The Third Part of the New Athenians no Noble Bereans: BEING AN ANSWER to the ATHENIAN MERCURY Of the 14th. 4th. Month, called June, in Behalf of the People called Quakers.  
THE first part of your third Mercury finds an Answer in the Conclusion of ours to your second; yet since you make such a Voluminous Puther about R. B.'s words of the Body of Christ, as well as of the Letter to G. F. taking up in their Ag 〈…〉 vation, more than the room of seven other Charges, we 〈…〉 consider what you say: Which is this. If the Nature of this 〈…〉 al Light, Substance or Spiritual Body that is in all of them, be 〈…〉 al, as it must be, because, according to them, a divisible Sub 〈…〉 e, then there's plain Penetration of Dimensions, and every Qua 〈…〉 carries about all Transubstantiation in his Belly. But why pray 〈…〉 must it be a material Substance? Do you find it in the first 〈…〉 John, 4,& 9. for there is our Light asserted and described. 〈…〉 Life of the Word is our Light, and your Light if you please. Word was Life, and that Life the Light of Men; and that was 〈…〉 rue Light, that lighteth every Man that comes into the World. Is that Life no Substance? And if it be, Is it a Material or Spiritual one? And if it be a Spiritual one, is it, or is it needful it should be a Divisible one? Consider well, is the Sun divided because all see by it? No more is Christ: So that Divisibility is your own Conceit, and not our Opinion or Consequence of it, but of your mistaking it: And all the Transubstantiation you thought was in our Belly, proves, at last, to be in your own Heads; and 'tis hoped this will help to get it out for you.  
Again, you say, If Immaterial, let 'em make sense of it that can, for to us 'tis pure Quakerism. How now Athenians! have you never met with Immaterial Substances in your Reading? Then surely you have travelled but a little way in the Commonwealth of Letters. Both the New and Old Philosophy must be Strangers to you; and which is worse, you are so to the Bible. Wash your Eyes therefore, I pray, and turn to Joh. 6. from ●8, to 63. and tell us if you will or can, Who is the Living Bread there that comes down from Heaven? And what is that Flesh and Blood Christians must feed upon, if they would be saved? Here is an Immaterial Substance or Body for you, one of God's providing, that you in derision call pure Quakerism; but very glad we are of it, and should be more, that you were better acquainted with it. We pity your extreme Ignorance of Heavenly things; for nothing else could make you so gross or abusive upon so Essencial a part of Religion, and us for asserting it. Take not that strictly which is spoken with Construction, nor that properly or literally, which is figuratively and mystically expressed or to be understood, and we shall neither appear so Monstrous, nor you so much mistaken. You may wring as great Inconsistency out of Scripture as any other Book, if you take that Course to expound it. Be therefore just to us, and show you would Inform us, or be Informed by us, as sometimes you would have us to believe; but do not jeer at what you do not understand, nor charge what you do not know. For your Aggravation of the Letter to G. F. and the confident Conclusions you make of our Idolatry, they are both untrue and abusive; It is not our Principle, it was never our practise; abhorring utterly that extravigant as well as unchristian Imputation; no People or Testimony, since the World began, laying Man lower than we have done, even to a fault in our Adversaries apprehension. For we have not only opposed an Idolatry to Creatures or Works of Mens Hands, which is the grosser sort, but that of the Mind also: The Worship Men too generally and too zealously pay to their own Imaginations or the ideas they have framed to themselves of God and Christ, and will at any rate make others do so too if they can. A refined Idolatry too many are guilty of that exclaim against the other; and very pernicious to the Souls true Knowledge and Enjoyment of God and Christ.  
Your Fifth Charge is, That we deny the Trinity. But you should in Justice, have added, of Persons, with all the School-Niceties and Distinctions that belong to that sort of explication of Scripture; for to that only it is your first Proof refers, viz. W. P.'s Sandy Foundation, p. 12. For the Scripture no where calls God the Holy Three of Israel, but Holy One of Israel. And if he had said Imagined Trinity, p. 16. as you city, which he does not in the Copy we have, it ought not to be so heinous with you, since Three Persons are not to be found in the Bible, which you exalt for the only Rule of Faith. And if you will not allow that Council to be Infallible that formed that Article above 300 Years after Christ's Ascension, as to be sure you will not, I hope it must be their Imagination of the Text, if not a Divine Inspiration. Your Proof, 1 Job. 5. 7. There are three that bear Record in Heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one, will not support your Charge, because it contains not the Matter controverted in it, viz. Three Persons, for that is the Point in Controversy. Let it suffice, if you please, that we believe the Scripture, tho' we reject that Interpretation; and that we own Three Witnesses, and that those Three are One; without allowing the Intricacy and Confusion of the Schools.  
