fit to be feeders of the flock of Christ at all appears clearly by their lives You shall know them by their fruits or works saith Christ speaking of false Prophets do men gather grapes of thorns or figgs of thistles No they are so far from being discovered by their fruits to be Peters spirituall successors that their fruits discover them to be false Prophets yea and such as have the preheminence among those who have deceived the Nations This stands in great Characters upon their foreheads that all may run and read Mistery Babylon the great the mother of Harlots and abominations of the Earth For what abominations be there that are not among them committed As for persecution they excell being drunk with the blood of Saints and with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus Rev. 17.5 6. They are arayed in purple and scarlet colour and decked with gold and pretious stone and pearls having a golden cup in their hand full of abominations and filthiness of their fornication vers 4. How far are these things differing from the spirit that was in Peter But to speak a little more particularly that they are not Peters spirituall successors appears in this because they are the least conformable or like to Peter of any men For Peter did really in life deny himself take up his crosse and follow Christ they do not so but are exalted like Princes in the earth possessing an earthly Kingdom They have indeed many images of crosses they glory in the shadow but deny the practise the life of the crosse which is that which Christ called for and Peter lived in but they are far from Again as they have not the life of Peter so they have not the spirit of Peter in them and therefore are not his successors and so are not a Rock for the Church of Christ to be built upon It was not Peters outside that was called a Rock but that spirit of life that was in him which could flow into the spirits of others and so cement many living stones into one spirituall house with him Now that they have not the spirit of Peter in them appears also by their fruits their lives their fruits are the fruits of Sodom and not the fruits of the spirit for they live in pride fulness of bread abundance of idleness covetousness Persecution and such like They seek the honor of this world and heap up to themselves the riches of this world and therefore cannot be Beleevers much less Rocks for the Church to stand on Joh. 5.44 How can ye beleeve who receive honor one of another and seek not the honor that cometh from God onely Now none receive greater honor among men then they do therefore none are further off from beleeving in Christ aright then they are Again they have not the true love of God in them 1 Joh. 2.15 If any man love the world the love of the Father is not in him And who are greater lovers of the world then the Bishops of Rome are Again they are not fit to teach others This also appears by their lives For what have they to do to take the word of God into their mouthes who hate to be reformed themselves and to live as Christ and his Apostles did How can they build up the Church of Christ by their Doctrine who live contrary to the Doctrine of Christ How can they teach men to take up the crosse and follow Christ who are enemies to the crosse of Christ whose God is their Belly who glory in that which will be their shame who minde earthly things Phil. 3.18 19. Thus I say their lives discover them to be nothing conformable to Peter to have none of that spirit in them which dwelt in him to be unbeleevers to want the love of the Father in them to be unfit to teach others All these I say appear clearly by their lives by their fruits by their works the Character that Christs gives to know false Prophets day Mat. 7.15 16.20 And shall any man then look upon these men as Peters as Rocks on which the Church stands as feeders of the sheep of the Lambs of Christ as the head of the Church and patterns for the Church of Christ to follow Friends it is love to you and the Truth which makes me to represent these things to you And I desire that you may well consider where you stand and on what you hang whether you stand on the Rock Christ or on the sands of an outward succession whether you hang on a sure naile or on a weak slippery pin It behoves all to consider well their foundation for the Lord is comming to discover the foundations of the Earth and to shake them till all the buildings raised up upon the sands do fall though never so glorious W. Tomlinson FINIS
A Word of Reproof TO THE PRIESTS OR MINISTERS WHO Boast of their Ministery and Ordinances and yet live in Pride Disdain Persecution c. SHEVVING What such are and how little cause they have to exclaim against those who separate from them AS ALSO A word to the Papists Discovering their Foundation to be carnal and sandie In a LETTER sent to some supposed Priests or Jesuits in the North BY WILLIAM TOMLINSON In the Cup wherein she hath filled to you fill to her double London Printed for Tho. Wayte and are to be sold at the Pavement in York 1653. A word of Reproof to the Priests or Ministers who boast of their Ministery and Ordinances and yet live in Pride disdain persecution c. O Ye Priests * I do not call you Priests out of derision I love not that though some must deride you But because most of you were ordained to your office under that very name and few or none of you have renounced that your Ordination Secondly because you conform