largest Magnitude must needs amount to a Redemption from death Righteousness saith the Text delivereth from death But the want of this Righteousness is as Death to those that want it and their usual both Temporal and Spiritual overthrow Vespasian asked Apallonius what was Nero's overthrow Nero said he could touch and tune the Harp well but would sometimes screw up the Pins too high sometimes too low And this ill-tuned Harp a Heart tun'd too high or too low like the Harp of Nero is the almost Epidemick overthrow They thereby usually perish that have it and are the cause that others perish I shall but present this perfect pattern of a wel-tuned Harp The man wounded by Thieves wanted help There was res rect a in se right in itself The good Samaritan the best Harper considering that Incomplex-right made it Complex took care to know it and to conform his Will and work to that known right They that are so busse as to pass by that which is right to others or take no due notice of it have not the Harps of David but Nabals voice Folly is with them be they never so wise or Learned But God would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the Truth 1 Tim. 2.4 God therefore as the greatest meroy to fallen Man and Saints revolted hath promised to call raise and draw them by the delicious harmony of the Harps of God that so they hearing his call may come to the knowledge of the truth and be saved For Truth is the Door of Life and Knowledge the Key to open it Knowledge of the Truth is twofold In Theory In Practice Theorical knowledge chiefly from Scripture as its Fountain is the knowledge of sound Doctrine Practick Knowledge is the Knowledge of that which is right in it self and due to be done to every man The first is opposite to Heresie The second opposeth Heathenism and Hypocrisie The first serveth to acquire a Form of Godliness The second conduceth to procure the practice and power of it The first is the Extrinse ground of Faith The second is the fruit and proof of Faith and the immediate Foundation of all good manners The Object of the first is Janua Doctrinae Truth in Doctrine The Object of the second is Janua justitiae Truth in practice Both are the Key or Means to Men Saints and Sects to come to the Door of Life that they may be saved without both can none come They that read not the Scriptures nor hear them read or seek not diligently to understand them by reading such Books or hearing such Teachers as fitly unfold them come not to the knowledge of the Truth Therefore such slothful Professors that would be saved by a Faith Implicit or wanting practice come not to the Door of Truth that they may be saved For God would have all men to be saved by a Regular means in a rational way and come to the knowledge of the Truth truth in Doctrine Truth in Practice without which they cannot be saved He that will come to the knowledge of the Truth must try all things Try all things saith the Text 1 Thes 5.21 Jacob wrastled with God by prayer all night not without much corporal labour prevailed and obtained the blessing So they that would come to the knowledge of the truth must not only wrastle with God by Prayer but expect to take serious pains in trying all things that they may find that which is pleasing to God and profitable to men Which Beroean-disquisition is the greatest pleasure to such as are sincere but a burden to base minds Heathens and Hypocrites Therefore Few find the strait-Gate the door of Life by coming to the knowledge of the Truth because they wrastle not like Jacob with God by Prayer nor take the pains to try all things But If Prayer without Pains will procure it many will not want this blessing But De Caelo ignavis precibus Deus ipse repugnat God resists the slothful though they make many prayers Hence we may demand why such Sects Jews Papists Turks c. and many Formal Professors so long abide in their blind Schisms and fruitless Formalities The Answer is almost as Obvious as the demand easie They count it Sacriledge to try their own Tenents Filthy Heathens hold it the highest Profaneness and so do Formalists and Hypocrites to examine what themselves mis-suppose to be true Religion But Sola nobilitas est unica virtus Virtus consist it in actione Actio virtutis est disquisitio veritatis None are noble but who try all things to find the Truth Ther 's no Nobility but what 's faithfully and soberly disquisitive A second Answer to the same demand may be this Therefore Sects Saints and Nations are so far from agreeing and so ready to make and maintain Divisions Because these Harpers that by their exemplary practice shall appease their Rage scarce yet appear to be the presidents those predicted first-fruits for others to follow Samuel's sons the Text sayes not they knew not the Law but walked not in his wayes turned aside after lucre took bribes perverted judgment They gave no good examples for others to follow Samuel was sufficient to teach his sons the knowledge of the Truth in the Doctrine of Faith and manners but they were so wicked that they would not learn to know that particular Truth that attends upon practice for which cause they were cast out and their Government translated For men may and many do attain to the knowledge of the Truth in the Doctrine of Faith and Manners and may add the greatest Gifts and Parts to the strictest Profession and soundest Doctrine and yet never come to the knowledge of the Truth to be saved but remain as Eli's sons did men of Belial and most wicked if they seek not to come to the knowledge of the Truth that particular Truth that attends upon practice That is If they do not duly consider that right and mercy that is due to be done and that they may do it to every man For the doers only of the truth in practice and not the sayers hearers or knowers of the Truth in Doctrine are justified and accepted in Gods sight But it 's the common practice of many strict Professors of Locusts and Hypocrites especially and too much of true Saints to take competent pains to come to the knowledge of the Truth in the Doctrine of Faith But to the knowledge of the Truth in practice they come not or scarce come They have hired Farms or are busie in seeking perhaps to come to the knowledge of the Truth in the Doctrine of Faith without regard to the knowledge of it in practice whereby they may be saved and by which true conviction and peace may be procured to all people Lastly Supercilious Pride surpasseth all other means that most oppose the peace of Men Sects and Nations Who is David sayes Nabal who 's the Son of Jesse Nabals folly might further thus plead I
