THE CHARACTER OF A QUAKER In his true and proper COLOURS OR, The Clownish Hypocrite Anatomised.  Sic oculos, sic Ille manus, sic ora movebat. 
Licenced and Entered according to Order.  
LONDON, Printed for T. Egglesfield. 1671.   

To the Reader.  

A Quaker with's dark Lantern light  
Is here exposed to your sight,  
Stripped of's nice Vizard and fair Paint,  
Wherein he's wont to Ape a Saint,  
So false Fires may delude our Eyes,  
And seem like stars to gild the skies;  
Till Reason proves they owe their birth  
To th' stinking vapours of the Earth.  
This Hypocrite we here essay  
In's proper colours to display,  
Whose Yea and Nay in mischief goes  
Beyond the Hectors damning oaths,  
But if you think we represent  
Not full enough each lineament,  
Next sitting may that want supply  
Provided still you this do buy.   
R. H.   

THE CHARACTER OF A QUAKER.  
A Quaker is a Vessel of Phanaticisme drawn off to the Lees; a Common-Shore of Heresy into which most extravagant Opinions at last disembogue themselves and centre, the fag-end of Reformation marked with a sullen meager look, and this Characteristic Thou; A Fox in a Lambskin Coat, that retains his subtlety though not his colour, a dough-baked piece of formality that decries Superstition, yet idolizes Garbs and Phrases. You may know him by his diminutive band, that looks like the Forlorne-hope of his Shirt crawling o 〈…〉 his Collar; for his purity consists only in his dress, and his Religion is, Not to speak like his Neighbours. His Original is as obscure as the head of Nile; some refer it to Behmen the canting Philosophaster of Germany. Others run his Pedigree higher, and say he was hatched when the degraded Seraphin first took on him to counterfeit an Angel of Light. He is a mere composition of Contradiction & Clownishness ana, with a few odd Scruples of Hypocrisy to give it a Tincture. Should the Parliament make a Law for Eating, he would starve rather than be guilty of obeying it; and if you would have him do a thing, you need only forbid it on pain of death; He thinks that to be religious one is obliged to be uncivil; and flings his Wits overboard to make room for Inspirations. His Dreams he entitles Visions, and each Capricio of his fancy must ●●ss for a divine Revelation, to which he blasphemously puts a probatum est, The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. The first Article of his Creed is to keep his Hat on, which he observes so religiously, as if he thought vailing Bonnet to be the sin against the Holy Ghost; Titles of Honour he takes for infallible marks of the Beast, and believes the Master of the Ceremonies to be Antichrist; He would have done rarely in the old Chaos before Nature had ranked things in their places, being a professed Enemy to all Order, that thinks there's no pure walking unless it be with the heels upwards; He hath a Pique against Paul for saying most noble Festus, and hates the memory of Sarah because she called her Husband Lord. His discourses are nothing but a Rhapsody of oft repeated Nonsense; and when he hath darkened your understanding with a cloud of insignificant Babble, he cries. Ah! friends mind the Light! He usually begins with Raving like Mahomet in his Fallingfit, or the Devil of Delphose's Priests, that never delivered their Lying Oracles, but with extravagant gestures and odd distortions of body. Swear not at all, is his Motto, but Lies he holds in many cases venial, and in two meritorious, when they make for the Interest of the beloved Seed, or reflect Scandal▪ on the Government. He cheats worse than a Long-lane Broker, by pretending to deal at a word, and the Hook whereby he draws in his Customers, is a far-fetched sigh, and plainly I tell thee Friend.  
This troublesome Insect (for all his demure looks) is deservedly suspected to be part of the Vermin dropped from the Beast, a Puppet of Religion, contrived to amuse the Rabble, that receives its motion from his Holinesses invisible hand behind the Curtain; for though the jesuit and he seem Antipodes, at long run (like East and West) they prove the same, Equivocations being as common with them both as Curses to a Gamester. Ask our trembling Saint if he believe the Resurrection of the dead, he shall answer yea; but tell you another time, he meant only an arising from sin; by Heaven and Hell he intends no more but several Scenes transacted within us, and abuses holy Scripture into a mystical Romance: Each of them averrs perfection attainable in this Life; but herein they differ, the Papist acknowledgeth but one Pope in the World, the Quaker sets up a Pope in every Individual Breast, to whom all Scripture and Reason must truckle; so that refusing the Polestar of God's Word and the Church's Compass, he will needs steer by the wand'ring motion of a treacherous Ignis fatuus within, subject to be blown any way, and often extinguished by the Hurricanes of Passion.  
