things which are despis'd yea and things which are not to bring to nought things that are that no Flesh should glory in his Presence And thus he destroys the Wisdom of the Wise and brings to nothing the Understanding of the Prudent so that it shall be said where is the Wise Where is the Scribe where is the Disputer of this World This they will acknowledge was the way of God's Dealing in former Times and why would they have him to alter it now when the Pastors Doctors and Teachers the Learned the Scribes and the Disputers of the Age are as full of their own Wisdom of their humane Studies and Learning as ever the Scribes and Pharisees the Wisemen and Philosophers were when God rais'd up Publicans and Fishermen to confound their Wisdom and Learning by the Simplicity of their Words That it is not St. Paul's Meaning that God may not thus communicate his Light and Truth to a Woman as well as Men for the Good of others is evident from the Sayings themselves In his time when the Faithful met together it was not as now when a Man who has his Head full of Learning declaims an Hour or two alone very often with Conceitedness enough to the People who must take for good Coin all that he says is such and which he stamps with Passages of Holy Scripture But then there were mutual Conferences where each of the Faithful were allow'd to tell their Sentiment or ask that of his Brethren and Elders but that all might be done in Order St. Paul ordains that their Women might not be of the number of the Interlocutors either by telling their own Thoughts or asking those of others but that they should do this at Home and even there should not pretend to teach their Husbands but learn of them It is evident then he speaks of ordinary Women married and encumbred with the Cares of their House who have need to learn and yet would be thought very Knowing and it is a Rule of Decency to avoid Confusion But at present they would have St. Paul's Meaning to be that Women enlightned by God in a free State always employed about Divine things should I do not say abstain from speaking publickly but even not write in secret in their own Houses the saving Light that God communicates to them and commands them and that when there is no fear of Confusion since such being very rare it is not to be fear'd that their number will bring Confusion This is as far from his Opinion as Falshood from Truth who a little before allows a Women to Prophesie if she have the Gift of it provided she be vail'd who knew that Anna spoke in the Temple and had seen Four Virgins Prophesie which were the Daughters of Philip the Evangelist Thus those envious Usurpers of the Key of Knowledge and Instruction are they become such absolute Masters of it as to oblige God to give it to no Body but to them A Passage of the Life of Tâ—resâ— is remarkable to this purpose as they spoke to her one Day of those Words of St. Paul and she thought on them God said to her Tell them not to be directed by one single Passage of Scripture but let them consider other Places and ask them if they will bind up my Hands XXIII They accused her of intolerable and blasphemous Pride in speaking well of her self in pretending to know the Accomplishment of the Holy Scriptures yea and to understand them better than they who wrote them that she calls her self a Mother of True Believers and that she exalts her self above the Prophets Apostles the Virgin Mary yea above God himself It is easie to give an ill turn to ones Words but Charity thinks no Evil and interprets them by the whole Tenour of their Life Spirit and Sentiments 1. That she exalted her self more than the Prophets Apostles the Virgin Mary c. she said was an impudent Lie for I know very well says she that I am a simple humane Creature as all other Men come of the corrupt mass of Adam And I do not say that I am either Prophet or Apostle or Virgin Mary or God himself as this Bucchardus says but I declare I am a frail Creature as all others to whom nevertheless God has sent his Light of Truth to communicate it to Men. Did they believe truly that there is a living God they durst not treat so ill the things which are declared from God and cause to be burnt by the Hangman the Books which the Holy Spirit has dictated of which they may have Evidence both from God and Men for they who see me write know very well that I do it without any humane Speculation or Study and that this flows from my Spirit as a River of Water flows from its Fountain and that I only lend my Hand and my Spirit to another Power than mine Many Persons are Witnesses of this God also has given me a more sure Testimony by imparting to me his Righteousness his Truth and his Charity for these things cannot come from Nature which being corrupt cannot produce any Good nor any Divine Vertues because I am come from the corrupt mass of Adam as all the rest of Men there could not be in me any Righteousness Truth or Charity which are all Divine and Supernatural Vertues which come not into the Souls of Men but by the work of the Holy Spirit for none but God only is perfectly Just and True And no Body can glory in the Righteousness Truth and Charity that he possesses without having a disordered Mind because these Vertues are no ways in the Person but in God alone who imparts them to whom he pleases And he who has receiv'd any of these Vertues ought to glorifie God and not to glory in himself for them as by the Grace of God I do not glory in my self And I do not fear that any Body can prove that I ascribe any Perfection or Vertue any manner of way to my self for God has given