If we consult the good of such men themselves so lapsed into Error and desire their Conversion Force and Imposition is no way to it If we consult our own Security there is no danger at all can come by it for as long as such Errors lie in the understanding and are only conversant about supernatural things they have no reference at all to the being or well-being of Mankind as such What hurt does an Error in Religion do me in my Neighbour that is otherwise an honest and good man He is rather in that an object of my Pity and Instruction than of my Anger If we desire to have all men of our Opinion because we think we are in the right 't is a very commendable thing and if we do it with such a publick Charity we shall use only such Christian means as naturally conduce to bring it about But if through the Pride of mens Hearts and the Intention of their own Exaltation thereby they will have every body of their Opinion and because they cannot convince and perswade them will therefore force them and trample upon them that 's an Odious Super-intendency To say That upon a prudential Account Liberty should never be allowed in a State because 't is that which will unite Parties and bring them to a Consistency amongst themselves and so render them much more dangerous is to say a thing upon a great Mistake For common Experience shews us That nothing unites Parties more amongst themselves than a hot Persecution For does any thing bring them so much together as that 'T is like a great Storm that drives Cattel that are scattered about altogether and brings them to meet in one common shelter to save themselves Ridly and Hooper agreed in the Goal that would hardly have disputed themselves Friends There is no Bond of Union amongst Disagreeing Persons like PERSECUTION The common Concern of their Security then begets Correspondency Acquaintance and such Intercourse and mutual Assistance as endears them above any thing one to another And for the Danger there may be of any Party there is nothing sure so like to remove that as indulging them with a Liberty The best way to be secured against the discontent of any Party is to remove the Cause of such Discontent and the best way to be out of fear of them unless you can totally destroy them is to oblige them and so at once to engage and win them over and thereby disband our own Fears A late Author tells us with particular Remark That Maecenus heretofore gave advice to Augustus That upon no terms he should endure such who would bring in any strange Worship into the State I believe it and 't was such kind of Advice no doubt that caused the Ten first Persecutions Methinks the Author should have remembred That that advice would have kept Christianity out of the World For if we follow the Track of such Policy we shall find that what we now say against Tolerating Dissenters amongst our selves the Papists first said and do still say against us all and if we go one step higher the Heathens said the very same against the Christian Religion it self and thought it a Factious Fanatick Project of sick-brain'd men and a thing not to be endured that men should not content themselves with the same Godds that the rest of World worshipped and acquiesced in 'T is a sad thing and much to be lamented that the Protestants should take up the Dregs of those Politicks and make use of them one against another upon very small difference amongst themselves The same Author in another part of his Book propounds this Question If divers ways of Worship saith he be allowed in a Nation what shall a Prince do If he keep any men of any Profession or Party out of Employment for their Opinion sake he disobliges that Party If he bring all men indifferently alike into Employment if he be of any Party himself he will disoblige his own Party who will expect Pre-eminence in that kind and so in Conclusion by endeavouring to please all he will lose all This is a Knot very easily untied I will suppose a Prince strict in the Profession and Practice of what he thinks is the Truth and the more strict Personally he is the greater will the favour of Indulgence appear to those that differ from him But there is no necessity that he should make a Party of those who are of his Opinion distinct from the rest of his Subjects 'T is below his Greatness and besides his Interest so to do they will soon become like the Sons of Zerviah and in time grow to be too hard for him Those that are of his Opinion he may think them in his private judgment better Christians than others but there is no Policy so to distinguish them as if they were thereby better Subjects than others All men in a State are to give one Common Assurance of their Fidelity and such who are allowed a Liberty in their Religion when differing from the publick Profession the Political end of it is to make them good Subjects and the end of that must needs be to make them serviceable to their Prince And there is no Reason to doubt but that they will be so and eminently so because they lie under an Obligation to his Favour those of his own Opinion are not capable of A Prince should seat himself in his Throne with an equal Political Aspect to all his Subjects and employ them as their fitness for his Service qualifies them There is no Reason to narrow and limit a Prince to any Party or to let any Party grow into such a Praedominant Opinion as if the Prince were confin'd to them No mans bare Opinion in such things should qualifie him for an Employment nor no mans Opinion ought to put a Negative upon him in that kind that is for a Prince after he has obliged all his Subjects to him to lose the use of a great part of them Let a Prince but chuse men to serve him whose Ability and Fitness carries the evidence of his Choice and other Exceptions will soon vanish 'T is below the Greatness of a Prince to have any Subject to pretend to Imployment upon any score but his Judgment of his fitness for it The King of France hath often with good success employed his Protestant Subjects Nay has often trusted the Command of his whole Army in the hand of the Protestant and yet feared not the disobliging of the Popish Party or being thought a man of no Religion for so doing 'T is a most Absurd and Impolitick thing because men differ in some divine supernatural things to put them under such Characters as to make them unuseful one to another in all other humane things Let a Prince once give Liberty of Conscience and he obliges all Parties to him and makes them wholly depend upon him the Tenor of their Liberty will be a Tenor in Capite and Quam diu
them altogether and what serves our turns at some times to oppose others may at last prevail upon our selves And so it is in our Practices reserving any of their Ceremonies may at last bring us to some of their Doctrines He that keeps a Holy-day is within a step of praying to that Saint for whose sake he keeps it especially if he have the wit to consider why he keeps it He that kneels and puts weight upon it is in a fair way to adoration and he that is for joyning the Cross with Baptism may come to do it after Grace and cross himself in time 'T was Bishop Bonner's observation when he saw the Reformation and how many of the Popish Ceremonies were retained being asked what he thought of it If they like saith he the taste of our Broth so well they will eat of our Beef shortly Secondly Liberty of Conscience is the great means to diffuse Gospel-knowledge in divine things and that 's the best and surest way to bar out Popery and lock the Door upon it forever Ignorance is the great and only preparative for implicit subjection Christendom cannot I dare say afford an instance that ever any State or People where Divine-Knowledge by Liberty of Conscience and a Liberty for the Gospel was once spread were in the least danger of turning Apostates to Popery but have grown daily more and more into a detestation of it and generally almost every man amongst them carrying a Weapon in his understanding to defend the Protestant Cause Were Liberty of Conscience granted in Italy and other Popish States we should soon see the Mitre totter upon the Popes Head and probably see as fair Churches there as in any other part of Europe 'T was observed in the Wars of the Low-Countries that when ever any Catholick began to look into the Bible