desolate Widow than of the first married Wife Esay 54. 1. And Christ gives that long and most solemn exhortation to his Disciples in the 14 15 16 and 17 Chapters of Iohn to this very purpose to establish and support their hearts in this passage so dark and dismal to flesh and blood into the Life and glory of the Resurrection Upon his fleshly departure and disappearance as their Bridegroom in that first way he knew they would have a little mourning season of it Mat. 9. 15. and therefore sets himself to comfort them before hand with the expectation of what was to follow You shall have another Comforter saies he meaning himself in the spirit and glory of the Resurrection I will not leave you comfortless Orphans and Windows I will come to you after a little while Ioâ— 14. 16 18. To the very same purpose is that Esay 54.7 8. For a small moment have I forsaken thee or withdrawn my self from thee as to my fleshly and first kind of manifestation to thee which looks like wrath but with great mercies and everlasting kindness will I gather thee up to my self in my second and more excellent glory and become thy husband in the new and everlasting Covenant saith the Lord thy Redeemer Both these Dispensations are on foot still Christ yet communicates himself to the souls of men in his fleshly way of manifestation bringing them into conformity with that holy state of his earthly manhood which makes the legal Christian first-covenant professor and Wife of Christ on this side the cross the grave the crown His withdrawing from them as to this appearance and the fruits of it is of the same import as his withdrawing from his disciples when he was actually personally in the flesh He was then litterally in the flesh in his own person but he was even then but mystically in the flesh as to the persons of his disciples as God manifested in their flesh so he is in all that thus experimentally know him but after the flesh now Their so being in Christ Jesus knowing of him and walking in him but after the flesh does not free or secure them from apostacy 2 Pet. 2.20,22 or condemnation Rom. 8. 1. but the knowing of him walking in him after the spirit as he is the new Covenant Bridegroom and better Comforter In this state they are married to him that is risen in the other to him only that was made flesh with whom they in that fleshly glory even from him received must be crucified How else can they be brought into conformity with him in his death It was holy flesh the natural man in its greatest purity that was offered up and slain in him This at the best then renewed by himself in us is also to be slain and offered up under and by the fire-baptism of the new-creature spirit or spirit of Christ that performes the new-creation work in man It must be the holy reformed natural state that must be offered as the true Christian sacrifice Rom. 12. 1. 2 By this means as we come to be married to Christ in the Resurrection so we come to be children of the Resurrection begotten by the force influence and benefit of Christ's Resurrection into a meetness of spirit to be married to him that is risen from the dead Luke 20. 36. 1 Pet. 1. 3. Such marriage there is even in the Resurrection Such a state of the resurrection there is while we are yet in this mortal body The spiritual man who lives in the spirit knoweâ— Christ in spirit and walks after the spirit Gal. 5. 25. Rom. 8. 1. is really and actually though but gradually in this mystical and best kind of Resurrection while yet in the earthly body The new creature he that lives the life and in the spirit of the new creation lives in the Resurrection The Resurrection of our Bodies after the death of them at last is not to be put in the ballance with the priviledges of this spiritual Resurrection while we are yet in the earthly body The spiritual new-creation Life we are risen into is eternal Life But millions of men will find their bodily rising to be but a Resurrection into eternal death and shame everlasting punishment and contempt Dan. 12. 2. Mat. 25. 46. But let 's take a little further view of Christ's first-Covenant Wife and Children what they may do and what may become of them They may play the harlot with that very beauty and comeliness that very first-creation kind of glory and perfect righteousnes of the Law that Christ has put upon them called God's comeliness and yet their own beauty because it beautifies and adorns but that selfish state of the first-creation Ezek. 16. 14 15. What comes of them for playing the harlot with this and opposing thereby the more excellent dispensation and glory that comes from the same Redeemer in his new-creation work They must be judged by Christ as those that shed blood and break wedlock are judged as Murtherers and Adulteresses vers 38. This they come to Not unlike to this is that Esay 63. 8 and 10. He said surely they are my People Children that will not lie so he was their Saviour But they rebelled and vexed his holy spirit therefore he turned to be their enemy and fought against them There are a People a Wife Children Members of Christ after the flesh that stand liable to forfeit all their priviledges and interest in him by apostacy and then Christ becomes their enemy As he delighted before to deliver and save them rejoyced over them to do them good and multiply them so now he will rejoyce over them to destroy them bring them to nought and root them out of the land he gave them Deut. 28. 63. If the transgression the apostacy be general so will the Judgement be too That which he hath built he will break down that which he hath planted he will pluck up even this whole land Jer. 45.4 This was the case between God and those religious Iews that lived and walked but in the wavering principles of the first-first-covenant They would be ever and anon starting aside like a deceitful Bow They were not of the right or new-new-covenant heart Their spirit was not stedfast with God and when they failed of their duty he let loose one enemy or another still upon them Then they remembred that God was their Rock and the high God their Redeemer Nevertheless they did but flatter him with their mouth and lied unto him with their tongues for their heart was not right with him neither were they stedfast in his Covenant or they were not in that new stedfast Covenant with him that is established in all things and sure And God will not be mocked he knows how to handle them All this over and over and much more is to be seen Psal. 78. 8. 35. 36. 37. and 57. verses c. And Ier. 3. 14. The same People in the same breath are reckoned
the Law or the ruling activity of their own rational powers in them But let him speak a word of the divine Life broadly and plainly in its distinction from their present attainment that is to be propagated in them by another birth he is presently looked upon as an enemy There are two births or formations of Christ in the souls of men Those that stay with unwise Ephraim in the first which is but that state or place whence the true Heavenly Seed and Children of God do break forth Hos. 13. 13. refusing to be born of God Iohn 1. 13. Of the will of God Iames 1. 18. By the new second and more excellent Birth will in fine appear in their colours false brethren that will hate and slander their own Mothers Son Psal. 50. 20. In order to this second birth under the metaphor of a Mother Paul saith He travelled with the Galatians again till Christ in his second more excellent appearance and communicable life be formed in them Gal. 4. 19. Veritas odium parit Truth brings hatred is a Proverb that holds too true in all sizes and kindes of Truth Let a man take upon him the boldness to exercise but his Moral-Philosophy-Principles in giving check to the open Enormities of his time drunkenness beastliness swearing and the like he makes himself a prey He reproves a scorner and gets himself a blot Prov. 9. 7. This is his portion from the lewd multitude that will but attempt so much as with the Pharisees to wash the outside of the dish and of the cup to circumcise and lop off the wild excrescencies and exuberant superfluities of naughtiness Sir Thomas Moore Overbury and many others for their faithful counsel on such accounts have been cut off If Socrates a heathen Philosopher through the sublimity of his speculation cannot own the Magistrates Religion but give his Testimony against Polytheisme or a plurality of Gods he must die for it without remedy If Seneca and other Stoicks declare against the corrupt manners and bruitish practises of the generation amongst whom their Lot is cast they are not like to scape much better The main bulk of mankind is so plunged and lodged in wickedness or the wicked one the Devil 1 Iohn 5. 19. and Chap. 3. 12. that they 'l not endure a word against downright Bruitism But for the true Believer that comes forth in and with the Spirit Testimony and everlasting Gospel of Christ he must expect to become hatred even in the house of his God Hos. 9. 8. As it fared with Paul in the Church of Galatia Gal. 4. 16. Yea Paul himself when an eminent practitioner in the righteousness of the Law or of Man was the hottest and maddest persecutor the spiritual believer had and verily thought that he ought to do what he did therein Acts 26. 9. 11. as Christ had foretold in like case Iohn 16. 2. They shall put you out of the Synagogues yea and whosoever killeth you will think he doth God service Your brethren that hated you that cast you out for my Names sake said Let the Lord be glorified we doubt not but we glorify God herein by punishing and excommunicating such Hereticks and Blasphemers but God himself takes up the Controversie very short telling his out-casts he will appear to their joy and their enemies shall be ashamed that cast them out Isa. 66. 5. Paul saw this bitter ignorant zeal in the professing Churches at Ierusalem which he had had experience of both wayes in himself towards other Saints and in other Pharasaical sticklers lately towards him He therefore chose rather to cast himself upon the Heathen Magistrate for his tryal than be returned to them and Festus answered unto Caesar shalt thou go Act. 25. 11 12. He did make the better choice for the Iews were ready to destroy him immediately without a hearing Act. 23. 12 15. Caesar gives him a breathing while He scapes his Sword two whole years what ever more Act. 28. 30 31. Yet suffers at last under that Lyon Nero whom he had for a season been delivered from 2 Tim. 4. 17. Tyrannical Magistrates are so metaphor'd in Scripture as also by others Beasts Birds and Fishes of prey the most potent and ravenous Creatures in Air Earth and Water Eagles Dragons Lyons Unicorns Bears Wolves Foxes the Leviathan or Whale c. But God hears that is delivers his humble broken-hearted Saints from the hornes of such Unicorns saves them from the Lyons mouth Psal. 22. 21. that is from the powers of the darkness of this World Devils or Men by them influenced till they be enabled to triumph over death and conquer them by dying Satan is called The God of this world the great red Dragon of a bloody murtherous colour the root faâ—her and spring of all corrupted worldly Magistracy and arbitrary domination Pharaoh is called a Dragon Ezek. 29. 3. And it is written As a roaring Lyon and a ranging Bear so iâ— a wickedâ— Ruler over the poor people Prov. 28. 15. Her Princes are like Wolves ravening the prey to shed blood destroy souls and get dishonest gain Ezek. 22. 27. Her Iudges are evening Wolves they gnaw not the bones till the morrow Zeph. 3. 3. In Herod they are termed Foxes Luk. 13. â—2 Such Foxes amongst others are taken notice of as spoilers of the Vines Cant. 2. 15. Wasters of the true Churches and People of Christ by their sacrilegious intrusions and magisterial lording it over those that after the way which men call Heresie are rightly worshipping the God of their Fathers What a world is here for a Believer To the generality of bruitish men an honest moral Heathen will be reputed a Phanâ—tick The Legal Christian with his Ordinances and imputed righteousness of Christ for his Justification and acceptance with God though but upon the tearms and in the renewed Principles of the first Covenant will appear so to the honest Heathen The spiritual Man as born of the will of God partaker of the Divine Nature the proper New-creature Principle of eternal Life that quallifies him for the steady Sonly obedience in the spirit and way of the new and everlasting Covenant he appears a Phanatick to them all a Fool a Mad man The Prophet is a Fool the Spiritual man is Mad Hol. 9.7 Yea he is reputed so in the house of his God vers 8. amongst his mothers children Psal. 50. Thus the Iewes Christ's own People said of him He hath a devil and is mad why hear ye him Yea his very friends go about to lay hold on him for said they he is besides himself Mark 3. 21. The Servant is like to find but harsh entertainment where the Lord is thus handled The bruitish party of men is incomparably the greatest and will carry it by Vote The honest Heathen and the Legal Christian will all joyn with them to call the Spiritual man mad The very Christ Christ in Spirit the very Christian the Spiritual man he is cast out of all their
or heaven that may be shaken Heb. 12. 26. Yea though they receive withall the baptism of gifts from this spirit of Christ and in that sence be made partakers of the holy Ghost yet they may prove at length to be but briars and thorns to this very spirit of Christ from whom they receive all and to those true believers in whom the very seed of this spirit is springing up as a well of living waters into everlasting life Ioh. 4. 14. The single Baptism of Gifts supernatural Ornaments and the tongue of Men and Angels all this amounts not to the Baptism with the holy Ghost and with fire Mat. 3. 11. The partaking of the holy Ghost in the single baptism of gifts without the very seed of spiritual eternal Life sown in the heart does not â—ar the visage of the natural man does not sacrifice and offer him up but more abundantly adorn beautifie and set him off Those that have the glory of their earthly man but thus higher advanced by supernatural gifts and accomplishments are liable to play the Idolaters against the glory that excels the Life hid with Christ in God and finally refusing the superior dispensation and those that own it return with the dog to the vomit upon the loss of what they have already received Ezek. 16. 1 15. 2 Pet. 2. 20 22. MORE in his MYSTERY holds that the Fall of the Angels came by their refusal of the divine Life and giving themselves wholly up to the animal and that satans kingdom of darkness extends to and comprehends all the inâ—â—rests and advantages of whatever Life excluding onely the Divine The same Author exhibits a new and unanswerable charge against Paganism that by whatever flights of wit the best of them all may seem to wipe off the imputations of Polytheism or Idolatry asserting themselves to be the adorers of one eternal Deity in his various manifestations yet they worshipped God in such appearances onely as related to and concerned but the animal Life 'T is to be feared this charge will reach a great way into Christianity abundance of the professors whereof are followers of Christ onely for loaves such cleansing gifts and ornaments as do but gratifie and advance their earthly first creation state Speak but a word of the cross and fire-baptism of the spirit that 's to come upon all this glory and goodliness of flesh in order to a more excellent birth and knowledge of Christ after the spirit in them you become an enemy presently if you tell them this truth Gal. 4. 16. If matters be well scann'd and weighed in the ballance of the sanctuary abundance of Religion and Professors will be found no currant and well tried Gold Rev. 3. 18. that will pass for the Kingdom of Heaven The Scripture latitude of the animal or natural man is comprehensive of all that is to be found in mans first-creation state and life in distinction from the spiritual new creation man The natural body or animal man is interpreted by the apostle to be of the same reach and significancy as the living soul of the first Adam at best as the spiritual body or man is comprehensive of that new-creature Life and perfection that 's recieved from the indwelling presence of the quickning spirit of the second Adam 1 Cor. 15. 44 46. Those Christians that are brought into communion with God but in the renewed activity of the natural body oâ— living soul of the first Adam taking the renewed old man for the new Restauration for Regeneration are apt to grow so conceited confident therein that they wil not lend an ear to the tydings of any superior dispensation and more excellent way Man in whatever possible refinement and glory of his first-creation state is yet but that natural man in whose mind there is so vast an asymmetry and incongruity to spiritual divine things the New Name the Life hid with Christ in God the Wisdom and Righteousness of God that shines forth in the New Creature that he knows not what to make of them 〈◊〉 are foolishness to him 1 Cor. 2. 14. Nothing less than the very seed of spiritual new-creature Life from Christ will find or make its way through all possible obstructions from within man or from without and prosper into that kingdome of grace and glory that cannot be shaken This will spring up in the soul and declare it self King take the Scepter and ruling power out of the hands of our first-creation spirit and principles and will safely steer our course direct our steps and enable us to work righteousness in the way everlasting Psal. 139. 24. Sensual Life generally rules at first in children When Reason springs up and begins to shew it self that takes or should take the Scepter curbes the insolencies and exorbitancies of the Sensual powers and governs the whole person If there be a seed of grace or spiritual Life sown in him when that springs up into exercise it will take the Scepter out of the hands of humane Reason and Wisdom and govern the whole person in the Divine Spiritual Reason and Wisdom of God The receivers of the spirit of Christ the seed of spiritual wisdom and divine Life are of two sorts either such as receive the single or such as receive the double portion thereof They that receive but the single will thereby be brought into the incorruptible form of the natural man which renders them fit associates for the elect angels to stand about the Throne as friends of the Bridegroom and the Bride They that receive the double portion of the spirit in the sense above expressed are the very Bride her self the Lambs wife that sits down upon the Throne with him in a more exalted state of Glory for ever The Mother of Zebedee's Children desired of Christ That her two sons might sit the one on his right hand and the other on his left in his Kingdom Mat. 20.21 There may seem to be a right and left hand scituation or state of glory for ever in the kingdom of Heaven The double portioned Saints are they that sit on the right hand the single on the left Christ tells her and her sons they know not what they ask if they would have either of these advancements on this side the Cross the grave the fire-baptism the strait gate that excludes flesh and blood all that is corruptible from the Kingdom of God Can ye saies he drink of the Cup I shall drink of and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with They answer We are able The single portion of the Spirit where it is received as a seed of new Life will not fail to perform that transforming fire-baptism in and upon the souls of men that will purifie them not onely from corruption the utmost extent of the inward water-baptisme and circumcision of the heart in the Letter but from corruptibility gradually fetching them up into the glory of the resurrection till their mortality be quite swallowed
