D' FOE
's Answer to the Quakers
Catechism:
OR, A Dark
LANTHORN
for a Friend of the Light.
To the READER.
A Quaker with's dark Lanthorn light.
Is here exposed to your sight;
Stript off's nice Vizard and fair Paint,
Wherein he us'd to Ape a Saint.
So false Fires may delude our Eyes,
And seem like Stars to guild the Skies;
Till Reason proves they owe their Birth
To stinking vapours of the Earth.
This Hypocrite we here essay,
In's proper Colours to display;
Whose Yea and Nay in mischief goes
Beyond the Hectors damning Oaths
A Play-house Beau, is not so Gay,
As now a Days the Yea and Nay:
Whose Wigg in Curles, with Powder Drest,
Makes him as Wicked as the rest;
And seems to Act so very oddly,
You'd Swear he's fallen from the Godly:
For when he looks the most Precise,
He tells you damn'd confounded Lyes.
D' Foe, &c.
London,
Printed in the YEAR, 1706.
D' FOE
's Answer to the
Quakers CATECHISM,
&c.
A Quaker is a
Hogs-head of Phanaticisme
drawn off to the Lees; a
Common-Shore
of Heresie into which most extravagant Opinions at last
Disembogue
themselves and
center,
the
fag-end
of Reformation marked with a
sullen meagre-look,
and this Characteristick
Thou;
A Fox in a
Lambskin Coat,
that retains his
Subtlety
though not his
colour,
a
dough-baked
piece of formality that decries
Superstition,
yet idolizes
Garbs
and
Phrases.
You may know him by his
diminitive-band,
that looks like the
Folornehope
of his Shirt crawling out at his Collar; for his
purity
consists only in his
Dress,
and his Religion is,
Not to speak like his Neighbours.
His Orignal is as Obscure as the head of
Nile;
some refer it to
Behmen
the can
ing Philosophaster of
Germany.
Others run his Pedigree higher, and say he was
hatcht
when the
degraded Seraphm
first took on him to counterfeit an
Angel of Light.
He is a meer Composition of
Contradiction
and
Clownishnessana,
with a sew odd
Scruples
of Hypocrisie to give it a
Tincture.
Should the Parliament make a Law for Eating, he would Starve rather then be Guilty of obeying it; and if you would have him do a thing, you need only forbid it on Pain of Death: He thinks that to be
Religious
one is obliged to be
Uncivil,
and flings his Witts over Board to make room for
Inspirations.
His Dreams he Intitles Visions, and each
Crapicio
of his Fancy must pass for a divine
Revelation,
to which he Blasphemously puts a
Probatum est, The Mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.
The first Article of this
Creed
is to keep his Hat on, which he observs so Religiously, as if he thought
vailing Bonnet
to be the Sin against the
Holy Ghost;
Titles of Honour he takes for infallible Marks of the Beast, and believes the Master of the Ceremonies to be
Antichrist;
He would have done rarely in the old
Chaos
before Nature had anked ihings in their places, being a profest Enemy to all Order, that thinks there's no
pure walking
unless it be with the Heels upwards: He bears a Grudge against
Paul
for saying
most noble Festus,
and hates the Memory of
Sarah
because she called her Husband
Lord
His Discourses are nothing but a
Rhapsody
of oft repeated
Non-sense;
and when he hath darkned your Understanding with a Cloud of infignificant
Babble,
he Cry's,
Ah! Friends mind the Light!
He usually begins with
Raving
like
Mahomet
in his
Falling-fit,
or the Devil of
Delphose's Priests,
that never delivered their Lying
Oracles,
but with
extravagant Gestures
and
odd Distortions
of Body,
Swear not at all,
is his Motto, but
Lies
he holds in many cases
Venial,
and in
t
o meritorious,
when they make for the
Interest of the beloved Seed,
or reflect
Scandal
on the
Government.
He Cheats worse then a
Long-lane Broaker,
by pretending to deal
at a word,
and the
Hook
whereby he draws in his Customers, is a
far-fetcht Sigh,
and
plainly I tell thee Friend.
This troublesome
Insect
(for all his
demure Looks)
is deservedly suspected to be part of the
Vermine
dropt from the
Beast,
a
Puppet of Religion,
contrived to amuse the
Rabble,
that receives it's Motion from his
Holynesses
invisible Hand behind the Curtain; for though the
Jesuite
and he seem Enemies, at long run (like
East
and
West,)
they prove the same
Equivocations
being as common with them both as
Curses
to a
Gamester.