me too much of the Light of Truth to do this having made me see clearly that all Good comes from God and all Evil from Man and from the Devil which two Creatures being equally withdrawn from God the Fountain of all Good are fallen into all sort of Evil. And therefore nothing can proceed from the corrupt Nature of Man but Evil and Sin for this cause a Man can have no occasion of glorying in himself for his Vertues which are not his nor at his disposal And therefore Bucchardus has said most injuriously in his Book that I esteem my self more than the Prophets Apostles c. of whom I do not know to what Degrees of Grace they arriv'd that I should compare them to the Graces that God has imparted to me I know well that I am a poor Creature subject to many Miseries and Infirmities which makes me often humble my self before God and Man But I well know also
Sin since which time it can produce nothing but all sort of Evil it being impossible for it to do any Good or to have one good Thought For this Cause Job had good Reason to curse the Day of his Birth for none of the Beasts would be so miserable in their Nature as is Man if he had not in him a Divine Nature 4. All must grant this and say with your Friends that it is impossible to imitate Jesus Christ seeing he lived supernaturally having subjected his Humane Part to his Divine and made his Flesh die that he might live to his Spirit and despised Temporal things that he might embrace Eternal But I would gladly ask all those Natural Persons if they desire to do the same things And if they have put to Death the old Adam in them that is the Inclinations of corrupt Flesh And if they have labour'd with all their Power to revive in them the Spirit of the new Adam which contradicts the Sensualities of the Flesh Which appears by the Person of Jesus Christ who overcame all Natural Sensualities 5. It may be they will say that it would be impossible for them to attain to such a Perfection as Jesus Christ had while they will not part with so much as one of the Affections which they have for their Pleasures or Sensualities that they might follow him at a distance For they do not so much as desire to imitate him far les to tend to his Perfection They believe indeed by an imaginary Speculation that Jesus Christ has satisfied all for them and they will not believe by a Divine Truth that he has merited for them by his Sufferings the Grace and the Power to imitate him because they do not desire to do it for they love rather to remain in the Corruption of the old Adam than to be quickened into the new which is Jesus Christ 6. Thus it is that those poor Souls flatter themselves to their Ruine while they say that they cannot imitate Jesus Christ nor live without Sin because of their great Frailty This is as much as to say that they resolve not to be saved and they resolve to die in their Sins for there are only two ways the one of Salvation the other of Damnation and Jesus Christ is that which leads to Salvation He who will not walk in the same Way in which he walked cannot find Life but without all doubt shall die for ever Therefore my dear Child do not give way to the Discourses of those poor blinded ones who have fill'd their Understanding with Errors but walk according to the Light that God has given you and labour to be born again in the Spirit of Jesus Christ our Saviour Withdraw from the World since he says that he prays not for the World but for those whom his Father has given him out of the World Those who are of the World are they who love the transitory things of the World and will not part with them to imitate Jesus Christ They are rich in Will and proud in Heart loving their fleshly Sensualities while they flatter themselves by saying that it would be impossible for them to imitate Jesus Christ and to live without Sin because of their great Frailty which if they understood aright they would use means to overcome it and he who felt his Heart cleave to Riches would not possess them but would put them far away from him as some of the Heathens did who threw all their Money into the Sea fearing least it should deprive them of the Liberty of their Mind And if a Man found himself so frail as to fall into the Sin of Pride he would shun Offices Greatness and Honours that he might follow the Poverty and Lowliness of Jesus Christ and if hâ— found himself so frail as that he could not eat and drink delicate things without falling into the Sin of Gluttony he would take the coarsest Meats and Drink proportionably to support the Weakness and Frailty of Nature weaning it from all Sensuality or fleshly Apperite But Men do not feel themselves too frail to iudulge their Body in all its Appetites and Pleasures and they will needs make themselves believe that they are too frail to abstain from Sin or to imitate Jesus Christ 7. This Sentiment is so Erroneous that I would be ashun'd to refute it were it not that I see so many Souls possess'd with it especially among those of Calvin's Reformatiâ—on who live and die in this Belief that Jesus Christ has satisfied all for them that it is impossible for them to do good or to imitate Jesus Christ This it seems is inculcated unto them from the Cradle since in effect we see that all their practice is founded upon it while they live according to the Motions of corrupt Nature and with this believe that they shall be saved by the Merits of Jesus Christ without striving to imitate him since they are taught that it is impossible to do this And tho' this is a false Theology yet every one follows after it leaning upon a broken Reed 8. For