceptable words but had every Tittle more immediately put into them then when they spake the Truth by word of mouth Dost not thou thy self say p. 9. Mat. 10.10 That the Apostles were not the Speakers of what they delivered but the Spirit in them Whereby the truer that is tthe more clearely thou contradictest thy self again and intimatest no less then thus much that the Spirit as immediately and distinctly brought to them gave and put into their minds and mouths what words they should use when they were speaking as what words they should use when they were Writing So that what ever was their common Preaching-Work and common Writing-Work in both which it 's true enough that they were assisted specially and in both equally by the holy spirit in the wisdom power evidence and demonstration of which speaking in them and moving them who were obedient to him to an active improvement and exercise of their rational faculties minds understandings wills memories thereunto they both preached and wrote 1 Cor. 2.4 2 Cor. 3.12 and so uttered no other truth then they were mostly made acquainted withall by the spirit within themselves and heard and saw by the light within as well as by hear-say and the Writings of one another from without Yet the common Preaching-work and Writing-work of thy self and thy fellow Ministers not of the Light and Spirit but of the Letter out of which ye surtively fetch filch and steal all your stuff and furniture wherewith ye feed people till they starve I say Your Preaching and Writing is of things that ye are not acquainted with from the Spirit of the Father nor from its manifestings the mind of God within you and moving you to utter them in words of his own immediate suggesting and supplying but a certain uttering forth in your own wills and times of what ye have no otherwise then by hearsay or from the Scriptures of those who spake and wrote as mov'd no more then what they both saw and heard and handled of the Word of Life a certain rude handling what ye never felt your selves nor your own hands ever yet handled of that Word of Life ye read others writing of a heedless holding forth of what ye hear not but onely hear of a talkative treating on what Truth ye do not truly taste of an impudent intruding of your selves into a self-ended shewing of what ye have not seen but as at second-hand ye see it shew'd in the Scripture by such as were in the true sight and substantial being of it vainly puffed up in your fleshly minds in which respect ye are no true Ministers nor true Witnesses for God but false Witnesses even when ye testifie the truth which is not yours as well as when ye tell lyes and teach the untruths which are your own as the old Truth stealers and Word-sellers were who though they said because they found it so said by such as felt it The Lord lives which is the truth yet they spake falsely forasmuch as they witnessed him nor risen and alive but murdered stew kill'd and crucified the holy and just one within themselves and spake not as Christ and his did what they knew Ioh. 3.11 and testified not what they had seen but worshipped and worded it about what they knew not Iohn 4.22 And so as a man can't be counted a Legal witness in foro hominum in a civil Court of Judicature among men that shall testifie of another's theft murder and scandal at second hand that is not as an immediate eye or ear-witnesse of it but on his reading in a Letter or hear-say from such as were so so much less in foro Dei Ecclesiae can any be owned as a true Minister of
written for the ends above specified in the Scriptures mentioned yet will it not follow that it was intended for the Rule to the Church much less the only perfect Rule or Standard of Faith and Life because God did not give order for â—s so to be but assured her before the Scripture was at all as much as God thought sufficient to create and preserve faith in the Gospel she had before she had it written in an outward Letter viz. the inward Light Word and Spirit that was in the beginning from which the Letter came And p. 43. to make a Rule much more then the only sâ—anding Rule exclusively of all other of all internal Light Word Spirit Revelation as JO. and T.D. both hold the Scripture to be is necessary Gods appointment of a Writing to that end to which he did and even in the Scripture it appears appoint the Spirit and inward Light and Word as I shew'd above but never at all appointed the Scripture it self And p. 17 18. of T. D's 2 d. Pam. the difference lyes in God's Arbitrary dispensation who from of old disposed the Light Word and Spirit alone to be the Rule without and before the Letter as being far more excellent and fully sufficient without it as to the nature and being of a Rule but never ordered intended designed appointed or established the Writing alone as the Rule as my two Vniversity Antagonists dispute without and câ—â—lusively of the other And as for the third and fourth Classis of J. O's Scriptures which seeing they are so near a kin to these of the first therefore I shall consider them here before those of the second they are of the same kind so that the same general Answer might satisfie sapienti cui verbum sat but seeing such stress is put on them by J.O. to the stablishing of a wrong Standard which iâ— of so great concernment to be stated right or else all the Building faulters I am free to insist a little more particularly on them then else I need to do They contain as thou sayest J.O. commendations of the Scriptures as to all uses of Religion both by the practises and precepts of Christ and the Apostles searching and expounding proving and trying all things by them themselves and also commending and commanding the searching of them and the trying of all things by them in and among all others Rep. That all the places enumerated by thee do contain any such matter at all I utterly deny for some of those thou citest as well as sundry of those afore spoken to neither expresly nor intentionally relate to the Writing or Scripture but onely to the Word of God and the Things and Truth and Commands of God written of onely in the Letter which things in what Text soever thou find'st them talkt of thou present'y run'st blundering on in thy wonted blindness which discerns no difference between the Writing and things written interpreting them without more ado of the Scripture as namely Deut. 28.58 whereby the words written in that Book is not meant the Writings but the Commandmenâ— therein rehearsed the Ceremonials and Morals of which they were to observe before that Booke of Deuteronomy was penn'd which is a story of Moses his repetition by word of mouth a little before his death of such things as he had from the Lord enjoined them to observe and some of them God also from his own mouth well-nigh forty years at least before that was penned Also that in Acts. 26.22 where Paul sayes he witnessâ—d no other things or truths as to the substance and matter of them though the manner was different the one testifying de Christo exhibendo the other exhibito one saying they should come t'other they were come then what the Prophets and Moses said should come Which things Paul could now witness were come if he had not seen their witness that they should And what mention is there of the Scripture at all in that Scripture Also John 1.7 where it s said of John Baptist he was not that Light but came to bear witness of that light which John Baptist wrote no Scripture at all that I know of which Light he testified to was not the Letter or Scripture but the same the Qua. bear witness to even that measure of its light within wherewith he inlightneth every man that comes into the world so that there is no Scripture mentioned or so much as meant in that Scripture Wherever thou seest in thy Concordance the word Scripture written of in the Scripture thou art ready to think straightway it Concuâ—r'â— and hath no â—mâ—l Concordance with thy cause and where thou findest the Words Rule Foundation Law and Prophets of God Light Word Commands Statutes Testimony Prophesie and such like thou as rashly and rawly imaginest the Scripture or meer outward Writing meant and mentioned by them in what ever is predicated of them and that it makes something for thy bâ—inde business of the Scriptures being the only standing Rule and Foundation But alas hoc aliquid verè nihil est this something is plainly nothing at all to that purpose for as it makes not a mice toward the proof thereof as appears above because the Scriptures were written for good ends and are prefiâ—â—blâ— to such and such good uses unless God had Canonized them as a Rule so neither doth it that Christ expounded the Scriptures and that some did search them and were mightily read in them as some are at this day who are supposed to deny them to the confounding the Scribes that searched them daily and therein lookt for life as their only Rule but never came to him that they might have life who was the Life and Light they came from but never heard him whom they testified of that his voice was now to be heard in whom God who under the Law before his coming spake in his servants the Prophets speaks under the Gospel as by his only Son 'T is true Abraham who lived long after Moses and those Prophets whose Writings ye have were born in that Parable which illustrates a precious truth that as to the mystery of it lyes yet hid from thee is brought in by Christ as saying of the Rich mans brethren by way of prevention of their coming into torment They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them if not they 'l not be perswaded by a miraculous message of one to them from the dead but what iâ— this to prove what thou here alledgest it for and more largely inferrest from it p. 63 64 65 66 67. where thou preachest on that Text a Sermon as long as little to thy purpose improving it and that of 2 Pet. 1.19 to the utmost to prove Moses and the Prophets Writings to be the best and most effectual means of bringing men to repentance on which that and all faith is immediately to be grounded and to prove the Scriptures to be that alone which we are sent to to be more effectual
