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First
Shortest-Way With The Dissenters
Introductory Note
Daniel Defoe (c. 1661-1731) was the son of a London butcher called Foe,
a name which Daniel bore for more than forty years. He early gave up the idea
of becoming a dissenting minister, and went into business. One of his earlier
writings was an "Essay upon Projects," remarkable for the number of schemes
suggested in it which have since been carried into practise. He won the
approval of King William by his "True-born Englishman," a rough verse satire
repelling the attacks on William as a foreigner. His "Shortest-Way with
Dissenters," on the other hand, brought down on him the wrath of the Tories;
he was fined, imprisoned, and exposed in the pillory, with the result that he
became for the time a popular hero. While in prison he started a newspaper,
the "Review" (1704-1713), which may in certain respects be regarded as a
forerunner of the "Tatler" and "Spectator." From this time for about fourteen
years he was chiefly engaged in political journalism, not always of the most
reputable kind; and in 1719 he published the first volume of "Robinson
Crusoe," his greatest triumph in a kind of realistic fiction in which he had
already made several short essays. This was followed by a number of novels,
dealing for the most part with the lives of rogues and criminals, and
including "Moll Flanders," "Colonel Jack," "Roxana," and "Captain Singleton."
Notable as a specially effective example of fiction disguised as truth was his
"Journal of the Plague Year."
In the latter part of his career Defoe became thoroughly discredited as a
politician, and was regarded as a mere hireling journalist. He wrote with
almost unparalleled fluency, and a complete list of his hundreds of
publications will never be made out. The specimen of his work given here show
him writing vigorously and sincerely, and belong to a period when he had not
yet become a government tool.
Shortest-Way With The Dissenters
Sir Roger L`Estrange tells us a story in his collection of Fables, of the
Cock and the Horses. The Cock was gotten to roost in the stable among the
horses; and there being no racks or other conveniences for him, it seems, he
was forced to roost upon the ground. The horses jostling about for room, and
putting the Cock in danger of his life, he gives them this grave advice,
"Pray, Gentlefolks! let us stand still! for fear we should tread upon one
another!"
There are some people in the World, who, now they are unperched, and
reduced to an equality with other people, and under strong and very just
apprehensions of being further treated as they deserve, begin, with Esop`s
Cock, to preach up Peace and Union and the Christian duty of Moderation;
forgetting that, when they had the Power in their hands, those Graces were
strangers in their gates!
It is now, near fourteen years, (1688-1702), that the glory and peace of
the purest and most flourishing Church in the world has been eclipsed,
buffeted, and disturbed by a sort of men, whom, God in His Providence, has
suffered to insult over her, and bring her down. These have been the days of
her humiliation and tribulation. She has borne with an invincible patience,
the reproach of the wicked: and God has at last heard her prayers, and
delivered her from the oppression of the stranger.
And now, they find their Day is over! their power gone! and the throne of
this nation possessed by a Royal, English, true, and ever constant member of,
and friend to, the Church of England! Now, they find that they are in danger
of the Church of England`s just resentments! Now, they cry out, "Peace!"
"Union!" "Forbearance!" and "Charity!": as if the Church had not too long
harboured her enemies under her wing! and nourished the viperous blood, till
they hiss and fly in the face of the Mother that cherished them!
No, Gentlemen! the time of mercy is past! your Day of Grace is over! you
should have practised peace, and moderation, and charity, if you expected any
yourselves!
We have heard none of this lesson, for fourteen years past! We have been
huffed and bullied with your Act of Toleration! You have told us, you are the
Church established by Law, as well as others! have set up your canting
Synagogues at our Church doors! and the Church and her members have been
loaded with reproaches, with Oaths, Associations, Abjurations, and what not!
Where has been the mercy, the forbearance, the charity you have shewn to
tender consciences of the Church of England that could not take Oaths as fast
as you made them? that having sworn allegiance to their lawful and rightful
King, could not dispense with that Oath, their King being still alive; and
swear to your new hodge podge of a Dutch Government? These have been turned
out of their Livings, and they and their families left to starve! their
estates double taxed to carry on a war they had no hand in, and you got
nothing by!
What account can you give of the multitudes you have forced to comply,
against their consciences, with your new sophistical Politics, who, like New
Converts in France, sin because they cannot starve? And now the tables are
turned upon you; you must not be persecuted! it is not a Christian spirit!
