1. Cast thy Bread upon the Waters for thou shalt find it after many days HEre 's an Admonition to the universal practice of Charity in doing good to all but specially to the houshold of Faith Gal. 6. 10. As having a compassionate fellow-feeling with our fellow-Creatures and Brethren in the same nature by a free-hearted distribution of this World's goods As contriving opportunities for the practice of this duty has God given some a super-abounding over-flow of such things while others are destitute of the very necessaries of Life To a faithful answering his design and our duty herein a Blessing is promised He that hath pity on the Poor lendeth to the Lord and that which he gives will he repay Prov. 19. 17. See also the contrary threat'ned Prov. 21. 13. Whoso stoppeth his Ears at the cry of the Poor he also shall cry himself and not be heard As for the peculiar charity to the houshold of Faith Christ's little ones as his spiritual Disciples this will not miss of the great reward Mat. 10. 42. 25. 34 40. But we should extend our charity also to all which though it seem but as a casting our Bread upon the Waters 't will through God's promised Blessing be found again Deut. 15. 10. Vers. 2. Give a portion to seven and also to eight for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the Earth The practice of the said duty towards others is oft made a seeds-time to ones-self in such an unfore-known time of evil wherein we may be reduc'd to the like want Give and it shall be given you The same measure ye mete with shall it be measur'd to you again Luk. 6. 38. Such retaliation in distress will be comfortable when the said duty has bin well perform'd in prosperity So much of the literal sence of these two Verses In the spiritual or mystical what 's casting Bread upon the Waters Obedience to the Cross the spiritual Law whereof calls for mystical charity even the free giving up of all the Life Riches and fading Glory Wisdom and Strength of our own Spirit so as to become poor and dead with Christ there in order to live and reign with 〈◊〉 in that life he has rais'd our Nature into Here 's the recompence of such Love Obedience and Conformity to Christ a quitting our perishing life meats and riches for his never-perishing Christ himself was made poor in our Nature as to the mortal first-Creation 〈◊〉 and State thereof that thro' his exemplary poverty he might make many all followers of his suffering steps rich in God or in the everlasting righteous life of the second 2 Cor. 8. 9. The kindly suffering of the natural is the mystical seeds-time that will bring in a blessed harvest to the spiritual Man thro' an abounding fruitfulness in a newness of life Psal. 126. 5 6. Gal. 6. 7 8. He that sow's to the flesh builds his Faith hope and expectation for Blessedness on the corruptible life and fruitfulness of his but restor'd earthy natural state will reap corruption and eternal death He that sows to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap Life everlasting All in spiritual life principle and fruits the mystical Births and Children therein have Holiness to the Lord written in all their fore-heads The spirit of bondage and her Sons all Fruits Births or Works producible or performable in the most restor'd righteous natural state or life of the Law have all of them vanity and vexation to the Worker enmity and rebellion against the Lord writ out upon them All the Children there then are Children of death Except the 〈◊〉 seed of God's left-hand planting by a first-creation die in us 1 Cor. 15. 36 38. 1 Pet. 1. 23 25. as obedient to the husbandry and plough of Christ's spiritual Cross the incorruptible seed of an everlasting righteous life of God's right-hand planting in us has no room or way made for a springing up into its own life activity and fruitfulness under the powerful quickning influence of the same Spirit of Christ that destroys all our earthly life and fruit the mystical 〈◊〉 tree of good and evil root and branch tree and fruit This spiritual Love or Charity is the Saint to shew to Christ as the full and right payment of all mystical tithes and offerings to the true Melchisedec or high-Priest of God in a universal surrender of all changeable good things in his nature for all unchangeable good things in his Spirit of Grace as rais'd out of the death of his slain sacrific'd Nature into the life of the very Priest that slay's him But why should he be thus charitable and obedient to Christ Because he know's not what evil may be or come upon the earth even on all that rebelliously remain in their earthly life under final Wrath in everlasting poverty want and nakedness as to any goodness changeable or unchangeable A being willingly made poor there intitles to the true durable Riches and secures from all want for evermore in eternal life Vers. 3. If the Clouds be full of Rain they empty themselves upon the Earth and if the Tree fall towards the South or toward the North in the place where the Tree falleth there it shall be Man's natural spirit how everfill'd with the fading life riches fruits and products thereof at best must be emptied of and lose all again or never receives an everlasting life with the never-perishing meats fruits riches and clothing thereof Mat. 16. 25. North and South here may signifie the first and second or old and new-creation state Man in the first corrupt or righteous fall's toward the North into a cold barren desolate starveling condition for ever In the second toward the South has everlasting warmth and blessedness under the joynt shinings forth of the Divine and Creature-Sun of 〈◊〉 and everlasting Righteousness As the Tree fall's or Man dies in a six'd enmity to God as establish'd in his own life corrupt or righteous or in a spiritual life of everlasting union with and obedience to God there he shall be in Hell or Heaven Cold comfort in the former none at all under the scorching flames of unquenchable Wrath which will be found to make up to incorrigibly wicked Angels and Men a state of eternal darkness and death Vers. 4. He that observeth the Wind shall not sowe and he that regardeth the Clouds shall not reap The slothful Man that looks upon Winds and Clouds that are nothing but uncertainty it-self in their motions omit's the diligent husbanding his Ground and will not so sow as to reap any true profit or advantage to himself In the mystical sense he that neglect's Christ's voice and convincing discoveries not submitting to the spiritual husbandry of his Cross on his earthy natural state to make way for the springing up of a spiritual Seed and listen's to the stranger's voice the uncertain words or reasonings of Nature in himself or others signified here by Winds and Clouds for sparing that
