A REPLY To a Pamphlet called The MISCHIEF of IMPOSITIONS; Which pretends to ANSWER The Dean of St. Paul's SERMON Concerning The MISCHIEF of SEPARATION.  
LONDON, Printed for Walter Kettilby, at the Bishop's Head in St. Paul's Churchyard. 1681.   

TO THE READER.  
THat several Leading Men of the dissenting Party were alarmed at the Dean of St. Paul's Sermon against the Separation, was not much to be wondered at; since it always concerns them as much as the Cause is worth to cry down any good Discourse that tends to Union: And it has still been the unhappiness of the Church of England ever since the Reformation, to be persecuted on this side with more than ordinary clamour when Popish Plots have broken out, and shown us our danger of being ruined by Violence and Treachery on the other. But it was generally believed that a Sermon so modest and unprovoking as this was, though it had not been Dr. Stillingfleet's, would have met with all that respect and civility in trying to Answer it, which these men could afford either to their Adversaries or their Betters. And therefore it was not a little surprising to see Mr. A. come forth against the Dean's Sermon, and fall upon it in such a rude and lubberly fashion, as if he had been to try his skill, and play a Prize of wit with some notable Buffoon like himself. We have not so much reason to be angry with him as the grave Men of his own Party have, who may suffer in their Reputation for the sake of this Man's folly and rashness. If it could have been done, they had shown their Discretion by chaining him up for this time, a great deal more than he has shown his Wit by coming abroad. To gratify a few of his own Temper, he has done great disservice to the Dissenters, who are desirous of Union, as I have shown in the following Book. And therefore I hope it will not prove offensive to These, how unwelcome soever it may be to the Rest. I cannot deny but Mr. A. has provided pretty well for the pleasant entertainment of his Readers, which was not the lest part of his design; And sometimes I was not able to forbear laughing a little to see what pains he has taken every where about a poor Jest that was somewhat backward, to pull it in by Head and Ears. But I cannot believe the Controversy in which he has meddled to be a laughing matter; And therefore if the Reader expects any of Mr. A.'s Wit in my Answer to him, he will be not lesle disappointed, than I was of my expectation to found some Seriousness in his Answer to the Dean.   

AN ANSWER To a Book Entitled the MISCHIEF of IMPOSITIONS; OR, A Sovereign Antidote, etc.  
DR. O. and Mr. B. had already done their best to preserve the people from being infected with dispositions to Peace and Unity by the Dean of Saint Paul's late Sermon: But this Gentleman, to show his greater skill, compounds their Arguments over again, gives them a tincture of his own unmannerly briskness, and sets them to sale at Mr. Benjamin Alsop's Shop, under the name of A Sovereign Antidote against a late Discourse, etc.  
If this man understands the temper of his Party, I see what it is that must make a Book a Sovereign Remedy to prevent their being wrought upon by Reason and Meekness. It must be set of with fulsome similitudes, and a scoundrel sort of Jesting, together with rude and insolent Reflections upon their Superiors; which operate marvellously well with some people. The man is eminent in these gifts above his Brethrens; and with some of them he goes for one of a sanctified and unanswerable Wit.  
And who can blame them for being charmed with such melodious strains of his Fancy as these are? Thus have I seen one sport with a Dog, showing him a Crust, 
p. 4.  which when the Cur has zealously jumped to reach, he holds it up higher. So have I known a sorry Jade, which in the hands of a poor Countryman would not give five Marks, 
p. 51.  and so forth. So have I heard somewhere of a Cutler's Boy that was making a Knife. So have I seen idle Master's delight themselves to see their Children play at Bob-apple, when the poor young Rascals would have been glad of a bit. And doubtless he has also seen these young Rascals riding on a penny Colt or Gelding, 
p. 11, 12.  and sometimes pouting for the loss of that famous Engine of the Nutcrack, just as Bishops do for Ceremonies. He has made, you see, a very profitable use of his time at play; and redeemed his idle hours by turning these goodly observations into spiritual helps. And he has been no unprofitable hearer neither at the Mountebank's Stage; where to his great. Improvement he hath heard the Fool entertain the Rabble with such Proclamations as he makes, 
p. 34.  O yes! If any honest Gentleman or Citizen has taken up, and so forth.  
But after all, this is a very clownish dirty way of Writing, so much beneath a Man, that a Schoolboy had deserved the lash for it; especially since this Author had to do with Dr. Stillingfleet, of whom at last he pretends with Hypocrisy enough, to have those awful thoughts, 
p. 101.  etc. which should have made him ashamed of spending such boyish Conceits upon that Reverend Person, as if this man were at his old sports of bobbing the Dog with a Crust, and the young Rascals with an Apple.  
