Testimony methought I saw the beast the powers of the world the Aire the Kings of the earth the great men the rich men and the chief Captaines and the mighty men that had the temporarie Crown given them endeavour by all waies and means possibly to destroy the Testifyers and the Testifyers Testimony Methought I saw the temporany and yet infernall Nobles of the earth that wear the momentany and yet perpetuall Crown of Hell and death in themselves according to the power that is committed unto them acting persecution in one form upon the Neck of another which is the manifestation of the varietie and yet unity of that state that body of Antichrist Hell and death sword hunger and beasts of the earth even Ephesian beasts after the manner of men and then I saw the doom of those that have the Testimony of the Lord Iesus and I brake out into Admiration in my self Oh eternity how do the Nations of the world the Nationall powers of the world hear and see and read and seem and would be supposed to understand yet they see not nor understand and yet they suspect not themselves but teach and declare of themselves and say that they are christians walk in the life supereminent But Nobles of the earth take this only if you can lovingly til I am more lovingly inflamed or untill the father will manifest himself more unto you or me even in the interiorest in the dividing assūder rending and tearing in pieces of all your fleshly deceitfull glories whereby you have for many hundred years past deceived the people of the earth I am no disputer of the world I desire to be Tomteltra and not Oedipus I desire not to insinuate with you but to live to my God the God and Lord absolute mercifull holy undefiled and eternall I desire only of the father that I unworthiness weakness may live to him and with him in the interiorest sublimest and truest and that thou worthiness gloriousness wouldest understandingly as to me comprehend my particular and do what thou wilt with me in my exterior or in this visible world if thou worthiness and truly eternall Lord wilt surrender me up into the hands of the Lords and powers of the earth that act in a constitution of persecution Let me in the interior say Amen But yet Sathan that Divell tempts me but yet me thinks I am surrounded and invironed in this my pilgrimage and methinks the exteriors of the world operate insinuate dispute and reason with me and tempts my exterior to conform me to its self and confound me in its self I heard a voyce in the world the other day saying very Schismatically erroneously and according to the witness of men and denying the absolute witness of the great Jehovah denying that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh denying that power is given to the Son loving to have the preheminence the uppermost Rooms at feasts and in Synagogues setting themselves in the place of God attributing that to their fallible deceiptfull devillish understandings actings and contrivings that is to be attributed to the alone supream not waiting when God the absolute changer will give repentance to those that beleeve not the truth but have pleasure in unrighteousness earnestly contending as they say for the faith that was once delivered to the Saints in such wayes of carnallity by such carnall weapons which were not used in the times of that excellent glorious Apostolicall ministrations of God and consequently denying the glorious and supream power of the spirit giving themselves to fornication and going after strange flesh to deceive the Nations desiling the flesh by their filthy dreaming by imposing such things for an exterior worship as if Commanders as are not consistent with the life and glory of the Spirit in us Whereas the flesh of Christ that visible manifestation of God at Jerusalem 1600 years ago was lead according to teachings of the Divine God despising the true and absolute Dominion and dignities of the most High speaking evill of those things they know not and what they do know as brute beasts in those things corrupt themselves running in the way of Cain killing their brethren in the flesh because they are not of the same judgement and understanding in the spirit envying them in the offering of their sacrifices because they offer not their sacrifices as they do pulling and halling them before Magistrates Counsells Powers and Authorities Imprisoning them Banishing them confining them depriving them of their liberties accounting the world not worthy of them acoūting them the off scouring of all things running greedily after the errour of Baalam for reward setting obstacles in the way of true reall and unblameable liberty of Saints in their true and glorious feastings of spirituall Charity and Love in the dispensation of the various gifts of the most High God feeding themselves without fear when others are living walking talking lovingly conversing eating and drinking in fear Clouds without water Clouds covering the clear Heavens and Firmaments as if they were full of water and as if showres would presently fall great Mountaines travelling in birth Clouds carried about of winds from Popery or Popish Episcopacy to Prelacy in another form and from that to Presbyterie and those that would have the same wind of Doctrine the same teachings of fallible men to blow others whethersoever it blows them whose fruits have often already withered from one age to another and more then twice dead and plucked up by the Roots raging waves of the sea foming out their own shame having not the spirit of meeknes gentlenes tender mercy compassion though Stars yet wandring Stars to whom is reserved blacknes of darknes for ever and therefore they would draw all men unto them Murmerers Complainers Informers Reformers according to their own lusts speaking swelling words having mens persons in admiration because of advantage not knowing the glorious minde infallible will of the eternall God as the Apostles of Iesus Christ Mockers walking after their own ungodly lusts seperating themselves by the power will minde fallibility of fallible sensuall men having not the spirit denying any one but themselves and those whom themselves approve of to build up any in the holy faith or to Minister the gifts they have had of the supereminent God Teaching by necessarie unavoidable consequences that their love sensuall carnall mutable affections are to be looked after before the love of God or as well as the love of God though God the absolute satisfyer informer and reformer satisfies not having no compassion but on themselves those that they thinke they can by flattery draw to themselves making no difference but from themselves making no difference according to the true nature of difference but only making a difference according to their Carnall Lawes ordinances Statutes decrees not endeavouring to save others according to the true absolute infallible holy just warrantable way of salvation Endeavouring to pull men that are as they say
