A Second beacon fired humbly presented to the Lord Protector and the Parliament by the publishers of the first : with their humble petition, that they would do what may be expected from Christian magistrates, in suppressing blasphemous books.

A Second beacon fired humbly presented to the Lord Protector and the Parliament by the publishers of the first : with their humble petition, that they would do what may be expected from Christian magistrates, in suppressing blasphemous books.

Table of contents

Title page

A Second Beacon Fired.

[Page]

[Page]

A Second Beacon Fired.

THat supream Magistrates ought to have a care of their peoples souls, in keeping from them the pestilentiall infection of Idolatry and Blasphemy, as well as of their temporall weale, is so well known unto You, as also the danger of knowing the Masters will and not doing it, that it would be needlesse for the most able men to teach You, and therefore great presumption in us.

But for the danger that these Nations are in of being overspread with Popery, Socinianisme, and inchanting Quakerisme, may not be known to many of You, or at least through other great affairs not throughly considered of, as through Gods blessing it may be upon a true and faithfull information.

Be pleased therefore to give us leave to reminde You,

1. Of the contrivances and actings of the Papists to introduce their Religion.

1. By sending forth their Emissaries, disguised under the name of Army-men, Church-members and Anabaptists, as we are able to demonstrate.

2. By their setting up an Hierarchy and Consistory, consisting of an Arch-Bishop with other dependents on him in this Nation, as appears by the Lord Protectors testimony in his late Speech (viz.)

[Page] We know very well, that Emissaries of the Jesuites never came in those swarmes, as they have done since these things were set on foot. And I tell you, that divers Gentlemen here, can bear witnesse with me, how that they have had a Consistory abroad, that rules all the affairs of things in England, from an Arch-Bishop, with other Dependants upon him. And they had fixed in England (of which we are able to produce the particular Instruments in most of the Limits of the Cathedrals,) an Episcopal-power, with Arch-Deacons, &c. And had persons authorized to exercise and distribute those things, who pervert and deceive the people. Thus far the Lord Protector.

3. By their publishing in the years 1650, 1651, 1652, 18 severall sorts of Popish Books in the English tongue, an Impression of each, in all (as we have cause to judge) no lesse then 30000, and all printed in London we are sure; the Names whereof do here follow,

1. The Golden Treatise of Vincentius Lirinensis. 2. The Verity of Christian Faith. 3. The Felicity of a Christian Life. 4. The Profit of Beleeving. 5. Saint Austin's Care for the Dead. 6. Parson's Resolutions. 7. Sales his Introduction. 8. The lost Sheep returned home, or The motives of the Conversion to the Catholike Faith of Tho. Vaine D. D. 9. A Missive to his Majesty K. James by Dr Carrier. 10. The Love of the Soul, by G. M. 11. A Manifest touching Mr. W. P. Aversion from the Protestant Congregation, and his Conversion to the Catholique Church. 12. The Examination of the late Act of the Convocation at Oxford, containing their Reasons against the Scottish Covenant and Presbytery. 13. The Right Religion Evinced by L. B. 14. Prayer to the Saints Vindicated by F. P. [Page] 15. A prudent and secure Choice, being a sure Landmark to all those who have been tossed to and fro in these wavering times, by H. G. 16. A Treatise of Schisme, by Scot. 17. The Christian Sodality, or Catholique Hive of Bees, by E. P. alias Gage, as is said. 18. The Christian Moderator.

All which we humbly minded the Parliament of, with the Contents of each Book, in a Book two years ago printed, called The Beacon set on fire. And we are very sure that since that time there hath been printed divers Impressions of other Popish Books not there named.

2. Of the great increase of Socinianisme, Quakerisme, and other fundamentall Errours.

1. By the publick meetings and Exercises that Socinians have in London and elsewhere every week, blasphemously holding and teaching their damnable doctrines.

2. By the like meetings of Quakers in London, whose opinions are Blasphemous, Paganish, Antiscriptural and Antichristian, even as the former.

3. By the Printing and Publishing many thousands of Books, containing Blasphemous, Hereticall and Antimagistraticall opinions, tending to unchristian and disorder the people of the Nations, and introduce Paganisme, Popery, Socinianisme and Libertinisme. A tast of the loathsome, poysonous, blasphemous Errours contained in the foresaid Books, we do herewith humbly present unto you, to provoke your zeal against them.

