for very vanity If it be not in this spirit in vain is all the tugging of our friends in Parliament though I would not discourage any honest and righteous spirit to be holding up the bucklers against oppression and slavery upon an honest account Yet I fear me nay I see and I see with joy that the day is gone down upon the head of man in his highest Activity wherein he boasts himself The Princes of Zoan are become fools through our laying too much stresse on them It is another spirit that must bring salvation a spirit that is true indeed that was never false a spirit that cannot lye nor deceive that cannot be corrupted A spirit that hath overcome the World And I hope this spirit is taking the work into his own hand in this day CHAP. VII Containing a brief Recapitulation of some principal Heads and the Conclusion of the whole TO sum up all briefly and clear up more distinctly what hath bin in general hinted Whosoever is able rightly to discern past affaires will see there was a double Cause set on foot amongst us viz. the Cause of God and the Cause of these Nations which most have had some notion of but few have adequately described or rightly distinguished them only have admitted the Interest of Spiritual as well as Civil liberties But certainly the Cause of God must needs be higher larger of nearer concerr of greater consequence than the Cause of the Nation though that be great as the Soul is more noble than the body and the Creator to be preferred before the Creature The Cause of God like the Heavens waters with its dew cherishes with its influence embraces in its Arms and bosome the Natural Rights and Liberties of men as its Earth and Spouse in a subserviency and usefulness to the illustration of its own bounty and glory The Heavens are independent on the Earth not so the Earth on the Heavens The Cause of God needs not us but we receive all our vigor and blessing from it 2. As there were two Causes so there were two people or sorts of men that were drawn forth to serve them some upon a Natural and Civil account only having a just resentment of the languishing state of their Civil and Natural Rights and Liberties and others upon a higher account as being sensible of the sad condidition we were in as to spirituall affairs by the Ecclesiastical Taskmasters 3. These 2 Causes and their Adherents went hand in hand together in a joynt socious way the cause of God the cause of the Nation The People of God were concerned in both Causes and contributed to both not only their lives and fortunes as we call them in common with the Nation but besides and above them their Faith their Prayers their Comforts their Experiences all their Interest in God and in the Promises for the promoting of both and this not only out of love to themselves and their own particular concerns but in love to the Nation and in duty and faithfulness to God whereby the Cause of the Nation in some sense became to them the Cause of God though always the distinction and subordination preserved The Cause of God consists of two parts the one outward and visible such as is the object of the Natural Man's discerning viz. Freedom from outward violence and persecution in the externall exercise of Religion and the worship and service of God which because of things that relate to God may in a large sense be called the Cause of God but in respect of the Subjects of these Liberties which are all Men or every Nation of men they are but Natural Rights such as every sort of Men and Religions whether true or false do challenge and expect for every Nation will walk in the Name of their God This part of the Cause of God is but as the outward Court which the Gentiles may come into and tread down and is such an Interest as may be playd fast or loose withall by the Owners if they hold it only on the tearms of a Natural Right according as its makes with or against their Ruling worldly Interest or Concerns whether it be profit or honour as hath been too too manifest in these days which hath made so many go back from those Principles in this kind which once they abetted and contended for The other part of the Cause of God is wholly spiritual and so invisible to that Eye that is only natural though ever so enlightned even in the Letter of the Scripture it self and is exprest by the Apostle to consist in the deliverance of the whole Creation from the bondage of Corruption into the glorious liberty of the Children of God It is the delivering up all to God the subjecting of all to him which is the true liberty of the creature and this delivering up to God is not to Him as the head of the first Creation exercising his Rule by natural Light or Principles but as the Head of the New Creation by Christ risen from the dead exercising a far higher and better Rule in the New Creature which though it have for its Subject Matter the same things that are found in the Rule of the Natural or Moral Conscience viz. All External righteousness Religion and worship yet it hath them upon another account that is on other grounds and to other ends and over and besides them it subjects the Mind in all its operations in these to the Law of the Spirit of Life which is in Christ Jesus whereby the Creature is brought forth in newness of operation with Christ not seeking its own glory but the glory of its Head as Christ seeks the glory of his Father And this true spiritual and glorious liberty where it is brought forth in any soul is such an interest as cannot be disposed of or parted with by its possessor or made to serve but disposes of all things in that soul to the service of the Lord seeking alwaies to do the things that please Him not being able to do any thing against the Truth but for the Truth Thus those whom the Son makes free are free indeed and abide in the house for ever and never prove false nor turn their backs upon God or that that is his interest and glory Every other Spirit is corruptible and the Rule and Law of its walking is uncertain and variable may be turned this way or that way as worldly Interest or advantage swayes but though every man be a lyar yet God is true and cannot deny himself and so are they true that are thus born of him and become one Spirit with him by the spiritual slaying and crucifying of that life in them which is subject to chaxges and may be corrupted bribed and bought off from its Allegiance Had all that took upon them the defence of our Cause been of this Spirit we should never have had cause to have complained of the betraying and deserting of it But
