THE AXE LAID TO THE ROOT OF THE OLD CORRVPT-TREE AND The Spirit of deceit struck at in its nature from whence all the error from the life among both Papists and Protestants hath arisen and by which it is nourished and fed at this Day In a Distinction between the Faith which is of man and the Faith which is of GOD And in some Assertions concerning true Faith its nature rise c. It s receiving of Christ its abiding and growing in his living Vertue With a warning concerning adding and diminishing from the Scripture in generall and the Prophesies of the Revelation in particular Discovering what it is and the great danger of it with the only way of preservation from it where is added a Short touch about the Use of Means As also a brief History concerning the state of the Church since the dayes of the Apostles With an Exhortation to the present Age By the movings of the Life in a friend to the Living truth of the most High God but an utter enemy to the spirit of error and blasphemy where ever it is found as well in the strictest of the Protestants as among the grossest of the Papists Isaac Penington the younger LONDON Printed and are to be sold by Lodowick Lloyd at his shop next the Castle in Cornhill 1659. THE PREFACE THere was a glorious day and bright appearance of truth in the times of the Apostles They had the true Comforter who led them into all truth and kept them alive in truly and truth alive in them By this Spirit they as living stones were built up a spirituall house founded upon Sion the holy mount into Jerusalem the holy City which is the church of the living God the pillar and gâ—ound of truth And here they had their conversation in heaven with God the Judge of all with Christ the Mediatour and with the Spirits of â—ust men and the holy Angels which alwayes behold the face of God They lived in the Spirit they walked in the Spirit they prayed in the Spirit they sung in the Spirit they worshipped in the Spirit and in that understanding which the truth had made free and had God dwelling with them and Christ walking in the midst of them and by the presence and power of his life in them were truly dead unto sin and alive unto God they being not strivers against sin with mans legall spirit but by the power of grace which made them more then conquerours through him that loved them This was part of the glory of that state in that day of the Sunshine of the Gospel But behold a thick night of darknesse overspread the beauty of this Some false brethren went out from the true Church into the world getting the Sheeps cloathing making a great outward appearance and drew the world after them yea and some from the very Churches themselves how hard was the Apostle Paul fain to plead with the Corinthians about his own Apostleship and Doctrine that he might preserve that Church from the false Apostles And when they had gathered a sufficient party in the world they made head against the true sheep lambs of Christ fought with them and overcame them And when they had overcome them that had the living testimony of Jesus and the true power and presence of the Spirit among them they set up their own dead form making a cry all over the nations of the earth Revelation is ceased there is no looking now for such an infallible spirit and such immediate teachings as the christians had in the Apostles dayes who had the anointing to teach them all things but they point men to traditions to the church as they call it which title the whore hath engrossed since the dayes of the Apostles or to searchings of the Scriptures and reading expositions upon it and bodies of divinity formed by the understanding part in man to instruct the understading part Thus the whole course of religion and of the knowledge of God came to be out of that Spirit and life wherein it first came forth and wherein it first stood and consisted in doctrines of men and a form of worship and knowledge which the wisdome of man had framed in an imitation of that which formerly stood in the life And now men being gone from the life from the Spirit and his immediate teachings into an outward form of knowledge and worship of God in the wrong nature now Antichrist is got up and the Dragon sits in the Temple appearing there as if he were God giving out laws and ordinances of worship in publique and putting men upon duties and exercises of devotion in private and he is obeyed and bowed down to in the observation of these but the true living God is not known nor his secret still voyce which calls out of these heard because of the great noise which the Dragon makes in his Temple for so it is now he having gained it though it was once Gods about his laws and ordinances of worship which he would have all compelled to and none suffered to testifie against them that they are his and not the Lords Yet it pleased the Lord all the night of this darknesse to raise up some witnesses against the Dragon and all his invented forms of worship though they were still hunted persecuted knocked down and their testimony cryed out against as error heresie schism and blasphemy and the wayes worships and ordinances of the whore the beast and the dragon still cryed up as the truth Thus the Papists they cryed out against the Protestanus as heretiques and schismatiques who were witnesses against them and the Protestants they cryed out against the non-conformists seperatists and brownists who were witnesses against them and every sect cries out most against them who are led further from the apostacy and raised up by the Lord as witnesses against them against their