that Man of whom I spoke to you formerly said that it was impossible for him to do any good Work yea to say the Lord's Prayer with Attention no more than they with whom he convers'd whom he had often ask'd if they could say it with Attention and they all answered they could not It is to be remarked that they were Merchants of great Trade and Spirit who found out all sort of Inventions for gaining of Money with great Dexterity and Care and their Spirit was not disingag'd for saying the Lord's Prayer with Attention For where their Treasure was there was their Heart and the Attention cannot be perfect in two so contrary things at the same time but if they had purg'd their Souls from coveting earthly Goods and as carefully applied their Understanding to speak unto God and to hear him without doubt they might not only have said the Lord's Prayer with Attention but might also have attention seriously upon continual Prayer which Jesus Christ has so much recommended to us saying that we ought always to pray and never to cease 9. But those poor Ignorants think to please God with fair Words as they please Men by saying that they are too frail to do any Good far less can they imitate Jesus Christ for these Excuses will condemn them For if they were truly sensible of their Frailty they would avoid the Occasions of Sin and use the Means of Poverty Humility and Patience that they might imitate Jesus Christ for he did nothing when he was upon Earth but that which another would do that were animated with the same Spirit that he was For the same God has through all the same Power and can do by the Body and Spirit of other Men that which he did by that of Jesus Christ 10. For in as much as he is God his Power is not limited provided that Man give no â—indrance
indifferent to God who is Self-sufficient and stands not in need of any thing besides himself God having created Man perfectly free in his Light and Love did foresee in the general all the possible ways how he might determine the Liberty of his Acts but would not determine them nor foresee them determined and far less determine or determinately foresee that Man would turn away from God and that by such Ways and Actions all determined and foreseen Now it cannot be said that God could not form a Man with such a Liberty This would be indeed to deny his Omnipotency there is no Contradiction in the Nature of the thing and therefore it was not impossible to God Now suppose that God determined so to do and actually did form Man in this Nature then his not foreseeing determinately how he would dispose of this Liberty is not a denial of the Omniscience of God Such a foresight is not an Object of Knowledge Our Concerns have no more relation to his absolute Perfections in himself than the dim Light of a Candle has to the Sun His Knowledge of us as well as his forming us is but the effect of his Arbitrary Will Besides if it be said that God cannot make a Contradiction to be true will we therefore affirm that such deny his Omnipotence Not at all for this is not the Object of it even so to say that the indeterminate Actions of free Agents are not determinately foreseen is not to deny Omniscience because this is not the Object of it yea to affirm the contrary is to ascribe to God a Knowledge that is not conformable to the Nature of things for to know a thing determinately that is in its own Nature 〈◊〉 ever till the free Agent determine himself is to know it contrary to its Nature and not as it is in its self The Divine Decrees being the pure effect of his Good Pleasure without any necessity in himself it was free for God either to decree from all Eternity all that he should bring to pass in all Events and all Circumstances in all Ages of the World Or otherwise having established his general Purposes in creating of the World to determine himself as to particular Events and Circumstances in effectuating and bringing about the same according to Occurrences in the Corresponding of free Agents throughout the series of Ages The former looks like the establishing a Fate to which not only all the Creatures but God himself is subjected and by which he has bound up his own Hands to all Eternity And it lays an eternal Restraint both upon his Liberty and Power If the other be granted which is most sutable to the Nature of an infinitely Free Wise Good and Powerful Being and is the greatest encouragement to Prayer and a continual Dependance upon God then all the rest of the First Objection falls to the Ground The Learned Dr. Henry More declares for this Sentiment upon the very same Reasons He shews that as no Body thinks the Omnipotency of God maimed because he cannot do those things that imply a Contradiction So if the certain Prescience of uncertain things imply a Contradiction it may be struck out of the Omniscience of God and yet God will nevertheless be as Omniscient as he is Omnipotent That this is no Impediment to his ordering the Affairs of the World for that eternal Mind that knows all things possible to be known comprehends all things and so has laid such Trains of Causes as shall most certainly meet every one in due time in Judgment and Righteousness let him take what way he will That the Perfection of Knowledge is to know things as they are in their Nature and therefore to know a free Agent which is undeterminate to either part to be so undeterminate and that he may choose which part he will is the most perfect Knowledge of such an Agent and of his Action till he be perfectly determinate and has made his Choice And therefore to know him determined before he be