of the Law and the intent of the Law-giver Else what shall we make of that seeming contradiction Jer. 7. 22. I spake not to your Fathers nor commanded them in the day I brought them out of Egypt concerning burnt-offerings c. But this thing I I commanded them Obey my voice c. Here the principal intention of God must give the Interpretation and take away the Contradiction Nor are affirmative places of Scripture to be many times less limited from their seeming Latitude Indefiniteness and Universality As All things are yours takes not away meum and tuum the properties of Christians as to what they have by private right and possession So All things are lawful must not be stretched to any immoral licentiousness but confined to such things as are by no word of God forbidden but left in an indifferency and to be used as Reason and Religion requires or the moral end of all things doth permit So I please all men in all things So To the pure all things are pure the meaning must not be after the Manichean and Familistical imagination as if such as are pure might do or use any thing even to those mixtures which are morally impure or sinful for these are alwayes and at all times forbidden to all men who may not fancy that pure which God hath marked with the brand of sinful impurity nor may they count that sinfully impure on which God hath set no such stamp â—y any Law forbidding it If Scriptures as I have largely shewed must be understood only by the bark or shell of words and not by the kernel and intent we shall make those expressions to be approbations which are the sharpest reproofes and prohibitions yet by way of Irony and seeming concession As Eccl. 11. 9. Rejoyce O young man in thy youth walk in the wayes of thine heart and the light of thine eyes So Christs commending the unjust Steward doth not import his justifying of his 〈◊〉 but of that prudence though sinister which he shewed to preserve himself from temporal extremities the more to reproach the improvidence negligence and supineness of those who will not use honest means for their eternal preservation It were easie by many more parallel instances besides those I for merly gave to manifest to the Quakers or any men not wilfully shutting their eyes against that light of Reason and Religion which shines in the Scriptures That since the Holy Oracles of God are spoken or written for the instruction of men and in such a familiar style or mode of speech as was used among men in the several times languages and occasions of writing them which the Hearers or Readers then easily understood it cannot be any part of Religion so to urge any Letter Phrase or Form of speech as to swerve the sense of words from the evident scope intent or end of the speaker which is gathered both from the rise or occasion and end why he spake and any additional instances which are oft given as explications and special marks or boundaries of the speakers meaning which are here evident For the Jewes were not blamable for swearing by the name of the true God as by the Law and Prophets they were commanded in righteousness judgement and truth nay they even superstitiously waved this kind of swearing but for their new and customary forms of swearing by the Creature and fancying it no forswearing themselves in case they were false either in intention or execution This being the usual and almost only swearing in fashion among them it is no wonder that our Saviour aiming only at this gives such a prohibition of Swear not at all that is not at all for matter or manner as you have accustomed your selves to swear contrary to or beyond what God allowes in his Law which was the thing I was to prove 2. My second Reason to prove that our Saviour and the Apostle do not forbid all swearing with its due reverence and integrity is from the moral nature end and use of an Oath First by the light of Reason and principles of innate Divinity yet unextinguished in the heart of man-kind it hath ever been and still is owned and used as a special part of Religion a solemn agnition of the Divine Being and Attributes in Omniscience Justice and Power which all men attest as believing that none can escape that Witness and Judge of all things Thus Egyptians Scythians Persians Greeks Romans and all Nations that had any thing Civil and Religious among them have used some form of Swearing by their respective Deities as a special honour and appeal to their Soveraignty as the only means in cases dubious to give satisfaction gain credit and make men assured of the veracity and honesty of the speaker in their promises and testimonies in their leagues and contracts And however the noblest and wisest of the Heathens required no less veracity and certainty in the bare words then Oathes of men yet they highly distinguished between swearing and forswearing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This last they thought a great sin and to be punished by the Gods if either they meant not as they sware or performed not what they had justly sworn yea and they oft brought in their Gods and Jupiter himselfe as chief swearing Polybius observes that in the better and simpler ages of the world Oathes were seldom used in Judicatures but after that perfidy and lying encreased the use of Oathes encreased as the only remedy meet to restrain those mischiefs that where men could not see or be sure the omniscience and vengeance of God should be invocated on mens consciences which none could elude or escape Hierocles also tells us That men ought not to swear but for great and necessary ends which cannot otherwaies be obtained But where the end was good and this a necessary means there they thought agreeable to true Reason and Religion that swearing was a lawful means Secondly God himself the great patern of all holiness and perfection would not have given so many express commands and regulations concerning Swearing if all swearing had in its nature been morally and so eternally evil The moral precept is Exod. 20. 7. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain or upon falsity which imports a lawful use of Gods name as is explained Lâ—â— 19. 12. Ye shall not Swear by my name falsly nor shalt thou profane the name of the Lord thy God Which sense is further cleared Deut. 6. 13. Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God and serve him and shalt swear by his name which is repeated Deut. 10. 20. So of vowing by an Oath to God Num. 30. 2. Deu 23. 21. So Is 45. 23. To me every tonguâ— shall swear So again Isa 65. 16. He that sweareth in the Earth shall swear by the God of Truth Jer. 4. 2. And thou shalt
