rightly what I have written than the Books themselves I leave them to judge and do as they are and as such men lead them And how far Tradition or History or Humane aide and Testimony is necessary to our Reception of the Scripture I have long agoe opened at large in the Preface to the second Part of my Saints Rest and shewed you that Dr. Whitaker Chemnitius Davenant Rob. Baronius and other Protestants usually say the same that I do and that otherwise by casting away such subordinate means Proud-ignorance and pievish wrangling will cut the throat of faith it self and undermine the Church of God Reader I will conclude also with an Admonition as my Accuser doth As thou lovest Christianity Scripture and thy soul take heed of those Ignorant destroying-defenders of the Scripture who would tell the Infidel world that they may continue Infidels till we can prove that the Scripture alone by its own light without humane Testimony History or Tradition will bring it self to all mens hands without mans bringing it and will translate it self without mans translating it or in the original tongues will make all English men and all that cannot read at all to understand it or being translated will tell you sufficiently which is the true translation and where the Translater failed or will tell you among many hundred divers Readings which is the right and which Copy is the truest and which particular text is uncorrupted or rightly translated For instance whether it should be in Luke 17. 37. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 when it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Matth. 24. 18. and Beza saith In uno exemplari apud Theophilactum Scriptum est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 id est Cadaver sicut etiam in nonnullis codicibus testatur selegisse Erasmus Videturque haec lectio magis accomodata c. Hundreds of such may be named And believe not these men till they can name you one man that ever knew before some man told him by the Book alone whether Esther and the Canticles were Canonical and the Book of Wisdom and Pauls Epistle to the Laodioaeans Apocryphal and knew what was the sense of the Original Text and what Copies and Readings and Translations were true and what false Yea or that knew these particular Books were the same that the Apostles wrote without alteration till some one told it them Would not that man reduce the Church into less than one single person who would have no man believe the Scripture nor take it for Gods word till he can do it without any help of man or humane History or Testimony or Tradition But of this I put him twenty Questions before It shall now suffice to tell you this much of the plain truth that such furious false Teachers as shall take the foresaid course may not utterly subvert your faith The Scripture and Christian Religion taken together as one frame or Body hath that in it self which may prove that frame and all the essential parts of our Religion to be of God And the true proof of the Divine Authority of the Scripture is by the evidence of the spirit not a new Revelation of the spirit But by a double Impression of Gods own Image made by the Holy Ghost one upon the Scripture it self The other by the Scripture in its continued efficacy on Belivers souls And both these Images are the Impresses of the Trinity of Divine Principles even of the Power Wisdom and Goodness of God which are unimitably done in both This is the true proof that Scripture is the word of God But this proof excludeth not but supposeth the Ministry and Testimony of man as a subservient help and means even to bring it to us to translate it to teach us how to know both the sense and verity of it and to testifie which is the true Canon Copies Reading Translation c. And they are ignorant subverting deceivers and destroyers of your souls who would separate the Word the Spirit and the Ministry which Christ hath conjoyned as necessary together for your faith and that would cast out subservient helps as unnecessary under pretence of the sufficiency of the Scripture As if Printing it were needless because Scripture is sufficient of it self And the fore-said self-evidencing Light is not sufficient without humane help and Testimony to make you know every Canonical Book from the Apocryphal nor to know the truest Copies in the Original nor the rightest readings nor this or that particular verse to be uncorrupted nor the translation to be true nor this or that to be the true meaning of the Greek or Hebrew word nor that the Minister readeth truly to the unlearned that cannot try it by his own skill nor read himself And he that would make the contrary supposition to be the foundation of your faith would destroy your faith the Church and you Postscript REader since the Writing of this two things have faln out which make it a more displeasing work to me than it was before And I am sorry that Mr. Bagshaw made it necessary The one is that as the current report saith he is again in Prison for Refusing the Oath of Allegiance And I naturally abhorre to trample upon a suffering person which hath caused me to say so little against the Armies and Sectarian miscarriages since their dissolution and dejection in comparison of what I did before in the time of their prosperity The other is The Printing of the Life of Mr. Vavasor Powel which hath so many good things in it that I fear lest the mention of his false Prophecies extorted by Mr. Bagshaw who first published also his name as the Author of them should abate their exemplary use But