THE PURITAN CONVERT Not to Prelatick Protestantism and yet to Prelatick Protestantism nor to Popery and yet to Popery but absolutely and without Reserve to Apostolical Christianity That is to whatsoever Doctrine or practice Prelatick Protestant or Papist can prove to have been taught the World by the Apostles of Jesus Christ OR A DISCOURSE By way of a LETTER Shewing That Prelatick Protestants if they will be true to their Practises and Principles have all reason to turn Papists in all things as to what Papists indeed hold but in nothing as to what Papists are vulgarly believed to hold And that de facto Non-conformists would turn Papists were they not imposed upon by false Principles and notorious Slanders devised by the first Separatists from the Church of Rome By W. H. Come and I will teach you how great things God has done for my Soul Printed Anno Domini MDCLXXVI Permissu Superiorum THE CATHOLICK NAKED TRUTH OR THE PURITAN CONVERT TO Apostolical Christianity BVT why the Naked Truth Because I design a Candid Naked Description of a Puritan Prelatick Protestant Papist c. I expect the fate of Poor Robins Adamite Some body or other will have a lash at me But if I scape so well as the Author of the Prelatick Naked Truth has done I hope no blood will follow To wit to be first lashed by a severe Animadverter and then to be stript Naked afterwards Had the Candid Author been stript first and then whipt his Case had been more pitious The Animadverter was a little too hasty A Third I hear has taken him to task but they say he is a more Gentle Whipster With my Soul I compassionate him as one meerly imposed upon by Forgeries and false Principles devised by the Reformers and amongst others especially by this that the New Scripiure is the adequate Rule of Christian Faith and Worship Go on Worthy Sir to Fast and Pray whilst others Feast and Play at Lantrelue The First Letter What the Author means by a Prelatick Protestant Puritan c. My Dearest Friends and Nearest Relations IT is my hearts desire to speak with every one of you and to tell you with all Sincerity what the All Good God has done for my Poor Soul but the troublesomness of the times and your great distance from one another not permitting me so great a comfort I have thought fit to communicate to you my good Wishes of your Eternal Happiness by Ink and Paper Our dear Redeemer Jesus Christ Bless my Poor Labours to you all and stir up others who are better able more fully to instruct you in the way to Everlasting Bliss which I know to be the great desire of your Souls After the search of many years spent in Prayer Reading and conference with Persons of different perswasions I doubt not but I have found out the Truth Almighty God be forever Blessed for it I doubt not but I have found out the True Church of Jesus Christ the indeed People of God who walk in the direct Path to endless Beatitude and whosoever walks as they walk and teach shall infallibly see God for ever I confess I am Converted from Puritanism But to what to Prelatick Protestantism No nor to Popery neither But to Antient Apostolick Christianity Though indeed I have not so much left Puritanism as Prelaticks call it as added that to it wherein I found it and I hope many of you will find it come short of the Holy Apostles Doctrine and Institutions That you may the better understand me in my ensuing Discourse I will briefly Explain to you what I understand by a Puritan what by a Prelatick Protestant and what by a Papist and what by an Apostolical Christian which I profess my self by the Grace of Jesus Christ to be I understand by a Puritan one that being Visited from Heaven by rousing checks of Conscience could find no Rest for their troubled Soul by living under the liveless Ministry and Spiritless form of the established Religion of England One who by reading some portion of Holy Scripture or other Spiritual Book or by hearing some awakening Sermon was so struck from above that he had nothing in his Heart nor Mouth but that great Question of the man concern Sirs What must I do to be Saved One who from the Visitation from on high had so much life in him as to be sensible of the heavy burden of a hard Heart and whose great Prayer to the Almighty was To take from him his Heart of Stone and to give him a Heart of Flesh No Books no Company no Sermons no Thoughts were gustful to him but such as were conducing to the melting and changing of his Heart and Soul All Lip-labour he deem'd but lost Labour so long as his Soul within was not chang'd so long as his Heart was hard he could find no satisfaction in words and expressions though never so Pathetical whether uttered by himself or others or set down in Printed Books Nay he was so far from being satisfied with such wordy Devotions that he was even afraid to use them for fear of being guilty of damnable Hypocrisy For Example to say or read by way of Prayer O my God my All How I love you How my Soul is grieved that ever I have offended you his Conscience telling him he had no such Affections but that his Heart was hard as a very Stone No relenting of hearty sorrow for past iniquities no tender resentments of the innumerable Divine Benefits no strong hopes of future Eternal Goods nor yet affrighting fears of the dreadful day of wrath