yourselves more to the Priests under the Law then to the Ministers of the Gospel The truth is ye are not worthy of that name for it is a name peculiar to the Saints onely and to all the Saints under the ministration of the Gospel 1 Pet. 2.5 9. Revel 1.6 you call your selves the Ministers of Jesus Christ when as you do nothing resemble him You have nothing to bear you out to be so but onely great swelling words As the Jews once gloried in the Temple when the Lord was departed out of it crying The Temple of the Lord The Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord as if those great words had been argument enough to bear it out to be the Temple of the Lord when he had left it So you cry the Ministers of the Lord the Ministers of Lord the Ministers of Christ the Ministers of Christ the Ministers of the Gospel the Ministers of the Gospel as if those great words were enough to prove you to be so when as the Lord is departed from you and your Ministery and leaves it to become as the blood of a dead man Revel 16.3 In which no life is to be found but death and stifeling of the Spirit For that holy unction which moves upon the hearts of the Babes of Christ and weaklings in stead of being strengthened is among you strangled and rendred as delusion and fancie and a thing which they must not trust to though this testimony be given of it from above That it is Truth and is no lie and is the onely preservative against seducing and the guide or Teacher that keepes us abiding in Christ 1 Joh. 2.26.27 For that Unction is Christ moving in us and as he is according to that obeyed and yielded to so he abides with us and we abide in him By that he leads on from truth to truth and so from strength to strength from comfort to comfort from light to light untill he lead into clearness and fulness and present us perfect before God and the Father without spot and blemish before his Throne Yet dare you blaspheme this holy Spirit which is no other but Christ himselfe in flesh which you deny fighting against him in every appearance of his in flesh and thereby manifestly declare your selves to be Antichrist and not the Ministers of Jesus Christ as you proudly boast your selves to be He is Antichrist that denies the Father and the Son 1 Joh. 2.22 He that denies the Son denies the Father also for they two are one And he that denies the Spirit or Unction that moves upon the hearts of Christs Schollars and fights against it when he would come and appear in flesh he denies both the Father and the Son for these three are one 1 Joh. 4.3 Every Spirit that confesses not Jesus Christ come in flesh is not of God and this is that Spirit of Antichrist whereof you have heard that it should come and even now already is it in the world I say every Spirit that confesses not Christ come in the flesh for so the words are more truely rendred as some of you know And so rendred they hold forth a constant Character or mark of that Spirit of Antichrist It doth not confess Christ come that is when he comes or appears in flesh or in his servants To say as it is translated in the English every Spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh To say thus is not a full Character of Antichrist For the Papists themselves and the Pope whom you all say is Antichrist He doth not deny but that Jesus Christ is come that is once came in flesh Therefore in that sence it discovers not Antichrist But both He and They and You do all deny and fight against Christ come in flesh of his servants that is when he comes and appears in them Therefore in the same sence wherein it discovers him I mean the Pope to be Antichrist in the same it discovers you also to be Antichrist For as he fights against the Appearances of the Lord and confesses not Christ in those commings of his in flesh whereby he leads his people out of his mystery so no more do you confess Christ in those commings of his in flesh now whereby he would lead his people out from under your mystery So that I say the Spirit of Antichrist manifests it self in you and yet are you bold to cry up your selves The Ministers of Christ The Ministers of the Gospel as if you were able by these words to strike dead all Reasons to the contrary You do wisely in your generation to keep you there and so to fear and dazle the minds of men with those great words keeping them off as far as you can from reasoning about it making them by your great words of Gospel Ministers and I know not what to fear even to question whether you be so or not Oh ye Opposers will you always strive against the Truth how many of you who stand in the publique Ministery as you call it have been leaders of the People out of Error How many of you have lighted the People by your examples to forsake and renounce the world and the things thereof yea I may say The Relliques of the Romish trash that Idol service Book and all the trumpery of it Nay have not the People therein rather taught you are they first in the obedience do not you stick to it untill the stream of the People shame you from it and the fear of loosing of your livings as you call them make you to part with it Is it not thus with you also in other appearances of Christ when he comes in flesh in weakness in his servants to consume the mystery of iniquity do you not stand out striving and opposing untill the last If you can espie failings and weaknesses in that weak flesh in which Christ comes those you use as instruments to fight withall against
