Selected quad for the lemma: spirit_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
spirit_n	ghost_n	holy_a	lord_n	23,094	5	4.0162	3	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A56305	The church of Christ in Bristol recovering her vail out of the hands of them that have smitten and wounded her, and taken it away. Being, a just and necessary vindication, from a false and scandalous imputation cast upon her by Dennis Hollister, formerly a member of her, but now an apostate from, and an opposer of those waies, truths, and people, which once he seemed zealous for. As appears by a late pamphlet put forth by him, called, The skirts of the whore discovered. With some particular words, from some particular persons whom he hath by name abused and reproached. Likewise a word by Thomas Ewen, unto what concerns him in the said pamphlet, and also to the later part of another book, called, Satan enthroned in his chair of pestilence.	Purnell, Robert, d. 1666. aut	1657 (1657)	Wing P4232; ESTC R213966	65,602	90

godly men I did sometimes hear expressions to this effect That there was a two-fold coming of the Spirit of Christ into the hearts of Believers The first was that by which the eyes of mens understandings are opened and they turned from darkness to light Faith and Repentance wrought in the Soul conversion regeneration or the new birth effected and so he that was once a dead sinner becomes a living Saint or Believer though as yet but weak a babe in Christ c. The Second work or coming of the Spirit is that by which the Soul is sealed confirmed established filled with joy and peace in believing and fitted and furnished to every good work that God calls them whether doing or suffering c. Now this put me upon the search of the Scripture as first Ephes 1. 13. After you believed you were sealed which Scripture relates to that Acts 19. 2. Have you received the holy Spirit since you believed c. So Acts 8. 14. to 17. Samaria having received the Word of God and believed in the Lord Jesus Christ were baptized by Philip the Deacon the Church at Jerusalem or rather the Apostles sent forth Peter and John that they should pray that they might receive the holy Ghost for as yet he was not fallen upon any of them c. Another Scripture I find Joh. 7. 37 38 39. In the last day the great day of the feast Jesus stood and cryed saying If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink he that believeth on me as the Scripture hath said out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water but this spake he of the Spirit which they that believe on him should receive for the holy Ghost was not yet given because that Jesus was not yet glorified So Luke 11. 9. to 13. such as God is a Father unto are bid to pray to ask to seek and to knock c. with assurance by many Arguments that they should receive the holy Spirit So in the 14 15 16 Chapters of John our Saviour speaking to such as did believe in him love him and keep his Commandments c. he promiseth to send the Comforter unto them even the holy Spirit which the world could not receive c and to this agree many of the Prophecies both in Isa Jer. Ezek. Joel Zach. and others Now then as to the first work or coming of the Spirit namely to make a man to become a Saint a Christian a Believer a new Creature c. I never denied but alwayes affirmed that whosoever did believe in the Lord Jesus Christ or had the least beginning of a work of Grace in their Souls it was by the Spirit of God and they had the Spirit of Christ in the first sense according to Rom. 8. 9. now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his c. But in the second or latter sense namely to seal stablish fill with joy and comfort c. with many other glorious effects which the Scripture speaks of and which the Saints in the primative times did enjoy in this sense I have often said that I did question Whether I then had or whether many others in the Church had received the Spirit and to this you did then assent c. And therefore I did often press it in the Church that we might pray more for that blessed Spirit according to the command and promise of Christ Luke 11. 9. 13. as before and this is that which I have often called the great legacie of the new Testament and as Jesus Christ was the great promise of the first or old Testament so this blessed Spirit is the great promise of the second or new Testament which all believers are to wait pray and long for as the believers under the first Testament were to wait and long for the Messiah and this was my meaning when I have sometimes said That a man may be a Christian a Believer a converted Soul or a babe in Christ and not as yet have received the Spirit I mean still in this latter sense in respect of sealing establishing c. yet I neither did nor do expect the Gift of tongues or working Miracles c. neither do I find that the great promise of the Spirit was principally to that end though that was accomplished by it when and how the Lord pleased as Heb. 2. 4. with divers miracles and gifts or distributions of the holy Ghost according to his own will but I find rather that the great promise of the Spirit is for such glorious ends as these c. 1. To open and reveal the hidden Mysteries of the kingdome of heaven as Matth. 13. 11. to you it is given to know the Mysteries of the kingdom of Heaven c. So 1 Cor. 2. 9. to the 14. we read that those things which the eyes of men as men have not seen neither can the natural man perceive yet God doth reveal by his Spirit c. So it is promised in John to lead and guide into all truth therefore Eph. 1. 17. the Apostle prayes for believers that they might receive the Spirit of wisdom and revelation c. 2. To comfort and chear up poor drooping believers filling them with all joy and peace consolation and refreshment which is one main end for which it is promised as in 14 15 16 Chapters of John to which agree many of the sayings of the Prophets c. 3. To heighten and strengthen the Saints with boldness courage constancy and resolution in their Spirits to do or to suffer for God as Acts 4 8. Then Peter filled with the Holy Ghost said c. so to the 19. vers So Acts 5. 41. And they rejoyced that they were counted worthy to suffer c. which thing neither they nor Peter could do a little before as Mark 14. 50 66 to 71. But observe they had not then received the Spirit so Acts 16. 25. Paul and Silas sang in prison 4. To purge and purifie clense and sanctifie believers and make them holy as Isa 4. 3 4. so Ezek. 36. 25. to 29. Joel 3. 17. then shall Jerusalem be holy that is when the Mountains shall drop new wine and the hills flow with milk as vers 18. And the fountain come forth of the house of the Lord to water the valley of Shittim 5. To make poor dry barren empty souls to become fruitful to God and to grow in grace Isa 32. 5. until the Spirit be poured from on high and the wilderness become a fruitful field Isa 44. 3 4. I will pour my Spirt upon thy seed c. and they shall spring up c. so Hos 14. 5. I will be as the dew unto Israel and he shall grow c. 6. To fill the Saints with meekness and love yea with end cared love towards Christ and bowels of pity towards men as we see it was with the Saints in the primitive times but is much wanting now 7. To unite

