A SKIRMISH MADE UPON QUAKERISM: Being a Brief CONFUTATION OF A most gross PRINCIPLE or Point of Doctrine:  
Published and Maintained by one WILLIAM PENN, a Quaker;  
In a certain Book, Entitled, Quakerism a Nickname for old Christianity, Subverting Religion, and all Duty both to God and Man.  
By J. C. a Minister of the Gospel.  
LONDON: Printed for Richard Butler, next door to the Lamb and Three Bowls in Barbican. 1676.   

Imprimatur  
Hic Tractatus, cui Titulus, A Skirmish upon Quakerism, & cui nulla praefigitur Praefatio.  
Ab. Campion, Reverendissimo Domino Archiepisc. Cant. à Sac. Domest. 16 Sept. 1676.   

A SKIRMISH MADE UPON QUAKERISM.  
THere have risen up in these days of outs a Sect of People called Quakers, about the Year, 1652. declaring themselves to be a People fearing God above all the Families of the Earth, and that do Worship him in his own Way, viz. in Spirit and in Truth; such also as do love God above all, and their Neighbours as themselves, etc. (as we are told by their own Writers, Moderate Enquirer, Pag. 3.) concerning whom and their Principles many are sufficiently informed by their own Experience and Observation, and by the Writings which are extant; and are sufficiently established in the Truth by the Grace of God in their Souls, and are better able to overthrow erroneous Principles than I. Confessing my own slender Abilities to any such Service, and relying only upon the clearness of the Cause, I presume to tender to Christian People an Account of one Capital Position and Fundamental Error of the Quakers, asserted by one William Penn, who styles himself one of them, in a Book Entitled, Quakerism a new nickname for old Christianity, Chap. 7. Pag. 71. with a brief confutation of it. If any one demand a reason of my do in this case, I beg his candour and charity, reason of I have in mine own breast, known and approved to others that know me, I do not forbear to mention them, because I distrust them, but I think the matter needs not, and I would not trouble the Reader with more than needs; if God and Conscience approve me, thou may'st well rest in the matter delivered as some reason to stay thy enquiry, and a little charity will serve for the rest, I have by me sundry other of their Errors gathered out of their Books, very gross and intolerable, with the constitation of them: but I forbear at present to make them public; and shall only now present the Reader with one, but such a one as may serve for all, and there needs no more to the subverting of all Piety, Charity and Equity than this one, which I here set down in his own Words:— No command in the Scripture is any farther obliging upon any Man, than as he finds a conviction upon his Conscience.— It is conviction that can only oblige to Obedience.— When any Man is convinced, that what was commanded another, is required of him, then, and not till then he is rightly authorized to perform it.  
For the confutation of this Position, I shall advertise and premise this, That the Quakers are by us charged to deny and subvert the Scriptures; which Charge they do deny, and account it a most vile and ungodly slander, and would not in any wise be thought to diminish aught in the least from the just authority and eminency of the Scriptures, and profess to be great honourers of them, and to build their Religion and Hopes upon the Scriptures. So that by their own confessions they give us ground to argue from the Scriptures against them. I shall here manifest that for all their pretence and profession of just respect to the Scriptures, they do quite subvert and undermine them, contradicting their own concessions, and opening a Floodgate to all Error, Atheism, Impiety, and Wickedness; and that this Position of Penn's is the overthrow of all Law and Government, a most intolerable and damnable Error.  
I. Since they profess so stick to the Scriptures, and that the Scriptures do in all Points make for them and against us, let them produce any one Text of Scripture, containing any such assertion, or favouring it. Let Penn. produce any one Scripture, which willeth any Man to forbear Obedience to the command of God and Scripture, till he shall be convinced thereof, or suspending the Authority and Obligation of Scripture-command till Conscience shall be convinced. Let the whole Bible be consulted, and view every Command, and see if any such clause can be found. Instance in all the ten Commandments where doth God say, none of these Commands shall oblige any Man whose Conscience is unconvinced, or contrary convinced. Instance in any the Precepts of the Gospel, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, repent and be converted, deny yourselves and take up the Cross, worship God in Spirit and in truth, and the like; where is there any such clause as Penn's; None of all these Commands shall oblige you further than you be convinced in Conscience? So when the Scripture forbiddeth Hypocrisy, forbiddeth Sensuality, or other sin. Where doth it say, as Penn saith, None of these Prohibitions are obliging further than there is a conviction upon your consciences? I provoke him and all his partakers to produce any Word of Scripture requiring Man's conviction as a condition antecedent to the being and binding force of God's commands.  