He makes Self the Centre whereunto the Lines of all his Actions tend, and like a Hedgehog wrapped up in his own warm down, turns out Brisles to all the World besides; you can come on no side of him but he pricks and bites, and all his Coasts are craggy and inhospitable. He that deals with him has need of more Eyes than Poets bestow on Argus, for he outvies a Genoe's for subtlety, and a jew may come to be an Apprentice with him; he loves the Exchange though he hate the Church, and admires no preaching so much as Foxes.  
For, all his peaceable sheepish countenance, he delights in Contention, and when he is Thouing a Court of Justice, thinks himself in his proper Element. He bawls (like an Oyster-wife) at other folk's pride, and evidences his own Humility only in defying the Pedlars Pack, Lace, Ribbons, and Bandstrings, whilst he saucily contemns his superiors, and prefers the Crotchets of his own Giddy Brain before the Decrees of a General Council. He hates no whore so much as her of Babylon, and ever and anon gratifies the Old man with a kind Green-aproned Friend, whom he picks up at a Conventicle by a lecherous touch of the hand, under pretence of a purer salutation, and finding by her rampant pulse, and tempting turning up the Whites, (which she pretends to do in devotion) that her desires are at flood, they retire together for mutual Edification. He is often drunk, but not like his Neighbours temporally, for sleep cannot cure him, but the fumes of his spiritual pride having intoxicated his head, makes his very Soul reel, and put his Body into a fit of shivering; yet will he not privately in the company of Friends refuse the refreshing Bottle, provided it be not known in Gath, nor published amongst the wicked of Askalon, for he confesseth the use of the creature (especially when it comes on free-cost) to be exceeding lawful. He is very curious to be in all things contrary to the common Mode, that he may be taken notice of, for a singular man, and having strewed his face into a Religious frame, and tuned his voice to a puling sanctimonious key, he uses it as a Low-bell to catch Larks, or rather such Owls as will be bubbled out of their money merely on the Repute of his conscientious dealing; he abominates our Churches, and says very well, that God must be worshipped every where in spirit, yet will rather be knocked o'th' head then forsake Devonshire-house; here it is that he glories in tribulations, and makes the Streets ring with persecutions and sufferings, when all the business is, he is only shut out of doors, and kept by the Officers from breaking a Law that would punish him; Then he ascends the Coblers-stall, flings abroad the Light and the Truth, bears his testimony openly; and at last retireing home, with a good Caudle concludes the work of the day. To this sanctified assembling place they flock in droves, as to an Ark, but sure 'tis none of Noah's, since here the Beasts come not in by pairs, for the she's are far the more numerous party, and in spite of Paul's injunction, will often be holding forth to the men.  
In brief, a Quaker is a Cynic in Religion, one that would have Ill-nature translated Grace; as if the Holy Spirit (that pure sweet gentle Dove▪) did inspire men with sullen humours and waspish dispositions: he hates both Magistracy and Ministry, and never speaks well of Authority or Obedience, but when he is going to lash his Maid or his Apprentices; for though himself have shaken off all subjection to Superiors, yet to his Domestics he is worse than an Egyptian Taskmaster, and speaks to his servants in a tone as imperious as the Grand Signior to his Mutes; he cannot endure Ceremonies or Compliments, especially where his Belly is concerned, and therefore falls to all meat (as Gallants do to a Wench or Oysters) without saying Grace; he is very diligent in his Generation-worke, and may therefore have many children but no heirs; for his issue comes into the World outlawed, and can no more boast to be born in lawful Wedlock, than the Kinchin-cove of a Gipsy got under a hedge by a strauling Tinker; he bannes the Banes, and in this respect only refuses Licence, consummating his Marriage before it is solemnised; for so soon as the Spirit begins to yield to the rebellion of the flesh, and his Bowels yearn to be multiplying, he and his willing Doxy never wait the Parson's leisure, but take each others word and so to Bed. Yet of late (to show how far they dare affront the Laws established) they have got a more solemn Knack of Fooling; A Westminster Wedding must be kept at Merchant-taylor's Hall, and a Trumpet sounded to publish the Nuptials between Diotrephes and Gomer the daughter of Diblain, where jews and Gentiles are jointly invited to a Feast, and Seven and Twenty Venison Pasties saw their stately Walls in a moment leveled. A Freak so wild and extravagant, that some of the invited Hebrews began to suspect their Rabbins mistaken in their Cabalistick Learning; and that Antichrist is as like to be hatched between such a mad Couple, as to be begot by an Incubus on a Harlot of the Tribe of Dan.  