by the variety of figurative light in the outward visible creation Christ is called The Sun of Righteousness Mal. 4. 2. Angels Stars Job 38. 7. And the Spirit of Man The candle of the Lord Prov. 20. 27. To wind up all then and secure our selves from the mistake of the German Divinity The servants that stand about the Throne are not the Bride that sits upon it The Bride is not the Bridegroom The Bridegrom himself in whatever creature-state he is married to men or angels by the new and everlasting Covenant is yet but as the Bride to himself in his purely divine form and as so yet he is not the Father but as the Bride of the God-head the express character or personallity of all the three as Image of the invisible God The Bride the Lambs Wife Angels or Men are all gathered up into one common Interest all do live in the beatifical Vision and enjoyment of God in Christ in their several intellectual distances ranks and capacities and may all be said to partake of the divine nature But more peculiarly next to the living creature that is under the God of Israel in personal union with God Ezek. 10. 20. the â—uperiour and more excellent sort of Saints are partakers thereof being actually brought forth in the highest kind of creature capacity that is next to the purely divine form See all summ'd up together Heb. 12. 22 24. Ye are come unto Mount Sion and unto the City of the living God the heavenly Ierusalem and to an innumerable company of Angels to the general Assembly and Church of the first-born which are written in heaven to God the Iudge of all and to the spirits of just Men made perfect and to Iesus the Mediator of the New Covenant Here we have a distinct expression of the heavenly Orders 1. An innumerable company of Angels and spirits of just Men made perfect 2. The general Assembly and Church of the first-born that have the double portâ—on of the Spirit 3. Iesus the Mediator of the new Covenant 4. God 〈◊〉 Iudge of all Will any now say What signifies this prolixe Discourse of Principles to the present undertake 'T is answered Much every way in case what hath been said be true and intelligibly expressed For it most exactly suits with what is engaged for in the Title Page He lived in the Spirit and walked in the Spirit Gal. 5. 25. 'T is this Life hid with Christ in God I principally intend the character of the Life of Faith which now with him is turn'd to sight being absent from the Body and at home with the Lord 2 Cor. 5. 6 7. This Life is no way explicable but by considering his Gospel Principles Doctrine and Way of Worshipping God in spirit and truth And what signifie all his publick and outward actings in Church or state but as issuing from and reducible to this his new-creature Life and the Principles thereof This discourse therefore is principally directed to Christian Readers who are furnished with the spiritual discerning of Faith which can take in the evidence and demonstration of things not seen to any other eye in man things eternal Heb. 11. 1. 2 Cor. 4. 18. This Pilgrim quitted the broad way that leads to destruction and took the narrow path that leadeth unto Life which few there be that find Mat. 7. 14. His lot was to be upon the earth while the Church was in her Wilderness condition in her sackcloth Briars and Thornes were with him all along he dwelt among Scorpions Ezek. 2. 6. Many archers shot at him they did shoot forth their arrows even bitter words they smote him with the tongue and at length with the hand but his Bow abode in strength his Armes were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Iacob Gen. 49. 23 24. His enemies encouraged themselves in an evil matter they communed of laying snares privily that they might shoot at him in secret their teeth were spears and arrows they did whet their tongue like a sword to wound him But God shall shoot at them with an arrow suddenly shall they be wounded Psal. 64. and 57. 4. He will whet his sword and ordain his arrows against the Persecutors Psal. 7. 12 13. But where may it appear that this sufferer was of the opinion that there are two distinct sorts of everlastingly saved men In his general Epistle to the Church of Christ upon earth which is like to be exposed to publick view before this Not long before his death I received express notice in a Letter concerning these two Witnesses of Christ both of them coming forth in the self-evidencing power and demonstration of the single or donble portion of his spirit He took rise for his conceptions herein from such irradiations of divine glory as he received in the contemplation of these following Scriptures with many others First Revel 11. 18. The Nations were angry thy wrath is come and â—he time wherein thou shouldest give reward unto thy servants the Prophets and to the Saints and to them that fear thy Name small and great There is said he intended here by the holy Ghost a considerable difference between those called Christs servants the prophets and the rest that are named saints all being such as are said to fear God's Name great or small and are declared to be objects of Christs reward who hath one kind of reward for the prophet and another for righteous men saints just men made perfect These as faithful servants are to abide in the house for ever friends to the Bridegroom that rejoyce at hearing of his second voice which they have but at second hand through the Bride But those more excellent sort of servants the prophets that are the very Bride they have their peculiar priviledge above the other personally to possesse the Bridegroom as his Name is the WORD of God a Name Rev. 19. 12 13. which no man knows nor angel but he himself and they to whom the Son will reveal it In this sence is that to be understood which is testified by Christ himself Luk. 10 22. No man knowes who the Son is but the Father and who the Father is but the Son and he or they to whom the Son will reveal him This is the Name that Christ â—y inheritance hath obtained more excellent than the Angels the Name above every Name that at the manifestation thereof every knee should bow and tongue confess to the glory of God the Father After this Name it was Iacob was so inquisitive Gen. 32. 29. saying tell me I pray thee thy Name And he came afterwards to understand it was the face of God or sight of God face to face in his very similitude which it is not permitted in so ful and intimate a manner for every saint to have Upon this Iacob's name was changed to Israel and he became a Prince or chief prevailer with God and with Man Agreeable to this distinction does the Prophet Esay describe
so also the Baptism of the holy Ghost There is a figurative outward Water Baptism and a real or inward In the first sense it is an Institution which doth appoint the outward man to be washed in Water thereby to signifie the proper effect and operation of that washing with Water by the Word which causes a renovation or restauration of man by his repentance from dead workes and return to the service of the living God in amendment of Life By this inward Baptism and real work of the Spirit on the hearts of men they are but cleansed from the filthiness and pollution of their corrupted Nature not regenerated and altered from their first make and constitution that is attended with instability and liableness to apostacy ` There is also a twofold outward Water Baptism mentioned 1. Iohn's Water Baptism which was the onely outward sign that accompanied his Ministry the Ordinance of that time and season to prepare the way for Christ's coming in the flesh and to signify the proper effect which his first appearance as God manifested in flesh was to have upon the hearts and natures of men consisting chiefly in these two particulars Repentance from dead Works and Amendment of Life 2. The second outward Water Baptism was that which Christ himself instituted and committed to his disciples in his Life time as the outward sign that was to accompany their first ministry when he employed them much in the same nature as Iohn was sending them before his face as labourers into the harvest to all places whither he himself afterwards intended to come Both these Administrations had their Known Administrators and were dispensations proper to that season they were ordained in to prepare the minds of People to receive Christ in his first appearance or coming in the flesh and the fruits flowing there-from in amendment of Life The inward or real Water Baptism consisting in the washing of man's nature by the Word unto Repentance and Amendment of Life is capable of being administred three wayes or by a threefold hand 1. By the Ministry Hand or Tongue of Men as by Iohn Baptist through the preaching of the written Word 2. By the Word as spoken by Angels whereby inward abilities and dispositions are wrought in the minds of men in some sort answerable to what is required by the Law of the first Covenant Thus the Law is given by the disposition of Angels 3. By the Word as spoken by the Son himself in his first appearance Heb. 1. 2. which is yet but the preparatory work to the Baptism of the holy Ghost and of Fire The Baptism of the holy Ghost is either a Baptism of Gifts onely or also of Fire 1. The first is that wherewith the earthly man is capable to be Baptized through the pouring out of the Gifts of the holy Ghost 2 The second is that whereby the natural or earthly man is Baptized into conformity with Christ in his death and is made to grow up into the incorruptible form of heavenly manhood Of these four Baptisms The two Water Baptisms have served their season and are gone off the Stage The single Baptism of Gifts or first Baptism of the holy Ghost hath been of late somewhat remarkable amongst us and the Baptism of the holy Ghost and of Fire is hastening upon us as a general dispensation wherein the Vision of God will be so plain that he that runs may read it The declining of the two Water Baptisms deprives not the Saints of these times of the true use of that Ordinance which is kept up in the third and comprehends all that is now useful in the other two in a more heavenly and Spiritual way leading us yet forward to the end they all aim at which is the very thing it self contained in the fourth and last Baptism that of Fire So much in brief of his Judgement as to Baptisms He was for Breaking of Bread in a way of Christian communion and any other useful Observations could he have found them practicable in the Primitive Apostolical purity spirit and way which what hopes he had of in any visible Form allowed by man while the true Church is in the Wilderness cannot be difficult to conjecture Such Meetings as he found to approach nearest to the Apostolical Order as to liberty of Prophesying one by one c. 1 Cor. 14. 31. he most approved and frequented Concerning the SABBATH HE accounted the Iewish Sabbath Ceremonious and Temporary ending upon the coming of the Son of man who was Lord of the Sabbath day Mat. 12. 8. And if he had thought that which is commonly observed in the room thereof to be rather a Magistratical Institution among Christians in imitation of the Iewish then that which hath any clear appointment in the Gospel the Apostle would not have him judged for it One man saies he esteems one day above another another esteemeth every day alike Let every man be fully perswaded in his own mind He that regardeth a day regardeth it unto the Lord and he that regardeth not the day to the Lord he doth not regard it Rom. 14. 5 6. This I can say he usually took the opportunity of spending more time in exercise and prayer in his family or other Christian Meetings on that day than on any other And will any yet say he was a Sabbath breaker If they do see what company we may find for him under that imputation Iohn 9. 16. The Pharisees said this man is not of God because he keepeth not the Sabbath day So Ioh. 5. 16. The Iewes did peâ—secute Iesus and sought to slay him for curing the impotent man at the Poole of Beâ—hesdaâ— and bidding him take up his bed and walk on the Sabbath day Yea with this they joyn another sad charge as they reckon that he had not onely broken the Sabbath but said also that God was his Father therefore they sought the more to kill him vers 18. And John 19. 7. They answer Pilate we have a Law and by our Law he ought to die because he made himself the Son of God What strange work do the Sons of Men make with the Sons of God with the spirit wisdom righteousness glory and kingdom of God It was the religious professing Iew that Crucified Christ and persecuted Paul where ever he came Pilate the Roman Magistrate would have acquitted Christ and Paul rather appeals to Caesar's Judgement seat than appear before the Iewish Consistory Act. 25. The true spiritual Sabbath is to be continually kept as it is charactered by Esay Chap. 58. 13. consisting in aâ—câ—ssation from the single activity thoughts words and ways of our spirit which is but letter and in the performance of all duty by power of the communicated spirit of the new creation springing up in us which alone is worshipping God in spirit and in truth after his own heart He was for taking all opportunities of assembling our selves together to instruct and exhort one another and so much
