WONDERS NO MIRACLES OR Mr. Valentine Greatrates GIFT of HEALING EXAMINED Upon occasion of a Sad Effect of his Stroking March the 7. 1665. at one Mr. Cressets house in Charter-House-Yard In a Letter to a Reverend Divine living near that place 1 COR. 12. 9 10. to another the GIFT of HEALING To another the Working of Miracles to another discerning of Spirit LONDON Printed for Sam. Speed at the Rainbow in Fleetstreet 1666. Wonders no Miracles OR Mr. VALENTINE GREATRATES Gift of Healing Examined Upon occasion of a Sad Effect of his Stroking Mar. the 7. 1665. at one Mr. Cressets house in Charter-House-Yard SIR WHen I consider in how many respects the world is now under the sad Judgement of being given over to believe a 2 Thes. 2. 11. Lies because it receiveth not the Christian truth in the Love and Power of it Errors and Impostures as a b Grotius Cont. Riu. Great man observeth being at once the Sins and Punishments of the later Ages of the World When I read that some pretensions in the last times will almost deceive the very c Matth. 24. 24. Elect insomuch that one of those Elect writing to his Brethren hath left this as the greatest Caveat amongst them Beloved believe not every Spirit but d 1 John 4. 1. try the Spirits whether they be of God And add to all these those sad words 2 Thes. 2. 7. That the Mystery of iniquity doth already work only he who now Lets will Let until he be taken out of the way and then shall that wicked one be revealed even he whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and LYING WONDERS and with all deceiveableness of unrighteousness in them that perish When I reflect on the state of the World now so parallel to that it was 4000 years ago especially in one particular viz. that it is immersed in Fancy Imagination and Lust which are all Inter-woven with its Philosophy its Religion Worship Doctrine Discipline and Government so far that it is as subject to Diabolical Impressions leading to Atheism now towards the end of the World as it was to such as led to Polutheism then in the beginning of it I do not so much admire your Caution in complying with the Vulgar apprehensions of this late Gift of Healing so much cried up amongst us as I do others unwillingness to comply with your Cantion so much more strange is it that the generality should allow such groundless and ill contrived pretences than that any man should scruple then were not we in England famous almost to a Proverb for our folly in reference to Prodigies and Prophecies and a People that would make it necessary that as it was one condition in the Judges of the Sanedrim that they should be skilled in Magic that they might detect and Judge others for it so it should be one in our Councils that they should be expert in the works of Nature that they might understand what is above it Sir Seriously since there is not a greater confirmation of what God speaks than what he doth and so no greater evidence of Religions proceeding from God than Miracles wrought by God And there being no ordinary way of conveying the evidence of divine Truth into the minds of Men but by a concurrence of a divine power set before their eyes to confirm that Truth The World is not capable of diving into the depth of Religious Mysteries so shallow narrow and dark are men's capacities and intellectuals and so apt are men to suspect impostures in things of subtlety reason and mystery and therefore they must have plain confirmations of those mysteries before their senses which they think will not deceive them so true is it what that excellent person observes The world being to be taught of God must be taught with actions which they can trust and not with words wherewith they may be deceived and hence Miracles or the performance of matters above the reach of Nature hath been always looked on as the greatest testimony to divine authority and revelation For the course of nature being settled by an omnipotent power and all Agents acting by the force of that power whosoever in doing wonders altereth the course of nature is esteemed to have the Divine presence going along with him Since I say the working of Miracles and performing things above the course of Nature hath been looked upon by mankind since God hath made use of men to act in his name here in the world as the best evidence of God's presence going along with them as the fairest credentials for their Message and the greatest argument for the truth of the Religion by them at several times published in the Name of God As it is certainly of very dangerous consequence to Counterfeit the King's Seal by which all Acts of State are confirmed and made authentically known to the people so it is to pretend to God's Seal whereby he doth convincingly make known his will in the world And as all the King's Liege People should beware of conniving at the one for fear of a misunderstanding likely thereby to grow between the King and the People none then being able to discern what is really the King's Act and what is not what they should obey and what they should not as they would not be guilty of misprision of Treason against the Government so all God's people should be very cautious in allowing the other for fear of a misunderstanding between God and their Souls none in case of such Counterfeit being able to discern what is really confirmed to be Gods will and what is only pretended so what is a Religion and what is a cheer Whence really there cannot choose but ensue these two sad things viz. 1 An opportunity in distracted and divided Times to broach strange and dangerous Opinions For if a man can but prevail with the People to believe that God assists him to Effect new and extraordinary things he may easily persuade them that the same God inspires him to speak new and extraordinary Opinions when they see God in what he doth they will easily believe he is in what he saith and where they observe omnipotence there they will believe infallibility and if the man saith now I received a voice from Heaven bidding me Cure all Diseases he may if this take say anon I am Commissioned by a Voice from Heaven to reduce the World to the unity of the Roman Church to teach the infallibility of the Pope to reveal a Messiab to come a fifth Monarchy and what not Thus a Clem. Rom. l. 1. Recog Iren. 1. 21 24. Euseb. l. 1. c 10. Epiph. haer 27. Sulpit. Sever. Sac. Hist l. 2. Just. Martyr Apol. 2. Zonar tom 3. Paul Diac. 18. Hist. the Arrians pretended Miracles by the infinite power of Christ to confirm the denial of his Deity Menander to blind his followers would restore their sight Basilides stroaked and deluded the multitude Cerinthus and Ebion performed as strange things as they taught Valentinus and Heracleon first set up with new Cures and afterwards with new Opinions Marcus Carpocrates and Cerdon were Magicians first and then Heretics Apelles Severus Tatianus and Montanus first had the gift of Healing and afterwards that of Prophesying Sabellius Samosatenus Photinus Macedonius Apollinaris had some thing singular in their practice before they had any thing Novel in their Opinions The Donatists and Luciferians pretended to do things above other Christians before they set up a separation from them The Nestorians and Eutichians got reputation by their converse with a bad Spirit before they durst deny the being of the good one All the sixteen false Christ's that obtruded themselves upon the world pretended to our Saviour's Miracles before his person Mahomet had two Masters a Magician and a Priest and the three first century of his prevalency in the world were called the Septemcastrensis lib. Magical ages The Church of Rome challenged the power of doing Miracles ever since she would be thought Infallible ever ushering in her strange Doctrines with strange performances and amusing the people especially here in England with the feats of one Seminary Priest thereby to prepare them the more readily to embrace the delusions of all no less than fifty seven Miracle-Mongers of that Gang being detected in England Scotland and Ireland within these fifty years and the Papists urging their power Vid. Bellarm. de Eccles. & Ger. de Eccles. of working Miracles as one of the most famous notes of their Church And to say no more the first Heretic since Christ's time was Simon the Magician of whom it 's said that he opposed the truth with the same artifices that Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses so true is that ancient observation of the knowing a Tertullian Maxima b De prescript contr a haret c. 34. Et de Anim. c. 57 haereticorum cum magis circulatoribus & curiositati deditis commercia and that Magiam esse haereticarum opinionum auctricem that there was always a great correspondence between the Heretics that had a design to impose upon men's understandings and Conjurers that could put a cheat upon men's senses knowing well that if they could take the senses with strange performances poor men that cannot examine the bottom of things will tamely yield their intellects to their strange tenets It being a generally allowed observation made first by St. Jerome that the Devil being discharged out of the Heathen Temples and Oracles took up with the Heretics Conventicles and Oratories playing those Legerdemains of late to support Heresies among the too curious Christians that pry unto things that they have not seen that they used of old among the loser sort of mankind to keep up Polutheism with Whence the early caveat Deut. 13. 