interpret the term of Light in those two Texts of no other thing then the Letter of the Scripture The words are these the People meaning the land of Zebulun and Nepthali by the way of sea beyond Iordan c. which sate in darkness saw great light and to them that dwelt in the Region and shadow death light is sprung up Rep. The juncture of time of which this is spoken concerning the land of Zebulun and Nepthali seeing great light was when Christ himself the light of the world came among them dwelling at Capernaum a chief City of those two Tribes by the Sea-coast and shone ronnd about them in his own immediate Ministry The Scriptures or letter which by the word Light there is by our great Text-man I.O. said to be intended must be either those of the Old Testament as ye speak or of the New those of Old could not be meant here for if they had been that Light they could not have been said to have sate till now in darkness and shadow of death neither could the light have been said as it is here to have sprung up now so newly to them for the outward Scriptures of Moses and the Prophets was sprung up to that people of Israel long before this time and those of the New it could not possibly beâ— for John the Baptist and Christ having written nothing at all that is extant in your Bibles though Christ after this wrote something that is not there and the Apostles and Evangelists having written nothing yet for not one o them was called till after this as appears by the verses following not one jot or tittle of that was sprung up to them as yet therefore what ever Light it was and what it was is well enough known to the children of the light though not to the children of darkness that despise and wonder and perish not beleeving the work that God is working in their own daye â—et this I can tell them which is as much as is meet for them to know till they live up to what they know already and as much as is needful to the case in hand that it was not the Letter of the Scriptures And now I am so near that Mat. 5.14 it is not amiss to step thither beâ— before I go back to Hosea where the words are Ye are the light of the world which place I. O brings to prove the Letter to be the Light Rep. I should sooner by the half have urged Gen. 1.2 God said let there be light and there was light to prove the Letter to be the Light for that hath a typical mystical reference to the true Spiritual light that inwardly inlighteâ—s every man that comes into the world then that clause of Christ to his Disciples Yee are the light of the world for that hath not the least tittle of tendency to such a thing unless I.O. who is blinde enough in blending the Writing and letter written of into one individium will now grow so gross in his confusions as to confound and thrust a third thing viz. the men that wrote some of the Scriptures into one and the same individium with them and so make a new kinde of Trinity in unity and unity in Trinity which if he shall then letting pass that long tale of the doctrine of the Trinity in seven or eight pages together viz p. 132. to p. 139. in which he talks as T.D. and most Divines do of he knows not whom nor what while he hates the light if I say I.O. shall fain such a new fangled Trinity as Writers Writings and Word written of and jumble them all three into one then t is time to tell these Trinitonians their Bell haâ— not Mettle Nor the Tune of a Bell but the Tone of a Kettle But I.O. hath a saying I toucht on above whereby perhaps hee may think this unfavoury sound is salved it is the writing it self quoth hee p. 71. that now supplies the place and room of the persons in and by whom God originally spake to men as were the persons speaking of old so are the Writings now Rep. Therefore say I as the outward persons of the men which I.O. reckons on were not the Word of God so neither were nor are their Writhings the Word of God Ad hominem Ob. But may he say the persons of the Discipâ—es are here called the Light of the world Rep. As vessels that bore the Name Word Truth or Light of God to the world by the figure or common metonymy as I said above whereby the thing containing is called by the name of that that is contained in it or held forth by it which yet either as to name and thing it really and properly is not I can allow I.O. his denomination of the Apostles by that name of a Light in such wise as commonly by the said figure but not properly the Lanâ—horn in sensu composiâ—o together with the Light shining in it is termed the Light which Lanthorn of it self is so far from being abstractively from the Revelation made in it by the light within it a light of it self that its a dark body that can neither shew any thing else nor bee seen it self without it bee manifested by something else that is truly Light But all this will lend I.O. as little help as none at all in his lame cause who hath entred the lists with Qua. before the world to vindicate the Word of God and the Light to be the proper name and nature of the Letter to evince it against them as to name and thing so to be p. 30. of his Epist. and p. 73 74. that the Scripture both is so and is so called or else it properly could not as having the very nature and properties of light and Ex. 1. s. 253. whos 's dealing with the Qua. is de Scripturae nomine proprio viz. titulo illo glorioso verbo Deo quod nomen sibi vendicat about that proper name of the Scripture to wit the glorious Title the Word of God which name it challengeth to it self and Ex. 3. s. 28 29. who sayes that Revelation the Scripture that is abstractively considered of it self and from the Light and Spirit the Qua. say is necessary is so omnibus numeris absoluta perfecta ut nihil opus sit c. so every way absolute and perfect and accomplishing all things as a Rule or Guide as who should say the Lanthorn is such a sure and sufficient guide of it self in the night that there is not any need at all of any other light the naked Lanthorn is a Revelation and will do well enough alone so that there is no need at all of any other direction to know God to salvation by nor of the Spirit and light within which is superfluous vain useless and dâ—â—estable I.O. is never the nearer as to his cause for all that which I can afford to allow him as abovesaid Moreover if men made after Gods Image
and truly partaking of the Divine nature and begotten by the light and living Word of Truth from death and darkness into a real union with it self by receiving with meekness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the innate ingrafted word â—am 1.21 by which they become incorporated and as it were transubstantiated into one seed with it self having the Image and glory of God seen upon them and shining in and through them before the world men before whom let your light shine faith Christ Mat. 5.16 Is. 60.1 2 3 c. 2 Cor. 2. ult I say if such men may be stiled the Light of the world as Iohn Baptist was stiled by Christ a burning and shining light Joh. 35 36 then whom yet Christ had a greater witnesâ— Wil I.O. therefore prefer the deaâ— copies of the writings of those living men who wrote from the life light and Spirit of God moving before or at least into an equality with the holy men who under God were the Authors of those writings as they were at first which now are but the fallible â—andyworks of by his own confession but meer fallible Transcribers or if he will will any wise men of God become so foolish with him I trow not in as much as the work-man is more glorious than the work that issues either originally from or but subordinately through his own hands the Writer more honourable than his meer writing as Heb. 3.3 4. Hee who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house for as every outward Writing or Letter yee now have the use of was written by some man as every such house is built by some man but he of whom are all things and he that originally built all things is God indeed Yet me thinks I sent not only I.O. but T.D. also who is so a kâ—n to him that in most matters here hee prosecues the same point unless where he contradicts him and hobbles upon the same notions enthroning the Scriptures or outward Letter very high above the Church whose children it immediately was pend by the hands of and whose meer outward Engine the outward letter is insomuch that I.O. makes it not only dearer to God then the whole world besides p. 171. but also p. 76. the very Darling of God so that his Church whose servant the Letter is and for whose sake written is made by him but some subservant to hold out the honour of the Letter that it may bee the more conspicuous rather then to let her own light image grace glory which is that of God Isa. 10.1 2. shine out before man the duty t is quoth he almost the whole of the Church to hold up that some time and when wee say the Church is a Pillar and Ground of truth from 1 Tim. 3.15 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which words Pillar and Ground should not bee taken for the supporter or foundation nor inholder of truth in sensu Architectonico which T.D. denies â—e not dispute See p. 356. See p. 355. but grant him his sensum forensem or foreign sense of it in which I.O. also who sayes absurdly however that these words Pillar and Ground may in good coherence of speech refer to the words following viz. the mystery of godliness as well as to the Church will take it in and let them have it yet what follows that the Church is but the Ground and Pillar to set the Letter upon which I.O. calls the light and truth there and to hold forth only the outward literal publication as T.D. pleads p. 18 19. of his 2. Pamph. or the seat or place of residence for the Scripture as upon the Exchange in London are pillars and places upon which hang Tables and Proclamations in no wise surely for though the Pillars of the Exchange are for support as well as shew and so T.Ds. Simile doth not quadrare nor run on all four to bee sure yet to give them the sense of a pillar to hold up or hold out only yet that which the Church is the Pillar to hold up that is hold forth is the Truth whether by or without the Scripture of it between which Truth and the book they both sometimes do distinguish which truth or light is the Foundation or Pillar in sensu Architectonico on which the Church is built and not it on the Church as the letter is which under God the Church that gives no being to the truth or light nor kindles one beam thereof as I.O. sayes but only bears witness to it gives being to and so is in sensu Architonico the Pillar or Foundation of though in sensu forensi of the light and truth only for the Church is more honourable then the letter as the Builder or that which supports the house is more honourable then the house that receives being under God and preservation from it and its Prophets but its less honourable then the light and truth it lives by and hath its being from as a Church in respect of which light and truth t is confest it is not a pillar and ground in sensu Architectonico as it is of the letter but in sensu forensi only that is the seat place or pillar from whence it is held out and shines or as the Church is called Reâ— 1.20 Zach. 4.2 a golden Candlestick that serves to hold out in life and doctrine voice and writing the eternal Word of grace light truth and word of life conveyed in measure to her from the two Olive trees or anointed ones or sons of Oyl the living Word and Spirit that empty themselves into the golden Candlesticks feeding them therewith and from thence shining as God witnesses to the world which two witnesses shining and prophesying to the Church or Candlesticks and through them to the world in power and much patience and sufferings stand before the God of the whole earth Zach. 3. Rev. 11. And if the Saints born of the incorruptible seed the Word of God which liveth and abideth ever may bee stiled the Seed of God Will I.O. thence conclude that a corruptible Letter copied out by corrupt mens hands as the Scripture is at this day may be so stiled also The Word of God took upon him the nature and seed of Abraham but never took upon him however he is written of in it the proper nature of a dead Letter that was written with ink and pen by mens hands There was no time wherein the Word and Light by which all was made was made or born into the true nature of such a Letter but there is a time of its being made flesh and dwelling as their food in the Saints Joh. 1.14 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 natus est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Word was born flesh and dwelt in us Ioh. 6.51 to 64. the bread I give is my flesh c. howbeit all flesh is not the same flesh there is a flesh of Christ that if eaten with a carnal mouth would as so have profited nothing vers 63.
