shall be told me being willing and desirous to have the scales fall further from the blinde eyes of my soul that they may be further open'd and that a power therewith may come in to my soul from the Holy Ghost which may inable me in the strength thereof to redeem my lost and mis-spent by-past precious time and not now to consult with flesh and blood in my daily taking up the Cross of Christ and following him whithersoever he shall by his call or heavenly Divine voice within me lead me I say I am compelled from a power within me at this present time in brief to tell thee these things and to require thee from God to give ear to that true convincing light that clearly speaks in thy conscience and by the assistance thereof to strive with the first or fallen nature yet ruling in thy soul and lay aside that greatness of wit and earthly wisdom that thou hast attained to and in that measure of Light that long since thou hast received withdraw into thy private Closet and seriously meditate upon these brief lines And being thou in my late conversing with thee told me thou hadst read or hadst sent me down from London most of the Quakers Books Let me in love to thy soul earnestly intreat thee with seriousness to read over strong and tall in Christ Iames Nayler his sheet of paper intitled Something further in answer to John Jacksons book called Strength in weakness which Iohn Iackson is my indeared friend and old and long acquaintance and a greater professor of Religion now then ever thou thy self in all thy zeal once was therefore in him thou mayest plainly read thy own condition and that precious prisoner of the Lords in Northampton Goal VVilliam Dewsbury his two books the first and excellentest of which is called The discovery of the great enmity of the serpent against the seed of the woman his other book is intituled The discovery of mans Return and the Lord by his almighty power set them home to thy soul I heartily desire to return thee my hearty thanks for all thy kindness and tenderness manifested to me at Jersey in our passage from thence and at thy own house so with my hearty salutations presented to thee and all thy friends that were with me at thy house at Weymouth I desire to let thee know that by my moral honest carefull and industrious old Nurse Elizabeth Crome who by reason of shortness of money with me I am forced and compelled to part with I have writ thee a few lines in her behalf intreating thy countenance and favourable respect to the old and real serviceable to me in my great distress in Jersey woman in case in things that are just and righteous before God she desire thy favour and what thee or thy friend and mine Edward commonly called Lievtenant Tucker in that particular doth for her I shal thankfully look upon as actions done to thy souls From Dover-Castle being a place wherein God hath more clearly then ever before opened the eyes of my understanding the 5. day of the to moneth 1655. Faithful hearty and real wel-wishing friend Iohn Lilburn With which fore-mentioned main or principal thing that I have now to say I thus proceed and go on with it here in the especial presence of the Lord declare that by that present measure of light now born up in my understanding and moving in my soul at this very time I am here compelled to let the Reader whosoever he be to know that as I have long understood from my wife the original of my fore-going Letter to her she conveyed to the hands of Oliver Cromwel himself and at his Son-in Law 's desire Charls Fleetwood my old and somtimes much familiar greatly obliging friend gave him a copy of it and notwithstanding the clear declarations of a sincere changed in measure heart in the said Letter at the penning of which I had then lost all manner of ability to consult with one grain of Machivel or humane deceitful policy having then the very dreadful and aweful immediate convincing judging and burning up power of God upon my soul yet upon my said writing and my wifes disposing as aforesaid of my said Letter many and great jealousies arise upon me at VVhite-hall at the strange politick contrivance of my largely reputed by them politique heart in my turning quaker of which I had several wayes exact information which it seems out of humane fear took that powerful impression upon my poor weak wife as that as I judged by her Letters to me troubled the poor afflicted Woman at the very heart and compelled her by writing in a vehement manner to press me to sign such an ingagement as George Fox did the Copy of which I have seen and read and sent it up to Oliver Cromwel to secure him from his pretended fears of my politick indeavouring to craw the temporal sword against him unto which for many reasons having then no manner of freedom in the earth to do it George Fox though even then a precious man in my eyes his particular actions being no rules for me to walk by unless I lived in the very same life and power of Spiritual injoyments that he did and had the very self-same motions in spirit from God that led him to a freedom and ability to do such and the like particular actions I therefore then ceased it and did it not and if I had then done it for my own particular human ends as to avoid further persecution and the like I had in so doing been an outside pharisaical imitator and the greatest and basest of hypocrites which sin alone is the height of Gods a Mat. 24.51 Rev. 3.15 16. See Mat. 6.5 23.13 14. Luk. 11 44.46 c. abhorrance for although I must before the Lord now truly avow that the said Letter was a true and faithful without fraud or guile declaration of as real