2. If this Position of Penn's be true, than sins of Ignorance are no sins; for all conviction is by knowledge: where there is no knowledge, there can be no conviction upon the conscience. So that this Position justifieth all sins of Ignorance. And whereas God in Scripture faith, It is a people of no understanding, therefore he that made them will have no mercy on them, Isa. 27.11. by Penn's Position, it should rather be said, You want knowledge, and so want conviction, and therefore God will have mercy upon you. And whereas God by Scripture saith, My people perish for lack of knowledge, Hos. 4.6. by Penn's Position it should rather be said, Your want of knowledge disobligeth you from obeying God's commands, because without knowledge you cannot be convinced, and without conviction the command of Scripture hath nothing to do with you. This doth justify the Jews murder of Jesus Christ, for the Scripture saith, they did it ignorantly, Acts 3.17. and had they known it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory, 1 Cor. 2.8. This doth justify Paul's Blasphemy, and Persecution, and gross sins against the Gospel, before his conversion, because he saith, be did it ignorantly, 1 Tim. 1.13. And whereas Paul doth up and down confess his sins, and acknowledgeth himself not worthy to be called an Apostle, because he persecuted the Church of God; Penn's Position tells another story, What needst thou accuse and judge thyself before all the Churches of Christ by such confessions, for no command in Scripture is of any such force to oblige ignorant unbelieving sinners: Thou didst all this in thy ignorance and unbelief, and therefore they were no sins and crimes, and if no crimes, they were innocent, yea laudable actions proceeding from a mind acting according to conviction.  
3. If this Position of Penn's be true, than sins of error are no sins, but virtues; and whatsoever is done through delusion, and a perverted hereticated mind and judgement is laudable. I verily thought (saith Paul) that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, Acts 26.9. and our Saviour saith, The time cometh, that whosoever killeth you, will think that he doth God service, Joh. 16.2. It it conviction (saith Penn) which can only oblige to obedience: doth not this patronise the grossest crimes, where the conscience is misconvinced and the understanding deceived? doth not this justify all erroneous Doctrines? and all erroneous Conceits, and practical Misapprehensions, and whatsoever Vices lie in the understandings of Men? for all conviction passeth into the Soul through this gate of the understanding. Now the understanding is naturally full of darkness, unbelief, and error; every ungodly man is practically an Atheist, an Heretic, a false Teacher to his own soul at least, and practical Ignorance and a perverted Judgement, are the mother of all the sins and abominations in the world: and what doth this Position but justify them all? When wicked men kill the Saints, they look upon them at wicked men, and so kill them; all that have been martyred by persecuting Popes, and Pagan Kings and Governors, and all the Persecutions that have been done to the Saints, have been through ignorance and practical error. Penn's Position doth justify the Irish Rebellion, the French Massacre, the Mari●● Persection, the ten Persecutions of the Primitive Churches, the Gunpowder Treason, Judaisme, Mahometism, Paganism, Popery, all erroneous Sects and Parties in the World, with all their false Principles and Practices. Christ saith, it is life eternal to know God and Christ Jesus, Joh. 17.3. Penn's Position saith, if you are ignorant and unconvinced, no Law can lay hold on you; if you be deluded, and practise according to the convictions of your deluded mind, you are warranted by the command of God, which do all centre in conviction.  
4. If this Position off Penn's be true, than conscience and conviction is God, and whatsoever conscience says must be done, be it right or wrong, and it lies in the power of conscience to abrogate and undo and make void all the Laws of God, and to make new Laws in their room and stead, and do whatsoever it pleaseth. If no command be of any force further than conscience shall assent to it, and if conviction, and conviction only oblige to obedience, than whatsoever conviction says must be done, let God and Man say what tehy will. If conviction bid us murder, we must do it, if to commit Treason we must do it, and that under pain of damnation.  
5. Then also it will follow, that he is the most free from all sin who hath the most seared conscience, and that the ready way to obedience and salvation is to debauch and sear the conscience, and and stuff it with the grossest errors, and quite kill it with conscience-wasting sins, and make it so void of life and feeling, that we may may do the most horrid crimes, and yet conscience stand to stand to them, and not only not smite us for them, but approve us, and praise us, and tell us we have done God good service.  
