Had God commanded every day of our Lives to be wholly devoted to him it had been but Reason and Equity and since that out of regard to our Weakness and that condition of Mortality wherein he has placed us he requires but one day in a week to be more especially set apart for his Service it were most irrational not to give him that Besides our merciful Lord has a regard in this Commandment even to the Beasts themselves as a part of his Creation which surely are not to be worse used now under the Gospel than under the Law but have as much reason to be rested on the Sabbath day now as they had then 3. Since that this is reasonable what fitter day can we pitch upon than the first day of the week on which our blessed Saviour Jesus arose from the dead For if the Jews together with the Commemoration of the Creation of the World wherein God having perfected all his works rested on the seventh day did likewise keep holy that day with respect to their deliverance from the Tyranny of Pharaoh How much greater reason have we to solemnize the Christian Sabbath with them indeed to celebrate the Goodness Wisedom and Power of God in making of all things in remembring the glorious Resurrection of the Son of God wherein he rose as a triumphant Conquerour from his bed of Darkness after he had dis-mantled the Prisons of Hell and the Grave and wrought a mighty Salvation for Mankind 4. That as God did then so Christ having transmitted his Power to them the Apostles and succeeding Church of God now may very reasonably dispose of us in matters of this nature and direct all its Members into some uniform way at such set times of the Worship of God And that they have done so appears both by some mentions of the Lords day in the Holy Scriptures and by the constant suffrage of the Fathers of the Church since that time which is a sufficient Obligation on all Christians to a due constant and diligent Observation of the Christian Sabbath Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day And lest any man shall say that this Command was given by Moses and so at an end and therefore that Christians are not bound by it Let him take this for an Answer and consider it well and then he will see there is no weight in the Objection and so will not be moved when by impertinent cavilling Fellows 't is urged upon him I say therefore first That every one of the ten Commandments is moral and for that very reason binds all Christians still and therefore the Church of England though these rebellious Quakers disown their Mother hath made them a part of her Liturgy and all good people teach them to their Children in their Catechisms as knowing that all Christians are to give obedience to them under the Gospel Secondly our blessed Saviour says Matth. 5. 17. that he came not to dissolve the Law and the Prophets but to fulfil Think not says he that I am come to dissolve the Law and the Prophets that is to take away the Obligation of that Rule of the Duty of Man to God and his Neighbour given first by Moses and afterwards repeated and inculcated by the Prophets but to fulfil them that is to supply accomplish and perfect those Rules and Doctrins of just and unjust conteined in them by a more ample Interpretation and other Improvement befitting the state of the Gospel And if as these Familists persuade their unwary Proselytes to fulfil were to put an end to a thing the sense must be thus that Christ came not to destroy that is to put an end to the Law but to put an end to it But who can imagine without Blasphemy our blessed Saviour would be guilty of such an absurd speech Now if it shall be asked why then Christ did not improve the fourth Commandment touching the keeping holy of the Sabbath it is answered That this was already strictly observed among the Jews even unto Superstition and therefore there needed rather a Relaxation than an Addition to this Commandment For whereas the Jews on that day would not so much as kindle a Fire or dress the Meat they should eat or carry any Burden or take a Journey and hence accuse our Saviour for healing on the Sabbath and his Disciples for plucking the ears of Corn Jesus tells them that The Sabbath was made for Man and not Man for the Sabbath intimating that Works of Necessity and Mercy may lawfully be done on the Sabbath though not the Works of a mans ordinary Trade and Employment SECT II. Almighty God having given the whole Earth to Man for his Habitation common Reason and Justice require that Man should sanctisie and separate some peculiar place for the Service and Worship of his great Creator And accordingly we find in all Ages of the world and by all Persons professing any Religion at all some particular and set places appointed to invocate and worship the supreme Deity Among the Jews God had his Temple whither all the Tribes went up to worship And in Prophane Histories we read of Temples dedicated to the Use and Service of some Supreme Deity From whence it appears that the very Law of Nature