hath not the Son hath not the true faith which immediately receives him and so is no Christian but hath stoln the name from the letter having never received the nature from the Spirit to which alone the name belongs X. He that hath Christ or the seed of eternall life which is Christ formed in him which seed the Spirit alwayes dwels in and utaer is absent from which is the same Spirit which gave forth the Scriptures he is a capacity of understanding those Scriptures which that Spirit gave forth as that spirit leads him into the understanding of them But he that hath not received that which is like the grain of mustard seed and so hath not Christ nor his Spirit what ever he may pretend to he by all his studies arts languages reading of expositors conferences nay experiences can never come to the true knowledge of the Scriptures for he wants the true key which alone can open He may have got a great many wrong keys none of which can open but wants the true key of the true knowledge and so is shut out of that and only let into such a kind of knowledge as the wrong key can open into And with this kind of knowledg the marchants of Babilon have long traded but their day is expiring apace and their night of lamentation and howling hasteneth XI Though he can understand the Scriptures as the Spirit leads him into the knowledge of them and can set his zeal to the truth of them yet he cannot call them his rule for having received the life for his rule and knowing it to be so he cannot call another thing it He that hath received the new covenant into his heart with the laws of the life thereof written there by the Spirit of life who doth write them there even in the least of all that beleeve as wel as in the greatest he knoweth that this living writing is his rule The Scriptures give relation where the covenant and law of life is writ and if I will read it thither must I go whither the Scriptures point me I must go to Christ the book of life and read there with that eye which Christ gives if I read the things of life And the Scriptures are willing to surrender up their glory to Christ who was before them and is above them and shall be after them but there is a false spirit which hath seated it selfe in a litterall knowledge of the Scriptures and hath formed images and likenesses of truth from it every one after the imaginations of his own heart and all these fall if Christ the life appear and so this Spirit cryes up the Scriptures now in a way of deceit just as the Jews cryed up Moses It was a good remove to withdraw the ear from the false Church and to listen to the true testimony which the Scriptures give of Christ but it is the seducing spirit which tempts to stick by the way and to rear up buildings and forms of knowledge from the letter of the Scriptures and not to come to feel after unity with and live in Christ the life And unlesse ye come to this your reading of the Scripture is vain and all your gathering rules of practise and comforts from promises will end in vanity for untill ye know and have received the thing it selfe ye are at a distance from that to which all belongs A lively and glorious testimony of truth hath God held forth in this age at which all that stick in the letter cannot but stumble and there is no possibillity of knowing or receiving it but by feeling the true touch of the inward life of it Wisdome is justified of her children but they that are not born of her cannot justifie her womb or birth To the Jews who were an outward people there was an outward rule given a law of commandements statutes judgements and ordinances proper to that state wherein they were and to that thing to which the ministry was But all this was to be done away and to end in that which all this represented So that to Christians Christ the substance being come which is the end of all these shadows the true Jew being raised in the immediate life now there is a necessity of the immediate life for the rule To them under the Gospel to them who are come to the substance to them who are begotten and born in the life there can be norule proportionable to their state but Christ the substance Christ the life here he alone is the light the way the truth the rule the Spirit is here the rule the new creature the rule the new covenant the rule all which are in unity together and he that hath one of them hath them all and he that hath not them all hath none of them So that directions taken out of the Scripture cannot be the rule to him who is the true Christian but the measure of grace the measure of light the measure of the Spirit the measure of the gift received into the living soule from the spring of life this is the alone rule of life But Christians in the degeneration have lost this and so have taken up words for a rule which were not given to that end and so with deductions by the earthly part they feed the earthly part What is fed by mens Scripture knowledge but the earthly understanding the earthly will heated the earthly affections warmed and of the fruits of this earth they bring sacrifices to God and they are angry that God hath raised up Abel their younger brother who offers up the Lamb of God to God and serves the living God in his own living spirit and with the faith that comes from him Abels religion stands not in that part wherein all other mens religion stands but in the death of that part and in the raising up of another part wherein life springs Can ye mildly receive these gentle leadings do not provoke the the tender heart of the Lamb against you who also hath the voice of a Lyon and can roar terribly out of his holy mountain against the enemies of his life and Spirit A Necessary warning and of very great importance to all that call themselves Christians and hope for a share in the book of life and the escaping the damnation of hell which is their portion whose names are written in the booke of death and blotted by God out of the book of life though they hope to find them written there Here and consider IT is recorded Rev. 22. 18 19. If any man shall adde unto these things God shall adde unto him the plagues that are written in this book And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy God shall take away his part out of the book of life and out of the holy City and from the things which are written in this book Great are the plagues that are written in this book even the powring out of eternall