no Redemption Psal. 49. 8. The first-covenant holy Place wilfully kept up against the second and most holy turns it into a most unholy Place a state of unchangeable enmity to God and death to Man 2 Pet. 2. 20 22. Heb. 10. 26 27. On this complicated twofold wilful sin against God and the distinct lights of his twofold Covenant as an enemy of all Righteousness does God bury and cover him with a spirit of unchangeable darkness So comes he to 〈◊〉 wholly forgotten in the City place or state where he hath so done The very name and memory of the whole earthly 〈◊〉 City or party of Men fix'd in the first-covenant holiness as turn'd into unchangeable enmity to God and the second will 〈◊〉 for ever They 'l be blotted out of all favourable regard or remembrance with God for ever The very state by them rebelliously chosen will 〈◊〉 made 〈◊〉 final prison and burying-place in which to 〈◊〉 for ever This get they by trusting in lying vanities Ver. 11. Because sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil Here 's a sad Account of the 〈◊〉 of all hearts as ready to abuse all the goodness and patience of God in deferring the execution of his sentence against their evil works God is of purer eyes than to behold with approbation any iniquity One time and way or other all sinners must be punish'd for all sorts of sins pardonable or unpardonable God punishes every evil work in Saints and puts the evil-evil-worker in them their natural spirit to death at long-run under the fatherly chastisements of his Cross as we find it in Solomon's own case and all the posterity of our spiritual Lord David Psal. 89. 26 -36. Then he quickens and sets up the life of his Spirit of Grace in them that never can sin 1 Joh. 3. 9. In this can they fully please God and overcome the Devil This get they by the Gospel exchange-traffick God's infallible Gospel-Spirit and Wisdom for their fallible Law-spirit All that fix in their Law-spirit become unchangeable enemies of God and his Gospel And all God's patience towards them herein do they abuse to a farther hardning and waxing confident in their folly setting their hearts to do evil because his declar'd Sentence against them is not speedily executed upon them v. 11. and Rom. 2. 4 5. God 〈◊〉 them line and opportunities of manifesting the utmost of their wicked thoughts and intents against him and so do they ripen themselves for the Sicle of his just Vengeance Rev. 14. 19 20. God will be abundantly clear'd and justified in all his ways and dealings towards them his long patience with them and then final severity upon them after all No Men without the Law or in the Law no Heathens in the rational light of Nature no Jews or Christians in the first-Covenant life of the Law will be found destitute of such conviction of the insufficiency of their natural state for Salvation as will expose them to judgment for their secret enmity to God in staying there by his infallible Gospel-Spirit Rom. 2. 12 -16. 'T will then be undeniably evident that neither from the fashion of being or changeable life given them by a first-creation nor from want of sutable helps for directing them towards eternal blessedness in the second the miscarriage of any to their eternal ruin has bin necessitated Their evil mind growing worse and worse under all a Sentence of unchangeable Death comes at length to be most justly executed upon them Under all the favour of a first-Covenant life a-fresh restor'd in them and the life of the second in its own light shew'd and offer'd them in such a Land or State of Uprightness do they deal wickedly in enmity to God and the second Isa. 26. 10. Pharaoh under all the wonders in Egypt hardned himself more and more against the messages of God presumptuously calling them vain or lying Words Exod. 5. 9. The Priests Scribes Pharisees and professing Jews in the view of all Christ's Miracles grew more wilfully hard'ned against his Gospel-doctrin and murther'd his Person Thus did they in a Land of Uprightness the holy Place or first-covenant State of their enlightned righteous natural Spirit Man's just demeaning himself therein is an obedient submitting to God's doing Judgment on it out of love to his mercy or unspeakable Gospel gift of eternal Life Mic. 6. 8. By humbling himself with Christ Phil. 2. 8. to the Death of the former comes Man to walk for ever with God as Enoch Gen. 5. 24. in the latter A surrender of all our own in the first-creation for God's own in the second is a doing righteously in and with our Land or State of Uprightness This answers the very end for which God restores unto Man or brings him again into his first-creation 〈◊〉 or Land of Uprightness If Man will not then honour God with his substance Prov. 3. 9. by giving it all up in sacrifice to his Will but rebelliously keep it up in a known enmity to him his destruction is undeniably of himself as fully setting his heart to do evil Ver. 12. Tho' a sinner do evil an hundred times and his days be prolonged yet surely I know that it shall be well with them thatf ear God which fear before him In this and the next 〈◊〉 Solomon positively asserts a twofold truth concerning the obedient Saint and the incorrigible Sinner The Saint who alone truly sears God it shall be well with And as certain is it it shall not be well with the wicked because he does not fear before 〈◊〉 This fear of God that carries such great and certain good in it to the Saint and the want whereof causes great unchangeable misery to the incorrigible Sinner can import no less than an universal obedience to God and compliance with every of his 〈◊〉 Such obedience is seen by God in the incorruptible Seed of spiritual life and true Holmess before quickned into life or motion in the Saint This holy Seed secretly disposes men to obey the Lord according to their various degrees of natural and legal light as honest moral Heathens or first-covenant Believers Cornelius an Heathen Captain was own'd as such a fearer of God with all his Family under his conduct and example Act. 10. 2 22. and as so accepted with him v. 35. This Fear consisted in a faithfulness to his present light against the workings of corrupt nature and a readiness to receive and obey a greater light when offer'd as by Peter's Ministry So 〈◊〉 before his Gospel-conversion was faithful to his Law-light under that higher dispensation of God then Cornelius was before his Gospel conversion and forthwith obedient to Christ's Gospel-light as soon as shining upon him and made God's new dispensation to him Gal. 1. 16. Act. 9. 6. 26. 19. Both Cornelius and Paul walk'd according to their light yet not so resolutely confident or