You have butchered one King! deposed another King! and made a Mock King
of a third! and yet, you could have the face to expect to be employed and
trusted by the fourth! Anybody that did not know the temper of your Party,
would stand amazed at the impudence as well as the folly to think of it!
Your management of your Dutch Monarch, who you reduced to a mere King of
Cl[ub]s, is enough to give any future Princes such an idea of your principles,
as to warn them sufficiently from coming into your clutches; and, God be
thanked! the Queen is out of your hands! Knows you! and will have a care of
you!
There is no doubt but the Supreme Authority of a nation has in itself, a
Power, and a right to that Power, to execute the Laws upon any part of that
nation it governs. The execution of the known Laws of the land, and that with
but a gentle hand neither, was all that the Fanatical Party of this land have
ever called Persecution. This they have magnified to a height, that the
sufferings of the Huguenots in France were not to be compared with them. Now
to execute the known Laws of a nation upon those who transgress them, after
having first been voluntarily consenting to the making of those Laws, can
never be called Persecution, but Justice. But Justice is always Violence to
the party offending! for every man is innocent in his own eyes.
The first execution of the Laws against Dissenters in England, was in the
days of King James I.; and what did it amount to? Truly, the worst they
suffered was, at their own request, to let them go to New England, and erect a
new colony; and give them great priviledges, grants, and suitable powers; keep
them under protection, and defend them against all invaders; and receive no
taxes or revenue from them!
This was the cruelty of the Church of England! Fatal lenity! It was the
ruin of that excellent Prince, King Charles I. Had King James sent all the
Puritans in England away to the West Indies; we had been a national unmixed
Church! the Church of England had been kept undivided and entire!
To requite the lenity of the Father, they take up arms against the Son,
conquer, pursue, take, imprison, and a last to death the Anoited of God, and
destroy the very Being and Nature of Government: setting up a sordid Impostor,
who had neither title to govern, nor understanding to manage, but supplied
that want, with power, bloody and desperate counsels and craft, without
conscience.
Had not King James I. withheld the full execution of the Laws: had he
given them strict justice, he had cleared the nation of them! And the
consequences had been plain; his son had never been murdered by them, nor the
Monarchy overwhelmed. It was too much mercy shewn them that was the ruin of
his posterity, and the ruin of the nation`s peace. One would think the
Dissenters should not have the face to believe, that we are to be wheedled and
canted into Peace and Toleration, when they know that they have once requited
us with a Civil War, and once with an intolerable and unrighteous Persecution,
for our former civility.
Nay, to encourage us to be easy with them, it is apparent that they never
had the upper hand of the Church, but they treated her with all the severity,
with all the reproach and contempt as was possible! What Peace and what Mercy
did they shew the loyal Gentry of the Church of England, in the time of their
triumphant Commonwealth? How did they put all the Gentry of England to ransom,
whether they were actually in arms for the King or not! making people compound
for their estates, and starve their families! How did they treat the Clergy of
the Church of England! sequester the Ministers! devour the patrimony of the
Church, and divide the spoil, by sharing the Church lands among their
soldiers, and turning her Clergy out to starve! Just such measures as they
have meted, should be measured to them again!
Charity and Love is the known doctrine of the Church of England, and it
is plain She has put it in practice towards the Dissenters, even beyond what
they ought [deserved], till She has been wanting to herself, and in effect
unkind to her own sons: particularly, in the too much lenity of King James I.,
mentioned before. Had he so rooted the Puritans from the face of the land,
which he had an opportunity early to have done; they had not had the power to
vex the Church as since they have done.
In the days of King Charles II., how did the Church reward their bloody
doings, with lenity and mercy! Except the barbarous Regicides of the pretended
Court of Justice, not a soul suffered, for all the blood in an unnatural war!
King Charles came in all mercy and love, cherished them, preferred them,
employed them, withheld the rigour of the law; and oftentimes, even against
the advice of his Parliament, gave them Liberty of Conscience: and how did
they requite him? With the villainous contrivance to despose and murder him
and his successor, at the Rye [House] Plot!
King James [II.], as if mercy was the inherent quality of the Family,
began his reign with unusual favour to them. Nor could their joining with the
Duke of Monmouth against him, move him to do himself justice upon them. But
that mistaken Prince, thinking to win them by gentleness and love, proclaimed
a Universal Liberty to them! and rather discountenanced the Church of England
than them! How they required him, all the World knows!
The late reign [William III.] is too fresh in the memory of all the World
to need a comment. How under pretence of joining with the Church in redressing
some grievances, they pushed things to that extremity, in conjunction with
some mistaken Gentlemen, as to depose the late King: as if the grievance of
the Nation could not have been redress but by the absolute ruin of the Prince!