and spirituall a power of God in its measure seising upon my soul for my conviction of my spiritual blindness and sinfulness as ever seized upon Pauls declared in the 9 of the Acts or any mans that ever breathed upon earth yet betwixt the Winter-storms and fierce tempests of conviction or rather the beginning of it and the pleasant Sunshine dewey and springing days of growth into a measure of refreshment there is a vast difference and therefore then the true occasion or real ground of all outward war and humane busling contest being not taken away or absolutely crucified or subdued at the very Root in my soul if then I had signed such an engagement I had clearly gone beyond my souls then living and real attainments and thereby ran presumptuously and wickedly beyond my measure and so had tempted the Lord my then present Leader and spiritual guide and abominably sinned against him But now in my already attained growing up measure having the experimental witness of God within my b 1
THE RESURRECTION OF JOHN LILBURNE NOW A PRISONER IN Dover-Castle DECLARED And manifested in these following Lines penned by himself and now at his earnest desire published in print in these following words The second Edition with remarkable Additions by way of Appendex London Printed for Giles Calvert at the Black Spread Eagle neer the West-end of Pauls 1656. THE RESURRECTION OF John Lilburne c. HAving many and strong compulsions from the measure of the light of the Lord now shining clearly within me and raised up now to a good degree of life and power in my soul to make a publike declaration in print of my reall owning and now living in in my present attained to measure the life and power of those divine and heavenly principles professed by those spirituallized people called Quakers at my owning of which all my old and familliar friends in a manner are so much troubled and offended with me for and my great adversaries so jealous of the reall intentions of my heart within me at my so doing and by that measure of the Light of JESUS shining in my soul I am now directed and guided to intitle it as aforesaid and here at this place as an introduction before I come to the main thing of that which through the strength of God I have now to say to insert here the copies of the very two first Letters that ever I writ of note after the great and glorious power of God had seized upon my soul to let in the real beginnings of convincement into my soul of my spiritual blindness deadness and emptiness and by which I came to see a clear glimps of that spiritual fulness that was and really is in the divine and heavenly declared principles of the aforesaid precious people The first Letter being to my wife take in these following words Dover-Castle the fourth day of the tenth moneth 1655. For my deer and loving wife Elizabeth Lilburn at her friend George Wades house a Cook at the Sign of the Sun neer Guild-Hall and Lawrence Lanes end in London these with speed deliver My dear heart WHat in a great measure my temper of spirit was before thy coming to me I in its measure communicated unto thee by the copy of my letter to Luke Howard which I have here inclosed thee at thy leisure to peruse And what distemperedness my earthly spirit was in at and towards thee at thy and my last meeting upon Saturday the tenth of November last I need not to repeat unto thee being I beleeve it is fresh enough in thy own memory And the frame of my heart after thy reconciliation and mine so far as God hath given me the spirit of discerning and searching it I in no small proportion in reallity discovered to thee And since my departue upon VVednesday the 21. of November last seâ—ting my-self seriously to a deep and weighty consideration of that work that my soul longed for a new to be a travelling in And giving fulness of scope to that divine and heavenly voice of God speaking plainly in my heart unto which I am truly able to set my seal to that it is that spirit or power of the Holy Ghost or true Comforter spoken of Joh. 16.7 8. that convinceth or reproveth the world or the carnal or first or fallen nature in me of sin and of righteousness and of judgement and is that eternal and everlasting spirit of truth that imbraced and closed with leads my soul by its divine and strong power or attractive drawings step by step in its measure and degree into truth and in my heavenly fathers good time I doubt not but it will establish and build me up in truth Ioh. 16.13 and mould me into a real conformity in life and power in real and substantial injoyment to the wayes of truth of light and life be they never so difficult to the flesh carnal man or fallen or first nature in me or never so full of the cross or self-denyall or giving up my own reason understanding will wisdom and affections to be crossed and crucified by the Will and Wisdom of JESUS the annoynted above measure of the Father and to be guided or led on by him the living life light or power in all the sons of men that have the greatest degree or least of sparks of divine or heavenly light shining within their dark in their small degree or measure or inlightned inlivened souls in their larger degree or measure I have since I see thee read extraordinary much of those two volumes which I shewed thee containing both almost seventeen hundred pages of the writings of those preciouseft though most contemptible people called quakers the truly beloved objects of my soul And this at present because I rather now heartily desire to live in the possession power or life of truth in my soul then in the bare profession notion or