commands to fix and set apart a place for the Service of God And God will have this of us too that as he hath reserved a portion of the Time of our Life for the celebration of his Honour so hath he also reserved a Portion out of the Place of our Residence Therefore in Ezek. 45. God commands the children of Israel and in them all the Nations of the World that when they come to inhabit the Land he gives them they must divide it into three Parts one for the People another for the King but the first for God himself But and if it shall be said that this was a Command under the Levitical Law and so not obligatory to us Christians who live not under that Law It must be remembred that though God commanded a House and Place for his Service to be built and set apart yet all Mankind were tied to the same Duty by a Law more Antient than that of Moses even by the very Law of Nature which lays a perpetual and indispensable Injunction upon all men that God have his Place of Worship and as it were Residence among them that they might live in a continual Dependence upon him and remember that that they receive the very Places of their Abode and Habitation from his Gift and Benevolence And it was some hundreds of years before the Law of Moses was given that Jacob when he was poor and had not wherewithal to build God an House yet consecrated a Portion of Ground by erecting a Stone and pouring oil on the head thereof calling the Place Bethel that is The House of God and vowed to build it when God should bless and make him able to do it Gen. 28. 22. So that
An ACCOUNT of FAMILISM As it is Revived and Propagated BY THE QUAKERS SHEWING The Dangerousness of their Tenets and their Inconsistency with the Principles of common Reason and the Declarations of Holy Scripture By Henry Hallywell 2 Pet. ii 1. There shall be false teachers among you who privily shall bring in damnable Heresies even denying the Lord that bought them and bring upon themselves swift destruction LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishops-head in S. Pauls Church-Yard 1673. To the Right Worshipful Sir John Covert Of Slaugham in the County of Sussex Knight and Baronet SIR THe daily and numerous Increase of the Heretical Generation of Quakers in these Parts made me a little more than ordinarily inquisitive into their Doctrins and Persuasions which I found not only destructive of all Civil Politie and Government but of Religion itself and the Worship of Almighty God established amongst us For what else can be expected from them who deny the Scripture to be the Word of God and our Rule and Guide in matters of Salvation And they being so well known to you as having had frequent Experience of their obstinate and perverse Humor in the Discharge and Execution of those Trusts and Employments committed to you under His most Sacred Majesty I could do no less than present you with this small Treatise that going under the Name and Protection of so worthy and accomplisht a Person as your self it may in some measure obtein its desired Effect by putting a stop to the growing Evil and confirming those who are not yet seduced in the Truth of their Profession and may testifie to the World how much I am Honoured Sir Your most Obliged and Affectionate Servant Henry Hallywell An Account of FAMILISM As it is Revived and Propagated BY THE QUAKERS CHAP. I. The Cognation and Agreement between the Quakers and other Antient and Modern Heretics OUr blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ came from Heaven and took upon him our human flesh and bloud and by his sufferings and death upon the Cross redeemed and purchased a Church with his own bloud and of this he took a singular care after his glorious ascension into Heaven and fully instructed and impowered his chosen Apostles to gather it from all parts and quarters of the world and they communicated to men the Word of Reconciliation and the Doctrin of eternal Salvation But the Devil who looked with an evil eye upon the Happiness of our first Parents in Paradise now envied mankind so great a Good and stirred up Persecutions against the Church of God round about And when it pleased the watchful Providence of God to give Peace to his Church by the Conversion of Emperors and Kings to the Faith of Christ the Devil then quickly shifted the Scene and what he could not do by open violence he endeavoured to effect by Subtilty and sought to undermine the Church by Schisms and Heresies and to destroy her by those who pretended to be her own children And this Course he holds on still and to come nearer to my present design it is the envy and hate the Devil bears against true Christianity that hath stirred up here in England an Heretical sort of People called Quakers to draw away and seduce men from the true Profession of Religion into damnable and pernicious Errors And because they borrow something of many Heresies which have been already in the world it will not be amiss to shew briefly in some particulars