[Page]

A Catalogue of some of those Blasphemies and Errours that have been Published within these two or three years last past.

1. THat no Opinion is damnable, or, that a man may be saved in any Religion. A Discourse touching the Peace of the Church, Chap. 5.

2. That Christ is a meer man, not having any other nature, besides his humane nature. Bidles Confession of Faith, Article 3.

3. That the holy Ghost is not God, but only the chief of the ministring Spirits. Bidle.

4. That God hath a similitude or shape, hath his place in the heavens, hath also affections or passions. Bidles Preface to his Catechisme.

5. That in case any assurance of the unchangeablenesse of Gods love, were to be found in or regularly deduced from the Scriptures, it were a just ground to any intelligent man to question their Authority and whether they were from God or no. Redemption Redeemed, p. 335.

6. That water-Baptisme is to be laid aside. Dell the Doctrine of Baptisme.

7. That if any man consider diligently, he will finde the Scripture and all ordinary Catechismes are at so wide a distance, that he will begin to question whether the Catechists gave any heed at all to what they wrote, and did not only themselves refuse to make use of their reason, but presume that their Readers also would do the same. Bidles Preface to his Catechisme.

[Page] 8. That Christs death did not reconcile God to us, but only us to God. Bidle Catechisme, p. 68.

9. That we are not justified by Christs imputed righteousnesse, but by faith and by good works. Bidle Catech. p. 82, & 96.

10. That the wicked shall not live for ever in torments, but shall be annihilated and utterly perish after the judgement. Bidle Cat. p. 133, 135.

11. That the righteous enter into life for their good-works. Bidle brief. Script. Catch.

12. That the Sacraments in use among us are not appointed in the Scripture. Farnworths Answer to a Petition.

13. That the light of God that is in all meu, viz. naturall conscience, the spirit of a man being the candle of the Lord, is sufficient, if we give heed unto it, to discover all sin, inform us of all duties, change our wils, turn our hearts from all sinne unto God, to delight in God, and to shew us the way to salvation; And that this light within every man is the grace of God, and that spirit which searcheth all things, even the deep things of God: yea, that it is Christ in us. Farnworths Generall good to all People.

14. That men cloathed with the Name of God and Religion, are generally the most dangerous and deceitfull men in the whole world, for instance, Aaron, the Kings, Priests, and Prophets in both Old and New Testaments, nor can it be otherwise whilest Kings and Priests claim a right from God to be above other men, Norwoods Additional Discourse.

15. That man is a right rule, yea, the rule of all things. Ibid.

16. That God never did, nor doth, nor possibly can [Page] hurt us, and therefore not to be feared. Norwoods Pathway.

17. That Unbeleevers that are under the Law should keep the seventh day Sabbath from the Creation, but beleevers must keep the Lords day. Braines New Earth.

18. That the worship that is performed by the people of England in fellowship with the Ministers thereof, is heathenish worship. Easter Reckoning.

19. That those Ministers that sing Davids Psalms, baptize Infants, wear double cuffs, or boothose tops, take Tithes, say men are not perfect in this world, and but sanctified in part, or that say the Letter of the Scripture, or the written Word is the Light and Word of God, and that salvation is in the Scripture, and call the four Books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John the Gospel, are Seducers, nor Ministers of the Word, and shew the spirit of errour. Easter Reckoning.

20. That acquired Learning by its self and of its own nature is nothing else but sin, and can no more truly and properly said to be sanctified, then sin. Websters Book.