he was not long-liv'd in the Roman Profession Thirdly Liberty of Conscience will breed men up with an irreconcilable dislike to all Imposition in Religion and Conscience and so unite them in a general abhorrence of POPERY as the grand Mother and Author of it all Chistendom over All Principles and Parties born from a Liberty given in Religion have an Antipathy in them to that Romish Yoke and do naturally unite against the Popish Religion as the grand and common Enemy of them all Let Liberty of Conscience once be given in a Protestant-State and though there be never so many differences amongst themselves yet men of all perswasions will concenter in that He that has the freedom of his Religion will be concerned to defend it and look upon Popery as the great Grant he is in danger of Experience and Fact the best of all demonstrations do evidence this Take a view of those places where Liberty of Conscience hath been most given and you will find there the greatest aversion to Popery that is in any parts of Christendom 'T is in other places where other Methods of Imposition and Persecution are used that compliance with Popery hath been attempted and projects set on foot to compound the Protestant and the Papists into an Agreement 'T is Imposition in Religion sweeps the House and keeps the Nest warm for Popery Liberty of Conscience mortally stabs it where that is once given it may be said to the Pope as it was to Belshazzar God hath numbred thy Kingdom and finished it And the place where he once Tyrannized shall know him there no more Lastly If the Church of Rome understand their own Interest as we have good reason to believe they do this Case is determined to our hands for upon every occasion since the Reformation both in Germany France Swisserland and all places where Liberty of Conscience hath been endeavoured the Popes have toto animo every way opposed it and declared it a thing perfectly destructive to the Church and such as where-ever it was suffered would destroy the Roman Faith and in that Maxim I believe their Infallibility is not much to be denied Some are so much otherwise-minded that they believe Liberty of Conscience will be the ready means to induce Popery again amongst us The Reasons of it seem invisible unless it be done by some new Rule of contraries It must either come to pass by giving Liberty in general to Protestants of differing perswasions or else by giving Liberty to the Papists themselves as included in a general Liberty For the first I hope it appears evidently to have another tendency And for the second The giving Liberty to the Papists themselves amongst us no man well informed can imagine that they should be included in any such Liberty First Because in their Practice amongst us they refuse to give that publick assurance every Subject ought to give of his Fidelity that expects the favour due to a Subject And secondly Because their Principles are such that if they understand their own Religion they can never be good Subject to any Protestant State He that knows not this knows not the ROMAN RELIGION And to prove it so by Fact Amongst very many other Instances let what was done here in the time of Queen Elizabeth to her and at the same time in France to Henry the Fourth forever lie upon Record against them Nor can a Papist ever become a true and hearty Subject to a Protestant Prince but by that act he ceaseth to be so And as common Justice does deny them all pretentions to Liberty so common Equity opposeth them for as both they and their Religion abhor giving Liberty to any but themselves so is their practice accordingly for they never give Liberty to a Soul living that differs from them where they are able and dare deny it To say That Liberty of Conscience can have no other effect but to tolerate damnable Heresies and all kind of Sectaries which is the usual way of discoursing it and so to enlarge into all kind of Satyrical Rhetorick upon that Topick is to put a Bears skin upon it and then to bait it 'T will be to impose a thing of a very hard belief upon me to say That Truth never gains by Liberty and that the Imposer is alwayes in the right and the Sufferer in the wrong especially considering he that thinks me an Heretick another thinks him so and a fourth thinks us all so and all the while we are all of us weak imperfect fallible men sitting in judgment and sentencing one another And there can be no other end of it but that he that is strongest makes himself in the right and destroys the rest When ever Truth comes to suffer by Imposition as many times it does and comes afterwards to be so acknowledged the evil of such Imposition carries its own evidence But suppose such Truth never gets any good and Liberty should be only to men under Errors and Mistakes 't were not fit then to deny it that is 't were not fit then to impose upon them for Liberty is nothing but a Negative upon Force and Imposition
by becoming Christian hath no addition of power to what he had before Magistracy is the same and as legitimated amongst Heathens as Christians A Magistrate when Christian exercises the power he had before otherwise but receives no addition of power to his Office Christ in the Gospel hath made no alteration in Magistratical Power nor hath he given any addition to it when exercised by Christian hands but a Magistrate when Christian is bound to exert his power in a way suitable to the light he then hath He that hath no other than the light of nature hath as much power about Religion as if he were Christian and is to take as much care of the Souls of his Subjects suitable to that Light as any Christian Magistrate is to do suitable to his The power a Parent hath over his Child a Master over his Servant a Prince over his Subjects is no more when they become Christian than it was before only that power must be otherwise exercised according to that improvement of light Christianity brings with it All natural and moral Power was the same from the beginning though God was not pleased to set that power distinctly in a Law written till long after the light of nature gave a plentiful information about these things The duty of all such relations in the performance mutually of them amongst men is greatly furthered by the Light of the Gospel but the duty is still the same several things do evidently evince this general Truth 1st All natural and moral Relations belong to men as men only so considered and not as Chrstians and are fully compleat and perfect amongst mankind both in the power of the one and the duty of the other without any reference to any Perswasion in Religion or other Qualification whatever 2dly It appears from hence because whatsoever the Gospel reveals to be the duty of such relations each to other we find practised by the light and law of nature from the beginning these things being of absolute necessity to uphold the frame and policy of mankind God had naturally endowed them with a sufficient discovery of his mind about them 3dly It appears to be so because Christians are obliged by the Laws of the Gospel to give the same obedience and perform the same duties in these Relations to Unbelievers that they are to Believers the Gospel speaks of these things without distinction Subjects are commanded to obey Heathen Magistrates in all things lawful and we are to obey Christian no farther Servants are commanded with the utmost duty of Servants to obey unbelieving Masters and so Wives to be subject to unbelieving Husbands all which declares these Relations perfectly inherent in mankind as such and no way relative to any other Qualification whatsoever These two preliminary considerations of the Magistrate 1st That he has his original in the light and law of Nature 2dly That his power and being is thereby perfect and compleat and that Christianity gives no addition of Power to such an Office will much further the right stating the chief and last thing proposed How far a Christian Magistrate under the Gospel is impowered negatively and positively in these things Before I proceed to which I shall come to the third thing intended which is To shew how some eminent Mistakes about the Magistrates Power in Religious things have involved us into very destructive and pernicious Extremities A Prospect of which may be had in these three things