the Agreement that is between them Simon Magus of old gave out That he was God the Father And how much I pray did George Fox come behind that great Magician when before the Justices of the Peace at Lancaster he affirmed That he was equal with God And James Nailor was no bad Proficient in that cursed School when he said That he did witness that he himself was as holy just and good as God Menander affirmed himself to be sent from the invisible Regions to be the Saviour of Mankind And it is well known to the world that James Nailor asserted himself to be Christ For though his followers would mince the matter as being ashamed of his Blasphemy yet it is certain that he accepted of Hosanna and Divine Worship in the Streets of Bristol and when he was charged with it would return no other answer but in the words of our Saviour Christ Thou sayest it which is as much as I assent to it or acknowledge it Photinus denied the Trinity acknowledging only the Father and excluding the Son and the Holy Ghost And George Fox in the Book called Saul's Errand to Damascus affirms that there is no distinction of Persons in the Godhead And if at any time they are forced to a Confession of it they deliver it so ambiguously that it amounts to no more than what Arius himself affirmed as his Faith who when he was commanded by the Emperor Constantine to give a Confession of it delivered a Creed in words ours but in sense his own Socinus denied the satisfaction of Jesus Christ and looked upon his Death and Passion only as an Example And this is expresly found in their Book called Saul's Errand to Damascus And James Nailor in his Love to the Lost p. 56. says That the end for which Christ did suffer was to be a living Example to all Generations The Valentinians arrogated to themselves a knowledge beyond Christ and his Apostles And what else do the Quakers when they so impudently throw away the written Word of God and by a false application of the Spirit of God to themselves blind and delude the easie and credulous Vulgar with new-fangled Revelations Thomas Holbrow a Quaker to one that urged Scripture answered What dost thou tell me of the Scriptures which are no better to me than an old Almanack Fox and Hubber thorn in a Book called Truth 's Defence say The Scriptures are no standing Rule and 't is dangerous for ignorant people to read them Are not these as impudent Heretics when they shall slight and contemn the Dispensation of Jesus upon Earth as an empty insignificant thing and reject the Ordinances of Christ as childish being themselves under an higher Oeconomy even the Rule of the Spirit And no question but they are under the Rule and Power of the Spirit but 't is of that Spirit which works in the children of Disobedience even the Prince of the Power of the Air. The fore-mention'd Heretics the Valentinians boasted of themselves as the only Spiritual Persons calling themselves Perfect and all others who in the humility of their souls profess themselves sinners and study to serve God with fear Idiots and Ignorant People And does not the same Spirit still possess the Quakers who in an extravagant and proud humour affect the Title and Appellation of Perfection When God knows the very boasting of a thing they have so little of argues their weakness and folly and those that talk and vaunt highest of this Perfection among them are
as perfect slaves to their Pride Hatred Malice Covetousness and Lust as any people in the World One of these perfect Creatures was accused lately for getting his Maid with Child And when R. B. a Quaker advised with Lacock concerning a Marriage intended by him with a rich Woman Lacock told him it was not fit for him having begun in the Spirit to end in the Flesh and no sooner had R. B. desisted in his Suit but Lacock takes the woman and marries her Was not this a perfect Cheat The Quakers pretend very much to Inspiration and Prophesie and so did Marcus an old Heretic who abused many silly women under colour of conferring on them the gift of Prophecying The same Marcus had a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a familiar Spirit by which he brought himself into credit with his deluded Followers and I have had it confidently affirmed that about the first rise of the Quakers in the North of England several persons by Gloves and Ribbands and divers Charms and Incantations were really bewitched by them And doubtless many of their Quaking Fits wherein they fomed at the mouth trembled throughout all parts of their bodies hideously groaned their visages distorted and tumbling upon the ground were real possessions by the Devil It were easie to draw out the Parallel between them into a greater length but that I think it would be too burdensom and tedious to the Reader forasmuch as it is true of them what Irenaeus said of the Heretics of his time Per singulos dies affectant novum aliquid adinvenire That every day they affect to bring in some novelty and dangerous Opinion I shall rather