setting down in their forme and not pursuing the guidance of that spirit which would lead them quite out of the darknesse and not have them sit down by the way Now the Lord God in these latter dayes hath not only raised up witnesses against the Whore the Dragon the Beast the false Prophets with all their inventions which they have set up instead of the truth but hath assayed and begun to deliver his people out of this Egyptian darknesse and to bring them back to the light of the land of Canaan And now great enemies have appeared the sons of the night exceedingly strengthening themselves to keep out the day light every one crying up his own form and all joyning hand in hand against the power yea that spirit which first tempted from God is exceeding busie to cause those whom the Spirit the Lord hath been drawing out of the land of darknesse to make a Captain to return to Egypt or at least to sit down in some form or some pleasant notion of things by the way not to follow the Lord through all his intricate
can ye see it Christ is descended into the lower parts of the earth and ye are using means to ascend upwards in the wrong nature how can ye meet with him the Gospel hath been hid the Sun hath not shined it hath been night and ye have got many fals candles which way can ye acknowledge the little glimmering of the day star who have such satisfaction in the warmth of your false fires ye are far from the true light who have not yet received so much of it as to discover the darknesse of the night Ye are too high too wise too knowing for Christ or for the sight and acknowledgment of the true means which lead to life And if ye could once come to see this there might be some hope but in that wisdome wherein your life and knowledge stands ye are shut out and ye are reasoning and stumbling at the stone while others who are broken in spirit and in meeknesse and humility led to try find it a sure foundation even a foundation of eternall life for the true seed of life and are built into the living City which is made without hands and without any of the tools of mans wisdome A Brief History of the state of the Church since the dayes of the Apostles with the living seal to it which he that hath eternall life abiding in him can read and witnes but that wisdom zeal and devotion which is in the death cannot AFter the universal degeneration and corruption of the Jewish state and the putting an end to the shadows thereof by the appearance and succession of the substance it pleased God to dissolve that people state and pollicy and by the power of his life without either the wisdome or strength of man to set upon the heathenish world which he subdued and brought under the power of his life By his Apostles and messengers who preached the everlasting Gospel the word of eternall life he gathered assemblies up and down the nations whom the nations by all their persecutions could not subject but they reigned over them in the power authority and dominion of God For they were Kings and Priests to God in the sight of all the Nations and they did reign upon the earth in somuch as the heathenish spirit of man observing their order in the Spirit and the wisdom and power of the Spirit among them who by his living light was able to search the hearts of those that came to observe them could not but acknowledge that God was in them of a truth Now the next thing to be expected is Satans opposition against this power of life his stratagems to undermine it He withstood the growth and settlement of the Church all that he could by open force making use both of the heathenish devout worshippers who fought for their Jupiter their Diana and other gods and goddesses and of the Jewish devout worshippers who fought for their Temple-worship with the Laws and ordinances of Moses which were now expired But neither of these would doe but the Church in the power of life gained ground upon him and did rather thrive and increase then diminish by this opposition Therefore now he falls to this stratagems he gets some false brethren out of the Church they went out from us these he cloaths as Angels of light puts the sheeps cloathing on their wolvish nature makes them appear as like the Apostles as may be endues them with an excellent taking knowledge of life and spirituallity in appearance forms in them an image of the truth and inspires this image with the spirit of his own life and with these he goes forth into the world and gathers the world about him Now the world was presently taken with this the world went after him for this is that the world would have an appearance of religion an image of truth but their own spirit in it The worldly spirit that flies off from the life from the power can readily close with this because it is its own Bring forth never so high notions of religion and spirituall wisdome the world will hug them the world will feed on them the world will cloath it selfe with them The world can swallow and digest any thing but life Any pleasant picture of things in heaven will down with the world but the nature the life the truth the Spirit Christ in his true arid living crosse this will not down with the world Now the Devil having thus set up his false image in the world and gathered a party after him then he sets upon the Church and the battel goeth very hard life striving to defend and death to overcome How hard did the Apostles strive in their day to keep their converts to the simplicity of truth to the way therof which even then began to be evill spoken of writing Epistles to the Churches warning them of