chief aim Therefore if any man be in Christ he is a new creature old things are past away behold all things are become new As if he should say This proves those that are in Christ to be new creatures that their aims and ends are holy and spiritual which is too high for an unregenerate man whose faith and love to them and concerning them is much too weak to steer the course of their lives as those that are bound for Christ and Heaven And as their ends so the means is altered for as before they shaped their whole course to please the flesh 't is now conformed to pleasing the Lord and providing for their souls welfare And whereas it is said though we have known § 12. Christ after the flesh c. It may refer to the Apostles in whose person the Apostle speaks though he himself were not concerned with them who did sometimes dream of being great in the world and sharing with Christ in an earthly kingdome but now being better informed and attained to a higher and more noble degree of spiritual understandings and affections they were crucified to those childish and carnal designs and their considerations of Christ in his glorified body and his exaltation in Heaven at the Fathers righthand did raise their souls to a longing after a further and compleat view of his glory and sharing with him in his heavenly Kingdome This is sutable to the eighth Verse of this Chapter which hath some Contexture with Verse 16. We are confident I say and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Then Christ was not in them as in his Heaven and Glory To conclude I beseech you who are engaged with the Quakers from the good opinion you have of their § 13 Tenets or from the other respects which may quickly produce their entertainment do not think it a light thing to disown him who must be your Redeemer or you must for ever perish or that the difference between the true Christ and any thing else that is so called is so small that you may wink and choose no danger of miscarrying which ever be your foundation If ye believe not that I am he ye shall die in your sins was the saying of Truth it self and he was not the light within but the man Christ Jesus who was then in Judea and no where else who is now in Heaven not on earth How is it that the Apostles whose knowledg of and zeal for Christ is not to be equalled by any of ours did preach Christ so abundantly by the name of JESVS which was the proper name of his humane nature and as the CHRIST which is a name proper to God and man in one person he that is the all sufficient Saviour and not by the name of the light within which is not to be found once in the Scripture and where the words are found which Christ himself spake which is but once it may be a terrible and a seasonable monitor to you But if the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness I beg of you once more to weigh what I have written in this Chapter and beg for you that the Lord would give you understanding in all these things CHAP. XVI The Quakers are gross Idolaters and Quakerism gross Idolatry THere have been great Contests in the world SECT I about the imputation of this Character of Idolaters and what is Idolatry Some have contended That not only a false worship though of the true God is Idolatry and by consequence that those who live in the practice of such a worship are Idolaters but also that any Appendices to that worship of God which in the substance of it is true worship are also Idolatry being of mans invention and added by his own proper Authority as a part of divine worship and that so doing is a crime against the second Commandment in the Decalogue or ten words or Commandments written in tables of stone The proof of my Charge against the Quakers will not depend upon such nice and disputable premises but if there be any such thing as Idolatry in the whole world I shall prove them guilty in the highest degree And because this Charge looks very big and would be no small sin against both the principles and persons of those concerned if untrue and also that such a crime of theirs is not so visible to the world as may be within the cognizance and notice of all who converse with them I shall dispose my Argument plainly and formally All those that own and profess that to be God which is § 2 not God are gross Idolaters But the Quakers own and profess that to be God which is not God Therefore the Quakers are gross Idolaters My second proof is in this Argument All those who worship that as God professedly and according to their professed principles which is not God are gross Idolaters But the Quakers do so Therefore they are gross Idolaters My first Argument I shall first prosecute and with that perspicuity as will be apparent to all that are not more blind than Bats For the first Proposition viz. That all those that own and profess that to be God which is not God are gross Idolaters I know none but will grant the truth of it who in matters of a religious nature can discern their right hands from their left The Minor or second proposition of my Syllogism I am concerned to confirm Here will be the issue depending and if this be throughly proved no man convinced thereof but will sit down by the conclusion That the Quakers are gross Idolaters I shall manage my proof of this by these two § 3 Syllogisms They who own and profess the light within every man to be God own and profess that to be God which is not God But the Quakers do own and profess the light within every man to be God Therefore The Quakers own and profess that to be God which is not God Again They that own and profess the souls or spirits of all or some men which are constitutive parts of all or some men to be God do own and profess that to be God which is not God But the Quakers do own and profess so Therefore They own and profess that to be God which is not God The first Syllogism I shall manage in the first place the Major and Minor of which I shall fully prove And although some have attempted the conviction of the Quakers by shewing the natural faculties of light in man to be far short of what they ascribe to it I shall not go their way to work for so long as the Quakers hold their light within to be Christ or God 't is vain to restrain it to less than infinite And I having to do with those whose opinion of the light within depends on such a conceit I shall prove the light within every man not to be Christ or God