his appearings in that weak flesh and so you stumble at that stumbling stone Yea you speak evil of that which God approves of If one come to you in meekness and calmnes of spirit using gentleness and patience towards you over-mastering you with reasonings out of the Scriptures Oh then you clamour such a one is a dangerous fellow He is as ill as a esuite It s as dangerous to come in his company as to go into an house infected with the plague such like railing accusations proceed from you to scar the people and to turn them away from trying the Spirits whether they be of God contrary to command 1 Joh. 4.1 On the other side if one come in the true severity of the Spirit as Paul and Steven and others yea as Christ the Prince of meekness himself sometimes did and tell you what you are warning you of the judgements that shall come upon you then such are cryed out against as judging censorious railing persons Let the innocent nature of the Lamb come to you in what way he will whether mourning or piping and dancing whether in Austerity or more liberty yet you will attribute it all to the Devill Let us tell you that the Lord teaches us inwardly by his Spirit you say that 's the spirit of delusion Let us say nothing of that but onely bring the writings of the Scriptures then you say the Devill can put Scripture into mens mouths T is true the Devil can put Scripture into mens mouthes but consider into whose monthes he doth put Scripture whether into the mouthes of those who would destroy his works or of those who uphold them Indeed where a Kingdom of Fride and vain glory and covetousness and pomp of the world and such like works of the Devil is upheld by Scripture there its likely that the Devill doth put Scripture into mens mouthes teaching them to wrest it to their own destruction But it s strange that the Devill should put Scripture into mens mouthes to destroy his works therewith shall we say that Christ is become now an upholder of the works of darkness and the Devill a destroyer of them This is the consequence of such Doctrine when you say It s the Devill that puts Scripture into the mouthes of such as would destroy his works You call your selves The Ministers of Jesus Christ But if you be not so and yet say you are consider in calmness of minde what you then are Some called themselves Jews and were not and this was Blasphemy So to say that you are Ministers of Jesus Christ if you be not so what 's this but Blasphemy For do not you Blaspheme that holy Name when you ascribe to him such Ministers as love the world and the things of it But hate his children whom he hath chosen out of the world Them whom he hath made as signes and wonders in the world by some appearances of his in them them ye hate Yea though words have faln sometimes from your own mouthes which have driven some of them from you yet you hate and oppose them for obeying that which your own mouthes have uttered When you have told the People that they worship God in vain if they have but the traditions of man for their ground yet if any of them hereupon have left your traditions you have been their greatest enemies Thus you hate the practise of Christianity though you sometimes speak of it You hate to deny your selves and to take up your Cross and follow Christ You hate to condescend to those of low degree and to make them your equalls lest your familiarily bring you to contempt You hate the way of Christs allowance for his Ministers namely to receive onely what 's freely given and of them onely who receive spirituall things of you You hate the way and manner of Christs Ministration and chuse rather the manner of the Oratory of the Nations Paul reasoned with them in the Synagogues he suffered others to speak to him and reason with him in the Synagogues This you hate Christ and his true Ministers Preached without Praying before and after as you do and this you hate In the Churches or assemblings of Beleevers they might all Prophecy as they received the gift and power one by one but this you hate In these and in many other things you hate to be reformed Shewing forth to every one your dislike of the things of Christ and yet you blush not to boast your selves to be the Ministers of Jesus Christ Consider if this be not to Blaspheme his name and again consider it Lay aside Passion and consider also whether that spirit of Jezebel Rev. 2.20 Do not rather act in you who called her self a Prophetesse and yet taught the servants of the Lord to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto Idols Do not you keep the People in that spirituall fornication which all Nations have been drunk with even to worship God after the traditions of men and so to eat things sacrificed to Idols things dedicated to your Idols of Honour and covetousness and your bellies I say things dedicated to these and upheld for the honour of these such things such sacrifices must the People feed upon But you shall not long continue to feed the flock with such things no nor your selves neither for the Lord will deliver his flock from your mouth that they may not be meat for you as he hath promised Ezek. 34.10 The Lord hath made me and others as examples among you for many years and hath made our lives a speaking voice to call out from your Ministry and by his strength hath held us as by an Anchor from returning to you making us to abide in this our Testimony And now I must also declare