THE TRANSLATOR TO THE CATHOLICK PROTESTANT, AND PAPAL READER.

Catholick Christian,
I Need not desire of you,
not to be offended at the
Popery in this Book as
I my self were because
being Catholick, you
have received the Vnction that teacheth
you all things. And you know what in
the Babel or Confusion of Articles of
Faith, Rights, Religious Customs, Institutions
and Ceremonies, hath been from
the Spirit of Christ, and now used or

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rather abused by the Spirit of Antichrist;
as likewise what hath been solely
from the spirit of Antichrist, and never
made use of by the Spirit of Christ.
Protestant Christian Reader, be not
offended as I were lest you lose the profit
of this Treatise, as I had like to have
done; you will meet with much Popery,
and more Christianity, you may for all
me condemn the former, so you do it
knowingly; but prize the latter, for it is
in this little Treatise as Savoury, as
Fragrant, and as well Seasoned with
Salt, as almost in any Treatise which
hath been since the Apostles time.
For the Popery in this Treatise, there
want not those that say, that the most of
it is spurious, and father'd upon this highly
illuminated Person, that under his
Name it may have the better reputation.
Martin Luther the great and valiant
Witness against Popish Tyranny
and Superstition gives this Author the
Title of a Prophet, calling him Homo
Dei, The Man of God. And our devout
Martyrologist, Mr. J. Fox, reckons him
among those, who to use his own words
stood in open defence of Truth against the
disordered Church of Rome.
Popish Christian Reader, do not
boast that this greatly illuminated Theologist,
was a Son of your Church, the
People of God may be Captives in Babylon;
and your Church with its enumerable
Doctrines, Rights and Ceremonies, is no
better if it be voyd of the Spirit of Christ.
What ever Doctrins, Rights and Institutions,
the Spirit of Christ hath brought
forth in the World, the same Spirit can
only teach the profitable use of them; he
that practiseth them without the guidance
and illumination of that Spirit, practiseth
nothing but Bodily Exercise & Will-Worship,
which profiteth not. This holy
Author exhorts you not to exercise your
selves according to your own will in rigorous
Fastings, Penances, Processions,
Pilgrimages, and the like, but to resign
your selves to the guidance and direction
of the Holy Spirit of Christ, which shall

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exercise you infinitely more profitably
than if you should enjoyn your selves in
your own Will and Resolution, all the Rigours
and Hardships, even of all the
Saints. But you will say, holy Church
enjoyns us such and such Rights. That
Church that labours not mainly and
chiefly, that Children may be born unto
God, of Water and of the Spirit; and afterwards
instructs such new born Children
in the exercise of this their new Life;
instructing them in Rights conducing
thereto; doth no better than those, that
should take not Children, but Apes to instruct
in humane Arts and Sciences. He
that cometh not to know the inward Cross
and how to submit to it, and take it up
dayly, and thereby grow in the knowledge
of the Mysteries of it; in vain doth
he bow to an outward Cross of Wood or
Stone, creep unto it, kiss it, say his Prayers
before it, or bear it upon his back. If
these things be any thing, it is because
they are Figurative and Significative of
the Mystery of the inward Cross: if they
teach not, nor express that, they are meerly
Bodily Labour and Will-Worship. The
like may be said of most of the Romish
Rights and Institutions, but it would be
too tedious to use many Instances. But
to conclude, if we did all learn to sink
into that profound Humility, Self-denial,
and Self-Inanition, which is every
where taught in this Treatise, we might
thereby even in enumerable things be advantaged;
whereof two or three I will
reckon and conclude.
First, We may hereby come to be Divinely
touched from above, and illuminated
by the Spirit of God, so as to be
able to see clearly what were the Doctrins,
Rights, Institutions, and Ceremonies,
which the said Spirit taught the
Primitive Church, before the removal
of the Candlesticks; or hath since taught
his Church in the Wilderness: and contrariwise
what hath been brought in by
the spirit of Error, Confusion, and of Antichrist.
And Secondly, We might see that
spirit of Wrath, Fury, and bloody Discord,
about Doctrines, Rights and Ceremonies,
which hath a long while raged in
the Christian World, be clearly discovered,
hated, and banished.
And Lastly, We might begin to discern
the new Jerusalem make preparation
to descend from Heaven; which will
put a Period to all the Miseries and Sufferings
of Gods faithful Ones, and begin
their everlasting day of Happiness, Joy,
and Peace: Which the Lord in great
Compassion hasten.
Farewel heartily.