Selected quad for the lemma: law_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
law_n	apostle_n	justify_v	work_n	13,797	5	6.2631	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A84760	A sober answer to an angry epistle, directed to all the publick teachers in this nation, and prefixed to a book, called (by an antiphrasis) Christs innocency pleaded against the cry of the chief priests. Written in hast by Thomas Speed, once a publick teacher himself, and since revolted from that calling to merchandize, and of late grown a merchant of soules, trading subtilly for the Quakers in Bristoll. Wherein the jesuiticall equivocations and subtle insinuations, whereby he endeavours secretly to infuse the whole venome of Quaking doctrines, into undiscerning readers, are discovered; a catlogue of the true and genuine doctrines of the Quakers is presented, and certaine questions depending between us and them, candidly disputed, / by [brace] Christopher Fowler & Simon Ford, [brace] ministers of the Gospel in Reding,	Fowler, Christopher, 1610?-1678.; Ford, Simon, 1619?-1699.	1656 (1656)	Wing F1694; Thomason E883_1; ESTC R207293	63,879	81

Apostle meanes not such an one as expounds and applies the written Word but either one that preached up the Jewish ceremonies according to the Letter which were the vaile that hid the Gospell instead of Christ the substance of them or else that preached the duties of the Law for justification and so your generation are the Ministers of the Letter who preach up a righteousnesse of workes under the notion of Christ in us to the decrying and blaspheming of the righteousnesse of Faith in Christs person without us And you your selfe speake scornefully enough of it though covertly p. 55. of your Book as of a righteousnesse beyond the Stars and a far off from us so that we feare your heart is the same with them though you be more wary in your expressions In a word if we mistake you you must impute it to your darknesse and ambiguity of expression which you affect in this Epistle that you may like a Carp by running your head in the mud of uncouth and ambiguous language avoid the Net of a just discovery and confutation and to your undertaking which being the justification of the people called Quakers we are necessitated to interpret you by what we know of them To your thirteenth Article concerning the unprofitablenesse Sect. 44 of talking and professing Christ in Orthodox notions except we witnesse we will suppose you understand find and feele by experience the life of Christ in us We would hope you mean as you say and no more and if so we mean and say as you do that it will not availe us or our hearers to talk of Christs dying for us and our being justified by his righteousnesse except we receive a spirit of holinesse from him and be taught by the grace that appeareth to us to deny all ungodlinesse and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world But we Tim. 2. 12. must tell you that we do not make our mortification of sin or resurrection to newnesse of life or any of the fruits growing upon those roots though we could be as holy as ever any Saint was upon earth any part of our righteousnesse in the presence of God but in matter of justification we renounce them all as abominable and filthy rags drosse and dung to the righteousnesse which is of God by faith and desire to be found in him alone who Isa 64. 6. Phil. 3. 8 9. Jer. 23. 5. Gal. 2. 16. is the Lord our righteousnesse We say with the Apostle Knowing that a man is not justified by the workes of the Law but by the faith of Jesus Christ even we have beleived in Christ that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by the workes of the Law Whether you be of this judgment or no we desire to know more fully in your next Those of your generation are not as we shall shew anon from their own papers which speak out what we see you have a mind to conceale In your fourteenth Article you confesse that you both publish Sect. 45 and practise an unmannerly disrespect of all persons in which because you scruple swearing we would as well as we may credit you without an Oath And that you publish and practise it as truth we will beleive But Omne simile non est idem as you may very well know Many of your quaking doctrines as you colour them are very like truth But we have in part shewn they are not what they shew for and shall do more ere vve have done vvith you Mean while vve will a little dispute it vvith you Whether Religion destroy civility and good manners For our parts vve humbly conceive that the fifth Commandement is not yet repealed that commands us to honour our Fathers and Mothers And Solomon vve suppose walked by that Law vvhen he bowed to his Mother 1 King 2. 29. Nor do vve dare condemne the bowing of Abraham before the Sons of Heth Gen. 23. 7. 12. Nor do vve think that cursed Canaanites are more capable of civill honour and respect then civill Magistrates And how far the examples of Luke dedicating his Book to the most excellent Theophilus Lu. 1. 