the Night shineth as the Day The Darkness and the Night are both alike to Thee And forasmuch as the closing of our Eyes to Rest so nearly resembles Death and our Beds are but models of our Graves out of which we must one Day be called by the sound of the last Trump to Arise and come to Judgment Let this and every Evening and every Morning of our Lives put us in mind of our dying Hours And let no worldly Affairs hinder us from being always in a readiness for our last and final Conflict with the Prince and Powers of Darkness who knowing their time is but short will be sure to make their fiercest Assaults upon Departing-Souls when they find them struggling with Bodily pains and sharp Diseases and drawing nigh to their last Agonies And sometimes to terrify them with frightful Dreams and Visions to make them if possible utterly to despair of God's Mercies and to let go their hold and quit their Hopes of Eternal Life and Happiness Make us therefore sensible how highly it concerns us while we have Health of Body and soundness of Mind to arm our selves like good Souldiers with Christian Courage and Resolution for those Death-bed Combats and critical Hours Minutes and Moments of our Lives And because we are to wrestle with invisible Enemies of mighty Power and wonderful Knowledge great Subtilty and long Experience who know too well our Tempers Inclinations and Infirmities and where and how to set upon us with the greatest Advantage Be pleased to send thy blessed Angels and Ministring-Spirits to comfort and assist us in all those siery Tryals and Temptations That so Death which is to so many others the King of Terrors may be to us a kind Friend and a welcome Guest and we may with all cheerfulness quit these Houses of Clay and fleshy Tabernacles and exchange the Troubles and Sorrows of a painful Pilgrimage in a Valley of Tears for the Joys of Heaven and Everlasting Happiness with blessed Saints and Angels in the highest Heavens All which with whatever else Thou knowest to be needful either for us or for any of ours or for any of Thine we humbly beg in the Name and for the sake of the blessed Jesus who in compassion to our Infirmities has taught us thus to pray Our Father which art in Heaven hallowed be thy NAME thy Kingdom come thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven Give us this Day our daily Bread and forgive us our Trespasses as we forgive them that Trespass against us and lead us not into Temptation but deliver us from Evil for thine is the Kingdom the Power and the Glory for ever and ever Amen A MORNING-PRAYER FOR Sundays Fasts and Festivals LET us now fall down and kneel before the Lord our Maker Most Holy Blessed Glorious and incomprehensible Triniry Father Son and Holy Ghost Three Persons and One God Almighty Maker of all Things and Judge of all Men Have mercy upon us miserable Sinners who are by Nature Children of Disobedience and by our actual Sins every Day and Hour of our Lives liable to Divine Wrath and Vengeance Remember not O Lord the many Follies and Vanities of our Child-hood and Youth nor the innumerable Transgressions of our riper Years and how we have always erred and strayed from the Ways of Truth and Righteousness and trod in forbidden Paths through the several Stages of our Lives leaving undone those things which thou hast absolutely commanded and doing those things which thou hast exprelly forbidden and many times drawing upon our selves the guilt of other Men's Sins by our Encouragement Connivance or ill Examples breaking the solemn Vows and Promises either made for us by others in Baptism or by our selves in Times of Danger or Sickness unthankful for Mercies and incorrigible under Judgments rejecting the Motiors of thy blessed Spirit and following the Devices Desires and vain Imaginations of our own Hearts and so running the hazard of losing our precious and immortal Souls for the enjoyment of a few sinful and short-liv'd Pleasures Blessed LORD we cannot but confess and acknowledge with shame and confusion of face that it is a wonder of thy patience and forbearance that we are yet alive and that thou hast not cut us of in the midst of our Sins and Doom'd us to dwell with everlasting Burnings among damned Souls and Spirits But this is our hope and humble confidence that we have to do with the God and Father of Mercies who takes no delight in the death of Sinners but is slow to Anger and ready to forgive all those who sincerely repent and truely believe in our blessed Lord and Saviour CHRIST JESUS for whose coming into the world to save lost Sinners and to open the Kingdom of Heaven to all Believers with Angels and Arch-Angels and all the Company of Heaven we laud and magnify thy great and holy NAME as we likewise do for thy