yet I must give this notice to forreigners and posterity that they must not judge either of the JUDGEMENT or the SUFFERINGS of the Non-conformists by these mens It is not for refusing the Oath of Allegiance that they are silenced and suffer as they do nor do they consent to the words which conclude the life of Mr. Powel That since such a time he hath learnt that we must pray for our present Rulers as sinners but not as Magistrates No man can truly say that such Doctrines as these have been proved against any considerable part of the Ministers that are now cast out or that they were deposed and silenced for such things seeing they commonly take the Oathes of Allegiance and Supremacy And how far the ejected Ministers of Scotland are from the Principles of Separation Mr. Browne a Learned Scottish Divine hath shewed in the Preface of a Learned Treatise Newly Published in Latine against Wolzogius and Velthusius even while he saith most against receding from a Reformation overthrowing the Tenents maintained by our two or three English Brownes which formerly were called Brownisme Though the same mans numerous reasonings against the derivation of the Magistrates Office from the Power of the Mediator I waite
he know that it is the Truest Copy that falleth into his hands and that all that differ from that are false Do not corrupt Copies come to other mens hands Why then might they not do so to his 10. How can he judge of the various Readings of all the rest of the Copies which he never saw 11. If a Translation will serve him to judge of the various readings in the Original are they not in the Translation fore-judged of to his hand 12. Is any man Infallible in Translating Is there a promise of Infallibility to them 13. Do not the Translations differ 14. How shall men know which Translation is truest when none is perfect 15. Must he see all Translations that shall judge or will one serve as aforesaid And how shall he judge of those he seeth not 16. Is it by Inspiration from Heaven such as the Prophets had that the true Reading must be known or to ordinary at least sanctified Reason by evidence in the Text it self If the former none but Prophets can know it If the later you can prove it to a Rational or sanctified man from some intrinsick evidence For instance suppose a man never saw but two Printed English Bibles and was never told which is right by others and in one is Printed Heb. 12. 2. he despised the same viz. the Cross and in the other he despised the shame for so two of them do differ how shall he prove which Printer erred 17. Do all the Men and Women that are Godly actually know the true and uncorrupt copies and readings by the Book it self without mans testimony Or what is the name of that one Man or Woman in the World that you know who without ever hearing it from man could tell all the true readings from the false or could tell that the Canticles or Ecclesiastes or the Book of Jonas were Canonical and that the Book of Baruck Wisdom and Pauls Epistle to the Laodiceans and Clemens to the Corinthians were not Do you know his name that ever knew this by Reading the Bible only without being ever told it by any If not and if it be sine quâ non to mens receiving of the Bible it self that some one brings it to their hands judge how wisely and fairly you deal with poor souls to talk at such a confident and yet confused rate And 18. Let me ask you one question more Is it necessary to Salvation that men be able to read Hath God promised it to all or most that shall be saved Faith cometh by hearing as the most ordinary way of old And he that will Preach the Gospel to most Nations under Heaven must Convert more than can read or but a few And if you Preach the Gospel to a Congregation that cannot read do you recite all the various readings in the Hebrew and Greek to them If not can they judge of that they never heard If you do are they ever the wiser as to know of themselves which of them is the right 19. But if you say that you suppose not only Grace but great Learning and Study to discern these things how cometh it to pass that the most Learned Studious and Godly men do still so much differ about the various Readings as Lud. Capellus Vsher Heinsius Bootius De Dieu and others And how come the Churches in the Ages next the Apostles to leave out so many Books of the Canon as many of them did while others received them And Luther Althamar and others to set no more by James's Epistle than they did And so many Godly men long and yet to receive much of the Apocrypha 20. How durst you that speak so hardly of the Jesuits honour them so much as to make your silly ones believe that their doctrine in this is no worse than mine when in so many Books I have left that at large which may confute you And you wisely ask me to tell you whether I will take the Jesuits into my Communion because they hold the same with the Arminians with whom I will communicate so they hold the same with all Christians that there is a God and a Christ and the Scripture true But it is not for this that I renounce their Communion but for some things else Will you communicate with none that holdeth any thing yea any errour which the Jesuits hold Or did you dream that the Arminians hold all that the Jesuits hold Or did you dream that the Arminians hold all that the Jesuits hold Sir I am ashamed to spend time-upon such triflings Sect. 59. E. B. The former Non-conformists thought there was no possibility of salvation for a Papist But you tell us that you affect not the honour of this Orthodoxness