were sealed I answer Their Title teacheth us the causes of their being so called They are called The first-fruits it seems because they are to be the first after the grand Apostacy that shall bring forth fruits of more visible and conspicuous Obedience to God and good Works to Men And the 144000 in the 7th Chapter to the 9th vers the Church sealed were for different or contrary causes not called The first-fruits To wit Because they during the time of the grand Apostacy ' did not bring forth fruits of such visible obedience to God nor good works so apparent to Men For such as the Tree is such is the Fruit but that Numerus sigillatus was the sealed Church And such must her fruits be sealed works of necessity For a Book or Letter sealed is scarce at all legible And such is the love and works of that sealed Church There 's little exemplariness in her practice for others to follow Her works so weak are they so over-grown with Weeds of evil Manners are scarce at all manifest But the fruits of these first-fruits cannot but be manifest must of necessity be signally manifest because they shall have the Name of God written in their foreheads And their works wrought in a quadruplex conformity after the Pattern of the good Samaritan their grand Exemplar shall be that Name of God written in their foreheads exemplary and legible to all Ages and Nations I do not absolutely state the Epoche of the sealed Church at the Commencement of the 1000 years about the beginning of the reign of Constantius the first For they are said to come out of great tribulations which is more truly intended of their Conscript Antitype vers 14. Howbeit They did then begin to come out of those tribulations when the first Dragon began to fall Therefore Their Epoche of being sealed might seem to begin then But if they begun to be sealed as 't is likely they might at the beginning of the fall of the first Dragon Then they were at first that Woman in Heaven clothed with the Sun c. Ch. 12.1 And the same Church that triumphed over that false-accusing first Dragon in these words Now is come salvation and strength and the Kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ For the accuser of our brethren is scast down vers 10. From that time her Graces decayed till after 400 when she fell from Heaven and fled into the wilderness vers 1 6 14. After that time she retained a great part though ftill decaying of her Primitive integrity for above 800 years Then her Graces grew still weaker till they were almost wasted and near quite spent For Abraham put Bread and a bottle of Water upon Hagars shoulder and sent her away with her son She wandered in the Wilderness till the water was spent and the Child ready to perish for whom she lifted up her voice and wept But God opened her eyes to see a Well of Water and she gave the Lad drink and he revived So the Righteousness and Graces of the sealed Church are like Hagars bottle of Water She also hath wandered in the Wilderness above 1200 years till her bottle is almost spent Well may her Children and she both ready to perish sit down and weep But the Name of God written in her and their foreheads shall be a Fountain of living Waters to revive both her and them For it is not an empty crackling of Thorns in a formal profession nor the vain blaze of foolish Virgins half-performances nor litigious contradiction nor bold confidence in blind obedience nor the stony-grounds shallow superficies of found Doctrine and practice like it nor Lo here nor Lo there nor the Witnesses weak and that also now expiting Sackcloth-Prophesie that can support the Gospel-Church whiles she herself is shivered into Schisms and Subdivisions brought to the brink of the Grave and her Righteousness that should sustain her almost spent Wherefore A necessity a necessity urgent and indispensible even comples the Gospel-Church and all Ministers and Magistrates to ask of God to open their eyes that they may see the life-redeeming River of apparent Righteousness and do as Hagar and her son did Drink and not dye That is That they may find what that sacred Name of God in the foreheads of his servants shall be and seek to have it fairly transcribed in their own that so they may be a part of those first-fruits redeemed from the Earth vers 3 4. We must therefore give all diligence to make this sacred Name of God sure to our selves to know what that life-redeeming Righteousness is and how to work it But how shall we know how to work it without a pattern A pattern a perfect Patern is and hath been long wanting upon Earth where then shall we find it We must seek the Patern in the Mount And I looked and lo a Lamb stood upon Mount Sion and with him an hundred forty and four thousand having his Fathers Name written in their fore-heads Chap. 14.1 There 's the pattern in the Mount and he that holds it forth The Name of God written and the Writer of it That Lamb was a light to the sealed-Church at least for about a thousand years Ch. 20.4 But to the Conscript-Church he shall be a Temple in her a Pattern to her not for a thousand years but unto all ensuing Ages Not by any corporal presence but by the abundance of the Graces of his Spirit When he was Corporally present on Earth he was called in scorn by the Pharisees a Samaritan and was indeed that good Samaritan that left the best Pattern upon Scripture Record of perfect Righteousness to all posterity And first Jesus said A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among Theeves which stripped him of his Raiment and wounded him and departed leaving him half dead And by chance there came down a certain Priest that way and when he saw him he passed by And likewise a Levite when he was at the place came and looked on him and passed by on the other side But a certain Samaritan as he journeyed came where he was And when he saw him he bad compassion on him and went to him and bound up his wounds pouring in Oyl and Wine and set him on his own Beast brought him to an Inn and took care of him and said to the Host Take care of him c. Luke 10.30 to 38. Saw him Not only the man but that which was right in it self and due to be done For the Priest and Levite passing by saw him but would not see to do what was right Their seeing him signified nothing So the Children of the Son of perdition see their neighbour So the sealed and true Saints commonly see their Brother Their seeing signifies little Inanimadvertency next to Avarice if not before it is the root of all evil in the body of the Apostacy of Antichrist But the wounded Man wanted speedy help There