3. Pauls Titles of King Agrippa and most Noble Festus and Act. 26. 7. 25. 1 Pet. 3. 6. Sarahs calling Abraham Lord practised in the old and commended in the new Testament vvill justifie the practise of those vvho bestow Titles upon men according to their quality from that respecting of persons vvhich the Apostle James condemnes it Jam. 5. 1. may be your own second thoughts will better inform you Surely the Apostle James doth not deny the distinction of Magistrates and others in their Seates and Benches We do not find the Apostles when they were called before Magistrates justle with them for their Chaires and Cushions or set themselves down cheek by joule with them upon the Bench. Nor was 1 King 2. 19. Solomon to be charged with respecting persons for calling for a Chair for his Mother Bathsheba and not for all others as well that came to present Petitions to him For a close we are perswaded that this levelling humour never lasted longer in any person then till he himself got into the Chair of Magistracy We know no Prince in Europe that ever King'd it with that state as John of Leyden did when he acted his part at Munster and yet he and his Generation were as much against respecting of persons a while before as any of our Quakers at this day In a word we are no friends to that great distance which meer wealth makes in the esteem of the world between man and man especially between godly poore and ungodly rich men And we hope we can say in the sincerity of our hearts that we know no godly poor man whom we would not and do not prefer in our esteems and respects as we have opportunity to shew it before any wealthy men that are not so But where the goodness is equall in both we suppose the modesty of the inferiour will not suffer him to be agrieved if his Superiour in any sort sit above him or go before him nor do we think it any token of humility which is one of the most eminent graces in true Saints for such an one to justle for the wall with another to whom in common courtesie and civility founded upon the Law of God Nature and Nations it is more due We shall not dispute against you the consequences of this Sect. 46 your Doctrine if it should take place as they touch our selves Let it follow as you say that we shall hereby be stripped of the Titles of Doctors or Divines we perswade our selves as well-pleasing as you think they are to us we have learned of our Master to be contented to be made of no reputation if God think fit to abase us among those with whom we have to do that vve should receive as little respect from others as vve do from

the same Apostles practise against coveting other mens silver and gold or apparell We have nothing to object against you provided that you will not call requiring that which is legally our own a coveting that which is anothers Surely no man holds the nine parts by firmer Law in these Nations then the Minister claimes his tenth by And how can it then be more covetous in a Minister to sue for that which is his by Law then in others to detain it from him without Law so that we feare the coveting other mens silver and gold will lye at yours and your brethrens doores and you will never be able to sweep it away The claiming a maintenance from those without and exacting it of those that never heare us which you further object against us as a disparagement to our Ministeriall calling comes under the See Sect. 18 19 20 c. consideration of maintenance in the way of Tithes which we refer to its proper place where it falls in your discourse That some who beare the name of Ministers and such Sect. 8. as we no lesse disown then your selfe live in darknesse swearing c. the declaiming against whom is the substance of your next Paragraph and your fifth proof against our Calling we confesse and bewaile and did the anger that dwels in you and your brethren extend to none but those who may justly come under that charge we should vvillingly joyne with you in the prosecution of them and do it where any such come within our reach Yea vve further must professe vve should be very glad that some men in power among us who are very favourable to your party vvere as zealous against them as vve We must freely declare that those that are indeed such have been sheltred upon prosecution under the vvings of some such among us we verily believe it is in their hearts to vvish us all such that they might have some colour to strike off the neck of the vvhole Ministry at a blow But vve must tell you whilst vve are not all such and now fewer such then formerly that it is an injurious procedure in you to reflect disparagement upon a vvhole Profession for the fault of some that against their vvills joyne themselves to them Should all the swearing drunken and otherwise disorderly companions that frequent the Quakers Assemblies be reckoned among them and all be judged by some you vvould think it hard usage We hope you vvill be contented to buy by the same Bushell you sell withall But you are fain to come off from this charge as too gross to be generally