walk who were shewed represented or propounded before God in the Temple over against the Candlestick but without the Holy of Holies Those twelve Cakes laid on the Table fresh every week were therefore called the bread of proposition and shew-bread But the Spirit of Man or rather the spiritual mind is to be the most holy place for God himself to dwell in This is the new-creature principle of marvellous light and eternal Life by which the Lamp or Candle of single humane Understanding is put out swallowed up and transformed into a better and more excellent the Light of the Sun The Lamp of Man's Understanding till transformed has nothing to do within the Veil The New-Ierusalem state of Life is so far from needing Man's intellectual Candle-light that angelical-star-light yea the sun-light of Christ's own natural perfection is out-shined there by the light of his Spiritual form which is sevenfold brighter There 's no need there of man's Candle or of the Light of the Sun or Moon for the glory of God lightens it and the Lamb is the light thereof Rev. 21.23 and 22. 5. What are in general all the Sacrifices and Ceremonies in the Old Testament but significant Types or Expressions of what we are to be or do in the New The Sacrifices Beeves Sheep and Goats taught and declared primarily the Sacrifice Christ was to make in his own person and secondarily also the sacrifices that all his true followers are to make in their persons that holy and acceptable sacrifice of our rational Life and powers thereof at best under the fire-baptism of God's spirit required Rom. 12. 1 2. that so we may be transformed and grow up into the spiritual powers of eternal Life hid with Christ in God as our true interest and grand concern without which we cannot be saved For persons Adam Enoch Noah Sem Abraham Isaac Iacob Ioseph Moses Ioshua Sampson Samuel David Solomon and many others were they not Types Letters or significant Figures of Christ Cain and Abel Ishmael and Isaac Iacob and Esau were Letters and Types of two Seeds or Births of Christ in Men one after the flesh for the cleansing them from the corruption of Nature another after the spirit which delivers them by degrees from corruptibility as before from corruption till mortality be swallowed up of Life Do not the Typical signifiers of Spiritual things in Moses and the Prophets hold on all along to the very end of the Revelation What 's the New Ierusalem character'd by at the very last but by the twelve precious stones in the High Priests Pectoral which also signified the twelve Tribes of Israel Are any so bruitish as to imagine that those glittering trifles of the East the Iasper Saphire Emrald Chrysoprase and the rest are litterally and really to be found in the heavenly Ierusalem Rev. 21 Does not Paul Allegorize the history of Abraham Sara Hagar Ishmael and Isaac as representing Christ the true Father of the faithful and as a twofold Husband to a first and second Covenant-Spouse which bring forth two sorts of Children one after the flesh another after the spirit The former of these Children arriving onely at the practical and experimental knowledge of and conformity with Christ in the flesh or in his fleshly changable manifestation persecutes the other the true Isaac the spiritual circumcision that 's born of Christ after the Spirit and brought into a likeness and conformity with him in his unchangable creature state Gal. 4. 22 31. Rom. 8. 1. Christ is that twofold Husband mentioned Rom. 7. 1 2 3. married first to a first-Covenant-Spouse then dies Unless that first Spouse be content to pass with him under the fire-baptism drink of his cup taste of his death in order to be brought into conformity with him therein she never meets with him or sees him more to her comfort Her Husband is dead but alive again and lives for ever more Rev. 1. 18. The Wife also must die with him or she cannot come to live with him for evermore 2 Tim. 2. 11. How die or to what To the Law or in the Ruling power of our own natural first-creation Spirit activity and principles however renewed or adorned that so we may come to live under grace the law of the spirit or spiritual eternal Life in the ruling activity and principles of that more excellent spirit we receive from Christ as a transcript of his heavenly manhood in us by the new creation This is that onely under the Government whereof Paul dares warrant us safe from sins ever recovering dominion again Rom. 6. 14. This is that state of Life onely in which as married to him that is risen from the dead we may bring forth fruit unto God in the newness of the Spirit of our new creation not in the oldness of the Letter of our first-creation Spirit as is signified Rom. 7. 4 5 6. The cleansed state of our first-creation Spirit amounts but to the renewed old man not the new but to the circumcision of the heart in the letter of the first-creation not by the spirit of the second whose praise is of Man not of God Rom. 2. 29. This makes but the concision that are of a diminutive narrow dogged snarling nature towards the true spiritual circumcision or circumcision of the heart in the Spirit whose praise is not of men but of God Phil. 3. 2 3. There may be a little dark interval in the passage the first wife of Christ adventures to make through death and the grave in order and with full assurance of hope to meet with him again in the better Life of the Resurrection But she will soon find her own again with usury the quitted and resigned activity and ruling authority of her own corruptible spirit which brings her into the true mystical grave and conformity with Christ in his death in the raised and advanced condition of the same spirit into harmony with and subjection to Christ in her superinduced incorruptible new-creation form and Life This is the mystical Resurrection the spiritual believer has real fellowship with Christ in even while yet in the mortal Body Such fellowship of Christs sufferings conformity with him in his death and power of his resurrection Paul lived in the experience and longed for the full accomplishment of Phil. 3. 10 11. This passage out of the Life of our first-creation spirit and form into that of the second being gradual and leisurely and the tempter laying all his engines of battery against those that are attempting this way and Christ for a little moment hiding his face or withdrawing that kind of comfortable presence he had afforded the soul in his first-marriage-union with her that after a little while he may with everlasting mercies have compassion upon her in the second these things considered 't is no wonder she sits for a little season as a disconsolate fruitless Widow But God bids her be of good cheer for more shall be the Children of the
both the Children and Wife of Christ though back-slider Turn again O back-sliding Children saith the Lord for I am married to you The Children that are born but of that changeable seed of the first-creation in Christ hate and persecute them that are born after the spirit or of the incorruptible seed of Christ in spirit as he is head of the new-creation in which he becomes that word or image of God that lives and abides in them for ever and then they backslide and lose what they have in the first-covenant Mat. 13. 12. 1 Pet. 1. 23 25. Esay 40. 6 8. These two Seeds Births Children as they are typified by Ishmael and Isaac Gal. 4. so by Cain and Abel Esau and Iacob and other pairs of brothers Aaron and Moses rather typify the natural and spiritual Saint in the glory of the Resurrection in the new and everlasting Covenant as above described But Cain and Abel c. signifie the fleshly or first-Covenant worshipper of the one party and both the spiritual new-covenant worshippers whether of the single or double portion on the other Cain and Abel c. may be Allegorized into this spiritual significancy and reach as mystically indigitating and presenting to us the distinction of the fleshly and spiritual Worshipper the reformed natural and the transformed or spiritual man the first and second Covenant Saint The elder often turns malignant envies hates persecutes the younger he after the flesh him after the spirit They may with good warrant also be Allegorized into a narrower compass yet as typifying the natural and spiritual man flesh and spirit in the same individual Saint that is born of Christ after the spirit and yet not quite rid of flesh which will be lusting against the spirit in him that is his sin as the spirit also will be lusting against that flesh which is his duty Gal. 5. 17. Not onely corrupt nature filthy flesh but renewed nature holy Flesh goodliness of flesh that that was born of Christ after the flesh will be envying and lusting against striving and contesting with that in man that is born of the same Christ after the spirit Iohn 3. 6. What struggle they for what 's the matter that enlightened reason and the marvellous light of Faith the renewed old man and the new nature and grace can't agree They have the same Father Christ they tumble in the same womb the soul of man This is it they struggle like Iacob and Esau in the same womb in the same person for the dominion the Scepter The question in debate between them is who shall be king The renewed enlightened natural mind which yet is but flesh though holy flesh thinks it self fit to rule and give Law to the whole person would keep all under the dominion of the Law of the first creation The spirit of the new creation claims all this as its right though the latter and younger birth as reason also had been to sense yet the true heir of the crown and the elder must serve or become subject to this younger The renewed first-creation spirit and state of life glory and freedom in man finally refusing resisting and persecuting the more excellent new creature Life spirit and glorious liberty of the sons of God in the second amounts to no less than the sin unto death the sin against the Holy Ghost or Christ in Spirit This same mystery is typified and by no other way but Allegorizing is to be fetched out of the history of Hagar and Sarai Hagar has the start of Sarai at fruitfulness she is first with Child Sarai is yet barren But sing O barren saies Christ in this sense that didst not bear more shall be thy Children greater thy fruitfulnsss at last God swore to Abraham upon his offering up Isaac and not with-holding his onely Son that blessing he would bless him and multiply his seed as the stars of Heaven and as the sand on the Sea-shore and that in his seed should all the Nations of the earth be blessed Gen. 22. 16 18. and Gen. 15. 3 6. This promise relates to Isaac not Ishmael and to Sarai not Hagar and to Abraham not Abram Ab-ram signifies high Father This was all the name he had while he had but Ishmael onely Gen. 16. but when Isaac the promised Seed is coming the syllable Ha or letter H being the first syllable or letter of Hamon a multitude is added to Abram and Sarai so he is called Abraham Gen. 17. 5. she Sarah v. 15. Abraham by this addition signifies high Father of a multitude of nations and for Sarah as type of the New-Ierusalem Spouse of Christ see her numberless Children her Isaac's Rev. 7. 4 9. We find here first â— hundred forty four thousand sealed ones that are the peculiar Bride and spouse of Christ resembled by Sarah and then a numberless multitude of the lower rank of everlastingly glorified men that stand about the Throne Children of the Bride-chamber and friends of the Bridegroom and the Bride But le ts review that Allegory first in History then Mystery Sarai gives her maid Hagar to Abram to be his wife Gen. 16. 3. Hagar conceives and presently the fruitful servant despises her barren mistresse vers 4. Sarai complaines of her to Abram Abram bids her handle her as she pleased Sarai deales hardly with her and she flies for 't vers 5 6. The Angel of the Lord finds her and advises her to return and submit her self under her Mistresses hands v. 9 Here 's the History Deny Allegorizing and there will be no Mystery in it and then what an insignificant story may this seem Did not all these things happen for ensamples were they not written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the World are come 1 Cor. 10. 11. Is not all Scripture given by inspiration of God for doctrine reproof correction instruction in righteousness 2 Tim. 3. 16. What doctrine reproof or instruction can we receive to any purpose from this and abundance of like Scriptures if Allegorical interpretation be carped at and exploded and insipid litteral glosses owned and adhered unto as the onely sence reach and intendment thereof With your leave then let us try by the Allegorizing engine our spiritual discerning if we have it to give birth to the mystical sence and rich significancy which this history carries in the womb of it As soon as Hagar saw she had conceived the next news we hear is her Mistress is despised in her eyes Behold here the proper Character of the first-covenant wife of Christ. She is warm flourishing prosperous and fruitful in a way of outward Ordinances and also in working Righteousness in the goodliness of Flesh in a wisdom glory and comeliness that Christ himself hath wrought in her and put upon her She is wise strong and honourable in Christ and makes no scruple but this will alwayes hold thinks her mountain so strong that she shall never be moved On this account the true new-covenant
beloved Son so 1 Tim. 1. 2. 2 Tim. 1. 2. and 2. 1. They are also called Pastors Mothers and Nurses to both the Seeds or Children of Christ in their kind 1 Thes. 2. 7 and 11. Gal. 4. 19. In another respect every true believer as he becomes the Child so is the Mother of Christ as with pangs and throw's towards the new birth to the loss and at last death of the single activity of his fleshly mind and heart Christ in spirit be formed and brought forth in him by him Then comes the Life of Faith the true reigning New-Ierusalem Principle in which reason has its resurrection the kingdom of heaven within him He ownes Christ in his heavenly headship as his Lord and King expressed Cant. 3. 11. by setting the Crown upon his head owning a willing subjection to the Law of the Spirit of Life in this day of espousal to him which is a day of gladness to Christ good men and angels Luk. 15. 10. The believer is the wise Virgin who becomes at same time the Mother and Spouse of Christ brings forth her own Lord and King in Spirit as the Virgin Mary brought him forth in Flesh. In the very day that Christ is thus brought forth in and by the believer they are espoused together by the new and everlasting Covenant The believer owns Christ as Head Husband and King Upon this Christ rejoyces Angels rejoyce the Believeâ— himself rejoyces with joy unspeakable and full of glory 'T is a solemn thanksgiving day a day of gladness of the heart unto them all Thus in a various sence is Christ Father and Son of the Spiritual believer and the believer the Mother and Child of Christ. Christ is Head Lord King Husband Brother Son Fellow-heir to believers They are Body Subjects Wife Children Members Fellow-heirs to him All these expressions are Allegorical borrowed from natural Relations to signify spiritual Mysteries of love union and converse between Christ and his Church One thing is said and a farther more excellent thing meant The Apostle having spoken of the duties of Husbands and Wives towards one another winds up all into this as his main intendment the spiritual marriage-union between Christ and his Church This saies he is a great mystery or mystically signifies a far greater thing concerning Christ and his Church Ephes. â— 22 23. The Revelation in a manner all along is a description of heavenly things by such earthly Mediums such Allegorical types and expressions as are borrowed out of Moses Pentateuch in the Tabernacle and Temple-worship And of Christ himself t is said that without a parable a similitude an allegory he spake not unto the people Mat. 13. 34. Mark 4. 34. Must not he then that truly expounds those parables allegorize them But how must he do it Parable in the Hebrew is a word that signifies sharpness as proceeding from a sharp wit and needing the like to interpret it That sharp wit must be no less than spiritual discerning and that strong and well exercised too or Scripture Riddles will be too hard for it One or two more of these let us take notice of Sampsons typical Riddle together with the Philistines exposition does yet want an exposition Out of Christ the strong Lion of the tribe of Iudah as the eater or sacrificer of the natural man in himself and us by the fire-baptism comes the choicest meat the sweetest hony-comb of all that that feeds and brings us into a conformity with him in his death and resurrection Christ ha's left his own interpretation of the parable of the Sower and Seed of the Tares and the like upon record in Scripture and yet who understands them how much do men yet need an exposition of those very expositions Paul tells us Hagar and Sarai are an Allegory two Covenants Gal. 4. 24. Then he mystically expounds Ishmael and Isaac into two 〈◊〉 of Christ the true antitypical Father of the faithful in both Covenants He declares moreover that he that 's born of this Father but after the flesh will persecute him that 's born of the same Father after the spirit Even so it is now vers 29. Notwithstanding this Allegorizing exposition given by Paul how little does the self-confident legal Christian hold himself concerned in the character of him that is born after the flesh How verily does he conceit himself to be the other that 's born after the Spirit Hereupon he justâ—es out the spiritual man indeed for a Fanatick wrangler a fool a mad man a blasphemer any thing that he lists to call him Hos. 9. 7. At last he comes to this downright willful resolution as Esau against Iacob and as the professing religious Iewes against Christ in the very same case Come this is the heir let 's kill him and the inheritance shall be ours They imagine this vain thing even to take the kingdom of Heaven by force from the right owner But if this eager-spirited generation would but give themselves leisure to consider thisâ— the like Scriptures they might see that they that are charactered here by him that 's born after the flesh are a holy seed of Christ that have Covenant interest in him and actual communion with him They are Children of Hagar or the first Covenant One would wonder how they should miss this But they shuffle it oft upon the Iews that were under the ceremonious dispensation of the Law and so rid their hands of it Is there no legal Christian then is there no danger of the leaven of the Pharisees under the outward dispensasation of the Gospel Yes say they but that lies onely at their door who depend upon their own personal operations for their acceptance and communion with God not on the imputed righteousness of the Redeemer I interrogate When Paul describes his Pharisaical state he tells us he was touching that righteousness which is in the Law blameless Could this be unless by the comeliness of God put upon him or perfect righteousness of that kind from Christ imputed to him Ezek. 16. 14. Was he a legal Iew was he any more than a moral Heathen else But if what is above said will not help to rectify this mistake I shall be somewhat hopeless of being instrumental to your relief in this point 'T is sad to see the self-pleasing interpretations of this and the like Scriptures all along the Bible so universal and unscrupled amongst all sorts of Professors an epidemical mistake How to lift them out of the mire of these their own self-bewildring imaginations who knowes but Christ Flesh and the carnal mind that 's enmity to God Rom. 8. 7. must never be of any larger compass or farther significancy with them than corrupt polluted debauched degenerate nature dead in trespasses and sins or at best but the moral heathen with some glimmering revivals and sparklings of rational Light and Life But as for their part they are in Christ they experience actual communion with God and once in Christ for ever