The Devil that furnishes others with his Tares but by Retail, deals with the Quaker by Whole sale, so many Heresies club to his Generation, that 'tis impossible to say which he resembles most. Sure Satan had a fancy to present the World with an Oglie, and therefore here hath rendevouzed all his Hellbred Errors in Epicomie, and set down a Catalogue of them in Shorthand.  
By his obstinate zeal to keep his Noddle covered, you may guests him a Mahometan, that resents nothing so dishonourable as a bare head; and indeed he hath no more Christianity in him than a Turk; His Good-Friday Looks speak him a superstitious Anchorite; his subtlety and equivocations would become a jesuit; he names his children with as little Ceremony as other Folks do their Whelps; and so far keeps pace with the Anabaptists, but of a sudden he outstrips them, and falls in with the Seekers to deny all Ordinances. From Socinus he steals Arguments against the blessed Trinity, and learns to disown all Government, from john of Leyden. At first he was much against the Carnal Weapon, but now begins to be reconciled to Fight, and if you anger him will rather venture a Rubbers at Fifty-Cuffs, then turn the other cheek to the Smiter.  
'Tis a prudent maxim in the Art Military, never to think too contemptibly of an Enemy. Our Grandfathers saw that Scotch-mist Presbytery rising no bigger than a man's hand, and yet how dismally did it in few years overspread our whole Horizon.  
Consider but this Quaking Gang in its true dimensions, and the Arts they have to promote their Designs, and they will appear more formidable than most of the other Factions.  
For, First, They are a People generally subtle, frugal, industrious, and wary in their dealing; by which and their large pretensions to a punctual Honesty, they have engrossed a grand part of the Nations Trade.  
Secondly, Whereas other Persuasions are divided into distinct Congregations, and so have several particular TEACHERS, who frequently broaching different whimsies, mince them into Subdivisions, whilst some dare not hear such an one, and others scruple to communicate with such a one, though all of a PARTY.  
The QUAKERS on the contrary, though no two of them scarce agree in all things, do yet generally throughout England keep themselves up in one entire Body, glued together with a strict Unity, as to Affection, and Correspondence, as is evident by their Weekly Collections in every County continually sent up to London, where their common stock cannot but in so many years as they have maintained it, be very vast. To which add the exact Account and Registry they every where keep of all their Births and Burials (which are likewise duly transmitted up) so that in an instant they are able to give a near estimate of their number and strength in all the three Nations. These and some other Import●●ts being duly weighed, render this shivering Sect not so inconsiderable as the common Rabble deluded with their specious pretences are apt to think them. 'Tis a good Caution of a Minor Poet, 
As white Powder discharges without noise,  
So many Saint-seeming Hypocrites destroys.  
Trust not too far, the soft hand sometimes smites,  
And Larks are Birds of prey as well as Kites.   
To conclude, a Quaker is a Canting thing that Cousins the world by the purity of his clothes, a few Close-stool faces and whining expressions, his Life is only a real Lie, his Doctrine contrary to all sober Religion, and withal so troublesome that I am grown quite weary of drawing his Character, and cannot but wish him and all his Trihe fairly Embarked for terra incognita, or the late found Isle of Pines, underthe conduct of Penn their high Admiral.  
FINIS.