further against you with the rest of my fellow servants then yet I have uttered and discover to the People what you are You are that Antichrist as I said before spoken of in the Scriptures Because you deny Christ comming in flesh Some of you have been convinced of some things and seemed to make out after them untill the world stole upon your hearts and then you have sought to quench and smother those motions both in your selves and others Others of you have been at continuall defiance against the breakings forth of truth in every degree and thus you stand in opposition against the truth You neither enter in your felves nor suffer those who are entring to goe in You are the false Prophets which are spoken of and although you come in sheeps clothing yet inwardly you are ravening Wolves and now the day is breaking and discovers you plainly to be so by your works Mat. 7. v. 16. By their works yea shall know them saith our Lord you are easie enough to be discerned when men look upon your works Indeed when men look upon your devotion your prayers your lifting up of your hands and eyes to heaven your sighings and faigned tone and expressions your
up a golden image and cast those that would not worship it into a fiery furnace Did ever Truth stand in need of Prisons to make men fall down to it Did ever any thing in that kinde need prison or furnace to make another thing stoop to it except onely Idols Did ever Christ or any of his Apostles call to Magistrates and Constables and other Officers to take others away to prison who interrupted them or needed they any other thing to keep men silent while they spake besides the Authority and Power of their words Surely if you be their successors as you would have men beleeve and if your Preaching be like theirs you would not need any other thing to make men silent but the power of your words But it s an Idol and so needeth iron to uphold and defend it and to fasten it as it were in a wall lest it fall It may be some will say Hath not God converted souls by this manner of Preaching in Pulpits I answer if any were thereby converted it was by some words of Truth falling upon the hearts of the hearers which might have had the same effect in other manner of speaking and therefore the converson of such is not to be ascribed to that Idolized manner of Preaching Sermons in Pulpits but to the Power of Truth which ought to have liberty to be spoken in other manner but cannot for that Idol I do willingly give my Testimony that the times of ignorance God winked at and was pleased to step in and give much power sometimes to the words of some who have spoken in that way especially to such as have been under some suffering for not being fully conformable Yea Babylon it self cannot keep him out but for his chosen sake he will speak to them there even in the midst of confusion But what then now when light is breaking out and discovering things more clearly He cals upon all men to repent and forsake the Error of their doings and he that doth not follow the light shall have nothing left him to uphold but an Idol For God is departing out of that which is not his own purely and will leave it dead and dry without life without nourishment Yea he hath already withdrawn himself and where formerly some life hath been found now it is become as the blood of a dead man Again if your manner of Preaching be not an Image an Idol of your own or other mens imaginations but the pure off-spring of the Spirit then tell us how it comes to pass that you can limit that holy Spirit now by the hour doth the Spirit Order you and administer words and matter to you by the hour or you Order him and keep him to your hour O vain men is it not the Idol of your own heads the formings of your own brain your woven and carved Oration-like speeches that you have this power over to reach to what length you would have them and to stop where you would have them They who have tasted of the Spirits ministring by them can witness that they then could not be stretched out to the hour or limitted by the hour Again is not your Preaching an Idol when as you uphold it onely for Gain It s from your own mouthes Take away livings say you that is tithes and other hire and what will become of the Gospel that is of your Gospel Oh ye earthly spirited men doth the care of the Gospel lie onely upon the shoulders of Hirelings Surely surely the time was when as the truth of the Gospel was upheld by suffering the loss of all things and is it now upheld by hire It was upheld and also spread abroad by a few sufferers but now it seems its otherwise No hire no Gospel no Livings no Preaching I think so indeed Such is your care of the Gospel You are worthy to be called Gospel Preachers and Gospel Ministers and yet the want of hire will divide between you and your Gospel Take away the one and take away the other also for so you speak plain out and are not ashamed Wo is us hath God committed his Gospel to such careless ones hath he hung it upon so tickle a point and in these times when men are ready every where to withdraw their stipends but onely that they are held to it by awe No no your Gospel and your Preaching is your Diana an Idol a gainful Idol and by that craft you have your gain If you should let the magnificence of it fall to the ground your gain were lost And therefore it behoves you to cry it up as the Ephesians did their Diana Act. 19.24 25 26 27 28. Cry it up with a shout