with false hopes and confidences here and come what will think they hereafter At length they must leave their false present rest and lie down in everlasting sorrow Who can help Satan's twofold party corrupt and righteous men fixed in nature with him will on in their fools Paradise in their various pathes under Satan's counsel and steerage to the same Tophet Saints ought to do their best in all meekness to recover any out of the snares of the Devil till evidently fix'd in Enmity God's method with men is that none should usually have two Heavens or two Hells All Good is the Saints all Evil the incorrigible sinners in the world to come All Saints tears are put into God's bottle of remembrance to requite all hereafter as Enemies oppressive madnesses shall also be paid off with such recompence of their Errors as is meet the vengeance of Eternal Fire Jude 7. All will come to their rights at last Friends and Foes This very Argument does Paul comfort oppressed Saints with 2 Thes. 1. 4 -- 10. At Christ's second coming will Saints ride in their Triumphal Chariots as more then final Conquerors over the Heads of their Oppressors Devils and Men who have had their turn to ride over their heads Ps. 66. 12. The Lord regards every sigh and groan of his Prisoners appointed to death under worldly Powers Psal. 12. 5. and 69. 33. and 79. 11. 146. 7. He will make his despised oppressed ones a praise in the Earth in the sight of all that have scorn'd and trampled on them Psal. 102. 13. 16. 19. 20. The true Saint pants after final deliverance from all Enemies within him Rom. 7. 24. as well as without All will be 〈◊〉 at last in Answer to their Prayer Psal. 74. 10. and ver 〈◊〉 Saints groan after deliverance from their mortal righteous earthly life of Enmity as well as from that of the Body 2 Cor. 5. 1 2. All in nature within and without them is in a universal confederacy against them What matter If God be for them who can be against them Or who can hurt them Rom. 8. 31. Here 's enough The whole first-creation world lies in wickedness litteral and mystical filth of flesh or spirit 1 Joh. 5. 19. and so in a universal daring affront and contradiction to all words and things of God in the next Jer. 44. 16 17. But God will hear or deliver Saints from the horns of the Unicorns Psal. 22. 21. That is from all oppressive Powers of this World visible and invisible without and within So have we in some small measure the meaning of these words Vers. II. Wherefore I praised the Dead which are already Dead more than the living which are yet alive The weight of these words lies not in the Litteral Sense For no miseries or oppressions incident to bodily Life in this world are comparable to the sad condition of the wicked after death under final wrath The spiritual truth here relates to Saints Saints departed are in a far better condition than those left behind them in the Body that have not fully passed through the twofold inward and outward oppression or suffering-suffering-work that 's to be undergon by them Saints departed out of the Body or while in the Body out of the Law-life of their own spirit are those A voyce from Heaven command's John to write as a most certain Truth blessed Blessed are the dead in the Lord Rev. 14. 13. All so dead with Christ will live with him for ever in his Immortal Gospel-life All others will perish in their own corruption or corruptible Law-life and state which they have rebelliously chosen and trusted in for blessedness against the Lord's known commands and warnings to the contrary By keeping up what Paul cast away as dung for Christ's spiritual Life will they perish as their own dung for ever Job 20. 7. A perfect death of the natural Spirit and Principle of Life and Action in man an everlasting cessation and rest from all the desire thought and unprofitable labour thereof and so the honourable burial of it in the mystical grave of Christ is true conformity to his death Christ came not to do his own Will nor speak his own words the Dictat's of his own understanding though spotlessly perfect in our fleshly nature but Crucified and ceas'd from all We must follow his suffering steps through the same fire of his eternal Spirit Heb. 9. 14. kindled by him on us as on himself Luk. 12. 49. Spiritual Circumcision and fire-Baptism put nature corrupt or righteous to death cut off and burn up all flesh even Holy Flesh Col. 2. 11 12. Man in the restor'd righteous Life of his own nature has nothing but a Body of Sin and Death about him which Paul pray'd for deliverance from Ro. 7. 24. Phil. 3. 6-8 Since the fall filth of Spirit Enmity to God is inseperable from the Life of nature corrupt or righteous Nature in whatever condition and Enmity to God Live or Die breath or expire together Paul when eminent in Holy Flesh breath'd out Enmity Threatnings and Slaughter against God's Holy Gospel-Spirit Saints and Truths Act. 9. 1. From the time this Spirit of Enmity was Death-struck by Christ in his way to Damascus he lived and brought forth Fruits unto God in a newness of Life In the restor'd Life of nature the great Sin of Enmity revives gather's Strength Credit and Authority By the death of it under the Cross that and all other Sins are pluck'd up by the Roots He that is so Slain and dead is freed from all Sin for ever Ro. 6. 7. When Planted together in the likeness of Christ's Death and Resurrection the Old Man is Crucisied the Body of Sin destroy'd v. 5 6. Man's natural Body or whole natural Man at best as a Righteous Living Soul 1 Cor. 15. 44 45. is by the twofold death and Life-work of Christ's quickning Spirit Transformable into the likeness of his Glorious Body or the glorified Body Soul and Spirit of our nature in his person Phil. 3. 21. On such death of nature Man ceases from sin for ever 1 Pet. 4. 1. If Obedient to the Slaughter-work of Christ's Gospel-Spirit on our Lawless or Law-Spirit in corrupt or righteous nature shall we by the second operation of it be quick'ned up into the Life of his Gospel-Spirit All dead with Christ shall after their season of dwelling in Dust arise with his dead Body into a newness of Life and Sing for ever Isai. 26. 19. Paul's argument in this case looks both way's If the Dead rise not Christ is not Risen 1 Cor. 15. 12-19 implying if Christ be Risen the Dead with him shall be Rais'd into that 〈◊〉 of Life our Crucisied nature in him Lives in for evermore Rev. 1. 18. Our nature in Christ is rais'd also into and possess'd of the very Divine Life So the fulness of the very Godhead dwells in him bodily in personal Union with his Manhood This is his peculiar Prerogative