Conscious to himself of a great deal of ill past and clear conviction of no present good disposition in his Soul and yet assuredly perswaded there must some good be in the Soul or no hopes of enjoying the Almighty for ever without holiness true Internal Holiness Heart-Holiness Spirit-Holiness in this life no hopes of seeing the All Good God in the next And thus much of a Puritan I think none that has any sense of a God can mislike of whatsoever perswasion he is whether he be Papist Protestant or Phanatick I do not use these terms to revile or exasperate any one but meerly for distinction sake And I beseech my Reader not to be offended at them if he meet with them now and then in my following Discourse God forbid I should willingly anger those wounds which with my Soul I desire to cure But what do I understand further by a Puritan I understand one who wearied out with wrastling against the corruptions of his own Heart still finds much evil in the interior of his Soul boylings of anger flames of concupiscence greedy desires of Money and the things of this life and however exteriorly reformed and changed he may seem to be to the World he 's dis-satisfied within himself that he is not changed enough nor changed enough I say although his profane Kindred and acquaintance think him changed but too too much
because he will not nor dare not Revel it with them as formerly Instead of Plays and Comedies his entertainments now are the Holy Scriptures or other good Books written by such who experimented in their own Souls what they taught others the works rather of Pious Mens Hearts than of Learned Mens Brains Whilst his Companions are roaring and rallying in Tipling Houses and Taverns he 's sighing and groaning in his Bed-chamber or Closet wrastling with his offended God by hearty Prayers according to what most presses his wounded and afflicted Spirit He dares not lye he abhors an Oath as Hell he is afraid to cheat or cozen any he deals with though he finds to his grief but too great desires of worldly wealth in the bottom of his Heart Upon days set apart for the Divine Worship he wishes he could keep his Soul wholly fixed upon God He can by no means satisfie his Conscience by bearing a part with his Lips only in any forms of Prayer though in themselves never so holy and good for an hour or two and then to spend or rather wast the rest of the day in idle talk disports and pastimes or somewhat worse Dalliances Revels c. But his employment is to lay up a stock of provision for his poor Soul to live upon all the week after Then he labours to renew his first repentant sorrow for his life past and to confirm his weak resolutions of another kind of life for the time to come c. But what hurt in all this if this be to be a Puritan would to God all the world were Puritans What need of such a Mans Conversion Whither must he turn What must he change to unless it be from better to worse But may he not change from good to better why what 's wanting in him That you shall hear by and by Only take notice for the present That I am so far from being Converted from thus much of a Puritan that I most heartily wish I could Convert all the World unto it The poor afflicted Puritan sadly and deservedly affrighted with the fear and apprehension of Eternal damnation labours and works how he may avoid it And Beading in the Holy Scripture those words of our Blessed Saviour Come unto me all ye that labour and are burdened and I will refresh you And seeing a necessity of some righteousness or other to entitle him to Heaven and finding nothing in himself but sin and wickedness and having heard much talk of the righteousness of Christ and of being saved by his Righteousness and finding some places in the Epistles of St. Paul which seem to sound that way all his care is to apprehend that Righteousness and to rely upon what Jesus Christ has done and suffer'd for him And by this means he begins to deem himself in a secure condition By the Blood of Christ thus apprehended and applied by a lively Faith he grows very confident and assured all the fire of Hell is quenched as to him and he fears damnation no longer And though unworthy of his Heavenly Fathers Benediction for any thing in himself yet appearing before him in the Garments of his Elder Brother he doubts not of a Blessing and that an Eternal one too And this conceit if it do not make hm very bold to sin at least it makes him very negligent in adorning his Soul with Piety Charity Meekness Patience Humility and other Christian Vertues partly thinking them impossible to be attained partly deeming there is no absolute necessity of them to his Salvation He having nothing to do but to believe that Jesus Christ has done all for him and what Love or Piety or other Vertue necessarily follows from such a Faith he willingly admits but for the rest solicitously to endeavour after the acquisition of Vertues he looks upon as the working of an Old Testament Spirit and a derogation from the perfect Salvation by Jesus Christ and his Righteousness The Old Covenant was Do this and Live but now he is under a better Covenant Believe and Live or Live and do this The impression his first awakening has left upon him keeps him from returning to open lewdness and profaness but his Faith of this imputative