not the sweet and candid Rule of Christ whom they refused in his heavenly appearance but an Earthly Lordly Rule puts an Iron Scepter into his hand to dash them in peices like a Potter's vessel and so answers these fools according to their folly yet answers them not Their spight was at the spiritual seed therefore they shall have the Children of the Earthly Jerusalem Reign over them for these were his Body or his Princes which he set over all the Earth Thus as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge or to entertain Christ in his meek large gentle heavenly appearance which knows how to give men their Rights as well as Christians and every one their food in due season The Lord gives them up to their own hearts lusts and desires and feeds them with flesh which they called for a fleshly Religion till it came out of their Nostrils and they are sick and vomit again and have enough of this Religious spirit insomuch that with all their hearts they would have had the power any where rather in this hand that in the name of God and Religion could do such things take away liberty and property destroy their Rights inslave their persons alter and change laws and times at his pleasure break Oaths and Engagagements without remorse Any spirit but this spirit Thus God filled them with their own ways and punisht them with their own Inventions Thus he brought fire out of Abimelech to devour the men of Shechem and fire out the men of Shechem to devour Abimelech for they were a plague to each other for they were of one spirit but thus wonderfully ordered to be each others Torment If you ask me now What spirit this was that made such work what was the spirit of that Generation and of Him that was in Judgment set over them though in mercy too I will grant you for God did make use of him as a Bulwark still against the Common enemy though we lost ground within doors Was it an evil spirit how then could any good come from it I answer It was not a profane spirit nor a spirit void of Religion there was much of Religion and Righteousness of one sort in it but if you would know what spirit it was It was the spirit of the first Covenant grafted indeed upon a new and living stock Christ and the Gospel but bearing its own sowre grape The spirit of the Law which you know makes nothing perfect though in a Gospel dresse the spirit of the first born after the flesh or the life of Christ's first appearance which is never safe and sure from starting back returning to corruption till it be made a sacrifice seasoned with salt and salted with the fire of the eternal Spirit through the offering up of the flesh And because this discovery is of so main importance and concern unto us therefore I shall discourse largely of it in the next Chapter and shew you How this is the Spirit in which our first life and Activity appears and how it ministers in the things of God that is in the first Court and where it is to give up and resigne which when it doth not it converts into Enmity against that better and latter spirit and so is justly rejected and throwen off by God And these things I shall as God assists discourse to you not as Notions barely but as things that have really operated and produced their fruits among us Which if the Lord give us to understand and make a right use of may make us wise to salvation to save our souls I am sure if not to save the Nation but I say to save the Nation also for This man shall be our peace when the Assyrian shall come into the Land and this wisdome and knowledge shall be the Stability of our times Though I cannot say whether we be yet humble and broken enough to receive it but may put the Lord to cast us again into the fire to make us Malleable to this Impression CHAP. IV. Shewing what manner of Spirit that was that miscarryed in this Cause I Am apt to believe that the Instruments which carryed on the work in this Nation generally were not mistaken in themselves but that they were sincere and upright with one sort of uprightnesse and did indeed intend the freeing and delivering of us yea I am apt to retain that charity of the late Protector that He intended no lesse when He dissolved the long Parliament and did those High Arbitrary things But it is not every spirit Nay it is not any spirit be it never so raised and anointed that can carry through to the end in case of some temptations but that spirit that is by extraction divine That that is of the Earth will seek and at last find its Center in the Earth though it may by strong Engines be carryed and kept aloft awhile But natural principles let them be never so much heightened will never hold out to the end of God's Works As the eye of the fleshly Israelite could not see to the End of those things that were to be Abolished And this is the great witnesse which God is minding to hold forth unto us in this day by all our Apostacy and backslidings even to distinguish between seed and seed Spirit and Spirit Then saith the Prophet ye shall returne and discern between the Righteous and the Wicked c. There is a Righteousnesse in the flesh which is Wickednesse before God not simply in it self but as it exalts and magnifies it self in a sense of its own self-sufficiency and in the excellency of its work opposing the work and way that is more excellent because it finds not its own strength adaequate to it as being that which Flesh and Blood cannot endure and yet cannot give way to Another no not to the Lord himself by the breaking and crucifying it in its Natural abilityes to do that which it cannot do This was the very Case in our Saviour's time The Jewes were pitifully at a losse and would faine have recovered their ancient splendor and glory but they mistook both their objest and their way to it expecting a Carnal when the designe of God was a Spirituall Kingdome and expecting to attain that by their own Righteousnesse which God discerning the insufficiency and weaknesse of the Law to assist them unto through the Flesh sent his own Son to do for them Rom. 8. And this is that alone that can unriddle and resolve our Case Therefore I said We must go into the Sanctuary to understand it To clear this up to those that are spirituall and can judge what I say I shall desire to make this Question Whether this Apostacy that is upon us be not a Judgment That is whether to be delivered up to such a Reprobate sense as we seeme to be both Rulers and people The one to act and the other to accept and submit to those very things which we destroyed be