other Mercies and Favours daily and hourly bestowed upon us We bless and praise Thee for giving us a Being in the World for that admirable Frame and Structure of our Bodies while we lay inclosed in our Mother's Wombs for breathing into us the Breath of Life and enduing us with reasonable Souls after thine own Image and Likeness for being Born where the Gospel of thy SON is openly preached and professed and not among Heathens Turks or Infidels For the unparallel'd Pattern of all Goodness in the Life of the holy JESUS and for the pious Examples of the blessed Patriarchs Prophets Apostâ—â—s and Martyrs who are gone before us and with their own Blood have traced out for us the true Way to Life and Happiness beseeching thee that we following their good Examples may with them be made partakers of Everlasting Life in the World to come We thank Thee LORD of Heaven and Earth for the wonderful Works of the Creation of which we all enjoy our shares and proportions for the Sun that shines by Day and for the Moon and Stars That rule by Night and by their regular Motions and sweet Influences serve for Signs and Seasons Days and Years for the Clouds that give Rain and drop Fatness upon our Fields and Pastures and for the Springs that go up by the Mountains and run down among the Vallies for reserving to us the appointed Times of Harvest and giving us the kindly Fruits of the Earth in their due and proper Seasons for our Food and Raiment and all the good things of this Life and our manifold preservations from sundry Dâ—â—â—â— and Dangers ever since we hung upon our Mother's Breasts for protecting us this last Night from many calamitous Accidents which in a Night might have befallen us and bringing us safely to the light of another Day and so giving us a longer time and space for Repentance and Amendment of our Lives most humbly beseeching Thee to continue these thy Mercies and Favours to us and to keep us the remainder of this Day and of our Lives from
of what he teaches he commits a Crime and may be justly punished for the same now this Lobster-like-argument of his being artificially thrown forward does again naturally crawl backwards His meaning is as he has too plainly exprest in many places That if a Man go from hence and preach a New Doctrine in Africa he commits a Crime and consequently St. Jude did very ill after Christ's Resurrection to take a Journey from Jerusalem into Persia and there to take upon him to rebuke the Superstition of the Magi and to preach a New Doctrine and so was put to death deservedly The like may be said of St. Paul for his making a Mutiny and Uproar at Athens and disturbing the Worship of the great Goddess Diana of the Ephesians And in fine both he and all the Apostles committed great Crimes in presuming to preach New Doctrine amongst all Nations where Idolatry was Established and owned by publick Authority for says the same Author page 152. To maintain a Doctrine contrary to the Religion Established is a greater Fault in an authorized Preacher than in a private Person And therefore they all suffered condign Punishments and were accessary to their own cruel Deaths But now this reflects more severely upon our blessed Saviour who gave his Disciples their Commissions Matth. 28. 19. Go yee and teach all Nations baptizing them in the Name of the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost And which is yet more it reflects upon God the Father who sent his Son into the World for that end and purpose and also the Holy Spirit which was sent down from Heaven after our Saviour's Resurrection to inspire those Apostles with diversity of Tongues and such other miraculous Gifts as might rightly qualify them for the preaching the Gospel throughout all the Nations of the World So that this last Assertion is in effect Blasphemy against the Three Persons of the sacred Trinity Our blessed Saviour 10 Matth. 33. Says Whosoever shall deny me before Men him will I also deny before my Father which is in Heaven And in another place By your Words you shall be justified and by your Words condemned So that to deny Christ before Men is our Saviour's sense in a Crime that excludes and shuts a Man out of Heaven But this Author affirms positively page 271. That the denying of Christ before an Infidel Prince is not a Christian's Act but his Soveraign's Act and consequently no Sin And so he plainly gives the Son of God the Lye Our blessed Saviour when he sent out his Disciples 10 Matth. 