that may be crowded into a little room but a body of flesh bloud and bones to be within a man surely no woman with child ready to be delivered would by her swelling and bigness proclaim it to the eyes of all beholders more effectually than such who should be so inmated And although they talk of all this being by faith S. 2. they must give me leave to tell them that though faith in Christ be so in the heart of a believer that it doth thereby enjoy the blessed effects and fruits of the Redeemer yet while the faith in Christ is in the heart the man Christ in his person or if you will his glorified body flesh bloud and bones is as far from them as beyond the visible Heavens And I care not if I mind you of the Popishness of their conceit near of kin to Transubstantiation but that is but an Infant-absurdity to this that one single body one individual man of flesh bloud and bones should be entirely in so many places at once as in every Quaker yea every man and woman in the world But it may be the Quakers being the only Masters of the Mysteries can say more for it than we can imagine I am sure more than any man in his wits can believe Let us therefore give them the hearing before we § 3 Fox great mystery c. p. 286. dismiss this importunate Candidate with Ignoramus or a condemning Verdict Now the woman here hath a husband to ask at home and not usurp authority over the man but Christ in the Male as in the Female who redeems from under the Law and makes free from the Law the man may speak Christ in the Male and Female who are in the Spirit of God are not under the Law but the Whore who drinks the bloud of the Saints is gone from her husband from under the Law to ask the Whoremaster that doth drink the bloud of the Saints which Christ the seed judgeth upon to whom he gives judgment I have transcribed the more of this Answer of George Fox's that you may see what spiritual rare matter the Quakers swallow from the hand of Fox's infallible and inspired Authority the Chief among that Sect. The non-sense and rarity of the Exposition of the Apostles Inhibition of Womens speaking in the Church I shall leave you to construe and descant upon But you find him owning a man Christ in the Male and in the Female The clearest Expositor that I have met with among the Quakers of this Mystery is Isaac Pennington Two passages of many I shall quote out of him Was not the Word made flesh And did not the Word § 4 Pennington's questions to the professors of Christianity p. 29. p. 20. made flesh dwell and appear in a Tabernacle of flesh and cause the glory of his own divine flesh to shine through the earthly flesh Is it the flesh and bloud of the body which was prepared for and taken by him wherein he tabernacled and appeared Or is it the flesh and bloud of hiâ— who took tabernacled and appeared in that body For that which he took upon him was our garment even the flesh and bloud of our nature which is of an earthly perishing nature and his flesh and bloud and bones are of his nature c. The scope of this judicious Author in many Pages a non-such for new discoveries is to let us know that there was a heavenly spiritual divine body constituted of flesh bloud and bones in which Christ came from Heaven and that he put that body into the other body of our nature which he took of the Virgin and that outermost body of our nature he left behind when he ascended into Heaven no body knows where And this heavenly spiritual body nothing of kin to Abraham David Mary according to the flesh is the man Christ which is in the Quakers and so the Quakers are as compleat Christs as ever the Son of Mary was for they also have the divine nature of Christ dwelling in a body of spiritual flesh and bloud and that dwelling in those their bodies which we see and are but the outward tabernacles of the God and the man Christ Jesus And when they speak and what they act all is but the words and deeds of this man Christ within the bodies of every he and she Quakers and so no more they but Christ in them However ridiculous this may seem to be it is no more but what they as seriously own as any Article in their Creed I say no more on this particular but that he that can digest such fables as these hath a stomack hotter than an Ostrich The Quakers in their opinion of the divine nature ECT. III. of their Christ are exceeding superfluous and they have not more diminishing thoughts of the humane nature of the true Christ whose body they have doom'd to perish into dust and corruption than they have magnifying apprehensions of the divinity of their false Christ Their Tenet which Iam next to consider is That every man and woman in the world have in them a saving light from Christ and this light is no other but Christ the Saviour and God eternal and there is no other Saviour but it It hath been the opinion of some before the Quakers known in the world that by the redemption of Christ called universal all men have a sufficient light given them from God the utmost improvement of which will prove saving but far were they from accounting this light to be the Christ the Saviour However alien my thoughts may be from this Tenet it is not my work here to consider it But that peculiar to the Quakers that the light within every man is Christ and the only Saviourand very God Although there are none of them will stick to proclaim § 2 this on the house-top yet I shall for general satisfaction give it you under their hands And no one Fox great mystery c p. 8. knows salvation but who knows this Christ in you who is the salvation and where he is within there is salvation And this Christ in us is be in whom our salvation Smith Cat. c. p. 64. standeth as the Mediator between God and man the man Christ Jesus And we also know and believe that he is the same p. 71. Christ in us which in dispensations past did humble himself to the Cross And you whom the Prince of the â—â—wer of the air § 3 Fox the younger p. 49 50. hath led out of me you scorn me the light in you They have disobeyed it and called it a natural light and ye have said that I the light am not able to save those that believe in me That if you would believe and wait in me the light p 54. I will purge out all your iniquities and forgive all your trespasses and I will change your nature and I will make you new creatures if you will hearken to me