But besides these excellent allusions for the edification of Boys and Girls, and the bringing down of his sauciness to the use of the meanest capacities; he has several Conceits of a bigger size to produce upon occasion; For Instance, 
Ep. Ded.  So have we sometime seen a mighty Conqueror impose such terms upon the Conquered. 
p. 49.  Somewhere or other I have seen or read of a great Gentleman who courted a Lady, and such an Inamorato was he grown, that he became exceedingly melancholy. And he has seen I know not how many more such sine things as these; and if he can but keep his eyes in his head, at this rate he is likely to be a Wit as long as he lives.  
But the sweetest of all his flourishes, is that Compliment to my Lord Mayor and the City, where he fancied the Dean's Sermon to be a Ship, and the desire of the Court that it might be Printed, to be the Flag of London streaming before it. 
Ep. Ded.  For he protests that he is always ready to strike Sail to the meanest Yacht that hangs out the Colours of so sacred a Name, so great an Authority; And it is no small condescension I assure you in so mighty a Man of War, as this fooling shows him to be in his own opinion, to strike Sail to a Yacht. However it was well done of him to tell us that he counts the Name and Authority of my Lord Mayor and the Court of Aldermen, Great and Sacred; for otherwise no man that reads his Book could reasonably believe that he had the lest reverence to any Authority in this Kingdom. But a well bread Clown will never shame his profession. He had hardly taken breath after his manners to my Lord, but he gives him a Jeer, the best he had, for Ordering that to be Printed which the Doctor had farther to deliver; for, says he, this looks like that Injunction in the Rubric, upon the Minister, to use a Homily that is hereafter to be set forth by Common Authority. These are brave fellows; If they have a mind to abuse my Lord Mayor, they make him like to something in the Book of Common Prayer, and the business is done.  
This is the Gentleman that does not think it lawful to be pleasant in so sad a case as theirs is, 
p. 2.  as he tells you when he complains of the pride, rigour and imperiousness of their Adversaries. But it is a sad case that men should not be ashamed of such open Hypocrisy as this. He would make you believe that they are battered continually with violence from without; 
Ep. Ded.  and as if he and all his Party were upon the Rack, he cries out, Give us a little ease from our present calamities. 
p. 47.  'Tis cruel to plague and torment us that are quiet and peaceable, and design nothing but serving our God and saving our Souls: Nothing in the world else, he assures you upon his honest word; and therefore he forewarns, you know whom, jest they make themselves guilty in the sight of God, 
p. 80.  of wilful and damnable sins, as bad as those of the Jews, who thought they did God good service, when they persecuted and murdered his faithful Servants. And at this rate he is ever and anon bemoaning himself and his companions, and upbraiding the Persecutors. But was ever any man so jocund withal, and so jolly in so sad a case as this man describes theirs to be, and all the while is not able to whine it out in a decent manner, for laughing? If they can found in their hearts to play with Nut-cracks, and Hobby-horses, and Inamorato's, etc. one would think the Animal life were under no great persecution, but that these men are as much at ease from present calamities as their Neighbours. I believe if this Gentleman or his friends either suffered, or were afraid to suffer such restraints from the Government as they had reason to complain of; they durst not provoke their Rulers in that insolent fashion, wherein this man uses them, who very pertly demands of them, Why they do not lose the bands of wickedness, and undo the heavy burdens, and let the oppressed go free, and break every yoke, Isa. 58.6. Some, says he, will say this Scripture is impertinently applied. 
p. 5.  Impertinently? 'Tis lewdly and seditiously applied, to inflame the people against their Governors, by libelling them as a company of wicked oppressors, whilst his own wantonness and presumption shows that in his sleeve he laughs at their patience. The greatest cause of complaint they have against the Government is, that the Law forbids their flocking together in great numbers, for which they may thank their own practices when time was, as we can show them, if they list to hear it. But notwithstanding this Law they meet as boldly, and the Government has for the most part, born it as gently, as if there were no such Law at all. This is their true case, which this Gentleman cannot express but in the Tragical Characters of a horrid design, 
p. 17.  of the fiery fury of persecution, of wrath and vengeance, fire and faggot. The Question now, he tells you is, Snick or snee, 
p. 64.  turn or starve, conform or hung, use the Cross or bear the Cross. What can be greater Impudence than this, to publish such odious suggestions against the Government, as are not better than notorious lies? If there were a Law to punish liars with death, he, to save himself from hanging, could not name a Nonconformist that has either been hanged or starved for his Nonconformity. And it is mere mockery in him to talk of bearing the Cross unless they will use it, since they live in as good plenty as other men, as every body knows, and are as much protected by the Laws. But such as he are as nice and delicate, and as fond conceited of themselves, as some of the froward young Rascals he has seen, that roar as if they were going to be flayed, unless they may have their wills in every thing. He mocks the Government, and profanes the Scripture phrase too, while he talks of their bearing the Cross, which is an expression that their sufferings would not bear, if their cause did. They have forgot sure, when they made merry with the ruin of hundreds of Clergymen and their Families; This was not persecution, but godly zeal; and one would guests this man has an aching tooth to be at it again, though with snick or snee, as he calls it. For he plainly warns us that we do not make it Indifferent to Dissenters, 
