An humble apology for non-conformists with modest and serious reflections on the Friendly debate…

Quest. 1. Whether or no you might not with as much reason, and more charity, have produced Testimonies out of the Large Annotations, Printed in the year 1651. to clear Nonconformists from temporizing, and conniving at Sacrilege, as you have done the Omissions you charge them withal in the Edition of 1646, to prove ⟨p. 148⟩them guilty. And sure I am, if you had pleased to search, you might have found in the Last Edition, their dislike of Sacrilege in their Notes on Prov. 20.25. It is a snare to the man who devoureth that which is holy. That is, say the Annotations, to apply it, or take it to his own use, which was appointed to Gods: yea, to go about to do it by inquiring how the Vow might be made void. As also on Acts 5.1. in the case of Ananias and Sapphira, they declare plainly and fully against Sacrilege as followeth. The scope of this History is to show how odious to God that perfidiousness is, which counterfeiting Sanctity, would impose upon God, as if He saw not what men do; for otherwise (Ananias giving a part, had been commendable) so great a mischief is Hypocrisy, so dangerous the perversion of an Holy purpose, and the with-drawing of things Consecrated to the Churches use (though by himself who gave) that the Sacrilegious perished by detaining a part of that whole which he would seem to give. — If he that taketh from the Church but a little of that which was his own, be Sacrilegious & struck dead for the same, what punishment will the same Divine Justice lay on him, who by fraud or violence taketh away the Possessions wherewith other men endowed the Church?

Quest. 1. Whether or no you might not with as much reason, and more charity, have produced Testimonies out of the Large Annotations, Printed in the year 1651. to clear Nonconformists from temporizing, and conniving at Sacriledge, as you have done the Omissions you charge them withal in the Edition of 1646, to prove ⟨p. 148⟩them guilty. And sure I am, if you had pleased to search, you might have found in the Last Edition, their dislike of Sacriledge in their Notes on Prov. 20.25. It is a snare to the man who devoureth that which is holy. That is, say the Annotations, to apply it, or take it to his own use, which was appointed to Gods: yea, to go about to do it by inquiring how the Vow might be made void. As also on