perfect was because it could not take away Sin and so that Perfection that is not sinless is no Perfection at all therefore it 's said That Christ by One-offering hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified Heb. 10.14 And behold the Lamb of God that takes away the Sin of the World Amen TO FRIENDS That Abide in the Truth AS ALSO To such as are gone from it FRIENDS all still mind the Light of God in you even that which is not of this World but leads out of the World and the Worships Lusts Customs Fashions Traditions and Inventions thereof up to God from whom it comes which Light was preached unto you in the Beginning and as your Minds were turned to it and believed in it true Judgment was executed upon the Man of Sin in you and through the Light wherein God's Saving Power is felt you became more than Conquerours over the World and the Mind thereof and so you became Lovely in the Eye of the Lord the Father of Light and so he entred into Covenant with you and you became his and he yours in Truth Power and Righteousness and his Banner over you was Love and is Love to all who have kept their first Love and have continued Faithful to his Witness and have brought forth Fruits to God you have reaped Life because you have lived in the Spirit and walked in the Spirit and sown to the Spirit of Life which God hath freely given you to profit withall and to be a Blessing unto you in the midst of the Earth But to such amongst you who came out of Egypt with you and saw God's wonderful Working at the Red Sea and came through the Sea to the dry Land amongst the Israclites of God but are now fallen a Lusting in the Wilderness and with your Hearts turned back again into Egypt and so cannot enter Rest with God's People because of Unbelief I say your Condition is Sad and greatly to be lamented and your Bondage is great that after all your Experiences of Pharoah's Oppression and the Mourning of the Seed under his Yoke and your Knowledge of God's great Power for you at the Red Sea that you should so soon forget your own Miseries yea and the Mercies of God also in delivering of you so Miraculously from under the Enemies Power that you would be yea are in the Brick-kills again What Is it the Onyons and Garlick of Egypt and Flesh-pots that hath bewitched you that you are so weary of the Lord's Yoke that the Heavenly Manna hath no Savour to you O Foolish People How are you bewitched that you should not love nor like to follow the Truth which hath wrought such Wonders for you O the Treacherousness of your Unbelieving Hearts How have they deceived your selves and all who looked for Good from you How Foolish and Unwise are you become to sell the Hope of eternal good Things for that which you have seen to be nothing but meer Husks Shadows and Vanity But now therefore if it be possible call in your Minds consider in your Hearts what it is that the Lord requireth of you you cannot be Happy without God and his Truth but he can be eternally Happy and Glorious without you he can cloth himself and wrap up himself in eternal Light Life Power Fullness and unspeakable Glory and Satisfaction without you but you without him cannot enjoy one dram of Light Life Comfort Satisfaction or any Good for in Christ the Light God's Gift all Fullness dwells and out of him or without him nothing but Emptiness Misery Disappointment and endless Woe yea Vanity of Vanities and a sore Travel as all things under the Sun in your best Condition without Truth whilst here and endless Woe without all Comfort when gone hence Without me saith Christ ye can do nothing And so say I Without Christ ye are nothing nor have nothing but are meer Beggars Prodigals Lost Undone Blind Wretched and Naked Out casts profitable for nothing so Return Return Renent Repent saith my Soul in the Light of the Living to you all So be it TO FRIENDS MY Dear Friends in Christ Jesus who are Faithful in God's Covenant of Light and Life to dwell grow and increase yea and to bring forth Fruit of Righteousness to God's Glory abundantly my true and tender Love salutes you all and my Spirit in God rejoyceth because of you all and I cannot but evermore upon every remembrance of you Praise Laud and Magnifie the great and glorious Name of our Heavenly Father for his tender Love and tender Mercy to you all and for the Power of his Love in Christ whereby he hath reached help to your Souls in the needful time when all help of Creatures was at an end and hath raised you up from the Dead to be his living Witnesses in the Day of his Love to Israel and hath chosen you for his People and to bear the Name of Sons and Daughters Servants and Hand-maids in his House to do his Service and to bear his Name in Righteousness before the Children of Men. O my Soul is even filled with the sweet heavenly Vertue of this Love of God upon every Remembrance of you even of you all and every Member of the Holy Body of Jesus Christ in every place For who can express the Beauty of your Life and Fullness of your Treasure which you possess in his Love O Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who hath chosen us and set his pure Love upon us whereby it comes to pass that we are more than Conquerors over all the things of Darkness and Powers of Evil that would separate us from his pure Love O Glory Glory to his great Name who by his pure Love hath begotten us again from the Dead into the Image of his living pure and holy Nature of Love to love one another and to reach forth pure Love in Spirit and Truth unto all yea unto Enemies for at the Birth of Jesus this was sounded forth by the Heavenly even Peace on Earth Good Will to Men. So that when Men have us and speak Evil of us we know they have no Cause for it for if they know our Love and good Will to them they would love us and much more the Father of our precious Life by whom we are begotten into such a pure heavenly Love as even labours and travels night and day how we may fulfil that great Service of Love and continual Duty of good Will that we owe to the whole Creation of God For Oh how great is the Bondage of a great part of it as yet being so burdened with the weight of Corruption that lyes upon it that it ever cries unto God by reason of Oppression and waits for the Manifestation and Enjoyment of the pure and holy Liberty of the Sons of God wherein God alone may be glorified and the Creature set free to run in the ways of his Commandments with Joy and the wicked one