6. If conviction be the ground of obedience, and the authority of Scripture depend upon the rectitude and purity of conscience, than all rational Law, Order and Government both Divine and Humane is over turned, and a stop is put to all Religion and Piety towards God, to all Conscience, Honesty and Charity towards Men, let God command what he will, conscience may come and say, I deny this command, and him that commands it. I know no such God, as Pharaoh says to Moses and Aaron, Who is the Lord that I should let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go, Exod. 5.2. and as proud Nabuchadnezzar says to the three Witnesses, who is that God that shall deliver you out of my hand? Dan. 3.15. and as Sennacherib sent a railing Letter by his Captain Rabshakeh, blaspheming the God of Jerusalem, saying, Who is your God, that be should be able to deliver you out of my hand? 2 Chron. 32.14. No God of any Nation or Kingdom was able to deliver out of my hand, how much less shall your God deliver you out of my hand? v. 15. And his servants spoke yet more against the Lord God, and his servant Hezekiah; he wrote Letters also to rail on the Lord God of Israel, and to speak against him, etc. v. 16, 17. So also Princes and Rulers may command and make never so good Laws, conscience may come and say, I deny all these Laws, and the maker of them: Children may refuse to obey Parents, and Servants their Masters, and Inferiors their Superiors, if conscience shall be unconvinced, and if it be deluded, Subjects may murder their Princes, Children their Parents, Servants their Masters, one Man another, there can be no Law but Conscience, and whatsoever Conscience says must stand.  
It is certain, that since the fall of our first Parent's Conscience in every man naturally is corrupted, and by custom in sin it becomes twice corrupted. By nature Conscience is dead in trespasses and sins, Eph. 2.1. and men live without God and Christ in the world, v. 12. being without hope, and aliens to the Commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the Covenants of Promise: By nature there is not one righteous conscience in all the world, Rom. 3.10. There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God, they are all gone out of the way, they altogether become unprofitable, there is none that doth good, no not one, v. 11.12. All the world is guilty before God of an evil conscience, v. 19 The mind and conscience is defiled, abominable, disobedient, and to every good work reprobate, Tit. 1.15, 16. Some men's consciences are twice dead, Jud. 12. seared with a hot iron, 1 Tim. 4. 2. past feeling, given over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness, Eph. 4.19. hard as the adamant stone, Zach. 7.12. having a whore's forehead, without shame, Jer. 3.3. impudent and stiff-hearted, Ezek. 2.4. rebellious, v. 5. doing evil with both hands earnestly, Mich. 7.3. insatiable, Ezek. 16.28. full of subtlety and mischief, children of the Devil, enemies of all righteousness, not ceasing to pervert the right ways of the Lord, Act. 13.10. and infinite more might be gathered out of the Scriptures, reporting the wickedness of man, and the corruptions of his Conscience, and all his powers.  
Experience witnesseth the same, what woeful consciences have many professing Christians? Penn himself saith of the Protestants, and them of the Church of England, That they abound in evil, equalizing, if not outstripping Papists and Heathens in all kinds of impiety, Truth exalted, p. 10. how then can such a conscience be a law or rule to all the world, and suspend and make void the obligation of all God's Laws? the Quakers conscience says one thing, the Papists conscience says another thing, the Pagans conscience, the Turks conscience, Jews conscience, the Tyrant's conscience, the Traitor's conscience, the Heretics conscience, the Worldlings conscience, the Hypocrites conscience, the proud man's, conscience▪ the Adulterers conscience. How many contrary Conscience are these? how many Gods shall we have, and how many contradictory Laws, if Conscience and Conviction be the only thing which obligeth to duty, and no Law or Command of Scripture oblige, Conscience repugning and being unconvinced?  