1 2 3. If there arise among you a Prophet or a Dreamer of Dreams and giveth thee a fign or a wonder and the fign or the wonder come to pass whereof he spoke unto thee saying Let us go after other Gods thou shalt not hearken to him for the Lord your God proveth you So just it is with God to try people's faithfulness to and steadfastness in the truth by Diabolical Wonders leading them to error So good a Caution is that of Gerson upon the different pretences of Miracles among the Papists themselves to carry on their different okpinions and factions one side pretending Miracles for their Opinion and the other for the contrary * De distinctione verarum & salsarum visionum That in this old Age of the world in this last hour and time so near Antichrists Revelation it 's not to be marvelled at if the world like a doting old man be abused by illusions and fantasies And so excellent is Dr. Fields observation that there being but two ways to confirm Religion the Testimony of God's Spirit to the heart called usually Gods privy Seal and the Testimony of his Miracles to the Eye called his broad Seal There cannot be a wider door opened for all the fallacies Satan would put upon mankind than the pretences of the first by the Enthusiast and the second by the Juggler There being no greater Testimony likely to be given to the truth than that they Sergeant for falsehood viz. the Testimony of God who can neither deceive nor be deceived confirming it by inspiration or operation These are sad things but the second consequences of these pretences is sadder for men deluded by these juggles of false Miracles are shaken in their belief of true ones and as by the first appearance of any pretended Wonders they may be cajoled to embrace some errors so upon the discovery of the bottom of them they are ready to cast off all truth and because they find themselves imposed on once their short reasonings cannot satisfy them but that they have been abused always and therefore saith the excellent Mr. Stillingfleet It is no wonder Atheism should be such a thriving Plant in Italy nay under if not within the walls of Rome itself where inquisitive persons do daily see the juggle and impostures of Priests in their pretended Miracles and from thence are brought to look upon Religion its self as a mere imposture and to think no Pope so Infallible as he that said Quantum nobis profuit haec de Christo fabula Sir By this time you see you are not the only Person that look upon rash pretenders to and rash believers of Miracles in these days as dangerous upon the two great accounts of letting in errors among the people and upon the discovery of the pretenders of letting out the people to Atheism and so are not singular in your compassion and pity towards this poor Nation for their so easy compliance with every thing that pretendeth to Novelty or Wonder being not so much concerned as you use to say for this nine days Wonder of Greatrates which carrieth with it its own discovery as for the opportunity and temptations offered to more subtle persons to work upon an unstable people to more dangerous purposes But in the mean time while we are preparing a just account of Miracles Prophecies Visions Impulfes etc. to Antidote and pr●●●nt those impostures likely to be obtruded upon the world in these last and worst days when it is thought that the Devil's time being short and the commission expiring that he had to deceive the Nations his diligence and artifices are improved take this short accout of this Mr. Greatrates An Account of Mr. Valentine Greatrates and his Performances SIR THe man it seems being bred up in loose times Mr. Greatrates temper and a more loose way a Soldier having prostituted his understanding to a variety of Opinions and Errors for he hath been in his time of most of the Factions that were lately extant and now pretends himself a Latitude-man that is one that being of no Religion himself is indifferent what Religion others should be of hath either a design to be even with the World and to deceive others as well he dwelling with delusions may think others have deceived him Or which I had rather believe for I would feign hope that the man is not a plain Impostor being unsettled in his mind and possibly in the turn of times discontented as to his Fortune is troubled with Fancies and Imaginations which he takes to be Impulses and indeed it is not so much a wonder to me that one should pretend these Impulses as that half the Nation doth not since they have been so given over to Fantasies and inward suggestions having lost almost the faculty principles and exercise of Reason How possible it is for a man especially in an age of Fantasies as a Learned man calleth this to be wrought by his Imagination to a belief of strange Abilities in himself may easily be discerned by Mirandulaes' Discourse the Imaginatione c. 8 where he saith 1. That by the predominancy of a melancholic humour for humours give complexion to a vulgar Fancy 2. By the imposture of the senses 3. By the strength of the passions that have a great command over this faculty 4. By the ministry of evil Angels who can easily cast into the Fancy strange and false species with such subtlety as shall easily gain them plausible credit and admittance 5. By the influence of a man's Stars 6. By hereditary imaginations 7. By sad Necessity 8. By windy meats and want of due Evacuations 9 By sor did dwellings and manner of life with thick Air. 10. By idleness and solitariness 11. By lying a bed and sleeping 12. By grief fear envy disgrace faction revenge etc. a man may become an Enthusiast So easy it is for these or the like causes to stir up a man's humours and those humours to work upon the Fancy And by the many Instances hereof throughout the World as 1. The Jew that did so really imagine he could raise the dead that he killed himself in order to the experiment 2. The Grecian that went upon a Vision 2400 miles to cure the Emperor of his deafness that had been in his Grave four years 3. The Italian that came by an impulse to France to restore light to the blind and lost both his Eyes 4. The Frenchman that heard a Voice speaking to him to make a man without a woman and endeavoured it seven years 5. The Dutch-woman that imagined she could be with Child when she pleased without knowing a man 6. The People that imagine they must sell all and live on Air till Famine hath made them wiser 7. The man that kept his Children as they died of the Sickness unburied till they stunk in hope of a Resurrection 8. The German that went as he said by Inspiration to cure the Duke of Tuscany of the Sciatica by breathing on him and died a Prisoner in Legorn 9 The Spaniard that went upon a Vision 600 miles to cure the Duke of Venice of the Gout and died himself of it in Irons 10. The Physician that thought he could make man immortal and died himself before fifty 11. The Sussex man that talked of Visions to his Minister who advised him to send for the Physician the Vision being no more than the effect of a feverish distemper 12. The Venetian that undertook to live without food and the tenth day heard a Voice saying to him Arise and eat two Eggs Not to mention hundreds more of the same infirmity too much imposed on by their Imaginations and the impresssions made by the Devil Qui miscet se atrae bili & phantasiae or their distemper thereupon which you may see in the Authors quoted in the * Agrippa de Occulta Philosophia l. 1. c. 6. & 64 65. Wierus de Lamiis c. 8 9 10. Zanchius de potentiâ Daem l. 4 tom 3. c. 12. Donatus l. 2. c. 1. de hist. medic mirab Lemnius the Occult Nat. mir l. 1. c. 12. Cardan l. 18. de rerum varietate Camer 1 Cent. c. 54. hor. subseciv Fienus de viribus Imaginationis Laurentius the melanchol Philostratus vitâ Apollon l. 1. Sennertus l. 1. p. 2. c. 8. de melancholiâ Benevenius de abditis rerum Causis G. Fablicius Cent. 3. Observ. P. de Sancta Creuz in Hippocratem de morbo sacro Zacuthus Praxis admiranda Margin It being so possible that the man is really possessed with an importunate Imagination that he should perform these Cures he pretends to let us condition whether the Attempt hath any thing more in it than Imagination 1. And to deal plainly with you Sir the very Observations on the time of Greatraies setting up this pretence of healing time of the pretence is suspicious it being a time of great Expectations among all men and of strange Impressions upon very many the very imagination of strange alterdtions in the world makes strange alterations upon men's thoughts and spirits it 's no wonder when all men look or a year of Miracles that one man should attempt to begin it Besides that since the true Wonder of his Majesty's Restauration evidencing the presence of God with his Person and Government the men of Mr. Greatrates party have spent their time in venting and dispersing false Prodigies to delude men into an Opinion of the displeasure of God against both and those that look narrowly into things are apt to suspect that Mr. Greatrates being concerned that the reports of Miracles and Prodigies did not work upon us imagined he might promote the cause further and perform Miracles himself It is a dull thing to tell strange things only to amuse people when men can do strange things to convince them And this * Observations on his first attempt upon the Kings-evil and the reason of that and his proceeding to other diseases suspicion prevaileth the more because of the first instance wherein this man discovered his gift I mean the curing of the † Vid Primrosium de vulgatis erroribus cap. ultimo Kings-evil A Cure that though entailed on the Kings of