Subtilty of the Enemy and the supine Negligence and Inconsiderateness and Folly of Men. And woe be to them who dare presume to be the Instruments and Leaders in these Abuses and Doctrines It is certain that our Saviour gave Instructions to his Apostles for the Settling of his Church and that they accordingly in all places where there were a competent number of Converts did ordain Elders and gave Authority to others to do the like and so settled a Succession in the Church which hath continued all over the World to this day And it is certain that the State of the Jews was so corrupted in his time as provoked the Judgment of God upon them so that they are a Monument thereof all over the World to this day and yet neither He nor his Disciples did ever refuse communion with them till they were cast out and so far was he from allowing them to separate that he foretold their being cast out of the Synagogues as part of the Persecution they were to suffer It is also certain that our Saviour did foretell that many false Prophets that is false Teachers should come in his Name and deceive many and gave great Caution not to go out or believe them and that his Apostles did the like and did with great earnestness exhort all to beware of Divisions Schisms and Separations in the Church And accordingly in all Ages for Men to take upon them the Office of Elders or Ministers of the Gospel without a Regular Ordination derived by Succession from the Apostles or to draw away people after them and engage them in Separate Parties hath been looked upon as a heinous Sin and whoever have done so have been Infamous in the Church ever since And therefore if our Dissenters did continue daily with one accord at our Temples as the primitive Christians did and did continue their Assemblies at their own Meeting-places for Instruction and Edification without any Separation from the Church provided there was nothing but true Christian Doctrine taught amongst them I do not see but they might be of very good Use and deserve not only an Indulgence but Encouragement from the Publick Authority But they who make a Trade of it to engage Separate Parties I do verily believe have much to answer for before God and those who desire to be Christians indeed had need to beware of them And this I must in justice say after all I have said concerning what is amiss amongst us that thanks be to God we have those amongst us who for good Learning for profitable Preaching and for sincere Piety Devotion and all Virtue are no way inferior to any of the Dissenters if to be equalled by any of them and yet I cannot say they are so many but there may be reason enough to receive those Labourers also into our Lord's Harvest And I heartily wish it was well considered How they may be made more serviceable in so important and needful a Work without any thing of a Separation and that they would consider Who They are who sit in Moses or rather the Apostles Seat and What our Lord doth require in that respect And now to come more particularly to the PEOPLE of that Party call'd Quakers I must first acquaint them that I have not only had several Conferences with the Principal Persons of their Party whom they call Ministers but have also sent them several Letters and Papers to their Second Days Meetings And as our Conferences have hitherto been managed in a very friendly manner so I do desire to proceed in the same manner with them also and therefore what is directed at first only to the second days Meeting I shall desire them now to receive as intended from the first for them all though I thought it most fair and decent to proceed in that order And it is as followeth To William Penn and the rest of the Friends with him at their second days Meeting in Grace-Church-Street William and the rest of the Friends with thee MY Hearts desire and Prayer to God for you all is that ye may be saved for I am perswaded that you have a Zeal of God at least many of you though not according to Knowledge in some things Nevertheless whereto ye have attained in that I desire ye may be established and that God will be graciously pleased to reveal the rest to you that ye may be perfect and intire wanting nothing For which purpose I come I trust by the Grace of God with a Message of Grace and Peace to you I am well satisfied that it is no meer Humane Project or Artifice that at first raised you up and hath conducted you hitherto but a Supernatural Power and that it is of the Lord some way or other as was the Separation of the Ten Tribes from Rehoboam 1 King 12 â— for Correction and Reformation of something amiâ— in this Church And therefore I dare not presume either upon my own head or by my own Ability tâ— intermeddle in it But my Heart is inlarged towards you upon these Considerations 1. Thaâ— ye