give forth some way or other to discover the thoughts of all hearts Oh Lord Supereminent Thou hast made all men almost to differ one from another and thou hast set the world in their hearts to some thou didst give the gift of prophesie it may be in some measure to some Tongues to some discerning of spirits to some working of miracles to some wisdom to some knowledge to some Faith if thou givest me but the glimmerings of love in the least of these or in any one let me not despise him that hath more or judge him that hath more nor yet despise him that hath less or judge him that hath less if any have less then my self in relation to capacity or understanding for thou art the same let me not pretēd to know above what I really know though the powers of the world would have me do that I am not convinced of or leave undone that which I cannot because I am thine not their servant Oh then the absolute Lord over-rule the lords in me and let me see thee and walk before thee in the understanding yet if thou wilt have a Nero a Domitian a Caligula or any power of the visible world to scourge me Give my back to the smiters and let me know and see thou givest it and then let me take pleasure in it For oh Lord me thinks I see that a man may have a vision of God and may see a star to arise out of Jacob and may be convinced in his conscience that the earth is the Lords and the fulness thereof and that God is the alone Lawgiver Judge and absolute supream as many or most of the Nationall Priests and Lords confess yet at the request of a base sensitive lust and divilish desire will endeavour to have Altars built yea Altar upon Altar to see whether they can curse the Israel of God Let us proclaim a Fast that so God may hear our Prayers and grant our desires the longing of our souls But Lord how far is this from the true life of Saintship and love in the World But O Lord refine me and then let me walk as refined Thirteenth The mandates of the Scripture even the Scriptures from which the Potentates and powers of the earth have and do maintain persecution and violence to others do all of them extend to the Magistrate and if he were in a Christian constitution as he pretends he ought not in that relation to use carnall weapons neither will he unless he supposes himself wiser then ever Christ or an Apostle was or hath received the Spirit more then an Apostle had or hath received the Spirit to maintain and defend such a practise as the Apostle could not neither did 2 Cor. 10.4 Christ saith when they were persecuted should pray when cursed bless Christ could have had twelve Legions of Angels to defend him in this visible world but he would not take any invisible glory or visible excellency of God to defend him And if the Magistrates will tell us plainly that they have that power given them as considered in a constitution of holiness and truth which the Father would not give Jesus the Son or which he would not assume or exercise nor give his Apostles power to assume or exercise Let them prove that they or this or that particular Magistrate had or have that which neither of them had neither Jesus Christ nor Apostles And let those whom they are pleased to call Hereticks and to banish imprison and afflict see their Arguments that they have in themselves as in the presence though they think it not nor perceive it or know it or though knowing it will not acknowledge it of the Eternall incomprehensible Judge non-respecter of persons the interiorest discerner that can describe that which man describes with a fuller description and judge with a fuller judgement then man or any visible glory or rationall intellect in the world who is without the exteriorest and within the interiorest and indivisible in himself who judges with a more absolute judgement then all the Councels Potentates Lords Synods or Parliaments of the earth And when he enters into judgement the flesh of a Lord is no more then the flesh of another man nor shall more be justified by him or be able to justifie it self But I beleeve if things were demonstrated in the world according to the spirit of truth reallity and non-confusion the Lords Potentates and Counsels of the earth would appear to be the greatest Anti-scripturists though in words they would not have it so expressed or so express it themselves Fourteenth Is it not a case of conscience or is there not necessity that every particular man should be perswaded in his own minde for what he doth or for what he is commanded to do least he call good evil and evil good least he call oppressing persecuting Lords Magistrates Counsels Synods followers of the God of heaven in love light and truth Citizens of the New Ierusalem Saints of the most high God livers in the Spirit those that walk with God when indeed they are not so but grinders of the faces of the poor Idolaters carnall sensuall and divilish having not the spirit having mens persons in admiration because of advantage making a prey of the poor and needy having wisdom yet are not wise unto God but to themselves oppressours though not of their friends or themselves of the Saints of the most High or those that are not perswaded in their consciences by the Divine Supream God It is not strange to say know and think that magistrates and ministers so called have been so are and may be so The Scriptures of the most High God testifie it the saints have witnessed it and still do witness it with their blood and bodies Are there not men magistrates and ministers of such mindes as Caesar Caligula was of that wished that all the people of Rome had but one neck that he might destroy many at once Many can apply this But Hell must inlarge her self Gods design must be accomplished in Hell as well as in Heaven Saints give your backs to the smiters In this my last Demonstration and apprehension I was in the conclusion desiring in my own spirit of that eternall Jehovah and everlasting God that I might be so swallowed up into that eternall glory wisdom power will that I might not manifest my self with my self but that my self or rather himself might be manifested in me by me and from me then though the mutable Lords of the Aire oppose me yet my alone substantiall ever-remaining supereminent Lord remaines If I live he is if I die those that live after me shall not truly say he is not but he is the same I also desired that I might be so swallowed up to the life of the Lord that in seeing of that Lord in the things of that Lord I might not respect persons that it might be all one to me to be hated and to be loved to