lose their whole Faith if they believe it not as before In the Ninth Article speaking of the Church he saith The Church is the Congregation of all the Faithful under Christ their Invisible Head and his Vicar upon Earth the Pope But how proves he this Neither by Scripture nor Apostolical Tradition for which he brings neither for there is none for certain for the Church hath not two Heads the Church is not a Monster with two Heads one Visible to wit The Pope or such-like and another invisible to wit Christ Neither is the Church an Adulteress with two Husbands one visible and another invisible For saith the Apostle I have espoused you to one Husband even Christ So all others are Antichrist And then this wicked Book farther asks What are the Essential parts of the Church And to that it answers A Pope or Supreme Head Bishops Pastors and the Laity To this I say It is rank Popish Poison And what Scripture have they for this Surely none nor Apostolical Tradition-neither for the Apostles could not contradict their own Writings the Scriptures of Truth as is said before And the Scripture doth no where make the Church of Christ consist of such Essentials for God's Church are his Cleroi that is his choice ones his Lot his Heritage his Flock all of them 1 Pet. 5.3 God's Flock are every one of them sound Sheep and Lambs and they are Men God's Cleroi that is Clergy and not Laity and the word Laity is Popish and Antichristian as well as the Pope And for the true Overseers and Pastors Feeders in and of the true Church What have you to do with them unless it be to Persecute them as your Custom hath been all along ever since Night and Darkness came upon you for your great Apostasie Then this blind Guide goes on asking How prove you St. Peter and the Pope his Successor to be the visible Head of the Church He answers First out of John 21.16 17 18. Where Christ saith he for a Reward of his special Faith and Love gave Peter absolute Power to feed and govern his whole Flock yea even the Apostles themselves to be his Sheep and he their Head and Pastor I answer This is a most shameless Lie For Christ was so far in those words from giving Peter charge of Feeding and Governing his whole Church in general much less the Apostles in particular who were his Equals that the same Charge that is given here is also given to the rest of the Apostles though not in the same express words as here yet in words of the same import fully as not only when he first called them to be Fellow Apostles but also and that most plainly when he departed from them as in Matt. 28.18 19 20. where it is said And Jesus came and spake unto them that is to say to the Eleven for Judas was gone to his place saying All power in Heaven and Earth is given to me Go ye therefore not Peter only but all the rest as well as he and teach all Nations Baptizing them in or rather into as the Greek there truly signifies the Name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you And lo I am with you to wit all of you not Peter only alway even to the end of the World Amen And whereas this Liar says It was for Peter 's special Faith and Love I say Peter had no Faith nor Love but what was common to all the rest of the Apostles But if all things may be reckoned he had but little Faith nor Love neither when he denied his Master And though Christ said Lovest thou me more than these He was taught by his former forwardness not to say Yea I love thee more than they all but humbly in the sence of his former weakness Lord thou knowest that I love thee And great cause had he to love Christ greatly seeing he had Dishonoured Christ and Wounded his own Soul by Denying and Forswearing Christ more than they all And so no Merit in Peter for any thing can be looked at but God's great and free Mercy in not only forgiving him but also in imploying him in his Service again So let your unclean Mouths be stopt for Ever ye Idolizers of Creatures For as Paul said to the Corinthians so may I say to you and all the World who are striving about Men What is Paul Or what is Apollos So what is Peter or others that God made use then or makes use of now as Instruments in his Hand for Peoples good but even as nothing seeing Christ is all and in all And with him there conclude Neither is he that planteth nor watereth any thing but God that giveth the increase 1 Cor. 1.11 c. and Chap. 3.3 4 c. His other Proof for Peter's Supremacy is out of Mat. 16.18 Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church therefore saith he the rest of the Apostles were built on him and hence it is saith he as often as they are mentioned in Scripture he is named first To which I answer and say It is no less than Blasphemy to say That either the Apostles or the rest of the Faithful were Built upon Peter as a Man for it contradicts all Scripture which every where give the Glory of being the Rock the Foundation yea and Corner-stone of the whole Building of the Church of God to Christ alone and not to Peter at all as a Man for what is said here of Peter hath relation only and altogether to the Faith of Christ the Rock here confessed only unto by Peter but given of the Father And Peter himself says expresly that the rest of the Faithful in those Days had obtained like Precious Faith with him and the rest of the Apostles See 2 Pet. 1.1 And the Apostle blames them greatly in 1 Cor. 1. before-mentioned for saying I am of Paul and I of Apollos and I of Cephas that is Peter and I of Christ as though Christ were divided For they all should have kept the one Head Christ without mentioning any Man's Name in this Matter For as Peter also said in Acts 4.12 There is no other Name but that of Christ Jesus by which Men can be saved then say I of Necessity there can be no other Rock And whereas this Imaginer would make something for Peter's Supremacy from his being named first often in Scripture when the Apostles are mentioned I say though it were always as he says it makes nothing at all for his purpose but is a meer childish empty Conceit not worthy a Man much less one professing Religion to talk on for some of them must be mentioned first but that thus mentioning Peter in Scripture had any such Intention in it as he here Dreams of I and not only I but all Saints with me do utterly deny And as for the word Supremacy it is inconsistent with the Nature of true