This is not the way of his coming nor could he come this way This is via non satis deceptiva There 's not deceit enough in such open enormities to deceive the Nations This had been the way to deceive none and to be seen of all Had he come this way not of deceit but apparent wickedness he had not laid his foundation of fraud in his misapplyed Tu es Petrus had not had power to pull down the Primitive Church nor to assume her proprieties and priviledges to himself to build his Apostacy therewith in her place Nor could he have drawn the Nations those that dwelt upon the Earth saith the Text nor the Primitive Church her self to be the Burgers of his new built City had he come with open hostility profaneness and gross Heresies This had been the way to affright her and them and to make both fly from his presence as the Church then also did from the face of the Serpent or second Dragon ch 12.14 For Such professed hostility open profaneness and gross Herefie best befits the Pseudoprophetick superintendent of Antichrist sensual seated in Spiritual Sodom and her head that Dragon who about the year 407 came not like this Bicorn Lamb-like builder with all deceivableness but with open violence armies of gross Hereticks Heathens and Arrians to kill the Church and her witnesses or to cause her saith the Text to be carryed away of the flood To wit By that flood of Military Forces vers 15. wherewith he vanquished Rome Imperial That so neither she nor any part of her being quite carryed away might be ever seen any more Therefore He did not deceive and draw her by fraud but by force drave her to fly with two wings of a great Eagle as into her subterfuge into this Tripolity of deceit which the false Prophets hands had constituted or was in constituting of it of ten Nations For That City of deceit and persecution but of her preservation from corporal and total destruction by that second Dragon the Text calls Her place prepared of God ch 21.6 And the woman fled into the wilderness where she hath a place prepared of God that they should feed her there 1260 dayes The same place and the same time is set down the second time in the same Chapter vers 14. For Though the False Prophet by Gods permission built this ten-fold City of Apostacy yet it was a place prepared of God for the purpofe aforesaid To wit To preserve his Church not from all persecution but from a total destruction by the rage of the second Dragon from whose face the Church then fled for 1260 years ver 14. For the false Prophet built that City a City both of affliction and refuge to the flying Church But God gave him power all power into his hands to crect that Decalabyrinth of errour Whose coming is with all power saith the Apostle 2 Thes 2.9 He shall wear out well nigh wear out the Saints of the most high and think to change times and Laws and they shall be given into his hands the Laws of power or all power as it were by a Law shall be given into his hand for three times and an half or 1260 years to be a refuge as well as a scourge to the Church so long Dan. 7.25 For as God prepared a Fish and that Fish to be a place for flying Jonah not as a Tombe to interre him in lasting oblivion but as a Womb to preserve him for a future birth to a better life So God prepared Rome Papal with her Sects for his flying Church as a womb to preserve her from perishing and for a future production of her to a far better reviction And the Woman fled into the wilderness into her place prepared of God where she is nourished for 1260 dayes from the face of the Serpent Apocal. 12.6.14 The time in Type and Antitype and how God prepared Rome Papal with her Sects to be a place to preserve his Church for 1260 years from perishing by the second Dragon we shall shew afterwards And therefore Male creditur Hosti It s dangerous trusting to Turkes and Mahumetants the main continued stem and Off-spring of this second Dragon For though they pretend to some slavish allowance of liberty to Christians and Sects for which some Sects and wicked professors wish them before Papists and indeed above others more Orthodox it may be undoubtedly expected That had they the power absolute in their own hands over all Christians they would Massacre all as they did formerly in Spain for the very name of Christ For so their like Pagano-arrian predecessors at the ingress of this second Dragon about 407 came with flood-like armies and with full purposes to destroy utterly the Gospel Church But The false Prophet came with all deceivableness Laid his foundation of deceit pulled down Church priviledges and built his Decapolite state of Apostacy under a strict and specious pretence of the Catholick and Apostolick Faith confirmed by many dreadful false Miracles and in shew of all meekness as being the servant of the servants of God and the tender Father of all the Fathers of the Church when all was nothing but a strongly deluding fraud in a superficial affected shallow knowledge and profession fruitful only in persecution and in bringing evil reports upon the best men then living A knowledge and profession casting the imputation of innovations upon their antient Catholick and most solid Truths as in the examples of the sixth Council of Carthage Saint Basil Jerom Augustine and others And calling their own Innovations Antient and Catholick Truths and Customes So Innocent the first did about his pretended antient right of Supremacy in his Epistles to the Bishop of Roan Augustine and others You have saith he to Saint Augustine had due regard of the Apostolick honour I say of him who hath the care and charge of all Churches in asking advice of him in these perplexities and intricate causes following therein the antient Canon which you know as well as my self to have ever been observed in all the world And yet Augustine and the sixth Council of Carthage clearly proved this his pretence of an antient and Catholick practice in all the world to be a notorious and remarkable lie in those four first Fabers of the Apostacy To wit Innocent Zosimus Boniface and Caelestin For The Son of perdition in all his Sects and Off-spring seeks seeks diligently to suppress solid truth and sincere obedience by casting the lying Imputation of innovation upon it and to preferre a shallow fruitless knowledge in a proud careless covetous practive as antient Catholick and Apostolick Thus he cast down the power of the Primitive Church and built his Apostacy in her place That is the Bicorn Seer by deceit by all possible deceivableness built this City And as the bands of the blinded Syrians sent to Dothan came instead of it to Samaria so these ten Nations with the Dragons floodlike armies or they
