Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	life_n	spirit_n	worship_v	1,905	5	8.8109	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A86489	The skirts of the whore discovered, and the mingled people in the midst of her. In a letter sent by Denys Hollister to the independent baptiz'd people, who call themselves a Church of Christ in Bristol, but are found to be a synagogue of Satan, in answer to a charge brought to him from them by some of their members, and by him ... published. Together with another letter written by him to Thomas Ewens, a teacher among them, ... referring to his speaking among his people of having Sarah Latchet a servant of Jesus, once a member among the Baptists, sent to Bridewell, and whipt for testifying to them in the name of the Lord in their meeting the second day of the ninth moneth. 1655. And likewise an answer to 16 antiqueries directed to the people called Quakers, which answer was sent to Thomas Ewens, from whom the antiqueries were received, though Iohn Pendarviss a long time after published the antiqueries by the name of Queries, without the answer to them, or taking the least notice of it in a book entituled Arrows against Babylon which hath occasiond the presenting of the one, and the other, now to the view of those who read, and understand, to judge of the whole, and of their unfaire and deceitfull dealing.	Hollister, Dennis, d. 1676?	1656 (1656)	Wing H2508; Thomason E896_3; ESTC R202571	35,627	37

any answer which was their manner also in many other places fulfilling the Scripture that the Wicked cannot stand in judgement nor sinners in the Congregation of the Iust but flies when no man pursues Now forasmuch as hereby it plainly appeares that the intent and end of those who sent the aforesaid charge to me was but to slander and accuse as hath been the manner of the Devill and his Instruments from the beginning who is the accuser of the Brethren and for that hereby my just and necessary defence is kept from the simple-hearted amongst them after whom my soule longs and for whose sakes it was principally intended Therefore that they may come to the knowledge thereof and that the exceeding deceit and filthinesse of the rest may be made manifest and the skires of the Whore discovered I am even constrained thus to make it publick that not only themselves but all in whom any spark of honesty and true discerning is may read and judge and so be led to consider their wayes brought to repentance and acknowledgement of the truth that their sonles may be saved im this great and notable day of the Lord Iesus which is the true desive of him that was and is a Lover of their souls known by the nature of D. H. TO THE INDEPENDENT BAPTIZED PEOPLE IN BRISTOLL Friends WHilest I slumbred and slept in security and outward fellowship among you absent from the Bridegroom and the Fathers house and knew not the Bread of Life which came down from Heaven and is the life of men but fed you in wisedom of words and spake unto you smooth things how was I as a prophet well esteemed among you but after that the kindnesse and love of God appeared and by the ministration of the Spirit which excells in glory after which my soule had long travell'd I was made in some measure to see the sandinesse of all Foundations and Professions which stood in the Imagination not in the Life and so the emptinesse of your Forme and the foundation of your Religion to be but in the imaginations which is only evill continually and all your Worships and Services which from thence proceed to be but the Witchcrasts and Sorceries of Babylon by which Nations are deceived and the Priests your Leaders to be one in the same nature with the Magicians and Sorceres of Egypt and Babylon who by the same spirit withstood Moses and Daniel then as they and you doe now the truth and so the same necessity and ground to separate and withdraw from you and your worshipping as formerly from the Parishes and their Whoredomes and began to warn you of it how soon were you offended and some of you greatly enraged Yet so tender was my heart towards you that for your sakes I did bear my burthen among you for a season till he who hath mercy on the ignorant and those that are out of the way pluckd me as a brand out of the fire from amongst you and gave me opportunity by your passionate furious and unchristianlike behaviour in your Assembly when others took their leave and testified against you to acquaint you after I had been witness against that spirit that then acted you that although I was altogether ignorant till then of any others being there to take their leaves yet had I the same thing to propound concerning my selfe and so tender over you I was that I only desired leave till I more sully saw which way the Pillar and Cloud moved to come into your meetings or not and if I came and had not freedome to speak among you as formerly but in silence to wait that offence might not be taken by any assuring you that I made not this motion out of any levity or lightness of spirit but of awfulness sear and dread of the Living God not to satisfie the flesh the affections or lusts thereof by living idly loosely or carelesly in the World but to deny my self and crucisie the flesh by casting off whatsoever might feed and nourish the same Not because I was at all shaken in minde as to sellowship or communion of Saints but because I seared you were not the Spouse of Christ but an Harlot and that your communion and sellowship was not in the light and life of the Spirit of Christ but in the spirit of the world which is the spirit of Whoredomes And how tenderly I behaved my selfe afterwards towards you