into which the various writings and discourses of that subject have chiefly issued themselves First Some do make the Magistrate the sole Judge of all Spiritual matters ascribe to him the power of setling what Government he pleases in the Church appointing Officers in it determining all differences in Religious things suppressing by his power all Errors and Heresies and superceding all matters that appertain to the Gospel A second sort with an equal warmth affirm the Magistrates Power in Religious things but say 'T is never to be exercised but in a perfect subservency to the Church and that whatsoever the Church determines he is bound to execute by the temporal Sword as the great Law of Christ A third sort as wide of the Truth as either of the other say positively The Magistrate hath nothing at all to do in Religious concerns that he is a meer civil Officer to take care of mens civil Interests and hath nothing to do with things of a spiritual nature That all these Principles have produced hurtful effects and that the truth lies distant from them all will be found in a distinct consideration of them The first does little less than revive in the Magistrate now much of that power Christ himself and the Apostles by his delegation exercised at first in setling the Gospel Church and unless it can be punctually made appear where in the Gospel Christ hath substituted the Magistrate to exercise such a dominion over his House it will soberly be found a dangerous Intrenchment upon his Kingly Office 't is one thing to take care of the execution of what Christ hath already setled and another to make Laws and Customs about those things This opinion as it is by many late Writers maintained dissolves all Ecclesiastical Regiment and annexeth the Government of the Church to the civil Power or indeed drowns the Church into the State or at least mixes them as much or more than they were mixed together under the Judaical policy What ever Government the Magistrate settles cannot be Ecclesiastical but Civil if it be Forreign to what is already divinely appointed if it be not then it s not the setling but the executing of what is already setled unless you will say that Christ entrusted him to settle the Ecclesiastical Government of his Church and that will seem not a little strange that the Magistrate who is no spiritual Officer set in the Church nor cannot himself administer in executing the least thing within it should have such a supream Power over it Either Christ and the Apostles did settle a Government in the Church or they did not if they did the Magistrate as well as others is obliged by it if they did not but that 't is left to the Magistrate he has a greater power at least in the exercise of it than ever they had For if we suppose they had power to settle a Government but did not think fit to exert that power but left it to the Magistrate his power in the execution of it is greater than theirs 'T is much that the infallible Wisdom of Christ and his Apostles could not better find out an order for the Gospel Church than to leave it to the mercy of every Magistrates discretion and 't is equally to be wondred at that an Officer of such necessary importance to the Church as to settle the Government of it should be wanting when the Gospel was first planted and every thing ordinary and extraordinary belonging to it was presented to accompany
Gospel not mighty through God but mighty through the Magistrates power and wholly to alter the nature of the Gospel and all its Institutions 't is to arm the Church with Weapons Christ never gave her and to make her a Military rather than a Spiritual Society Thirdly Suppose but this truth That all Churches even the purest are in the execution of Christs Laws fallible and lyable to mistake this Doctrine hath a marvellous tendency to bring the Magistrate under great transgression and each Christian under a possibility of such bondage as the Gospel no where imposes on him If a man be unjustly cast out of a Church and the Magistrate proceeds against him he executes an evil Sentence and does it blindfold being by this Doctrine an Officer no way competent nor in any capacity to make a judgment of the truth or error of it and so cannot possibly escape a greater sin A Christian unduly cast out of a Church hath this security against such a proceeding that Christ will never ratifie it upon his Conscience but by this manner of execution he is sure whether the Sentence be right or no to fall under as heavy an outward suffering as the Magistrates Sword can inflict upon him And by this means it will come to pass that men shall be more dangerously concerned in their Lives and Estates by being in the Church than by being Members of any Society whatsoever The third Extream in this matter lies amongst those who say That the Magistrate hath nothing at all to do about Religion This lies very wide from truth and cannot in such a general Position be made good if we consider First That every man in the World as he is a Creature and a Subject to the great God is bound in his station and in Gods way to promote his honour and endeavour that his Will may be done in the World it would be strange that the Magistrate who is his chief Officer should be no way concerned to see the Laws which God gives the World put in execution by the Persons and in the manner he hath appointed it 't is not to be imagined that he that hath the complicated relation of a Christian and a Magistrate to others should have no care relative to their Spiritual good 't were to say the Magistrate must not do that which every man else in the World is bound to do Secondly God never since the world began trusted any with the care of mens bodies but he entrusted them likewise with some care of their Souls If we look over all the Natural and Moral Relations in the world such as Parents Masters General of Armies we shall ever find it so Men are to be ruled over as Creatures that have immortal Souls to be chiefly cared for and they are to be ruled over as such who have a special relation to God and a homage to pay him above all the rest of the world a rule over men without some respect to this would denominate mankind into Brutes Thirdly To say the Magistrate hath nothing to do about Religion is to deny what hath been practised by the Light of Nature before the Law was practised under the Law suitable to that dispensation and both commanded and commended and is to be practised under the Gospel suitable to this dispensation and is foretold as a blessing so to be and in fact hath been so ever since there hath been a Magistrate Christian in the world Having thus considered these hurtful Extreams about the Magistrates Power the last thing to come under consideration will be the due bounds of a Magistrates Power under the Gospel that is How far a Magistrate being Christian may improvedly exercise his natural power for the advantage and benefit of the Gospel and wherein he stands bounded and obliged not to proceed The preserving a right state whereof through the torrent of these Extreams will be of singular moment to the matter in hand We have seen that the power of a Heathen and a Christian Magistrate differs nothing at all in kind A Heathen Magistrate hath the same right and is bound to do as much in Religion as a Christian only the one having more knowledge of God and his Mind is bound improvedly to exercise his power accordingly the first thing a Christian Magistrate stands bound to do for the good of Religion is to afford the Churches all negative good that is to remove all Oppression from them and all things that do any way hinder them to enjoy the Institutions of Christ he is to give them rest that they may be edified and walk in the comforts of the Holy Ghost and lead quiet and peaceable Lives in all godliness and honesty This as 't is a special blessing the Church does not often enjoy so 't is one chief part of that benefit it receives by Christian Rulers And this the Light of Nature will easily guide a Magistrate to do for any Religion of the truth of which he is perswaded In the Affirmative he is not only to see that the Gospel be preached and all under him fully instructed in the truths thereof to unite all Christians and as much as in him lies preserve peace in the Church to encourage