chuse now to represent them under the Notion of Familists CHAP. II. Of the Authors of Familism and the Quakers Agreement with them in their Doctrin IT was not long after David George had disseminated and spread abroad his pernicious Errors but they were greedily sucked in and embraced by Henry Nicholas who being of a crafty and subtle Temper a plausible and winning Deportment as if the Stars had pointed him out for a grand Impostor carefully concealed his Doctrin at Munster in Westphalia where he was born and in the mean time diffused it by Letters and Emissaries instructed by him in many places of Germany forty miles distant from him so that the Sect of Familists grew and increased for a good while before it was known who was the Fomenter of it At last he removes to Amsterdam sets up the Trade of a Mercer and professes his Doctrin calling his Fraternity and Society The Family of Love and in his Writings gave a Symbol or Cognizance Charitas extorsit per H. N. as may be seen at the end of every Epistle or Treatise of his For his Person he was corpulent of a good Presence and Sanguine Temper shrewdly suspected of Incontinence with some Women in his house and 't is no wonder if he should not bathe his begodded Humanity as he phrases it of himself in carnal and sensual Pleasures when the great Arcanum and Mystery of his Doctrin was mere Sadducism that is A Denial of the Immortality of the Soul and a Life to come From Amsterdam he sails over into England and here divulges and communicates his destructive Errors among a company of Artificers and silly Women who being unstable and not well principled in the Rudiments of Christian Religion became an easie Prey to this white Wolf He wrote an Epistle to two Daughters of Warwick dissuading them from Regeneration by the Word of God read or preached calling it ceremonial elementish and false and laboured to persuade the Maids to a spiritual new birth through his Doctrin His Errors were afterwards discovered and refuted by J. Knewstub in a Book dedicated to Ambrose Earl of Warwick and printed at London by Order from the Queen 1579. He pretended a Revelation from the Angel Gabriel He affirmed that Christ was neither God nor Man but the State of his Doctrin and that every one of his illuminate Elders was Christ He held a Perfection without sin and that the whole History of Jesus Christ was not to be understood in a literal but Mystical and Allegorical sense that there is no Heaven Hell nor Judgment but what is in this Life and that all outward Ordinances in Religion are foolish and trifling things But I shall trouble my self no further to collect the Heads of his Doctrin since I shall take a general view of it by comparing the Doctrin of the Quakers and that of H. N. together SECT I. H. N. says that not only the Law of Moses but the Ministration of Christ and his Apostles were only temporary things instituted to bring men to the full and perfect Reige of the Spirit and as Children when they arrive to a good competency of understanding and can read well they throw away their Horn-books and Primers so the Pedagogy of the Law and Gospel are to be cast aside when men come to the Spirit and this Dispensation of the Spirit is only in the Familists and in their doctrin And that this is the full sense of the Quakers appears from their own Books which they cunningly spread abroad to infect and poison the minds of weak and ignorant People In the Book called A Declaration of the Faith of Quakers penned by four of that Gang John Crook says thus We believe by the same gift of Grace that there are several Ministrations and several Operations according to 1 Cor. 12. and all by the same Spirit as before and after the Law by Moses and after by John the Baptist and Christ and his Apostles and in all those the Ministration had acceptance with God through the management of the Spirit and its rejection and dislike of God for the want thereof And by this Spirit were the Scriptures given forth and the Holy men of God did speak prophesie preach and pray as they were moved and for want of it the Letter did and doth kill And for the further appearance and pouring out of this Spirit answerable unto the work and service that God had for them to do they were to wait as Christ commanded his Disciples to do at Jerusalem to receive the promise of the Father for by this Spirit he that speaks speaks as the Oracles of God And therefore as it was the practice of the People of God in old time to wait for the moving and stirring of this Spirit that they might speak as it gave them utterance in the evidence and demonstration thereof so do this People called Quakers now and according to its moving in their hearts they minister according to the signification of the Spirit whereby they understand both what and when to speak and when to be silent Although this sweet sugared speech seem to be without deceit yet there is gall and wormwood mixed with it and in this new wine drawn from their own Cellar which lies deep in the lowest Region of the Body there is a