determined or while he is free is an Imperfection of Knowledge or rather no Knowledge at all but a Mistake and Error And indeed is a Contradiction to the Nature of God who can understand nothing but according to the distinct Idea's of things in his own Mind And the Idea of a free Agent is undeterminateness to one part before he has made his Choice Whence to foresee that a free Agent will pitch upon such a part in his Choice with Knowledge certain and infallible is to foresee a thing as certain even then when it is uncertain which is a plain Contradiction or gross Mistake And as to the Second Objection that this is inconsistent with Prophesies and Predictions of future Events he shews That there is still room enough for Millions of certain Predictions if God thought fit to communicate them so throughly to the World For tho' the Souls of Men are free yet there are infinite numbers of Actions wherein they are certainly determined Such are the Actions of all those that are deeply lapsed into Corruption and of those few that are grown up to a more heroical State of Goodness It is certainly foreknowable what they will do in such and such Circumstances Not to add says he That the Divine Decrees when they find not Men fitting Tools make them so where Prophecies are peremptory or unconditionate This he tells he proposes by way of Essay rather than that of Dogmatizing and when so worthy and pious a Member of the Church of England so rational a Defender of the Faith of Jesus Christ against the Socinians and Deists thought fit to offer this as an Essay for the clearing of those Mysteries it may teach others to be more Sober in their Characters and Censures But this matter of the Divine Prescience and of the certainty of Divine Predictions and Prophecies is at large and most distinctly treated of in M. Poiret's Oeconomie de la Providence Chap. 10. upon more Just and Divine Principles than those which make the Introduction of Sin and Wickedness into the World necessary for the Glory of God for accomplishing his great Designs on Mankind and for the Manifestation of his Wisdom Mercy Justice and other Glorious Attributes a most cursed and blasphemous Principle The former are most Just Representations of the Truth and Righteousness and Goodness of God the latter most contrary to all of them A distinct Account of the former Principles is to be had best from the Book it self and I am perswaded a sincere and impartial Enquirer into Truth will thank me for the Advertisement XIV Another Errour in her Doctrine they say is that she affirms That it is possible to keep the Commandments of God and to imitate Jesus Christ and to attain to a State of Perfection One would think this should nor be reckoned a Heresie amongst Christian who profess to believe the Scriptures and the Gospel of Jesus Christ She says nothing but what
shall consume them as Bread God will not defend them and he is with us therefore let us not fear them Thus we ought to animate all well-disposed Persons and let them see that the Ways and the End of Christianity are very possible with the Grace of God If this Method had been taken the Doctrine of Christian Perfection and its Practice would not have been so strange and so rare a thing XV. I shall here mention another Accusation as having Relation to this from which she clearly vindicates her self and that is That they said she believed herself impeccable and that her Friends did so at least that she never actually sinned no not in Thought and that she derived no Guilt and Corruption from Adam She vindicates herself from this Accusation in a Letter to Serrarius In the eighth Place you accuse me says she very falsely in saying that I say or that I believe I am impeccable and cannot fall any more for in Effect I have no other Fear but that of not abiding faithful to my God and I cannot endure those who say or believe that there is a State of Perfection in this World in which Persons are impeccable I look on this as a great Errour and Self-presumption Is it possible that I should hold my self what I blame so much in others I say God ought to be served with Fear and Trembling and I never demand of others what I do not first my self If I say that God ought to be served with Fear I still do it first and I am sure if God did withdraw his Grace from me I should fall presently You have been present several times when I related to many how I fell after that I had been from my Youth prevented by the Grace of God yet being grown up I let my self be carried away to follow the Vanities of the World and resisted the Inspiration of God which drew me to the contrary and because of this Resistance I deserved that God should withdraw from me and I began to please my self in the Pleasures and Divertisements of the World and the Praises of Men so that this Fall was the Cause that I gave my self to great Mortifications of Body to Watchings Tears and Prayers for the Space of about 7 Years This Story was told many times to your Disciples and in your Presence Now if I relate so freely how I fell so basely from so exalted a State of Grace in which God had put me how could I say or believe that I could not fâ—ll any more or think my self impeccable since what a Person has done once they may do many times The State of Integrity in which I was before my Fall might rather have rendred me impeccable than that in which I live after it I do not believe that ever any Creature on Earth can be impeccable during this miserable Life where there are so many Stones of Stumbling a S. Peter the Apostle a David according to God's own