those he finds most zealous constant and sincere in the profession of the Gospel and by his own example to lead forth his Subjects in all sound Orthodox Profession and Practice But to comprehend all in one he is to endeavour in a Gospel-way to see all the Laws of Christ put in execution and as much as in him lies see his Will done in the World he is so far from being bound to execute only what the Church will have him that he is to over-see their proceedings and to take care as Christs chief Officer in the World that all things in the Church be duly and according to Christs appointment administred The Apostles words are general and full Let every Soul be subject to the higher Powers Wheresoever the highest power is it must needs be so unless you will have a highest and a highest which will breed inevitable confusion the Civil power bidding a man do one thing and the Ecclesiastical another it hath ever in fact been so but under the Roman Church where the Emperors were made believe that 't was the highest piece of Religion voluntarily to yield up their Power to the Church and submit to her direction for the use of it which at first they confessed was inherent in the Emperors and not in the Church Before the Law not only the Power but the Exercise of the Priesthood it self naturally fell into the Magistrate 'T was so in Noah in Abraham and in Melchizedeck who was a King and a Priest 'T was so in Moses the Regal and Sacerdotal power were both in him till they were by God divided between him and Aaron ever since which time the exercises of Magistracy and Ministry have been and are to be distinct 'T was so likewise amongst
the Heathens Homer tells us of Princes and Heroes that Sacrificed and performed the Worship to the gods In Rome 't was manifestly so the first Roman Kings did the like Since Magistracy and Ministry has been distinctly exercised still the Inspection and Regulation of Religion and the Officers Ecclesiastical have been in the Magistrate Under the Law 't was plainly so Under the Gospel so soon as there was a Christian Magistrate that could exercise such a Power we find it so The right was the same in the Heathen powers which happily was the ground of Paul's Appeal unto Caesar though they could not then exercise it There is nothing more plain than that there may be a Right where there is not an Ability to exercise it Constantine and the Christian Emperors after him till the Church of Rome had cheated them into subjection took upon them the care and over-sight of all Religious things and to see all Christs Laws executed Constantine used to call himself The general Bishop to take care that all things were duly performed in the Church Amongst our selves we reap the Advantage of our Kings and Princes care and concern in that enjoyment we have of the Protestant Religion This shews the great weakness on the one hand of such who say the Magistrate hath nothing to do with Religion and the perfect mistake of those on the other hand who would have the Magistrate wholly Subordinate to the Church and the third extream in those who would place the Magistrate in so supream a Power as upon the matter to do what he pleaseth will be sufficiently enervated if we consider That as the Magistrate is to see that executed that Christ hath appointed in Religion so he is to bring in nothing of his own he is punctually tyed up neither to add nor diminish neither in the matter nor the manner his business is to see Laws executed not to make Laws nor change Laws Christ has no where granted any such Commission either to the Magistrate or any else upon Earth and therefore we come to a right state of the Magistrates Power when we consider him as Gods chief Officer in the World directed by the Light of Nature as well as otherwise to see that which God reveals to be his Will put in execution And that which comes particularly to the present matter in hand That he doth it under the Gospel in the manner Christ hath appointed The manner Christ hath appointed being as positively obliging as the matter and therefore the Temporal Sword when 't is used by Magistrates in the concerns of the Gospel is the Dead Fly that corrupts all their otherwise very laudable endeavours Nor need it seem strange that a Magistrate should have the care and over-sight of that wherein he is not to use the Temporal power as he is to endeavour to see that done by others under the Gospel as the Administration of the Sacraments and the like which he is not to do in his own person so he is to see that done by the Spiritual means Christ hath appointed for it which he is by no means to force the doing of by the Temporal power He that thinks the Magistrate cannot be useful to the Church without the Temporal power may with as good reason say That all other powers in the Church are useless where there is not the Temporal Sword to execute them All Societies of men are under the Regulation of the highest power but yet may act and ought to do so by distinct and proper wayes and by means suitable to each A Colledge of Physitians in a State are under the Regulament of the highest Power and yet it were very absurd to force them to give Physick as a thing in it self both unnatural and unreasonable The case is much more so in the Church nor can any instance fully reach it because the Church is a distinct thing of it self and hath Powers proper and peculiar to it in which it is so compleat that it can subsist without the Magistrate as it did in the primitive times The Civil and Ecclesiastical Power are things perfectly in themselves distinct and ought in their exercise to be kept so The highest Power governs men as men by the temporal Sword but as Christians by the spiritual and by seeing all things done in Religion by those spiritual means Christ hath appointed all which means he may make use of though exercised by other hands than his own and still in a subordination to him as Christ's chief Officer in the World who hath the Charge incumbant upon him to see all that Christ hath commanded duely put in execution But the Magistrate himself with the Power proper to him which is the temporal is not immediately to act any thing in the Church what he does is in a collateral way that were to bring a new Officer into the Church and a Power new and forreign to execute the Gospel contrary to the nature and totally destructive to the being of it The Magistrate hath wayes such as Christ thought sufficient to promote the good of Religion and propagate the growth of the Gospel without drawing the civil Sword which will make no more impression in spiritual concerns than it will do upon a Ghost that hath no real body In the execution of those he ought to acquiesce but if not content therewith he will use the civil Power to force men to believe and worship according to his Light and will take Offenders in the Church and punish them by his temporal Power what is this but to lord it over Gods Heritage and to make the Gospel Church and being a Member of it a thing of greater outward carnal fear bondage and subjection to men than ever the Law was This use of the temporal Power is the sting that wounds all liberty of Conscience and totally overthrows it If the Magistrate where I live be an Arrian a Socinian or in any such Error while he enforceth this but in a Gospel way and in Christs way of enforcing Truth only by instruction and perswasion this doth not mortally wound me this does not Petere jugulum of my liberty to keep to the Truth but if he come to establish it by the civil Power and by that suppress all else as Error my liberty in a differing perswasion is totally gone The admitting the Magistrate to use the temporal Power in executing his judgment about Religion hurries every man out of the world that is not of his mind for whatsoever will make a man an Heretick will bring a man to the Stake and every Opinion that is not the Magistrate's must needs make a man so If Christ hath enjoyned the temporal Power to be used it must have its utmost effect not only upon Hereticks within but much more upon those that are Infidels without the Church If the Magistrate be appointed to use such a power he must not tolerate any thing upon any terms nor exempt it from the lash of
