TENDER Counsel and Advice By Way of EPISTLE To all those who are Sensible of their DAY of VISITATION And who have Received the Call of the Lord By the Light and Spirit of his SON in their Hearts to partake of the Great Salvation wherever scattered throughout the World Faith Hope and Charity which overcome the World be multiplied among you By William Penn. The Second Edition LONDON Printed and Sold by T. Sowle near the Meeting-house in White-Hart-Court in Gracious-Street 1695. TENDER Counsel and Advice By Way of EPISTLE To all those who are sensible of the DAY of their Visitation c. My Dearly Beloved Friends WHO are sensible of the Day of your Visitation by the Light of the Lord Jesus in your Hearts and who have gladly received the holy Testimony thereof by which you have beheld the great Apostasy that is in the World from the Life Power and Spirit of God and the gross Degeneracy that is amongst those called Christians from the Purity Self-denial and holy Example of Christ Jesus and his Primitive Followers and how Pride Lust and Vanity reign and how Christendom is become a Cage of Vnclean Birds Who have mourned under the sence thereof and have cried in your Souls How long how long how long O Lord God holy and true will it be ere thou takest to thy self thy great power and reignest To whom the World is become a burden and the Vanities and Glory of it but vexation of Spirit Who despise the things that are seen which are Temporal for the sake of the things that are not seen which are Eternal Whose Eyes look through and beyond Time and Mortality to that Eternal City whose Builder and Maker is God Whose daily Cries and Travails are to follow Jesus in the way of Regeneration to live as Pilgrims in this World for the sake of that Glory which shall hereafter be revealed that can never fade away that you may attain unto the Eternal Rest of God To you my dear Friends to you it is that the God and Father of him that was dead and is alive and liveth for evermore Christ Jesus the faithful and true Witness who hath loved and visited my Soul hath now moved upon my Spirit to write and visit you with this Epistle Receive it then and with it the endeared Salutation of that Love and Life which are not of this World but overcome the World Great and frequent are my Travails for you that you may persevere and not faint but endure to the end that you may obtain that glorious Salvation and Redemption that is in Christ Jesus Yea for this are my Knees bended before the God of the Spirits of all Flesh that you may be entirely kept that you may so run as you may obtain and so fight as you may overcome that an Immortal Crown and Kingdom may be your Portion when all Sins and Sorrows shall be done away And that this you may do hear my Exhortation to you in the Spirit of Truth Dwell in the sense that God hath begotten in your Hearts by the Light and Spirit of his Son who is now in his Son in you reconciling you unto himself Watch that this blessed sense be preserved in you and it will preserve you For where the holy sense is lost Profession even of the highest Truths cannot preserve against the Enemies Assaults but the Gates of Hell will prevail against them and the Enemy's Darts will wound them and they will be carried again Captive by the Power of his Temptations Wherefore I say again live and abide in that Light and Life which hath visited you and begotten an holy sense in your Hearts and which hath made Sin exceeding sinful to you and you weary and heavy-laden under the burden of it And hath raised in you a Spiritual Travail Hunger and Thirst after your Saviour that he might deliver you that ye might be filled with the Righteousness of his Kingdom that is without end Dear Friends God hath breathed the Breath of Life in you and in measure you live for dead Men and Women do not Hear or Hunger or Thirst neither do they feel Weights and Burdens as you do The Day of the Lord is dawned upon you and it burneth as an Oven you know it and all Works of Iniquity are as Stubble before it You feel it so they cannot stand before the Lord His Judgments take hold of them and consume them O love his Judgments that with those of Old you may say In the way of thy Judgments O Lord have we waited for thee the desire of our Soul is to thy Name and to the remembrance of thee With our Souls have we desired thee in the Night yea with our Spirits within us will we seek thee early For when thy Judgments are in the Earth the Inhabitants of the World will learn righteousness Part part with all My dear Friends that is for Judgment let him arise in your Hearts that his and your Enemys may be scattered That you may witness Him to be stronger in you then he that is in the World If the desire of your Soul be to his Name and the remembrance of him you will love his Judgments and abide there the days he alloweth for your purification Behold his blessed Visitation is upon you His Angel hath Saluted you and his holy Spirit hath overshadowed you he hath begotten holy desires in you I pray that they may never be extinguisht and that you may never faint Wherefore look to Jesus that is the Author that he may be the Finisher I Testify