toyes The Devil then that 's called the God of this world together with his fallen angels knows exactly what this world amounts to knows all inferiour nature humane amongst the rest through and through He can tell where to have man and fit him at every turn He thorowly knows all the things he is to tempt him with and he thorowly him that he sets himself to tempt and so is compleatly accomodated for his seducing work in all points And this will be his course till he be sealed up in the bottomless pit which will be Synchronal with Christ's coming forth to reign Rev. 20. But if once man become a new creature by receiving either the single or double portion of the spirit he passes out of the devils hands This manchild is quite out of his reach Revel 12. The spiritual believer that is partaker of the divine nature in the â—ence above expressed is partaker of the wisdom holiness and righteousness of God Then he is wiser than the Devil if the wisdom of God be superiour to the wisdom of that Serpent This is a thing one did once spitefully tax this Sufferer with as boasting that he was wiser than the Devil because on some occasion that was offered he replied He was glad he lived in a spirit the Devil was so little acquainted with Sure he that lives in the spirit of God lives in a spirit that is superiour to the devil and that he is little acquainted with The lowest degree of wisdom light life and glory in the new creation is above the highest excellencies and glory of any nature or creature in the old He that has but the single portion of the spirit and that but in seed will be too hard for that roaring and devouring Lion will resist him effectually and finally in the stedfast faith of God's elect 1 Pet. 5. 8 9. Even babes and suckling in the Life of grace shall be able to still that enemy and avenger with all his shews and flourishes in Natures â— excellencies first-creation power or things Psal. 8. 2. 16. 'T is observable from the sentence passed upon the Serpent that the devil and his angels are yet alive He with Adam and Eve are summoned to appear before Christs Tribunal to answer what each of them had done in that business of the fall His sentence runs thus Because thou hast done this thou art cursed above all cattel and above every beast of the field upon thy belly shalt thou go and dust shalt thou eate all the dayes of thy Life Angels and men the highest ranks of Creatures in the first world are comparatively with the new-creature state of men and angels in the second world reckoned but as cattel the choicer sort of the beasts of the field Satan with his retinue of fallen angels does yet live His diet is dust As God of this world he has all sorts of beings and excellencies of the first creation before him This is the dust he feeds on and feeds others with This diet he offered to Christ himself when he was hungry His trade of seducing mankind managable by these things he has been at well towards six thousand years 'T is a Rabbinical observation that these six thousand years of the worlds labour under this seducing work of the devil as plunged in that wicked one were resembled by the six dayes works in the creation of it a thousand years being with the Lord as one day The seaventh thousand the Iewish doctors held to be typified by the Sabbath day in which the world should rest from this bondage under the God of this world They observed also that the Sabbath is not described as the other six dayes by an evening and morning as having no darkness at all in it that so it might more fitly represent to us the perpetual joyes and light of the New-Ierusalem or World to come During the six thousand years of the Worlds miserable thral dom and labour under the Satanical yoke righteous men are perpetually oppressed from Abel downwards and there is no judgement for them to be had in this world But in the seventh thousand year the seventh day of the world they will be in their proper Sabbatical state and nothing shall hurt in all the holy Mountain or kingdom of Christ. The light glory and wisdom of the first creation when men or angels are deteined and held by them from entring into the more excellent glory of the second are but as chains of darkness upon them When Satans time is come to be sealed up in the bottomless pit at Christs coming forth to reign this yet does not absolutely and finally strip him of his first-creation flourish but onely suspends his exercise of it as to his former deceiving of the nations thereby till the thousand years be fulfilled and then he comes forth again for a little season to deceive the nations and engage his whole party of angels and men in order to the giving his final utmost assault to the New-Ierusalem camp of Christ and all his Saints the beloved City So far he will â—e permitted to proceed herein as to besiege it with a kind of seeming hopefulness to outvie it in a flourish of spirituality and in the state of the resurrection in order yet to carry the Kingdom and dominion from Christ and all his saints Then fire comes down from God out of Heaven upon him and his on the New-Ierusalem's ascending into their utmost glory of the resurrection and full vision of God for evermore and then nothing but torment wil be their portion for ever and ever when perfectly stripped of all first-creation glory enjoyments and fixed in the second death however he cozen men with conceits even to this day that those torments shall have a period and all shall be saved In Rev. 20. we have an account of these particulars 17. What are the Old and New Testament as written Books representing the mind of God in a sound or sight of words but Letter Shadow or significant Figure of natural and spiritual-creature perfection in Christ and men in men as natural and spiritual properly distinguish old and new creation Life in them Men of a first-first-Covenant old Testament old Adam natural or legal spirit are all one thing So are men of a new Covenant new Testament second Adam new Creature or truly evangelical Spirit the same In the former is the Life of the Law or the ruling activity of rectified humane first-creation Principles In the latter the Life of the Gospel or the ruling activity of the new-creature Spirit and principles One is the Legal professor the other the Spiritual believer One is under the Law of Nature or the first Covenant the other under Grace the Law of Faith spiritual Life or the new and everlasting Covenant 18. The Law of Nature and of the first Covenant are the same thing in man but as to the perfection of them in or upon man this difference is observable Man
Nature the true end of all Government in humane Societies turn their own Reason out of Doors and so turn beasts for their Governours to ride on That the Iews Greeks and Romanes the wisest States in the world have over and over used this Liberty of Changing their Government as they saw occasion and that often with very good success is undeniable Were it unlawful for a State in any case to depose remove Kings what Titles have any Monarchs now upon earth to their Crowns that are descended of those who were elected into the room of such as the people deposed How bruitish then and destructive even to the Interest and Title of the present Kings that hesought to gratify and flatter is Belloy's Assertion That a Family once setled in the Crown though they prove never so wicked vitious and abominable yea though they go about to destroy the Common-wealth must yet be sacred to us and permitted to keep their Seat without any direction restraint or punishment from the Common-wealth but from God onely At this rate all the Carlees in France were Usurpers because Pepin the first of that Race came to the Crown upon the deposition of Childeric the Third and so wiped out the Merovees or Pharamonds Line The like is to be said of the Capevingiens who have now sate in the French Throne almost seven hundred years since the deposition of Charles of Lorain last of Pepins race into whose room Hugh Capet was elected by the People The same thing is to be seen in the Spanish Histories and where not Four Races of Kings have been there since the expulsion of the Romans The first was from the Goths The second from Don Pelago The third from Don Sancho Mayor The last from the House of Austria England has had more changes of this kind that both these neighbour Monarchies together in the same space of about twelve hundred years They all three got loose from the Romane Yoke so long ago This blessed Witness and Assertor of the Fundamental Rights Truths and Liberties of Christs Kingdom as also of the Common-wealth of England and that has sealed his Assertions in both kinds with his blood was not onely well skilled in setting the right bounds to civil and spiritual Power in the outward government of Worldly States but he did yet more clossly distinguish between natural whence civil springs and spiritual Power as to the inward regulation of particular persons You may take a glance into his larger Discourses on this Subject by a short glosse on the two Trees in Eden that of Life and that of the Knowledge of good and evil These two Trees were the first significant Types in and by which man was instructed in this doctrine which rightly divides the word of Truth Christ the living and Scriptures the written Word of God between the natural and spiritual man alotting unto each their proper portion and character One of these Adam might yea ought to have fed upon the Tree of Life the other not By the Devils suggestion to the Woman and hers to him he made a contrary choice He did eat of that he should not to the loss even of that he thought to gratify himself in his temporary Life of righteousness and communion with God and neglected to eat of the other and so of Christ in spirit the Antitype thereof for the feeding and building him up into eternal Life and true blessedness These two Trees were an Allegory of like significancy with Sarai and Hagar Isaac and Ishmael Old and New Testament or Covenant c. One of them signified the first Adam with his living Soul and freedom to good and evil the other the second Adam with his quickning spirit and freedom to good onely which he communicates and builds men up into the life and exercise of in fellowship with himself Adam chose to gratify his primitive natural constitution and freedom to good and evil which together with the things that feed it were typically stated and represented in the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil The new-creature Life and the glorious Liberty of the sons of God together with the things thereof not seen to man in the former capacity things eternal were typically stated and represented to Adams natural discerning in the tree of Life with instruction what was his concern to do or not to do as to that or the other But although these Types were given and expounded also by Christ unto Adam before hand yet was there room left after his fall for the exercise of a distinguishing dispensation of mercy towards him and his posterity from that of severity which was forthwith put in execution against the apostate angels excluding them from any possibility of ever entring into Gods Rest. This argues that the Angels who excel in strength and are higher than man had a clearer understanding in that point as to the requisiteness of a transition for themselves and for men out of the mutable state of life and righteousness received in their first creation into the unchangable Life and everlasting righteousness of the second Their fall therefore was more knowing wilful fatal and irrecoverable upon any tearms whatsoever That which Paul said of himself may be said of Adams first transgression comparatively with the first sin of the Angels that he did it ignorantly and so obtained mercy 1 Tim. 1. 13. But let man after renewed ad revived look to it for if after all this warning he sin again after the similitude of Adams transgression he becomes a Tree twice dead and will be pluckt up by the roots This second fall of man is as fatal and irrecoverable as the Angels first â— Adam's eating the forbidden fruit imported no less than a pleasing himself in the single Liberty Righteousnessâ— Life and Enjoyments of his first-creation state in preference to what was attainable for him in the second He preferred the creature or glory of man in the first to the glory of God that rests upon men for ever in the new-creation state He preferred the Law of works or the natural power of working righteousness set up in him by the first creation to the Law of Liberty Grace Faith that heavenly power of working righteousness that is set up in man by the new creation which can do all good and no evil so that against such there is no Law Gal. 5. 23. This is the glorious liberty of the sons of God Iam. 1. 25. and 2. 12. To prefer the lesser glory of the first creation the glory of man to the greater glory of the second the glory and righteousness of God is to worship serve and value the glory of the Creature more than that of the Creator who is blessed for ever Rom. 1. 25. They that prefer the lesser glory to the greater the righteousness and glory of man's first-creation to that of the second will prove hypocrites and persecute A hypocrite is not onely he that makes a shew of righteousness and
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF Sir Henry Vane K t. OR A short Narrative of the main Passages of his Earthly Pilgrimage Together with a true Account of his purely Christian Peaceable Spiritual GOSPEL-PRINCIPLES DOCTRINE LIFE and WAY of WORSHIPPING GOD for which he Suffered Contradiction and Reproach from all sorts of Sinners and at last a violent Death Iune 14. Anno 1662. To which is added His last EXHORTATION to his Children the day before his Death Printed in the Year 1662. The LIFE and DEATH of Sir HENRY VANE Knight Christian Readers PRepare your Faith The ensuing Narrative concerns a person who for his unweariedness in doing well and suffering ill together with the ground and spring of his deportment in both doth in very truth exceed the single reception of humane understanding He was partaker of the Divine Nature 2 Pet. 1. 4. 't is past the skill of humane nature to interpret him His attainments were too big for the tongue of Men and Angels Divine Life must have divine words words which the holy Ghost teacheth to give its own Character All other will be swallowed up of matter He had the New Name which no man knowes but he that hath it A Riddle therefore he was to man in his New Birth Nature Life Principles Ways Actions He was full of Faith and of the holy Ghost Who can expound Sampsons typical Riddle unless he plow with his Heifer The things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God and he that hath it 1 Cor. 2. Can any give a true account of things he hath neither heard nor seen Can any see or hear Spiritual things without Spiritual Senses or have such Senses without Spiritual Life the New Name He was but affected not to be Mystical He sighed after he longed for the manifestation of the Sons of God He desired godliness might put off its mystical dress lay aside its sackcloth that they that are all glorious within Psal. 45. might be so without too they who are the Sons of God might appear to be so 1 Iohn 3. 2. When the seventh Angel begins to sound Time shall be no longer to wit for godliness to be a mystery The mystery of God shall be finished Revel 10. 7. This Angel is ready to come forth Then Godliness will be manifest and triumphant While that is a Mystery Iniquity is so to during which he that will live godly must suffer Persecution 2 Tim. 3. 12. He that departs from evil maketh himself a prey and there is no Iudgement Isa. 59. 15. Men hear of the Divine Life in a disgustful sound of words that lie cross to their designs and hate it It disparages it discountenances the whole Scene of things seen speaking of them as of things that are not What can they think of this that see no other It judges condemns the World the God the Spirit the Religion of this World It spares not the very goodliness of flesh the wisdom the glory the righteousness of Man It declares all to be vanity that man puts value on yea man himself and that at his best estate altogether vanity a goodly flourishing but a corruptible vanishing thing The day Adam sinned he died Lost the life glory wisdom and righteousness he was created in and so his communion with God in such shadowie manifestations and resemblances of divine glory as were suited to the discerning and made up the happiness of that condition 'T is sad tydings to all those whose Life is but of the first-creation-strein lies in things seen to hear that all they have are or aime at is less than nothing and vanity Isa. 40. 