Ask our
trembling Saint
if he believe the
Resurrection of the Dead,
he shall answer
yea,
but tell you another time, he meant only
an arising from Sin;
by
Heaven
and
Hell
he intends no more but several
Scenes
Transacted
within
us,
and abuses
holy Scripture
into a mystical
Romance
Each of them averrs
Perfection
Attainable in this Life but herein they differ, the
Papist
Acknowledgeth but
one Pope
in the World, the Quaker sets up a Pope in
every Individual Breast,
to whom all
Scripture
and
Reason
must
Truckle;
so that refusing the
Polestar
of Gods Word and the
Churches Compass,
he will needs
Steer
by the wandring Motion of a Treacherous
Ignus fatuus
within, subject to be
blown any way,
and often Extinguisht by the Hurricanes of
Passion.
He makes
Self
the Centre whereunto the Lines of all his Actions tend, and like a
Hedge-hog
wrapt up in his own warm down, turn out
Brisles
to all the World besides; you can come on no side of him but he
Pricks
and
Bites,
and all his
Craggy
and
Inhospitable.
He that deals with him has need of more Eyes then
Poets bestow on Argus,
for he out-vies a
Genoe's
for Subtlety, and a
Jew
may come to be an Apprentice with him; he loves the
Exchange
though he hates the
Church,
and Admires no Preaching so much as
Foxes.
For all his peaceable
Sheepish
Countenance, he delights in
Contention,
and when he is
Thou-ing a Court
of Justice, thinks himself in his proper Element. He bawls (like an
Oysterwife)
at other Folks
Pride,
and evidences his own
Humility
onely in defying the
Pedlars Pack, Lace, Ribbons, &c.
whilest he
sawcily
contemns his
Superiours,
and prefers the
Crotchets
of his own
giddy Brain
before the
Decrees of a general Council.
He hates
no Whore
so much as her of
Babylon,
and ever and anon greatifies
the old Man
with a kind
Green-apron'd Friend,
whom he picks up at a
Conventicle
by a
teacherous Touch
of the Hand, under pretence of a
pure Salutation,
and finding by her
rampant Pulse,
and tempting turning up the
Whites,
(which she pretends to do in
Devotion)
that her desires are
at Flood,
they retire together for mutual
Edification.
He is often
Drunk,
but not like his Neighbours
Temporally,
for
Sleep
cannot cure him, but the
Fumes
of his spiritual Pride having
Intoxicated
his Head, makes his very Soul
Reel,
and but his Body into a fit of
Shivering;
ye, will he not privatly in the company of
Friends
refuse the
refreshing Bottle,
provided it be not known in
Gath,
nor published amongst the wicked of
Askalon,
for he confesseth the use
of the Creature
(especially when it comes on
Free-cost)
to be
exceeding Lawful.
He is very curious to be in all things
contrary to the common Mode,
that he may be taken notice of, for a
singular Man,
and having screw'd his Face into a Religious Frame, and turn'd his Voice to a
puling sanctimonious Key,
he uses it as a
Low-bell
to catch
Larks,
or rather such
Owles
as will be
Bubbled
out of their Money merely on the Repute of his
conscientions Dealing;
he abominates our
Churches,
and sayes very well, that
God must be Worshipped every where in Spirit,
yet will rather be
knock'd o'th' Head
theu forsake
Bull and Mouth,
here it is that he
Glories in Tribulations.
In brief, a Quaker is a
Cynick
in Religion, one that would have
Illnature
translated
Grace;
as if the
Holy Spirit
(that
pure sweet gentle Dove)
did inspire Men with
sullen Humours
and
waspish Disposition:
He hates both
Magistracie
and
Ministrie,
and never speaks, well of
Authority
or
Obedience,
but when he is going to lash his
Maid
or his
Apprentices;
for though himself have shaken off all
subjection
to Superious, yet to his
Domesticks
he is worse then an
Egyptian Taskmaster,
and speaks to his
Servants
in a tone as imperious as the
Grand Seigniour
to his
Mutes;
he cannot endure Ceremonies or Complements, especially where his Belly is concerned, and therefore falls to all meat (as Gallants do to a Wench or Oysters) without saying Grace, he is very diligent in his Generation-work, and may therefore have many Children but no Heirs; for his Issue comes into the World out-law'd, and can no more boast to be born in lawful Wedlock, then the
Kinchen-cove
of a
Gypsie
got under a Hedge by a strauling
Tinker;
he bannes the Banes, and i
this Respect only refuses
License,
Consummating his Marriage before it is Solemnized; for so soon as the Spirit begins to yield to the Rebellion of the
Flesh,
and his Bowels Yearn to be Multiplying, he and his willing
Doxy
never wait the Parsons Leisure, but take each others Word and so to Bed.