Apostate in Manners was laid in the Ballance and found wanting wantinng in the weight of her former graces in the worth of her first works She fell from being most fruitful in well doing to be a Cage of every hateful Bird Therefore Her plagues came in one day Death Mourning Famine Fire c. I might produce many Presidents As the fall of Pharaoh's servants Sodom Jerusalem And indeed all places and persons that have perished have had this levity of Judgement and works the cause of their perdition Therefore It requires our speedy disquisition to find out what this dangerous levity that brings such swift destruction is that we may with all diligent care avoid it and find out that substantial Gold of sound Judgement and sincere Obedience which shall be subordinate to Christ the Rock of safety to Ages and support of all Princes and people Levity in love and Works is Sensual Earthly and Devilish And first Sensual Sensual Professors filthy Sodomites make substantial Truth sober Advice and sincere Obedience matters of extream Laughter So Lot seemed to his Sons in Law as one that mocked or made sport And this makes all their sins so far incorrigible These Professors though they scarce can be so called can condemn any man O horrendum bestiale before they hear him any Book before they read it and the Grounds of their such solid Judgements is their trivial Levity of lavish petulancy Sodom 't is not said she gave no Alms strengthened not by giving the hands of the poor And her Antitype Such Sodomites do the same give perhaps but by giving strengthen not the needy These men grow daily as they grow in years not in Grace but Wit And that Wit is only extream Folly These wild Beasts are but sensless Risibilists and their Judgements and Works so light that they are not worth the weighing of them But God will lay them and their works as he did revelling Belshazzar in his ballance Secondly The Judgements and works of Earthly-minded Professors seeming more solid are much lighter Their levity is less seen and longer before it be discerned So Pilate heard and examined seemed duly to examine our blessed Saviour found no fault in him and then through Earthly Interests condem'nd him to be put to death whereas filthy Sodomites professors sensual are not fit nor able to examine any man searce with any appearance of Sedulity Their volatile petulancy and levity of folly permits them not to be so serious or industrious Or if they have so much sobriety as to examine any man and find him faultless they are not usually so wicked with Pilate and secular Professors as to condemn him For it is not so much Sensual as Covetous and Earthly Interests that tend to condemn the Truth in deed and the witnesses thereof to Death Their Doom the Sentence of Men Earthly-minded falls far above the bolts of filthy Sodomites heavier upon the Truth and the Witnesses of it at last though they seem greatly to favour both at first For their levity of Love and Works being less seen is longer before it be discerned So Judas was Earthly-minded a thief saith the Text long before he was found out nor was he perceived by the Apostles for about 1260. dayes but then that Type-Son of Perdition and the Mystery of Iniquity in him was revealed His love to the Truth Loyalty to his Master Charity to men and care of the poor was laid in the Ballance and found wanting The Levity of the love of Earthly-minded Professors is discovered by the outward indices Angustum pectus parca manus Narrow hearts hands not enlarged Their rewards are ever inconform to the works of the well deserving or dilatory to destroy them Their grand pretence for their so doing is their great business both Secular Sacred So Ahab a Type of Antichrist was busie here and there saith the Prophet and by means of that business minded not the command of God lost his Kingdom thereby and destroyed himself and his family for ever So Secular Antichrist Ahabs Antitype is not ashamed no more then Ahab was to make the pretence of much business his plea against Obedience For Earthly minds full of worldly business exclude the testimony of the Truth at least in Works and all due regard to the witnesses of it Therefore Men Earthly-minded Secular Antichrist may be well known by their accumulating such business as arms them with sufficient excuses against the practice of good manners Their business is either Secular for Earthly Interests or seeming sacred for secular ends Therefore There 's no weight in all their good Works of which the best are strangled with a strait hand and being laid in the Ballance are found light like the Crowns of the Locusts But Thirdly The levity of Professors proud and Pharisaical being most light is more traductive and devilish Therefore they can censure not as Sodomites but as it were in sobriety before they see cause condemn before they know whom or for what They can readily say with Apostate Julian Legi Cognovi Damnavi Legi Here 's some labour lost labour the worst labour Cognovi Here 's some profit a man would think of their pains pains to no purpose pains without profit Damnavi Here 's the cursed truthcondemning fruit of proud Professors the fruit of all their pains in reading the result of all their acquisitions They only dream they know as some Prophets did and discern nothing Therefore as Balaam could not be stoptin his course to curse Israel these cannot be stay'd by any course from rash-censuring The Cataracts of rash condemnation fall not to be by any force repelled from the high praecipices of Pride and Ignorance and are the infallible Characters of Locusts and Hypocrites They are ever most busie and their business is about they think things sacred but serves only to deceive and be deceived In a word Their good works are so light that in substance they are but words of which none are good but in appearance and deceit The levity of the Righteousness of the Locusts and others consists in their Inadvertency or want of care to conceive and observe those Principles aforesaid of Incomplex-truth A Quo Quid Cui Quantum Quoties whose necessary considerations being but hinted before here fall under our further examination And First A Quo Or from whom what Truth in practise should chiefly proceed Silver and God said Peter have I none such as I have I give Rise up and walk Acts 3. From such as have no Silver nor Gold neither is due Nor must we expect that such as have no Spiritual use of any Limb themselves should afford the means to make others walk in right Obedience to God and good Works to men No man though many pretend it gives that to another which himself hath not to give But it 's a duty universal from all to do good to all which that they may do they must first have or seek to have the gift
