A. No, by no means: The Party is neither the Worse, for having Ill men in it, nor the Better, for Good. For whatever the Members are, the Party is a Confederacy; as being a Combination, against the Law.
Q. But a man may Mean honestly, and yet perhaps ly under some Mistake. Can any man help his Opinion?
A. A man may Mean well, and Do Ill; he may shed Innocent Bloud, and think he does God good Service. 'Tis True: A man cannot help Thinking; but he may help Doing: He is Excusable for a Private Mistake, for That's an Error only to himself; but when it comes once to an Overt Act, 'tis an Usurpation upon the Magistrate, and there's no Plea for't.
Q. You have no kindnesse, I perceive, for a Dissenting Protestant; but what do you think of a bare Protestant without any Adjunct?
A. I do look upon Such a Protestant to be a kind of an Adjective Noun-Substantive; It requires something to be joyn'd with it, to shew its Signification. By Protestancy in General is commonly understood a Separation of Christians from the Communion of the Church of Rome: But to Oppose Errors, on the One hand, is not Sufficient, without keeping our selves Clear of Corruptions, on the Other. Now it was the Reformation, not the Protestation, that Settled us upon a true Medium betwixt the two Extreams.
Q. So that you look upon the Protestation, and the Reformation, it seems, as two several things.
A. Very right; But in such a manner only, that the Former, by Gods Providence, made way for the Other.
Q. But are not all Protestants Members of the Reformed Religion?
A. Take notice, First, that the Name came Originally from the Protestation in 1529. against the Decree of Spires; and that the Lutheran Protestants and Ours of the Church of England, are not of the Sam Communion. Now Secondly; If you take Protestants in the Latitude with our Dissenters, they are not so much a Religion, as a Party; and whoever takes this Body of Dissenters for Members of the Reformed Religion sets up a Reformation of a hundred and fifty Colours and as may [sic] Heresies. The Anabaptists, Brownists, Antinomians, Familists, &c. do all of them set up for Dissenting Protestants; but God forbid we should ever enter these People upon the Roll of the Reformation.
Q. Well! but what do you think of Protestant Smith and Protestant Harris?