Righteousness of Christ makes him take little pains in the cultivating of his own Soul either in purging it of the Relicks of ill habits or in planting in it the Divine Vertues our Lord Jesus taught us to exercise by his Word and Example And this is our Puritans first mistake and a dangerous one too as I shall show afterwards His next mistake is he begins to quarrel with all Exterior Worship and Ceremonies And he falls into this mistake by reflecting upon his own Experience as having reaped no benefit by forms of Prayer by Bowing at the Name of Jesus by looking upon certain days as Holy-days and Fasting-days c. Hence he begins to think all such Observances are wholly useless and unprofitable if not abominable and superstitious besides And he is much confirmed in this his Imagination by considering the open profaness and little sense of God he observes generally in zealous Conformists Moreover on the other side he takes notice of his Brethren Non-Conformists that they are generally free from open and scandalous sins and at least sigh and breath after Interior Spirit and Devotion which certainly must be that must give us a Title to Heaven rather than a few cringes or Exterior Verbal Devotions which any one though never so Profane may easily exercise and indeed he sees with his Eyes many do Exercise who give no Testimony at all of any work of Regeneration in their Hearts but by their profane light and vain Conversation give too clear evidences of their being still in their natural unregenerate condition And accordingly their Preachers in their Sermons have little life or zeal and seldom discourse of such Truths as are apt to awaken Mens Consciences and make them lay to Heart the great concern of the Salvation of their Souls Or if they do at any time Preach of Judgment or Hell Repentance or a New Life they do it very coldly and imperfectly and seem to talk like Parrots what they have learnt by rote and out of others Books and not what they have had any Experience of in their own Hearts Such Reflections joyn'd with some places of the New Testament not rightly understood make him think that whatsoever was pleasing to Almighty God or profitable to the Jewish People under Moses Now we that are under the Gospel must be Spiritual Worshippers if we will be Worshippers in Truth and must cast away all Exterior forms of words and outward observances of days and places as hindrances to True Spiritual Gospel-worship And all agreeing that the Body of the Mosaical Law is abolished with its Priesthood Sacrifices special Garments in time of Divine Worship particular days to be kept Holy c. This being confessed by all as well Protestants as Papists and finding no clear
great Lord Jesus in Heaven represented by those Figures Put all that has been said together and you will see there is no great wonder in it that the commonalty of our sadly divided Countrey should believe a thousand lies in matters of Religion concerning their Catholick Neighbours especially if you add that those who have been about 150 years slandering of them have withall told the vulgar that Catholicks are such a cunning and deceitful people that you may not believe them in one word what they say to you concerning their Religion but being asham'd of their Fopperies they will deny them if you lay them to their charge Or if at any time you meet with any whose candor and sincerity you are so convinced of that you cannot think he would tell you a lye Then you must imagine him to be of a particular belief and temper from all other Catholicks and though he hold no such absurdities by reason of his better understanding learning c. yet the generality of the people most certainly hold them all O the craft and cunning of the Devil and deceitful Men thus to blind and miserably impose upon the simple and well-meaning vulgar Jesus of his Mercy open their Eyes and make them see who they are that thus sadly delude and cheat them Besides the Laws being very severe against Catholicks many are afraid to have a better opinion of them than they are taught to have though they even see they are much slandered lest they should be convinced of the truth of their Religion and then be obliged either to damn their Souls if they would not embrace it or loose their Estates and Preferments if they did embrace it Finally Catholick Religion is a Holy and Strict Religion and therefore no wonder if the Professors of it be hated and ill spoke of by the wicked and loose world Libertines willingly speak ill of those that are strict and very conscientious in their ways but being ashamed to revile them for their Vertues though that be the real quarrel which they have with them they mis-interpret their innocent and good Actions and calumniate their persons with a thousand slanders For Example Catholick Religion teaches that if any one have wronged his Neighbour by cheating cozening or stealing any thing from him he 's bound if he be able under pain of damnation to make restitution and without this no Tears no Prayers no Faith in the Blood of Christ can save him The same Religion teaches also that you are bound under pain of damnation to confess your most secret sins to a Priest and that if you be truly penitent and resolved to lead a new life upon the Priests absolution