laid upon the whole Ministry with are there not a great sort of you such and are your hands all cleane from this filth only you come in vvith an after-charge against the rest in another Quaere Viz. Among those of you that have escaped that open pollution of drunkennesse with Wine are you not yet intoxicated with wrath and rage against the innocent And you proceed enquiring Whether in the Prisons and Dungeons of England Jesus Christ doth not as truly lye bound by our instigation and procurement to wit in those deare Servants of his the Quakers who account it no robbery to be at least equall with their Master as he did by the procurement of Saul in Damascus And yet further Whether if any poore Jeremiah came from the Lord to beare witnesse against our abominations to vvit in those abominable practises of instructing the people against the delusions of the times vvhich is the greatest Antidote against that Plague of Error and Heresie that is dispersed over all the Nation and vvorshiping God according to the rule of his blessed vvord and the light of our own consciences Whether there be wanting among us a Lordly Pastor who in case the Magistrate be so honest to wit through cowardize or luke-warmnesse as to refuse will not with his owne hands put his feet in the Stocks To vvhich vve say vve know none of our Profession that take so much upon them if you do you may do vvell to discover them and vve should be vvell contented for their paines to see them set there a while themselves till they learn to do their owne businesse And then you catechize us further in our rule as with scorne enough you often cal the Scriptures for which we must reckon with you at large anon Whether ever the true Prophets of the Lord did persecute or imprison any that were differing from them in matters of Religion And Whether they be in Christs esteem Shepheards or Wolves who worry the Sheep instead of feeding them c After vvhich you spend a great deale of rhetorick in anticipating the Judgment of Christ at the last day as if you vvere already bespoken to be Clerk of the Arraignments against that Assise In answer vvhereunto vve say no more but this Judge not that yee be not judged And vve make no question that if no better evidence be brought against us at that day then any you yet offer to prove those high Criminations that our Not-guilty vvill be as good a plea though vvithout a distinction as your charge of Guilty vvill be an Indictment vvithout a proof But supposing vve vvere indeed the Persecuters the Sect. 10 Worriers the Imprisoners of those men of your right hand provided we were legally commissioned thereunto which we hope we shall never desire for our selves nor allow in others of our Function yet why all distinctions should be a plea so inconsistent with the Justice of that Court as you intimate to us it will be we know not Nay we have a little light from our low rule the Scripture that perswades us there P. 4 5. may be some use of them then For in that short description of the last Judgment whence you draw out a Copy of our Arraignment not without some aggravating expostulations viz. Mat. 25 41 42. c we find the Judge distinguishing upon the Bench to conclude the Offenders within the reach of the Law For the wicked there indicted are brought in pleading their Not guilty as to the neglect of relieving and visiting Christ in his own person To take off which plea and cleare the equity of his condemnatory sentence he distinguisheth between himselfe in his person and himself in his little ones or Members and granting their plea as to the former rejects it as to the later Now surely we cannot believe that the Judge of the whole World will not at that great and solemn day give us the latitude he takes to himself If he distinguish upon the Law he will allow us to distinguish upon the Indictment We know not if we be indicted for worrying the Sheep why we may not plead the Scripture distinction between Sheep indeed and Wolves in Sheeps clothing and if we can indeed prove that we worry no other but disguised Wolves upon which proof indeed we are contented to lay the whole stresse of our present and we hope

future justification in this whole matter now in debate between us we cannot but expect the same discharge at the Bar which we should not doubt from humane equity in case being indicted for assaulting and beating a true Subject upon Salisbury plaines we could make it appeare that we beat only a Theef and that upon our own necessary defence So that indeed all that outragious cry which you afterward make against the poore Presbyters for justifying the Scribes and P. 5. Pharisees and the Lordly Bishops in former times who you perswade your self had the same distinction to plead for crucifying the Lord of Glory and his precious Saints and persecuting the Puritanes c. to wit that they used them thus under the notion of blasphemous Hereticks and Deceivers falls to the ground if we can prove those whom we are charged to persecute such as we take them to be And this we