talk of it I shall and can in sincerity say to thee that my soul hath been amazed and even confounded by them not as Herod by Iohn Baptist preachings was for fear of eternal wrath or loss of his Tetrarch-ship by or for his sins which to avoid made him reform and amend many things Mark 6.20 but of real breakings or shame of soul that so glorious a Talent as my Lord and Master by the clear lively and powerfull breakings in of his divine and heavenly light into my heart long and many yeers ago bestowed upon me should by me or my first and carnal wisdom be most ungratefully and unfaithfully like a lighted candle put under a bushel or hid or buried in the earth in me in obscurity and darkness Or that my soul should by the will and wisdom of the first nature ambitiously Adam-like eat anew upon the tree of Knowledge of good and evill and thereby covet to be esteemed something amongst the sons of men more then the Divine Wisdom would have me with that measure or degree I had attained to and therewith be with it like the unbelieving Jews the type in the flesh or the first or mean in its degree or measure to what I ought to have thirsted after out-goings of the divine and heavenly teaching and instructing spirit or voice of God in or unto my soul willing and content to sit down in the wilderness or journeying way to Canaan and not with precious Ioshua and Caleb the spiritual anti-types in that particular or in another particular the outward types of the spiritual travelling anti-types the seed of God under the Gospel into Gods spiritual rest in himself be willing longing and desirous by faith in the strength of God resting as the old Israelites after the flesh ought to have done in his faithfull and powerfull promise of carrying me on through all difficulties self-denyals crosses and hardships whatsoever to travell into the spiritual Kingdom or heavenly Land of Rest that God in the naked injoyment of himself hath prepared for and at this very day I beleeve hath experimentally
and really bestowed the clear injoyment of upon many of his Ransomed ones contemptibly and scornfully called quakers I say unto thee the real and close applyed home unto my soul by the spirit and power of life from God that now aloud again speaks within me consideration of the premises or that which is foregoing and that people afar off yea ignorant ideots fools and prophane * * As is clearly proved by the printed speeches of severall of the prisoners in Northhampton and Eversham Goals ones in comparison of my being so nigh at hand so many yeers ago to the clear and full possession of the spiritual Land of Canaan should enter into the glorious Kingdom of God or that clearness of Rest Peace and Union in and with him that now clearly to my spiritual understanding they iajoy and there bring forth the ripe fruits of spiritual old age in comparison of me of Praises Honor and Glory to the Lamb and to the ancient of Dayes that clearly sits upon the Throne in their hearts as having judged down conquered and overcome within them all their sinns or spiritual enemies and caused them to triumph over them as in his strength divine and heavenly power reigning and ruling as King and Lord over them O I say unto thee again the real sight in its measure and degree and spiritual consideration of these things since I last see thee for divers hours in several nights one after another when my God denyed sleep unto my outward eyes and caused my soul to be awake with himselfe and to be really exercised in an interchange of Divine conference contemplation or parley with him hath even caused my soul to weep sigh and mourn within me before him and in his strength and almighty power to indent with him and now in good earnest to ingage in my soul or spiritual man to be obedient to his heavenly and divine voyce speaking clearly in me and to follow him least I should now by any longer resistance totally quench his divine drawings through the denyal of my own or natural reason will wit wisdom desires and affections and with a real weanedness from worldly or fleshly honour applause glory riches or creature-fulness yea even to a final denyal of father kindred friends my sweet and dearly beloved by me babes or thy own self who viz. thy self for many yeers by-past I must avow it before the Almighty in sincerity and truth hath been to me the greatest dearest of all earthly delights and joyes And now therefore look about thee in good earnest and see what thou hast got to thy self as to the flesh by thy eager desires and strong indeavours to bring me back again into England for the day of thy real strong and full temptation and trial never came upon thee till now if God give thee not by degrees the fulness and compleatness of spiritual and heavenly strength and ability to bear it and go through it For my part I am now in reallity and truth in the clearly lively or evident seeing of the wisdom and loving hand of a tender and indeared eternal father in stripping me naked of all earthly and created excellencies and taking my outward Estate and profitable worldly Imployment and all my worldly glory from me and graciously and supportingly leading me through the valley of Baca Psal 84.6 or tears outward dangers and death for now almost four yeers together and seperating fromme for a long time that wonted delight that used to be betwixt thee my old and real I doll and me and at my coming to this place clearly unrobeing me of all and every one of my old friends and familiar acquaintance that were any way fit or able to do any thing for me and thereby hedging up my way that I must