transcendently above the highest Saint for ever But all Saints in new-Creature Life are in Personal Union with that which in him is in Personal Union with the Divine nature and thereby fitted to see and Enjoy the Divine Glory as coheirs with him of God Ro. 8. 17. They are thus one with him Personally as he and the Father are one Jo. 17. 21 22. We must Obediently suffer and die with the Man Christ as to the best and most righteous first-Covenant Law-Life in our restor'd nature or not live with him for ever in his Spiritual Gospel-Creature-Life 2 Tim. 2. 11 12. Such dead ones rest from all their sinful and unprofitable Labours in their own Spirit of Enmity and their righteous works or fruits done and brought forth by them in the Spirit of Grace follow stand by them before the Judgment Seat of Christ and justify them as owned and approved in their whole persons and all such works The changableness before the fall and enmity also since found in Man's whole nature render it not properly that is unchangably good and truly Holy in God's sight as under his Approbation-Seal Yea since the fall is Man at best in his single naturals hateful to and a hater of God and therefore can't be profitable to himself by any thing done therein as to true hapiness Wilful fixure in nature at best is unchangable Union with the Devil in Enmity to God So that which he willingly mistak's for Salvation is Everlasting Damnation to him In stead of the Saints Everlasting Rest he 'l find the Sinner's Everlasting Torment and Vexation of Spirit as the Fruit of all his Vain Labours Solomon therefore Preferr's the dead in and with Christ as to the Life of their own nature corrupt or righteous in the Profane Publican or Righteous 〈◊〉 to any yet alive in their own nature Vers. III. Yea better is he then both they which hath not yet bin who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the Sun Better are the compleatly dead in the Lord then either those Saints that yet live in the Mortal Body and have something of the remaining Uncrucified first-Covenant Life of their own Spirit about them so are yet under the Oppressive Practicings of Devils and Men without and Fleshly Lusts within them Warring against the Spirit Gal. 5. 17. Or those Saints who are yet Unborn The departed Spiritual Saint is better then the Saint yet in the Mortal Body amidst a throng of Enemies without and within surrounded with all sorts of worldly Allurements Disturbances wicked Men and Devils Paul therefore earnestly groan'd after deliverance from his earthly Tabernacle by the dissolution of it that he might be at home with the Lord in his Heavenly House So only comes Mortality to be compleatly swallow'd up of a life that 's above all death or chang 2 Cor. 5. 1-6 And if Saints departed enter into a full peace and rest Isai. 57. 1 2. and so a better condition then that of Saints in the Body more yet are they beyond such as shall be Saints that are yet Unborn who have all the said Miseries and Oppressions without and within wholly behind to pass thorow But the letter of this Scripture seem's to look another way that the yet Unborn may seem better then the actually engag'd in this Mortal World of Miseries and Troubles or then the deceas'd who has pass'd through them and that all sorts of deceased good and bad Men as not having yet seen the Oppressions and evil work that 's done under the Sun This as relating to the Miseries of all in this Mortal World and Life of Vanity only He that 's dead is freed from all these things be he unchangably good or evil for ever after The wicked cease from troubling them and the weary are at rest Prisoners no more hear the voice or feel the hand of the Oppressour Job 3. 17 18. The sense in which the yet Unborn is better then both they that are in or have pass'd thorow and out of the Miseries of this World singly consider'd without what follow 's to wit the Grievances and Oppressions incident to the natural Man of Saints or Sinners may seem to import a never being Born at all a meer nullity Such a nullity by an annihilation-death will all that finally perish ever desire and seek but never find as better than to be tormented for ever in Hell or afflicted with the miseries and Oppressions of a mortal Life on earth In this twofold sense had it bin good for Judas never to have been born or bin at all Mat. 26. 24. And this Job seem's to mean Job 3. 11 12. 16. and 10. 18 19. Vers. IV. Again I consider'd all travel and every right work that for this a Man is envied of his Neighbour This is also vanity and vexation of spirit Fallen Man is so brutishly wicked as to envy and hate every right work and worker in the but restor'd Spirit and Life of his own nature as condemning him for the contrary Some of them have affirm'd God gave not Man Free-will but with intent that he may lawfully walk in the uncontrolled liberty thereof And so is it lawful to hate the righteous Life and Action of their own nature in Legal Christianity or Heathen Morality Hence Speak they evil of all that run not with them into the same excess of riot 1 Pet. 4. 4. While such Brutes please themselves with and promise others such Liberty they are the servants of and will utterly perish in their own corruption 2 Pet. 2. 12. 19. Thus do they render the righteous works of restor'd nature which yet are but vanity vexation of spirit to the workers And hence does Satan puff up such persecuted conscientious workers with a confident opinion that they are Christ's true persecuted Gospel-Saints Thus does he play his game so as to be a Winner every way in both these bussling worldly Combatants corrupt and righteous keeping them all in his differing snares and at his beck to let them both loose as he sees occasion against the spiritual Saint One sort of them hates all that run not with them into litteral uncleanesses with greediness the other all that run not with them into mystical uncleanness The righteous first-covenant-professor is the odious Butt at which a profane party shoot their revengeful Arrows And they are at the same work towards the spiritual Saint Because his way 's are of another fashion from and better then theirs For this very cause Cain kill'd Abel 1 Jo. 3. 12. Cain mystically wicked the fixed Enemy of God in the establish'd righteousness of man a first-covenant Brother murthered his natural Brother as found a Second The right work 〈◊〉 here meant is what 's done in the Spirit of Grace not of Nature that can never deceive be deceived sin erre or miscarry All done and said in this spirit only is pleasing to God hateful to righteous men in restor'd Nature only All in the right