Your Second Proof is from Sweet Sips: But that's no Quaker's Book, and so no Proof upon us. Be more cautious another time, and know better what you do.  
Your Sixth Charge, That we hold the Soul Sleeps, you yourselves retract, but would have it a Fruit of your Ingenuity; and because we would encourage a thing so rare with you, we will at this time spare your Disingenuity in making it. But, as if you were more troubled at our being Clear than Guilty, and at yourselves for missing the Blow at us, than for abusing us, to recover that Slip, and to make us amends, your Ingenuous Retraction ends in two other Charges.  
1. That we Deny the Resurrection of the Body. 2. The Distinct Existence of the Soul after Death. Your Proof for the first is G. Whitehead's saying, That he did not believe his Body should rise again after Death:( But G. W. denies that to be his Answer:) And William Penn's not denying it to John Faldoe. Whereas they answer no otherwise than what the Apostle said to the Corinthians, That sowest not that body which shall be, 1 Cor. 15. 37. How is it then a Crime to deny your gross Conceit of the Resurrection? for in all Scriptural respects we reverently and joyfully own the Resurrection, as we have good cause to do of all People. And if you believe that Death came by Sin, That Innocent, Wise, and Upright Man, J. Pennington, 2 Prin. p. 34. was not out of the way to say, that what we lost in the first Adam we regained in the second; and the Resurrection, to be sure, is not the least part; which is alone through him that was himself the first begotten from the dead. And for Sweet Sips, tho' none of ours, yet no proof for you, for the very quotation owns the Resurrection. But Curious Quesions we avoid, and count them the Foolish and Unlearned Ones that the Apostle forbade, 1 Tim. 6. 4, 5. 2 Tim. 2. 22, 23. being more solicitous that we appear accepted with God, than God, than with what Podies we shall appear.  
2. That we Deny the Distinct Exislence of the Soul, is as false as that we assert the Soul sleeps; but, perhaps, you think that Sweet Sips will help you out, Ch. 26. but for that very Proof you owe us another Retraction; and we wish you may do it more ingeniously than you did your last.  
Your Seventh Charge is, That we have been looked upon as Byblows of the Jesuits. If so, upon what Church, pray you, did they beget us? But out of the abundance of your Hearts your Mouths speak, and that foully, and falsely too, too often. But your Proofs for this? Why, most Writers say so. Do they so? where are they pray, and for what reasons? but you say not a word of that. This you cannot think a fruit of your Ingenuity; but it seems, if we would peruse Ignatius's Life, weed think him as errand a Quaker as William pen himself. So that while you take it ill of us to refer you, for our belief, to our own Books, and don't writ new ones, to tell you our Religion, you take upon you to sand us to other Peoples Books to learn our own, and that with Reflections also. In this whatever you think, you are not over modest or reasonable. But if Inside, be Outside; if Spirit, be Forms; Plainness, Pomp; Conviction, Implicit Faith; and Christ's Kingdom be of this World, you are in the right, or else you abuse us.  
Your Eighth Charge makes us to deny the Plenary Satisfaction of Christ, and to rest upon our own Merits. 'tis some comfort to us, that there is not one Charge that is a Text of Scripture, or delivered in Scripture-phrase. Where do you find Plenary Satisfaction in the Bible? or what do you mean by it? You that would have it the only Rule, should make it yours. You city J. N.'s Love to the lost, p. 7. his Righteousness imputed, or put into the Creature; and this you squib at, considering that Abraham was really righteous, when his Faith was imputed, or accounted to him for righteousness; or you will charge the Holy Ghost with wrong reckonings. But any thing rather than have Christ's righteousness within Men. Pray red 1 Sam. 22. 15. Psal. 32. 2. and you will find impute or imputeth so applied. Your second Proof is R. B. p.( no where) saying, we are justified by Christ formed in us. And so we are in the complete sense of the word; for the word comprehends remission of sins that are past upon repentance, and sanctification, or being made holy ●●d just inwardly. And to be plain with you, we do believe, 1st, That Christ died for all, and is a propitiation for the sins of the World, 1 Jo. 2. 1, 2. 2dly, That he was herein the effect rather than cause of the Fathers love; as Jo. 3. 16.& 1 Jo 4. 9, 10. God so loved the world, &c. 3dly, That Justification, as taken for remission of sin, accounting Pentients as just as if they had not sinned, refers to Christ as a Propitiation. He was our common Offering for Sin; and as the word is taken for man's being made inherently just and holy, it refers to Christ as the sanctifier of his People; so that 'tis Christ still, every way, by which we hope for salvation. And for our Works, even the best, such as James meant, Jam. 2. they are rewardable, but not meritorious; because there is no proportion between the Work and Wages; for the Wages of Sin is Death, but the Gift of God is Eternal Life, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Rom. 6. 23.  