Instance in that Law about putting Idolaters to Death where if we consider the circumstances attending it we shall find it impossible nay unlawful now to be executed Whosoever tempted another to Idolatry was not to be conceal'd but the Person tempted was obliged to kill him himself whether he were his Brother Son Wife or whatever Relation it were In the 13th of Deut. vers 9. Thou shalt surely kill him thy hand shall be first upon him and then the hand of all the People and they shall stone him And afterwards we find there whole Cities of Idolaters are to be raced to the ground and their Children and Cattel utterly destroyed These are Laws that cannot be now executed under the Gospel nay they are forbidden for we are bid to walk in Wisdom to those that are without to do good to all men and to give no offence neither to Jew nor Gentile Nay Believing Husbands and Wives are bid to live with their Unbelieving Relations in hopes to convert them Who can avoid seeing that these Punishments as well as Promises were relative to that People and that state of things to preserve them from the rest of the World and expired with the distinction of Jew and Gentile Thus I have endeavour'd to oppose the Magistrates using the civil Power to force Religion under the Gospel First because 't is against the Light of Nature And secondly 't is not only without but against the Command of the Gospel so to do Famous is that saying of Tertullian to Scapula It appertaineth unto the Authority of the Law of Man and Nature that every man Worship as he thinketh good and one mans Religion doth not hurt nor profit another Neither is it any piece of Religion to inforce Religion which must be undertaken by a mans own accord and not through Violence So thought Turtullian antiently So saith Lactantius Who shall inforce me either to believe what I will not or not to believe what I will So saith Cassdor Religion cannot be forced And Bernard hath an excellent saying to the same purpose Faith is to be planted by Perswasion not obtruded by Violence Bede tells us That here in England so soon as King Ethelbert was converted by Austin the Monk he made a Law That none should be compelled to Religion having understood that Christ's Service ought to be voluntary and not compelled A third Reason against using Force Compulsion about things under the Gospel is Because 't is not adequate to the Malady for if the meaning be to make a man forsake Error and imbrace the Truth 't is no Remedy suitable to the Disease nor will it ever reach such a Distemper or effect such a Cure The Disease lies in the Soul and in the Understanding the compelling and punishing the Body will never help it the end will be wholly lost A man can never be forced to alter or imbrace an Opinion he may deny it or conceal it But if he had a desire through fear or other slavish considerations to do it yet he cannot and so a man is compelled to an impossibility This usually makes Hypocrites and at last Atheists but never makes a right Convert So the Souls of men this way are endangered the Devils Interest promoted but neither the Salvation of Souls nor the Honour of God by enlarging Truth any way furthered He that useth no other Medium but force to me makes a Lyon and a Mastiff-Dog as capable of converting me and giving Laws to my Understanding as he We are bid to restore Persons fallen into Error by a Spirit of Meekness considering our selves lest we also be tempted So Paul to Timothy The Servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle to all men in Meekness instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure will give Repentance No man ever yet did any good to himself or others by forcing a man against the Law of his own Light and Reason How many that through fear and oppression have gone against their Light have repented openly to the shame and disgrace of those who violently obtruded Principles upon them contrary to what was natively and properly their own Take amongst many one famous instance recorded by Socrates in his Ecclesiastical History The Emperor Valens by threats and menaces to confiscate and banish him made Elusius Bishop of Cyzicum turn Arrian and approve the Decrees of the Council of Arminium The effect of it was Elusius presently fell into horror of Conscience openly at Cyzicum recanting what he had done crying out of the Emperors unjust cruelty and made all men loath such a proceeding A late Author undertakes to justifie the use of Force in Religion from the Opinion of Saint Austine whose Opinion at first as is well known was That it was no way lawful to use Force to men of differing Opinions in Religion The retraction of that and the change of his mind was occasioned by a particular accident at Hippo and it may be if we consult all circumstances we shall find his last Opinion had more need of a retractation than his first and yet at last he is very positive against all capital punishment his words are Nullis tamen bonis 'T is a thing says he that pleaseth no good man that any Heretick should be put to death We may see by this how men do curtail and enlarge these things according to their interests and particular affections and set bounds at their own pleasure some are for one kind of temporal severity and some for another and so when we leave the Scriptures that give no direction for any we lose our selves and wander as the fancies and interests of men lead us But the Authors words are these Though Force saith he will not remove the Error yet it may prevent its spreading though it doth not take away the Cause yet it hinders most of the mischievous Effects The mischievous effects of an Opinion is considered as it relates to a man himself who is possessed with it and as it relates to others who may be by him infected with it Force doth in no wise hinder the spreading of an Opinion for if a man be punished for declaring to others what he thinks is right and he thinks himself bound in Conscience to declare others are more easily taken and by his Sufferings made more pleased with his Notion and sooner become his Proselites In the other case he that forceth me to deny my Opinion sins in doing it but I sin likewise if I comply with him for such mischievous effects as relate to the Person himself possessed with an Opinion hinders them not at all unless you can convert him by it for it either confirms him in one Error or leads him into a worse If he stand it out and suffer he will be the more rooted in his perswasion by it and be apt to think want of Arguments brings men to Club-Law If he comply against his Light he runs then into an apparent and
large De pace Religionis ut vocant seu de Libertate Religionis seu de bono Autonomiae An quatenus concedi possit a pio Magistratu Concerning Liberty of Religion and how far it may be granted by a pious Magistrate he saith That though the Magistrate be to defend but one Religion even that which he judges to be Truth by the Word of God yet none ought to be compelled to that by outward force but every mans Conscience to be left at Liberty Et nonnunquam diversaram Religionum exercitium si non publicum saltem privatum aut clandestinum ex singularibus causis permittendum esse statuimus Atque hoc demum sensit pacem concordiam externam seu politiam inter Orthodoxos non Orthodoxos saepe etiam Hereticos simul colendam ab ipso pio Magistratu procurari posse debere existimamus And he gives these three following Reasons for his Judgment Prima nititur generalibus illis Scripturae dictis quae justiciam charitatem studiumque pacis concordiae serò nobis omnibus commendant ne quid aliter adversus proximum statuamus quam qualiter nobiscum agi vellemus diserte praecipiunt Denique at conscientiis suam libertatem concedamus dissentientes in negotio Religionis amice toleremus omnino mandant Mat. 5.7 Rom. 12.14 alibi Secunda petitur ab exemplis sapientium piorum Regum tum in veteri tum in novo Testamento c. Tertia ab ipsa naturali Equitate itemque adjuncta utilitate quam etiam experientia quotidiana fere comprobat Nam praeterquam quod aequissimum est in causa Religionis ab omni vi coactione externâ abstinere ipsis etiam rebus publicis ut ita fiat omnino expedit atque conducit quippe quae alioqui facillime turbarentur ut intestinis bellis ac mutuis lanienis tandem considerent prout hactenus in multis Europae provinciis Galliâ praesertim Belgio