R. B. It is confutation enough of such an accuser to recite the words which he accuseth which are Vnless you do as Mr. Perkins doth to make it good be so charitable to all the millions else among them as not to call them Papists except they practically hold the most pernicious opinions of their Councils and Divines I confess I affect none of the honour of that Orthodoxness which consisteth in sentencing Millions and Kingdoms to Hell whom I am unacquainted with So that I distinguish of Papists properly so called who practically hold all the Popish errours and Nominal Papists that call themselves such or are called so by others who know not or practically hold not the pernicious part of their errours These latter I refused to undertake to judge to Hell and consequently to damn all in France Spain Italy Germany c. who are called Papists And if this accuser be more valiant and dare damn them all I do not wonder that he dare damn me for not damning them For he that can eat and digest an Oxe will never stick at one crumme more But he should not be also so cruel to the Reader as to put him to read my words twice over because he dismembers them to make them seem to have some loathed sense Sect. 60. E. B. p. 19. The former Non-formists said The filth of nature cannot be sufficiently spoken of But you c. R. B. 1. When you tell us in what common Confession of theirs they say so I shall try whether you say any truer than in the rest 2. Reader I answered him on this point before by no less than twenty instances proving that Nature may be too ill spoken of And he saith nothing to any of them but sings over his old song again Is not this a fine man to dispute with Sect. 61. E. B. I shall conclude with mentioning one thing more I affirmed that by Flesh you had told us war only meant the sensitive appetite This you reply is an untruth and a meer fiction for you never said so Sir you had need have a good memory for you have writ many Books in which as containing many words there cannot want much sin and vanity And indeed had you meditated
on these terms I shall consider of your words and help you better to understand your self Sect. 1. E. B. It will be a favour if I look on you as one that desireth not any such expressions of familiarity as to be called Brother Reply You may suppress your own Charity but not mine you may call me what you please but I will call you what I think my duty requireth me to do As Optatus initio tells the Donatist My warrant is ubi supra Lev. 19. 17. 1 Cor. 5. 11. If any man that is called a Brother be a Railer And 2 Thess 3. 14 15. If any man obey not our word by this Epistle note that man and have no company with him that he may be ashamed yet count him not as an enemy but admonish him as a Brother But it is the Spirit or tendency of your Doctrine and principles to renounce fraternity with all of Christs Church that are not liker to your self than I am Pag. 2. You tell me that I shew how much I am for a middle way neither hot nor cold for a luke warm and neutral indifferency Reply I take your warming in good part I daily beg of God that the decays of my natural spirits and fervour by frigid age and weakness may not abate the true fervour of my soul much less any abatement of the estimation of holy Truth the search of which hath been the unwearied business the almost uninterrupted pleasure of my life And specially that my love to God and Heaven and Holiness may not decay which alas was wofully cold and little at the best But I confess to you that I am for a middle way between fury and stupidity pride and baseness superstition and profaness the love of Anarchy and Tyranny and many such like pernicious extreams And you remember me of the folly of my youthful ignorance in which I presently suspected any man of tepidity and carnal indifferency who wrote for reconciliation of Contenders and for a middle Conciliatory way such as about Arminianism Pet. Molinaeus Vsher Vossius Davenant Hall Preston Fenner Crocius Martinius Camero c. and so in other points O Lord forgive the sins of my ignorant unexperienced age Sect. 2. E B. I hope you are not to learn that every untruth is a lye R. E. I suppose your citation of John 1. 62. 2. 21. is mis-printed for 1 John 1. 6. 2 21. The first of which saith If we say that we have no fellowship with him and walk in darkness we lie and do not the truth The other saith that No lie is of the truth But do either of these say that every untruth is a lie Is it not enough to hold 1. That every designed untruth which is positively voluntary is a lie 2. And that every rash and carelesly uttered untruth which is privatively voluntary that is where the will omitteth its Office is a lie Sure brother these many will be heavy enough upon you you need not contend by false doctrine for any more And supposing that you are not to learn how singular you are in this assertion is it any sign of your humility to think that so few Divines before you who so little avoid it did know what a Lie is If I had called you a wise a calm a sober and charitable man when I had no evidence of the contrary how can you prove that this had been a lie You tell us anon that Prophets Nathan Samuel and good men have been mistaken And did those Prophets lie You deny not that your Brother Powel was mistaken And yet you would not have it said that he lied Let this go therefore for your first false doctrine when you say that every untruth is a lie Sect. 3. E. B p. 2. You are not afraid to dethrone the Scripture from being a perfect Rule Par. 1. p. 99. 