whether I will or no in spite of my teeth once again give ear to the serious and plain voice call or counsel of the most High speaking in and unto my soul And so in much mercy and indeared loving kindness as he did in my great straits in the Bishops time prouided and sent to me a poor dispised yet understanding Priscilla to instruct me in or expound unto me the way of God more fully or perfectly whom I am compell'd now to tell thee I shall love respect therefore the longest day I live upon the earth let her continue by whomsoever to be judged never so rigid or contemptible so here at his place he hath also provided for me an Aquilla being a contemptible yet understanding spiritually knowing single hearted Shoomaker to do the same now to my spiritual no small advantage refreshment benefit by means of all which I am at present become dead to my former busling acting in the world and now stand ready with the devour centurion or captain spoken of Act. 10. to hear and obey all things that the lively voice of God speaking in my soul shal require of me upon the further manifestation of whose glorious presence my heart with a watching fear care desires to wait and to walk faithfully and tenderly and humbly in that measure of Light already received and out of the strength of indearedness of love and tenderness of affection that hath long in times by-past dwelt in me towards thee and of late in much sincerity is renewed unto thee again I have with the same eternal wel-wishing of thy-spiritual happiness as I do my own ordered Giles Calvert to send unto thee several of those printed pieces of the quakers that in the serious reading of which have been most convincingly instructive unto my soul amongst which I have judged in the first place Iames Naylor that strong or tall man in Christ his Something in answer unto thy and my indeared friend John Jackson that tall Cedar in great profession of Religion his book called Strength in weakness which book the last Post I received from thee in the reading of which piece of Iames Naylors I must set my seal to it that there goes along in the breathings out of it a great deal of the quickning life power of the spirit of God unto it are annexed several pieces of that precious and divine soul VVilliam Deusbury the Lords now or late glorious prisoner in Northampton common goal to whose precious and heavenly spirit although I never see his face mine in indearedness of love is glued unto whose books is cald The discovery of the great enmity of the Serpent against the Seed of the woman and his discovery of mans return have been pieces in my reading of them seriously that by the power of the Almighty hath spoken home to my soul I have ordered to be annexed unto them as I remember as many as makes them ten in number and then twelve more in another volume principally for answering Objections I have ordered to be sent unto thee which I hope thou wilt receive before this come to thee bound up in that method that J have directed
And now my dear love for whom my soul travells with God for thy eternal good with the same sincere heartedness as for my own hoping that thy late out-fall and mine was but for a set season that so as divine Paul in another sense speaks Phil. 15. thy reconciliation and mine again might now remain firm in love for ever I therefore earnestly intreat thee not to much cumber thy self in thy many toilings and journeyings for my outward liberty but sit down a little and behold the great salvation of the Lord and if by any means possible thy spirit can be made free to it retire thy self but for one week or the like into thy own chamber as being sequestred from all thy friends acquaintance and with as much seriousness and deliberation read this and the forementioned precious books with the letter that thy my indeared spiritual faithful friend Luke Howard yesterday sent unto thee as the real out goings of the measure of the spirit of God in his heart towards thee as I have often and deliberately read thy last Post-letter to me Dated at VVhits-Hall upon Wedneseday the 28 of November last and often wept for joy and gladness of heart at that they honest exhortation to me at the last and of it in those words viz. My Dear Retain a sober patient spirit within thee which I am confident thou shalt see shall be of more force to recover thee then all thy keen mâ—…tal hath been I hope God is a doing a work upon thee and me too as shall make us study our selves more then we have done O my dear Love I am deeply already entred into my part of it The mighty power of God inable thee to get in too and also to go through thine and effectually to go cheerfully willingly along hand in hand with me which abundantly would render thee more amiable lovely and pleasant in mine eyes although thou wert then clothed in rags then thou couldst be to me in thy drawings back or standing still where thou wast when I last see thee though therein thou wert clothed all over with rich and outwardly glistering earthly Diamonds and in the greatest of earthly prosperities I am sorry for that hard portion thou tell'st me thou hadst in going from me in thy dangerous travelling upon the Thames and I desire to bless God for thy deliverance from so nigh a death I am also sorry thou art so straightly put to it for money but to live upon God by faith in the depth of straights is the lively condition of a Christian O that thy spirit could attain unto it According to thy desire in thy Letter and my own present genius or frame of Spirit which now can contentedly feed savourily upon bread and cheese and Small-Beer alone