England since Edward the Consessor and looked on as a gracious Gift of God that God's Vicegerents hand should cure that malady which Gods hand hath inflicted it being as probable that there should be a healing virtue in the highest sort of animals as well as in the lowest sort of vegetables confessed by our a A Papist in Prison being troubled with the Kings-evil and being cured by Queen Elizabeth after five years' Expense upon Physicians in vain and being demanded what News I perceive said he now at last by plain experience that the Excommunication against the Queen is of no effect since God hath blessed her with such a Gift Adversaries whereof one being cured by Queen Elizabeth acknowledged her Authority when he selt her Power and derived to the Kings of France per aliquam b Vid. Laurentium de mirabist flrumarum Curatione Propaginem by a sprig of right derived from the Primitive Tackerum de chorismate Peùcerum de fascinatione power of our English Kings under whose jurisdiction most b St Lewis of France not performing it till 145 years after King Edward begun it of the French Provinces were once subjected A cure I say though so Generally owned to the great honour of his Sacred Majesty of Great Britain yet cavilled at by the more morose sort of people as superstitious in the Ceremonies used about it I mean the Gospel the Collect the Angel the Cross the Belief required notwithstanding that it is well known that our Kings can heal by a bare stroke without these circumstances which are rather arguments of the devotion of the great Personage that heals than means necessarily influencing upon the people that are healed and as ordinary in the manner of performing it for say they we need not run to Miracles or to the and occult qualities for the pretended Wonder of c Vid Ferrer l. 2. Me bc 11. de Homer Curate Healing the King's Evil It 's only the power of Fancy say they and Imagination for when the poor Patient who perchance feldome heard of and never saw a King before shall behold his Royal Hand dabbling in a puddle of putrefaction and with a charitable confidence rubbing smoothing chafing those loathsome Kernels which I may call clouds of carruption dissolved oftentimes into a feculent shower I say when the sick man shall see an Hand so humble of an Arm so high such condescension in a King to stroke that soar at which meaner Persons would stop their Nostrils shut their Eyes or turn their faces this raiseth erecteth enthroneth the Patient's fancy summoning his Spirits to assist Nature with their utmost might to encounter the Disease with greater advantage And certainly might a Melancholy or a discontented man think any man may work upon the imagination as well as Princes and finding it feasible by one or two experiments he with other cunning people's suggestions might set up an Healing power as well as the King levelling his Gift as well as they would his Office with a design that when it appeared he could do no more than other men he should be no more than other men yea and when parity of reason led them to attempt in other Diseases what with some success they had begun in the King's Evil they might not only outdo his Majesty but be in a fair way to give Laws to the world 5 For mark the ground of this man's attempts and he tells you in his Letter to the L. Bishop of Chester that The voice from Heaven which he preterds twice to have heard and his account of it in a Letter to the Lord Bishop of Chester examined he had a voice from Heaven assuring him first that he had a power to cure the King's Evil and afterwards that he might cure all Diseases that he could not be quiet until be had undertaken it And that a Woman unknown to him had a Vision to come to him and that hereupon notwithstanding he was dissuaded by his Friends from the practice and jeered out of the imagination he had a constant impulse to force him upon the several experiments that he had made till the whole Country thronged to him This is sum of what the man saith for himself 1 How dangerous it is to admit of Impulses & Vifions and how common it was with men of Mr. Greatrates former way to obtrude need no further proof than oliver's Impulses James Naylor and other Quakers Visions and light within which would have superseded if allowed all Religion Law Duty Right and wrong and common honesty there being hardly any villainy Imaginable against any of these that hath not been and may be perpetrated upon the account of this Impulse and Inspiration and if people will but allow any thing to be true upon these Enthusiastic grounds they must allow all things that a deceivers fancy or interest shall suggest to them And more particularly Consideration touching the Voice Mr. Greatrates heard 1 He voucheth a voice from Heaven for his extraordinary Performances when yet he should vouch extraordinary performances to make good that voice from Heaven the voice of God gives not evidence to Miracles because the Devil in the Air or the Fancy in the Brain may counterfeit such a voice but Miracles give evidence to his voice How shall the people be assured saith Moses Exod. 4. 1 2 3 4 5. that thou O God hast appeared to me take the Rod and it shall turn to a Serpent that they may believe that the Lord God of their Fathers hath appeared to thee saith the Lord It 's impossible for us to be satisfied of any appearance of God to this man bidding him work Miracles unless we had other Miracles to satisfy us about the appearance of God 2 Gods revealing himself to men by Bath Col or the daughter of a Voice which was indeed the last way that he was pleased to communicate his mind to his people seems to be now superseded by that of the Apostle 2 Pet. 1. 18 19 And this voice which came from Heaven we heard when we were with him in the Holy Mount 19 We have also a more sure word of Prophecy whereunto ye do well that ye take heed as unto light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn and the day star arise in your hearts and we are obliged by the voice of God confirmed by uncontrolled Miracles not to give heed to any voice pretended to give credit to new unnecessary and doubtful ones 3 The Voice of God concerning any extraordinary Person under the Old and New Testament was not spoken only to the Person himself as it is in this case in private but to several others in public as you may see Exod. 4. Mat. 3. Act. 1. 2 Pet. 1. and the History of the Transfiguration These things as the Apostles argue were not done in a Corner 4 The Voice of God was agreeable always to the dispensations that were then a foot so that when they heard the Voice they had Prophecies Precepts and Rules directing them to the belief and use of the voice a particular defective in this Case where the dispensations of God amongst us are so far from concurring with this pretended Voice that the established Religion is inconsistent with it we having a complete platform of the will of God conveyed to us by Voices and Signs from Heaven that rendereth it needless to have any more extraordinary revelations till the great day of the Revelation of all things unless we add mit menstruam & diurnam fidem a new Faith every month and day for what is this Voice for is it to confirm our faith that is already done or we have been Infidels all this while and indeed know not when we shall be complete Christians because we know not when these pretenders will have done Is it to reform the corruption that hath overgrown Religion in the theory and practice of it Indeed the Prophets under the old Testament had extraordinary Voices to this purpose but it was provided by the Law of Moses in the time of the Theocratia that it should be so and the Pedagogy of the Jews might look for it but it 's not so under the Gospel whereby we are Conjured not to be soon shaken in mind either by Spirit or by Word or by Letter or by Voice is it to beget Faith 1 ● 14. 22. Signs saith the Apostle who had Signs to confirm what he said are for unbelievers is it to supply any defect in natural causes This pretends not to it the ordinary way of Physicians being together with Philosophy the ground of it at the height in these times and however God never wrought a Miracle for no other design than to alter the course of nature Is it to do good to some particular persons God never miraculously did good to any particular but with reference to the common good of mankind shall we make providence so cheap as to put it upon such mean Offices as helping the Patient to another stool more than his Physic could work to cure a poor body of a swelling to save 20 s. charge It 's true when God hath a great and suitable design to be carried on by Miracles he condescendeth to show those Miracles in such charitable and good Offices as these but not barely for them Christ confirmed Christian Religion by Healing here and there a poor person but neither he or any other extraordinary person came to the world with so low a design as only to perform those Cures Is it to set out this person for an eminent instance of Heroic virtue and holiness besides that the man pretends not to such heroic attainments his carriage being loose and like a good Fellow his Religion Latitudinary his discourse unsavoury sometimes breaking out to Oaths as I have been Informed by a very discerning and honest person at the  who heard him in much passion say that though the poor people that urged him to touch them from the length of the journey they had taken to come to him came from Jerusalem he would not by his Maker meddle with them often incohaerent faltering