100 101. R. B. Though all untruth be not a lye I cannot say that this is none I have no such word or sense I maintain the Scripture to be a perfect Rule so far as it is a Rule But so far as it is no Rule it is no perfect Rule I do there maintain that it is not a particular Rule for a Watchmaker a Carpenter a Physicion a Mathematician a Musicion c. to do their work by nor what Metre or Tune to sing a Psalm in and such like but only a General Rule for these And because you charge this on me as my error if I can understand you this is your second false doctrine implyed that Scripture is a particular Rule for the things which I there exclude And a third false doctrine implyed that if it were not so it were not a perfect Rule For your words have no sense which I can discern if this be not the sense of them Whosoever denyeth the Scripture to be a particular Rule for the things instanced by R. B. p. 99 100 101. doth dethrone the Scripture from being a perfect Rule But so doth R. B. Ergo your Major includeth the two fore-mentioned false doctrines Sect. 4. E. B. The whole design of your Book was to make your Brethren that have not your latitude and cannot reach the subtilty of your distinctions odiâ—us c. R. B. Here is a former falshood justified and doubled or increased 1. It is false that this was any design of my Book 2. But that it was the whole design what man of Sobriety that ever read it could imagine 3. Yea and that these brethren that I designed to make odious were such as have not my latitude and cannot reach the subtilty of my distinctions Sect. 5. E. B. Many hundreds of sober impartial and unbyassed persons have carefully read your Book as well as my self and they all make the same judgement of it R. B. I will not number this with your bare falshoods Whether many hundreds have told you their judgement of it who have read it I know not But contradictories cannot be true on both parts It is a slander therefore of so many hundred such persons which you utter For if they were indeed sober impartial unbyassed persons and carefully read the Book it is scarce or not at all possible but indeed a contradiction that they should judge it the whole design to make my brethren odious that cannot reach the subtilty of my distinctions Sect. 6. E. B. p. 3. You call separation a crying sin nay the crying sin and you scruple not to insinuate that all the judgements which in this Nation we do either feel or fear were to be charged on separation as the principal procuring cause R. B. Here is your third falshood in matter of fact There is not a word in the places nor any where else in all my Writings if I know what I have written that chargeth all this on separation as the principal procuring cause But the contrary in the comparison is oft and plainly asserted and greater
matters when all your curious Enquiry into an open matter of fact what so many persons hold could do no more to save you from mistaking it If you never read what lrenaeus Lactantius and others of old held If you never read what is written by Mr. Mead Dr. Twisse Mr. Archer c. Did you never read any Pamphlets within these thirty years that say more Did you that converse so much among such never hear what I that so seldom converse with them have heard so oft and seen offered me in Writings that I might have procured the Printing of them Do you believe that none of the Levellers or those whom Oliver Cromwell suppressed under the name of Fifth Monarchy men held no more Did Venner and his company think you hold no more 2. But so strange is your forgetfulness or your self-contradicting faculty that you need none to tell your Readers that you write untruths but your self Do you take no notice that all that is my words is that such a Holy and Righteous Government is desirable and may justly be sought as all Christians agree But your profession is that most of your converse is with those that do in faith expect it And could you see no difference between seeking it and in faith expecting it I desire the conversion and salvation of all the men I know and I seek it of God in prayer and of as many of them as I have fit opportunity or ought so to do at least I desire the Conversion of all the Kingdoms and people of the world but whether I may in faith expect it I am so ignorant that I cannot tell I desire and seek by prayer of God that all the world may have holy and just Governours but I cannot boast of so much faith or hope in this as those that you converse with As proud as I am I freely confess my Ignorance to you But certainly they that take it for an Article of their faith do carry the Notion further than I can do who profess that I am ignorant of it whether it be a promised thing or not Sect. 24. E. B. p. 7. Because you dare not own any hazardous and persecuted truth and you find it far easier in your Notional Divinity to recant all that formerly you were convinced of than to bring your heart to a willingness for Martyrdom R. B. 1. You spake of danger before you now add Persecution and Martyrdom intimating that this is such a persecuted point which as far as ever I heard who live in the same Land and have as hard thoughts of persecution as many others have there is not any thing true in your intimation Name the Law that is against the Opinion of the desirableness of a holy Government of all the world Name the person that ever suffered for that Opinion Though those that will resist or pull down Governours because they take them justly or unjustly to be ungodly may suffer for it Again therefore to imply