15. Tells them That into whatsoever City they entred and were not received it should be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment than for that City That is to say the refusing to receive and hear the Doctrine of Christ's Disciples was a greater Sin then that of Sodom But this Author tells us page 286. That those who refused so to hear and receive them did not Sin in so doing And here we see again the Arrogance and Impudence of the same Author in giving the Lye to the Lord Jesus Our Hebrew Masters do indeed teach us to read the Words and Sentences of part of the Scriptures but this politick Pedagogue would instruct us to read not only the Words and Sentences but the true Sense and Meaning of them backwards Our Saviour Christ in divers places owns his casting out Devils and unclean Spirits and sometimes these unclean Spirits owned him to be the Son of the most high God as did the Legion of Devils with which the Man was possessed in the Country of the Gadarenes 5 Mark 7. and divers others And the Pharisees the worst and most malicious of his Enemies acknowledged his casting out Devils Yet notwithstanding the composer of this Treatise had the Confidence to affirm page 354. That no Man was ever possessed with any other Spirit than that by which his Body was naturally moved And so gives the Lye not only to our Saviour but to all the Four Evangelists who have left upon Record most remarkable Instances of those Miracles In page 62 63 and 64. this Author tells us That Man by Nature is in a State of War every Man against every Man and every Man has a right to every thing over the Goods and Body of his Neighbour And yet in his next Chapter which is not above eight pages further he sets down Ten Laws of Nature which Laws of Nature are immutable and eternal and stamped upon Men's Souls and every of them tends to Peace and Quietness Love and Kindness Gratitude and doing to others as we would be willing they should do to us and these two Assertions are as contrary one to the other as Light is to Darkness however it is much more modest to give himself the Lye then to give it so often as he has done to the Saviour of the World and the second Person of the Trinity In page 88. he acquaints us That by the People assembled are transferr'd all their Right on him whom they chose their Soveraign which Soveraign can do no Injustice though at his pleasure he take away any of their Lives And yet page 152. he asserts That no Man in the institution of their Soveraign can be supposed to give away the Right of preserving his own Body And page 112. If an Assembly meet and agree together they may rebel and make War against their Soveraign And I affirm that no Man of Sense or Reason can be supposed to defend the Authors reputation in so notorious a Contradiction In page 285. and divers other places he affirms That Christ's Kingdom not being of this World he left the Jews to the Law of Moses and other Nations to their respective Soveraigns and yet page 106. he plainly affirms That Christ acted in this World as King of the Jews and by his Soveraign Power and Authority sent two of his Disciples to untie and bring away the She-ass and her Colt on which he was to ride into Jerusalem Page 62. He affirms That the Desires and Passions of Man are no Sin though it be an absolute Breach of the Tenth Commandment Our Saviour forbids swearing by Heaven Earth Jerusalem or a Man 's own head 5 Matth. 34 35 36. but this Author asserts page 71. That such kind of Oaths is no swearing and so makes our Saviour guilty of Lying Page 152. he says That every man is supposed to know the Law of Nature it being so plain and yet pag. 141. he avers That the Law of Nature is of all Laws the most obscure Pag. 261. he says Christ s death did not satisfy God 's justice and yet pag. 356. he acknowledges That the Passion of Christ is a full Ransom for all manner of Sins Pag. 272. he affirms That there were no true Martyrs but those who conversed with our Saviour while he was here upon Earth and that he who is no Minister can be no Martyr Now if so all other Martyrs have
to all intents and purposes most spiteful and malicious O cruel Satan Was there not room enough for thee and all thy Infernal Crew to range up and down in the vast and wide Expanse without intruding so rudely and abruptly into Paradise O spiteful old Dragon What Wrong or Injury did our first Parents do to thee while they were dressing the Garden which their MAKER had so lately placed them in that thou shouldest invent so hellish a Stratagem and in Masquerade make so fatal an Address at once to rob them of their Innocence disturb their present Peace and disappoint them of their future Happiness Be therefore for ever accursed O Beelzebub Thou Prince of Devils and true Original of all Sin and Wickedness for thy malicious Practises to deceive all the Nations of the World for so many Thousand Years whenas thou canst not be ignorant but that the Sins of every Soul that thou has tempted be it Saved or be it Damned shall one Day be set