and crucified became the living way Heb. 10.20 as with God I shall shew another time Fifthly that worthy man brings men to the way but not to the Truth and Life Now Christ was all First the way for no man cometh to the Father but by me Iohn 14.6 now 't is a vain thing to keep men still in the way to stand still in the way and not to goe on by Christ into the Father into the holiest and thus was Christ the Truth Iohn 14.3 also taking us into the Father with himself for as this was eternall life to know the Father to be the onely true God Ioh. 17.3 and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent so Christ was sent or God even the Father was manifest in his flesh that we might see God in us as he was in him Iohn 17.21 23 24. and our life with him in God Lastly thus Christ is the life and thus he that hath the Son hath life that is the Son being once revealed in us reveals the Father in us also God in our flesh as in his and we living with him in God alone Joh. 14.19 20. 1 Joh. 5.11 12. This is the knowledge of Christ in the Spirit and this is the fourth step which some have attained to holding forth Christ in the Spirit as Mr. Sedgwick Mr. Sterrie Mr. Sprig and others these with their fellows are neerest Zion yet are they not come into it for as every Prophet shall one day be ashamed of his vision Zach. 13.4 yea prophesie it self shall fail So it is manifest these men are of a dark and deeper speech then can be easily understood Isai 33.19 therefore it is not Zion when there shall be such a glorious appearance of God in men that all shall see and hear him in them and as they shall see eye to eye when the Lord shall bring again Zion Isai 52.8 or bring forth himself cleerly in us who are now in captivity or he rather captive in our flesh so men shall hear God himself in us for so it is in the Hebrew Zach. 8.23 not we have heard that God is with you but we will go with you for we have heard God with you and in you Then man shall be nothing and God shall be all in all yet man shall be all in God and nothing but God shall appear in man This glorious appearance of the great God in man the three Shepherds the Pastors and Teachers doe indeed abhor they hate his appearance as I said and he abhors all their performances But who are these three Shepherds the Pastors of Churches What their cutting off is my former Letter shewed to suffer the curse of God and contempt of men How God cuts them off It is by unchurching them and by confounding or dividing them the Lord doth first unchurch them burns up the Church with fire Zachariah 11.1 there he calls Lebanon to open the doors that the fire may come in to burn up the tallest Cedars What 's Lebanon but the Temple for it was built with that Who are the Cedars but the tallest Members the principall of the flock What is the fire but the Spirit of the Lord as the Lord God calls upon Lebanon so he commands that the Church doors may be open for the fire to enter and the spirit to burn up all their chiefest members and Ministers for so it is vers 2. The mighty men or the gallants are spoiled yea there is a howling of the shepherds for their glory is spoiled v. 3. Their Church-fellowship and forms is that they glory in God spoils them and stains the pride of all their glory yea he burns it up How By fire The baptisme of the Spirit and of fire was the first Gospel-Ordinance Acts 1.4 5. or that which first set up the Church in a Gospel-order Fire will be the last that shall burn up the Churches who because they would not as the Primitive Saints did wait for the Spirit to build them the Spirit shall come to burn and consume them at last Secondly God cuts them off confounds and divides them he cuts them into three parts as we shall see by and by Thus then the three shepherds are the Pastors of all the Churches or whole Ministery of the Church Ezek. 16.30 Rev. 17.2 for as the Apostate Jewish Church was a Type of the Christian Church now under the Apostacie the whoredomes of Israel typifying the great whore whose fornications and the wine thereof in their forms of doctrine and false worships as we shall shew another time so Junius well notes the three Shepherds to signifie the whole teaching Ministery of the Jewish Church Vid. Junium in Zach. 11. for the Pharisees Sadduces and Essenes saith he were the onely Pastors or Teachers who did instruct the people in the Word of God as Prelates Presbyters and Independents are the whole Ministery of the Church of England this day These are divided not onely in Worship and Discipline but in doctrine also especially in three things 1. In the free grace of God which some call Antinomianism 2. In the free-will of man which otherscall Pelagianism 3. In the death of Christ or universal Redemption of mankind thereby which both Presbyters and Independants abhorre as Paganisme though nearest the Gospel indeed I shall not now shew the cause of all those divisions in Doctrine being engaged onely at present to prove their defilements in the worship of God and in their walking with men Yet this is one cause of their former difference and divisions in Doctrine Acts 