nor false accusers but we must turn that back again upon your self professing to all the World that you have wronged us in what you have written against us As for the other part of your Letter wherein you sometimes flatter your self and commend your self about your righteousness faithfulness diligence and deserving as likewise how freely you had served us and been a keeper of our Vineyard and that now it is time to look to your own Vineyard and to mind your eternal habitation c. We answer first as Prov. 27. 2. Let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth a stranger and not thine own lips But we never did blame you nor admonish you for any good you did among us but for your departing from that which was good Jehu was not blamed for the good he did but because he took no heed to walk in the Law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart neither was Amaziah blamed for any good he did but because he did it not with a perfect or upright heart and as for your gift of discerning c. most of us know it was a thing you did much pretend to and boast of c. though we could observe your gross mistake therein c. And for your now looking to your own Vineyard and minding your eternal habitation c. truly we hoped you had done that when you were among us and that your care and diligence which now you speak of had been as well about your own soul as others but if it were not we wish you may make better use of your present time than you have done of that which is past As for any manifestations of truth breaking forth in you as you say page 20. at which some of our hearts burned and others were offended c. We know not any one Truth that ever you spake in the Church but it was readily assented to and seconded by those that sate by whether you did press to believing or holy walking but for other things which were not according to Scripture nor did not tend to faith or holiness c. some of us did sometimes manifest our dissent from you yet with all tenderness as knowing your spirit and the spirits of some others now with you we were not willing to offend you or them And as for that which you so often asserted in the Church and now mention page 20 21. That you did not know Christ and that that knowledge we had of him should profit us nothing and that our habitation is in deceit and through it we refuse to know the Lord c. First we did not violently oppose you in that thing as thinking that it arose from a sight and sense of the want of the Spirit of Christ to open and reveal the glory of his person virtues Offices and Mysteries more clearly unto you according to what is written Ephes 1. 17 18. Col. 2. 2. John 16. 14 15. and herein we could and did joyn with you in complaining of the littleness or smalness of our knowledg of Christ yet some of us did often tell you that our comfort stood not so much in a speculative knowing as in a believing acknowledgment of Christ to be that which he is said to be in the Scriptures and so to own him believe on him love him and obey him and therefore we did then and have since and do now declare that we owned no other Christ but that one annointed glorious person who was born of the Virgin and who is made both Lord and Christ who died rose and ascended and is now sitting at the right hand of God and is the Mediator between God and man who shall one day come again according to the Scriptures Secondly we do own no other knowing of Christ but that which is according to the Scripture namely understandingly to know him in his person without us and experimentally to know him in his Virtues or by his Spirit within us and so through grace we do know him in our measure and are waiting and praying daily for a further and clearer knowledge of him in his Virtues and powers by the revelation of his glorious Spirit according to the Scripture in the mean time we desire to acknowledge him believe on him love and reverence him as our Lord and King and do submit to his Laws and Commands lest in his Word but we did little think that your meaning had been as now you declare both in your Book and by your practice that you and we should take up that kind of notion of Christ as to call that light that is in every man both Heathens and others Christ and so to slight and nullifie that glorious person now in heaven from being the object of Faith c. as many of your way do and have done to some of our faces scoffing and jeering at us for speaking of the person of Christ and for thinking to be saved by the blood of him that died at Jerusalem and as you your self did jeeringly ask one of this Congregation to this effect whether we did believe Christ to be an old man sitting in a chair in heaven c. You further tell us page 21. That many who desired to see Christs first Appearance in the flesh became his betrayers and murderers so now in his second Appearances in life power and spirit would be found the greatest enemies to him and that some of us would betray him and then appeal to all that have any discerning to judge how sadly this is already fulfilled in us c. We grant that many did stumble at Christ when he came in the flesh and that many in all ages have stumbled at the truth and waies of Christ as likewise many do now at his person his Gospel his waies and his Ordinances c. which might put you to consider two things First whether you be not one that do so and secondly whether you be not one that have caused many to do so c. But you seem to beg the question and take it for granted that Christ is now come in life power and spirit in you and your party but truly you must give better demonstrations of it before we or any other judicious Christians will believe you for we have read much and know something by experience through grace what the sweet gentle dove-like spirit of Christ is we have seen and known by sad experience how unlike your spirit is to that Secondly how can you call this a murdering and betraying of Christ namely our sending brethren three times in love and pitie to enquire after and admonish you and the rest that departed from us we shall leave this to the Lord to determine c. As for those strange and unchristian expressions page 21. of our sporting our selves and making a wide mouth and drawing out the tongue and the hand against you c. and then calling us children of transgression a seed of falshood