future and if he be indeed so blinde as he makes himself and so mean of memory as not to remember any name whereby the Lanthorn or Letter can bee called but that name of the light and VVord though himself calls it not the light or word only but by the name of lanthorn letter or Scripture also save that Trapezantius-like who in a long fit of sickness forgot his own name I.O. forgets himself and heeds not that himself often calls the letter as others do by its only due and proper name of letter or Scripture 't is fit he should be plainly told what to call it and minded of it as I here do tell and minde I.O. who calls to the Qua. to tel him what to call the letter that the name of Lanthorn by which though he forget that hee doth so himself doth call the lanthorn and the name of Scripture by which he though heâ— forgets it calls the Scripture is a more proper name then those of light and the Word of God and the most proper names that can possibly bee given to them And if for all this he will obstinately oppose the truth and wilfully wa'k on without wisdome then nescio quid indeed the dotage being so deeply dyed into him that its scare like to depart if he be brayed in a Morter I know not what more to say but Nescioan Anticcyram ratio illidestinet omnem Now I.O. ne Kideas be not so merry about the mouth for such a man there is and nigher to thee too then thou thinkest he is so nigh that thou canst not step an inch from him -- nete quaesiveris extra hee is a well known to thee as any man in thy cloaths and thou canst not bee ignorant of him if thou be not willingly ignorant of thyself yea verily Thou art the man that art found in that folly and falsehood that is aforesaid about the lanthorn and the light as is shewed so abundantly above that there needs little more to be said in proof thereof Tu Dominus Tu vir aut Doceas nos quid sibi vuls santa blateratio mugitus c. what means such a blâ—ating and bellowing out for the letter such a pleading it to be the true light which it doth but plead for such a striving to have it stiled the light and the meer writing and every tittle of it to be called the Word of God which bears in truth caeteris paribus but such a reference to the true light and Word of God respectively as the lanthorn doth to the light of the candle which is set up and held forth in it Quid sibi vuls detestaâ—io execratio tanta c. what means such direful detestation extrâ—am execration and thundring out of little less then Anathama Maranathaes against the light within and word within and all that confess to it as I.O. himself doth too but that hee forgets it and so curses himself by craft Ex. 1. s. 4. as Fantastical foolish deluded Enthusiastical enemies to denyers and reproachers of the Scripture because they deny the letter to bee that light and Word of God which as through a lanthorn glass or vail and not so brightly but more dimly then when viewed with open face as shining in the heart are seen and shew themselves through it siccine se gerunt ministri lucis sicut vosmet vos geritis O ministri literae tantaene a nimis caelestibus irae Quid sibi vuls tanta terminorum transpositio verborum ista tua mutatio mussitatio mangonizatio c. supradicta If there bee not such a man and I.O. be not he teach us I.O. plainly what thou meanest by that peeping and muttering out of thy minde by that mumbling and fumbling in such foul fallacious wayes about things wherein if thou wert not minded to mask over thy meaning that men may not minde too much where thy lame cause halteth nor finde where its false and falters thou mightest have made it fairer in it self I cannot say for the fairer and fuller thy openings of it are the falser and fouler it appears but tenfold fairer to bee seen in its falsness and foulness then now it is tell us what means that mess of medley that Mangonization and mixture thou makest of both thy matter and thy meaning that Tohu Vabohu that tangled and tangling kinde of talk that thy Treatises do consist of wherein not only like him that talks up the lanthorn into the name of the light and talks down the light as nothing thou triest to turn the outside inwards and that which should be uppermost downwards i.e. the light within which is the Truth it self out of doors and the outward letter which is but a Writing of it in its room place power use and name but also in the proof and prosecution of that most subsenseless subversion dost in one place or other one place well compared with another subvert thy self by thy own sayings and unsayings how much more I cannot say but little less I dare say then twenty times over tumbling about like a Bull in a net turning things to and fro transposing thy termes and introducing the prime praedicate in place of its own prime subject one while using the terme Scripture Letter Writing which witness thy â—itle pages is the sole subject expected by thy Reader according to thy intimation of no less to be proved to be the Word of God and treated on without varying from it under that terme of Scripture Letter Writing other while in thy very Argumentation for the Truth of thy untrue affirmation which is that the Scripture in esse both reali cognoscibili is the Word and in answer to that queston how is it known that the Scripture is the Word of God promiscuously putting all these termes viz Book Faith Bible Truth Writing Doctrine Letter Light Scripture Word of God Declaration minde will of God and things declared together again as if 't were already out of question which is the matter in question that these are all one thing and termes Synonymous and compounding and confounding them into one Chaos or lump of confusion chopping and changing popping out and pulling in mounting up and then dropping down as if thou wert sensible of being got too high then hiding they head again and there as those that are afraid out of their close places moving out of thy ho'e as a worm of the earth and twining every way fair or soul to secure the main chance and to make good thy bad cause and carry what thou contendest for which yet when all 's done beside the getting to thy self among seeing men the blot of blindness ignorance weakness folly falshood fallacy and confusion thou wilt which way soever thou orderest or disorderest thy Arguments for it even by thy own Management of it bee on the losing hand till at last thou hast lost it altogether for though thou makest as much of it to the utmost as another can well do that hath taken
within viz. Jam. 1.21 Receive with meekness the ingrafted Word able to save souls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 insitum vâ—rbum That the Word is a light thou dost not deny and that its within sure thou wilt not who sayest Ex. 1 s. 40 thus That Word within is the Word of faith the Apostles preached and that we are here called to it thou canst not So Gal. 5.16 17. Walk in the Spirit c. of which Spirit he saith it lusteth against the flesh which lusting must be where the flesh that private earthly evil spirit that man in the fall is possest with lusteth against it to envy and all evil but that is within and the Scripture saith so not only in Iam. 4.5 but in some other place whence he a leadgeth it whose words are Think yee that the Scripture faith in vain the Spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy So 1 Joh. 2.24 27. Let that abide in you c. If that ye have heard from the beginning remain in you c. and what 's that but the anointing the Spirit of God within which though â— O. may call a whimsy and delusion a lye and such like yet is Truth and is nâ— Lye yea t is nothing but that which is in the lye which calls it a lye and that which is already deceived and hath nought but deceit it self to bee deceived of that cryes out Deceit and Delusion of the Truth To which I might adde all such places as call to the Light and mention the Light as that which though evil ones hate yet such as dâ— truth come to and Christ both warned men himself to walk by and beleeve in and sent Paul and Iohn and therest of hiâ— Ministers to turn men to and Iohn the Baptist pointed at and witness'd to which Light was not the Letter in which they wrote of this Light as thou silliâ—est supposest for they were not Aâ—inisters of that 2 Cor. 3. But the Light of Christ and Christ the Light of the world who enlightened every man before the Letter was and that is within in the minde and conscience where the darkness is for the darkness is within and not without and therefore the Light must bee much more within which shines within the darkness though not comprehended by it for that Light which shines in the dark place till the day dawn and the day-star arise there which is the heart must be also in the heart and that Light which shineth within the darkness which is within men must needs be much more within them as the candle that shines within a dark Lanthern that is seated within a Room must need be within the Room as much if not more inwardly then the Lanthâ—rn is Another Argument against the Light and Spirits being the Rule and so consequently that the Scripture onely is it is the uncertainty of all sorts of Enthusiasms J O. That which is every way uncertain yea most uncertain deceitful whether we consider thâ— principle of the Revelation or the things revealed that we ought not to attend to as a Rule or guide in the way of life and the worship of God but that 's the nature of all Enthusiasmes Therefore c. Reply Is thy Text then such a certain Rule with thee which thy self confessest to bee so uncertain that Criticks may alter it as they please and about which thou confessest ye are in such a heap of uncertainties 2. Wee talk not of Enthusiasms as the Rule but of the Light within and Spirit of God in the conscience and Word in the heart manifesting good and evill lusting against the flesh which the Letter calls a Light to the feet a lamp to the paths and this as is above shewed from 2 Pet. 1.13 is a sure word of Prophesâ—â— yea this is most certain unchangeable eternally the same incorruptible living and abiding ever what ever become of the dead Letter that is so liable to be altered corrupted nullified that there need no other Argument in the world be used to prove it not to be the Word of God unless God have an uncertain and corruptible Word which iâ— blasphemous and contrary to the Scripture to imagine then the utter uncertainty and corruptibility of it insomuch that we may safely Syllogize thy own Argument against the inward lights being a Rule from its uncertainty back again upon thee against the Letters being a Rule ab eâ—us omne genus incertitudine from its uncertainty and corruptibility thus viz Quod omni modo est incertum incertissimum corruptibile c. That which is every way uncertain most uncertain liable to be altered falsified corrupted to be mis-transcribed mis-translated mis-interpreted wrested this way and that to moulder away to perish be torn to peeces burned and many wayes brought to nothing is not the Word of God nor the only Rule c. But the Letter or Scripture is so as abovesaid witness the written Role of Ieremiahs Prophesie which Zedekiah cut with a pen-knife and consumed in the fire and thy own confessed mouldring away of the very first manuscripts therefore c. Another Argumen of I.O. against the Light and Spirits being the onely Rule is this J.O. It s of no small moment that leaning to these principles following thâ—se guides rejecting the Rule of the Word written the Fanaticks are daily driven to pernicious manners abominable Idolatries Murders Whoredomes Blasphemies and in all Nations to unhappy ends Rep. Whether there be more abominable Idolatries Murders Whoredoms Blasphemies and pernicious manners among Qua. or other men called Christians and Christian Ministers that suck at the breasts of the Vniversities or nursing Mothers is sufficiently shew'd above as for unhappy ends t is tâ—ue by bloody persecution many Fanaticks as thou callest the Qua. have come to untimely deaths the more shame for New England where two of them have been hanged for coming into their coasts and Old England also where for all the pretences to Reformation many have perished in prisons and by blows and bruises for their testimony to the truth the more shame for Oxford it self too where one of the first that came thither dyed of the bruises and abuses there received from the Scholars but if by unhappy ends thou mean such as befall men as his Judgements from the hand of God immediately in some eminent notable way seizing on them and cutting them off these are untimely ends that many not for following but forsaking and fighting against the Light the Qua. testifie to have brought on themselves in these latter years in these Nations besides many sharp sufferings in their lives time in which thy self I.O. hast had a just share for flinging at the Qua. as Fanaticks who art now flouted at as a Fanatick thy self Beware therefore and be warned in thy life-time leâ—â— thy latter end be as some of theirs How scores at least of persons have been taken away for their hands being heavy on the Qua. by the hand of God