many of your fore-fathers even you your selves varied from Apostolicall knowings and livings in the Spirit If I did think Antichrist would not lye or if you were competent Judges of your own hearts in this great time of your contention for Masteries for power and authority for the sitting in the uppermost Rooms of feasts for Judging according to your selves you would tell me that you have all gone out of the way and that you are altogether become abominable even in the eyes of the divine invisible presence as it is in the Son of the Fathers love and also in your own eyes Have not many of you endeavoured to finde out the profound unsearchable riches of the incomprehensible God who is every where in all the natures of things and yet can hide himself in relation to any thing beside himself so that they shall not perceive him May not God work upon the Left hand and upon the Right hand you see him not surely it 's recorded that Job was in such a condition Job 23.9 Have you not endeavoured to finde out that one indivisible mind that one unalterable God as if you contained him in the hollow of your hands in one associated assembled company Oh! then truly those that you are pleased to call Sectaries of all men are most miserable Have not you thought you might finde truth's glory by the knowledge of the Etymologie of words by your artificiall learning and parts by finding out the fallible derivations and nationall changings of Termes Have not your Sermons been cunningly and artificially composed like Menander his two Comoedies Andria and Perinthia which were very unlike in composition And hath not this deceived the hearts of the people though your subject matter as you will say differ little Do not you in your great contentions endeavour to make a Uniformity in worship which you are pleased to call circumstantials or to give some other slight name to it and also an Uniformity in your substantialls so that the Magistrates have been as the Priests or the Priests as the Magistrates and so Priests Magistrates and people have been almost all one But you must likewise go to the Sepulchre of your fathers to be intoombed or hidden mystically in the conteyning Bowels of the earth the grave of the eternall God for all Yesterday it was to a persecuting Papist afterwards to a persecuting Protestant power and to day is to a domineering Presbyter Hinc illae Lachrymae here is unstedfastness in all our wayes here is persecution under 3. adulterated formes though I mention only these formes I complicate other formes whatsoever they are in the world that are not of God even the Father as considered in the body of the Lord Jesus Christ Give me leave to reason with you and take all in good part for I freely give in a loving consideration but let me tell you in this little Tract that which I apprehend will in the time of the invisible omnipotent Father peirce you to the very heart even some of you in this Generation before it passeth away by that word which endures for ever Oh thou Papist hast thou Iesus Iesus so much in thy mouth Oh thou Protestant hast thou Christ as much in thine and thou Presbyter hast thou the Lord Jesus as much in thy mouth as either of the former to throw both down and others also that are in a form of contrariety to thee and to make thy self an absolute Lord an absolute lover of thy self an absolute pleaser of thy self an absolute liver to thy self I only give these names because you are capable of those names you own your selves by and distinguish your selves and indeed are distinguished in the world therefore be not offended at it You speak much of Christ and your own ordinary and frequent expressions to maintain your own Jus Divinum are frequently in your mouths nay I think in your hearts You say indeed Interrogemus Christum but you do take councell with your selves and if you or any of you shall be subject to the sweet teachings of God of the most holy true and absolute you will tell me hereafter or others if not me or your selves if not others or be told of God that you did proclaim a Fast but you intēded to cut of Naboaths head before hand to stone poor Naboath all because he will live in the inheritance of his Father You will say that you had self-contrivings and Law-makings to destroy those that would walk and live and speak as being the inheritance and in the inheritance of the Father of freeness love and excellencie You will say that you with the will of your selves and the minde of your selves though unseeingly to you the minde of the incomprehensible did make way for Stigmatizing and Stigmatizing Informers if you fasted from your selves if you did not ask councell of your selves in the forms of truth make interrogatories to your selves and answer your own questions it would be a great question whether you obeyed the voyce of God or walked after your own premeditated Ordinances Laws and Designes What though your Counsels as it is recorded of Herod in the peoples apprehensions do speak as the Oracles of God what though you make your selves strong by arguments drawn from your vast Humane Intellects according to the formall denomination of wisdom and understanding in the world it is all but your selves it is but the high glory of an exterior and mysticall Antichrist it is but ad res inanes studia convertere It is that that hath deceived all the Nations of the world and doth deceive the people multitudes of the earth and make them to wonder at you and indeed it hath not only drawn the earthly and beguiled the simple ignorant of God through deceipt but also the heavenly the Saints of the most high those that are in the fathers bosome glorious teachings even to make a Disciple for a season to deny his Master till the substance the invisible incomprehensible God hath given them to see himself more and also themselves and others and to see and live to themselves and others less and to see him inmost of all within every vail within whom nothing is and without whom nothing is or is not is it not evident in the world that Synods and Assemblies have more looked upon and judged truth to be according to mens various argumentative varieties according to the seeing of the eye and the hearing of the ear rather then the true and reall discendings of God in their own understandings by the absolute spirit witness Testimonie or manifestation of the sole supream How many thousands of adulterous voyces have the world heard and worshiped with even with the Supereminentest names of Glory how many false and uncertain sounds have the Plebeians so called by many in scorn affected from a Causidick or a Terrestriall Polititian or an affected self-affecting Priest when the sound have been given by those that have the power of
