had a commandement concerning the Temple and they might say unto Jeremiah who was as a stripling and as it were a childe Art thou greater then Solomon whom God appointed to build us this Temple Neverthelesse and although Jeremiah was as one alone in that work yet this was his testimony he knew that he was of God Jer 26.15 Whether they would heare or forbeare and they having corrupted themselves in a commandement he was therefore sent to cry against them and if they were cryed against as being a people corrupted in a commandement how much more thinke ye ought ye to be born witnesse and testimony against who have contrary to the Word or any command abused your selves and dishonoured God in and through the workes and inventions of your degenerated fore-fathers much lesse therefore could you in your nature receive my testimony in the name and power of the Lord if ye were commanded as the Jewes were or had any example as they had so suitable with their time seeing ye sleight my testimony and do make a mock of my witnesse against your Temples pictures bowings beads crosses and crossings c. for which ye have neither precept president example or the least commandement throughout all the Scriptures of the Prophets Christs words and the Apostles writings that ever such things were or should in any age in the Truth come to passe What benefit therefore doe you purchase to your souls through the exercise of your tongues in smooth words and flatteries what advantageth it if you say that you believe in Christ whilest the words of Christ are not a Law unto you but the traditions of your Fathers stand the Law of liberty for your blind hearts to walk in the crookednesse of their subversion What is Christ Jesus unto you whilest you forsake his way life and council and in enmity thereunto are acting worshipping and walking in the way life and councils of men of corrupt and degenerated minds which you call the faith of the Roman Catholique Church what is the Catholique Church to the Church of Christ seeing they have not the word nor council of Christ And therefore much farther from the work life and faithfull order of the doctrine of Christ You may blind the simple and deceive the ignorant and destroy the souls of thousands that know not the right hand from the left Unto you Doctors I speak unto whom also my words in the Light and Life of the Lord Jesus is a Riddle and a Parable Ye know not the right hand from the left and therefore I write little things unto you do speak plain words concerning you that in all your Countreys and Colledges ye may be no longer the deceived and deceivers The deluded and deluders The destroyed and destroyers And therefore I further say That it is not a shame unto you whose long hairs declares seniority without in the Antiquity of your dayes to stoop and bow your necks for your backs to bear the chastisement of the Rod of your younger in years and know ye that it was prudence in as many of the aged whose faces wore a fair shew of grey hairs not to despise the youth of tender Timothy And remember that little David smote and slew the great Philistine and the glory was the Lords and in this also I give the praise and honour unto God who is arisen to smite the earth who also hath smitten many Islands thereof and his word reacheth unto the utmost end of the many continents wherein the Beasts of the field have an habitation and the Lord God will hunt the Foxes and destroy the Wolves and slay the Lyons of the Forrests which have scattered the sheep of the Fold and preyed upon the Heritage of God Oh earth where are they devourers hid they have made merry but they shall be vexed they have sported but they shall be tormented Ye men of learning what is your learning Ye men of strength what is your strength Bring forth your Books and let us put them in the Ballance Rome Rome Hide not thy Daughters but let the whole earth see the Daughters of thy pleasure and let us come and reason with you a little to see if thy daughters of delight and ease which have been born without pain are meet to make marriage with the Sons of God for whose birth Zion hath travelled Yea her children yea all the daughters of your mother Rome plead with your mother and say unto your mother if thou who hast born us without travel beest not an Harlot in thy prophane pleasure then let us know of a truth also whether it is not meet that we may be given unto a holy Nation that a Seed may be preserved to the praise of the name of the Leader of Israel out of Aegypt Oh Italy thou hast a remnant within thee which plague shall not touch although Pestilence as a Besom shall sweep thy Land Repent if peradventure ye may be spared Ye Doctors I have not yet left you having also publiquely to proclaim Gods controversie with you take to you the Officers of your two Churches number your Armyes arme your Hosts whet your swords yet behold in the day of battel God will wound you when you shall not smite the Lord. I have seen your strength and have passed by your trust and at that time the wind of the Lord God did shake the earth wherein I walked What is your Spear to the Arrows of the Lord Let Romes University answer my enquiry What is your weavers beam unto Davids smooth stones What are your Silogisms to truth What