Ranters, and charges them with running out!* Now what kind of argument is this in the mouth of G. Fox against any fanatic, however furious, when he himself has taught him, that he is to listen to the Spirit of God within himself, in preference to the authority of any man and of all men, and even of the Gospel? G. Fox was not more strongly moved to believe that he was the messenger of Christ, than J. Naylor was to believe that he himself was Christ: nor had he a firmer conviction that the Lord forbade hat-worship, as it is called, out of prayer, than J. Perrott and his company had, that they were forbidden to use it in prayer. 2dly, with respect to the excesses and crimes committed by many Catholics of different ranks, as well as by other men, in all ages, I answer, that these have been committed, not in virtue of their rule of faith and conduct, but in direct opposition to it; as will be more fully seen when we come to treat of that rule: whereas the extravagancies of the Quakers were the immediate dictates of the imaginary spirit, which they followed as their guide. Lastly, when the doctors of the Catholic Church teach us, after the inspired writers, not to extinguish, but to walk in the Spirit of God, they tell us, at the same time, that this Holy Spirit invariably and necessarily leads us to hear the church, and to practise that humility, obedience, and those other virtues which she constantly inculcates: so that if it were possible for "an angel from heaven to preach another gospel than what we have received," he ought to be rejected as a spirit of darkness. Even Luther, when the Anabaptists first broached many of the leading tenets of the Quakers, required them to demonstrate their pretended commission from God, by incontestable miracles, or submit to be guided by his appointed ministers. I have now to notice the letter of Mr. Topham.|| Some of * Speaking of James Naylor, he says, "I spake with him, for I saw he was out and wrong-he slighted what I said, and was dark and much out." Journ. p. 220. + Journ. p. 310. This and another Friend, J. Love, went on a mission to Rome, to convert the pope to Quakerism; but his holiness not understanding English, when they addressed him with some coarse English epithets in St. Peter's church, they had no better success than a female Friend, Mary Fisher, had, who went into Greece to convert the great Turk. See Sewel's Hist. "Now he (Fox) found also that the Lord forbade him to put off his hat to any men high or low; and he required to thou and thee every man and woman without distinction, and not to bid people good morrow, or good evening neither might he bow, or scrape with his leg." Sewel's Hist. p 18. See there a dissertation on hat-worship. § Sleidan. It was originally intended to insert these and the other letters of the same description: but as this would have rendered the work too bulky, and, his objections have already been answered, in my remarks of Mr. Rankin's letter. What I find particular in the former, i the following passage: "Is it possible to go against conviction and facts? namely, the experience that very many seriou Christians feel, in this day of God's power, that they are made partakers of Christ and of the Holy Ghost, and who hear him saying to the melting heart, with his still, small, yet penetrating and renovating voice, Thy sins are forgiven thee: Be thou clean Thy faith hath made thee whole! If an exterior proof were wanting to show the certainty of this interior conviction, I might refer to the conversion and holy life of those who have experienced it."-To this I answer, that the facts and the conviction which your friend talks of, amount to nothing more than a certain strength of imagination and warmth of sentiment, which may be natural, or may be produced by that lying spirit, whom God sometimes permits to go forth, and to persuade the presumptuous to their destruction. 1 Kings, xxii. 22. I presume Mr. Topham will allow, that no experience which he has felt or witnessed, exceeded that of Bockhold, or Hacket, or Naylor, mentioned above; who, nevertheless, were confessedly betrayed by it into the most horrible blasphemies and atrocious crimes. The virtue most necessary for enthusiasts, because the most remote from. them, is an humble diffidence in themselves. When Oliver Cromwell was on his death-bed, Dr. Godwin, being present among other ministers, prophesied that the protector would recover. Death, however, almost immediately ensuing, the Pu ritan, instead of acknowledging his error, cast the blame upon Almighty God, exclaiming, "Lord, thou hast deceived us; and we have been deceived!"*. With respect to the alleged purity of Antinomian saints, I would refer to the history of the lives and deaths of many of our English regicides, and to the gross immoralities of numberless justified Methodists, described by Fletcher in his Checks to Antinomianism.† I am, &c. JOHN MILNER. as the whole of the objections may be gathered from the answers to them, that intention has been abandoned. * See Birch's Life of Archbishop Tillotson, p. 17. + This candid and able writer says, "The Puritans and first Quakers soon got over the edge of internal activity into the smooth and easy path of Lao. dicean formality. Most of us, called Methodists, have already followed them. We fall asleep under the bewitching power; we dream strange dreams; our salvation is finished; we have got above legality; we have attained Christian liberty; we have nothing to do; our covenant is sure." Vol. ii. p. 233. He refers to several instances of the most flagitious conduct of which human nature is capable, in persons who had attained to what they call finished salvation. DEAR SIR LETTER VIII.-TO JAMES BROWN, ESQ. SECOND FALLACIOUS RULE. I TAKE it for granted, that my answers to Messrs. Rankin and Topham have been communicated to you, and I hope that, in conjunction with my preceding letters, they have convinced those gentlemen, of what you, dear sir, have ever been convinced of, namely, the inconsistency and fanaticism of every pretension on the part of individuals, at the present day, to a new and particular inspiration, as a rule of faith. The question which remains for our inquiry is, whether the rule or method prescribed by the Church of England, and other more rational classes of Protestants, or that prescribed by the Catholic Church, is the one designed by our Saviour Christ for finding out his true religion? You say that the whole of this is comprised in the written word of God, or the Bible, and that every individual is a judge for himself of the sense of the Bible. Hence in every religious controversy, more especially since the last change of the inconstant Chillingworth,* Catholics have been stunned with the cries of jarring Protestant sects and individuals, proclaiming that the