crucifying within us by disobedience to the light in our Consciences A strange merit and purchase of Salvation and way of pacifying the wrath of God for sin D Damnation Being condemned within by the light in the Conscience and the terrour and affliction arising from thence but nothing of a pain of sense after the body is dead and turned to dust Darkness Not acknowledging the light in every man to be Christ and being guided by its immediate teachings as the only and all-sufficient Rule Death of Christ The light within not obeyed The dead Body The Body living in sin Disciples of Christ No other but those who submit to the light within and follow only its dictates E Election Christ the seed not the persons of men and women Vulturous-Eye The understanding faculty piercâ—ng into and earnestly seeking after Divine Knowledge F Faith A believing in the light within Righteousness of Faith Those acts of Obedience performed by themselves in their own bodies conformable to the dictates of the light withinâ— and in the Faith of its being Christ and the Rule Teaching or doing falsly When not from the immediate motions and teachings of the light within though what is taught be in its self true and what is done be in its self good False Prophets All that are called by men however qualified otherwise all that teach from or out of the Scriptures and not from immediate inspiration as the Prophets and Apostles by whom the Scriptures were penned False Witnesses All who speak not from inspiration and inward meerly divine motions and experience not what they affirm in themselves Flesh Whatever is not from the light within originally and immediately Wisdom of the flesh All Wisdom attained by industry Denying Christ come in the flesh Denying Christ come in the Flesh of Joseph John Sarah or any other who are Quakers Christ come in the flesh Come in their Flesh The Flesh of Christ The Spiritual Flesh that descended from Heaven not the Flesh that lay buried in the Sepulchre after death The Fold of Christ Christ himself Following Christ Obedience to the light within The Friends Friends All professed Quakers The will of the Flesh All that is chosen by man though he be thereto disposed by the will of God revealed in the Scripture G Preaching for Gain Receiving any thing as the reward of preaching the Gospel State of Glory The State of Peace and Joy resulting from the witness of the light within in this life GOD. Father Son and Holy Ghost without distinction the light within every 〈◊〉 the spirit of the Quakers every one of them the soul the seed and much 〈◊〉 that he is not Foundation of God The light within and the inspirations and motions of it The Gospel Christ the light within not the written Word or the sense of it as a Narrative of the good will of God to men in Christ H Handled the Word of Life Not as the Apostles who handled the Body of Christ but feeling by a spiritual sensation the motions of the light within or the Christ within them Hearing the Gospel or Word Listening to and obeying the light within Heaven Not the place where the Man Christ is above or beyond the visible Skies but the happiness they have within them I could never yet hear or read them mention any other Heaven to be enjoyed by them as distinct persons but what they have within them in this world Hell The present torment and loss within Preaching for Hire Hirelings To have provision for the oâ—tward man as a maintenance or reward for preaching though no bargain be made yea though such who receive it would preach iâ— they had never a peny reward in this world from those they preach to Holiness Obedience to the light within and that without any failing The womans Husband at home Christ the light in the conscience I Idolatry Often for worshipping the Man Christ Jesus who is at the right hand of God above or beyond the Stars and visible Heavens taking the examples of the Saints and Churches in the Scripture recorded and doing likewise JESVS The light within the Word in the beginning not the Son of Mary who was made or created The Imaginations All conclusions how demonstrable soever which accord not with their Tenets or are not by immediate inspiration Inchantments Bewitchings A being perswaded and established by Reason and Scripture but especially if humane Artâ— or Sciences have any hand in it Infidels All that obey not or do not place their Salvation in the light within Workers of Iniquity All that live not without sinning against God The Judgment day of Judgment Sin being judged in the Conscience by the light within in this life Justification Christ the light within obeyed K Kingdom of God The Rule and Government of the light within and the peace and joy arising from thence Carnal knowledge All knowledge but what comes by the immediate inspiration of the light within L The Law Christ the light within the Law written in the heart Leadings in Spirit The motions of the light within immediate inspirations and teachings The life Christ the light within The life of Christ The prevalency of the light within Eternal life Being taken into God Saved by the Life of Christ A being saved by the prevalency of the light in the conscience The Letter The dead Letter The Letter that killeth The Scriptures or written Word A Lye Lying What is spoken though true in it self if not from immediate teaching or the light within The Light within Christ God Father Son Spirit the seed of Abraham and David according to the flesh Jesus the only Saviour the Law the Testimony the Gospel the Prophets the Advocate Righteousness Sanctification Justification the only Rule Guide Teacher Judge the Way the only way to the Father the Truth the Life the Power of God the Eternal God God Almighty that which pardons and conquers sin the Judgment the Lamb of God that is slain from the beginning the Word in the beginning the Creator of all things the end of all Books Laws and abundance more than can be crowded into many Pages The Lust All desires that accord not to the light within and proceed not from thence M The Man Christ The spiritual Body of Flesh Blood and Bones which they say descended from Heaven and dwelt in the Body of the Son of Mary and doth also now in every Quaker Cease from man do not hear man What the Faculties of Man have any hand in either by inventing working or expressing all that comes not purely from the light within Measure of God of Christ of the Spirit That degree of the power and inspirations of the light within Something more or less of the very being and Essence of God the Father Son Spirit Meditate Not pondering or exercising the judgment and understanding on holy and divine Objects but a stilness and emptiness of all thoughts attending for the immediate impulses suggestions inspirations and motions of the