to be delighted in it thou that hast habitation and habitations and yet hast no habitation at all to inclose thee comprehend thee inviron thee do good unto thee if thou hast eternally will'd it let me be the habitation of thy wisdome though a prison shall be a habitation for me Oh sweet God! how sweet will it be that I should be a habitation for thy invisible indivisible self in the spirit of understanding conquer that Divell for me whom thou hast made and given power to deceive and yet hast power to conquer him and if thou hast a minde that I shall speak of thee and acknowledge thee manifest it and then let me not fear the face of a man whose breath is in his nostrils but yet Lord let me have that courage that belongs to thy immutable life and to those that live unto God and not themselves When I shall or if I shall be brought before Magistrates Kings Counsellours or Judges of the earth let not that move me let me not be tossed to and fro by them so as to give up or make recantation of those thngs thou manifestest by thy eternall impress let me be before the Magistrate and judge as knowingly in the presence of the judge of Magistrates and Judges and let me speak as in thy presence Lord I have spoken in private of thee and to thee and thou vouchsafest to reason with with me and discourse with me but man is vain man is sensuall man is proud and the lofty ones would be more lofty then the lofty one that inhabits eternity Wilt thou invisible God draw me to speak to thee and furnish me with arguments and shall I be afraid to speak of thee to thee in the face and hearing of a dying man But Lords of the earth Lords in time I may truly say as in the presence of the Lord of times and seasons Oh Lord my God! other Lords besides thee have had Dominion over me have been in me the head of a designe but by thee will I only make mention of thy name Temporarie Lords Counsellours Synods if he that sees would make you see that say you see if he that apprehends would make you apprehend you would see your selves neither Lords to your selves nor Lords to others in things concerning the invisible life you would be glad to have your selves dethroned and the absolute supream in all your titular momentary glories alone dignified and exalted But Mutable Dominion what will it avail in the day of the Triumph of the absolute perpetuall Triumphant when sorrow and mourning shall flie away from your abjects the off-scum and off-scouring of your worldly glory when fears death and Hell when worse then the Plagues of Egypt shall fall upon you possess you even you that have had the pleasures of Egypt power given not only to your selves but pleasure in your selves to scourge the Nations especially the refining Jewels of the great God of heaven and earth Me thinks I see and hear that the Lords of the earth the Potentates of the world the praying the preaching the fasting the fleshly glories and the spirits of Antichrist but I must confess with some comfort it is only during their time of dominion and whilst their place is to be found endeavour to destroy the prayers of Saints by praying the declarations of Saints by Preaching to destroy the glory of true reall and absolute fasting by fasting This Nationall Interrogatory may be indeed asked What Religion do you profess May there not be a generall cry by those that see May there not be a Trumpet sounded in the Nations of the World but more especially in the commonly called house of Jacob or England that seemingly there is a daily delight to know the wayes of the most high as if a Nation that did righteously and did not forsake the ordinances of the great God as if they walked according to the dictamen of the absolute sole supream and lived according to the absolute spirit of the eternall God in the truth of understanding do they not seem to ask of God he Ordinances of Justice when their own praemeditated praeordinated fleshly Antichristian Ordinances Lawes and Statutes are maintained by their fleshly carnall accomplishing power But these delight in their approaching to and by the name of the eternall God Have we not the Monarchs the powers of the world of Nations the spirits of darkness death hell and the Grave that challenge the holy one of Israel to his face that insultingly and domineeringly and as much as in them lie blaspheme the absolute supream wisdome and would be in the place of the supream Cause or would have the supream Cause to be their servant and they to be Master to that eternall absolute undefiled immutable glory as if they should say we have fasted and thou seest not have we observed dayes and moneths and years and observest thou not We love the Nation with our hearts and we will preserve the Nation with our prayers Shall we observe a day and wilt thou not observe both the day and us We have not only afflicted our bodies but our very souls if bodily whippings scourgings and lashings of our selves as many of us are perswaded in our understandings will not move thee yet our afflicting our soules piercing our selves through with many sorrows or reducing our selves in body soul into a super-superlative way of sadness and affliction will must move thee Wilt thou take no knowledge of this excellent daies work of ours We came with an intent to have thee know what we would have thee know and do what we would have thee do against Hereticks and Sectaries disturbers of the Peace we would have thee our servant our slave but we wil not say so for that wil too much undeceive the world if out of our own mouth we should judge our selves we should no more binde the world in temporarie chains and in fetters of our own devising But Oh Lords Oh you Monarchs in a Nation and Nations you have here in this little Tract but an earnest of your charge drawn up but when the interiorest of all when that knowing seeing and judging God that lofty one shall come and judge you according to that you are within for you are not alwaies the same without that you are within What are yee What difference shall you see Shall you not see a change and a vast disproportion betweeen a Lord and a Lazarus that was captivated to the light and knowledg of the absolute Lord But Lords or powers of the World by what name or title soever distinguished what though in the day of your fasting you found pleasure and delight yet it was but an exaction of your own labours ye fasted for strife and prayed for debate and to smite with the fist of wickedness as a Nation that did righteousness justice and mercie as if you lived to the highest formes of truth in relation to humanity and likewise to
would scarce afford him to write or seeme to write upon the ground If he did we should have a gangraena made presently to condemn this Heretick this Belzebub this friend to publicans sinners But Lords But Counsailes but Synods in fine but men when the absolute Lord and supereminent God shal tell you though a poore man it may be that is iudged and condemned before you may not neither doth that you who were or are called Lords in the sublunary Visible Kingdome glory did endeavour to cast a moate out of anothers eye you had a beame in your owne and that you having a beam are no competent judges of a mote But it may be you will say that you are infallible in this and also say that that saying of Christ doth not appertain to you Let him that is without sin cast the first stone when God shall discover himself and manifest you what you are even that you that judge other are Cast-awaies your selves are Hereticks your selves you would not be very willing to finde a stone for another When the Lord shall say though you cried Templum Domini Templum Domini yet the everlasting was not in your esteem even he that can when he will both cast out Beam and Mote But thus it is