or constant steddy spirit of everlasting Truth and Righteousness and Works thereof David pray'd for Psal. 51. 10. All fix'd in the but starting righteous natural spirit or principle of Life and Action hate with a perfect hatred as they them Psal. 139. 21 22. Righteous first-covenant Brethren are the most fierce persecutors of the second can't afford them a good word sit and speak evil against them Psal. 50. 20 21. Such Crucified Christ. Profane persons hate all such right works as are performable in renew'd naturals But all of both sorts Profane and Professors are against all spiritual Saints Works Things and Truths Many lesser Ruffles may the fix'd first-covenant righteons have with the Profane party but they mortally envy and hate the spiritual Saint with all his right works and words as seventy times seven fold more abominable to them than the profane party with all their brutish vilenesses Away with them 't is not fit they should live say they Masqu'd Papists worse than bare-fac'd or Mahumetans Spiritual Saints with their truly right works are a thousand-fold more envied by sowre leavened Legalists then common sinners of the Gentiles and their generally discernable wrong works This has bin found in all times and places towards all true prophets Christ himself and Saints before and under Law and Gospel Christ came to his own in the first-covenant and they blasphemed and Crucified him for the Gospel-doctrin of the second Never more will the whole World be in an uproar against Christ and his Saints then when he is just at the Door ready to come forth with them to reign over all such enemies What a universal surprize and amazement will this be to them all one and 'tother Heathen and first-covenant people As wondering at both their madnesses against Christ in his first and second coming the Psalmist ask's Psal. 2. 1. Why do the Heathen rage and the People imagine a vain thing What vain thing do they imagine and tumultuously assemble in a Union of their otherwise 〈◊〉 minds to do to cast down Christ God's supreamly anointed one and Saints Christ's anointed ones vers 2 3. A likely Project to thrive in Do either or any of them know what they do The Mystical Kings do in some measure the greater their madness the litterai less the less their folly though they also Rage and Tumultuously Assemble in this case Both are guilty enough to find a conclusion bad enough to them all Let the two earthen Pot-Sherds corrupt and righteous tugg and fight it out with one another That 's a lower trade of Sinning in either But if they peece up and joyntly fight against their maker they are at the highest point of Folly and Madness And then highest wo to both and all Isai. 45. 9. They contend against Almighty and Irresistibly mighty Divine and new-Creation Power Is all this Hubbub and Tumultuous Assembling of Mankind with all their combined Counsels and Forces against the insinite Divine Father and his Divine and Creature-Son like to Prosper They 'd break their Bands and cast away their cords srom them This is the Rebellious Design and Plot. They 'l not be subject to limited or bound up by their Laws or words of command This is their desperate case and Resolution This Universal Conspiracy to be remarkably the case in the last beyond all former times is on the very account here declar'd their incorrigible envy at or Enmity to God's Divine and new creature-Spirit of Grace with all the right words works or fruits thereof in true Saints which offer to lay Bands on all their unruly Wills This they 'l not endure but labour might and main to shake them off and cast them away from them This is that which corrupt and righteous humane with Evil Angelical nature make head against God Christ and Saints about The two-edged Spiritual Sword in all these hands speaks death to nature in them all Therefore they all fight against it But this will in Love or Wrath perform the whole Will and Counsel of God as to the death of nature on every Angel and Man good and bad Isai. 1. 19 20. and 55. 11. 2 Cor. 2. 15 16. Christ in that Spirit wherein any can or ever could be saved is the stumbling-Stone and rock of Offence the only Rock of Defence to Saints to the numerous Troops of innumerable evil Angels and Men that Build on the Sandy fallible Principles of nature for Salvation They utterly defy all the words of the Builders on the Rock that speak nothing but War and Death to them attempting to set Fire on their House Guess who of the Earthy party are like to take this most heavily at Christ's and his Saints hands as offring to take down a beautiful Church-building with pretence to set up a better unchangably glorious That Mystical Temple of his Body or whole natural State that Christ said was to be pull'd down So as not to have one stone of it left upon another and in which he Refus'd at the Jews desire to be their King saying he 'd build it up into another more glorious Temple-State in which he would be a King this was the very ground of the Professing Jews proceeding against him to the death He has built up our nature in himself by way of Resurrection into a new-Creation Temple of the Living God for evermore His Doctrin of the Cross upon them and Practice of it upon our nature in himself did the Professing Jews and their Teachers Priests Scribs Pharises c. call Blasphemy or evil-speaking against the first-Creation Temple and Life of the Law as no State of true Salvation This they reckon'd an Evil Hurtful or false speaking that is Blasphemy And in saying so they Blasphem'd or spoke and did evil and hurtful things Maliciously of and against him and all his Gospel-Truths First-Covenant Brethren hate the very Gospel-Principle and all the Right Works and Words of Christ and Saints therein For which of my good works do ye stone me Said Christ. Not for any good work but for Blasphemy replied the Jews Jo. 10. 32 33. What must Steven or any Servant expect if the Lord were thus handled See Act. 7. 51-60 with the ground Act. 6. 9-14 A first-Covenant People among the Gentiles under Gospel do the same things to their Spiritual Brethren as the Jews under the dispensation of the Law in the self-same Law-Principle and Life the very leaven of the Pharisees But these disturbers of Gods true Israel in both will be cut off Gal. 5. 12. They labour to keep off all true Gospel-Doctrin from all hearing as the most abominable Heresy and Preachers of it not fit to live Act. 22. 22. and 24. 14. Law-circumcision for cutting off Filth of Flesh they prefer to the true Spiritual Gospel-circumcision that cutts of Holy Flesh restor'd righteous nature from which filth of Spirit or Enmity to God's Gospel-Spirit is inseperable For this Murdering-minded Cain's Envy Mortally Hate and kill Spiritual Abels from