Here is an instance of their Temper, their Peace, and Charity!
To what height they carried themselves during the reign of a King of
their own! how they crope [creeped] into all Places of Trust and Profit! how
they insinuated themselves into the favour of the King, and were at first
preferred to the highest Places in the nation! how they engrossed the
Ministry! and, above all, how pitifully they managed! is too plain to need any
remarks.
But particularly, their Mercy and Charity, the spirit of Union they tell
us so much of, has been remarkable in Scotland. If any man would see the
spirit of a Dissenter, let him look into Scotland! There, they made entire
conquest of the Church! trampled down the sacred Orders and suppressed the
Episcopal Government, with an absolute, and, as they supposed, irretrievable
victory! though it is possible they may find themselves mistaken!
Now it would be a very proper question to ask their impudent advocate,
the Observator, "Pray how much mercy and favour did the members of the
Episcopal Church find in Scotland, from the Scotch Presbyterian Government?"
and I shall undertake for the Church of England, that the Dissenters shall
still receives as much here, though they deserve but little.
In a small treatise of The Sufferings of the Episcopal Clergy in
Scotland, it will appear what usage they met with! How they not only lost
their Livings; but, in several places, were plundered and abused in their
persons! the Ministers that could not conform, were turned out, with numerous
families and no maintenance, and hardly charity enough left to relieve them
with a bit of bread. The cruelties of the Party were innumerable, and are not
to be attempted in this short Piece.
And now, to prevent the distant cloud which they perceive to hang over
their heads from England, with a true Presbyterian policy, they put it for a
Union of Nations! that England might unite their Church with the Kirk of
Scotland, and their Assembly of Scoth canting Long - Cloaks in our
Convocation. What might have been, if our Fanatic Whiggish Statesmen
continued, God only knows! but we hope we are out of fear of that now.
It is alleged by some of the faction, and they have begun to bully us
with it, that "if we won`t unite them, they will not settle the Crown with us
again; but when Her Majesty dies, will choose a King for themselves!"
If they won`t we must make them! and it is not the first time we have let
them know that we are able! The Crowns of these Kingdoms have not so far
disowned the Right of Succession, but they may retrieve it again; and if
Scotland thinks to come off from a Successive to an Electric State of
Government; England has not promised, not to assist the Right Heir, and put
him into possession, without any regards to their ridiculous Settlements.
These are the Gentlemen! these their ways of treating the Church, both at
home and abroad!
Now let us examine the Reasons they pretend to give, why we should be
favourable to them? why we should continue and tolerate them among us?
First. They are very numerous, they say. They are a great part of the
nation, and we cannot suppress them!
To this, may be answered,
First. They are not so numerous as the Protestants in France: and yet the
French King effectually cleared the nation of them, at once; and we don`t find
he misses them at home!
But I am not of the opinion, they are so numerous as is pretended. Their
Party is more numerous than their Persons; and those mistaken people of the
Church who are misled and deluded by their wheedling artifices to join with
them, make their Party the greater: but those will open their eyes when the
Government shall set heartily about the Work, and come off from them, as some
animals, which they say, always desert a house when it is likely to fall.
Secondly. The more numerous, the more dangerous; and therefore the more
need to suppress them! and God has suffered us to bear them as goads in our
sides, for not utterly extinguishing them long ago.
Thirdly. If we are to allow them, only because we cannot suppress them;
then it ought to be tried, Whether we can or not? And I am of opinion, it is
easy to be done! and could prescribe Ways and Means, if it were proper: but I
doubt not the Government will find effectual methods for the rooting of the
contagion from the face of this land.
Another argument they use, which is this. That this is a time of war, and we
have need to unite against the common enemy.
We answer, This common enemy had been no enemy, if they had not made him
so! He was quiet, in peace, and no way disturbed and encroached upon us; and
we know no reason we had to quarrel with him.
But further. We make no question but we are able to deal with this common
enemy without their help: but why must we unite with them, because of the
enemy? Will they go over to the enemy, if we do not prevent it, by a Union
with them? We are very well contented [that] they should! and make no
question, we shall be ready to deal with them and the common enemy too; and
better without them than with them! Besides, if we have a common enemy, there
is the more need to be secure against our private enemies! If there is one
common enemy, we have the less need to have an enemy in our bowels!