to choak that good seed of Religion which is sown by the publick Ministry and fenced by legal Authority As I would have that Religion only setled in its Doctrinals Devotionals Discipline and Government which is by publick consent according to the word of God and Catholick prudence judged to be the best for Truth Sanctity Order Decency which blessed be God is in England so I would have It and It only to enjoy all publick countenance and encouragements by the injunction and protection of the Laws by the favour and example of the Prince by publick maintenance and honour by the use of publick Churches and Oratories To the Preachers and professors of this publick Offices and Employments of honour and authority foraign and domestick ecclesiastical civil and military should be chiefly appropriated of these advantages dissenters should be generally deprived because they are the proper honoraries of those who most serve the publick Peace by their due observance of the Religion and Laws established from which whoso openly vaâ—ies and dissents layes the foundations as of distraction and division so of destruction and confusion With these outward advantages added to that internal power of truth holiness which are in the established Religion it may as I think not only be happily suppoâ—ted but easily prevaile in a short time by Gods blessing against all factious and feeble oppositions unless the scandal negligence levity and luxury of its Ministers Bishops Presbyters and Professors overthrow it by casting such immoral disgraces upon it as make people dissbelieve and abhorre both it and them as was in the case of Eli's Sons But I confesse I would not have this legal and avowed Religion of the Nation so rigorous sharp and severe as Sarah to Hagar by the suddain over-awing or violent overlaying of all other different perswasions in peaceable men as not to let them breath in the same common Air or not to enjoy their lives civil liberties and estates with their dissenting consciences in all modest privacy and safety I abhorre as much as I dread all racks and tortures of mens souls or those cruel no less then curious scrutinies of mens consciences which covet first like God to search mens hearts and then like the Devil delight to torment them in their Estates and Liberties only because they are not so wise or apprehensive as themselves but as honest perhaps and sincere in the sight of God True I think that some little pecuniary mulct as one or two Shillings to the poor for every Lords dayes absence from the publick Church or Assembly may be justly laid as a mark of publick dislike upon Dissenters and Separaters from the established Religion not for their private difference in judgment which possibly is not their fault but for their publick deformity in practise to the scandal of the established Religion and to the endangering of the publick welfare whose strength and stability consist in unity and this in uniformity to the setled rule and in conformity to outward practise yet still no Inquisition to be made into free mens Consciences nor any great penalty laid upon them for their perswasions further then their words and actions do discover their Principles Opinions Correspondencies and Adherencies to be contrary and dangerous to the publick Peace Order and Justice which all are founded in and flourish by our setled Laws and Religion Thus permitting sober men not a declared toleration or publick profession by way of open rivalry to the established Religion but only such an arbitrary connivence and conditional indulgence as gives them no trouble for their private and untroublesome Opinions while they are kept in their breasts and closets or in their private houses and families to which all dissenters ought in reason to be confined on the Lords day without any convention of strangers to them though perhaps on the week-day they may have their meetings allowed yet so as to be kept within parochial bounds or to such a number of persons and families as shall be thought safe But for Dissenters to have multitudinous Conventicles as it were musterings of their forces when where and as many as they please cannot be safe for thereby they not onely affront the established Religion but confirm each other in their opinions yea and as Charcoals in heaps they more kindle and enflame each other by their numbers to such proud animosities and rebellious confidences as may hope to set up their Faction supream not only in the repute of Religion but in civil power which is the ambitious aim of all parties except that which is purely Christian wholly resolved into suffering principles All others we see whether Papists or Presbyterians or Anabaptists or Independents affect summam Imperii as Diotrephes to have the preeminence as Lucifer and Antichrist to exalt themselves above all and therefore they must by wise and vigilant power as well as by good preaching living be kept as fire within the hearth of their private opinions and parties left they prevaile by popular Arts against the publick established Religion which is the Palladium or Conservator of civil peace and prosperity and never to be rashly changed or rudely contemned while it is authorised