2.42 because the Apostles Doctrine being before all Gospel-Ordinances is out of order in the Churches 1 Tim. 6.3 2. Tim. 1.13 who not content with that forme of sound words and wholsome Doctrine delivered by them doe follow the childish Dictates of Fathers the Decrees of Councels being a company of Bishops with such Creeds Confessions and Catechismes formed by them and reformed Churches whose conformities and fooleries in formes of worship though our Churches cannot chuse but see yet with a blind devotion they follow all their formes of doctrine not suffering a doubt or the least debate to passe upon their reason and judgement therein How injudicious this is with ingenuous men let all men judge Iohn 3.12 for if I tell you of earthly things saith Christ and yee beleeve not how will yee beleeve if I tell you of heavenly all outward worship is but an earthly thing Now if all Fathers and former Churches have erred in worship why not I pray you may they not erre in Doctrine in heavenly and hidden things in the high Mystery of God and of Christ especially seeing the Apostles did prophesie of such deceit to come in this by vain Philosophy Col. 2.8 and metaphysicall speculations of the Deity by the traditions and inventions of men the rudiments of the world the rudiments that is the A. B. C. or common Catechismes which
mind the first line that darted in mine eyes was alwayes something against Oppression as Isay 5.7 8. Micah 2.2 3 8 9 10. ver Again Isaiah 9.16 17 18 19 20. Isaiah 30.10 11 12. Jer. 22.17 Ezek. 7.19 These and many other Scriptures came not in by way of a Concordance nor yet as sought out by me but they found me out so that I once feared to open the book any more But there was a book within me Isai 29.18 which though I would shut and be willingly deaf to what was written therein yet I was made to hear with a witnesse Isaiah 33.14 The sinners of Zion are afraid fearfulnesse hath surprized the hypocrites who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire who among us shall dwell with the everlasting burnings he that walketh righteously and speaketh uprightly and despiseth the gain of Oppression c. he shall dwell on high c. This was my morning thought which made me rise up quick from my bed April 8. and after second thoughts I hastened away to Church where the Sheriffe and Judges were expected to come unto sermon there I resolved in the face of all the Country to cast off the gain of Oppression and burthen of Tithes intending with their Honours leave in the end of all to have spoken a few words on Psal 68.5 But the Judges not coming that day to Church the Preacher did no more but expound in the pue there being but a thin Audience upon this my former resolutions fell and I thought within my self surely the Lord would not I should openly meddle with this point nor be too scrupulous in an outward thing as this of Tithes so I quietly heard the Man and God also in the very words then read Eccles 7.7 Surely Oppression maketh a wise man mad and a gift destroyeth the heart For all this I returned home without the least touch or trouble of conscience saying now I shall have peace and be still provided for as formerly I have been to offer up my Isaack my beloved Tithes but the Lord hath spared it and accepted me I see a Ram caught in the bush for a Sacrifice that is my carnall mind and imagination for now I looked upon this of Tithes but as a fleshly outward thing a poor low business for any spirituall man to be scrupulous of therefore I said I would go to my heights again if once I might see the King in his beauty and the land that is very farre off Isaiah 33.16.17 The next day I came to your chamber where I was welcomed with respect and kindnesse but before I could sleep that night I was awaked again and the Lord began to answer in the secret place of Thunder Psal 81.7 he that despiseth not the gain of Oppression shall not dwell on high Then down I came to the deep and dwelt that night in the dark in the shadow of death yea in the belly of hell I cryed the next day also O Lord I am oppressed undertake for me Isai 38.14 This Scripture was that dayes Text when I was to speak good things to the oppressed I heard nothing but bad newes and sad tidings to my self standing there under the gain of Oppression I could experimentally tell this truth that God would plague the oppressor in whose stead me thought I was that day chattering like a Crane and mourning as a Dove in my cry O Lord I am oppressed undertake for me it was answered thou art an oppressor of men and now thou art justly oppressed by God That was the summe of that morning exercise how men oppresse God in mans oppression and then that God oppresseth also their spirits as they doe his Truly to that time I never found the experience of this so true The love of money is the root of all evill evill of sin and of punishment for by this I began not onely to erre from the faith and from trusting on God but to be pierced through with many sorrowes yea to be drowned in perdition and destruction 1 Tim. 6.9 10. And yet how often did my desire to be rich make me fear to be poor