the false Apostles and wishing them to stand their ground yea Christ himselfe writes severall Epistles from heaven to some of them cheking their backslidings and encouraging them to renew their zeal and strength putting them in mind of the Crown which attended the victory But at length the Divill with his stratagems prevails gets the possession of the Churches territories and the Church is faine to fly for her preservation and such of her seed as are left behind her the enemy makes war against slayes drinks their bloud Now here 's an end of all the glory of that state now the Divil hath gained the world again The same spirit that lost it under the heathenish power for there he was conquered recovers it under an Antichristian appearance setting up the same wickednes and the same course and current of death under forms of Antichristian religion as he had done before under forms of Heathenish devotion Thus the Devil being conquerour having gained the field he divides the spoils among his army he takâ—s whatever was the Churches and make his own and ranks them in his way of Antichristian religion and devotion so that now hence forward those things which were once Christs and the Churches they are noâ— all his and distributed by him among his followers He gives the name Church to the whore which he sets up he gives the name Christian to his Disciples he prescribes baptisme and the Supper which he calls Sacraments and praying and preaching and singing which he calls publique ordinances and be prescribes private duties and exercises of devotion and he gets the letter of the Scriptures and forms multitudes of meanings and expositions and has lying signs and wonders for such as need them that he might keep all the severall Brigades of his army quiet under his pay and might have some pleasing wares of traffick for every sort of his Merchants in his Babilon For this is the City of that King which he built after his conquest over the life and which he hath enriched with the spoils from the life And here all his subjects shall have content they
truth aright in others Nay thou measurest by a false appearance of things in the fallen understanding and in the wisdome which thou hast gathered there since thou thy selfe fellest from the living principle and this must needs commend that most which is neerest to it and not that which is neerest to truth And this is the great error of this age men with a gathered knowledge from Scripture-words without the true faith and life go about to measure that life and knowledge which comes from the faith and because it suites not with the apprehensions which they have taken into their minds they condemn it And thus being in the stumbling wiâ—dome and way of observation to which truth was never revealed but was ever an offence they stumb'e at it and thus men generally dish and split themselves against the same rock now as the Pharisees did of old Now this understanding must perish and this wisdome in men be brought to nought before that can be raised up which can judge aright Hearken therefore to my exhortation as ye love your souls Come out of popery indeed and in truth come out of the spirit of popery burn the whore in her new forms as well as in her old Cast off all these new names of the Beast under which the old spirit has made a prey of the life in your own particulars and lies lurking to make a prey of the life in others and to force it into its own deceitfull forms of death and slay it Leave defending your faith and church by the Beasts horns and come to that faith and church which is received gathered and defended by Christ the one horn of salvation Leave your reasonings and disputings in that wisdome which has slain the life and come to that wisdome which comes from the life and springs up in the life and ye will find more certainty and satisfaction in one touch of true life then in all the reasonings and disputes of wise men to the worlds end The ground wherein mens religion grows even of the most zealous is bad even the same ground wherein the Pharisees religion stood and grew and it hath brought forth such kind of fruit namely such a kind of conformity to the letter as theirs was which stands in the understanding and will of man rearing up a pleasant building there but keeps from the life and from building in it But the true religion stands in receiving a principle of life which by its growth forms a vessell for it selfe s and all the former part wherein sin on the one hand or selfe righteousnesse on the other hand stood and grew passeth away These things following strike at the King of Babilon himselfe yea even at the very root of the Antichristian spirit in every man which he that can mild y receive the stroake of may feel the true Spirit of life which lies slain underneath spring up in him and give life to his soul which when it is delivered will be able truly to know and rejoyce in the Lord its Saviour And when the root of that spirit is cut downe which never brought forth sweet pleasant fruit unto life but only sowre fruit finely pâ—inted and dressed for the eye and palate of death its body branches leaves and fruit will wither and dye dayly and truth come to grow safely A Distinction between the faith which is of man and the faith which is of GOD One whereof is the Faith of Sion the other the Faith of Babilon the one laying hold on Christ as he is revealed the King of life in Sion the other layes hold on an Historicall relation of Christ the fame whereof hath sounded in Babilon THere is a faith which is of a mans selfe and a faith