without doing or speaking ought by which you might be offended or your minds made evill-affected towards the truth is in part known to some of you Nevertheless the wrath and rage of many of you waxed great against the Truth and was made manifest by much railing reviling slandering and false accusing in your Pulpits and other your Meetings those that entertain'd the same in which my selse was a Sharer and matter was sought for whereof to accuse me but when nothing justly could be sound an accusation made up of apparent lyes falsehood and deceit as is manifest in my Reply is prepared and sent me by three of your Members being all the men you have lest of those to whom I was joyned and two of them became Imitators of Water-Baptism a practice disowned and testified by those to whom I joyned but when I had prepared my Defence in answer to your Accusations I sent for two of your aforesaid Messengers to whom I read what I had written to you and manifested my desire to have it publickly read among you at a full meeting and asked their freedome to doe it who answered they were free to doe it and saw no reason why it should not be so done and told me I had created more trouble and paines for my selfe because an Answer to it I might be sure to receive yet when it came so great was the deceit among you that it could not be permitted to have an hearing by you lest thereby as was pretended the weak should be stumbled but the truth was lest deceit and hypocrisie should be thereby manifested to the view of the simple-hearted among you who discerning the same might be drawn out of your snares and Satan lose his dominion over them and that the eyes of their minds might be the more effectually blinded kept it was till a Fasting day was appointed and therein an Answer pretended by some among you from God that it must not be read * Isa 58.4 Behold you fast for strife and debate and to smite with the fist of wickednesse And so after a moneths space or thereabouts was it return'd not into mine but into the hand of one of my servants without signifying in the least to me any reason why it was so return'd And as if your former wickedness had been too little in laying things to my charge which I never knew and refusing to receive or to heare my charge which is just and true you proceed to another wickedness little lesse then the former and send your Messengers again

to be in such confusion that you cannot discern the mother of Harlots the father of Lies neither know the Wine the Church the cup nor the Kingdom of the Lord further then you can imagine in your earthly sensual wisdom and you being so blinde and in such confusion without the power which laid the foundation as you confess we deny your spirit and account your stuff in your Answer as not worth mentioning to rake up after you but what you want in answering you can make up in asking shewing unreasonableness by your own confession And likewise appears that you would cover your selves and hide your perswasions and had rather pry into the conditions of others then bring your own deeds to the Light and seeing there is insulting because of our not answering in your time and false conclutions drawn we bear witness against your deceit and proceed to answer declaring that we differ by the power of the living God who by his spirit hath quickned us by which we see and discern you to be in the Will-worship in the wisdom which is from below of that number who are measuring your selves by your selves and comparing your selves among your selves and not according to the measure of the rule which God hath distributed with which we agree but that to us from you doth not reach and therefore your voice and spirit we deny though you take the Scriptures to talk upon and trade withal in your earthly imaginations looking that the Kingdom of God should come with observation and say The cup of the Lord which is the true Vine is an outward cup when as the Kingdom of God is within O ye blinde guides how can you teach others who are your selves ignorant of the Kingdom and of the cup of the Lord and we bear witness to the sive things at least of great concernment and with your spirit we do not agree First We own and witness that God by Jesus Christ calls sinners to repentance and saves his people from their sins and redeems them from the wrath to come soul and body as many as rightly believe and work by love And that the same Jesus that at Ierusalem was crucified and before Pilate witnessed a good confession is now in the Heaven and the same that descended did ascend and comes again in like maner and also that our vile bodies shall be made like unto his glorious body and be flesh of his flesh and bone of his bone And again Every spirit we credit not but believing in the Lord Jesus we try the spirits and yours is tryed and seen to be the spirit of the world and not believed by us nor credited though you pretend to come with light therefore your spirits are rejected And lastly We know that it is not every one that saith Lord but he that doth the will of the Lord that enters into the kingdom of God And such have right to the Tree of Life and interest in the Promises made to Believers who worship God in Spirit and Truth and keep the Commandments according as they have received not by tradition nor imitation by and in the earthly carnal wisdom but led and guided by the spirit of the living God by which spirit we bear witness against your traditions and inventions and herein we differ and we do agree with that which convinceth you of sin and makes manifest your deceit and calls you to repentance from dead works that is the light which we love and you hating