and noise of words with staves and clubs and Constables and Bayliffes and sines and Prisons for this will be your best Argument Tell the People ingeniously as Demetrius did That by this craft or Art you have your wealth and therefore it behoves you to uphold it Not that you care for the Gospel any further then it s made a gainful trade and upheld by you as an Idol to bring in your gain for take away gain and farewell your Gospel and Preaching all dies with hire if that be taken away Much more may be said to your Preaching but I pass on to your singing You have Psalms indeed but how come you by them In the Primitive Church that is in the first gathering of Saints out of the world into fellowships one with another by the Apostles they had Psalms 1 Cor. 14.26 One had a Psalm another a Revelation another an interpretation They had all these and such like gifts given them by the Spirit which ministered to every one severally as he pleased 1 Cor. 12.11 But whence have you your Psalms Doth the Spirit of the Lord minister them to you Or do not you because you want that gift set up a Clark or reader in many of your Congregations to supply the want of that gift as if he were the ministring spirit to minister a Psalm to all the Congregation what is this pure fire from the Altar or strange fire like Nadabs and Abihu's taken from the Kitchin of your smoakie imaginations Or else you have your Psalms from your Books and so all times are alike to you you can sing when you will and forbear when you will which would not be if the spirit which breathes when and where he listeth did administer them to you for he would rule you and not you him Did not Christ ascend on high and give gifts to men for the work of his ministery But you descend to make use of the invented Rimes and Metters of men to make up with your ministery I know and witness that sincerity of heart expressing and breathing forth it self in these things in the time of ignorance hath been accepted and cherished by the Lord but now when light is come to discover them to be of humane invention in respect of the form and use
of them and yet men cry them up for the Ordinances of Jesus Christ the Spirit of the Lord arises up in indignation against them as they are so abused If you say where are those gifts of singing which are spoken off there 's no such thing to be found I Answer you They are not to be found with you you are the Land of Captivity you are Babylon we may sit down by the Rivers of Babylon weeping in remembrance of Zion while we are held captive by you for how should any sing the Lords songs in a strange Land The shadowes are not yet fled away the winter is not yet over and gone and therefore we cannot say to you that the time of singing is come we cannot tell you that the voice of the Turtle is to be heard in your Land It may be it is heard somewhere though you hear it not Lastly you have that among some of you which you call Communion But where that Communion lies I cannot tell If it were Communion with God and Christ then the Nature of God and Christ which they have communion with at that Supper as you call it though it be a dinner would put forth it self in the partakers of it They would walk as children of light and not as children of darkness in the works of darkness If any man say he hath fellowship or Communion with God and walk in darkness he lies and doth not the Truth 1 Joh. 1.6 But your Communion shewes forth no such thing accompanying it For men come to it proud and they go away proud They come covetous and they go away covetous They come persecutors and they go away persecutors They come worldly minded ones and they go away worldly minded Now they who are such know neither the the Father nor the Son nor have Communion or fellowship with them Yea it may be they come Extortioners Oppressors hard hearted task masters of Egypt liars cheaters Over-reachers defrauders drunkards swearers whore-mongers full of malice and revenge and such like Thus they come and thus they go as they came having no participation or Communion of the Divine nature in their Spirits to alter them But thus come and go in their sinfull nature having Communion with the spirit of darkness and unrighteousness while they pretend Communion with God and thus go on eating and drinking unworthily they know not what and you suffer them to do so and do it with them eating and drinking judgement to your selves while you thus take the Name of God and Christ in vain 1 Cor. 11.29 This is not to eat the Lords Supper This is not to eat the flesh of Christ and drink his blood for then would ye become dead to this world with him and Christ would live again in you Take notice of the words which Paul the servant of the Lord spake 1 Cor. 10.16 The Cup of Blessing which we bless is it not the Communion of the blood of Christ The bread which we break is it not the Communion of the Body of Christ Now the right Communicants are one bread and one Body being all made partakers of that one bread vers 17. which bread is Christ But ye cannot be partakers of this bread nor have Communion with it so long as you are in your Gentilisme or heathenish Nature living in Pride Covetousness Persecution oppressing over-reaching uncleanness lies and such like For saith Paul v. 21. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of Devils ye cannot be partakers of the Lords Table and of the table of devils Now the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to Devils and not to God vers 20. Gentiles are every one in their Gentilising nature and what ever they sacrifice that is what ever worship they offer in pretence as to God it is to Devils and not to God Though they say it is to God as the Athenians did Act. 17.23 Yet God ownes it not such as worship him in Spirit and in Truth those are they whom he seekes to worship him As for those who walk in the works of darkness he hath not Communion with them nor they with him For what Communion hath light with darkness 2 Cor. 6.14 Further you have not so much as Communion one with another in that which you call Communion for which of you imparts to the rest of the Communicants as every one hath need You are so far from Community in these outward things that you will go to Law for your propriety one with another if you apprehend your selves but a little wronged therein contrary to the minde and counsell of Christ Mat. 5.40 Thus it is apparent for all your boasting of the Ordinances of Christ I say it is apparent that you have but a counterfeit image of the form of some of them and not the very true image of those which you have If you had the very expresse image of all the outward forms of Ordinances of Christ or practises of the Apostles and Beleevers yet these were poor things to boast of and to be exalted with Laodicean-like for if you had all these in form nearer then they are among any people in this Nation yet if your spirits fall downwards and become earthly the Lord would leave them and slip away from you to another people who arise in their spirits casting off every weight and the sins which beset them or hinder them that they might run with patience the race set before them Yea let me tell you that if you had not onely a true image and form of Ordinances but also a form of godliness in words and sayings of Christ and the Apostles alwayes in your mouthes Yet all this could not binde or hold the Lord with you But still he would slip away from under all these leaving these as huskes and chaffe for you who are disobedient and earthly to feed upon and boast your selves in while in the mean time another people should enjoy his presence for it is not any form of godliness that the Lord takes pleasure in but the Power the Truth the life the spirit And therefore he doth not binde us his servants to abide in Communion with any that live in any form of godliness without the Power But commands us by his Apostle to turn away from such 2 Tim. 3.5 And this is no unwarrantable Schisme or separation So that whether we look at the form of Ordinances or at the Power of godliness we have warrant enough to turn away from you and to have no fellowship in your holy things For as I said you have but an image of some Ordinances onely and that without the life and Power of them Others traditions of Christ you do altogether disown for they will not stand with your profit as namely to deny your selves to take up his Crosse daily and follow Christ which is a great Ordinance of Christ for without this one cannot be his Disciple Again you disown the liberty which Christ hath
given to all his members namely Ye may all prophecie one by one that all may learn and all may be comforted You disown every gift that would bring to nought the magnificence of your Diana But what you can form to profit your selves withall that you retain And can adde also other things to make Merchandize of them which have no shadow of any footstep in the practises of the true Messengers of Christ as namely Your Marrying of Persons for mony your buryings for mony and your most absurd Mortuaries or stipend which you challenge for the dead Your funeral sermons for mony also I am weary with raking in these filthy puddles which are fit for nothing but swine to wallow in And thus though you both adde and diminish from the things of Christ and Counterfeit other things which you uphold for your gain yet all that separate from you must be cried against as Hereticks Sectarists Schismaticks Separatists Indeed there is a separation which I do not here plead for and that 's a separation upon conceit of ones own holiness because they are devout in some outward observations of worship more then other men such as are spoken of Isa 65.5 Stand by thy self come not near to me for I am holier then thou These are a smoke in my nose a fire that burneth all the day and these were devout in holding up Ordinances rather then they would have no sacrifice they would sacrifice in Gardens and rather then they would have no incense they would offer it upon Altars of Brick vers 3. They are charged to be a people who walk after their own thoughts vers 2. Such also were the Pharisees who stood glorying in their own outside painted holiness and thanked God that they were not as other men and even as this Publicane when as within they were full of rottenness and all uncleanness full of envy wrath malice persecution disdain covetousness pride and such like And all these they retained under a shew of godliness and outward observation of Ceremonies and traditions of their Fathers They were strict in washing off the defilement which they had any way contracted if water would have done it They bare great reverence to the sacrifices upon the Altar which were Ordinances then in force They made conscience of paying tithe of all they had even of Mint and Annise and Cummin They were not wanting in prayers