for saving of money I have discharged my old Nurse and borrowed 20. s. to give her to carry her towards her husband and by her have I sent these lines to deliver to thine own hands Of which poor ignorant soul I must say this to thee in truth that although the woman in my clear understanding be but wholly in the first nature of fallen man-kinde yet she hath been in the hand of God an instrument of much service honesty performed faithfulness and tender compassion to me in the day of the greatest and unparalelled extremity of my outward desires in the Isle of Jersey for which in her station I must value her as long as I live and if ever outward prosperity in any competent degree be my portion really requite her therefore I expect from thee if she have occasion to use thee that thou beest tender and respectful to her for my sake And for my Liberty about which thou so weariest and spendest thy self and earthly strength as thy Letter acquaints me with thou dost I can say no more to thee then what was contained in my Letter directed to thee and Dated Nov. 21. last which I gave here to thy own hands but that I am in my present temper of spirit ready really with Peter at the sight of the glorlous transfiguration of Christ to say its good being here for me for here in Dover Castle through the loving kindness of God I have met with a more clear plain and evident knowledge of God and my self and his gracious out-goings to my soul then ever I had in all my life time not excepting my glorying and rejoycing condition under the Bishops and now the pangs and travelling throes of God are powerfully afresh upon my very heart and therefore now in my own will I could rather wish thee and my sweet Lambs to be with me here then I at present with thee and them where thou art yet submissively and heartily I say and can say the Will of my heavenly Father be done in me by me and for me in whose Will I leave thee and thine with all thy and my friends and rest From Dover-Castle the place of the present injoyed delightfull dispensations of the eternal everlasting love of God unto my soul the 4th day of the 10 th moneth 1655. Thine in the strength of renewedness of true love John Lilburn The forementioned second Letter take in these following words Dover-Castle the fifth day of the tenth moneth 1655. For my indeared friend William Harding commonly called Mayor at Weymouth in Dorcetshire these deliver Kind friend SInce my arrival here I have often been desirous in my own spirit at large to have writ to thee but hitherto by a power above me I have been hindered and yet am as to the particular aforesaid only now I thought it not only convenient to acquaint thee but am thereunto compelled to tell thee that meeting here with one of those precious people called quakers of which people thee and I at the Isle of Iersey had much talk of and getting into my hands two Volumes of their printed papers amounting to about seventeen hundred pages I have with seriousness of discourse and serious reading therein been knock'd down off or from my former legs or standing and giving scope to my true teacher and guide the light of God speaking in my soul I am becom at present dead to my fallen or first natures reason wit wisdom and desires and also totally becom dead to my old busling waies in the flesh and now in a great degree or measure am struct down dead to the very earth within me and by that light which gloriously with in my soul hath shined round about my first or corrupt nature within me I am like Paul with astonishment and amazement Act. 9. fallen down flat at the feet of Jesus and hearing a voice speaking within me to perswade me for my good and benefit to become willing to be guided and directed by the heavenly wisdom of Jesus my Anoynted I have thereupon given up my self wholly to be guided by his divine teachings shining within me before which I now stand ready to give ear to what by it
Joh. 5.10 self that I am already truly and really attained in substantial and witnessed within me real truth with the young men in Christ spoken of by the Apostle c 1 Joh. 2.13 John to a good measure or degree in overcoming the wicked one within me so that now I am able to witness in truth and righteousnes that the true grounds or reall occasions of all outward wars and all carnal bustings and all fleshly stâ—ivings within me is in a very large measure or degree become dead or crucified within me wen true grounds real occasions of all the outward iron and steel sword war in the world and all the wâ—cked and fleshly fore-runners of it and dependants upon it truly riseth from its fountain the raging power of sin or lust within in carnal and unregenerated unsanctified and unjustied before God mens hearts as is plainly truly witnessed by the apostle d Jam. 4.1 2 3 4. James in these words From whence comes wars and fightings among you come they not hence even of your lusts that war in your members ye lust and have not ye kill and desire to have and cannot obtain ye fight and war yet ye have not because ye ask not Ye ask and receive not because ye ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lusts Ye Adulterers and Adulteresses know you not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God whosoever therefore will be a friend to the world that spiritual Kingdom of Satan in unsanctified mens souls is the enemy of God And therefore Christ the true Lord of the soul and the true Head-Master and King of that heavenly spiritual kingdome as the Devil or Prince of the air is the Head-Master King or God of the Kingdom of this world in the hearts of the children of unsanctified and unjustified disobedient e Eph. 2.2.3.5 6.11 2 Cor. 4.4 Jam. 1.13 14 15. Joh. 12.3 16.11 Rom. 6.16.20 2 Tim. 2.26 2 Pet. 2.19 1. Joh. 3.8.10 men that he hath provided for all redeemed sanctified justified and righteous f Rom. 6. â—0 22 23. 