which is the gift of God or a power of beleeving which is found in the nature of fallen man and a power of believing which is given from above As there are two births the first and the second so they have each their faith and each beleeve with their faith and seem to lay hâ—ld on the same thing for life and the contention about the inheritance will not be ended till God determine it Cain will sacrifice with his faith and he beleeves he shall be accepted if he had not beleeved so he would not have been so angry when he found it otherwise And the Cainish spirit in man the vagabond from the life of God which hath not an habitation in God nor the eternall life of God abiding in him he is busie with the same faith at this day and hath the same expectation from it as Cain had This is the root of the false religion of the false hope of the false peace of the false joy of the false rest of the false comfort of the false assurance as the other is the root of the true In this faith which is of man and in the improvement of it stands all the knowledge zeal devotion and worship of the world in generall and of the worldly part in every man in particular but the true knowledge the true zeale the true devotion the true worship stands in the faith which is given of God to them which are born of the immortall seed which liâ—es in God and in which God lives for ever Now it deeply concerns every man to consider from which of these his knowledg religion and worship proceed and in which of them they stand for if they proceed from and stand in the faith which is of man they cannot please God nor conduce to the salvation of the soule but though they may tast very pleasantly to mans pallate now and administer much hope and satisfaction to him at present yet they will faile at the time of need For as Christ said concerning the righteousnesse of the Scribes and Pharisees so may I say concerning this faith Except your faith with the works of it exceed that faith and all the works of it even to the utmost improvement thereof which is to be found in mans nature it will never lead you to the kingdom of God nor be able to give you any right to the inheritance of life For he that will inherit must be the right heir must have the faith of Abraham the faith of Isaacâ— which springs up from the root of life in the seed and this leads the seed into that spring of life out of which it shot forth as a branch which is the inheritance promised to the seed And here is Christ Alpha and Omega in every particular soul where life is begun and perfected â—unning its course through time back to that which was before the beginning Therefore observe and consider well what this faith which is of a mans selfe can doe and how far it may goe in the changing of man and in producing a conformity of him to the letter of the Scriptures And then consider where it is shut out what it cannot do what change it cannot make what it cannot conform to
that so the true distinction may be let into the mind and not a foundation layed of so great a mistake in a matter of so great concernment 1. A man may beleeve the history of the Scriptures yea and all the doctrines of them so far as he can reach them with his understanding with this faith which is of man As by this faith a man can believe an history probably related to him so by this faith may he beleeve the historyes of the Scriptures which are more then probably related As by this faith a man can receive doctrines of instruction out of Philosophers books so by the same faith he may receive doctrins of instruction out of the Scriptures Reading a relation of the fall of man of the recovery by Christ that there is no other way to life c. This faith can beleeve the relation of these things as well as it can beleeve the relation of other things 2. This being believed from the relation of the history of these things this naturally sets all the powers of man on work kindling the understanding will and affections towards the avoiding of misery and the attaining of happinesse What would not a man doe to avoid perpetuall extremity of misery on soul and body for ever and to obtain a crowne of everlasting blessednesse This boils the affections to an height and sets the understanding on work to the utmost to gather all the rules of Scripture and to practise all the duties and ordinances therein mentioned What can the Scripture propose to be believed that he will not believe What can it propose to be done that he will not do Must he pray he will pray Must be heat he will hear Must he read he will read Must he meditate he will meditate Must he deny himselfe and all his own righteousnesse and duties and hope only for salvation in the merits of Christ he will seeme to do that to and say when he has done all he can he is but an unprofitable servant Does the Scripture say he can doe nothing without the Spirit he will acknowledge that too and he hopes he has the Spirit God hath promised the Spirit to them that aske it and he has asked long and asks still and therefore he hopes he has it Thus man by a naturall faith grows up and spreads into a great tree and is very confident and much pleased not perceiving the defect in his root and what all his growth here will come to 3. This being done with much seriousnes and industry there must needs follow a great change in man his understanding will be more and more enlightened his will more and more conformed to that to which he thus gives himselfe up and to which he thus bends himselfe with all his strength his affections more and more warmed he will find a kind