and inconsistent an effect of the weakness of his memory his converse and dealing with Women notorious and scandalous his privadoes and familiars men of no great repute for common honesty and though our Saviour conversed with Publicans to convert them he was not guided wholly by such men to set them up in the world his fallacies put upon poor people as to the places of his abode palpable his neglect of ordinary Christian duties intolerable his account of himself very various broken and ambiguous 5 Besides that the holy men inspired of old time approved themselves to the most knowing & discerning persons in the world yea and addressed themselves upon any extraordinary occasions for advice whereas this man began and set up among the Ignorant and Rude part of mankind the Irish easily imposed on when he should by right have sat among the Doctors as the greatest worker of Miracles did and have answered them about the ground of this pretention and have asked them Questions not appearing among wise men in public till his feats had prevailed with the more Ignorant in private How much more agreeable had it been for him upon the hearing of the pretended Voice to have repaired to some Reverend Divines and Physicians than to chat with his Wife and some two or three old Women and then set up for it seems he told his Wife the Vision and when she laughed at him he trieth experiments upon her and between them behind the Curtain was begot this great faculty 6 Nay and this voice was in his sleep too the season of sowing the Devils Tares and should every Dreamer of Dreams practice in the world according to his Visions on his Bed the whole world would require again Christ's miraculous power of curing Lunatics and that but twice notwithstanding that the doubts of men require the oftener promulgation of it whereas all the real testimonies that ever God gave were given as often as there was occasion for them Sir But the man replieth that however we are The Impulse that moved him to hearken to this voice considered at liberty to dispute this extraordinary faculty of his he was forced by an impulse and motion over all his body to exercise it But considering how much Impulse as they call it is put out of countenance and exploded by reason of the horrid Villainies at all times especially of late performed upon that ground This pretence is worse than the other there being nothing more desperate than a man given over to his own Impulses and inward Motions without any regard of Religion Reason Laws Rules and Principles And 1. The jolly man doth not look as if he were much troubled with Impulses 2. He can be no more sure of his Impulses being from God than he was of the Voice and therefore this should not be any Motive to him to hearken to that the Impulse may be a cheat as well as the Voice 3 Impulses being the method of Satan when he reigned among the Children of disobedience I mean the Heathens such as the Sibyls the Corybants the Bachides the Zabii etc. God allowed no Impulses for currant under either the Old Testament or New but what were agreeable to and made good by the established Religion If they speak not according to this word It is because the truth is not in them 4. God looks upon it as contrary to the nature of man to be acted by brute Impulses and Instincts having hitherto led him to all his performances by a rational discovery of the grounds leading thereunto 5. But of the madness of being guided by Impulses you may see in Laureminus de melanchol C. 4. Casaubone and Dr. More of Enthusiasm Savanorola c. 4. the aegrit cap. Hercules de Saxonia de melancholiâ Burton's Melancholy Meursius in Apollonium Antonii ponte sancta Cruz. prelectiones vallesolitanae in Hyppocratem de morbo sacro Arist. Problems Antonius Bennivennius de abditis M. causis etc. Sir But why should we suspect a man that makes His taking no money examined no advantage of his practice A. 1. He takes nothing in public himself but it hath cost some good round sums of money to his followers who are observed to be noted Projectors John Terril Gent. expending 100 l. to come at him James Bivion 40 l. William Feltiplace 60. and others to the number of 500 that have expended above 7000 l. to follow this man 2. He may have a greater design than money let him gain Reputation the first quarter and he shall not fail of money the next 3. He borroweth money of his Patients though he takes none 4. Nay what if it be proved that such as he have those that maintain them and hire them Patients Now the Story about his great Estate of 800 l. a year dwindling to a hundred and he living at the rate of a thousand a year being certainly kept by a party and the Patients he produceth for his vouchers being poor Women and Children that no body knows whence they come nor whither they go The English understand too well now what the Preachers mean that will take no Tithes and the Physician that will take no fees And the dullest nose may smell the matter when he heareth but this tradition of him that being a Member of an Independent Church he was Excommunicated thence for pretending to this gift of Heaven and thereupon his gift left him until being absolved he was readmitted at once to his Church-Priviledge and his Gift Sir Why is he followed if he be but an Impostor His being followed examined why do not the people cry out against him and the Magistrates restrain him A. That the giddy multitude should follow any strange thing that the English so notorious for their unsettledness should gaze after a novelty at first is no wonder especially in such a year of expectation as this is But they follow him not in any place so eagerly at first as they leave him discontentedly at last He is not so much cried up in the places where he comes as he is cried down in the places where he hath been and he removes from place to place not so much to Communicate his virtue as to save himself being not known two nights together in one Lodging I and whereas it might be expected that he should come with Certificates of recommendation he comes loaded with reproaches from each place where he hath been And if the deluded souls reply as some very Blasphemously do that that was our Saviour's case for no less a parallel will do We Answer that our Saviour being to alter old Customs to cross men's lusts to overthrow their Laws and Government to prejudice their carnal interest to reprove and reform their vices and corruptions by the Religion to be confirmed by his Miracles was reproached indeed for the Religion he taught but all that saw him reverenced him for the Miracles he did His Miracles being equally recorded and owned among Jews and Heathens and among Christians their affection and interest as it is clear carrying them to speak the worst of his person when their hearts and consciences thought best of the actions done by him as appears in divers places of Scripture But this man pretends to nothing that grieves or disobligeth men crosseth no man's opinion stands in no man's way only takes on him to help the miserable and afflicted and to do good and yet is cried upon not certainly because he doth such innocent things as cure a  help the Eyesight lance a Sore which good old women have practised these many years without any clamour against them but because he pretendeth these things and doth them not and so puts an injury upon people which they are most impatient of called by them a Cheat. And to make it evident that this whole Affair is but a Cheat I 'll not instance in the 1000 that have been deluded by him in Ireland the West in  and other places nor those at Whitehall St. James Lambeth Westminster Fleetstreet Bread-street Cheapside Foster-lane that make horrid complaints of his undecent and intolerable handling of all their parts of his pinching rubbing chafing and lancing their Sores of his inflaming of their blood and humours and rendering many of them by cutting them and other ways incurable Not to tell you that there is not a man woman or child that may be trusted and are well known that is the better for him that all that he doth is but by raising people's Imaginations especially the weaker sort by rubbing and chafing to scatter the humour for the present to the Patients little ease till it returneth with more violence after the chafing than ever I say not to instance in any thing but what I have seen This Mr. Greatrates was at one Capt. Cressets in What Cures he performed at the Charter house Charter house-yard the 10 11 and 12 of March there several people applying themselves to him some he would not take notice of notwithstanding that he had an impulse and could not but heal and do good Others he could not help he said although he pretended his second voice commissioned him to heal all Diseases Others he directed to some impertinent means as to wash their sore eyes in fair water and it may be he said God might do them good One that was almost blind he directed to some frivolous remedy adding what every body saw that God in time would make him blind Others that were deafish he rubbed and chafed poking in their ears leaving them after all that within three hours in the same condition he found them But one poor Fellows Case there is more eminent than any that I have heard of except the Gentlewoman in Austin-friars-s and the Gentleman of Harrow of the Hill The poor man a member of the  being A Fellow in the Charterhouse which Greatrates had almost killed and how a little troubled with a sore knee and so little that he did but just take notice of it must needs address