and incourage men to hearken after and waite for the voyce but it is the immediate voyce of Christ in the soul which alone can quicken the soule to God and till the light of life shine immediatly from Christ in the heart the true knowledge is never given 2 Cor. 4. 6. Therefore they that never yet heard the immediate voice of Christ are still dead in their sins and have not yet received the true living knowledge but a dead litterall knowledge which gives a false shining of things in the dead part but kills the life Indeed the proper use of all means is to bring to the immediate voice life and power and till this be done till the soule come to that to hear that to feele that to be rooted there there is nothing done that will stand but men stick by the way crying up the means the means and never knowing tasting or enjoying the thing which the means point to But he that knows God comes into the immediate presence and he that dayly lives in God lives in the immediate life and the true faith leads to this giving the soul such a touch and tast of it at first as makes it unsatisfiable without it By this Christ cuts off the Jewes with all their zeale and knowledge Joh. 5. 37 38. Ye have not heard his voyce at any time nor seen his shape and ye have not his word abiding in you There 's the hearing of the voyce the sight of the shape and the having of the word of God abiding in the heart which gives both the hearing of the voyce and the sight of the shape and keeps the soule quick and living in the life The voyce gives life the sight of the shape daily conforms into the image which is beheld by the eye of life and the word abiding in the heart nourishes and feeds the living soul with the pure bread of life But the Jews knew not this but were crying up their Sabbaths the Law of Moses the ordinances of Moses the Temple of God the instituted worship of God and so were shut out of the thing it selfe which those things ended in and out of a capacity of receiving it And thus many zealous ones at this day not having come to this no more then the Jews did but sticking in the letter of the Gospel as the Jews did in the letter of the Law stumble at the present dispensation of life and cannot do otherwise IV. That Christs immediate revelation of the nature of his Father is to his babes Not to the wise not to the zealous not to the studious not to the devout not to the rich in the knowledge of the Scriptures without but to the weak the foolish the poor the lowly in the heart And man receives not these revelations by study by reading by willing by running c. but by being formed in the will of life by being begotten of the will of the Father by coming forth in the will and lying still in the will and growing up in the will here the childe receives the wisdome which is from above and daily learns that crosse which crucifies the other wisdome which joyns with and pleases the other will which loves to be feeding on the shadowy and husky part of knowledge without life Therefore if ever thou desire to receive this knowledge from Christ know that eye in thy self that is to be blinded which Christ will never reveal the Father to read at home know the wise and prudent there whom Christ excludes from the living knowledge And if thou canst bear it that eye that can read the Scriptures with the light of its own understanding that can consider and debate and take up sences and meanings of it without the immediate life and power that 's the eye that may gather what it can from the letter but shall never see into the life nor â—ast of the true knowledge for Christ who alone opens and gives the knowledge hides the pearl from that eye The true knowledge is only powred into the new vessell It is the living soul alone that receives the living knowledge of the living God from Christ the life The old nature the old understanding is for death and destruction The wisdom of flesh though painted never so like to the spirituall wisdome is not to be spared anywhere but that wisdome with all its zeal and growth and progresse in religion must perish All mens knowledge of the Scriptures which they have gathered into that part will profit them nothing but hinder them Every building which the leprosie of sin hath overspread is to be pulled down therefore he that hath had only the old house swept and garnished never received the true knowledge from whence the true faith spring but his life lies in the oldnesse of the letter in the conformity of the dead part to that and he knows not the vertue of the knowledge of God in the newnes of the spirit the vailt being over his heart which is only given to the new understanding V. That this faith which springs from the true knowledge is Gods gift and is not that power of beleeving which is to be found in mans nature but of another nature even of the nature of the giver And when man is called to