Bible, the Bible alone is their religion and hence, more particularly at the present day, Bibles are distributed by hundreds of thousands, throughout the empire and the four quarters of the globe, as the adequate means of uniting and reforming Christians, and of converting infidels. On the other hand, we Catholics hold that that the word of God, in general, both written and unwritten, in other words, the Bible and tradition, taken together, constitute the rule of faith, or method appointed by Christ for finding out the true religion; and, that, besides the rule itself, he has provided in his holy church, a living, speaking judge, to watch over it and explain it in all matters of controversy. That the latter, and not the former, is the true rule, I trust I shall be able to prove, as clearly as I have proved that private inspiration does not constitute it: and this I shall prove by means of the two maxims I have on that occasion made use of; namely, the rule of faith appointed by Christ must be CERTAIN and UNERRING; that is to say, it must be one which is not liable to lead any rational and sincere inquirer into inconsistency or error; Secondly, this rule must be UNIVERSAL; that is to say, it must be proportioned to the abilities and circumstances of the great bulk of mankind. * Chillingworth was first a Protestant, of the establishment: he next became a Catholic, and studied in one of our seminaries. He then returned, in part, to his former creed; and last of all he gave in to Socinianism, which his writings greatly promoted. I. If Christ had intended that all mankind should learn his religion from a book, namely, the New Testament, he himself would have written that book, and would have enjoined the obligation of learning to read it, as the first and fundamental precept of his religion; whereas, he never wrote any thing at all, unless perhaps the sins of the Pharisees with his finger upon the dust, John, viii. 6.* It does not even appear that he gave his apostles any command to write the Gospel; though he repeatedly and emphatically commanded them to preach it, (Matt. x.) and this to all the nations of the earth, Matt. xxviii. 19. In this ministry they all of them spent their lives, preaching the religion of Christ in every country, from Judea to Spain in one direction, and to India in another; everywhere establishing churches, and "commending their doctrine to faithful men who should be fit to teach others also." 2 Tim. ii. 2. Only a part of them wrote any thing, and what these did write, was, for the most part, addressed to particular persons or congregations, and on particular occasions. The ancient fathers tell us that St. Matthew wrote his gospel at the particular request of the Christians of Palestine,† and that St. Mark composed his at the desire of those at Rome.‡ St. Luke addressed his gospel to an individual, Theophilus, having written it, says the holy evangelist, because it seemed good to him to do so. Luke i. 3. St. John wrote the last of the gospels in compliance with the petition of the clergy and people of Lesser Asia,§ to prove, in particular, the divinity of Jesus Christ, which Cerinthus, Ebion, and other heretics began then to deny. No doubt the evangelists were moved by the Holy Ghost, to listen to the requests of the faithful, in writing their respective gospels; nevertheless there is nothing in these occasions, nor in the gospels themselves, which. indicates that any one of them, or all of them together, contains an entire, detailed, and clear exposition of the whole religion of Jesus Christ. The canonical epistles in the New Testament show the particular occasions on which they were written, and prove, as the Bishop of Lincoln observes, that "They are not to be considered as regular treatises on the Christian religion."|| II. In supposing our Saviour to have appointed his bare written word for the rule of our faith, without any authorized judge to decide on the unavoidable controversies growing out *It is agreed upon among the learned, that the supposed letter of Christ to Abgarus, king of Edessa, quoted by Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. 1. i. is spurious. Euseb. 1. 3. Hist. Eccl. Chrysos. in Matt. Hom. 1. Iren. 1. 3. c. 1. Hieron. de Vir. Illust. Euseb. 1. 2. c. 15. Hist. Eccl. Epiph. Hieron. de Vir. Illust. of it, you would suppose that he has acted differently from what common sense has dictated to all other legislators: for where do we read of a legislator, who, after dictating a code of laws, neglected to appoint judges and magistrates to decide on their meaning, and to enforce obedience to such decisions? You, dear sir, have the means of knowing what would be the consequence of leaving any act of Parliament, concerning taxes, or enclosures, or any other temporal concerns, to the interpretation of the individuals whom it regards. Alluding to the Protestant rule, the illustrious Fenelon has said, “It is bettter to live without any law, than to have laws which all men are left to interpret according to their several opinions and interests."* The Bishop of London† appears sensible of this truth, as far as regards temporal affairs, where he writes, "In matters of property, indeed, some decision, right or wrong, must be made; society could not subsist without it;" just as if peace and unity were less necessary in the one sheepfold of the one shepherd, the Church of Christ, than they are in civil society! III. The fact is, this method of determining religious questions by Scripture only, according to each individual's interpretation, has always produced, whenever and wherever it has been adopted, endless and incurable dissensions, and of course errors; because truth is one, while errors are numberless. The ancient fathers of the church reproached the sects of heretics and schismatics with their endless internal divisions. "See," says St. Augustin, "into how many morsels those are divided, who have divided themselves from the unity of the church!" Another father writes, "It is natural for error to be ever changing. The disciples have the same right in this matter that their masters had." To speak now of the Protestant reformers. No sooner had their progenitor, Martin Luther, set up the tribunal of private judgment on the sense of Scripture in opposition to the authority of the church, ancient and modern,¶ than his disciples, proceeding on this principle, undertook to prove from plain texts of the Bible, that his own doctrine was erroneous, and that the Reformation itself wanted reforming. Carlostad,** Tertul. de Præscript. This happened in June, 1520, on his doctrine being censured by the pope. Till that time he had submitted to the judgment of the holy see. ** He was Luther's first disciple of distinction, being Archdeacon of Wit temberg. He declared against Luther in 1521. |