to thy Accompt and add Degrees to thy Eternal Torment From all Evil and Mischief and from all the Crafts and Assaults of the Devil and all his Infernal Spirits Good Lord deliver us Now here I doubt not but that the ingenious Reader will expect I should insert some short Discourse concerning Blessed and Apostate Spirits and I could heartily wish I had a sufficient Knowledge of and Insight into those Mysteries to answer fully his desires But I am afraid on the one side that he would be very little satisfied with my Endeavours in case I should in imitation of a late learned Author try to squeeze a plausible Description of LOST PARADISE out of St. John's Vision in the Isle of Patmos and fancy to my self a formal and pitcht Battle upon a vast and wide Plain in the North part of Heaven fought between two mighty Hosts of Blessed and Revolted Spirits conducted and led up by mighty Arch-Angels for their Generals riding in Brazen Chariots drawn by foaming Steeds and clad with Adamantine Coats one of which was by a massy Sword cut down to the wast and stain'd with Angelick blood Where the one of these Armies dug up the Terrain of Heaven and with the Materials they there found made Powder Bullets and great Guns it is pity that Bombs were not in use when he wrote that Treatise and with them did great Execution upon their Enemies who in Revenge tore up great Mountains by the Roots and hurl'd them at their Heads with a great number of other Romantick Stories which is Ludere cum Sacris and much fitter for Poets and Painters who when they are got to the top of their Pâ—rnassus frame to themselves Idea's of what Chimera's or Goblins they please And on the other side I judge it altogether needless to make use of the Dark-Lanterns of Homer Ovid Virgil or any of the old Heathen Poets or to borrow the dim Tapers and blinking Lights of Plato Aristotle Seneca or any of those half-Half-Divine Philosophers or to be beholding to the School-men for their vain Distinctions and splitting of Hairs with their lame Definitions and Explanations of Obscurum per Obscurius Neither am I willing to tire my Reader with endless Quotations out of the Ancient Pious and Learned Fathers who were for the most part somewhat tender in delivering their Opinions about the Doctrin of Spirits but wisely waved the positive Determination of Questions relating to the Invisible World and those deep Mysteries of Incorporeal Beings as not to be fathom'd by the Line and Plummet of Human Understanding And therefore I shall content my self with what Light I can get from the Holy Scriptures and where those are either obscure or silent to be very cautious sober and modest 1. That there were are and ever shall be true and real Subsistencies of Good and Evil Angels the following Passages of Sacred Writ do plainly inform us viz. Before the Angels of God 12 Luke 8. He shall come with all his holy Angels 25 Matth. 31. If God spared not the Angels that sinned 2 Pet. 2. 4. The Angels that kept not their first Estate Jud. 6. The Angels came 4 Matth. 11. Out of whom went 7 Devils 8 Luke 2. Everlasting Fire Prepared for the Devil and his Angels 25 Matth. 41. But are as the Angels in Heaven 22 Matth. 30. 2. As concerning the Time when the Angels were Created it may be conjectured by comparing several Texts of Scripture and making the following Inference viz. The Sons of God and the Morning-Stars are put together and the Morning-Stars were made before the Earth Job 38. And the Earth was made three Days before the Stars in the Firmament Gen. 1. And consequently Morning Stars cannot be meant Stars of the Firmament Again by Stars are meant Angels 12 Rev. 4. And by the Heavenly Host are meant Angels 2 Luke 13. and 1 Kings 19. 21. And the Heavens and Heavenly Hosts are joined together 2 Gen. And the Heavens said to be Created the First Day Therefore it seems probable that the Sons of God otherwise the Morning-Stars or which is the same thing Angels or the Host of Heaven were created on the first of the Six Days in the Morning 3. That there were great Numbers of both Blessed and Apostate Angels we are assured from several Passages in the Old and New Testament More than 12 Legions or as some compute it 79992 Angels 26 Matth. 