when the Lord is not or will not be understandingly supereminently in the Lords thoughts though he be neer and sees yet he will not be seen but they say how doth God know can he judge through the dark Cloud thick Clouds are a covering to him that he seeth not and he walketh in the circuit of heaven Job 22 23 24. But Oh Immortality thy righteousness thy seeing and thy seeing to be seen thy knowing to be known and thy understanding to be understood shines not upon all Thou hast O Lord set the world in my heart so that no man can finde out the work that thou hast made from the beginning to the end Ecclesiastes 3.11 Therefore Lord if thou wilt give a Crown Power and Authority to Temporarie Lords to excercise their Dominion and power even upon me if thou shalt manifest me and make me a little flame of thy self thy will be done It is only in thy self to comprehend the works that thou hast made from the beginning to the end if man indeavours to comprehend endeavours to inthrone himself in a state of comprehending others and persecuting others from an apprehension that he comprehends when he doth not in deed and in truth and though I shall if thou comprehending incomprehensib e willest be afflicted scorrned contemned by that generation yet let me in particular lie down and be satisfied that I am apprehended and comprehended of thee and that I know see and speake according to the true and reall nature of knowing seeing speaking living and injoying as comprehended let me see before I say I see know before I say I know and be spoken to before I speak Oh! thou immutable knower see'r and absolute speaker as to the things that thou hast made capable of seeing knowing and speaking let thy loving spirit of righteousness and wisdom uphold me and though thou deliverest me to the ungodly and turnest me over into the hands of the wicked let me say truly knowingly and understandingly my witness is in heaven and my record is on high in love Job 26.19 But Counsellours of the Earth Weak Contenders of the Earth with the absolute Lord I see and consider oppressions though I see not all oppressions under the Sun But a comfort it is that the absolute Lord sees Eccles 4.1 2. But it may be Lords you will say when you persecute there is no remedy in the death of a man it is sutable to conveniency and the constitution of a Kingdom to destroy a man so as it was indeed to crucifie the Son of God who was known is known to some not to be held of the grave But you it may be will say you have not known any man to returne it may be you will say men are born at an adventure and shall be hereafter as though they had never bin that the breath of your nostrils is as smoake a little spark in the moving of your Breast which being extinguished your body shall be turned into ashes and your spirit shall vanish as the soft Aire therefore you will lie in waite for the righteous because he is not for your turn he is clean contrary to your doings because he professeth to have the knowledge of God and he calleth himself the child of the Lord he is made to reprove your doings therefore he is grievous to behold because his life is not like other mens his waies are of another fashion because you are esteemed of him as counterfeits and he abstaineth from your filthiness and because he maketh his boast that God is his Father And therefore you will examine him with despightfulness and torture to know his meekness and prove his Patience But Potentates I shall present a few things to your consideration paradventure you may see with your eyes and heare with your ears and when you are converted if ever you shall you may set to your seals that these things are true to the praise and glory of the absolute infallible God Judge power wisdome and true glory 1. God is the alone supream King of kings Lord of lords and God may as well as he hath already give the Nations or those to whom he intends to shew and manifest himself unto a light and glorious understanding to see that Lords by speciall authority and power formerly constituted are but types and shadowes of the absolute supream immortall God and Judge but this is true though the Lords and Kings see it not themselves for I know they will say you Prophecie not good unto them in these things 2. Christ the perfect pattern of the Fathers manifested perfection to men never gave any such power or kingly authority to any that then were in the world either Magistrates or Apostles he never gave the Apostles power to exercise themselves with scourgings whippings imprisonments banishments or oppositions of such a kind therefore there is no such successive Magistracy 2 Cor. 11.3 4. verses If he that cometh Preacheth another Jesus whom we have not Preached and if ye receive another Spirit whom ye have not received or another Gospel which ye have not accepted ye might well bear with him Likewise there was power given or the manifestation of the most High in a way supereminent that the Saints should do great things by the power of the Spirit and in the name of the Lord Jesus that supereminent name that name above every name In whose name the seventy returned with joy and said the Devils were subject unto them by it Luke 10.17 I know no other authority power or glory given to any that should profess that name according to the spirit 3. Christs commanding the Apostles to give Caesar his due and God
was to be with Jesus Christ who was manifested in the flesh or when the body is exercised according to the life power and will of the supreame Lord in Communion with those that have the same spirit of the most high in knowing and understanding then the Saints must not feare them that can kill the body viz magistracy but they must walk as the divine supereminent Saviour Lord King Judge wil have them Suppose that a Magistrate commands my body to do one thing but the invisible God in the understanding he that is God of body and soule commands another thing whether is it lawfull to obey God or man Judge ye 6. Suppose there is such a Magistrate in the world that does truely and really conceive that there is one eternall God the judge the absolute God the Lawgiver in the conscience and he according to rationality doth endeavour to demonstrate it can he make another beleeve it if any conforme to what he saieth not knowing it is not he an ignorant doer of what he would have him to do or a dissembling person But Aug. one of Gangraena's Fathers saith Simulata sanctitas est duplex iniquitas But the Magistrates and Priests of the earth have led the world in a string and they are at the sensuall beck and will of every base lust and that rule is verified amongst them qui nescit dissimulare nescit vivere But Oh! how excellent will it be when Saints shall more and more live to the supreame absolute God! 7. Whether a man may not have a word of God to deliver to a Magistrate as well as a Magistrate to another man Formerly I know God called some to speake to Kings and Potentates of the earth But we are better then our Fathers