himself to him He pincheth and lanceth the poor man the Sore gangrenes the worthy Doctor Bevoir Physician to that House and Mr. Harrison the Chirurgeon are sent for to the fellow who within a day after takes his bed They gave him over almost for dead yet using all means possible for his recovery with the blessing of God upon their endeavours and incredible care and pains they stop the Gangrene set the man past danger though he be like to be long bedrid Greatrates heard of this and comes to the man and would have been tampering with him but the man would not endure him charging him with his blood if he had died and wishing him no more to delude the people If he hath not the grace to make good use of this Instance to undeceive himself who as I told you I hoped rather deluded than a deluder and the world Certainly the Magistrate who would not hinder any man from doing any good he can pretend to will take care that he do no more mischief And the people being now convinced how easily they may be deceived will take care whom they follow But as the Atheist thinking our Saviour did all his Miracles by the power of men's Imaginations say that Christ so some people say this man cannot do any Miracles because of men's unbelief Ah that any Christian should talk so who must needs know that the meaning of that passage about Christ is not that Christ could not work Miracles because men believe not but that he could not prevail with himself to do what he could and that it is not the want of Imagination or Fancy which is indeed enough to set up a Juggler whereof the a And our Saviour wrought Miracles on things that had no fancy as the Figtree the dead the water the winds the Heavens people at distances the loaves Jews had good store but of the grace of Faith which was the condition of embracing and benefiting by a Saviour that rendered them uncapable of his Miracles And can the man blame men for want of Faith when they see nothing that deserveth it or was he so weak as to undertake Miracles which yet he could not perform unless men believed he could do that which no man ever saw he could It is well the folly is grown so notorious that it hath no other plea than this That he cannot cheat the people if they will not trust him But his Jack-Puddings I mean his Vouchers and Familiars who have been caught in fearful untruths about him and his acquaintance with Friars he speaking one thing and they another he saying he had not heard from such a man in eight years and one of his followers showing a Letter he had from him in eight days he showing how he had Cured one with a stroke and one of his Comerades ask the man unawares how his Pill Glister and Plaster wrought last night he pretending to pray all day and yet one of his Zanies saying to take off from him the suspicion of a Fanatic that he was none of them that spent their time in Canting Whining and Praying I say his Disciples alleged for him that the Apostles could not work some Miracles that they attempted To which we Answer That possibly they could not where they had no Commission as they had not but in some cases before our Saviour's Resurrection and if for that reason he can cure no Disease let him say so or possibly they might by unbelief whereof they were too frail in Christ's life time provoke God to suspect the virtue which they really had shall a pretender thence argue for want of that power which he never had let him show us that he can do any thing that the Apostles did and we will bear with him if he fails only in what they failed in however this is certain we believe Christ and the Apostles could do more Miracles than in some cases they would we see jugglers would do in all cases more Miracles than they could Sir Now you may expect I should add a line Of the temper of the body and whether some by virtue of their Crasis or Complexion can work Miracles and of Dr. Mo●es opinion concerning him touching his Crasis or Temperature some giving out that Dr. More should say of him That he saw nothing in him Diabolical little Divine all Humane and that he might do some feats by virtue of his Crasis or Complexion But the man hath done nothing worthy such an inquiry and we should be as ridiculous as he should we discourse the ground of that man's actions that can do nothing only as to that surmise of as Paracelsus calleth it or i. e. a just and equal temperament and complexion that may enable men to work Wonders besides that it is the old Atheists obsolete cavil against Christ's Miracles Vid. Medin 1. 2. c. 7. fol 66. Fuse hanc questionem explicantentem Videses etiam Leon Vairum 1. 3. de Fascin c. 6. that he did that by the extraordinarily exact complexion of his humane nature which all that saw confessed done by the power of the Divine either this complexion is the complexion of all men and then every man could do feats as every Herb of a kind will cure or of some and then I wonder we have not yet been told either by God or Men what are those Individual qualifications that constitute this complexion and if there be some secret healing Virtues in Men as well as in Plants Stones and Herbs as the factors of this Opinion allege out of * De in cant c. 3. Pomponatius and others how can they heal all Diseases any more than these how comes the one to be a real panacea and catholicon when they cannot be so how a virtue in man to cure all Diseases that is not in any Herb if it cure the Dropsy how doth it relieve the  what natural virtue is that that may be applied to the infinite contrarieties that are in the nature of man if because other creatures have man should have a healing quality then certainly as their quality is limited to certain Diseases one thing good for one Disease and another for another so should man 's * Besides if so what need the pinching stroking and cutting too Doth not say some the Torpedo stiffen a man's hand by a bare touch doth not the Hyena strike Dogs dumb with the shadow doth not the Serpent die with the stroke of an Oaken leaf do not the strings of the Wolves guts make those of the Lambs fly to pieces with a touch Alexander's casting a sweet perfume and the Jews a stink round about them the Carcase bleeding at the touch of the murderer the Cures by sympathy and why may not a Man then do Feats by bare Stroking and Touch As much as is true of these and many more like Instances of this Nature may be referred to that Sympathy and Antipathy that may be between these things that thus strangely touch one another which cannot be imagined between any man and all men in the world and Alexander's Aromatic smell is but a piece of flattery on the one hand as Cardan's imagination to that purpose of himself was but a fancy as the Jews stink is but the invention of malice on the other True as others argue some creatures can do mischief with a Breath or Touch but that they can therefore Heal doth not follow it being easy to do mischief but not so easily to cure it and malum est ex quolibet defectu when bonum is only ex Intergrâ causû And as true as they urge that imagination may do much upon people that fancy great matters of a man it may gather up a man's fear desire hope and other affections with the spirit and blood that may be moved by them and remove or scatter an humour for the present as many have known by exrience yea and by chance being very strong cure a light sore but usually the humours return more violently after they have been disturbed and settle incurably as an * Anan l. 4. the not daemon Albert. Mag. l. 3. de motu animal excellent Author in a book written to that purpose hath by many examples made evident and so it happeneth in most of this man's Cures Sir Had Apollonius the Heathen been among us to make his Dog lick all Diseases to a curing himself curing the Dog at last which was done by compact with the Devil appearing under the shape of that Dog we could have judged it Witchcraft had the same Heathen here as in the Temple of Esculapius Cured a man of the Dropsy by prescribing him Temperance we had thought it a piece of good morality had the same man for the Heathens in whom the Devil prevailed so much before Christ cast him out of their Temples Oracles Persons and Hearts by greater Wonders than he could pretend to outwent in juggles wonders enchantments any of our Modern pretenders freed us from the Plague as he did the Ephesians by making them all meet in a Theatre to stone an old Beggar which he called the Plague and wiser men know a Devil the very Devil that brought carrying away that Pestilence God permitting him then to exercise his power as Prince of the Air to that purpose we had concluded it Magic Did he among us raise people when dead we should discern that they were only in a Trance and that the pretended Resurrection had been but a contrivance Had a Mahometan given men stools and vomits by stroking them as the man of Smyrna did we would have searched his Pockets and have found the Doses there Had Alvarez the Spaniard endeavoured among us to cure men with Apotelesmes or Figures agreeable to the aspect of Heaven at our Birth we had laughed at him for an Almanac-maker Had Paracelsus applied the secret virtues of things secretly to Patients we had commended his Philosophy only for his pretence to heal by a rub we had questioned his honesty Had Fonsieca kept the Bird Gagalus in his Chamber Which cures the Jaundice at sight here and prentended to cure the Jaundice with the stroke the simple would have admired his performance when wiser men might discern his applying of natural causes together though pretending