danger of Martyrdom for that which no man that ever I heard of suffered for and to feign the avoiding of that danger to be the Chief Cause of my recanting or changing my mind or words which I never recanted or changed is a monstrous course of fiction and temerity 2. Your talk of Recanting all that formerly I was convinced of implyeth more temerity and falshood Any man of humane modesty would have thought All too bigg a word when the instances produced by him prove nothing If you refer to the Revocation of my Book you should have opened your eyes and seen that I profess not to Recant all the doctrine of it though I revoke all the Book and wish men to take it as non-scriptum And sure that passage had no peculiar recantation 3. But if Recantation be so easie to me remember that I pretend not to Infallibility nor am altogether unwilling to Repent As for Martyrdom I take it to be every Christians duty yea necessary to salvation to prepare for it that is to deny his life and to forsake all in true resolution for the sake of Christ and hopes of Heaven But how far my heart is brought to a willingness of it though I am sure you know not and therefore venture to speak what you know not yet I have no reason to boast nor to be self-consident nor to be high-minded but to fear Sect. 25. E. B. And this alone I take to be the true cause why so weakly and so unlike a Minister of the Gospel you inveigh against sufferings For you have never yet experienced either the comfort or the cleansing of them and therefore venture rashly to speak evil of what you know not and which I fear you have neither courage nor affection to venture the tyral of I speak it to your shame R. B. 1. Thus sin useth like a River to run on the longer the greater Wonderful that you can believe the people that fear God to be so sottishly credulous of all the falshoods that you shall tell them as not so much as to open the Book which you accuse and to see that you deceive them If you will prove that true which you say it must be by this argumentation He that telleth men that sufferings have their temptations as well as prosperity and warneth men to fear and avoid those temptations doth weakly and unlike a Minister of the Gospel inveigh against sufferings But so doth R. B. Ergo But the Major is false and therefore insufficient to support your false Conclusion Let the Reader but peruse my words and if he find one syllable of inveighing against sufferings let him believe you the next time and take you for a man that hath not quite forfeited his credit 2. And what friendship to sin and continued enmity to vigilancy and repentance do you express when you were told an unquestionable truth and but warned of an unquestionable danger and duty to reject all so senslesly and that with such false retortions Tell your followers 1. Is it false or true that sufferings have their temptations as well as Prosperity and in particular to drive us into uncharitableness and extreams from them that we suffer by 2. Are not you and others that suffer in danger of such temptations and sin in sufferings 3. Should not such temptation and sin be carefully watcht against Is there any falshood in all this 4. And is he fit to glory in the cleansing fruit of sufferings that shall falsly say that such a necessary warning is an inveighing against sufferings c. 5. Do you believe that they that turned Quakers in Prison are gainers by their sufferings or they that lose more of their Love than of their Liberties 3. If I never experienced the comfort or cleansing of sufferings I have cause of great lamentation as having suffered very much in vain I will not with Paul here glory in my infirmities but I shall confess that they greatly aggravate my sin
me was He that is not sound in the Doctrine of Justification or to that sense And what made them threaten to disown him if he would not cease such wayes Did ever sober men go about with such general accusations and expect that men answer to they know not what 6. But what are the few words that would satisfie you A yea or a nay What if I say Sir I think I am sound in the doctrine of Justification and I think you speak evil of the things you know not Would that have satisfied you Sect. 32. E. B. And in another place you tell me that you have written the better part of above fifty Books against the prophane the Jews and the Mahumetans I will not enquire to what purpose for I am very confident none of those did ever read what you have written against them But add to these your several other Treatises your Books will in all amount to as many Volumes as Tostatus writ concerning whom and all such kind of Writers you once gave this true Character though since you have most unhappily forgotten it I cannot but account all those Tostatus's as impudently proud who think the world should read no bodies works but theirs Pray Sir read this passage again and compare it with what you have already written and what as I hear you do yet further intend to write and then tell me in earnest what you think of your self R. B. 1. Seeing our debates about Church-dividing must needs be turned to this Whether I am proud I grant you the conclusion that I am proud and what would you have more 2. Your ductile followers that never saw Tostatus know not how you cheat them by these words and that you measure by Number and not by bulk and twenty of some of my Books will not make one of Tostatus's for bigness If you go to number how many more wrote Origen But a Sheet is not so big as a large Volume in folio 3. I never