do assert one of the Great and Chief Principleâ— of the Christian Religion which I have observeâ— to be very unworthily and even despitefully treated by too many who have gotten into or seek Preferments and Imployment in the Church without Checâ— or Reproof and so unworthily deserted by most for fear of reproach or disgrace or hindrance in their Preferment that I have not known it generously asserted by above two or three in the Pulpit but those great Men indeed though it be plainly a Doctrine most authentickly and solemnly professed and declared in the Church of England 2. That ye do bear a good Testimony against other Abuses connived at or tolerated amongst us 3. I am moved with Pity towards you that you should have so great Causes of Offence or Scandal given you against the Holy and Established Institutions and Ordinances of Christ for the Ministerial Office for the Admission of Proselytes and for the great Solemnity of the Christian Worship which hath been so long abused with Controversies that I know very few Persons now amongst us who do rightly and compleatly understand it and even against the Person Satisfaction and Merits of Christ himself But when I consider your Notions and Sentiments concerning these things though I am well satisfied that you are under the Conduct and Energy of some Spiritual Power yet What that Spirit is and Whether One or Divers in my Judgment doth deserve very good Consideration Ye know what Spirit it was which God sent between Abimelech and the Shechemites Jud. 9.23 and what that was that was sent from the Lord to Saul 1 Sam. 6.14 and what that was that was commissioned by God in the case of Ahab 1 King 22.22 23. and what that was in the midst of the Princes of Noph Isa 19.14 which was from the Lord too And that such a Spirit hath been among some call'd Quakers is manifest both by
AN APOLOGY For and an INVITATION To the PEOPLE call'd QUAKERS TO Rectifie some ERRORS which through the Scandals given they have fallen into WHEREIN The true Original Causes both Humane and Divine of all the Divisions in the Church and Mischiefs in the State and among the People are plainly and briefly opened and detected LONDON Printed for the Author 1697. ADVERTISEMENT THAT whole Bodies or Societies of Men are subject to the same Infirmities which the Individuals of which they consist are and often Sick of the same Diseases and the very worst of all those of the Mind Blindness Conceitedness Perversness Obstinacy Incorrigibleness and Impatience of Reproof or even Friendly Admonition the Experience of all Ages doth abundantly manifest but in none is it more manifest than in the People of the Jews whom God raised up to be an Example Admonition and Warning to the rest of Mankind Their whole History and all their Prophets are Testimonies of this all along from first to last and of this height of the Disease to be most offended and inraged against their best Friends such as most earnestly desire and most faithfully seek and endeavour their Good and Recovery They reckon them their Enemies who tell them the Truth Isa 29.21 make a Man an Offender for a Word and lay a Snare for him who Reproveth in the Gate that is publickly for National Sins and those of the Great Ones Act. 7.52 Which of the Prophets have not your Fathers Persecuted saith Saint Stephen Besides this common Infirmity it is very obseravble in the unhappy Divisions which are now among Christians that generally in all there is a greater Zeal and concern for their own Church or Party than for the common Interest of Christianity and the real Service of God and Salvation of Souls And this being so What Entertainment is such a Discourse as this like to meet with in the World But if it be considered for what End and for whose Service it is written that may be sufficient for Encouragement to the Author and for Caution to the Reader how he treats it And that with the Lesson now to be read Decemb. 18. may serve for sufficient Advertisement Isa 50.7 8 9. The Lord God will help me therefore shall I not be confounded therefore have I set my Face like a Flint and I know that I shall not be ashamed He is near that justifieth me Who will contend with me let us stand together Who is mine Adversary let him come near to me Behold the Lord God will help me Who is he that shall condemn me lo they all shall wax old as a Garment the Moth shall eat them up Some things but briefly mentioned here upon this occasion which may seem doubtful or obscure are intended upon another more proper to be more fully explained and cleared An Apology for And an Invitation to The PEOPLE call'd QUAKERS To rectifie some ERRORS which through the Scandals given they have fallen into c. ALmighty God doth in many things govern the greater Collective Bodies of Men as he doth the