Is not the spirit of forbearance as good in a Magistrate as it is in another man if the Magistrate hath had experience that no man can make him beleeve the truths of God that he can not make any one likewise why should he use violence bitterness and wrath But we call it not wrath we call it Justice But the absolute distinguisher sees what it is and he will call that wrath and anger in you which you call justice But we will contrive a great many fine words to waue it But there is nothing hath power but what is given to it nothing enjoyes it longer then he that gave it pleaseth neither shall any thing be waved but what he will wave even that absolute I am But oh Lord supereminent if thou callest me causest me to speak of thee to manifest thee though magistracy heape up words against me strengthen their mouthes according to the judgement of Causidicks Synods of the earth though they hale me teare me in their ire sharpen their eys at me yet let it be sufficient that thou lovest when soever I see man let me be drawn to God let me say with Iob in the spirit of understanding without respect of persons Iob 20.4 5 6 7. Knowest thou not this of old since man was placed upon the earth that the triumph of the wicked is short and the joy of the wicked is but for a moment Though his Excellencie mount up to the heavens and his head reach to the clouds yet he shall perish for ever like his owne dung they which have seen him shall say where is he 8. Those that the Magistrates endeavour to compell to the Laws wills Ordinances interpretations of Scriptures the Magistrates being and confessing themselves fallible may for ought the Magistrates know have an obligation and an absolute understanding ingagement upon their spirits as to God to live to Gods owne interpretation Law will and ordinance which may be contrary to the Magistrate For God is the absolute originall of all things that are and that are to be interpreted 9. The People shall not suffer for the Magistrates sins but their owne nor the Magistrates for the peoples sins but their owne But the soule that sinneth shall die But yet in a common calamity the one may suffer as well as the other though not for the sins of another 18 Eezekiel 1 2 3 4. c. There is a declaration as from the Lord. And the word of the Lord came to me saying What meane ye that ye Use this Proverb concerning the Land of Israel saying the Fathers have eaten sower Grapes and the childrens Teeth are set on edge As I live saith the Lord ye shall not have occasion any more to use this Proverb in Israel Behold all souls are mine as the soule of the Father so also the soule of the sonne is mine The soule that sinneth it shall die you may reade the whole Chapter This was a glorious Prophesie of the time that should be when God should peculiarly manifest himselfe when God would be no more vayled by a man when God would manifest himselfe to be the absolute Lord me thinks a Magistrate confessing himselfe fallible should feare to desire much more to command another to that which that other is not satisfied of God For the soule of the person that the Magistrate commands is Gods It was no argument for a poor soule when the absolute supreame entred into judgement to say that the Magistrate gave me and I did eate nor an argument for the Magistrate to say that a companie of people invested me with this and that authority as I thought or desired this or that thing and I did eate I had received a Petition from the people or from the Major part to release one Barabbas crucifie Jesus Christ I received a Petition to deprive such and such People of their liberties being such as they when they did petition confessed God had honoured in doing them good estates priviledges and benefits of living in the world unlesse they indeed were not perswaded of in their own consciences If it was an Argument inexcusable that Adam and Eve used to God this may also hardly be They had an infallible Ministration what should be death and life But the Magistracy of the world and Synods of the times confess themselves fallible It was an Argument in that most certain case for Satan to use to suggest to poor weak Eve as it was presented to deceive God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof your eys shall be opened and ye shall be as gods knowing good and evil But oh Lord I let me seek unto thee with thee and from thee though that Devil tempts me to unite and manifest my self to that and in that way of darkness and man-sinning in the world whatsoever specious and fallacious pretences I shall receive from the men of the world and from my own soul as considered in its way of operations contrary to the body of Jesus Christ Let me though I hear men in the world pretend to the glorious mysteries of the Eternall God and the honour and glory of him try things with thy self alone and therefore be
be honoured and to be dishonoured to have evill report to have good report to be buffetted scorned contemned despised and to be counted the off-scouring of the world to be courteously entertained affected delighted in to be out of prison when I am in and to be in when I am out to have all things when I have nothing and to see only that all that eternall wise God alone when I have any thing if he shall call me to speak of himself that I may not live to any thing under the Sun for I see vanity in all things I desired that I might see and live in the eternall life in the life supereminent and if I shall be called amongst the called Gods and Lords that I might speak as seeing truly but one eternall God and Lord For all the Gods and Lords of the earth shall wax old lik a garment and shall be folded up like a vesture this I know and see by experience Thou Lord makest the lords of the earth their name to rot and their memory to perish and what shall be to them in their severall particulars everlastingly thou LORD knowest In companie I desire to see thee and to look up to thee in the understanding as if I had none that so I might see and not see behold and not behold be thou my alone companion Here in the world men love one another because they are as to one another according to sence but let me not be to any but to thee alone let my life as the Apostle said be in the flesh by the faith of the Son of God in the Spirit In this world none must speak of the God but that those the gods will approve of none must speak of the eternal immutable incondemnable but those whom the mutable condemnable dying Lords please none must declare the eternal God to the world but those whom the Ministers or Synods of Nations or the Gods of the Nation pleaseth But if thou absolute infallible minister ministrests to me if thou committest a word unto me inflame me and let me be thy flame in the spirit though the world indeavour to drown to quench thy glory in me But if I am not manifested by thee let my hiding place be in thee and of thee so that let manifestation and cessation to be and not to be and again to be be all of thee who hast