the very secret instinct and working of Nature leads men to the Practice of this Duty and hence likewise it was that the Jews though never commanded of God had two sorts of Places for Religious Duties besides their Tabernacle or Temple the one called Proseuchae Oratories and the other Synagogues The Oratory or Place of Prayer was a Plot of Ground encompassed with a Wall or some other like Mound or Inclosure and open above and the use was properly for Prayer and this stood without the City But the Synagogue was a covered Edifice as our Houses and Churches are where the Law and the Prophets were read and expounded and the People instructed in Divine Matters according to that Acts 15. 21. Moses of old time hath in every City them that preach him being read in the Synagogues every Sabbath day and this stood within the City The Oratory or Place of Prayer is sometimes mentioned in the New Testament as in Luke 6. 12. where it is said that our Saviour went out into a mountain to pray and continued all night 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in an Oratory or Prayer-house of God And in Acts 16. 13. St. Luke tells us that St. Paul being come to Philippi in Macedonia On the Sabbath day they went out of the City to a river side 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where there was famed or reported to be an Oratory yet if we render it Where Prayer was wont to be made it will follow that here was a place set apart and used for Prayer and there St. Paul sate down and spake to the women that were come together there From what has been said it follows that to set apart a Place for the Worship of Almighty God is the common Voice and Dictate of Reason and Nature inasmuch as the Jews had set Places in and about every City and Town where the Word of God was preached and to which they assembled to pray unto him which Places God never commanded them to erect and build and yet both these sorts of Places were sanctified with Christs own presence in them And what they did all other Nations equally thought themselves obliged to do as I have above instanced in the Heathens yea the very Turcs have their Moschs or Places to pray in and to worship God Only these Familistical Heretics because they deny the Lord Jesus Christ do likewise despise his Religion and the Place wherein he is worshipped And because the Familistical Generation do at this time befool ignorant though many honest and conscientious People and draw them off from the Truth which their Fore-fathers peaceably and harmlesly mainteined by telling them that to call a Material Building a Church is Popery and Antichristianism I shall shew 1. That it is so called and used in the Holy Scripture 2. That there were such Places in the Apostles times That the word Church Ecclesia is used for the Material Building as well as to signifie the People or Congregation let any man that doubts consult 1 Cor. 11. 22. Have ye not houses to eat and drink in or despise ye the Church of God That by Church here is not meant the Assembly or Congregation but the Place appears 1. By comparing the 18. and 20. verses before-going When ye come together in the Church and the Apostle in the 20. verse continuing his speech upon the same subject goes on thus When ye come together therefore into one place so that now it is determined what the word Church signifies namely the Place whither they came together 2. The Apostle opposes the Church to their own Houses Have ye not Houses to eat and drink in As if he had said Your houses are the places to eat and drink in but the Church is the Place of Prayer and to commit such a Disorder there is to vilifie and contemn the Place which is set apart for Gods Worship And therefore in the last verse the Apostle says If any man hunger let him eat at home by which 't is plain the Church and their Houses were different Places 3. The very Etymology of our English word Church denotes the Place for that comes from the German word Burken and that of the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies Dominicum the Lords House or the Place where the Lord is worshipped But if such Whifflers did not despise all Learning as well as the Church of God they might from an ordinary School-Boy be furnished with Examples enough where one and the same word signifies both the Persons and the Place as he would tell them that Civitas signifies both the Citizens and the City Collegium the Society and the House Senatus the Senators and the Senate-house Synagoga the Assembly and the Place of the Assembly and so Ecclesia Church signifies both the People and the Material Building For the second thing that there were Churches that is Oratories or Places set apart for Divine Worship in the Apostles times and that they did not assemble promiscuously and uncertainly here and there as they pleased and in places of common use appears not only from those Records which make mention of their Times but from some places in the New Testament We read in Acts 2. 