Moses and other Prophets were seized with at the appearance of God The Truth No other but Christ the light within Speaking Truth Truly When it is spoken from immediate inspiration and motion of the Spirit but however true without these it is falsly spoken Witnessing to the Truth Declaring or suffering for the light within and its dictates V The flesh of the Vail The Body wherein Christ dwelt and tabernacled which for a while he took of the Virgin Mary but at the death of that left it no body knows where The Vail is over them The belief of the Man Christ Jesus which was of our Nature to be the Christ and now existing in Heaven in that body of flesh of our Nature which he took of the Virgin Mary The Vessel The Body wherein for a while Christ dwelt also our bodies Victory over the devil sin flesh world Perfection in this life resulting from the travail of the light within In the Vnbelief Not acknowledging the light within to be the only Teacher and Saviour whatever the faith and life otherwise may be The Vncircumcised and Vnclean All that are not Quakers Vngodly The same Vnlearned and without Vnderstanding To be without the light within its teachings and immediate Revelations The Voice of the Lord. The secret immediate lively touches and teachings within W Hirelings serving for Wages Ministers who receive maintenance little less then Robbery at least very Jewish and Antichristian Wait on the light Desisting from a search after Truth by any external means and passively attending to the motions and teachings within Watch to the light To be so listning and attentive to the inward teachings as not either to let slip any of its motions or reject them Blind Watch-men Those Ministers who see and warn by Scripture-light and not their light within Watch to the Morning To be diligent to observe and improve the first breakin gs forth of the power of the light within The Way CHRIST The way of Truth Those into which they are led by the pure light within The Whore of Babylon All forms of Worship visible Worship all that is believed or practiced from the written Word Will of God The Commands from within from the light Will of Man Will of the Flesh All that we chuse by the direction of the understanding or in which the humane faculties have any thing to do Will-worship Whatever Worship is not from the motions of the light within Children of Wisdom The Quakers born to the light within We Witness We experience we speak it from the testimony and feeling of the light and motions within And Pen saith This is right witnessing to witness what they experience But they that testifie what they believe from the Scriptures and right rational demonstrations go by hear say and reports but cannot witness it The Word The Word of God The Word of the Lord. No other but Christ the Eternal God The secrets of the Work of God The inward power and motions neither wrought nor perceived by or with the use of the humane understanding and will Righteousness of Works Whatever man hath any hand in or doth chuse The World All that are not Quakers Worship in Spirit Not the Worship where the heart and will goes along with the outward appearance but what is from the motions of the light within Wrath of God Day of Wrath. The inward judgings and terrours by the Light Christ within and that in this world The Writings when spoken diminishingly The Scriptures or written Word I have the Witness of my Conscience that I have not in this Key in any measure abused or wronged the Quakers but have declared what in their Writings and Verbal Converse I have found to be true and could have proved by particular instances but for being too large They who weigh what is written in the Body of the Book may find satisfaction in the most if not all of them THE CONCLVSION I Have not in this Treatise dealt with the more minute and light Errours and Absurdities of the Quakers because they would amount to too large a Volume for this Subject and I love not to Tythe Mint Annis and Cummin where weightier matters call forth my thoughts Where the Lord shall make what hath been written convincing and effectual those Superstructures and Appendices of the conceit of Perfection denying the sober use of Civil Ceremonies unnecessary scrupling at modest Ornaments Pedantick Words Phrases and Gestures obstinate Jewish and Ceremonious respect to this or that place for Worship and a multitude more will quickly and easily dissolve of themselves I doubt not but all whose Judgments are not in § 2 captivity to the silliest Errours will conclude with me that Quakerism is no Christianity yea Not consistent with Christianity being no more capable of dwelling together in one Breast than light and darkness in their absolute and supreme Dominion I am perswaded that all who have honest meanings among the Quakers little think that in turning to Quakerism they turn Christianity out of doors yet it is a truth a sad truth that calls for more serious notice than themselves or most others afford it who profess and that sincerely a love to Truth and Souls My greatest discouragement in writing this Treatise § 3 was from the sense of the Quakers being out of the reach of Scripture and Reason to almost or altogether a Spiritual Delirium Yet I was not without some encouragement from my hopes that the Lord would bless it to the informing and securing of many whose feet are yet out of their snare I have not a little been amazed to read in their Authors such Expressions as prompt us to divest our selves of being men that we may be Christians As if Rational and Spiritual God and the Scriptures Understanding and Christianity were mortal Foes I intended a Chapter by it self to demonstrate Quakerism to be no Christianity from its excluding right Reason any thing called Reason from having to do in the search after Christianity its Choice Defence or Approbation I care not if I collect a few for my Readers satisfaction § 4 Smith's Prim. pag. 56. Quest How do you manifest this inward foundation which you say is Christ to be the true and only foundation which God hath laid Answ From the feeling we have of it by which we know that it is sure in us and from the sure and certain knowledge which we have of it in the feeling we manifest it from its own Nature and Being to its own Nature and Being You may here perceive what a reasonable Religion the Quakers is whose demonstration is nothing else but sense and feeling and this sense and feeling nothing is capable of but the very nature and being of this Foundation He proceeds further pag. 65. Quest And can § 5 none have true Faith unto Salvation and Life Eternal but such as are of your Opinion Answ We are not in any Opinion but in the principle of Life by which we are