reference to that seriously consider these places 2 Thes 2. 1 to 13. Rom. 14. 4 9 10 11 12 13. The Lord give you to see your wickedness in your bitter censorious spirit which sure is not small though you Ezek. 16. 1 2. Isal 30. 1. seem not to discern it but cover it with a covering that is not of Gods Spirit and so add sin to sin and the good Lord give you repentance for it you have not hurt or injured me at all by it though your self you do God hath of his infinite goodness made your hard false speeches and censorious judgings of me of good use to me though no thanks at all to you for it nor any thing but what is sad to think on can you reap from it As I have said to you somtimes upon the like occasion when you affirmed unto me that some men to wit such as then you had in admiration though for that in which they exceeded or God owns above others I never saw nor yet heard but this you affirmed to me concerning them that when they were in the light they could see what mens inward states was before God some of which as you said they saw you named to me though such as they never saw Matth. 7. 16. 19 20 1 Cor. 4. 5. Deut. 29. 22. nor yet heard of any thing visibly apparently evill by them by which man by the blessed Rule of the Scriptures of truth is to judge otherwise our rule is to judge nothing before the time until the Lord come who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts and then shal every man have praise of God My answer then to you in that affirmation concerning Isai 8. 20. 1 Cor. 4 4. Job 10 15. 2 Cor. 10. 17 18. 2 Cor. 5. 9. them was this in words or to the same effect that as I could give no credence to such assertions groundedly but contrarily had more than ground of jealousie to be suspitious they were delusions as all such things and pretended revelations be which have not the Law and the Testimony to warrant them So what if all the men in the world did approve me what is that in order to certain ground of holding up my head before God in reference to it So if all did disapprove me yet upon from such a ground as that I have a sure word certain witness of Gods approving of me I should not flagg in my Spirit nor hang down in reference to that That use besides others as to my self I have endeavoured to make of those great charges you lay upon me and if your considerations Were otherwise of me as sometimes it hath been and also of others I would not in Phil 3. 3. the least heed or give any regard to it so as to flesh my self from it Phil. 3. 3. The charges indeed that you lay upon me and send me cloathed with before the world if so indeed how sad were my condition well might my countenance be changed and my thoughts be troublesome unto me and the joynts of my loyns be loosed and my knees smite one against another as if I did inhabit deceit and devise wicked imaginations and speak lies to you and that in the name of the Lord and the like Sore charges they be wickedness of the highest degree and of the dangerousest attendance that can be But truly it is sufficient to me that under all the charges you load me with that I have alwayes a witness in heaven Rom. 8. 33 34. Psal 3. 3 4 5. Job 34. 29. and brought into my own heart from thence and confirmed unto me by the Spirit of truth which proceedeth from the Father and the Son by which I am cleared of your charges and so by that means they take no hold upon me God To wit your own private spirit and consideration 2 Pet. 1. 20 21. gives me much case under all your clamors Truly it is a very small matter to me to be judged of you I say of you who are more than apt to judg all both persons and things to be light that bears no weight in your Ballance By which Ballance I know you must not your self be weighed at the great day and appearing of the Lord Iesus but by that Ballance or Rule that who ever walk according to it peace and mercy shal be upon them the Word that John 12. 48. Christ hath spoken must judge all at that day But truly Dennis Hollister I pitie thee me thinks I could even mourn over thee in the consideration of thy being in Rev. 12 10. Luke 3. 14. Mat 12 43 44 the Divels work and imployment to wit an accuser of the brethren as I am sure thou art in thy printed Papers And for that false charge as it is altogether of my speaking lies to you in the name of the Lord. That charge of yours I know hath reference to my being as you slightly say the mouth of three Messengers sent to you by the Church to admonish you of your sins which sins of yours I am sure was obvious visible and clear Truly in order to that I knew well what I spake Mat. 28. 18. Mat. 18. 16 17 18. when I spake on that rate I did unto you I with my brethren that came with me had a Warrant sealed and given forth to us from him who hath all power given unto him in Heaven and Earth for what we did And if I may speak it without boasting as I trust I do so we did attempt it as those that God had vouchsafed that grace unto to take up into the Mount with him to confer with his Majesty by Christ about it before we did dare to attempt upon it his Majesty being pleased graciously to incline our hearts in some measure of holy reverence feare and trembling and in faith to wait upon his Majesty by Christ our Mediator and Iutercessor and we had a gracious answer from him by Christ to our very hearts about it And so we are strenthened to that work of the Lord which otherwise we had rather any had been Exod. 3. 11. Jer 6. 7 8 9 sent about than we And then we went not staggeringly nor yet ignorantly but knowingly and understandingly about it God having in some measure fitted us for it and left us not without some sure witness that he was with us in it And not any reluctancie have I or my brethren had for what we did but are fully satisfied that what ever was set upon you and laid at your door as your sin to a tittle Isal 28 17. is true and will be so found when the Lord shall lay Judgment to the Line and Righteousnesse to the Plummet and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place And whereas you say in the first line of your Letter to me that it