a supernatural cure If Lindan would desire only a drop of a wounded man's blood after he had stroked him and so cure him we have learned now that the stroke is but a formality to amuse people and that the blood by sympathy doth the cure If Cerdon pretends to dissolve all Tumours with a touch and by a legerdemain dazelling the eyes conveys ointment etc. to the tumors insensibly we would call it a juggle and not a cure In a word should a man have familiarity and make a compact with Satan and should the Lord per● Satan to work some strange things not that Satan can do any thing above nature but that he may do many things that seem to us above nature because above our understanding it might exercise and try our Faith If a man had some secret skill in heavenly influences upon men's bodies and could counterfeit that with a stroke of his hand which is really done by the influence of a Star he might exercise our Philosophy Had a man skill in the secret virtues of things and could secretly do cures by applying these virtues insensibly while he doth nothing but touch men seemingly It would be some satisfaction to our curiosity did a man understand some Critical times and take them to perform his feats we might discern some reason in it If the Salutators of Spain or the Sons of the Passover in Holland would bid men here as they do there drink wine lustily and be healed lie with such a man's Wife and be healthful eat the bread that they chew and recover go into the fire and be cured of a Fever touch the seventh male-child Vid. Viarum de Fascino of a man that had no female between and be well of the Dropsy It would be worth the while to consider what they do But for a man to pinch lance and rub people and after all this stir not to be able to show one knowing or sober person Women and Children being not capable of understanding how they are cured and he deals most in such or one credible person many of those that are under his being capable of being tampered with and corrupted to own that to be done by his touch which may be done by Physic privately given and other means And there is no other Reason to be assigned for his stroking one day and the people's being cured many days after when Miracles may be done in an in stant nothing respecting Infinite power but this that he may act the Miracle-monger upon a man one day and practice Chirurgery upon him afterward till he comes and voucheth that he hath been cured by the Stroaker Or one near that a man may see we being usually remitted for proof of his power to instances of 100 or 200 miles' distance the Londoner being sent to be satisfied in Dublin and the men of Dublin being sent to London or both to Cornwall Or one perfectly cured rubbing chafing and stroking some sores with the Patients strong Imagination working some slight alteration of the humour but not a cure driving it from place to place but not removing it Or one cured by stroking only and not by some accident happening about the stroking time A man is Sea-sick going over to England and is stroaked his Sea-sickness easeth him of the matter of his Disease the stroke hath the reputation of it A man is troubled with the head-ache is stroaked and sleeping well that night finds ease and cryeth up the Miracle Accidents may perform many of his slight cures and yet he have the credit of it The danger of running after such Pretenders as this Greatrates When I say an obscure man in loose and troublesome times of a suspicious education and course of life shall undertake in the face of three Nations what he can produce no warrantable ground to attempt nor any considerable power to perform what is it but an evidence of the just judgement of God upon us to make us now as ridiculous by our credulity to these simple pretensions as we have been odious by others more dangerous and more subtle to keep up the French surcasme that we are a B●dlam still and not a Kingdom and to justify wise men's fears that we shall be so tossed to and fro and so distracted by the various pretensions of deceivers in Church and State that every Juggler may impose on us and every Mountebank put his tricks upon us An intolerable reproach to so wise and understanding a Nation as the English were reputed in former Ages What is it to see a plain fellow draw after him some Noblemen many Courtiers a few Clergymen several Magistrates all sorts of Citizens People of all ages sexes and conditions in spite of the ill report of him wherever he hath been the great mischief they see him do and the little good they either see or hear but to warn us of the just Judgements we may still fear upon us in that God as his manner is with people devoted to ruin seems to make the first stroke at our heads and understanding What is it for a man to take on him to work Miracles Mr. Stubbe saith that Nature hath and may do more than his Miracles pretend to in the Name of God when yet he doth but play the Chirurgeon chafing and cutting people's sores without any word or thought of God discoursing with standers by in the mean time about the pictures in the room or the like subject Whence a poor fellow I spoke with said that his heart misgave him he could do no good because he spoke not a serious word all the while he was lancing him not once mentioning or thinking of the God by whose power he pretends to heal But to teach how easy a matter it is for one to obtrude what Doctrines and Practices they please upon the inconsiderate and undiscerning part of mankind in the Name of God especially when ungrounded in the true ways of that God and the sober principles of his Religion and an argument when men have quitted solid Principles how easily they are ensnared with sly appearances having no rules to judge of those appearances for a man to pretend a Voice from Heaven in a Nation that hath the whole will of God as far as it concerns them published amongst them in the complete Canon of the Scripture and being taught of God not to gaze up to Heaven for voices thence the will of God being nigh them in their mouths and in their hearts and for people to follow him what is it but to declare That after Christianity hath been amongst us 1500 years and the clearest and most powerful publications of it for these last 150 years of any in the world to our shame we are yet unsettled and wavering like a wave of the Sea upon every blast of wind What is it but a fulfilling on us of God's sore Judgement mentioned 1 Tim. 4. 1. that because men of itching ears and curious minds turned from the Truth they should be given to Fables and to give heed to Doctrines of Devils What can it be but a trial how far we are fitted for Enthusiasms and all the Delusions of the latter days Enthusiasm preparing people for all the bad Impressions that can be made upon men by Men or Devils that being indeed his Throne when he played Rex among the Heathens and may do among any upon whom he hath a design to reduce them to Heathenism What may it be but an Essay what Annulets Charms Crosses holy Waters Periapts Characters and other Romish feats might do if they were set up again at Wolverhampton St. James etc. and in the name of St. Hugh cure Fevers of St. Joyce cured Dropsies of St. Dennis the Pox as they have a Saint for every Disease and whether as Williams writ to Holden The English Nation be not in a fit temper to be wrought upon at this time What is it but the prelude to the last Effort of Diabolical Illusions coming to try all those that dwell upon the face of the earth in Judaisme Mahometanisme Heathenism Enthusiasm and what is a mixture of all these Papism to see whether we are throughly taken off from the Wisdom and Power of sober Religion and sufficiently prepared by Scepticism Itching after novelty weariness of sound Doctrine unpeaceableness and discontent of Spirit unwarrantable curiosities in Philosophy and Religion illusions and appearances in Opinions and Practices wild and distracted notions and Enthusiasms unmortified and unbounded Lusts Atheism and Profaneness canting toning and wording Religion into noise forms and gestures breaking the Community of Church and State into Parties and Factions the ignorance and noise of common Teachers that understand not the grounds of the Religion they Preach and may be imposed on in the Scripture whose Original they understand not that wrest Scripture to what it never meant and make quid libet ex quo libet that set up a parcel of formal words as Faith Spirit Gifts Edification Out-going In dwellings etc. instead of real and solid a Whose right and genuine Notions are lost See Mr. Patrick's excellent Book called the Pilgrim and I fear Men will not be more than ordinarily careful in opening the genuine meaning of such fundamental words in Religion as Faith Spirit etc. now so much wrested and abused by the ignorance and interest of Modern Preachers and Hearers the whole is like to run into Gibberish and Enthusiasm as by the mistake of the fundamental words Religion of old was turned into Mythology and Gentilism vid. voss. de Idol Religion The Implicit Faith got up among Protestants as well as Papists to follow some Men through thick and thin having their Faith wholly with respect of persons the looseness of Professors so inconsistent with Christian purity the people's attending Prophecies and expecting strange Events rather than learning and practising their plain duty their uncontentedness with their present condition I say what is this practice but an Essay made to try how far we are prepared by these foresaid particulars for the