it and walking contrary to it and loving darkness differs you from the children of God and there is your condemnation and for answer to your other Quaeries take as followeth Query 2. Whether you doe not by many of your sayings craftily hide your perswasions from the sight of some honest people And is not this dissimulation at the best or lying after the manner of Ananias Acts 5.2 Answer Dissimulation at the best or lying against the Spirit we deny and from honest people we doe not craftily hide our perswasions but by manifestation of the truth commending our selves to every mans Conscience in in the sight of God not walking in craftiness but renouncing the hidden things of dishonesty and if our Gospel be hid it is hid to them that are lost Query 3. Whether your selves even all of you be not Men and Women of finfull failings and imperfections as those godly people you cry down If not tell us who are the persons among you without their failings and imperfections and how they came so to be Answer This Query is rais'd from a Lye godly people we cry not down but deceit in all we witness against by that which is Eternal without imperfection And for being free from sin we say the Sonne of God is come which takes away sinne and he that 's borne of God sinneth not he that is in Christ is a new creature and this many among us are Witnesses of but the sinfull failings are without and such we do not justifie by saying they are not where they are or pleading for them where they are Query 4. Doe your in your judgements of the Congregations of Believers look after those things which are commendable as well as those which are condemnable in their practises doc you not on the contrary cry them down in general without any mercy Answer Yea we doe look after those things which are commendable in Believers and own them but they that say they are Believers and are not are to be witnessed against But to cry all down without any mercie is false and the lyar is for condemnation with the Light and with it we have unitie Quere 5. Whether your declaring against instrumentall Teaching and yet going about informing and instructing your selves and others doth not discover a grosse contradiction between your principles and practises and whether it be right to set them against it to bring them to hear your declaring altering only the name Answer Against the Teachings of Man or such who know what they know naturally we declare yet we are sent to turne from darkness to light and this is right and no contradiction but as the Prophets and Apostles who went up and down declaring against Seducers Deceivers and false Teachers and they informed and instructed and they that were of God heard them and this is not only altering the name But the Spirit is another and so the nature which beares witness against the spirit of the world where ever it rules Let your name be what it will your nature is seen and witnessed against Quere 6. Whether instrumentall Teaching be unsuitable unto the new Covenant If so why did Christ being ascended appoint Pastors and Teachers till all came into the Vnity ordaining Ministers for the Work while Work remaines did Christ burden his Saints with needlesse appointments Answer It s confest we goe about informing and instructing our selves and others and the New Covenant we own where all are taught of God and why Christ

the sake of him whom the world knows not and therefore persecute who was ever a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief have I chosen rather to suffer afflictions with the people of God then to enjoy the Pleasures and Treasures of England and can truly say Much rather would I be a Door-keeper in the House of God where the living presence and power of God is manifested known and witnessed then with you to dwell in the Tents of ungodliness where pride oppression violence persecution is owned and practiced These things are found among you if any of you deny the Spirit of persecution let him declare it and any of you are tender hearted and desire after the Lord Come forth from among them and be ye separate saith the Lord and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you and will be a Father unto you and ye shall be my sons and daughters faith the Lord God Almighty The LETTER to the INDEPENDANT-BAPTIZED People Friends ALthough I cannot own any power at all you have over me neither am careful of the judgement of man who must abide the judgement of God before whose seat all must shortly come yet some Messengers from you having some time past been with me and told me they were sent by the Church of Christ and in the name of Christ to warn me of some things they lay to my charge as sin The true love I ever had to your souls constrains me to give you an answer in all simplicity and plainness and by the same spirit by which I often spake among you when many could not bear it but were offended as they still will be which I matter not well knowing from what fountain of darkness and ignorance it comes But before I proceed to answer the Particulars I must in faithfulness to your souls tell you that I am even constrained to bear witness that you are no Church of Christ neither know the name of Christ but a Synagogue of Satan and a Cage of unclean and hateful Spirits in which lodgeth Pride Hypocrisie Envy Slandering Back-biting Railing Lying love to this present World and conformity to the fashions customs and conversation of the same notwithstanding there is that in some among you after which my soul doth greatly groan with much longings that the salvation of God were come out of Sion c. but the Temple of God is holy Christ dwells not with these