took care of him saith the Text and said to the Host Take care of him Care is to all good works the Girdle of Truth without which they are neither true nor good Had not the good Samaritan though he had done all he did besides taken care of him he had wholly omitted his Christian duty For as Faith without Charity is dead so Charity without care is dead A true christian care to do good is the edge of Charity and the life of it It 's the grand misery and mistake of Men and Saints to do perhaps many good works carelesly whereby they become not good works but deceits Such works though commonly practised by sealed or Wilderness-Saints are far from that practice which they should perform but are the proper works of the members of of Antichrist and the Characters of them By those Characters therefore we shall discover who are or appear to be careless Professors and who are careful in the practice of Christianity And first They that are careless to collect and consider the incomplex-principles of right in it self are careless in their conversations and cannot come to the knowledge of the Truth in Practice These Incomplex-principles rightly collected are the Basis and Grounds of all Mercy and Equity to Men And that which the Scriptures and we commonly call The cause of any man Plantiff or Defendent stated Neither doth the cause of the Widow saith the Text come unto them Isa 1.23 That is They do not collect nor consider the Incomplex-principles aforesaid of Mercy and Equity Such Professors Judges or Magistrates it matters not what their Church-Society Sect or their repute for Learning Strictness or Religion is are corrupt and unjust Professors and at least in appearance Members of Antichrist But we shall illustrate the Premises for the Reader 's better understanding by one or two Examples And first A Prophet's poor Widow made her address to Elisha and stating her own cause her self thus laid down the principles of Right in it self necessary and due to be satisfied unto her Thy servant my Husband said she is dead 2 King 4.1 There 's the Cui a desolate Widow to whom mercy and equity was due to be done A second Incomplex-right in it self was A quo or from whom which is implyed in the same words of the poor Widow To wit Prophet who was principally concern'd and bound both by the Levitical Law and by the royal Law of Love to make her Incomplex-condition Complex or to take notice of it and duly consider it Levit. 25.35 to the end Deut. 15.8 11. A third Incomplex-right is exprest in these words Thou knowest that thy servant that Widow's late Husband did fear the Lord That was a further tye though he must do right and shew mercy to all men to the Prophet to make her condition Complex or to have full knowledge of it A fourth Principium praecognoscendum or truth in it self which the Prophet was bound to know is exprest in these words And the Creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen These Principia praecognoscenda or Truths in themselves thus lay'd down were the Cause of the poor Widow stated before the Prophet And they that are not truly careful and diligent to know and rightly apprehend the causes of Plantiffs or Defendents stated by word or writing are unjust Judges corrupt Magistrates careless Christians make themselves at least appear to be the Members of Antichrist The cause of the Poor of the Widow of the Fatherless and of strangers in distress comes not before those careless Christians nor can they discharge any duty of Mercy or Equity to men But the Prophet did not tell the poor Widow she was a trouble to him or that he was busie about matters of much higher concernment nor did he bid her come two moneths hence and talk with him Nor tell her to encourage her he would move it to friends at his best leisure as many Professors commonly do and at last perhaps revolt from all he had promis'd to little purpose and she expected But he immediatly bid her borrow many Vessels and pour Oyl out of a Vial she had into those Vessels and filling them with Oyl sell so much as would pay her Creditors and live her self upon the rest Thus the Prophet took effectual care to make the poor Widows Incomplex cause Complex or to take full cognizance of it Secondly He took care to make her Complex or by him known cause Triplex by conforming his will that he might relieve her to his right informed intellect Thirdly He took care to conform his works to his right-informed will and intellect wherein he had due respect to another incomplex-right To wit Quantum The fruit of his charitable care was not a fragment or piece of a good work nor an half-performance but a plenary supply of full relief to all her wants with due respect to all Principles of Right in it self Such works only are Christian and shall be the practice of that incontaminate company of conscript Harpers that shall be found without fault in Gods sight We shall shew a contrary Patern in Pilat's careless practice Pilate was careful to do right by halves or but half careful Christ's Cause came under his disquisition The first incomplex Truth in his Cause was that he was blameless or without fault Pilate made that Truth in it self half-complex or took half cognizance of it For he having examined him said thrice I fina in him no failt John 18.38 Ch. 19.4 Luke 23.4 He was willing to release him but not effectually careful to do it For overpowered by his adversaries importunities he gave sentence to put him to death So all Laodicean half hot half cold half careless half careful Spurious Professors though never so strict devout or zealous will but talk trisle cavil delay promise not perform practise by halves falsifie forget or before they begin be weary of well doing and thereby wear out the Saints of the most high and destroy his faithfullest Witnesses as Pilate by like practices caused Christ to be put to death For All Professors Judges and Magistrates half-careful only to collect and consider the Systems of Incomplex-causes cannot expect to exceed Pilat's unjust practice by whom our Lord was crucified Had Pilate been faithfully careful to do right he had not regarded the Jews favour nor been by any business or other means drawn or deterr'd from doing of it A second Incomplex-Truth in Christs Cause was That the Scribes and Elders as Judas had betray'd him to them through covetousness had delivered him into Pilates hands out of envy who was but half-careful to make this Truth it self Complex or to know it He knew saith the Text that for envy they had delivered him Mat. 27.18 But his care to know the cause of Christ was but by halves For To this end said our blessed Saviour was I born and for this cause came I into the world that I should