accidisse novimus Cum contra in Germania Helvetia Polonia alibi locorum in quibus Religionum libertas hactenus indulta fuit istis discordiis lanienis non fuerit locus Ergo resipsa per se licita bona est etiam si per accidens abusus aliquis accidere possit Alst de Eccl. Lib. 4. Cap. 14. What can be said with more truth and soberness about this matter LIBERTY of CONSCIENCE The Magistrates Interest Or To grant Liberty of Conscience to Persons of Different Perswasions in matters of Religion is the Great Interest Of all Kingdoms and States and particularly of ENGLAND Asserted and Proved HAving thus far considered those things which do most immediately reflect upon the Magistrates Duty in allowing a due Liberty to each mans Conscience We will in the next place consider how far his Interest engages him this way That 't is the great Interest of all Protestant States and particularly of England To give Liberty to men of differing Apprehensions in the Protestant Religion is evident if we consider That a Prince or State by imposing the Principles of any one party in Religion makes himself of that party and engages all the rest against him 'T is no way prudent for a Prince when his Subjects consist of many differing Judgments to resolve to have them all of one mind a thing impracticable or else to be their declared Enemy and Persecutor 't is a ready way to interrupt his own quiet and repose without any other effect for he will never by force and violence unite them in one Opinion those differences will rather be fomented and all Animosities arising thereupon and men rather fixed and confirmed by such Persecution than any way removed from their Principles by it 'T is not the having several parties in Religion under a State that is in it self dangerous but 't is the persecuting of them that makes them so First It puts them all under discontent and then unites them together in such discontent Thuanus a wise States-man saith Heretici qui pace datâ factionibus franguntur persecutione uniuntur contra Rem Publicam Those who in their Principles largely differ from each other when they come to be all bound up together in one common Volumn and linked in the same chain of Persecution and suffering will be sure to twist themselves into an united Opposition to such an undistinguishing severity Whereas the thing in it self rightly considered so many divided Interests and Parties in Religion are much less dangerous than any and may be prudently managed to ballance each other and to become generally more safe and useful to a State than any united party or interest whatever He that is suffered to enjoy under a State the freedom of his Religion when differing from the publick Profession has not only the common tye of a Subject upon him for his protection as a man but the cumulative obligation and thanks to pay for his Indulgence as a Christian under such a Character Subjects in such a posture as they will ever be studious of an opportunity to testifie their grateful fidelity and by some eminent service to lay up a stock or Merit that may secure their future quiet so they will be of any most careful not to forfeit so pleasing an Indulgence by falling under a publick displeasure A Prince in such a state of things by making himself a common Father to the whole Protestant Religion though made up of some differences within it self will be secured not only of that common Homage of Obedience and Subjection but with it that more noble of the Hearts and Affections of all his Protestant Subjects To say any party in Religion is disaffected to a State and therefore not fit for such favour when such disaffection if it be does plainly arise from the Severity of the State against them in that case the reason why favour should not be shewed is removed by showing of it For as persecuting men for their Religion must necessarily disgust them so giving them the freedom of it must needs equally oblige them 'T is no true measure to take of any parties in Religion to say the one are better Subjects than the other when the one are favoured and countenanced and the other still kept under and oppressed There is no reason but to believe there is an equal Tendency in all to love that Prince or State where they find favour and protection 't is a common disposition runs in the blood of all men and by how much the Principles of any party are less taking and plausible the less dangerous still is that party and as they will need favour more than others so they must needs lie proportionably secured to a State by the Obligation is put upon them Take it for Truth which is commonly affirmed That all such for whom Liberty is at any time desired are men full of Faction and full of Error For the first 't is certain Persecution will not only continue but foment
such Faction and give it a plausible pretence to justifie it self upon whereas a Liberty granted in matters of Conscience will either wholly win such men to a due and hearty Obedience as finding themselves in a posture they cannot expect to mend or else will lay them open to such apparent justice for punishment and bring them under such a general contempt as shall leave them stript of all pretensions and render them wholly inconsiderable 'T is marvellous prudence to separate between Conscience and Faction which can never be but by a Liberty of the one that so they may distinctly punish the other He that hath liberty granted to worship God according to his Conscience and yet is not satisfied but continues troublesom makes every body ready to be his Executioner and makes that discovery which could never have been made before that Faction was his end and Conscience but the pretended means such men will not only lie open to the States just severity but to the hatred of all men who do generally dislike ill actions most when they come from men of the best pretensions Punish men for their Religion because you judge them Factious and mix all together and you fall into this double Error Either you punish men for Faction that deserve it not and so besides a piece of Injustice do what you can to make those Enemies who are not nor would not be so or else those that are so you give them the pretence of Conscience to justifie themselves in whatever sufferings comes upon them When people differing from the publick Religion meet to worship God and are seized and punished for so doing the Magistrate saith He punisheth for Faction they say They suffer for Religion And all People who see the actual punishment inflicted for things relating to Conscience and Religion will be sure to believe and pitty them and be ready to condemn the State A due Separation as 't is best to be made so 't will only by a Liberty given be obtained He that intends nothing but to give God the Homage of his Conscience will have freedom to do it and he that under that has other ends and aims will be justly punished for it But for a State to imbibe a general belief that all who differ from the State-Religion are factious to the civil Power and not to be suffered and so to punish them as such and if they be not so to tempt them thereby to be so is to do an act of injustice to them and to forfeit their own prudence towards themselves For the Errors you may suppose men possessed withal as an eager Persecution is apt to make the Professors of them think them more than ordinary Truths and themselves some great men in maintaining them so it makes others seek after that when driven into a Corner which were it in the open Streets no man would regard He that preaches and writes under restraint that restraint begets him readers and hearers that would else pass through the World with very little notice taken of him things difficult and hard to come by carry some weight in mens expectancy Foolish and absurd Opinions are only put to Nurse by Persecution and by that made to have something in the concerns and fears of others which has indeed nothing in it self The hiding men by a keen pursuit after them in the profession of such things keeps them alive whereas if they were openly preached written and discoursed of the folly of them would appear such as not only others but the men themselves would be ashamed and a weary of them Besides punishing men for Religion where there are several parties lays a Foundation of endless