sought or desired by me which hath much supported my Spirit under many tryals and temptations which I have met with since But all this is little in comparison of what I have yet through grace farther to speak and that is That the Lord hath been pleased through his goodness to own me in my Work so that though I am the unworthiest in the world yet I trust I may say with a holy reverence and humble boldness that my record is on high and that God hath given me a seal of my Ministry in Bristol there being many Souls in this City that lay weltring in their bloud of ignorance and ungodliness when I came hither that are now through the riches of grace made living and pretious stones and are able to give to any man that shall ask them a clear account of the time when the place where the manner how and the word and instrument by which the Lord was pleased to turn their Souls unto himself several of which are since received into this Church and though they seem contemptible now in your eyes and in the eyes of some others yet I have good ground to believe that they are pretious in the sight of the Lord Jesus and will be found in him at his appearance Likewise I doubt not but I have a testimony in your conscience though now it seem obliterated that you have found by experience that Christ was with me in my Work and I am sure I have often heard it from your mouth if that were worth any thing c. But I trust there are hundreds in Bristol that can say That the Lord hath been and still is with my Ministry quickning comforting teaching and refreshing their Souls however you and others make it your work to traduce and reproach me casting contempt upon me to weaken my hands and sadden my Spirit and what in you and them lyeth to discourage and take off people from hearing of me you saying to one in this City That I Preach the Doctrine of Devils c. And to another That I do wors hurt to your Way than all the Preachers in Bristol Others cry me down as an Vsurper Vncalled Vnlearned Ignoramus c. And another in his late Book loads me with Scoffs Jeers 〈◊〉 c. which makes me wonder That you and they which are so different in other things yet can all agree to cast stones at me and discouragements upon me who never intended them or you any hurt c. But through grace I find this by experience That all your and their labour as to this particular is in vain for the more you and they strive to beat me down and to cast me out of the hearts of the people the more room the Lord gives me in them and the more prosperous and successful I trust and some think my work is among them through the help grace and goodness of my dear Lord Jesus I write this with lowliness and humility without boasting or vanity to the praise of God and to the stoping the mouth of envie c. It is true I am no Preacher of that thing which you and some of your way call the Gospel namely To bid every man turn to a Light within him neither did I ever read or hear that any of the Prophets Apostles or holy men of God did preach such a Gospel c. But that Gospel of good newes and glad tydings which Jesus Christ gives commission and commanded to be published and preached to all Nations and to every creature that Gospel I preach and you have sometimes born witness to me therein though now your testimony be vailed even the Gospel of the grace of God as Acts 20. 24. wherein the everlasting love grace and good-will of God in Christ is freely published and declared to poor lost and one sinners and the way to eternal life by Jesus Christ through Faith in his bloud and righteousness c. this Gospel I preach pressing all that receive it to give up themselves to Christ in love and obedience according to the scope and tenor of the Gospel But the great Argument by which you would prove me to be no Minister of the Gospel is my speaking as you say in the second branch of your title page of having Sarah Latchet whipt and sent to Bridwel c. Now that the Reader may be informed and you if possible convinced of your weakness and folly in publishing this thing I shall here faithfully relate the truth of that story This Sarah Latchet was sometime a Member with the Baptized people in Bristol but Apostatizing from them was Excommunicated by them and so doth seem to have the greater hatred to and rage against the truth wayes and people of Christ this Sarah Latchet being one of the fiercest sort of the people who call themselves Quakers hath come several times to disturbe us in our Meetings I shall mention three times especially First Once in the publick Place after Sermon was done she fell a rayling at me as their manner is with fierce and cruel words at which time she was only turned out of the place and nothing done to her Secondly Another time the Church being assembled to break Bread and to celebrate the Lords Supper this Sarah Latchet came into the place I having spoken to the Church a word of Exhortation in reference to that Ordinance and addressing my self to administer it to the Church this Sarah Latchet came rushing up towards the Table and in the face of me with a loud shrill voice began thus O thou deceiver the plagues of the eternal God c. I spake not a word to her but desired the Church to be still in their spirits and to mind the work in hand one of our Brethren stept forth and took her by the arm and led her to the door and put her forth and this was all the hurt she had at that time Thirdly Another time the Church being assembled at the usual time and place of Meeting one of our Brethren being in Prayer as soon as ever he had done she being present in the room did again with a loud shrill voice begin thus The Prayers of the wicked are abomination to the Lord c. and so ran on a long time with railing menacing dreadful expressions wher upon I did endeavour to stop her by casting in some words but it would not be she still continued to heap up and threaten plagues and judgements against us then I went near thinking to speak a word to her but she let flee at me with a multitude of rayling reviling terms such as they use to give to the Ministers of the Nation and that in such a fierce and furious manner as hardly any Scould in the street could parrallel whereupon I spake these words or to this effect That it were fitter such an idle Huswife as she was should be whipt and sent to Bridwel to work than to go about railing at people as she did