I would know of Penn or any man else, what conviction there is upon a Drunkard's conscience when he is dead drunk in his drunkenness, and yet Penn's. Position is, that no Command in Scripture is obliging upon the Drunkard to repent and be sober, supposing him in his drunkenness unconvinced. The most godly Ministers find by sad experience, it is one of the hardest matters in the world to convince an impenitent man of his impenitency, to convince a worldling of his worldliness, to convince a sinner of heart-sins, such as heart-pride, heart-malignity against God and godliness, heart unbelief, and Atheism, and irreligion, and hardness, and earthliness, and other lusts and, vices. And if Penn and his fellows shall lay the blame upon the Preacher, and say the fault is in Preachers, and not in People, let him take heed lest he charge God and Christ, and the Holy Ghost and Scripture, and Prophets and Apostles, who have preached to sinners as well as we, and yet thousands have remained unconvinced. Will Penn undertake to answer for all the crimes of an ignorant, blind, and erroneous conscience against the commands in Scripture? Will he be an Advocate at the day of Judgement to plead the cause of unconvinced consciences, and maintain his Position then to the face of God, as now he doth publish it to the world, and pretend to write from the warrant of God, and from the sense of his eternal spirit, Reason against Railing, p. 164. and crying down the observation of the Lords Supper, and Baptism, as sottish, and that a spirit of whoredom from God, gross Apostasy into Superstition and Idolatry, yea a spirit of Hypocrisy, Persecution and Murder, and all manner of wickedness hath got them, and covered itself with them. p. 108, 109. And he testifies from the same spirit, that Paul renounced Circumcision, that the Appellation, Ordinances of Christ, and particularly Baptism and the Lords Supper are to be rejected.  
Had this Position been, that every command in Scripture is not obliging upon every man, it had been sound Doctrine, for we acknowledge, that every command of God is not obliging to every man, but only such commands as it is Geds will and intent that they should be obliging to all. Some commands of God are but temporary, personal and local. Many commands in Scripture are long since abrogated and null. The command to Abrabam to slay his Son, was extraordinary, and not to be obeyed by any without the like warrant. The command to sacrifice slain Beast, to Circumcise, the command of the Passover, these are ceased. We may sufficiently collect God's mind from his word, which commands are temporary, and extraordinary, and concern but some particular men, and do only oblige in certain cases, and which be perpetual, and oblige all men, at all times, in all places, and the love of God and Man, innocency, holiness, godliness, faith, fidelity, truth, temperance, self-denial, zeal for God's glory, the commands that Parents bring up Children in God's fear, that Children honour their Parents, that we do to all men as we would be done unto, and a multitude more such like. Now Penn's Position is, That no command at all in Scripture is obliging without conviction upon the conscience; and he makes conviction to be the only thing obliging and authorising to duty, and to be of such force, that without conviction no command at all bindeth. For if that be the reason why Gods command written obligeth not, because the conscience in not convinced, then ubi eadem ratio ibi eadem lex, an unwritten command of God obligeth not where there is no conviction. And since all God's Laws are comprised within these two of written and unwritten, Precepts written in Scripture, and Precepts unwritten and contained in Nature, it will follow, that no Law of God is further obliging any man than he is convinced of it, that it is God's Law, and that he stands bound to obey it. It will then follow, That if the Conscience be blind, erroneous, seared, and corrupt, there must needs be a multitude of things in God's Laws most weighty and important duties, which the conscience will be utterly ignorant of, and will call good evil, and evil good, and justify that which God doth condemn, and condemn what God doth justify, and will walk contrary to God, against which is the woe in Isa. 5.30.  
For it is certain, that a carnal man discerneth not spiritual things, and all God's commands are spritual; every command of God is holy and pure and spiritual, whether it be written in Scripture or written in Nature, and without a spiritual Principle in the conscience, the conscience being carnal and blind, discerneth not spiritual things; and so it will follow that all spiritual obedience to God's Laws is made void.  
Can Penn answer this or confute it? let him. Let him demonstrate how a carnal conscience can obey a spirtual command, every man by nature is earthly, God's commands are heavenly, we are by nature unholy, God's Laws are holy. If God's Laws bind none but such as be convinced of them, and no further than they are convinced, than it will unanswerably follow, that no man in the World is under any Law of God to perform spiritual obedience. For instance, God's command is, Thou shalt not murder. Now this command is a spiritual command, requiring the subjection of the heart, and condemning all Murder both of Soul and Body, and whatsoever is a degree of it, and tendeth to it. Now no unregenerate carnal conscience doth discern this command of God in its extent and spirituality, he is no convinced of it, and by Penn's Position there lies upon him no obligation to spirutal obedience.  
Had it not behoved Pen to make good his Position by solid proof? it had, especially when called to it by John Faldo, who chargeth the Quakers, and that justly, for subverting the Scriptures. What says Penn for proof▪ why he contradicts himself, or says something like a contradiction, which is frequent in his Writings.  