Destroying one another So I rest in the Blessed Peace of my God a Sufferer for his Blessed Truth Blessed for ever be his Name who hath called me and counted me worthy thereunto But it will not be well with such as hate the righteous Man as saith Scripture But my Heart can say Father forgive them for they know not what they do And concerning Kings and all that are in Authority my Heart hath said according to the Holy Doctrine of the Apostle Lord Grant that they may Rule well that it may be well with them in the latter End and that we thy People whom thou hast redeemed to thy self may lead a quiet and peaceable Life in all Honesty and Godliness under them to thy Praise And for this Cause pay we Tribute c. This his own Sincere Account appears truly agreeable to what the Holy Apostle saith in the like case 2 Cor. 1.12 For our Rejoycing is this the Testimony of our Conscience that in Simplicity and Godly Sincerity not with fleshly Wisdom but by the Grace of God we have had our Conversation in the World and more abundantly to you-wards These things are recommended to all Serious and Well-inclined Readers who desire to seek the Lord his Kingdom and the Righteousness thereof to weigh and consider knowing that 't is all our Concerns tenderly to mark and behold the perfect and upright Man for the End of that Man is Peace as was the End of this Innocent and Upright-hearted Man whose Memorial is Blessed Divers Friends have been for some time concerned that the following Collections were not publish'd some Years ago but many Occasions and Exercises intervening have thus long prevented the Persons concerned in Collecting Inspecting and Placing his Writings in Order as they could find them and as might most tend to future Service Admonition or Warning that they might be preserved for Ages to come We have great Cause to Praise the Worthy Name of the Lord our God that he hath raised and sent so many Faithful Witnesses in our Days who have not been as Clouds without Rain but Divinely Replenished and Qualified with Life Wisdom and Sanctity for the Work which the Lord hath called them unto And therefore Wo will be to those Enemies Apostates and Back-sliders who Contemn Reproach or Harm any such who are the Lord 's Anointed ones Prophets or Faithful Servants either while Living or Dead And it highly concerns all the Lord's People who profess his Light and Truth sincerely to approve their Hearts unto him with unblameable Lives and Conversations walking before him in true Love and Christian Charity and truly to prize the Mercy of the present Day and Dispensation of Grace and fervently to pray the Lord of the Harvest to raise up and send forth more Faithful Labourers thereinto that his Gospel-harvest-Day and Work may go on and prosper both in this Age and the Ages to come to his Eternal Praise and Renown and his Church's great Joy and Comfort in him for ever Amen WE being satisfied and having Vnity with the foregoing Preface with Relation to and in behalf of our deceased Friend and Brother Thomas Taylor his Service Labours and Travels in the Gospel of Christ do hereunto Subscribe our Names Theodore Eccleston William Ellis Samuel Waldenfield George Bowles Charles Marshall Thomas Lower John Bowater Joshua Middleton Richard Needham John Field I Am Concerned to give this further Account The said Thomas Taylor after other Imprisonments being Twice Imprisoned at Stafford for his Tender Conscience to Christ In the first Imprisonment there he was near Eleven Years a Prisoner as I Remember and the Second Imprisonment there was for a short time being Threatned Reviled and Falsly Aspersed and called a Jesuite-Rogue by the Deputy's Steward of the Court I was made Instrumental in God's Hand for his Release both times the First in 1672. by Solicitation for him and many others whom thereupon K. Charles the Second Released And the Second by Endeavouring for himself about 1679. Manifesting him to be no Jesuite nor Papist but a Peaceable Harmless Man in his Conversation and a Dissenting Protestant Distinguished under the Name Quaker to clear him from the False Aspersions cast upon him in which my Solicitation and Endeavours for his Liberty I had great Peace and Comfort and the more in obtaining the same for him and others for I truly Loved him for his Innocency Integrity and Love to the Lord and his People G. Whitehead London the 20th of the 3d Month 1697. AN INDEX OF THE CHIEF HEADS Contained in this BOOK I. A Testimony concerning our Dear Friend and Brother Thomas Taylor who was Convinced of the Lord's Everlasting Truth and Received it in the Year 1652. II. Christopher Taylor 's Testimony concerning Thomas Taylor III. Thomas Taylor 's Testimony concerning his Father IV. A short Testimony of Hannah Taylor concerning her Dear Father Thomas Taylor V. Robert Barrow 's Testimony concerning Thomas Taylor VI. William Fallowfield 's Testimony concerning Thomas Taylor VII A short Testiâ—oâ—y concerning that Faithful Servant of the Lord Thomas Taylor whose Memory is Blessed THomas Taylor 's Epistles To Friends Page 2 To Friends at Strickland head Page 4 To Friends in Warwick-shire and Stafford-shire c. Page 7 To Friends Page 10 A Loving and Seasonable Advice to the Children of Light from a Brother Thomas Taylor Page 11 To Friends that abide in the Truth as also to such as are gone from it Page 15 To Friends Page 17 To Israel 's Babes Page 20 Of Prayers Page 22 Concerning Zion Page 23 The Life more than Cloaths and Meat ibid. To the Vnsatiable Devourers of Strong Drink Page 24 To my Dear Friends every where Page 26 To Friends Page 28 To Friends in London Page 30 To Friends of Sadbury side Page 32 To Friends Richard Boothman and Robert Clough Page 34 The Day of the Lord is Dawned Page 35 Some Prison-Meditations in the 7th Month 1657. being a Free-gift Sermon mainly touching the Religious Robbers or Spiritual Murtherers the Sermon and Prayer-sellers of the former latter and present Times even to the whole Company of Mystery Babylon 's Merchants and Members a Warning Page 37 To the Judges Justices Juries Teachers and People of the Nation who Profess themselves to be Christians and the Scriptures to be their Rule and yet account themselves disturbed if any speak unto them and cry against them in their Assemblies or Streets in the Name and Word of the Lord without any Authority from Man a few Queries Page 50 To those of Manchester that are Zealous for their Sabbath Page 53 To a Wandering Apostate Page 55 To George Ward and those that had Fellowship with him Page 56 To a Plundering Priest Page 58 To those that Rejoice in Bells and Bonefires Page 59 To them that plays the Fool upon the Stage Page 60 Against Mass Times Page 61 To the Bear ward Page 62 To the Dancers on the Ropes Page 63 A Warning to all People ibid. For the