Heart a Solomon filled with the Holy Spirit with so many others have committed gross Faults and great Faults after having received great Grace from God Should I be so Ignorant as to believe that I could not fall any more or fail of the Grace of God I may do it assuredly every Moment if I should withdraw my Conversation with God to converse with my Senses for God forces no Body having given to all Men Free-will with which they shall act to all Eternity and as long as this Will abides fix'd in God it is impossible that the Person fall but if this Will withdraw it self from a Dependance on its God it falls easily even tho' it had been exalted as high as a Seraphim For this Cause I said I have no other Fear in the World but that of not abiding faithful to God because I know that so long as I shall be united to him I cannot fall but if I withdraw my self from him I shall fall at the first Step as an Infant that cannot walk And yet you dare say that I call my self impeccable and when I ask where I have said or written such things You tell you draw it from my Writings by Consequences But I would gladly ask you if in case I had drawn by Consequences out of your Letters or Words that you are a wicked Man would it be lawful for me to go and publish it from Town to Town as you do the ill and abusive Consequences that you say you draw from my Writings without letting me know where how in what Place and by what Words I may have given Matter for drawing of such Consequences directly contrary to the true Sentiments that I profess I know not with what Conscience you can do this and say that it is for Good that you may warn Persons that I believe my self impeccable and that I exalt my self and so forth but tho' indeed there were in me any such thing it would neither be good nor necessary to advertise so many Persons of it For First my Imperfections cannot defile them it is I that must account for them to God and my Words cannot wound them because all those whom you sent to me are Persons who have their Five Senses and a good enough Judgment to discern if what I say be Good or Evil and to take only that that may serve them for Good lâ—tting the rest alone so that it is not necessary for you to go tell them the Faults which your Fancy has imagin'd Your procedure is very contrary to that of Jesus Christ who said to the People speaking of the Pharisees Hypocrites do what they bid you but do not as they do You will grant I say very good things as the Truth is but you would annihilate that Good by the Evil that you untruly say is mine The Evil that was in these Pharisees was not powerful enough to discredit the Good that was in their Words but you make my imaginary Sins mount to so high a degree that they are capable of discrediting all the Good even that which you confess to be there If you were Just you would make a right Judgment of what you ought to do and leave and if you had Goodness you would procure to all those Persons the Good that they might receive by the Light which God gives me and if you had Truth you would not perswade them to believe a Lie in this that I say I am impeccable Thus as on the one hand she evidently shews the Duty and Possibility of obeying the Commands of God and of tending to Perfection by his Grace only so she as plainly shews her Abhorrence of the Presumption of being impeccable in whatsoever state in this World XVI Another Sentiment which gave no small Offence was that she says When Jesus Christ took on him our Mortality his inferiour Will or Self-will was Evil so that he behov'd never to follow but always to resist it This they cry out on as a Blasphemy
understood them they afterwards despis'd them and would no longer believe them so as to mock and make a by-Word of what the Prophets said to them Even Jeremy himself thought he was much mistaken when he saw not the Effect of the good Promises that God had made to his People Ah! Lord God surely thou hast greatly deceived this People and Jerusalem saying Ye shall have Peace whereas the Sword reacheth unto the Soul The same Difficulty of not being able to comprehend the Word of God according to our way of conceiving it befel the very Disciples of Jesus Christ who had convers'd with him they were mistaken and thought themselves deceived witness the two who after his Death going to Emmaus sad and without hope said We trusted that it had been he who should have redeemed Israel and beside all this to Day is the third Day since these things were done And even when Jesus Christ ascended into Heaven some ask'd him if at this time he would restore Israel The Holy Spirit makes many things be said in another Sense than Men understand it as in what he made Caiphas say concerning Jesus Christ that it was expedient that one Man should die that the whole People perish not which he spoke not of himself and understood in another manner and for a quite different end than that of the Holy Spirit Thus we see we may be easily mistaken by our way of understanding the Words and Revelations of God They are an Abyss and Depth of Spirit which our natural Sense cannot comprehend We must free our Mind from our way of conceiving things and place it in the Liberty of a Faith which may make it reckon its own ways of conceiving obscure and dark There we shall receive the Abundance of the Spirit Wisdom and Understanding proper for conceiving aright the Words of God which no Man that is not Spiritual can comprehend or judge of they being Divine He cannot judge even reasonably of them and if he judge of them according to the outside he is not Spiritual For tho' they be covered with this outside yet he cannot understand them as St. Paul says that the natural Man does not conceive the things which are of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him and he cannot understand them because they are Spiritual But the spiritual Man discerns all things It is a rashness therefore to give our selves the Liberty to treat of Divine things by a way of comprehending them naturally when they require a Discerning that is Supernatural to Sense Let us conceive this also by some Examples Suppose a Holy Person sees he is persecuted by his Enemies and God says to him I will deliver thee from them all see Jer. 1. 