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While researching my books on William and Mary Dyer, and my 2018 book on Anne Hutchinson, I found many books, images, and ballads from their time period, the early- and mid-17th century.
This broadsheet, basically a paper periodical of the day, was written by an unknown author and published in 1647, during the English Civil Wars. The ECW had begun over royal authority (the divine rights of kings) and religious upheaval and reformation that had been fomenting for a hundred years, with the Puritan faction coming into the majority.
The author commends the worthy and pious Parliament, which was a different strain of Puritan than the zealous ministers and their flocks who emigrated to New England and formed a theocracy.
Anne Hutchinson and her followers, including William and Mary Dyer, were called by their Puritan contemporaries libertines, familists, and antinomians.
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A catalogue of the severall sects and opinions in England and
other nations
With a briefe rehearsall of their false and dangerous
tenents.
[London]: Printed by R.A., 1647. |
Jesuite.
By hellish wiles the States to
ruine bring,
My Tenents are to murder Prince
or King:
If I obtaine my projects, or
seduce,
Then from my Treasons I will let
them loose:
And since the Roman Papall State
doth totter,
I'le frame my sly-conceits to
worke the better.
Socinian.
By cunning art my way's more
nearly spun,
Although destructive to
profession;
Obscuring truths, although
substantiall,
To puzle Christians or to make
them fall:
That precious time may not be
well improv'd,
Ile multiply strange notions for
the lewd.
Arminian.
Would any comfortlesse both live
and die?
Let him learne free wills great
uncertaintie:
Salvation that doth unmov'd
remaine,
Arminian Logick would most
maintaine,
And faith that's founded on a firme
decree,
Is plac't by them to cause
uncertaintie.
Arrian.
What they dare to deny,
Christians know,
Christ God and Man, from whom
their comforts flow,
'Tis sad, that Christians dive by
speculation,
Whereby they loose more sweeter
contemplation:
Where Christian practice acts the
life of grace,
There's sweet content to run in
such a race.
Adamite.
Hath Adams sin procur'd his naked
shame,
With leaves at first that thought
to hide his staine?
Then let not Adamites in secret
dare
Aparent sinfull acts to spread;
but feare,
Since Adams sin hath so defil'd
poore dust,
Cast from this Paradise by wicked
lust.
Libertine.
A pish at sin and open violation,
By wilfull lust, deserves just
condemnation:
Repentance, though a Riddle, this
Ile say,
Thou must unfold the same or
perish aye.
Then least this holy Law thou yet
dost sleight,
Shall presse thee one day with a
dreadfull weight.
Antiscripturian.
By cursed words and actions to
gainsay
All Scripture-truth, that ought
to guide thy way,
Without all question, were it in
thy power,
Thou would it all sacred Rules at
once devoure:
Poor man, forbear, thou striv'st
but all in vaine,
Since all mans might shall but
confirme the same.
Soule-sleeper.
That soules are mortall, some
have dar'd to say,
And by their lives, this folly
some bewray;
Whilst (like the beast) they only
live to eat,
In sinfull pleasures wast their
time and state:
Meantime forgetting immortality,
To woe or joy for all eternity.
Anabaptist.
Poore men contrive strange
fancies in the braine,
To cleanse that guilt which is a
Leopard staine:
'Tis but a fain'd conceit,
contended for,
Since water can but act its
outward matter:
Regenerate, new-born; these babes
indeed
of watry Elements have little
need.
Familists.
Were all things Gospell that H.N.
bath said,
A strange confused worke were
newly laid:
A perfect state, like Adams, is
pretended,
Whilst out wardly each day God is
offended:
No Sabboth, but alike all daies
shall be,
If Familists may have their
Liberty.
Seeker.
All Ordinances, Church and
Ministry,
The Seeker that hath lost his
beaten way,
Denies: for miracles he now doth
waite,
Thus glorious truths reveal'd are
out of date:
Is it not just such men should
alwaies doubt
Of clearest truths, in Holy Writ
held out.
Divorcer.
To warrant this great Law of
Separation,
And make one two, requires high
aggravation:
Adultry onely cuts the
Marriage-knot,
Without the which Gods Law
allowes it not.
Then learn to seperate from sin
that's common,
And man shall have more Comfort
from a woman.
Pelagian.
What Adams state had been with
out a fall,
Is but presumption to contend
withall:
But Adams state of deprivation
Profits by serious meditation;
Men it keep backe, Christ's all
in all to all,
Then live by faith obedientiall.
Separatist or
Independent.