p. 5.  whether they be smothered in the House, or forced to venture their necks by leaping out at the Windows; for, says he, so have the miserable Hungarians been tempted, to think it better to live, nay to dye once under the Ottoman Sword, than to be always dying under the Austrian Tyranny. To say no more of it, this was at lest very rashly and indiscreetly said, unless this man be privileged to favour the Popish Shame of charging the Presbyterians with a Plot; for his meaning is plainly this, that they are tempted to think it better to take a part in the Design of the Papists, to overthrew Church and State, though they run the hazard of having their throats cut by them at last, than to be so miserably persecuted as they are, under the Tyranny of the present Government. He tells us indeed towards the end of his Book, that they shall not petition with the Papists for a general Toleration; and therefore I can make nothing of his menacing us with the Hungarian Precedent, but that they may venture their necks once more to get the power into their hands, of tolerating, or refusing to tolerate whom they please. But I hope the Dissenters understand their interest, and their duty better than to be wheadled into such dangerous practices, by the intimations of this seditious Talker. And thus much I can say for some of them, that they utterly dislike the intemperate and rude expressions, as well as the Buffonery of his Book; And if what he sometimes suggests of the Nonconformists was true before; that they are hugely agreed among themselves; he has altered the case since, by publishing his Antidote: for though there are some amongst them that think he hath done eminent service to the Party, yet there are some again, as wise as they, that are of another opinion, and will give him as little thanks for his labour, as he gives Dr. Stillingfleet for his Defence of the Church of England against T. G. the Papist.  
There are a sort of men so given to railing, that they can not more forbear it than a common swearer can his oaths. And I never met with a plainer Instance of it, than in this man; who if he were as much afraid of the severity of the Government, as the doleful complaints he makes of persecution would persuade us, should in prudence have given his Master's good language at lest, how spiteful soever his thoughts might have been: especially when he was answering a Sermon designed to work upon the Dissenters, by nothing but the Force of Reason, and the Gentleness of Persuasion. If he had not been ready to burst with Choler and Disdain, he had waited for a fit occasion to vent himself; which because he had not, he was feign to pretend one though he lied for it. He asks the Doctor amongst others, 
p. 10.  You are able to forbear railing and persecuting, are you not? and he often insinuates that they are so provoked, that it is impossible for them to keep silence: Whereas, there is not the lest severity of expression in the whole Sermon, but that the Doctor knew not how it came to pass, that the most godly among them can least endure to be told of their faults. And I think they have shown since, that he was not much mistaken in them; this man especially, who I dare say does not count himself the lest godly of the Party.  
If you will believe him they do not complain of their hardships with uncivil reflections, 
p. 95.  and yet in the next breath he compares the Doctor to the keepers of the Inquisition, that jeer at their wretched prisoners, and this only for advising them not to be always complaining of their hardships and persecutions. Nay he makes him like Julian the Apostate in mocking the Christians when he had stripped them of the world's cumber, which was an hindrance to them in their spiritual race. Are not these uncivil, or rather are they not lewd and ungodly reflections, upon a man that never intended nor did them the lest harm, but gently advised them to beware of doing that, which in plain terms, this man is a Hypocrite for doing. How easy is it, he cries out, for them that are at ease to read lectures of patience to those in misery! But where are those miserable creatures he talks of? In what holes have they been hid all this while, that we have not seen one of them this twenty years? Why not so much as one of the wretches brought forth to move our compassion? or at lest should we not be told where one of these sad spectacles might be seen; which would convince us of the mischief of Impositions, and incline us to pity a thousand times more than this man's clamour and bawling? If any of them are in so hard a condition, as he would make us believe, let us but know the man, and he shall soon see that we will be more merciful to him, than those of his own Party, who, it seems, as wealth as they are, can be so covetous and hard-hearted, as to let them be ready to perish for want of relief. Possibly some of them may be in a mean condition, and when he has told us how many they are, we will show him double the number of conformable Clergymen that are as low in the world if not lower than they; and withal many more worthy persons that were utterly ruined under the zeal of such men as this, when they called out one another to go a Parson-hunting. These things they have been told of some years since; nor have they said any thing to it; 
Friendly Debate. 3a. pt.  but still they go on to complain of their Persecutions. As far as I am able to inform myself, these men do not need our pity, but are better to pass than most of us that conform to the Laws, and we envy them not; but 'tis intolerable wantonness in them all the while to roar and bellow as if they were forced to beg their bread from door to door.  
For my part, I could wish that they would give encouragement to our Rulers to take their pretences against Conformity, as things stand, into consideration once more, and to make some trial what good might be done upon such terms as would satisfy the most reasonable amongst them, and to govern even those