8.1 2 3 4. Rom. 14.17 15.13 14. 1 Cor. 4.20 2 Cor. 4 6. Gal. 5.22 23 24. Eph. 5 7 8 9. Heb. 12.22 23. 1 Joh. 1.5 6 7. Rev. 6.14 15 16 17 21.3 4.22 23. 22.1 2 3 4. Isa 60.19 20 21. souls declares at his very answer before Pilate for his life and saith My Kingdome is not of this world if my kingdom were of this world then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews but now is my kingdom not from [g] Joh. 18.36 hence and therefore it was when Judas betrayed this spiritual King Christ into the hands of his murdering enemies and that his servant Simon h Joh 18.10 Peter stretched out his hand and drew his sword and stroke a servant of the High Priests and smote off his ear that this spiritual King Lord and Master cured the wounded man although he was his i Luke 22.50 51. enemy commanded his servant Peter to put up his sword again in his place further saying to him For all they that take the Sword mark it well shall perish with the k Mat. 26.51 52 53. see Gen. 9.6 Rev. 13.10 Sword Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father and he shall presently give me more then twelve l A constituted full Roman Legion of souldiers at this time as I remember the Roman Histories was reputed to be commonly about 7 or 8000. men Legions of Angells And therefore all the whole Laws of his inward and spiritual Kingdome are made in quite opposition against the Laws of the meer glorious out-side kingdome of the God and Prince of this world unto which two Masters or Kings or Law-givers it is impossible for any man in the world or upon this globy earth to be a servant to them both at one the same m Mat. â—24 Luke 16.13 time but he that commits sin is the servant of sin and so the servant of the n Joh. 8.34.41 42 44. Rom. 6.16 2 Per. 2.19 1 John 3.8.10 devil and he that is the servant of sin is free from righteousness and so from being a servant or subject unto o Rom. 6.17 18 20 21 22 23 1 Joh. 1.6 cap. 3.3 4 5 6 9. 5.1 2 3 4 18 19. Joh. 7.17 8.31 32. 9.31 12.26 14.15.21 23 24. 15.4.7.10.14 Christ And therefore the Spirit of Christ this spiritual inside-King dwelling in the Apostle Paul declares that there is no fellowship betwixt righteousness and unrighteousness nor no communion betwixt light and darkness nor no concord betwixt Christ and Belial nor no harmony betwixt the true beleever that knows p Joh. 17.3 God and the infidel and such are all they that truly knows not q 1 Thess 4 5. Se Tit. 1.16 Ex. 5.2 Psal 79.6 Jer. 10.25 Ro. 1.19.21 Eph. 4.17 8 19. God And there he further demands what agreement hath the Temple of God with Idols for ye are saith he to the true knowers of God in Corinth the Temple of the living God as God hath r Levit. 26.12 said I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my people wherefore come out from among them and be ye s Isa 52.11 separate saith the Lord and touch not mark it well the unclean thing and I will receive you and will be a Father unto t Jer. 31.1 you and ye shal be my Sons and Daughters saith the Lord u 2 Cor. 6.14 15 16 17 18. Almighty And therefore it is that the very same Divine Spirit that dwells in this Spiritual King Jesus speaking in the Apostle Iohn requires all his Spiritual and true Subjects not to love the world neither the things that are in the world for if any man love the world that Kingdom of Satan the Prince of Darkness as the lusts of the Flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life is not of the Father but is of the world and the world and the vanities and empty pleasures of it passeth away and the lusts thereof but he that doth the will of God abideth for w 1 Joh. 2.15 16 17. ever Yea the contrariety is so great betwixt the foresaid two Kings and Masters that whatsoever in the King or Ruler in the Kingdom of the world or falne or unrenewed man and the Subjects thereof is esteemed highly or excellent is an abomination in the sight of x Luke 16.15 See chap 6.24 25 26. Mar. 13.13 Joh. 5.41.44 7.17 18. 8.50.54 11.41 43. 15.19 16.35 God And therefore this Spiritual King having purchased all his Subjects and Servants with a glorious price as the greatest demonstration of love of his own blood by his spiritual Command requires them not to
be the servants of y 1 Cor. 7.23 men but to glorifie him both in body and z 1 Cor. 6.20 see chap. 3.16 17 2 Cor. 2.5.15.17 c. soul and therefore his grown up servant Paul declares himself to be no man pleaser avowing himself that if he were a man-pleaser he should nor could not be the servant of a Gal. 1.10 see 4.3.9 10.11 5. 1 Col. 2.8.30.22 Christ And therefore the same Apostle by the infallible spirit of the Lord requires the Spiritual Subjects of this Spiritual King Jesus to present their bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto God which saith he is your reasonable service and be not conformed to this world the kingdom of the prince of darkness but be ye transformed by the renewing of your minde that ye may prove what is that good acceptable perfect will of b Rom. 22.1 2. God and therefore when any man becomes a spiritual Subject of this Spiritual King Christ and dwells in him he becomes a new creature old things in him are past away and all things in him are becom c 2 Cor. 5.17 new spiritual savory yea even his very thoughts his words are found few and divine his behaviour righteous and solid his deeds upright and free like God from all respect of d Mat. 3.34.37 39 40 41 45 46 48. 