and my proud heart seek to silence the cries of God and men within me to shift off the thoughts of oppression and the businesse of Tithes as a thing not belonging to me but for the States to reform Again my heart told me that Tithes are now new modled and set in another form with some moderation also And again Tithes are coming into the Treasury of the Common-wealth God forbid said one within me but thought I why may not I take at present this free gift from the civill powers as the Pastors Teachers and Preachers of the Gospel in Wales this day who are maintained by Tithes Oh this renewed my former troubles enraged those terrors telling me if now I be silent I should not onely betray my Country and the Governours of our Common-wealth to the judgement of God but be base and lye to the Churches not speaking the truth which many poor Christians not attending to doe daily wound their weak consciences by a little too much worldlinesse as in other things so in farming of Tithes which all the godly Preachers and people of God in Wales did formerly profess preach and pray against Thus many Ministers also are unsensibly fallen into a new light which themselves condemned in others for my part I follow the old and professe that I can see yet nothing in Tithes but the gain of Oppression continued and kept up meerly by Ministers and Church-Members who being men of power this day might easily prevaile to remove this and many other oppressions at least with the people of the Land to petition the present Governours to ease the oppressed of their burthens as to release the prisoners from their bonds and to releive poor families with bread by a publick stock I speak not now of those Tithes which are part of mens temporal estates but of such Ecclesiastick revenues appointed at first for Popish Priests now for Preachers of the Gospel this being a greater oppression than the tithes of former times my spirit was oppressed by the Lord till I had quite thrown away this abhomination and burthen of the Land Thus then to me it is presented as more oppressive than Priestly Tithes secondly more oppressive than Popish Tithes and thirdly than Prelatick or Presbyterian Tithes heretofore First I say Priestly Tithes under the Law had the command of God Secondly 't was not forced on men by the power of the sword but either freely given by the people or urged by the Prophets with promises and threats to such who were disobedient or unwilling Thirdly Deut. 14.28 29. the Priests did not eat up all the Tithes themselves but as there was a yearly Tithe for the Priest so every third year there was a tithe for the poor Oh that the poor might have their Arrears out of the unreasonable gain of Gospel-Priests Fourthly Priests under
lowness of your walkings in your worldly designs in your desires for profit your tithes augmentations consolidations Church offerings and such things unheard of in Gospel-times yea it was a strange language to latter dayes But how doe the Priests rob God in tithes and offerings the people rather should be said to rob the Priests in this and yet it is proved before that all was spoken of the Priests they rob God in Tithes Certainly there 's a Mystery in this as in all other legall expressions Mal. 1.11 Isai 66.23 For as Gods Tith or tenth is that small remnant of his people reserved from the Churches Apostasie Isai 6.13 In it shall be the tenth c. So the Lords offerings is all the people of the land Bring yee all the Tithes into my storehouse that there may be meat in mine house Mal. 3.10 The Lords House is of a larger building then the gathered Churches have set up as you may see Isaiah 66.19 20. Where many Nations yea strange and savage people are brought into the house of God who I beleive in his due time will gather these three Nations into one Church as the first fruits of his glory and fame to the world So then the whole Nation is the Lords offering a Nation to be offred unto God God is now rob'd of this offering by our Gospel-Priests not onely the Tithes the scattered Saints but the Nation even the Lords offering God is robbed of by the gathered Churches and their Priests For so it is clearer exprest by Malachy c. 3. v. 9. Ye are cursed with a curse for yee have robbed me even this whole Nation not that the whole Nation did rob God as the words seem to import but taking away the word even not in the Hebrew the sence is clear ye have robbed me this whole Nation that is as God with us is the Nations Motto so God in the Nation or the whole Nation as the offering or people of God the Independent Churches will not own though the Presbyters in this are of a better judgement who professe the Nation to be in Covenant with God and his people and upon this account baptize all their children c. But sure 't is a truth not onely in the Mysterie but in the Historie or Letter The Priests in Tithes and Offerings doe rob the whole Nation for the Nation is even ruined by the oppression thereof Therefore our Gospel-Priests who by the power of the sword take up their Tithes or other wayes force a maintenance from the people are called thieves and robbers