lesser of Families and single Persons and therefore what is the Duty of single Persons or of the Heads of Families under several occurrences of the Providence of God the very same is the Duty of the Governors of those greater Bodies whether they be Civil or Ecclesiastical And therefore again as when any Cross or Affliction befalls a Person if he have any Sense of God and Religion in him he ought not to neglect it as an insensible Creature or a brute Beast nor to look upon it as a meer Accident and Misfortune like an Atheist or Infidel but to acknowledge the Hand and Providence of God in it examin himself and consider well for what intent or purpose it may have been ordered or permitted by the Righteous Wise and Gracious Over-ruling Providence of God and without delay apply himself to do and perform what that Dispensation doth appear to him to call for When Divisions Schisms and Separations of Parties do fall out in a Church these are such Afflictions as ought to be looked upon as the Loss of one in a Family or of a Member in a particular Person and therefore not to be made light of or passed over as Misfortunes and Accidents but to be well considered as ordered or permitted by the Special Providence of God with great Justice and Wisdom and therefore for some special End to be inquired into taken notice of and observed by his Church that they may thereupon apply themselves to what he requireth of them for his Service and their own Good When this is neglected all other Means usually prove not only ineffectual but productive of more or greater Evils What was written afore-time was written for our Admonition and Instruction and as we are plainly told that in the Division and Separation of the Ten Tribes from the House of David the Cause was from the Lord 1 Ki. 12.15 So in that great Division of the Eastern and Western Churches and breach of Communion between them and in the Western Church that great Division and Separation of all those Churches call'd Reform'd and in the great Division again amongst them into Lutheran and Calvanist and the several Sub-divisions of several Parties and Sects amongst them and lastly to come nearer home in all the Divisions Sub-divisions Sects and Parties which have separated from the Church of England and afterward one from another there is as certainly the Hand of God and did we consider it well we might plainly see that the Cause is from the Lord. This we can all see in the Great Division and Separation of all these Churches call'd Reformed from that of Rome but she her self either cannot or will not see it And this to say no more of the Foreigners here our Dissenters at home think they see and do see but we of the Church of England do not see or will not see to any purpose as we ought But as they of the Church of Rome lay all upon the Hereticks and will acknowledge nothing amiss among themselves so we of the Church of England lay all upon the Separatists and Dissenters but will acknowledge nothing amiss among our selves And that which dazzles the Eyes and blinds the Minds of People in both is chiefly the Pomps and Vanities of the World which are renounced at Baptism without and the God of this World who blinds their Minds within The things of this World to Earthly-minded People are like Sugar-Plumbs to Children which stop their Mouths and satisfie them that all is well with them But if things were more narrowly looked into it might be perceived That there is scarce any Party of Separatists or Dissenters that hath not something of Truth peculiar to them and that there is something in particular amiss in the Church which gave Occasion to that Separation and whereof something peculiar in that Sect may serve for Admonition And therefore that in all there is a
secret Providence of God ordering or permitting them for Judgment Correction Reproof and Admonition to reform unto the Church and unto those very Parties in which any such Division and Separation hath been made But generally all they who should have taken the Admonition have had their Mouths so stopp'd and been so bribed and enchanted with the Devil's Sugar-Plumbs and Baits of Preferments that while all was so well with them as they thought they could see nothing amiss in the Church but magnified it as a most glorious Church and layed all the Fault upon the Dissenters and Soparatists who they thought only wanted what they were possessed of and the Scandal of their Ambition Pride and Covetousness and Neglect of a due Care of Souls hath by their Preaching I doubt betrayed more Souls into the Snares of the Devil than all their Preaching hath rescued out of them and throughly converted unto God It is a sad Truth but Truth it is and a Great one too and very manifest to all whose Eyes are open That our Vniversities and Church