21. That it is a Question whether the godly actions of Saints are duties or priviledges. Ibid.

22. That those who in print say, The Ministers of England [are of the Synagogue of Satan, and know nothing of God, but are enemies of God, being guided by the spirit of errour, without, among dogs, whose humility is fained; That their Sermons are fleshly fancies and Conjurations, dirty miry Doctrine, a stinking puddle; That their hearts are filthy, deceitful, seeking praise from men; That they are scandalous, folluwing the waies of Balaam and Cain, [Page] worse then Simon Magus, knowing nothing of the life of the Gospel; That they are heathens, wallowing in the mire and filth of the flesh, on whom all the Plagues of God are to be powred, blinde guides, proud, Baals Priests, Lyars, Blasphemers, Enemies to Christ Jesus, Murtherers, Sorcerers, Whoremongers, Children of disobedience, greedy dumb dogs, Witches, Antichrists, Antichrists Merchants, Robbers, Deceivers, Ministers of the world, Conjurers, Devils of a Serpentine nature, a Brazen fac't Beast, Covetous, Idolatrous Priests, Theeves, Devilish Priests, Priests of the world, Foxes, Ministers of Antichrist, Proud Pharisees, Envious, malicious Priests, Egyptians, Sodomites, Gog and Magog, a Seed of evil doers, children of the devil, Blinde Watchmen, Back-biters, Raylers, Seducers, Taskmasters of Egypt, Devouring, Lions, Firebrands of hell, Sonnes of Belial] are themselves notwithstanding holy, perfect, new creatures, called out of the world, an humble, meek, innocent people, yea, though they are the maintainers of the errours contained in this Paper. Out of most of the Books before and after quoted.

23. That none are Ministers of God, and called by him who are sent forth by authority of man. Farnworths Answer to Pet.

24. That he who is not infallible in his judgement when he gives counsell and advice, is no Minister of Christ. Ibid. To the Law and to the Testimony.

Antimagistraticall Errours.

25. That the Magistrates are not to have Titles of Worshipfull or Right Worshipfull. Ibid.

26. That the Subjects of a Common-wealth which is not the Common-wealth of Israel, are to disturb [Page] and destroy that Common-wealth. Ibid.

27. That no civil Government is to be acknowledged but the Government of the Law within us. Ibid.

28. That in the Apostolicall Precept, Let every Soul be subject to the Higher Powers, By power is meant God the Father of Jesus Christ, and by King the Lord of Hosts. Farnworths Gen. Good to all people.

29. That no man having the absolute intire Rule and Government of himself in himself, inseparably united to him in his very essence and being, none whomsoever upon any pretence whatsoever may or ought to challenge, assume, or exercise in any measure, in any kinde or sort, any right or power with him or over him herein, for he was made perfect, which admits of no supplement, and is commanded to have no other God. Norwoods Additionall Discourse.

30. That in a people, no one or more part or parts whatsoever, can in any proper and true sense, be called or said to be the Soveraigne or Supream. Norwoods Pathway to Englands settlement.

31. That as we finde not any rule or dominion given unto one man over another in the beginning, neither is it so now here. Ibid.

32. That the Souldier shall take down the Law-rule or Government that is by the Commons in Parliament, as being of the fourth Monarchy. Brains New Earth.

33. That the Civil Magistrate hath not any positive power to punish any man, or restrain any for their light, judgment, conscience, opinion or way of worship, if so be they act or speak nothing that is destractive [Page] or destructive to the Civil Power, or tending to the breach of the Peace, or to injure one another; The reason is, because the Magistrate man, as he is naturall, knoweth not what is Blasphemy, Errour or Idolatry, they are foolishnesse unto him, neither can he discern them. Websters Book.

34. That under the fifth Monarchy now setting up, the world must be governed without the mixture (as now is) of mens Laws and Inventions, whether in respect of Magistracy or Ministry, Church or Civil affairs. Declaration of Church members walking with Mr Feake, Dr Chamberline, Mr Highland, Mr Barbone, &c.

What true Christian can reade or hear such things as these without much trouble of soul and spirituall indignation? How can the Friends of Christ chuse but endeavour the stopping of this mouth of Blasphemies? But alas, for some years last past, either there have been none that could or at least that would do it; So that the children of Zion have only spread the blasphemies and errours of the time before their God, who in answer to their praiers, we hope, hath by his Providence assembled you, conjoyned, and united your Powers and Councels, to try if you will own him as your King, by suppressing the grand Traitors and Treasons against his Majesty. Will Heathens allow men to blaspheme their false gods? Oh ye Rulers of these Nations, kisse the Son lest he be angry, and ye perish in the way; and if your rule, power, sitting, should miscarry upon this account, you will come off with more honour and quieter consciences then shall accompany any Successor [Page] or Successors in his or their taking part with the enemies of God by a boundlesse Toleration.