19. this Prophecy may be true tho' his Enemies kill him as it happened to that Prophet therefore he who should understand this Prediction in a temporal way should be deceived for God might have spoken of the true and chief Deliverance and Victory which is Salvation by which the Soul is victorious and delivered from all its Enemies in a far more true and profitable way than the temporal and outward Deliverance And in this Sense that Prediction was more true and ample than the Man would have conceiv'd it to be if he understood it only for this temporal Life For the Words of God do comprehend always the principal and most useful Sense and Man may understand them after his way according to the less principal Sense and so be mistaken Add that if a Person to whom God has given such a Promise be the Head of a Family or Society bodily or spiritual the Promise may concern his Children or those associated with him bodily and may be fulfilled in them tho' as to the Death of the Head the Promise is annihilated Even so if a Soul desiring to die a Martyr for God receive this Word from him Thou shalt be a Martyr it may fall out that the Person shall not die a Martyr and yet the Promise remain true for it will be accomplish'd according to the principal and essential part God giving him the Love and Recompence of Martyrdom making him a Martyr of Love giving him a Martyrdom lengthned out in Labours the continuance of which will be more troublesome than Death In which he will accomplish both the desire of the Soul and his own Promise for the desire of the Soul was not simply that kind of Death which of it self would signifie nothing without God's Friendship but to render to God the Service and the Love of a Martyr The other because God will give most perfectly the Reality and Recompence of this tho' by other means God has promised to fulfil the Desire of the Righteous because their Desires are just and true If therefore God do not fulfil them during this temporal Life it is certain he will do it after this Life and in a most perfect manner so that the Promises do still remain most true The second Cause why divine Words and Visions tho' always true in themselves yet nevertheless are not always certain as to us is because of the Reasons Motives and Grounds upon which they are built since they may change the Effect does not follow We must therefore believe that these things will infallibly come to pass so long as that shall remain which moves and incites God for Example to punish as if God said Within a Year I will send such a Plague upon this Kingdom the Ground of this Threatning is a certain Transgression which they commit in this Kingdom against God If therefore the Transgression cease or vary the Punishment may also cease or be changed Nevertheless the Threatning was true forasmuch as it was founded on an actual Fault and it would have been executed if the Offence had continued This appears in what happened to the City of Ninevah whither God sent the Prophet Jonah to denounce from him Yet Forty Days and Ninevah shall be destroyed Which nevertheless was not fulfilled because the Cause of this Threatning ceas'd which was the Sins of the People who immediately repented otherwise this Denunciation from God would certainly have taken effect The same thing as to the matter of divine Threatning we see in King Ahab whom God threatned by the Prophet Elias with a great Judgment Him his House and Kingdom But because he rent his Garments with Grief covered himself with Sackcloth fasted and lay in Sackcloth and Ashes humbled and afflicted himself God immediately tells him by the same Prophet that he would not send that Evil in his Days Where we see because Ahab chang'd the Threatning and Sentence of God ceas'd also From hence we must conclude that tho' God reveal or speak affirmatively to a Soul any thing in Good or Evil concerning it self or others this may change more or less or none at all according to the Change of the Affection or Disposition of that or these Souls and according to
the Cause and Reason that God looks to and this will not be fulfill'd after the Manner that we look for it even without knowing sometimes wherefore but God only knows For tho' he say and teach and promise things many times this is not that they are to be understood received or possessed at the same time but that they are to be afterwards understood or when it shall be fit to give Clearness in them or when the Effect shall follow as this fell out often even to the Disciples of Jesus Christ of whom S. John says These things understood not his Disciples at the first but when Jesus was glorified then remembred they that these things were written of him There may pass many particular things after this Manner which cannot be understood before their Time To shew this in the Matter of the Promises of God which are not fulfilled to those to whom they were made for want of good Dispositions we