Preferments which were designed by our Pious Ancestors for the promotion of true Piety as well as Learning are by the Subtilty of Satan and Neglect of true Piety and Devotion to God become very subservient to the Kingdom of Darkness less to the Kingdom of Light From which corrupt Fountain hath proceeded one way or other not only all our Divisions but most of all the Evils which do now afflict either the Ecclesiastical or Civil State and if some very good Care be not speedily taken more and greater yet are more like to ensue than these be removed Of all the Sects which have sprung up amongst us there is none more considerable in this respect whereof I am speaking or less considered as it ought to be than that of the QUAKERS as they are abusively called begun by GEORGE FOX a young Man born of mean but honest and religious Parents at Drayton in Leicester-shire in the Year of our Lord 1624. and educated from his tender years in the Fear of the Lord but to no more Humane Learning than only to read English and write indifferently He was in his Youth disposed to Virtue and Piety and when upward of Nineteen retired from his Relations and Acquaintance and lived in divers places where he was not known working at his Trade of a Shoe-maker with his hands for his Livelyhood but exercising his Mind in serious Meditations both while at his Work and at other times of Leisure especially In the Year 1646. he understood That Vniversity Learning was not enough to qualifie Men to be Ministers of Christ and thereupon instead of hearing them used to retire with his Bible into Solitary places joyning neither with the Ministers of the Church nor with the Dissenters but relying wholly upon the Lord Jesus Christ for his Inward Teaching At another time he understood That God who made the World did not dwell in Temples made with Hands but in his Peoples Hearts And in the Year 1647. having been for some time exercised with Temptations and Troubles in his Mind he came farther to understand That all was done and to be done in and by Christ and How he conquers and destroys the Tempter And some time after he went among the Professors at Duckenfield Manchester and declared Truth as he calls it amongst them and also at Broughton in Leicester-shire and Mansfield in Northamptonshire and then People came far and near to see him And here his Preaching seems to have commenced And in 1648. were divers Meetings of Friends in several Places And this was the Beginning of that Sect which is now become so considerable in outward Appearance and I wish more considerable in a true inward Power than it is For as all Man-kind are apt to relapse and sink down again from the Elevation to which God at any time raised them so I doubt are this People now relapsed very much into a Form only of a different sort and appearance The Beginning of George Fox seems to have been by and under a true Divine Conduct such as Abraham was led by such as Moses was driven by from the Court of Pharaoh into the Wilderness and such as the Holy Prophets of Old and greater numbers of Holy Christians afterwards were partly led and partly driven by into the Wilderness Solitary places and Retirement from Relations Friends and Acquaintance as our Saviour saith to forsake Father and Mother Brother and Sister and House and Land for his sake and in those Retirements he did receive Openings as he calls it of Truth indeed and when he came from his Retirement and went into the Meetings of Professors he did declare Truth indeed as he expresseth it For it is a certain Truth that University Learning that Preaching and Praying at Churches or elsewhere that the Studying of the Holy Scriptures that the Profession of Faith in Christ the Use of the Sacraments and most frequent and constant use of the great and chief Solemnity of the Christian Worship nay even Zeal for Christ and doing Miracles in his Name and Reliance upon his Merits are all though good in their kind and very necessary and some absolutely necessary yet are all short and deceitful to those who rest in them and seek not in all and above all that inward Principle of Light and Life which is Christ in them who receive him in Sincerity and Purity and retain it by faithful and ready Obedience to his Conduct This George saw very well and rightly And if he did in the heat of Disputes either through Transport or any humane Infirmity or through the Subtilty of Satan getting any Advantage of him over-shoot himself it is no more than what Luther and Calvin and the rest of the Reformers have done who whether they have reformed or deformed most may very well bear a Dispute and he and his Party deserve to be pitied and helped out by gentle and kind means And great reason there is for it upon two accounts at the least 1. Because the Scandals given