The great Charity to which includes even a charity to all those which differ from its present settlement who commonly are more miserable in the riotous mutations which their folly and rudeness affects then in those sober restrictions of which they are so impatient that from different perswasions they break out to petulant oppositions by Tongue and Pen thence they are betrayed to seditious projects and at last these must be brought forth in tumultuary and violent actions which are so intolerable that the very first sparks of their insolent and seditious Expressions especially in Pulpits and Presses ought by great penalties to be suppressed there being nothing more unreasonable then for any man rudely to blaspheme and reproach that Religion which his Prince and Countrey professe unless he be so impudent as many are to blaspheme that also which himselfe owneth as the true Religion with them This tenderness moderation and indulgence I bear only to humble modest and innocent dissenters upon the account of Christian Charity which ought in all things becoming humanity to exceed all other men as Tertullian well observes To which Christian Charity of mine towards sober dissenters besides the confidence I have of Truth and its prevalency perhaps my native temper and candor may contribute something which abhors after the genius of Primitive Christians all severity or rigors only upon the score of Religion farther then is necessary for the cure of offenders and the conservation of the publick Peace I know the roughness or smoothness of mens educations and complexions like Esaus and â—acob's have much influence upon their opinions and conversations yea and upon their consciences too If this may seem to some too great a facility and gentleness in me yet it is an error on the right hand
to them is because they are a Sect lately bred by a kind of equivocal generation as Vermine out of the putid matter and corruptions of former times in which so many Factions cast forth their spawn and filth to the deformity and confusion of all things Civil and Sacred in this Church and Kingdom They had their beginning from the very rabble and dregs of people uncatechised undisciplined and ungoverned in England No wonder to find these people fly to inspirations and new lights when they were hatched in dark times which sought to put out all the old light of Law and Gospel They might easily run to Rudeness toward their betters and Refractoriness against our Laws and Obstinacy in their Errors and Impatience of any just coercions when they had their first original and extraction out of that squalor mud and fedity of times which destroyed all fear of God and reverence of Man which denied the holy institution of Ministers the orderly presidency of Bishops the just authoritie of Magistrates the freedome and honour of Parliaments and the Sacred Majesty of Kings All these being troden under the feet of profane Levellers and cruel Vsurpers who can wonder that the impiety and scandal of those times should lead such silly people in those temptations which sought by some unwonted waies to make even their obscurity remarkable at least by the parallel boldness of their Opinions and the rudeness of their Actions 3. Lastly I pity them because to me it is no wonder if people of so plain breeding of unpolished manners and possibly of no evil minds compared to others of those times though easie and unwary as the Quakers for the most part are if I say they were scared from all Swearing by the frequent forfeited Oaths and repeated Perjuries of those Times in which the cruel Ambitions and disorderly Spirits of some men like the Demoniack in the Gospel brake all bonds of lawful Oaths by which they were bound to God and the King daily imposing as any new Partie or Interest prevailed the Superfoetations of new and illegal Oaths monstrous Vows factious Covenants desperate Engagements and damnable Abjurations Poor men the Quakers as well as others had cause to fear lest if they took an Oath to day they should to morrow be forced to renounce and abjure it not as to own a quiet submission and profession of passive obedience to Powers at present prevalent and protecting which is the way of temporary and reciprocal Oaths of Allegiance among those Subjects whose fortunes lying on the frontiers of Dominions expose them to the vicissitudes of Wars and change of Governours but to a formal comprobation of most unjust Actions yea to renounce and abjure the undoubted rights of others to attest even by Oath the Usurpations of those as lawful which were most diametrically contrary to the Laws of God and Man This great temptation under which these Quakers then lived makes me have much compassion for them it being not only easie and obvious but venial and almost commendable for them to be carried to an utter aversation from all Swearing whatsoever when they saw such desperate abuse and breaking of publick and solemn Oaths in those dismal days But as the abuse of things lawful and good must not take away the lawful use of them no more then some mens gluttony and drunkenness may deprive us of all eating and drinking soberly so neither may Christians therefore deny all Swearing because some men cared not what and how they did Swear and Forswear Here a little clearing of those superstitious fears and prejudices which first possessed these men against all Swearing may at once let them see the liberty they have for doing that which our Laws require and our Saviour in the Gospel no where absolutely forbids but onely regulates and restrains Nor do I only thus pity the Quakers but I praise them also in some respects being as no enemie to their persons so a friend to any thing that is good in them First for their chusing as they profess in those Papers given in that day to some of the Lords rather to suffer then sin against their Consciences and so against God whose holy will