The Ranters Religion. OR, A faithful and infallible Narrative of their damnable and diabolical opinions, with their detestable lives & actions.  
With a true discovery of some of their late prodigious pranks, and unparallelled deportments, with a paper of most blasphemous Verses found in one of their pockets, against the Majesty of Almighty God, and the most facred Scriptures, rendered verbatim.  

Published by Authority.   
 woodcut of naked ranters Behold these are Ranters.  
London, Printed, for R. H. 1650.   

An Advertisement to the Reader.  
he that labours, said the old hermits, is tempted but by one devil: he that is idle is assaulted by all: if Iron had reason, it would choose rather to be used in labour, then to grow rusty in a corner: That idleness is the mother of all mischief was never so evidently proved, as by the monstrous production of a Sect, but of novel growth, yet now strangely prevalent amongst us, called Ranters, a People so dronish, that the whole course of their lives is but one continued Scene of Sottishness, their jestures filthy, their words obsceane, and balsphemous, and all their deeds which they wretchedly glory in, impious, and horrid: I beseech thee, good Reader, to peruse this Pamphlet as thou wouldest Aretines Pictures, with a will to know such filthiness, that thou mayest be incited the more hearty to abominate it.  
Farewell.   

The Ranters Religion, &c.  
THe stoics( among many other excellent contemplations) in the discourse of joy came the nearest to divine truth, when they put a main and real difference between laetari & gaudere, mirth and joy, the former is a light and toyish passion, which stirreth the spleen, skipping up( in wanton maner) into the face, the latter is a concinuall exaltation of the soul in the enjoyment of some excellency; mirth is a sudden or short fit raised by some pleasant or ridiculous accident, joy is a settled and constant delight, by the presence of some possessed good; mirth( such as that of our new gnostics at this present) is ever in the sensual appetite; joy is onely from the soul and will, from which inference they drew that admirable Paradox ( scoffed at by the other Philosophers) that a wise man only rejoiceth truly, though a fool be always more merry, for this St. Augustine found warrant in Scripture, non est gaudium impiis, the wicked can never truly rejoice, and he adds the reason, quia effunduntur, &c. because they are ever restless, ever wandring from themselves; I have been something prolix in this exordium, as well to satisfy some, as to undeceive others; the first standing in admiration to see how harmoniously these gnostics, or Ranters deport themselves one towards another( being in continual exaltations & jollities;) the second being willing to believe that so pleasing a Symphony cannot proceed from that Master of misrule, beelzeebub, but by an heavenly influence, &c. but I have satisfied them, I hope, that the rejoicings of these Ranters is merely sensual and devilish, and with St. Augustines warrant, that they are of their Father the devil, whose works they do.  
These Rantets are but the gnostics of former Ages brought backward amongst us, these are but the same with those of old, whose description Epiphanius gives us, who had only certain Dictates and Positions, and peremptorily affirmed, that let them live as they listed, they were sure to be saved; so far these are stamped with the old Impressa, but our gnostics cannot content themselves in such bounds and limits, they affirm that God is so far from being offended at the crying sins of drunkenness, swearing, blaspheming, adultery, &c. that he is well pleased therewith, and that[ O strange and horrid impiety!] it is the only way of serving him aright: all true Christians know that it is not lawful for them to flatter themselves with any thing of their own judgement, nor to adhere to that which any man brings in of his own head; we have the pattern of the Apostles to imitate, who took no thing to bring in after their own pleasure, but faithfully assigned to the Nations that they had received of Christ; where on the contrary these licentious Sciolists affirm, that each whimsy, each motion, whether to swear, to whore, yea to commit incest or buggery, is of God, and proceeds from him, he being the author, Orderer, and Origen of it; a Doctrine which the very Divels sure would tremble to hear.  
The very Heathen by philosophy and the scale of the creatures have asccended so high, as to the knowledge of one supreme Deity, this the course of nature taught them,( for indeed the whole world is nothing else but a Commentary or paraphrase of the Deity) and to that omniscient ever living power, they ascribed all purity & sanctity, proclaiming him to be the Patron of all virtue, and punisher of all 'vice; and therefore these Monsters come short of the very Heathen, while they make the Almighty not only the Countenancer, which but to imagine is damnable blasphemy, but the efficient cause of sin, and dare impiously to affirm, that that man who tipples deepest, swears the frequentest, commits Adultery, Incest, or Buggery, the oftenest, Blasphemes the Impudentest, and perpetrates the most notorious crimes with the highest hand, and rigidest resolution, is the dearest Darling to Heaven.  