universal Apostasy so much feared in the latter days To say no more if because the Man is but only bold enough to pretend Strange Cures he is so much followed by the undiscerning multitude what if he could really perform them as the Devil now we are so willing is ready and able enough if God should permit him and lengthen his Chain to work any of these Cures perfectly by this man's stroking what if he could cure every body he toucheth as he might if Satan finding him so willing would assist him how would all the Nations run Wondering after him Sir Since he performeth not as you see the Cures he pretends to and if he did it might be so many ways as I have hinted to you privately used though the Stroking be all that is seen that we need not put God upon making his Miracles so cheap as to perform the part of a Chirurgeon and Quack without any further design fix we with all sober people upon this resolution 1 That true Miracles or the altering of the course a The Devil may do strange things and what we would think were above nature but nothing really so of nature by God who alone can do it are the greatest Testimonies that God useth to evidence his presence otherwise invisible with any Doctrine or person sent by him to the world 2 That if God should assist a man to work Miracles that hath no Divine truth to confirm nor any suitable Design to carry on by them as this man hath not but possibly may be in an error as this man may be men could not be sure when Miracles confirm truth and when they do not for by this it should seem they might go along with truth in one man and with error in another and so men should see the greatest assurances they have of Gods being with any Doctrine attending the loser and the stricter Opinions of men the indifferency of the Latitude-man and the heat of the Zealot and so men that had a certain way of intercourse with God and discerning of his voice by the Miracle that so solemnly attended his voice will lose it if Miracles be wrought by all sorts of men upon every petty and trivial occasion 3 God doth not work such a Miracle as this is that is produce an effect without any second causes but for some very considerable design for otherwise as a learned man observeth when God works Miracles they would not be taken notice of nor thought to be an alteration of the course of nature but only some rare contingencies that lie hid in the order of causes but only break out at some times 4 That if a Simon Magus and Apollonius a Barchochebas David el David or any other pretender should hereafter presume to work Miracles among us upon the Impunity of this undertaker we may judge of him by these rules and criteria whereby true Miracles may be discerned from false 1 a Rules to discern true Miracles from false Though Jugglers may do much to work upon men's minds in appearances and Magicians more when permitted by the Divine providedce in reality yet there is such an evidence attending Divine Miracles as after much jealousy and suspicion may convince men that they are of God Moses his Miracles after much contest with the Magicians of Egypt being owned as the effects of the finger of God and Christ's as things that evidence him the son of God whereas there is nothing above the art of man and the power of Nature in any Miracle since those of Christ and his Primitive followers 2 Divine Miracles are done without means forms Rites Ceremonies Cuttings Lance Plasters etc. Sine ullâ vi carminum sine herbarum aut graminum succis sine ullâ aliquâ observatione sollicitâ Sacrorum Libaminum temporum Sine ullis adminiculis rerum sine ullius ritus observatione vel lege non Inquiro non exigo saith Arnobiis whose rule this is Quis Deus aut quo tempore cui fuerit auxiliatus aut quem fractum restituerit sanitati illud solum audire desidero an sine ullius adjunctione materiae i. e. Medicaminis alicujus ad tactum morbos jusserit ab hominibus evolare which words amount in brief to this that Cure is Divine that is done without observations prescriptions and applications otherwise Cures performed by means saith he are beneficia rerum non curantium potestates to heal men by Prescriptions Applications and ordinary Operations arguing no extraordinary power at all in the Prescriber or Operator but an ordinary virtue in the Prescription or Operation And it 's observed as an Argument of Christ's divine power that he practised not on sleight Sores but on the most acute chronical and malignant diseases Some learned Physicians affirming those Diseases our Saviour cured incurable by the ordinary way of Physic and Chirurgery and all this with a word a touch of himself or garment a thought or such means mystically chosen as naturally would rather as the Clay and spital to open blind men's eyes improve the Disease than heal it 3. * Divine Miracles are done in an instant nothing This third Rule is drawn from the History of Moses Elisha Elias and our Saviour's Miracles being able to oppose and consequently to delay the workings of a God Those that wrought Miracles formerly did some of them indeed in time and by degrees to comply with the weakness of men I mean such as looked upon them that they might discern the manner of working as well as the work itself but they did most instantly to evidence the power of God 4. * True Miracles were most commonly done under And this 4th the open Air in Fields and public places before both those that favoured the person that wrought the Miracles and those that opposed him in such a manner as there should be no suspicion of any private dealing or compact usually the people that most suspected the person bringing him patients and those patients afterwards so far from following the Healer as his confederates that we hear no more of most of Christ's followers but that they blessed God for their Cure and went to their respective homes 5. * We read of none that wrought Miracles in And this 5th Scripture but that they could and did confer that Gift upon others and pitched not upon rich but poor not upon knowing but simple persons not at all versed in matters of Art or subtlety that they should work Miracles likewise fine fucis & adminiculis without any fraud or assistance 6. * Neither were the Miraculous Cures only And this 6th little Eases for the present but perfect and complete Cures and that not of one or two of 500 that are touched but of all Divine Power never failing nothing being impossible with God 7. Divine Miracles being the Seals of Divine Truth and the only way that poor men that cannot see God and yet must hear from him or perish have to know whether God speaketh to them really or not must be wrought only by an infallible person otherwise poor mortals may as well be infected in their minds by the Errors of those that touch them as they are cured in their bodies by their powers 8. There are Prophecies and other divine Dispensations that make way for divine Miracles and the Jews had not been under so great a sin for not embracing Christ for his Miracles had not the Prophecies that went before of him the nature of the Mosaical dispensation to be removed by him the condition of Mankind expecting to be improved by him made it necessary for them to look for such a Thaumaturgh as he was before he came and to believe in him when they saw by his works that he was come Whereas now the state of things being fully completed and we being not to have any Revelations from God until the last day nay being bid by that last and perfect will of God confirmed by Miracles to look for Impostures and Lying Wonders to try our Faith whether we will neglect the Miracles wrought already to gape after new ones but no more true Miracles than those wrought by and his primitive followers to confirm it We need not trouble ourselves so much to find out whether a man that pretends Miracles doth work them or no as conclude such a sudden ungrounded and unwarrantable pretence its self as against the present state of things in the Christian Church where he that looketh for Prodigies true Religion being settled in the World by uncontrolled Miracles is saith St. Augustine a Prodigy himself 9 * Miracles indeed are gratia gratis data but seldom performed by any but such as were at the time of the working of them under the power of gratia gra●um faciens For to what end should God show himself by a wicked man's hand who denycth him in his life Divine Miracles make divine Impressions upon the minds of those that believe them There was no Miracle whereof we have any undoubted record excepting the a Vid. Grotius in 2 Thes. 2. 