for God he has appeared to you yea he hath said to you as to Andrew Philip c. follow me And I say unto you follow him Come and see where he dwelleth do not lose Sight of him let him be lifted up in you and your Eye be to him Who whereever he is lifted up draweth all such after him And this is the reason why People are not now drawn after Christ because he is not lifted up in their Hearts he is not exalted in their Souls he is Rejected Opprest Crucified and Buried yea they have Rowled a Stone upon him and set Guards that he should not rise in them to Judge them But blessed are you whose Eyes have seen one of the days of the Son of Man Blessed are you at whose Doors he hath knocked to whose Heart he hath appeared who have received his holy Visitation who believe it is he and not another and therefore have said in your Hearts with Nathaniel of old thou art the Son of God thou art the King of Israel and with Thomas my Lord and my God O what have you my dear Friends to do but to keep with him for ever For whither should you go the words of Eternal Life dwell with him He is full of Grace and full of Truth and of his Fulness ye have received Grace for Grace And this is that Grace which bringeth Salvation to all that receive it
and joyn with their Sacrifices For all these things greatly help to extinguish the Divine sense begotten in your Hearts by the word of Life And as you are faithful to the Light and Spirit of Christ which giveth you to discern and relish between that which standeth in your own will and the will motion of the Spirit of God in your selves so will you by the same Light discern and savour between that which proceeds from the will of Man and the will and motions of the Spirit of God in others and accordingly either to have or not to have fellowship with them For what hath Light to do with Darkness Or what hath Spirit to do with Flesh Or what hath Life to do with Death For the Grave cannot Praise thee O Lord Death cánnot celebrate thee They that go down into the Pit cannot hope for thy Truth The Living the Living he shall praise thee as doth my Soul this day This was the Testimony of the blessed Prophet Esaiah and it standeth true for ever According to the Prophet Thou hast ordained peace for us for thou hast wrought all our works in us Wherefore I exhort you in the Spirit of Truth and in the Counsel of the God of Truth keep in the Divine Sense and Watch if you would endure to the end in the will of God And I say again Touch not with Man-made Ministrys nor Man-made Worships let their words be never so true 'T is but Man 't is but Flesh 't is but the Will and it shall have no acceptance with God O this is the Golden Cup of the Whore that is gone from the leadings of the Spirit with which the Nations are defiled have nothing to do with it Keep to Christ Jesus God's great Light follow him as he shineth in your Hearts and ye will not walk in Darkness but have the Light of Life not of death to Condemnation as in the World but unto Life which is Justification and Peace And remember that nothing bringeth to Christ that cometh not from Christ Wherefore all Ministry that cometh not from Christ God's great Prophet and High Priest to all true-born Christians cannot bring People to Christ Man only gathereth to Man to hear and believe in Man and depend on Man And if the Church of Corinth sought a proof of Christ's speaking in Paul that had begotten them and had wrought the Signs and Works of an Apostle in them how much more reason have you to demand a proof of Christ's speaking in the Priests and Ministers of this World who have not wrought the Signs and Works of Apostles or true Ministers And by what should you try them but by the Light and Spirit of Christ in you Yea 't is Christ Jesus in you that giveth you to savour if others speak from Christ in them And this the Apostle referreth the Corinthians to for a proof of Christ's speaking in him For nothing leadeth to God but that which came from God even Christ Jesus the Son of God O let him be your Vine and know him to be your Fig-tree Sit under his holy Teachings whose Doctrine shall drop as Myrrh upon your Souls He will feed you with the Bread of God that cometh from Heaven that feedeth and leadeth them thither that feed upon it And He is that Bread Therefore wait and watch unto his daily and hourly Visitations to your Souls and against all the Approaches of the Enemy that so he may not take you at unawares but that you may be preserved from the power of his Darts and the force of his Temptations by the Holy Armour of Light the defence of the faithful Antients If you be willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the Land Now is your Day now is your Time work while the light is with you for the Night cometh in which none can work Not only the Night of Eternal Darkness to the Wicked but the Night of Death unto all For in the Grave there is no Repentance neither can any Man there work the Works of God You know the Foundation Is he Elect Is he Precious to you Have ye chosen him Yea I am satisfied you have See what you build upon him Have a care of Hay Straw and Stubble Have a care of your own Wills and