Testimony lives with me to bear for my Dear Father Thomas Taylor that True and Faithful Servant of the Lord who was Born near Skipton in Yorkshire and was brought up a Scholar and sent to the University and in process of time he came to be a National Minister and so continued for some Years but in those Days he had not many Equals for he was a Man of a Tender Spirit seeking after a further Attainment of the Knowledge of God and his Holy Way whom to know is Life Eternal which the Lord in his own due time made known unto him After he had heard the Word of Life declared in the Demonstration of God's Holy Spirit through his Faithful Messenger George Fox he was then evidently Convinced of the Blessed Truth as it is in Jesus he never after turned his Back upon it many Days and Nights of great Sorrow and Anxiety of Spirit he underwent until the Old Leaven was purged out by the Spirit of Judgment and then he became a Vessel of Honour fit for the Lord's Service and left his Benefice which he then had at Richmond in Yorkshire not consulting with Flesh and Blood what he should do for a Livelihood but trusted the Lord that he would provide for him and his Family he having then a Wife and Five small Children whom he afterward through the good Providence of God lived to see brought up to be Men and Women Now this Faithful Servant of the Lord not distrusting of the Mercies of God gave up freely whatsoever was Dear and Near unto him that the Lord required of him that he might win Christ the Lord who had Visited him with his Day-spring from on high and Ruled him by his Grace and gave unto him the Word of Life to declare unto the Sons and Daughters of Men Warning and Admonishing them to turn from their evil ways and to seek the Lord whilst he might be found and great was his Labours and Travels in those Days being moved often to go into Market-places and Steeple houses to declare the Word of the Lord to the People where he often met with great Opposition and Sufferings from the Hands of Unreasonable Men but the Lord by his Mighty Power delivered him wonderfully out of their Hands and many long and tedious Imprisonments this good Man underwent in his Day but with great Patience and Contentedness of Mind knowing it was for his bearing his Testimony to the Lord's Blessed Truth and not for evil-doing And this I have further to say for this Worthy and Honourable Servant of Christ who loved not his Life unto the Death that he might serve the Lord in his Day who was a Faithful and True Minister of the Everlasting Gospel and laboured mightily in Word and Doctrine and many in this Nation were Convinced by that powerful Word of God that run through him and they have great Cause to Bless and Praise the Name of the Lord even as I may say on his behalf for he was a Zealous Man for the Truth in his Day and was one of the Worthies in Israel who went through many Combates both with Professors and Prophane and by the Assistance of God's Holy Spirit oftentimes put them to silence and the Truth prevailed over all Blessed be the Name of the Lord for Ever And now not being willing to be too tedious to the Reader else I could mention many more things concerning my Dear Father who was a Faithful Follower of the Lamb wheresoever he led him through good Report and bad Report for he valued nothing so much in this World as the Propagation of the Truth for his Life was hid with Christ in God at whose Right Hand there is Joy and Rivers of Pleasure and that for Evermore And a little before my Father's Departure out of this World as he lay upon his Sick-bed several Friends that came to Visit him standing by him he being very sensible to the last spoke on this wife I am going to my Father and your Father to my God and your God and so departed like a Lamb and is gone to his Everlasting Rest to receive that weighty Crown of Glory that is laid up in store for all them that loves the Appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ and keeps their Garments unspotted of this World Thomas Taylor Jun. Middlesex the 3d Day of the 3d Month called May 1697. A short TESTIMONY OF Hannah Taylor Concerning her Dear Father Thomas Taylor THis I have to say concerning this dear Servant of the Lord who followed the Lamb through many Tribulations and wash'd his Garmens white in his Blood That he served the Lord with a perfect Heart and that he was endued with the Spirit of Wisdom and of Understanding in the Truth which he did value above all the World and all the Preferments thereof For he counted all as Dross and Dung in Comparison of that Pearl of Price which he Laboured for both Night and Day Yea for Sion's Sake he could not rest and for Jerusalem's Sake he could not hold his Peace Because the Spirit of the Lord was upon him and he had Anointed him to be a Preacher of Glad-Tidings to the House of God's Israel But he was a Reprover of the Vngodly yea his Testimony was against all Wickedness and Evil-doers Yea he was clad with Zeal as with a Cloak and with the Righteousness which God had put upon them as with an Helmet Yea he was a Valiant Soldier indeed he fought a good Fight he kept the Faith and from henceforth for him was laid up a Crown of Life which at the time appointed he did receive with all the Redeemed of the Lord who rest from their Labour and their Works follow them Hannah Taylor Robert Barrow's TESTIMONY Concerning Thomas Taylor HE being a Man with whom I was Acquainted and Conversant for the space of Thirty Years some part of our Acquaintance in the time of our Notion and Outward Profession of Religion in the form thereof but the most of our time was after God in Mercy had opened our Understanding and revealed his Son in us by the Word of Life and Spirit of Truth to know Christ in us the Hope of Glory He was Educated and Bred up at one of the Colledges of Oxford and became a Parish Preacher and had a Place in the County of Westmoreland yet in those Days he was a Seeking Man having Real Desires to understand the Things of God and the Mysteries of his Kingdom and was a Man of an Honest Life and Clean Behaviour and in his Preaching and Judgment was more Refined than the rest of his Neighbouring Priests and many of his Hearers were a People commended of the Common Hireling Priests of the World which Priests Nick-named his Hearers Roundheads and Puritans and many of those so called came frequently from the next Parish and Town of Kendall to hear him amongst whom I was one and he used to let John Audland and Francis Howgill sometimes Preach in his