And when I had spoken these words I went from her and she went her way and never was questioned nor punished for any of these abuses and those words I spake but once to her and this was all I did and the occasion of it upon which you build your great structure concluding that I am no Minister of the Gospel but a Persecutor of the truth c. as in your large Letter to me thereupon you declared and that now in the title page of your Pamphlet you proclaim to the Nation c. but I wish you lay a better foundation for your other buildings lest you prove a foolish builder Now I would ask you a few sober Questions First How comes it to pass that you can stile Sarah Latchet a Servant of Jesus and publish her so to the world who is an Apostate and an Excommunicate person going on in such a rayling reviling fierce manner as hath been now declared and as divers witnesses can prove whereas there are many pretious Servants of Jesus and Saints of the most High now living in England and Bristol that have been known to walk with God for many years in uprightness their foot having held its steps and not declined from the good wayes of the Lord neither gone back from the Commandments of his lips but have esteemed his words before their appointed food and have stood fast in the worst of Times and sorest of Tryals c. and yet they must be censured judged condemned and cryed out against by you as if they were the vilest Persons on earth and all because they cannot close in with you and your way c. Secondly How durst you in your Conscience say That those raylings revilings cursings and lies c. which she uttered are a testifying from the Lord Do you not blush to name or write such a word Will Jehovah the great and glorious God of Heaven and Earth ever own such raylings revilings c. to be a testifying from him Or will he ever justifie you in what you have here written and published to the world O be ashamed and confounded poor deceived man Thirdly How will you bring both ends of your Parallel together you endeavour in your Letter to parallel Sarah Latchet with Paul and Sarah Latchet 's sufferings with Paul 's sufferings and me with Paul 's Persecutors Now then let me a little examine your Parallel 1. Paul the Apostle of Jesus Christ having received a Commission from heaven doth accordingly preach and publish the glorious Gospel of the grace mercy and love of God in Christ to poor sinners and likewise sets forth the Lord Jesus in his person virtues and offices inviting and beseeching with all love and tenderness those where ever he came to receive this grace and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ c. And Sarah Latchet comes forth rayling reviling cursing c. Ergo Sarah Latchet and Paul are alike 2. After Paul had with meekness and love tendred the grace of God and the person and vertues of Jesus Christ the Saviour as before some did rise up against him beat him stone him imprison him and whip him so that five times he received forty strips save one with many other fore and cruel abuses as you mention in your Letter out of 2 Cor. 1. c. And Sarah Latchet after she had rayled reviled and pronounced curses against people it was said to her It were fitter such an idle Huswife were sent to Bridwel Ergo Sarah Latchets sufferings and Pauls sufferings are both alike c. 3. Pauls Persecutors after they had heard the pretions glad-tydings of the Gospel and the report of Jesus Christ made unto them as before did actually take and cruelly beat stone whip and imprison Paul c. And I after I had been revised rayled upon c. said of Sarah Latchet it were fitter she were whipt and sent to Bridwel Ergo Pauls Persecutors and I were both alike and under the same condemnation c. Is this good Logick May not all that read your lines read your folly c. But to go on Fourthly Will you ask your Conscience this question Did you not publish and set forth this thing to wit of my not being a Minister of the Gospel c. to lay me if you could under contempt and scorn both in the City and Nation though you know in what sence and upon what ground I had denyed the title and dignity of a Minister as I have before declared but you knowing that this was a nail that would go and therefore you strick here and was not this such another piece of envie and hypocrisie as poor Mris. Prince did manifest when she came to rayl at me and reproach me at my Lecture at Nicholas when in her Conscience she durst not object against any thing that was delivered though it were often put to her by me but instead thereof after much bitter revilings against me called to the People and bid them to beware of me for she had heard me say I had not the Spirit of God c. Now suppose this had been true That I had at any time uttered my complaint to her or any others in the sadness and bitterness of my soul when under temptation as the Lord knows what sad hours and dark dayes I have passed through since I came to Bristol though you and many others little observed it or enquired after it but suppose I say I had uttered my complaint to her as she and many others have done to me was it a Christian-like part in her to publish this in the face of a Congregation many of which might be apt enough to take up a prejudice against me c. would you or she or any other think it either honesty christianity ingenuity civility or humanity in me if I should publish to the world what you or she or they have at any time uttred to me as a matter of grief burden trouble sadness affliction or temptation that lay upon your or their spirits now both you and she also knew full well the sad complaints of my soul under the sense of my own weakness the fore and terrible temptations that I encountred with the greatness and weightiness of my work the many eyes that were upon me and the great dishonour that would have come to the name of Christ if I should have miscarried in my work which made me to see the necessity and prize the excellency and long for the supplies of the Spirit of Christ and often to complain of that small measure I apprehend I had of it c. But Secondly Both you and she and some others know in your Consciences that there was another ground upon which and another sense in which I had sometimes questioned whether I and many other Christians had yet received the Spirit which for the Readers information end my own vindication I shall now declare When I lived in London and sate under the Ministry of some choice