were the occasions of their Errors 2. Because Christianity having before been pull'd to pieces and no where compleat intire and clear from Corruptions and Abuses to be found in any Church or Party of People in the World they of all the parts chose the better the Soul leaving the Body as a dead Carcass to the rest It is true this is in a great Measure to be imputed to those who by their Empty Formality gave the Occasion yet it was a Fault in Them who took such Offence at it What God hath joyned together Man must not presume to put asunder If the Leaper be commanded to wash in Jordan 2 King 5.10 he must not think that to wash in the Rivers of Damascus will do as well If the Blind Man be commanded to wash in Siloam Jo. 9.7 or even Moses to cast up Ashes into the Air Exod. 9.8 the Command must be obeyed and
restrain that Command to Baptism by the Holy Ghost only XVIII Whether if such Construction be by any Spirit more than humane it be not the Spirit of Antichrist or Satan transformed to with-hold Men under his own Dominion from solemnly ingaging with Christ and from Forgiveness of their Sins in his Name or If it be only by Opinion of Men such Opinion obstinately persisted in be not a Damnable Sin contrary to subjection of all Imaginations to the Obedience of Christ and subverting of Souls and such Teachers to be abominated and anathamatized by all sincere Christians as Seducers and the Ministers and Instruments of Satan though they appear in Sheeps cloathing XIX Whether it having been the constant belief of all Nations whether Jews or Gentiles that they had a real though Spiritual Communion with the Gods they worshipped in their Participation of their Sacrifices as St. Paul intimates 1 Cor. 10. and may be proved by good Authority and Christians duly disposed having a like Communion with Christ in the participation of the consecrated Bread and Cup as St. Paul affirms and the solemn Worshipping of God by presenting our Prayers to the Father with those Memorals of our Saviour's Passion being plainly a Recognition of our Redemption by Christ and of his Dominion over us acquired by his Passion and that that is the only Propitiation and He the only Mediator by which and by whom we Mortals born in Sin can have Access to and Acceptance with the Father and St. Paul having received the Doctrine of what he taught concerning this from the Lord and the ancient Christians frequenting this Ordinance after they had manifestly received the Holy Ghost Whether I say this being so to reject these either as Types and Shadows which are indeed Antitypes as the Grecians express it Solemn Memorials and Sensible Declarations before God Angels and Men of present internal actions of our Minds for the greater Manifestation and Notoriety of the Fact be not meer Sophistry Shuffle and Evasion or as needless upon pretence that Christ is come to them in the Spirit or of their having the Substance be not to set up themselves in Pride above the Apostles and Holy Christians who had so manifestly the Spirit of God nay above Christ himself viz. to reject that as needless which he instituted as necessary and a plain Evidence of the Subtilty and Delusion of Satan to oppose Christ and detain and withdraw people from his Solemn Worship and under the most specious appearance of the Spirit of God by sensible Motions to things appearing Good and by False Lights to corrupt and adulterate them and get and keep a residence in them as if it was the Spirit of Christ Whether such Obstinacy such Fallacy in such a Matter of such Importance in Christianity and yet so easie to Man and void of all Exceptions be not plain Evidence of a Mystery of Iniquity in it XX. Whether to deliver those things in the Name of the Lord as immediately from the Lord and by his Spirit which may be plainly perceived and detected to proceed either from a humane Spirit or a Spirit of Error be not a great Presumption against the Holy Majesty oâ— God and a great Scandal to the Holy Doctrine of the Guidance of the Spirit of God and therefore a double and great Sin the Sin of the False Prophets of old and that which in Germany formerly and since in this Nation raised so great a Prejudice against the Truth Upon the perusal of these Questions it may be supposed that some Answer was returned and therefore some account of that may reasonably be expected and I should have been glad to have been able to have answered so reasonable an Expectation more fully but the truth in short is that eight of the first ten were answered affirmatively but the other two were answered indeed but with Answers not to the Questions and the other ten remain yet to be answered but I hope upon due consideration will be answered at last not with words only but with deliberate solemn Actions Nor are my Hopes without