And now we hope your Highnesse and your Honours will consider, that the Printing and Publishing so many thousands of such Books aforesaid, argues that there are many buyers, and the many buyers argue a great infection by them, which like a Gangrene spreads more and more, and chiefly in London and the North parts of England, where there was a meeting lately of about Two thousand Quakers. And that this four leaven threatens the leavening of the whole lump, and that too soon, though it should not be compleated untill by age or death you be called off the stage, when the Lord shall examin how you have improved your Talent: And what a Popish, or what a Paganish Parliament shall we have then, if any? Where then will be our Laws, Magistrates, Religion, Ministry, Liberties, Strength, when a Papist or a Nero, taking the advantage of our confusion, shall get into the saddle, though by the stirrup of a pretended Fifth Monarchy? If you should judge us too presumptuous in this addresse (as we hope you will not) our apologie is, that through grace we are Christians, that judge it no great adventure to appear before the Rulers of this world in so good a cause, sith we are used to frequent admittance into the presence of the King of Kings our dear Lord and Master. And if it shall be blamed as discovering the nakednesse and wounds of our dear Country, to the Churches and Nations round about; we hope that reason will plead for us, that you cannot cure these wounds untill they be discover'd and search'd; and that if such Books and blasphemous [Page] Opinions were not suffered to be spread all the Land over, we had not troubled You with the mention of them.

The Premises considered, we humbly renew our Petition to his Highnesse the Lord Protector and the Honourable Parliament, and heartily implore You by God and Mans Expectations, your own publique Professions and Engagements, and as ever you expect to appear before God with comfort, who hath put power into your hands to doe much for his beloved Spouse and Cause; That you would stir up your strength and your zeal against the Enemies of both the souls and bodies of the people of this Commonwealth; by suppressing of Popish, Blasphemous, Antimagistratical and Antiministeriall Books, which are the nursery of Errour, Idolatry and Rebellion, Putrefaction and Shame of a Nation, Provocation of Divine vengeance, and high-way to eternall perdition. And to the end so good a work may be accomplished, and effectuall means may be applied, we shall humbly offer our Proposals (if commanded) how it may be done, without any trouble to the State; In the mean time begging leave, that without offence we may say, we humbly conceive, that we shall despair of ever seeing a sufficient Redresse in this case, unlesse the way of Licensing Books, by faithfull able men that are sound in the Faith, be strictly enjoynd, and an equitable Penalty laid upon all that Print and Publish, or cause to be Printed and Published, any Book not Licensed; and the said Penalty to be recovered by any that shall prosecute the Offender at the Common-Law, with good encouragement to the Prosecuter.

And lastly, Least the Parliaments great Affairs [Page] about Warre and Peace should hinder such an Information as this from being heard; we doe beg (in the Name of Christ) of all persons, of all degrees, whether Ministers of the Gospel, Gentlemen or others, by what Names soever distinguished, that are or would be esteemed real Friends to true Religion, the Lord Protector, the Parliament and Commonwealth of England; that they would improve all the Interest they have both in God and men in authority, for the effectual Suppression of such Books, as are destructive to the Religion and welfare of these Nations.

Octo. 9. 1654.

And the Petitioners shall ever pray, &c.

Luke Fawne.

Samuel Gellibrand.

Joshua Kirton.

John Rothwell.

Thomas Ʋnderhill.

Nathanael Webb.

[Page]

§

§

[Page]

A Second BEACON FIRED.

Humbly Presented to the LORD PROTECTOR AND THE PARLIAMENT By the Publishers of the First.

With their humble Petition, that they would do what may be expected from Christian Magistrates, in suppressing Blasphemous Books.

For Sions sake we cannot hold our peace.

ANCHORA SPEI.

LONDON, Printed for the Subscribers hereof. 1654.

Information about this book

Title statement

A Second beacon fired humbly presented to the Lord Protector and the Parliament by the publishers of the first : with their humble petition, that they would do what may be expected from Christian magistrates, in suppressing blasphemous books.