Spirits Labour not for the Bread that perisheth as all the Bread of Man's-making doth But labour you in the Light and Strength of the Lord for the Bread that never perisheth that Bread that cometh from Heaven that nourisheth the Soul in that Life that is heavenly that is hid with Christ in God the Root and Father of all Life that of this Fountain you may drink that is clear and pure that cometh from the Throne of God and of the Lamb and not of the muddy Puddle of Man's Invention There is a Bread that perisheth and there is a Drink that perisheth and Wo to them that feed thereon for their Souls shall perish also if they Repent not But there is a Bread that never perisheth and there is a Fountain that springeth up unto Eternal Life and Blessed are they that Feed and Drink thereof for they shall have Eternal Life with God This is that which only satisfieth what is Born of God it will feed on no other Bread nor drink of no other Water I cannot but warn you all that are come to the Lord's Day that you cease from all other Food from Man and Man's Will and Invention for that stifleth the Divine Sense that overlayeth and killeth this Heavenly Birth There are no Grapes to be gathered of Thorns nor Figs of Thistles Keep to your own Vine and Fig-tree Christ Jesus sit under him that you may eat of his Fruit which is the fruit of Life the hidden Manna hid from the Nature and Spirit of this World a Mystery thereunto Two things consider first you must wait till the Manna cometh and then you are not to be idle you are to work and next as it daily cometh so it must be daily gathered and fed upon For the Manna that was gather'd yesterday will not be Food for to day it will not keep for that use As it was outwardly so 't is inwardly Time past is none of thine 'T is not what thou wert but what thou art God will be daily look'd unto Didst thou eat yesterday That feedeth thee not to day Therefore Jesus taught his Disciples and us in them to pray for our daily Bread for the present sustenance and to look no farther but depend upon the Lord and live by Faith in him that raised up Jesus from the Dead so that the time to come is no more ours than the time past can be recalled Wherefore Blessed are they that fear the Lord and confide in him they shall never be confounded They shall lack no good thing for the Lord loveth Israel he is good unto Israel and all that are of an upright Heart whose Hearts look up to Heaven and not down to the
prevail to draw out the Mind from its sensible Habitation to embrace his Representations of old Lusts and Pleasures that are wicked in themselves he will present you with lawful Objects your outward Enjoyments Business and Calling and steal in upon your Minds in the Croud of these Lawful things and there lay his Snares hid and covered and at unawares catch you My Dear Friends Blessed are they that see Jesus their Captain going before them and counselling and leading them in all their outward and lawful Concerns that they offend not For my Friends this know you may unlawfully think of lawful things either in thinking on them unseasonably mark that when your Souls should be wholly retired and exercised in the Lord's Light to feel his presence in which is Heavenly Life Or in thinking on lawful things carelesly not with regard to your Guide he that hath bought you throughout with his own precious Blood that he might have the Government of your Bodies Souls and Spirits that is of your Bodily concerns as well as of the things relating to your Souls and Spirits This prevents much harm and mischief in Business and Families and preserveth the Divine Sense that God hath begotten and the Creature in it So that its Fellowship and Peace with the Lord runneth as a River it is not stopt or hindred by the designs of the Enemy Or lastly in thinking on lawful things excessively too much more than is needful without limits thereby gratifying the fleshly Mind which is Enmity with God and that Sense which he begetteth in the Soul O the Mountains that are raised by such vain Thoughts betwixt God and the Soul How doth the Soul come under an Eclipse lose sight and at last all Sense of the Living God like Men drowned in great Waters And thus many have lost their Condition and grown unsensible and then questioned all former Experiences if they were not meer Imaginations till at last they arrived at Atheism denying and deriding God and his Work and those that kept their Integrity For whom is reserved the Blackness of Darkness for ever unless they timely and truly Repent But when this subtle Enemy of Man's Salvation seeth that he cannot make you bow to the Glory of this World that all his Snares that he layeth in the things that are seen which are Temporal are discover'd and broken and that your Eyes are directed to those things that are Eternal then will he turn Accuser He will aggravate your Sins and plead the impossibility of their Remission He will seem to act the Advocate for the Justice of God that he might cast you into Despondency that you may doubt of Deliverance and Salvation Many are the Thoughts with which he perplexeth the Sons and Daughters of Men But this know that he