46. of the first Christian Society at Jerusalem That they continued daily in the Temple and breaking bread 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the house ate their meat with gladness and singleness of heart That which I observe from hence is this that the Disciples at Jerusalem met together in a certain House which was dedicated and set apart from common use for the peculiar Worship of God and therefore ought to be read in the House and not as we translate it from house to house And so 't is used elsewhere in the New Testament as Rom. 16. 3 5. Greet Priscilla and Aquila and the Church that is in their house And again sending salutation from them 1 Cor. 16. 19. Aquila and Priscilla salute you much in the Lord with the Church in their house Now that by the Church in their house is not to be understood their Family is evident in that St. Paul useth it only to some persons and not to others who questionless were Masters of Families likewise Thus St. Paul salutes Philemon and v. 2. the Church in his house from which I gather that Philemon's House was the Church in which the believers met to serve God in Laodicea And I have these two reasons to think it to be so 1. That if by the Church in Philemon's house were meant his Family it should properly and regularly have been joyned immediately after the greeting of Philemon whereas St. Paul salutes Apphia and Archippus between 2. It were very strange he should not salute the Family of Archippus who was then Bishop of Laodicea as well as the Family of Philemon By the Church therefore at such a mans house must be the whole Congregation of the Saints which assembled at such a house which House
just a claim to them as any man has to his own Free-hold Estate I am sure their title to Tithes is much more antient than any mans title to his Temporal Inheritance and no one thing hath been oftner confirmed and ratified by the Acts and Statutes of this Kingdom than the Possessions Tithes and Rights of the Clergy SECT IV. Having proved by undeniable Arguments that God is to have a portion out of our Lands and Goods and that no man unless he be impiously prophane and Atheistical can deny the just payment of these Dues much less plead Conscience to excuse Sacrilege It remains only now to shew the grounds upon which the present Ministers of England claim these devoted Lands and Profits as their Inheritance The Foundation of their claim is this That they are true Ministers of the Lord Jesus or true Pastors under that great Shepherd and Bishop of all our souls Now 't is required in every true Minister of the Gospel that he be rightly and duly called to the executing of this his Function According to these express Scriptures Heb. 5. 4. No man taketh this Honour unto himself but he that is called of God as was Aaron And Rom. 10. 15. How shall they preach except they be sent Yea our Blessed Saviour himself did not take upon him publicly to preach the Gospel till he was solemnly inaugurated and installed in his Office by the descent of the Holy Ghost and a voice from heaven which said This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased Matth. 3. 16 17. And when the Lord Jesus was risen from the dead before he ascended into heaven he gives a Commission to his Disciples John 20. 21. As my Father hath sent me even so send I you Christ here rehearses his own Commission and then gives the Apostles theirs and when he had said this he breathed on them and saith unto them Receive ye the Holy Ghost And lastly v. 23. he declares to them the Power that he had invested them withal Whos 's soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained and this Power was not only inherent in them but is derived to all the succeeding Ministers of the Gospel to the end of the World But the most solemn and public Inauguration of the Apostles in their Office was by a bright and shining glorious Descent of the Holy Ghost upon them by this visibly ratifying and confirming the Commission that Christ had before given to them This being certain then that no man ought to execute that sacred Function of a Minister of the Gospel but he that is called thereto I shall now shew the manner of the Designation or Authorizing of any man to execute this holy Employment and that was by Imposition of hands according as it was used by the Apostles and commanded by them to their Successors and continued from thence in the Church unto this very day Insomuch that the great Apostle of the Gentiles St. Paul though he were honoured by a singular Prerogative and Call from Heaven by Christ himself yet was to stay till he had the ordinary Call of the Church too and was consecrated by the Imposition of hands Acts 13. 