Edition statement

1654

Publication

Publisher

Text Creation Partnership,

Place of publication

Ann Arbor, MI ; Oxford (UK) :

Date

2007-10 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1).

ID [DLPS]

A40997

ID [STC]

Wing F565

ID [STC]

ESTC R389

ID [EEBO-CITATION]

13166448

ID [OCLC]

ocm 13166448

ID [VID]

98248

Availability

This keyboarded and encoded edition of the work described above is co-owned by the institutions providing financial support to the Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership. This Phase I text is available for reuse, according to the terms of Creative Commons 0 1.0 Universal. The text can be copied, modified, distributed and performed, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission.

Series

Early English books online.

Notes

(EEBO-TCP ; phase 1, no. A40997)

Transcribed from: (Early English Books Online ; image set 98248)

Images scanned from microfilm: (Early English books, 1641-1700 ; 417:1)

Source

— A Second beacon fired humbly presented to the Lord Protector and the Parliament by the publishers of the first : with their humble petition, that they would do what may be expected from Christian magistrates, in suppressing blasphemous books., Fawne, Luke, d. 1666..

Extent

[2], 12 p.

Printed for the subscribers hereof,. London :: 1654.. (This pamphlet was one of a series in a controversy over the publication of seditious or blasphemous works.) (By the so-called "Six booksellers"; signed (p. 12): Luke Fawne, Famuel Gellibrand, Joshua Kirton, John Rothwell, Thomas Underhill, Nathanael Webb.) (Reproduction of original in Union Theological Seminary Library, New York.)

Creation

Created by converting TCP files to TEI P5 using tcp2tei.xsl, TEI @ Oxford.

Editorial practices

EEBO-TCP is a partnership between the Universities of Michigan and Oxford and the publisher ProQuest to create accurately transcribed and encoded texts based on the image sets published by ProQuest via their Early English Books Online (EEBO) database (http://eebo.chadwyck.com). The general aim of EEBO-TCP is to encode one copy (usually the first edition) of every monographic English-language title published between 1473 and 1700 available in EEBO.

EEBO-TCP aimed to produce large quantities of textual data within the usual project restraints of time and funding, and therefore chose to create diplomatic transcriptions (as opposed to critical editions) with light-touch, mainly structural encoding based on the Text Encoding Initiative (http://www.tei-c.org).

The EEBO-TCP project was divided into two phases. The 25,363 texts created during Phase 1 of the project have been released into the public domain as of 1 January 2015. Anyone can now take and use these texts for their own purposes, but we respectfully request that due credit and attribution is given to their original source.

Users should be aware of the process of creating the TCP texts, and therefore of any assumptions that can be made about the data.

Text selection was based on the New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature (NCBEL). If an author (or for an anonymous work, the title) appears in NCBEL, then their works are eligible for inclusion. Selection was intended to range over a wide variety of subject areas, to reflect the true nature of the print record of the period. In general, first editions of a works in English were prioritized, although there are a number of works in other languages, notably Latin and Welsh, included and sometimes a second or later edition of a work was chosen if there was a compelling reason to do so.

Image sets were sent to external keying companies for transcription and basic encoding. Quality assurance was then carried out by editorial teams in Oxford and Michigan. 5% (or 5 pages, whichever is the greater) of each text was proofread for accuracy and those which did not meet QA standards were returned to the keyers to be redone. After proofreading, the encoding was enhanced and/or corrected and characters marked as illegible were corrected where possible up to a limit of 100 instances per text. Any remaining illegibles were encoded as <gap>s. Understanding these processes should make clear that, while the overall quality of TCP data is very good, some errors will remain and some readable characters will be marked as illegible. Users should bear in mind that in all likelihood such instances will never have been looked at by a TCP editor.

The texts were encoded and linked to page images in accordance with level 4 of the TEI in Libraries guidelines.

Copies of the texts have been issued variously as SGML (TCP schema; ASCII text with mnemonic sdata character entities); displayable XML (TCP schema; characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or text strings within braces); or lossless XML (TEI P5, characters represented either as UTF-8 Unicode or TEI g elements).

Keying and markup guidelines are available at the Text Creation Partnership web site.