the Saints more together in judgement and affection into one heart and one way as the Scripture speaks 8. To make them more exact and spiritual in the use and practise of all Gospel Ordinances as Acts 2. 41. to 47. 9. To beautifie and adorn Christians with every spiritual gift and grace as Gall. 5. 22. Ezek 16. 10 11 12 13. 10. To fill them with a mighty Spirit of Faith and Prayer as the Saints in the primitive times after the pouring forth of the Spirit had In a word it is a Christians All for by it he can do all things as Phil. 1. 19. 4. 13. and without it he can do nothing well as John 15. 5. Without me ye can do nothing And thus I have declared my judgment fully about this blessed truth and what I mean by the pouring forth of the glorious Spirit which I so often mention in prayer and preaching as the great legacy privilege and portion of the Saints or believers in the New Testament c. Now then let me ask you this Question Whether it had not been better for you and those that are gone away with you that you had set your selves solemnly to seek the Lord by Supplication and Prayer and so have continued in the wayes and under the Ordinances of Christ waiting for that blessed spirit as many of the Servants of God have done and still do c. rather than to have taken up a Notion of a Light in every man and call that the eternal Spirit as some of your way do and then jeer and scoff at them that pray for the Spirit and reproach them which complain out of their sense of the want of it as poor Mris. Prince did when she came to revile me at my Lecture c. But blessed be the Lord there are many Churches in England and Wales that are now wrestling with the Lord day after day joyntly and day and night singly in the deep sense of their wants for the accomplishment of that glorious new-Testament promise and such an Answer is already given to some both Independant and Baptized as you call them that they have no cause to repent of the time they have set apart for that work and I verily believe That if the people whom you and others so much despise go on and continue praying as now they do for the pouring forth of the blessed Spirit there will shortly be such a breaking forth of the day of Christ that all the antichristian foggs of false doctrins and false worships will flie and fall as the darkness before the rising Sun And Oh that some men in England and Bristol that are now wrangling and quarrelling about their humane learning and scoffing and envying those that have it not would seriously consider this thing before their lamp go out in obscurity and their feet stumble upon the dark mountains before their arm be dried up and their eye utterly darkned c. Now before I part with this I will also clear my self about another expression that I have sometimes used and at which many have been offended and that is about an old and a new Testament Spirit though of late to avoid offence have forbore it now by those expressions I did not mean nor intend the Spirit of God so as to call that an old Testament Spirit for I know that Spirit was one and the same from everlasting but by an old or new-Testament Spirit 1. I mean the frame and temper of a mans own Spirit and so by an old-Testament Spirit I alwayes mean that dark weak childish and low frame and temper of Spirit which professors generally had in the time of the old Testament while under the Mosaical administration with that bondage and fear that weakness and sadness that did accompany it c. 2. By a new-Testament Spirit I alwayes mean that lively chearful active joyful bold son-like frame and temper of Spirit which the Saints generally in the primitive times under the new Testament did enjoy which is called a Spirit of Adoption as the other is called a Spirit of Bondage a full description of what I mean is set forth in two Scriptures as namely Gal. 4. from the 1. to the 7. and Heb. 12. from 18 to 24. In which two Scriptures is set forth First The weakness darkness childishness fear bondage c. of the old-Testament state which is that that I call the frame temper or spirit of the old-Testament And Secondly There is set forth the light life strength boldness comfort courage joy rejoycing of the new-Testament state which is that that I call the frame temper or Spirit of the new Testament c. And whether Christians be not generally more under the old-Testament frame than under the new I leave to their experiences and thus I have fully declared my self as to these two particulars and if any sober Christian into whose hands this may come shall apprehend that I am mistaken in either of them I shall be glad to receive a word from them in love but I do not expect it from you to whom I now write c. You farther tell me in your Letter that you were warned from invisible lights some months past to beware of me which you could not believe till now it breaks out like fire c. I conceive those invisible lights were some secret whisperers that did bring you many stories both of me and others c. but truly I could discern by visible light long before you left us that my speaking was but little acceptable to you and some others especially after I did begin to oppose your spleen and passion though whilst I sate still and silently approved of what you spake then I was the excellentest man that ever you met with you would often both to my face and behind my back applaud and extol me but when once I began a little to cross you as many others of the Brethren did and as some godly men had formerly done as they saw cause enough then you and your partie began to fume and fret and as it was often observed to go out of the Meetings when I had been to speak though I did oppose you with all the tenderness that possibly I could as knowing what a partie you had in the Church and what influence you had upon them but now you say the fruits doth appear and break out like fire c. Q. And what is it But that I should say That such an idle Huswife as is before mentioned should be sent to Bridwel rather than to go rayling about as she did Now I appeal to all Christians upon the face of the earth what hurt this was to this poor rayling cursing fierce creature c. Q. And was this the ground upon which some of your company spread it about the Country and place of my nativity what a persecutor I was become so that the good people there that had known me to be of another temper did wonder