bear witness unto the truth John 18.37 38. This is the final cause and supreme end for which Christ was Incarnate Man created Saints regenerated That they should bear witness to the Truth in Words and Works Not in words only as the leaves of a fruitless Tree but in works also as the Fruits All hearing reading preaching praying are but subordinate duties to this supreme end That they should let their works wrought in a foursold conformity so shine before men that they seeing them may glorisie God must be every mans chief christian care But Pilate though much more careful than many strict and Orthodox Professors are was scarce so much as half-careful to make Christs Cause and this Truth in it self Complex or known to himself What is Truth said Pilate and when he had so said he staid not for an answer but went out again to the Jews and said unto them I find in him no fault at all John 18.38 What is Truth A cursory careless Question of regardless Pilate Si licet exemplis in parvo grandibus uti If we may by the Patern of one man manifest the practice of many If we may by the example of one Heathen express the Manners almost of all Modern Christians Then this is their manner of advancing Virtue and the way of their seeking the Truth Sic virtutis Alumni sumus sic Veritatem quaerimus Men and many Saints are now as Pilate was more cursory swister than Asahel in running Doth the cause of the Widow of the Fatherless of the stranger come before them They can run by it or glide over it and take no notice of it Is any thing spoken to them They can run over it by a rash answer before they hear it Is any work in writing requisite to refel errours to reform manners offered to them They can run by it or run over it by a cursory reading and never understand it Is any man faln amongst Thieves and wounded like the Wayfaring man They can run by him and never mind him Is any thing that is right in it self laid before them They can run by it and take no notice of it What may I say of such men of such Saints but this Their feet are swift too swift to shed blood These are not the works of the good Samaritan This is the practice of Pilate Pilate examined Christ once with some seeming meekness and sobriety Thrice did he justifie him as a man in whom he had found no fault Once he washed his hands in water before the multitude to signifie his guiltlessness of his innocent blood Five times did he refist the rash violence of that blind zealous Councel What Professor now or perhaps what Saint would take that care and pains that Pilate took for Christ for the most innocent man manifestly injured Pilate took care for the Pharisees did not not to credit Christ's false-accusers and found them Lyars but Professors now and I am affraid I may say many sealed Saints take little or no care how they credit false accusers according to Scripture-Rule Deut. 19.16 17 18 19. But they by believing their lyes they seeming to them devout and zealous justifie the wicked and condemn the most innocent wherefore eveu Pilate by whose wicked Sentence Christ was condemned and crucified shall rise up in judgment and condemn many careless Modern Professors and Saints But the good Samaritan was faithfully careful to do all good works in a fourfold-conformity He took care for him saith the Text and said to the Host Take care of him Go and do likewise said Christ to all Saints and Professors in all Ages and Nations Lastly Had the good Samaritan poured Wine Oyl into the wounds of the Way-fairing man had he bound up his Wounds had he also given him Money for his relief with a liberal hand and had so left him He had no doubt perished in the place and had been re-exposed to Robbers to kill him outright for that money for all times aftord many Theeves sew Samaritans Such careless care and helpless half-help had not exceeded the Righteousness and Mercy of Locusts Hypocrites And such pains and expences had but been the price the blackest Simony of exemption from performing good Works For Simon the Sorcerer sought to purchase the gifts of the Holy Ghost with money But double-minded men deceive themselves and deceive others with far more depraved Simony in seeking to purchase by careless half-performances not the gifts of the Holy Ghost but their exemption from them or from bringing forth the fruits of them The Man of Sin is a man of mistakes and deceits His coming and continuance was with all deceivableness But this is the Master-piece of deceit Saints scarce excepted in that son of perdition That his Members mistake the purchase of their exemption from good Manner by half-performances for true Christian-practice False sincerity the Parent of half-performances is the Fountain of Deceits in the Apostacy of Antichrist and is it self a deficiency in the knowledg of that Incomplex-truth of degree or quantity and in conforming the Will to the knowledg of it Lovest thou me said Christ to Peter more than these That is Than these Earthly or Wordly things Covetous Professors deceive themselves but can never be sincere nor their practice more than half-performances Peter lovest thou me said Christ Peter reply'd Lord thou knowest that I love thee Feed my sheep said Christ And so he said thrice Covetous professors can never be sincere nor fit to feed Christ's sheep For Covetousness is quite contrary to sincerity which is the Superlative degree in the quantity of love pains and expences to promote the Truth in Doctrine and Practice Had Peter loved the things of this life as much as the living God or as much as his Kingdom and the righteousness thereof he had not been sincere but an Hypocrite in his heart and his Religious actions had been but Hypocritical half-performances Half-performances or a constant falling short of the quantity of love care pains or expences to practice good works are the fruits and infallible Characters of Hypocrites and do denote in incult barren Wilderness-Saints that commonly perform such works great want of sincerity Sincerity is a sufficient care pains and expence to perform good works in a fourfold conformity and such practice is the express command of God Deut. 15.7 8. Thou shalt open thine hand wide to thy poor brother and shalt surely lend him sufficiēnt for his need Thou shalt surely give him and thine heart shall not be grieved vers 10. Shalt surely lend him sufficient Sufficient care pains and charge is the substance of sincerity and the due measure of Right and Mercy as we shewed in the foresaid examples of Elisha and the good Samaritan But Quantum deficit deficient care pains and charge is the false measure of Impostors in the Apostacy of Antichrist And the fruit of it the deceitful price of exemption from the practice of good Manners