Prophet Doth not the difference that is serve us against thee whilst it s no other then thus that of the two the spiritual man is the greater for if every Prophet is not a spiritual man yet all spiritual men are Prophets or more then Prophets And that there are spiritual men in these dayes thou wilt prove thy self to be what thou art but a meer animal and fleshly man in denying for as there are millions even many more then a good many spiritual men in Title so assuredly as few as they are there are a good many so in truth and so many as are so are more then Prophets or inspired ones that are but barely mov'd to speak or act by the Spirit for all holy men of God spake and wrote of old and speak and write now as they are acted or moved of the holy Spirit but all that speak as the Spirit of God may move act and give them utterance are not holy men of God for Prophesie is but a gift that wicked men though seldome yet sometimes may have who never come into that more excellent and spiritual way which is to last when all Prophesie is ceased of living in love and other fruits of the Spirit witness Balaam the Prophet that lov'd the wages of unrighteousness and taught Balaak King of Moab to cast a stumbling block before Israel and to eat things sacrificed to Idols and to commit fornication whose way you follow who neither live the life nor will unless ye repent for all your hopes so to do die the death of the righteous and that you will see when you fall into his Trance with your eyes open as you will at last so as to see him even that Star of Iacob as he did afar off not nigh but with a gulf betwixt and Lazarus in his bosome though you are yet in a Tâ—ance of your own with your eyes shut and not come so far into the bare sight of Truth as Balaam was who for all his wickedness was moved of the Lord and overpowred by the Word of God put into his mouth to speak many precious Truths and full sore against his will which would have been at work another way for hire and have cursed and divin'd against them for money to bless Israel altogether Numb 24. Witness also Caiphas the High-Priest who gave the Iews wicked counsel against Iesus and yet prophesied that Iesus should dye for that Nation and gather into one all the children of God that were scattered abroad which not knowing well the true meaning of his own words he spake not of himself as ye do of your selves not understanding well what you say uttering in words many eminent truths out of the Prophets and of the Prophets which not knowing the Prophets voices ye fulfill to your own ruine but by way of Prophesie as the Spirit made use of his mouth to utter it Iohn 11.47 51 52. And was not Saul also among the Prophets so that evil men may be moved and inspired by the Spirit and obey also so as to Prophesie as they are moved led or acted by the Spirit who never obey the Spirits motions of them to better and greater matters that spiritual men obey him in yea fleshly selfish men may be moved and made of the Lord which is more then ye yet are Prophets of True things but what holy and spiritual man is not a Prophet or not inspired or not truly moved of the Lord or however fallible in himself as other men is not anamartetos or infallible as led by the Spirit wherefore then makest thou this matter Theopneustian or divine inspiration or moving of the Spirit such a singular thing as peculiar onely to the dayes of old nay verily though all men are not so far inspired and moved of the Spirit as to be made Prophets yet if by the Term Theopneustia thou mean bare inspiration and motion of the Spirit and speak of that thing it selfe and not of such or such a degree or measure of it canst thou tell me the man or woman vpon earth letting onely Infants and meer Fanaticks aside who are not or have not at some time or other been moved by and with good motions to better things then they follow inspired by the Holy Spirit Who is there â—aving him who walks no more after the Flesh but after the Spirit and so is not excepted from but more highly accepted into this Theopneusty or inspiration in all the world of either Heathens by name or meer nominall Christians that are as reall Heathens as the other who cannot truly say Video meliora prâ—bâ—que deterior a sequor And what is that in them who have no outward Scripture that makes them say and gives them to see that they behold and approve of better things while they practise worse Is it not the same light and Spirit within by which Christ went and preached to the spirits in prison when once the long suffering of God waited while the Ark was preparing Is it not the spirit of Truth that guides the followers of it into all truth and strives with men though the stiff necked and uncircumcised in heart and cares alwayes resist and strive against it and lusts in them against the lustings of their flesh to filth and envy c Is it not that which convinceth and reproveth the world of sin because they believe not in Christ and of righteousnesse and judgement so that they know righteousnesse and the righteousnesse and truth of the judgement of God that who do such things as they do are worthy of death though yet they enter not into the narrow path of righteousness and life nor repent to the acknowledgement of the Truth And though the earth by reason of the transgression till God create the Heaven and Earth again anew as he did in the beginning be without form and void and darknesse be upon the face of the deep yet in order to its coming into order again by the new Creation Doth not the Spirit of God move upon the face of the waters where the Whore sitteth peoples multitudes tongues and nations And doth not God say Let there be light and there is light shining in the daâ—knessâ— though the darknesse comprehends it not And doth he not separate these clearly in mens consciences the inner world from each other calling the light day and the darknesse night And do not many of you men called Ministers use to teach your unconverted people to take the advantage of the Spirits moving upon their hearts and not to quench them but to step in while it moves least like those that lay diseased at the Pool of Bethesda waiting for the moving of the waters by the Angel that came down which in the Antitype is not the letter but the Spirit not waiting for the movings or neglecting to observe and obey and close with the Spirits motions before the motions of sin in the flesh step in and cool and quench them they lie
of God is said to be preached published multiplied received which as is shewed more at large above is as non-sensicall as for a man to say that the Lantern though formaliter it be not so but only the light that is contained in it is so doth yet challenge to it self that name of the light as its proper name yet engages himself against the Qua. in vindication of the Word of God to be the proper name of the Scriptures so truly that those are injurious to it and opproâ—â—ious reproachers of it who will not allow it to be properly called by that glorious title So thou engaging thy self in vindication of the Scriptures to be the Word of God 1 Giving us the Question to have been debated flinkest away into the proof of another matter saying that ye upon the matter contained in the writing which say we is another business the holy truth that is there told and the Light and Word of God Law and Gospel there witnessed to being a thing to distinct from the Scripture of it that as it is now where the letter is not and was two thousand years before the letter was so it will be for ever for its an euerlasting Gospell when the letter of it shall be no more Whether that be your Rule of Faith and Life a matter in no wise denyed by the Qua. if not only by the Scripture ye mean as properly ye cannot do the holy Doctrine Truth Word Light Law Gospell of Christ therein declared to be in some measure at least in the heart of every man preached in every Creature that they may hear and do it but also by thy Term Our Rule of Faith and Life that which de jure ought to be your Rule otherwise if ye say even of that de facto that it is your Rule or in esse actuall that which ye do actually and indeed walk by I deny even that also for howbeit ye should own that also and not the letter and text only as I.O. doth yet so farre are ye from so doing that if thou do not yet at least I.O. both doctrinally and practically denies and damnes it down as a meer nescio quid of the Qua. coyning Moreover much what in the same manner dost thou in the Point of Iustification give us no lesse then the Question as to the Termes wherein it was stated and then startest a new Question in thy Sophisticall sâ—â— it of subtilâ—y which is so familiar with thee that it 's seen by any that are but â—â— unculi only in the thing called Dispute by staring and translating the old one under new termes For witness thy own disagreeing counterfeited Account thereof p. 14. 1. Pamph. the new Termes wherein that thou mighest the more easily wrong me by thy wrong Representation of me to the world as a rank Papist and render me suspitious and the more securely write me out as thou doâ—t in the second Page of the lying Narrative of thy second Pamp. under that traducing Title of one suspected to be a Iesuite thou with much ado as thy phrase there is drewest and wrestedst the Quest. into and â—ayest on thy own head they were slated in were whether Our Good Worâ—s are the meritorious cause of our Iustification which I hold in the affirmative no further then as by Our good works are meant the good works of God and Christs own working in us by his Spirit which though most truly his are by the Spirit it self vouchsafed that name of Ours witness Isa. 26.12 not as by Ours those only of our own working in our will wisdome and strength are expressed and intended for all such are Our righteousnesses which I who own none of Christs working in us to be so as thou T.D. blasphemously dest if p. 15. and 22. of thy I. Pamp. be rightly soan'd do own to be but durg lâ—ss and filthy rags according to Isa. 64.6 But the true terms of the Quest in which it was stated and debated if we may as sure enough we may believe the joynt testimony of both thy self and those Gentlemen and Ministers in the Margent as in thy Epistle thou stilest them of whom there thou sayest also they are witnesses of the terms of the Questions agreed to by the Qu. before the testimony of thy single double lying self-contradicting self were otherwise witness thy own Relation thereof in thy lying Narrative which hath not any thing at all of that little truth that 's in it more true then this wherein p. 58.1 Pamp. setting all these witnesses viz. Hen. Oxenden Io. Boys Esqs N. Barry T. Selyard C. Nichols Ministers o're against it in the Margin to testifie the truth thereof together with thee thou relatest thus The terms of the third Quest. were Whether Good Works be the meritorious