6.25 31 32 33. and 7.12 13. and 23 3.5 6 7.8 9.10 Mark 12.14 Luk. 20 21. Act 10.34 35. Deu. 10 17. Esth 3.2 5 6. Job 32.21 22. Prov. 10.20 28.21 Rom. 2.11 and 1 Cor. 2.16 and 15 33 Gal 2.6 Eph. 4 29. and 5.4 and 6.9 Phil. 2 5. Col. 3.5.8 15.16 4.6 1 Tim. 1.10 6.3 4 5 6. 2 Tim. 1 7.13 and 4.3 Tit. 1.9.17 and 2.1 2.8 Jam. 2.1 to 10. and 5.12 and 1 Pet. 1.15 16 17. and 4.12 and 2 John 9 10 11. persons and although there be such a perfect and absolute contrariety betwixt all the laws constitutions of these two Kings or Masters and a continuall and perpetuall war betwixt the Subjects thereof yet the weapons of the warfare of Christs Spiritual Heavenly and glorious Kingdom handled and used by his Servants and true Subjects who although they do walk in the flesh yet do they not war after the flesh and therefore their weapons of warfare are not carnall but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth it self against the knowledge of God and bringeth into captivity every thought to the obedience of e 2 Cor. 10.3 4 5. Christ The Armour of Proof of these Spiritual warring Subjects and Souldiers of this spiritual glorious King is to have their loynes girt about with truth having on them the Brest-plate of righteousness and their feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace above all taking the Shield of Faith wherewith they shall be able to quench the fiery-darts of the wicked and taking the Helmet of Salvation and the Sword of the Spirit which is the word of f Eph 6.13 14 15 16.17 God which Spiritual Sword or Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper then any two edged Sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight who is this Spiritual sharp Sword or eternall and everlasting Word of God that indures for ever but all things are naked and opened to the eyes of him with whom we have to g Heb. 4.12 13. do With which Spirituall Sword this spiritual conquering Lord and King pricked and wounded to the very heart three thousand of his enemies at once by the Ministration of his single Spiritual Souldier the Apostle Peter which made them bitterly to cry out for a Plaister and a Physician to heal and cure h Act. 2.37.41 them which spiritual Sword is the only and alone weapon that this glorious conquering spiritual King useth to fight withall against all enemies the powers of the Prince of Darkness of this world and with which only and alone he conquereth and i Rev. 1.16 and 2.12.16 and 19.15.21 Hos 6.7 overcometh carnal Weapons of any kinde whatsoever having no place nor being of no use at all in his spiritual Kingdom for his Subjects are to love their enemies to do good unto their haters and to resist or requite their evill with k Matt. 5.39 40 44 45 56. good and to dwell in love towards all men as the God of love himself dwells in l Gal. 6.10 and 1 Thes 3 12â— 5.14 15. 1 Joh. 4.16 17. love and to be holy as God is m 1 Pet. 1.15 16. holy and perfect as he is n Matt. 5.48 perfect and therefore not in the least to draw temporal weapons against their enemies for among the true and real Saints of the Lord in the mountain of the Lord where the Lord himself is the inward and soul-teacher and instructer of his people and Subjects in his own waies there all the temporal swords are to be beat into plowshares and their earthly spears into pruning-hooks no more using of carnal swords or so much as learning of earthly war is to be exercised amongst o Isa 2.2 3 4 5. them but they are to walk in the pure holy peaceable light of the Lord which shal wil lead the sanctified justified and redeemed soul to advance or set up the innocent harmless peaceable lamb-like nature or seed of Christ to become Lord and King in the heart of and over the Lyon-like warring devouring and destroying-wicked nature of the serpent the devil satan within man yea in the Gospel-mount of God or the spiritual kingdom of Christ under the Gospel-dispensation the habitation of the true Saint of God The wolf shal dwel with the lamb and the leopard shal ly down with the kid the calf the young lyon the fatling together a little child shal lead them And the cow and the bear shal feed their young ones shall lye down together And the lyon shall eat straw like the oxe And the sucking-child shall play on the hole of the asp and the weaned child shall pui his hand on the Cockatrice Den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy p Esa 11. 6 7 8 9. 65.25 mountain saith God For the earth shall be full of the Knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the Sea Yea they shall be far from q Esa 54.14 66.11 12. Oppression Yea and violence shall no more be heard in the Land of the spirituall Kingdom inhabited by the spirituall subjects or true Saints of Christ nor wasting nor destruction within their borders but they shall call their wall salvation and their Gates Praise The Sun or borrowed