into his rest And what was the cause of such great wrath Because saith he they always erred in their hearts and have not known my ways They always erred c. Et quid error mentis what 's an errour of the Heart or rather what and how many are the Errors of the Hearts of Professors Saints not excepted in the Spiritual Wilderuess Had they utterance and indeed they have that they might auswer for themselves and say My Name is Legion for we are many So many are the Errors of the Hearts of men that they are as also their Prophetick Type predicted continual and universal scarce admitting any limitation So God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the Earth towards the end of the Old World and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was evil continually Gen. 6.5 The limitation or exception was only of one or two men ver 8. So all Israel in the Type-Wilderness two or four only excepted had corrupted their wayes were faln away from Faith and Obedience And so Gospel Israel especially towards the end of her Wilderness aberration hath so corrupted her ways that scarce may Faith be found And they very few excepted always err not caring to know the wayes of God And wherein are all the imaginations of their hearts thus only evil continually It 's a continual Error in the Hearts of Men and Saints to imagine that a careless shallow trivial knowledge and like practice is sufficient to please God and purchase their own salvation This was the delusion of Laodicea and is the deceit of Locusts and Hypocrites Therefore Their practice conform to that knowledge is ever half-performances Good Works perhaps well begun but desisted from before they be finished Bede we noted before complained that Christians in his time were contented with a trivial literature His complaint then is not now without cause and it 's tâ—e fault of many that the Female Sex suffers most under the burden of this Misery By this means many Men and Women are at best like those silly Women that were ever labouring and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth These may be ready to hear like Herod gladly and to read Books that unfold the Scriptures but cannot understand what they hear or read for want of due literature whereby they may understand But this kind of incult Christians are usually through for did illiterature and beastial ignorance the railing Frogs of croaking convitiations against men of parts and deserts For Art and Desert hath no adversary like unto ignorance Nor is careless contented ignorance the Mother of Devotion but Parent of Divisions and the Fountain of Factions and Schisms in States and Churches that divides and destroys both But Bede's complaint in his time grievous hath now got another complaint more grievous than it self which is this Most men that have gained a competent Literature and many that have attained a large measure of Learning abuse those gifts to advance Avarice Ignorance and evil Manners and make themselves thereby much worse and more wicked than any careless incult and illiterate Professors are and having less cause are more confident than the most ignorant This careless contented ignorance and vain confidence is a continual Error in the Hearts of those Men and many Saints Their fruits are usually but the deceitful works of half-performances for which the plagues of the wrath of God are poured forth upon them as they were upon Hered Saul Judas for like contented shallow knowledge and half-practices And Secondly It 's an Error in the Hearts of men to imagine That the Witnesses Sackcloth-Prophesie can procure that promised vigorous Repentance which Prophets and Apostles predicted It may and doth oft work a weak barren scarce-visible Wilderness true Faith and Repentance whereby many are saved but it 's too weak to bring forth those generous fruits of the Conscript first-fruits in a four-fold consormity to the perfect and durable good of men and to Gods glory in all ensuing Ages For the Winesses were to Prophesie 1260 years in Sackcloth and thereby to smite the Earth with all manner of Plagues Rev. 11.3 6. But they that were not killed by those Plagues saith the Text expresly yet repented not Ch. 9.18 And that Particle of time yet is the period of the six Trumpets sounding and conterminates the Witnesses 1260 years Sackcloth-Prophesie And therefore Thirdly They much Err in their Hearts that imagine that the Ministry under which they live or the strictness of the Sect or Church of which they are Members or that their own Zeal and Devotion can exempt them from the Plagues and Wrath of God which he pours forth upon such Semiadvertists and half-performists For then had Herod Saul and Judas been free from such Plagues because the greatest Prophets were their Guides and Teachers And the Pharisees and the Church of the Jews might have been exempted from the final excision of them and that Nation because they were the peculiar People and Church of God and the Pharisees the devoutest and most Orthodox of all Sects Thus we see that Type and Antitype Apostate Israel in the Literal and Spiritual Wilderness erred do always err in their hearts and know not ineed for such works are far from them the wayes of God nor are Saints themselves there exempted from the same vail of universal darkness that overspreads all Nations For There is a Cloud of darkness that covers all people as barrenness the Wilderness or waters cover the Sea Isa 25.7 But that darkness of ignorance was to be more prevalent during the time of the Gospel-Churches abode in her place prepared in the Spiritual Wilderness but most effectual immediately before or after the period of that duration This Cloud of darkness was signally shadowed forth by that borrour of great darkness and deep sleep that fell upon Abraham Gen. 15.12 which Prophesie was fulfilled in his Literal and Spiritual Seed in the Type and Antitype-Wilderness But That the right-Series of the Mystery of God and of the Mystery of Iniquity may plainly appear and what the power of Religion is may be more evident we shall with some diligence further enquire First what the Wilderness Literal and Spiritual was Secondly What the place prepared of God was in both Thirdly We shall prove that place to be the Theater or proper Seat of the Apostacy of Antichrist Fourthly We shall shew what that Apostacy is And Lastly We shall shew that Antitype Sion shall be the derivative Foundation of the Churches deliverance and redemption from the grand Apostacy And first We need not describe the Desert wherein Egypt stands that is done already sufficiently for this purpose and we shall but hint it here But Egypt was the place or one place therein prepared of God to preserve his Church in a Figure It was chiefly a Figure of its Antitype in the space of its seven years Famine It was part of the Wilderness and of it self more