of life and growth in this according to its kind Let a mans heart be in any kind of study or knowledg applying himselfe strictly to it he gathers understanding in his mind and warmth in his affections so it is also here Yea this being more excellent in it selfe must needs produce a more excellent understanding and a more excellent warmth and have a greater power and influence upon the will 4. Now how easie is it for a man to mistake here and call this the truth First he mistakes this for the true faith and then he mistakes in applying to this all that which belongs to the true faith and thus entring into the spirit of error at first he errs in the whole course of his religion from the beginning to the end He sees a change made by this in him and this he accounts the true conversion and regeneration This leads him to ask and seek and pray and this he counts the true praying the true seeking the true asking This cleanseth after its kind his understanding will and affections and this he takes for the true sanctification The justification which is to the true beleever he also aplyes to this faith so he has a peace â— satisfaction a rest here and an hope of happinesse hereafter Thus he receives what is already revealed he waits for what may be further revealed which he can embrace and conform to turning still upon this center and growing up from this root And he that does not come hither in religion falls short of the improvement of mans nature and of the faith that grows there which naturally leads all the powers of nature hither and fixes them here which is but dead And now this man is safe he is a beleever he is a worshipper of God he is a Christian he is an observer of the commands of Christ when the overflowing scourge comes it shall not touch him all the judgements plagues threatnings in the Scripture belong not to him but to the unbelievers to them that know not God to them that worship not God to them that observe not the commands of Christ thus by his untempered morter from his false faith he has built up a wall against the deluge of wrath which wall will tumble down upon him when the wrath comes The growth of this faith and great spreading of it into all this knowledg zeal and devotion hath not changed the nature of it all this while but it is the same that it was at the beginning even a power of nature in the first birth and all these fruits are but the fruits of the first nature which is still alive under all this All this can never kill the principle out of which it grows but feeds it more and fattens it for the slaughter Thus far this faith can go But then there is somewhat it is shut out of at the very first There is somewhat this faith cannot receive beleeve or enter into What is that It is the life the power the inward part of this Though it may seem to have unity with all the Scriptures in the letter yet it cannot have unity with one Scripture in the life for its nature is shut out of the nature of the things there witnessed As for instance it may have a litterall knowledge of Christ according as the Scripture relates of his birth preaching miracles death resurrection ascention intercession c. Yea but the thing spoken of it knoweth not The nature of Christ which is the Christ is hid from that eye So it may have a litterall knowledg of the blood of Christ and of justification but the life of the blood which livingly justifieth that birth cannot feele but can only talk of it according to the relation it reads in the Scripture So it may have a litterall knowledge of sanctification but the thing that sanctifieth it cannot receive into it selfe So for redemption peace joy hope love c. it may get into the outward part of all these but the inward part the life the spirit of them it is shut out of and cannot touch or come neer nor can it witnesse
wrath without mixture torment day and night in the presence of the Lamb c. As the growth and fulness of the mistery of iniquity is spoken of in this book so the measuring out of the fulnesse of wrath to it is spoken of also And great is the life and blessedness that is here promised to those that fight with and overcome the mistery of iniquity and receive not any of the marks or names of the beast nor are subject to any of his hornes though â—e push never so hard with them Now to meet with all the plagues here threatned and to miss of all the blessednesse here promised is it not a sad state Why he that addeth to these things here spoken or diminisheth from the words of this prophecy the Lord hath said this shall befall him Therefore in the fear of that God who hath spoken this and will make it good let every one search who is the adder who is the diminisher Now mark see if this be not a clear thing He that giveth any other meaning of any Scripture then what is the true proper meaning thereof he both addeth and diminisheth he taketh away the true sence he addeth a sence that is not true The Spirit of the Lord is the true Expositor of Scriptures he never addeth nor diminisheth but man being without that Spirit doth but guess doth but imagine doth but study or invent a meaning and so he is ever adding or diminishing This is the sence saith one this is the sence saith another this is the sence saith a third this saith a fourth another that is witty and large in his comprehension he sayes they will all stand another perhaps more witty then he sayes none of them will stand and he invents a meaning different from theÌ„ all And then when they are thus expounding them they will say take the sence thus it will yeeld this observation