doubt not to make good against you and your brethren in the way of Quaking in the processe of this our book and then shall leave the whole matter to our Lord and yours to judge between us at the great day of his appearing But then you will allow us Sect. 11 we hope not to suffer you to phrase your own Indictment as you do very dextrously and artificially in favour of your self and your Generation in the following Section of your Epistle wherein you make your self and your Reader pretty sport by drawing up a ridiculous charge against your selves and then set our names to it as if we had made so great a cry as you mention for so little wooll and had no matters of greater moment to exhibit against you then those which you will confesse against your selves And yet we must tell you that you were not very well advised if you meant wholly to clear your selves from those imputations to confesse so much as you do in many passages of your Book which we shall deale with anon Mean while we dare not let you alone to cousen the World into a good esteem of your opinions by your ambiguous expressions and therefore we must crave your patience if we come after you and sift you that by being first in your owne cause Pro. 18. 17. you may not seem uprighter then indeed you are First you take it ill to be charged as Blasphemers for Sect. 12 affirming that Christ is the light that enlighteneth every one that cometh into the world and that he that followeth that light your Jo. 8. 2. Text by the way saith He that followeth me and the words that light are your interpretation and meaning which were we as peevish as those of your way we might reject shall not walk in darknesse but shall have the light of life adding further that that light is sufficient to teach them and guide them to the Father and thence ask for a close What need then of our teachings We hope seeing you stand upon your purgation you will give us leave to ask you a few questions upon this Article 1. Q. What light is that with which Christ enlightens every man It is Christ himself we would say if you would give us leave for distinction sake personally or is it a light infused in him If so 2. Q. It is the light of bare reason in a reasonable Soule or is it the discovery of himselfe by supernaturall revelation 3. Q. Whether the meer light of reason be sufficient to lead all men Heathens and all to the Father savingly or onely as the place partially quoted in your next Article hath it to that which may be known of him by the things that are made that they may be without excuse or 4. Q. Whether if any meer Pagan live up to the naturall light of his own reason or conscience God be bound to bestow upon him that farther light which is sufficient to bring him to salvation Q 5. If Christ be in your sence the light of every one that comes into the World why is it that Judas saith Jo. 14. 23. Lord how is it that thou wilt manifest thy self to us and not to the World And when you have answered plainly and without equivocations to these quaeres possibly you may retort your closing Quaere upon your selves What need then of our teachings as well as the Priests You would faine make us believe in your next Article Sect. 13 that you say no more in the case of the Heathens light then the Apostle doth Rom. 1. 19. 20. which is as you render it That that which may be known of God is manifest in their consciences where again though we contradict it not yet we observe you can interpret and give your meanings upon Scripture though in us it be adding to the Scripture for the Text saith no more but in them or as in your Margin to them God having say you farther revealed it to them shewed saith the Text revealed is your meaning because it makes more for your own turn so that they not having a Law without them interpretation again they are a Law to themselves c. Rom. 2. 14 15. Now you would insinuate that you hold forth no more then the Scripture doth therein Which whether you do or no will appeare by your plaine and ingenuous answer to the former Quaeres Mean while we desire you to take notice 1 That the words in the Text That which may be known of God implies that there is something of God which may not be known to Heathens as such which is the way of being reconciled to him and justified in his sight through Christ Jesus and other like Gospel discoveries of him necessary to salvation 2. That the knowledge they have of him is by the Apostle affirmed to be a light without them as well as within them for God shewes it to them by the things that are made 3. That if the Heathens as you say have only a Law within them and none without them we are little beholding to your principles that would reduce us to the condition of Heathens by setting up a light within us to the exclusion of a light without us As also 4. That Quakers and Heathens may shake hands seeing both of them live by the same Law and the same light too You further insinuate Artile 3. that in the Doctrine Sect. 14. of perfection here below you are falsely accused by us for blaspheming Whereas you say no more then our Saviour himself commands when he bids us be perfect as our Father in Heaven is perfect which commands you say is not given in Mat. 5. 48. mockery or requires an impossibility You add that the same Christ spake truth when he bore witnesse of Nathaniel that he was an Israelite in whom was no guile and that Paul did not Io. 1. 47. designe an impossibility when he laboured to present men perfect in Christ Jesus And you would suggest that you affirm no more Col. 1. 28. We answer whether this