'T is too painful yea 't is impossible for man Save in sanctuary-life and light Ps. 73. 16 17 to discern the spiritual new-Creation things of God's House and less yet the deep things of his very infinite Divinity The truly Spiritual Man Judges or discern's and sees all things 1 Cor. 2. 15. Divine Spiritual and natural The highest first-Covenant-Saint in Holy Flesh Righteousness of Man is a Fool a Stranger an unreasonable Man a Profane Infidel as to all Gospel-Things and Truths Such troublesome self-confidents Paul desir'd to be delivered from 2 Thes. 3. 2. and 2 Tim. 4. 14 15. as most impertinent irreconcileable Babblers and Disputers against all those Gospel-Truths or Sanctuary-things they bid at and pretend to the knowledg of That contradicting Wisdom and very Understanding they use in the dispute is to be abolish'd by the Cross as the Blasphemous Enemy of God and all his Gospel-Truths Thus Paul found it in himself till Christ knock'd down that earthly Wisdom and caused him to turn from that fleshly Mind Understanding or Principle of reasoning in obedience to his heavenly Act. 9. 3-6 Gal. 1. 16. Christ himself in the flesh turn'd away his foot or feet his own fleshly or natural understanding and will the two Feet of the Living Soul on which it walks abroad to View Desire and feed upon worldly Vanities Perishing Meats refusing to think the thoughts do the will or speak the words thereof but the will and words of him that sent him by Crucifying that Will and Understanding utterly Abolishing all the Life Desire Thought and Motion thereof And such death is the only Consecrated Living way into the new-Creation Sanctuary-Life Heb. 9. 12. and 10. 19 20. The natural man even in Christ's person however perfect was a prohibited Stranger amongst the rest that might not enter into his own new-creation Sanctuary House or Temple in the single changable first-covenant law-life in and under which made 'T was impossible even for him as so to enter By Death he ascended into it and set it open to his followers in the like Death of nature Such obedient Death is the only way to eternal life Never was there any other way to it for any Angel or Man That law-life that was but a changable shadow in him and in us must pass by the death of nature in both and all under the cross-work of the Gospel-spirit that the life which is true in him may be true in us also 1 Joh. 2. 8. and 5. 20. In Scripture sense all 's true in the new-creation all shadow in the old True Life Light Wisdom Righteousness is found in the new only All things eternal things of God are there All the Wisdom Life Light Righteousness Glory things of Man or Angel in the old are but shadows of the substantial things of God in the new The changable earthy Image of God and righteous first-covenant Life of the Law Man was at first created and set up in is but shadow of the new-creature life and Image of the heavenly or second Adam All in the former are things of man Life Wisdom Righteousness of Man all in the latter things of God Life Wisdom Righteousness of God A zeal for God's heavenly Spiritual things must eat up our earthly or natural The fire of his heavenly Sanctuary-Spirit must consume our Earthly Life and state eat up all mortal desire and thought root and all By such destruction of our flesh or natural state can we come to be Saved in that Spirit We must put off the old Man the Image of the earthy or can never put on the new and Image of the heavenly The Earthly House and Life of this present tabernacle must be dissolved that we may have that Building of God not made with hands eternal in the heavens 2 Cor. 5. 1. Think any to enter into that House any otherwise then Christ himself could to go whole and unmaimed into it in that Life or natural state he crucified Gal. 3. 1. Nature in all men is an enemy to God and his Sanctuary-Spirit Paul in righteous nature was in union of mind with the Devil an enemy to the Spirit of Grace to God Christ all Gospel-Saints and truths a stranger to all things divine and Spiritual God the Mediator in his changable Angelical nature from the beginning and humane toward the latter end of this world did cease by a Holy death from all the works of both in the activity of the changable principle of first-covenant Life Angels and Men must do and suffer likewise or never enter into his rest Heb. 4. 4. 10. The mystical Sabbath-Law of the Cross upon the works and and working Spirit of nature is expressed by turning away our foot from the Lord's Sabbath from delighting in our own will and way 〈◊〉 our own Pleasure and speaking our own Words Isai. 58. 13 14. This is the very same Death-doctrine and work of the Cross on the whole natural Spirit at best The Obedient submitting thereto is the keeping our foot from the Lord's house and turning it away from his Sabbath Those that honour God herein he will put everlasting honour upon lifting them up over the heads of all earthly powers humane or angelical called the high places of the earth He will cause them to ride upon these high places that have had their turns to ride over their heads Psal. 66. 12. But those that from a fond love to their own vain life despise the Lord's sanctuary life shal be lightly esteemed 1 Sam. 2. 30 yea made vessels of dishonour and everlasting contempt The Spiritual Heavenly Original Gospel-Light of Christ's Sabbath or Sanctuary-Spirit is the day the Lord hath made in which Saints will rejoyce and be glad for evermore Psa. 118. 24. This heavenly Sanctuary and Sabbath that 's the Lords doing his own immediate divine Workmanship from everlasting Prov. 8. 22 23. is marvellous in our eyes The earthly Wisdom of man at best despises and wonders at this heavenly creature-wisdom of God The Orthodox humane builders of a first-covenant Church which their Wisdom Judges asserts and warns firm and safe for Salvation reject and refuse the corner-stone of the second and so the whole new-creation building on the rock the true church or house of God Man's wisdom won't believe or receive the words of God's though plainly declared to it Act. 13. 41. Abundance of professing wise first-covenant Saints believe not any such thing as that creature-Wisdom of God in the Mediator from everlasting by which the Worlds were made How can ye believe says Christ to the professing Jews who receive honour one of another and seek not the honour that cometh from God only Joh. 5. 44. A mercenary self-seeking trade in the first-covenant exceedingly indisposes and hinders any listning to one right word of the second None so highly Prejudic'd and offended at the least Word of Christ's Gospel in the second as the engaged ministers of Satan's in the first Such Gospel-Teachers are