23. Thousand Thousands ministred unto him and Ten Thousand times Ten Thousand stood before him 7 Dan. 10. and 5 Rev. 11. An innumerable Company of Angels 12. Heb. 22. A multitude of the Heavenly Host 2 Luke 13. His Tail drew a Third part of the Stars of Heaven 12 Rev. 4. My Name is Legion for we are many 5 Mark 9. Now if Solomon who was LORD but of a very small Spot of the Terrestrial Globe which Globe is by us thought to be little more than a Point if compared with the Starry Firmament had so many Attendants What Number should we think a fit Retinue for the KING of KINGS and LORD of LORDS Myriades Myriadum will be too small a Summ And so will our ordinary Terms of Arithmetick and we must be forced to borrow some of the learned Commentator upon Archimedes his Arenarius and say Billions Trillions Quadrillions c. of blessed Angels to attend his Throne and to make up the Court of Heaven 4. That there were different Orders and Degrees of Good and Evil Spirits we have reason to believe from the following Texts viz. The great Prince Michael 12 Dan. 1. Beelzebub the Prince of Devils 11 Luke 15. The Prince of the Power of the Air 2 Ephes 2. The Voice of the Arch-Angel 2 Thess 4. 16. Thrones or Dominions Principalities or Powers 1 Coloss 16. Michael and his Angels and the Devil and his Angels 12 Rev. 3. 9. 5. That all the blessed Angels which attend God's Throne are Ministring Spirits and sometimes appeared in Humane shapes we find in the following Texts
and Delusions and Idolatrous Worship of divers kinds so as to make sure of them in the main and always hold them fast within his Clutches Thus in the foregoing Instance of the Tunquineses the Hermite Chacabout left behind him Ten Commandements which he enjoined his Followers to observe with all manner of strictness viz. First Not to Kill Secondly Not to Steal Thirdly Not to defile their Bodies Fourthly Not to Lye Fifthly Not to falsify their Words Sixthly To restrain their inordinate Desires Seventhly Not to do Injury to any Man Eighthly Not to be great Talkers Ninthly Not to give way to their Anger Tenthly To labour to their utmost to get Knowledge Besides all this They who designed to lead a Religious Life must renounce the Delights of this Life be Charitable to the Poor overcome their Passions and give themselves up to Meditation He taught moreover That after this Life there were Ten distinct Places of Joy and Torment and that the Contemners of these Laws should feel Torment proportionable to their Offences without any End of their Torments That they who endeavoured to fulfil his Law and had failed in any point should wander in divers Bodies holding Transmigration of Souls for the space of Three Thousand Years before they entred into Happiness But that those who had perfectly Obeyed his Laws should be rewarded without suffering any Change of their Bodies And that he himself had been Born ten times before he enjoyed the Bliss that he possessed not having in his first Youth been illuminated with that Knowledge which he afterwards attained Reflection As for his Ten Commands and his other Instructions immediately following one would think at first sight that this Impostor had collected them out of the Holy Scriptures save only that there is not a Word therein that has the least regard to a Saviour or Messias But alass that subtil old Serpent and Prince of Darkness who is so perfect a Hater of the Saviour of the World and of Humane Race makes it his principal Care and Caution to keep all his Subjects and Vassals from the least Knowledge of those divine Mysteries which relate to the holy JESUS For my part I am apt to believe altho' so many Ages have past since the Martyrdom of the blessed Apostles among the Pagans and Barbarians who undoubtedly converted very great numbers of them while they lived amongst them that some of these Converts left behind them many pious Instructions to their Children who also left the same to their Children and so from Generation to Generation which in process of time were corrupted by Satan's Artifices being confounded and intermingled with a great number of foolish and extravagant Traditions Of this I shall here take the freedom to mention one famous Instance There were about fifteen Years since as a Traveller assures me who was himself in those parts and probably are to this day living above Twenty thousand Families of a certain People who call themselves Christians or Disciples of St. John from whom they pretend to have received their Faith their Books and Traditions These people inhabit at present at Balsara about ten days Voyage from that place where the River Tigris divides it self into two Arms the one running through the ancient Chaldaea and the other towards Mesopotamia in view of which stands an old Wall of about a League in compass which the Chronicles of that Country say was the Ruins of the ancient Babylon upon which Wall six Coaches may go abreast being made of burnt Brick each Brick ten Foot square and three Foot thick These Christians of St. John anciently lived by the River of Jordan where St. John baptized and so from him they took their Name But since the time that Mahomet conquered Palestine although he had given them his Hand and Letter of Privilege not to be molested his Successors