troubles and perpetual feuds for that ill Opinion and anger which makes one party when prevaling to suppress and punish the rest propagates still the same anger and dislike in the parties punished and begets by such provocation a certain resolution to retort the same again and a readiness to embrace all opportunities to effect it whereas that party that once gives liberty to the rest buries all those Evils and unites all in the common union of their own interest and security 'T will be impossible to find out a way for men of differing Judgments in Religion to live together and enjoy the common advantages which as men they may afford one to another unless they exercise an Indulgence to each other in that variety they stand in as Christians Where there are many differences and a State denyes any Liberty but strictly imposeth the State-Religion upon all the case always falls out to be that the earnest desire of that we call Liberty of Conscience lies glowing in the Embers of mens discontent and is a thing in it self so popular a thing of so great evidence of Reason when it may be discoursed upon equal terms and so much the concern of every man but the present Imposer that 't is very apt to kindle and flame out and upon any strait or emergency of State either by Forreign War or Domestick Division to make such an Earthquake as may endanger the whole 'T is most prudent in a State to give Liberty when there is least power to demand it those may be gained by giving it that may prove dangerous in forcing it To force and pen men up in such things is wholly unnatural and will like Wind penned up in the Earth or the Sea shut up by Banks break out at one time or another with the greater violence Liberty in Religion was never yet denyed in a Protestant State but it had first or last a mischievous effect To instruct men in Protestant Principles and then to put a Yoke of Vniformity upon them hath no more proportion in it than to educate a man at Geneva that is to live at Rome and to breed him a Calvinist whom you intend for a Papist Were there no other reason to make a Prince or a State out of love with punishing men for Religion and matters of that nature this were sufficient to consider such punishment ever falls upon the most honest of his Subjects in every differing party men of loose jugling principles and unsound hearts will be sure to escape the Net only the sincere plain-hearted man that cannot dissemble is caught 't was the device against Daniel heretofore they knew in the matters of his God 't was easie to deal with him because in those he would not upon any terms dissemble This has Three ill Effects always attending it First It disobliges the best sort of men in every party whom the State should most cherish and engage whatever is said to the contrary those that are the truest Subjects to the Great King will be also found the best to his Vice-gerents here 'T is a strange Heterodox kind of policy to make all the honest sincere men in a Nation of every party but that one the State adheres to the object of the States displeasure and to make Laws that can
by their Number outgrown the Political part of Persecution For the Second Consideration of Liberty the giving it so as will naturally produce several Principles and Opinions in men he that would prevent that must give no Liberty to the Protestant Religion must not let the Bible be read by the Vulgar There is no way to keep out several Opinions in Religion but an implicit ignorant Subjection to an imposed Infallibility and to do as the Turks do who will not have any Learning or Discourse amongst them of Religion for that very Reason because they will have no Religion but Mahomet nor no Learning but the Alcoran Such Policy to Murder mens Souls is hatcht in Hell The Art of Printing was at the first thought dangerous because it was looked on as a thing like to introduce several Opinions in Religion Cardinal Woolsey in a Letter of his to the Pope hath this Passage about it That his Holiness could not be ignorant what divers Effects the New Invention of Printing had produced for as it had brought in and restored Books and Learning so together it hath been the occasion of these Sects and Schisms which daily appear in the World but chiefly in Germany where men begin now to call in question the present Faith and Tenents of the Church and to examine how far Religion is departed from its Primitive Institution And that which particularly was most to be lamented they had exhorted the Lay and Ordinary men to read the Scriptures and to Pray in their Vulgar Tongue That if this were suffered besides all other dangers the common People at last might come to believe that there was not so much use of the Clergy for if men were perswaded once they could make their own way to God and that Prayers in their native and ordinary Language might pierce Heaven as well as in Latin How much would the Authority of the Mass fall How Prejudicial might this prove unto all our Ecclesiastical Orders Lord Herberts History of Hen. 8. Liberty of Conscience lies as naturally necessary to a Protestant State as Imposition to a Popish State he must be a good Artist that can find a right middle way between these two 'T is the Glory of Protestant-States to have much of the Knowledge of God amongst them and that variety of mens Opinions about some less weighty and more obscure matters of Religion as it much tends to a discovery of the Truth of them so it no way breaks the Bond of Protestant Union where men generally agree in the same Rule of Religion and in all the chief and necessary Fundamentals of Salvation Liberty of Conscience in such States as it is their true and genuine Interest and without which they will but deny themselves those advantages they might otherwise arrive at so with the forementioned Boundaries can never prove hurtful or dangerous there being always a just distinction to be made between those who desire only to serve God and such who pretend that to become injurious to men And thus we have seen that not only Religion but Reason not only Duty but Interest do invocate Princes and States in this particular To whom it may fitly be said in the words of the Psalmist Be wise now therefore O ye Kings and be instructed O ye Judges of the Earth FINIS De Christiana Libertate Or the Mischief of Impositions amongst the People called Quakers Made Manifest Shewing The Inconsistency betwixt the Church Discipline Order and Government erected by G. Fox and those of Party with him and that in the Primitive Times Being Historically treated on WITH A Word of Advice to the Pencilvanians And is the First Part of Naked Truth By FRANCIS BUGG GAL. 6.12 As many as desire to make a fair shew in the Flesh they constrain you to be Circumcised c. GAL. 5.1 Stand fast therefore in the Liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and be not again intangled in the Yoak of Bondage GAL. 5.2 Touch not taste not handle not c. London Printed for the Author 1682. An EPISTLE Dedicated to the Noble BEREANS Of this Age. HAving by the Book prefixed laid before the Magistrates and others concerned a clear Demonstration and many weighty Arguments for Liberty of Conscience to all Protestant Dissenters who desire to live a peaceable Life under the Government I am now come to treat on the Religious Differences amongst us the People called Quakers and therein to vindicate the Christian-Quakers who retain their Primitive Principles and defend their Plea for Liberty of Conscience from the Calumny and Reproach which the Innovators have put upon both it and the Pleaders thereof as if the Tendency thereof was to introduce Loosness Ranterism or the like sort of Abominations all which we detest and deny And in the Introduction to the Accus c. they have Sentenced William Rogers to be no Quaker by which they mean no Christian for if I may be in their account a true Christian and yet no Quaker then what damage is it to be no Quaker So that as the Baptists and others about the Year 72. by their Dialogues and otherwise rendred us no Christians because our Creed lay not litterally in their 8th Article of Faith So doth the Apostate and Innovator endeavour to Unchristian the true Christian-Quaker And the two principal Reasons that can be alledged against us are First our Nonsubmission