The Saints Communion Christians
do professe,
Most necessary to the life of
grace,
But whilst some shrowd them by
this bare notion,
Condemning all the rest for
Antichristian,
Preferring much confused sad
destraction:
They thus disturb a settlement in
the Nation.
Antinomians.
Under this name shrowds many
desperate
Destroying Doctrines,
unregenerate,
Expresse opposing grace in its
true power,
And glories lustre some do much
abhor;
Repentance and obedience are
condemn'd,
And rarest Christian duties much
contemned.
Anti-Sabbatarian.
This curst opinion long hath been
on foot,
A Christian Sabboth from our Isle
to root:
When for base pleasures or curst
recreation,
On Lords daies duties lost by
prophanation,
Divine example hints
sufficiently,
A first daies Sabboths full
Authority.
Anti-Trinitarians.
That dare to search into the
Trinity,
And in divine distinctions much
to pry:
Christs humane nature they would
dare to staine,
As ours by Adams guilt, but all
in vaine:
Then let's beware, least diving
thus too far,
We leese our love, and much
increase sad jar.
Apostolicks,
That now expect a new revealed
way,
Unknowne in Scripture, they have
dar'd to say,
Beyond the way of usuall
dispensation
Guifts infallible with
Revelation,
And miracles againe with
Ministry,
Thus men are lost, when they too
far do pry.
Thraskites.
The Jewish Sabboth these would
have remaine,
As warrantable by command most
plaine:
But since the Priest and
sacrifice are ceast,
That Sabboth Judaicall is
decreast:
The Lords daies ravishment
divinely is
Confirm'd by Practice which
unerring is.
Hetheringtonians.
That Englands Church is false do
firmely hold,
What truths are therein taught
deny thus bold
Without true ground, there's many
yet that say
As much as these that erre and go
astray:
Oh could we keep within a
Christian bound,
That should such sad division not
be found.
The Tatians
In what time that Eusebius lived,
have
All Pauls Epistles dar'd reject
and have
The Acts of the Apostles ser at
nought,
Thus strange opinions have
confusion brought:
Not far from those are some now
in our daies,
That leave the Word and act
contrary waies.
The Marchionites.
All Matthew, Marke, and Iohns
divine
Most sacred Writ, these Gospels
trine,
Tertullian doth report, rejected
were,
By this strange Sect, thus
heretofore:
As now we see, division greatly
spread,
And from the bounds of practice
get a head.
WE read how that
in the last daies many false Prophets shall arise, and many shall say, Loe here
is Christ, loe there is Christ, and shall deceive many, 2 Pet. 2.1. there were
false Prophets also among the people, as there shall bee false teachers among
you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that
bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction, therefore we had need
to be established in the truth, as in 1 Cor. 16.13. stand fast in the faith, 1 Pet.
5.9. whom resist stedfast in the faith, 1 Joh. 2.23. Let that therefore abide
in you which yee have heard from the beginning, and yee shall continue in the
Sonne and in the Father; Vers. 25. These things I have written unto you,
concerning them that seduce you. Many, strange Sects and Opinions are held
amongst us, so that it is to be feared, that what rule soever our wise and
honourable Parliament shall establish it will not content the unquiet spirits
of a lawlesse generation, which would have no rule; for set any Rule in the
Church they will call it persecution, and they say they dislike some things
commanded because they are Imposed.
Some there are that looke for a Temporall
Kingdome of Christ, that shall last a thousand years this opinion is most
dangerous for all States, for they teach that all the ungodly must be killed,
and that the wicked have no propriety in their estates. Others out of confidence
that they are ruled by the spirit, despite all ordinary calling to the
Ministry, all written prayers, all helps of study: Some make no conscience to
heare and sing Psalms, but rather follow their own inventions, as he that would
not believe the sun because it went not with his watch: Likewise this ordinary
saying of theirs; Be in Christ and sin if thou canst; meaning, that regenerate
men cannot sinne; this is the Doctrine of the Anabaptists: also that to receive
the Communion with a prophane person, is to partake of his sinne; that the
Lords Prayer was never taught to be said; that the Gospell was never purely
taught since the Apostles times; that a liberty of Prophecying must be allowed;
that all humane Lawes must be abolished; that Ministers of Gods Word should
rule both the Spirituall and the Temporall; that distinction of Parishes is
Antichristian.
Should these absurd and grosse opinions take place, what
division and confusion would they work amongst us? but such is the wisdome and
care of our worthy and pious Parliament, to provide an Ordinance for preventing
of the growing and spreading of heresie.