cause of our Iustification which was expresly affirmed by them i.e. by the Qu. in which terms staring the Question without that term Our which is of thy own foisâ—ing in the other place where even thereby on thy own head thou alterest the stare thereof and makest it clearly another Question I affirm it to this very day and ever shall to the faces of any of you as occasion is yet owning no works to be truly good but what are done by the Believers in Christ and his Light and done by Christ and his Power and Spirit whether in their persons or his own who never did evil work in his or without blasphemy in Paul that can be call'd as thou call'st that he wrought in Paul and works in us Pauls own and ours which is but dung less and filthy rags or deserve condemnation or any less then Justification both of himself and his Saints in the sight of God by any good work that ever he wrought either in himself or them And so my Argument a Contrariis ye so ball and squabble with me about was both intended and urged in effect viz. If evil works deserve condemnation then good works no Condemnation alias Iustification but this is true therefore the latter Which question so stated thou T.D. not only affirmest with me For thou neither dost nor daâ—est deny but that we are justified by the good works of Christ or that any of his worksare not good or are a violation and not a fulfilling of the Law only thou foolishly flamst it off with his good works done ad extra and not ad intra without only and not within us thy folly in which I have largely enough manifested before but also urgest the same thy self P. 15.1 Pamp. thus viz. Evil works which are the violation of the Law d serve Condemnation Ergo Good works that are the fulfilling of the Law deserve Salvation and we know no good works such sayest thou but Christs and so say we too Thus thou givest us that Question also And this G.W. tells thee of and turns upon thee in his Reply to thy first so plainly that thou dost but add to thy shame in thy Reply
coin to your selves in your own conceits I care not for knowing for more then a good many ye have but this I know that if the Scriptures be true as I know they are which ye profess to be your Rule of Tryal for all things there is noe true way of coming to the true knowledge of God so much as a Iudge much less as a Father but one and that is neither the Scripture itself which tells of that way nor any thing else but Christ himself and his Light to whom God hath committed all Iudgement which Iudgement he administers by his Light before any see his face as a Father in righteousness and live He hath given forth a Light to the world whereby to know himself but this Light is in his Son he that hath the Son and believeth on the Son in whom is the Life and his Life is the Light of men hath everlasting Life he that hath not and believeth not in the Son hath not life though he is capable of it but by the Light in which he stands condemned the wrath of God yet abideth on him So that whereas ye say there 's knowledge of God but not of Christ by that universal internal light there is in truth no knowledge of God at all but in the Light of Christ who bears his Image who gives forth the Light of the knowledge of his own glory in the face of Iesus Christ I am the way saith he John 14.6 the Truth and Life no man cometh to the Father but by me The Father reveals the Son in men by his Light before he reveals himself Gal. 1.16 So that as no man knows the Son but he in whom the Father reveals him so no man knoweth the Father but the Son and he to whom the Son will reveal him as he will to all that wait and walk on in his Light let him search ne're so long after or in the Letter Mat. 11.27 Ioh. 6.45.46 till he feel after him in the Light within himself in which only God who is not far from every man though most men are far from him is to be found Act. 17. No man hath seen God at any time the only begotten Son who is in the bosome of the Father whose out-goings from thence have been from of old Mic. 5.2 as well in a way of manifestation of the Fathers mind to men from the beginning of the world as in way of Eternal Generation before the world began Prov. 8.20 to 32. though T.D. not knowing the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world knows not how to say Amen to this See page 4. of his 2. Pamp. he it is that by his Spirit and Light within which the Letter only relates of doth reveal him Ioh. 1.18 Men must know Christ i. e. in his Light which Cornelius was in which is his day that Abraham saw whether they ever see his fleshly person yea or nay before they can know God who is known in nothing but his own Light the Son who is known in nothing but his own Light the Spirit that comes from and leads to him so that to say as a Professor of note said in a publike Assembly in Ireland of a Friend of Truth call'd a Qua. whom I know having heard him speak This man knows much of God but little of Christ is little less then a Bull that favours for all the natural literal knowledge of both of little less then a spiritual ignorance in the mystery of both God and Christ. And this gives me the hint to make mention of another Argument That this Light is not natural which is in all viz. because it comes from God and Christ into every creature not by Creation as the rational Soul and its faculties of understanding will mind memory conscience it self do and such properties as are de esse hominis whether constitutive or consecutive so that a man is no man at all or hath not the essential form of a man as distinct from the outward Brutum or Beast of the Field for a man may remain Phusicos a natural man or rather Psuchicos as the word is in many places where rendred natural as well as where sensual 1 Cor. 2. 1 Cor. 15. Iam. 3. Iude 15. a true animal soul-ly man a man that hath a Soul rational and sensitive though in its faculties defaced clouded darkned benighted and lost from the Lord and his Light now withdrawn from him even after the Light is kid from his eyes as it was ever at last from such as to any life by it who would not be led to life by it while they had it witness the Pharisees and Ierusalem and after he remains now irrecoverable for want of Light to the primitive pure nature which only loveth and obeyeth the Law and delighteth truly in the Light The Light then I say comes from God and Christ into the mind and Conscience not as the Soul and its essential faculties of understanding will c. do which with the Organical body make that one compositum call'd man that may be either in unity and communion with God and Christ or in onmity and separation from them according as he walks or walks not in the Light that shines from them but by way of immediate infusion from them into the mind and conscience which of itself is a dark place 2 Pet. 1.19 and destitute as to the knowledge of God without a measure of it as a thing distinct and separable from the man in whom it is and a witness against him when he runs from the Will of God revealed to him in it though eternally one with God and Christ from whom it shines and flows and not ex principiiis natura as I. O. sayes with whom it ever sides let the man go whether he will never consenting to any but condemning all iniquity committed by him and counselling continually whether heeded or no before hand against it And lastly from whom it is as unchangeably inseparable as the light beams and rayes of the Sun are from the Sun it self from whence they shine with which they are in conjunction still whether this or that part of the world be actually enlightned by it or by the Moons interposing eclipsed from it yea or no. So that upon these considerations it can't be natural as I.O.T.D. I.T. R.B. deems it but do nothing at all to the purpose in proof of it so to be So that in further proof of it to be spiritual and supernatural and disproof of their proof-lesse position that its natural to save the pains and charge of laying them out at length I lay down these following proofs which wise men may argue out more at large to their fuller satisfaction within themselves Argum. The Light in all Consciences shines thereinto from God Christ and his Spirit therefore 't is not natural but supernatural and spiritual for these two viz. natural and spiritual natural and supernatural do tollere se invicem are inconsistently
to face each other but when that came then he saw sin was alive in him and he dead and that he was then while beginning to war with it sold under it and captivated by it and wretched by reason of it Rom. 7. but that now when he wrote this the Law of the Spirit of Life or Light in his mind which was by Christ had made him free from thâ—t Law of sin and deaâ—h which warr'd in his members and oft enslav'd him I say when Paul made this and many other modest acknowledgements of Gods Grace and Power towards him in delivering him and how now he walkt not after the flesh but the Spirit and how holily and justly and unblameably he and other Apostles behaved themselves 1 Thes. 2.1 2. 3. c. and should have said as to the same effect he did that they were no lyars nor deceivers nor wicked ones nor hypocrites and 2 Cor. 13.8 could do nothing against the truth as every sin is but for the truth and such like Whether I.O. would have punisht him as an Impudent Boaster yea or no and have put him in Bâ—cardo where besides whippings and other punishments and abuâ—es some of the Qua. have been put if yea see what kind of provision the poor Flock of Christ must expect from out of the silken Snapsacks of these University Shepherds and Overseers if they had the over-sight of all Corrective as much as they have it Directive over Magistrates and all And what a Generation of Godly Ministers as they have been call'd have grown up under pretence of Reformation of late even in old England which has been so long renewing as well as in New-England which is now growing old again where they punish the same seed to deathâ— where however they idolize Christs holy Apostles now they are dead would no less then persecute them were they now alive if nay I would know Quo Iure some Reason if that these Rabbies can render a right one why the Saints that walk and live in and after the same holy Spirit now that leads into all truth and no transgression and witness the same freedome from the Law of sin thereby should for making the same confession to the glory of Gods Grace be so ill used as I.O. would have them as Impudent Boasters any more then them of old What ever the Qua. do and are who by the Grace of God being what they are glory in nothing of their own knowing they have nothing but what they have received I shall here clear many Clergy men more then any men unless some Lawyers be as clear as them from that so punishable crime of glorying and boasting in being free from the least sin or from those fore-named grosser evils either for as if they should be found glorying in freédâ—me from either they would be found lyars one way more then now they are so in truth both those kinds of wicked hypocritical deceitful lyars I mean in plain terms many Priests and some Lawyers who can neither of them live on poor mens labours as many of them do in all lands any longer then while men lye dead in their trespasses and sins are for ought I find so far from glorying in their immunity from those and all other iniquities that like those old Christian Enemies to the Cross of Christ Phil. 3.18 19. whose end is destruction whose God is their belly who mind earthly things and whose glory is in their shame they glory yet in that immunity and freedome they can get from the powers that are intoxicated with the wine of the wrath of their fornications to commit all evil and so continue in those lyes deceits frauds cheats hypocrisies bloody persecutions spoilings of mens goods devouring Widows houses for Tythes and for a pretence making long prayers and much more wickedness and prophaneness which from these Law and Gospel spoilers is long since