seeing we are told Heb. 6. 17. that God himself allowes himself to sweare for those ends for which an Oath is legally used by men viz. for confirmation of his word Q. 5. Whether without swearing upon the call of a Magistrate all mens estates be not as liable to prejudice as the maintenance of the Ministry And whether cheating companions will not be as prone to take the same advantage against other men in case there was no judiciall Oathes required as it seems by the Authors confession Hereticks would against poor Ministers except we must take it for granted that every mans yea yea and nay nay is as a sufficient security in this case of testifying the Truth judicially as a solemn Oath Q. 6. Whether Abraham did well or ill to require an Oath of his Servant Gen. 24. 3. Jacob of Joseph 50. 5. Nehemiah of the Jewes Neh. 13 25. Or if you evade these examples as being before Christ whether the Apostle Paul did well or ill to sweare Gal. 1. 20. c. In a word this Doctrine of the unlawfulnesse of swearing in Sect. 14 any case is a fragment of the old Germane Anabaptists a Generation of men against whom the Magistrates saw sufficient cause to dispute with the Sword of Justice for being publick enemies to humane Society and it concernes you to take heed that the Magistracy of England may never have the like provocation to follow their example against their genuine issue the Quakers and other Sectaries among us But least you should seem justly to charge us with swearing our selves and teaching others to do so contrary to the command of Christ we must in the close let you know how we sweare and allow others to do so and what swearing we forbeare our selves and preach downe among them in obedience to Christs command We must tell you that being lawfully called to witnesse to truth upon Oath before a Magistrate we shall not our selves refuse to sweare that is according to the forme required in Law to call God to witnesse that we lye not But in our communication or ordinary discourse we desire both we and our hearers may keep to our yea yea and nay nay as Christ commands and not to sweare at all because we dare not take or allow others to take the name of God in vaine And this we suppose to be all that our Saviour intends in that Prohibition that in our communication we should not sweare at all If any one be not convinced hereof by what we have said let him reconcile our Saviours Prohibition to the precepts and examples before pleaded some other way and Phyllida solus habeto He shall gaine the cause in this point Your following three Articles viz. 6. 7 8. are all concerning Sect. 18 Tythes and forced maintenance wherein the summe and upshot of all shewes your charity to the poore Ministery that you would faine have them reduced to the condition of the unjust Steward that is either to work or beg For working we suppose in such a Generation as God hath now east us into we shall not want whilest besides the ordinary attendance upon our charges which the Apostle Paul accounted a work and a great one too 1 Thes 5. 13. Eph. 4. 12. and such as none will be too forward to intrude into that sufficiently understands the weight of it 2 Cor. 2. 16. The work of a Builder a Sower 1 Cor. 3. 10. Mar. 4. 13 1 Cor. 3. 6. 2 Tim. 2. 6. Jo. 21. 26. Heb. 13. 15. 2 Tim. 2. 3 P. 40. a Planter an Husbandman a Shepheard a Watohman a Souldier We are called upon to answer every idle rayling Paper that you and your companions send us But seeing you account this no work it seemes you would have us worke with our hands or beg An hard Law for men that have been bred in a way of humane Learning which elsewhere you seem to allow some use in the World it may serve to tile the house you confesse and in that place you are content it shall stand But surely should this Law of yours take place that those that have been bred to study must have no subsistence but by handy work or begging I feare the next Generation would yeild few Tiles to keep the house in repaire so that it would quickly drop through and you as well as others would not be able to lye dry in it For who will give his Children ingenuous Education at the Schooles of Learning and set them there to spend the flower of their youth in acquiring humane literature when the highest preferment they could expect after ten or twenty yeares Study would be either to work or beg would not every one conclude it better to set their Sons to some Trade or other in their youth that so at the end of seven yeares they might