unclean Spirits And it becomes all who name the name of the Lord to depart from these iniquities his Name is dreadful to it and those that know his Name know it so c. To the Particulars 1. You say my sin lies in leaving the Church which hath these three sad considerations in it as you judge The drawing of many from the Faith and way of the Gospel The offending staggering and grieving many weak souls And the opening the mouths of many to speak evill of the wayes of Truth To which I Reply That all Judgement is given to the Son whom you being ignorant of and enemies to in your minds by wicked works by what can you judge or what is your judgement worth The Church I own as the Pillar and ground of truth which are all living stones built upon the living Foundation and groweth up into an holy Temple for God through the eternal Spirit in which the Lord God Almighty dwels and walks and manifests himself which Church I have not left But if by the Church you mean a company of people dead in trespasses without the life and power of godliness or true knowledge of God by the Revelation of the Sonne living in pride in the customes and loves of the world serving diverse lusts and pleasures ever learning but never comes to the knowledge of the Truth walking like other Gentiles in the Vanities of their minds having their understandings darkned and hating the true Light so that they are alienated from the life of God through ignorance feeding on ashes not on bread having a dead Forme without the living power of Godliness From this if I turn away it is not my sin but my duty and from this if any be drawn it is matter of joy in Heaven and of no sadness except to that which is beneath and to be cast out At which that which is offended stagger'd or griev'd may wel be said to be Weak and must perish It is true the mouths of many are now open to speak evill of the waies of Truth and of things they understand not as ever it was of old But as many among your selves are not the least in that transgression so shall you not miss of righteous Judgement except you repent in this approaching day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ Who is to be reveald from Heaven in flames of fire to take Vengeance on them who know not God nor obey the Gospel of our Lord Iesus Christ c. 2. You say my sin lies in neglecting and comtemning some of the Ordinances of Christ To which I Reply The Inventions Traditions and Imaginations of mens carnall wisedome withall that is done in the first nature being bus Cains Sacrifice and nol acceptable to God I am learning to neglect and disesteem Yea all that of which the Lord by the true Prophet Isay complaines Isay 11.10 to the 16. where you may read that in the account of the pure God the multitude of Sacrifices Oblations Incense New Moons Sabbaths solemn Assemblies appointed Feasts spreading forth the hands and making many prayers was to no purpose no delight had the Lord in it he required it not at their hands it was vain abominable and burthensome to him who could not away with it his soule hated it it was a trouble to him it was iniquity coming from impure hearts and bloody hands but the ordinances and appointments of God to his people I own approve and long after in the pure light life and spirit in which the true Saints had communion and fellowship When I asked your Messengers as they call'd themselves what they meant in particular by the ordinances that I neglected They rereplyed Baptism by Water and breaking of Bread To which I answer How can you but blush when you consider that degree of deceit and hypocrifie in which you now speak doth not that of God in all your Consciences reprove you I know it doth if you will observe it and therefore in plainness yet with true love let me ask you how can you say to me pull out the mote that is in thine eye when behold a beam is in your own eyes Can you judge me and not condemne your selves who doe the same things A Member of an Anabaptist Assembly I never was but did bear witness against it as ye know and the people with whom I walked was once neer upon casting out one for entertaining that opinion of Water-Baptism And when did you baptize as you call it your children I have known no

such thing in use among those with whom I walked these many yeares And although many among you are now running from mountain to mountaine building Altars in your own inventions yet can you not from thence Enchant nor ensnare the Israel of God the true Seed whom the Lord hath blessed and with whom the Lord of a truth is And whereas you charge me with neglect of breaking of Bread I answer Have not you your selves neglected it have you medled in any such thing for some yeares past Oh my Friends durst you pretend to come in the name of Christ with such things as these know ye not that his Name is dreadfull to all Hypocrites and his wrath to be reveald against such Hypocrisie and Deceit He loveth truth in the inward parts and those that name his Name must depart from iniquity But Baptism and the Supper of the Lord I own c. 3. You say my sin lies in extreme censoriousnesse and rash judging not only of men abroad but if the Church calling the Church of Christ an Harlot To which I reply the charge is false and from the Father of lyes for I never called the Church of Christ an Harlot but doe own it dearly and in my measure know it to be chast and pure yea an habitation for the Lord who dwells not with impurity I judge it to be so but the Harlot is an Harlot and not the Church of Christ and it is not my sin but my duty to declare it so * And let the Spirit that moved in your Assembly not only that day that proves my parting day