they in whomsoever not in person or appearance disliking the same thing in this person and countenancing it in another If ye desire to see your sin This is thy sin O England All our thoughts all our wayes all our motions all our imaginations have bin are will be found before the Righteous God in this Day of his clear Judgment that is coming upon thee evil onely evil and that continually thou canst not turn thee to any one of them to find the least comfort and satisfaction of a good and righteous working and operation in them for How can an evil tree bring forth good fruit or a bitter fountain send forth sweet water Thy fountain is bitter thy root is rottennesse This I must testifie against thee from the Lord. Not but that thou hast done Gods work and fullfil'd and executed his pleasure upon Kings Nobles Bishops and all the slain and poyled of the Land Thou hast dressed the Lord's sacrifice but thou hast done it in thine own spirit and so art no better then Jeroboam then John then Nebuchadnezar and art accountable for all that thou hast done And God hath now taken thee in the snare of thy own heart and hath spread thy filthynesse thy unrighteousnesse thy ambition thy partiality thy hypocrisie in the sight of the Sun Thou art returned with the Dog to the vomit and with the Sow to the wallowing in the mire Thou hast corrupted thy self and art become abominable Judah hath justified Samaria Thy sins are as Scarlet they are of a double dye to the sins of the former generation which God hath cast out before thy face Thou sawest the Judgments of God on them for the wayes of pride unjustice oppression which thou walkest in and wast the Rod in his hand the Instrument of his vengeance upon them shalt thou therefore escape O! I dread to think what a sad reckoning this Generation hath to make I can see no glimpse of Comfort for us in any promise or prophecy or example or record in Scripture unlesse God powre out a spirit of grace and supplication a spirit of deep contrition and humiliation upon us but our Carcases must fall in the wildernesse as Israel's did Loruhamah and Loammi must be named upon us Israel shall be as Ethiopia and the bringing up of the Phlistins from Caphtor and the Assyrians from Kir shall be of as sacred memory as our Victories and successes the successes of the great Turk as holy things as all our deliverances I say unlesse God make us ashamed not onely of our sins but of our selves and of the spirit and root we have growen upon and acted from in all this I speak not now to natural men I know God judges every one by the light and law that they are under but I speak to the Saints of England that would be thought and call'd so many moral men have done bravely and faithfully and those that have corrupted in those principles having profest no higher shall be judged no deeper But you that say Ye see you that have discern'd and cryed up a Cause of God not civil liberties onely as men but a Cause of God in civil liberties all for God for the glory of God for the Kingdome of God I say you shall be judged out of your own mouths Is this the Cause of God Is this the Kingdome of God You in the Council you in the Army Is this the Cause of God now your turn is served Moral men shall onely be judged for their work not prosecuting the Cause but letting it fall but you shall be judged for no better a spirit unless you judge your selves I say there is no hope for you unlesse a spirit of judgment and burning arise up within you and cleanse your blood and filthynesse from you And ye shall pay not onely for your spirit but for that guilt also wherein ye are in Common with others for not prosecuting but letting fall this Cause when so far carryed on though darkly and blindly by you and in the letter For the same evil made you desist namely self-Interest that made you manage it in unrighteousnesse For be it known unto you The Cause of God is amongst us and shall go on and is carrying on through all these dark Meanders and Intricacies whilst you sleep on your down Pillows and stretch your selves upon your beds of Ivory and the next advance of it will be the routing of you Except God awaken you to meet him by speedy Repentance God will glorifie himself in his Judgments on you as upon the Cavaleirs before you Therefore trust not in vain Visions and cry not The Temple of the Lord. Is there any truth mercy and justice in the Land Are not the necessities of the poor as great as ever are not the oppressions as many is not pride luxury and profannesse as rife are not the Courts of Justice as corrupt Is not the spirit of God restrained and persecured Is Christ in the Throne Will ye call this a Reformation that ye are made Kings and Princes No! the Lord will not own it This is your work and your Cause it is none of his and God will make you know one day ye had power to have reformed these things but used it not forsooth because you would have offended this great man and tother useful Interest ye must have broak with a broken shatter'd World which will not be able to afford you the least shelter in the day when God shall visit you God will carry on his own Cause if we had never a tongue in the Parliament to plead it nor never a pen in the Nation to contend for is but what will become of you I know not How God will do it I know not but by his own appearing It is the day of His Power the day of the Spirit that is to have its turn next not Man's day but God's not Man's spirit but God's and whom He will use as his Instruments I know not if any of this Generation it must be by a Regeneration of them new moulding new framing new spiriting new principling of them The new wine must have new bottles but I see little towards any such thing in any of you Yet I believe God hath a remnant among you whom He will lead on to farther things but it will be with weeping and supplications with great brokennesse of heart and poverty of spirit with self-judging and self-abhorring and then what revenge will ye take of your selves what restitution will ye make to the Nation what right will ye do to all men even to your enemies Then will ye throw away your Idols of Gold and Silver to the Moles and to the Bats Then the lofty looks shall be humbled and the haughtinesse of man shall be laid low and the Lord alone exalted in that day Till the Spirit be thus powred forth from on high I look for no salvation to be wrought but the people shall labour in the fire