be able to get a livelyhood at their fingers ends or turne them a begging in their Childhood rather then maintain them twice seven yeares at Schoole and University to come thence to be preferred to a certain beggary as being the only lot of the two like to befall them who are utterly to learne to work having never been bred thereunto But the measure you mete unto us is harder yet You that will have us work or beg will not allow us to carry so much as a Purse to put our Wages in when we have earned it nor a Scrip to put our Almes in when we have begged it but to live as the Sparrowes do that digest one meales meat in seeking where to get another I suppose should God call us to that condition either by an extraordinary command as Christ did his Lu. 10. 7. Apostles in the place you quote or by an extraordinary providence as we suspect in case you can compasse your fifth Monarchy it would befall us we should not want faith to trust him who feeds the Sparrowes and clothes the Lillies whether in a way of working as we are able or asking the charity of others when disabled We have learned a distich of learned and honest Musculus which he made when the fury of the Germane Anabaptists your Predecessors turned him out of his Pulpit and maintenance and enforced him to weave and dig for a subsistence for himself and his Family Est Deus in Coelis qui providus omnia curat Credentes nunquam deseruisse potest Which for the sake of your Brethren who whatsoever you are are no great friends to Latine we shall english A God in Heaven lives whose care extends To all and therefore will not faile his friends But we question yet further whether you that would require Sect. 19 us to follow precisely the Apostolicall example in that Chapter will not yet go further then this in your rigorous exactions Suppose we should work without a Purse and beg without a Scrip at your command what security will you give us that you will not make us work and beg barefoot too For if your Text

whether you vvill submit your Revelations to this Touchstone or no If so you yeild the question If not then whatever Commands or Prohibitions you receive in the way of revelation you must obey vvhether agreeing or disagreeing to the written Law of God And then how far the examples of Abraham offering up his Son and Phinehas executing vengeance yea and vvhen time serves Ehuds message from God to Eglon may be witnessed in you as you speak we know Judg. 3. 19 not and shall pray vve never may by experience Q. 9. Whether the Scriptures do not establish it selfe as the rule of Faith in referring all pretenders to new light to the Law and the Testimony and telling us expresly That if they speak not according to this word it is because there is no light in Isa 20. 8. them And whether the light in you and in your companions be not darknesse that will not undergo this tryall Q. 10. Whether the phrases of walking in the Law of the Lord keeping Gods Testimonies taking heed to a mans way according to Gods word not wandering from Gods Commandements Ps 119 1 2. 9 10. 21. 30. 35. 51. 102. 110. 133. 157. laying Gods Jugdments before him going in the path of Gods Commandements not declining from Gods Law not departing from Gods Judgments not erring from his Precepts ordering his steps in Gods word not declining from his testimonies Are not cleare evidences that David made the written word that then was his Rule And you owne Davids Rule for yours p. 8. Q. 11. Whether you think in your conscience that Deut. 5. 32 33. doth not convincingly prove the Scripture to be the Saints rule The words are Yee shall observe to do therfore as the Lord your God hath commanded you and before vve have the repitition of the written Law You shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left c. Your answer in your book is in summe P. 7. that all the Scripture was not then written But did not Moses therein establish as much as was then written for the rule the Saints of those times were to walk by Besides these words immediatly refer to the Morall Law before repeated in the same Chapter And will you exclude that from being the Saints rule as well as other Scriptures Then indeed there vvill be no duty or sin but as a man thinks Q. 12. Whether you deale honestly with Calvin in that P. 20. Scripture Eph. 2. 