beleeve he is not called to put forth that faith wherewith he beleeveth other things but to receive and exercise the gift of faith which is from above That which is to be believed in is spirituall and that must be spirituall which believes in it Man with all the powers of his nature is shut out it is another thing distinct from man which is let into life and which lets man in For man receiving the faith entering into the faith and becoming new-formed in the faith then he also may enter but till then he is shut out and knoweth not the life let him beleeve and read and pray and hear and exercise himself in that which he cals duties and ordinances never so much for all these set up in the wrong part in man they onely feed the wrong part and that withall its food and nourishment falls short of the life Therefore the true entrance into religion is to feele that power which slayes mans naturall ability and propensity to beleeve that so the gift of the true faith may be received for there is no rising up and living of the second without the death of the first with all his naturall faculties and powers VI That by this faith alone which is the gift which is from above and not that faith which grows either in the wilderness or garden of the old nature and is fed by the oldness of the letter and not by the newnesse of the Spirit is Christ received For Christ can be received by the faith alone that comes from him and that faith which comes from him cannot but receive him Mans faith refuseth him it receiveth a litterall knowledge of him from what it heareth from
part which would be forward and running before hand till the key be given and to know how to receive it as it is offered in the light and not to wait in the will or expect to receive it according to observations in the fleshly wisdome from the letter 2. Let not thy understanding have the mannaging of this key when it is given but know the true opener the skilfull user of the key the hand which can only turn the key aright and let him have the mannaging both of his own key and of thine understanding Do not run in thine own understanding or in thine owne will to search out the meaning of Scripture for then thou feedest with the Scripture that which it is the intent all words of life to destroy but as thou waitest for the key at first so continually wait for the appearances and movings of the user of the key and he wil shut out thy understanding and will continually which would stil be running after the litterall part of Scriptures and let thee into the life both of the prophecies and doctrines thereof Man when he hath received a true gift from God he would be mannaging of it himselfe and to be sure he will mannage it for himselfe for the gratifying and pleasing of himself and not for God and then God being provoked takes away the substance and leaves him the shell Therefore he that hath received a gift must be very watchfull against that which would betray or he may easily loose it for though the gifts and caling of God are without repentance yet if that lay hold of the gift which was not called and to which it was not given the Lord will thrust that by and take away his gift from it 3. Do not grast any of the fruit of the tree of life upon the tree of knowledge for it will not grow there an appearance a likenesse of the true fruit may grow there but the true fruit it selfe will not My meaning is doe not make a treasury of knowledge in the understanding part which is to perish but know the true treasury of all the things of life which is in the life it selfe and in that understanding which is formed kept and lives in the life Lay no manna by to feed upon in the old store house lest the fleshly part should be running thither when its fleshly appetite is kindled after food but daily receive the continuall bread from the hand of life The wisdom of the life strikes at â—hy wisdom and understanding and if ever thou wilt grow wise any more there thou loosest this and canst not possibly retaine it for that part is then getting up in thee in which it cannot be held but only a shadow an image a resemblance and likenesse of it which feeds and pleases that part which fain would have life but cannot know it and therefore is necessitated to make images and likenesses of things in Heaven or things in earth that it might have somewhat 4. Take not up a rest in openings of things though by the true key Take heed of over-valluing that kind of knowledge for that part which over-vallues that knowledge will presently be post up with it but there is a more excellent and safer kind of knowledge to be pressed after which is a knowledge of things by receiving of them There is a knowledge of things by the Spirits opening the words which speake of them or by inward immediate prophecies from the word of life in the heart this is an excellent knowledge and not to be found in the earthly part of man yet the earthly part when this knowledge is given is very apt to be swelled and exalted with it but then there is also a knowledge which ariseth from the gift of the thing it selfe This knowledge is very precious and much more full and certain then the other having the nature and immediate power of life in it self and so is perfectly able to preserve As for instance to make it more plaine There may be a knowledge of Justification by the Spirits opening the words written in Scripture concerning justification and the blood of sprinkling and this is a good knowledge where there is a true opening of it from the Spirit but then there is a knowledg by feeling of the blood of sprinkling in the heart and by seeing with the new eye the way