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B06714
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The Athenian Society unvaild: or, Their ignorance and envious abusing of the Quakers detected and reprehended
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Wyeth, Joseph, 1663-1731.; Whitehead, John, 1630-1696.
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1692
(1692)
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Wing W3760; ESTC R186898
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9,433
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4
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to be the detestable Opinions which we hold and indeed do not nor never did Decemb. 22. 1691. By one who is in Scorn called a QUAKER By this it appears that its end is either that you would prove your Assertions or retract them but instead of doing either in that which you call your Answer you have only shewn a little more ill Nature and a great deal of Impertinency in running so very wide from the Mark as you have done by making your foolish and false Harangues without proving any thing and all this with a design to use your own words to preserve those of your Communion by shewing them what Principles you say we really hold But if you have no better Preservatives than these palpable Lies you need not wonder that People coming to the Knowledg of that self evident Principle of the Light Grace or Spirit of God in their own Hearts do then leave you and your refuge And here I must observe that to evade the proving your Charges and to prevent any closer Answer you endeavour to amuse the Reader and frighten us by asking 10 Questions if at least they all deserve that Name in which you think there is so much Acumen that they touch us to the quick and all these to be answered Catagorically or else the worst is to be taken pro Confesso Now to Questions on which so great stress is laid the Reader will very naturally suppose they ought to be very pertinent and very weighty but I must inform him that in this present case it 's far otherwise as will appear plain enough by repeating them and which are as follows 1. Whether they all generally own the Scriptures to be the Word of God 2. Whether they own Jesus Christ to have been God equal with the Father from all Eternity 3. Whether they own the Holy Spirit to be God and that in the Holy Trinity there are three Persons and one God blessed for evermore 4. Whether they hold their boasted Light within to be this very third Person or only their own natural Reason 5. Whether they partake of either of the Sacraments in their Congregations or whether they do not absolutely neglect both Baptism and the Supper of the Lord 6. Whether they believe Angels or any Immaterial Spirits besides the Soul of Man 7. Whether they believe the Existence of the Soul after Death and Resurrection of the Body and Reunion of the Soul thereunto at the day of Judgment Now the terrible ones 8. Who was your first Founder 9. Did they Quake and Tremble or no when they first came into England and the reason thereof 10. Where may we find their Creed or an Act of their Religion And whether it is not altered in several particulars since their Rise tho' but of so few Years standing These are what you vainly and falsly set to measure Christianity by but they cannot do it because some of them are Antiscriptural which yet you call your Rule and others so ridiculous that they could not be asked by a Man truly Christian so that if I should not refer you to any Answer to these for you would not have it now done de Novo but by the Testimony of our Authentick Writers your mighty Threaten would signifie nothing for it remains for you to prove your Assertions they being denyed by us and tho' at pleasure you throw by your own Rules yet you must not pretend to do so by the continual Rules of Debate and Discourse But the trouble hereof being as small as your expectation can be great I shall for this once do it when I have first acquainted you That tho' you pretend to be more Athenian than the Senate of the Nation yet it will hardly become you to pretend to be more Christian than it And if so then since Malice or some such Humour has spoiled your Memory I will take leave to acquaint you that in an Act made 1689. Entituled An Act for exempting their Majesties Protestant Subjects c. there is something which upon the Authority of Holy Writ as well as their own is call'd a Christian Belief and was made on purpose for us call'd Quakers as by the Act appears and is as follows I A. B. Profess Faith in God the Father and Jesus Christ his Eternal Son the true God and in the Holy Spirit one God blessed for evermore and do acknowledg the Holy Scriptures of the old and new Testament to be given by Divine Inspiration This having been at all times as it now is our hearty Belief you might have spared your three first Queries which are not so Scriptural To your fourth query read Geo. Keith of Immediate Revelation not Ceased To your sixth and seventh read Sam. Fisher in a Treatise Entituled Some certain hidden Spiritual Verities revealed And likewise for Answer to many of them you may read The Christian Quaker written by Geo. Whitehead and Will. Penn And lastly both to these and the rest read Rob. Barclay in his Apology for the true Christian Divinity in which you will find a distinct Account of our Principles and that they are consonant to Holy Writ right Reason and pure Antiquity for which reason it is that our Principles are not chang'd nor indeed can be they being preserv'd by the Spirit of God in us with which there is no Variableness nor Shadow of turning And many more would I be prolix I could number up but here being enough and more than is needful in this occasion I shall stop Now in these cited Authentick Writings you may find as I have said not only more than enough to Answer your Queries but also the Truths therein contained so clearly delivered that were ye honest enough to confess it you would say there is much less of the Jesuit in them than there appears to be of their Nature in you as is evident by your gross Lies and Abuses which that I may not forget and you run from by that Evasion which you pretended to fear in us I shall here put you in mind That whatsoever you shall say hereafter cannot be look'd upon to have any Weight unless you either prove or retract these your bold Affirmo's which are hereby returned upon you as your Lies viz. You affirm 1. That the Quakers rest on their own Merits 2. That they deny Heaven Hell Angels and Spirits 3. That they believe the Soul to sleep in the Grave until the Resurrection 4. That they deny the Divinity and Humanity of Christ 5. That they deny the Scriptures to be the Word of God or given by Divine Inspiration And 6. that Fanaticism Enthusiasm and Infidelity do make up the Quaker's Creed If you pretend to prove them it is expected that you do it from our Selves or our own Writings but if you cannot let it hereby appear how fairly you have merited the Title of Incendiaries which yet you 're loath to own but it being your due you must be so accounted in that you 're