shining on the Soul in Reason and Religion either seeming or real is indeed the present rule of Conscience Nor may any man act contrary to these dictates which he judgeth to be Gods though he erre as to the Truth of the Rule yet his judgement binds so far as it represents though in a false Glass the supposed light of Gods will For he that will venture to act against Conscience though erroneous will also act against it though never so clear and perspicuous Here the first care must be that the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 judgement be according to Truth and then to act accordingly Else however the integrity of intention may be commendable and so mitigate the fault yet the sin of the action may be great as to the enormity or aberration from the rule of eternal Truth and Justice As that of Paul was when he persecuted and blasphemed the Christian Religion being verily perswaded that he ought so to do against that way So others should think they did God good service while they killed Christs Disciples A Conscience thus erring falls into the snare or dilemma of the Devil if it act according to its error it sins materially against the intrinsecal Justice and Truth of God and his holy Will the conformity to which is the measure of moral good and holiness if it act contrary to its appearing Principles it sins formally and maliciously as wilfully rebelling against the supposed will of God So much it concerns every Christian to be fully informed of that Divine Truth and Light which alone shews the right and good way Else they will easily be brought to call evil good and good evil to call light darkness and darkness light to be over-righteous by adding to the commands of God or over-wicked by making or esteeming themselves sinners when indeed they are not so either negatively superstitious in abstaining from that as sin which is no sin or affirmatively superstitious in counting that a duty which is not so Both are injurious usurpations upon the soveraignty of God whose Scepter is infallible Truth as his Sword is just and irresistible Power So dangerous are erroneous fears where no fear is or presumptuous confidences where is no Divine permission Men must not set up the Idols of their own imaginations in Gods place nor may they be falsaries or forgers of that Coyne which as to duty is only then currant when it hath not only good metal but also the clear stamp of Gods express will on it The Mint of humane fancies either melancholy and timorous or pragmatick and adventurous is but an adulteration of Religion and a kind of stuprating of Conscience The will of God which is clear either in right
possibly now in England be not only destructive to many thousands but very disadvantagious to the King and Kingdome to the Trade and Commerce of the Nation by opening a little Wicket of Royal Clemency only to some few and shutting the great Gate to many whose tender and unsatisfied or scrupulous Consciences do as much expect need and deserve it as those that have it in petty matters while all others scruples are driven to discontent and despair by denial of all indulgence to them in greater scruples There are but these four wayes of treating any party that dissents from the publick establishment of Religion and its Lawes in any Church and Kingdom 1. Either to impoverish imprison banish and destroy all Dissenters as the King of Castile did the Moores of Granada which is a very rough barbarous unwelcome and unchristian way disallowed by all wise men of all perswasions Or Secondly by rational convincing them of their errors which is a work of time and dexterity not to be done on the sudden no more then bodily cures without a miracle though very worthy to bear a part in the Discipline of the Church which should require of every one a reason why they differ from or forsake the established Religion and treat them according as their perswasion passion or pertinacy shall appeare to the Conservators of Religion Or Thirdly by changing established Laws for their sake which is not for the Piety Prudence Honour and Safety of a Nation and Church when it judgeth its Constitutions to be religious righteous and convenient Or Fourthly by way of discreet connivance and charitable indulgence so farre as the civil peace of the Nation will bear until Reason and Religion of whose prevalency wise and good men never despair have by calme and charitable methods recovered people from the error of their wayes by the sacred Doctrine and good examples of those who conforme to the established Lawes in Church and State This being first done will render Dissenters unexcusable and justifie any severity which shall be inflicted upon the extravagancies of those opinions and actions which do any way perturb the publick peace or affront the established Religion And in this particular case of the Quakers who refuse all legal Oathes upon scruples of Conscience and so threaten either to subvert our Laws or to obstruct all judicial proceedings pleading for their disobedience to mans Laws the express command of Christ and his Apostle Saint James no sober man can think by meer penalties to reduce them to a conformity with our Laws or to stop the spreading of their Opinions untill it be plainly shewed that it is not true Religion but onely Superstition in them a fear where no fear is a being righteous over-much by a mistake of Christs meaning a wresting of those Scriptures by their own unlearnedness and unstableness to their own destruction as well as to the publick perturbation Noble Sir this great work for so it is to convince weak and wilful men of the error of their wayes I have undertaken in this little Treatise by Gods blessing not unseasonably I hope as to our times nor unsuitably as to my profession If I may be happy to do any of them good who possibly may erre in this with no evil mind by redeeming them from their mistakes and so from