9 in opusculis or Lying Wonders of Antichrist that come to bring men to the deceivableness of unrighteousness but were wrought to render men more holy to work in men clearer apprehensions of God to overthrow the power of Satan that hid himself amongst Jugglers and Wonder-mongers some thousands of years in the time of men's ignorance to improve humane Nature and those Wonders that have no other effect upon men than to make them talk admire gaze and dispute and pretend nothing more than the saving the little charge of Physician and Chirurgeon are certainly as low in the power that works them as in the design that is aimed at by them And it being a matter of too much curiosity for common heads to inquire into the nature of a Miracle in itself and to know exactly when Nature hath gone in a thing as far as it can and when a supernatural cause raiseth it to what itself cannot do It 's the safest and the only certain way left men in this case not to poor on the thing done but to look to the Agent his design his pretence and see whether the man be likely to do so much good in the World as that God should bear witness to his Person and Proceedings And indeed it is a great help to discern things of this Nature to understand the condition of the people that either practice or promote them and as much as you see of God's goodness impressed on their a Judas might work Miracles and the m●n that Christ knew no● might pretend they head wrought them bu● ne●●ther since they le●t Christ or were cast off by him souls so much of his power you may believe going along with their actions if they savour of no more than ordinary men in the one ye may be sure they are no more than ordinary men in the other And if there be any extraordinary evil principle of looseness to be discerned in their lives there may be suspected as extraordinary an evil principle of juggling in their practices If the vouchers of this practice among us be people of no credit and people that have writ for and maintained the worst practices and cheats that were amongst us these twenty years I need say no more than that in an age wherein from the rash believing of every thing we are come seriously to believe nothing Epicharmus his old Rule will not be unseasonable viz. With which in compliance with the time of night and the importunity of your Messenger I will conclude when I have told you that there are in Spain you know some Soldiers of this Gentleman's profession called Salutators who pretend to heal all sores with a touch the application of white Linen and this form of Per Christum & cum Christo Et in Christo est tibi Deo patri omnipotenti in unitate Spiritus sancti omnis honour & gloria per omnia secula seculorum oremus salutaribus precept is moniti & divina institutione formali audemus dicere Pater noster qui es in Coelis etc. Amen jesus potentia patris sapientia filii virtus spiritus sancti sanet hoc vulnus ab omni malo Amen jesus Domine mi jesu Christ credo quod nocte Jovis Sancti in caena post quam lavastipedes tuorum sanctorum discipulorum accepisti panem sanctissimis manibus suis & benedixisti & fregisti & dedisti tu is sanctis discipulis dicens accipite & comedite hoc enim est corpus meum similiter accepisti calicem in sanctissimas manus & gratias egisti & tradidisti illis dicens accepite & bibite quia hic est meus sanguis novi testamenti qui pro mult is effundetur in remissionem peccaterum hoc quotiescunque feceris facite in meam commorationem obseero te domine milesu Christe ut per haec sanctissima verba & per virtutem illorum & per meritum sanctissimae passionis tuae sanetur hoc vulnus & malum istud A usen jesus in nomine Patris & Filii & Spiritus Sancti Amen jesus And these people though at first allowed because one or two of the first of them seemed to be serious The reason why the Salutators of Spain have been restrained and punished men and men of Estates and because they pretended the public good and took no money are now severely prohibited 1. Because they are a lewd people unlikely to have that Commerce with God they pretend to 2. Because they are but loose and unsettled in Religion and would render others so 3. Because they made the people tempt God to do that by an extraordinary way of Miracles which he had appointed to be done in the ordinary way of means and Physic 4. Because they had seduced people to the neglect of the ordinary means of their preservation to the danger of many people's lives 5. Because they brought the Curse of God upon poor people many having confessed that they perished under the just hand of God for having any thing to do with these Salutators 6. Because they were abetted by desperate men of dangerous principles and practices 7. Because they took the Name of God in vain and abused his Word to superstitious purposes 8. Because they performed no real or lasting cures 9 Because they distracted the people's thoughts Vid. Malleut tract de mortissimis and prepared them for Diabolical illusion and Ma gick 10. Because many of them could do nothing till they had well drunk a pottle of Sack being required to a Miracle when they pretended that they were Inspired and had with them a mad Dog 11. Because they gave occasion to strange discourses about the Miracles of Christ and his followers and so overthrew the great ground of Faith 12. Because they persuaded people to do themselves mischief that they might do cures 13. Because there were several instances brought in of their confederacies impostures and juggles In fine because they did a world of mischief and but little good Because some of them were convicted of familiarity with Satan Because the pretence and cheat by reason of the curiosity of some and necessity of others was spreading because these Miracle-mongers proved at last Atheists Apostates or Heretics because it took people off their callings spending their time in vanities Because some of them were Enthusiastical because they set many others upon unlawful distracting and intolerable courses to attain that gift Because they were mostly men of bad looks Because they took men off their art industry and skill pretending to that in Physic that gifted men do in Divinity both with a design to overthrow the standing Ordinance and order of God All these the Articles against them in the Bishop of Ypres Court and in other Ecclesiastical and civil Courts to be considered by all sober Christians But what need you will say all this when Mr. Stubbs himself in a a Called the Miraculous Conformist Book written in the man's behalf hath sufficiently laid open his pretence for indeea upon perusing that Book I find 1 That the ground b Page the 3. of that Book of this strange attempt is but an Impulse and some chat thereupon between him his Wife and a poor Woman of the Village 2 That the man observing how his stroking c Page 4. was ineffectual upon some Diseases betook himself without any Voice or Impulse to Incision 3 That d Page 4. Dean Rust being solemnly employed by my Lord Conway to bring him from Ireland to the Lady Conway he came and could do her no good 4 That some say his body smells strongly but Mr. Stubbs found it not so which if it did there is nothing extraordinary in the Case 5 That notwithstanding the pretended virtue of his body together with the pinching rubbing and cutting of people's Sores and the people's imagination fermenting the mass of blood spirits and humours wherein lie all the diseases as Mr. Stubbes saith he pretends to cure for he meddleth not with any in whom nature is decayed all that he can do is to ease people a little by Pinching and Rubbing an humour from one place to another which Mr. Stubbes takes some pains to prove Natural Ordinary and not at all Miraculous by many instances e Of the said Pool where he showeth how Nature and Art doth as much as Mr. Greatrates pretendeth to Pag. 18 24. 25. yea and Pag. 14 he concludes that the removing of a distemper from place to place is the effect of Nature invigorated and not of his touch 6. That there are none perfectly healed by him one Gentleman failing because he laid aside his Cap too soon f The Gentleman at my Lord Co●wayes wh●m he Pinched from place to place to no purpose another because the humour settled again into an Aposthume The Maid that was struck dumb by a Poison being able only to cry Ma for mother for all his stroking the Gentlewoman that he went to dispossess of a Devil when she was only troubled with the wind being still troubled with the Colic and the rest of the simple people mentioned in that book finding no other benefit of his rubbing pinching and cutting than a little alteration as they poor people imagine for the present 7. And therefore Mr. Stubbes saith that as he added Lancing and Pinching without any extraordinary Commission to his stroking when he saw it would not do so he added Physic to his Lancing for he saw him apply Eye Salve to one persons Eye and he had leave of him to apply Physic to others after his stroking so dividing the honour of the Gift that Mr. Greatrates touched and Mr. Stubbes Cured And to say no more I find that all that Mr. Stubbes can say for this pretender is that for aught he can guess by a few a Page 4 5. 14. he saith he had not the happiness to converse with him long hours converse with him he may be a Primitive Christian and a conformist though no rigid one that there were formerly Gifts of Healing in the Primitive times which he proves out of I Cor. 12. 4 5. That the cheating Soldiers called Salutators in Spain that Pyrrhus Vespasian Simon Magus Apollonius and other Heathens that some Turks by a Gift left them by Mahomet do feats of the same nature about whom Mr. Stubbes refers us b The substance whereof together with etc. to Delrio who indeed hath written six Books of Magic not to approve as a man would think by Mr. Stubbes his quotation but to discover these Legerdemains And that he finds nothing in what he calls Miracles but what he undertakes to Salve by Natural causes Pag. 18 19 20 21. the effects whereof by reason of the ignorance of some sort of people may seem Miraculous which to others more knowing are ordinary the Sympathetick Cure and others of the same nature may be thought Conjuring by the Vulgar when they are known Physic to Philosophers and therefore when I have entreated you to pardon the mistakes of a Letter that I have not time to Read over I conclude that though you and other Reverend Persons may think charitably the man means no hurt all men confess as well as our Society that he can do no good March the 13 th' 1665. FINIS