The Devil that furnishes others with his
Tare
but by Retail, deals with the Quaker by Whole sale, so many
Heresies
Club to his Generation that 'tis Impossible to say which he Resembles most. Sure Satan had a Fancy to present the World with an
Oglio,
and therefore here hath Rendevouzed all his Hell bred Errours in
Epitomie,
and set down a Catalogue of them in
Short-hand.
By his obstinate Zeal to keep his Noddle covered, you may guess him a
Mahumetan,
that resents nothing so Dishonourable as a bare Head; and indeed he hath no more Christinaity in him than a
Turk:
His
Good Fryday Looks
speak him a superstitious
Anchorite;
his Subtlety and Equivocations would become a
Jesuite;
he Names his Children with as little Ceremony as other Folks do their
Whelps;
and so far kees pace with the
Anabaptist,
but of a sudden he out-strips them, and falls in with the Seekers to deny all Ordinances. From
Socinus
he steals Arguments against the blessed
Trinity,
and learns to disown all Government from
John
of
Leyden.
At first he was much against the
Carnal-Weapon,
but now begins to be Reconciled to Fighting, and if you Anger him will rather venture a
Rubbers at fity Cuffs,
then turn the other Cheek to the Smiter. He has of
ate so far fallen from his first pretence of Humillity
hat he out strips Handsom
Fielding,
or any
Playhouse Bully
for Wig and Vanity.
'Tis a prudent Maxime in the Art Military, never
o think too Contemptibly of an Enemy. Our Grandfathers saw that
Scotch-mist Presbytery
rising to bigger then a Mans Hand, and yet how Dismally did it in few Years over-spread our whole
Horison.
Consider but this
Quaking Gang
in it's true Dimensions, and the Arts they have to promote their Designs, and they will appear more formidable then most of the other Eactions.
For First, They are a People generally Subtle, Frugal, Industrious, and Wary in their Dealing; by which and their large Pretensions to a punctual Honesty, they have Ingrossed a grand part of the Nations Trade.
Secondly, Whereas other Perswasions are divided into distinct Congregations, and so have several particular TEACHERS, who frequently Broaching different Whimseys, Mince them into
subdivisions,
whilst some dare not hear
such an one,
and others scruple to Communicate with
such a one,
though all of a PARTY.
The QUAKERS on the contrary; though
o two of them scarce agree in all things, doe yet generally throughout
England
keep themselves up
n
one intire Body,
glewed together with a strict Unity, as to
Affection,
and
Correspondence,
as is
vident by their
Weekly Collections
in every Coun
y continually sent up to
London
where their common Stock cannot but in so many Years as they have Maintained it, be very vast. To which add the exact Accompt and
Registry
they every where keep of all their Births and Burials (which are likewise duely Transmitted up) so that in an Instant they are able to give a near Estimate of their Number and Strength in all the three Nations. These and some other
Importants
being duely weighed, render this
shivering Sect
not so in considerable as the common
Rabble
Deluded with their specious Pretences are apt to think them. 'Tis a good Caution of a Minor Poet,
As white Powder discharges without Noise,
So may Saint-seeming Hypocrites Destroys,
Trust not too far, the soft Hand sometimes Smites
And Larks are Birds of Prey as well as Kites.
To conclude, a
Quaker
is a canting thing that Cozens the World by the Purity of his Cloaths, a few
Close-stool Faces
and whineing Expressions, his Life is only a real Lye, his Doctrine contrary to all sober Religon, and withal so Troublesome that I am grown quite Weary of drawing his Character and cannot but wish him and all his Tribe fairly Embarqu'd for
terra Incognita,
of the late found
Isle of Pines,
under the Conduct of
Penn
their high
Admiral.
FINIS.