the penalties of the Law I shall more rejoyce in that success then those Souldiers did who among the Ancients were rewarded with Civick Garlands for preserving any of their Countrey-men and fellow-Citizens which Honour you know the Roman valour esteemed more then any victorious Laurels for destroying their Enemies And in this charitable endeavour prospered by Gods grace I shall the more seriously triumph because I believe it most agreable as to my Saviours preoept and primitive examples of Christian Bishops so to your generous Soule whereby this piece may probably be fortified with the approbation of so pieus and judicious a person whose single suffrage is to me more valuable then the sequacious and vulgar votes of thousands whose empty brains and clamorous mouths like hollow places where Echo hides her self do commonly receive and report things not as the Truth is in them but as the noise and cry is lowdest I know you are as much above plebeian censures as titular Honours traditional Philosophy and popular Religion being every way judiciously devoted to God and his Truth full of Loyalty to the King and Laws also of sober Conformity to the established Religion of this Church whose royal Law is that of Charity the bond of perfection and centre of Peace In all which respects you deserve and have the love and honour of all worthy Persons and particularly of him who may without vanity own this as an instance of some worth in him that he is SIR Your most affectionate Friend and humble Servant JOH EXON March 20 1661. A DISCOURSE Concerning Publick Oaths and the Lawfulness of Swearing in Judicial Proceedings c. FInding lately in the most Honourable House of Peers that a Law was likely to pass in order to punish with great Penalties those English Subjects who under the name of Quakers shall refuse to take as other legal Oaths so those which are usually required in Judicial proceedings thereby to prevent either the alteration of the good Laws and Customs of England according to private mens fancies or the obstructions and violations of publick Justice the free course of which as that of the Blood and Spirits to the Natural is the preservation of the Life and Health the Peace and Honour the Happiness and very Being of the Body Politick which by the Laws and ancient Customs of this Kingdom of England cannot be duly administred but by those forms of solemn and religious Oaths in the Name of the true God which are the highest Obligations to Truth and Justice upon them that swear also the greatest satisfactions or assurances that can be given to others for the belief of what is so attested and for acquiescency in what is so decided I was hereupon bold thus far humbly to intercede with that Honourable House in the behalf of those poor people who are likely to fall under the Penalties of that Law That however I might consent to the passing of that Bill out of that justice and charity which I owe to the publick peace and welfare to which all private Parties Interests and Charities must submit yet I craved so far a respite for some time as to the execution of those Penalties upon any of them as Offenders until some such rational and religious course were taken as might best inform those men of the lawfulness by God's as well as Man's Law of imposing and taking such publick Oaths That so answering first their Scruples and fairly removing their difficulties either they might be brought to a chearful Obedience in that particular or else be left without excuse before God and man while the truth of the Law was justified against
their error and the severity of it only imputable to their own obstinacy I further recommended this previous method of Christian Charity or meekness of Wisdome as best becoming the Piety Humanity and Honour of that House 2. as most agreeable to the wonted Clemency of His Majesty to all His good Subjects 3. as the aptest means to reclaim such as were gone astray from their duty by the error of their fancy 4. and to stop for the future the spreading of this and other dangerous Opinions which are usually known under the name of Quakerisme the Cure of which is easilier done by rational applications then by only rigid inflictions upon those who pleading Conscience will by the Vulgar be thought Martyrs for their Sufferings their patience spreading a love and esteem of their Opinions by that pity and sympathy which people will be prone to have for their persons 5. I further asserted this humble motion as very sutable to my Profession as a Minister of the Gospel as the special care of the Bishops and Fathers of the Church relations which carry in them great obligations to Humanity Charity Ministerial Duty Episcopal Vigilancy and Paternal Compassion to any men specially Christians who are weak or ignorant erroneous in their judgement or dangerous in their actions 6. Lastly I urged the paterne of Divine Justice whose usual fore-runner is Mercy Vengeance rarely following but where Patience hath gone before instructing men of their duty warning them of the danger of their sins bearing with their manners for a time and calling them to repentance before the Decree come forth to execution To this purpose I am sure I spake how I worded my meaning I cannot exactly recollect confessing that I never found my self who am thought neither a barren nor a diffident speaker more surprised with an ingenuous horror in any Audience then when I adventured to speak in that most august and honourable Assembly of the Lords in Parliament where there are so many excellent Orators and accurate Censors among whom it is safer to hear then to speak and easier to admire then imitate their judicious Eloquence As the Motion seemed to have some favourable Acceptance in that Honourable House from many Lords Temporal and from some of my Brethren the Bishops so I presume it will not be displeasing to their Piety and Charity if I do that