Rev. 1. ch 3.9 and when Eliz Marshal was sent of the Lord among you for your good but at many other times since manifest and testifie who dwells there an habitation for whom you are and whether you are an holy habitation for the pure God or a Cage of unclean and hatefull Birds And truly in this my desire is that prejudice passion and fuay may not so blind your eies But that in the pure feare and light of the Lord you may consider and try your selves that so you may not be deceived and prove rebrobate silver in the day when God shall try you for to triall you must come c. 4. You say my sin lies in asserting the Church-Principles contrary to Truth As first that Faith is an eternal thing To which my Reply is That Faith is a Mystery held in a pure Conscience hid and unknown to all ignorant and vulturous eies as well as to yours And when you are guided by the pure light of Chr. to know what it is they speak til which time it will be your wisedom to keep silence For the wise mans eies are in his head but a foole will be medling Yet let me ask you whether that Faith by which the Saints are justified by which they overcame the world by which they saw him that was invisible by which their hearts are purified by which Enoch was translated that he saw not death and is the substance of things hoped for be eternal or carnal or what middle place you have to account it in Oh that you were not wise in your own eies Secondly That Christ and Faith were all one To which I only reply that I never asserted any such thing but enquired after it as you very well know Yet this I say let the difference be manifested by you if you can and how you will divide them Thirdly That Christ Jesus is not the object of Faith To which my Answer is that the word object in this sense is your own not mine nor the Scriptures and therefore is denied with much more of like stuff in use among you But that Christ Jesus is the only foundation laid in Sion and that no other foundation can be laid besides him is it that I have and still doe assert and affirm against all gainsayers and opposers whatsoever And withall that but very few in the world know this foundation but are offended at him and stumble at that stumbling stone as it was in dayes of old But plainly and honestly let me ask you Why floe you question me for these Principles as you call them now i● it be for Connscience sake as that which is your duty why had you not done it sooner or while I was among you Why had you not then disapproved me by the Scripture Why would you suffer things which you call Principles contrary to truth to be asserted among you without rebuke I advise you once more to take heed and beware of this Hypocrisie and Deceit for God is not mocked His name is dreadfull and must not be pretended to cloak and cover such deceitful actions Did not many of your hearts burn within you when I spake did you not wait for my words Why then doe you now rake together things in your carnal imaginations to lay to my Charge which I know not and pretend the holy and dreadful name of God to it Am I become your enemy because I told you the truth Truly these hidden things of Esau will be sought out the skirts of the Whore will be discovered and all deceit manifested And then woe from God will be the portion of thousands But if the ground upon which you charge me be your passion your corruption carnal wisedome and pretences to have something whereof to accuse me as doubtless it is and that in your Consciences will witness it then I demand of you whether your Charge as well as your Church is not to be denied and witnessed against by every sonne and daughter of Sion as carnal sensual and devilish and much like unclean persons which whiles together in acts of uncleanness approve each others practises but when separated accuse one another of evil deeds This cannot stand with devouring fire 5. You say my sin lies in speaking reproachfully of the precious Scriptures of Truth affi●ming that it is one of the greatest Plagues of the Land a blinding to souls and not the Word of God nor Rule of Life All which is false and from the Father of lyes for I never affirmed any of the three among you though something of query hath been put concerning the two last and therefore my Reply shall be to each and shall say The Scriptures of Truth I ever own'd and still doe as that which was given forth by inspiration of the Spirit and is profitable c. But that ever I said or thought or that it ever entred into mine heart to think that it was one of the greatest Plagues of the Land is so utterly groundless false and proceeds only from the father of lyes and invented by his instruments among your selves that I cannot but wonder what spirit hath possessed you and that you durst mention such filthy Vntruths and pretend it in the name of Christ But surely the righteous Judge in whose presence the lying lip and double tongue can never stand will require it at your hands It