of its justification and in this knowledge is the power and the cleansing of the life received which in the other was but spoken of Therefore rest not in openings or prophecies or true meanings of these things though this kind of knowledge is very excellent and hath been very rare but wait to feele the thing it selfe which the words speak of and to be united by the living Spirit to that and then thou hast a knowledge from the nature of the thing it selfe and this is more deep and inward then all the knowledge that can be had from words concerning the thing 5. When thou feelest things then seek their preservation in the proper spring of their own life Let the root bear thee and all thy knowledge with all that 's freely given thee of God When thou feelest thy selfe leavened with the life and become a branch shot out of the life then learn how to abide in the life and to keep all that 's given thee there and have nothing which thou maist call thine own any more but to be lost in thy selfe and found in him Know the land of the living wherein all the things of life live and can live no where else Now in all this in this whole course from the very first step of it there 's certainty there 's stability there 's infallibility From the very first opening of the true key I begin to learne somwhat of God and to learn certainly and feel an assurance and establishment in it and growing up here I grow up in the true learning and in the true settlement and so I am not unlearned and unstable wresting the Scriptures to my own destruction for I take none of the knowledge of the Scriptures from my selfe from my own understanding from my own study and invention or from the studies of other expositors but from a certain hand And how can he rest Scripture who is kept single and has no desire to have any thing to be the meaning of it but what is the meaning nor no will to know the meaning further then the good wil of him whose Spirit penned it thinks good to give forth the meaning to him and who waits to receive this not to feed the lustfull knowing pare in himselfe but to feed the life with it and when the life hath no use for it he is content to have it shut up and to be without it I say how is it possible for this man to wrest Scriptures But now a man that hath taken in a body of knowledge already he goes to the Scripture and bends it to make it speak
but the Lord God is feared and the Dragons arm withers and the head of his pollicy whereby he ensnared intangled from the life is crushing glory to the endlesse power of life for ever and for ever Be wise now therefore loose not your share in the immortal Crown Take heed how ye be found fighters against the Lamb in the wisdom power of Babilon which is to fall Painting will not passe now That bloud of the Lamb is felt which washes off the whores paint even all her painted notions of the blood of christ of sanctification and redemption c. the whorish nature being discovered underneath all these Ye have got the name of Church the name of Christians the name of ordinances c. by the whores help but the nature of life ye want and the living power is come to recover the name from you and we his living witnesses testifie to your faces that ye shall not enjoy it but the name and the thing shall go together and he that hath not the thing shall also loose the name Yea your eyes shall see that ye have been the sacrilegious ones who have stoln holy names and tirles which ye never received from the hand of God but the whorish spirit which out of the life and an enemy to the life hath handed them to you And this is told you in dear and tender love that ye might not perish but have eternall life abiding in your hearts and the new name written by the Spirit of life on your foreheads which all that know the writing of the life may be able to read and acknowledge There are severall touches of these things in diverse of of the Epistles of the Apostles but the full relation is given forth in that book of the Revelation which was penned by the Spirit of God to be read in the light of the Spirit and so to be a preservative against the overspreading contagion of Antichristianism Adn it is said at the entrance into it Blessed is he that readeth they that hear the words of this prophests keâ—p those things wch are written therein But men having lost the Spirit have not been able to read it and having lost the right ear they have not been able to heare the words it speaks and how then could they keepe the things written therein He that doth â—ot understand what he is warned against how is it likely he should be preserved by the warning The Spirit of God judged this warning necessary but the spirit of deceit cryes it is a deep thing not to be medled with Now this is a plain demonstration that men generally are overtaken with the whoredom and drink of the whores cup submit themselves to the beast and exalt his horns and receive his mark and some or other of his names because they have not the knowledge of that which discovers these things and was given by the Spirit of God to forewarn and so to preserve out of them He that knoweth not the mistery of iniquity working under a form of godlines may not he easily be deceived with the mistery of iniquity He that knoweth not what is become of the true Church ministry and where to look for them may not he easily own a fall Church and ministry He that knoweth not the Spirit of the Scriptures which the Church carried with her when she left the letter behind her may not he easily set up the letter for his rule He that knoweth not the living mark and name of a Christian with which the Spirit of life