2 3. As they ministred to the Lord and fasted the Holy Ghost said Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have â—alled them and when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them they sent them away And these same very persons having in their travels converted whole Cities and Towns to the Gospel of Christ they leave them not as sheep without a Shepherd but they ordain them Elders in every Church Acts 14. 23. And St. Paul leaves the Ordination of Timothy upon record together with the manner of it that it was by the Imposition of his hands and the hands of the Presbytery 2 Tim. 1. 6. and 1 Tim. 4. 14. And because the Apostles could not live always they transmitted their Power to others and those likewise to their Successors As the Scripture informs us Tit. 1. 5. For this cause left I thee in Crete that thou shouldest ordain Elders i. e. Pastors and Ministers of the Gospel in every City as I had given thee order These things being so it follows First that the present Ministers of the Gospel in the Church of England are true Ministers of Jesus Christ and therefore have right to Tithes forasmuch as they have both an inward and outward call The inward call is the Testimony of their own Consciences in that they believe themselves furnished in a good measure with gifts for the discharge of their Office and desire to employ them for the advantage of mens souls And then they have the outward call of the Church being consecrated and set apart for that Office by Imposition of hands and Prayers Secondly it follows that no man though he have the inward call that is find himself gifted ought to take upon him the Office of a Priest or Minister of the Gospel without the outward call likewise And therefore it is an intolerable presumption for illiterate Mechanics and Tradesmen to take upon them the Office of a Minister of the Gospel and for this their boldness they may justly expect if not the same yet as great Judgments as befel Korah Vzzah and Vzziah for invading of and intermeddling with the Priests Function And it were easie to imagin the Idolatry and Heresie that must needs overspread a Nation where the Russet-Rabbies and Apron-Levites are the Instructers of the People CHAP. IV. That Quakery though it pretend high is mere Sadducism at the Bottom IT is well known that the Immortality of the Soul by the Doctrin of H. N. was nothing but the Perpetuation or Continuance of the Succession of the Family of Love and the Resurrection was nothing but a Mystical Rising into his Doctrin that the day of Judgment was then in being the Nations of the Earth being judged by him as by the Man whom God had appointed as he sacrilegiously arrogates that place which was spoken of Christ to himself Acts 17. 31. Now according to this Doctrin if there be no other but a Mystical Resurrection and that Immortal Life be but the Continuance of H. N.'s Doctrin among his Followers for ever and that the day of Judgment be already past then it is certain that men have no Souls nor any thing to answer for in another world but die like beasts The full sense of H. N. concerning these things is expressed in his Euangel c. 34. Behold and consider my beloved how wonderfully God worketh in his holy ones and how that now in this day or light of the love the Judgment-seat of Christ is revealed and declared unto us out of heaven to a righteous Judgment upon Earth from the right hand of God and how that on the same Judgment-seat of Christ that the Scripture might be fulfilled there sitteth one now in Truth in the
discourse and their Auditors are such fools as to believe them in whatever they say 3. A third way which they make use of is to decry all Human Learning and the use of Reason And hence it comes to pass that the Atheist and Enthusiast mutually confirm one another in their Errors the Atheist laughs at the Enthusiast for denying his Reason and the Enthusiast thinks the Atheist a fool for relying wholly upon it But though it be common to all Enthusiasts to despise Human Learning and reject the Improvement of Reason yet the Quaker makes the loudest outery against it and thinks it his interest to exclame against Learning because he himself hath none being the most ignorant and sottish Sect that hath yet appeared in the world Whereas since the extraordinary gifts of Prophesie and Languages have ceased in the Church Secular Learning hath been of the greatest use and benefit to Religion of any thing in the World And although these impudent Heretics be the open enemies of Learning and learned men yet when they hope to make an advantage by it they will be nibling at it witness George Whitehead who would prove the breach of the Sabbath lawful from a moth-eaten Manuscript cited by Beza in his Annotat. on Luk. 6. And the cause of this their Enmity against Learning is apparent enough forasmuch as by it men discover their Cheats and Impostures and their Visions and Inspirations are found but Dreams and Melancholic Fansies and their Folly and Ignorance laid open to the World But if we consider it well we shall find that it is set in Scripture as the Commendation of Moses that he was learned in all the Wisdom of the Egyptians