and Nonconformity to the New Order of the Women Erected by G. Fox and Confirmed by a London Yearly-Meeting And Secondly That their way of compelling and Antichristian way of Proceeding to bring to and force a Uniformity is by us slighted and contemned and published in Justification of our Plea for the Liberty of the exercise of our Conscience in Matters Spiritual I say these two are the grand Reasons for which they render us no Quakers as I said consequently in their Esteem no Christians Whereupon we the Caluminated Abettors of the Cause of Truth can do no less than call to you the BEREANS of our Age not to believe every wandring Book that is put forth against us but read and examine the Matter and before you pass Judgment see what we can say for our selves in Defence of our Christian-Plea for Liberty of Conscience and for which Reason I choose to Dedicate the Ensuing Tract in the first Place to you expecting your Impartial Examination c. For as William Penn very well says in his Epistle to you the Noble and Examining BEREANS who usually hear both Sides in the Front of the Book Entituled the Christian-Quaker and his Divine Testimony Vindicated c. So we find it Experimentally viz. The Insatiable Thirst of men after Religious or Civil Empire hath filled almost every Age with Contest There is something in Man that prompts to Religion and such as stand not in the TRADITIONS of Men nor any meer Formality But Man that he may not loose the Honour of a Share with an unwarrantable Activity so Adulterates by
Practices a man may discern without a pair of Spectacles ERROUR and SUPERSTITION coming in apace LIMPING upon their old crooked Crutches of IMPLICIT FAITH and BLIND OBEDIENCE And least you should not know how to answer these Queries I will answer them in the Words of our own Principles that so you may the better behold your Revoltings and perceive your Innovations and take notice of your Apostatizing from your Primitive Principles But if my Answer please you not then let me see by one Answer of your own what you can say for your selves Query I. Whether to Impose any thing upon another Mans Conscience either to do or practice be not a doing otherwise to others than we would they should do unto us and so Antichristian See the Second and Third Chapter about Marriages Answ Yea For so says R. Hubberthorn in his Works p. 188. where he tenders seven Reasons why no Impositions ought to be upon any Mans Conscience by any but the Lord. And says he To Impose any thing upon another Mans Conscience either to do or Practice is not A doing to others as they would be dealt by and therefore is contrary to Christs Doctrine which say I is ANTICHRISTIAN Query II. Whether such Societies as do not govern themselves according to their Primitive Principles but erect new Orders and new Models of Government New Ceremonies and new ways of Sentencing Judging and Condemning the Innocent Recording and Excommunicating such as cannot yield Conformity and Uniformity thereunto do not more resemble Tyranny than Order Nay Is it not Antichristian Answ Yea For all Societies are to Govern themselves according to their Institutions and First Principle of Union where there is violence upon this Part Tyranny and not Order is Introduced Now since Perswasion and Conviction begun all true Christian Societies ALL Christian-Societies MVST uphold themselves upon the same Free Bottom or they turn Antichristian Query III. Whether to restrain People from the free Exercise of their Consciences or to compel People to act against their Faith and Perswasion in Matters Spiritual be not Popish and a Practice of the Church of ROME Address to Prot. pag. 149. 150. Answ Yea For the Apostle in his Day said Let every Man be fully perswaded in his own Mind or Conscience And did not go about to force People to Conform to such Things as they were not perswaded of in their own Consciences But the Church of Rome doth not admit that every one should Walk or Act as they are Perswaded in their own Conscience See Josiah Coal's Whore Vnvailed p. 71. 72. Query IV. If so Whether it be not Wisdom to beware of this Trojan Horse of this Practice which so much resembles Rome who commonly lay more Stress upon their own Ceremonies and written Traditions Orders and Institutions than upon the holy Scriptures or the Primitive Christians Example Answ Yea I beseech you Protestants by the Mercies of God and Love of Jesus Christ Ratified to you in his most precious Blood Fly Rome at Home have a care of this Presumption carry it not too high lay not Stress where God hath laid none Neither use his Royal Stamp to Authorise your Apprehensions in the Main of his Institutions Address to Prot. p. 77. Query V. Whether the holy Scriptures be not of more Authority than our written Traditions and Orders And whether it be not as commendable now to search the Scriptures to see whether our Orders Traditions and Ceremony be agreeable to them as it was formerly for the Bereans who by the Scripture examined Pauls Testimony Seeing some of you call them the Professors Weapons and will not suffer them to be alledged in our Quarterly-Meetings Answ Yea For it cannot be denyed But that the great Foundation of our Protestant Religion is the Divine Authority of the Scriptures from without us and the Testimony and Illumination of the holy Spirit within us Vpon this Foot the First Reformers stood and made and maintained their Separation from Rome with good Cause therefore it is the general consent of all Sound Protestant Writers That neither Traditions Counsels nor Cannons of any Visible Church much less the Edicts of any Civil Sessions or Jurisdiction but the Scripture ONLY Interpreted by the Holy Spirit in us give the final Determination in Matters of Religion and that Only in the Conscience of Every Christian to himself which Protestation made by the First Publick Reformers against the Imperial Edicts of Charles the Fifth Imposing Church Traditions without Scripture Authority Mark you Order Makers the same Cause moves to the same thing gave first beginning to the Name Protestant and with that Name hath ever been received this Doctrine which prefers the Divine Authority of the Scriptures and Spirit to that of the Church and her Traditions Address to Prot. p. 148. Query VI. Whether it be not a Popish Tenet to cry down Wisdom and to say That Wisdom will destroy us as 't is usually with you to say for the Papists care not how foolish the Common People are nor how much in Ignorance it being as they say the Mother of Devotion they educate them provided thir Ministers and Jesuits be very expert and able to defend their way of Worship and heap of Ceremonies And when do any that Write or Dispute to defend our Way of Worship write and speak like Fools except they can neither write nor speak otherwise and why do you cry out against Wisdom upon every occasion as if Ignarance were become our only Darling Answ For to admire what Men do not know and to make it a Principle not to enquire is the last Mark of Folly in the Believers and of Imposture in the Imposers To be short a Christian Implyes a Man and a Man implyes Conscience and Vnderstanding but he that hath no Conscience nor Vnderstanding as he hath not who hath delivered them up to the Will of another men is no Man and therefore no Christian Upon this Principle Men must be made Fools in Order to believe Shall Folly which is the Shame if not the Curse of a man be the Perfection of a Christian. Address to Prot. pag. 187. Query VII Is it not great Deceit and Illusion first to make Rules or Cannons to walk by and when any refuse Obedience to them and cannot for Conscience sake Conform to them then to Senctence Judge and Record such out of the Unity and yet to the World pretend and that in Print that we do no such Thing I say Is not this great Decoit and Delusion Answ Yea That our Friends says W. P. meaning us the People called Quakers Require any men to practice what they are not convinced of I utterly renounce in their Name and that at an Infamous Slander Alexander the Copper-Smith page 10. Query VIII Whether Antichristian Practices Popish Principles Contempt of Scriptures Folly Ignorance and Partiality Practising one thing and Pretending another be Corruptions or no If yea then whether or no a private Man ought not