laid to Heart and not at all to be slighted And therefore I say unto you O People even you that love your Souls and are not yet come to the true Rest Christ Jesus in Spirit but are wandering from Mountain to Hill after the Hireling-Teachers one day after another and yet are not satisfied with their empty Words but are dead dry and barren in Heart as to the Power of Godliness after all your Money spent and Labour taken I said Is not this an evident Sign that it is not Bread that hath by them been ministred to you but the Chaff of Mens Inventions For saith the Lord Does not my words do good to them that desire after me But alas People the Hireling's Words which he sells you for Money are not the Word of God but only what he hath gathered and conceived from the Letter of another Man's Line and so cannot profit you though you should hear never so much of it no more than Chaff can feed And so do not say the Fault is not in our Teachers but only in us For I say unto you in the Spirit of Truth the Fault is now in you both for the Day of God is dawned and now you are both warned and so are left both without Excuse There was a Time of Darkness and Ignorance which God winked at but now the Life is manifest and the true Light that enlightens being broken forth through the Clouds you are hereby warned and all every where exhorted to Repent So harken to the measure of that Light that shines in your dark Hearts which convinceth you of Sin and Unbelief and would lead you from them this is the Word of the Spirit of God that is nigh you where-ever you are and from whose sight you can hide nothing though never so secret Here is your Guide to God and Life eternal if you love it and here is the Door that shuts you out from God and his Glory if you hate it so prize your time and while you have time learn to know this Light of Christ in your Consciences to be your Teacher and only Guide For why will ye die why cease you not from Man whose breath is in his Nostrils that broken Cistern Time will come when Fools will wish they had been wiser and when God's Witness will be remembred and when such as now Suffer for Righteousness sake will be had in Honour Rests as always your Friend Thomas Taylor And you that go carelesly by this Window and do not regard the Word of the Lord Hear the Word of the Lord ye Careless ones ye go and come from the Steeple-house and in your Minds secretly conclude that you shall have Peace and no Evil shall come upon you when the Lord God hath spoken no Peace to you for there is no Peace to the Wicked and there you are even in the Wickedness under the Wrath of God for the Wrath of God abides upon all the Children of Disobedience And verily the Lord is arising in mighty Power to Judge the World by Jesus Christ whom ye have Crucified and whose Counsels you have set at naught and have chosen rather to follow the Hireling-Teacher and his ways than the way of the Lord God So consider what is here said and run not head-long to your own Destruction for what account can ye give to a pure God in the day of his fierce Wrath who are not yet at all cleansed from your Unrighteousness Will your crying Lord Lord Save ye who are found doing your own Wills and satisfying your own Lushs without Repentance To that in your Conscience I speak which in the day when the Book of your Conscience is opened will justifie the Truth of these things against you all who in the broad way are found at that day to Condemnation and the Day is at hand and the Judge is at the Door and Wo will be to such as put it far off Rests the Lord's Servant still in this Prison but the Truth cannot be bound Thomas Taylor To King Charles the Second concerning Persecution c. IT is in my Heart as from the Lord God of Heaven and Earth to warn thee to stop the Current of that grievous Persecution which is raised up against us the Harmless People of God in Scorn called Quakers for our pure Conscience sake at this day For of a Truth the Lord God hath raised us up in his eternal Love to be his People to bear his Name in Righteousness before the Children of Men and so to exercise our Consciences in a pure Love and true Good Will towards God and all Men as he hath taught us and doth teach all that come to him And therefore weigh things well in thy Heart in the cool of the day and be not a means of injuring us for this the Exercise of our pure Conscience for truly the Lord Jesus Christ is highly displeased already for what is done against us O consider consider Doth not his Holy Eye behold and his Heavenly Heart consider the great Wrongs that are daily done us for his Names sake our Bodies imprisoned our Estates spoiled our Meeting-houses pulled down yea whole Families ruined as to the outward World for no other cause but because we cannot cease to meet together in his Name as he requires us and required his in a most harmless and peaceable manner as his People in former Ages did and as we have always done since we were to God a People And never let it be said that Charles the Second disappointed the Good People of the Land under his Government of their Expectations for behold we looked for the Continuance of Good Things from thee because of some words passed out of thy Mouth but behold great Evil hath ensued O let not the Evil Counsel of thy own Heart or of others cause thee to go on in that which will certainly bring God's Judgments upon thy Soul and Body and the whole Nation if it be persisted in as this present undertaking against us will do We desire not your Ruin no more than our own but this we know certainly and the Scripture of Truth abundantly witnesses it That never did any Prosper who did or suffered to be done so great Injury against a Harmless and Innocent People as we are known to God to be O let not the King believe any longer the vain and false Suggestions of evil Men against us If we had had any Mind against the King's Welfare we should not have had that Boldness that we have in God's sight and thine but now knowing in our Consciences that all our Endeavours have been from the beginning how to gloâ—ifie God and to serve all Men in Love to this day therefore are our Hearts in God's Truth greatly strengthened and emboldened to hold forth our Innocency before thee and all Men For the Righteous are bold as a Lyon praised be God for ever And why should it seem strange to thee or any at this day that