by her Nothing but what 's unchangeably good is properly and truly good before God No man then that has not some unchangeable good thing or goodness in him can please God Without a spiritual Faith or new-creature principle of life and action something of the life of the Faith of the Son of God Gal. 2. 20. distinct from and superiour to the most righteous life of the Sons of Men 't is impossible to please God Heb. 11. 6. Man wise strong and honorable in Christ as a fleshly Bridegroom that has restor'd the old first-creation righteous life of Nature in him and rendered him fruitful there 1 Cor. 4. 10. This is not yet the He that singly as so pleaseth or can please God For then what was Paul that had quitted all the advantages or priviledges that such knowledg of Christ himself after the flesh brings along with it and includes in it 2 Cor. 5. 16. He became a fool weak and despicable there having parted with all that as dung for the knowledg of Christ after the Spirit in his Gospel-life into which risen from the dead Phil. 3. 6 10. Rom. 7. 1 4. Christ requires his Law or first-Covenant Spouses to quit him there as he them die with him there in order to meet him in the life of the second First-Covenant Spouses or Children of Christ live in him but he comes properly to live in them in the second Gal. 2. 20. T is but the Life Wisdom and Righteousness of Man Christ restores and afresh sets up in Men in order to render them his first-Covenant Children and Spouses The Life Wisdom and Righteousness of God a spiritual immortal Gospel-life he sets up in the second in the room of their surrender'd fading mortal Law-life in the first Christ abolish'd death or crucified that Law-life in himself that was subject to death and so brought a Gospel-life and Immortality to light 2 Tim. 1. 10. This is true life in an absolute sence th' other but a shadow In the infallible Light or spiritual Understanding that accompanies and is found in Gospel-life are true Saints enabled to discover all the wiles of the mystical Woman here All the subtile practices and falshoods of evil Angels coming as false Christs and their false Apostles and Prophets Mat. 24. 24. 2 Cor. 11. 13 -- 15. in the dress language and neerest resemblance of the true Christ and his Prophets or Apostles lie open and naked before that understanding in spiritual Saints that judgeth or discerneth all things 1 Cor. 2. 15. That Spirit in which they can discern the deep things of God ver 10. the utmost depths and heigths of Satan can't lie hid from All his nets and snares are seen and all his power of darkness overset and master'd by this Gospel-spirit and marvelous light thereof When the mysterious methods of God's wisdom for Salvation are seen all the depths and methods of delusion Satan can use in the utmost stretch of his Serpentine Wisdom to destroy Men flie open All Satan's Apostles Ministers of his Gospel in whatever variety of doctrine form language or way in the same sandy fallible first-Creation Principles do all center in this point whatever their thought or intent be to run their hearers into the very arms of the Devil as their only security for Salvation If the Devil can impose himself upon them as Christ and God as he can 2 Thes. 2. 4. This must needs be the issue and result of all their teaching 2 Cor. 11. 13 15. Their end will be according to their works All 's earthly and so fewel for the fire of that Wrath that will be kindled on them and all their earthy doctrin life and works at the day of the Lord 's appearing in that Gospel-spirit and life they 'l be found in unchangeable enmity to 2 Pet. 3. 10. No wisdom of Man secures from this Woman here Adam in his unspotted naturals clear from all silth of flesh and spirit too was not fence-proof against the wiles of this Woman The womanish fading changeable first-Creation life in the evil Angel when fallen was too subtile and powerful for man in his inferiour womanish-life of the same kind to deal with before his fall Satan's first lie to Eve passes currant all along this World with multitudes of professors and high pretenders to the Gospel of Christ and Kingdom of God for the very Gospel of Christ to wit that the establish'd righteous life of the first Creation-state of Man is eternal life that man need not will not die at all Literal Sodom Egypt and Babylon are made up of Men sixed in corrupt Nature given up by themselves and therefore also by God to the vile affections enormous lusts and madnesses of that Ro. 1. 26. Mystical Sodom Egypt and Babylon are made up of Evil Angels and enlight'ned first-Covenant Brethren or Professors establish'd or six'd in the 〈◊〉 righteousness of Man and so in unchangeable enmity to the Gospel-righteousness of God These two sorts of Babylonians and Sodomites in these last and worst of times do or will so fill the scene with their super-abounding iniquities literal and mystical as to leave no room for any hearing of Christ's Gospel at all The spiritual Saint by his Gospel-life of that faith that overcomes the World 1 Joh. 5. 4. remains secure amidst this vast heap this innumerable multitude of Babylonians visible and invisible evil Men and Angels under the protecting shadow and comforting influence of Christ's new name that 's the strong Tower into which he runs and is safe Prov. 18. 10. Heb. is set a-loft to wit on that Rock that 's higher then he Psal. 61. 2. But all incorrigible wilful haters and refusers of Christ and his Gospel-truths will every one of them be taken in the snares of the said Woman So it follows Text. But the sinner shall be taken by her He that 's abhorred of the Lord falls into the mouth of this strange Woman whose heart is a deep pit full of snares and nets and her hands bands Who is this sinner the Lord abhors The fixed incorrigible hater and loather of God and his Spirit of Grace call'd God's Soul or Spirit as the spirit of nature Man's Soul Zec. 11. 8. All blind leaders with their followers tumble into this deep ditch or pit Prov. 23. 27. Luk. 6. 39. All whose minds are willingly blinded by the God of this World the Devil lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the supream creature-image of God should shine into or upon them all such embrace Satan's accursed other contrary 〈◊〉 and his spirit of unchangeable enmity to Christ and his They are engaged what in them 〈◊〉 to shut up the Kingdom of Heaven 〈◊〉 off the 〈◊〉 of that Kingdom out of all hearing or reception and to 〈◊〉 open the Kingdom of the Devil asserting that to be the Kingdom of God and his Gospel Christ's So are they with their admirers engaged in 〈◊〉 of the bottomless pit