on Earth you are most certainly pardoned in Heaven It teaches also that you have a like obligation to abstain from Flesh in Lent and upon other days of Abstinence Fridays Vigils c. Now Flesh and Blood does not like these Restraints And hence those that have no mind either to make Restitution of ill gotten Goods or to discover their shameful sins to a Priest or to abstain from Flesh on certain days and understanding that Priests when people confess to them enjoyn them to make Restitution and if they be not able to fast enjoyn them oftentimes to give Alms in lieu of it and in such cases dispense with the Ecclesiastical Law of Abstinence this is ground enough to calumniate poor Papists and to tell the simple Multitude that they can buy pardon of their sins for Money and have leave from their Priests to break any Law of God for Money and let them commit what villanies they please 't is but confessing them to a Priest and this without any repentance or purpose of Amendment Misereor super turbam What Christian Heart would it not make to bleed to see how the well-meaning Multitude are abused and imposed upon by their deceived Guides My Dear Relations For the love you have to your Immortal Souls do your selves that right as but familiarly to converse with your Catholick Neighbours and with as little passion as you can do but ask them an account of their Religion and do not against all common sense and reason believe the Testimony of their Adversaries concerning them and their Religion rather than them themselves and if you do not find that you have been taught a thousand lies concerning them and that they hold nothing nor practice nothing but what they are able to give a very satisfactory Account of to any impartial Enquirer then say I am a Knave a Lyer and a Cheat one that deserves no Mercy from God or Man in this World or the next but if you find what I have said to be most true pray for those that have deceived you and think seriously what it behoves you to do and whetehr you have not reason to suspect those Church-men who stand in need of such notorious lies and slanders thereby to defend themselves against their Adversaries If Popery be such a doltish and senseless Religion then what need of belying it and slandering it to make it odious to the People and what fear of Its overspreading the Nation by a free and unlimited Toleration But the truth is it 's a Holy and most rational Religion and such as Men must cease to be Men or they cannot but acknowledge the Finger of God in it when it is duly and truly represented as it is in it self devoid of all those fopperies and lies with which it is calumniated by its Adversaries For the love of God what Papist in the world believes that the Gospel is but a Fable of Christ that the Bishop of Rome is a God Not any sin but is or may be indulged amongst them and scarce a known sin but there is a known price for it and at their Market-rate you may commit them when you will that they allow Whoredom all the year long and the practices of other uncleannesses not to be named among Men in some Months of the year that mortal sins are put away by Agnus Dei's by little parcels of the Gospel by Popes and Bishops Pardons c. That Christ is the Saviour of Men only but of no Women for Women are saved by St. Clare and Mother Jane That the Pope may check when he pleases the Epistles of St. Paul and controul any thing avouched by all the Apostles That we must simply believe the Church of Rome whether it teach true or false and if the Pope believe there is no life to come we must believe it as an Article of our Faith What Papist in the world believes one of all these Madnesses and Blasphemies and yet the whole Roman Church is charged with them all by no less a Man than the present Arch-Bishop of York if that Book be his Grace's which is commonly sold in London with his Name to it and the Printers also under the Title of a Manul of Active Positive and Oppositive Divinity written by him to preserve a Noble
Lady from the danger of Popery I confess a Protestant to whom I read a Dialogue in that Maunal said Surely some body to disgrace his Lordship had Printed it under his Name But on the other side it is not credible that a Book should be publickly sold all over England for four years together under so Great a Persons Name and yet be none of his if there were any thing in it his Lordship was asham'd to own I well foresee what I have written will be ill taken by many but I dare not but discharge my Conscience and profess as in the sight of God I wtite not thus to disgrace any Mans Person but meerly to dis-abuse my well-meaning Relations who I am sure have such a Zeal of Godliness and true Sanctity that they would love Papists and their Holy and strict Religion with their Hearts were not they and their Religion mis-represented unto them To defame a particular Person is a great wickedness but to slander a whole Church is a Detraction of a higher rank and assuredly does oblige the Detractor to revoke his Calumnies God be merciful to us we have faults but too too many what need of belying one another Let us believe one another what we say our Tenets of Religion are and dispute against those and not against the uncharitable surmizes of our own Brains To judge my Neighbours