times and seasons comprehended in thy self But Lord if the lords of the earth imprison me visit me in the understanding and lay not if it be thy will that sin to their charge for I desire not to have pleasure in their horror when hel and death seizes upon them I desire not to be taken up with them nor to live unto them nor to rejoyce in their pains for I desire not to live unto my own pleasure in me nor any pleasure to me but be affected with pain to me from them if thou wilst it But let me wholly live to thee but Lord thy will be done for all things are of thee all things are for thee all things are to thee though particulars see it not 15. If it be supposed as there is great probability to suppose or if it hath been and be known as by experience that Magistrates Lords Potentates Counsellours Priests yea high Priests are swearers drunkards oppressors walkers after their own lusts blasphemous fallible men will-worshippers having none as they say to rule them contemners and despisers of that which is good unless it be from a Priest from a Carpenters son from a fisherman then Lords are you competent Judges May not a man say to you when you would punish such a one as you call a Heretick though a man doth not countenance Heresie no more then Christ did countenance adultery in the woman when they would have had her stoned Let him that is without sin cast the first stone at her so you that are without Heresie or without the same Heresie for many times expressions of formality do make a difference cast the first stone imprison destroy banish or take away the lives of those you call Hereticks whose life perhaps may be better then ten thousand of yours But precious in the sight of the Lord though not of the Lords is the death of his Saints but you may do such a thing in your dayes that you may never blot out of your consciences at such a time when you shall not be able to redeem your selves or others with ten Thousands of Gold or Silver or ten Thousand Rams or ten Thousand Rivers of Oyl or the first fruit of your body for the sin of your soul But the Will supereminent indescribable is that there must be persecutors and persecuted crucifiers and crucified Lords and high Priests look to your selves if you can God hath chosen the poor of the world rich in faith not many mighty not many rich not many Noble c. I exclude not all What eternity hath done that it self knows 16. A man for what he doth especially in a business of high concernment had need be infallible be absolutely resolved it is the minde of God as in Jesus Christ for if you live not to the supream Originall according to the of knowledg God you judge the things so God with your own mindes you judge the supream so that it may be said as well that the lords Judge the Lord as that the Lord judges the lords But ye will not say so will ye neither wil you say you think so but whether you say or think so you do so 17. If you are infallible your infallibility must proceed from the most high immediately truly and understandingly if you will declare things without the Scriptures as you say you will not if you will be absolute Judges if you will have Hereticks depart out of your coasts if you will have them banished according to the minde of a Synodean Minister who declared himself so to me if you your selves are your own teachers you will not say you are infallible if the pretended Ministers of the Lord Jesus are your teachers they will not alwaies be so audacious thanks be to the most High to say that they are infallible so that you shall finde great cause to confess you are at a loss 18. If your infallibility depends upon the understanding of the Scriptures and so you as you say will walk according to the Scriptures you must have the infallible Teacher to teach according to them what is mysterious and what not to distinguish between the mysticall and the plain if you acknowledge that there is a plain and a mysticall and so to be more infallible distinguishers then others Suppose a Noble man should send a Letter to one that hath been an intimate friend of his in the Kings Army and they having had precedent intimacy know the minde one of another by this Letter but when this Letter is intercepted and comes to the hands of others every man interprets this
Letter as he pleaseth would you not esteem it an indignity when the supream Judge shall come to judge the world as the Apostle saith according to his Gospel when the supream God shall averr in the interiorest and say that indeed he sent his Son and anointed him with the Oyl of gladness above his fellows and gave him the spirit not by measure so that unmeasurableness and mysticalness was manifested in him and by him and he spake to a few Saints and gathered by the power of the Spirit a few poor men to teach the mysteries of Christ but there was one William Pryn Esquire a Lawyer I will not say Saint Pryn and the Lords of the earth and the Synods of the world proved interpreters with their own lusts according to their formall artificiall terms of distinction and so they said this must be the meaning to day this must be the meaning to morrow Procul dubio Lords is this not indignity But Christ will not be for ever crucified in his body the Church crucifying will be over may be in time but surely will when time shall be no more 19. If the Scriptures were so plain that he that runs may reade he that barely reads may understand to what purpose is the spirit promised to lead into all truth since the Ascention If I may absolutely knowingly understandingly infallibly Aopstolically Christ like know and understand all that I see and heare concerning my self and others But truly Lords and mutable Potentates though you reade hear see as you say you do you may say as the Eunuch how shall I understand without a guide But remember this the guides say and confess they are not infallible 20. If you do confess the spirit was promised to be given after the Ascention if it be given to ye it is a greater glory for you to tell us of it then laugh at it to tell of it how it came to you and when then to tell us what you have done for us if any thing in relation to civils Paul was not ashamed of it 21. If you confess that the spirit was promised to be given after the Ascension you had need to averr justifie and prove that it was promised to be given to Magistrats Lords and Synods not poore men not Fisher-men that the spirit went from the poore to the rich from those that the honourable count base to the honourable And though it were so it is no good Argument to convince a man even to strike him to imprison him and defame him as the false prophet did the true when he said when went the spirit of the Lord from me to thee 22. If you prove that the spirit was to be given to Magistracy Lords Nationall preists both you and the people had need know whether you in this age that now is more then any other are the Magistrates and the Preists For it was not promised to Magistracy in all Ages if it had it would have