by God Oh how secretly and suddenly is the day of the Lord or the Lords day stollen upon the Churches of Wales Christ being come as a Theif in the night to spoil them of all their glory and honour yea their goodness is quite gone and carried away into captivity For how hath God prophaned the Princes of the Sanctuary or the holy Princes as the Hebrew reads Isai 43.28 The holy Princes in Church and Commonwealth are not onely become prophane covetous cruel cunning for bloud but they are prophaned by God this the holy Princes will not hear that God should prophane any man but now they may learn by experience and be made to cry at last Lord why hast thou made us to erre from thy wayes and hardned our hearts from thy fear Isai 63.17 Oh what prophanesse is this that the holy Princes should be not onely proud peevish c. but thieves and robbers in the way to rob the whole Nation Isai 43.28 to rob God and man at once No wonder God doth give Jacob to the curse and Israel to reproaches This is worse then hanging it self to have the curse of God and the contempt of man truly it is far from my temper to reproach any man much lesse the people of God but if God shall give them to the reproach and the curse what man can help it I will send a curse upon you and curse your blessings yea I have cursed them already because ye have not laid it to heart Mal. 2.2 Behold I will corrupt your seed or as the Margent reads I will reprove your seed and not onely the Word you preach but the tithe-corn you gather for pay and the tithe of your cattle too I will spread their dung on your faces and the dung of your solemn feasts and thanksgiving dayes when ye look up to bless my Name I will spread dung on your faces v. 3. And then it followes one shall take you away with it v. 3. One Who is that Sure there needs not the strength of many but one man yea a babe in Christ can take away the Church with the Priest from their setled places How easie is it for one for a very child with his little finger to push down all the Churches in Wales being fallen already by their own divisions and defilements in worship and in their walkings also their wrath worldliness and which is worse the thing of Tithes wherewith they have foul'd their fingers Yee are departed out of the way yee have caused many to stumble at the Law or in the Law yee have corrupted the covenant of Levi v. 8. What 's the Covenant of Levi Oh to live in the Lord alone to look for maintenance from him onely no other maintenance but himself for he was Levies portion Thus it was with Levi and the Priests of old under the Law the other Tribes had portions in the land but the Lord God alone was Levies portion and yet his allowance was from all so Levi wanted nothing though he had no portion but the Lord. Thus 't was with the Apostles and Primitive preachers of the Gospel Luke 22.35 they went forth without scrip or silver in their purses yet they wanted nothing and having nothing they possessed all things 2 Cor. 6.10 But our Gospel-Priests must have portions in the Land Mal. 2.9 or pay in their hand else they will not preach Therefore saith God I have made you contemptible and base before all the people Truly Sir as I was forcibly carried forth to speak at first so now to write my last which I pray receive as the words of a dying man desiring to dye to all things below God to my own life and livelihood Others preach for a hundred pound a year I have now preached to lose it in which indeed I have found my life and a better livelihood in the Lord who hath promised that he will not leave me nor forsake me Hebr. 13. And truly you may beleeve me I have more content quietnesse comfort in my present losse and low estate Mich. 5.7 then in all my gainfull Tithes I then laboured to be rich I now learn to bee poor to be Independent indeed to depend on no man Micah 5.7 not to wait on men nor the sounes of men but on the mercifull providence and dispose of God for my abode and being Thus saith the Lord God
then the Prelates fell the second was of Parliamentary Priviledges when the Army came up to purge it then Presbyters fell there will be a third overturn whether for better or worse I know not yet I hope well of the Common-wealth and Rulers thereof but down goe the ruling Elders with all their Churches the very next moneth when a change of things will be But thirdly May not this moneth be another thing yet something more Psal 119.96 for the Commands of God are exceeding broad and there is a mighty bredth height and length in the least word of his what is the moneth Is it not the new Moon spoken of so much by the Prophets as a type of that new Moon and Sabbath which shall be in the new Jerusalem Isai 66.22 23. What is the new Moon then Truly to me it is new Light as our life in God alone is the Sabbath there spoken oh how terrible is this to the Pastors and Teachers to look for new light much more to look on it it will dazle and destroy their sight and make them stark blind and also dumb as we shall see anon Every moneth we know the Moon receives new light as we call it then the new Moon though it be the old still so