to be void of common understanding and destitute of naturall affections know nothing but naturally o o Rom. 1.21 23 24 25 28 31. 2 Cor. 4.4 6. Eph. 2. i 2 3. 4.17 18 19 1 Thes 4.5 1 Tim. 4.1 2. Tit. 1.16 as a bruit p p Rom. 1.31 Jude 10. beast My Wife and Babes are lately come down to live at Dover Town but she being there absent now from me I can onely in my own name salute thee and thy Husband If thou hast any freedom to write to me I should be glad to hear from thee And so in my Light and Life I rest From my innocent and every way causeless Captivity in Dover-Castle this first day of the week being the 18. day of the 3d. month 1656. Thine as thou art one in love and obedience to that true light that now in much brightness and clearness shines in the hearts of the washed purged redeemed sanctified and justified sons of God reproachfully called quakers IOHN LILBVRNE The Copy of the forementioned second Letter take in these following words Dover-Castle the 25. of the 3d. month 1656. For Robert Barrington one of the members of the meer outside imitating without life or power VVater-Baptists Congregation in Dover in Kent Robert Barrington BEsides those many and wrangling Encounters and Assaults that I have of late had from several of thy meer outside Form which they profess without life or power true Administrator or right Subject having also perverted that sometimes Ordinance or Divine Institution of God VVater-baptism from its primitive forerunning end of Christ the real sum and substance of all Shadows Figures Rudiments outside-Ordinances and Types yea and of all the Prophets whereof John the Baptist was one Administrations to make it now all in all as though damnation were the absolute portion of him that hath by faith never so much communion in the spirit with the souls true spiritual food the spiritual Jesus Christ the true and real light of the world or of all falne mankinde if he be not water-dipt in your meer empty outside vain traditionall humane invented as you use it form which you falsely and untruly call Baptism I say I have besides all aforesaid from thee of late received by VV. S. one of thy own Congregation a Message to this very effect That by my turning Quaker as we are commonly called I had denyed the faith And therefore although my late condition or that first beginning of growing measure to which through riches of mercy I have attained to hath much required of me a silent still quiet home-dwelling patient waiting r r Esa 30.7 15 18. Act. 1.3 4 5 8. Luk. 24.49 2 Pet. 4.10 11. upon God as having the declaration of a promise of blessedness annexed to it to be upon all those that so do rather then to spend my then present stock or attained to portion in running out in Pen-contests and controversies though for truth but notwithstanding now to take away thy reproach from the truth and thy ordinary and continued blasphemy as my often information tells me by thy self cast upon it I do hereby truly tell thee I have of late within these very few dayes been in spirit much compelled meerly for the truths sake to which according to my measure to the very death I am bound as I am called to bear witness to to indeavour to vindicate it from the said reproaches And whilesâ— I was strongly meditating with the Rock of my strength the Lord Jesus Christ the pure inlightner of my soul is handed out unto me a necessity to revise anew for the Press my foregoing Declaration unto which by way of part of an Appendix I have had much impression upon my spirit to insert a few substantial lines unto thee in it in truths behalf purely flowing from the dictates of that measure of Light life and power now brought forth and born up in my understanding by which I am in a measure enabled truly and really to know s s Luk. 24.44.45 comp with Joh. 20.21 22. Act. 1.3 4 5.8 2.4 11.34 35.38.43 44 45 46. But see 1 Cor. 2.10 11 12 13 14. Eph. 4.10 â—â— â—3 3. 1 Joh. 8.10 27. 5.20 2 John 7.8 the things of God as they are in Jesus and by which I am guided at this present time thus further and substantially to express my self to thee Robert Barrington viz. That the very first Principle of all true Religion is the Light of Christ without the real knowledge embracing and being guided by which I do here in the strength presence and power of the Lord my light and life aver thou knowest nor canst not truly know without it any thing of God at all no no more then the devills know a a Matt. 8.28 29. Mark 1.23 24 25. 3. 11 12 5.2.5 6 7. Luk. 4.33 34 35.41 8.27 28. 10.17 Act. 16.16 17 18. 19.13 14 15 16. Ja. 2.19 acknowledge and confess or then the high Priests the Scribes and Pharisees or Iews did know that put Christ to death who not only had the Scriptures commonly and publikely read amongst them but also many of them beleeved the words spoken by the sound of the flâ—â—hly mouth of Christ and yet not minding the measure of Christ within them he tells them plainly they were of their Father the b b Act. 13.26 27 28. ch 3.12 13 14 15. 4.1 2.5 6.11 12.17 18. and 5.17 18.21.28.40 6.13 14 15. and 7.1.37 38.51 52.54.57.59 compared with Joh. 1.32 33. 5.16.18.24 25.28 29.32.38 39 40.46 6.56 57.60.63.66 7.26.28.31.45 46.49 8.26 27 28 29 30 31 32 to 48. devil And therefore I further lay down this as a positive Position which through the strength of God I shall not only be able by the Letter or Witness without me viz. the Scripture or Declaration c c Luk. 1.1 Acts 1.1 10.37 13.32 15.35 17.23 20.27 1 Cor. 15.1.3 Gal. 1.16 1 Joh. 1.3.5 Rev. 19.13 of the word of God clearly to maintain against the ablest man whatsoever that speaks with a tongue that can or shall oppose it but also to lay down my very life by vertue of that measure of living power or life already raised up or dwelling in me for the defence of it That is to say That the very principle of all true religion is without the knowledge of which no man whatsoever can truly know himself or his own corrupt heart which is above the knowledge of d d Jer. 17.9 10. 11.20 Gen. 6.5 8.21 Deut. 11.16 1 Sam. 16.17 and 1 Chron. 28.9 29.17 2 Chr. 32.31 Psal 7.9 10 3.6.11 14.1 44.21 64.5 6 7. 139.1 Prov. 16.1 2. Rom 8.27 1 Joh. 2.20.27 ch 1.5 6 7. 4.20 Rev. 2.23 3.7 Joh. 16.6 7.11.27 and 1 Cor. 2.11.14 15 16. Eph. 5.8.13 Heb. 4 12 13. man or