Selected quad for the lemma: religion_n
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A48797
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Wonders no miracles, or, Mr. Valentine Greatrates gift of healing examined upon occasion of a sad effect of his stroaking, March the 7, 1665, at one Mr. Cressets house in Charter-house-yard : in a letter to a reverend divine, living near that place.
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Lloyd, David, 1635-1692.
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1666
(1666)
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Wing L2649; ESTC R12386
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29,587
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51
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upon the imagination as well as Princes and finding it feasible by one or two experiments hee with other cunning peoples suggestions might set up an Healing power as well as the King levelling his Gift as well as they would his Office with a design that when it appeared he could do no more than other men he should be no more than other men yea and when parity of reason led them to attempt in other Diseases what with some success they had begun in the Kings Evil they might not only out-do his Majesty but be in a fair way to give Laws to the world 5 For mark the ground of this mans attempts and he tells you in his Letter to the L. Bishop of Chester that he had a voyce from Heaven assuring him first that he had a power to cure the Kings Evil and afterwards that he might cure all Diseases that he could not be quiet untill be had undertaken it And that a Woman unknown to him had a Vision to come to him and that hereupon notwithstanding he was dissuaded by his Friends from the practice and jeared out of the imagination he had a constant impulse to force him upon the several experiments that he had made till the whole Country thronged to him This is sum of what the man saith for himself 1 How dangerous it is to admit of Impulses Vifions and how common it was with men of Mr. Greatrates former way to obtrude need no further proof than Olivers Impulses James Naylor and other Quakers Visions and light within which would have superseded if allowed all Religion Law Duty Right and wrong and common honesty there being hardly any villany Imaginable against any of these that hath not been and may be perpetrated upon the account of this Impulse and Inspiration and if people will but allow any thing to be true upon these Enthusiastick grounds they must allow all things that a deceivers fancy or interest shall suggest to them And more particularly 1 Hee voucheth a voice from Heaven for his extraordinary Performances when yet hee should vouch extraordinary performances to make good that voice from Heaven the voice of God gives not evidence to Miracles because the Devil in the Air or the Fancy in the Brain may counterfeit such a voice but Miracles give evidence to his voice How shall the people be assured saith Moses Exod. 4. 1 2 3 4 5. that thou O God hast appeared to me take the Rod and it shall turn to a Serpent that they may beleeve that the Lord God of their Fathers hath appeared to thee saith the Lord. It s impossible for us to be satisfied of any appearance of God to this man bidding him work Miracles unless we had other Miracles to satisfie us about the appearance of God 2 Gods revealing himself to men by Bath Col or the daughter of a Voice which was indeed the last way that he was pleased to communicate his minde to his people seems to be now superseded by that of the Apostle 2 Pet. 1. 18 19. And this voice which came from Heaven we heard when we were with him in the Holy Mount 19. We have also a more sure word of Prophesie whereunto ye do well that ye take heed as unto light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts and we are obliged by the voice of God confirmed by uncontrolled Miracles not to give heed to any voice pretended to give credit to new unnecessary and doubtful ones 3 The Voice of God concerning any extraordinary Person under the Old and New Testament was not spoken only to the Person himself as it is in this case in private but to several others in publick as you may see Exod. 4. Mat. 3. Act. 1. 2 Pet. 1. and the History of the Transfiguration These things as the Apostles argue were not done in a Corner 4 The Voice of God was agreeable alwaies to the dispensations that were then a foot so that when they heard the Voice they had Prophesies Precepts and Rules directing them to the beleif and use of the voice a particular defective in this Case where the dispensations of God amongst us are so far from concurring with this pretended Voice that the established Religion is inconsistent with it we having a compleat platform of the will of God conveighed to us by Voices and Signs from Heaven that rendereth it needless to have any more extraordinary revelations til the great day of the Revelation of all things unless we ad mit menstruam diurnam fidem a new Faith every month and day for what is this Voice for is it to confirm our faith that is already done or we have been Infidels all this while and indeed know not when we shall be compleat Christians because we know not when these pretenders will have done Is it to reform the corruption that hath overgrown Religion in the theory and practice of it Indeed the Prophets under the old Testament had extraordinary Voices to this purpose but it was provided by the Law of Moses in the time of the Theocratia that it should be so and the Paedagogy of the Jews might look for it but it s not so under the Gospel whereby we are Conjured not to be soon shaken in minde either by Spirit or by Word or by Letter or by Voice is it to beget Faith Signs saith the Apostle who had Signs to confirm what he said are for unbelievers is it to supply any defect in natural causes This pretends not to it the ordinary way of Physicians being together with Phylosophy the ground of it at the heighth in these times and however God never wrought a Miracle for no other design than to alter the course of nature Is it to do good to some particular persons God never miraculously did good to any particular but with reference to the common good of mankinde shall we make providence so cheap as to put it upon such mean Offices as helping the Patient to another stool more than his Physick could work to cure a poor body of a swelling to save 20 s. charge It s true when God hath a great and suitable design to be carried on by Miracles he condescendeth to shew those Miracles in such charitable and good Offices as these but not barely for them Christ confirmed Christian Religion by Healing here and there a poor person but neither he or any other extraordinary person came to the world with so low a design as only to perform those Cures Is it to set out this person for an eminent instance of Heroick virtue and holiness besides that the man pretends not to such heroick attainments his carriage being loose and like a good Fellow his Religion Latitudinary his discourse unsavory sometimes breaking out to Oaths as I have been Informed by a very discerning and honest person at the Charter-House who heard him in much passion say that though the poor