the present posture of the Quakers Religion as may render it no great strain to jump into it when-ever they find it their interest For why should it be thought unreasonable that they should rather choose to submit their particular Sentiments to the Determinations of a Pope and Council who pretend to the Spirits guidance infallibly therein than to the Determinations of George Fox and his silly Adherents called the Body who can give no better assurance of their Infallibility or common Reason either than mere pretences mounted on confident Ignorance and Arrogancy Especially considering that such a change will better bear the fine affected Mystery of being felt in a measure of the Vniversal Spirit which seems to be no other than the so-much vaunted Universality of Rome cast in the Canting Mould of the Quakers Phraseology Besides they will then have the Accession of the numerous Auxiliaries of Rome not needing to be so straitned and put to their shifts as now by laying the weight of their yet unformed Cause on so many Equivocations and thin Subterfuges defended by only two or three unskilful and unwary Patrons And what if they shall think meet to embrace the Traditions of Rome instead of THE DOCTRINES OF GOOD ANCIENT FRIENDS I am sure it would be short of a Miracle And the things being the same in Substance why should a mere verbal difference be a Gulph unpâ—ssable And if many of the more devout sort of Quakers should be loth to part with their Darling Singularities and Morosities If Rome be pleased so far to indulge to them as to afford them a Dispensation till time and other things have weaned them it is not the first time she hath been so kind a Mother However if they will but own the Roman Head as far as they now own George Fox they may have their Religion with all or most of its other Disorders and be owned good Catholicks of the Foxonian Order and George Fox Sainted to boot for his good service I desire the Quakers to be but so just to themselves as to consider whether what hath been said do not at least call them to a suspicion that their Leaders are rowing towards Tybur whatever face they put upon it And what an exchange they have made in rejecting the Scriptures from being their Rule taking at length the Impositions of men in its room which are so much the more wicked and blasphemous as they lay them to the Spirit of God as their Father and so much the more dangerous as the Opinion these men have obtained among them will render it neither pleasant nor credible for them now to question any thing they say or reject any thing they impose A Summary of the Capital Errours and Blasphemies of the Quakers Concerning the Godhead THey deny a Trinity of distinct Persons to subsist in the Godhead They own the Father Son and Holy Ghost to be God under those distinct terms yet deny either of them to have any relation or property incommunicable to each other They divide the Divine Being and Godhead into measures and parts Concerning the Scriptures They hold That the Scriptures are not the Word of God and that Christ only is the Word of God That much of them were the Words of God but those things are not now the words of God That a great part of the Scriptures were the words of wicked men and the Devil therefore cannot be the Words of God Not considering those parts of the Scriptures to be the Historical Word or Words of God containing in them a Divine Truth of History That the Scriptures are not a Rule of faith and life That not any part of the Scripture hath Authority to oblige us to any matter of faith or practice unless it be dictated to us or inspired into us by the Spirit immediately as the Prophets Apostles and Penmen of the Scriptures received it That those who determine their faith and practice by the Scripture are begotten into the words without the life and power That he that preaches the Doctrines of the Apostles and Prophets expressed in the Scriptures not having them by Inspiration as they and yet calls them the Word or Words of the Lord tells lies is a Thief and a Robber stealing the Prophets words c. and runs into other mens lines and labours That to follow the examples of the Church in those things which were commanded to them and practised by them under the Gospel or New-Testament-Administration is to commit Idolatry and to offend God by making to our selves Graven Images and Likenesses That to own and embrace the Scriptures for our Rule is Idolatry placing them in the room of Christ the Light within Concerning Christ. They hold That the Son of God is Christ and also that the Father or the Spirit is Christ as well as he That God or the Godhead only is the Christ That Christ is not of the Humane Nature or Man according to Adam's nature That the Body of Jesus the Son of Mary which died on the Cross without the Gates of Jerusalem was never nor is not an Essential Constitutive part of the Christ of God That the aforesaid Body is not now glorified and in Heaven and that it is not now alive That Christ was never seen with bodily eyes That Christ never died in a proper sense he being only God and so immortal That God is now manifested in the flesh as he was in the Son of Mary above 1600 year since That Christ hath Manhood but is not a Man of our nature That there is a heavenly Body of Christ consisting of Spiritual flesh blood and bones which came down from Heaven and dwelt in the Body that was born of the Virgin Mary and dwells now at least in every Quaker That every man hath a Light in him which is Christ the Eternal Word of God Concerning Christianity They hold That the Quakers only are true Christians and own the true Christ and all who own not and submit not unto the Light within as Christ are Infidels That those whom we call the Heathen have somewhat of Christianity because they have some justice and common naural Vertues although they believed not on Jesus the Son of Mary nor have any knowledg of him nor make any Profession of him to be their Lord and Saviour Concerning the Soul of man They hold That the Souls of men are a part of the Being of God of his very Life and Substance came out of God are no Creatures are Infinite in themselves and shall return into God again Concerning Redemption They hold That Christ came to Redeem the Seed which is no other but Christ himself That Christ before man's Conversion is the lost in man That the Redemption by Christ is to obedience to the Light within and thereby to Peace and Righteousness That we are not redeemed by what was done and suffered by the Son of Mary above 1600 years since and without us in respect of place That Christ