gone forth into all lands By that little Cloud then which appears dropping from I.Os. pen though no bigger then a mans hand we can see his complexion and what muddy stuff was working what bloody storms of persecution were brewing in I.Os. mind against that more tender and true Tenet of perfect purging from sin in this life and the innocent Asserters of it and so I shall take him till he either takes in again that terrible tale of his or at least till he tells the world that it repents him that ere he told it for a joynt Antagonist to the Quâ— together with T.D. in that point Nevertheless T.D. being the only man that mannages that matter more at large on behalf of himself and many others I shall without more ado let this short Return stand as to I.Os. brief opposition of us in this point of perfection and the rather sith I believe it will be long enough ere it return from him to us again with any solid or satisfactory answer and address my self to deal more down-rightly yet no otherwise then uprightly neither with T.Ds. writing with whom I together with R. H. G. W. and A.P. also once have had to do about it by word of mouth The second Quest. between him and the Qua. as himself relates both it and what little he thought fit which is scarce one word to his ten in such manner also as might best serve his turn to set down of our Discourse with him about it 1 Pamp. was this Whether in this life the Saints attain to a state of perfection or freedome from sin Which we as to the possibility thereof viz. that they may and also as to the necessity that they must be purged from sin in this life or no where there being no Purgatory in the world to come holding in the affirmative T.D. brings in himself replying thus T.D. Your Doctrine of perfection is against the tenor of the Scripture let us hear what you can say for the proof of it And to R. H. urging 1 Ioh. 3.9 Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin T.D. replyes thus viz. T.D. That cannot be meant of freedome from sin but either there is an Emphasis in the word sin intending under that general â—eâ—m one kind or sort of sin which is spoken of 1 John 5.16 There is a sin unto death Or if not in the Substantive on the Verb Poiei which notes to make a trade of business of sin as 't is explain'd ver 8. where he uses the same Verb for the Devil sinneth from the beginning He hath never ceased to sin since he began thus indeed the Saints sin not but a course of sin is broken off and there is not such a free trade between the Soul and sin as in the state of unregeneracy whereof this is given for one character that cannot cease to sin 2 Pet. 2.14 Rep. 1. Here thou art in thy old wonted way of scruing the Scripture besides the proper import and ordinary literal sense of the words and true mind of the Spirit in them into thy
the Term Our which quite alters the state of the Question and makes it altogether another This Truth is told us viz That the Terms of the 3. Question were Whether Good works be the meritorious cause of our Iustification which was expressely affirmed by the Qua Witnesse Hen Oxenden Iohn Boys Esquires Mr. Nath Barry Mr. Thomas Seyliard Mr. Char Nicolls Ministers a few of very many Witnesses quoth T.D. in his Epist to the Reader of the Terms of the Questions agreed to by the Qua who will free me and how well they free him let all the world judge from the suspition of a partial Relator Witnesse also T.D. himself who if it be the same T.D. as no doubt it is who wrote both that Book and the Epistle and Narrative thereto annexed in p. 58. of the self-same Book to the Contradicting and Confounding of himselfe in the former Tale together with those his own Witnesses tells all that Truth that is last related 2. They tell us one while that is when we not only assert it but evince it from the Rule of contraries that its rank Popery to say Good works deserve Iustification Otherwhiles that is when to the contradiction of themselves they assert and evince the same from the same Rule then to go round again it 's no Popery Witnesse T.D. who in p. 14. of his 1. Pamphlet sayes S.F. shews himself a rank Papist indeed in so arguing yet p. 15. in proof of himselfe to be a good Protestant no Papist allows himself so to argue viz Evill works which are the violation of the Law deserve damnation Ergo Good works which are the fulfilling of the Law deserve salvation adding That he knows no good works such but Christs To which I answer Nor do I know any good works such but Christs and I adde I own all Good works such that are Christs and there T.D. dissents in not owning all Christs own Good works such but some only namely such as he did at Ierusalem and some even of Christs own Good works as namely all such as he works in his Saints who works all their good works in them Isa 26.12 as no better then dung losse and filthy rags Witnesse his blind blending of these two distinct businesses into one and the same viz The righteousnesse wrought by men without Christ and the righteousnesse wrought in men by Christ or Our good works alias Mans own righteousnesse wrought only by men in their own wills wisdome strength according to their thoughts imaginations conceits traditions c. without Christs Light and Spirit which is that only the Spirit calls Ours that is as an unclean thing as filthy rags Isa 64.4 which God speaking to Israel that being ignorant of Gods righteousnesse went about to establish their own Rom 10.3 calls Thy righteousnesse thy works which cannot profit nor deliver Isa 57.12 13. And which Paul Phil. 3.9 stiles his own righteousnesse which was of the Law as in opposition to that of God and Christ And those good works of Christ in our persons in performing whereof the righteousnesse of the Law is said though by Christs Power only to be fulfilled in us Rom 8.4 Or that righteousnesse which is though in the Saints yet of God alone through their faith in Christ Iesus the Light Phil 3.9 For these two Righteousnesses the one whereof who is not blind may see to be only mans own which is worse then naught and avails not The other only Christs own which must be of infinite worth and desert to justifie as T.D. also to the further confounding of himselfe truly confesses p. 15.1 Pam from the dignity of the person or subject i.e. Christ in us by whom it 's performed T.D. confounds together both into one and the self same and consequently concludes himself unavoidably to be respectively both a Self Contradictor and which is worse a most abominable Blasphemer For if the Righteousnesse and Obedience that is by Christs Power performed in his Saints Persons be both Christs own and yet mans own also Then being one and the same individual righteousnesse it must have a mutual participation of the same Properties and Denominations respectively so that if Christs own righteousnesse may be said to be of worth and desert to Salvation as it truly is by T. D. himselfe then â— mans Pauls the Saints own righteousnesse which T.D. sayes was Christs received from Christ wrought by Christ must be consequently meritorius also and that 's a piece of rank Popery and wretched Foppery of T.Ds. own broaching who yet would Father it upon the Qua which the Qua who own all mans own righteousnesse to be as the Scripture sayes of it unclean dung losse and filthy rags and utterly unprofitable do as utterly abhorre and so T.D. makes himselfe a Merit Monger with a witnesse such as never yet was found among the Qua That dying-Qua at Dover himself whom T.D. belyes in that particular not excepted And again If Mans Pauls the Saints own righteousnesse may be said as it truly is Isa 57.12 13. 64.4 Phil. 3.8 to be unprofitable unclean dung losse and filthy rags then the self same which Paul and other Saints their own righteousnesse being no other then Christs then what they receive from him and he works in them as T.D. sayes for their Sanctification some of Christs own righteousnesse Yea even that too which serves for the Saints sanctification and to make the Saints meet for that possession where â—no unclean thing must enter must be unprofitable unclean dung losse and filthy rags which is no lesse then point blank blasphemy yea in expresse terms p. 23. I deny our justification by Christ in us quoth he by that righteousnesse in us whereof Christ is the Author as if that Christ in us and that righteousnesse of his in us which is the same with that without us deserved nothing 3. Moreover in saying there are two Righteousnesses of Christ when as the Righteousness of Christ whether in himself or in his Saints is but one he crouds confusion upon confusion in the eye of every clear considerer of his inconsiderable stuff which cannot but see that what God joyns together as one this he separates and puts asunder what is truly one and undivided as Christ and his Righteousnesse is this he divides and distinguishes into two righteousnesses 2 Things meant by that one name of Christ his Person and his Operations in us The latter whereof he denys for righteousness to justification But what things are truly and distinctly two and ought accordingly to be and by the Lord are divided separated and put asunder as Mans Pauls the Iewes own righteousnesse and that righteousnesse which is of God by faith in Christ received from and wrought by Christ in his Saints which the Scripture Rom 10 Phil. 3. opposes and speaks of as in contradistinction each to other These two T.D. and his Brother Builders whose work it is to build Babel or confusion as their
David even when he was guilty mark that of adultery and murder such sins as for which the Scripture when he lay impenitent under them denotes and excepts him as a man not upright a despiser of God and his Commandemenes A doer of evil in his sight 2 Sam 12. whom God also had not mercy on but did both condemn and severely judge with no lesse then Hellish horrors for his filth blood-guiltinesse till he had repented for it and was throwly purged from it Psalm 51. was not in a condemned but in a justified estate So that the sum of T.D. and those Doctors Doctrine that side with him therein is this viz to begin the dance right David while he commited adultery and murder not repenting was guilty before God and consequently not just nor justified but condemned for whom God holds not guiltlesse but guilty they are not justified accepted acquitted absolved approved but which is all one accused reproved condemned in his sight Yet to go round again David while he committed adultery and murder not yet repenting was not guilty before God but held guiltlesse not condemned nor reprobated or reproved but cleared acquitted absolved excused approved For between the two slates of guilty and not guilty non datur medium Contradictions Confusions and Rounds about Liberty of Conscience II. As to the Doctrine for Liberty of Conscience and against persecution for cause of Conscience in matters of Religion One while they tell the world the doctrine and practice of rigid imposing upon any sub penâ or persecuting any tender Consciences for beleeving and living according to their conviction or denying to beleeve or live contrary thereunto is a Bloody Tenet a way to make more hypocrites that for fear will conform to what they beleeve not to be truth then true Christians an evident note of a false Church and Antichristian Ministry that is degenerate and apostatized from the true pure Primitive Church of Christ which never did compel any by force and violence to be Christians but rather suffered all sorts of sorrowes and bare all manner of abuses from the whole world of false Worshippers whether Heathens or Nominal Christians barely for confessing to the truth of Christ and testifying against the evil lives of all Christs enemies whether such as hated the very outward name of Christ or such as named his Name and yet departed not from iniquity and were every where cursed yet blessed the cursers of them prayed for such as persecuted them intreated those that desamed and ill-intreated them