17. Who can bear it Yet the design is honest and full of kindness 'T is to rid our hearts of things seen which are temporal and make room in them for things not seen eternal 2 Cor. 4. 18. While the Believers Life is hid with Christ in God and he speaks at this rate of all the visible glory and righteousness of man and much more yet against the shameful apostate and unrighteous state of Man what entertainment is he like to find There are two sorts of Princes in this World that are on horseback by turns he is against them both and goes on foot till his great master come upon his white Horse with his heavenly Armies on the like Rev. 19. 11 14. There are inward and outward Princes of this World Princes over themselves and Princes over others The former have their rational Powers restored into Dominion over their sensual whereby they become workers of righteousness in the renewed Spirit of a man Such Princes reigning as Kings 1 Cor. 4. 8. were some of the Priests Scribes Pharisees and professing Iewes who yea knew not and therefore crucified the Lord of glory 1 Cor. 2. 8. because both in his example and doctrine he gave forth the proper character and discovery of a more excellent way The latter sort of this Worlds Princes are such as do sit upon visible Thrones of Judicature furnished with Crowns Scepters and other pompous Badges of Soveraignty and Dominion over others These are often such as have no Dominion over themselves at all the basest of men Nebuchadnezzar himself the golden head of the four worldly Monarchies Dan. 2. 38. was so and accordingly handled followed not the light of his reason and therefore was turned to graze among the very beasts of the field Dan. 4. 32. The true spiritual watchman of God is to warn both these sorts of Princes and all others the righteous and the wicked the one that he turn not from his righteousness or rather that he seek the righteousness of God in the true regeneration which cannot be turned from The other that he turn from his wickedness and work righteousness Ezek. 18. and Chap. 33. Will men bear this Can he that is a man of a marred visage one in whom the glory wisdom and righteousness of man is daily passing away spoil'd and triumphed over by the cross and spirit of Christ give this twofold witness against these two sorts of Princes and their Nations called Revel 13. two Beasts in all their flourish and ornament of things seen and will they not stone him will they not be ready to tear him in pieces Divine Life together with the Wisdom and Words of it seems such foolishness and is so distastful to man that let the person of the true spiritual watchman be cloathed as David with the outward Pompe of Thrones and visible Scepters this shall not secure him from the ill word of the Judges or from appearing so contemptible as to become the song of drunkards Psal. 69. 12. 'T is the divine Life men chiefly hate and strike at all along from Cain downwards but can hit onely the humane the Woman that brings it forth The natural man of the Saint is persecuted into a desolate wilderness condition but his spiritual part the Man-child is caught up to God and secured from the persecuting Dragon Rev. 12. 5
6. He that is begotten of God keepeth himself and that wicked one toucheth him not 1 Iohn 5. 18. That which the Believer hath in common with his Persecutors flesh and blood that cannot enter into the Kingdom of God is all that Divel◠or Men can touch And this no farther no◠till such time as God permits which never is till he hath served his Generation done his Work and it be great gain to him to be stripped of his mantle that he may come fully to experience what he hath been long obscurely guessing at amongst his fellow 〈◊〉 Mortality swallowed up of Life 2 Cor. 5. 4. Spiritual or divine Life and the things 〈…〉 righteousness glory and all concerns thereof have more of essence and so of intelligibility in them than any first creation Life or things They are therefore in themselves more intelligible though less yea not at all understood by man 1 Cor. 2. 14. What 's the matter where lies the fault In man's understanding The objects are too dazling and bright for it over-master over-set it That is not all They are quite out of its reach shut up in an utter invisibility It can receive no notice of them but in a type and if this condiscention be made for the expression of them it decries allegory runs away with the shadow and rejects the substance But if God please to enlighten and raise mans understanding in some hopeful measure towards its first-created capacity will that do it No. There is utterly a fault an inability in it at its best to take the immediate view of these things This seems a hard saying But God himself who pronounced of every thing in the first-creation that it was very good Gen. 1. 31. doth yet comparatively find fault with the very best things in it Heavens Angels Men and that at their best estate 'T is written His Angels he charged with folly Job 4. 18. The Heavens are not clean in his sight Job 15. 15. and Every man at his best estate is altogether Vanity Psal. 39. 5. The first Covenant or first state of Life in man and communion therein with God was faulty comparatively with the new-creature-state of man and the new and everlasting Covenant-communion with God that he forms and sets up the Believer in by true Regeneration Think we what we will if God say so shall we contradict and blaspheme He tells us If the first Covenant had been faultless there had been no place for the second Heb. 8. 7. and Gal. 3. 21. If there had been a Law or a ruling power of Life given and set up in man at first or renewed since that could have given Life or have carried us through for eternal life everlasting righteousness and Life should have been by that Law there would have needed no other by a new creation God will not do any thing that is impertinent or redundant So Rom. 11. 6. If eternal Life be by Grace or by the Law of the Spirit of Life Rom. 8. 2. brought into man by a new creation then it is no more of works proceeding from the utmost activity of the Law or ruling power of natural Life and perfection set up in man at his first creation What shall we say to these things How is man out in his divinity God's thoughts are not as our thoughts nor his ways as our ways they are 〈…〉 8 9. his footsteps are not known To be 〈…〉 unequal He will be Judge Every way of man is right in his own eyes but the Lord pondereth the hearts Shall not the Iudge of all the earth do right Can he do wrong God is 〈◊〉 a man that he should lie He giveth not account of any of his matters Job 33. 13. neither is there need for he will not do wickedly or pervin◠Iudgement he will not lay upon man more then right that he should enter into Iudgement with God Job 34. 12. and 23. But the person here character'd as he affected not to be mystical in his person so nor obscure in his language 'T is the fleshly veil on mens understandings as to his matter that makes them carp at his expression and cry obscure obsucre doth he not speak parables Ezek. 20. 49. The mystical reach and significancy of Scripture as exhibiting the peculiar form of new-creature Life under the letter or most significant figures thereof that are to be found in the first-creation by a sound of words lies so remote from the veil'd understandings of men that they make nothing on 't They are willing to be blinded and deceived as to Gods Truth that they may more 〈◊〉 please themselves in their own lie 2 Thes. 2. 10 12. and the 〈◊〉 Serpent the God of this World is as ready and willing to beguile and blind them that the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the Image of God may not shine unto them 2 Cor. 4. 4. In this discouraging posture of the present World did this believing Pilgrim wade through it waiting on the Lord and seeking out such acceptable words for the explicatiug of Divine Oracles as were most exactly calculated and accommodated to the understandings of men so as to unlock insinuate into and gain them by a holy guile into the entertainment thereof upon convincing demonstration of their grand concern therein He did most industriously set himself to bring forth the most inward thoughts of his heart in characters to be seen and read of all as to the Life hid with Christ in God experienced in his person and held forth in the Scriptures of Truth This was his essay in his Retired man's Meditations even to present to our view this mystical life in the most intelligible form language or certain sound of words he could any wayes hit upon which yet how subject they have left him to misconstructions through the ignorance and presumption of his confident undertakers is sad to see in their most groundless calumnies of his Person and gross mistakes of his Doctrine and Principles To obviate such causeless misprisions of him I shall briefly present you with some chief Remarques of his Life He was born a Gentleman My next word is so much too big for that that it may hardly seem decorous to stand so near it He was a chosen Vessel of Christ seperated as Paul from his mothers womb though not actually called till 14. or 15. Years standing in the world 't was longer ere Paul was called during which time such was the complexion and constitution of his Spirit through ignorance of God and his wayes as rendred him acceptable company to those they call good fellows yet at his worst restrained from that lewdness intemperance sometimes leads into which he hath been oft heard to thank God for and so long he found tollerable quarter amongst men Then God did by some signal impressions and awakening dispensations startle him into a view of the danger of his condition On this he en◠his former jolly Company
sinners of the Gentiles that never yet peeped out of the bondage of sensual Lusts. Men of this spirit in Religion stand every moment liable to be run a ground by Satan into the most dangerous and remediless posture of all a latter end worse than their beginning a state of sin and sorrow unchangedable This we are still to have in our eye Where ever two or more natures meet together in any creature 't is the true interest and concern of that creature to yield up the Scepter and Government over all other nature life and operation in it to that which is in it self superiour to all the rest and best able with safety to manage the whole person Divine nature that is the highest Principle of Life and operation communicable to man will upon on lower tearms enter as an ingredient into his constitution than to be king 'T will be Caesar or nothing 'T is man's interest priviledge security it should be so 'T is not in man that walketh at his best estate with stability certainty and continuance to direct his steps Jer. 10. 23. He is therefore in a sort under the curse of the Law even whilst he is working the righteousness of it because not in the continuing principle For 't is said Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the Law to do them Paul alledges this as a warning-piece to those that were of the works of the Law or that were working righteousness but in the single activity and ruling power of their own renewed enlightened cleansed spirit and humane principles Gal. 3. 10. The question is Whether God's Spirit or our own be best at working righteousness steering our course directing our steps whether Law or Grace Old or New-creature Life the Soveraignty of our own or God's Spirit in us be fitter to undertake the work keep off Satan from re-entry sin from returning into dominon Paul warrants us not safe from the most dangerous apostacy under the Law or ruling power of our own renewed mind but under grace onely the Law of the spirit of Life or ruling authority of participated divine Nature Men are ready to say here as Pilate to the Jewes in a different case concerning Christ's person What will ye crucifie our King Strike down the ruling authority of the Law or soveraignty of our own renewed mind for the directing of our steps Yes 'T is best for you to let this king this spirit be taken to task in you bruised sacrificed crucified triumphed over and brought into an everlasting captivity and most desirable subjection to a better king a better spirit that can wilde the scepter of righteousness in you with a more steady hand against all enemies Men should take heed indeed of yeilding up the Scepter out of their own hands to a worser spirit the devil who will not fail to use all his wiles engines and glittering flourishes as transformed into an angel of Light to impose himself upon us as our Baal or Moloch our Lord and King Such error may involve us in a more dangerous hardened fixed enmity to all farther visits or approaches of the Redeemer than ever and in a remediless deprivation of all further benefits of his sacrifice and death It was the refusal to surrender up the ruling power of their own renewed spirit to be bruised crucified and triumphed over by the fire-baptism of the spirit of Christ upon it that made the Princes of this world the Priests Scribes Pharisees and other professing Jewes 1 Cor. 2. 8. that were reigning as Kings as to the righteousness of the Law 1 Cor. 4.8 cry out so eagerly and prevailingly to Pilate that Christ himself might be crucified He that is not made willing by the second divine new creature-birth of Christ in him to have the first birth of a renewed humane life and Principle in him thus handled will be sure to prove a spiritual Idolater at last become a member of mystical Babylon trample under foot the Son of God count the blood of the Covenant wherewith he was sanctified in the first birth as it is offered in a farther and greater benefit thereof for the working this spiritual new-creature-form and more excellent spirit in him an unholy thing a diabolical figment doing thereby despight to the spirit of grace which is the sin against the holy Ghost Heb. 10. 29. Mat. 12. 31 32. 'T is better to be servants and subjects under God's spirit then Rulers in the soveraign authority and uncontrolled activity of our own God's service is that perfect freedom wherewith the son makes us free indeed our soveraignty leaves us liable to eternal bondage 'T is better in this sense also to obey God rather than men his spirit in us than our own yea to bring our own with all that before it was Ruler ofâ— into pure and everlasting subjection to God's we shall otherwise be sure to find our selves at last under the dominion of sin again Let as many natures as will be in man that nature or principle of Life and operation in him that rules denominates the person If sensual nature in its operations desires and delights bear sway in a man over the head of his own rational powers causing them to truckle under it and become serviceable in their witty pleadings and devisings to gratify and humour that over which they should be rulers that man is a beast If rational powers bear sway over sensual he is a man If spiritual a Saint The participated divine nature is the onely spring of the power of godliness in man and sure foundation of eternal Life The grace of God that bringeth salvation reaching effectually to deny all ungodliness open and mystical to Tit. 2. How apt are men to give up the scepter and soveraignty over themselves into the hands of the basest principle of Life in them sensual and how apt is that to catch at the scepter as the basest of men have been usually catching at visible Thrones and Soveraignty over others that are Princes in understanding a hundred times more men than themselves Such Princes are oft walking as servants upon the earth when servants are upon horses It is an evil an error which proceedeth from the Ruler to set folly in great dignity and let the rich sit in low place Eccles. 10. 5 7. Those men that are willingly subject to the basest lusts of sensual Life in their own persons are willing to set up the basest of men on outward visible Thrones over them Dan. 4. 17. that they know are in bondage to the same inferiour lusts with themselves and therefore such under whom the godly man ceaseth and the vilest men will be exalted Psal. 12. 1 8. What amounts all this to without us and within us but a most irrational yeelding up our selves into captivity under the soveraign authority of the bramble as in Iotham's Parable Iudg. 9. 7 15. In such case the bramble when once it finds it self