and fastings to the Lord and their prayers were no short ones which gave all to think that they were not weary of serving the Lord. Yea they compassed Sea and Land too to beget people to the Lord to make proselites thus they appeared righteous unto men But yet for all that they were but whited Sepulchres full of Hypocrisie and iniquity when that light came which was able to discover them and to uncover their hearts by their works Even by their covetousness and hard heartedness to the poor Widowes by their love of honor by their neglect of the weightier matters of the Law Judgement Mercy Faith as also by that persecuting spirit which was in them and such like and yet these men added one thing more to glosse all the rest over the better they abhorred to be companions to Publicanes and sinners and blamed Christ for eating and drinking with such Yea they made it matter of thankfulness to God acknowledging it to be his work that they were not such and thus they said in their hearts Stand by thy self for I am holier then thou There were some also spoken of in the Epistle of Jude ungodly men walking after their own lusts sensuall not having the Spirit ver 19. These separated themselves from the fellowship of those Saints who stood in the pure truth turning the grace of God into lasciviousness the pure Love into wantonness They crept in unawares and drew an image of the pure Love and grace of God shed abroad upon the Saints and in their carnall hearts it became wantonness and lasciviousness and so they withdrew themselves again and separated from that holy fellow-ship to follow their ungodly lusts of uncleanness covetousness gluttony and such like Now I say such separations as these I do not plead for But I own and defend that separation from the inventions and traditions and Formalities of men which is commanded in Scripture under the name Babylon Rev. 18.4 Jer. 50.8 Ch. 51.6 45. The whole chapters speak much thereof Oh ye Priests ye Merchants of Babylon out of the North there arised up a Nation against you which shall make your Land desolate Ch. 50.3 ch 51.48 It is time to separate from your Babylonish inventions for the hewers are already entered into your forrest Oh thou that dwellest upon many waters thine end is come and the measure of thy covetousness Jer. 51.13 Thy strength faileth the mighty men of Babylon have forborn to fight they have remained in their holds they are become as women Jer. 51.30 If my application fail it will not fail long Babylon the great is fallen is fallen and is becom the habitation of Devils and the hold of every foul spirit and a Cage of every unclean and hatefull bird All Nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornications and the Kings of the earth have committed fornication with her and the Merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies Rev. 18.2 3. And for this cause is she fallen Because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication Rev. 14.8 Therefore to obey that voice from Heaven which hath said in the hearts of many come out of her my people that ye be not partakers of her sins that ye receive not of her plague I say to obey this voice is not Heresie Schisme and such a separation as you have made it Heresie and Schisme and Separation and Sects rightly taken is this To separate divide or make a rent and breach from the truth and from them that dwell therein as namely from the Spirit and life of our Lord Jesus Christ and from such Apostles and servants of his as have walked or do walk in that spirit and in that life and from them in that thing wherein there is truth But you cannot be said to be such you are far enough from the pathes and spirit too that dwelt in them And therefore I leave it to the daylight which shall arise in mens consciences to discover whether you your selves be not Grand Hereticks grand Schismaticks grand Seperatists swarving from the Life and Spirit of them whom you cry up in words And such grand Schismaticks and Hereticks you are that you would stop up the way for ever if it were in your power to keep men from returning back again into the purity and Simplicity of that truth from which you are separated crying out to the people to take heed of Heresie and Schisme and separation scaring them with these termes when as you your selves are the
if that spirit of innocency finde nothing but an Olive leaf it must return again untill the waters be further abated these I write for those who understand And now I shall leave one Querie with you who are the Nationall Ministers I pray tell me who are those Sorcerers which have been so numerous that they have bewitched and deceived all Nations those Enchanters who have made the inhabiters of the earth drunke with the wine of their fornication and with whom the Kings of the earth have been so good friends that they have committed fornication with them Post-script THese things which I have written are not from an intention to draw people off from these men to follow or hing upon my self no but to witness with the rest of my fellow sufferers against Delusion and to help to bring down that proud Lording spirit which is in the new Prelates which would sit as God in the Temple of God Lording it over mens consciences through fained words and causing poor slaves and souls of men to dread them even as God himself I say my desire is to be helpfull to bring down to the dust that deluding Lording spirit That the