and were patient silent when reviled and buffeted beaten banished as Vagabonds because for truths sake they often left their own Homes and had no certain dwelling place as seditious tumultuous disturbers of the peace because they peaceably went into Synagogues to reason and preach the Gospel of peace as turners of the world upside down because they sought to change men from their evill manners foolish customs vain inventions and wicked wayes that were abominable to God and to bring them to repentance from their dead works and worships in which their souls could never live to worship the living God who is a Spirit and not tyed to places in Spirit and in truth in the inner parts and to turn all men from the darknesse wherein they lived in the world without to the Light of Christ within themselves and from the power of Satan unto God Sometimes I say our great Gamaliels not only grant these things but also give them out for truth to the Civill Powers of the Earth most especially then and that with no small greedinesse when the Clergy of one kind feel themselves begin to be griped under the greedy clutches of the Clergy of another colour when they are likely to be imposed upon by others and to be clapped down under hatches by the Clerical cruelties of each other respectively As for example where ever the Papal or Roman or else the Presbiterian Primacy keeps the Keys spreads their Black Eagles clams over all others hath the power of permitting or poenal imposing there the Prelatick Pastoralty pleads his priviledge to have the liberty of his Liturgy he behaving himselfe no otherwise then peaceably among them Where the Episcopal Priesthood holds his Hierarchy and is Supream there as the Papal would willingly have his liberty and I blame none neither Iews Turks nor Heathens for desiring the like to walk every one in the Name of his God Mich 4. Soth that Right-rigid Scottish Presbiterian Race and that Mongrill seed of loose IndependentPresbiters are more loud for liberty then any other sort of Sectaries so called whatsoever who do all no lesse rationally then they they demeaning themselves peaceably as the very Principle of the Quakers binds them to do to all men require each the peaceable enjoyment of his Religion Church-Ministry fellowship faith and way of Worship under them When the Rabbies are ready to be Ridden one by another witnesse the Outcries once of New-England against Old when under the heat of far lesse Persecution from the Bishops then they have acted since themselves Old England it self was too hot to hold them also the present pleadings not only for their Directorian Liberties but Turpe et miserabile their very Livings Tythes Preferments and their Places now the Common Prayer Book Priesthood whom they unhorsed hath his foot in the Stirrup again and may not unlikely push the Presbiter besides the Saddle then Oh then what Hue and Cry against the bloody Tenet of Persecution and grievous groans for this desire of all Nations and People Liberty of Conscience Liberty of Conscience do we dayly hear from Smectimnuus his own as well as others mouthes Otherwhiles again yea ever when the Clergy of any one colour hath by either craft or conquest catcht the Keyes of the Kingdome and atchieved the Holy chaire they straightway clap their cruell clawes upon them to the keeping down by force of Armes more then Arguments all Liberty for any consciences but their own Then to go round again come let us sing a new Song Behold cry the Counsellers of Egypt the People of the children of Israell are more c. Exod. 1.9 10 11. As Pharoah said unto his people Behold the people of the children of Israel are more and mightier then we Come on let us deal wisely with them lest they multiply and it come to passe that when there falls out any war they joyn also unto our enemies and fight against us and so get them up out of the Land Therefore they did set over them Taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens and they built for Pharoah Treasure cities Pithom and Raamses Then they set Taskmasters Then say the Sanballats and Tobiasses the Ammonites and Ashdodite as they Neh. 4.1 2 7 8 11. But it came to passe that when Sanballat heard that we builded the wall he was wroth and took great indignation and mocked the Iews And he spake before his brethren and the
others out of their own private furniture and pag. 27. of his Epist. he grants that there are Corruptions mark and various lections in the Greek Copies of the Scripture and our grant quoth I. O. is founded on this experience that we evidently find various lections in the Greek Copies we enjoy and so grant that which ocular inspection evinces to be true And though I.O. having yielded the Greek Text to be corrupted which is enough to prove his foundation faulty and fallible if the Hebrew Text were to a tittle entire fills up that gap again with this fiddle-fadling defence viz. Tet there are none able to shew out of any Copies yet extant in the World or that they can make appear ever to have have been extent that ever there were any such various lections in the Originalls of the Old Testament Neverthelesse to go round again notwithstanding what hath been spoken quoth he p. 178. We grant that there are and have been various lections in the Old Testament and the New and so falls a shewing in many pages together many varieties in the Old Testament himself to save his Antagonists the labour of shewing what he tells them they are not able to shew some of which are not obscure and private as I. O. sayes they are but publick and open as I.O. sayes not as I. O sayes they are of no importance but of importance and inconsistent with the sence as I. O. sayes to go round again not novell and of late only as I. O. sayes they are but as I. O. sayes to go round again of longer standing of some good Antiquity Thus I. O. all this while gives and takes grants and begs back again abates exacts the whole again allows and pulls in again owns and denyes le ts go and commands home again his Assertion till by a little and a little he hath let it go and granted it all away and then to go round again fearing he hath let it go too far from serving his turn does what in him lyes though hoe a liquid nihil est by a little and a little to fetch it all in again to his first pretended purpose he goes on granting from ore shooes to ore boots till in the quagmire wherein he quavers too and fro in his quarrel for his quick-sandy foundation he sinks first up to the Ankles then up to the Knees anon up to the Loynes by and by up to the neck And Lastly fearing lest he hath gone so far in granting to the weakening of his own Assertion of the Texts integrity to a little that he shall hardly ever recover it to stand for truth in that ex sui site primitive posture wherein he at first exerted and propounded it unlesse he utter somwhat more like a man more to the purpose then all those childish pedling put offs I.O. urges a knocking Argument from the multitude of the Copies to the impossibility of the Texts being corrupted thus viz. p. 175. There was a multiplying of Copies to such a number that it was impossible any should corrupt them all willfully or by negligence which hath as much reason in it as his other confident conclusions have for Riddle me this ye Rabbies why might not the same fate fall out to one Copy of Scripture in its transcribing as to another and if the fate and fault of falsity and mistake to some why not to all Yet if it were never such a solid consequence we need not deny it I. O. who still saves us the labour of confuting I. O. knocks it down and confounds it himselfe while elsewhere he argues from the multitude of Copies to the impossibility of their escaping corruptions For To go round again That so many Transcriptions quoth he should be made without some variation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is impossible thus running out in hast to recover his lost Assertion he runs himselfe or'e head and eares in the Gulf of most irreconâ—ileable contradiction and irrecoverable confusion yea how many various Lections and various contradictions to himself are to be found yet here 's not all in I. Os. opposing of that one plain undeniable truth viz. That there are various Lections in the Copies of the very originall Texts of the Scripture which they call their Rule which though they say truly witnesse R. B. I. T p. 43. 51. That a Rule and grid should be certain which will not deceive and that which is variable and alterable cannot be a persons Rule for it is the property of a Rule to be invariable and the same at all times the Rules Measures Weights Dialls Squares and what other things are made if they be varyed they cease to be Rules for Rules should be sized and certain and confesse also withâ—us that Error minimus in principio fit major in medio maximus in fine the least errour in a foundation makes a thing not fit to be a foundation and so if the Scripture be not intire to a little so but vel 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one jot or tittle fail and every letter be not preserved by Gods providence from being lost they must needs cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they have no footing nor foundation for their faith and see no means of being delivered from utter uncertainty in and about all sacred truth Witnesse I.O. Ep p. 25. and much more of that sort in his book as its more at large talkt with in the second of my four Exercitations and do confesse also the Scripture is not only flexible and lyable to be changed easily at every Criticks will and the Transcribers might and did fail and mistake so that various Sections are thence arisen witnesse I. O. p. 167. and Epist. p. 21 22 23 24. where he tells how many wayes its easie for a Critick to alter it Yet To go round again and face about half way at least they plead the said confessedly variable and much varied Text to be the only fixt firm foundation sure Basis stable Standard right Rule true Touchstone and such like Yea and to go the whole round and face quite about as they were that it is neither so varied nor variable by reason of the loving care and aspect of God over the Transcribers whom yet for all thaâ— he would not guid infallibly whose promise and providence which cannot fail are engaged to preserve the Hebrew Greek Texts in their integrity to a tittle but that its most fit to be own'd as the most perfect and only steady Rule and foundation Moreover how entirely true soever the Transcriptions are the Translations which is all the Rule the people have unlesse the Priests prattle must be their Rule are confessed to be most various and abominably and wofully corrupted Witnesse I. O. who is scarce more busie to evince the entirenesse of his Hebrew and Greek Text then in evidencing the erroneousnesse of all Translations some of which that are most a client and of most account among most