a hint of what certainly is and will be And so having cleared my Conscience to God and paid my debt of Love to you in this matter I leave all to him who is the righteous Judge and the true Pleader of the Cause of the Innocent in all Generations and the Avenger of all Wrongs that are done upon the Earth and rests his Servant in whose Love is my Souls Life who am a Sufferer for the Testimony of the Everlasting Truth amongst the Despised People of God whom the World in Scorn call Quakers yet the Reproach of Christ to us is great Riches Thomas Taylor An Exhortation to remember the Judgments of God HOW long O ye People of this present time will ye grieve and burden the Spirit of the Lord with your Works How long shall he suffer your Manners unpunished Is it not high time for the Lord to lay to his Hand seeing you have so covered his Law with your Traditions and vain Customs that the poor People can hardly find any one thing you do savouring of Pure Christian Doctrine or the Apostles Practice But the Hand of the Man of Sin is the Worker in you and by the power of the Earth is your Building upheld But Wo to the Building which the Lord hath not builded and Wo to the Builders of that House wherein all the Wicked of the World inhabit lye down and are at ease and bring forth their Young Is this the Church of God Nay nay this is the Synagogue of Satan and not of the Living God for the House of God is Holy and nothing but Holiness dwells there nothing that defileth can enter this day into God's Temple for Holiness is the Ornament of God's House for ever So Wo to the false Builders and Daubers that cry Peace to People in their Sins the Lord speaks no Peace to any Sinners but Judgments Plagues and Woes to Priests and People who live in their Sins and plead for a Continuance in Sin as long as they live as at this day Wo to the unspiritual Men that bind heavy Burdens upon others and will not touch them with one of their Fingers that bind the poor Men whom they call Wardens of their Church by Oath to do impossible things and punish them that make Conscience of their Ways and dare not Swear nor Forswear but would keep their Hearts clean to Christ in whose Church is neither Swearing nor Forswearing this day but the Yea is Yea and the Nay is Nay in all things in Truth and Righteousness But Wo to the wicked World that takes God's Name in their polluted Lips the Lord is arisen to judge thee in Flames of Fire for the day of the Lord is dawned upon thee and thy building will he thrown down and a visible downfall shall Babylon have upon the Face of all the Earth for the Pastors have not gathered in nor visited with Truth the good Seed but with Force and Violence over it do they Rule and therefore is the Lord arisen to plead the Cause of the Poor and Innocent as the Mouth of the Lord hath said So be it And let all the Earth fear and tremble before the Lord this day fâ—r our God the true God is a consuming Fire and will by no meaâ—s acquit the Guilty Thomas Taylor To the Unclean Communicants YOU that tell of a Communion and say you eat Bread and drink Wine in remembrance of Christ's Death and yet live in your Sins confessing with your own Mouths that you daily leave undone that which you ought to have done and do what you ought not to do and that there is no Health in you Consider of your Ways and see in what your Fellowship and Communion stands Doth it not stand in Sin and Disobedience And examine your selves what you eat Do you not eat Damnation to your selves not discerning the Lord's Body For the Lord's Body is Holy but you are Unholy and live in Unholiness as your selves confess and as is manifest in your Lives and Conversations so you have cut your selves off from being of Christ's Holy Body you that live in your Sins and do your own Wills and leave undone that which he wills now to do for no unholy or unclean thing can be joyned to Christ's holy Body Again Christ's Body is a sound and healthful Body and no Leper in it but you have no Health in you as you confess and so you are of that Body and Number who have not as yet so much as touched the Hem of Christ's Garment with a true Heart but are in the Mud and Filth and Diseasedness of this sinful lost World through which the wholsom Waters of God's Sanctuary have not run to cleanse you So all you do in this your sinful State is unclean in the sight of God and he can take no pleasure in your seeming Services because of your Sins For as the Leperous Bodies under the Law were shut out of the outward typical holy Place so the Spiritually Defiled are altogether unfit in this day to enter into or have Communion with any thing of Christ's Kingdom Thomas Taylor God's Virtue and Goodness Extolled O Thou pure God of all Heavenly Glory Virtue and Goodness how Holy are all thy Ways and Righteous all thy Judgments O how plainly and clearly hast thou manifested thy Mind and Will to Mankind in all Generations and especially since the first publishing of thy Gospel and in this of ours and yet alas with grief of Heart may it be said never was the Earth more burthened with the Evil of her Inhabitants than at this day never was there more provoking of God by evil Customs and bad Doings than now They spend their Days in satisfying the Lusts of the Flesh and of the Mind that is Earthly Sensual and Devilish and say in their Hearts unto God Depart from us for we desire not the Knowledge of thy Ways The strait way of Christ they perfectly hate and the broad way of the World which leads to Destruction they willingly chuse because their Hearts are evil and to Christ's Light they will not bring their Deeds because they be so evil that the Light will utterly condemn them And thus in the Blindness of their uncircumcised Hearts they heap up Wrath against the Day of Wrath and Revelation of God's just Judgments upon them And though the Trumpet of the Lord hath been plentifully sounded amongst them yet they will not hear nor awaken to Judgment but say in their Hearts Yet a little more Sleep yet a little more folding of the Hands to Slumber the Judgment is far off we will not forego our present Pleasures and worldly Delights for Glory to come Where is he that 's come from the Dead to tell us what 's in another World Let 's Eat and Drink and take our Fill of Pleasures for to-morrow we Dye and are not say they O the Wretched O the Atheistical Hearts of the Men of this present evil and adulterous Generation The Lord