resolved to extirpate them ruining their Churches burning their Books and exercising all manner of Cruelties upon their Persons which obliged them to retire into Mesopotamia and Chaldaea and for some time they were under the Patriarch of Babylon from whom they separated about 175 Years since and then removed into Persia and Arabia and the Towns round about Balsara Their Creed is full of Fables and soul Errors They never Baptize but in Rivers and only upon Sundays But before they go to the River they carry the Infant to Church where there is a Bishop who reads certain prayers over the head of the Child from thence they carry it to the River with a train of Men and Women who together with the Bishop go up to the knees in Water then the Bishop reads again certain prayers out of a Book which he holds in his hand which done he sprinkles the Infant three times saying Beesme brad Er-rabi Kaddemin Akreri Menhal el Gennet Alli Koulli Kralek which is in English In the Name of the LORD first and last of the WORLD and of PARADISE the high Creator of all Things After that the Bishop reads something again out of his Book while the Godfather plunges the Child all over in the water after which they all go to the Parents house to feast If any tax their Baptism for insufficient in regard the Three Persons of the Trinity are not mentioned therein they give no reasonable Answer nor have they any knowledge of that Mystery only they say that Christ is the Spirit and Word of the Eternal Father They believe the Angel Gabriel to be the Son of God begotten upon Light yet will not believe the Eternal Generation of Christ as God although they confess he became Man to free us from the punishment of Sin and that he was conceived in the Womb of a Virgin without the knowledge of Man by means of the Water of a certain Fountain which she drank of They believe he was Crucisied by the Jews That he rose the Third Day and that his Soul ascended up to Heaven his Body remaining upon Earth but withal That Christ vanished when the Jews came to take him and that he deluded their Cruelty with his shadow In the Eueharist they make use of Meal kneaded up with Wine and Oil the Wine they make with Grapes dried in the Sun and casting water upon them let them steep a long time and with that they Consecrate the Cup The Arabians under whose Government they live not permitting them the use of ordinary Wine The Words of their Consecration are no other then long Prayers but make no mention of Christ's Body or Blood which they say is not necessary because God knows their intention After the Ceremonies are ended the Priest eats some of the Bread and distributes the rest to the people All their Bishops wear their Hair long with a little Cross wrought with a needle These People believe and say That the Angel Gabriel undertaking to create the World according to God's Command took along with him Three hundred thirty six Thousand Demons and made the Earth so fertile
that it was but to Sow in the Morning and Reap at Night That the same Angel taught Adam to plant and sow and all other necessary Sciences Moreover That the same Angel made the Seven lower Spheres the least whereof reaches to the Center of the World in the same manner as the Heavens do all continued one within another and that all these Spheres are of different Mettals That next the Center of Iron the Second of Lead the Third of Brass the Fourth of Laten the Fifth of Silver the Sixth of Gold and the Seventh of Earth which contains all the rest They believe that over every Heaven there is Water and that the Sun swims in a Ship upon that Water and that the Mast of that Ship is a Cross and that there are a great number of Boys and Girls to guide the Ships of both Sun and Moon Besides they have the picture of a Bark which they say belonged to the Angel Bachan whom God sends to visit the Sun and Moon to see whether they move exactly and keep close to their Duty In reference to the other World and Life to come They believe there is no other World but where Angels and Divels together with the Souls of Good and Bad reside That in that World there are Cities Houses and Churches and likewise that the Evil Spirits have their Churches where they pray singing and rejoycing upon Instruments and feasting as in this World That when any one lies at the point of Death three hundred and sixty Demons come and carry his Soul to a place full of Serpents Dogs Lions Tigers and Devils who if it be the Soul of a wicked Man tear it in pieces but if it be the Soul of a just Man it creeps under the Bellies of those Creatures into the presence of God who sits in his Seat of Majesty to judge the World That there are also Angels who weigh the Souls of Men in a Ballance and those who are