people that urged him to touch them from the length of the journey they had taken to come to him came from Jerusalem he would not by his Maker meddle with them often incohaerent faultring and inconsistent an effect of the weakness of his memorie his converse and dealing with Women notorious and scandalous his privadoes and familiars men of no great repute for common honesty and though our Saviour conversed with Publicans to convert them he was not guided wholly by such men to set them up in the world his falacies put upon poor people as to the places of his abode palpable his neglect of ordinary Christian duties intollerable his account of himself very various broken and ambiguous 5 Besides that the holy men inspired of old time approved themselves to the most knowing discerning persons in the world yea and addressed themselves upon any extraordinary occasions for advice whereas this man began and set up among the Ignorant and Rude part of mankinde the Irish easily imposed on when he should by right have sate among the Doctors as the greatest worker of Miracles did and have answered them about the ground of this pretension and have asked them Questions not appearing among wise men in publick till his feats had prevailed with the more Ignorant in private How much more agreeable had it been for him upon the hearing of the pretended Voice to have repaired to some Reverend Divines and Physicians than to chat with his Wife and some two or three old Women and then set up for it seems he told his Wife the Vision and when she laughed at him he trieth experiments upon her and between them behinde the Curtain was begot this great faculty 6 Nay and this voice was in his sleep too the season of sowing the Devils Tares and should every Dreamer of Dreams practice in the world according to his Visions on his Bed the whole world would require again Christs miraculous power of curing Lunaticks and that but twice notwithstanding that the doubts of men require the oftner promulgation of it whereas all the real testimonies that ever God gave were given as often as there was occasion for them Sir But the man replyeth that however wee are at liberty to dispute this extraordinary faculty of his he was forced by an impulse and motion over all his body to exercise it But considering how much Impulse as they call it is put out of countenance and exploded by reason of the horrid Villainies at all times especially of late performed upon that ground This pretence is worse than the other there being nothing more desperate than a man given over to his own Impulses and inward Motions without any regard of Religion Reason Laws Rules and Principles And 1. The jolly man doth not look as if hee were much troubled with Impulses 2. He can be no more sure of his Impulses being from God than he was of the Voice and therefore this should not be any Motive to him to hearken to that the Impulse may bee a cheat as well as the Voice 3 Impulses being the method of Satan when hee reigned among the Children of disobedience I mean the Heathens such as the Sybils the Corybants the Bachides the Zabii c. God allowed no Impulses for currant under either the Old Testament or New but what were agreeable to and made good by the established Religion If they speak not according to this word It is because the truth is not in them 4. God looks upon it as contrary to the nature of man to be acted by brute Impulses and Instincts having hitherto led him to all his performances by a rational discovery of the grounds leading thereunto 5. But of the madness of being guided by Impulses you may see in Laureminus de melanchol C. 4. Casaubone and Dr. More of Enthusiasme Savanorola c. 4. de aegrit cap. Hercules de Saxonia de melancholiâ Burton's Melancholly Meursius in Apollonium Antonii ponte sancta Cruz. prelectiones vallesolitanae in Hyppocratem de morbo sacro Arist. Problems Antonius Bennivennius de abditis M. causis c. Sir But why should we suspect a man that makes no advantage of his practise A. 1. He takes nothing in publick himself but it hath cost some good round summes of mony to his followers who are observed to be noted Projectors John Terril Gent. expending 100 l. to come at him James Bivion 40 l. William Feltiplace 60. and others to the number of 500 that have expended above 7000 l. to follow this man 2. He may have a greater design than mony let him gain Reputation the first quarter and he shall not fail of mony the next 3. He borroweth mony of his Patients though he takes none 4. Nay what if it be proved that such as he have those that maintain them and hire them Patients Now the Story about his great Estate of 800 l. a year dwindling to a hundred and he living at the rate of a thousand a year being certainly kept by a party and the Patients hee produceth for his vouchers being poor Women and Children that no body knows whence they come nor whither they go The English understand too well now what the Preachers mean that will take no Tythes and the Physician that will take no fees And the dullest nose may smell the matter when hee heareth but this tradition of him that being a Member of an Independant Church he was Excommunicated thence for pretending to this gift of Heaven and thereupon his gift left him until being absolved he was re-admitted at once to his Church-Priviledge and his Gift Sir Why is hee followed if he bee but an Impostor why do not the people cry out against him and the Magistrates restrain him A. That the giddy multitude should follow any strange thing that the English so notorious for their unsettledness should gaze after a novelty at first is no wonder especially in such a year of expectation as this is But they follow him not in any place so eagerly at first as they leave him discontentedly at last He is not so much cryed up in the places where he comes as hee is cryed down in the places where hee hath been and hee removes from place to place not so much to Communicate his virtue as to save himself being not known two nights together in one Lodging I and whereas it might bee expected that hee should come with Certificates of recommendation hee comes loaded with reproaches from each place where he hath been And if the deluded souls reply as some very Blasphemously do that that was our Saviours case for no less a parallel will do We Answer that our Saviour being to alter old Customes to cross mens lusts to overthrow their Laws and Government to prejudice their carnal interest to reprove and reform their vices and corruptions by the Religion to be confirmed by his Miracles was reproached indeed for the Religion hee taught but all that saw him