and St. Paul cites Aratus Menander and Epimenides three heathen Poets but I need not stand long on this for if learned men had not translated the Bible I very much question whether Quakers would have had any knowledge of it notwithstanding their pretended Revelations And if God did once open the mouth of an Ass to forbid the madness of the Prophet yet the Quakers cannot prove from that one instance that he now speaks to the World by them And therefore for men to throw aside their Reason and the Knowledge of Arts and Sciences which are now the Supporters of Religion is all one as if they should put out their eyes and call to the blind to lead them 4. Their way is to deceive and associate themselves first with the Women And herein they imitate the Devil who first tamper'd with the weaker Vessel and seduced Eve as well knowing that the Masculine Temper of Adam would contemn and slight the Bait till presented by the fair hands of his Virgin Bride And this is no new thing for many Heretics have diffused and spread their desperate Errors by insinuating them first into the Women yea so far had Mareus the Valentinian proceeded in this Art that he not only vitiated the Souls but abused the Bodies of many of that yielding Sex And such was the Temper of the Quakers great Master H. N. when he came over into England drawing after him a great number of those easie Captives whom he quickly found kind and coming when allured by the specious Title of The Family of Love And this has been a very great help in the Propagation of Quakery by making the Woman first in the Transgression who by her continual Solicitation and Importunity as Delilab did Samson wins the good man to betray himself into the hands of these uncircumcised Philistines CHAP. X. The Advantage of Familism above other Sects and Heresies IT will now be questioned since Quakerism is so monstrous and sottish a Persuasion as tends to the overthrow of all true Religion by rasing the very Foundations of it by denying the Person of Jesus Christ as God and Man now living in Heaven and taking away the future Subsistence and Immortality of Human Souls yet nevertheless it should take so much with the ordinary sort of People and gain ground upon so many of them In answer to this I may suggest that those who are caught and drawn into this abominable Heresie of Quakerism are but the Refuse of the World Persons of the meanest Quality and lowest Parts and Education and for such as these to be enticed by Quakers is no strange thing they being indifferent to any Religion and that they observe any at all is more out of Custom and Fashion than Choice and Understanding Or I may say that it is to be feared 't is a just Judgment of God for their former unfaithfulness not only to the Light of their own Consciences but of the holy Word of God that since they would not receive the love of the Truth that they might be saved God should send them strong Delusion that they should believe a lie And although this may give some Account of the diffusion growth of Quakery yet I shall mention some particular Advantages it hath over other Sects and Heresies and the First is this 1. In that it pretends to a high degree of Holiness above all other and to be raised above the rest of the world lying in sin That all the Earth is in Bondage and Slavery overspred with Lusts and Sins and therefore are in a dark and blind Condition not knowing how or by what means they shall escape out of that lamentable and confused state they are in But the Quaker he is mounted up so high that it is broad day with him when yet 't is perfect night with all men beside he is in the Light and this Light leads and guides him into all Truth so that henceforth he sins no more but is pure and clean in his own eyes Christ is within him and he has atteined to a Perfection and Freedom from Sin and whoever comes not to this state is not of God These are fine things and high Conceits and the giddy Multitude that always affect Novelties are very much pleased with so much holiness as is pretended and it works mightily upon their Fansies that if they be once Quakers they shall be without sin and by the cunning management of this pretence of Holiness the People are quickly catcht in their nets 2. Quakery cracks and boasts much of immediate Inspirations which every one in their measure are capable of And this is a strong and potent temptation to inveigle the multitude withal to tell them that when they are once Quakers they shall be immediately acted and moved by the Spirit of God as the Prophets and Apostles of old were and that what they now speak and write is as good Canonical Scripture as the Bible that they need no external teaching being all taught by the inspiration of God which is so pleasing and easie a Doctrine that it is very strange if the vulgar who would fain go to Heaven by the easiest and least troublesom way should not be seduced by it 3. The luscious and sweet bewitching Language which they use as if