thought worthy are immediately admitted into Glory That Angels and Devils are Male and Female and beget Children and that the Angel Gabriel has a Daughter called Sâ—â—ret who has two Sons That the Angel Gabriel has several Legions of Demons under him who are instead of Souldiers and others that are his Officers of Justice whom he sends from Town to Town and from City to City to punish the wicked They hold that Christ left 12 Apostles to preach to the Nations That the Virgin Mary is not dead but lives somewhere in the World though no body knows where and that next to her St. John is to be the chiefest Saint in Heaven and next to them Zacharias and Elizabeth of whom they recount several Miracles and Apocryphal Tales That when St. John came to be of Age his Father and Mother married him and also that he had four Sons which he begat upon the Waters of Jordan and not upon the Body of his Wife That he died a natural Death but commanded his Disciples to Crucify him after his death that he might be like Christ and lastly that he died in the City of Fuster and was buried in a chrystal Tomb brought to that City by a Miracle and that this Sepulchre was in a certain House near the River Jordan They highly adore the Cross because say they we have a Book wherein it is written That every Day early in the Morning the Angels take the Cross and put it in the middle of the Sun which receives its Light from it as the Moon does also hers And that without these Crosses neither Sunnor Moon would give any Light and the Ships they were in would suffer Shipwrack Their Festivals are Three the one is in Winter that lasts three Days in memory of our First Parent and the Creation of the World The Second in August and called the Feast of St John The Third lasts five Days in June during which time they are all Re-baptized On Sunday they do no work They neither Fast nor do any Penance They have no Canonical Books but a great number of others that treat of nothing but Witchcraft in which they believe their Priests to be very crafty and that the Devils are at their beck They suffer no Women to go to Church nor any of the Laity to kill a Hen or any Fowl They eat of nothing drest by the Turks and after a Turk has drunk in one of their Cups they break it to pieces and picture Mahomet and four of his Parents as shut up in Hell and say That all Turks are carried to the same place to be devoured by wild Beasts They all pretend to Salvation by a Promise made by God to Gabriel on their behalf when he framed the World They have a great Antipathy against the blew Colour called Indigo which they will not so much as touch For say they certain Jews dreaming that their Laws should be abolished by St. John told it their Country-men which they understanding and seeing that St. John prepared to baptize Christ in a great rage fetch a vast quantity of Indigo in their Language Nill and flung it into Jordan which continued unclean for some time and had hindred the Baptism of Christ had not God sent his Angels with a large Vessel of Water which he caused them to fill out of Jordan before the Jews had defiled it with Indigo and that for the foresaid bold Attempt to defile the River God particularly cursed that Colour Ejaculation How long O Lord Holy and True wilt thou cease to be avenged of that Prince of Darkness for tyrannizing and triumphing over the poor Heathens and beguiling them with his Sorceries Witchcrafts and Enchantments for so many thousand Years How long wilt thou suffer that Enemy of Souls secretly to divert and please himself by seeing such vast numbers of his Slaves and Vassals to take more pains undergo more hardships and to endure more exquisite bodily Torments in travelling along the Broad way and passing through the wide Gate that leads to endless Woes and Miseries than thou sufferest a great number of thine own Elect and chosen Servants to meet with in the Narrow Way and in their passage through the straight Gate that leads to Eternal Life But to return to my Observations of the Devil's practices When God had covenanted with Abraham that his Seed should be multiplied as the Stars of Heaven and inherit the Promised Land What Stone did Satan leave unturn'd Or what Opportunities did he ever lose of attempting to frustrate God's gracious Designs His first Atchievement was to exasperate Esaâ— to murder his Brother Jacob upon whose individual Person his aged Father had so lately fixt a Blessing and out of whose Loyns were to come forth 12 Tribes whose Posterity were to be as innumerable as the Sands of the Sea hoping that he being once removed the blessed Effects of all God's promises would be utterly vacated and disappointed When Jacob's Family were kindly received by K. Pharaoh and the Egyptians How