accused Augustine Chrysostom Calvin Zanchy c. as imitating Tostatus And I have not wrote so much as they 4. The best way to cure one that writeth too much is to perswade men not to buy and read it and then the Booksellers will not print it And till you can do that you see that all men are not of your mind And by what obligation am I bound to be of your mind alone rather than of many thousands that are of another and those that still importune me to write more Is it pride only to differ from you and to write against your judgement Or were not the Fathers and Divines fore-mentioned with Rivet Chamier Beza Luther c. yea and Dr. Owen too proud if large Writings be a sign of Pride 5. When you question to what purpose it is to write Books against the Prophane and Jews and Mahumetans that is against Infidelity and to defend the Christian faith you shew what a Guide you are to the Church 6. When you are confident that none of the Prophane c. did ever read what I wrote against them either you believe your self or not If you do how unfit are you to be believed of any that know no better what is credible in a matter of fact Could you think for instance that my Call to the Vnconverted hath been printed so oft I think some scores of thousands and translated into French by Mr. Eliots as he said he was doing into the Indian Tongue and no prophane person ever read it You will take this very instance its like for my pride which you make necessary to shew your temerity and deceit But if you do not believe your self how much less should others believe you 7. Will no sober Readers think that you set your self to do the Devils work against the service of the Church of God by seeking to silence us from writing by your contumely and scorns even from writing against the Prophane and Infidels at a time when we are by others silenced from publick preaching Let your conscience tell you if I had obeyed you from the first and never written whether the Devil or most that have made use of what I wrote would have thankt you more 8. Did not the Primitive Teachers Apostles and others leave us their Examples for Writing as well as for Vocal Teaching And are they not two wayes of predicating or publishing the same Gospel And if so would he serve God or the Devil that would scorn us all as Proud for preaching so much as the best men do 9. And do you not yet see how much you have of the same silencing Spirit which you profess to separate from 10. But your warning for a review hath brought me to Repent of and Retract that passage against Tostatus as being too rashly uttered Because 1. He wrote when good Writers were more scarce than now 2. Because he might be willing that other mens works should be preferred before his and that his own should not be wholly read but partly perused on particulas occasions 3. And it is unseemly to reprove industry Now we come to the Question after all this Sect. 33. IN stating of this Question You do E. B p. 10. your self grant so much that you scarce leave any thing to be either disputed or denyed R. B. Remember Reader that my Professed design on the Title page is 1. To invite all sound and sober Christians by what names soever called to receive each other to Communion in the same Churches 2. And where that which is first desireable cannot be attained to bear with each other in their distinct Assemblies and to manage them all in Christian Love 3. And that under the first head I particularly prove that It is lawful to hold Communion with such Christian Churches as have worthy or tolerable Pastors notwithstanding the Parochial order of them and the Ministers Conformity and use of the Common-Prayer Book This last is the true state of the Question which I affirm with these two limitations or explications That is 1. That it is lawful statedly to communicate as a member with such a Parish Church where we cannot consideratis considerandis have Communion with a better upon lawful termes 2. That those that can have stated Communion with a better may yet lawfully communicate sometimes with such a Parish Church as we may do on just occasion with a Church of Neighbours or Strangers where we live or come Yea that we ought to do so when some special reasons as from Authority Scandal c. do require it These are the summ of my Assertions Though my main cause oblige me as much to prove to a Conformist that he may have Communion with a Church of Non-conformists yet I had no call to prosecute that particularly as I had to the other for the reasons which I rendred at large And this being the Case judge now of this mans Dissent and furious opposition whether sober people have reason to
wonder if others do it by slandering them and perswading all to separate from them And if they say Rom. 3. 