seals all the Lambs of Christ in the life may not he easily give this name to himself and to others who have not this mark but the beasts mark He that knoweth not the true faith the true love the true hope the true joy the true peace the true rest the true consolation in Christ the life the true meeknes and patience of the Sâ—ints c. may not he easily set up shadows or liknesses of these which he gathers from the letter of the Scriptures and the promises thereof receiving the knowledge of them into the wrong part applying them to the wrong thing instead of these Ah poor hearts The book of the Revelation is easie to that Spirit that wrote it and it was not given forth to be laid by as uselesse but to be serviceable in the hand of the Spirit for the ages after the dayes of the Apostles and in the true light it is easily read and they that can read it can see that in it which they that cannot read it cannot beleeve And this is plainly seen That theâ—e is but the Spirit of truth and the Spirit of deceit but the Lambs wife and the whore which hath whored from the Spirit which hath made use of the lotter to run a whoring from that Spirit that wrote it that there is but the true Church and the false Church but life and death but form and power but Christ the mistery of godlinesse and Antichrist the mistary of iniquity but God and the dragon God in the Church or Temple in the Wildernesse and the dragon in the worlds churches and temples appearing there as if he were God giving sorth lawes and ordinances like God and all the world falls down before him and worships him as if he were God and hopes by this worship which they perform to him and by their faith and hope which they receive from him to be saved at last I say there are but these two and he that is joyned to the one of these is not joyned to the other Let him that readeth understand which he may easily doe by the wisdome of the Spirit but never can by the wisdome of the letter For though we know how to join these two in the life yet there is a necessity of seperating them at present till the letter be gained out of the hands of the whorish spirit which hath built up severall forms of knowledge religion and worship in mistery-Babilon by the letter without the life all which must fall with Babilon AN Exhortation relating to the workings of the mistery of Iniquity and the mistery of godlinesse in this present age ALL people upon earth who love your souls and have any true secret pantings after God look to the nature of your Spirits and look to the nature of those things ye let into your minds least ye take in death for life error for truth and so sow to your selves corruption and rear up a fabricke in mistery Babilon which will be turned into desolation and utter ruins by the power of life from Sion Strong is the Spirit of deceit that is entred into the world and glorious and very taking are his images and likenesses of truth which will deceive all but the very elect who were chosen from the foundation of the world and whose eyes are opened to see the foundation of life which was before the foundation of the world It
leadings in the vast howling Wildernes til he bring them into the possession of the true rest What a work there was to quench that spirit wch stired in the Protestants against Popery to fix the in Episcopacy in the use of the Common prayer book When that was detected turned from then Presbittery endeavoured to take its place to bring it its directory but the pursuit of the Lord was so hot against that that it stunk presently his mighty hand would not suffer that so much as to arise Much about the same time Independency and Anabaptism appeared and contended and there was a more simple and honest thing stirring there then in the other and accordingly the blessing of the Lord which was not to the form but to the life that was stirring within did appear more among them But they fixing there lost the life and simplicity to which the blessing was and met with the death and the curse which is the proper reward of the form for any form out of the life kils the life and its reward is death to it selfe The form kils the life which stirred underneath and made it appear with some freshness and when the life from which it had its seeming beauty and lustre dyes then it soon withers and dyes also so that the living principle being once slain there remains nothing but the dead spirit feeding on the dead form There was one more pure appearance and neerer to the Kingdom then all these which was of seeking and waiting but death overcame this also making a form of it and stealing in some observations from the letter of the Scriptures concerning the Kingdom whereby their eyes were with held from beholdingthe inward principle and seed of life within to look for some great appearance of power without such as was among the Apostles to set things to rights and so they were held captive by the same spirit in their seeking and waiting whereby the others are held in their forms Thus have persons generally missed the following of that good Spirit which began to lead them out Aegypt the dark Land and loosing their guid have fixed somewhere or other by the way resting in some form or in some notion or expectation of things according as in their wisdome they have imagined from their skill in the letter short of the life it selfe Thus have their carkasses fallen in the Wildernesse Now this I have to say to you all All you who rest in any form whatsoever or rest in any notion or apprehension of things short of the life it selfe ye had een as good have stayed in Egypt as to fix by the way and to take up a rest in