First he says, that no command of Scripture is obliging upon any man further than he hath a conviction upon his conscience; afterwards he says, that such commands as these, be holy, be just, be sober, and such like, together with holy Examples are obliging upon all; Why? because they more or less meet with a conviction in the consciences of all: for (saith he) I am persuaded, none that has a reasonable soul, who has not outlived their days, and on whom the night is not come, among the Indians themselves, but would readily say, these are true and weighty. And so he wipes himself and his Brother Burroughs as he thinks clean, and acquits himself from all crime against the Scriptures, and evades John Faldo's Charge. But not to stand answering every word, the sum of Penn's Defence and come off (to give it the Reader in more intelligible words) is this: That such commands in Scripture as be of universal and perpetual obligation, such as holiness, purity, innocency and generally all that concerns honest and godly living, all these be obliging to all, because there is no man so sottish and impious but his conscience assenteth to these commands: But Mr. Penn what do you say, if men be so sottish and impious as to be ignorant that these are commands of God, and to live without God in the World, and to have abominable and filthy and reprobate consciences? It is plain from your Position and defence of it, that you make conviction the ground and spring of obedience. So that where there is no conviction, there is no obedience due; where the conviction is but partial, the obedience due is but partial; where the conviction is erroneous, the obedience must be erroneous. It this Divinity? and is this your Religion? Why then do you not speak out and say, fully and plainly, Every man follow his own Lusts, every man follow his own conscience, every man burn his Bible, and make Conscience and Conviction your Bible? For this is the genuine product of your Opinion. It is a Rule in Logic, That what is not in the premises cannot be in the conclusion, and that every redundancy in the conclusion exceeding the Arguments laid down in the premises in vicious, and that the conclusion is virtually contained in the two foregoing Propositions. Now you make conviction one of your premises, and you lay down this Proposition▪ That where there is no conviction, there is no obedience, and that obedience can rise no higher than conviction.  
Now may one not admire, that a man of your reading and bringing up should be so persuaded of the holiness and goodness of Mankind, as to write and publish to the World, That none that hath a reasonable soul, no not among the Indians themselves, can be unconvinced of that faith in God, and an holy selfdenying life are necessary both to temporal and eternal happiness.— Quis ●alia fando temperet à lachrymis? The Lord forgive me my want of compassion to this man. Alas, how many thousands are there in the World that know not God, not what faith in God is, that know not what a holy selfdenying life is, that worship Devils, that make the Belly their God, and with them a holy selfdenying life is to live as if the must never die, and follow their pleasures; and Religion with them is mere Epicurism and sensuality, let us eat and drink for to morrow we shall die.  
You would have us to believe, that all the World is perfectly holy, and that there is never a corrupted and defiled conscience in the World, and that Adam's fall is no such thing, and that the redemption of Mankind by Christ's blood, and regeneration by the Holy Ghost, and original sin, and hereditary corruption, and man's deadness in sins and trespasses by nature, are no such things. O marvellous! that you can be persuaded, no man that hath a reasonable soul, not a savage Indian, but he hath a conscience within him assenting to all the rules and precepts of holiness, self-denial, godliness, charity, and heavenly conversation: or that no man in the World hath a blind understanding, a seared conscience, an impotent foul, needing no purgation and cure from Jesus Christ, and his good spirit by the new covenant.  
I do grant you this, that no man stands bound to obey any command which it is utterly impossible for him to know and be convinced of. And by granting this, I do sufficiently assoil and clear the justice of God. God doth not enjoin any man that which is simply and totally impossible. God and Conscience will never smite and condemn for mere and total impossibilities. But where nothing hinders a man from knowing his duty but his own neglect and wilful carelessness; and where a man shall by sin debauch and sear his Conscience, and Conscience misguided and seduced shall put him on to worship Idols, to bow to a wooden God, to blaspheme the true God, to murder, persecute, commit all or any crimes; will you excuse this man from sin for going according to his Conscience, and exempt him from all, going against his erroneous Conscience?  