is your Philosophy to the Light What are all your critical Inventions and cunning contrivances to the word which cannot be changed You cal'd Jesuits what are your many colours to white You Priests what are your changeable Coats unto that one without a seam Oh Athens Thy Members are in my remembrance and ye the Pastors of the People mark your sheep yea your sheep do bear your own mark The Lord moved me on the 27. day of the 7. Month in the year accounted 1657. being the first day of the week the day of Greeks solemn worship Hear this ye Doctors of Athens and Priests thereof who minister in the Idols Temples and House of Rimmon The Lord moved me to read in the place of your solemnity and a witnesse went with me to the sealing of my testimony and at which time Behold your worshippers did bow to their pictures giving forth contempt and laughter in our faces and I said Gods hand is against you and he that fits in Heaven laughs you to scorn O horrible abomination Hear this ye Priests mark the fruits of your ministry ye Doctors Behold they declared you in the street and spread your name in the open places your Temples could not contain their lightness and wickednesse for afterwards in a mock of the Crosse of Christ Jesus even in the streets of your City the people would meet us and stand
AN EPISTLE TO THE GREEKS ESPECIALLY To those in and about Corinth and Athens WITH Certain Queries propounded to the Priests and Doctors and all the rest of the Members and Officers belonging unto the two Churches of Greeks and Romans which is of concernment for the view of them all throughout the WORLD Written in Egripo in the Island of Negroponte By a Servant of the Lord J. P. LONDON Printed for Thomas Simmons at the Bull and Mouth within Aldersgate 1661. To the Reader Friends THe Word of the Lord is the Proclamation of War onely with the wicked and the messengers thereof holds not the persons of men in contempt or scorne it casteth out the root of envy which Satan planted in the heart and fixeth the love of God for the souls inheritance which floweth in pitty and aboundeth in mercy to others He that readeth and receiveth in him also hold 〈◊〉 and he shall bear Testimony to the Truth and witnesse for God that the zeal of the Lords House is neither Envy Emulation Wrath or vain Contention Wherefore I say God who hath 〈◊〉 mercy and 〈◊〉 bountifully of the riches of his Grace unto me hath freed me from the nature of evill towards my neighbour and hath given me of his Love therewith to seek the lost from which issues the plainnesse of my Declarations and Speeches which without guile fraud or flatteries Love in simplicity holds forth the Truth in nakednesse and this will stand a Yoak to the stubborn and a Dart in the side of the rebellions The enmity is 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 He that hath an ear to heare let him heare This is verily a character of the same nature of what follows in the succedent Pages Given forth by a Friend in the Truth A lover of souls J. P. The Day will declare the Dreadfull and Mighty Work IN the Councel of the wonderfull Counceller and All mighty Father and Fountaine of Wisdom who confoundeth the Councils of the wise and the wisdome of the Fathers of this world in whose sight the prudent and learned amongst men are but as fools plotting in their works the contrivance and invention of the perpetual evil of their souls This is given forth to the only true intent that the simple hearted may be rightly informed of the way to salvation life and peace everlasting For of a truth the Lord God of Heaven and earth is arisen who for many hundreds of years hath been as a stranger upon the earth And now in this his mighty day which is broaken and breaking forth by the work of his own hand he will frustrate the tokens of lyars and make the Diviners mad and turn wise men backward and make their knowledge foolishnesse who will open a door to the simple and lead the Wayfaring men and fools in the unerring path of Righteousnesse and the deceit in the earth shall no longer stand without a heavy work as it did in the dayes of the ancient Fathers Doctors and Lawyers of the world who took from the people the key of knowledge who entred not in themselves but stood in the gap and set Bryars and Thorns in the way and hindred such as was entring The flame of the fire of the Lord will finish the course of the former times for shall it not burn in a dry Countrey And if the Nations post unto Euphrates for water to quench the fire shall not that River be also dryed up before they come there And if from thence they flye unto Jordan shall not the utter Consumption be ere they can have help from thence Behold the Lord will make a quick work in the earth Let the Nations therefore repent and now not in any upbraiding or rash judging manner but in the Councel of God as a servant by Commandement in the work of the Lord in love unspeakable to all souls I shew unto the people their states and unto the sons of men how they stand in the sight of God my testimony reaching that of God in mens consciences to the measure of the Light in all desiring only to be made manifest which when the sinner is convinced of his sins and the wicked man converted in his mind and turned from the