s true I said the thing called the Body of Divinity by the Wizards of this world was a plague to the Land and doe still affirme it to be so Although I perceive some among you are so blinded by the god of this world that they know not how to put a difference between the spirit of Witchcrafts which acts in the Diana called Divinity and the pure Spirit of Christ by which the Scriptures were given forth And whereas you accuse me for saying the Scriptures were a blinding or a veil I demand where are your eyes Hath the god of this world indeed so blinded it that you cannot read plain words of Scripture but lay that to my charge as sinne which is according to that which came out of the mouth of him whom you pretend to honour Doth not Christ Jesus the Light of the world and the wisedome of God say Mdrk 4.11 12. Vnto you it is given to know the Mysteries of the Kingdom but to them that are without all these things are done in Parables that seeing they might see and not perceive and hearing they might hear but not understand c. And the like words in Luke 8.10 Was not Isaiah sent to this purpose to make the peoples hearts fat and their eares heavy and to shut their eyes And to say unto them hear ye indeed but understand not and see ye indeed but perceive not Isa 6. Doe ye not understand that the Letter killeth and the Spirit quickneth besides many other Scriptures manifesting the same thing Oh my Friends were you not wholly given over and become past feeling without any sence of the life and spirit of God how can these things be especially at such a time when the night is so far spent and the day so much appeared and the true Light come and the glory of the Lord risen and the children of the Lord walking in the light of the Lord and calling each other thereinto according to the Scriptures were it not your way to be silent and not manifest your ignorance and folly in accusing others for speaking upon the matter the very words of Scripture when it is your own ignorance even of the very Letter of Scripture that is the cause of it And whereas you accuse me for affirming in the Church that the Scriptures were not the Word of God and Rule of Life when I only propounded it among you to consider whether it was so or not In this you manifest your ignorance as well as in the former And therefore I demand of you where doth the Scripture call it selfe the Word of God and to whom was it the rule of life It is true the Holy Scriptures of Truth declare of the Word and that Word of which it declares was God and took flesh and by that Word was the world made and by the same Word it is reserved to the judgement of the great day And if you can find the Scriptures declaring of any other Word of God let me know it and till then be silent and adde not your imaginations which are onely Evill and that continually to the Scriptures Thus having answered what you sent to me I shall further adde that I take notice that God hath granted me that mercy that in all studied accusations raked up together against me you cannot finde one particular thing to lay to my charge condemned by the spirit of Christ to be contrary to the Scriptures of Truth and that all or most part of what you seem to gather up is of that which was done or spoken whilest I was among you and not then reproved and so your own evill is manifested and not mine But to conclude for my heart is moved after some of you why would you stone or otherwise harm me what evill have I done Why doe ye wait for my Halting and lay snares for him that reproved you in times past by words and now by silence Why are your spirits imbitter'd against him that thought nothing deare to doe you service Have I not served you freely many years together and been a keeper of your Vineyard In which all my reward from you was to beare and be broken under your backbitings murmurings formality and unfruitfulness and other evils not a few then in being and still is among you Is it not time now for me to look to my own Vineyard and to mind my Eternal Habitation Have I ever made a gain of you or any of you Surely I have been servant to you neer as long as Iacob was to Laban for both his wives And may I not now be permitted to mind mine own but you must pursue like Laban after poor Iacob when God bid him return I know and am perswaded that the most embitter'd spirit among you cannot but say I have been more righteous then you more discerning more faithful and diligent then you though I am not thereby justified neither have I whereof to glory And may I not say to you as sometimes the poor Ass abused by the blind Prophet said to his Master what have I done Have I not been your servant these many yeares was I wont to doe as now Surely if ever the Lord take pleasure in you and open your eyes you will soon see the Angel in the way and that the poor Ass hath more discerning then the wilfull angry and passionate Prophet You are my Witnesses that some manifestations of truth was breaking forth in me some yeares past and was sometimes manifested among you at which some of your hearts burn'd some trembled some were offended and contradicted c. My selfe in all was groaning after power spirit and life without which no satisfaction came to my soul from whence I ceased not to warn you from day to day of your danger in the state where you stood short of the life But you not being warned how often hath mine heart lamented in your hearing in these and the like words To whom shall I speak and give warning you will not hear your hearts are uncircumcised and you cannot hearken The word of the Lord is a reproach so you and you have no delight in it O that my head were water and mine eyes a fountain of tears c. Oh that I had in the Wildernesse a lodging-place of Wayfaring men that I might leave my people and goe away from them for they are Adulterers an Assembly of treacherous men and bend their tongues like bowes for lyes but are not valiant for the Truth upon Earth c. But this seemed as idle words yet was I made to proceed and to warne you of the mighty day of the Lord now at the doore in which you could never stand I told you your foundation was on the sand short of the life your profession was in words not in power and that your mountaines must be brought low and your valleys exalted before the Lord come to your Temple and at last that your Church was but an Harlot and the spirit