If indeed the case were so that no conviction could be, or none that I could any way compass, than I were in no fault: but where it is my fault, if I be unconvinced, and I might know my duty were I not wanting to myself, and there is no defect in the means, but all the defect is in me, in such case God may justly charge me with the omission of duty, and the commission of evil though I know not of it: for I might have known if I would; and my not knowing my duty which I might have known, it cannot excuse me from sin, nor nullify the command of God. If God should command a Beast to do him reasonable worship, it were an unreasonable command, because the beast hath no reasonable powers or capacity thereto, the command to him is simply impossible. So if God should command a man to reach the Stars with his hands, such a command would not oblige, because it is naturally and simply impossible. But when God commandeth the Jews to believe on the same Jesus, and own him for the true Messiah, this command is reasonable, because Jesus Christ doth abundantly testify by his doctrine, life, and miracles, that he is the Christ of God. And if the Jews will not believe, but contrariwise look upon Christ as a deliverer, and put him to death, and all this in blind zeal, and think they do God good service, shall we say, These men are excused, because they did it ignorantly and of error? In all cases where God doth afford due means of knowledge and conviction, there ignorance and base want of conviction is sinful, and Gods command both written and unwritten doth oblige, though the sinner be never convinced. For man's sin and neglect cannot make void Gods Law. It is true, I grant that without the light within we could not at all come to the knowledge of the Scriptures. What then? will it thence follow, That no command in Scripture doth oblige without conviction? Had we no light within we should be very brutes. Every man hath a reasonable soul, which soul doth essentially contain a principle or power of rational light, by which man, as man is differenced from a beast, and is Animal rationale, by the help of his reason, or that light which is graven in his mind by the Creator, and cultivated by education, he may know that there is a God and a Life to come, and many things pertaining to Religion and Morality▪ Will it hence follow, that because we are men and have reasonable faculties, there lies no obligation upon us, to obey any command of God, further than our reason shall acquaint and certify us, and further than the light shall inform us? What if the light be negligent, idle, sleepy, unfaithful, and bribed, and shall let the sinner sin, and die in sin, is God unjust for taking vengeance? If the Coachman sleep and the Horses run wood, or if he drive so that the Coach is over-turned, doth he not deserve correction? But Penn and all his partakers conceit strange things of the light within, and set it above Scriptures, above all written and unwritten Laws, and this is their very Principle, That the light within in all things is to be, our Rule, and that the Scripture is inferior to it, and to be ruled by it, and so God and Christ, and the Spirit and Scripture and all Duty and Religion are made servants to the light within. Whereas it is evident, That the light within gives the Drunkard leave to be drunk, the Worldlng to be a worldling, and the impenitent man to be impenitent, there is never a soul in Hell but he may have the light within, for if the light within were faithful to God and the Soul, it would not suffer sin to dwell in the soul, it would not suffer any man to live in sin and die in sin. God charges man to be holy in all manner of conversation, and man being so charged by God doth choir the contrary. The light within which should be his guide, like a negligent drunken Coachman sleeps, and the Horses run wood, or he drives into pits and bogs. So doth the light within take part with the flesh, and Satan against God, and suffers the soul to be sensual, worldly, and ungodly, and so is at least a permissive cause of the sinner's sin and damnation; being charged to watch over the soul, and doth not. Now comes Penn and a Sect of people called Quakers, and cry, Up with this light within, and tell us, that we must hearken to this in all things; and further than the light within shall teach and lead us we are to give no harkening to any thing that Scripture saith; and if Scripture go, farewell God and Christ, and Heaven, and all Law and Rule. This is that Pen whose zeal for Quakerism exceeds, that hath written sundry Books for it, and in the end of his Book, Reason against Railing, pag. 185. doth commend unto us his own with other his brethren's Works, for an account of the Quakers Principles, confessing, That they do contain much of what can be said in behalf of their Principles and Practices, vaunting as though they could not by reason be silenced, nor confuted by sober Argument, pag. 186. I refer myself and what I have here writ to impartial censure, warning and entreating all people, as they love their souls, to take heed of Quakerism.  
I would be glad to make the best I can of your Position, but I must protest my Conscience and Conviction, I cannot find out what to say to solve your Position, and make it but a tolerable Error. All this while I speak not against you but your Error; you make bold and free to publish such matter to the World, allow us the same boldness and freedom to detect your Errors, and to do our best to save the Souls which be in danger to be subverted by your Principles. Keep your poison to yourself, and none will perish by it but yourself: but if you will needs vend it, and in the view of all the Nation, and such at least as know the English tongues set up a Position subverting all Religion, and all Law and Government, and levelling all holy and profitable Rules and Commands to men's lusts, leaving no man in the World under any obligation to any duty to God or Man further than he is convinced in his conscience, be it known to you, that Jesus Christ hath his servants abroad to bear testimony for him against such God-baspheming and Soul-damning Errors, and if you repent not, this that I have writ shall rise up in judgement against you, and shall be an aggravation of your misery in that day.  
Prepare to answer the righteous Judge, if your Conscience be blinded and seared now, it will be open and awaken then.  
Sept. 6. 1676.  
FINIS.