Christ their natural head refusing to adventure the exchange of their first-creation glory and Life through unbelief of the gain and usury thereby attainable even the fixedness and unchangableness of what they already had in the greater and more excellent glory of the resurrection By this not yeilding to the conditions of passing along with their head into the more excellent state and unchangable form of their very natural Beings they lost even that they had their first creation glory righteousness and the Life of communion with God in Christ manageable therein Iude tells us vers 6. what befel them hereupon The angels which kept not their first estate but left their own habitation or head Christ choosing their distinct opposite Luciferian head the devil and satan are with this their chieftaine reserved in everlasting chaines under darkness unto the judgement of the great day When Lucifer had drawn to himself and engaged a numerous party of angels with him in his apostacy by attempting to assert maintain and exalt the lesser natural glory of the first creation into a competition with yea a preference and opposition to the new-creature state of Life and glory in the second which excels his next business was to seduce our first Parents and in them all their posterity into the same opposition to new-creature Life and Glory the true mystical Sabbath state THE SAINTS EVERLASTING REST. This most desireable Rest is attainable only by our being made willing to enter into a conformity with Christ in his death through a surrender of the single and ruling activity of our first-creation principles at their best and giving up our selves wholly into a pure subjection to what we meet with that 's more excellent in the second Angels fell more knowingly than man who was lower than they in understanding and strength and therefore irrecoverably Man fell somewhat ignorantly as over-reached through the woman his weaker part by the beguiling insinuations of the Serpent so he and his are again set upon their feet in some degree or other by the mighty Redeemer to try them over again in their own persons how they will â—eâ—ean themselves in this great fundamental point about yeilding to the tearms of a transition out of the corruptible state of the life glory and righteousness of their first-creation the house upon the sand into the incorruptible and unchangable life glory and righteousness of the second the house founded upon the rock Christ in spirit So The soul that sinneth again after the similitude of Adams first transgression after all fair warning it shall die for its own personal transgression and not for the fathers having eaten sower grapes Ezek. 18. 1 4. In order to this new creation Christ in the single or double portion of his spirit is given forth received and owned by the sons of men either in the unchangable spiritualized state of his natural manhood or also in the more exalted capacity of his spiritual each of which gifts do baptize and transform the corruptible state of their natural man into an incorruptible life and unchangable union with the natural or spiritual man in Christ's person by the new and everlasting Covenant established in all thinâ—â— and sure The twofold creature-nature in Christ's person as the former and inferiour is transformed and brought forth by the latter and more excellent into an unchangable state of Life and union therewith is called the WORD of God that abides for ever in them that receive it the spirit of God Christ in spirit the Son of man in heaven Joh. 3. 13. that overshadowed the Virgin and formed for himself a fleshly tabernacle in her womb The clothing of himself herewith for the Redemption of man was a greater condescention than his actual coming forth in the Life and capacity of the first-born of every creature for the Creation of the World Redemption is a greater work than Creation and requires greater condescention in the undertaker As first-born of every creature he was in a superiority of headship to all the angels as the works of his hands therein the highest ranck of meer created Beings in the first world But when this WORD which was God and the twofold original spring of all creaturely life and perfection also was made flesh took on him the particular nature of man not angels he became little lower than the angels for a season Heb. 2. 7. and 16. and not onely so but was content also to suffer the visage of this flesh to be marred more than any man and to be humbled and abased therein even to the death upon the Cross Esay 52. 13 14. and Chap. 53. The creature-nature in Christ is so enfolded together and hypostatically united with his purely divine form that it receives the denomination from that supream form of all He is therefore called Michael Gods equal and the man his fellow Zech. 13. 7. The whole person of Christ as comprehending all fulness of perfection creaturely or divine is very God But the persons of men and angels that are brought into an everlasting union and association with Christ in one or both of his creature forms are not God nor Christ. For the highest denominating form in their personal constitution is but creaturely yet spiritual and divine in distinction from the natural corruptible form of men or angels received at their first creation The everlasting security of elect angels and men lies in their inseparable union with their head the Mediator in whom alone both creature capacities are in personal union with God The exalted creature nature in Christ is divine altogether lovely Cant. 5. 16. the true Vine Iohn 15. 1. that cheareth the heart of God and man as in Iotham's parable Iudg. 9. 13. It is the Spirit of God the immediate womb parent fountain-head of all new-creation life and principles in men or angels by the fire-baptisme An inferior work to this is also thereby performed upon and in the sons of men to wit all that gradual revival of rational light life in the moral heathen or legal Christian that is very obvious and familiar to observation all the world over The legal Christian experiences such an operative actuating influence from this spirit as revives enlightens cleanses renews restores him to some good measure of first-creation Life righteousness As for the flawes deficiencies yet incident to his personal operations God imputes to him or puts upon him that perfect righteousness of the Law called Gods comeliness Ezek. 16. 14. which Christ himself performed and had in his fleshly manhood rendring it applicable to men through the merit of his death therein This whole work of Christ in men inwardly washing sanctifying them by his blood as also justifying them by the imputation of the perfect righteousness of the law to them from his own person amounts but to their practical and experimental knowledge of him after the flesh 2 Cor. 5. 16. and a prospering onely into that Kingdom
up of Life It will make them of the same mind that was in Christ willing so to suffer in the flesh under the power of his spirit as to cease from sin or from that state that can return back into sin again 1 Pet. 4. 1. This incorruptible form atteinable onely by the fire-baptism performed upon the natural man at his best by the single portion of the spirit of Christ is called spiritual and denominates the whole person a spiritual man though yet in the mortal body in distinction from those who have but only the renewal of their first-creation form by the influence and gifts of the same spirit All that these receive is but the goodliness of flesh renewed adorned nature which is decried and blown upon by a second vice a superior dispensation and ministry of the same spirit as a perishing vanity after the first voice has done its work made a straight path for God in the desert by rectifying the rational powers in bewildred man Esay 40. 3 8. Our corruptible tabernacle is to be taken down This mantle this filthy garment this vile body flesh and blood at its best is to be chaned into the likeness of Christs glorious body his heavenly man by the mighty power and transforming operation of that spirit whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3. 21. We must put off the old man at best and put on the new which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness Ephes. 4. 22 24. Col. 3. 9 10. That Image of God received by the first-creation and all the wisdom glory and righteousness thereof is but shadow to what is to be received by the new creation 'T is but self-glory self-wisdom self-righteousness and when these are opposed to the wisdom righteousness and glory of God in the new creation they are Idols shadows preferred to substance the Law or ruling Principles of our first creation Life to grace and truth in the second Some few Results or Corollaries of what hath been said in this matter take as followeth 1. The Spirit of God the holy Ghost the divine Nature which the Scriptures do evidently assert and declare to be communicable to men exceeds not in its reach and significancy the natural and spiritual creature capacity in the person of the Mediator whereby individual angels and men are brought into an everlasting union with him in one or both as he is one with the Father Iohn 17. 22. 2. Where-ever the Seed of eternal Life is sowne by Christ's causing himself to be received in the single or double portion of his Spirit it will mar the visage or wisdom of man it will take him off from his way of working righteousness and worshipping God in the oldness of the letter of the first creation and enable him to perform all in a more excellent and acceptable way in the newness of the spirit of the second Paul in his own person gives us notice of this distinction which he stood in from those youthful flourishing professors that were reigning as Kings at the righteousness of the Law performable in their own spirit 1 Cor. 4. 8. 10. With such he said he durst not compare himself 2 Cor. 10. 12. who pleasing themselves and applauding one another in a way of mutual self-deceivings and commendations are not those whom the Lord commendeth as he rather desired to be vers 18. They have but the inward heart-circumcision in the letter of the first not in the spirit of the second creation whose praise is not of men as is implied Rom. 2. 29. 'T is worth observation that even in the ancient Hieroglyphical divinity of Egypt no service or worship of God was accounted acceptable and well-pleasing but what was performed by some divine power of God himself in them 3. There are two distinct sorts of everlastingly saved men such as receive the single and such as receive the double portion of the spirit Both pass under the fire-baptisme The former are exalted into association with the elect angels and have for the immediate and adaequate object of their fruition and converse God as shining forth to them in the incorruptible form of Christs natural Manhood The latter and more exalted sort of Saints are taken into association with the spiritual manhood in Christs person and have for the immediate and adaequate object of their fruition and converse God as shining forth to them in that highest and most exalted creature form in Christ's person And by and through these who do properly constitute the general assembly and Church of the first-born the spirits of just men and the holy angels even those principalities and powers in heavenly places do as at second hand receive that manifold wisdom of God that shines forth more immediately upon the Church Ephes. 3. 10. 4. The highest sort of these Saints are not Christ or God much less the lower Christ is the head root and parent to both these sorts of glorified men in his twofold creature capacity or manhood natural or spiritual And Christ as he is the purely divine form or image of the invisible God is head to both these creature-headships in his own person and God is the head of Christ considered as in his purely divine form 1 Cor 11. 3. 5. Christ in his creature-capacity is the maker redeemer and heir of all things in both worlds as all things were created by him so for him Col. 1. 16. Heb. 1. 2. and Rom. 11. 36. Of him through him and to him are all things 6. Men that in their first creation were made little lower than the Angels Psal. 8. 5. are in the second or new creation made equal to the elect angels and all those of the double portion are advanced quite over the heads of all the angels into an immediate association with Christ in his most exalted creature-capacity on the Throne of his glory even in that more excellent creature name than the angels have Heb. 1. 4. Behold then the heavenly order in the whole family of God First God himself the head of Christ and that as Christ is the Image of the invisible God very God Secondly Christ himself as thus considered in his capacity purely divine head to his twofold creature-headship the natural and spiritual man in his own person Thirdly Christ in his twofold creatureship as the immediate head to all spiritual and natural men and angels in his heavenly family his members his body mystical Fourthly Behold these also in their two grand distinctions of superiority and subordination spiritual and natural Fifthly There may seem also to be intimated in the Scriptures a gradual difference of capacity in the individuals of either of these two ranks of everlastingly glorified men Dan. 12. 3. and 1 Cor. 15. 41. There is one glory of the Sun another of the Moon and another glory of the Stars and one Star differeth from another Star in glory Variety of intellectual light or discerning is resembled in Scripture
Israel Chap. 41. 8 9. Thou Israel my servant Iacob whom I have chosen the seed of Abraham my friend unto whom I have said thou art my servant I have chosen thee and not cast thee away Here the holy seed or divine birth of God's Image that makes the true Israelite by faith is described to be of a nature and quality that is incorruptible securing him in whom it is whether Iacob the chosen servant or the seed of Abraham the chosen friend as well as chosen servant from ever being a castaway Hereby is intimated what it is to be the chosen faithful servant and no more and what it is over and above to be the chosen and intimate friend that is called and admitted to see God face to face a friend speaks with friend Thus of Aaron it is said Exod. 4. 15 16. That Moses should speak to him and put words in his mouth and saies God I will be with thy mouth and with his mouth and will teach you what ye shall do And Aaron shall be thy spokesman unto the People he shall be to thee instead of a mouth and thou shalt be to him in stead of God Consider how interpretable this is of the son of man glorified the great Prophet of all in the person of the blessed Mediator set down on the right hand oâ— the Majesty on high who still reteins the form of a servant or perfection of his natural man in its incorruptible form with which as with a mouth typified by Aaron he comes forth as a head to the holy Angels and Iacob his chosen servant in a suitable way of converse and fruition to their capacity speaking therein to the body of the People whilst at the same time he is in his spiritual manhood exalted to an equality with the eternal WORD as the man God's fellow admitted to a communication with God face to face as fâ—iend speaks with friend In this glory he is more properly the very mouth of God typified by Moses in a capacity andâ— fitness for converse with the Bride the Lambs Wife as head to the general Assembly of the first-born who are a sort of saints of greater dignity and preheminence by whom the manifold Wisdom of God or secret Name his WORD shall be made known to principallities and powers Ephes. 3. 10. The lowest sort of all these heaven-born Saints that have but the single portion of the spirit have not onely by the external influence of Christs heavenly Nature such a change as the legal or first Covenant Saint has from the polluted to the cleansed and reformed state of the natural man which make but a member of the mystical earthly Ierusalem that may become the spiritual Sodom but by the very seed of Christ's heavenly nature sown in them they have an inward real partaking of the divine nature or that new principle of Life which baptizes the natural state into a conformity with and subjection thereunto advancing it thereby for ever into a sublimated incorruptible form It is in his Light onely with whom is the fountain of all Life and perfection that we can see Light Psal. 36.9 In the spiritual new-creature discerning onely of a divine communicated understanding and superinduced form can we see that objective light or unveiled glory of God that renders the true heir everlastingly blessed But even amongst the children of the heavenly kingdom the children of the Resurrection there are some of a first and others of a second Resurrection into a more exalted state of Life and glory Yet all the Vessels of glory great and small will be filled from the Ocean of those unutterable riches of divine Glory that are in Christ which no natural eye can see There will be no want or envying one another there Concerning ORDINANCES HAving already spoken joyntly concerning this Sufferers Principles and Doctrine I come now to mention his way of worshiping God and what his Judgement and Practice was as to Ordinances After that way which men call Heresie did he worship the God of his believing Fathers Abraham and the rest Acts 24. 14. He was for worshipping God in spirit and in Truth such the Father seeks to worship him Joh. 4. 23. He lived walked worshipped prayed spake in the spirit and so as the oracles of God 1 Pet. 4. 11. ministring as of the ability that God gave him that God in all things might be glorified This language and way of Worshipping God that is so despicable to man is that onely which hath the praise of God He kept the true mystical Sabbath not thinking his own thoughts c. Esay 58. 13. He was baptized with the holy Ghost and with fire He did in such sort eat the flesh and drink the blood of Christ that he was thereby brought into a conformity with Christ in his death and had eternâ—l Life abiding in him Iohn 6. 54. This is satisfactory to God in this point that that answers his well pleasing What further shall be said shall not be in order to please but instruct convince and stop the mouâ—hes of gainsaying men Tit. 1. 9. He that worships God in the power of the single or double portion of the spirit of Christ does undeniably worship him in spirit and truth The power of godliness comes in with this new creation Spirit All Worship Righteousness Ordinances or whatever performed but in the renâ—wed reformed enlightned gifted adorned state of our first-creation spirit amounts but to the form of godliness that faith that may be shipwrack'd that interest in Christ and that good conscience that may be lost 1 Tim. 1. 19. They that have not the divine nature in the sence above expressed 2 Pet. 1. 4. are blind and cannot see afar off vers 9. they discern not the land of distances the new Ierusalem They may have great illumination excellent gifts and in the confidence of these they say they see what get they by that Therefore their sin remaineth Iohn 9. 41. that is is unpardonable there remaineth no more benefit of Christ's sacrifice to them There remaineth onely at last upon final refusal and resistance of the new-creature life spirit and way of worship nothing but a certain fearful looking for of judgement and fiery inignation which shall devour the adversaries Heb. 10. 27. and Chap. 6. 4 8. Their light their seeing takes away all cloak for their sin Iohn 15. 22 and 24. The warning which the true spiritual watchman gives them if neglected and despised by them does dangerously set forward this work through their miscarriage under it and becomes a savour of death to them Act. 13. 40. 41. but even so a sweet savour to God as prospering in the thing whereto he sends it and accomplishing his pleasure 2 Cor. 2. 16. Esay 55. 11. These keen concisionists that cannot afford a good word for the true circumcision that worship God in the spirit and have no confidence in the flesh or in the knowledge of Christ after the flesh they