rational Ground For in the several Conferences I have had with them seven or eight at a time of the principal leading Men of their Party they behaved themselves as became serious considerate Persons heard patiently and attentively replyed gravely and calmly none interrupting either me or any of their own party while speaking and our Conclusion was friendly though not altogether agreeing in the same Sentiments And this is my Ground in respect of the Persons And for the Matter it self in question That they have been led into Error and Mistake in some things the due Consideration of these Questions will in a great measure make them sensible And when besides they shall consider by what Means they who misled the rest came to overshoot themselves and fall into those Mistakes viz. through the Scandals before-mentioned and that common Infirmity incident to us Mortals to run from one Extream into another this will farther satisfie and confirm them in the truth of it And if to these Considerations be added a clear Explication of the Truth which they did not rightly apprehend before this with the Grace of God will farther inlighten the Mind of those who are sincere and regard Truth more than any temporal Concern with much Satisfaction viz. That Baptizm with Water and that Noble Solemnity of the Christian Worship are not needless Types and Shadows oâ— things past and fulfilled as they imagin but Solemn Expressions and Declarations more comprehensively and remarkably significative than Words before God Angels Devils and Men oâ— present Acts of the Mind of what is internally and invisibly at the same instant acted in Spirit the one of our Engagement in an Holy Covenant with God in Christ by putting off by Repentance our Pollutions through Sin and Dedication of our Selves to the Holy Trinity the other of our Recognition of our Redemption by Christ by his Death and Sacrifice upon the Cross and of his Dominion over us and our Subjection to Him even to lay down our Lives in Obedience to Him as he did His in Obedience to his Father which is done by making our Solemn Address and presenting our Prayers to the Father with the Memorials of his Passion as the Great Propitiation for the Sins of Mankind and Participation of those Memorials being Consecrated not only by a Separation to a Holy Use but by a real Sanctification through the Spirit of God at the Prayers of the Church whereby the Faithful have a real and Spiritual Communion with Him and one with another This is the pure Offering of the Gentiles foretold by Malachy That it should be Offer'd by them from the rising of the Sun even unto the going down of the same And this is the Sense and Meaning thereof received and retained by the Church of Christ all over the World till Calvin's new Notions became received as the Pure Word of God and made this
most Sublime most Holy and most August Sacrament as it is deservedly call'd by Dr. Morton be taken in effect for a needless Ceremony or of no great Importance by others besides the Quakers and used or rather neglected accordingly even to this day These are the great things in it which I have now mentioned but rare to be found in our Books now a days or heard of from our Pulpits Nor can it conveniently here be explained as it deserves But as to both these what is said before pag. 13 14. ought to be consider'd These things I say well consider'd cannot choose but make great Impression upon the Minds of those who are sincere and have a due sense of their own Spiritual and Eternal concerns But when they shall also understand That the great Principle of the Guidance of the Spirit of God is not so peculiar to themselves as they imagin but the constant Doctrine of the Church of Christ in all Ages and of the Church of England in particular as I have shew'd in a Discourse of Mystical Divinity and some others under the Title of Asceticks or the Heroick Piety and Vertue of the Ancients and notwithstanding the Extravagancies of some inconsiderate Opposers of Fanaticism asserted by most eminent Men of this Church as the profound Dr. Cradock lately deceased who himself told me he had Preached twenty or thirty Sermons upon that Subject and others now living and that there are and have been before George Fox appeared in the World Persons in the Communion of the Church of England as well acquainted with Spiritual things as themselves and by consequence how little necessity there is of venturing upon the Sin of Schism for that cause And moreover consider that Christ appointed an Order of Men for his Ministerial Office to succeed in his Church by an external Call and Commission and notwithstanding the Corruptions of those who sate then in Moses's Seat would not suffer his Disciples to break Communion with them or disregard their Authority and