7. If the Truth of God hath more abounded through my Lye unto his Glory why yet am I also judged as a sinner But God and Truth may be better served by Truth But falshood must by falshood be upheld But Sir my Reputation is at your service for an honester use but seeing it was but for the destruction of Christian Love and Peace that you designed to make a stepping-stone of it try whether you be not slipt beside it into the dirt Sect. 77. E. B. I thought it my duty to reprove you and to see your sin and error herein in order before you R. B. I have much more sin than you are aware of which all such invitations do call me to renew my sorrow for and vigilancy against But when I once take the Principles of Christian Love and Vnity for sin and the principles and practice of Enmity and Division for my duty I shall then avoid sin as sinfully and lamentably as many in this age have done Sect. 78. E. B. If you will still go on and under pretence of writing for Love do what you can to keep up a mixed disorderly persecuting and imperfect Church-State leaveing us no hope nor possibility of reformation R. B. 1. This is another implyed Untruth that I keep up a persecuting Church-State when I have written so much more than you against it yea that I do what I can to do it as if you thought that we can do no more evil than we do and our power were as small to sin as you make it to be to good But you will find at last that separating from Churches for mixture and imperfection and such disorder as we have now in question and to cloak this with slandering the honest Conforming Ministers with Persecution who lament it in others and never practise it though I am not one that take them to be blameless this will prove a greater hinderance to Reformation than a sober peaceable Christian conversation will be 2. And thus unskilful builders do pull down Did our Separations and Church-divisions these six and twenty years last past promote our Reformation Wonderful That men can yet take that for the reforming way which hath destroyed Reformation and brought us into all the confusions we are in Will all this experience teach us nothing I will cease wondering at the words Luke 16. 31. If they hear not Moses and the Prophets neither will they be perswaded though one rose from the dead And do you not know how your erronious reasonings and practices do occasion men even to scorn at your talk of Reformation and if we did not disown you and renounce your errors and mis-doings the Non-conformists were like to be exposed to common derision for your sake and accounted a sort of men at enmity with sobriety and peace and multitudes were like to be hardened by you into greater evils and enmities than I will name And can any ignorant Mountebanks more mortally and perniciously practise Physick than you thus practise the Reformation of the Churches Which are wounded and torn by such Reformers Sect. 79. E. B. My miscalling you Learned Judicious Mortified is indeed the only untruth which you can justly charge me with R. B. Alas Sir is that sin such a jesting matter Will you end as you begun When you said you had done will you not have done writing untruths When you have no other matter for Vntruths will you make this another to say that no one of thirty three which I named to you can be justly charged on you Ask any sober impartial man who hath read your Book and mine whether you have cleared your self of any one of them or spoken any thing that is considerable and probable to such a purpose Sect. 80. R. B. 23. Mr. Bagshaw having done begins again to call me to recant unseemly abuses of Mr. Brown and one that a Book prefaced by him is written of And he reciteth both their Letters As to Mrs. Letter I give her this account of my thoughts of her and the Book that 's written of her 1. That I make no doubt but all the holy truth which she hath learned all the mortification of sin and reformation of life all the faith in Christ and Love to God and holiness which is in her are the true fruits of the Spirit of God and he is a wretched person that will ascribe these to Melancholy 2. And I doubt not but in a Melancholy distemper as Satan findeth his advantage for some special temptations so God can make his advantage to further the sanctification of such a soul 3. But he that giveth me that Book to read and would have me ignorant that Melancholy had a great hand in her fastings temptations and several conceits there mentioned and this after my experience of multitudes in the like condition yea when I am still wearied out with the Cases of such from time to time doth put an utter impossibility upon me For if my Ignorance herein would gratifie such it is not in my power to be ignorant when I will But I can bear with it in others Therefore her words If this be the effect of Melancholy go on an untrue supposition I have told you what were the effects And her sorrow that I am found deriding the effects she mentioneth is the effect of worse than Melancholly as being founded in her untruth Next this Woman accuseth me with all these following untruths 1. That Brother Browne was the Author of that Book Answ Not a true word I only said that it was published by him as uncontrolled fame affirmed but not that he was the Author I can find no such word in my writings If you can tell me where And doth not his Epistle before it shew that he was one of the Publishers 2. That I was suddenly moved to go hear Mr. Baxter Answ False again I only said was suddenly moved to go into the Church that is As she was passing by in the street not knowing who Preached 3. That ought of his Sermon had any impression upon me which I could not attend to because I was so terrified with the words of the Text Rom. 6. 21. Answ False again I have no such words that ought of my Sermon had any impression on her but only of the Time that before the Sermon was done she oould hardly forbear crying out 4. That I went away resolved upon a holy life Answ Another mistake I said only she went home a changed person Resolved that is did resolve for a holy life That she went home changed she denyeth not for her terrours were some change That she Resolved for a holy life her self and her Book profess But whether as soon as she went home or how many dayes after I never undertook to tell But how could she be Converted without resolving