or take it thus and it will afford this observation Doth not this plainly shew that he who thus saith hath not the Spirit of the Lord to open the Scripture to him and manifest which is the true sence but is working in the misery of darknesse And yet this very person who is thus working with his own dark spirit in the dark will in words confesse that there is no true understanding or opening of Scripture but by the Spirit of God If it be so how darest thou set thy imagination thy fancy thy reason thy understanding on work and so be guessing at that which the Spirit doth not open to thee and so art found adding and diminishing Now he that is adder he that is the diminisher he cryeth out against the Spirit of the Lord and chargeth him with adding and diminishing for man being judge he will judge his own way to be true and Gods to be false That which is the adding and diminishing he calls the true expounding of the place but if the Spirit of the Lord immediately open any thing to any son or daughter he cries this is an adding to the word The Scripture is written there are no more revelations to be expected now the curse saith he is to them that adde Thus he removes the curse from his own Spirit and way of study and invention to which it appertains and casts it upon the Spirit of the Lord And man cannot possibly avoid this in the way that he is in for having first judged his own darknesse to be light then in the next place he must needs judge the true light to be darknesse He that hath aforehand set up his own invented meaning of any Scripture to be the true meaning he must needs oppose the true meaning and call it false and so apply himselfe to forme all the arguments he can out of other Scriptures to make it appear false Thus man having begun wrong in his knowledge of the Scriptures stands engaged to make use of them against the Lord and against his own soul and yet really in himself thinks that he makes a right use of them and that he serves the Lord and that he is not opposing his truth but opposing error and heresie while he himselfe is in the error and in the heresie and against the truth being a stranger to that Spirit in whose immediate life and presence the truth grows Did the Lord in these words of forbidding to adde or diminish upon so great a penalty lay a restraint and limit upon his owne spirit that it should no more hereafter speak in his sons daughters or did he intend to lay bounds upon the unruly spirit of man Did God leave mans spirit at liberty to invent and form meanings of his words and bind up his owne spirit from speaking further words afterwards When Moses said thou shalt not adde nor diminish was this to be any stop to the Prophets in whom God should speake afterwards Is not this one of the subtle Serpents inventions to keep up the esteem of mans invented meanings as the true sence and to make a fortification against the entrance of that spirit which can discover all his false interpretations of the true words of God and to make him see that he is the adder and the diminisher and that his name will not be found in the book of life when the true light is held forth to read by But this is generall extending to all Scriptures my drift is more particular concerning adding to the things or diminishing from the words of the book of this prophecy There are two things chiefely spoken of in this book Mistery-Sion Mistery-Babilon the true Church the false Church the Lambs wise the whore the hiding of Mistery-Sion the appearing of Mistery-Babilon in her place the flying of the Church out of her heaven into the wilderness leaving all behind her which she could not carry along with her even all the ordinances and institutions of Christ wherein once she appeared worshipping and serving God and the starting of the false Church into her place taking up all that she had left even all the ordinances and institutions of Christ in the letter thus covering her selfe with the form of godlinesse with the sheeps cloathing that she might passe the better for the true Church And the Dragon who mannaged the war against the woman and her seed raiseth up first one beast and then another and sets this whore on the top of them who with the cup of fornication makes all the earth drunk all nations peoples kindreds tongues languages And the beast he has his horns every where his marks every where his names every where and also his image in every part of Babilon And who will not worship him he fights with yea such as are led by God to rent from the whore he calls schismaticks hereticks blasphemers and persecutes them as persons not worthy to live Thus the state of things is quite changed the power of truth lost the form set up without it those that seek after the power hated persecuted