was a Liar from the beginning For the Lord doth not visit the Souls of any to destroy them but to save them For this end hath he sent his Son a Light into the World and they that bring their Deeds to it are not of the Devil who hateth the Light Neither doth the Lord cause People to Hunger and Thirst after him and not fill them with his good things Be assured my Friends where ever the Lord hath begotten Desires after him and where ever Sin is become exceeding sinful yea a burden to the Soul the Devil's Kingdom is shaken the Prince of this World is begun to be Judged and God is at Work for the Redemption of that Soul Hearken not to the Voice of the Serpent for that lost your first Parents their blessed Paradise And with the same Subtle and Lying Spirit he would hinder you from returning into Paradise But when he is herein disappointed he shifteth his temptation and presenteth another temptation viz. that though you have begun well yet ye will never be able to hold out to the end That the Temptations are so many and the Enemys so strong they are not to be overcome by you and that it were better never to profess such high things than to fall short of them this will but bring Reproach to the way and the People of it Again that 't is Curiosity and Spiritual Pride and Conceitedness for you to be thought better then others with the like Suggestions on purpose to stagger your Resolutions and weaken your Faith Ah! he is a Devil still a Liar and a Destroyer Look not to him but to Jesus who hath called you Keep but your Eye to him of whom the Brazen Serpent in the Wilderness was a Figure and he shall Cure you of all Diseases of all Wounds and Stingings of Serpents and Scorpions c. that may attend you in the Wilderness-travail which is the hour of your Temptation God is exalting him in you a Saviour therefore is he manifested viz. to destroy Sin Yea stronger is he that is in you than he that is in the World He is able to bind the strong Man and cast him out do but believe truly in him and cleave to him Remember there were evil Spies of old those that brought false nitelegence that Canaan was a pleasant Land but the Way impassible but the Faithful Enter'd and Inherited Keep therefore in the righteous Life of Jesus and walk in his holy Light and you shall be preserved through all exercises and difficulties unto the Eternal Canaan the Land of rest Neither Wonder at these things that temptations attend you or that the Lord tryeth and proveth you it is the way of all that are gone to God For even Jesus was tempted and tryed and is therefore become our Captain because he overcame Neither be ye cast down because the Lord sometimes seemeth to hide his Face from you that you feel not allways that Joy and Refreshment that you sometimes enjoy I know what work the Enemy maketh of these withdrawings of the Lord. Perhaps he will insinuate that God hath deserted you in his displeasure that you must never expect to see him that he will never come again And by these and the like strategems he will endeavour to shake your Faith and Hope and distract you with Fear and to beget great jealousies and doubts in you and by impatience and infidelity Frustrate your good beginnings But though David said of Old in the distress of his Soul One day shall I fall by the Hand of Saul yet he overcame him and had the Crown Yea the Lord Jesus himself cryed out in the agony of the Cross my God my God why hast thou forsaken me Nevertheless he gloriously Triumph'd over all and lead Captivity Captive for the joy that was set before him Which joy is bebore you it is the mark of the price of your great and holy calling Wherefore faint not neither murmur if your Spiritual Moses seem to withdraw a while from you Do not you make Images in his absence neither wax Wanton but possess your Souls in holy fear and patience waiting with holy Reverence and Diligence for his appearance who is
embrace it and will be led by it For it teacheth such as it did the Antient Christians to deny all ungodliness and the world's lusts and to live soberly and godlikely in this present evil world looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the great God and their Saviour Jesus Christ who hath given himself for them to deliver them from all sin and to redeem them from all iniquity You know that you are bought with a price now you feel it and in measure discern the preciousness of that Price which hath bought you namely the Life of the Dear Son of God Grieve not his Spirit that is ready to Seal you to the Day of your perfect Redemption But give up your Bodies Souls and Spirits to his service whose they are that they may be order'd by him to his Glory I write not to you as to the World for you are called out of the World by him that hath overcome the World that as he is not of this World so you may not be of this World Come then out of it more and more out of the Nature out of the Spirit out of the Fruits and out of the Fashions of the World They are all for the Fire Christ said the World loveth its own Search with the Light of the Lord Jesus what there is in you that the World owneth and loveth For that is its own And consider what