in them doth offer up himself a Living Sacrifice to God for them by which the wrath of God is appeased towards them Justifying-Righteousness They hold That the Righteousness of Christ and their Righteousness is but one and the same thing That what Righteousness they perform is the Righteousness of Christ because performed by the Teachings and Power afforded to them by him That they are justified by a Righteousness within themselves and not by a Righteousness performed without them or before they had a being That no man is justified who doth not perform every demand of the Law i. e. Of the Light or Law within Concerning Sin They deny Original Sin They deny that motions from within to sin are sin if not complied with They hold That men may attain to be without any sin in this life And that some of them are perfectly freed from its stains and prevalency They hold That there can be no sin but what is commited against Conviction Concerning the Light within They hold That the Light within them is God Christ the Spirit the Law the Gospel the Life the Power the only and sufficient Rule of faith and Life Vid. The Key That all men have this Light within themselves That this Light is not a natural or created Light or Humane faculty That it is of the same nature in those who obey or disobey it That while men resist this Light the Light or Christ is in bondage and kept under That men heeding and obeying this Light Christ is risen in them which is the Resurrection and the life Concerning Ordinances They hold That there is no such thing as Ordinances now under the Gospel That Baptism and the Lords-Supper were once Ordinances butâ— now since the Spiritual Administration are abolished Concerning a Ministry and Preaching They hold That all that pretend to be Ministers of the Gospel and have a Call from Men are not the Ministers of Christ That their Ministry teach only from the immediate Revelation and Inspiration of the Spirit That their Ministers are infallible in their ministring That our Ministers who receive Maintenance for their work are Hirelings Thieves and Robbers That those who preach from the Scriptures taking their Sermons from thence steal the Prophets words and are not sent of God That men are to preach nothing but what they have a motion to from the Spirit at that time That those who preach Christ without are false Ministers and those are true Ministers who preach Christ within and put people upon believing on him as he is manifested in themselves That the end of all their Teaching is to bring men to the Everlasting Word of God in themselves i. e. To follow the Light within That whatever their Ministers teach it is not they that teach but the Spirit through them Concerning Prayer They neither confess their sin in publique Prayer nor beg pardon for themselves They pray not Ministerially in their publick Assemblies as the mouths of others but alway in the singular number scil I pray c. They pray not in the name or for the sake of Christ the Mediator They use no Family-prayer or at set-meals They deny That we are to use our wills or understandings in prayer Concerning the Church of Christ and its Officers They hold themselves only to be the Church of Christ They hold some of them That there ought to be no such thing as Elders and Overseers in the Church but that the Spirit alone is Apostle Prophet Elder Overseer c. This was the first and general Opinion But since they have so far changed their minds the most of them as to hold Dignities Offices Government necessary and also That it is not the Officers but the Spirit in the Officers that doth all the parts belonging to their Offices They hold only one Vniversal Church not particular Churches and that Church to be in God the Jerusalem which is from above In their Meetings sometimes they have nothing but a profound Silence which formerly was when they had no motion but now for most part when none of their Ministry either of the men or women in that Office are there They have a strange Officer among them George Fox whose Titles are full of Blasphemies scil A King the Witness of God the Father of many Nations c. See the Letter to him from Coale This man is a Sphere above any of the rest Concerning Judgment Heaven and Hell and the Resurrection All these things they hold to be within in the time of this life The Day of Judgment is with them the judging of the Flesh or all disobedience to the Light by the Light within and this is the same with Hell And for Heaven they hold 't is within too but no such place as that where we believe the man Christ to be above the visible Heavens The Resurrection of this body wherein the soul now lives they peremptorily deny affirming The belief that ever it shall be quickned and made alive again to be ridiculous and irrational They profess Eternal Rewards but it amounts only to this conceit That the body shall not live again after its death and so there is no reward to that And the soul they say is Eternal came out from God is a part of his Being shall return into him again So that the soul shall be changed from a part of God dwelling in flesh to a part of God resolved into his own and original Being which was the state of their souls a thousand years afore they were born as they conceit Thus God alone shall be Eternally rewarded by being delivered out of these Prisons of the Quakers bodies FINIS ERRATA PAge 8. line 26. for distraction read detraction p. 7. l. 29. for Denomination r. Domination p. 11. l. 16. for Babes r. Babel