alway's for An open 〈◊〉 to the 〈◊〉 voice and too general reception of the methodiz'd words of man's wisdom as orthodox-Gospel does wonderfully disframe Peoples minds and prejudice them as to a right listning to one right Gospel-word of God's If the true Gospel-Preacher gratisie not their prurient or itching ears their vain wanton understandings or fancies with the humane methods they have bin all along accustom'd to and habituated in from enmity to and dislike of the matter they 'l pretend that occasion to fly off from any farther hearing it The numberless things of the Gospel one thing 〈◊〉 the Pearl of great price the unspeakable gift the Thoughts Affections Words Works Births Fruits and products thereof will be sound to out-number as well as transcendently to exceed in dignity all man's first-creation no-things shadows things that are not Things 〈◊〉 have their numerous varieties as well as excellencies above all first-creation perishing vanities The New-creature Gospel-spirit brings with it into man the New-creature Life Wisdom and 〈◊〉 of God that is that creature-life that being in Christ personally united with the Divine and in Saints in unchangeable harmony with the Divine is call'd the Life of God and they that have it are said to be born of God and partake of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1. 4. All things are theirs and they are Christ's and Christ is God's 1 Cor. 3. 22 23. God or the infinite Divine Nature is their inheritance by way of object to their sight and enjoyment not an ingredient into their persons as in Christ's That 's his super-eminent Prerogative But Saints are Co-heirs with him of God Rom. 8. 17. as to the vision of and feeding on the Divine Glory to eternity The great design of the whole Scripture is to bring Men into the view love and enjoyment of things eternal 2 Cor. 4. 18. all which are comprehended in the explain'd one thing necessary The vast number of things eternal in the one eternal Creature-spirit of Christ Heb. 9. 14. are handed to us in great variety of Expression Types Figures Parables Similitudes with most significant Instructions about the one thing or spirit that comprehends them all as the natural spirit in Man and Angel comprehends all their natural things first-Creation Shadows perishing Vanities Those that come to any right frame of mind towards God's Gospel-things will quit and rid themselves of all those Prejudices and false Conceptions they have bin cramm'd with and built up in by worldly-Church-custom's and freely expose their darling nature to be touch'd and hit between the joynts of the Harness or Armour of Man by the sharp doctrine and discipline of the Gospel-sword and Cross of Christ. Man at best in his own Strength Wisdom and Armour stands ready to resist and fight against God not the Devil Whose side was Paul engag'd on when according to Law blamless Every right interpretation of Scripture will be at this work with us even the darting in mortifying Truths upon Nature's heart shooting in the sharp Arrows of the Lord into the hearts of the King's Enemies even in Saints the foes of their own house their own very Spirit and that at best with all the mystical Children Works Fruits or Products thereof as altogether Vanity and sinful All the desires thoughts and reasonings our own spirit the foe of our own house people's our Souls with against God and his only way of saving us are a numerous throng of Enemies Fighters and Warriers against God and the true interest or eternal concerns of our own Souls These are all struck at at every turn by every right Gospel-word or doctrine of the Cross. If we come with but itching Ears to gratify our curiosity by hearing a few Gospel-words of God's Wisdom as a novelty among the various Words or Doctrines of Mans for our understandings to trade in to furnish notional Discourse only and so to pride our selves in over-topping others understandings we shall find our selves sorely mistaken in the case Such a design may seem a-kin to Ptolomee's curiosity in procuring the Greek translation of the old Testament by 72 Jews 6 of each of the twelve Tribes call'd thence numero rotundo the Septuagint to furnish his new-erected Egyptian library amongst the learn'd writings of the wise Greeks and others from others parts God's Word is another-gets thing and has far other-gets matters to do with Men then to furnish a little overly Discourse Where rightly interpreted in the Words of his Wisdom or of that spirit which inspired the holy Pen-men thereof 't will be a Savour of Life or Death to the hearers 2 Cor. 2. 15 16. 'T is as a sire in and upon Men's spirits Luk. 24. 32. A hammer that breaks the Rock in pieces Jer 23. 29. 'T will prosper in the thing whereto he sends it accomplish that which he pleases Isa. 55. 11. Life or Death in and to the respective heedful or regardless hearers thereof 'T is dangerous dallying with such sharp two-edg'd tools Do we stand trifling and lie at catch with the Pharisees to see what Gospel-doctrine will be at Where it will pitch Alas alas Every Word of it rightly heard and consider'd makes a home-thrust at Nature's heart howe're it slips o're Men's inadvertent heads while they confusedly wait for they know not what hoping to hear some change of voice in favour to poor Nature's head and that the Righteous Life of the earthly Jerusalem State thereof need not be surrendred to the Gospel-sword and Cross. A like vain thought to that of King Zedekiah when he sent privately for Jeremy out of a Dungeon to speak with him Is there any Word from the Lord Says he to him There is says Jeremy and this is it Thou shall be deliver'd into the hand of the King of Babylon Jer. 37. 17. How Nebuchadnezzar handled him see Jer. 52. 8 11. The Word of God is a steddy constant Word not off and on no yea and nay with it all 's yea and amen 2 Cor. 1. 17 20. Or absolute infallible Truth The mercenary preachers of Satans accursed other Gospel in great variety of opinion and way flourish in worldly dignities and recompences for their pretended skil in spiritual affairs the whole world running after them 1 Joh. 4. 5. Rev. 13. 3. Amidst this self-exalted crew of mercenary Babylonians with their many inventions if the true spiritual Gospel-Declarer can but scape blows he will think himself tolerably treated He comes with a Doctrine that strikes at the very root and foundation of all their humane self-interests the very principle of all their Life Desire Thought and Action at best CHAP. VIII V. 1. Who is as the wise Man and who knoweth the interpretation of a thing Heb. word A man's wisdom maketh his face to shine and the boldness Heb. strength of his face shall be changed HEre are too questions the latter implying an answer to the former and then a declaration of the valuable priviledges of the truly wise man The