the perfection of which say they stands in no other thing than in sufficiency to effect its proper end which is with them the most perfect instruction of men in the knowledg and worâ—hip of God so that they may obtain eternal salvation witness I.O. whose Kâ—unds and Contradictions to himself in that point I shal here see down in his own words Englished which were written by him in Latine J.O. God the Author of the Scripture being the most perfect Agent must necessarily act for some end therefore in the Declaratiâ—n of his wiâ—l in the Scripture 't is sure he had some propounded end but â—herâ—as the end is tâ—ofâ—ld â— Vâ—timaâ—e and â—emoâ—e 2. Next and immediate we state the ultimate supream and general end to be his own glory The immediate or next end of his giving the Scriptureâ— and so of the Scriptures themselves we conâ—end to be our direction in the knowledge of God and obedience to be yeelded to him that at length we doing his will may obtain eternal salvation and the enjoyment of himself for this is the end of the worker and of the work What God intends by the Scriptures that they to wiâ— morally and in the way of operation proper to them dâ— effect But when aâ— the perfection of every Discipline consists in relation to its end and that is to be held perfect wâ—ich is sufficent to its next end but that imperfect which cannot obtain it propâ—sed end the perfection of the Scriptures can consist in no other thing then in its sufficiency in respect to its proper end which is the instruction of men in the knowledge and worship of God that they may attain eternal salvation In this sense therefore we assert the Scripture to be the most perfect Rule of the whole worship of God and oâ—r obedience Reply Whether â—â—ere be not a more perfect way of our instructâ—on in the saving knowledge of God then the Scripture appears elsewhere where I shew no saving knowledge of God comes any way but the inward Revelation of himself in us by his Light and Spirit Here only obseâ—ve I O. confusiâ—ns and confutation of himself in this above by that which follows when the Quae. say the Scripture is perfect to its own proper end and its end being obtained it ceases Then quoth he It s most false that the Scripture obtains it whole end in respect of us while we are in the world therefore till heaven and earth pass away not one jâ—t or tittle of the Law i.e. Letter with him shall fail for not only the begetting of faith but also the building up in it while we live here is the end of the Scripture So then its end which is begetting to and building up in the faith is not effected by it here is it then in the world to comes 〈◊〉 no neither quoth he in the self-same Section the use of the Scripture shâ—â—â— cease then being accomodated only to our present state and faith also as founded on it â—â—â—ll be done aâ—ay Ex 3. s. 39. Here then is the round I.O. makes with a Cris-cross in the middle of it viz. The perfection of the Scripture which we plead and affirm and of every thing else is its sufficiency and efficacy to accomplish its own proper immediate end and what ever doth not so is imperfect The immediate end of the Scripture is its direction instruction of men in the saving knowledge of God his will worship their obedience and duty to him the ingeneration of faith and edification up in it to salvation This whole end of the Scripture its most false to affirm that it accomplishes till the world to come it must do it in this world or in the world to come in this world it cannot possibly do it for perfection in the faith in holiness freedom from sin here is not attainable in the world to come it cannot possibly for there both the Scripture it self and also the faith it seâ—f that is founded on it will cease to be of any use at all being of use only here â—nd shall be both done away Verbum sat sapients insipienti plura plus satis Never did I see such Rounds and crosses and confusions and contradictions such self-confutations and Net-works and Checker-work and Webs and Snares as I.O. makes and hangs hampered in himself when he hath done made and woven among any but our wofully benighted Divines all whose works are done in the darke Isa. 29.15 in all my dayes before Is the Scripture then the Power of God to salvation able mighty effectual available to its end that is to save the soul as I.O. sayes it is no quoth I.O. it is not it s most false to say it doth or can avail to its end in this world in the world to come its of no force so if it be the power of God as I.O. affirms it over and over again it is it must be in some world that is past away or some new found world or other for he himself sayes its neither in this present world nor that to come neither now nor hereafter neither here nor there But alas as the world it self wherein he fancies such a thing to be is none knows where but a meer Chimaera of his own coining hatcht no where but in his own head the Shop where and whence many more such like toyes are shapen sold and uttered among such as having sold the truth are willing rather to trade in utter untruths then in nothing at all and not receiving the love of the truth that they might be saved but taking pleasure in unrighteousness more then it are given over to strong delusion to beleeve lyes that they may be damned For seriously that the Letter or Scripture is the power of God to salvation or that Word of God which brings forth any good fruit to perfection among either the Seedsmen the Ministers of the Letter that sow nothing but their own senses and thoughts upon it or in the stony thorny common high-way ground of Parish peoples hearts in which they sow the Letter mingled with their own chaffy cogitations saying Hear the word of the Lord when yet they confess themselves neve heard his voice This however ye imagine Oh ye power less profitless Prophets is a meer no such matter for that is the Word or Seed that is sown by the Supreme Sowes the Son of Man himself in the same Field or World of mens hearts in which the World is where the Devil in the dark night while men sleep and watch not to the light sows Tares among the good Seed which where it lights on honest hearts that hear and heed the Word patiently continuing in the keeping of it brings forth abundantly in some Thirty some Sixty some â—n Hundred fold Indeed the Letter the Text or Scripture declares and bears witness to the Word which is absolutely necessary effectual perfect to the ends aforesaid which is the power of God
the light of God the wisdome saving truth immediate witness clearest way of Revelation soul-cleansing Law sure foundation most perfect Rule immoveable stedfast Standard of Gods setting up but it self is nos all nor any of this nor doth it at all any where avouch it self to be any of it at all The Scripture points to that which is the Power of God by the being of which in and upon his people who only own and joyn to it they are made a willing people in the day thereof when such as turn from and against the light which is the power and labour in the weak naked Letter labour in vain and are left unwilling to leave their lusts and lives for Christ as his Maryrs or outward witnesses did in all Ages But the Letter it self is not Power of God that sustained them in the suffering and inabled them to forgo what was dear to them and to undergo what was dreadful and destructive to nature in its dearest concernments The Letter tells us that the Saints did so and tells us and all Saints that we should do for Christ but the Power by which this is done is another matter then a Letter ad extra even the inward light Word and Spirit that thou doest despite to even that in the conscience that made them indure as seeing him who is invisible and discovered the darkâ—â—ss upon the discovery of which they rather chose death then to own it as Light and Truth not only in ages as high as Moses who by faith in the Light chose affliction rather then sin and feared not the wrath of Pharaoh but also from him downward as low as Maries dayes in which some died for denying the darknâ—ss of the Popes Dâ—ctrines of Transubstantiation c. which the Light in their consciences told them were too gross to be of God who yet by their confession could not dispute against it with Vniversity Sottish Sophisters Doctor Dunces out of Letter nor so much as read a letter therein and also as low as these dayes wherein by the Power of God many are born up to bear the Trials of the cruel Academical mockings scoffings scourgings inâ—lictings stonings bonds imprisonments abuses to death witness one of the first of the Lords two Hand-maids that were sent to warn the Vniversity of their universal abomiâ—ations at Oxford in the time of I.Os. Vice chancellorship there who perhaps may not be so learned literally though mystically and spiritually more in the Letter as obtuse aÌ„cuti â—omunâ—ioneâ— many of those dull-beaded nimble disputers out of it are in their bald fashion of Syllogistical form Neither did the Letter either of the Old Testament which is the Letter without of what things soever written or the outward Letter of the New ever conquer the world in which thou sayest it brought forth so much fruit further then into a meer empty fruitless form of Godliness without the power thereof insomuch that though as to the Primitive Christian Churches while they kept in the Light which the Apostles Ministry whether by word of mouth or Writing Letter Scripture was to turn them to walk by and beleeve in and in the Spirit in which they began till fooâ—ishly being bewitched from obeying the truth it self they turned aside to the outward Text that tells it and so thought to be made perfect by the flesh and the fleshly bodily exercises they found in the Letter which once used were as low weak beggeâ—ly elements for a time the power of God and godliness was much â—elt among them and abode with and upon them to the prevailing against the Powers of the earth and the overcomming the world it self and Satan the Prince of it by the blood of the Lamb and the Word of his Testimony not loving their lives to the death and much fruit of the Spirit and of righteousness was brought forth to the glory and praise of God But when Synods and Councels doting Doctors infatuated Ghostly-Fathers and such as admired their persons as they the persons of the Apostles and primitive Disciples began to bundle together what they could get of the Wâ—itings of such as were coaetaneous with Christ and the Apostles and without any such order from either Christ or the Apostles to canonize what in their conceits might be useful to others as they had found them t is like to be to themselves into a Rule or Canon and stated them into a common Standard for all to have their sole recourse to in soul-cases and matters of Christian faith and holy life and so to adore the dead letters of those holy living men and to run a whoring after some remnants of Writings that dropt from them then in the whole world now called Christendome instead of an Apostolical Spouse of Christ as Christians were at first presented a chaste Virgin to himself by them there stands up an Apostatical Strumpet that had the Letter and good words written there but neither the life of God nor the Word of life therein testified to that according to the nature of Error which is ever multiplying degenerated more and more into the dark till at last being gone from the Word Spirit Light and Life within to the outward Letter that relates of it they ran into the Wildernes of their own numberless senses upon it so that they lost the Letter also and fell from it into Tradition and a thousand Old Wives Fables and though it is good and acknowledged so to be so far as it is that the Protestants have marched from Rome under the conduct of the Leâ—ter yet for all they are come back from the blinde screel scrawls of the Popish Scribes for their smoaky imaginations to a pretensive profession of and prate prâ— Scripturis for the Scriptures unless they march on according to the conduct of the Scriptures till they come into the Light and Spirit which they point to and by a dotage upon the Scriptures ye would run from they are not so much as come yet to the Scriptures nor to conform to that counsel of the Prophets and Apostles given in it but are yet erring from the Scriptures even in and by their very eager Scriblings for it as the only most perfect Rule and from the only Rule of faith and way to Life the Letter is as loud for but that they are dull of hearing as they in their naked Writings are loud for the naked Letter it self And so it comes to pass that as Israel was of old who was as laborious in the Letter busie about the Bible and strict for his Scripture-standard as our Israel for the self-same which yet they confess too is abolished as to the Litteral observation of it with the Appendix of a few of Stories and Letters and Revelations of those holy men next to Christs time who by the Spirit wrote much more then is there own'd as their Standard I say as the old Israel proved as to God an empty vine Hos. 10.1 bringing forth