Your Ninth Charge is, That we deny the Divinity of Christ,( but your Reasons shane your Charge) and this they do with a witness, say you, if they make him nothing but themselves: But if we don't, what have you made of yourselves, think you? Who of us ever said so? Are we the Light that lighteth all that come into the World? or did we make the World? Indeed you are very gross. Your other Proof is as lame; you say, we deny him to be God; but not a word of ours cited to that purpose, for we believe, that Christ was God manifested in the flesh; as Jo. 1. 14. 1 Tim. 3. 16.  
Your Tenth Charge is antarctic to your Ninth: For now you say we more plainly deny his Humanity. Thus you make us shift and take turns at Faith, till you have left us none: But what are your Proofs? G. F. mist. p. 71. Christ is not human; where doth the Scripture speak of human? we deny the word human. But that all Readers may deny you, till you deny yourselves, the pleasure of Abusing us, we'll repeat the place as it lies.  
Priest saith Christ's human Nature, &c.  
G. Fox Ans. Where doth the Scripture speak of human? The word human, where is it written? tell us, that we may search for it? Now we do not deny, that Christ according to the flesh was of Abraham, but not the word human; and Christ's Nature is not human which is earthly, for that is the first Adam. Now Athenians, if you can, blushy! What; make us deny that Christ came of the Seed of Abraham after the Flesh, by a Place that owns it, and that owns it fully, scripturally, and as it should be owned and worded by Christians, that use thee from of sound words given them by the Holy Ghost, denying only a School-Term borrowed from the Ground: This is hard.  
Thus you serve us also in your last Charge, where you will have us to deny Angels, Spirits, Heaven, and Hell, and so make an end of us and our Religion. And to prove it, you bring a Book, that is none of ours; and not without injury to the Author neither; and then conclude us a Compendium of all Heresies; naming 22 of them in rank and file, and a cum multis aliis at the tail of them. But if they had foul play from their Judges as we have had from you, they will deserve a better name. However, you are obliged to us, that we have abbreviated heresy for you, and yet you have not convicted us of any one Point that deserves that black name. We must say, we are sorry to see you act as if you thought us exempted from the common Claims of Humanity; to be dealt with as you please, and as if Injuries could not be committed upon such wretches as we are in your esteem: For you add, diminish, pervert, and that boldly; and when you have shap't and dressed up the Monster, you are pleased to writ Quaker upon him, and then led him about the Streets in your Mercuries for a Show, at Pence a piece: God Almighty show you Mercy, that allow us none, but refuse to be just; for after all your black Charges, you fall to asking what our Faith is, which should have been first done.  
You objected upon us, of turning the other Cheek; saying, it was patience per force.  
But you are mistaken in fact, we have put up legal Advantages many times, and endured and forgiven innumerable personal Injuries from those out of Office as well as from those that have been in Government, nay, often-times dared Cruelties and Oppression with a literal conformity to the Text. Speak not so peremptorily of what you do not know, nor cannot imitate; 'tis strange, that you expect better things from our Religion, than your own, and yet would have ours to be worse.  
2. You say, It was not Conscience, but an unaccountable, not to say brutal Stubbornness. You have endeavoured to rob us of our Religion, will you now rob us of our Suffering, and the good Intention of it too? for that word of yours, authorizes all the Imprisonments, Plunders, Banishments, and Murders we have suffered since a People, and if we should strain consequences, entitles you as errand Persecutors as B. Bonner, or Dr. Story.  
But, 3dly, You say we give hard words; Do we? such as the things call for, doubtless; I hope no personal Reflections? Yes, Whitehead complains of a new Persecution; and with very good reason, when the old ones are justified by you, and you proclaim us a Compendium of 22 Heresies, with multis alits at the end of it; which, in other words, is saying, Take them Dr. Pinfold.  
Again, You take it ill, he says you make Beasts, and Devils, of us; but what else, pray, do you make of us, when you cannot make worse of us than you have?  