the new light is nothing but the old even the everlasting Gospel that glory hid in God before the world will come forth in men at last yea that old light of Law and Gospel-Churches which hath been hid and darkened by the Apostacy shall be more fully known and come forth from all that traditionall knowledge of God which is yet received by men Rev. 10.23 Oh this moneth will be a day of doom to the Churches the new Moon this new light will darken them at noon day pray read Amos 8.9 where there is a greater than this yeares Eclipse the earth is not onely darkened at noon but the Sun goes down and sets at high noon What is that When men think they are in highest light as Churches look no higher God doth suddenly darken them and makes them also dumb verse 11. for there is none left to preach the Word being no more to be heard from North to East verse 12. from Scotland to England and Wales Why is all this wrath think yee The end is come upon my people Israel that is the Church verse 2. then there is the howling of the Shepheards and their silencing verse 3. This is wrath indeed but what is the cause of all Sure first because the Churches take no care for the poor of the Land verse 4. they may look to their own poor but the poor of the Land are swallowed up by their silence and made to fail for the Ministers will not open their mouths nor speak a good word for them to the present Governours who doubtlesse would and will help the poor at last though never moved by the Churches But secondly They cannot abide new light therefore darknesse comes as we said when will the new Moon be gone say they or as the margin reads the new Moneth this kills the Pastors and Teachers this one Moneth cuts them off by God But why would they have this new Moon gone and the Sabbath past Oh that they may sell Corn and set forth Wheat verse 5. for there is no buying nor selling nor a stitch of work to be done on the Sabbath Wheat what is that What is the Chaffe to the Wheat Ier. 23.28 saith the Prophet Wheat sure is the pure Word called the fat of the Kidneyes of Wheat and so the pure word is Deut. 32.14 it is the finest fattening thing that man can take that immontall seed of the Word when it is sincere spirituall and pure how pretious and how powerfull it is But what is the Chaffe to the Wheat Chaffe hath the form and fashion of Wheat but it goes away with the wind yea the Fan of the Lord or any sufferings from men as I said before blowes away the Chaffe both the Word and the Preachers of it But suppose it be Wheat that they sell it is but the refuse of Wheat as themselves confesse Amos. 8.6 what lean low and legall teachings doe our Preachers of the Gospel set forth and sell it is but the refuse of all that which good Mr. Perkins Doctor Preston and the rest of those pious men left behind it is not their spirit these men speak with it is but their words or the language of old Writers in a new dresse Nay most of these Pastors or Preachers of the Gospel can goe no farther than the flesh of Christ A cheif one of the Army would once usually say that the flesh of Christ and letter of Scripture were the two great Idols of Antichrist Iohn 6.63 Heb. 4.12 and the letter of Scripture as for that eternall Spirit which dwelt in the one and which spake in the other they know not the flesh profiteth nothing saith Christ it is the Spirit that quickeneth the words that I speak are Spirit and life where is that spirituall quick and lively words Spirit and life it self ministred to men and in them Is it not the refuse of Wheat that they sell when all that is sold by them is not worth the knowledge of a Christian Henceforth saith the Apostle know we no man after the flesh yea though we have known Christ after the flesh yet now henceforth know we him no more 2 Cor. 5.16 We know not Christ now saith he but God in Christ verse 19. for so Christ would be known onely as the Fathers Image Ioh 14.9 10. he that sees me sees the Father if thou hadst known me thou wouldst have known the Father it was God even the Father who was all in all in his flesh who did all and spake all in him and by him he was indeed the way to the Father not that men should stand still in Christ as I said before but by him goe to the Father and with him dwell in God so he was the truth because the everlasting Father 1 Pet. 3.18 the onely true God sent the Son or came forth in flesh and crucified it also to himself to bring men to God and thus Christ was the life and our life also For indeed all the life knowledge and faith of a Christian by Christ as the way doth tend and end in God 1 Pet. 1.21 Yet this is not all and yet this the Pastors and Teachers know not 2 Cor. 5.17 for if any man be in Christ he is a new Creature or as the Greek reads a new Creation why the greatest of them all goe no higher than the first Creation as I said before But again God in Christ and Christ in men is a Mystery yet that none of the Ministers of Churches can manifest to the world those hidden Mysteries and Secrets of heaven that high Mystery of God even the Father and of Christ and the Mystery of the Gospel these Ministers of