but the Lord God is feared and the Dragons arm withers and the head of his pollicy whereby he ensnared intangled from the life is crushing glory to the endlesse power of life for ever and for ever Be wise now therefore loose not your share in the immortal Crown Take heed how ye be found fighters against the Lamb in the wisdom power of Babilon which is to fall Painting will not passe now That bloud of the Lamb is felt which washes off the whores paint even all her painted notions of the blood of christ of sanctification and redemption c. the whorish nature being discovered underneath all these Ye have got the name of Church the name of Christians the name of ordinances c. by the whores help but the nature of life ye want and the living power is come to recover the name from you and we his living witnesses testifie to your faces that ye shall not enjoy it but the name and the thing shall go together and he that hath not the thing shall also loose the name Yea your eyes shall see that ye have been the sacrilegious ones who have stoln holy names and tirles which ye never received from the hand of God but the whorish spirit which out of the life and an enemy to the life hath handed them to you And this is told you in dear and tender love that ye might not perish but have eternall life abiding in your hearts and the new name written by the Spirit of life on your foreheads which all that know the writing of the life may be able to read and acknowledge There are severall touches of these things in diverse of of the Epistles of the Apostles but the full relation is given forth in that book of the Revelation which was penned by the Spirit of God to be read in the light of the Spirit and so to be a preservative against the overspreading contagion of Antichristianism Adn it is said at the entrance into it Blessed is he that readeth they that hear the words of this prophests keâ—p those things wch are written therein But men having lost the Spirit have not been able to read it and having lost the right ear they have not been able to heare the words it speaks and how then could they keepe the things written therein He that doth â—ot understand what he is warned against how is it likely he should be preserved by the warning The Spirit of God judged this warning necessary but the spirit of deceit cryes it is a deep thing not to be medled with Now this is a plain demonstration that men generally are overtaken with the whoredom and drink of the whores cup submit themselves to the beast and exalt his horns and receive his mark and some or other of his names because they have not the knowledge of that which discovers these things and was given by the Spirit of God to forewarn and so to preserve out of them He that knoweth not the mistery of iniquity working under a form of godlines may not he easily be deceived with the mistery of iniquity He that knoweth not what is become of the true Church ministry and where to look for them may not he easily own a fall Church and ministry He that knoweth not the Spirit of the Scriptures which the Church carried with her when she left the letter behind her may not he easily set up the letter for his rule He that knoweth not the living mark and name of a Christian with which the Spirit of life seals all the Lambs of Christ in the life may not he easily give this name to himself and to others who have not this mark but the beasts mark He that knoweth not the true faith the true love the true hope the true joy the true peace the true rest the true consolation in Christ the life the true meeknes and patience of the Sâ—ints c. may not he easily set up shadows or liknesses of these which he gathers from the letter of the Scriptures and the promises thereof receiving the knowledge of them into the wrong part applying them to the wrong thing instead of these Ah poor hearts The book of the Revelation is easie to that Spirit that wrote it and it was not given forth to be laid by as uselesse but to be serviceable in the hand of the Spirit for the ages after the dayes of the Apostles and in the true light it is easily read and they that can read it can see that in it which they that cannot read it cannot beleeve And this is plainly seen That theâ—e is but the Spirit of truth and the Spirit of deceit but the Lambs wife and the whore which hath whored from the Spirit which hath made use of the lotter to run a whoring from that Spirit that wrote it that there is but the true Church and the false Church but life and death but form and power but Christ the mistery of godlinesse and Antichrist the mistary of iniquity but God and the dragon God in the Church or Temple in the Wildernesse and the dragon in the worlds churches and temples appearing there as if he were God giving sorth lawes and ordinances like God and all the world falls down before him and worships him as if he were God and hopes by this worship which they perform to him and by their faith and hope which they receive from him to be saved at last I say there are but these two and he that is joyned to the one of these is not joyned to the other Let him that readeth understand which he may easily doe by the wisdome of the Spirit but never can by the wisdome of the letter For though we know how to join these two in the life yet there is a necessity of seperating them at present till the letter be gained out of the hands of the whorish spirit which hath built up severall forms of knowledge religion and worship in mistery-Babilon by the letter without the life all which must fall with Babilon AN Exhortation relating to the workings of the mistery of Iniquity and the mistery of godlinesse in this present age ALL people upon earth who love your souls and have any true secret pantings after God look to the nature of your Spirits and look to the nature of those things ye let into your minds least ye take in death for life error for truth and so sow to your selves corruption and rear up a fabricke in mistery Babilon which will be turned into desolation and utter ruins by the power of life from Sion Strong is the Spirit of deceit that is entred into the world and glorious and very taking are his images and likenesses of truth which will deceive all but the very elect who were chosen from the foundation of the world and whose eyes are opened to see the foundation of life which was before the foundation of the world It