It was a great argument some people used against suppressing the Old
Money, that "it was a time of war, and it was too great a risque [risk] for
the nation to run! If we should not master it, we should be undone!" And yet
the sequel proved the hazard was not so great, but it might be mastered, and
the success [i.e., of the new coinage] was answerable. The suppressing the
Dissenters is not a harder work! nor a work of less necessity to the Public!
We can never enjoy a settled uninterrupted union and tranquility in this
nation, till the spirit of Whiggism, Faction, and Schism is melted down like
the Old Money!
To talk of difficulty is to frighten ourselves with Chimeras and notions
of a powerful Party, which are indeed a Party without power. Difficulties
often appear greater at a distance than when they are searched into with
judgment, and distinguished from the vapours and shadows that attend them.
We are not to be frightened with it! This Age is wiser than that, by all
our own experience, and theirs too! King Charles I. had early suppressed this
Party, if he had taken more deliberate measures! In short, it is not worth
arguing, to talk of their arms. Their Monmouths, and Shaftesburys, and Argyles
are gone! Their Dutch Sanctuary is at an end! Heaven has made way for their
destruction! and if we do not close with the Divine occasion, we are to blame
ourselves! and may hereafter remember, that we had, once, an opportunity to
serve the Church of England, by extirpating her implacable enemies; and having
let slip the Minute that Heaven presented, may experimentally complain, Post
est Occasio Calvo!
Here are some popular Objections in the way.
As First, The Queen has promised them, to continue them in their
tolerated Liberty; and has told us She will be a religious observer of
herword.
What Her Majesty will do, we cannot help! but what, as the Head of the
Church, she ought to do, is another case. Her Majesty has promised to protect
and defend the Church of England, and if she cannot effectually do that,
without the destruction of the Dissenters; she must, of course, dispense with
one promise to comply with another!
But to answer this cavil more effectually. Her Majesty did never promise
to maintain the Toleration to the destruction of the Church; but it was upon
supposition that it may be compatible with the well - being and safety of the
Church, which she had declared she would take especial care of. Now if these
two Interests clash, it is plain Her Majesty`s intentions are to uphold,
protect, defend, and establish the Church! and this, we conceive is impossible
[that is, while maintaining the Toleration].
Perhaps it may be said, That the Church is in no immediate danger from
the Dissenters; and therefore it is time enough.
But this is a weak answer. For first. If the danger be real, the distance
of it is no argument against, but rather a spur to quicken us to Prevention,
lest it be too late hereafter.
And secondly. Here is the opportunity, and the only one perhaps, that
ever the Church had to secure herself, and destroy her enemies.
The Representatives of the Nation have now an opportunity! The Time is
come, which all good men have wished for! that the Gentlemen of England may
serve the Church of England, now they are protected and encouraged by a Church
of England Queen!
What will you do for your Sister in the day that she shall be spoken for?
If ever you will establish the best Christian Church in the World?
If ever you will suppress the Spirit of Enthusiasm?
If ever you will free the nation from the viperous brood that have so
long sucked the blood of their Mother?
If ever you will leave your Posterity free from faction and rebellion,
this is the time. This is the time to pull up this heretical Weed of Sedition,
that has so long disturbed the Peace of the Church, and poisoned the good
corn!
But, says another hot and cold Objector, This is renewing Fire and
Faggot! reviving the Act, De heretico comburendo! This will be cruelty in its
nature! and barbarous to all the World!
I answer, It is cruelty to kill a snake or a toad in cold blood, but the
poison of their nature makes it a charity to our neighbours, to destroy those
creatures! not for any personal injury received, but for prevention; not for
the evil they have done, but the evil they may do! Serpents, toads, vipers,
&c., are noxious to the body, and poison the sensitive life: these poison the
soul! corrupt our posterity! ensnare our children! destroy the vitals of our
happiness, our future felicity! and contaminate the whole mass!
Shall any Law be given to such wild creatures! Some beasts are for sport,
and the huntsmen give them the advantages of ground: but some are knocked on
the head, by all possible ways of violence and surprise!
I do not prescribe Fire and Faggot! but as Scipio said of Carthage,
Delenda est Carthago! They are to be rooted out of this nation, if ever we
will live in peace! serve God! or enjoy our own! As for the manner, I leave it
to those hands, who have a Right to execute God`s Justice on the Nation`s and
the Church`s enemies.