to be guilty of most horrid Blasphemies when they protest they abhor them no less than my self if this be not to Judge my Neighbour which is notwithstanding most severely prohibited me by my Blessed Saviour I know not what is Now for a Grave Doctor to accuse not some private Authors but the whole Roman Church of all those Blasphemies and Absurdities I but now mentioned and yet not that so much as one single Papist you can meet with will own so much as one of them I am at a stand what to think Surely no Man could be so malicious to write such things on purpose to abuse a poor Lady and on the other side to think that a Doctor of Divinity could be so ignorant of the Tenets of Papists as to believe that no body can be a Papist but he must necessarily believe the Pope is a God that he may have leave to commit almost any sin at a known price when he will that the Gospel is a Fable c. Had he in plain terms told the good Lady some Roman writers as he understood them or as Protestants cited them held such and such Absurdities and Blasphemies but not one Papist she could meet with would own so much as one of them this would have signified nothing to the retaining of her in the Protestant Communion For the Reply would have been easie Either you mis-understand the Authors or else they are at most but the phrensies of some particuler Men and consequently I may be a Papist and hold none of them but abominate and detest them all But that he might be sure to preserve the Lady from the danger of Popery under the disguise of a Dialogue he makes a Papist give for Reasons why he cannot become Protestant the Blasphemies and Absurdities above which is as much as to tell her if she will turn Papist such and so Blasphemous must her Faith and Religion be Methinks knowing many of his Catholick Neighbours to be Men of good Judgment and honest Conversation he should have demanded of them whether such things were generally believed by them or no before he had printed them as Reasons why a Papist could not change his Religion for if one may be a sound Papist and hold none of them then all his Lordships discourse falls to the ground whatsoever some particular Doctors may hold concerning them Though that also be a meer calumny and should any be so extravagant as to assert such Diabolical phrensies he would be cast out of our Church as a Blasphemer And that you My Dear Relations may see that I have not at all wronged the Doctor I have thought fit to transcribe some few Lines out of his 7th Chap. Page 101. The next to his Dialogue The foregoing Sixth Chapter says he gives an account of some of the Blasphemies and Abominations of the Roman Church many more might be instanced c. Where in plain terms as before under the disguise of a Dialogue he charges not barely some particular Authors but the whole Roman Church and all Roman Catholicks with the Blasphemies in the foregoing Dialogue He goes on Where is their Piety towards God while they affirm that the Gospel is but a Fable of Christ c. Nay even that the Bishop of Rome is a God c. Where is their Sobriety and Chastity while they Authorize Stews allow Whoredom all the year long c. Scarce a known sin but there is a known price for it and at their Market-rate you may commit them when you will c. Such extravagant Discourses though they may hinder some from ever examining the Catholick Religion yet they are oftentimes God Almighty out-shooting the Devil in his own Bow happy occasions of the Conversions of others I remember to have read of a German Count who reflecting how divers of his Catholick Neighbours were Persons of a very sound Judgment and Understanding he began to think with himself how they could believe such strange Doctrines as were by his Ministers commonly laid to their charge hereupon he resolved to inquire into their Tenets and he found for a great part they held no such Doctrines as they were commonly taxed with and as for what they did indeed hold they had very good Reasons for their Faith And so by the merciful Grace of God became a happy Convert to that Religion the which before he impartially examined it seem'd so exotick and incredible unto him Which I hope My Dear Relations will one day be your happy lot also Take but pains candidly and diligently to inquire and I doubt not but it will But if you will needs go on to think your Catholick Neighbours to be such Monsters of Men and to hold such horrid Blasphemies and Absurdities which they profess no less to abhor and detest than your selves I hope I have done the duty of a Christian Kinsman and to my grief must one day bear witness against you that I told you how grosly you mis-apprehended the True Worshippers of Christ but you would neither believe me nor seriously use any means to inform your selves aright But I hope better things concerning you Another great cause of all your mistakes is the scandalous lives of too too many Roman Catholicks For the truth is no Catholicks believe so much as one of the above-mentioned Absurdities yet many of them Christ Jesus mend us all live so as they may seem to a prejudiced beholder to believe divers of them Considering their Mock-prayers Mock-fasts and Mock-confessions without any Amendment of life c. But to help you against this you must remember the Counsel