servant There and then he began his Prophetick-Pilgrimage For he travelled thence one days journey into the Wilderness lay down and slept under a Juniper-Tree There an Angel touching him awaked him and bid him eat and drink He lay down again and the Angel touching him the second time bid him eat and drink So Christ commanded his Disciples to watch and pray and coming the first time found them asleep So did he three times and said Now sleep on Eliah so sleeping and the Disciples sleeping three times as aforesaid Prophetically prefigured the sleepy disposition of the Gospel-Church and Saints in the Spiritual Wilderness And what is sleep Sleep is a Mirrour of false Idea's wherein all the Imaginations of men are vain Visions and the things and actions which they dream they see or do are not in the least the same not seen nor done indeed So the Antitype-Hermitage of the Gospel-Churches aberrations is a large Vally of vain Vision where Saints and Professors wander in darkness and live if such may be said to live in a deep Lethargy of forgefulness forget the manner how to shew Mercy keep Faith or practise Right But dream they see what indeed they see not and do what in deed they do not mistaking morose long-delay'd half-performed good-works the Imposturous deceits of Antichrist for true Christian practice But Sion signifies not a sleepy Couch but a Watch-Tower and shall afford a clear Prospect where Men and Saints awaked from sleep revived from death shall see a far off right Idea's real Substances and practise according to Right Representations Thirdly Christ was led of the-Spirit into the Wilderness to be tempted of the Devil There he fasted forty dayes and forty nights Then and not till then did the Devil fiercely assault him with his fiery Darts which shews that the Gospel-Church and Saints should fustain the forest brunts and sharpest assaults of dangerous tryals and temptations about the end of her and their Wilderness-Pilgrimage Satans first inducement was to sensuality Most Men and most Professors fall into and fall by this temptation of the Devil And many without his tempting can be drawn away of their own lusts and enticed But Christ was far from being brought to practise this Pollution or being otherwise drawn or inticed Secondly The Devil taking him into an high Mountain tempted him to worldly covetousness Luke 4.5 This is the deplorable state and desperate condition of Saints and Professors in the Spiritual Wilderness That they are there alway subject to be haled by the hands of the Devil to be tempted by him to their own destruction Lastly The Devil tempting him to Spiritual Pride set him upon a Pinnacle of the Temple The Temple was built upon Mount Moriah that was part of Sion There the Devil departed There Christ overcame the Devil To intimate to all Ages That when the Gospel-Church and Saints shall arrive unto and be built upon Mount Sion to wit upon the lasting Foundation of a fruitful and living Faith then the fiery Darts of the Devil shall be spent Then shall she be ever Victrix and they overcome the Devil For Secondly The Prototype-Desert was as it were more peculiarly under the Devils jurisdiction There he tempted our blessed Saviour There Type Israel tempted and provoked God to wrath Such is the Antitype and Spiritual Wilderness much more For that is the place where the seven Vials full of the plagues and wrath of God were to be poured forth for above 1260 years upon Gospel Apostate Israel for her continual provocations Rev. 15.1 Ch. 16.1 But God chose Mount Sion which he loved For in Salem is his Tabernacle his dwelling place in Sion Psal 76.2 Psal 78.68 That is God chose loved and dwelt in literal Sion by a Prophetick-Adumbration but shall chuse love and dwell unto all after-Ages in Spiritual Sion by a much more manifest and real love power and presence Revel 14.1 Ch. 21.3 Ch. 22.3 4. Because Thirdly From Horeh part of Sinai was Sin from the Law there given made exceeding sinful But in Moriah part of Sion did the Lamb of God by the Sacrifice of himself take away the sins of the World But the efficacy of the satisfaction of that Sacrifice shall be principally illustrated and manisested to all Ages in Spiritual Sion where the Conscript-Church is called The first-fruits redeemed unto God and to the Lamb Ch. 14.1 3. Where its manifest from these express Texts that the Hermite-Churche's arrival in Spiritual Sion is contrary to the careless inadvertency of formal true Saints and Professors accounted and so called matter of Redemption Redemption the price and fruit of Christs Blood was wrought in Sion He first brought it forth planted it there Thence it was disseminated into many Nations where it brought forth its first-fruits That Primitive dispensation was the Gospel-Churches Spting succeeded by a short Summer For both expired soon after the year 400 Then a sharp Winter and a dark Night began to surprize that Royal Plant wherein it continued in much like condition to that Tree in Daniel and indeed was shadowed by it that was hew'n down had its Branches cut its Leaves shaken off its Fruits scattered till seven times past over it as they shall over this Dan. 4.16 Revel 10.7 Ch. 11.15 This Royal Plant those Times and that Winter of Tempests over-past shall be by the Lamb replanted not as at first in literal Sion but in Sion Spiritual and shall again bring forth the first-fruits redeemed from the Earth to God and to the Lamb Ch. 14.1 3 4. Fourthly Both the Legal and Gospel-Churches in the Literal and Spiritual Wildernesses provoked the most High Psal 78.17 Then was his wrath kindled against his people insomuch that he abhorred his own inheritance Therefore he consumed their days in vanity and their years in trouble Vers 33. Psal 80.40 Consumed their days in vanity c. How in vanity The true Gospel-witnesses had power to Prophesie 1260 years in Sackcloth Vers 3. And what was the power of that Prophesie They had thereby power to shut Heaven that it should not rain in the days of their Prophesie and to smite the Earth with all Plagues Vers 6. that is Power to render the Antichristian World inexcusable to make their sins exceeding sinful their plagues insusserable At quando Messis What Reformation of mistakes in Manners What information against Errors in Opinions where are the first-fruits And what 's more vain Therefore God listed up his hand against his inheritance to overthrow them in the Wilderness consumed their dayes in vanity their years in trouble Rev. 11.2 7. Ch. 12.15 17. But God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes in Spiritual Sion Ch. 7.17 Ch. 21.4 rectified their Judgments reform their Manners and render them undefiled and without fault in his sight Ch. 14. But. Fifthly Great was the cause when God complained of his own people in the Desert That they provoked him to swear in his wrath that they should not enter