But, if we must be frighted from this Justice, under the[se] specious
pretences, and odious sense of cruelty; nothing will be effected! It will be
more barbarous to our own children and dear posterity, when they shall
reproach their fathers, as we ours, and tell us[!], "You had an Opportunity to
root out this cursed race from the World, under the favour and protection of a
True Church of England Queen! and out of your foolish pity, you spared them:
because, forsooth, you would not be cruel! And now our Church is suppressed
and persecuted, our Religion trampled under foot, our estates plundered; our
persons imprisoned, and dragged to gaols, gibbets, and scafolds! Your sparing
this Amalekite race is our destruction! Your mercy to them, proves cruelty to
your poor posterity!"
How just will such reflections be, when our posterity shall fall under
the merciless clutches of this uncharitable Generation! when our Church shall
be swallowed up in Schism, Faction, Enthusiasm, and Confusion! when our
Government shall be devolved upon Foreigners, and our Monarchy dwindled into a
Republic!
It would be more rational for us, if we must spare this Generation, to
summon our own to a general massacre: and as we have brought them into the
World free, to send them out so; and not betray them to destruction by our
supine negligence, and then cry "It is mercy!"
Moses was a merciful meek man; and yet with what fury did he run through
the camp, and cut the throats of three and thirty thousand of his dear
Israelites that were fallen into idolatry. What was the reason? It was mercy
to the rest, to make these examples! to prevent the destruction of the whole
army.
How many millions of future souls, [shall] we save from infection and
delusion, if the present race of Poisoned Spirits were purged from the face of
the land!
It is vain to trifle in this matter! The light foolish handling of them
by mulcts, fines, &c.; `tis their glory and their advantage! If the Gallows
instead of the Counter, and the galleys instead of the fines; were the reward
of going to a conventicle, to preach or hear, there would not be so many
sufferers! The spirit of martyrdom is over! They that will go to church to be
chosen Sheriffs and Mayors, would go to forty churches, rather than be hanged!
If one severe Law were made, and punctually executed, that Whoever was
found at a Conventicle should be banished the nation, and the Preacher be
hanged; we should soon see an end of the tale! They would all come to church
again, and one Age [generation] would make us all One again!
To talk of Five Shillings a month for not coming to the Sacrament, and
One Shilling per week, for not coming to Church: this is such a way of
converting people as was never known! This is selling them a liberty to
transgress, for so much money!
If it be not a crime, why don`t we give them full license? and if it be,
no price ought to compound for the committing of it! for that is selling a
liberty to people to sin against God and the Government!
If it be a crime of the highest consequence, both against the peace and
welfare of the nation, the Glory of God, the good of the Church, and the
happiness of the soul: let us rank it among capital offences! and let it
receive punishment in proportion to it!
We hang men for trifles, and banish them for things not worth naming; but
that an offence against God and the Church, against the welfare of the World,
and the dignity of Religion shall be bought off for Five Shillings: this is
such a shame to a Christian Government, that it is with regret I transmit it
to posterity.
If men sin against God, affront His ordinances, rebel against His Church,
and disobey the precepts of their superiors; let them suffer, as such capital
crimes deserve! so will Religion flourish, and this divided nation be once
again united.
And yet the title of barbarous and cruel will soon be taken off from this
Law too. I am not supposing that all the Dissenters in England should be
hanged or banished. But as in case of rebellions and insurrections, if a few
of the ringleaders suffer, the multitude are dismissed; so a few obstinate
people being made examples, there is no doubt but the severity of the Law
would find a stop in the compliance of the multitude.
To make the reasonableness of this matter out of question, and more
unanswerably plain, let us examine for what it is, that this nation is divided
into Parties and factions? and let us see how they can justify a Separation?
or we of the Church of England can justify our bearing the insults and
inconveniences of the Party.
One of their leading Pastors, and a man of as much learning as most among
them, in his Answer to a Pamphlet entitled An Enquiry into the Occasional
Conformity, hath these words, p. 27: "Do the Religion of the Church and the
Meeting Houses make two religions? Wherein do they differ? The Substance of
the same Religion is common to them both, and the Modes and Accidents are the
things in which only they differ." P. 28: "Thirty - nine Articles are given us
for the Summary of our Religion: thirty - six contain the Substance of it,
wherein we agree; three are additional Appendices, about which we have some
differences."
Now, if as, by their own acknowledgment, the Church of England is a true
Church; and the difference is only in a few "Modes and Accidents": why should
we expect that they will suffer the gallows and galleys, corporal punishment
and banishment, for these trifles? There is no question, but they will be
wiser! Even their own principles won`t bear them out in it!