the Wildernesse short of Canaan In plain terms ye had as good have abided in Popery or in Episcopacy ye had been as acceptable to God there as here Not that I say your forms of Indepedency Anabaptism or seeking are as bad as Popery Episcopacy or Presbittery nay they are all somewhat neerer and the last of them very much neerer but your fixing there and the dead spirit feeding there on the dead thing is as remote from life as if it had gone quite backe again And this dead spirit is as hatefull to God here as it is among the Papists yes and in one sence more because it makes a pretence beyond them And the truth is ye have gone back againe though not in the direct form yet into that very spirit wherein Poperey's strength and kingdom lies so are becom one of the beasts names your strength defence lies in the beasts horns either in the outward powers of the earth or in that inward knowledge of things and wisdome from the letter which is out of the life and so are not yet come out of the City Babilon For mark The spiâ—it that fixeth in a form short of the life is the same that whored from the life and the same spirit is the whore still in what form soever she be The spirit that rose up in the life against the death and corruption whereof Popery wholly corsisted was a good spirit and this spirit would passe through all forms till it meet with the life it is the other spirit that sayes to thee thou host gone far enough and so tempts to stay by the way And he who hearkens to this spirit and staies anywhere by the way he is caught with the old whore in a new dresse and is drinking the cup of fornication afresh And then like the Papists he runs to the powers of the earth to defend his form against the witnesses of God and that 's his cover under which he persecutes and there he lyes hid or at least to his own wisdom and reason to strengthen himself with arguments for fixing here and against going any further And then he grows wise in the flesh and cryes out against them who are stil led by the same spirit to presse on further as weak silly giddy Unsetled seduced people that can never know when they are well Thus the wise Episcopalians revlied the simple-he-arted non-conformists who pursued further then they and the non conformists when they lost their simplicity and begun to stick reviled those that pursued beyond them and thus at this day those who are pressing on in the spirit are disdained by those who have took up their station in the flesh and with their two great horns of earthly power and earthly wisdome are they pushing at them Look about you look about you all sorts of devout professors see where ye are are you not dead in your forms is not the good old puritan principle wherein once was true life in its measure dead and buried there Consider with your selves hath that grown in your forms or hath it been slain there Speak the truth in your own hearts Can ye truly say from a sercible feeling in the life that that principle is still alive in you If it were so ye could never be drawn to persecute no nor to suffer persecution ye that have power to hinder it but if that seed be choked then ye may well connive at if not further the enemy and plead for him and joyn iâ—terests with him While Abel lived in you Cain could not rise up in his dominion but now the righteous seed is ' slain the murthering nature appears O hasten out of this spirit hasten out of Babilon cast off the spirit of popery return to the old puritan principle Do not cry it up in deceit to oppose the present appearance of truth which is grown up further in it but subject that dead formall earthly spirit to it which is fallen beneath it and when ye are come to a true touch f life there ye may be able to own the same truth in its growth to a further measure But while thou art in the dead undeâ—standing and from the power and life of truth in thine own particular dost thou think to be able to measure
truth aright in others Nay thou measurest by a false appearance of things in the fallen understanding and in the wisdome which thou hast gathered there since thou thy selfe fellest from the living principle and this must needs commend that most which is neerest to it and not that which is neerest to truth And this is the great error of this age men with a gathered knowledge from Scripture-words without the true faith and life go about to measure that life and knowledge which comes from the faith and because it suites not with the apprehensions which they have taken into their minds they condemn it And thus being in the stumbling wiâ—dome and way of observation to which truth was never revealed but was ever an offence they stumb'e at it and thus men generally dish and split themselves against the same rock now as the Pharisees did of old Now this understanding must perish and this wisdome in men be brought to nought before that can be raised up which can judge aright Hearken therefore to my exhortation as ye love your souls Come out of popery indeed and in truth come out of the spirit of popery burn the whore in her new forms as well as in her old Cast off all these new names of the Beast under which the old spirit has made a prey of the life in your own particulars and lies lurking to make a prey of the life in others and to force it into its own deceitfull forms of death and slay it Leave defending your faith and church by the Beasts horns and come to that faith and church which is received gathered and defended by Christ the one horn of salvation Leave your reasonings and disputings in that wisdome which has slain the life and come to that wisdome which comes from the life and springs