Regenerates them nor Seals it unto them but is a thing of Mens devising which the Lord never required at your hands And though Scriptures be wrested by you to keep it up and many Reasons brought to prove it yet I say and I and not I only but many more know in the Light it is proved that there is not one Scripture rightly understood that is for it nor one true Reason from Scripture to keep up your Sprinkling Infants But it is a Custom that in the Apostasie had its Rise and by such as are not recovered out of the Apostasie kept up and pleaded for Now for the stir thou makest about something that was said by one of our Friends about the Press that was about Christ by People that came to be Healed and that therefore the Disciples might say something as tending to hinder the little Children from coming and that the Children were brought upon other accounts to Christ and not to be Baptized at all with outward Water I say thou wrongest our Friend in mixing and charging words on him he spoke not and therefore now that I see thee make so bad an use of his words and so misrepresent them it is good time to take notice of thee And now I may add something more concerning thy ungrounded Reasons thou bringest for Infant-Baptism 1. Thou sayst Where the Disease is there ought the Remedy to be applied but the Disease to wit Original Sin is in Children as well as Men Therefore the Remedy which is Baptism ought to be applied to Children as well as Men. I answer That by this both thy self and all that take part with thee in this thing are manifest to be like the Papists in this Point about Infant Baptism for they hold that Baptism of Infants washes away Original Sin and so do these English Priests it seems I knew that you were Idolaters from the Womb giving that to the Creature which is proper to the Creator If the Disease be Original Sin and the Remedy be outward Baptisin then it seems those that are so cured must certainly be saved then it 's no Wonder though poor People that are perswaded of this Lie do run so fast to you with their Children to be Sprinkled and no wonder that they do so admire you and worship you that are such Saviours and none must be thought worthy to do it it seems but your selves O sad Work But by this Craft you get great Livings and that pleases your Carnal Mind well But God will judge for all such things And if this Tradition of yours were true How can ever any that have Original Sin so cured and washed from them Sin at all For take away the Cause and Root of a thing and the Effect and Fruit which comes and springs from them must needs cease also And therefore thy Interpretation of the Remedy against Original Sin that it is outward Water-Baptism which thou didst mention in thy Argument I do utterly deny and do with all the Children of Light pronounce it to be contrary to the Word of God for God's Word is Truth and no Lie is of but contrary to the Word of Truth And so where the Door or In-let into your Church is such an unsound Doctrine as this what a Church is that And now if thou couldst convert to Truth according to thy seeming Promise it would be well for thy Soul Therefore whilst it is called to day harden not thy Heart Thy second Reason is answered already in shewing thy false Exposition of that place of Scripture Gen. 17.7 3. Thy third Reason No means of Salvation ought to be denied to the Children of the Faithful whereof they are capable but Baptism is an outward means of Salvation whereof Children are capable under the Gospel as well as Children of the Jews were capable of it under the Law therefore c. To this I say Though in a general Sence Your own grant that Insants cannot observe the Requisites of Baptism to wit Faith and Repentance shews their Incapacity for it the Major Proposition as you tearm it may be granted but restrained to your Sence I say that before you intitle your Children to Priviledges because of your Faith you had need prove your selves to be in the Faith which yet you have not done lest both the Root Tree and Branches fall all together And for the Minor as you tearm it I say it is false that your Sprinkling is any means of Salvation either to your selves or your Children because as is proved it hath no ground nor footing in the Truth but a meer Invention of Man's wanting both Precept and President in the Scriptures of Truth And for Children being capable of it under the Gospel I ask how capable Dost thou say they understand what is done to them in it or can make any Spiritual use of it in their Infancy Then I say The Multitude shall condemn thee and the least in the Flock witness against thee But if thou say they are capable of it only so as to suffer it to be done on them without understanding then I say it is no Gospelâ— Capacity for in the Gospel Ministration all must be done and received in and with the Spirit and Understanding except you will joyn hands again with the Papists and say ex opere operato to wit From the Work of the Priest done upon them they are saved O sad That ever we should have occasion to speak thus to a People after so long a time of professing the Scripture and Protestant Religion 4. The fourth Reason speaks all as it were in one and doth fully make manifest the Darkness in thee from whence all thy Unchristian Doctrines have proceeded and it is this All those who receive the thing signified by Baptism ought to receive the outward Sign it is the Argument of St. Peter Acts 10.47 Can any Man forbid Water that these should not be Baptized who have received the Holy Ghost as well as we But Children of the Faithful receive the thing signified by Baptism to wit Regeneration and Remission of Sins Therefore c. To thy first Proposition drawn from Peter's words Acts 10.47 thou might have left that to others who Idolize outward Baptism in another Form for they will tell thee it belongs nothing to you at all who Sprinkle before Confession or any visible Appearance of any inward Work But then sayst thou If Children be not Regenerated and receive Remission of Sins you must needs hold that all Children are damned I say thou belies us and the Truth for there is no necessity at all for such a wild and falfe Conclusion from our true and harmless Premises for what though God please to have Mercy upon Children whether some or all whom and as he pleaseth What ground is that for you to say hand over head that all that you Sprinkle are Regenerated when you know nothing at all of God's Mind in the thing And for your calling such Children