it is that the World is offended with Not that that cometh from it self of its own making and inventing but that which crosseth its Inventions that is of another Nature and springeth from another Root O be not conformed to the Fashions of this World that please the Lust which grieveth the Spirit of God but be ye renew'd in your Minds and being so within you will be as a new People without They that have been truly with Christ are quickly discovered they cannot be hid So it was of old the Jews said of the Disciples these men have been with Jesus their Speech and Carriage bewray'd them their outsides were not like the outsides of other Men they were not currant with the Fashions and Customs of that time Nor can they that have been with Jesus conform to the vain Fashions and Customs of this World wherefore be not you in any sort of this World but give diligence to make your holy high Calling and Election sure For many are called and few are chosen and the reason is they are slothful Servants they hide their Talent in a Napkin neglect the Day of their Visitation and work not out their Salvation with fear and trembling And then the Night overtaketh them in which they can never work the works of Repentance and the things that belong to their peace are hid from their Eyes for ever But the Lord forbid that it should be so with any of you No no I hope yea I believe better things of you And I am assured that as you keep your Hearts chastly to the Light and Grace that with which you have been visited of the Lord you shall be kept to Eternal Salvation For they are saved that walk in the Light Into the Light the Enemy cannot come for the Light is Christ Jesus and the Enemy hath no part or place in him he is driven out from the holy place by transgression and he is now a fugitive from Heaven but he goeth up and down the Earth seeking whom he may devour whom he can catch and carry away with his baits and Snares Wherefore Wo to the Inhabitants of the Earth that is the earthly Inhabitants such as love and live in the earthly Nature for all such shall be a prey to him he shall have power over them and keep up his Kingdom in them But those that receive and abide in Christ Jesus the Light Life and Truth are out of his reach they are in the munition of Rocks under the pavilion of the Lord and in the safe Ark of the most High God However he is permitted to tempt try till the time shall come that he is not only trodden under Foot but also bound and cast into the Lake that burneth with Fire and Brimston And he is the greatest Enemy to those that turn their back upon him wherefore he watcheth to surprize them that he might take them at unawares and triumph over their failings And for that reason Christ Jesus preached the Watch earnestly and with repetition to his Disciples Now my dear Friends there be several things or the Enemy in several Appearances will attend you in this holy march you are making to the Eternal Land of rest of which I would caution you that you may none of you make Shipwrack of any of those holy beginnings you have experienced by the Light and Spirit of the Lord. Beware of vain thoughts for they oppress and extinguish the true sense These vain thoughts arise from the Enemy's presentations of objects to the mind and the Mind 's looking upon them till they have made their impressions upon the mind and influenced the mind into a love of them This is a false liberty a dangerous ye a destructive liberty to the holy Sense that God hath begotten in any For as that is not received but hindered by such thoughts so it is not improved but destroyed by them The divine Sense in the Soul is begotten by the Lord 'T is his Life and Spirit his holy Breath and Power that quickneth the Soul and maketh it sensible of its own state and of God's will and that raiseth fervent desires in it to be Eternally blessed This is that which Satan rageth at he feareth his Kingdom he findeth that he is come that will cast him out of his possessions He cryeth out Why art thou come to torment me before my time He is the Father of vain thoughts he begetteth them in the mind on purpose to draw off the mind from that Sense and to exercise it in variety of conceptions in a self-liberty of thinking and imagining concerning Persons and things Here he offereth his Baits and layeth his Snares and never faileth to Catch and defile the unwatchful Soul Now if you should say what are these vain thoughts I tell you my Friends All those thoughts and conceptions that either bring not Real Profit to the Soul or that Grieve Hurt or Oppress that holy Sense which is begotten of God in the Soul And that by which Thoughts are to be examined is the Light of Christ Jesus For as whatever may be known of God is manifested within man for there God hath shown it him as saith the Apostle Paul to the Romans So what ever is reproved is made manifest by the light for whatever maketh manifest is light saith he to the Ephesians By this Light of Christ Jesus examine your own Thoughts see whence they rise from whence they come and what they tend to O Friends here is a Mystery and the Evil One worketh here in a Mystery For where he cannot