They will certainly comply with the Laws, and with Reason! And though, at
the first, severity may seem hard, the next Age will feel nothing of it! the
contagion will be rooted out. The disease being cured, there will be no need
of the operation! But if they should venture to transgress, and fall into the
pit; all the World must condemn their obstinacy, as being without ground from
their own principles.
Thus the pretence of cruelty will be taken off, and the Party actual
suppressed; and the disquiets they have so often brought upon the Nation,
prevented.
Their numbers and their wealth make them haughty; and that is so far from
being an argument to persuade us to forbear them, that it is a warning to us,
without any more delay, to reconcile them to the Unity of the Church, or
remove them from us.
At present, Heaven be praised! they are not so formidable as they have
been, and it is our own fault if ever we suffer them to be so! Providence and
the Church of England seem to join in this particular, that now, the
Destroyers of the Nation`s Peace may be overturned! and to this end, the
present opportunity seems to put into our hands.
To this end, Her present Majesty seems reserved to enjoy the Crown, that
the Ecclesiastic as well as Civil Rights of the Nation may be restored by her
hand.
To this end, the face of affairs has received such a turn in the process
of a few months as never has been before. The leading men of the Nation, the
universal cry of the People, the unanimous request of the Clergy agree in
this, that the Deliverance of our Church is at hand!
For this end, has Providence given such a Parliament! such a Convocation!
such a Gentry! and such a Queen! as we never had before.
And what may be the consequences of a neglect of such opportunities? The
Succession of the Crown has but a dark prospect! Another Dutch turn may make
the hopes of it ridiculous, and the practice impossible! Be the House of our
future Princes ever so well inclined, they will be Foreigners! Many years will
be spent in suiting the Genius of Strangers to this Crown, and the Interests
of the Nation! and how many Ages it may be, before the English throne be
filled with so much zeal and candour, so much tenderness and hearty affection
to the Church, as we see it now covered with, who can imagine?
It is high time, then, for the friends of the Church of England to think
of building up and establishing her in such a manner, that she may be no more
invaded by Foreigners, nor divided by factions, schisms, and error.
If this could be done by gentle and easy methods, I should be glad! but
the wound is corroded, the vitals begin to mortify, and nothing but amputation
of members can complete the cure! All the ways of tenderness and compassion,
all persuasive arguments have been made use of in vain!
The humour of the Dissenters has so increased among the people, that they
hold the Church in defiance! and the House of God is an abomination among
them! Nay, they have brought up their posterity in such prepossessed aversion
to our Holy Religion, that the ignorant mob think we are all idolaters and
worshippers of Baal! and account it a sin to come within the walls of our
churches! The primitive Christians were not more shy of a heathen temple, or
of meat offered to idols; nor the Jews, or swine`s flesh, than some of our
Dissenters are of the church and the Divine Service solemnized therein.
The Obstinacy must be rooted out, with the profession of it! While the
Generation are left at liberty daily to affront God Almighty, and dishonour
His holy worship; we are wanting in our duty to God, and to our Mother the
Church of England.
How can we answer it to God! to the Church! and to our posterity; to
leave them entangled with Fanaticism! Error, and Obstinacy, in the bowels of
the nation? to leave them an enemy in their streets, that, in time, may
involve them in the same crimes, and endanger the utter extirpation of the
Religion of the Nation!
What is the difference betwixt this, and being subject to the power of
the Church of Rome? from whence we have reformed. If one be an extreme to the
one hand, and one on another: it is equally destructive to the Truth to have
errors settled among us, let them be of what nature they will! Both are
enemies of our Church, and of our peace! and why should it not be as criminal
to admit an Enthusiast as a Jesuit? why should the Papist with his Seven
Sacraments be worse than the Quaker with no Sacraments at all? Why should
Religious Houses be more intolerable than Meeting Houses?
Alas, the Church of England! What with Popery on one hand, and
Schismatics on the other, how has She been crucified between two thieves. Now,
Let Us Crucify The Thieves!
Let her foundations be established upon the destruction of her enemies!
The doors of Mercy being always open to the returning part of the deluded
people, let the obstinate be ruled with the rod of iron!
Let all true sons of so holy and oppressed a Mother, exasperated by her
afflictions, harden their hearts against those who have oppressed her!
And may God Almighty put it into the hearts of all the friends of Truth,
to lift up a Standard against Pride and Antichrist! that the Posterity of the
Sons of Error may be rooted out from the face of this land, for ever!
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