up in the life and ye will find more certainty and satisfaction in one touch of true life then in all the reasonings and disputes of wise men to the worlds end The ground wherein mens religion grows even of the most zealous is bad even the same ground wherein the Pharisees religion stood and grew and it hath brought forth such kind of fruit namely such a kind of conformity to the letter as theirs was which stands in the understanding and will of man rearing up a pleasant building there but keeps from the life and from building in it But the true religion stands in receiving a principle of life which by its growth forms a vessell for it selfe s and all the former part wherein sin on the one hand or selfe righteousnesse on the other hand stood and grew passeth away These things following strike at the King of Babilon himselfe yea even at the very root of the Antichristian spirit in every man which he that can mild y receive the stroake of may feel the true Spirit of life which lies slain underneath spring up in him and give life to his soul which when it is delivered will be able truly to know and rejoyce in the Lord its Saviour And when the root of that spirit is cut downe which never brought forth sweet pleasant fruit unto life but only sowre fruit finely pâ—inted and dressed for the eye and palate of death its body branches leaves and fruit will wither and dye dayly and truth come to grow safely A Distinction between the faith which is of man and the faith which is of GOD One whereof is the Faith of Sion the other the Faith of Babilon the one laying hold on Christ as he is revealed the King of life in Sion the other layes hold on an Historicall relation of Christ the fame whereof hath sounded in Babilon THere is a faith which is of a mans selfe and a faith which is the gift of God or a power of beleeving which is found in the nature of fallen man and a power of believing which is given from above As there are two births the first and the second so they have each their faith and each beleeve with their faith and seem to lay hâ—ld on the same thing for life and the contention about the inheritance will not be ended till God determine it Cain will sacrifice with his faith and he beleeves he shall be accepted if he had not beleeved so he would not have been so angry when he found it otherwise And the Cainish spirit in man the vagabond from the life of God which hath not an habitation in God nor the eternall life of God abiding in him he is busie with the same faith at this day and hath the same expectation from it as Cain had This is the root of the false religion of the false hope of the false peace of the false joy of the false rest of the false comfort of the false assurance as the other is the root of the true In this faith which is of man and in the improvement of it stands all the knowledge zeal devotion and worship of the world in generall and of the worldly part in every man in particular but the true knowledge the true zeale the true devotion the true worship stands in the faith which is given of God to them which are born of the immortall seed which liâ—es in God and in which God lives for ever Now it deeply concerns every man to consider from which of these his knowledg religion and worship proceed and in which of them they stand for if they proceed from and stand in the faith which is of man they cannot please God nor conduce to the salvation of the soule but though they may tast very pleasantly to mans pallate now and administer much hope and satisfaction to him at present yet they will faile at the time of need For as Christ said concerning the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharisees so may I say concerning this faith Except your faith with the works of it exceed that faith and all the works of it even to the utmost improvement thereof which is to be found in mans nature it will never lead you to the kingdom of God nor be able to give you any right to the inheritance of life For he that will inherit must be the right heir must have the faith of Abraham the faith of Isaacâ— which springs up from the root of life in the seed and this leads the seed into that spring of life out of which it shot forth as a branch which is the inheritance promised to the seed And here is Christ Alpha and Omega in every particular soul where life is begun and perfected â—unning its course through time back to that which was before the beginning Therefore observe and consider well what this faith which is of a mans selfe can doe and how far it may goe in the changing of man and in producing a conformity of him to the letter of the Scriptures And then consider where it is shut out what it cannot do what change it cannot make what it cannot conform to
shall have what they will if they will but be faithsull to him in the main Call for what likenesse what invention what appearance of truth they will they shall have it so they will but be content without life No notion about the Spirit wil be deny them so they will be content with the notion without the presence of the living Spirit They shall have light in their understandings warmth in their affections joy peace hope comfort out of the Scriptures They shall apply as many promises to themselves as they will have what they will do what they will so they keep out of the feeling of the living principle but if once that stir and there be any hearkning after that then he begins to shew his tyranny on the one hand to force them back and his stratagems on the other hand to tempt them aside from it The devil having thus gained the form and enriched himself with the Churches spoils and slain them