The Wisdom of the Law will not suffer any Man to Exercise a Trade that
he has not serv’d his Time to; and a Body would think that the Reason
of this Provision should hold as well in Divinity, as in Manual Crafts,
for _Revelations_ at this time of the Day, are as much out of Date as
_Miracles_. This Comical Whimsie may serve in General for a Reproof to
Bold and Ignorant Pretenders in matters that they do not Understand;
and so to those also that Confidently Usurp upon other Mens Provinces,
without any Right or call to the Function. What are the Freaks in fine,
of these _Religionaries_, but Fits of the _Spleen_, and the Fumes of a
Dark Melancholy, Cover’d under the name and pretence of Divine Gifts
and Graces? They’ll Cap ye _Texts_, as School-Boys Cap _Verses_; and in
Defiance of all the Extraordinary Cases, the Figures, Types, Allegories,
and Parables that are so frequent in Holy Writ, every thing must be
Understood too, as the Doctor has Turn’d it here upon the _Vint’ner_ and
the _Botcher_, according to the _Letter_. They’ll draw ye a Warrant for
the Murdering of Kings, from the Example of _Ahab_ and _Benhadad_. An
Authority for _Couzening_ their Neighbours, from the _Israelites Robbing
the Egyptians_. In One Word, they shall Overturn all the Principles of
Human Society, Morality, and Religion it self, and shew ye a Text for’t:
And upon the whole Matter, what is the Conscience of these People more at
last, then _Fancy_ and _Illusion_? They Contend for they know not what,
like the Two Fellows that went to Loggerheads about their Religion; the
One was a _Martinist_ he said; the other said that all _Martinists_ were
_Hereticks_, and for his part he was a _Lutheran_: Now the Poor Wretches
were both of a Side, and Understood it not. As for the Bus’ness of
Learning and Common Sense, they call it _the Wisdom of this World_, and
effectually make it a Heavenly Grace to be an Egregious Coxcomb. There
was an Honest Simple Tradesman, wonderfully Earnest with the Parson of
the Parish to know what the _Forbidden Fruit_ was; as if there had been
no more in’t, then whether ’twas a _Kentish_ or a _Kirton Pippin_. The
Good Man told him, that it was an _Apple_, and that _Adam_’s Eating of
it, brought all his Posterity under a Sentence of Condemnation. T’other
said, it was so hard a Case, that in reverence to the Divine Mercy,
he thought himself bound to question the whole Story. This Liberty of
Retailing Divinity by the Letter, is the very Root of Infidelity and of
all Heresies, nay of Atheism it self. For when people have been Beating
their Brains about a Difficulty, and find they can make Nothing _on’t_,
they are apt to think there’s Nothing _in’t_; for the _Mystery’s_ Lost to
Him that stands Poring only upon the _Letter_.