spouse of Christ the right new-spirited Saint is despised and slighted as a weak foolish contemptible thing no body at Ordinances and righteousness in her way which she experiences to be the way of Christ finding the fruits of his presence in it Thus was it between Paul with others and some of the Corinthian Church Both were married to and interested in Christ but by different Covenants We are fooles saies he for Christ's sake ye are wise in Christ. We are weak ye strong Ye honourable we despised 1 Cor. 4. 10. and 2 Cor. 10. 12. We dare not make our selves of the number or compare our selves with such as commend and compare themselves with one another of the same principles and perswasions and so applaud themselves in one another by their mutual self-deceivings The true spiritual Elder Paul the aged he is in body with this flourishing youthful warm legal-spirited generation The main business he has to say for himself is a Life hid with Christ in God and worshipping God in spirit and truth This they reckon as nothing but discourse fiction foolishness But be it known those that with Paul are weak foolish and despised for Christ are better than such as he there implicitly reproves and taxes with folly that yet he acknowledges were wise strong and honourable in Christ. Such foolish weak despised ones of Christ as Paul was are they that will quite confound the wise the mighty the honourable The things that are not shall bring to nought the things that are and no flesh with all its ornament righteousness and wisdom shall enter into Christ's kingdom or glory in his presence 1 Cor. 1. 27 29. And as the spiritual saint is thus handled by the fleshly so is the spirit or spiritual part in the same saint dealt with by the fleshly Holy flesh the renewed natural mind will be despising the feeblness of the spiritual while weak and low and jusling it out of the Throne as to its interesting it self as the ruling Principle at working righteousness and worshiping God Having thus in Hagar taken notice of the malapert proud insulting carriage of the first-first-covenant Wife or Spirit in different saints or in the same against the right spirit of the second through confidence in the works of the Law or works performed in the ruling activity of their own renewed mind let us proceed to other branches and observables in the said Allegory before us Abram as a type of Christ delivers up Hagar into Sarai's hand Sarai dealt hardly with her so she should Hagar fled 't was her sin What signified Sarai's hard dealing with her Persecution No the Spirit of Christ the fire-baptism the strait gate that will not suffer flesh and blood to enter into the kingdom of God this it signified Hagar's flight then imports the declining and refusal of all these The legal spirited professor confident in the works of the Law will endure none of these things They are all a sad story a hard saying to him His usual way of waving them if urged and hard put to 't is to call them Blasphemy and the Witnesses thereof Blasphemers and on he goes very secure in his doatage But say or think man what he will this is Christ's way he gives up the fleshly worshipper and the fleshly part in the true spiritual worshipper to the spiritual to be humbled and abased broken and subdued hardly dealt with crucified slain and offered up in sacrifice under the power of the Cross of Christ or fire-baptism of his spirit typified by Sarai There 's no entring into the kingdom but we must pass thorow this fire this tribulation this bruising of the inmost part of the natural man his very spirit and rational powers whatever ever becomes of his outward as to persecution from the world Hagar despised Sarai Ishmael mocked Isaac Gen. 21. 9. this was persecution Usually those that are taken out of the world or worldly first-creation constitution and frame of spirit within them by the fire-baptism do so differ even from the professing part of the world in their very religion or union with God by another Covenant and in their more excellent way of worshipping God in spirit and truth not letter and form that they seldom or never scape the external branch of the cross and baptism of blood through the rage enmity of man against this new-creature marvellous light and life that is springing up in those whom God is transforming into another nature But let men take it how they will the cross the fire-baptism we must come to within us first or last or we cannot be saved The fleshly worshipper either yields to this fiery doctrine ministry and way or resists or flies If He get the magistrates sword on his side as if Hagar could have got Abram to side with her against Sarai then he 'l make the messenger of such tydings fly Sarai must fly or suffer under Hagar Men decry it for heresie blasphemy and persecute him that talkes at such a rate Thus Christ himself was served by the zealous legally religious Iew. 'T was the religious professing party of the Iewes that crucified Christ and would take no answer hear no reason or argument from Pilate the Heathen Magistrate to the contrary But if the sowre Legalist neither will yeild nor can bruiâ—ishsly resist this hard doctrine by outward force or persecution then he takes Hagars course flies it And what then He every where decries this spiritual doctrine of the cross and fire-baptism for heretical dangerous and seductive wishing all to beware how they meddle with such books converse with such persons or listen to such dangerous suggestions While toleration lasted I have experimented this to be the too general frame of spirit amongst professors in this nation who have evidently chosen rather to venture a persecution of their own doctrine and persons than endure this and the assertors thereof Here 's the mystery of Hagars flight The Angel of the Lord advises her to return and submit her self to her Mistris In her all these timerous fugitive envious legal-spirited Christians that are leavened with the leaven of the Pharisees are admonished to entertain better thoughts of the New-Ierusalem Spouse resembled by Sarai and submit themselves to her doctrine and more excellent way to the cross the fire-baptism the spirit of Christ the covenant of grace Sarai This is the doctrine the reproof the correction the instruction on in everlasting righteousness which that History that Allegory is pregnant with Christ with both his Covenant Spouses and Children are allegorically expressed by Husband and Wife Father and Children Head and Members with the like Such expressions are interpretable into mystery by a due considering the duties and offices of such Relations in the letter And as Christ himself so Paul and others are in way of Allegory called Fathers of such as by them are begotten to Christ through the Gospel 1 Cor. 4. 15. and vers 17. he calls Timothy his
in his first creation as he came out of the hands of God had the Law of Nature or the ruling powers of natural Life in full perfection inherent and operative in his own person The same Law of natural or first created Life and perfection is renewed by Christ in men as to kind so as also to be inherent and operative in them in some degree but the deficiencies of inward personal sanctity and of inward and outward operations are made out by the compleat righteousness of the Law as wrought by another person for them and imputed to them for their justification before God upon the tearms of the first Covenant qualifying them for communion with God therein In this sence Paul was according to the Law blameless to wit under this comliness of God put upon him In the other sence as to inherent personal perfection 't is said 1 Iohn 1. 8. If we say we have no sin we deceive our selves and the truth is not in us 19. As to the whole bulk of the written Oracles of God there is frequently given the proper character both of the Law and Gospel Principle or state of Life in the old Testament as well as new but of the latter more eminently and plentifully in the new 20. There were true spirituall Saints both before and under the outward dispensation of the Law Enoch Noah Sem Heber Abraham David and many others and there are sowre narrow Pharisaical legal-spirited Christians under the outward dispensation of the Gospel at this day 21. Even the first Covenant or Legal state of first-creation Life and Principles renewed in men comes to them in the way of Gospel or through the glad tydings of the mighty Redeemer who was promised to Adams under the name of the womans seed that should bruise or break the Serpâ—â—â—s head Gen. 3. 15. This he did by dying through death destroyed him that had the power of death that is the devil Heb. 2. 14. Thus Christ died for all 2 Cor. 5. 14 15. to recover all again out of that dead sleep in trespasses and sins into which they were cast by Adams first transgression and to set them upon their first-creation â—eâ—t again in order to a new trial of their personal demeanour in that great point Adam first miscarried in as to the loosing the Life quiting the righteousness wisdom and lesser glory of their first-creation for that which excelleth in the second the tree of Knowledge that puffeth up for the tree of Life that edifieth Thus was Christ a propitiation not for the sins of his elect onely that of the whole world 1 Ioh. 2. 2. Here 's all the general Redemption the Scripture holds forth 22. If these things be so what signify all the voluminous Controversies of the Pelagian and Antipelagian Arminian and Antiarminian Supralapsarian and Sublapsarian about Free-will general Redempton and the Like What Free-will is it the one pleads for the other denies Only such as Adam was created with the wavering Liberty of the sons of men the object whereof is natural good and evil As for spiritual new-creation things they were in themselves in their own naked essence clear out of sight to Adams discerning at best which was but natural They were onely representable and understandable to him in a riddle through some first-creation shadow the Tree of Life Neither of the above mentioned parties in all their warm digladiations and pickeerings once dream of a distinct superiour state of Life and Liberty that should swallow up all that of the first creation into victory bring it forth again with uâ—ury and great gain by way of resurrection in the glorious Life and Liberty of the sons of God the spiritual eternal Life and Freedom to good onely and not at all to evil But whoever returns not into the exercise of his retified first-creation Principles and Liberty as a general fruit of Christ's death 't is his own voluntary default He sins against God and wrongs his own soul he hates Christ and loves death Prov. 8. 36. He refuâ—es the righteousness and glory of his own humane nature and chuses to be a beast 23. But what lies in man to do towards the superiour and more excellent dispensation and way by which he should be led forward into the glorious Liberty of the â—â—â—s of God and eternal Life 'T is answered He hath power in the right use of his natural freedom not to resist it but upon experience of the insufficiency of the selfish spirit and wavering Principles of his first creation to submit all the Life and glory thereof to the fiâ—e-baptism in order to the being brought forth in a more excellent state that is unchangable 'T is not in man to do any thing towards his new creation as neither did he contribute any thing towards his first make But God makes such proposal and offer of this new-creation work to all mankind as not one man fâ—iles of being made a new creature but it will be most righteously interpreted by God to have befallen him through his own voluntary default in neglecting refusing and resisting that offer Where comes in the difference then A remnant according to the election of grace obtain it the rest are voluntarily blinded and fall short Rom. 11. 5. 7. That saying of Austin is not amiss God will not save any man whether he will or no but he will make that man willing to be saved that he resolves to save He may do what he will with his own Mans first-creation Liberty misused in this great point brings forth this sad truth Thy destruction is of thy self O man And Gods reserving singly to himself the forming up of the new creature and the prerogativeâ— Liberty of effectually and irresistibly disposing of this great favour where when and to whom he pleases brings forth that excellent truth That our salvation is onely and meerly of God as Sir Francis Bacon observes in his Confession of Faith Who then maketh men to differ one from another the new creature from the old Man makes himself to differ from the new creature or spiritual man by his voluntary rejecting and despising this more excellent Life but God alone makes him that is a new creature to differ from the old And this indeed is the proper meaning of difference in such cases To differ is to excel Phil. 1. 10. That ye may approve things that excel or differ So 1 Cor. 15. 41. One star differs from or excels another star in glory Thou wilt say if the case â—e thus Why doth God yet find fault For who hath resisted his will Those that he hath elected and is resolved to save he will effectually and irresistibly make willing to be sayed and they will certainly be saved and no others Nay but O man who art thou that replict against Goâ— Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it why hast thou 〈…〉 He may make vessels of honour or dishonour as he pleases amongst Iewes or