evill of his wayes then shall they confesse of a truth the blessed day of the Lord and say Surely it was well for us that the Prophet spared not to shew unto Judah her sins and unto Jerusalem her transgressions Yea well sprang forth that day and that hour was the certain timely season of the appearance of mercy and manifestation of loving kindnesse wherein Nathan was sent to shew unto David the treachery and rebellion of his heart And now what am I that God should remember me also with the mercies of David to shew me my transgression that by his word I may be converted and healed Verily of none other do I make mention but only of the name of the Holy One and that which proceedeth from his presence declaring this Dread shewing unto all people the Door of mercy the Fountain of life the Gate of knowledge everlasting treasure of undefiled pure wisdome For as much as the Lord holdeth forth a day of visitation unto all that the whole world may be left without excuse in the day of Gods dreadful judgements when the compleat fulfilling and finishing of the time cometh to passe of the full gathering of the scattered Seed in the Fields of the Earth and full calling of his Remnant from the four windes of the Heavens throughout all Nations Kindreds Countryes Tongues and Peoples and the Lord hasteth the Reaping of the Harvest A warning to the World to repent and this to the Debtors and Captives of the house of Israel is sounded and sounding The year of Jubilee beginneth in the morning season yet a little while and your slumber will be over and the clouds of the night will passe from the sphear of your low degree which ariseth and will quickly passe over the Sun of another exalted Nation Oh how doth the day change the times the Children are become Dogs and the Dogs which were are become the glory of the earth and who hath an eye to see or a heart to believe that this is come it cometh and is at hand that the Dogs shall eat the Childrens bread and no more shall their name be a reproach among the Gentiles but their day of Son-ship shall be the Dread of the Heathen Who is he now that will set Briars in the way or Thorns in the breach of the Gap which the Lord hath made and who is he that contendeth against his maker saying why cometh this thing to passe mine hand is turned against it Ye despisers and wonder and perish behold I work a work in your dayes which if a man shall tell it unto you ye shall in no wise believe it And you that resist are but for the consumption of the fire of Gods jealousie in the day of his wrath A warning a warning
to the whole world is come it cometh it hath sounded and is sounding The mighty day of God is at hand therefore whilest you have time repent And allthough the Gentiles resist and all the Heathen every where gain-say yet the Lord will be glorified over all the world unto whom the Light is the sure message of the Most High whether they will hear or forbear AN EPISTLE TO THE GREEKS I Have heard a rumor in mine ears of a hard cry among the people Alas alas Our glory is defaced and our ancient praise and renown is utterly defamed Our wives are made the Vassals of other women and we are become slaves to a strange Nation We are no more under the Government of the Scepter which swayed our Fathers but the wills of another people works violence over us Our houses are but as habitations lent unto us and our substance and portion at pleasure may be spoyled by the hand of the Devourer Our children unto us are not as were the children of our fore-fathers in their Generations our wives and children treasure and substance is but a burden unto us when the eyes of our Lords looks over us Alas alas our misery is great and none regardeth it the sound of our cry hath reached far yet few have pondered it And the Lord said unto me Cry also among the Professors of Christian Religion even thus it is come to passe in many Regions of the earth the bondage it great and the captivity is doubled with violence and with cruelty The chains and yoaks are twice laid on and the people are under the indignation of the Lord The judgements of their adversaries lyes heavy upon their heads and their Loins are banded with the oppressions of their Rulers as with Iron and with Brasse and they cannot break the Cords to cast off their burdens and this and much more is the misery of the Greeks which their fathers iniquities first brought upon their heads in their dayes and the children of their Generations drinking of the Cup of their abominations unto this present Seed of evill doers Wherefore the hand of vengeance still toucheth their shoulders and in this manner God hath seen it equall to lay the burden upon that man which with his transgressions hath laden and pressed down the righteous soul of the Lord as a Cart is laden and pressed down with sheaves This is the end of their labours they ploughed the fields of the pleasure of their own hearts they sowed the seed of unrighteousnesse in the depth of the ground of iniquity who notwithstanding the Lord watered them with the water of adversity yet returned they not in the day of affliction wherefore of corruption they have reaped this abundance of misery YE Greeks unto whom I write for the seeds sake as a husband unto a wife not covering the