learned and godly that are of my judgement in this particular so as to hold communion with persons differing in that point and so I do administer the Lords Supper to this people in Bristol as they are a Church of godly sober Christians believing in Christ though some of them mis-baptized yet none of them deny the Ordinance of Christ onely some of them have not light to see the right Administration of it but reckon their Infant Baptism sufficient yet as further light comes in they are willing to walk up to it in the mean time we can bear with them in love as we desire them and others to bear with us in other things As for that mis-construed passage in my Lecture about dry breasts which he applies to Infant Baptism c. 1 I deny that ever I spoke those words in such terms 2. Much less to that sense but I have often prayed against that sore judgement threatned Hosea 9. 14. and that I might not have a miscarrying womb so as not to bring any soul to Christ by conversion or dry breasts so as not to feed or refresh any poor thirsty soul that comes to wait upon God in his Ordinances as I fear it is with many Congregations in England and this was the substance and sense of what I spake though as for Infant-Baptism I have declared and do declare my dislike of it yet so as not to judge or condemn any godly man that thinks he hath Warrant to do it c. And whereas he saith That the professed thorow-paced Anabaptists leave me and would not joyn with me and therefore commends them that they are true to their principles and do not juggle implying that I am not so but do juggle c. Truly I know no thorow ●ac'd godly man either Anabaptist or others in Bristol but do shew love and respect to me in their way onely in this they walk according to their light and so do I but they think I am too large in my Principles and I think they are too strait in theirs yet we do not differ but can bear with each other in love though for my juggling or dis-ingenuity I pass not to be judged by him c. though I know it would please him better if I were of a furious impetuous violent spirit so as to break all in pieces and set the Citie and this Church in a flame and thereby make my self to be abhorred of all both good and bad but I trust as the Lord hath so he will graciously give me a more sober sweet spirit to walk tenderly towards all and to do good to all And truly I can say through grace that I do not love any man the more or less for his judgments sake whether he be Presbyterian Independent Baptized c. But where ever I see the Image of Christ appear which is love and holiness there I desire to love and honor And for his large Parentheses from page 52. to page 55. wherin he makes an Apologie for his bitterness passion as he had need enough to do and then closes with a proposal that if we will but acknowledge his Ministery Churches and Ordinances to be according to the Institutions of Christ and such as with whom we will hold communion then he will write a Retractation c. I answer let him first but prove that they are so and then we will soon acknowledge it but till then though he be so wise as to propse it we shall not be so foolish as to grant it c. And as for his Marginall Note upon page 55 about our being thought to own their Ministery because we hear some of them Truly I think he had need not speak of that for few of us do hear him or intend it till he be of another temper yet I do not refuse to hear any sober godly man though I must needs say I have but little comfort in or incouragement to the hearing of some who are so often venting their passion and bitterness c. The next thing concerning me is pag. 55. where he layes an accusation against me and the Society with whom I walk that we neglected for a long time the Declarations of his Highness for solemn meetings c. whereby he endevours if he could to render me and this Church obnoxious in the eyes of the Governours of England but through mercy the chief Magistrate and chief Governours of this Common-wealth have more wisdom and grace than to hearken to such accusations especially from men of his temper but if I were so wicked and void of ingenuity as to go about to accuse men for such neglects I might find matter enough to write and publish against my neighbours but I abhor and detest such an envious and unworthy spirit c. But I do not remember that ever this Church neglected one such meeting neither did I ever omit above once or twice at the most preaching publickly as I durst appeal to the whole Citie to bear me witness but suppose I had upon the change of the Government being scrupled or dissatisfied so as to omit once or twice preaching are there none in England or Bristoll have done the like and is it the part of a Minister to rake up old Stories to present to the ears of the Magistrate and to publish to the Nation to incense them against a person or people that live peaceably under are subject unto and make supplication for those that are in authority as the Scriptures require Titus 3. 1. 1 Tim. 2. 1 2. and as we are well known to do c. I shall say no more but the Lord rebuke the Spirit of Envie c. As for many other things in his Book both concerning me and the Church with whom I walk as first his jeering at our cutting out Churches according to our fancied primitive patern and our being mar'd in the shaping c. wherein he pleaseth himself and men like himself And secondly his gross mistake in laying the blame of all the mischief the Quakers have done in Bristoll with many other evils and falsities to the charge of this poor Congregation some of whom bave stood as much and born as full a testimony against the principles and practices of those miserable deluded people as ever he hath done and perhaps to better purpose c. Now as for his large and unlearned Discourse about an ungodly learned man being fitter to preach than a godly man that wanteth onely human learning in respect of divers Tongues as likewise his supposed insufficiency of the Spirit of Christ to furnish and accomplish fit and enable men to that work c. I shall not undertake to answer every particular that he asserts about this matter from pag. 62. to pag. 66. Onely if I might be thought worthy to inform such a man as he is or any other of his mind I should advise them to take heed of grating upon jerking against slighting or undervaluing of