been performed for he promiseth nothing but what he performeth And that precedent Magistracy have been enemies and persecutors of the Saints of God under the notion of Heretiques or those that have been contrarie minded it is playnly apparent Historie declare it and you your selves confess it are convinced of it in your own hearts as you say therefore let that Magistracy as well as other men let that Synod that thinks he stands take heed least he falls or is already fallen or that he takes falling for standing in himselfe and standing for falling in others and so judges condemnes and persecutes 23. Me thinks I heare in my eares a urge saying and a voyce to my understanding declaring that there was a Nation or multitude of people met together as Episcopalls Presbyters and Independents so called and did convene from remote parts the East West North and South and these chose some to consult and debate what should be for the good of that Nation and kingdome and gave them power and honour and externall glory so much as they could or was in their power but the prevayling party tooke upon them the things of God and the place of God as much as in them lay and beat and wounded those that were contrary minded in their minds as to God though they still continued loving and affectionate to them Is this good Oh! sad requitall may not you say woe to your owne soul for you have rewarded evill to your selves Isa 3.12 Oh! my people they which leade thee cause thee to erre and destroy the way of thy paths 24. Suppose that a multitude of faire complexioned men of straite deportment should choose and elect a companie and place them in honour and dignity above themselves but these poore creatures or some of them may be Iob in the paralell should have an affliction upon them their faces should be changed their bodyes should grow crooked and this should be inflicted by the God of all natures mutable glories and excellencies or suppose God should send Sathan to tempt them or some of them that they may consent to the temptation and whereas Iob had boyles and sores even from the Crowne of the head to the sole of the feet would it not be sad now that one should come and lay Iobs affliction more heavie on him whipp the man sting him with scorpions But would it not be as sad also to see two that were full of boyles and sores wounds of Sathan temptations of the Devill that contrarie that roaring Lion in the shape of man to whip one another and lash one another for I have heard many of the nationall preists confess themselves publiquely that they have been full of wounds and sores and putrifactions even from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot Oh! Preist it is better for thee to tell who healed thee then to wound another that is in thy former condition if thou art out of it and truly translated But would not this make a man to breake out after this manner and say O inhumanitie had I knowne this should I have been so inhumane to my selfe I am scourged because I am sore wounded because I have boyles because I am in temptation because I am in errours because Sathan that politique Devill that contrarie hath deceived me and I am deceived though I have boyles and sores from the sole of the foot to the crowne of the head sent me of the God of Gods and Lord of Lords the Ruler of Princes yet after the manner of men I might have spared the rending and tearing my owne bowells I cannot comprehend the heavens and the earth much less him that is greater then both I cannot change my selfe nor make him change me till he will But the will of eternitie be done why should I contend with the God of all changes when I did choose them I was weakness it selfe I was the weaker vessell and I am despised for being so yet I made not my selfe so neither can I add one Cubit to my stature reade 1. Isa 29.30.31 25. Admit that those that are generally called and doe call themselves Ministers of the Gospel and prophets of the most high God in an eminent and a supereminent manner have communion with God and should be told of God as the Prophet was what they should do 13 Kings reade the whole Chapter must we goe forward and backward because the Prophets do so But surely I hope there is the Lyon of the Tribe of Judah in the way I who am weakness desire of thee O Immortall strength that I may more and more walke as comprehended of thy divine will that I may neither goe backward and forward and forward and backward to the right hand and to the left hand because the Nationall preists and Prophets do so but that I may walke as became a child to thee the Father of spirits and the God of all consolation and therefore let me live to the willing life and living will of thee O supersupereminent God 26. Magistrates and ministers of God so called you are but men subject to like passions that other men are as well as an Apostle was as he confesseth if not much more and you were not long since under Episcopacy and owned it as of God many of you if not all did did you satisfie your selves or were you satisfied of God if you were can you or we that are contrary minded draw God to us to satisfie us when you or we will our selves your selves 27. You Magistrates and ministers so called are but at the most or the most you can say of your selves in your own applause is that you are but wise and prudent men But saith Christ Father I thank thee thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent Scribes Pharises Lawyers chief Priests and revealed them to babes but may be you will say now as Lloyden said the case is altered but many Scriptures will prove this 28. Magistrates and ministers so called you shall die as well as other men the King and the Beggar the Fool and the Achitophel the master and the servant ye shall go to one Tomb that contains all generations mystically in it self But I will not say you think you shall have a Pardon or a Purgatory or both 29. Magistrates and minsters so called the Kings the Priests and the people the beggar and the rich the wise and the foolish the abased and the abounding person the Lawyer with his terms fallacies and term-pleadings and the Divines so called with their formall Sophistical Criticisms shall appear if there be any judgement as indubitably there is and shall before the absolute perfect Tribunal all the restitution of all things when all things shall be brought forth according to the will powerfull Excellencie and minde of the supream Cause when the things that are mystically unsearchably brought forth and are again mystically hid in its proper center in a way of mutability shall be brought forth in everlastingness but this is a mystery of eternity at which time and in which appearance you Lords of the earth shall be judged in those things that ye judge questioned in those things that ye question others and be your selves examined whether you are in the faith in a supersuperlaive manner And so farewell mutable dying vain unholy unnaturall temporarie judging inconsiderable man FJNJS