diseased parts or falsly solving up the forest and most dangerous wounds not seeking to seal up your states in hidden sentences from your understandings or your conditions in parables nor to shut the door of the Kingdom against the seed of the Kingdom It hath pleased the Lord contrary to every part of the natural and desire of the carnall to lead me through some of the Countryes wherein as Sojourners you are Inhabitants among whom I did earnestly seek but could not find and then I returned to the Lord and sought with tears yet truly could not find one in a City that was worthy Ye ought to bear with me for the Truths sake nevertheless whether you will hear or forbear for the Lords sake and his seeds sake I am obliged by that which stretcheth forth love unto souls in this manner to stretch forth mine hand to draw back the Curtain that you may look to the Light which breaks through the Lattice and to remove the skirt which it folded over your nakednesse that your eye may see your filthinesse O misery misery the seed is in bondage that 's your greatest misery within the burdens of which is the ground of your misery without Consider consider and lay it to heart use diligence in the search of your hearts for the Lord God cometh quickly to try and to search every heart and to reward and give unto all according to their deeds done in the body whether they be good or whether they be evil Consider your Life which is the ground and cause of the mourning of the Land Jer. 23.10 I have passed through you and have seen the life of your people Behold abominable swearing lying cheating coveting drunkenness whoredom adultery murder Rom. 1.23.24 c. Changing the glory of the incorruptible God into Images made like unto corruptible man Wherefore God also hath given you up to uncleannesse through the lusts of your corrupt hearts Who have changed the truth of God into a lye and to worship and serve the Image of the creature more than the Creator Whos 's own Image only praiseth him who is blessed over all for ever and evermore Amen And this is truth in the presence of the Lord God of Heaven and Earth and unto the Light of Christ which shines in all your Consciences which shews you all your sins even unto that true Witnesse in your own hearts I speak I have been an eye witnesse of the bowing of the bodies of many of your people unto the works of your Fathers idolatrous hands unto which your corrupt hearts and deceitfull affections are joyned whilest not one of you in a Nation which mine eye ever beheld came to bow his heart in Righteousnesse and his life in Spirit and Truth before the Lord God who is a Spirit John 4.23 Whose day cometh and now is that the true Worshippers do worship him in Spirit and in Truth And for as much as Ye with other Idolaters do make these few following dark words the seeming ground of your standing places saying Viz. That you are the Roman Catholique Church and that you believe in Christ and do believe the Words and Doctrine of Christ the Scriptures of the Prophets and writings of the Apostles and that you hold the Precepts and do follow the instructions of the ancient Fathers c. Answ You whose Fathers made many Temples and painted Pictures therein that they might worship and bow down unto the works of their own hands Ye see the day in the midst of your calamities and time of sorrows how that many of the houses which they built are left unto you desolate And if now you the seed of the corruption of their generation were but come to the losse of your Fathers naturall Image in your carnal hearts and affections You would also as clearly discern your greatest misery which through the grosse vail of darknesse over your hearts is hid from your eyes Oh the captivity the captivity you are held in the possession of bondage and captivity under the profession of the name of Christ and Christians in the lusts of unrighteousnesse and the pleasures of
Lord and the wicked shall be turned into hell But every member according to the diversities of their measures of the Spirit of life who are of the true Church can witnesse and read the Scriptures with the life in their life which is hid with Christ in God Col 3.3 but you standing only in that which hath written Annotations and which draweth Inferences Conclusions and meanings from the Scriptures that witnesseth sufficiently concerning you that you are not in the life of the first Principle of pure Religion which giveth the understanding of the Scriptures Ignorance therefore is the cause of your error Math 22.29 Math 13.34 as saith Christ You erre not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God Wherefore unto you they are parables and hidden sentences from the darknesse of your clouded understandings who is he that seeth your misery and doth not lament you who have consented to the blinding of your selves through the yeelding of your minds captives to the perverse wills of your Instructers they have trodden out paths in unrighteousnesse and you have walked in their crookednesse Verily I am as one wounded for your sakes and heavily pressed with the clods which the ploughers have ploughed upon your backs Oh where is the hand which hath holpen you Have not your watchers forgiven you your sins in vanitie and strengthened