Consciences of people may stand open and free to the voice of the Lord in them and may not be captivated with such who live in words And if after these others shall arise into the same spirit as these have risen into the spirit of the Prelates after their decease He that hath discovered them and these will also discover such as shall succeed and so in this sense as well as in outward Governments Overturn Overturn Overturn untill he come into his Temple whose right it is You may call these things which I have written flashes of new light if you please for so you brand every thing that breaks forth now in this dawning of the morning after the sad night of Antichristian darkness But be it known to you it is not so to me being that same which hath been sprinking up in me and others these many years For you have been a long time represented to me as men under thick darkness which hath kept me off thorow the tender mercy of my God from entering into your wayes in which I could see no light I have been onely brought to the brink of your Babylonish Rivers which bring up your gain I mean your Ordinances that I might taste of the bitterness of them but there have I been made to sit down weeping in remembrance of Zion which Zion hastens to appear Allelujah Thou that readest these things and art convinced of the truth of them Boast not against these men But look towards the Lord who is making his righteous Judgements manifest and fear For he will in due time discover much more then this both concerning them and others He is about to fan the Nations and to gather his wheat into his Garner and to burn up the light chaff with unquenchable fire therefore Glory not But let him that thinketh hestandeth take heed lest he fall Be not high minded but fear For my part I write not these things out of bitterness against any of their persons or to boast over any of them for the Lord can soon make a blaspheming Saul to become a Paul But rather to let proud boasting reviling Preachers to see what little cause they have to carry so clamorously against those who withdraw from them In respect of my self I had rather be silent and let them plow all the day long upon my back with their revilings But if these things shall be instrumentall to bring some of them to consider their wayes and to look better to the foundation of their practises and to cease from beating their fellow-servants and be stirred up to seek the way to Zion that 's as much as I look for Farewell A Letter to the Papists SIRS HAving touched in discourse with you upon that which is the very foundation of your Religion and seeing it in my understanding to have nothing but the sands to stand upon I cannot but in love to you represent again before you the same thing that I then said to you that you may seriously ponder it for it overturns your Religion at the very root Your foundation is this that Peter must have a succession and secondly that the Bishops of Rome are the onely successors of Peter and so they being the successors of Peter are the Church built upon him the Rock and from them all Teaching must flow Here is your Basis or foundation on which you stand Now friends consider whether an outward succession of Bodies inhabiting the place where Peter lived if he lived at Rome be a good foundation for the Church of Christ to stand upon When Christ the promised seed came you know that the Church slipt away from the carnall seed to a spirituall leaving the carnall Jew boasting of its carnall succession when as yet God had departed from it Now shall we think that God would ever after tie himself to a carnall succession again having once cut off Abrahams who was the friend of God Certainly if any may stand upon an outward succession then Abrahams seed after the flesh may having so many Promises running to them in outward appearance But he is not a Jew now who is one outwardly neither is Circumcision that which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew who is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the heart and they who are of the faith of Abraham are counted for the seed So I say he is not of the succession of Peter who is one outwardly but he who is of the same spirit with Peter No Nation or place or outward order of men can confine the succession of Peter to themselves since God laid aside all such outward entailment from Abraham and hath betaken himself onely to a spirituall line a spirituall seed For it were contrary to all reason that God should lay aside or cut off Abrahams carnall seed of the Jewes to take in a spirituall seed out of any Nation and yet after that take up again a carnall or outward succession to Peter and that in one part of one Nation only namely at Rome For this were to build up again that which he had formerly destroyed and to destroy that which formerly he had built up To build up again a carnal succession to Peter which he had destroyed in Abrahams line and to destroy and keep out a spirituall seed fearing God in all Nations which once he had taken in The Progresse of the Lord with his Church is not a going back from spirituall to Carnall but a going forward from carnall to spirituall and after that to more spirituall Now that the Bishops of Rome are not the spirituall seed nor the spirituall successors of Peter nor the Rock upon which the Church of Christ is builded no nor the Church of Christ it self nor the sole feeders of the flock of Christ no nor