20. whilest you tell your Readers that he saith in Terminis That the Apostle doth in that Scripture intend Jesus Christ to whom the Prophets and Apostles did beare witnesse Whereas Calvin saith expresly It is without doubt that the foundation in this place is taken for the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles And therefore Paul teacheth that the Quin fundamentum hic pro doctrina sumatur minime dubium est Et itaque docet Paulus fidem ecclesiae in hac doctrina debere esse fundatam Calv. in l. Churches faith ought to be founded on this Doctrine And there is not any mention at all of those vvords in Calvin vvhich you quote from him To say the truth vve much vvonder how you could have the brazen face to father a saying upon Calvin vvhich he never said till vve looked upon Marlorate whose mis-quotation or rather the fault of his Printer it seemes deceived you for there vve find among other things there ascribed to Calvin this passage you mention But it concerned a man of your acutenesse not to have taken up a report from another vvhen Calvins vvorks are so common in every Shop and Study that vvith a little paines more you might have conversed vvith the Originall Author whence Marlorate makes his collections But it seemes you vvere vvilling to snatch at any thing that seemed to support your cause vvhere ever you found it And yet you shewed no part of ingenuity in your usage of Marlorate himself vvho together vvith that passage vvhich you quote and under the same note by which he distinguisheth Calvins vvords cites Calvin point blank against you saying that the Apostle shewes in that place how the Ephesians vvere made fellow Citizens vvith the Saints Nempe si fundati sint in Prophetarum Apostolorum Doctrinâ to wit If they be founded on the Doctrine of the Prophets and Apostles These words and others to the same purpose immediatly precede your owne quotation vvhich renders your dis-ingenuity the more culpable as shewing a vvilfull designe of abusing so reverend a name to delude your Readers Q. 13. In a vvord tell us ingenuously Whether we must or must not beleive the Doctrines which the Scriptures lay downe upon their owne authority If vve must vvhy do you quarrell at those that call them the rule ground foundation of faith seeing every intelligent man will tell you that it is the same thing to beleive the Doctrines of the Scripture upon the Scriptures authority and to make the Scriptures the ground rule foundation of faith If vve must not then tell us what superadded to the Scriptures owne Authority renders their Doctrines more credible We observe the Papists state this question as you do But they vvill answer us ingenuously That they beleive the Scriptures because the Church hath confirmed them And the Socinians are of your mind also but they deale fairely too and speak out That they will beleive the Scriptures as far as reason votes with them Would you speak out vve doubt you must confesse you are very neer these last in your judgment Why do you not tell us plainly that you beleive the Doctrines laid down in the Scripture as far as the light within you concurs with them And then vve shall know vvhat you mean in denying the Scriptures to be the rule and ground of faith Viz. That as much as pleaseth you you vvill beleive and vvhat dislikes you shall be cashiered as an old Declarative or an Almanack out of date as some of your Cater-cosins the Familists have blasphemously called the Bible Q. 14. Lastly Whether God vvill not judge every man vvho lives within the sound of the Gospell by the written word If not what meanes the Apostle Paul when he saith that as many as have sinned in the Law shall be judged by the Law in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my Gospel Rom. 2. 12. 16. And seeing we are upon this subject give us leave to enquire yet a little further what are those Books out of which the dead shall be judged and whence one day God will draw the rule of his proceedings in the day of Judgment as you may find Apoc. 2. 12. If God vvill judge us out of the written word after death surely we are not to be blamed if we study that Statute-Law and labour to conforme our beleif and practise thereunto whilest we live which must judge us when we dye Or else we pray you

Pamphlets to the Bible c. Thus you see the practise of our Saviour Christ notwithstanding Sect. 78 his infallibility which we pretend not to is and ought to be herein our example But we need not defend our practise with so great a name having the examples of so many Apostles and other primitive Teachers to plead for us We pray you tell us otherwise how the Apostles proved by the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ Did they or could they bring any one Text in all the old Testament that saith so in terminis That Jesus the Son of Mary berne in Bethlem is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Act. 17. 2. Messiah No but the Text tells us that they opened the Scriptures and laid them one by another in a way of reasoning as the word rendred alledging signifies in the Originall and so convinced the Jewes How will you dispute with a Jew that ownes not the infallibility of the Pen-men of the New Testament and so will question the truth of what is there affirmed that this Jesus is the Christ you have no Weapon to encounter him withall but Argument and deductions from the old Testament For did the old Testament expresly say so any where the question were at an end between us and him We intreat you further to tell us how the Apostle Paul Sect. 79 makes good his assertion concerning the lawfulnesse of his and Barnabasses requiring and receiving maintenance out of the Law 1 Cor. 9. 