by a private and single hand which I perswade my self all of them would readily assist me in by their joint suffrages and consent if their leisure would permit them in common to consult and determine of this point Nor can I but believe that His Majesties Royal Clemency which hath sought in the gentlest way to convince and conquer all His Enemies whose Pride and Folly hath not made them desperate and so the severest punishers of themselves will graciously approve this my charitable endeavour to redeem many of his well-meaning Subjects from those mistakes in Opinion and mischiefs in Practise which must either expose His Majesty and his Kingdomes to great troubles and dangers if unpunished and permitted or else compel His Native Gentleness to use at last and it may be too late those Severities which not His own Benignity but the publick Necessity will require of a Wise and Just King whose Lenity to any party of his Subjects contrary to Law will soon become an injury to the Community which cannot be safe or happy but by an uniform obedience to the same Laws which must be the rules and measures of all mens publick Actions the tryers of their failings and the inflicters of their punishments This Office of Christian Charity I have undertaken for Christ his sake by whom I have received many mercies not bespoken or in the least sort obliged by any of that Sect called Quakers with whom I have so little correspondency that I have not any acquaintance not knowing any of that way by Face or Name or one hours conversation They being a Generation of people so supercilious or so shy that they are scarce sociable or accessible speaking much in their Conventicles behind mens backs but seldom arguing any thing in presence of those that are best able to answer or satisfie them seeming wiser in their own conceits then seven men that can render a reason I have seen indeed some of their Papers and received some of their Letters written to my self truely not very rudely nor malapertly yet with so abrupt and obscure a way so blindly censorious and boldly dictating that saving a few good words and godly phrases in them I found very little of rational or Scriptural demonstration many passages so far from the beauty and strength of Religion that they had not the ordinary symmetry of Reason or the lineaments of common sense in them at least in my apprehension who am wholly a stranger to any Canting or Chymical Divinity which bubbles forth many specious Notions fine Fancies and short-lived Conceptions floating a little in an airy and empty brain but not induring the firm touch or breath of any serious judgement Nor do I expect any thanks for my pains from any of that Faction while they continue in their morose Opinions in their surly rude and uncourteous Manners I do not hear that they are generally a people of so soft and ingenuous tempers as to take any thing kindly or thankfully from those that are not of their own Perswasion many of them seem to affect a ruserved and restical way of clownish yea scornful demeanour prone to censure despise and reproch not only their betters but even their Benefactors and Instructors Their rude and levelling humour denies to shew common courtesie and wonted tokens of civil respect to their Superiours contrary to the reverent gentle and humble behaviour of all God's people in all Ages Jews and Gentiles then whom none were more full of inward humility or of outward respect and civility according to the custom of their Countries Possibly these Quakers may in a fit fear and flatter some men in power but they do not seem much to regard any man with any true love or honour as to real worth unless they be of their Fraternity who pretending to a diviner spirit and higher lights then either Reason Law or Scripture afford to other men do think they have cause to glory in their own imaginations and to despise all those who are not yet arrived to the pitch of their presumption Some men I find look upon these Quakers with an eye of publick Fear and Jealousie lest the leaven of their Opinions and Practises spreading far among the meaner sort of people to whose humour that rude and confident way is very agreeable while in a moment all their defects of Reason Learning Education Religion Loyalty and Civility are made up by a presumed spirit and light within them lest I say it should after the pattern of other Sects both later and elder such as were the Montanists Manichees Circumcellians Euchites
Reason or true Scripture-demonstration is sufficient to make the man of God perfect to every good word and work without any additions or detractions which are but as the Wens or witherings the excrescencies or deficiencies of mens extravagant minds and actions so far from advancing the peace of Conscience or the honour of true Religion that they debase and deforme both of them As no Laws of men contrary to Gods Word are to be actively obeyed so Laws of men which are not contrary to right Reason and Scripture must not be disobeyed but conscientiously observed for the Lords sake 1 Pet. 2. 13. Rom. 13. 5. in whose wisdom and authority such Laws are made and executed The contrary will not only trouble the publick Peace but that also of a mans own soul at least when after the vain flashes of light kindled from the sparks of their private fancies they shall lie down in darkness as to their comfort and reward from God whose judgment is according to righteousness and truth Secondly I cannot but commend the Quakers for their declared esteem in this of the authority of the holy Scripture as the rule of Faith and holy life For as by their instances alledged out of Scripture they profess a fear to sin against the commands there given by Christ against Swearing so I may charitably presume however they are by many suspected to slight the Scriptures and fly to Inspirations or Lights within them that they will be no less strict in doing what therein is required of them as to Truths to be believed Mysteries to be celebrated and Duties to be done to God and Man The only Caution that here must be given them is to take heed that they do not wrest the Scriptures 2 Pel. 3. 