read in the Book of the Kings that God being provoked against the High-Priest Eli because of the Sins of his Children whom he did not correct sent to tell him these Words by Samuel I said indeed that thy House and the House of thy Father should walk before me for ever as to the Priesthood but now the Lord saith be it far from me For this Office being founded on this that he ought to glorifie and honour God and God having promised the Continuance of it to him upon the same Ground presupposing that on his Part he would not be wanting in his Duty it came to pass that Eli coming short in his Zeal for God's Honour who as the Lord complains of him honoured his Sons more than God himself dissembling their Sins for fear of dishonouring them it fell out I say that God's Promise failed him also which would have been firm if they had remained firm in their Piety We must not therefore think that Divine Visions and Revelations tho' true in themselves ought to fall out infallibly as they â—ound particularly when by the Order of God they depend upon human things which may vary change be omitted or not Now God knows when Revelations are thus annex'd to Conditions and Dispositions which depend upon Men and he does not always discover it and oftentimes he speaks or reveals the Thing without saying any thing of the Condition as he did to the Ninevites to whom he foretold determinately that they should perish within Forty Days Sometimes also God declares this Condition as he did to Roboam If thou keep my Commandments as my Servant David I also will be with thee and will build thee a stable House as I did to David But whether he declare these Conditions or not it appears by what has been said hitherto that we cannot be assured by the natural Way of Perceiving that we are not mistaken in the Understanding of Divine Revelations They will say it may be Why then does God communicate them It is to make them be understood in their Time by the Order of him who has told them and he shall conceive them to whom it shall please God to give the Understanding of them yea even those shall see the Ratification of them who shall be in the Dispositions requisite and annex'd to those Declarations Laying aside this People expose themselves to great Dangers of Error and Confusion when they will needs judge determinately and absolutely of them by what seems and appears at first outwardly of them The Prophets knew this very well they who had God's Word in their Mouth and to whom it was heavy and grievous to carry it to the People because a great Part of the Predictions did not fall out according to the Sence of the Letter nor so soon as they look'd for them which made the Prophets so ridiculous that Jeremy said I am in Derision daily every one mocketh me for since I spake I cried out I cried Violence and Spoil but the Word of the Lord was made a Reproach unto me and a Derision daily Then I said I will not make mention of him nor speak any more in his Name And the Reason why Jonah fled when God sent him to denounce the Destruction of Ninevah was that he could not comprehend assuredly the Truth of the Divine Words nor determinately understand their Sence So for fear they should mock at him if this Prophecy came not to pass he chose rather to flee than to prophesie and having prophesied he abode forty Days without the City to see if his Prophecy should be fulfilled which when it was not he was so far grieved as to say to God in his Complaint I pray thee O Lord was not this my Saying when I was yet in my Country Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish for I know that thou art a Gracious God and a Merciful And the Saint being grieved prayed to God that he would take him out of this World Must we therefore be astonish'd if the things that God reveals to his Friends do not fall out as they might have conceived them and far less as others understood them For suppose God declare unto them some Good or Evil for them or others if these things are founded on certain Dispositions of Spirit the Obedience of those Souls as to God and a certain Perseverance and that this must fall out upon these Conditions yet it is not certain for this that the Event shall fall out as the Words sound so long as the Condition and Perseverance are uncertain and do not appear Here is more than sufficient for solving all the Difficulties that may occur in the Writings of A. B. as to any Predictions And as to the Promises and Declarations of God how absolute soever they may seem in Words yet the Completion of them is not to be look'd for when there is not a Correspondence by an entire Conversion unto God in those to whom they are given God does not retract his Promises but he leaves them to whom they were given takes his Talents from them to give them to others till he find such as will profit by them A. B. has declared all that has been said on this Head in Two or Three Lines God says she is always True and cannot Lie But Men do not understand his Language or do not know the Time of his Predictions or they hinder the Effect of his Promises by their Sins or Indispositions XXV In the last Place it is given as an Instance that A. B. was not led by the Spirit of God and that she had not the Gift of Discerning if Spirits were of God or not in that she was deceived for many Years by S. Saulien and others It is to be considered that the Holy Spirit does not confer his Gifts upon those in whom Self-will does yet reign and who are guided by it but on those only who are dead to their own Wills When these are endued with the Gifts of the Holy Spirit they