which had the living testimony then he falls to corrupting the form For that filthy spirit though he can cloath himself with the form to deceive from the life abid there to keep down the life yet he does not much love it he loves his own form better and when he is out of feare of assaults from the life then he returns to his own form againe or patches up a garment more suitable to his own nature taking iâ— somewhat of the other with it to make his own passe the better for if he should have returned to the direct heathenish forms of idolatry and false worship he could not so well have â—ayn hid therefore he makes a mix uâ—e of somewhat which was prescribed the Jews with some things sound practised among the Christians Thus he brought in inventions of crosses and images and beads and pictures and reliques and ceremonies beyond number insomuch as not only the life and power was lost but the true likeness also even so lost that it is impossible for all the wisdome of man to recover the knowledge of the likenesse againe Men have striven much but they never could form a true likenesse of the Primitive Church and the way thereof Now though it is the desire of the Devill to keep men in the grossnesse of darkness yet rather then loose them he will let them have some part of the form again nay he will tempt them with a gaudy appearance of the form to keep them from meeting with the power and life when he perceives true secret inward stirrings in them which will not be quieted without somwhat Thus when there was a stirring against Popery he tempted aâ—iâ—e into Episcopacy when that would hold no longer then to Presbitery when that will not serve into Independancy when that will not keep quiet but still there are searchings further into Anabaptism if that will not doe into a way of seeking and waiting if this will not satisfie they shall have high notions yea most pleasant notions concerning the Spirit and concerning the life if they will be but satisfied without the life yea they shall have all the liberty in the creatures they can desire the best painted liberty if they will but be satisfied without that liberty which stands not in the creatures out of the life but over the creatures in the life And he that turns aside to any of these he is still under the dominion of that spirit and there he holds his knowledge and there he performes his worship and there he has his unity his liberty his life his rest his peace his joy his hope Now no man can worship God till he comes out of every part of this Babilon and his feet touch Sion though there may be a secret panting and an unknown safety and an acceptation of the poor mourning soul in the passage Yea all sorts of people here ye were accepted in your stirrings after life in hearkning to the leadings of life from out of the Babilonish Spirit but your turning aside to the Babilonish wisdome in a new dresse and sitting down in a new form of her inventing hath brought you to a losse of life and hath made you hatefull to the living God who hath drawn his sword against you and hath prepared his vialls his thunders his plagues his woes and ye must drink of his cup with sorrow as ye have drunk of the whores cup with pleasure Ye that have found a bed of pleasure in any of your forms or in any of your notions and so have found ease in the Sion of the whores painting ye must be cast into the bed of sorrow and know the fire the Gods Sion and the furnace in his Jerusalem if ever ye become an habitation for God or expect to feed on his holy mountaine The condition of the Church all this while all this time of Satans reigne in forms of knowledg and worship hath been very lamentable and is expressed in Scripture by parables and resemblances of a sad state She hath been as a City pulled down like a ruined City which needs rebuilding before she can come to be a City again when the Lord shall build up Sion She hath been like a wildernesse barren undressed unregarded She hath been like a mournfull widow whose husband hath been rent from her and her children slain She hath lost all her ornaments all her garments all her ordinances all her appearances and wayes of life in somuch as the wayes of Sion mourn But Babilon the mother of harlots she has got all the beauty all the glory all the Churches attire all the Churches ordinances and all the trade and traffiqe runs thither and she is cryed up for the true Church and if any dare speak a word against her for the true Church indeed they are exclaimed against for schismaticks and hereticks and war prepared against them and some or other of the beasts horns presently pushing at them Thus it has gone all the time of the Apostacy the whore has flourished with the name of the Church making great merchandize of souls selling their formall stuff for mony and abundance of children hath the whore brought forth and nourished with her milk of deceit but the true woman the Lambs wife with her seed and the living food from her living breasts have had no place on the earth But this state of things is ended in part and ending apace The Lord God of life is arisen out of his holy habitation to assault the Dragon to discover and strip the whore to recover a possession for his life in the earth to make roome in the world for his Church which he is bringing out of the wildernesse The battel is begun the territories of Antichrist are assaulted the Lamb hath appeared on his white horse and hath gathered many of his called faithfull and chosen about him the Ensign is liâ—ted up the light which searcheth the inwards of the enemies dominions hath appeared and his inmost power and wisdome is not feared