16. by their ignorant and unstable minds that they believe not every Spirit or seeming and partial Allegation of Scripture since the Devil oft feathers his temptations and fiery darts as against Christ Mat. 3. with Scriptural Citations partially and preposterously applied Not the Letter in its abruptness or nakedness of sense must be swallowed presently but the mind of God must be searched out in the scope and end also in the manner and emphasis of what is expressed Scripture is indeed sufficient for the substance of all necessary Truths to be believed and Duties to be done or left undone but it doth not stretch it selfe to the instances of every particular circumstance or ceremony which private Prudence or publick Laws may regulate according to order and decency to edification Nor is Scripture to be well understood in retaile that is by single places taken apart by themselves but in whole-sale by the proportion of Faith the analogous or concurrent sense which is made up or twisted from many places Many things in some Scriptures are expressed darkly metaphorically figuratively parabolically comparatively by way of allusion in Metonymies Synecdoches Ironies and Hyperboles in Vniversalities which are limited to the subject intended Many popular expressions have special regard to particular times places persons customs and usages and must be so taken as temporary and occasional These must have commodious interpretations consonant to that grand tenour of Gods word which as the life and spirit runs through all the parts of it but resides most eminently in some places as the Soul in the Brain or Heart which are as the essential vital integral and principal parts of Scripture the main standards and measure of all others and of true Religion both as to Morals and Evangelicals Mysteries to be believed and Duties to be performed Unless we observe these prudentials in searching the mind of God and taking the true meaning of the Scriptures we shall as Saint Austin observes draw poyson with Spiders from those sweet flowers which would afford us honey A depraved and private interpretation is the corruption wrack torture of Scripture whose every line is as the Sun-beams light and straight of it self but erroneous minds like Glasses of Refraction or false Mediums pervert them from their simplicity to their own destruction as S. Peter speaks It were endless to enumerate those places of Scripture which have either more or less or something other in their meaning and design then the Letter seems to hold forth in the bare words of it Extraordinary Commands as to Abraham for sacrificing his Son Isaac to the Israelites to rob by way of borrowing and recompense the Egyptians the heroick impulses and actions of others as Moses Phineas Elias and Sampson Commands to do things less comely and honest either in a reality or in a vision and representation as Hosea's marrying an Harlot the faults or failings of others which were holy men as to their integritie barely recorded but not there blamed as Rebecca's and Jacob's supplanting by a lye and fraud the officious lyes of the Midwives Rahab and others David's feigning himselfe mad the equivocations and dissimulations of others These and such like that have any thing in them which seems or is contrary to the constant rule of Morality Piety Sanctity Honesty and Veracity must be salved by such an interpretation and taken in such a sense as may no way bring them into an ordinary rule or imitable example contrary to the express and constant command of God in his Word which is never to be allayed by the mixtures of humane Passions Frailties and Infirmities So in things that are preceptive either enjoyning or forbidding by way of proverbial speaking the meaning must not be stretched on the tenter or rack of the Letter but as we gather some fruit that grow with thick shells only to gaine the small kernels in them so in these no more is to be collected from the Letter then what may have due regard to the design and scope of the speaker So in the fifth sixth and seventh Chapters of Saint Matthew Christs Sermon in the mount hath many such expressions as of anointing the Head Face in fasting pulling out the right Eye and cutting off the right Hand giving to them that ask to sell all and give to the poor to turn the other Cheek to the smiters These do not run Christians upon maiming and deforming their Bodies or expose them to poverty and stupidity but only they teach them to bear with patience repeated injuries rather then be put beyond the bounds of Christian patience and charity and to sustain any outward difficulties rather then inward enormities of lust or covetousness and the like So not to lay up treasure on earth to take no thought for their life or care for to morrow Labour not for the meat that perisheth c. Joh. 6. 27. to call no man Father or Master on Earth Mat. 23.9 not to salute any man by the way Luk. 10. 4. not to put on costly Rayment or Jewels c. 1 Pet. 3. 3. So Hosea 6. 6. I will have mercy and not sacrifice So Rent your Hearts and