8. Say I these things as a man i. e. by mine own private judgment or saith not the Law the same also We pray you tell us where the Law saith in so many words that Paul and Barnabas might lawfully forbeare working expect to eat the fruit of the Vineyard they planted c. Sure we are the place quoted by him out of the Law saith no more but this Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the Oxe that treadeth out the Corne v. 9. Here is not a word of Paul and Barnabas except Paul and Barnabas be Oxen would a Quaker reply But though the Text speak expresly of Oxen yet the Apostle finds Paul and Barnabas in the reason and equity of that Law and so makes a strong Argument of it vers 10. And surely it will prove an hard matter to your self or your Sect. 80 Companions to draw forth to any rationall man the Dectrines of election and reprobation out of Gen. 25. 23. Mal. 1 2 3. quoted for the proof thereof by that Apostle Rom. 9. 11 12 13. and the righteousnesse of these decrees out of Exod. 33. 19. and many other Doctrines of affinity with them in that Chapter out of the rest of the old Testament Texts there alledged without consequences We are sure none of them all are in expresse termes in those Scriptures brought to prove them We might add the proofes that the Author to the Hebrews brings for the Godhead of Christ from Psa 45. 6 7. 102. 25. 110. 1. quoted Chap. 1. 8. 9. 10. 13. and the Eternity of Christs Priesthood from the History of Melchizedek and Psa 110. 4. quoted Chap. 7. But we foreseee that the question will still be between us Sect. 81 Whether we be infallible as the Apostles are supposed to have been in our interpretations and deductions For answer whereto we refer you to what was even now said on this point Only here we crave leave to add that we have reason to think our infallibility and yours is much at a rate And yet we find you very frequently taking that liberty which you deny us For how do you conceive the Prophesies of Micha against those that taught for hire and the woes of our Saviour against those that do their workes to be seen of men and stand praying in the Synagogues and love the uppermost roomes at Feasts and greetings in the Markets c. and the commands given to the Apostles of Christ that then were sent by him upon a speciall errand of giving freely what they freely received c. concerne us whose names are not expresly mentioned in those Texts but by deduction or argumentation such as it is Nay how do you bring downe the prohibitions of calling men Masters respecting of persons c. to be obliging to you and your Proselites but by consequence Were it not easie for us were we minded to play the same Childs play with you which you do with us to require of you an expresse place of Scripture forbidding Thomas Speed by name to do thus and thus or at least every Christian or Disciple and yet then you would need a deduction to bring downe the prohibition to your selfe in particular such as this No Christian or Disciple of Christ must call men Masters But T. S. is a Christian We wish he were Therefore T. S. must not call men Masters Nay to go yet further with you we might very well require Sect. 82 of you an expresse Scripture for your two fundamentall Articles That Christ is the light that enlightens every one that comes into the World and that Christ is the word of God and not to the Scriptures A good friend of yours in a discourse T. C. with one of us having before denied all consequences and deductions from Scripture as you do was pittifully gravelled when he was required to produce expresse Scriptures to prove these propositions and was told that the Texts he produced which were Jo. 8. 12. I am the light of the World and Jo. 1. 9. That was the true light which enlightneth every one that comes into the World had not the name of Christ in them but it was to be concluded by Argument that those words are spoken of Christ and that the place Jo. 1. 1. did not expresly affirme that Christ is the word but is onely inferred thence by deductions And as for meanings and interpretations it was none of the best which the same party gave of that Scripture which forbids the Disciples to carry shooes as well as a Purse or Scrip whence he was told that it as much concerned G. Fox to go without shooes as us without Purse or Scrip Viz. That the Text forbids to carry shooes but not to weare them A learned interpretation and such as becomes your infallibility And your selfe however unlawfull you judge it in us to interpret Scripture yet Sect. 83 more then once undertake it very Dictator-like as p. 8. where you interpret the word Rule Gal. 6. 16. for the rule of the new Creature not the Scriptures as if the Scripture and the rule of the new Creature were opposites and so p. 19. where you interpret the Record spoken of 1. Jo. 5. 10. to be eternall life not the Scriptures and againe p. 20. you interpret the foundation spoken of Eph. 2. 20. to be that same Jesus who was preached by the Prophets and Apostles So hard a matter it is for men that undertake to give Law to others not to transgresse it themselves and not