You add, That we call you Impertinent; and pertinently we think, to ramble as you have done, from your Province, to spread Invectives upon us. Wicked; what can you think it less, to abuse a whole People in the tenderest Point? Followers of blind Guides, or how else could you have missed your way so much? for 'tis plain, nothing can be more mistaken: 'tis a wonder, say you, dumb Dogs don't come in too, tho' we have no silent Meetings. We can't think why you should wonder at that, since you know how much you have barked at us. There is no danger of your being dumb, but deaf. And since you brought in this to introduce your profane Jest at our silent Meetings, we must tell you, you may see in yourselves the use of Silence, by your abuse of Speech; and therein▪ Defence for us, and a Reproof to you. In short, we recomme 〈…〉 silence to you, as Pythagorus did to his Scholars, till you ha 〈…〉 learnt to speak better than you do.  
The next thing is your ten Questions, an unreasonable 〈…〉 well as an unsuitable Conclusion; for you first Judge, and 〈…〉 Query; and after charging us home, you ask, What's o 〈…〉 lief? It shows too great a levity for Men of your cla 〈…〉 Sense; and, tho' not Enthusiastical, yet, if you will no 〈…〉 gry, it looks very silly: But because for that reason it does 〈…〉 look malicious, you may have an Answer, tho' least of al 〈…〉 your sakes, by another hand. But, before we part, pray 〈…〉 this along with you: Our Religion and the True Religion, 〈…〉 makes People truly religious, is the Fear of God planted i 〈…〉 Soul by the Grace of God, which sanctifies and rules the 〈…〉 and ●ffections, and not Creeds of Words, tho' never so tr 〈…〉 for the Devils have Knowledge and Faith, but their Knowledge does not work by Obedience, or their Faith by Love; and therefore they are never the better for it: Nor are wicked Men, as the World shows. Religion then is a Divine Experience and Work in the Soul, by the Divine Spirit. It is Regeneration, and that a new Creature, Gal. 6. 15, 16. And as the Jew inward is the Circumcision of the Heart, so is that the Character of a true Christian. A short Creed of Words served of old with an upright Heart. Thou art the Son of God, Thou art the King of Israel, was Nathaniel's Confession. My Lord and my God, was all Thomas his Retraction and Creed, Jo. 20. 28. And Peter's Confession of Faith is little larger, Matth. 16. 18. Thus also the Blind, Lame, and Sick, that came believingly to him.  
To be a Christian then was to be like Christ, Meek, Humble, Holy, Loving, Patient; and this his Light and Spirit maketh those that embrace them. Unto which we refer and exhort you, and all to whom these Papers may come, as the great Agent of Man's Happiness; desiring earnestly that our care may be about our Conformity to our Saviour, rather than Controversies about him; since the true Religion is to be ●ike Christ, 1 Pet. 2. 21. Chap. 3. 10, 11 12. 1 Job. 2. 6. Say not then that we value our Title to Christianity by Human Laws; you wrong us much: Ours hath a higher Claim and so must yours, if you expect to be saved by it. We spoken not of being therefore Christians in God's Account, but of being esteemed enough, to live quieter than your Invectives seem to let us, among Men. But it is not he least part of the across we bear, to be, in almost every thing, so much misunderstood, and by some so evilly represented. One while they will have us deny the Divinity of Christ, another while the Humanity. Sometimes we must be Socinians, then Sabellians. Very often we are  told that we expect to be saved by our own Works; and as often that we will do nothing unless the Spirit move us. Again, sometimes we are said to sand all to Hell but ourselves; and presently we deny any such thing. Ay, we are accused with Idolatry to Mens Persons, and yet scorned for denying all Honours or Respects to the Persons of Men. Just thus we are made to disown all Ministry, and by and by accused, That every one among us is a Minister or may be so. It would be tedious to repeat the Contradictions and absurd dilemmas Men have brought themselves into, by their rash and unjust Attempts against us; which they will easily perceive, that please to peruse some of our Controversial Tracts, as Rusticus ad Academicus, the Christian Quaker, in two Parts, R. B.'s Apology and Defence, Quakerism a New Nick-Name for old Christianity, and the rejoinder in its Defence, the Way cast Up, Reason against Railing, and Wisdom justified of her Children, &c. In which our Belief is distinguished and defended against the Abuses, Men, through Ignorance or Prejudice, have put upon it. God Almighty enlighten and forgive them; that is the worst of our Wishes, for their many hard Speeches against us and our Holy Profession; Concluding, your well-wishing Friends, after all your Unfriendly Usage.   

LONDON: Printed for Thomas Northcott in George-yard in Lombard-street, 1692.