a Christian may swear vainly and rashly by a spontaneous and occasional easiness either promising or asserting although it be a truth and by the true God but without reverence to God and in matters of so little yea no importance or difficulty as neither deserve nor need nor require an Oath To this we all agree with the Quakers Christs words condemning all such profane and trivial swearing much more if it be in fraud and falsitie which makes such Oaths as the Coyn of an Usurper which is false metal and stamp too a complicated sin and one of the strongest chains of darkness which the Devil and a mans own lusts hamper the Soule withal 2. Not is it any question whether Christians may swear in any case by any Creature as such not relating by it and through it to God above all who is the Alpha and Omega the center and circumference of all things from whom they have their being and in whom is the Idea or Prototype of all their perfections To terminate an Oath in a Creature is to put the stamp of Divinity on it to make it an Idol in Gods stead and to profane his holy name by swearing by it as by a false God The swearing by any Creature as such we all own to be a great sin according to those instances which our Lord Christ and Saint Iames from his mouth give us when they explain their meaning of Swear not at all c. 3. Nor is it a question whether an Oath made by the name of any Creature and in a thing lawful may yet be broken or whether it be a sin to swear falsly by them All agree that though the Oath be rash as by a Creature yet it binds in things lawful no less at least to truth and justice then any simple promise and it may be something more Here that is true Fieri non debuit factum valet Like Bastards they should not have been begot but they must be kept unless the matter be sinful as Herod's Oath was which beheaded Iohn Baptist Mat. 14. 9. 4. But the question is Whether those words of Christ and the Apostle do utterly forbid all Swearing in any case whatsoever to all Christians so that by the Law of Christ it is a sin to swear as in private so in publick transactions or any Courts of Judicature be the matter of the Oath never so just and true and the manner of it never so solemn and sacred and the Authority requiring them never so lawful in civil respects This the Quakers affirm led thereto as they profess meerly by the Conscience of that obedience they oweto Christ whose will they say is expresly declared in those words to all his Disciples Not to swear at all in no case at no time upon no mans command Nor do they argue any thing further by way of rational deduction moral grounds or religious principles either from the nature of an Oath or from the consent of other Scriptures or from the Divine Attributes and glory but barely insist upon the words and urge the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Letter as an absolute or universal Negative without any limitation or dispensation So feeding on the rinde or shell of the Letter and gnawing the bone of the bare words that they never come at the kernel and marrow or true meaning of them On the other side I do deny in the behalf of my own Conscience and the consentient sense of this Church and Kingdome yea of all Christian and Reformed Churches of any renown That all swearing is forbidden by those words of Christ and his Apostle But that our Saviours words are to be understood with such a limited sense and strict interpretation as suited to his scope and design which was to rectifie popular errors and remove common abuses in Swearing but not wholly to forbid the use of it in a religious and lawful way And because it is not sufficient in order to my design which is to justifie the legal proceedings of this Kingdoms Iustice by Oaths and to satisfie the scruples of the Quakers to oppose my Nay to their Yea or to offer the husk and chaff of words void of such Reasons as either slow from the nature of all things and all actions as good or evil morally or from the will of God revealed in the Scriptures which is a Treasury of right Reason as well as a Rule of true Religion I will endeavour to give those Reasons which induce me to believe that the Quakers as Christ said to the Saducees do erre not knowing or not right understanding the mind of Christ in those Scriptures which is not to forbid all Swearing nor such as the just and religious Laws of England do require of all under its subjection in some cases I will not seek to oppress or confound the Quakers with the shew of many Reasons as if I would carry the cause by number and not by weight but content my self with those few which are most pregnant plaine and easie to be understood by them 1. Reason From the occasion of Christs and the Apostles words and the scope or end of them to which his own instances by way of explication of his meaning do best direct us both as to what he forbids and enjoynes to some of which the Quakers themselves do consent 2. Reason From the moral and religious nature end and use of Oaths which God had instituted and approved without any repeal by Christ or his Apostles 3. Reason From other places of the New Testament which give light to these both by principles granted and suitable examples expressed To these Reasons I will add by way of full measure heaped up and running over the concurrent judgement of other Christians and Churches ancient and modern in their interpretation of these words with answer to the Allegations made from the sayings and manners of some Primitive Christians This done the conclusion will easily follow with great clearness and good authority to all that are truely wise and have their eyes opened and senses exercised to discerne good and evil The first Reason is from the occasion scope and end of our Saviours words and so of the Apostles For these as the biass of all speech do best discover the speakers mind there being no surer way to wrest and pervert Scriptures then to take them abruptly and absolutely when they have a relative comparative or limited sense in the aim and purpose of the speaker Our blessed Saviour in this Divine Sermon on the Mount of which Saint Matthew gives us so large an account makes it his main aim and scope first to set forth those spiritual heavenly and eternal blessings which beyond those sensible earthly and temporary ones which were so much of old set before the Jews to invite them to obedience of Gods Laws were now to be chiefly regarded by Christians as their peculiar comforts hopes and rewards under the Gospel