THE Athenian Society Unvaild Or their Ignorance and Envious Abusing of the QUAKERS Detected and Reprehended THE Prediction of the Blessed Apostle 2 Tim. 3.12 All that will live Godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer Persecution has been the perpetual Experience of the Church of Christ in all Ages only with this variation that their Sufferings have been sometimes after one manner and sometimes after another one while Life another Liberty and very frequently Estates have been the Prizes that an innocent and harmless Life have cost their Owners The Truth hereof is attested not only by History very Ancient but also by some so very Modern that it is not yet past Memory But when all these in good measure have by God's Providence and a Government 's Favour been stopped then the same Spirit frequently in the same Members and sometimes in others hath laboured to blacken and misrepresent those they could not destroy under the Pretext of Law This is the present Case it is but a little while since that Liberty and Estate were the common Rates which we call'd Quakers with many others were made to compound at if I may so speak for our Innocency and Conscientious Scruples But the mildness and gentleness of the present Government has so signally gone beyond that of some of their Predecessors that they have not only recommended these excellent Qualities by their particular Example but also by the Authority of a Law which is remembred by us with true Gratitude and Thankfulness Now the Advantage of so Noble an Example one might think should have been sufficient if not to sweeten yet to chill the most virulent Spirits and more especially yours who call your selves the Athenian Society and have made so many Offers at a Reformation by the pubick Pretences you have made to encourage some and advise all to the furtherance of it These 't is true have been your Pretensions but your Practice is no other than the Transcript of the * Preface to the second Volume Jesuits Maxim who you say were they that by their Disguises and false Pretences were the first Promoters of the many unhappy Differences that are now among us both in Church and State Now what is odious in them can it be lovely in you Or what is against the Peace of Government in them can it be otherwise in you Surely no For Crimes lose not their Nature when they only change their Agent nor is Satan at all the more Holy for being in an Athenian or in one called a Christian The Truth of this you have sufficiently evinced by the Falshoods and Abuses which you have so liberally bestowed both upon Communities and particular Persons And yet you are the Men who at your appearance by this Name promis'd to use in your ensuing Design much Christian Candor and Modesty and not to * Preface to the second Volume widen the Breaches but to avoid either Practices or Disputes that might tend thereto And further that you would answer no obscene Questions nor any whose Answer should be an Abuse to particular Persons With more to the same purpose which I could here recite were it as necessary as it is easie But I shall here pass it over as well as your other Contradictions and Nonsense of which we have generally notice once a Week by the London Mercury for my Design is herein chiefly to instance in those Answers of Questions which were the cause of the Letter I sent you which I shall set down anon to which tho' you promis'd an Answer yet have not given one unless Queries and Impertinency may deserve that Name by detecting your Falshood and Lies and also something concerning John Whitehead whom by Name you have abused in your Buffoonry But I have observed that in defiance of your Rules in breach of your pretended Charity and contrary to Morality and to true Christianity you have seemed glad of an opportunity to be abusive towards us in particular as will plainly enough appear by your Answer to a Question in Vol. 3. N. 8. q. 6. Whether it be lawful for a Christian to Swear To which you not content to deliver your Answer in the Affirmative only have stigmatiz'd all as silly Enthusiasts who believe the contrary Now as this Answer of yours did cause so your Promise that you would fairly Answer any Objections that were made to your Answers did encourage the sending of a Letter to you soon after wherein among other Things were the three following Queries 1. Whether since the very end of Christ's coming into the World as is testified was to take away Sin and finish Transgression he did not thereby supersede the very use of all Oaths 2. Whether if Men did cooperate with the Assistance that Christ Jesus lends and obey the Precepts he has given they might not thereby attain the end of his coming 3. Whether there is any positive Command in the Gospel enforced by words more comprehensive full positive and pertinent than this of Swear not c. To these you have not returned any Answer as by your fore-mentioned promise you were obliged but still proceed further to abuse and belie us in such Instances as your own Eyes and Ears if you ever imployed them to read or hear our Principles from our selves must needs convince you of for you say you have used them herein From whence the Inference is very easy that your Disease is Malice because your Assertions are directly contradictory to what has been at all times Spoken and Written by our Friends But if you have not read or heard from our selves what you have asserted to be our Belief then what Abatements are to be made from the Malice of your Charge must be added to the Impudence of it in that you are of those who said Report and we will Report it which shews you to be neither more Christian nor less Wicked this will best appear by the Charge it self Where in Vol. 3. N. 23. q. 4. you affirm the Quaker's Opinions to be dangerous and detestable as indeed they were were it true that you afterwards affirm that they speak contemptibly of the Bible and will by no means allow it to be God's Word that they have turned the most Sacred Truths therein contain'd into jejune Allegory that they speak not very Honourably of our Saviour deny the Trinity and many if not all embrace the other Socinian Dream of the Soul 's Sleeping till the Resurrection And afterwards in Vol. 4. N. 30. q. 1. The Quakers have been e're since their rise look'd upon as the Jesuits By-Blows of the Jesuit that they deny the plenary Satisfaction of Christ and rest on their own Merits that Fanaticism Enthusiasm and Infidelity together make up the Creed of the Quaker they being a Compendium of almost all sorts of Heresies who deny the Satisfaction and Divinity of Christ as also his Humanity nay deny Angels Spirits Heaven and Hell and the Existence of Souls after Death Here is the