of Israel did burn Incense to it and he called it Nehushtan that is Brass nothing of a Deity in it but a little piece of Brass So it were fit the Scriptures should be demoâ—ished as having nothing of divine authority stamped upon them When I have established this Charge by the mouths of two or three Witnesses it will be time to leave off pouring in more where the measure is already running over § 2 W. D. discoveâ—y of mans return p. 21. All people may search the Scriptures and see how yâ—u have been deceived by your Teachers who havâ— caused you to seek your lost God in carnal and deaâ— observaâ—ions which they have not any Scripture forâ— Who this lost God should be except Jesus Christ who is ascended above the visible Heavens is not to be imagined by those who are acquainted with the Quakers Tenets and Phrases as will appear more plainly where I treat on their Idolatry And if so as there is reason to believe there are two grand parts of Idolatry we are charged with in complying with the Scripture Precepts and Institutions as in Preaching Prayer Church-order Baptism Lords-supper The first is a false object of worship which all § 3 of them that ever I met with in print or otherwise will not deny that to be which is given to the man Christ Jesus who was crucified between two Thieves at Jerusalem The second is false worship for the matter which is Idolatry although it were intended to the true God as the object the sacrificing of Children was intended ultimately to the true God yet it was gross Idolatry And they have huilt the high places of Tophet which is in the Valley of the son of Hinnom Jer. 31. to burn their Sons and Daughters in the fire which I commanded them not neither came it into my heart But you will say how is this charge for walking § 4 according to Scripture instructions and examples seeing he doth seem to advise to trying by the Scriptures whether they do not thus I answer that they take not any thing in the Scripture to be obliging but what comes by immediate inspiration as the Scriptures were given to the Prophets and Apostles and whatever we do however consonant to the precepts there expressed is all contrary to the Scriptures with them as I have proved already if not by immediate inspiration and motion of the Spirit If this be not clear we shall pump clear by and by And this is Babylon the mother of Harlots viz. § 5 Morning watch p 23. to read and practice as the Saints did and the Apostles in the Scripture of the New Testament and the abomination of all uncleanness That many Children have been brought forth of flesh and blood and of the will of man that is our choice and not passive obedience to the motions of the thing with in which is the birth that persecutes the Son and heir And not one of them must stand though ever so seemingly glorious fâ—r the day is come and the true birth is born the light within whose right it is to reign and his glory he will not give to another nor his praise to Graven Images If erecting and worshipping God by graven Images be Idolatry than the Quakers do charge us with Idolatry for walking according to Scripture instructions and examples He who will take the pains to read this inspired Author though by an evil spirit pag. 18 19 20 21 22 23. will find it his scope to prove all Idolaers that ground their worship and order on the Scripture examples and in page 17. he likens all professions among Christians this day to Nebuchadnezzar's Image and though some are more shining and glorious in appearance as the head of Gold was beyond his legs of Iron yet he calls all part of the Image and the Scriptures the Feet of Clay they had their standing on And in pag. 16. hath these words Then searches the Scripture for words to prove their Image a lawful Son and this is the bottâ—m and foundation of all Religions this day I am e'en tired with searching these sulphureous § 6 Veins of the Pit and Mine of Quakerism the root of all which is the deified light within If you have not enough of this smoak to satisfie you it is the bottomless Pit it rises out of I will give you two ebullations more and and leave you satisfied or to get better senses So amongst the words you find how the Saints in Morning watch p. 45. some things walked and what they practised and then yâ—u strive to make that thing to your selves and to observe it and do it as near as you can and here you are found transgressours of the just Law of God who saith thou shalt not make to thy self any graven Exod. 20. 4. Image nor the likeness of any thing And it follows now what difference is there in the ground betwixt you and the Pope though in the appearance there seem to be such a greate space The Quakers having thus stript the holy Scrip SECT II tures of their divine beauty and authority both name and thing plucked out their very heart and strength let us resume the particular Arguments produced to prove that they deny the Scriptures and look on them at one view so shâ—ll we better discern their united testimonies and strength They who Deny the Scripture to be the word of God Equal their own writings and saying with the Scriptures and prefer them before the Scriptures Deny the Scriptures to be a rule of faith and life or a Judge and determiner in religious controversies Take men off from reading the Scriptuses and looking into them for instruction and comfort Deny the Scriptures to be any means by which we may come to knâ—w God Christ or our selves Affirm the Scriptures tâ— be no means whereby to resiâ—t temptation and that they are dangerous to be read Deny the Scriptures to be read to any profit any farther then they are beforehand experienced by them that read them Put or render the Scriptures and the Spirit of God in opposition to each other Affirm the doctrines commands promises holy examples expressed in the Scriptures as such to be not at all binding to us Hold it is a sin the sin of Idolatry to believe and live according to the instructions and holy examples expressed in and by the Scriptures except we have them by immediate revelation as the Apostles They who do all these things mentioned in the foregoing particulars deny the Scriptures But the Quakers do all these things mentioned in the foregoing particulars therefore the Quakers deny the Scriptures If any one or all these arguments together will prove what they are brought to confirm it is proved if it be not I shall for ever dispair to prove any thing For as much as the holy Scriptures being our § 3 compass on earth and our evidence for Heaven are mostly struck at by the Prince of