that blessed Spirit of the Lord Jesus in any of its Offices operations effects or different administrations in and among the People or Church of God I say I should advise them to take heed lest when God sets the solitary in families the rebellious dwell in a dry land and whilst some are like trees planted by the waters never ceasing to yeild their fruit others be like the Heath in the Desart that should not see when God cometh but inhabite the parched places in the wilderness For all the Trees of the field shall know that the Lord can bring down the high Tree and exalt the low Tree he can dry up the green Tree and make the dry Tree to flourish yea and by the pouring forth of the Spirit from on high can make the Wilderness become a fruitful Field and the fruitful Field to be counted for a Forrest as Ezek. 17. 24. Isa 32. 15. He layes it upon some as a reproach page 62. That we teach by the Spirit c. I desire humbly to acknowledge and attribute it unto the blessed Spirit of Christ that I have at any time been or now am enabled in any measure to speak or publish any truth of God either to the conversion of sinners or to the edification or consolation of the Saints and People of God and truly if this man do not lean and depend upon the help of the Spirit in his work of preaching I shall not much wonder if his Ministry prove as I have sometimes said or feared many mens have done as a miscarrying Womb and dry breasts notwithstanding all their great learning of which they seem to boast He further demands page 62. whether all that have the Spirit can teach publickly c. First if by teaching publickly he mean preaching and publishing what God hath done for them and likewise declaring to others what the Lord hath taught them c. Then I answer it is the duty of all Christians so to do 1 Pet. 4. 10. As every man hath received the gift so let him minister the same c. as Eldad and Medad did Numb 11. though one man envitd and another complained as some do now yet Moses the man of God he approved of it c. But secondly if by preaching publickly he mean a publick and solemn undertaking the work of preaching c. Then I answer I do not think that every one that hath the Spirit of Christ in him or the work of grace in his soul is fit to be a publick Preacher for there are diversities of gifts and differences of administrations as appears 1 Cor. 12. 4. to the 11. Yet where the Spirit of God hath fitted any and the People of God that know them well do see them fit and judge them fit and approve of them publickly calling them thereunto these may be fit to teach publickly at lest to their own Nation as the 70 Disciples were Luke 10. 1. though they had no gifts of Tongues as we read of no more than the twelve Apostles had during the time of their preaching to their own Nation before the Assention of Christ and that they were to preach to all Nations according to their second Commission Matt. 28. Mark 16. yet I do not in the least slight despise or undervalue learning nor learned men that have grace with it and do not scornfully trample upon them that want it but to say that no man may preach without it is to make a law where Christ hath made none for the seventy Disciples and twelve Apostles did preach long before the day of Pentecost c. He likewise demands who will step forth and tell him and not lie that the Spirit doth teach them to understand the meaning of the word Justification or Adoption c. I answer if none but such as can speak Greek and Latin can understand what Justification and Adoption is c. how then can any that have not Greek or Latin believe they are justified or adopted seeing that it is another Maxim in the Schools that no man can believe more than he doth understand But surely those Souls that have been first enlightened by the Word and Spirit of Christ to see and know their lost condition while under sense of condemnation and hath also been led by the same Spirit through the Word of grace to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with all ther hearts and by his pretious blood to see themselves freed from condemnation and in his righteousness to be made righteous aod so to find the comfort of it in some measure in their own souls they can speak of it to the praise of God and to the edification of others and that by the help and assistance of the same blessed Spirit yea perhaps more sensibly feelingly plainly and profitably than the most learned Doctor in the world that knows it onely speculatively by learning reading and studying As for that scornful word unlettered which he doth so often use and cast as a reproach upon some men c. I answer truly some of us do know our Letters as well and can put them together into Syllables and Sentences as right and pronounce them as distinct and plain perhaps as himself but I shall not ad to this onely conclude with Prov. 3. 34. Surely the Lord scorneth the scorner and giveth grace to the lowly And I desire seriously to weigh and to commend to all sober Christians those words of the Apostle 1 Cor. 1. from 19. to 29. and Chap. 2. from 1. to 15. and Chap. 3. 18 19 20. by all which it appears the great Apostle of Christ was of another mind than this man seems to be He demands page 65. what an unlettered Teacher or Ignoramus would say if he were to discourse with a Papist or an Adversary about Justification c. Truly I would say this if any should out of pride curiosity and vain confidence run without a call to discourse with an Adversary Papists or others about that or any other point of Christianity c. he might expect that the Lord might justly leave him to himself and so he might betray or shame the truth and so might it be with the most learned Teacher in the world But secondly if a godly man were providentially or clearly called to maintain or defend that or any other truth of God against an Adversary Papist or others he going in the fear of the Lord and in a sense of self-insufficiency in faith and hope of the presence and assistance of the grace and Spirit of Christ he might expect according to his promise Matt. 10. 9. Take no thought for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak And verse 20. For it is not ye which speak but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you And how truly was this fulfilled in the Martyrs both in plain Country-men and also Women yea young Youths and Mayds who discoursing about points of Christian Religion