The Heads of their damnable Errors, and horrid Blasphemies.  
They Believe( and these are the wisest sort of them) that a Resurrection is possible, and that there may be a Restitution of our bodies, but then they say that the stars and planets, by whose decay and continuance they measure the perpetuity and stability of all sublunary things to be the only causes of it, and so they run giddily into Plato's circumvolution of yeares.  
2. They affirm that all Women ought to be in common, and when they are assembled altogether( this a known truth) they first entertain one another, the men those of their own sex, and the Women their fellow females: with horrid oaths and execrations, then they fall to bowzing, and drink deep healths( Oh cursed Caitiffes!) to their Brother God, and their Brother devil; then being well heated with liquour, each Brother takes his she Otter upon his knee, and the word( spoken in derision of the sacred Writ) being given, viz. Increase and Multiply: they fall to their lascivious embraces, with a joint motion, &c.  
3. They affirm, that there be three keys that God always keeps in his own hands; the Key of the womb whereby he lets us into this world; the Key of Liberty, whereby he Authorizes us to fulfil our own Lusts, and sensual appetites, opening the doors of liberty and licentiousness, which were fast locked to the men of former ages, sure, to his praise and glory. Their opinion about the Resurrection of the body is so strange, and withall so absurd, that I must by no means omit to recite it.  
4. They tell you there is a certain little bone in every mans back that shall never be subject to any putrefaction, and this bone, say they, at the last day shalbe mollified and softened by a due from Heaven, and it shall swell, having the nature of leaven, and it shall diffuse its virtue to the collecting of all the dust that belongs to its own body, and prepare it for a Resurrection.  
5. They maintain, that to have their women in common is their Christian liberty, and very prettily, indeed la, that that Sister among them who can make the beast with two backs the most strenuously, viz. entertain most men longest, and oftenest, hath a sufficient canonization for a Saint triumphant. This they frequently, and with much fervency affirm.   
These Beasts of Ephesus do not tremble over a pint pot, or in the parenthesis of a whiff of Tobacco, to vaunt blasphemously their insatisfaction in matters of Religion, and with the execrable and ridiculous solecism of God Dam me, dare at the same article of time sand challenges to reason, to prove there is a God, and the Scriptures are but a mere Romance, a Chimera, &c.  
One of them( lately in my hearing) disputing with a Gentleman( who as all good Christians ought, was very zealous in the defence of the most sacred Scriptures) about the blessed Virgin Mary, our Redeemers mother, according to the flesh, had this most impious quere.  
If she descended of the seed of Adam, said he, then the infection of original sin must needs devolve into her, isshe did not descend from Adam, then is she not the seed of Abraham, nor of the seed of David, nor by consequence of our Saviour, nor are the Genealogies of the Scriptures truly delivered: O most horrible blasphemy!  
These most impious, blasphemous, and devilish Verses were found in the pocket of one of the prime Ranters, who is at this time in Bridewell,( condoling his condition over sacred hemp,) which I will here set down to the end the whole kingdom may be made sensible what Vipers are sheltered in their bosom  

They talk of God( believe it fellow creature)  
Theres no such bugbear, all was made by nature,  
And then, the rabbis that do rule the roast  
Do babble of a Son and Holy Ghost.  
God have a Son? Why sure that Son must needs  
Beget another( nature always breeds)  
His Son a Son, so a whole Generation  
Of Gods and Goddesses by procreation:  
And then( forsooth) a Holy Ghost proceeds  
From that great God, who comforts us, and feeds  
Our souls with heavenly manna: O such lies  
Cannot be sound in any Histories,  
Save in that book of fallacies, they name  
The Bible, which from some fools fancy came  
We know all came of nothing, and shall pass  
Into the same condition once it was  
By natures power, and that they grossly lye,  
That say theres hope of Immortality.  
Let them but tell us what a soul is, then  
We will adhere to these mad brain-sick men.   
This damnable atheism some of them are so bold as to aver, many of them being arrived at that height of incorrigible madness and abominable impudence, that they fear not( in all companies where they come) to contest that all things were made by nature, that mans soul dies with his body, that the Scriptures are mere lies and tales, &c.  
One of these roisters sitting over his cups( with the rest of his companions) evacuating wind backward, used this blasphemous expression, let every thing that hath breath, praise the Lord.  
Another of them taking a piece of boiled beef betwixt his hands, and tearing it in pieces, gave part thereof to one of his companions, using these words( in derision of the blessed Sacrament) the body & blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.  
A shee Ranter said openly in the hearing of many,( a friend of mine accidentally one of them) that she should think herself a happy woman, and should esteem herself a superlative servant of Gods, if any man would accompany with her carnally in the open Market place.  
O wretched people! O monstrous Times! I pray God put it into the hearts of our vigilant Senators( as they have already began to suppress this most blasphemous, impious Sect) to go thorough with it, and to make these Monsters of mankind, examples to the whole world, the frame of these schismatics( or rather caco-Demons) is already out of joint, one pull more, and their machine come in pieces about their ears; such Devils clad in flesh are not fit to have subsistence amongst those who boast themselves Christians, but merit( as unsavoury salt) to bee thrown out, and to betrodden under foot of men.  
FINIS.