Darkness and grand enemies of Souls especially the two great Antichrists the Roman Bishop and Church and the new Upstarts who hold the light within every man to be the Saviour Light Righteousness all who do not only as other erroneous or heretical persons a little eclipse or pervert the light of the Scriptures but attempt to pull it down out of the Firmament or render it a dark and useless body but as it receives Light from their Idol the one party to set up the Pope at Rome as absolute in matters of Religion The other to set up the Pope within as absolute and more than he in the little world of every individual man I shall within these following parallel lines give you a view though but in part how both these adversaries do openly spit their venom and discharge their shot against the holy Scriptures And considering how they in most things jump together in the contempt of and detracting from the Scriptures you may conclude that although the Jesuite was not the first contriver of the Quakers grand notion of the Light within to be Christ which I am verily perswaded of to be true yet that he was a promoter of the building erected on that foundation we may easily guess by his mark on so many parcels of it yet I must say that the Romanists were much more sound in their opinions of the Scriptures until about Luther's time wherein the Protestants were too hard for them at those weapons I give you the mind of the Spirit of God expressed in the middle collumn the Quakers Tenets on the left and the Jesuites and Papists on the right hand The Quakers Opinions and Sayings of the Scriptures and those that adhere to them The Scriptures are not the rule of Faith and life Parnel Shield of the Truth The Spirit of God speaking by the Scriptures Thou shalt not turn aside to the right hand or to the left viz. Gods Statutes and Judgments Deut. 5. 23 32. The Jesuists and Papists Tenets and Sayings of the Scriptures and those that adhere to them The Scripture is not the rule of Faith Greg. de Valentia Jesuita libro quarto analyseos Carranza in prima controver The Scriptures are not the judge and determiner of Controversies in religious matters Smith Prim. He mightily convinced the Jews and that publickly shewing by the Scriptures that Jesus was Christ Acts 18. 28. He had put the Sadduces to silence Mat. 22. 3. viz. by Scripture Neither the holy Scripture nor the holy Spirit speaking by the Scripture is the supream and general judge of matters of Faith Beccanus item Gretserus Jesuitae in Colloquia Ratisbon It is impossible for the Scripture to be judge of doubts concerning Faith and the Christian Religion Lorichius Jesuita in fortalitio Matthew Mark Luke and John The beginning of the Gospel of Christ The Gospel is not Scripture it was commanded is not the Gospel Paper sent into the World pag 2. the Son of God Mark 1. 1. to be preached but not to be written Carranza Jesuita in colloquio The light within every man is the rule and guid and not the Scriptures and this light is infallible and will teach you all things Smith Catechis If the light that is in thee be darkness how great is that darkness Mat. 6. 23. Vain man would be wise though man be born like a wild Asses Colt Job 11. 12. The Tradition of the Church i. e. Roman is the first chief certain and infallible rule from which any thing may be known to be true and certain to be held in matters of faith and Christian Religion Carranza Jesuita in prima controversia The Tradition of the Church is the very rule of Faith and Piety Pighius The Spirit was before the Scripture therefore we must be led by the Spirit not by the Scripture the Spirit with the Quaker is the light within Smith Prim. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness 2. Tim. 3. 16. We say that the Church is a rule before the Scripture and more known than the Scripture Carranza in secunda Controversia The Scriptures are the Traditions of men Naylor's love to the lost Holy men of God spake the Scriptures as they were moved by the Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1. 21. Traditions of the Church to be preferred before the Scriptures Frequent among the Papists Light without must be guided by light within John Story short discovery Ye do err not knowing the Scriptures Mat. 22. 29. I have hid the wâ—rd in my heart that I might not sin against thee Psal 119. 11. The Scripture is to be ruled by the Church and not the Church by the Scriptures Carranza in secunda Controversia The Scripture is a dead Letter carnal Letter Ink and Paper Parnel Shield of the Truth The words that I speak unto you are spirit and life Joh. 6. 63. For the Word of God is quick and powerful Heb. 4. 12. The Scripture hath no voice it cannot pass judgment viva voce Beccanus Gretserus in Colloquio Ratisbon The Scriptures are but dumb Judges Pighius controversia tertia The Scriptures may be burnt Frequent The Scriptures cannot be broken John 10. 35. Write this for a Memorial in a Book c. Exod. 17. 14. All the Scriptures in the common and native Tongues are to be burnt by a Law The light within was the rule from the beginning and not the Scriptures Smith Prim. The Scriptures were a rule so soon as they had a beginning The Fathers of the Church were expert in the Traditions of the Church from the beginning as being more effectual than the Scriptures Pighius Jesuita in Colloquio Dry cavelling Letter-mongers Scraping in the Scriptures Will. Pen Spirit of Truth c. Fisher veluta quaedam c. An eloquent man and mighty in the Scriptures Acts 18 24. And Paul as his manner was went in unto them and three Sabbath days râ—asoned â—ith them out of the Scriptures Acts 17. 2. These Lutherans and Hâ—gonots are all for the Letter Frequent He that prefers the Scriptures before the light within is blind in darkness Parnel Shield of the Truth To the Law and to the Testimony if they speak not according to this Word it is because they have no light in them Isa 8. 20. He that shall say the Scripture is to be believed rather than the Church is to be condemned as a Heathen and a Publican and a Sâ—ranger to Gods people Noguera libra secâ—ndo de Ecclesia They are Idolaters that act by Whatever things were written were They are Hereticks and to be condemned who Scripture examples not having their rule by inspiration immediate from God Naylor's love to the lost Morning watch written for our examples Be ye followers of us and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an example take the Scripture for their rule without the authority of the Church The Scriptures do not