Gentiles all the world over Rom. 9. 19 24. God that is infinitely â—ust and can be no otherwise is not bound to give an account of any of his matters Job 33. 13. Why therefore do ye strive against God while ye put forth this querulous demand Who hath resisted his will Will you cast all your sins and destruction too upon God's final rejection of you as reprobate silver Ier. 6. 30. God strives by his Spirit with men to bring them to himself Gen. 6. 3. to which Peter refers 1 Pet. 3. 19 20. Men strive and fight against God are disobedient and rebellious If God suffer men to prevail in a final resisting of his spirit that strives with them they are undone for ever If they be conquered they are saved If they lose their mutable Life they find it again in that which is unchangable If they keep it a while in opposition to the more excellent Life they lose it at last in eternal death These are the Gospel riddles which the very disciples scarcely understood while Christ was with them in the flesh nor we while we have but the like knowledge of Christ after the flesh as they then had Knowingly to resist and hate the new-creature Life and words thereof is to do despite to the spirit of grace to sin against the Holy Ghost He that hath an ear to hear let him bear 'T is in vain for man to quarrel God will be justified when he judges Ps. 51.4 He will at last bring forth the grounds of all his dispensations towardâ— man and proceedings with him in such a demonstrative and undeniable consonancy to the very reason of man that every mouth shall be stopped Yea there is enough said already in his written Oracles to stop every mouth 24. We may take notice from what hath been said who those poor mourning meek-spirited men those merciful pure peace-making yet persecuted Children of God are that Christ pronounces blessed Mat. 5. 3 11. We may also come thereby to know on the other hand what Christ meanes by that rich full laughing sort of people to whom he cries wo wo wo Luke 6. 24 25. The poor in spirit are they that are willing to be broken emptied of the activity life righteousness glory wisdom reasonings desires thoughts and wayes of their own mutable first-creation spirit in order to be filled with the spirit of Christ the wisdom and righteousness of God in the new creation Thus with Steven they come to be ful of faith and of the Holy Ghost Act. 6. 5. rich in God or rich towards God Luk. 12. 21. That righteousness that is imputed to or inherent and operative in the new creature is called the righteousness of God All the fruits of saving faith all the works that are performed in the operative principle of new-creature Life are the righteous works of God who by his indwelling spirit worketh all such works in us Esay 26. 12. On the other hand all the righteousness imputed to or inherent and operative in the first Covenant Saint is called the righteousness of man such righteousness as Christ had and wrought in his changeable fleshly manhood which he imputes to them that are sanctified through his blood into an experimental knowledge of him and conformity with him in the flesh This imputed comeliness or righteousness is called both God's and Man's in a breath Ezek. 16. 14 15. Men dome too often to trample the blood of this Covenant under their feet after they have been so sanctified Heb. 10.29 and to play the harlot with that sort of righteousness imputed to them after they have been so justified The first creation state of Life in man by being broken and crucified under the second comes into a peaceable everlasting harmony with God This makes a true son of peace as well as of righteousness answering his father Melchizedeck's constitution who is both king of righteousness and king of peace Such sons of peace are commonly reckoned men of contention though the only true peace-makers the world has in it that desire and labour to bring others also into the same state of peace harmony and everlasting union with God as one spirit with him the state of love charactered 1 Cor. 13. Is not God himself reckoned a God of contention for striving with men by his spirit in order to conquer them into a state of salvation deliver them out of their own hands take them out of their own dispose by bereaving them of their own liberty and power of sinning against him and wronging their own soules And is not Satan the God of this world reckoned the God of peace that speaks smooth and pleasing things to flesh and blood by all his various instruments from amongst men even by those whom he transformes into the very likeness of the Apostles of Christ 2 Cor. 11. Do not men generally approve of and like the doctrine of him and his ministers best as orthodox and sound that advises men not to gaze after or listen to those spiritual wanderers â—hat speak of an attainment beyond the righteousness and glory of our first-creation This doctrine of his runs through all forms of proâ—essing Christians at this day and the spiritual man is reckoned mad for contradicting it Is not Satan reckoned the God of order that is for one man's continued speaking onely in a Pulpit accounting it a breach of the peace punishable by the Magistrates sword for any other to speak there though all that his pulpit man does is but to shut up the kingdom of heaven and in effect to charge men that they look not after it that is not listen to those who after the way which they call Heresy are worshipping God in the spirit Is it not the business of those authorized deceivers to open their mouthes in blasphemy against God to 〈◊〉 his Name his tabeâ—nacle and them that dwell or have their conversation in heaven Rev. 13. 6. Phil. 3. 20. And is not God himself reckoned the author of disorder and confusion for saying If any thing be revealed to another that 〈◊〉 by â—â—t the first hold his peace for ye may prophesy all one by one that all may learn and be comforted 1 Cor. 14. 30 33. Thus Satan and men neâ—tâ—e warm together in the first creation and no right tidings or character of the second will be listened to That crafty Serpent has blinded their mindes and stop'd their ears least this light of the glorious gospel should shine unto them or find any entertainment amongst them The Things the Persons the Churches that this strong man thus fraudulently possesses are in peace till Christ the stronger than he cometh to force him out He is coming 25. Those rich full old foolish kings as to the righteousness of man 1 Cor. 4. 8. That will no more be admonished or warned by the wise child in the true regeneration Eccles. 4. 13. those flourishing legal-spirited Christians that laugh are warm and confident in their present
into an absolute compliance and unchangable harmony with his will Rom. 12.1,2 Crucifie the flesh with the affections and lusts Put off the old man These and many other Scriptures of like import do all together and each of them apart compendiously imply the whole duty of man even all that God requires of him which is to humble himself under the cross of Christ and walk for ever with the Lord. So Psal. 50. 23. whoso offereth praise glorifieth me So the Septuagint render it in Greek In the Hebrew 'tis whoso sacrificeth confession which the Caldee renders whoso slayeth his evil or fleshly concupiscence that is the fleshly or natural mind The renewed mind of man is out a labile wavering corruptible thing This is not onely to be confessed but the confession or thing it self that is confessed thus to be is to be sacrificed and offered up to God by a living active faith If not it will resist the spirit of God refuse his new-creation work seek to save its own life keep it self whole and unbroken and fo will evidence it self in conclusion to be that carnal mind that 's enmity to God and works eternal death to man Rom. 8. 6. To come roundly and freely off with the sacrifice of self in the full Scripture latitude thereof by a thorow self-resignation is the great duty of man and the onely true and acceptable offering of praise to God Truly and substantially to praise God amounts to no less than this offering Le ts not please and delude our selves with a noise a found of words shadowes for things substance truth 28. Know then O vain man that without works thy faith is dead Jam. 2. 20. What works the works of an active saving faith the fruits that flow from the proper spring and principle of new-creature Life in man One great work of this faith is to lay hold on the unchangeable and everlasting righteousness of God in Christ's person Another great work of it is to crucify the fleshly mind or principles of humane nature however renewed so as for ever to disable them either for working sin or righteousnesse in the single first-creation activity or Life thereof A third work of it is to enable man to worship God in spirit and truth and to perform all righteous works towards God and men in a more excellent and acceptable way and with more steadiness and certainty than ever the renewed natural mind with all its ornament and furniture could perform such things Without such a faith and the workings of it it is impossible to please God Heb. 11. 6. Thus by being disabled to perform one tittle of the Law in the single activity of our corruptible though renewed mind we come so to fulfil the whole Law in the continuing and incorruptible principle of new-creature life that against us there is no Law that has any thing to say Gal. 5. 23. Do we then make void the Law through faith God forbid yea we come by this means onely to establish and fullfil the Law Rom. 3. 31. Mat. 5. 17. They that believe in God must be careful to maintain such good works to wit the works of faith Tit. 3. 8. This is the letting our light so shine before men that they may see our good works and glorifie our father which is in heaven Mat. 5. 16. We shew hereby that God's spirit which is set up in man by the new creation is better at working righteousnesse than mans spirit that was set up in him by the first-creation Any works we do as born of God in the new-creation are better on all accounts than what we can do as made of God in the first whatever work is good in the honest Heathen or legal Christian shall be owned and out-done by the spiritual believer in his more excellent principles and way The highest Principles of Life in man include ratifie and out-do all that righteousness that is performable in the lower In such Principles was this Sufferer a worker of righteousness such a worshipper of God as the Father seeks and approves of such a true Son of peace such a peacemaker as hath bin described but reckoned a man of contention for that very reason He was content with Paul to be a fool for Christ despised for Christ the poor and needy man with David As a true Embassador of Christ and minister of the everlasting Gospel he warned and besought the sons of men to consider their own true interest in becoming not onely almost but altogether such as he was except his bonds His Life was not like other mens nor his Ministry His wayes were of another fashion as they reason Wisd. 2. 15. therefore have I writ his Life after another fashion that mens Lives use to be written treating mostly of the principles and course of his hidden Life amongst the sons of God that the sons of men may the better know and consider what manner of man it was they have betrayed persecuted and slain For this read on from vers 15 to 23 of Wisd. 2. which I quote not as Scripture but as a notable character of mens rational conviction and acknowledgements together with their false reasonings and most perverse deductions therefrom in the present case We are esteemed of him as counterfeits or hypocrites he absteineth from our wayes as filthyness He maketh his bâ—ast that God is his Father Let us see if his words be true If he be the Son of God he will help him and deliver him from his enemies Let us examine him with despitefulness and torture that we may know his weekness and prove his patience Let us condemn him with a shameful death for by his own saying he shall be respected Such things they did imagine and were deceived for their own wickedness hath blinded them As for the mysteries of God they knew them not nor discerned the reward of blameless soules Thus not owning any need of an Apology for having been so large in the exposition of his divine Life Principles and Doctrine save onely this that I have spoken these things rather as an instruction to the living than an Apology for the dead I return to the more publick and overt acts of his humane pilgrimage and conversation amongst men having mentioned the private passages thereof in the beginning Would you know his Title in reference to his countrey He was A Common-Wealths-Man That 's a dangerous Name to the Peace and Interest of Tyranny I have lately met with two new State Paradoxes in Print which speak ruine to all that own that Title 1. That the Common-Wealth is not safe while Common-Wealths-Men are alive 2. That the Lawes are not safe while they are alive that every day call for the aid of the Law These Assertions carry with them such an appearance of contradiction to say no more that I am not so much an OEdipus as to unriddle them The Character of this deceased Statesman with whose Principles those two sayings carry little
the heathen and punishments upon the people even upon both those sorts of enemies that took counsel together against them whether the prophane or but legally religious party Psal. 2. 1 2. Both the Heathen that are no People of God at all and such a People of God as may apostatize become no people again they shall all go to wrack their Kings shall be bound with chains and their Nobles with fetters of iron All this shall be performed by the faith and prayer of Believers in association with the holy Angels Such honour have all his Saints This concluding Battel that is to make a clear riddance of all the wicked tyrannical Monarchies and Powers of this world is else where expressed thus Not by might nor by power but by my spirit saith the Lord of Hosts Zech. 4. 6. But the greatest conquest that can be attained over enemies while t is yet but a suffering season is by Death This Martyr followed his great Master herein Who by Death overcame him that had the power of Death the Devil Heb. 2. 14. He that conquers by killing overcomes but men he that conquers by dying overcomes the Devil His false friends conquered their enemies by killing them he tried another and the surer way of Conquest though mystical to conquer them by being killed by them He has more advantaged a good CAUSE and condemned a bad one done his honest Countrey-men more service and his enemies more disservice by his death as Sampson served the Philistines then before in all his Life though that also were very considerable If death were not the noblest most excellent and certain way of conquest would the great Captaine of our Salvation have led us that way Are we followers of that Captain unless we go the same way he went They that conquer by killing others are still subject to death themselves Yea to be killed by some remainders of those they conquered They that conquer by dying are no longer subject to death 'T is appointed unto man once to die No rage or power of man can take away this Martyrs Life the second time 'T is true Christ himself offered up supplications with strong crying and teares unto him that was able to save him from death and was heard in that he feared Heb. 5. 7. that is was delivered from the fear of Death before hand and out of the jawes of it after for it was not possible he should be holden of it Act. 2. 24. This disciple of his prayed for the same thing and he did experience and say Death shrunke from him not he from it He had experienced the good hand of God in delivering him from Deaths ofâ— and when the season was come he found that Death it self would prove the greatest deliverance that he ever had in all his life So he experienced the delivering hand of God from Death oft and by Deaâ—h once which was the accomplishment of all his former deliverances He did look Death in the face with a true chearful boldness not in a transport or dissembled courage as is usual but in a fixed composure and full vigor of all his natural senses To be thus delivered from the fear of Death is more then to be delivered from Death So to be delivered from all inordinate love of our natural Life and the concerns thereof is a greater mercy then to be gratified with a confluence of all worldly desirables All the Crowns and Scepters of this world are short of this frame of mind crucified to things seen Alexander put so great a value upon a shadow of this in Diogenes that he said Were he not Alexander he would be Diogenes The Conqueror accounted a deadness to the whole scene of outward Vanities the best condition next to the having all at command Had he not been partial he might have reckoned it better He soon after lost his world and himself together in a drunken fit at Babylon the common Rendevouz for bruitish pomp under three of the four worldly Monarchies Assyrian Persian and Greek The love of this world is enmity to God and breeds in us the fear of man that can deprive us of what we love and the fear of man brings a snare will keep us from witnessing a good confession as Christ did If we fear them that can kill the Body we shall never be bold in a good cause before wicked Judges This Patriot feared not Death and therefore did as boldly fully and clearly assert his Countries Rights and Liberties at their Bar as he had before for many years together on all occasions in the Parliament House His stedfastness in the Faith in the Covenant his constancy for the publick Interest rendered him very unsolicitous as to his own personal concerns or Life And what must all this be tearmed by his enemies This steadiness and boldness of spirit in asserting the Cause of God and these Nations to the Death which is highly esteemed of God and all good men is by his bruitish adversaries called an impudent defence of his Treason He was well steeled and made of God with Ieremy as an iron pillar and brazen walles against any impudence or treason that others could affront him with under a face of authoâ—ity He evidently preferred the Lives and Liberties of all the knowing honest-hearted people in the Nation to his own He was couragious therefore in the defence of them What thought his enemies of this Ready they were to charge him with such deportment in his Trial and on the Scaffold towards them and the king as Iob was truly charged with by Elihu against God Iob 34.37 He addeth rebellion to his sin he clappeth his hands amongst us and multiplieth his words against the King What were the words can any tell They multiplied their words against God the Laws of England and him He resisted them unto blood This was the highest demonstration of his sincerity that was possible to be given and the greatest victory over all his enemies that was possible to be obteined Cromwels victories are swallowed up of Death he has swallowed up Death it self into victory and is gone in the Charet of salvation to receive his Crown from the hands of Christ 2 Tim. 4. 7 8. which no man by any treachery or force can ever take from him He let fall his mantle left his body behind him that he had worn nine and forty years and is gone to keep his everlasting Jubile in Gods â—â—est 'T is all DAY with him now no night or sorrow more no prisons or death He is gone from a plâ—ce where so much as the righteousness of man can't be endured He is gone to a place where the righteousness of God is the universal gaâ—be of all the inhabitants He is gone to that better City the New-Ierusalem He had served his generation in his mortal Body done his work and was glad to fall a sleep and go look for his reward some where else You see what this ingrateful world has