your hands with the strength of their own hearts in iniquitie In what manner have they brought you unto confession and what will that availe you if after your confessions the same and worse sins and iniquities are wrought and committed by you Are you so ignorant as to thinke that their words of absolution is the covenant of pardon and salvation Or do you thinke that bare confession of your sins only will bring you under the Condition of mercy Mark the order of the declaration of Solomon's wise sentence which maketh frustrate the expectation of your vaine confidence Pro 28.13 He that covereth his sins shall not prosper but who so confesseth and forsaketh them shall finde mercy Oh people why therefore will ye thus rest and remaine in the night of slumber when will ye be awakened to come to see the works of your teachers how that they have double-girded your loynes with the cords of ignorance and have made that the strength of their renowne and praise in the Nations and your cloathing with the clouds of darknesse is your Priests garment of glory over you by this their power governes in Dominion and Majesty and you remaine as Subjects chained under the yoak of their iniquitie Oh who can declare your misery It is my sorrow for the Seeds sake to behold it and I know that it suits not with the delight of your hearts to read the explanation of it But hath the Lord a Remnant and shall he not visit for the sake thereof yea verily and this therefore in love to the soules of the simple that they may come to the light of the day each one in the sensiblenesse of his own heart and life to reade with understanding the mystery of godlinesse and Scriptures of truth which do speak one and the same thing in the word and intention and not of many things as by more then one but of all things in and by one through whom the worlds were made and the Covenant of God stands sure through whom also grace mercy and peace is come to as many as are joyned to that one in the clearnesse of the naked truth through the relinquishing of the hidden things of deceit and all the former wayes vanities customes traditions superstitions and ungodly words and works and renouncing the counsells of the many fathers and men of the world through the spreading of whose spirit and the fruits of their life delusion hath a long time reigned in the world cleaving to the only sound counsell of the living God father of truth which deceiveth nor deludeth any man but establisheth all men that come unto it in a holy way exceeding the errors of mans wayes even in that new and living way which he hath prepared wherein the uncleane cannot walke Isa 55.8 but it is unto those the way-faring men though foales shall not erre therein Wherefore all people be not any longer blinded under the perverse crooked wills of your Instructers and Pastors but examine and try truly whether they have lead you in the way of God wherein the wicked cannot walke And now in all this will you count me your enemy in putting you upon diligent inquiry and also in telling you the truth Lay it to heart oh people and you Doctors and Teachers of the Nations Come forth and consider assemble assemble the principal members of your bodyes together and call a full Councell of the Magicians of your Lands and suffer us then to prove you before all men provide your rods that you may cast them in the presence of the Nations and behold ours is ready to be cast also that it may be knowne whether God is the God of Egypt or of Israel and that all the Inhabitants of the Earth may have an understanding who are the people that have stolen the name of Israel that were never borne of his Seed and if it shall be seene that the Serpent of our rod shall eate up the Serpents of your rods then of a truth it shall be knowne that God worketh with us and not with you but against you But if the Serpent of our rod shall be swallowed up and by the Serpents of your rods utterly devoured then let not the Nations spare to publish and cry in their streets that the God whom we worship hath utterly forsaken us Againe I say assemble your Prophets and let the worke of the Lord and his word answering by fire give testimony to the Prophets whether the Prophets of your Lands are the true Prophets that the Inhabitants thereof may truly know and understand that if the Lord be God then let them follow him but if Baal whom ye worship he God then do you continue following of him no hurt will come unto your Nations through the tryall of the Prophets so that if the Lord answers our Prophet by fire and kindles the sacrifice of the oblation in your sight then shall ye know that our Prophet is the true Prophet of the Lord but if your Prophets shall cut themselves even to the drawing of blood of their bodyes and no word of answer to their supplications as the answer of the Lord by fire from Heaven but afterwards if in their madnesse and wilfulnesse they shall kindle a fire in their wrath and charge you to kindle fires in your houses to burne this testimony among whomsoever it comes then behold that shall be a signe unto you that God is not among them for if the Lord be their God then would he plead for them or if they be Jealous for the Name of the Lord God of Hosts then will they stand forth to plead