Provision for the Flesh to satisfie it in the Lusts thereof with Meats Drinks Pleasures Pastimes and all manner of foolish Inventions but that People should abstain from Fleshly Lusts because they War against the Soul And did not the Apostle weep for such as made a God of their Belly and Gloried in their Shame and minded Earthly Things and plainly tells them That they were â—nemies to the Cross of Christ and their End was Destruction Phil. 3. And so thou whoever thou art that pretends to Honour Christ by making Provision for thy Fleshly Part to satisfie it in the Lusts thereof thou art no Servant of God and Christ in this but a denyer of his Truth and so instead of following Christ in the Regeneration and daily Cross and Self denlal thou follows Christ's Enemy the great Antichrist and Satan who hath seduced the Minds of People from Christ's Doctrine and Life into the Doctrine and Life of all Unrighteousness and so they that Eat and Drink and Game and Sport after the Custome of the Heathenish World their Professing of Christ in Words will do them no good in the Day of the Lord when God will Reward every Man according to their Deeds for now instead of a Holy Pure Righteous Self-denying Life which God requires thou offers him an unclean Sacrifice of an unholy and corrupt Life which he will not accept And so many shall come in that Day and say Lord Lord Open unto us to whom he will Answer I know ye not depart ye Workers of Iniquity O dreadful Sentence to such as it hits who like Esau sell their Birth-right for a mess of Pottage and chuse rather to follow the Fleshly Sinful World in the broad way to Destruction than the Lambs of Christ in the streight way that leads to Life Eternal So all Awake and Arise from your dead defiled Customs and Practices of Sin to the pure clean Fear and Worship of God for God is a Spirit and Christ is a Spiritual Lord and will be Worshipped and Served in Spirit and Truth and who is this Day seeking such to Worship him who shall bring forth Fruits to him worthy amendment of Life And one thing is needful saith Christ and Mary that sate at his Feet hearing his Word chused that good Part which shall never be taken from her but Martha was cumbred about much in the outward as too many are now and that in a Heart far from that of Mary's Heart to their Souls great disadvantage So he that hath an Ear let him hear for these Words are Faithful and True Thomas Taylor To the King O That the King and all his Councils the Parliament and the Rest would hear and believe these Words for in the Truth of God's Spirit and Uprightness of my Heart are they thus written and sent to them for that purpose Consider of your ways for thus saith the Lord the Holy One Creator of Heaven and Earth Mine Anger is kindled against you because you have not made a Separation betwixt the Precious and the Vile but have numbred my People who tremble at my Word with the Transgressors and will not hear the Voice of my Mouth to let my Israel have their Liberty to meet together in my own free Spirit as I have Taught them to wait upon me and to Edify one another in their most Holy Faith but you will Punish them and Afflict them and evil Intreat them for this and surely if you go on in this Work and think to destroy this my Heritage from being a People upon the Earth and to Root them up from bearing a Testimony to my Name in their Holy Assemblies before the Children of Men I will Work Wonders yea I will Work Wonders and make all the Earth to know that these your Thoughts and your Doings are against the Lord and his People as truly as ever Pharoah and Egypt and the Nations there abouts in that Day of Israel 's Oppressions and Deliverances did know have you no Vnderstanding that you would eat up my People as Bread saith the Lord in whose hand is your Breath Oh! that you could once lay things to Heart what you have done and what you should do and not still take Counsel at a wrong Spirit which hurries you thus on in a way that is not good to the grief of God's Spirit and in the end if continued in your own Destruction have you not Heard and do not you Read what God hath done in former times to great Kings and strong Nations for their Doings against his People and do you not know that the same Evil Spirit which causes you in other things to do what you ought not to do and to leave undone what you ought to do is the putter of you forward in this grievous Work of Persecuting the Seed of God who Fear and Tremble at his Word and work out their Salvation with Fear and Trembling as the Lord Commands and who in their Meetings never had nor at this Day have any other end but to Glorifie their God the true God over all in obeying his Voice with a true good Will in our Hearts towards all Men without the least thought of Evil to any as God's true God over all Men without the least thought of Evil to any as God's true Witness in all Consciences where it is harkened unto doth plainly Testifie at this Day as it hath done ever since we were to God a People For from War Bloodshed Wrong and Spoil hath the Lord called and delivered our Souls into his Holy Habitation of Truth Peace and Love that as Lambs we might in the midst of the Earth stand in Christ's Innocency to hold forth the Virtues of God who hath Blessed us in Christ Jesus with the Knowledge of himself whom to know is Life Eternal And so if you hate us because God loves us what will be the end O Consider consider this matter is of the weightiest Nature And so though at present by reason of the Darkness that is upon your Minds you do not see us as we are but present us to your selves as Evil-doers or so yet seeing you know in your own Consciences as in Words also you often Confess that in other things you are miserable Offenders you ought to be more Moderate Sparing and Careful what you do in this present matter concerning us because where Sin is and remains there must of necessity be a want of Ability as to the right judging and discerning of Men and Matters Spiritual as Christ foretold of some that through the Error of their Minds should think they did God Service when they were Killing his Children This was a sad Mistake Therefore let this be upon your Hearts when you lye down and when you rise up and when you sit in Counsel and walk by the Way to keep you from Sinning this great Sin against God for never did any strive against God and Prosper and thus in God's Spirit having given you in a few Words