by consequence how dangerous it may prove in the end for Men to presume to set up Parties and draw People after them contrary to his Orders and to continue so to do after fair Warnings and unanswerable Admonitions to the contrary To conclude When they shall farther consider how horrid a Sin it must needs be to presume to attribute to the Holy Spirit of God the Workings of their own Imaginations or perhaps the Subtile Suggestions of some wicked Spirit of Delusion and to expose and scandalize the Holy Doctrine of the Guidance of the Holy Spirit by denying of certain and manifest Truths and using such little Shifts and Evasions to oppose plain Evidence as an honest and ingenious Lawyer would scorn and be ashamed to â—se for his Client When all these things and â—ore that might be observed are well understood and considered why may I not with reaâ—on hope that all who are really such as they â—ave appeared in the several Conferences I have had with them to be should answer the End of my Letters and Questions with more than civil and kind Words in real and solemn Actions Why should I not hope that no priâ—ate Interest nor any Temporal Concern should â—inder them Why should I not hope that â—nce God hath apparently again concluded all â—nder Sin which all Parties confess of all â—thers but their own and is true of all without â—xception that all should humble themselves â—efore Him return to mutual Charity one with â—nother and subject themselves and all their â—maginations to his Wisdom as well as their â—ctions to his Will to the intent that he may have Mercy upon all Why should I not hope I say since God hath done this and for thiâ— End that they if they be indeed partakeâ—â— of his Holy Spirit should be the first in giving Glory to God by such a just and reasonable Humiliation before his Divine Majesty and Acknowledgment of our Humane Infirmity if never so little left to our selves or but steping aside out of the Order of his Holy Conduct 〈◊〉 and subject themselves intirely and readily to aâ—â— the Orders he hath appointed in his Church No sober wise Man will expose himself and leaâ— others into Danger or Hazard when he maâ— without any Difficulty or Incumbrance put himself and them into Safety and Security Noâ— will any ingenious Man if he have committeâ— a Mistake stand it out and maintain it againsâ— a Grave and Judicious Man Much less will any considerate Man who hath any sense of God and regard to his tremendous Majesty dare tâ— persist in Opposing or Disputing his Institution or Orders and therefore I shall here concludâ— this But because I have received certain Question concerning these Matters but without anâ— Name of any who sent them or to whom 〈◊〉 should return Answer though I shall forbear tâ— expose them by making them publick yet bâ— cause I am debtor both to the wise and to thâ— unwise for their Satisfaction who are eitheâ— moved with such Scruples or rely upon such infirm Grounds I shall return a brief comprehensive Answer to the Eight Questions in these following Assertions The Holy Scripture of the Old and New Testament is the only Rule of Faith and Practice rightly understood and used But it is in many Cases only a General Rule leaving the special Application in some to all Persons in others to certain determinate Persons And therefore to require Express and Plain Scripture for Faith and Practice in all things doth proceed from Ignorance and Weakness in some but too often from a disingenuous Spirit of Contention a dishonest Design or Satanical Delusion The Practices of the Primitive Christians were some Permanent to continue in the Church others Temporary and Alterable according as there might be occasion for Order Decency and Edification and did vary from the beginning in several Churches and parts of the World whereas the others were truly Catholick according to Vincentius Lirinensis his Rule that is universally observed without any known beginning since the Apostles The Spirit of God was poured forth upon all Flesh when the Gospel was Preached to all Flesh or to every Creature that is not only to the Jews but to the Gentiles also But as to individual Persons it was never so poured out upon all Flesh but there were some things pre-acquired as Faith in Christ Jesus and ordinarily Baptism with Water Obedience and Prayer c. Nor was the Manifestation thereof ever given to every one but to every one to whom it was given it was given to profit withall As many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God and If any Man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his Rom. 8.14 9. But it is to be known and remembred that a great and principal and the most certain Leading of the Spirit of God is not sensible or easily perceivable how it comes but it is generally a Secret